Again, and through the arras of the gloom Are the pale breezes moaning: by her tomb Bends Julio, like a phantom, and his eye Is fallen, as the moon-borne tides, that lie At ebb within the sea. Oh! he is wan, As winter skies are wan, like ages gone, And stars unseen for paleness; it is cast, As foliage in the raving of the blast, All his fair bloom of thoughts. Is the moon chill, That in the dark clouds she is mantled still? And over its proud arch hath Heaven flung A scarf of darkness. Agathè was young! And there should be the virgin silver there, The snow-white fringes delicately fair! He wields a heavy mattock in his hands, And over him a lonely lanthorn stands On a near niche, shedding a sickly fall Of light upon a marble pedestal, Whereon is chisel’d rudely, the essay Of untaught tool, “_Hic jacet Agathè_,” And Julio hath bent him down in speed, like one that doeth an unholy deed. There is a flagstone lieth heavily Over the ladye’s grave; I wist of three That bore it of a blessed verity! But he hath lifted it in his pure madness As it were lightsome as a summer gladness, And from the carved niche hath ta’en the lamp And hung it by the marble flagstone damp. And he is flinging the dark, chilly mould Over the gorgeous pavement: ’tis a cold, Sad grave; and there is many a relic there Of chalky bones, which, in the wasting air, Fell mouldering away: and he would dash His mattock through them with a cursed clash That made the lone aisle echo. But anon He fell upon a skull—a haggard one, With its teeth set, and the great orbless eye Revolving darkness, like eternity. And in his hand he held it till it grew To have the fleshy features and the hue Of life. He gazed, and gazed, and it became Like to his Agathè—all, all the same! He drew it nearer,—the cold, bony thing!— To kiss the worm-wet lips. “Aye! let me cling— Cling to thee now forever!”—but a breath Of rank corruption, from its jaws of death, Went to his nostrils, and he madly laugh’d, And dash’d it over on the altar shaft, Which the new-risen moon, in her gray light, Had fondly flooded, beautifully bright! Again he went To his world work beside the monument. “Ha! leave, thou moon! where thy footfall hath been In sorrow amid heaven! there is sin Under thy shadow, lying like a dew; So come thou, from thy awful arch of blue, Where thou art ever as a silver throne For some pale spectre-king! come thou alone, Or bring a solitary orphan star Under thy wings! afar, afar, afar, To gaze upon this girl of radiancy, In her deep slumbers—wake thee, Agathè!”