In the hall, with sconces blazing,
  Ladies waiting round her seat,
Clothed in smiles, beneath the dais deg. deg.35
  Sate the Duchess Marguerite.

Hark! below the gates unbarring! 
  Tramp of men and quick commands!
“—­’Tis my lord come back from hunting—­”
  And the Duchess claps her hands. 40

Slow and tired, came the hunters—­
  Stopp’d in darkness in the court.
“—­Ho, this way, ye laggard hunters! 
  To the hall!  What sport?  What sport?”—­

Slow they enter’d with their master; 45
  In the hall they laid him down. 
On his coat were leaves and blood-stains,
  On his brow an angry frown.

Dead her princely youthful husband
  Lay before his youthful wife, 50
Bloody, ’neath the flaring sconces—­
  And the sight froze all her life.

* * * * *

In Vienna, by the Danube,
  Kings hold revel, gallants meet. 
Gay of old amid the gayest 55
  Was the Duchess Marguerite.

In Vienna, by the Danube,
  Feast and dance her youth beguiled. 
Till that hour she never sorrow’d;
  But from then she never smiled. 60

’Mid the Savoy mountain valleys
  Far from town or haunt of man,
Stands a lonely church, unfinish’d,
  Which the Duchess Maud began;

Old, that Duchess stern began it, 65
  In grey age, with palsied hands;
But she died while it was building,
  And the Church unfinish’d stands—­

Stands as erst deg. the builders left it, deg.69
  When she sank into her grave; 70
Mountain greensward paves the chancel, deg. deg.71
  Harebells flower in the nave. deg. deg.72

“—­In my castle all is sorrow,”
  Said the Duchess Marguerite then;
“Guide me, some one, to the mountain! 75
  We will build the Church again.”—­

Sandall’d palmers, deg. faring homeward, deg.78
  Austrian knights from Syria came.
“—­Austrian wanderers bring, O warders! 
  Homage to your Austrian dame.”—­ 80

From the gate the warders answer’d: 
  “—­Gone, O knights, is she you knew! 
Dead our Duke, and gone his Duchess;
  Seek her at the Church of Brou!”—­

Austrian knights and march-worn palmers 85
  Climb the winding mountain-way.—­
Reach the valley, where the Fabric
  Rises higher day by day.

Stones are sawing, hammers ringing;
  On the work the bright sun shines, 90
In the Savoy mountain-meadows,
  By the stream, below the pines.