'Knew himself a villain--but he deemed The rest no better than the thing he seemed; And scorned the best as hypocrites who hid Those deeds the bolder spirit plainly did. Lone, wild, and strange, he stood alike exempt From all affection and from all contempt. None are all evil--quickening round his heart, One softer feeling would not yet depart. Yet 'gainst that passion vainly still he strove, And even in him it asks the name of Love! Yes, it was Love--unchangeable--unchanged, Felt but for one from whom he never ranged. Yes--it was Love--if thoughts of tenderness, Tried in temptation, strengthened by distress, Unmoved by absence, firm in every clime, And yet--oh! more than all! untired by Time. If there be Love in mortals--this was Love! He was a villain--aye, reproaches shower On him--but not the Passion, nor its power, Which only proved--all other virtues gone-- Not Guilt itself could quench this _earliest_ one!' The following verses are full of meaning for the initiated: I. 'Deep in my soul that tender secret dwells, Lonely and lost to light for evermore, Save when to thine my heart responsive swells, Then trembles into silence as before. II. 'There, in its centre, a sepulchral lamp Burns the slow flame, eternal--but unseen; Which not the darkness of Despair can damp, Though vain its ray as it had never been. III. 'Remember me--oh! pass not thou my grave Without one thought whose relics there recline: The only pang my bosom dare not brave Must be to find forgetfulness in thine. IV. 'My fondest--faintest--latest accents hear-- Grief for the dead not Virtue can reprove; Then give me all I ever asked--a tear, The first--last--sole reward of so much love!' Conrad and Medora part, to meet no more in life 'But she is nothing--wherefore is he here?... By the first glance on that still, marble brow-- It was enough--she died--what recked it how? _The love of youth, the hope of better years_, The source of softest wishes, tenderest fears, The only living thing he could not hate, Was reft at once--_and he deserved his fate_, But did not feel it less.' The blow he feared the most had fallen at last. The only woman whom he loved had withdrawn her society from him, and his heart, 'Formed for softness--warped to wrong, Betrayed too early, and beguiled too long,' was petrified at last!