XXI.

And when the exhausted aching frame
Would fain have dropped in seas of sleep,
He thought how high the teacher's aim,
How dread the watch 'twas his to keep.

XXII.

So have I seen upon a hill
A fair green tree of milk-white flowers,
Where bees sucked out their honeyed fill
Through all the long day's basking hours:

XXIII.

To its green cells and vases white,
That yield an odorous air,
The swarm with musical delight
For their sweet gold repair.

XXIV.

But dark decay may mine the tree,
Or lightning-bolt may blast,
And not a flower for wind or bee
Delight the saddening waste.

XXV.

The winter pressed with gloom and chill
Round Henry's wavering thread of life,
And though the eye shone boldly still,
The cheek grew thin amid the strife.

XXVI.

And while at solitary night
His candle showed some ancient page,
And like a deft familiar sprite
Evoked for him the buried sage;

XXVII.

While from the distant snow-clad wold
The clown, belated, marked the beam,
Nor guessed of what the glimmering told,
What human task, or goblin dream,—

XXVIII.

The lonely student oft would shrink,
And startling, clasp his painful breast,
With long-drawn sigh of Jane would think,
And seek at last reluctant rest.

XXIX.

Yet once again did Jane and he
By Simon's hearth at evening meet,
And once beneath his bare ash-tree
They filled at dawn their grassy seat.

XXX.

'Twas then a cold and misty morn,
The churchyard seemed a cave of death;
They saw the yew, by cold unshorn,
Stand hearse-like black in winter's breath.