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On the turf dead lies the boar.

       God! the duke lies stretched beside him,

       Senseless, weltering in his gore.

      In the dull October evening,

       Down the leaf-strewn forest-road,

       To the castle, past the drawbridge,

       Came the hunters with their load.

      In the hall, with sconces blazing,

       Ladies waiting round her seat,

       Clothed in smiles, beneath the dais

       Sate the Duchess Marguerite.

      Hark! below the gates unbarring!

       Tramp of men, and quick commands!

       “’Tis my lord come back from hunting;”

       And the duchess claps her hands.

      Slow and tired, came the hunters;

       Stopped in darkness in the court.

       “Ho, this way, ye laggard hunters!

       To the hall! What sport, what sport?”

      Slow they entered with their master;

       In the hall they laid him down.

       On his coat were leaves and blood-stains,

       On his brow an angry frown.

      Dead her princely youthful husband

       Lay before his youthful wife,

       Bloody ’neath the flaring sconces—

       And the sight froze all her life.

      In Vienna, by the Danube,

       Kings hold revel, gallants meet.

       Gay of old amid the gayest

       Was the Duchess Marguerite.

      In Vienna, by the Danube,

       Feast and dance her youth beguiled.

       Till that hour she never sorrowed;

       But from then she never smiled.

      ’Mid the Savoy mountain-valleys,

       Far from town or haunt of man,

       Stands a lonely church, unfinished,

       Which the Duchess Maud began.

      Old, that duchess stern began it,

       In gray age, with palsied hands;

       But she died while it was building,

       And the church unfinished stands—

      Stands as erst the builders left it,

       When she sank into her grave;

       Mountain greensward paves the chancel,

       Harebells flower in the nave.

      “In my castle all is sorrow,”

       Said the Duchess Marguerite then:

       “Guide me, some one, to the mountain;

       We will build the church again.”

      Sandalled palmers, faring homeward,

       Austrian knights from Syria came.

       “Austrian wanderers bring, O warders!

       Homage to your Austrian dame.”

      From the gate the warders answered—

       “Gone, O knights, is she you knew!

       Dead our duke, and gone his duchess;

       Seek her at the church of Brou.”

      Austrian knights and march-worn palmers

       Climb the winding mountain-way;

       Reach the valley, where the fabric

       Rises higher day by day.

      Stones are sawing, hammers ringing;

       On the work the bright sun shines;

       In the Savoy mountain-meadows,

       By the stream, below the pines.

      On her palfrey white the duchess

       Sate, and watched her working train—

       Flemish carvers, Lombard gilders,

       German masons, smiths from Spain.

      Clad in black, on her white palfrey,

       Her old architect beside—

       There they found her in the mountains,

       Morn and noon and eventide.

      There she sate, and watched the builders,

       Till the church was roofed and done;

       Last of all, the builders reared her

       In the nave a tomb of stone.

      On the tomb two forms they sculptured,

       Lifelike in the marble pale—

       One, the duke in helm and armor;

       One, the duchess in her veil.

      Round the tomb the carved stone fret-work

       Was at Easter-tide put on.

       Then the duchess closed her labors;

       And she died at the St. John.

      II.

       The Church.

      Upon the glistening leaden roof

       Of the new pile, the sunlight shines;

       The stream goes leaping by.

       The hills are clothed with pines sun-proof;

       ’Mid bright green fields, below the pines,

       Stands the church on high.

       What church is this, from men aloof?

       ’Tis the Church of Brou.

      At sunrise, from their dewy lair

       Crossing the stream, the kine are seen

       Round the wall to stray—

       The churchyard wall that clips the square

       Of open hill-sward fresh and green

       Where last year they lay.

       But all things now are ordered fair

       Round the Church of Brou.

      On Sundays, at the matin-chime,

       The Alpine peasants, two and three,

       Climb up here to pray;

       Burghers and dames, at summer’s prime,

       Ride out to church from Chambery,

       Dight with mantles gay.

       But else it is a lonely time

       Round the Church of Brou.

      On Sundays, too, a priest doth come

       From the walled town beyond the pass,

       Down the mountain-way;

       And then you hear the organ’s hum,

       You hear the white-robed priest say mass,

       And the people pray.

       But else the woods and fields are dumb

       Round the Church of Brou.

      And after church, when mass is done,

       The people to the nave repair

       Round the tomb to stray;

       And marvel at the forms of stone,

       And praise the chiselled broideries rare—

       Then they drop away.

       The princely pair are left alone

      

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