ONCE on the throne of Argos sat a maid,
Daphles the fair; serene and unafraid
She ruled her realm, for the rough folk were brought
To worship one they deemed divinely wrought,
In beauty and mild graciousness of heart:
Nobles and courtiers, too, espoused her part,
So that the sweet young face all thronged to see
Glanced from her throne-room's silken canopy
(Broidered with leaves, and many a snow-white dove),
Rosily conscious of her people's love.
Only the chief of a far frontier clan,
A haughty, bold, ambitious nobleman,
By law her vassal, but self-worn to be
From subject-tithe and tribute boldly free,
And scorning most this weak girl-sovereign's reign,
Now from the mountain fastness to the plain
Summoned his savage legions to the fight,--
Wherein he hoped to wrench the imperial might
From Daphles, and confirm his claim thereto.
But Doracles, the insurgent chief, could know
Naught of the secret charm, the subtle stress
Of be beauty wed to warm unselfishness,
Which, in her hour of trial, wrapped the Queen
Safely apart in golden air serene
Of deep devotion, and food faith of those
The steadfast hearts betwixt her and her foes.
The oldest courtier, schooled in statecraft guile,
Some loyal fire at her entrancing smile
Felt strangely kindled in his outworn soul;
Far more the warrior youths her soft control
Moulded to noble deeds, till all the land,
Aroused at Love's and Honor's joint command,
Bristled with steel and rang with sounds of war.
Still rashly trusting in his fortunate star,
This arrogant thrall who fain would grasp a crown,
Backed by half-barbarous hordes, marched swiftly down
'Twixt the hill ramparts and the Western sea.
First, blazing homesteads greet him, whence did flee
The frightened hinds through fires themselves had lit
'Mid the ripe grain, lest foes should reap of it;
Or here and there, some groups of aged folk,
Women and men bent down beneath the yoke
Of cruel years and babbling idiot speech.
"Methinks," cried Doracles, "our arms will reach
The realm's unshielded heart, for lo! the breath,
The mere hot fume of rapine and of death
Which flames before our legions like a blight
Withers this people's valor and their might."
The fifes played shriller; the wild trumpet's blast
Smote the great host and thrilled them as it passed;
While clashing shields, and spears which caught the morn,
And splendid banners in strong hands upborne,
And plumèd helms, and steeds of matchless race,
And in the van that clear, keen eagle face
Of Doracles, firm set on shoulders tall,
Squared like a rock, and towering o'er them all,
With all the pomp and swell of martial strife,
Woke the burnt plains and bleak defiles to life.
So phalanx after phalanx glittering filed
Firm to the front: their haughty leader smiled
To see with what a bold and buoyant air
The lowliest footman marched before him there,
Till his proud head he lifted to the sun,
And his heart leaped as at a victory won
That self-same hour, o'er which bright-hovering shone
The steadfast image of an ivory throne.
But the Queen's host by skilful champions led,
Its powers meanwhile concentred to a head,
Lay, an embattled force with wary eye,
Ready to ward or strike whene'er the cry
Of coming foemen on their ears should fall,
Nigh the huge towers which guard the capital.
Not long their watch: one bluff October day,
There rose a blare of trumpets far away,
And sound of thronging hoofs which muffled came,
Borne on the wind, like the dull noise of flame
Half stifled in dense woodlands; then the wings
Of the Queen's host, as each swift section flings
The imperial banner proudly fluttering out,
Spread from the royal centre. Hark! a shout,
As from those thousand hearts in one great soul
Sublimely fused, rose thunder-deep, to roll,
In wild acclaim, far down the quivering van;
And wilder still the heroic tumult ran
From front to rear, when through her palace gate,
Daphles, in unaccustomed martial state,
A keen spear shimmering in its silver hold,
And on her brow the Argive crown of gold,
Flashed like a sunbeam on her warriors' sight.
Girt by her generals, on a neighboring height
She reined her Lybian courser, while the air
Played with the bright waves of her meteor hair,
And on her lovely April face the tide
Of varied feeling--now a jubilant pride
In those strong arms and stronger hearts below,
And now a prescient fear did ebb and flow,
Its sensitive heaven transforming momently.
