<*  And  where  is  the  diver  so  stout  to  go—
I  ask  ye  again — to  the  deep  below  ?  "

And  the  knights  and  the  squires  that  gather*d  around*

Stood  silent— and  fix*d  on  the  ocean  their  eyes ;
They  look'd  on  the  dismal  and  savage  profound.
And  the  peril  chiU*d  back  every  thought  of  the  priae.
And  thrice  spoke  the  monarch — "  The  cup  to  win.
Is  there  never  a  wight  who  will  venture  in  ?*'

And  all  aa  before  heard  in  silence  the  king-
Till  a  youth  with  an  aspect  unfearing  but  gentle,

*Mid  the  tremulous  squires — stept  out  from  the  ring.
Unbuckling  his  girdle,  and  doffing  his  mantle ;

And  the  murmuring  crowd  as  they  parted  asunder.
On  the  stately  boy  cast  their  looks  of  wonder.
As  he  strode  to  the  marge  of  the  summit,  and  gave

One  glance  on  the  gulf  of  that  merciless  main ;
Lol  the  wave  that  for  ever  devours  the  wave,

Casts  roaringly  up  the  cbarybdis  again ;
And,  as  with  the  swell  of  the  far  thunder-boom.
Rushes  foamingly  forth  from  the  heart  of  the  gloom.
And  it  bubbles  and  seethes,  and  it  hisses  and  roars,
As  when  fire  is  with  water  commix'd  and  contending ;

And  the  spray  of  its  wrath  to  the  welkin  np-soars.
And  flood  upon  flood  hurries  on,  never  ending.
And  it  never  will  rest,  nor  from  travail  be  free.
Like  a  sea  that  is  labouring  the  birth  of  a  sea.
And  at  last  there  lay  open  the  desolate  realm !

Through  the  breakers  that  whiten'd  the  waste  of  the  swell.
Dark — dark  yawn*d  a  cleft  in  the  midst  of  the  whelm.
The  path  to  the  heart  of  that  fathomless  hell.
Round  and  round  whirl'd  the  waves — deep  and  deeper  still  driven.
