======================================== SAMPLE 1 ========================================

"And in blue ink he capers: 'Here! 'dam!
There! get away! The place is bad;
This lamp burns!" Ben he seizes,
And on the night's dark pages slips,
Quivers, and checks the eager lips.

'Bring it!' The ship is brought ashore;
The crowd goes with it. Far and wide
The tumult of the crowd is spread,
The sheet-wraith's voice comes up the shore
And clamours up the stormy tide.

Wives, long abandoned, long ago,
Long since, long since, were all too rude
To find a hiding-place below;
It's horrid in the very stews
Of Pharaoh, in this ugly wood;
For one black devil-hole he 'll spout,
And all his host (the devil-worshippers)
Will split the dozen, you'll be there,
Just in the middle of the street;
And others more from underground,
And others from the church and ground,
Will have to quake before the rain
Will prove a welcome, or a chain.

Long life indeed! but not in vain.
Well not in vain, in less than pain!
Our very joys are mixed with pain!
And let this day be half an hour
With lingering, melancholy train.
Hark! Hark! Euroclydon has set
The bell-goats too, they're fast at it,
And faster than the pace they keep
The minutes, faster than the wheels;
And, going, see the wheel go round,
And backward fall the men and women
Just as the opening ruin palters.
They "came a word" to tell the world,
And on their faces read the title,
Which says, that hell's initial heir,
Auld Satan must be quite forgotten,
For he was in King George's reign,
And twenty-four the next that's known,
And many more will be the leader
Of the astonished nation round,
All Europe's issue now to yield,
And purse them all in one black stave,
Shave them, or pull them out at length,
First of the race they were called in,
And now among a thousand men,
That have for centuries been numbered,
They take the time, all having done,
According to the prompter's title,
For every one of their succession,
There is a record, every member crowned
With his eight hundred cannon loaded,
They say the grand command is ended,
The rulers shall go down as dust,
And every man in the dominion

What are the laws? The people say
They are five thousand in the score
Of members only, like the rest;
While they have not been held in sight;
Their case they cannot well uphold,
Being with several other men,
What order would become of them
These dukes and earls, so long in store,
These devils themselves do take away,
And be the doom of public men,
They crack'd their whiskers in their sleeves,
Their noses being all in five,
So that the lesser would not look,
They did not break their teeth at all;
The doctors cut a wondrous deal,
Yet neither half so good a deal
As that of Scrope or of Macaul,
Could tell a thing so lively,
They gave a very pretty squint,
And twenty cuts across the plan,
And sent the cocks to be at rest,
When three rose spirits took their nest,
And not a word was 'understood;"

Of three who strive for crook or sheet,
From four pluck'd leaves and four large roots,
The south and east brought champions three,
Ringed in each other's arms were free,
With four white steeds behind them ride,
With good steeds running into place,
Then, as if lame, he toss'd a race.

Riding in arms, as southward you may take,
Yet you must turn, and run, brave gentlemen,
For if you turn, proud gentlemen,
The least of you shall lose the race.

The sons of England, England, proud and great,
From England were turn'd enemies to the state,
And none should England front against a State:
Since when was William Conquer and she fertile lands,
And a great war was held within her wide commands,

The English drew the sword, the King blew down,
And a fresh blood ran on through ev'ry tongue,
When William Conquer and she came among
The rights and lives of all the English reign,
Where Scotland reign'd, when she was own'd again,
And all who knew her power, and all who owned
======================================== SAMPLE 2 ========================================
's strait.

We are come straight to be good friends--
We who have seen the world's broad track,
But lost to us, and lost to us--
We wait the call of each to help;
In the eternal bounds below,
Behind us, and beyond our view,
They bide but a few scant mile--
They will not stay till I am well--
They hold me close for evermore,
But all that's made for us they leave,
And every shadow that may fall
To walk with down-bare feet and hands
Together, and our fate be ours.

All faces changed for in that day,
From the crude bonds men used to break
They long to feed us, as we stray
Along the crowded paths we make.
I marvel not at morn and eve;
Naught but the boughs and swaying leaves
Wore for all time the shape of speech--
The leaf-bound things and words we teach.

"Wisdom supreme! but not for us,
Not for the dim and sordid days
Of dull repute--we worship you,
"For none may know or help--not none
Shall claim you homage and be won
"Shall pray for you and hunger for
And go back thither in the sun,
"And you shall come and live with us,
Here where the will found fitter ease,
Here where the trouble comes to all."

Not without promise, not with love,
I deem that I shall yet prove true
To this same beauty in my heart
That other people used to love;
"For in our pleasant bowers of ease,
And by the good light of this sky
You shall receive and understand
How there the times go by and by
And in their careless places where
The good things that have died are by.

But if I long for you and you,
Here in the little corner here
To watch the new light fail you,
I cannot but say you may hear
In what I hear--and in this year
There will be May forever near,
And in your place beside the wood
Where you and I together stood
And sat and talked the truth to be
Until our two souls grew one with me.

Oh, you'd not say what you thought about it
If you had fallen asleep with the night--
The real morning and dream came out of it
But not for me, with its whispered light
That how hardly you knew it, and doubt it,
And come with a laugh and pretend not,
And try to believe that it's made of
A dream and a world of long shadows,
And each with his reason on earth for a
Narrowly longing to think that you
Were to take the thing and live with me--

A year ago, the world that seems so splendid,
Now many months I'm back again for roaming
And am alone, and longing for it
Dwelt all unknown.
My dream was sad for lost and desolate
Where I was born;
But now I see the lights that rhymed in glory
Burn quietly out of wakening chimes,
And wake in rhyme.

No prowling gnat the prowling carmine breaks
From tombs of dun to lonely lonely isles;
All calm beneath the winds we flutter up
As if we knew we were not born for this.
Not all the birds, from piercing ferns and tangles,
Have ever told us of this hindering air
Where in the pastures herds in greenness trod.
Ah me, the unborn year brings nothing of it
On the old way we know,
Nor can it surely bring as lovely an answer
As when we knew!

Ah, love comes never,--yes, and numb looks are weary,
And longsome toil arises from the stream
To weep upon the pastures where all else is weary
And hope seems not to dream.
We shall not know, perhaps, these sad and sorrowful days
That are no dream,
For life lies far away, unheeded by the suns
Whose rays
Roll back the morning star; they tell thetale--
They tell of it to us, but still the tale
Are we to tell again.

I saw the little man who cried,
"Let go!
Oh, I have found my soul!" and died
A deathly cry.

When I have felt thy hand in mine
Came I in silence--I alone,
A silence, deep as thy soft eyes
And lips that met in happier skies,
So full of beauty, so divine,
So full of bliss--oh, I have known
All these!

My thoughts have found a music free,
======================================== SAMPLE 3 ========================================
 air,
He plunges off,--'tis plain to know all truth,
But how this stingsome wood, this wounding horse,
Now like a charred stake crackling to the sand
Of whatsoever wretch can suffer more,
Than his head totters on? Who knows indeed
But noble Neleus' son was wont to burn,
And hurl him on the shoulder, as he might
(For that's his father's self, his patron's foe),
Had he but loved the king, or had not kneel
To give it to his king.

And ere he sprung
Across the plain, to view his manly form
Clad in the mine of all most virtuous sire,
To Hercules he gave the key, of right
To hear his charge commit, and sorely vex
His people with misdeeds, to drive them hence
With madness. Yet before the seasons came
He had a care to plant his banyan tree
In Lyoneserian arms,--so one palm's worth
Might tempt his parents from the lofty snows
And to the hollow trunk his person bind
With brambles, roses, osiers, twining reeds.

He had but one right to subdue the weak,
That he might make them mourn their many woes;
So all too soon, with thought so vain and strange
Of the full theatre to cross the stage
Of pleasure, and so cross to Corinth's side,
To weep for Turnus, all but him and Fate
Therefore he wandered to and fro, and thought
How for the horse his father would have died,
If 'twere not done--if now he had remained
Amid the maddening waves, all night, in tears,
What sorrow had he suffered, how he bade
Helpless Polyxena stay the holy rite.

Gazed at the king, the people thus bespake:--
"Ye would have worship to our holy King
Muse and Dominus, should he call upon
His only heir, Demodocus, or take
All heaven, our happy cov'nant."--With that word
They went and waited for the hand of death,
Hoping with mournful memory to soothe
Themselves of others, and to add a groan.
But all on fire for Turnus--for his mind
Was hot to follow his unhappy sire
And his chaste son, nor know what tears were spilt,
Nor what he bade, nor how to live again.
Meantime Apollo, from his chamber soared
A voice, as though a lark had sung to rest,
And on the topmost boughs an ash-tree stood.
Then, on a sudden perched a quailing deer
As if to set them free, and bade the rest
Follow him.  Roared the baying pack before.

Then Jove bespake the Lord of counsel thus:--
"Go, gallant bark! and bear it to thyself:
Nor to the enemy did he connrive,
But dared the battle.  On his throne he sat
(In presence of the throne) by Juno's will,
An awful satra, suited to thy maw.
Now must I battle with the seed of Mars;
Nor dream I beauty or I gouged hard
By my own eyes--I shall not fight the gods;
Nor stand the fiery sire to my commands:
He never could endure a mortal's spear,
But he that would offend my wrath shall slay."
With that he vanished from the lusty crew,
And left them to debate in doubtful plight
Of coming battles.  Through the middle space
Incensed the Trojan strength and angry words.

Wild-eyed Malaperti saw the unasked-for fight,
And shook with rage his peaceful temples.  Then
He sought, Leucaspis, sought the noble youths
With eager shouts (for one amid the rest
Slew him, and left him in the rear).  The host
Severing their ranks, and launching back the cars
Before them, to the woods and slayers went,
All that the old man had in his house,
Found void of men and horsemen, many of whom
Drave back and slain, and many left untold.

And now his blood was mingled with the dust,
His cheeks were purple, and his ears were rung
With uproar, and his mind was mixed with thoughts
Of battle.  Then (for on his mind was laid
That battle) from a hollow rock he sprang
And gave command that Teucer be not loth
To render back with this foredoomed assault
A Trojan hero, if so be that he
Should wage fierce war against
======================================== SAMPLE 4 ========================================

That I should go astray,
And sleep before the mountains
And with thee make my way!

Take a leaf to fill thy heart;
Over and below
The leaves that will droop apart
Borrow all that they throw;
But come to thy heart, and thou
Art grown so dear to me!

Lully, the summit of God's mysteries
Seems far above us and below.
To be a page of human history
Is what I long to know.
For the love and glory of my mother
Shall have been mine alone;

And the old, old, holy faith of my mother
Shall have been mine alone.

My loved ones, long ago,
Buddha, will have ruled their young
 steadging to the gods, to come and go
And dwell with me at that moment so.
Do you know how it would end?
The shadow about me,
The flood ahead of my thought,
The wind under the rim
Of your spirit-swelling,
The trees before you,
The root-fountains above,
The plain before you,
The soft earth at your feet
Up-flinging its beautiful flower,
Will find a pavement in the dust of your garden

THEY laughed, poor little children,
At the blue-bird, the thrush,
While away the butterflies danced
In a flurry of rain.

How they thought you were happy,
They thought you were gay;
You turned with a merry mirth
As they talked about you,
"Do you know, do you know, little children,
How it's always the way."

Then they laughed and sang softly,
And the old birds sang
And the new come home again
In their telling,
Out of the ages,
They who made it wise
And had it and it,
For the little children
Of the long ago.

THE blossoms waken and beat on the stalk,
And the waves swell the song-birds' throats sing;
Each time they listen, each time they hear
A wonderful singing,
A wonderful, glorious thing.
In the broad-winged days of April
How beautiful the world was,
When I was little enough,
And when the grass was green,
And all the sky was blanched with swallows,
And all the earth was pregnant with
welcome,
For I was little enough,
And now I am old,
And my heart is well-nigh broken,
And everything is seared,
And I am very glad,
And I long for the little things
That God has given me,
For the love I shall give to you,
For the memory of things I shall know.

NOW the grass is brown and fresh,
And the last leaves curl and fall.
But in afternoons the cold
Rises, and the long days pass,
And the stout old chestnuts, lifted high
To the sun in amorous Heaven,
Fold above my head the gray
Warmless honey-weed,
And the old-time comrades come
With a shaking and a laughter,
That I love, and am immortal.

NOW the meadows are before me,
And I follow everywhere
The foresters, and follow them,
And my youth's old meadow fare;
Shaking off the grass to hide
Where they lured me or they led me,
And I follow, and follow on,
Finding it is pleasant weather,
And they lead and they lead me
By a little winding lane
Through the bright spring day again.

See the wild grapes on the blossom,
And the red fruit on the bough,
And the flowers so ruddy and white
Coming quick with the dawn,
Coming with the dusk's last light,
And the capers overhead,
And the fruit at their eaves undrowned
Sitting in clusters overhead.

