6

We of the court' said Cyril.

From the court'

She answer'd,' then ye know the Prince?' and he:

'The climax of his age! as tho' there were

One rose in all the world, your Highness that,

He worships your ideal:' she replied :

'We scarcely thought in our own hall to hear

This barren verbiage, current among men,

Light coin, the tinsel clink of compliment.

Your flight from out your bookless wilds would

seem

As arguing love of knowledge and of power;
Your language proves you still the child. Indeed,

We dream not of him: when we set our hand

To this great work, we purposed with ourselves

Never to wed. You likewise will do well,

Ladies, in entering here, to cast and fling

The tricks, which make us toys of

men, that

So,

Some future time, if so indeed you will,

You may with those self-styled our lords ally

Your fortunes, justlier balanced, scale with scale.'

At those high words, we conscious of ourselves, Perused the matting; then an officer

Rose up, and read the statutes, such as these:

Not for three years to correspond with home;
Not for three years to cross the liberties;
Not for three years to speak with any men;
And many more, which hastily subscribed,

We enter'd on the boards: and Now' she cried

'Ye are green wood, see ye warp not. Look, our hall!

Our statues!-not of those that men desire,

Sleek Odalisques, or oracles of mode,

Nor stunted squaws of West or East; but she
That taught the Sabine how to rule, and she

The foundress of the Babylonian wall,

The Carian Artemisia strong in war,

The Rhodope, that built the pyramid,
Clelia, Cornelia, with the Palmyrene
That fought Aurelian, and the Roman brows
Of Agrippina. Dwell with these, and lose
Convention, since to look on noble forms

Ꭰ

Makes noble thro' the sensuous organism

That which is higher. O lift

your

natures up:

Embrace our aims: work out your freedom. Girls,

Knowledge is now no more a fountain seal'd:

Drink deep, until the habits of the slave,

The sins of emptiness, gossip and spite

And slander, die. Better not be at all
Than not be noble. Leave us; you may go:
To-day the Lady Psyche will harangue

The fresh arrivals of the week before;

For they press in from all the provinces,

And fill the hive,'

She spoke, and bowing waved

Dismissal: back again we crost the court
To Lady Psyche's: as we enter'd in,

There sat along the forms, like morning doves
That sun their milky bosoms on the thatch,

A patient range of pupils; she herself

Erect behind a desk of satin-wood,

A quick brunette, well-moulded, falcon-eyed,

And on the hither side, or so she look'd,

Of twenty summers. At her left, a child,
In shining draperies, headed like a star,
Her maiden babe, a double April old,
Aglaïa slept. We sat; the Lady glanced:
Then Florian, but no livelier than the dame
That whisper'd' Asses' ears' among the sedge,
'My sister.' 'Comely too by all that's fair'
Said Cyril. O hush, hush!' and she began.

'This world was once a fluid haze of light, Till toward the centre set the starry tides, And eddied into suns, that wheeling cast

The planets: then the monster, then the man;

Tattoo'd or woaded, winter-clad in skins,

Raw from the prime, and crushing down his mate;

As yet we find in barbarous isles, and here

Among the lowest.'

Thereupon she took

A bird's-eye-view of all the ungracious past;

Glanced at the legendary Amazon

As emblematic of a nobler age;

Appraised the Lycian custom, spoke of those
That lay at wine with Lar and Lucumo;

Ran down the Persian, Grecian, Roman lines
Of empire, and the woman's state in each,

How far from just; till warming with her theme
She fulmined out her scorn of laws Salique
And little-footed China, touch'd on Mahomet
With much contempt, and came to chivalry :
When some respect, however slight, was paid
To woman, superstition all awry :

However then commenced the dawn: a beam
Had slanted forward, falling in a land

Of promise; fruit would follow. Deep, indeed,
Their debt of thanks to her who first had dared
To leap the rotten pales of prejudice,

Disyoke their necks from custom, and assert

None lordlier than themselves but that which made

Woman and man. She had founded; they must build.