What, of all things, midst the heap,
Should I light on, fast asleep,
But the little desperate elf,
The tiny traitor, Love himself!
By the wings I pinched him up
Like a bee, and in a cup
Of my wine I plunged and sank him ;
And what d' ye think I did?—I drank him!
Faith, I thought him dead. Not he!
There he lives with tenfold glee;
And now this moment, with his wings
I feel him tickling my heart-strings.
Two pilgrims from the distant plain
Come quickly o'er the mossy ground.
One is a boy, with locks of gold
Thick curling round his face so fair;
The other pilgrim, stern and old,
Has snowy beard and silver hair.
The youth with many a merry trick
Goes singing on his careless way;
His old companion walks as quick,
But speaks no word by night or day.
Where'er the old man treads, the grass
Fast fadeth with a certain doom;
But where the beauteous boy doth pass
Unnumbered flowers are seen to bloom.
And thus before the sage, the boy
Trips lightly o'er the blooming lands,
And proudly bears a pretty toy,
A crystal glass with diamond sands.
A smile o'er any brow would pass
To see him frolic in the sun,
To see him shake the crystal glass,
And make the sands more quickly run.
And now they leap the streamlet o'er,
A silver thread so white and thin,
And now they reach the open door,
And now they lightly enter in :
"God save all here," - that kind wish flies Still sweeter from his lips so sweet; “God save you kindly," Norah cries, "Sit down, my child, and rest and eat."
"Thanks, gentle Norah, fair and good,
We'll rest awhile our weary feet;
But though this old man needeth food,
There's nothing here that he can eat.
His taste is strange, he eats alone,
Beneath some ruined cloister's cope, Or on some tottering turret's stone, While I can only live on- Hope!