And I follow and follow till the rain
Washes the redoubt from my face
With a widened breadth, I wonder,
And the whole bush overhead
Is as red and as still as a rose,
And I look through my eyes
To see a shape in the cloud,
A sunbeam suddenly,
And a voice, that seems to say,
"Lo, I am but a dream!"

And I follow and follow till the rain
Wraps all things round my feet,
And my heart's head lies with pain,
Sick with bliss and dizzy
Till the world seems but a dream,
Till my name is writ in flame
In flames that cannot smother.
Ah, the knowledge full of a thousand things,
The light that burns on a thousand hills,
The love that
======================================== SAMPLE 5 ========================================
, for I kent
That I could sort it wi' them.

It set my heart a-flame wi' pride,
To see the siller siller,
I thought, 'As charmers use to try
Their tips wi' sklentin-trick;
I thought, within an hour ago,
I first had sat to wonder,
Thinking, "The sun had left the sky
For worlds of other wonder."

Then up I gat, with nimble feet
O'er flowers and thistles,--round;
And through the flower-beds, wet with dew,
Myself came flaunting dew.

My little Mad-Love, here I sate,
Under the wide redwood;
And, 'twixt the dark green leaves, I held
The swing of legs of wood.
The wind was in the east; the tide
Had got into the west;
All night we heard the river's din,
Its fall just lit the west;
And, when we climbed upon its brink,
The far-off elm trees crested high
With willow-wands of dry.

The night was in the drift; the clouds
Glimmered on every fence;
While 'mid the elm trees all the frost
Hot-tooth'd and mired we wailed
Like ships in wet wind-travell'd coasts
Left desolate and quailing.

But when the moon sank slowly down
I crouched and loitered hum
At what the catbird's golden plume
Flung through the boughs of hawthorn.
No flocks of winged seeds, or plumes
Of bramble-blooms escape;
Each sinceom flies, and skimming lifts
Its head, its billow to the skies
Of everlasting day.

O for a moment, ere it drop
On the breast of my wide breast,--
Its pale face, fringed with rosy fire,
Like heaven's own lightning-quest.
Dear child! I can no longer keep,
For now the moon is gone;
With footsteps slow I hear her tread,

The wind, that sweeps the snows
Of naked foliage through their sphere,
And rustles fresh and clear,
While boughs in sleepy disleaf sweep,
And trees like sentinels appear.
Dear child, the month is near,

When two by two,
And, slowly turning, chant the hour
In over-pream'd abode;
When at the church's outer gate,
Little we see,
With long-subjected boughs hangs down
The wild grass-bushes of state.

The garden in its maze,
As yet unseen,
With shrubs and hedges far and wide
Sleeping alone,
Is like a scene
Drear in the desolate homestead's midst:
The cricket shrills his song;
The moths that haunt the hazy air
Move with faint wheel-tracks o'er the snow,
While in the woods the butterflies
Stay wing'd to go.

Come, patter now the feather'd leaves,
While the pale dewdrops pour.
Ye see the kindly flowers thrive,
But dearest to the flowers,
Ye run among the sleepy leaves
In all the forest's solitude.
Then whither go ye, Winter, go!
Be rough as cold,
Unkind, though very near ye love:
And do not let me move.

The pumice is a stormy hill;
Lash'd with silver frost and chill;
And the lamplight's long and bright
Rainbow dew falls on the night.

Out of the buried sea I leap
And prowse about with fear,
And see the streaming world beneath
Like a giant of the dead;
The sifted mist is quenched in space;
The jagged clouds hang heavy and chill;
And the sea's mists are rising chill
Above the grey and waning sky;
And I sail like a phantom bark
That has long been hid from ken,
With vague and aimless fears o'erthrown,
That I fear not the autumnal sun
For all the mournful summer days,
If I be not as their grey mother was!

Lie softly in the cedar chest;
Over the cradle softly flings
The scrawl of a dead man's broken breast;
And the fairy dreams of life are o'er,
That we were born an hour before;
When shall we sleep in the cedar chest?
<|endoftext|>

TANOh! my heart is sick and wounded,
Cold and
======================================== SAMPLE 6 ========================================
 and hum; the censers murmured,
Tears came down like flakes of dew,
Loud, and sudden, and sharp--
That is why I've wished you!

Plented when you and I were young;
You are always afraid of dread;
Well, we might look at you and flout
Our faults 'neath our own heads;
And once or twice ago we thought
Our first poor joy was past,
When somebody called you to be had
And came and bidden us fast.

Oh, the long, far journey to arrive
And learns by rote-paths plain and dell,
How easy it feels and easy to climb
Up the hill-top if one can tell!
You feel the path wind through the trees
And down the meadows throw your feet,
And there is nothing going to lose
Except to eat and drink and eat;
You feel that life has some eternal  cure
For every ill that you could fear.

For they who sell their souls to gain
In golden fields of endless ease,
Know neither pain nor disappointment,
They have no longing to be happier.
But do not think they've got this scope
That draws them all to heaven again.

I asked of Celia, "If I dare
You'll try the heart of Celia," I said,
"I'll try the laddies; they'll be my dead,
And let me, oh, I'll come again."

"I'll come and sit by the golden fire,
And tell them they would soon be there;
It is only the living scene
That makes Celia smile. They'll stay on here,
And she will have to leap, ah, smile,
And perhaps she has but an added charm
To make them smile."

Thus Celia spoke, and I did speak,
"They're all a pack of common things
When one has heard each word a book
That's like the language of the birds,
And starts to talk. I hear them groan
And hoot, as if in loneliness,
Babbling, but always hearing none.
One needs to hear each pretty throat
Re-murmur, speaking soft and low,
And once or twice to see each note
That's like the language of the birds,
And once or twice to see the toys
The grass used to be made to look
So softly and so tenderly.

When I was down beside the sea,
A child stood at my knee,
And all my other children came
And shook their curls with me.
Then, lulling in a bed of down,
They laid them down to sleep,
And with their naughty arms made their
Poor little pretty neck sweep.

The night is cold and the house is dark,
Lone and silent all the day,
And the wind keeps singing the shrill notes
As we go our ways,
Chattering, chirping, but never a song,
And never a cry of sorrow or pain,
And all the night brings the happy throng
Bringing people home again.

Send home the child, your peace is gone,
And to my father's house again
Bring the little brown boy;
Give him a little ball,
And let the fire glow
Through the painted window-pane
That stands in the garden,
And the little red house
Where the flowers blow.

And after that the little empty pot
Will be left in the earth,
That a butterfly may live, and live,
And the little world may come
And carry the smell of the fresh-smothered wood
Through the days of the summer.
And when the sun sinks slowly down,
And the birds are quiet and a-sleeping,
Why must the world begin to weep?
Because the good days have gone well.

There are many mysterious things
That the old world knows;
There are strange and many springs,
And the hill brooks flows;
There are deep grass and withered trees
Where the wind will never cease,
And the dreamers of the forest trees
Will never cease.

They do not know the life I pass,
Nor the deeds that I have done;
The thoughts that fill my memory
Will pass like some immortal dream,
But all the dreams will pass away
And all that was is done.

For there's a little house that stands
Beyond the stars,
And on this summer-evening's day
A pewter-pitted knife,
A paper-covered wall,
A piece of broken board,
And on this Summer-noon,
A barefoot boy I'll dream at home
About this little house.

And just this day a bag of corn

======================================== SAMPLE 7 ========================================
-nubling--the wall;
The hanging wall and the gate of the world.
Yet some endure that its walls lie ill
Admiringly, and are not built again
For forms of Death; for their clear eye
Builds in the ceaseless moat of Time,
Where huge rains fall and the snows heap high,
And the gray storm-tost soul, that sways and swoons,
Is now more safe from the furious teeth of the world.
And, lo, as these are built of my clay,
Even here on the tiles of Eternity
I speak in language that breathe with my breath
More delicate than on earth before death,

And I marvel to look on them with eyes
As dull as the gloom of a marsh-plaiced fen.
And these, as yet, are not these of my earth?
Or, hast thou not heard, O fisher-folk,
The beating of hearts in these waters of Thought?
Where are the wandering waves and the glorious sun
That stirred the tide of the blood of the sea?
Where the tide of the world?  Where the wind and the tide
In a mystical rhythm of song and of rhyme?
Where the strident voices of earth and of sky?
Where the sound of the wind and the tide of the tide
Brake out of the ears of the senses aflame?
Where the heart of the hill-stream or the plain
Gone, in the day or in sunset or dawn?
Where the gorse by the torrent?  Where the plain,
In the heart of a darkness, arises, a dream
That stills all the turmoil, all the turmoil of day?
How many a story of days and of days
Rises on the dark wall of Time,
With its morning and shadow engrave
A prismy screen from a sun-baked wave,
That on Summer's great ruins enshrouds
The thunderous arches of heaven,
As, in Memnon's plain-shaded towers,

Yet the fates' thin voices of men
Stir in every one life anew:
Echo, in thine ears, forevermore,
Doubtless midst these joyless children of Song,
Lift thy lyres and lift the psalm of thy Land;
For the Spring of those royd-singing throats
Makes no land from the boundless sea,
Nor from out the dim and budding lands
Isses a man-of-war to roam,
All unarmored, and all unblamed,
And for toil of faith at last
War no less than the finer thought,
And for hope of profit and fame.

For by the high sea of old Romance,
One that wakes to the sorrowful swells
At Magellan's farm, at Agincourt,
Far over the waves of a mellow plain
Dumb ortsnean, rose the heroic strain
That teemed with tears and laughter and wine;
And other singers, with more of the heart,
That now shall surround the Poet, or start
A musical undertone and on
To the call of a bird, beyond the mere
Raptize, with a swan-winged ball,

"O soul of beauty,
Poet in thought,
Ah, set me apart
From the light and the centre, far, far
From the light and the centre."
But ever, like a star,
On to its own sunset,
Raying dark and afar,
All the world's mists apart
Fell from the sphere
That holds thee apart
So long in the heart
With the angels of love
And the thought of the heart,
That, sleeping or waking,
I shuddered to hear
The far-off voice of it make moan
From the leafless tree of it thrown
In broad leaves of the world alone.

In light as the rose,
Flecked with light,
Through the blackness the starlight shone
Far out o'er the hills.
All the loveliness that was mine
Felt the touch of the dear night-dew
Shall fade in a transient shine,
Shall wither away and be gone,
And the world be aware of the dawn,
The world of the heavens unfolding their finical
richets,
And the world of the sounding skies.

Through the veil of whose folds the moon
Burns a star intense
On the white horizon in cold apoge
Where the sorrowful planet-star
Burns and withers afar
The west star's fierce-plume's curling flame
Through the arrased windows of night,
Gleaming, kindling the void,
Shadows
======================================== SAMPLE 8 ========================================
!  See, see, how thickly the wit,
Of those true witlings, is printed complete!
'Tis surely a curse to my great disgrace;
A shadow of sin, to my dear Friend the prize,
But you've cheated it all, and we cannot refrain;
You've cheated us all, you're us only to wed!
You lie in the dungeon and live to be fed,
And we'll never escape till the judgment day's come!

You lie in the prison and live to be fed,
And live to be fed with our food and our crumbs,
While we're running our tippets and paying our debts,
And never escape till the judgment day's come!
We are all jolly courtiers,
And we never escape from our happiness;
We'll promise to each other,
And you'll never hereafter escape from our woe!

When you come to die,
Every nerve and bone
Soon lulled in sleep,
Secure and free,
Sleep will seize on you.
When you come to die,
Every nerve and bone
Soon lulled in sleep,
Sleep will seize on you.
When you come to die,
Every nerve and bone
Soon lulled in sleep,
We'll still be free,
And you'll never escape from our woe!

When you come to die,
Every nerve and bone
Soon lulled in sleep,
We'll still be free,
And you'll never escape from our woe!

A woman sat in yon trim place,
Says she, "My lady, pray be mine,
Put out the fire, I pray,
Put out the Bible, I pray,
And I'll be the, lady, straight,
Up till the chimney stoops!"
The little brown wife said, "I'm sure
My darling will hear when I've come,"
And her husband said, "Go on,
It is only my darling, please,
That makes the kettle squeam."

The little brown wife looked around
And saw a pig, that was spotted and spotted,
That was spotted, and spotted, and spotted;
He looked as black as the sky,
And he said, "Dear me, don't go on,
It is just as red as the ground!"
"I beg your pardon," the little brown wife said.
"It is only my darling, and not her mother,
Who taught me to spin, and to shuttle the thread,
And now, dear old woman, I pray you,
Let us now make ready for bed,
And the little brown wife, if she can,
She shut the door, and she will see soon,
How I wish I was there, or she could!"
"It is not my darling," the little brown wife said.
"Oh, let me shut the door," the little brown wife said.
A green-hide pig, all golden brown,
Was passing merrily home;
He was but a merry thing, you'll think,
And he wished he was overjoyed.
He was glad his friends would let him roam,
But he only laughed at the pain;
He said, "I wish I could see him now,
I'll make a very merry train!"

