Nought shook him then: he was serene as brave;
Yet later knew some shocks, and would grow grave
When pondering them; shocks less of corporal kind
Than phantom-like, that disarranged his mind;
And it was in the way of warning me
(By much his junior) against levity
That he recounted them; and one in chief
Panthera loved to set in bold relief.

This was a tragedy of his Eastern days,
Personal in touch--though I have sometimes thought
That touch a possible delusion--wrought
Of half-conviction carried to a craze -
His mind at last being stressed by ails and age:-
Yet his good faith thereon I well could wage.

I had said it long had been a wish with me
That I might leave a scion--some small tree
As channel for my sap, if not my name -
Ay, offspring even of no legitimate claim,
In whose advance I secretly could joy.
Thereat he warned.
"Cancel such wishes, boy!
A son may be a comfort or a curse,
A seer, a doer, a coward, a fool; yea, worse -
A criminal . . . That I could testify!"
"Panthera has no guilty son!" cried I
All unbelieving. "Friend, you do not know,"
He darkly dropt: "True, I've none now to show,
For THE LAW TOOK HIM. Ay, in sooth, Jove shaped it so!"