But soon the foeman's cohorts, like a sea,
With waves of steel, and foam of snow-white plumes,
Slowly emerged from out the forest glooms,
In splendid pomp and antique pageantry.
An ominous pause! And then the trumpets high
Sounded the terrible onset, and the field
Rocked as with earthquake, and the thick air reeled
With clangors fierce from echoing hill to hill.
Bloody but brief the contest! All the skill
Of Doracles against the steadfast will
Planted by love in faithful hearts that day
Frothed like an idle tide that slips away
From granite walls! His knights their furious blows
Discharged on what seemed statues whose repose
Was iron, or their fated coursers hurled
On spears unbent as bases of a world!
Meanwhile the whole dread scene did Daphles view
With anguished, tearless eyes. But when she knew
The victory hers, down the hill-slopes she urged
Her restless steed, where still but faintly surged
The last worn waves of tumult; there her bands
Of conquering captains she with fervent hands
And o'erfraught swelling breast did proudly greet;
Yet her pale face was touched with pity sweet
While the chained rebels passed her worn and sore
With ghastly wounds, and shivering in their gore.
But when, untamed, uncowed, in 'midst of these,
The grand, defiant form of Doracles
Rose like a god discrowned, her wan cheeks flushed,
And through her heart a quick, hot torrent rushed
Of undefined, mysterious sympathy.
Viewing that haughty brow, that unbent knee,
"O kingly head!" she thought, "too well I know
How bitter-keen to him the signal blow
This day hath dealt! O kingly resolute eyes,
Shrining the sov'ran soul! 'twere surely wise
To change their glance of cold vindictive gloom
To grateful light, and make what seemed a doom
Heavy as death, the clouded path to fame,
Lordship, and honor!" Ah, but pity came
To crown admiring kindness with a flame
Of subtler life; for he, the vanquished one,
On whom that day his fate's malignant sun
Had set in storms, that night would slumber, kissed
By a fair phantom girt with golden mist,
A new-born delicate love, but dimly guessed
Even in the pure depths of the maiden breast,
Whence the sweet sylph had 'scaped her unaware.
But when the evening silence drew anear,
And round about the borders of the world
The second night since that great contest furled
Its brooding shades, the young Queen, all alone,
Paused by the dungeon floor whereon were thrown,
At listless length, the limbs of Doracles.
"How, how," she murmured, "may I best appease
His stricken pride, or touch to tender calm
His fevered honor? with what healing balm
Allay the smart wherewith his spirit groans?"
Perplexed, and yearning, on the dismal stones
Without the prison door she walked apart,
Love, doubt, and shame, all struggling in her heart,
Till the large flood of mingled love and woe
Rose to her snowy eyelids and did flow
In soft refreshing tears like spring-tide showers;
Then, bright and blushing as the moss-rose bowers
Of dewy May, she pushed the huge grate back,
And through the dusky glooms, the shadows black
Dawned glowingly! Next for a moment she
Stood in a timid, strange uncertainty,
Changing from rosy red to deathly white;
When, as a Queen sustained by true love's right,
She spake in mild, pure, steadfastness of soul:
"I come, O Doracles, with no mean dole
Of transient pity, but to show thee how
Thy mistress would exalt tile abasèd brow
Of one who knows her not!" Therewith she freed
His fettered limbs, or yet his brain could heed
Or comprehend her mercy's cordial scope:
His soul had shrunk too low for dreams of hope,
Such swift misfortunes smote him: still, when all
The Queen's fair meaning on his mind did fall,
The locked and frozen sternness of his look
Broke up, as breaks the death-cold wintry brook
Its icy spell at noonday; yet his face
Was lighted not by thankful, reverent grace,
But flashed an evil triumph where he stood
Spurning his unloosed chains. In such base mood,
One eager foot pressed on the dungeon stair,
"What terms," he asked, "O Queen, demand'st thou here?
