ONE THOUSAND FAMOUS THINGS 75

Peace, the Lovers are Asleep

npo those whom death again did wed
i This grave's the second marriage bed.

For though the hand of fate could force

Twixt soul and body a divorce,

It could not sever man and wife,

Because they both lived but one life.

Peace, good reader, do not weep ;

Peace, the lovers are asleep.

They, sweet turtles, folded lie

In the last knot that love could tie,

Let them sleep, let them sleep on,

Till the stormy night be gone

And the eternal morrow dawn

Then the curtains will be drawn,

And they wake into a light

Whose day shall never die in night.

An epitaph by Richard Crashaw on husband
and wife who died and were buried together

I Am Five Centuries Old

TADDEO GADDI built me. I am old,
Five centuries old. I plant my foot of stone

Upon the Arno, as St Michael's own

Was planted on the dragon. Fold by fold,
Beneath me as it struggles, I behold

Its glistening scales. Twice hath it overthrown

My kindred and companions. Me alone

It moveth not; but is by me controlled,
I can remember when the Medici

Were driven from Florence ; longer still ago

The final wars of Ghibelline and Guelf.
Florence adorns me with her jewelry ;

And when I think that Michael Angelo

Hath leaned on me, I glory in myself.

Longfellow on an old bridge

I

I Heard the Trailing Garments of the Night
I HEARD the trailing garments of the Night
Sweep through her marble halls I
I saw her sable skirts all fringed with light
From the celestial walls 1
I felt her presence, by its spell of night,
Stoop o'er me from above ;
The calm majestic presence of the Night,
As of the one I love.
Longfellow