| |
| THE LANDLORD ended thus his tale, | |
| Then rising took down from its nail | |
| The sword that hung there, dim with dust, | |
| And cleaving to its sheath with rust, | |
| And said, “This sword was in the fight.” | 5 |
| The Poet seized it, and exclaimed, | |
| “It is the sword of a good knight, | |
| Though homespun was his coat-of-mail; | |
| What matter if it be not named | |
| Joyeuse, Colada, Durindale, | 10 |
| Excalibar, or Aroundight, | |
| Or other name the books record? | |
| Your ancestor, who bore this sword | |
| As Colonel of the Volunteers, | |
| Mounted upon his old gray mare, | 15 |
| Seen here and there and everywhere, | |
| To me a grander shape appears | |
| Than old Sir William, or what not, | |
| Clinking about in foreign lands | |
| With iron gauntlets on his hands, | 20 |
| And on his head an iron pot!” | |
| |
| All laughed; the Landlord’s face grew red | |
| As his escutcheon on the wall; | |
| He could not comprehend at all | |
| The drift of what the Poet said; | 25 |
| For those who had been longest dead | |
| Were always greatest in his eyes; | |
| And he was speechless with surprise | |
| To see Sir William’s plumèd head | |
| Brought to a level with the rest, | 30 |
| And made the subject of a jest. | |
| And this perceiving, to appease | |
| The Landlord’s wrath, the others’ fears, | |
| The Student said, with careless ease, | |
| “The ladies and the cavaliers, | 35 |
| The arms, the loves, the courtesies, | |
| The deeds of high emprise, I sing! | |
| Thus Ariosto says, in words | |
| That have the stately stride and ring | |
| Of armèd knights and clashing swords. | 40 |
| Now listen to the tale I bring; | |
| Listen! though not to me belong | |
| The flowing draperies of his song, | |
| The words that rouse, the voice that charms. | |
| The Landlord’s tale was one of arms, | 45 |
| Only a tale of love is mine, | |
| Blending the human and divine, | |
| A tale of the Decameron, told | |
| In Palmieri’s garden old, | |
| By Fiametta, laurel-crowned, | 50 |
| While her companions lay around, | |
| And heard the intermingled sound | |
| Of airs that on their errands sped, | |
| And wild birds gossiping overhead, | |
| And lisp of leaves, and fountain’s fall, | 55 |
| And her own voice more sweet than all, | |
| Telling the tale, which, wanting these, | |
| Perchance may lose its power to please.” | |
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