blind to the lure of the red-cross bright,
He will bask, for life, in thy beauty's light!"

The morn in the radiant east arose:--
The Red-cross Knight hath spurred his steed
That courseth as swift as a falcon's speed:--
To the salt-sea shore Sir Raymond goes.

Soon, the sea he hath crossed, to Palestine;
And there his heart doth chafe and pine,--
For Hubert de Burgh is not in that land:
He loitereth in France, with Philip's band.

But De Clifford will never a recreant turn,
While the knightly badge on his arm is borne;
And long, beneath the Syrian sun,
He fasted and fought, and glory won.

His Gertrude, alas! like a widow pines;
And though on her castle the bright sun shines,
She sees not its beams,--but in loneliness prays,
Through the live-long hours of her weeping days.--

Twelve moons have waned, and the morn is come
When, a year before, from his meed-won home
Sir Raymond went:--At the castle gate
A reverend Palmer now doth wait.

He saith he hath words for the ladye's ear;
And he telleth, in accents dread and drear,
Of De Clifford's death in the Holy Land,
At Richard's side, by a Saracen's hand.

And he gave to the ladye, when thus he had spoken,--
Of Sir Raymond's fall a deathly token:
'Twas a lock of his hair all stained with blood,
Entwined on a splinter of Holy Rood.--

Then the Palmer in haste from the castle sped;
And from gloomy morn to weary night,
Lorn Gertrude, in her widowed plight,
Weepeth and waileth the knightly dead.--

Three moons have waned, and the Palmer, again,
By Gertrude stands, and smileth fain;
Nor of haste, nor of death, speaks the Palmer, now;
Nor doth sadness or sorrow bedim his brow.

He softly sits by the ladye's side,
And vaunteth his deeds of chivalrous pride;
Then lisps, in her secret ear, of things
Which deeply endanger the thrones of kings:

From Philip of France, he saith, he came,
To treat with Prince John, whom she must not name;
And he, in fair France, hath goodly lands,--
And a thousand vassals there wait his commands.--

The ladye liked her gallant guest,--
For he kenned the themes that pleased her best;
And his tongue, in silken measures skilled,
With goodly ditties her memory filled.

Thus the Palmer the ladye's ear beguiles,--
Till Gertrude her sorrow exchangeth for smiles;
And when from the castle the Palmer went,
She watched his r