you might lie and dream of nymph and faun, woodgod and satyr, Daphne pursued by Phœbus, Actaeon flying before Diana, of Pan and Syrinx and Echo, and all the rustic joys of peaceful Arcady—or of elves and brownies, fair princesses and cruel monsters, Launcelot, Mordred, and Carodac, Sir Gawain the courteous with his "lothely ladye," the compromising cup, the misfitting mantle, all the bright pageantry, quaint device, and deep, tender romance that groups itself round good King Arthur and the Knights of his Pound Table—or of Thomas the Rhymer as he lay at length under the "linden tree," and espied, riding towards him on a milk-white palfrey, a dame so beautiful, that he could not but believe she was the mother of his lord, till undeceived by her own confession, he won from her the fatal gift of an unearthly love. And here, perhaps, you branch off into some more recent vision,
