And a languid fire creeps
Through my veins to all my frame,
Dissolvingly and slowly soon,

From thy rose-red lips My name
Floweth; and then, as in a swoon,

With dinning sound my ears are rife,
My tremulous tongue faltereth,
I lose my color, I lose my breath,
I drink the cup of a costly death,
Brimmed with delirious draughts of warmest life
I die with my delight, before

I hear what I would hear from thee;
Yet tell my name again to me.

I would be dying evermore,
So dying ever, Eleänore.

THE MILLER'S DAUGHTER.

I SEE the wealthy miller yet,

His double chin, his portly size,
And who that knew him could forget

The busy wrinkles round his eyes?
The slow wise smile that, round about

His dusty forehead dryly curled,
Seemed half-within and half-without,

And full of dealings with the world?

In yonder chair I see him sit,

Three fingers round the old silver cup—-
I see his gray eyes twinkle yet

At his own jest-gray eyes lit up
With summer lightnings of a soul

So full of summer warmth, so glad,
So healthy, sound, and clear and whole,
His memory scarce can make me sad.

Yet fill my glass: give me one kiss :
My own sweet Alice, we must die.

There's somewhat in this world amiss
Shall be unriddled by and by.
There's somewhat flows to us in life,

But more is taken quite away.
Pray, Alice, pray, my darling wife,

That we may die the selfsame day.

Have I not found a happy earth?

I least should breathe a thought of pain. Would God renew me from my birth

I'd almost live my life again.

So sweet it seems with thee to walk,
And once again to woo thee mine-
It seems in after-dinner talk

Across the walnuts and the wine

To be the long and listless boy

Late left an orphan of the squire, Where this old mansion mounted high

Looks down upon the village spire: For even here, where I and you

Have lived and loved alone so long, Each morn my sleep was broken through By some wild skylark's matin song.

And oft I heard the tender dove

In firry woodlands making moan;
But ere I saw your eyes, my love,

I had no motion of my own.
For scarce my life with fancy played

Before I dreamed that pleasant dream— Still hither thither idly swayed

Like those long mosses in the stream.

Or from the bridge I leaned to hear

The mill-dam rushing down with noise, And see the minnows everywhere

In crystal eddies glance and poise, The tall flag-flowers, when they sprung

Below the range of stepping stones, And those three chestnuts near, that hung In masses thick with milky cones.

But, Alice, what an hour was that,

When, after roving in the woods, ('Twas April then,) I came and sat

Below the chestnuts, when their buds Were glistening to the breezy blue;

And on the slope, an absent fool, I cast me down, nor thought of you, But angled in the higher pool.

A love-song I had somewhere read,
An echo from a measured strain,
Beat time to nothing in my head

From some odd corner of the brain.
It haunted me, the morning long,

With weary sameness in the rhymes, The phantom of a silent song,

That went and came a thousand times.

Then leapt a trout. In lazy mood

I watched the little circles die; They past into the level flood,

And there a vision caught my eye; The reflex of a beauteous form,

A glowing arm, a gleaming neck, As when a sunbeam wavers warm

Within the dark and dimpled beck.

For you remember, you had set,

That morning, on the casement's edge A long green box of mignonette,

And you were leaning from the ledge: And when I raised my eyes, above

They met with two so full and bright— Such eyes! I swear to you, my love,

That these have never lost their light.

I loved, and love dispelled the fear
That I should die an early death:
For love possessed the atmosphere,
And filled the breast with purer breath.
My mother thought, What ails the boy?
For I was altered, and began
To move about the house with joy,
And with the certain step of man.

I loved the brimming wave that swam
Through quiet meadows round the mill,
The sleepy pool above the dam,
The pool beneath it never still,
The meal-sacks on the whitened floor,
The dark round of the dripping wheel,
The very air about the door

Made misty with the floating meal.

And oft in ramblings on the wold,

When April nights began to blow,
And April's crescent glimmered cold,
I saw the village lights below;
I knew your taper far away,

And full at heart of trembling hope,
From off the wold I came, and lay
Upon the freshly-flowered slope.

The deep brook groaned beneath the mill;
And "by that lamp," I thought, "she sits!"
The white chalk-quarry from the hill
Gleamed to the flying moon by fits.
"O that I were beside her now!

O will she answer if I call?
O would she give me vow for vow,
Sweet Alice, if I told her all?”

Sometimes I saw you sit and spin ;

And, in the pauses of the wind, Sometimes I heard you sing within;

Sometimes your shadow crossed the blind; At last you rose and moved the light, And the long shadow of the chair Flitted across into the night,

And all the casement darkened there.

But when at last I dared to speak,

The lanes, you know, were white with May Your ripe lips moved not, but your cheek Flushed like the coming of the day; And so it was-half-sly, half-shy,

You would, and would not, little one! Although I pleaded tenderly,

And you and I were all alone.

And slowly was my mother brought
To yield consent to my desire:
She wished me happy, but she thought

I might have looked a little higher; And I was young-too young to wed:

"Yet must I love her for your sake; Go fetch your Alice here," she said:

Her eyelid quivered as she spake.

And down I went to fetch my bride :
But, Alice, you were ill at ease;
This dress and that by turns you tried,

Too fearful that you should not please.
I loved you better for your fears,

I knew you could not look but well; And dews, that would have fall'n in tears. I kissed away before they fell.

I watched the little flutterings,

The doubt my mother would not see; She spoke at large of many things,

And at the last she spoke of me; And turning looked upon your face, As near this door you sat apart,