Then in the night a trumpet; and the dull Close thud of horse and clash of Puritan arms; And glimmering helms swept by me. Sorrowful I stood and waited till upon the storm's Black breast, the Manse, a burning carbuncle, Blazed like a battle-beacon, and alarms Of onslaught clanged around it; then, like one Who bears with him God's curse, I galloped on. The Forester I met him here at Ammendorf one Spring. It was the end of April and the Harz, Veined to their ruin-crested summits, seemed One pulse of tender green and delicate gold, Beneath a heaven that was like the face Of girlhood waking into motherhood. Along the furrowed meadow, freshly ploughed, The patient oxen, loamy to the knees, Plodded or lowed or snuffed the fragrant soil; And in each thorntree hedge the wild bird sang A song to Spring, made of its own wild heart And soul, that heard the dairy-maiden May's Heart beating like a star at break of day, As, kissing ripe the blossoms, she drew near, Her mouth's sweet rose all dew-drops and perfume. Here at this inn and underneath this tree We took our wine, the morning prismed in its Flame-angled gold.--A goodly vintage that! Tang with the ripeness of full twenty years. Rare! I remember!--wine that spurred the blood, That brought the heart glad to the limbered lip, And made the eyes unlatticed casements where A man's true soul you could not help but see. As royal a Rhenish, I will vouch to say, As that, old legends tell, which Necromance And Magic keep, gnome-guarded, in huge casks Of antique make deep in the Kyffhäuser, The Cellar of the Knights near Sittendorf.-- So solaced of that wine we sat an hour. He told me his intent in coming here. His name was Rudolf; and his native home, Franconia; but no word of parentage: Only his mind to don the buff and green And live a forester with us and be Enfellowed in the Duke of Brunswick's train, And for the Duke's estate even now was bound. Tall was he for his age and strong and brown, And lithe of limb; and with a face that seemed Hope's counterpart--but with the eyes of doubt; Deep restless disks, instinct with gleaming night, That seemed to say, "We're sure of earth, at least For some short space, my friend; but afterward-- Nay! ransack not to-morrow till to-day, Lest it engulf thy joy before it is!"-- And when he spoke, the fire in his eyes Worked stealthy as a hunted animal's; Or like the Count von Hackelnburg's that turn, Feeling the unseen presence of a fiend. Then, as it chanced, old Kurt had come that morn With some six of his jerkined foresters From the Thuringian forest; wet with dew, And fresh as morn with early travel; bound For Brunswick, Dummburg and the Hakel passed. Chief huntsman he then to our lord the Duke, And father of the loveliest maiden here