Classic Poem

S IR G RAHAM look'd from out his bower
In the sloping woodside tower,
And gaz'd upon the lovely sight,
His stern face handsome with delight:
He gaz'd below, he gaz'd aloft;
With lonely sighs his heart grew soft,
Fill'd to o'erflowing, like the vale,
With pleasure of the nightingale;
Till, pondering upwards on the moon,
Thoughts came again but ill in tune
With the sweet bird's enamour'd song,
And " Edgar" thought he, " journeys long:
Two weeks he bade me wait, to know
What secret 'twas he guarded so;
And now two months, and nigher three,
He stays; nor with his love is he;
Nor stoops her pride to speak one word
Of care about her future lord,
But conquering goes, 'twixt town and tower,
In her frontless thirst of power,
With a cheek that shines, not glows,
A petrifaction of the rose,
And eyes whose joy is like a foe's!
God send the love thus won at last
Beat not the pangs he fancies past,
With smiles at best as endless cold
As those of yon fair witch of old,
Who meets the look of glad and sad
Alike, and drives the gazer mad.
O grief! to think a soul like his
Should love and doat where no love is;
Should task its priceless worth to gain
A puppet made of hard and vain,
Who boasted she could love no knight
Without the fame of matchless might!
Without the grace to have beat down
Ev'ry fresh plume that topp'd renown,
And at the peril of her scorn,
Should some fool come, robuster born!
Fame is fame truly and might might,
But love like this outvenoms spite;
Welcomes new chances of defeats
And final loss, for him that beats;
And should his task be ever done,
Crowns his bad luck, in being won!"

Sir Graham smiled with grim disdain,
Then sigh'd to think his scorn was vain,
When suddenly there reach'd his ear
A sound to heed, if not to fear,
Which seem'd to yearn, in pain and woe,
Heavily from the croft below
With eager caution, swift and soft,
He stoop'd, and look'd into the croft.
Full on the grass the moonlight shone;
His steed fed there, and was alone;
And all was still, his ear beneath,
Save the cropp'd herbage in its teeth.

Yet hark! the groan was surely nigh;
Sir Graham starts, and turns his eye
Round his own room to his own door,
And staggering o'er the unhappy floor
Bursts in Sir Edgar, the good knight,
A bloody and a doleful sight.
His face was smear'd with his own hands,
Which yet were dress'd with swathes and bands;
He had more wounds with sword and knife,
Than ever man that had his life.
To the couch with help he went,
And mov'd his lips as though he meant
To speak, but nothing could he say,
And fainted with a groan away.

Sir Graham clasp'd him with wet eyes,
And " What is this, great God!" he cries:
" Where hast thou been, and not with me?
Alas! that I should live to see
The day when thou wert in distress,
And I at home in carelessness!
What dastards can have carv'd thee thus?
What murderer, that shall yet mourn us?"

Oh! piteous was Sir Edgar's groan:
" One warrior met me — one alone.
Gone is my fame for evermore,
And gone the lady; gone Linore."

" Oh no!" cried Graham: " such renown
How can one brief mischance pull down?
A fame built up of hundreds more,
And such as thou shalt thrice restore.
Must not e'en thou endure the chance
Of a lam'd steed, or a warp'd lance?"

" No more, no more;" the knight replied;
" Never had man arms better tried,
Nor horse, nor health; and I rode forth
To meet one man, and he is worth
Ten such as I am Let me lie,
I prythee, seen of none, and die."

And as he spoke, he swoon'd again:
His eyes were clos'd for shame and pain:
His hands lay by him, like one dead;
And tears crept forth he could not shed.

With cordials, and with noble words,
Just as the happy morning birds
Had made his feeble eyelids weep,
Sir Graham lull'd his friend to sleep,
And then he stood, and mark'd him well. —
Sad was his state, and strange to tell;
For all in front, from side to side,
And all about his shoulders wide,
And arms and hands, and either knee,
One fretwork of fierce wounds was he.
The blood from most — a piteous sight —
Had oozed, and stained the linen white:
But all had carefully been dress'd
With skill and grace the tenderest;
The odour of the balsams rare
Touch'd with sad sweet the morning air,
And on one hand there was a glove,
As soft as gift of lady love,
Tied close about the wrist with silk:
The stuff was white as morning's milk
Like Misery that had met with Love,
Were those poor wounds, and balms, and glove.

" Some lady," sigh'd his friend, " has done
What his would hear of but to shun:
Some stranger, with no heart of stone:
Would he had paid her with his own."