I pledge thee faith!" Silent were Daphles' lips,
And all her gentle hopes by swift eclipse
Were darkened. With a deathly smile she signed
The chief farewell, as one who scorned to bind
Her mercy with set terms. He turned to go,
Self-centred, callous, dreaming not how low
Her heart had sunk at each cold, shallow word
With which his barren nature, faintly stirred
By ruth, or love, or pardon, dared repay
Her matchless mercy. On his unchecked way
He turned to go, when, with one shuddering sob,
And deep-drawn, plaintive breath, which seemed to rob
Life of its last dear hope, the Queen sank down,
Wrapped in a death-like trance. With sullen frown,
And many a muttered oath, he raised her form,
Frail now as some pale lily by the storm
Wind-blown and beaten; for at woman's love
He could but vaguely guess, and no poor dove
Pierced by the woodman's shaft was less to him
Than this fair spirit struggling in the dim
And tortured twilight of unshared desire;
Nor could he part the pure romantic fire
Of such high passion from the lukewarm flame
That feebly burns in sordid hearts and tame,
Not of love's heat, but vacant flattery's born,
To feed his pride, yet stir the latent scorn
Of that rough manhood such hard natures know.
Waked from her trance, with wandering eyes and slow
The Queen looked round, but dimly conscious yet,
Until at last her faltering glance was set
On Doracles, to whom--that he might see
How a soft ruth to love's intensity
Had strangely grown--she laid her deep heart bare:
Then, with a sweet but nobly queen-like air,
She said, "O Doracles, in just return
For all this love and pity, which did yearn
To lift thee fallen, and to find thee, lost,
And slowly sickening underneath the frost
Of bleak despair, I well might ask of thee
Thy heart, with all its rarest freight in fee,
Save that I feel my virgin fame and life
Must count as pure, when then hast made me wife,
Though but a wife in state and name alone.
Behold, O chief! I proffer, too, my throne,
Not as thy freedom's sole condition given,
But that men's eyes and scornful thoughts be driven
Away from what in me may seem as ill,
If--if--perchance, thou should'st reject me still."
At which hard word she droops her head, and sighs,
While patient tears bedew her downcast eyes.
Now, with sly semblance of a soul at ease,
Her liberal proffer crafty Doracles
Freely embraced. They passed the prison-bound,
And that same day with silver-ringing sound
Of trump and cymbal, the state heralds cried
Abroad through all the city, far and wide,
The Queen's vast pardon; whereupon her court,--
Nobles and dames,--each quaintly gorgeous sport,
Known in the old time, bold or debonair,
With feasts, and mimic strifes, and pageants rare,
Did hold in honor of their sovereign's choice;
A choice none there would question! Not a voice,
Gentle or simple, but was raised to bless,
And pray the kindly gods for happiness
And peace on both! Meanwhile the thrall made king,
Albeit a secret anger still would wring
His thankless soul, in princely fashion took
The general homage, nor by word or look
Betrayed the festering consciousness within:
So gracious seemed he, Daphles' hopes begin
To wake, and whisper fond, sweet, foolish words
Close to her heart, that flutters like a bird's
Wooed in the spring-dawn: yet, alas! alas!
For joy that dies, and dreamy hopes that pass
To nothingness! In 'midst of this, her trust,
Came a swift blow which smote her to the dust;
News that her ingrate love had basely fled,
Whither none knew. Scarce had this shaft been sped
From fate's unerring bow, than swift again
Hurtled a second steeped in poisoned pain,
For now the whole dark truth came sternly out:
Leagued with her bitterest foes, a savage rout
Of mountain-robbers o'er the frontier land,
He unto whom she proffered heart and hand,
Kingdom and crown, had bared his treacherous blade,
And of the great and just gods unafraid,
Upreared his standard 'neath the blood-red star,
And raised once more the incarnate curse of war!
So from that day all gladness left the heart
Of broken Daphles; she would muse apart
From court and friends, her once blithe footsteps slow,
Her once proud head bowed down, and such wild woe
Couched in the clouded depths of mournful eyes
That few could mark her misery but with sighs
Deep almost as her own. At last, she wrote
(For still her soul hailed, watery and remote,
One beam of hope) a missive tender-sweet,
Charmed with such pathos, to her delicate feet
It might have lured a spirit, nigh to death,
And straight imbued with warm compassionate breath
A heart as cold as spires of Arctic ice!
Ah, futile hope! Ah, fond and vain device!
Not all the pleading eloquence of wrong,
Veiling its wounds, and golden-soft as song
Trilled by the brown Sicilian nightingales,
In dusky nooks of melancholy vales,
Could melt the granite will of Doracles.
