Erewhile

I am as fair now as I was erewhile.

She runs you through, nor asks the word. O thou, that dear and happy Isle, The garden of the world erewhile, Thou Paradise of the four seas Which Heaven planted us to please,

The dame sans merci's broken strain, Whom I erewhile, perchance, have known, When Orleans filled the Bourbon throne, A siren singing by the Seine.

Quoth he to me, "Thou shalt fare with me to Cairo where dwelleth a friend of mine and to him will I give thee, for erewhile I promised him that on this voyage I would secure for him a fair woman for handmaid."