"At once, that inward strife suppress'd, The dame approach'd her warlike guest, With greeting in that fair degree, Where female pride and courtesy Are blended with such passing art As awes at once and charms the heart. A courtly welcome first she gave, Then of his goodness 'gan to crave Construction fair and true Of her light maidens' idle mirth, Who drew from lonely glens their birth, Nor knew to pay to stranger worth And dignity their due; And then she pray'd that he would rest That night her castle's honour'd guest. The Monarch meetly thanks express'd; The banquet rose at her behest, With lay and tale, and laugh and jest, Apace the evening flew. "The lady sate the Monarch by, Now in her turn abash'd and shy, And with indifference seem'd to hear The toys he whisper'd in her ear. Her bearing modest was and fair, Yet shadows of constraint were there, That show'd an over-cautious care Some inward thought to hide; Oft did she pause in full reply, And oft cast down her large dark eye, Oft check'd the soft voluptuous sigh, That heav'd her bosom's pride. "Another day, another day, And yet another, glides away! The Saxon stern, the pagan Dane, Maraud on Britain's shores again. Arthur, of Christendom the flower, Lies loitering in a lady's bower; The horn, that foemen wont to fear, Sounds but to wake the Cumbrian deer, And Caliburn, the British pride, Hangs useless by a lover's side. "Another day, another day, And yet another, glides away! Heroic plans in pleasure drowned, He thinks not of the Table Round; In lawless love dissolved his life, He thinks not of his beauteous wife: Better he loves to snatch a flower From bosom of his paramour, Than from a Saxon knight to wrest The honours of his heathen crest; Better to wreathe, 'mid tresses brown, The heron's plume her hawk struck down, Than o'er the altar give to flow The banners of a Paynim foe. Thus, week by week, and day by day, His life inglorious glides away; But she, that soothes his dream, with fear Beholds his hour of waking near.