Spirits of grief, sing not your "Well-a-way!"
For Isabel sweet Isabel, will die;
Will die a death too lone and incomplete,
Now they have ta'en away her Basil sweet.
LXII.
Asking for her lost Basil amorously:
And with melodious chuckle in the strings
Of her lorn voice, she oftentimes would cry
After the Pilgrim in his wanderings,
To ask him where her Basil was; and why
'Twas hid from her: "For cruel 'tis," said she
"To steal my Basil-pot away from me."
LXIII.
Imploring for her Basil to the last.
No heart was there in Florence but did mourn
In pity of her love, so overcast.
And a sad ditty of this story borne
From mouth to mouth through all the country pass'd:
Still is the burden sung—"O cruelty,
To steal my Basil pot away from me!"
