Which stood that moment like brute Druid gods,
Amazed upon the rim of ruin, where,
As into a blackened socket, the great fire
Had dropped,—still throwing up splinters now and then,
To show them grey with all their centuries,
Left there to witness that on such a day
The house went out.’
‘Ah!’
‘While you counted five
I seemed to feel a little like a Leigh,—
But then it passed, Aurora. A child cried;
And I had enough to think of what to do
With all those houseless wretches in the dark,
And ponder where they’d dance the next time, they
Who had burnt the viol.’
‘Did you think of that?
Who burns his viol will not dance, I know,
To cymbals, Romney.’
‘O my sweet sad voice,’
He cried,—’O voice that speaks and overcomes!
The sun is silent, but Aurora speaks.’
‘Alas,’ I said; ‘I speak I know not what:
I’m back in childhood, thinking as a child,
A foolish fancy—will it make you smile?
I shall not from the window of my room
Catch sight of those old chimneys any more.’
‘No more,’ he answered. ‘If you pushed one day
Through all the green hills to our father’s house,
