Page:Romance of the Rose (Ellis), volume 1.pdf/249

The rivers of Fortune In rippling wavelets speeds along
This gentle stream with tinkling song,
More musically sweet, I ween,
Than ever broke from tambourine6340
Or silvery cymbal. Those who stroll
Beside the flowery meads where roll
These singing waters haste anear,
Impatient such sweet sounds to hear
More perfectly, but when the side
Attain they of the murmuring tide,
Can nowise find the manner how
To reach the farther bank, for trow
Ye well that when their feet they set
(No more than just enough to wet6350
Their shoe-latch) in the trancing wave,
And drink one drop, then nought can save
Their hearts from lust of that sweet drink,
And plunging in o’erwhelmed they sink.

Others, more bold, from off the brim
Leap hardily, and think to swim
Across the current; from among
The waves they shout, in accents strong,
The joyousness of their success;
But suddenly a wavelet’s stress6360
Carries them back, and there on dry
And arid earth, heart-sick, they lie.

And now will I relate to thee
The other stream’s strange history.
Its waves are sulphurous, black and grim,
No birds flit o’er it, no fish swim