He then, to keep the news unspread,
Awoke his page and squire in bed,
And sent them forth in endless quest
Of the friend thus re-possess'd;
And then Sir Edgar's brother Clare
He summon'd to assist his care,
A close, but true and loving boy,
And these two watch him, and with joy
Perceive that he sleeps sound and long:
For not again did sweet bird's song
Move him; nor any jar within
The penitent, sad room; nor din
Of brass for bees; nor headlong steed
Neighing to pleasures in the mead;
Nor roof and casement cluttering loud
With hailstones, when a hard big cloud
Split on the sapphire edge of June,
And stainless left the afternoon.
And as he slept thus, like a child,
With open mouth, up breathing mild,
His brother swept aloof, with soft
Still hand, the fly returning oft;
And longing to hear all, Sir Grame
Ponder'd a deed beyond a name.

All day he slept, and all next night,
And waking with the pious light
Of the third dawn, he breath'd a prayer,
Despairing, yet with mild despair,
And smiling on those two, he press'd
Their hands, and thus his friend address'd: —

" I heard in secret of a knight
Come over seas, of matchless might,
Who slowly shifting his abode
From place to place upon the road,
And quelling every knight that came,
Was hither bent, to crown his fame.
I, in my foolish pride, God wot,
Thinking to save more shields from blot,
And speed his coming with his own
Revers'd, and as my trophy shewn,
Rode forth to meet this man half-way. —
Loud as the bird I sang that day.

" Far eastward rode I, over hill
And vale, and moorlands blackening still,
And sullen countries of no sound,
Until a forest girt me round;
And there I heard the pleasant fall
Of woodman's axe, and at my call
Forth came the woodman, and I then
Heard surely of this man of men.
Too dull he seem'd to pity me,
That peasant; yet confus'd to see
Another bold wretch doom'd to die;
And staring, ask'd me earnestly
If I had fame in my own land
The knight, he said, was close at hand,
Lodg'd in the house of him last slain,
And was a man of great disdain,
Who left a mark on those he slew
In scorn of what they dar'd him to.
No plume he wore, nor aught of gay
Or bright, but all in armour grey
Was lock'd and shap'd, from head to heel,
And hence men call'd him Sir Gray-steel
With beard his face was overgrown,
Sharp his small eye, his speech unknown;
And seldom utter'd he a word,
But when his horrid heart was stirr'd
By some huge gash which he bestow'd,
And then his bloody laughter flow'd.

" I left the woodman, and went straight
Through lanes of pine-trees to a gate
Which open'd on a glade right fair;
A mighty horn was hanging there,
Like the dumb voice of the slain knight
I made it speak with all my might,
Chearful and wide; and then I pass'd
The gate, and for a while stood fast.
My stand was good, my heart in mirth,
I felt the fear of none on earth.

" Nothing I heard, until my steed
Look'd up before him, taking heed
Of something coming in the trees;
And then, with headlong earnestness,
Making him charge with all his might,
Forth on his horse there rush'd a knight.
We dash'd asunder as we met,
For speed. Alas! my side was wet
With the first gliding of his spear.
Like a wind he pass'd mine ear,
And turn'd him to the couch again,
And miss'd me; but my steed was slain.
I leap'd to earth, my foot was free,
I would have drawn my sword; but he,
No knight in that, but churl and clown,
Rode on me, Grame, and trod me down."

" Curst be his soul for deed so base!"
Cried Grame; " and call you this disgrace?
Call you this fighting and defeat?"

" Alas! the wolf and lion meet
Sometimes," Sir Edgar sigh'd, " in one
Think of these wounds but then begun
I got my sword out as I might,
And steed for steed I slew. The knight
Then drew his own sword, a dread sword;
The blood about my shoulders pour'd;
A brief confusion fell on me,
And then I heard him screech for glee.
I paus'd an instant; — I saw glare
Through his barr'd helmet and his hair
His ferret eyes; and as I look'd,
Strokes like a sledge my pause rebuk'd,
Cuffing me with a bulk of pain,
And then he screech'd and laugh'd again"

" 'Tis some brute beast or devil come
To shame us, out of Heathendom,"
Sir Graham cried: — " Heav'n help my vow,
So as I swear, — But what didst thou?
How paidst thou him — for thou didst pay —
For all the sores thou broughtst away?"

