Then my Lover lifted me up in his arms, And swiftly arose. How the grey-roofed farms Receded into the cup-like earth! And I chanted a canzone of Springtime and Birth, Which called o'er the sea to the firstling swallow, Who flew beside us o'er height and hollow, Till others came from their home of the Sun, And the farm-folk cried, "Dear Summer's begun." Hundreds and thousands followed our flight-- ALL ENGLAND WILL HAVE A SWALLOW TO-NIGHT. By the old elm's portal of Arcady My Lover alighted and whispered to me, "O lily of laughter! O sister of flowers! Wander alone in Arcadian bowers, And I will return when the sun goes down, And wing you home to your grey, grey town. I kiss your little white hands and feet: Farewell!" And he rose, on wings so fleet Over the nests in the cradling larch, Over the bow of the rainbow's arch. Where conifers grow in fine profusion, And birches quiver in sweet confusion, Where hawthorn waits with a danseuse grace To burst on the scene with her milk-white face, And pirouette near some stately spruce, Scattering around him pearly dews, Where rabbits scamper thro' grasses lush, And a pheasant's screech breaks the noon-day hush, I journeyed on, till the sun began His westering course. "Evoë, great Pan! Never a note of your pipings to-day Has guided my steps thro' the sylvan way. O! where must I seek in this Paradise?" "Evoë, Evoë," a linnet sighs, "Seek where the sisterly marshes are, Where the marigold twinkles, a golden star, Where willow and alder hide the river, Where timid reed-warblers tremble and shiver." The sky showed pink thro' the branches grey, And then I heard, as if far away, A tremulous song, a music of fears That was strung together by trills of tears, A quivering star glowed, curtained by leaves, And the hullets called from some distant eaves. I found Pan crouched by the river's edge, His hoofed feet hid by the rushy sedge, And I listened his plaint. "O great god Pan, You sing with the broken heart of a man! Your song is of Syrinx, who, æons ago, Escaped from your loving. Alas! that you know The music of love, and the music of lack, And you mourn for the hours that cannot come back,-- But I would learn of merrier things: The melody murmurs of fluttering wings, The secrets that fill the nightingaled glades, The music that stirs in the leaf-colonnades."