And she talked on--_we_ talked, rather! upon all things, substance, shadow, Of the sheep that browsed the grasses, of the reapers in the corn, Of the little children from the schools, seen winding through the meadow, Of the poor rich world beyond them, still kept poorer by its scorn. XLIX. So, of men, and so, of letters--books are men of higher stature, And the only men that speak aloud for future times to hear; So, of mankind in the abstract, which grows slowly into nature, Yet will lift the cry of "progress," as it trod from sphere to sphere. L. And her custom was to praise me when I said,--"The Age culls simples, With a broad clown's back turned broadly to the glory of the stars. We are gods by our own reck'ning, and may well shut up the temples, And wield on, amid the incense-steam, the thunder of our cars. LI. "For we throw out acclamations of self-thanking, self admiring, With, at every mile run faster,--'O the wondrous wondrous age!' Little thinking if we work our SOULS as nobly as our iron, Or if angels will commend us at the goal of pilgrimage. LII. "Why, what _is_ this patient entrance into nature's deep resources But the child's most gradual learning to walk upright without bane? When we drive out, from the cloud of steam, majestical white horses, Are we greater than the first men who led black ones by the mane? LIII. "If we trod the deeps of ocean, if we struck the stars in rising, If we wrapped the globe intensely with one hot electric breath, 'T were but power within our tether, no new spirit-power comprising, And in life we were not greater men, nor bolder men in death." LIV. She was patient with my talking; and I loved her, loved her certes As I loved all heavenly objects, with uplifted eyes and hands; As I loved pure inspirations, loved the graces, loved the virtues, In a Love content with writing his own name on desert sands. LV. Or at least I thought so, purely; thought no idiot Hope was raising Any crown to crown Love's silence, silent Love that sate alone: Out, alas! the stag is like me, he that tries to go on grazing With the great deep gun-wound in his neck, then reels with sudden moan. LVI. It was thus I reeled. I told you that her hand had many suitors; But she smiles them down imperially as Venus did the waves, And with such a gracious coldness that they cannot press their futures On the present of her courtesy, which yieldingly enslaves. LVII. And this morning as I sat alone within the inner chamber With the great saloon beyond it, lost in pleasant thought serene, For I had been reading Camoëns, that poem you remember, Which his lady's eyes are praised in as the sweetest ever seen. LVIII.