Her meek brow bound with smooth unbraided tress?
For Music knew not yet the stately guise,
Content with simplest notes to touch the soul,
Not from her choirs as when loud anthems rise,
Or when she bids orchestral thunders roll!


XII.

Here too the deep and fervent orison
Hath matron whisper'd for her absent lord,
Peril'd in civil wars, that shook the throne,
When every hand in England, clench'd the sword:--
And here, as tales and chronicles agree,
If tales and chronicles be deem'd sincere,
Fair Warwick's heiress smiled at many a plea
Of puissant Thane, or Norman cavalier.


XIII.

Or dost thou sigh for theme of classic lore
Midst arms and moats, and battlements and towers?
Behold the Vase! that, erst on Anio's shore,
Hath found a splendid home in Warwick's bowers:
To British meads ere yet the Saxon came,
The pomp of senates swept its pedestal,
And kings of many an Oriental name
Have seen its shadow, and are perish'd all!