Chapter XXXIX: =A Dream of Fair Women=

[In the 1833 volume the poem opened with the following four verses, suppressed after 1842. These Fitz Gerald considered made 'a perfect poem by themselves.']

As when a man, that sails in a balloon,
Downlooking sees the solid shining ground
Stream from beneath him in the broad blue noon,
Tilth, hamlet, mead and mound:

And takes his flags and waves them to the mob
That shout below, all faces turned to where
Glows rubylike the far-up crimson globe,
Filled with a finer air:

So, lifted high, the poet at his will
Lets the great world flit from him, seeing all,
Higher thro' secret splendours mounting still,
Self-poised, nor fears to fall.

Hearing apart the echoes of his fame.
While I spoke thus, the seedsman, Memory,
Sowed my deep-furrowed thought with many a name
Whose glory will not die.

=Miscellaneous Poems and Contributions to Periodicals= =1833-1868=