Ill Monarch of man's heart the Maiden who Does not aspire to be High-Pontiff too! So she repeated soft her Poet's line, 'By grace divine, Not otherwise, O Nature, are we thine!' And I, up the bright steep she led me, trod, And the like thought pursued With, 'What is gladness without gratitude, And where is gratitude without a God?' And of delight, the guerdon of His laws, She spake, in learned mood; And I, of Him loved reverently, as Cause, Her sweetly, as Occasion of all good. Nor were we shy, For souls in heaven that be May talk of heaven without hypocrisy. And now, when we drew near The low, gray Church, in its sequester'd dell, A shade upon me fell. Dead Millicent indeed had been most sweet, But I how little meet To call such graces in a Maiden mine! A boy's proud passion free affection blunts; His well-meant flatteries oft are blind affronts, And many a tear Was Millicent's before I, manlier, knew That maidens shine As diamonds do, Which, though most clear, Are not to be seen through; And, if she put her virgin self aside And sate her, crownless, at my conquering feet, It should have bred in me humility, not pride. Amelia had more luck than Millicent, Secure she smiled and warm from all mischance Or from my knowledge or my ignorance, And glow'd content With my--some might have thought too much--superior age, Which seem'd the gage Of steady kindness all on her intent. Thus nought forbade us to be fully blent. While, therefore, now Her pensive footstep stirr'd The darnell'd garden of unheedful death, She ask'd what Millicent was like, and heard Of eyes like her's, and honeysuckle breath, And of a wiser than a woman's brow, Yet fill'd with only woman's love, and how An incidental greatness character'd Her unconsider'd ways. But all my praise Amelia thought too slight for Millicent And on my lovelier-freighted arm she leant, For more attent; And the tea-rose I gave, To deck her breast, she dropp'd upon the grave. 'And this was her's,' said I, decoring with a band Of mildest pearls Amelia's milder hand. 'Nay, I will wear it for _her_ sake,' she said: For dear to maidens are their rivals dead. And so, She seated on the black yew's tortured root, I on the carpet of sere shreds below, And nigh the little mound where lay that other, I kiss'd her lips three times without dispute, And, with bold worship suddenly aglow, I lifted to my lips a sandall'd foot, And kiss'd it three times thrice without dispute. Upon my head her fingers fell like snow, Her lamb-like hands about my neck she wreathed. Her arms like slumber o'er my shoulders crept, And with her bosom, whence the azalea breathed, She did my face full favourably smother, To hide the heaving secret that she wept! Now would I keep my promise to her Mother; Now I arose, and raised her to her feet, My best Amelia, fresh-born from a kiss, Moth-like, full-blown in birthdew shuddering sweet, With great, kind eyes, in whose brown shade Bright Venus and her Baby play'd!