The ladye hieth to her couch;-- And when the morn appears, The changes of her cheek avouch, Full virginly her fears;-- But her doating father can nought discern In the hues of the rose and the lily that chase Each other across her lovely face,-- Save a sweetness that softens his visage stern. FYTTE THE SECONDE. Romara's skiff is on the Trent, And the stream is in its strength,-- For a surge, from its ocean-fountain sent, Pervades its giant length:[8] Roars the hoarse heygre[9] in its course, Lashing the banks with its wrathful force; And dolefully echoes the wild-fowl's scream, As the sallows are swept by the whelming stream; And her callow young are hurled for a meal, To the gorge of the barbel, the pike, and the eel: The porpoise[10] heaves 'mid the rolling tide, And, snorting in mirth, doth merrily ride,-- For he hath forsaken his bed in the sea, To sup on the salmon, right daintily! In Romara's breast a tempest raves: He heeds not the rage of the furrowy waves: Supremely his hopes and fears are set On the image of Agnes Plantagenet:[11] And though from his vision fade Gainsburgh's towers, And the moon is beclouded, and darkness lours, Yet the eye of his passion oft pierceth the gloom, And beholds his Beloved in her virgin bloom-- Kneeling before the holy Rood,-- All clasped her hands,-- Beseeching the saints and angels good That their watchful bands Her knight may preserve from a watery tomb! What deathful scream rends Romara's heart?-- Is it the bittern that, flapping the air, Doth shriek in madness, and downward dart, As if from the bosom of Death she would tear Her perished brood,--or a shroud would have By their side, in the depths of their river-grave? Hark! hark! again!--'tis a human cry, Like the shriek of a man about to die! And its desolateness doth fearfully pierce The billowy boom of the torrent fierce; And, swift as a thought Glides the warrior's boat Through the foaming surge to the river's bank, Where, lo!--by a branch of the osiers dank, Clingeth one in agony Uttering that doleful cry! His silvery head of age upborne Appeared above the wave; So nearly was his strength outworn, That all too late to save Had been the knight, if another billow Its force on his fainting frame, had bent,-- Nay, his feeble grasp by the drooping willow The beat of a pulse might have fatally spent. With eager pounce did Romara take From the yawning wave its prey,-- But nought to his deliverer spake The man with the head of gray: And the warrior stripped, with needful haste, The helpless one of his drenchëd vest, And wrapt his own warm mantle round The chill one in his deathly swound.