A spinner with a clean green gown,
Looks at the family below;
But the family children look so small
They scarce can get through to a bone.
"For all that little pigs are stabled,
And all that little pigs are fat,
And all that little pigs are housed
To skin with asparagus."

A spick, a stew-pot, and an earthen pot
Are standing near the roadside table set;
But the little brown wife does not mind it,
She shut the door, and she did not find it.
He hung a paper on the table,
He did not think to cry or talk,
But stood and looked into the pew,
And very quickly ate and drank.
The goose that was to be forgotten,
He sent it to the beau;
The fowl that was to be forgotten,
He sent it to the hawk;
And so it was carried away
To be an old man and gray.

In a crowded Union Churchyard
What is happening everywhere?
Something in the sky above us,
Something in the river,
Beyond our cloudy screen;
Something that the whole world passes
Like a minute's breathing,
Lifting up to heaven's blue
Rank above the blue;
Something of the earth and ocean,
Tremble on the distance,
All too thin and fetid for the soul,
Far too thin and fetid for the soul.

And there's something in this pressure
======================================== SAMPLE 9 ========================================
 with good estate and many a pound.
In all the land there is a place for me;
Thou wilt not tempt me there to stay;
There is a woman with an angel's eye
That makes me stay.
I have no tears in hand;
And the plaints of it are all from me;
And yet I can not understand
The comfort of that worldly day,
Nor the joy of it; but, lo, this land
Bids me draw back from its antiquity.

All through the watches of the night
I cry with groans of anguish sore,
And all for her I leave not right,
Nor ask where death has laid me low:
But no! from that sad country I,
With steadfast step and noble eye,
Set my face full of charity
Upon the way.

The path is sweet to the weary feet
That it must often meet,
And the tongue of the thing that we hate is sweet
To the weary heart and feet.
Ah! had I known and had met my fate,
On that dark disastrous day,
When the iron man was my hated mate,
And I my foe.

O the woman! O the woman!
I do not crave to ease my pining heart;
I shall learn to live a second life
Before it cease.
And for that I am mistress of the sun,
And the stars above me,--they, the eyes,
The soul and the body,--all of them,
And all of them, have sinned and lied,
And yet I dare not even speak to them,
Nor speak to them, and they return not,
Or speak to them.

Oh the woman! O the woman!
As I lay sleeping at her door,
And heard her weeping and her sobbing
And sobbing and distress'd sobbing
And the silence of the night grew full
Of the dews of dawn that hung above
The garden door.

But the voice was still'd, and through the lattice
All things were still as a wide star.
And her picture still lives on in the window,
And never a sign, till the gray moon
Lights up the garden of the night
And tells them of the moonlit day
When nothing takes them from the sight
But the sound of the song and the dance,
The light of her beautiful talk
In the garden without on the stair,
By the hearth, and the empty room
For the soul of an hour.

Like a child who has sin'd, and has slept,
He reaches toward the garden,
And beneath the orange and the Cypress
The moonlight on his shoulder leads him
In green and silver charmed glooms
Towards the middle of the valley
Where the rivulets and the birch and maples
Stand out from the October twilight
To breathe their perfume
Over the graves where the dead have slept
And from the windows the dust and mould
Lay over them that never died.

The jasmine stars are humid,
The wind blows moist,
But in the evening twilight
To the pond the dead men rise
And collect about the roses
On the mound where the dead have slept.
The grey riders go on their fastest speed,
Drinking all together;
They follow a ban with loud and hoarse cry
To where the houses are shut out on the sky;
Or in crowds crowding around one palace-gate,
They follow an empty reticence.

The builders of vessels that suddenly burst
Are black with the rain in the streets they are lost;
And a blue silken veil of gray,
With a quietude of clouds across her face
They leave their track,
And are strewn with desolate streets.
The mist lifts dark and thick
Over them in dense and sullen folds
That are black with the autumn moon.

One watches the lightning flash
In the cataract of the wind;
The knife-blade on the heaving stone
Gives a sharp and sable shock
And with it incessantly
She forces fast and steadily
The moon's way:
They cross over the flaming rain,
And are strewn with desolate streets.

Over the sinking and tarnished rain,
Over the sullen rain,
The women wait in their discontent
Until the sunset gleams
Over the blistering steaming roofs,
To watch the ships come past.
The black men's thunder of cannon and gun,
The rough-faced men with their feet in the snow,
The tired men that cannot guess at sleep
And fear the dawn, for the dawn is cold,
The old with the battered heart.

Under them are grimy walks
That pass through paths of stone;

======================================== SAMPLE 10 ========================================
est use, and that those may thy strong trap not have
loose to thy hold!  But I will tell thee one and all, if thou
wilt come to me.  Tell me of our escort."

v.Course of the hapless wights thitherward the woeful band drew on
and on, which he at first had called them, wherefore weeping
their hearts with their tossing locks, they cried to their God in
to their shame; and their mouths were so full of guile and enmity that
the mother only made them happy; for she was a woman of great

their wives, and have no other care than they for that which
they said and flee.  Then they formed a terrible snake, wherein
are thickest, in the great gulf called and plunged him in the
earnest sea.  The ferryman could find no pass through the gulf
into which the serpent was drawn, and the boat drew back
into the hollow cave, when the fury fell from him.  There he
was living in the very body of Patroclus and of his squire who gave
the Trojans death.

Patroclus gave him a steeds to bear to his own ship, and the
horses to bring him to his own country.  He sent four ships of
them into the ship and all that way whereby he would go.

NOW when we had crossed the sea for the space of seven days, I
found the seals that have a hundred hands just off from the time
when any one or other of the other crew could see us so
wholly perish and how close they are themselves, so many and
So spake I to him, and he replied, "Tell me this first;
how are they all brought thus far from our own country?  are they
all come to a bad end, from the waves? or did some prophecy
or other manifest destiny of their lives make them forget
the ten years' separation knit them and betoken them to this
?"

which in evil hour shapes the hour as it changes, as a spider
draws an air when she seizes it, lies soft when the long
particle falls into the hand of one passing over a banquet.
And these too took their seats; but my father and my
mother went on board ship to consult the matter, and I, being
not a whit older than he, made a wait, and bade the
housekeeper wait on before the vessels themselves, so as
the harbour-men, grasping a glimmering oar, went on board,
saying, "Lo, we are oager, and we are come for the belly of
mighty Jove, to witness that which ourselves may do."

Ithaca had been on a coast in the Arimy parental, and the natives
were far the best of vessels, and their decks were lying
so thickly in the stern of the vessel.  Then Ithaca began to
bless that princely guest who stood in the midst of all his
gifts, so fair was he.  But Ithaca still stood with his
company, and sent twenty ships to their father Jove, who
dwells on Olympus.  Thenceforth, when Ithaca had heard of this
gift, they resolved to send the best of the ship to the
hands of Ithaca, and bring us their convoy, and send forth
again the loosened vessel to the city."

When they had thus fulfilled their mind, they yoked the ship for
their courses, with the masts and halyards piled out upon the
sea shore; then they took their seaman to the chambers of
Eurymachus.  They brought them wine out of a fair golden cup,
brought them sweet scented meat, and their eyes were filled
with tears and dust; for a dark cloud held over their bodies
their heads.  But Telemachus alone could fare without his
ship, so tarrying so long in his own house.  And Telemachus
bare his men to his own room, and they laid their places
ually aside.  Now there was the slaughter of the men and of
their women, and a din rose about the tables of the
foster-fatted herdsman.  The heifer bounded forward and
stared at the unwearied as before, but the sons of the
swineherd were feasting in their own houses for them.  Then
the swineherd could see the trees of the forest, and could
hereafter see them and mark them, for he bethought him to
go and lay his hands upon the good cheer set before him.

"Forth on this, stranger," said he, "fearing not the shame and
======================================== SAMPLE 11 ========================================
 me before the fire, 'twas when the race is up,
We won a chance to follow what, and find their chips.
I know it was for skilful fingers,--and for hair,
Also--I see the head and shoulders too and fro,--
Then some one says, "Good evening, ladies: take this oil,--
Thoughts turned like snow, like windy Christmas-chats too,
Pass the fire, cut out like icicles, and then,
One follows you,--why, I'd be better then,--
Have a good bit of a dinner,--and I don't fear
You'll in nor even abandon this.  It's most in town,
This very night, to find your roses gone.
I'll set you in a jewelled band, and you,
Ere many weeks are passed, shall have your death.
Yes, I'll have those who could, and have no fear
If I should die for love,--I shall lie here
Not to look back for once; since very fair
The sun becomes, the frost has ceased to bite
The last is better, though I'm strong, perchance,
Than my bad fortune's done.

From the close retire-joys of those days
When I was brought up with I much maintained
By candles buttered in the convalescence
Of unpermitted cigarette, such rays
Were no good instruments of disappearment,
Methought in that supreme arbitrament
I heard men singing, "Hither, thither, choir,
"And make you sing, and you
"Make music, be along
And pipe, and such soft notes and lute-like flute-like flute-like flute-like flute-like flute-like flute-like
And I'm grown up smart
And rough indeed,
Yet would much less, (however fond of songs)
I'd do it still: but I'm not in a mood
At what I'd do.  I am the sport
Of those who flung me out of life and days,
Not for myself, but for your own praise,
But for your mountain-way, your vales and bays.
Be brave enough!  For me, I've done my best,
To be your guide, your flower, your road's observant rest.
Here in this company
My sorrow I delight,
And joy in you.

I can feel, my dear,
My pains and fears, and hope
To know you near.
Yet here I am!
I could not weep for you,
And yet I'm blest;
I do not cry
For any but you,
You are the sweetest friend
I have in my way.
On friends I do not feast,
I laugh at a friend,
But the heart aches
With recollection
As though I'd fain
For a charm
To dream for aye,
I'm with you all,

The summer day.  How can I know
When the morning leaves her dun and bare?
How can I, between town and city,
Dare in the wayside glare hearth-smoke,
And see it while the country-side
Rings as the hivefives' honey-hives
From fall to empty honey-hives?

I fear the phrase of one who says
That I am when I've been on the way,
Afar, as if I'd fain been kissed
By others ever to be gone;
And that's my business.  No, I'm not
In turn a friendly word or jest,
But just my lesson's best,--
A living book that's best
That's hard to get,
And better still that's sweet,
Oh, best!

And I'd more heed of it, I swear,
Than how I'll read and scribble now,
And leave it all to chance, now this--
You lose it: take it, I'm your friend!
There's nothing for it like content,
Only a heaven that's meant.
Oh, then it does me good to smell
The water laughing through its shroud,
The smouldering, smell-drip heavy dew
Along the meadows dense and dun,
Blue in a moonbeam, fine and blue,
And if a cloud has fallen, near or far,
To make a place where breezes are,
A tiny world of lonely thought,
A heaven of merry hopes, a heaven of joy,
A sunny land of singing seas.

Oh, such is life, not quite so sweet,
If life be only as it is;
If there's a God that is to love,
If
======================================== SAMPLE 12 ========================================
ly, Jock and Bessy-Locks
To poor Cordelia chiefly owe a debt;
Yet they in Church-yard laid the scruples low
Which, if at frosted Kaub we keep it, know.
First, Jock, I put your Horse upon the fire,
And, if I can, put out both Horse and G ire.

By this Daye-tide the French return their way;
For, by this Daye-tide, which is more I say,
A Spanish eighteenth Crown is left in hand,
Which once was Thamis in the Ayre of Spie,
A more fair Idol, and a more brave seize,
Which now is but the valour of their Land.
For here their Right may safely rest at will;
And for their Country's weal I cannot fill.
So they the Ranks, and the Brothers rush on him,
And so the Ranks, and the Brothers rush on him.

Sir Knight, (for you are with me) know that I
Am Brave, and out of One as well as I.
For if one wear the best I sell, one treadleth right,
Whilst the other, like a Knight, doth all that's good:
On Man no felon no felon could be read;
What of the Ranks--on one thou must have read.
Of the Ranks--on one thou must repent to say
That setting English in disgrace and gore,
Because they robb'd us of a Knight of some,
A right good fellow in their Grand Ayre;
As the Ranks do then, that he the King should take,
Of men like these all but the most rich in wakes.

One pound of Boyne,^10 Sir Knight, it much behoved me
That I to carry on these Earls a Tragic Jament,
Inferior far unto that to countenances,
How dreadful to make Lady Elfinhart,
And to her own self might she and I compare
In vertues equal to a Crownes Lebmond beare.
But after, in a cloud, poor Cloe must likewise
Be placed on the margin of the Table Round,
And see if by the luckless chance you can
Have him uncounted and beloved of all,
On he returning will he chuse to goe,
For that my Lady, when she saw him so,
Did to the Front of that old Lyonors house,
Before her see a Knight all earlily,
With these Hirsuteous and Catch-'em, one of those
Whom the old King had made of Castlereagh.

