She laughed again, my sister laughed,
  Made answer o’er the laboured cloth: 
’I would rather be one of us
    Than wife, or slave, or both.’

’Oh better then be slave or wife
  Than fritter now blank life away:  70
Then night had holiness of night,
    And day was sacred day.

’The princess laboured at her loom,
  Mistress and handmaiden alike;
Beneath their needles grew the field
    With warriors armed to strike.

’Or, look again, dim Dian’s face
  Gleamed perfect through the attendant night;
Were such not better than those holes
    Amid that waste of white? 80

’A shame it is, our aimless life: 
  I rather from my heart would feed
From silver dish in gilded stall
    With wheat and wine the steed—­

’The faithful steed that bore my lord
  In safety through the hostile land,
The faithful steed that arched his neck
    To fondle with my hand.’

Her needle erred; a moment’s pause,
  A moment’s patience, all was well. 90
Then she:  ’But just suppose the horse,
    Suppose the rider fell?

’Then captive in an alien house,
  Hungering on exile’s bitter bread,—­
They happy, they who won the lot
    Of sacrifice,’ she said.

Speaking she faltered, while her look
  Showed forth her passion like a glass: 
With hand suspended, kindling eye,
    Flushed cheek, how fair she was! 100

’Ah well, be those the days of dross;
  This, if you will, the age of gold: 
Yet had those days a spark of warmth,
    While these are somewhat cold—­

’Are somewhat mean and cold and slow,
  Are stunted from heroic growth: 
We gain but little when we prove
    The worthlessness of both.’

‘But life is in our hands,’ she said: 
  ’In our own hands for gain or loss:  110
Shall not the Sevenfold Sacred Fire
    Suffice to purge our dross?

’Too short a century of dreams,
  One day of work sufficient length: 
Why should not you, why should not I
    Attain heroic strength?

’Our life is given us as a blank;
  Ourselves must make it blest or curst: 
Who dooms me I shall only be
    The second, not the first? 120

’Learn from old Homer, if you will,
  Such wisdom as his books have said: 
In one the acts of Ajax shine,
    In one of Diomed.

’Honoured all heroes whose high deeds
  Thro’ life, till death, enlarge their span: 
Only Achilles in his rage
    And sloth is less than man.’

’Achilles only less than man? 
  He less than man who, half a god, 130
Discomfited all Greece with rest,
    Cowed Ilion with a nod?