IX
AND as she read that letter, she became
The primitive huntress; neither fear nor shame
Could turn her from her purpose now. For still
She felt his love, and his cool reasoned will
Seemed to her trivial. . . a straw. . . beside
Her love that rode victorious on the tide
Of will and passion. For woman's love is clear
And primal and unquestioned, and as near
To nature as the fall of day and night,
The tides, the seasons. . . It assumes its right
To earthly consummation as a star
Its right to shine. For it is older, far
Older by long millenniums and ages
Than all such moral principles as sages
Invent to guide man through his native fog -
Such as conventions and the Decalogue.