So, as of his own motion, Shimei woke-- And instantly was sorry for the change. His eyes he dared not open to the day, Holding them shut to hold himself asleep. Alas, in vain! Too late! Full well he knew Now what he was, and where, and that in truth His happy boyhood had come back in dream. Yet lay he lapped in luxury of pain And pathos, and sweet pity of himself, And longings toward a past beyond recall, With something also of a good remorse That he was such as then he felt he was, Poor broken worldling, empty heart, and old (In contrast of his visionary youth!), Therewith perhaps some upward-groping wish That he were other. All-undoing stress It was, of elemental motions blind About the bases of his being bowed Like Samson, and his state was overthrown. Those agéd eyes that had been used to glint Metallic lusters, or of adamant, Softened beneath the lids, unseen, and tears Forced themselves forth down either temple falling. Instinctively he stirred, and with his hands (Vainly, encumbered with their manacles!) He sought to brush those trickling tears away. They wandered down to mingle with his hair, Long locks, and thin, of iron grey, unkempt, Close clinging to the sunken temple walls. Rachel with Ruth remarked the motions vain, And gently, without word, moved to his side. There Rachel with her kerchief wiped the tears With strokes as of caress, so loving light; But Ruth, observing for a moment, turned With token to Eunicé, quick of heart To understand, who hastening lightly thence A laver full of water brought, wherefrom The mother washed the forehead and the face, As had that agéd man her father been, Then dried them with a towel clean and sweet. Not once the while would Shimei lift the lids That trembled shutting over his dim eyes: Strange new emotion made him shrink from seeing-- Shame, and a tenderness of gratitude, And love, that, with wing-footed Memory, Ran backward to his boyhood and there fell With tears and kisses on his mother's neck-- Remembered, she, a _woman_--such as these!