t: she spoke of such a cloud--
I struck her for't, and said it was a fiend--
She's happy now, before the throne of God--
I should be merry; yet my heart's floor sinks
As on a fast day; sure some evil bodes.
Would it were here, that I might see its eyes!
The future only is unbearable!
We quail before the rising thunderstorm
Which thrills and whispers in the stifled air,
Yet blench not, when it falls. Would it were here!

[Pause.]

I fain would sleep, yet dare not: all the air
Throngs thick upon me with the pregnant terror
Of life unseen, yet near. I dare not meet them,
As if I sleep I shall do--I again?
What matter what I feel, or like, or fear?
Come what God sends. Within there--Brother Gerard!

[Gerard enters.]

Watch here an hour, and pray.--The fiends are busy.
So--hold my hand. [Crosses himself.] Come on, I fear you not.
[Sleeps.]

[Gerard sings.]

Qui fugiens rnundi gravia
Contempsit carnis bravia,
Cupidinisque somnia,
Lucratur, perdens, omnia.

Hunc gestant ulnis angeli,
Ne lapis officiat pedi;
Ne luce timor occupet,
Aut nocte pestis incubet.

Huic coeli lilia germinant;
Arrisus sponsi permanent;
Ac nomen in fidelibus
Quam filiorum medius. [Sleeps.]

. . . . .

Conrad [awaking]. Stay! Spirits, stay! Art thou a hell-born
phantasm,
Or word too true, sent by the mother of God?
Oh, tell me, queen of Heaven!
O God! if she, the city of the Lord,
Who is the heart, the brain, the ruling soul
Of half the earth; wherein all kingdoms, laws,
Authority, and faith do culminate,
And draw from her their sanction and their use;
The lighthouse founded on the rock of ages,
Whereto the Gentiles look, and still are healed;
The tree whose rootlets drink of every river,
Whose boughs drop Eden fruits on seaward isles;
Christ's seamless coat, rainbowed with gems and hues
Of all degrees and uses, rend, and tarnish,
And crumble into dust!
Vanitas vanitatum, omnia vanitas!
Oh! to have prayed, and toiled--and lied--for this!
For this to have crushed out the heart of youth,
And sat by calm, while living bodies burned!
How! Gerard; sleeping!
Couldst thou not watch with me one hour, my son?

Ger. [awaking]. How! have I slept? Shame on my vaporous brain!
And yet there crept along my hand from thine
A leaden languor, and the drowsy air
Teemed thick with humming wings--I slept perforce.
Forgive me (while for breach of holy rule
Due penance shall seem honour) my neglect.

Con. I should have beat t