These then, with pleasing smiles and carrols playing,
In the mid Chase before the Castlereagh,
Knew that a present of those Ranks was say'd
To this Dame Prouin, when to this she hied.
So on the hunt upwent this Lady Vade,
And with her practised eye survey'd the glade;
But when the Forester upshot her eyes,
She blush'd, and to her Dowager she cries,
"Good Father dear, and have you heartily
I may behold you well." Then to herself she cries,
"The Lady Fair is fairer unto me."
So thinking, reverential to the Dame,
From her right side she drew Sir Knight and friar,
And after him Sir Lancelot he espied,
On whom the maiden waited with such pride,
That to leave him he could not well enquire.
But when Sir Lancelot him beheld, astride
In his own strength and vigour, down he gan,
And to his side Sir Lancelot thus address'd,
Gan full of doubts, and holding high his crest,
"Lady, what see'st thou, Sir Percivale, with eyes
Like those which under Mars great Appelists
Have seen their King--nay, turn thy face away
As if to say, if this thy heart can gain
Aught of thy trial, and the man be slain,
Let him resign himself to mere pretence,
And he, thy servant, to the King of Heav'n
Will make the pretext of a pretext, free,
And by the King's permission do what he
Will partly loose, himself may freely go.
Of those who so have pass'd through warlike actions
Brave Guelpho blame the Knight to go into,
And that, as well as those who wish'd, he teaches
To go, and on a sudden down to sinning
In open field to die disgrac't with him.
And she, 'twas said by Richard, "Lord, the King,
If thou the
======================================== SAMPLE 13 ========================================
! within her place-box!"
"Ah no, you must not catch him, darling,
If you wish to wed with that sweet maiden."
To the chimney-top she brought him,
And the kettle called her aunt,
"Dinah, dinah, dinah, here comes
To the gate, this present morn,
Where you will hear a footstep, and see with his eyes the locks

He wrote this song,
"You have wedded your fair lady, your wife is an exile,
You never can make a long purse, or you can buy it.
Whether he's poor or rich, he has riches, but never
Can make a will for two, but one gold ring alone.
Then please to follow me,
For to give you freedom, then
To accept your wife to the issue,
And live free,

If you would approach,
Let the six that keep it ten times longer,
For it's better to be brave and true, than to tarry!"
I told you once a bargain,
And he refused to sell
All the money which he had

But what's the use?
You'll not have a wife,
So you will not marry a new woman.
But he was rich and well-bred, and his father had such a heart,
That he said to his wife,
"Your wife has a right
Honor and favor; what will you give her?"
And the little one,
The red, red, and blue,
Whispered out this jocular way,
"Your wife has a right
Honor and favor; what will you give her?"

And the little one said,
"Because she has the one soul in her,"
And the little one,
The big, sweet Red,
With the funny, high-curled smiles
Of the little one behind the other,
A-bobbing with glee
Just as if he'd like to doze
The potation of the grog-pies!
But for all that they had to say,
And not having heard or heard,
You can't afford to use the word
Which means so all the other people.
Just then she knew 'twas jewelled hands,
And the old one pouting, "Oh, how admirable it is!"
And you'll remember,

There are so many other people
Who get them into trouble,
There's little men,
And for the most part of their life,
There are rich men like undenyed men.
And if one takes a drop of driving,
Another drops it easily.
There are so many honest people
Who shun a house that can't be hiding.
What delicate people are you all,
You are so very flattered
That when you get a grudge,
Or trouble it all with feeling,
They don't know who are good friends.
For all your merry mirth and merriment,
And all your merry laughter,
There's one who has but one mind,
What is it that he knows of friends?

Here's somebody that don't like his mirth,
Or his father's ploughing,
And that is all the question he
May choose to live in,
And that's the point he fires the most,
And makes his cares to creep about.
There's faces with the legs outspread
In the road that he sets out.
Though you look at the beaten men,
Or see them on their feet,
They've got a perennial row
Of legs in the street,
And so it's clean and good to be
A hero like you.

If you see a road outspread,
Or upon a summer's morning
Dream-like from the plain,
You just let the water flash,
You never let it stain;
The man that's real good and kind
Is one of us who knows.

Here's another with the heart outspread,
But we won't go again.
The dying stream is running red
As it runs along the bed.
Your window keeps a constant pull
To see the stream's reflection--
But go, don't start to fret;
'Twas here the water came to be
A big pebble spray and sea.

Here is a heap of gilded wood
Where the man's candle was:
We're on the journeying side astride
When I was but a little child.
Now, our three-legged girl beside
The fire with one good arm
Will take us unaware.
And that's what we shall wear.

Here's a bit of a new round,
And a bit of a hill,
And a better room
With a pool on the hill,
======================================== SAMPLE 14 ========================================
 on the tee-jib's wa'-shoo;
The beggar'd hodm'd in bed,
Wi' a sark-sleeve-sleeve in his back,
Whenas his wee bit bairns did come,
And cried, "Eh, faithless Tam!
A better dochter couldna be!"

But, word for word, the vera lad
(His misther had na sta'n a')
Bliss Carler, wha kens thy saw,
Wad hint the vera baith thy heid:
He kens the vera baith thy saw,
For vera baith thy saw and saw;
Sae tak' your misther apron, M'Let!

Or, ken ye weel, ye wuird poor thing?
I've seen them ca'ed them a' in thrall,
In park or stately hall.
I've seen them sairly chant their lays,
In furth or woak, in barks or plays;
And meikle-dum, and wood-nymph's lays,
They maun bewiss the baith men say;
And meikle-dum, and wood-nymph's lays,
They maun bewiss the baith men say.

And mony a cantie carle, O Tum!
Ye'll still be tunefu' at the sound,
Wi' music's mair than a' the ices;
And to the warld, wha hiz upo'
Your misther, Tam, they can a' gie ye
Wi' melody, and fun and glee,
And mad-tonage, and the evenin' cry,
They maun bewa'ed by a' the ninnies;
But, O Tum, ye'll no be for aye
(The truth may be) pit-a-pather.

The quiltins, whether they be waur,
Or be themsel's plays deid for feir,
Maun be ta'en up, wha're gaun to braw,
As fast as twa are leevin's.
A quiltins, wha'll be fash'd sark-fast?
A thrawart sark an' a auld man's breech?
A whistles, that's sound wi' t' wind?
A whistles, that's sound wi' t' rain?
A ne'er, that I think, will be for thee;
And a ne'er, that I think, will be for thee,
When nae the sea comes, simmering tow'rds me,
Wi' dancin' sails, owre a' the blue,
An' the wind blaws i' the gummin' yooth;
And whiles, whan my heart beats in the stoup,
An' I rin an' dream, at evenin', droop,
An' then, wi' the wind, I'll end my sang,
An' seek my lane, at the mirk stane,
Wi' her green wull for my lanely stane.

Wi' the bricht blade o' burnin' ling,
When the water, mak' a leis mair bricht,
Than has been step for noontide twenty sicht,
Frae my awnell starns I gae a sicht,
Afore I began to think o' it;
When I gaed to the byre o' it
A-heppin' my ain wee carkit carkit carkit carkit carkit carkit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit cawit caw
======================================== SAMPLE 15 ========================================
, who come and have but their language--
Lady, list to the rustling of dew,
List! we heard a love-call come and go,--
Fiery and fierce and bitter as blood,
O'er the Mermaid stealeth as hath been said.

Mighty prophet! Seer of the stormy soul,
Tempter of the blast, wretch, tempter of soul,
Nature's prophet, seer in Thee, Thou dost roll
Rocks along the Eternal which are now to gnaw.

"Oh thou of Homakers! Oh thou of the Frosts!
Oh thou of the Thrang! Oh thou of the beasts!
Oh thou of the under-world that seest the ghost
Of the golden-scaled sage, Father Whittington!
Thou of the Forests! who in the night
With the cutting hoof of a lion must fight,
Stalking the ghost of a King; oh thou
Of the scarlet-throated Pithe, Oh thou
Of the blazing throat and the battle-snow!
Whittington! Swarming divine of Art!
Sweet of taste and proud of heart,
Flowers of culture, fruit of desire,
Woods for sport, and whiting for fire!
Crass, at highest, within and without
Frost, and snow, and, to give the grim foe drink,
Roaring and frothing at each other, drink.

Yea, the crows, the enlightened, the dear,
Vague of remembered, vain-glorious year,
Now, the soul, half turning, half turning,
Looks on the master's face, like a moon
Rising and setting, and looking from thence--
He, the Master-in-Law, who hath named
The king, Wielder, justly--who he was
When the poet came by the way to France,
And here, then, for the sight of a queen,
Hath called over the infinite sea.

Voiceless, perchance, to the Heart's desire,
Soul that hath found eternal calm in the flesh,
Is the nobler, softer the nobler man,
Hiding his own, the beneficent,
An heir of earth, nor in measureless length
Of the being welded to form and made
To shed the light of humanity
O'er the being for her great deliverance
Earned by her mighty natural.

Lavish of the realm in which the sea,
Scattered over the world, is trodden and trodden,
O Art, make now for thy perfections this:
That in likewise of which we are come,
When you alone man's heart shall unlock,
Afar, by some strange fate, in a world
Which, darkly inscribed on the ivory keys,
Was trapped by the midnight bird as a seal.

Love first that which the senses took
With aspect and thought, soul of beauty,
'Tis it, in the therefore, we are able
To fashion the bright loveliness
By which to the wondrous inner sight.
Love which yet lives, in beauty's light,
Alone possesses all excess.

Upward then from breast unto breast
Is drawn the elusive modesty
Of that purity, every whiteness,
That art hath in itself the law
Of all the seas, in each, sea-breathing
Rooted in the fields, wide-opening,
To the intimate heart's deep centres of thought.

From God-is there comes an inner light
That fills and feeds us with emotion
In lofty, unmeasured epics
Of beauty, that is love's abiding-place,
Thou shalt discern the complex play-ground
Of beautiful words, or my song will trace
The hieroglyphics of my thoughts,
And fathom why, and sing their glory,
Tracing them with deep tenderness.

Not only these, O little poets!
The world you know is full of them,
And perfect for you are they all.
For each, of these I have sung
Is full of the full, golden light
That through our fair poet-heart thrashes
Before his marriage with light:
The full-ed souls are the worlds.
But, dear books, in love's far dominion
I am your heart-deep, loving nation.

Hath she with such a genial voice
Uttered this outer world,--
With softest echoes, sweetest touch
Of hand, and foot, and heart,
For all men's wonder, more than those
Sylvanian music which,
Fading through his chrysolite vine,
Speaks, and makes visible
The radiant gates of daylight
======================================== SAMPLE 16 ========================================
 fell asleep,
His brow was circled with a weight
Of lovely thoughts. In dreams he read
The story of his fathers' deeds
Of wonder and of blood's remorse.
On heads of corn he held high feast,
In robes of purple, silken down,
His star-bright body hung in light,
His powdered forelock wore a crown,
With broideries of crushed burnished gold,
And rubies of the cobweb cold.
I saw him as he lay, whereon,
Upon a hill's fantastic crown,
While all his gathered life lay dead,
Like to some old musician's head,
Came to the cataract's dashing flow,
And there, in softer voice, he said:
"Why art thou here, a fen to roam
Far from the buzzing clamour of the dead?
Pluck up thy hasty fruit, destroy
With wine the brimming goblet's foam.
Come, drain the goblet's strength destroy,
And drink the brewage of thy thirst
Then, only then, with magic art
To waken from its long delay
The long hours of thy joyous play."

And now he heard a funeral-peal,
A sorrowing voice, that fared along
Beneath the moonlight's gracious lay,
And funeral-pipes that called to-day
Farewell, farewell, forever nigh!
At the outer door
Lay many a goodly kid,
Tremembered like a hare.
But his precious flesh was gone,
No longer young, nor yet
With any pledges of good grace
Fastened itself at home.
For past the feast and done,
On a shabby gray stone old,
That overlooked the well-built place,
And met by a small village gray,
And a small hut in a woody nook,
That stood there, near a gloomy nook,
Where the brown taper lit each hole,
And opened over and let in
Darkness and sunshine, sunlight and moonlight,
That glimmered through the windows' gloom,
Like an old friend's sepulchre.

Short the way
Here, when the snows were gone,
In summer, on the hill,
Close up the stile;
The snowdrop, with his head
Across his shoulders, hung
Like a bunch of flowers
Shaped in a sunny dell.
And the pears, that were the heap
Of flowers late so dear,
Trembled and flashed and fell
On the table there.

Nothing says this place.
The faded flower-bud,
On its dead lord's bones,
Was hidden close;
Its blooms were gone,
And the golden grass
Sifted dust around;
The lone Rose put forth its leaves
In the garden of her heart,
Whose sad thoughts wandered forth,
In many a humble mood,
Through the very solitude
That once was her own mood.

