THE BLAMELESS PRINCE
And the trains joined behind, the lady bore
Her beauteous head askance, yet wist full well
How the Prince looked and spoke; unwittingly,
With the strange female sense and secret eye,
Made of him there her subtle estimate,
Forecast his lot, and thought how all things flow
To those who have a surfeit. Could the great,
The perfect Queen, she marvelled, truly know
And love him at his value? In his turn,
He read her face as 't were a marble urn
Embossed with Truth and blushful Innocence,
Yet with the wild Loves carven in repose;
And as he looked he felt, and knew not whence,
A thought like this come as the wind that blows:
"A face to lose one's life for; aye, and more,
To live for!"—So they reached the sculptured door
And casements gilded with the dying light.
That eve the host spread out a stately board,
And with his household far into the night
Feasted the Prince. The lady, next her lord,
Drooped like a musk-rose trained beside a tomb.
Loath was the guest that night to seek his room.
Ah! wherefore tell again an oft-told tale,—
That of the sleeping knight who lost his wage
In the enchanted land, though cased with mail,
And bore the sacred shrine an empty gage?
How this thing went it were not worth to view
But for the triple coil which thence outgrew;
How, with the morn, the ancient chamberlain
Made off, and on the marriage business moved;
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