CANTO HI AND said I that my limbs were old, And that I might not sing of love?— II. In peace, Love tunes the shepherd's reed; In halls, in gay attire is seen; In hamlets, dances on the green. Love rules the court, the camp, the grove, And men below, and saints above; For love is heaven, and heaven is love. III. So thought Lord Cranstoun as I ween, And scarce his helmet could he don, A stately knight came pricking on. IV. But no whit weary did he seem, He marked the crane on the Baron's crest; Few were the words, and stern and high, And snorted fire, when wheeled around, To give each knight his vantage ground. V. In rapid round the Baron bent; He sighed a sigh, and prayed a prayer: The prayer was to his patron saint, The sigh was to his ladye fair. Stout Deloraine nor sighed nor prayed, But he stooped his head, and couched his spear And spurred his steed to full career The meeting of these champions proud VL Stern was the dint the Borderer lent! The stately Baron backwards bent; Bent backwards to his horse's tail, And his plumes went scattering on the gale; Into a thousand flinders flew. But Cranstoun's lance of more avail, Pierced through, like silk, the Borderer's mail; Through shield, and jack, and acton, past, Till, stumbling in the mortal shock, Down went the steed, the girthing broke, VII. But when he reined his courser round, 29 Lie senseless as the bloody clay, And there beside the warrior stay, For the kinsman of the maid he loved. VIIL Away in speed Lord Cranstoun rode; His lord's command he ne'er withstood, As the corslet off he took, The Dwarf espied the Mighty Book! Much he marvelled, a knight of pride Like a book-bosomed priest should ride: He thought not to search or staunch the wound, IX. The iron band, the iron clasp, A nut-shell seem a gilded barge, A sheeling* seem a palace large, And youth seem age, and age seem youth- X He had not read another spell, So fierce, it stretched him on the plain, The clasps, though smeared with Christian gore, He hid it underneath his cloak. Now, if you ask who gave the stroke, I cannot tell, so mot I thrive; It was not given by man alive. Unwillingly himself he addressed, Even to the Ladye's secret bower; And, but that stronger spells were spread, He had laid him on her very bed. Whate'er he did of gramarye, Was always done maliciously; He flung the warrior on the ground, And the blood welled freshly from the wound XII As he repassed the outer court, He spied the fair young child at sport: He thought to train him to the wood; For, at a word, be it understood, He was always for ill, and never for good, Seemed to the boy some comrade gay XIII He led the boy o'er bank and fell, 1 Until they came to a woodland brook; The running stream dissolved the spell, And his own elvish shape he took. Could he have had his pleasure vilde, He had crippled the joints of the noble child; Or, with his fingers long and lean, Had strangled him in fiendish spleen: But his awful mother he had in dread, And also his power was limited; So he but scowled on the startled child, And darted through the forest wild; The woodland brook he bounding crossed, And laughed, and shouted, "Lost! lost! lost" XIV. Full sore amazed at the wondrous change, The child, amidst the forest bower, And when at length, with trembling pace, Glare from some thicket on his way. Thus, starting oft, he journeyed on, For aye the more he sought his way. The farther still he went astray, Until he heard the mountains round Ring to the baying of a hound. XV. And hark! and hark! the deep-mouthed bark Bursts on the path a dark blood-hound, |