The Dramatic Romances

AN OLD STORY. It was roses, roses, all the way, With myrtle mixed in my path like mad: The house-roofs seemed to heave and sway, The church-spires flamed, such flags they had, A year ago on this very day. The air broke into a mist with bells, The old walls rocked with the crowd and cries. Had I said, "Good folk, mere noise repels-But give me your sun from yonder skies!" They had answered, "And afterward, what else?" Alack, it was I who leaped at the sun To give it my loving friends to keep! Nought man could do, have I left undone: And you see my harvest, what I reap, This very day, now a year is run. There's nobody on the house-tops now-Just a palsied few at the windows set; For the best of the sight is, all allow, At the Shambles' Gate-or, better yet, By the very scaffold's foot, I trow…