eek just the colour and line
Which fade not before him nor swerve:
Yet _she_ has no child!--the divine
Seal of right upon loves that deserve.
Sleep.

VI.

My child! though the world take her part,
Saying "She was the woman to choose;
He had eyes, was a man in his heart,"--
We twain the decision refuse:
We ... weak as I am, as thou art, ...
Cling on to him, never to loose.
Sleep.

VII.

He thinks that, when done with this place,
All's ended? he'll new-stamp the ore?
Yes, Caesar's--but not in our case.
Let him learn we are waiting before
The grave's mouth, the heaven's gate, God's face
With implacable love evermore.
Sleep.

VIII.

He's ours, though he kissed her but now,
He's ours, though she kissed in reply:
He's ours, though himself disavow,
And God's universe favour the lie;
Ours to claim, ours to clasp, ours below,
Ours above, ... if we live, if we die.
Sleep.

IX.

Ah baby, my baby, too rough
Is my lullaby? What have I said?
Sleep! When I've wept long enough
I shall learn to weep softly instead,
And piece with some alien stuff
My heart to lie smooth for thy head.
Sleep.

X.

Two souls met upon thee, my sweet;
Two loves led thee out to the sun:
Alas, pretty hands, pretty feet,
If the one who remains (only one)
Set her grief at thee, turned in a heat
To thine enemy,--were it well done?
Sleep.

XI.

May He of the manger stand near
And love thee! An infant He came
To His own who rejected Him here,
But the Magi brought gifts all the same.
_I_ hurry the cross on my Dear!
_My_ gifts are the griefs I declaim!
Sleep.

LORD WALTER'S WIFE.

I.

"But why do you go?" said the lady, while both sat under the yew,
And her eyes were alive in their depth, as the kraken beneath the
sea-blue.

II.

"Because I fear you," he answered;--"because you are far too fair,
And able to strangle my soul in a mesh of your gold-coloured hair."

III.

"Oh, that," she said, "is no reason! Such knots are quickly undone,
And too much beauty, I reckon, is nothing but too much sun."

IV.

"Yet farewell so," he answered;--"the sun-stroke's fatal at times.
I value your husband, Lord Walter, whose gallop rings still from the
limes."

V.

"Oh, that," she sai