60
KNICKERBOCKER GALLERY.
Francesca.
I listen: read!
Nay, do not: I can wait, if you desire.
Paolo.
Draw closer: I am weak in voice to-day. (Reads.)
"So sat Guenevra and Sir Lancelot
Under the blaze of the descending sun,
But all his cloudy splendors were forgot.
Each bore a thought—the only secret one
Which each had hidden from the other's heart—
That with sweet mystery well nigh overran.
Anon, Sir Lancelot, with gentle start
Put by the ripples of her golden hair,
Grazing upon her with his lips apart.
He marvelled human thing could be so fair;
Essayed to speak; but in the very deed
His words expired of self-betrayed despair.
Little she helped him, at his direst need,
Roving her eyes o'er hill, and wood, and sky,
Peering intently at the meanest weed,
Ay, doing aught but look in Lancelot's eye.
Then, with the small pique of her velvet shoe,
Uprooted she each herb that blossomed nigh;
Or strange, wild figures in the dust she drew,
Until she felt Sir Lancelot's arm around
Her waist, upon her cheek his breath like dew:
While through his fingers timidly he wound
Her shining locks; and, haply, when he brushed
Her ivory skin, Guenevra nearly swooned;
For where he touched, the quivering surface blushed,
Firing her blood with most contagious heat,
Till brow, cheek, neck, and bosom, all were flushed.
Each heart was listening to the other beat.
As twin-born lilies on one golden stalk,
Drooping with summer, in warm languor meet,
So met their faces. Down the forest-walk
Sir Lancelot looked; he looked, east, west, north, south:
