To which the lover answers lovingly 'I am beside thee.' Lost, lost, we have lost the way. 'Love, I will guide thee.' Whither, O whither? into the river, Where we two may be lost together, And lost for ever? 'Oh! never, oh! never, Tho' we be lost and be found together.' Some think they loved within the pale forbidden By Holy Church: but who shall say? the truth Was lost in that fierce North, where _they_ were lost, Where all good things are lost, where Tostig lost The good hearts of his people. It is Harold! _Enter_ HAROLD. Harold the King! HAROLD. Call me not King, but Harold. EDITH. Nay, thou art King! HAROLD. Thine, thine, or King or churl! My girl, thou hast been weeping: turn not thou Thy face away, but rather let me be King of the moment to thee, and command That kiss my due when subject, which will make My kingship kinglier to me than to reign King of the world without it. EDITH. Ask me not, Lest I should yield it, and the second curse Descend upon thine head, and thou be only King of the moment over England. HAROLD. Edith, Tho' somewhat less a king to my true self Than ere they crown'd me one, for I have lost Somewhat of upright stature thro' mine oath, Yet thee I would not lose, and sell not thou Our living passion for a dead man's dream; Stigand believed he knew not what he spake. Oh God! I cannot help it, but at times They seem to me too narrow, all the faiths Of this grown world of ours, whose baby eye Saw them sufficient. Fool and wise, I fear This curse, and scorn it. But a little light!-- And on it falls the shadow of the priest; Heaven yield us more! for better, Woden, all Our cancell'd warrior-gods, our grim Walhalla, Eternal war, than that the Saints at peace The Holiest of our Holiest one should be This William's fellow-tricksters;--better die Than credit this, for death is death, or else Lifts us beyond the lie. Kiss me--thou art not A holy sister yet, my girl, to fear There might be more than brother in my kiss, And more than sister in thine own. EDITH. I dare not. HAROLD. Scared by the church--'Love for a whole life long' When was that sung? EDITH. Here to the nightingales. HAROLD. Their anthems of no church, how sweet they are! Nor kingly priest, nor priestly king to cross Their billings ere they nest. EDITH. They are but of spring, They fly the winter change--not so with us-- No wings to come and go. HAROLD. But wing'd souls flying Beyond all change and in the eternal distance To settle on the Truth. EDITH. They are not so true, They change their mates. HAROLD. Do they? I did not know it. EDITH. They say thou art to wed the Lady Aldwyth. HAROLD. They say, they say.