Alone, in that dark sorrow, hour after hour crept
by;
Star after star looked palely in and sank adown
the sky;
No sound amid night's stillness, save that which
seemed to be
The dull and heavy beating of the pulses of the sea;
All night I sat unsleeping, for I knew that on the
morrow
The ruler and the cruel priest would mock me in
my sorrow,
Dragged to their place of market, and bargained
for and sold,
Like a lamb before the shambles, like a heifer
from the fold!
Oh, the weakness of the flesh was there, the
shrinking and the shame;
And the low voice of the Tempter like whispers to
me came:
"Why sit'st thou thus forlornly," the wicked
murmur said,
"Damp walls thy bower of beauty, cold earth thy
maiden bed?
"Where be the smiling faces, and voices soft and
sweet,
Seen in thy father's dwelling, heard in the pleasant
street?
Where be the youths whose glances, the summer
Sabbath through,
Turned tenderly and timidly unto thy father's pew?
"Why sit'st thou here, Cassandra?-Bethink
thee with what mirth
Thy happy schoolmates gather around the warm
bright hearth;
How the crimson shadows tremble on foreheads
white and fair,
On eyes of merry girlhood, half hid in golden hair.
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