Page:Poems of Sentiment and Imagination.djvu/129

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In the histories of nations will you find our names recorded,
Going back in kingly pedigree, a proud, distinguished race;
To whose faithful aristocracy this honor was awarded,
To be first in glory, first in fame, and first in wealth and place.

"Not that I would say our blood in aught is different from your own,
Or that a peasant's son may not be nobler that a king's; 334

For virtue makes the serf a king, and vice degrades a throne;
Yet there is a certain pride of power a use of power brings;
Nor that we are happy—for such cares on our position wait,
We have no choice where hearts are played, and only play our hands;
We are not born to happiness, but only to be great,
And on our greatness' highest point our altar of hope stands.

"If I chose to have my son forsake his birthright and his duty
(For it is his duty now to keep our princely fame unspotted),
And give his soul, like other men, to worship of mere beauty,
Your daughter surely were the one of all the world allotted.
But he must wed with one whose name will live like ours in story,
Who can confer, as he confers, a world-wide reputation;
Whose family mark history's page with deeds of fadeless glory,
And who control, as we have done, the interests of a nation.

"Yet, if"—and here she smiled again, as if her fancy needed
Excuse for being so wild a one—"yet if, like the Medici,
You had so risen, by giant strides, that princes had conceded
Your right to rule among their powers, truly I might say this, I
No longer, seeing your daughter's love, could hold your suit as idle;
Yet think that now 'twere far more wise to check this bud of feeling,
And by all gentle arts and means its froward strength to bridle—
Believing that these now fresh wounds will soon be safely healing."