" Were it good for me to live on,
Well it had been my sword was gone,
For never had I brought away
Blood else, enough to creep to day
But with me was my dagger still:
I ran with it against his will
Betwixt his hands, and made him quit
His sword, and draw his own to it,
And then we too, Grame, knife to knife,
That dev'l and I, we fought for life.
Under his belt, with all my pith,
I struck a blow which he groan'd with;
And then I got blood out of him
Here and there, through all his trim,
And forc'd him to breathe hard, and grasp
My waist in stooping, clasp for clasp,
And up into each other's face
We struck. Alas! it was great grace
I saved mine eyes, for he struck well;
My brow seem'd stoop'd on prongs of hell;
But straining all my strength, I gave
A blow which to his own brow clave,
And with his blood half made him blind:
Alas! it left the blade behind.
A dash yet with the heft he got,
Which cost his mouth some teeth, I wot;
But what for loss of arms and blood,
Weaker and more weak I stood,
While spitefully he stuck his dirk: —
Mine habergeon of Milan work
Serv'd me no better than my skin,
Nor the Milan quilt therein
Which in a battle once had kept
My father safe. I almost wept
To think it had wrapp'd him and me;
But felt too dull with enmity.
Hands, rage, all fail'd me. Every mesh
Of steel seem'd only in my flesh;
By nought but his own grasp I stood;
My blind eyes grew forlorn with blood,
And my brain reel'd, and down I fell
Betwixt his hands. He gave a yell
Which seem'd to wither up my head,
Then dropp'd me, and I lay for dead.

" How long I lay I know not. He
Was gone, when sense return'd to me;
And with him from my hand was gone
(This hand the gentle glove is on)
A little finger. I, for woe,
Lay back, and wish'd my life would go,
When to mine ear there came a sound
Of water through the grassy ground
I rose, and on my hands and feet
I crept, and found that water sweet.
I steep'd me in it, all I could,
The freshness was so pure and good,
And wash'd the blood from out mine eyes,
And breath'd till I could better rise,
And then I stood a little space,
And look'd about through all that place.
No one I saw; but near me lay
My gear that had been hack'd away,
My broken sword, and haft of knife,
And red the grass was, nigh with life.
I could have wrung my hands to see
What mockery had been made of me.
My steed, a little farther on,
Lay stuck. He seem'd my last friend gone;
But looking round again, I spied
Another, saddled. Heavy-eyed
He rais'd his neck from where he fed,
To hear me speak with voice half dead;
And seem'd to love, yet doubt my sight,
For he belong'd to that slain knight;
And stopping oft, he came to me.
Oh! heavily and painfully
I clomb that steed, and paced him forth:
The task was not the trouble's worth

" Slowly I rode till it was night:
I saw a turret by a light
A little from a murmuring town;
And as I near'd it, I got down
And sate me on a bank to rest
My wounds, and think what course was best,
For help they needed, flesh and bone,
And I was loth my name were known.
The pain they gave me made me speak
Against my will, I was so weak;
And at the little cry, I heard
A startled and a gentle word,
And then a call upon a name,
And tow'rds me many servants came
Out of a doorway in the wall,
And help'd me in to a great hall,
Where stood three ladies, waiting me
With brows of aching sympathy,
And hands that help'd me, ere we met;
Mine eyes at theirs turn'd glimmering wet.
Beauteous they were, sweet sisters all;
It seem'd a sudden heav'n, that hall.
The eldest had been walking forth
To mourn a knight of matchless worth
Slain by the very man I met:
She counted every wound a debt
For him she lov'd and paid it me,
She, and the whole sweet sisters three,
With care and cost full tenderly.
Oh! such a life I just had led
'Twas heaven alone to see a bed.
In a silver goblet first
They gave me water for my thirst;
And in a silver goblet thrice
With their own hands they bath'd mine eyes,
Roses gave the water grace,
And breath'd a bliss upon my face.
I never knew till then what dowers
Of Eden lay in leaves of flowers.
I felt as if mine eyes and hair
Suddenly met angels' air,
And my life began anew,
Far as man's nigh slain could do.
With their gentle fingers dear
They remov'd then all my gear,
And wash'd my wounds, and made them calm
With many a costly tent and balm,
And words that did me good no less
'Twixt pleasantry and tenderness;
And when they found I thought it shame,
They never tried to know my name,
Nor yet would have my face be seen,
But let the curtain blush between
The light of it; though half the day
They would extol me as I lay,
And every night a guard would keep
And lull me with a lute to sleep,
Singing low of all sweet things
That sort with shades and murmurings,
But none that either wept or laugh'd,
(And that, methought, was lovely craft)
Till into rest my grief and I
Went drooping with the harmony.
And when their care had heal'd me so,
That I could rise, and needs must go,
And would not wait a stronger hour,
They stay'd me not with wayward power
Nor any the least shade of look
That gives a hasting guest rebuke
But only begg'd that I would take
All comforts with me for their sake,
And set me on a noble steed,
And shook my hand; and then indeed
I saw their beauteous bosoms rise,
And farewell drops perplex their eyes,
But still they smil'd with chearful glee,
And said all happy words to me,
And those were surely angels three."

" In Welcome's very Paradise,"
Thought sad Sir Graham; " yet thine eyes
Could quit them to behold again
Halls that exclude thee with disdain!
The sullen, overlooking bower
Of devilish Pride's own paramour!"

" I rode," Sir Edgar said, and sigh'd,
Many a morn and even-tide