"Or has thy good woman, if one thou hast, Ever here in Cornwall been? For, an if she have, I'll venture my life She has drank of the Well of St. Keyne." "I have left a good woman who never was here," The stranger he made reply; "But that my draught should be the better for that, I pray you answer me why." "St. Keyne," quoth the Cornish-man, "many a time Drank of this crystal well; And, before the angel summon'd her, She laid on the water a spell,-- "If the husband of this gifted well Shall drink before his wife, A happy man thenceforth is he, For he shall be master for life; "But if the wife should drink of it first, God help the husband then!" The stranger stoop'd to the Well of St. Keyne, And drank of the water again. "You drank of the well, I warrant, betimes?" He to the Cornish-man said; But the Cornish-man smiled as the stranger spake, And sheepishly shook his head:-- "I hasten'd, as soon as the wedding was done, And left my wife in the porch; But i' faith she had been wiser than me, For she took a bottle to church." XXXV. THE ISLES OF GREECE. LORD BYRON.--1788-1824. The isles of Greece! the isles of Greece! Where burning Sappho lov'd and sung, Where grew the arts of war and peace, Where Delos rose, and Phoebus sprung! Eternal summer gilds them yet, But all, except their sun, is set. The Scian and the Teian muse, The hero's harp, the lover's lute, Have found the fame your shores refuse: Their place of birth alone is mute To sounds which echo further west Than your sires' "Islands of the Blest." The mountains look on Marathon-- And Marathon looks on the sea; And musing there an hour alone, I dream'd that Greece might still be free; For standing on the Persians' grave, I could not deem myself a slave. A king sate on the rocky brow Which looks o'er sea-born Salamis; And ships, by thousands, lay below, And men in nations;--all were his! He counted them at break of day-- And when the sun set, where were they? And where are they? and where art thou, My country? On thy voiceless shore The heroic lay is tuneless now-- The heroic bosom beats no more! And must thy lyre, so long divine, Degenerate into hands like mine? 'Tis something, in the dearth of fame, Though link'd among a fetter'd race, To feel at least a patriot's shame, Even as I sing, suffuse my face; For what is left the poet here? For Greeks a blush--for Greece a tear. Must _we_ but weep o'er days more blest? Must _we_ but blush?--Our fathers bled. Earth! render back from out thy breast A remnant of our Spartan dead! Of the three hundred grant but three, To make a new Thermopylae!