wered me, "There is
No voice to speak of these deep sanctities,
For Love hath sealed his servants' lips with fire."

Yet in his faithfulness put thou thy faith,
Though he hath bound thee in the house of pain,
And given thy body to the scourging years,
And brought thee for thy thirst the drink of tears,
That sorrowing thou shouldst serve him unto death;
For when Love reigneth, all his saints shall reign.

She kindled and flamed, her whole being one inspired and burning
sympathy. She knew what it was all about. She was on the track of a
Poet's Progress in quest of the beloved Perfection, Beauty and Truth
in one. Of those nine and twenty sonnets she looked for a score that
should make immortal the moments of triumph and of vision, the moments
of rapture and fulfilment of the heart's desire. Her glance fell now
on two lines that clearly pointed to the goal of those who travel on
the divine way--

--Elysian calm and passion with no stain
Of mortal tears, no touch of mortal pain--

She hoped he had reached it. And more than that she hoped. She was
ignorant of what his life had been before he knew her; but the _Song
of Confession_ had made her realize that besides this way where the
poet went invincibly there was another where the man desired to go,
where, as they were so ready to tell her, he had not always gone. But
that was before she knew him. She hoped (taking her beautiful view)
that in this gift of his he had meant to give to her who understood
him some hint or sign that he had come near it also, the way of
Righteousness. She looked to find many sonnets dealing with these
secret matters of the soul. Therefore she approached them fearlessly,
since she knew what they were all about. And since, in that curious
humility of the man that went so oddly with the poet's pride, he had
so exaggerated his obligation, taking, as he said, the will for the
deed and making of her desire to serve him a service actually done;
since his imagination had played round her for a moment as it played
round all things, transforming, magnifying, glorifying, she might
perhaps find one sonnet of dedication to her who had understood him.

But when she had read them all, she saw, and could not help seeing,
that the whole nine and twenty were one continuous dedication--and to
her. If she had found what she looked for, she found also that a
revelation had been made to her of things even m