Whither the days go?
Take me, tender May,
Ye have passed away,
By the cold world's way,
Under autumn's sun.
Fields fresh with autumn,
Budding where the eglantine
Winds the cottage that once stood,
Where the alders stood.

Where the slanting yellow
In the warm hedge-row
Seems to bar the way.
Towers and fields with flowers,
Winding where they go,
And the traveller brings
His blind wand back to go,
Where they might not see.

Come to me at evening,
Come when the shadows fall,
Come in the gloaming,
In such an hour,
Such a wandering home.
I'll be your shield.
Fear not. Thou only, I know,
The gleam, the hope and you shall go,
While I smile on your face,
And sweet dreams in your voice.

Yet many a promise yet remains,
That my young days may still succeed
In useful converse sweet, but pain
To live in, and that need to breed
A love within me that shall be
More perfect in itself. The end
Is come, but soon or late.
O thou, by Heaven sent
To my bedside mast;
Come while I glory in my love,
In my low bed to pray,
A white robe and a star above,
And a blessed blessed day!

Bend down your head,
And look up.
Ye hosts of sorrow ones, come down,
Ye palaces of woe,
Prayer for the faithful ones that die,
And have no place to go,
But go up on the silent seas,
The lonely homes, and homes,
======================================== SAMPLE 17 ========================================
 from head to foot, the few trees which Christ's careless force
and spells will draw down to them, he will see that ever
the evil is done--hiding life's shame away from the seeker,
the hopeless perishing, the ignorant man, and he will gaze again,
turning from shore to shore and bidding adieu to the heroes.

When I once had heard voices, 'twas but a long while ago, and I
knew them the same--how should I know them?  Yet, God knows,
it is plain enough that not the angels, not the saints who
live always, not the redeemed,
must ever greet my spirit more closely than my
verses.  My heart still kept telling my very dear love's
story to me, but so many nights ago--so many years since
he told me all the love he could ask--and so many
moments since that time--his tale told of the love
which he could not withhold, yet still lives, in the distance
beforetime, when the glory of God glitters brightly in the
heart.

God sends me home with power,
With power to sound the lonely hours
To numbers of true worth;
To make the earth, the forest-trees,
To rosy-bosomed flower,
And mould the solemn thoughts to be
Which May-time cares to wean;
To blot the fairy-fleece
Which hides its loveliness and truth,
Its little hour of bliss;
To darken the deep-sea of woe,
And set the blue above it so,
That far from earth he trod.

Lord, grant me Peace; I'm slow to grudge,
Or pit me for my sins like these;
Lord, wilt Thou help me in my need,
Or strengthen me in dreams?
Rather than fail, as storms are driven,
And rigorously out endeavour,
Lord, send me Peace again;

To win no heart, to take no rest,
Then, never, Lord, forget,
Thy holy name we angels know,
That we are stretched in welcome so.
And grant us Peace again;
And strengthen us in this great fight,
Where One in Glory is;
That, to make all of time restored,
Belongs to me in heaven.

As the fisher remembers the sunnyted shallows,
When the winds are in fields which are parched and
unprisoned,
The line stretched, so long beyond sands or mountain,
But drifting away in the distance beyond
The quiet, still darkness, he saw that it reached
the shore
And the rushing wind, and the golden sea, and the
glory that crowned the bright bay.

And all the long night I would wistfully scan,
As I thro' the grey dawn I watched it rise,
With the flashing wing of a golden chrysolite,
And the ocean behind, and the leaping wind,
And the soft, sweet kiss of the lonely sea,
That makes Love home, and we two together,
To shore upon the sweet bay weather.

Ah, dream too bright to be dreaming
Like those far-away stars we see,
Who come to us, glad and unwearying
As Hesper falleth from the sea!
O, dream too bright to be weeping
Like those far-away stars we see,

He comes with a sombre, leaden wing,
He tarrieth in gusts of flame.
Ah, dream too bright to be weeping
Like those far-away stars we see,
To bear, as falleth love's bright wings,
His bright soul back to us and us,
To chant of grace in this dim air,
And feast us with many a star,
The music that doth not come near,
Whence no winged soul doth come near.

Ah, dream too bright to be weeping
Like those far-away stars we see,
To teach us how each one maketh
A vision and a glorious birth.
Poor fools, they cry, they love thee,
They hide thee with their hoods above thee,
They lash thee with their chains to rend thee,
They tear thee with their knives of love,
They bid thee writhe up in the wood,
Thy life is a mockery to love,
And love is a lesson to love.

O, dream too bright to be weeping
Like those far-away stars we see,
To teach us how each one maketh
His bright soul back to us and us,
To bear, as falleth his bright soul,
His bright soul back to us and us,
To bear, as falleth his bright soul.
======================================== SAMPLE 18 ========================================
 to the father as he came down
His Argives from the sun's way, and they chose
No armed men for the War-god.  Sudden bright
As the thronged scroll-clouds, when their handiwork
Fills the portentous bridge across the flood,
And the hero leaps out with his utmost power
Back on his own ship, and with one vast shout
In anguish and alarm the Trojans sprang
Crashing together, like a storm-cloud's cloud.
Such the confederate robins.  Who would dare
That the great Sea-maids bring them safe again
Across that narrow sea, and drag them back
From the stanchions where their brethren slept?
Then a great whirlwind threw them from their frames,
And smote the heavens, and they sank to earth.

Even then Achilles knew the deep desire
Of war-destroying foes.  He started up
Through the thick gloom; no flickering blazing sun
Gleamed above, no starry glimmer of blazing stars
Shone round him; from his temples swelled his eyes,
And his heart leaped with the bliss of that fair deed
As, running, he essayed to conquer them.
But the strong God withheld not in his heart
The vision of that Might-have-been.  Long time
He trembled, and in awe, all trembling, cried,
While his loud heart with anguish was o'erflowed.
But the great God withheld not in his heart
The vision of that which he foreknew,
Of that shame wrought, that honourable pride
Stamped on his unforgotten name.  His wrath
Marvelled at such indignity to him.
He suffered not that he should not fight
His despoiled people ever more in fray.
But now when a great host he beheld,
And marvelled, being wrangling, how to press
The Immortal gates again, he cried aloud,
"Dog, be no coward:  let the thing be cast
Into the very heart of a great Lord!"

Then from his presence shrank the Argive men
With awe-struck courage.  Onward then they poured
Indomitable wine, and made them thrall
With their great masters to their joy.  Long since
The supreme Fates had given him strength to rouse
The Argives on their knees to pity.  Him
They softened, but abashed.  With anguished heart
They banched him from the battle.  A great shout
Then rose for joyous hearts around their lord,
And shouted, and the people bickering ran
As the storm-showered river leaps upon the hills
And spurns the thirsty walls.  The chariots whirled
To meet the warriors, mad with eager haste,
And with their thunderer o'er the hollow wave
The limbs were quivering.  Each man, though he
Fought breathless round him, grasped the mighty spear
Which Achilles' broad breast bore, and eagerly
Would fain have thrust it from his mighty hand
And quencht it in his own despiteful heart.

So in great strength they smote him with their might.
Then did the Blessed Battle-eager draw
At last within a wall not far apart
Which o'er the mighty dead had fallen a-stretch
Before the Gods' stern doom.  There in the wall
Lay perishing the Thracian, as a babe
Blest with the firstlings of its mother's breast
And milk the little brooks of a mother's milk
On a cradle of the aged:  for Achilles' hand
Thrilled to a sudden the air, tremulous
And quick, and from beneath his feet as loud
Rushed a white steed fast by, as, wild with fear,
The rush of men rushed onward, or a cry
Pressed from the mighty heart; loud rang the stones
As on the wind of Zeus.  Tumult there came
Hovering, and echo of the pitiless deeds
Of those that perished in that battle-strife.

So in their multitude he rushed out like
A thunderbolt from Jove, in thunderstorm
Tossing the earth.  The chariots then were turned
Back to the rampart; and with clash of arms
And sound of heavy hurling of man-steeds' heads
Rose the great Amazons.  Anon the Greeks
Halted with panic-stricken hearts, and caught
The beams that flashed from their still-rooted shields,
For in that better fight they deemed them all,
But laid the earth in drudgery behind them.  Then
Marvelled the highest of the inthwits of their
======================================== SAMPLE 19 ========================================
.
"How still the sky! nor how the seas in brass
Scattered the mists,--alas! not those who rule
O'er rolling waves, who sail so ill at ease
Groping for mercy! how it is with me
Man tramples down, from all the vast domain
Of all that earth has made! And this is he
That must break Sin's chain, and break the free
Of man's desire! And this is he, the Lord
That captive led to shudder, and indeed
Such as he now rejoices, to restore
Peace to his folk, and daily to assuage
His of that woeful realm to come! And some
Heard in the murmurings of the multitude
And village preachings of a mother; some
Saw fervid with the faith that they believe
No less than they, to those who for the good
Compel the evil, and confound the good
For which they are undone. And lastly, see,
With just-accordant piety their hands
Healing and huge altar-laying have done
Their sacrifice, and poured their wine, and gave
Their God! And lastly, in that plenteous hour,
Since with the early-born they met together,
This Eve was named. "Come then with me," they cried,
"To the Unseen Land, the glory-haunted sea,
To the Unlighted Land! And we will sail
Each to his home again, till o'er us break
The unnamed Starry Dominion! See ye all,
How silver-feathered Eve went up the wall!
For lo! the light! she cometh! Go, and speed!"

So went they; and so crashed the gateway, each,
As, pealing, shouts the other from the stall.
They crossed themselves the doorway to draw back
At the long bright line of the unlighted track.

Then Eve stood still, and looked down shadowy and pale,
Like one impelled by some new-yoked control,
When he sees all the human multitude
Hanging in earth--the Adam and the Man,
Who, bodyless, with eyes that flash like fire,
Turn to the field--his porter! His askan
Rises, and looks, and beckons with desire.

The innumerable-throned Lord of all,
We greet you, O ye myriad-spreading stars!
We touch you with red meteors of delight,
And glittering things of the world afar
Pile before him in the confluence of far-off spheres,
And from his throne, like some resplendent sphere,
The flaming cycles go along and die,
Like little things beneath some infinite sky.
And far and near, the innumerable host
And pale-faced moon, that, whereof thou wost impart
The secrets of all worlds to other men,
Step before their vast stature. For the day
That brought them forth, was on the golden way,
And by their light about you shall be seen
Upon the world's far-wandering world the seven.
The passage--spring o' the cloud--even now,
Is clear, and all its waves are one wide law,
Which hangs with you, and passes as you do.
All things grow new and strange; and, so, I trust
That the rude sounds of this world are scarce a rust,
For thou art heard of, that in thee is heard.

Again the murmur runs, and from the sky
The thunders liquidness, and cloud on cloud
Swell the resounding hoofs--even now, methinks,
A sound like those of aspen-trees are wont
To quiver, and flash up in rushy bars
Into the atmosphere. I hear it sweep
With such a force, I know not how it comes.

All suddenly the gates swing back, and press
Up to the luminous upper upper vault;
The strong-lights' music climbing up the sky
Is heard, and the wide hall is dimmed as with a sigh.
Through all the palace rings a clamour of

Such as no other might be. So she fled,
The Shadow Lady of the skirts of Time,
Fair-haired, and flower-clad, and dauntless Thrice,
With mocking smile and glimmering beckoning throng,
Went wading through the heavy laden void
And brightening to the pool where threads of dust
Bent idly round and darker. There she stood,
Her sun-robed self behind her, then one breast
She lighted to a sudden and to rend,
And then her heart was snared; she reeled again,
As if to one
======================================== SAMPLE 20 ========================================
:
Thus verily I'll venture down
With sulphur to that nit.
A good fat creature was at home,
My husband and my darling wife,
And she was taken by the arm
That kept her there from harm;
'Twas one of those vile, grousome boys
Who stood upon the floor,
Who, for my sins, might well be famed
For making those ashamed.
Their neighbours and my milk-pans
Were not to blame at all,
The men they killed and unfortunate,
In thousands to extol:
Yet were they to the bottom filled,
'Twould make an honest thrall.
But still it was my great disgrace
To see them still take in,
The man who shot the curdard first
And after died of sin.
My husband and my brothers fat
'Twas all to make him well,
I thought it would be no disgrace
To take them in a quill.
But though the hands that he has gone
Those hands have left in vain,
The head that went, the shape that went,
We'll keep him in the rain.
That fowl who to the wind that's named
With plumes and bill and bag,
When weary of the yoke is broke,
May fly to meet the gale;
No earthly beast of earth, or sun,
Can to his funeral make
A human figure; or, as one,
His life may be redeemed.
For all from God, and saints, and kings,
And thousands thousands many,
A brother's welfare is a thing
Which makes him howl with pain,
And, bent on earth, he walks about
In sorry mood, like any cork,
For wanting in that small lost thing.

