. The princess, a medley. VII. So was their sanctuary violated, So their fair college turnd to hospital; At first with all confusion : by and by Sweet order lived again with other laws : A kindlier influence reignd ; and everywhere Low voices with the ministering hand Hung round the sick : the maidens came, they talkd, They sang, they read : till she not fair began To gather light, and she that was became Her former beauty treble ; and to and fro With books, with flowers, with angel offices, Like creatures native unto gracious act, And in their own clear element, they moved. But sadness on the
. The princess, a medley. VII. So was their sanctuary violated, So their fair college turnd to hospital; At first with all confusion : by and by Sweet order lived again with other laws : A kindlier influence reignd ; and everywhere Low voices with the ministering hand Hung round the sick : the maidens came, they talkd, They sang, they read : till she not fair began To gather light, and she that was became Her former beauty treble ; and to and fro With books, with flowers, with angel offices, Like creatures native unto gracious act, And in their own clear element, they moved. But sadness on the soul of Ida fell,And hatred of her weakness, blent with studies faild ; seldom she spoke ; but oftClomb to the roofs, and gazed alone for hours A MEDLEY. On that disastrous leaguer, swarms of menDarkening her female field : void was her use,And she as one that climbs a peak to gazeOer land and main, and sees a great black cloud 123. Drag inward from the deeps, a wall of night,Blot out the slope of sea from verge to shore,And suck the blinding splendor from the sand,And quenching lake by lake and tarn by tarnExpunge the world : so fared she gazing there;So blackend all her world in secret, blankAnd waste it seemd and vain; till down she came,And found fair peace once more among the sick. And twilight dawnd; and morn by morn the larkShot up and shrilld in flickering gyres, but ILay silent in the muffled cage of life :And twilight gloomd; and broader-grown the bowersDrew the great night into themselves, and Heaven,Star after star, arose and fell; but I, 124 THE PRINCESS: Deeper than those weird doubts could reach me, lay-Quite sunderd from the moving Universe,Nor knew what eye was on me, nor the handThat nursed me, more than infants in their sleep. But Psyche tended Florian : with her oft 4o Melissa came ; for Blanche had gone, but leftHer child among us, willing she should keepCourt-favor : here and there the small
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