Pike County Ballads | Page 9

Carabanchel."
Both ladies, though not over wise,?Were lucky in prophecies.?For the Boulevard shopmen well?Know the form of stout Isabel?As she buys her modes de Paris;?And after Sedan in despair?The Empress prude and fair?Went to visit Madame sa Mere?In her villa at Carabanchel -?But the Queen was not there to see.
A TRIUMPH OF ORDER.
A squad of regular infantry,?In the Commune's closing days,?Had captured a crowd of rebels?By the wall of Pere-la-Chaise.
There were desperate men, wild women,?And dark-eyed Amazon girls,?And one little boy, with a peach-down cheek?And yellow clustering curls.
The captain seized the little waif,?And said, "What dost thou here?"?"Sapristi, Citizen captain!?I'm a Communist, my dear!"
"Very well! Then you die with the others!"?--"Very well! That's my affair;?But first let me take to my mother,?Who lives by the wine-shop there,
"My father's watch. You see it;?A gay old thing, is it not??It would please the old lady to have it;?Then I'll come back here, and be shot."
"That is the last we shall see of him,"?The grizzled captain grinned,?As the little man skimmed down the hill?Like a swallow down the wind.
For the joy of killing had lost its zest?In the glut of those awful days,?And Death writhed, gorged like a greedy snake,?From the Arch to Pere-la-Chaise.
But before the last platoon had fired?The child's shrill voice was heard;?"Houp-la! the old girl made such a row?I feared I should break my word."
Against the bullet-pitted wall?He took his place with the rest,?A button was lost from his ragged blouse,?Which showed his soft white breast.
"Now blaze away, my children!?With your little one-two-three!"?The Chassepots tore the stout young heart,?And saved Society.
ERNST OF EDELSHEIM.
I'll tell the story, kissing?This white hand for my pains:?No sweeter heart, nor falser,?E'er filled such fine, blue veins.
I'll sing a song of true love,?My Lilith, dear! to you;?Contraria contrariis -?The rule is old and true.
The happiest of all lovers?Was Ernst of Edelsheim;?And why he was the happiest,?I'll tell you in my rhyme.
One summer night he wandered?Within a lonely glade,?And, couched in moss and moonlight,?He found a sleeping maid.
The stars of midnight sifted?Above her sands of gold;?She seemed a slumbering statue,?So fair and white and cold.
Fair and white and cold she lay?Beneath the starry skies;?Rosy was her waking?Beneath the Ritter's eyes.
He won her drowsy fancy,?He bore her to his towers,?And swift with love and laughter?Flew morning's purpled hours.
But when the thickening sunbeams?Had drunk the gleaming dew,?A misty cloud of sorrow?Swept o'er her eyes' deep blue.
She hung upon the Ritter's neck,?She wept with love and pain,?She showered her sweet, warm kisses?Like fragrant summer rain.
"I am no Christian soul," she sobbed,?As in his arms she lay;?"I'm half the day a woman,?A serpent half the day.
"And when from yonder bell-tower?Rings out the noonday chime,?Farewell! farewell for ever,?Sir Ernst of Edelsheim!"
"Ah! not farewell for ever!"?The Ritter wildly cried;?"I will be saved or lost with thee,?My lovely Wili-Bride!"
Loud from the lordly bell-tower?Rang out the noon of day,?And from the bower of roses?A serpent slid away.
But when the mid-watch moonlight?Was shimmering through the grove,?He clasped his bride thrice dowered?With beauty and with love.
The happiest of all lovers?Was Ernst of Edelsheim -?His true love was a serpent?Only half the time!
MY CASTLE IN SPAIN.
There was never a castle seen?So fair as mine in Spain:?It stands embowered in green,?Crowning the gentle slope?Of a hill by the Xenil's shore?And at eve its shade flaunts o'er?The storied Vega plain,?And its towers are hid in the mists of Hope;?And I toil through years of pain?Its glimmering gates to gain.
In visions wild and sweet?Sometimes its courts I greet:?Sometimes in joy its shining halls?I tread with favoured feet;?But never my eyes in the light of day?Were blest with its ivied walls,?Where the marble white and the granite gray?Turn gold alike when the sunbeams play,?When the soft day dimly falls.
I know in its dusky rooms?Are treasures rich and rare;?The spoil of Eastern looms,?And whatever of bright and fair?Painters divine have caught and won?From the vault of Italy's air:?White gods in Phidian stone?People the haunted glooms;?And the song of immortal singers?Like a fragrant memory lingers,?I know, in the echoing rooms.
But nothing of these, my soul!?Nor castle, nor treasures, nor skies,?Nor the waves of the river that roil?With a cadence faint and sweet?In peace by its marble feet -?Nothing of these is the goal?For which my whole heart sighs.?'Tis the pearl gives worth to the shell -?The pearl I would die to gain;?For there does my lady dwell,?My love that I love so well -?The Queen whose gracious reign?Makes glad my castle in Spain.
Her face so pure and fair?Sheds light in the shady places,?And the spell of her girlish graces?Holds charmed the happy air.?A breath of purity?For ever before her flies,?And ill things cease to be?In the glance of her honest eyes.?Around her pathway flutter,?Where her dear feet wander free?In youth's pure majesty,?The wings of the vague desires;?But the thought that love would utter?In reverence expires.
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