That saint, which now in human things
Hath passed away,
Whose body life and soul have clung
To be so long a prey,
Think how in heart he could be blessed
If not by death away!
O Church, how dead and mute, how dead
With all thy boasted bliss!
How desolate, how stark, how stark,
England! thy proudest bliss!

O broken, shattered, restless heart,
That, trampled, dealt its blow

Think how in heart had sunk that blow!
Think how in heart had died that blow!
Think how in heart had died that blow!

Come, knit the braid round brow that wears
The plaid that I must wear,
The ribbon that must travel too,
The plaid I cannot wear;
And think upon the fading rose
I leave behind my care,
The blue-bell that shall no more bloom
Because I would not share
The blue-bell of the skies, the rose
That withered when we sought the bower
To gather aught but sorrow
And left to sorrow.

Thrice, O thine eyes of tender light,
And if my feet be led
To the dear place where Vision dwells
That fills with love thy dead;
Thrice return to me that light
That filled the love we tried
To fold within our hearts again,
And find that it is thine.
I know not if this world be so
It yet may soon be mine,
But if, in days far sweeter spent,
The dream of hope is thine,
Remembering that thou waitest late
For those who wait outside.

And if, in happier days than these,
Thou shouldst not yearn for love,
Or fear the word he says, "Approach,"
Thou wouldst not wait to prove
That promise to thy lips is still,
For all would welcome will,
That to thy couch as bridal bier
Thy soul with gladness all should come,
That thou, when Death draws near,
Shouldst, in immortal guise,
In that pure rest to which the spirit clung,
An untroubled Spirit find,
Thou shouldst not sleep
Nor ask thy mortal help in vain,
But loving thee in all thy grief and pain

I am come to see thee--I am bent
O heart! at last to lull thy weariness
So when thou shalt the eyelids meet
I may not long to lay me down in rest.
O spirit of my soul!
Beneath the fellowship of one
Who ruled my fate while yet my heart was young
And thine in beauty grown,
Now when thou hast my heart to love anew
But scarce can know my own,

Then by thee all our thoughts should slumber,
And past each thought and fear of heaven--
O then, when I have learned to love the shade,
Thou wilt have grief to bear
And be as I were
======================================== SAMPLE 21 ========================================
 as he was,
With flint anon he could throw from the plate;
But the boy, seeing this, refused to feed,
Unfolding the straw, or empty the basket;
For Jumper the spit on the fire bestowed,
And they found their fellow an ox they hated.

Eagerly said Jumper, "This must be done:
Come, fellow! come! we have watched thy house,
We see the walls of thy dwelling to rue.
But what has Jumper done?"  'Twas said in the Greaze,
As he kicked his horse's foot, and his breeches' weight;
A half-star found him, and the whole world heard,
And a half-provoked fire burnt under his head;
He whelmed the horses, and his harness heared.

"It was an insult to me," muttered Jumper;
"Who else but Jumper should deal properly
With me, my brethren?  These Numidian dwellers,
The gallant Capuletos, men and women?
Had they been asked by aught on this condition,
'Twould grieve them in their hearts should have relied
On looking out for these white, terrified thieves,
The worst holds, and the worst does nothing.

"Yes, I am the man, as I should well have the boy,
A non- unfit man must not have an older;
He knows the thing already, and laughs in the mouth,
Beethoven or Utica, or chief of the Greeks;
But why shouldn't I tell you, then, of him, Jumper,
Whether he knew him, or I?  I know him well,
In answer to question, whether he knew him
Better or nearer; and this I am not;
Only the man, I suppose, was taken away,
The town conceals him:  the town then presents him.
He has an ancient city and little more,
Except what you ask for and help it receives:
Three great logs, trunks packed there:  this will stand for
Ninthric, for evening.  Strew him on him well
With furs; take off his robe with fillet, too;
Do what you will, let him have hose and stockings,
To-morrow may'st overtake him here, and so
With food and flowers feed him; let him see
An idler in the vesture of his dress,
I mean that, taking off the hat, he begs
To have no object.  First, let him devise
The whole disordered story:  he himself
Hastes by a horse's foot towards a river,
With as much heart as can both side of it,
To see if anyone may in his dream
In the region be a clown, as I have seen.
When a block's lying there is much to say,
And theBeing asked, who dug it up?  He first
Arose, and then the lying judge's plea,
And then went on:  but whence it came, I say?
Both of the bodies and the parts he there,
The souls and souls, the souls which did suggest
In that case, made the corpulence which showed
Consumption, as the mind was, through excess
Resembles it by ill indigence, whereon
The parts dissipated the sense of blows.
Next then, to be a person heard, I mean
A gen'ral voice; for much I know the means
Of bringing back to him my father's words,
And to his saying, 'What, what, in that third act,
Com'st thou to spy him?  Tell him what they bring.'
Then to the living judge 'Thou demandest,
O noble lords!  I will un-abasement
The censer's fulsome precept, and we'll say
How blessed are the Gods, and if not all,
They leave no less presents there than smiles.'

But this the instant, as the fine voice swore,
'O perjured witnesses! the guilty fear
Which first broke off, and then attested wrong,
Now not to utter offence or bite, or make
The deed itself a lie, but to prevent
From speaking of the crime to any sense,
Yet feeling of what guilt upon his head
By such a judge's was done, as I have seen.

"'O madman, think what in a clown you are!
Confirm the truth:  I tell thee, nothing false!
What you believe not, who believe not God?
That which is truth, if any, nothing seems.
In man you trust too much, his life, his death
Secure, and therefore innocent at last.
O, when
======================================== SAMPLE 22 ========================================
, brave Bopeepin, with intent
To rescue for the fleet the Grecian host
From great Aeneas in the halls of Troy,
Were crowded on with wondering arms. Then sprang
Alecto the immortal, for he deemed
His mother's son and her of noble race.
But Neptune, sorely troubled at the view,
Looked up, and marvelled at the work he plied.

He, seeing it was fruitless to his work,
Now drew the bow-string forth and slung it on the string,
And, thrusting it, urged forth his master's shaft
And darted at its head, and pierced the shaft within.
Just where the mark of the unerring bow
Fell in huge fragments, from the lofty tow
Of lofty Troy the arrow home he plied.
Of spear he smote him; quiver-bolts he left
And flinging it afar. He grasped the string
Snatched by the hand of ever-flowing shafts
Of Aeacus; in the midst he smote him dead,
And with his own hands caught it by the cord,
And, dying, the hand laid thereon, with the shaft still
Considered there and again, and the hand held fast
With the deadly arrow, and the string of the bow;
And in his own hands held a heavy stone.
So by his back upon the wound he cast,
And throned above the battle, and his heart
Went with a writhing sigh, and all around
Thwarted the arrow of death, and in his own wound
Dying he fell, and forth a living wound.

He fell there and with groaning, ever more
Points out the arrow from its home in the wound,
So that the arrow passed of death a prey,
And from the hand the bow-string draws it out
For his own hands to reap the last of the bow.
There, with his bosom covered o'er with blood,
On the fair bosom of his mighty friend
Stood Bopeepin, whose hands outstretched to kill
That murdered man, and draw the arrow out.
And all with mighty joy had filled his heart
To see the hand so like the hand of Fate.
For as the arrow drew the string he fell
Still as a mast it moved, still as if mauled
By axe or axe or axe-blade. But the wound
Achilles' steeds once smote, nor in the plait
With which the King did bear away the spear,
Till in his breastplate his beloved life
Fell out. And like a powerful eagle's beak
Armed with two spears was Sthenelus of Crete,
Whom, midst the rushing darts, whene'er he saw
Fire in the wound, he flung afar to fight
From all sides, as a father's hand is charged
With many a mighty buffet of the bane.
Still on the bosom of his friend was slain
That son of Troy, the death-spear, and he fell.
In Cleopatra's hand he wounded else,
While neck and liver liver with the lance
Out-stript, and on the orifice's floor he pressed
His brawny body, corse and flesh and all
The bones about that in his heart he threw.
Then valiant Peleus' noble son cried out:
"Patroclus, is this such a glory now
To me? What profit had I then to live
With one in this wound-wasted carcase rent
From my own head, slain by the murderess dead
Ere the blood touched my flesh?  Why did my hand
Rest on the wound, that here I see so clear
The wound, and recognize the bitter death?
But, that such glory may remain with me
While I am suffering still this deadly wound,
While Greeks and Trojans in the funeral strife
Are dealing with me, let me reap it then."
He sang awhile, then bravely spake to him,
And in winged words his courage roused:
"Great son of Tydeus, thou indeed have known
My sorrow, and my grievous wound I bear
For all, all that I have. Thou hast redeemed
Him in my latest hour, when it is born
That I shall call him forth to battle from
His deck of battle, for indeed, despite
Of body and mind thou art, as it were,
As free from body is as best of form.
Him once who, sitting near my side, didst bring
From out the hall the mail-coat that he wore,
For the war-shout, I know not whence, when
He hurled his buck
======================================== SAMPLE 23 ========================================
 it would have been,
That all of us had got within his load,
Before he turned his footsteps to his steed,
He had found some work that drove him mad,
He knew the manner of riding on,
It was so far from pleasant."

"I'll come to you," said Cole,
"With just enough of my tools.
"I'll learn the craft of riding first,
"And see if you'll keep them to be surpassed,
"For these are Orion's sneaking ones,
"Who look upon the Sun and Moon,
"And offer tobacco, to my taste,
"But, somehow, don't you think it brooks
"A good, deep matter in these matters,
"That country Cupid has to be
"He will be lacking in the forest,
"For he can work and he can run."

"What for?" admitted Swift.
"One that can do no mischief.
"He will have to fill the buskins
"With powder, and so hack and pitch,
"And he will be too late for tea,
"And, (tho' the job's as hard as his,)
"So, on the walls, the boy is born,
"And still the Bull keeps close to Heaven,
"Till evening shall retire."

A parson's boy, "Cease your boy!
"Those pies shall be our last."
"And for that's quite gone."
"Those pies shall be our last."

"No, for I'll stop
"An' don't know to whom."
"My dear," said Dick,
"I'd love to make a pair."
"And, with you, wear my best
"To do what's right in there."
They're out in the tavern,
They're in the cellar,
They're out there, and their stories
Are much too exciting.

My dear little Star, will you ever so nice?
Peppermint and appleblossom, sugar and rice
Are all the good things which my grandmother piles
Here in my garden, there in the country lane.
Peppermint and appleblossom, candy and raspberries
Are the good things that my grandmother piles
Here in my garden, there when the day shines.
Peppermint and appleblossom, cinnamon awm
Have neither barley nor fruit, they are good to me
All through the summer of life, and I can see
Nothing in this world so tempting as it can be.

Hey diddle diddlety,
The cat and the fiddlety,
The cow jumped over the moon;
The little dog laughed
"Oh, dear little Duckie,
Are you in a barn?"
The little sheep answered,
"Oh, dear little Sturdy,
You ought to be a pauper.
You ought to be a pauper."

The sheep looked very silly,
And looked very silly,
And the little sheep answered,
"Pauper not, for I'm gladsome,
And I'm goin' to be a pauper."
Then up jumped the little hen,
And away they ran,
All in the high winter-time,
To the fields where the golden grass
Islanded for half an hour

There was a little Pig, whose eyes
Were fair as elfin Brun;
He made a little supper,
And not one day envied
His Paa, so pretty and fat.
He ate and drank but little;
When he was thinking, "What a lovely day
To be so frisky, and not to play!"
"I wonder what they're going to say,"
Replied a little Pig, whose nose
Was like a Pig in cotton,

He was chubby, and tawny,
And ten to one, but one;
His waistcoat was a silver pin,
His face a golden sun.
And he had a little gun,
Made out of all red leather,
To shoot the little birds in,
And leave theabies on the air;
With which he sent them flying,
To bring a feather;

A rabbit on an apple-tree,
Who always wore a scarlet coat;
He was a red and yellow coat,
Perhaps because his name was careless;
But when it came to his true heart,
He said, "Although I hate to shoot,

"I love to hear the words you say,
And when you send them home they'll stay,
And all the flowers will turn your nose,
You know that I will stay and fight,
And scratch your very soul, good night!
Why, not a poor soul must I fight,
Unless, like
======================================== SAMPLE 24 ========================================
 in this brave.
To these:--from debts to dues, from towns to streets
Ceased, storing hard for the long moment's ease,
And something I half forgot that day, you know.
Think what you will of it, and you'll be gone:
--To the fields, to the woods, and the weary way,
The sleepy bees, the rustling heath-bells,
The ringing crow, the swinging cuckoo.
The kindly grass, the viewless hawthorn,
The song and voice of all things made for love,
The many, many seasons over-score,
And after till their life with time was o'er,
They toil'd to find it out, through those long days
Which Eve had often left, or could not take
For memory of some bliss from her, or me,
Aught the soft breathings of the summer. Love
The human landscape scarcely heeded now,
For the gray cheeks that would be bleached with bread
Were plump for the mere work. All things were his.
His journey, 'twixt the world and the hard work
Were his. Though these things kept their forms from touch
To see, far to the most, the beauty which
His childhood could beget; but these things left
A space for Nature's loving looks to wave
Before them and to give her. Silently, stealthily,
Out he went under sun, or resting-place,
Which a slow nomad fashioned for his thought,
And gave him thinking of. This was his first
Desire to be upraised, then sought him out
And gazed, as if in doubt. His search was set,
And no one knew what yet it might be. Quick
She caught the thought, 'He's nowhere in the place.'
'You come to fetch me!' With a bitter laugh
She half replied. 'No. Every note of his
Was his last wish, and he'd be here this night
With me. Each passing moment of his life
We all were in, nor cared what there was left
That could be sought by us; he toiled and groan'd,
Welded awhile, to win immortal praise.
He loved her. He was starving in the street;
Wept with his passion, anxiously he asked
What thing he could not do, what greater gain
He could not seek; what pain he could not gain
Was none of hers; and oftentimes he thought
'What I must do if I would wed again
And live twice o'er again.' But in his rage
He cried, 'I'll rather live with you and miss
What you're for marriage, than in all the world,
If so be that.' 'I'm done with it,' she said;
And he, 'Let's wed.' And to that passionate lord
He yearned. 'But I shall miss it' added, 'No.'

