For, from beneath her lattice, came
A low and once repeated call!
She knew the voice that spoke her name,
And swiftly, through the midnight hall
She fluttered noiseless as a flame,

And on its unresisting hinge
Threw wide her hospitable door,
To one whose spirit did not cringe
Though he was weak, and knew he bore
No right her freedom to infringe.

She wildly clasped his neck of bronze;
She rained her kisses; on his face,
Grown tawny with a thousand suns,
And holding him in her embrace,
She led him to her little ones,

Who, reckless of his coming, slept.
Then down the stair with silent feet,
And through the shadowy hall she swept,
And saw, between her and the street,
A form that into darkness crept.

She closed the door with speechless dread;
She fixed the bolt with trembling hand;
Then led the rebel to his bed,
Whom love and safety had unmanned,
And left him less alive than dead.