She says: 'Poor Friend, you waste a treasure Which you can ne'er regain-- Time, health, and glory, for the pleasure Of toying with a chain.' But then her voice so tender grows, So kind and so caressing; Each murmur from her lips that flows Comes to me like a blessing. Sometimes she says: 'Sweet Friend, I grieve you-- Alas, it gives me pain! What can I? Ah, might I relieve you, You ne'er had mourned in vain!' And then her little hand she presses Upon her heart, and sighs; While tears, whose source not yet she guesses, Grow larger in her eyes. _Aubrey de Vere_ THE BARD ETHELL _Ireland in the Thirteenth Century_ I am Ethell, the son of Conn: Here I bide at the foot of the hill: I am clansman to Brian, and servant to none: Whom I hated, I hate: whom I loved, I love still. Blind am I. On milk I live, And meat, God sends it, on each Saint's Day; Though Donald Mac Art--may he never thrive-- Last Shrovetide drove half my kine away. At the brown hill's base by the pale blue lake I dwell and see the things I saw: The heron flap heavily up from the brake; The crow fly homeward with twig or straw The wild duck a silver line in wake Cutting the calm mere to far Bunaw. And the things that I heard, though deaf, I hear, From the tower in the island the feastful cheer; The horn from the wood; the plunge of the stag, With the loud hounds after him down from the crag. Sweet is the chase, but the battle is sweeter, More healthy, more joyous, for true men meeter! My hand is weak! it once was strong: My heart burns still with its ancient fire. If any man smites me he does me wrong, For I was the bard of Brian Mac Guire. If any man slay me--not unaware, By no chance blow, nor in wine and revel, I have stored beforehand, a curse in my prayer For his kith and kindred; his deed is evil.