Page:Twilight Hours (1868).djvu/82

The walls were oaken, wrought in deep device
Of pomegranates and acorns — once our shield ;
While underneath the mantel one had carved,
With mingled vanity and insolence,
" Here dined with Owain Prynne, King James the Small."

Beneath a northern light my father sat,
Conversing with the stars from night till morn,
While I sometimes would stand beside his knee
And gaze at Cassiopeia, till I saw
" The lady in the chair," and said she had
My cousin Agnes' face, and smiled well pleased, —
She being lady-moon of my young life.
The foolish fancy of a foolish child,
So said my father, while he bade me look
Along the telescope to find out truth.

Then, through the dark and narrow way I peered,
To see the little star become a sun,
With satellites, and bright mysterious rings,
While finest fragments of the Milky Way
Grew into spheres and systems infinite,
Until I sighed — " God must be very tired,
With such a weight of worlds hung round His neck."