Canto XVIII

Johns head bends to the table from the blow?
The fountain spring of his tears freely flow,
.What she then said,— his voice broken by woe-
Sounds as spoke he to himself slow and low.

"Why did I not fall midst the battle's strife?
Why to the sea I did not yield my life?
Why was I born at all? That cruel fate,
With thunderous blows shall make it desolate?'

Slow, by degrees his grief grows less severe.
—As had he fallen asleep it would appear—
"How did my sweetheart die? What ailed my rose?"
He gently asked, looked up and listened close

To the young woman's tale. "List! Xo disease
Killed her, but her stepmother's cruelties.
The old witch though, paid for her meanness, she
Died as a beggar in great misery.

Your sweet Helen constantly called for you.
"My dear John" was the last breath which she drew.
"My darling John, 't is you alone I love,
We shall united be in heaven above."

Then to her endless sleep she closed her eyes.
Not far from here the graveyard where she lies.
All the village to her interment went,
And at her grave tears of deep sorrow spent."

The woman then escorted him to where
Llis sweet Helen had been laid by, and there
She left him with his grief. Heartbroken he
Before that holy grave fell on his knee. ,

All mute, his thoughts roamed o'er the beauteous

days
When his were still the glowing, ardent rays
Of Helen's eyes, the smile, the heart of her,
Who how is bedded in that sepulchre.

The setting sun paints the horizon red,
The pale moon rises in the sky instead.
And through the autumn mist a sad look gave
On John, who reeling left his sweetheart's grave.

But he returned. Above the grave there grew
A tiny rosebush on which still a few
Sweet roses he had seen. He plucked one .rose,
And said to himself, when at last he goes:
"Sweet flowerlet who grew out from her dust,
We two shall faithful comrades be, I trust.
While o'er the world we roam, — Yo,u and my grief —
Until my longed for death brings me relief."