Each tender line she sent him did but tease
And sting his obdurate temper into hate,
As if the deep harmonious terms that wait
On truest love, were wasp-like, poisoned things:
Her timorous hints, her sweet imaginings,
Far thoughts, and dreams evanishing, but high,
Filled with the maiden dews of sanctity,
He crushed, as one might crush in maddened hours
The fairest of the sisterhood of flowers;
No further answer made he than could be
Couched in brief terms of cold discourtesy.
Holding all love--the noblest love on earth--
Of lesser moment than an insect's birth,
Buzzing its life out 'twixt the dawn and dusk.
That letter stilled the last healthful spark
Of the Queen's flickering reason, turned her wit
To wild and errant courses, sadly lit
By wandering stars, and orbs of fantasy.
Deeming that she full soon must sink and die,
Daphles, still true to that one dominant thought
And firm affection which such ill had brought,
Summoned her learned scribes and bade them draw
After strict form and precedents of law,
Her solemn testament; whereby she gave
Her throne to Doracles, whene'er the grave
Closed o'er her broken heart and humbled head.
But now her chiefs and nobles, hard bestead
By circumstance, and dreading much lest he,
The renegade, and rebel, who did flee
From love to league with license, yet should sway
The honored Argive sceptre, on a day
Called forth to solemn council and debate
Lords, liegemen, ministers, to save the state
From threatened tyranny and upstart rule:
Thereto the wan Queen, powerless now to school
Features or mind to subjugation meet,
Came weakly tottering; in her lofty seat
She sank bewildered, listless; all could mark
Beneath her languid eyes the hollows dark,
And--save that sometimes as she slowly turned
Her wasted form, the fires of fever burned,
Death's prescient blazon, on each sunken cheek--
Her face was pallid as a cold white streak
Of wintry moonlight on Siberian snows;
Her quivering mouth and chill contracted brows
Bespoke an inward torture, while from all
The shrewd debate within that council hall
Her dim thoughts wandered vaguely, lost and dumb.
But when her pitying maidens round her come,
And gently strive on her drooped head to place
The self-same laurel garland which did grace
Her warm, white temples on that morn of strife
And woeful victory, her sick brain seemed rife
Once more with memories; in her hand she pressed
The half-dead wreath, and o'er her flowing vest
Strewed the plucked leaves those aimless fingers tore
Unwittingly; which on the marble floor,
Down fluttering, one by one, lay blurred and dead,
Like the sere hopes her withered heart had shed,
Smitten of love; for now she touched the close
Of the soul's dreamy autumn, and the snows
Of winter soon would clasp her eyelids cold.
Yea, soon, too soon! for while her fingers fold
The garland loosely, and in fitful grief
She still would strip the circlet, leaf by leaf,
Till now one-half the wreath is plucked and bare,
She lifts her dim eyes, hearkening, as though 'ware
Of mystic voices calling on her name;
Therewith her cheek, whence the quick, fevered flame
Had quite pulsed out, with one last quiver, she
Drops on the cushioned dais, passively;
For death, more kind than love, hath brought her peace.
Long was it ere her stricken realm could cease
To mourn for Daphles; yet her burial rites,
With all their mournful pomp, their sombre sights
Funereal, scarce were passed, when her last will,
Despite its humbling terms, which rankled still
In all men's minds, her faithful courtiers sent,
With news of that most sudden, sad event
Which made him king, to restless Doracles.
What recked he then that to its bitterest lees
A pure young soul had quaffed of misery's cup,
And after, death's? "My star," he thought, "flames up,
Fronting the heights of empire! All is well!"
Thereon, impelled by keen desire to dwell
In his new realm, with reckless haste he rode
From town to town, till now the grand abode,
The palace of the royal Argive race,
Did rise before him in its lofty place,
O'erlooking leagues of golden fields and streams,
Fair hills and shadowy vineyards, by great teams
Of laboring oxen rifled morn by morn,
Till the bared, tremulous branches swung forlorn
'Gainst the red flush of autumn's sunset sky.
