How didst thou pass the intervening sea?
Lady. If I be sure I am not dreaming now,
I should not doubt to say it was a dream.
Methought a star came down from heaven,
And rested 'mid the plants of India

Which I had given a shelter from the frost
Within my chamber. There the meteor lay,
Panting forth light among the leaves and flowers,
As if it lived, and was outworn with speed;
Or that it loved, and passion made the pulse
Of its bright life throb like an anxious heart :-
Till it diffused itself, and all the chamber

And walls seemed melted into emerald fire
That burned not. In the midst of which appeared

A spirit like a child, and laughed aloud

A thrilling peal of such sweet merriment
As made the blood tingle in my warm feet:
Then bent over a vase, and, murmuring
Low unintelligible melodies,

Placed something in the mould like melon-seeds,
And slowly faded. And in place of it
A soft hand issued from the veil of fire,
Holding a cup like a magnolia flower;
And poured upon the earth within the vase
The element with which it overflowed,
Brighter than morning light, and purer than
The water of the springs of Himalay.

Indian. You waked not?

Lady.

Not until my dream became

Like a child's legend on the tideless sand,

Which the first foam erases half, and half

Leaves legible. At length I rose, and went
Visiting my flowers from pot to pot, and thought
To set new cuttings in the empty urns;

And, when I came to that beside the lattice,

I saw two little dark-green leaves
Lifting the light mould at their birth, and then
I half-remembered my forgotten dream.
And day by day, green as a gourd in June,
The plant grew fresh and thick, yet no one knew
What plant it was. Its stem and tendrils seemed
Like emerald snakes, mottled and diamonded

With azure mail and streaks of woven silver;
And all the sheaths that folded the dark buds
Rose like the crest of cobra-di-capel,

Until the golden eye of the bright flower
Through the dark lashes of those veinèd lids,
. . disencumbered of their silent sleep,
Gazed like a star into the morning light.

Its leaves were delicate; you almost saw
The pulses

With which the purple velvet flower was fed
To overflow, and, like a poet's heart
Changing bright fancy to sweet sentiment,
Changed half the light to fragrance. It soon fell,
And to a green and dewy embryo-fruit
Left all its treasured beauty. Day by day
I nursed the plant, and on the double flute
Played to it on the sunny winter days

Soft melodies, as sweet as April rain

On silent leaves, and sang those words in which
Passion makes Echo taunt the sleeping strings.
And I would send tales of forgotten love
Late into the lone night; and sing wild songs
Of maids deserted in the olden time;
And weep like a soft cloud in April's bosom
Upon the sleeping eyelids of the plant,—

So that perhaps it dreamed that Spring was come,

And crept abroad into the moonlight air,
And loosened all its limbs, as, noon by noon,

The sun averted less his oblique beam.

Indian. And the plant died not in the frost?
Lady.

And went out of the lattice which I left

Half open for it,—trailing its quaint spires

Along the garden, and across the lawn,

It grew;

And down the slope of moss, and through the tufts
Of wild-flower roots, and stumps of trees o'ergrown

With simple lichens, and old hoary stones,

On to the margin of the glassy pool,

And lilies-of-the-valley yet unborn,

Under a pine with ivy overgrown.

And there its fruit lay like a sleeping lizard

Under the shadows.

But, when Spring indeed Came to unswathe her infants, and the lilies Peeped from their bright-green masks to wonder at This shape of autumn couched in their recess,

Then it dilated; and it grew until

One half lay floating on the fountain wave,
Whose pulse, elapsed in unlike sympathies,
Kept time

Among the snowy water-lily buds.

Its shape was such as summer melody

Of the south wind in spicy vales might give

To some light cloud bound from the golden dawn To fairy isles of evening; and it seemed

In hue and form that it had been a mirror

Of all the hues and forms around it and
Upon it pictured by the sunny beams
Which, from the bright vibrations of the pool,
Were thrown upon the rafters and the roof
Of boughs and leaves, and on the pillared stems
Of the dark sylvan temple, and reflections

Of every infant flower and star of moss
And veined leaf in the azure odorous air.
And thus it lay in the elysian calm

Of its own beauty, floating on the line
Which, like a film in purest space, divided

The heaven beneath the water from the heaven
Above the clouds. And every day I went
Watching its growth, and wondering:
And, as the day grew hot, methought I saw
A glassy vapour dancing on the pool,—
And on it little quaint and filmy shapes
With dizzy motion wheel and rise and fall,
Like clouds of gnats with perfect lineaments.

O friend, sleep was a vale uplift from heavenAs if heaven dawned upon the world of dreamWhen darkness rose on the extinguished day Out of the eastern wilderness.

Have found a moment's paradise in sleep
Half compensate a hell of waking sorrow.

XCIV.

CHARLES THE FIRST.

SCENE I.-The Masque of the Inns of Court.

A Pursuivant. PLACE for the Marshal of the Masque ! First Citizen. What thinkest thou of this quaint masque,

which turns,

Like morning from the shadow of the night,

The night to day, and London to a place

Of peace and joy?

Second Citizen.

Eight years are gone,

And hell to heaven!

And they seem hours, since in this populous street

I trod on grass made green by summer's rain;

For the red plague kept state within that palace
Where now that vanity reigns. In nine years more
The roots will be refreshed with civil blood;

And thank the mercy of insulted Heaven
That sin and wrongs wound, as an orphan's cry,
The patience of the great Avenger's ear.

A Youth. Yet, father, 'tis a happy sight to see,—
Beautiful, innocent, and unforbidden

By God or man. 'Tis like the bright procession
Of skiey visions in a solemn dream

From which men wake as from a paradise,

And draw new strength to tread the thorns of life.

If God be good, wherefore should this be evil?
And, if this be not evil, dost thou not draw
Unseasonable poison from the flowers

Which bloom so rarely in this barren world?

Oh! kill these bitter thoughts which make the present

Dark as the future !

When Avarice and Tyranny, vigilant Fear

And open-eyed Conspiracy, lie sleeping

As on hell's threshold; and all gentle thoughts

Waken to worship Him who giveth joys,

With his own gift.

Second Citizen. How young art thou in this old age of

time!

How green in this grey world! Canst thou discern
The signs of seasons, yet perceive no hint

Of change in that stage-scene in which thou art
Not a spectator but an actor? or

Art thou a puppet moved by [enginery]?

The day that dawns in fire will die in storms,

Even though the noon be calm. My travel's done,-
Before the whirlwind wakes I shall have found

My inn of lasting rest; but thou must still
Be journeying on in this inclement air.
Wrap thy old cloak about thy back;

Nor leave the broad and plain and beaten road,
Although no flowers smile on the trodden dust,

For the violet paths of pleasure. This Charles the First
Rose like the equinoctial sun,

By vapours, through whose threatening ominous veil
Darting his altered influence he has gained

This height of noon-from which he must decline,
Amid the darkness of conflicting storms,

To dank extinction and to latest night.

There goes

The apostate Strafford; he whose titles. . .

whispered aphorisms

From Machiavel and Bacon: and, if Judas

Had been as brazen and as bold as he.

Second Citizen. Rather say the Pope :
London will be soon his Rome. He walks
As if he trod upon the heads of men :
He looks elate, drunken with blood and gold.
Beside him moves the Babylonian woman
Invisibly, and with her as with his shadow,
Mitred adulterer! he is joined in sin,

Which turns Heaven's milk of mercy to revenge.

Third Citizen (lifting up his eyes). Good Lord! rain it

down upon him!

Amid her ladies walks the papist queen

As if her nice feet scorned our English earth.

The Canaanitish Jezebel! I would be

A dog if I might tear her with my teeth!