they drift down the hall together;

he smiles in her lifted eyes;

like waves of that mighty river,

the strains of the "danube" rise.

they float on its rhythmic measure

like leaves on a summer-stream;

and here, in this scene of pleasure,

i bury my sweet, dead dream.

through the cloud of her dusky tresses,

like a star, shines out her face,

and the form his strong arm presses

is sylph like in its grace.

as a leaf on the bounding river

is lost in the seething sea,

i know that forever and ever

my dream is lost to me.

and still the viols are playing

that grand old wordless rhyme;

and still those two ate swaying

in perfect tune and time.

if the great bassoons that mutter,

if the clarinets that blow,

were given a voice to utter

the secret things they know,

would the lists of the slam who slumber

on the danube's battle-plains

the unknown hosts outnumber

who die 'neath the "danube's" strains?

those fall where cannons rattle,

'mid the rain of shot and shell;

but these, in a fiercer battle,

find death in the music's swell.

with the river's roar of passion

is blended the dying groan;

but here, in the halls of fashion,

hearts break, and make no moan.

and the music, swelling and sweeping,

like the river, knows it all;

but none are counting or keeping

the lists of these who fall.