70
        In a chamber next to an ante-room,
        Where he breathed the breath of page and groom,
        What he called stink, and they, perfume: 
—­They should have set him on red Berold
Mad with pride, like fire to manage! 
They should have got his cheek fresh tannage
Such a day as to-day in the merry sunshine! 
Had they stuck on his fist a rough-foot merlin! 
(Hark, the wind’s on the heath at its game! 
Oh for a noble falcon-lanner 80
To flap each broad wing like a banner,
And turn in the wind, and dance like flame!)
Had they broached a white-beer cask from Berlin
—­Or if you incline to prescribe mere wine
Put to his lips, when they saw him pine,
A cup of our own Moldavia fine,
Cotnar for instance, green as May sorrel
And ropy with sweet—­we shall not quarrel.

IV

So, at home, the sick tall yellow Duchess
Was left with the infant in her clutches, 90
She being the daughter of God knows who: 
        And now was the time to revisit her tribe. 
Abroad and afar they went, the two,
        And let our people rail and gibe
At the empty hall and extinguished fire,
        As loud as we liked, but ever in vain,
Till after long years we had our desire,
        And back came the Duke and his mother again.

V

And he came back the pertest little ape
That ever affronted human shape; 100
Full of his travel, struck at himself. 
        You’d say, he despised our bluff old ways? 
—­Not he!  For in Paris they told the elf
        Our rough North land was the Land of Lays,
        The one good thing left in evil days;
Since the Mid-Age was the Heroic Time,
        And only in wild nooks like ours
Could you taste of it yet as in its prime,
        And see true castles, with proper towers,
Young-hearted women, old-minded men, 110
And manners now as manners were then. 
So, all that the old Dukes had been, without knowing it,
This Duke would fain know he was, without being it;
’Twas not for the joy’s self, but the joy of his showing it,
Nor for the pride’s self, but the pride of our seeing it,
He revived all usages thoroughly worn-out,
The souls of them fumed-forth, the hearts of them torn-out: 
And chief in the chase his neck he perilled
On a lathy horse, all legs and length,
With blood for bone, all speed, no strength; 120
—­They should have set him on red Berold
With the red eye slow consuming in fire,
And the thin stiff ear like an abbey-spire!

VI