He cried, 'and I shall miss.' Her eyes grew dim,
And something trembled when he asked her why;
'You did not understand me.' 'I understand,
But not till then--I did believe you then.'
She said, 'I did obey.' He turn'd his head
And added, 'You saw that I was bound to love.
And if you will not trust the thought I think
As I did first when first you came to me
I'll say you love me. It's a heavy thing
To win love back; not so if I grow dull
And you must love me when you come to me,
And you must serve me just as I should love.'

Then came the hare's glad beating on her ear,
And she cried out again, 'It's all too much;
You loved me, Geraldine?' and therewithal
She sighed and sobbed, 'If I but loved you then,
I'll die of sheer neglect, for all the blame
On me, on your poor child.' But Vivian, 'You,
I'll not be hard to win me if I will,
(You'll get my offer if you will)--and so
If I will let you up and follow me
My vows won wholly out of Mary's heart,
I'll eat my supper, or come back to life
And hide my heart within it.' Then she thought
'I will be kinder to you if I will,'
And there she wept, and there she flung her arms
Back to her beating heart. But once alone
We went up through the wood, and Vivian,
With a bright beating heart, as only lovers
Who have known sorrow are content to live,
We took our way along the open walks,
And rested by the wayside well awhile,
And loitered at
======================================== SAMPLE 25 ========================================
 the CHAMER, or elegant steeds;
Or cob-horned peed his grace had prized,
And, in a form too fine for modern steeds,
Has ridden over some black-fruited hill
With a frigate on the watery plain
That wades below some gallant cavalier.
And now my simple tale, old foxen bird,
Has pecked the quivering limbs of girls and boys
With half a glance at the spray that stings
Their plumage in the clear wind as they pass.
The OLD CAUSE, though, in his gray old age,
He pours into the printed book the live
Romantic lays that touch the trembling heart,
And from the bloodstained feathers of their frock
Draw the deep breath of death, and haunt, and smite
Some weak but vivid bark in that bright ball,
Who, in the distant isle of his fond love,
Now counts but one unsteady stanza still
Sounding his sonorous canticle, and smooth
His silvery way beside the stream, to launch
His babbling torrent on the beechen oaks.
So every Muse of Greece whose harp has hung
The scaly fretting of that raven's wing,
And which, when put to use, unceasingly
Drops in the lap of breezy Helicon
His ivy wreath and lovely fountain-spring,
Let the fond Sisters, to her airy mood,
Twine round their limbs a bright and filmy dress,
And decorate in vestures of blue sky
Their snowy forehead and soft dimpled chin,
That rise from their fair hands like moving flowers,
And shine from their fair hands like water-cups.
How lovely is the mossy bank, and still
The curling rushes glisten in the sun,
In one green line among the old Apeloes
That stud the oaks for bees in their high pride
And overhang the castle's southern side!

There was a goodly quiet that down-hearted
Rode in the sunset on the grassy slopes,
The long, cool, silver pines, that spread their umbrage
And crowned the Titian glade like floating bells
That whispered "Blessed Mary" o'er the mountain.
A beautiful old mansion stood within
Its circling walls, that from the rosy sunset
Of a bright May, looked like a hilly nest
Of robin redbreast buds that fluttered white
And flung them fragrance-like into the meadows,
Lily-like, on the grassy slope, and closed
On their soft stems the creamy purity
Of its dark panes and leaves like hyacinth.
And all about it was a porch of leaves,
With ivy and wild vine and walnut-tree.
O'er it a vine-embroidered canopy,
Gleaming and warm with dewy-sprinkled savors
Of sleepy, golden-rod and chesnut-thicket,
Ripe cherries, and sweet musk-olias, and violets,
Primroses, and white lilies with dark eyes,
And rich gazelles, and chrismalacked hollyhocks
That hung above the door that that leaned above them.
The whole plantation stirred with a wild passion
At the scene now glowing like the tropic moon;
The glorious windows glittered with bright glories,
The soft soft echoes of the summer winds
That thro' the lilacs, low and murmury,
From the bright beechen casement there came stirrling
And ringing with a sound more lovely still
Than ever mortals have heard in Arabian dales.

These, the imperial City of the Moon,
The wonder of the earth, the palaces,
The many Temple walls, the Eastern crowns,
And the majestic ruins of an Age!
Was never witness seen so strange and beautiful
As the green wonders of those black hills and vales,
Which gleaming with the light and beauty of the moonshine,
Glowed like a lake of crystal that was washed with silver,
And glistened like a soft and amber light
When the sun sheds his benisons upon the earth!
And, all around them seemed that Temple, carved of white,
The work of Nature's handiwork, and set
In flashing raiment of bright buds and bluer gold.
It was an hundred and seven daughters of the earth,
And a thrice-fifty and three maidens of the earth.
The eldest of the young men was a queen,
With a fair golden head and fair cheeks,
And a ruddy cheek, and a rosy mouth,
And
======================================== SAMPLE 26 ========================================

Had not he said a little thing!
So Aunc noses, prayers, and psalms
Were far less dear than their own wills,
And pray'd to Death the Lord to die.
In such a case the chequered board,
Whose stings struck dead the dead,
Had more of shrewd portent expressed
Than a boy's ringing--hoary, gray,
Blue, white and brown, black, crackling, grey,
Spare't you--for they were mark'd by sight
Of an undelible dinner-table.

To choose each crisp and eager thing
Of hanger-life was the cool trysting
With dainties of an hour or two--
Last night--when, deeming himself distrest,
The "encer-barrels" flash'd and bled
With scalding tears; for, at his best,
The touch-box set, wherein were slung
The patience of the aged young--
And joyously that laugh had sung,
That none forgot to raise the song;
That none regretted aught were heard
But the musicians--oh, 'twas hard!

Whispering out tenderly the while
The lutes were crackling in the smile
Of the warm evening--and once more
Had he, too, joined the melanch crew
Before their song lay to and fro,
With uncontroll'd tears for his winning.

Again, where now he stood or stood,
He, seeking out the willing hand
Which aye, more buoyant, smooth, and good,
That day had spent, it must be said,
More pain the more, for than was said,
Or answer could be made;
That the same headlong barbarous band
By the child's bare arms was well sustain'd,
A years ago--so curious-read--
Had sate beside the duchess' waist,
His knee as well had dropp'd upon,
To feel his mouth so slightly drawn,
To melt his lip as gently now,
As its own innocent kiss allow'd:
To dream, and never wake again!
That his young life was too enamour'd
To live, nor dream of any failure
On the seas of Death as bright and gay.

He never fail'd--for he was strong
As some proud bird that meets his mate,
And his own heart beats quicker when
He strikes it with a wiser clime;
And so it went. The charm was soon
Bestuck'd together; quick as thought,
Flashing between the brows as cream,
Full stream'd the word--as round the ring
The maiden ran with eager spring.

O thought of that unselfish day,
That miss'd the hermit long away!
That call from such forever rest
As might the spirit, which was best!
O pain of all the parting bliss!
That bids me think what parting kiss
Held her above his lips and his--
The kiss that never brought him near,
The kiss that won him to be true,
The kiss to be as woman too!

All this he granted--for, no more
Than at such leisure he had store,
He pass'd again, in fever's flight;
He caught the heart that yearned for light,
And rent it up in sighs of sighs
Between the lips that yearned for light,
Until the voice by sorrow woke
Both at the hour of morning, spoke,
At once to her, and did not make.

But round that starry shrine, that look
Whose ray is white as mountain brook,
Another light steals from above,
A fitful radiance from the sphere
Of love to both, that burns more clear
As heaven's own sunset burns in love,
Than she,--ah, half so tenderly!
Not cold, but like two maiden dears
Breathless, yet faint in beauty's tears,
That round the ring in solemn row
Doth whisper her soft natal vow;
Not cold, but like two maiden dears
She blush'd with tears: thus every day
Doth fall;--and 'mid the city's roar,
Or in the wake of summer morn,
To listen to the blithe and gale,
Hear not the whispering wind, which chills
The ring, on which those eyes would gaze,
Though high that night it waits for stills,
As if some solemn memory,
Both breathed and weather'd in their beams,
Should fold the cradle of the stars;
And thus, into those eyes that peer'd
Betwixt the crowns, a bridge of spears
Planted, as if the deity
Of heaven itself should kindly
======================================== SAMPLE 27 ========================================
, you think about your turkey;
They see a matter which they're too fond of,
And which they don't care for,
So if I add not this,
And save my poetry
It's almost surer, surer.

Went down the staircase
And in he stood awhile,
Then cried to himself,
"To have a relish
A little relish,
A little relish,
A little relish,
Upon the field of war,
A little relish,
A little relish,
That is my darling."

At the window sat a club boy,
And watched his big face well,
And shook the big club from its burden,
But therewith mocked the yell,
And cried, "Fall back, and eat your bread
While only the keeper keeps!"

"Soldier, soldier come in training!"
Ankered with many a yell,
Gazing with fixed grimaces,
Clad on with silken dresses,
Tired with new life's new distress,
Coming screwed till you can dress,
And with your arms wide open,
And your elbows on your knees,
You who were six months old,
I loved Captain Kidd.

Marching was his work well done,
When I put my hands on you,
Marching was my darling son,
And I put him back with you.

"The big black band, you know,
Was horribly fulfilling,
When they all came down the way,
The boys had all been mourning;
The boys all screamed and quaked,
Their stumps were shaking,
As a vision of beauty--
As a passion that's unbroken!

Then I slipped away,
Like a delicate crystal stone,
And from my pocket slipped
Tones of indelicate cannon,
Through my feathers, torn and furled,
And the black battalions
Drew the flag-staff round the world.

"I had no rest: I had no joy:
Nothing else seemed pleasant,
The shadows of star-worlds came,
The glories of the dumb.
Stole my threadbare songs:
Went my music and my cloaks:
One went up in my cellars
To the under-brassy.

I had then to work again:
I had so many songs;
Now I laugh out of my pain
Drinking with thunderous wings;
Now I weep a happier strain."

So the sullen evening went.
I and Haw were out alone
And he who was not left alone
Sent to the others joyful news
How Haw had got a gun.

In a dark hall a huge redoubt
Sat with blank lid across,
Like a weary drunkard's heart
In a wretch's drunkenness;
And he thought, "How cool it is!"
Spent with the great dead king
Till the blood ran over him:
Spent with the brave live men
When the cruel world began.

Weep not for the dead king
When he sends you home;
Who shall carry you king
When the war goes down?
When the lady leaves her lord
He is sorry for the grave,
With the rose of summer and treason
In the loam: the beauty sea
Of a country sweeter for thee
Than for him, good woman!

Live and let him have his whim,
Weaken to him gray with time,
More than let him dream atween
A grind in the realm of men.
Clive and weas and steaming brass
Never have to tell him of,
Having cast the camp's renown
Under his eyes, alive
For one poor look and cry:
If he had but known and missed,
And the redness of his dress,
They he had not known and missed,
Or the whiteness of the press.

Squandering a thousand miles,
Weary of changing mood,
He that the winter suffers
Found but an endless food,
And the thing that lived but in it
Lord of the hidden soul,
Gave it the touch of it,
Touch of his hand and whole
Beheld it, and his eyes,
With the brown fool-miracled hell
Ever uncouth, and seen
Tortures of grisly vice,
And things as shameful and as vile
As the mean thoughts of mortality.

High he went up to it,
Burning out blind,
Killing it with the strength of fire
And smoke, and roaring 'In,
Beyond the length of sky,
Far down in the blue vale,
With a dream and a loud roar,
Past the firth of the purple fen,
Out over the icy moor.
======================================== SAMPLE 28 ========================================
 is there, and hopes no other ill
Than water fume, that curles, and flings them here?
Why say I as it is? What said your friend
When ye went singing thus?

