But something still each act belied,
      My manner chill’d, restrain’d my love! 
    E’en at the time my spirit died
    With aching tenderness, my eye,
    Encountering thine, was cold and dry! 
    To maim intention, fondness,—­came
    The sudden impotence of shame. 
    Thy happiness was thriftless wealth,
    For I could only hoard by stealth! 
    Affection’s brightly-glowing ray
    Shone with such strong, o’erpowering sway,
    That service fainted by the way!

      “But now an impulse, like despair,
    Makes me these inner foldings tear! 
    With desperate effort bids me wrest
    The yearning secret from my breast! 
    Far be the thought that any blame
    Can fix on thy beloved name! 
    The hapless Minstrel may not feign;
    But thou, I know, canst all explain—­
    Yet let me from this place depart,
    To nurse my fainting, sicken’d heart! 
    Yet let me in a cloister dwell,
    The veiled inmate of a cell;
    To raise this cowering soul by prayer!—­
    Reproach can never enter there!

      “Turn quickly hence that look severe! 
    And, oh! in mercy, not a tear! 
    The most profuse of parents, thou
    Didst every wish fulfil—­allow;
    Till that which us’d to please—­invite,
    Had ceas’d to dazzle and delight;
    And all thy gifts almost despis’d,
    The love that gave alone I priz’d.

      “My yielding spirit bows the knee;
    My will profoundly bends to thee: 
    But paltry vanities resign’d,
    Wealth, gauds, and honours left behind,
    I only wanted, thought to quit
    This strange, wild world, and make me fit
    For one of better promise—­given
    To such as think not this their heaven! 
    Nay, almost in my breast arose
    A hope I scarcely dare disclose;
    A hope that life, from tumult free,—­
      A life so harmless and so pure,
      A calm so shelter’d, so secure,
    At length might have a charm for thee! 
    That supplications, patient, strong,
    Might not remain unanswer’d long! 
    And all temptations from thee cast,
    The altar prove thy home at last!”

      The artless Isabel prevails—­
    That hard, unbending spirit fails! 
    Not many words her lips had past,
    Ere round her his fond arms were cast;
    But, while his vengeful conscience prais’d,
    He chid; and, frowning, would have rais’d
    Till her resistance and her tears,
      The vehemence of youthful grief,
    Her paleness, his paternal fears,
      Compell’d him to afford relief;
    And forc’d the agonizing cry—­
    That he could never her deny!

      Of what ambition sought, beguil’d,
    His crimes thus fruitless! and his child,
    The beautiful, the rich and young—­
      Now, in his most triumphant hours!