II.

  “The pearl of the morning, the glow of the noon,
  The play of the clouds as they float past the moon,
  The most magical tint on the snowiest peak,
  They are gone while I gaze, fade before you can speak,
    Yet they stay in my palace of memories.

  III.

  “I stood in the midst of the forest trees,
  And heard the sweet sigh of the wandering breeze,
  And this with the tinkle of heifer bells,
  As they trill on the ear from the dewy dells,
    Are the sounds in my palace of memories.

  IV.

  “I looked in the face of a little child,
  With its fugitive dimples and eyes so wild,
  It springs off with a bound like a wild gazelle,
  It is off and away, but I’ve caught my[1]
    And here’s mirth for my palace of memories.

  V.

  “In the morning we meet on a mountain height,
  And we walk and converse till the fall of night,
  We hold hands for a moment, then pass on our way,
  But that which I’ve got from the friend of a day,
    I’ll keep in my palace of memories.”

[Footnote 1:  Word here illegible.]

The verses which Landor praised with enthusiasm so excessive were most, or I think all of them, published in the annual edited by his friend Lady Blessington, and were all written before our marriage.  I have many long letters addressed to her by that lady, and several by her niece Miss Power, respecting them.  They always in every instance ask for “more.”

Many of her verses she set to music, especially one little poemlet, which I remember to this day the tune of, which she called the Song of the Blackbird, and which was, if I remember rightly, made to consist wholly of the notes uttered by the bird.

Another instance of her “multiform faculty” was her learning landscape sketching.  I have spoken of her figure drawing.  And this, I take it, was the real bent of her talent in that line.  But unable to compass the likeness of a haystack myself, I was desirous of possessing some record of the many journeys which I designed to take, and eventually did take with her.  And wholly to please me she forthwith made the attempt, and though her landscape was never equal to her figure drawing, I possess some couple of hundred of water-colour sketches done by her from nature on the spot.

I used to say that if I wanted a Sanscrit dictionary, I had only to put her head straight at it, and let her feel the spur, and it would have been done!

We lived together seventeen happy years.  During the five first, I think I may say that she lived wholly and solely in, by, and for me.  That she should live for somebody other than herself was an absolute indefeasible necessity of her nature.  During the last twelve years I shared her heart with her daughter.  Her intense worship for her “Baby Beatrice” was equalled only by—­that of all the silliest and all the wisest women, who have true womanly hearts in their bosoms, for their children.  The worship was, of course, all the more absorbing that the object of it was unique.  I take it that, after the birth of her child, I came second in her heart.  But I was not jealous of little Bice.