Housed with rich state therein, full regally
The king his sovereign life and course began,
Striving at one swift bound to reach the van
Of princely fame; his rare magnificence
Of feasts, shows, pageants, and high splendors, whence
The wondering guests all dazzled went their way,
Grew to a world-wide proverb for display
And costly lavishness. Yet one there was
O'er whose gray head these days of pomp did pass
Like purpling shadows o'er the faded grass:
Wit touched him not to smiles, gay music's flow
Fell powerless on his closed heart's secret woe,
While at their feasts silent he sat, and grim.
Ofttimes the king a cold glance cast on him,
As one who marred their mirthful revelry,
And in the boisterous spring-tide of their glee
Rose like a boding phantom! More and more
He felt a vague, dim trouble at the core
Of his rude nature stirred, whene'er he saw
Phorbas draw near; something akin to awe,
If not to dread, for this old man did stand
Chiefest of Daphles' mourners in her land,
As chief of her life's friends, ere that black doom
Stole from her heart its joy, her check its bloom.
Just where the mellowed rays of noonday light
Streamed through the curtained gloom, obscurely bright,
Which wrapped the great art-galleries richly round,
There hung, 'mid many a stately portrait, bound
In frames of costly ivory, carved and wrought,
A picture, which the king's eyes oft had sought,
With anxious wonder; for day following day
Would Phorbas, mutely sorrowing, make delay
Going or coming from the council-hall
To view that muffled mystery on the wall.
Over it flowed a veil of silvery hue,
With here and there fine threads of gold shot through
The delicate woof; and whoso chanced to turn
A glance thereon, would feel his spirit burn
To pierce the jealous veil whose folds might hide
Some priceless marvel. Now, at high noontide
Of one calm autumn day, the king again
Met Phorbas--his worn features drawn with pain,
And in his eyes the sharp salt-rheum of age--
Still poring on the picture! "Thou a sage!"
Sneered Doracles, "yet idly bent, forsooth,
On vaporing fancies?" Then, more harsh, "The truth!
The truth, old man! What strong spell drags thee here?
(Some charm, methinks, 'twixt passion and despair
Morn after morn, forcing thine eyes to stray
O'er yon blank mystery? Prythee, Phorbas, say
What image lurks beneath that glimmering shroud?
Perchance the last king's? Well! am I less proud
And princely wise than he? Or art thou bold
To deem me, all unworthy to behold
My brave forerunner?" Thereupon he knit
His rugged brows, the while his soul was lit
To keen, impatient wrath. With trembling hands--
But not for fear--Phorbas unloosed the bands,
Studded with diamond points. which clasped the veil
Close to its place. The startled prince grew pale,
As there, in all her fresh young grace, did shine
The face of Daphles, with a smile divine,
Into arch dimples rippling joyfully!
Some faintly-pensive memory seemed to vie
With deeper feelings, in the low, quick tone
Wherewith the king spake, whispering to his own
Half-wakened heart,--"Certes, it could not be,
That she, who owned the glorious face I see,
Bright with all brightness of a young delight,
Yet pined and withered 'neath the fatal night
Of starless grief!" To which, "Thy pardon, sire,"
The old man said, "but ere my life's low fire
Hath quite gone out, I fain would free my soul
Of that which long hath borne me care and dole;
So, sovereign lord, list to the tale I tell!"
And therewithal did Phorbas deem it well
To show how Daphles' darkened life did wane;
How love, first touched by doubt, soon changed to pain,
And, last, blank desolation, whose wild stress
Wrecked and made bare her perfect loveliness,
O'erwhelming wit with beauty. "Still," said he,
"O sire! to her last hour most tenderly
She spake of thee, her twilight reason set
On the sole thought, 'My love may love me yet:
For man's love comes with knowledge, so I deem,
Slow-hearted man's!' Ah, heaven! she could not dream,
But thy name filled her dreams. When madness stole
Like a dread mist about her, and her soul,
Wound in its viewless cerement-folds accursed--"
"Madness!" the king cried in a sharp outburst,
Of wild amazement: "madness! I have known
The mad impatience of a will o'ergrown,
When sternly thwarted in its fiery zeal,
But dreamed not how these fairy creatures feel,
These soft, frail-natured women, if, perchance,
Love turn on them a cold or lukewarm glance
Of brief denial!" Then the impatient red,
In a swift flood,--but not of anger,--spread
O'er the king's face; convulsed it seemed, and stern.
