So that night we went. And, all the way, my gay guide rail’d at me. “Aha, my bachelor, your roving love, Aha, has had its day! Yon sunset hues But deck the curtains hung before its night.” “Alas,” I cried, “if I must through them pass, Woe me who wish it! See, in front of them, The river in the horizon underneath—” “Your Jordan, ere your promis’d land!” she said; “You need baptizing for your harden’d heart.” “Ah me!” I sigh’d, yet strangely; for there seem’d, While all the way the twilight thicker sank, Sweet silence luring dreamward wind and bird Until the reverent air lay hush’d where came The hallowing influence of holier stars. And, all the way, deep folding round my soul, With every nerve vibrating at its touch, Fell dim delight, through which, as through a veil, Some nearer presence breath’d of holier life. Ah, wandering Heart, and had I had my day?— With closing gates as golden as yon west? And whither was I moving in the dark?— “Who knows?” my spirit ask’d, “who knows or cares? On through the twilight threshold, trustingly! What halt thou, Night, that weary souls need fear? Thou home of love entranced, thou haunt of dreams, Thy halls alone can hoard the truth of heaven! Thy dome alone can rise to reach the stars!” XV. She roused me, crying out, “Look toward the porch!” I look’d, and there beheld our waiting friends, And, grouped with them, some ruddy German maids Whose deeper hues but finely rimmed with shade The subtler beauty of our special hosts. These came from out that western world wherein, By fresher breezes and by brighter suns, The Saxon tissue, sweeten’d and refined, Unfolds, each season, more ethereally. The two then moving from their sister-maids, Like petals loos’d from roses when in bloom, Came forth to welcome us; and, greetings o’er, Of Europe, Edith spoke, and Germany, And books, and music—how the church of Greece Had carved earth’s pivot that earth whirls upon Within the centre of a flag-stone round That paves a chapel in Jerusalem. But she, who track’d that viewless whirl by sound, And deem’d all harmony to centre here, A Grecian only in her love of art, Had found that pivot fix’d in Germany. XVI.