She might have been false. Of her withered dust There scarcely would be enough to write Her guilt in now; and the dead have a right To our lenient doubt if not to our trust: So if the truth cannot make her white, Let us be as merciful as we--must. II. The queen died first, the queen died young, But the king was very old when he died, Rotten with license, and lust, and pride; And the usual Virtues came and hung Their cypress wreaths on his tomb, and wide Throughout his kingdom his praise was sung. How the queen died is not certainly known, And faithful subjects are all forbid To speak of the murder which some one did One night while she slept in the dark alone: History keeps the story hid, And Fear only tells it in undertone. Up from your startled feet aloof, In the famous Echo-Room, with a bound Leaps the echo, and round and round Beating itself against the roof,-- A horrible, gasping, shuddering sound,-- Dies ere its terror can utter proof Of that it knows. A door is fast, And none is suffered to enter there. His sacred majesty could not bear To look at it toward the last, As he grew very old. It opened where The queen died young so many years past. III. How the queen died is not certainly known; But in the palace's solitude A harking dread and horror brood, And a silence, as if a mortal groan Had been hushed the moment before, and would Break forth again when you were gone. The present king has never dwelt In the desolate palace. From year to year In the wide and stately garden drear The snows and the snowy blossoms melt Unheeded, and a ghastly fear Through all the shivering leaves is felt. By night the gathering shadows creep Along the dusk and hollow halls, And the slumber-broken palace calls With stifled moans from its nightmare sleep; And then the ghostly moonlight falls Athwart the darkness brown and deep. At early dawn the light wind sighs, And through the desert garden blows The wasted sweetness of the rose; At noon the feverish sunshine lies Sick in the walks. But at evening's close, When the last, long rays to the windows rise, And with many a blood-red, wrathful streak Pierce through the twilight glooms that blur His cruel vigilance and her Regard, they light fierce looks that wreak A hopeless hate that cannot stir, A voiceless hate that cannot speak In the awful calm of the sleepless eyes; And as if she saw her murderer glare On her face, and he the white despair Of his victim kindle in wild surmise, Confronted the conscious pictures stare,-- And their secret back into darkness dies. THE FAITHFUL OF THE GONZAGA.[2] I. Federigo, the son of the Marquis, Downcast, through the garden goes: He is hurt with the grace of the lily, And the beauty of the rose.