For giving me life that day,
As I took you, lying so helpless,
From the gates of death away.

How your noble kinsmen laughed and wept
O'er their treasure snatched from the flood,
And your white-faced brother brought me gold--
You loved him, or I could
Have obeyed the fiend that told me
To curse him where he stood.

Gold! Oh, darling, they had no need
Such insults to repeat;
I knew the Heaven was above the earth,
I knew, I knew, my sweet,
I was not worthy to touch the shoes
That covered your dainty feet.

I knew as you laid your hand in mine,
So kind as I turned away,
That we were severed as wide apart,
That hour, as we are to-day,
And you in your stately English home,
So far, so far away.

That soft white hand you laid in mine
With a smile as I turned to go,
Oh, Lady Maud, I marvel
If you ever stoop so low,
As to wonder what those tears meant,