But when from garrulous Phorbas he did learn
How the queen's laurel wreath half bare became,
The hot blood ebbed, and o'er its waning flame
Coursed the first tear his warrior-soul had shed.
Nor could he rouse again the lustihead
Of ruder thoughts, but, thickly muttering, laid
On the fair portrait of the sovereign maid
A reverent hand; from 'midst the painted dome
Of the great gallery forth he bore it home
Unto the secret chamber of his rest;
There next his couch he placed the beauteous guest;
There feasted on its sweetness; and since naught
Of public import now did claim his thought,
No fierce war threatened, no shrewd treaties pressed,
Strangely the picture mastered him; it grew,
As days, then weeks, and seasons, o'er him flew,
A part, an inmost essence of all life,
Which touched to joy or thrilled to shuddering strife
The soul's deep-seated issues: yet, at last,
Stronger the fierce strife waxed; the bliss was passed;
And, wheresoe'er the king went, night or day,
One haunting phantom barred his doomèd way!
But ere he reached the worst wild stage of woe.
Through many a change of passion, swift or slow,
The king passed downward, nearing treacherous death;
And thus it happed, our old-world legend saith:
The more he gazed on Daphles' blooming face,
All flushed with happy youth and Hebe grace,
The more her marvellous image seemed alive;
He saw, or dreamed he saw, the warm blood strive,
In ruddier tide, with conscious hues to dye
Her lovely brow and swanlike neck, or vie
With Syrian roses on her cheeks of flame;
The more he gazed, the more her lips became
Instinct with timorous motion, till a sigh,
New-born of honeyed love unwittingly,
Seemed hovering like a murmurous fairy-bee
About their rich, half-parted comeliness:
What slight breath softly stirs the truant tress,
Which like a waif of sunset light did rest
In wandering golden lustre on her breast?
And what dear thought her bosom graciously
Heaves into gentle billows, like a sea
Moon-kissed, and whispering? Thus the king would task
Long hours with doting questions, when the mask
Of dull state forms and ceremonial play
With wearied brain and hand was cast away,
And he a dead maid's crafty image turned
To breathing life, and blissful love that burned
From her wild pulses and fond heart to his,
And on her mouth he pressed a bridegroom's kiss.
Then the sweet spell was broken; conscience spoke;
And in her burning depths pale memory woke.
Even in that gentle shape his cold self-will
Had strangely turned, and wrought him direful ill;
Distempered, moody, sometimes nigh distraught
With ceaseless pressure of one harrowing thought,
He grew, and hapless thrills of lonely pain;
Her picture, imaged on his heart and brain,
Ruled all his tides of being, as the moon
Draws changeful seas; now in a clear high noon
Of memories bitter-sweet his soul would swim,
Anon to sink in turbulent gulfs and dim
Of wild regret, or as the dead to lie
Locked in a mute, life-withering lethargy.
Creator sweet of all his fortunes high,
Oh, that in Hades she could hear his cry
Remorseful, and come back in pitying guise
To ease his grief and calm his tortured sighs!
A thousand, thousand times this wild desire
Would wake, and surge through all his veins like fire:
Followed, alas, too soon, by such deep sense
Of powerless will, and mortal impotence,
As in red hurry up from soul to cheeks
Runs rioting, and ever harshly seeks
To drag them into gaunt, gray lines of care!
Months sped eventless, with his dark despair
Grown darker; till, one sad November morn,
Set to the rhythmic wail of winds forlorn,
They found, just where the mornings shadowy gloom
Had gathered deepest in the prince's room,
His prostrate body, cold and turned in part
Upwards,--the blade's hilt glittering o'er his heart,
Where his own mad right arm had sent it home.
Beneath him, in soft-tinted, fadeless bloom,
Beneath him smiled the portrait he had torn
Madly from off the wall, his wan face borne
Next the clear brightness of that lifelike one
For whose fair sake he lay, at last undone;
But whose glad smile, could she have lived that hour,
Had waned and withered inward, like a flower
The storm-wind blights, at stern revenge, like this,
Of love's cold scorn and passion's unpaid kiss.