Some way of cheering comfort or distress,
From the chief topic of Dempster to ask:
What words did any man express?
And did each one express?
Did any one know clearly how they went?

When I saw you, my fair one, speaking so,
I could not but believe it ye were blind,
And but the tale that Aesop would unfold
No meaning did my heart diviner grief;
And could, like other bridesmen, be of cheer
As glad as I could then be made of stone,
I should speak quietly in this same tongue,
And your kind presence cheerly bade me bear
My burden upon sorrow, and could say
That all unweary I have borne the wrong,
Longing to find you again.

O dear St. Andrews Bay,
With many a happy way
And a sonnets waving free
I catch your light winged way!
The voices that you sing
I hear in loneliness,
And when in theltring
Your water-songs increase,
I taste your sweet and strong
O woman with the smile
And the jocund air,
"He reached it,--and he bore it all a child!"
O children, happy and fair,
Beneath your mother's sod!

At dawn the day departs,
The fading east withdraws his light,
The Sun comes slowly forth to light,
The Shepherd is at rest;
Come hither, my whole heart,
Come, with the mother's love,
And welcome you, and blessed be,
The friend of my youth and me!
O for an answer to the cry
My heart has borne to-day!

O for an eye
That has been bright with tears,
A heart that can understand
And fail to set it right!
"Then follow on the cry
Out of the East, to-night!"
And so to the world go they
To the endless gates of light!

And yet to-day
The strange light sleeps before them,
The dim light is gone from me;
I hear the sad bells toll,
I watch the uncertain streets,
The light upon your pale,
I catch the fading gleam
Of the last last gates of destiny.

I had love in my heart
That was a shrine
And flower and tree and star;
I had love in my heart
And glory in mine!

Not the grave of its owner,
Not the sepulchral shares,
Not the radiance of light
Glorified with sorrows and cares,
And not all the tears
That sparkle in all the unspoken skies,
Not all the bright words
At the darkened Gate of the eyes!

The implacable door is silent,
It has no key to the earth,
No key to the heaven of stars;
But the porch of one day is strewn
With a sky of calm, kindly peace,
Full of the peace of her peace
As who should find,
Before the days have changed,
A blissful couch, a mate.

A hush is in the sky,
The clear sky turns to grey
And the chill winds seem to doubt
(Not heeding the wonder)
Why why? because
I loved him so long ago.

An hour ago
I said in a low voice
That he loved me before his face
That the old graces to replace
Might have been foolish, but could not quite -
I only knew that the old gods must
Not be forsaken.

Gods have forgotten
The prayers that are pious,
The hatred unfaithful,
And love, that deceives you,
Who have never forgotten
Praise and forget,
God's prayer fulfilled -
God's rose and thymy,
But one like the yew
For the bud and the flower,
Whose lips, unkempt
In the June sun's bloom,
Have no share in gloom.

Hush!  One was singing to me
Of a song made of eternity,
And the light was dying,
From the lands where it lay,
For the soul who had never again
Grow glad for an ecstasy
That was singing with him;
Of a song held with him.

Of a song held with him.

I went back to the earth
To the light of my birth,
And I heard, as I lay,
The mounting of his feet,
And the old, old song.

"I am listening
======================================== SAMPLE 29 ========================================
.

O Death, thou hast a pall
Upon this cruel breast,
Thou hast a crimson shroud
Upon thy scowling crest;
And on thy hollow throne,
Long have been worshippers
Of some poor ruined thing
The thunder shook from sun to sun,
But now thy funeral-song is done.

Beat back the drums! Let mourning cease
To chant the requiem of the just!
And the old world's a tomb
Without which all too long
Loves not the loudest tongue
Of all God's creatures dark and drear.
His thought is strong, his hope sublime!
Yet does not Death his vigil keep,
A blind man's unbelieving crime
Neglect in that dark shroud he sleeps.

Dost thou not hear us pleading cry,
With unavailing prayers,
As we kneel in that voiceless grave?
Does the dull earth his tribute pay
Of clay, to his unweeting hand,
The grievous seeds of this frail band
In the wild bloom that bursts in bloom,
Hath God indeed in each short hour
For each oblation--fire and flower,
Cannot but burn to ashes--fire?
O Love, without our prayer,
Look down from heaven above,
Lift us a little toward the skies,
Lest in our love-sick eyes
The world be all too dark for thee.

O Palm! thy sisters pluck away
The stricken sparks that we entwine,
And thou, for thy sad sorrows' sake,
Dost hope to hear us moan and sing?
The flower's withered leaves are cast
Along the glimmering branches;
Below thy gray and shadowy crown
The lordliest wreath is torn.

The throne is broken; yet it seems
Forever strong as truth,
When years of bitter brine shall stream
Into the mouth of youth.
Awake! Cast sleep, lest waking, thou
Shouldst waken from a dream!

Thou canst not see what is within
Thine hour of anguish here.
No, not in dreams must he who feels
His heart's blood quiver in the bond
That binds us to his heart.
The anguish in the common cup,
Though but the sign of strife,
Is of the crowning sorrow's cup,
The universal life.

Oh, not on the lonely plains,
Lulled by the heavy blast
To rest from the inmost soul,
Could the twin-throb and the chain
Of the beasts of the waste remain;
But the burden of thy woe,
Blessing the heroes who are free
To all men, to thy queen!

"Oh, my brother!"
Shines the rifle cracked in his hand,
"Halt!"--for the silence, grim and dread,
Stands the garish church-yard wall.

Leisurely the uplands look down--
On the stately shadows all--
On the city of the poor,
Where the driver's son returns.

Wildly tread, like the foot of man,
On the city of the free,
Least its worship by his will
May be powerless--even he,
Only, hath the gift of day,
Broken the arms that crush away
All its folds that day has stored,
Sealed from the stress of angry storm.

That a prison still is Time,
That with earth its chains may bind.
Only, not a dungeon vast,
Shall this one day halt and keep
All that is and holds it fast,
Crush its ashes and its ward;
Only, but for me, would'st know
How they twine in hearts that glow,
Strewn by some forgotten hand,
Scatter, as it forced them so,
All the old and thrice-wrought bands
That guard these dust-embroidered lands.

There the murmur of the streams,
And the singing of the birds,
Reverberate welcome and mild:--
Yonder only shalt thou see,
Weaving this son right and sane,
Towering far, like the too-much rain,
All these with the same clean heart.

There shall come to thee the jests
As the chains on him who betters,
There shall come to thee the smiles
When he sees thy wound and scar;
And his war-whoop kindly rings,
Singing just for him that sings;
There the festival of earth
Shall loudest bechoes her horn,
And his playmate, glad to know
He may laugh, and fight, and dance,
And the island ever shall be there.

Yes, thou art a dream, and
======================================== SAMPLE 30 ========================================
,
To sell the best and most."

Just yet the moon had passed, and through a cloud
What seemed a little sky with low-hung shroud
Marked the long mail the little army wore;
But soon the white and gold alarms the view,
For they were bent on plunder, sword, and shield.
Scarce did the keen inspection drop a spark,
The silver lake had cleared the sandy beach.
"As yet the smallest thing," you might have said,
"Must steal," and that was in December's day.
The French camp slipped into the evening gray
Which gave new colour to the setting day.
The French camp camp, through the hills, across the dew
Pretended speedy, hand in hand, and lay.
They heard the cry, but saw no sun; the blast
Prevented; and the death, their common dread,
Stole on the prospect and perhaps had passed.
Tears, at their eyes a double light suffused.
Leapt their cold eyes, their honour made them bend
To read the ensuing morning read in vain,
The scenes on which their comrades cried in vain;
Now getting lost, now gain'd, now vanquish'd, blind
To see their evil messengers again.
They saw their wicked traitress, and her vow,
How she avers banish'd from her native land.
To poison France the Emperor was design'd
To conquer France by dint of means of war.
That death to France the king no longer tasted,
A life of hopeless and unguarded merit.
Her old dishonour, seen so long, had 'neaded
The peerless blood of Gage and Barbary.
To France the day was set in tempests came;
And thence the fortune of the youth and dame.
To France was given the evil day's misdeed,
And cruel was the plague which laid them lead.
Barbarian marks each neck and hand attempted,
By many a wound, by many an old assailing;
The knightly form of twenty fighting horses,
Who disunite away the galling chains,
And plunder from the Pagans land and then
A soldier made for France the insolence,
And told the laws they knew, and thus affronted.
The duke, who saw their wiles with angry eyes,
And lordly stature spied and visage woof,
Granted his signal and advanced his bands,
That they a fearful fight might prepare,
Of broken shields, of women cut in twain,
Of screaming men, or bids his troops complain,
All, all the dreary wastes, must yield their food
To the fierce savage boar, and thus persuade
Their vanquish'd foes to yield their lives, and thus
To their slain troops bring danger, death, and shame.
King, Charles, and Dardinel, the chivalry
Of Gascony, had given a pass to three,
That, were they kill'd, the Christians would not die
For grief, but for that instant would they fly.
At that defiance by his prance they ran,
For great was their desire to quit the field,
The distant mountains, and the vales that were,
And where they left their mangled arms and shield,
As if that they might slaughter yet be made,
If with that evil will the Pagans made,
They should have rest and safe escapes afraid.

Where they besought the advancing army to
Suppose assault, fierce battle heretofore,
And still continuing on their feats they stood;
In looks and gesture leftward, looks and hands,
With his fierce eyes beholding, strove to seize
Him, that unlook'd-for combat, but the knights
Whose weapons, in their mood, he thus bestow'd:

"And in what purpose, wherefore keep we back?
Could we have turn our faces to the foe?
Swear and protest, and die, before we pause
To find us still unsatisfied revenge."
This said, his knights; with firmest looks his suit
He charg'd, and to him spoke without delay:
"Sir, you have wounded me so sore, that I
No visage anywhere can recognize.
But bear, let me become an Ortwine hack,
And lead this madman out, and undertake
To whet the sword, and kill him as he doth,
And come no nearer to him: let him run
Till he have fought, and then before him run."

When these words were heard, they lit, or donn'd,
And up the sum kick'd with their biting swords:
Yet him nor knight kept back, but stood apart
Amidst the Pagan's
======================================== SAMPLE 31 ========================================
 within thee----
Is there aught that can be more?

Ah, not there thy voice can reach
Thy heart of hearts in me;
And ever after shall I hear
Thy eloquent self-praise, who are still as the morning star.
O strong heart, blood-red with gladness
'Tis not in thee alone
Thy fate and mine is one.
Thou art my life, thy words I defy,
Still barren in thy surging die.
Yet, till thine eyes grow old and dim,
No more at night my heart shall hymn
Itself for me in air, in starry skies,
Unnoticed, unentailed, unentraced, unfallen,
As a bird's unseen wings o'er ocean.

There are songs of youth and death,
Wild thoughts and hopeless quarrels--
A shameful life of sullen folk
Where love and death alone come true.
Though mine arms reach not your feet,
Mine eyes still weep and murmur;
Your long hair is uncrowned and torn,
Your hair with loveless locks and scorn,
And the strength of a red goad
All down your frame is known,
And a stanch and bitter bone
Gangs from my throat o'er your head,
And this hour by a dead man's side
I shall watch you cross my tide.

"Hear, sister, sister, speak,
What wouldst thou say to me?
The Earl who, on a rock,
Sits like a tall, old oak,
And we two by the crumbling grey
Rises, and sits by his lady-side."
"Hear, sister, sister, speak,
What wouldst thou say to me?
The Earl who at thy feet
Trembles at thy powerless feet,
And for me words, fearful
Of losing thee so dear, so dear:
'Mis lure thou not, nor boastful things
From ages yet to be,
But rise and know a field of wings
Which made thy brow a throne,
Where in his boyish craft
Thy bearded elfin
trail has never more been known,
And of his iron heart
Shall end our battle-ore.

"And thou wert born a King,
And upon England's throne
Hadst turned thy face away?
Nay, sister, nay! nor say
Of earthly things thou art the King.
What wert thou?  Was thy birth
Born of one maid's hand?
Nay, sister, nay! not so:
From birth and death, thou shalt not go,
To earth--to heaven, again--
And this thy dearest father-summer!"

(Child, vol. iii.  Early Edition.)

Come, and be pitiful
with love,

(The fair are about.)
Be pitiful and trustful
that women
shall know!
You have nae cares for,
as well as kisses,
as for little lasses,
I'd call you daisy
Because your pretty lasses
have drawn in
from them?
Yet we're glad, sister,
you've nae cares for,
For little lads and lasses,
weylike what no man feels,
We are all in love.
You may be gowned for,
but may be glazed for,
You'll find two white snails
beyond you're dwined for,
you'll find two globes
Of ice melt earthward
through the rivers,

It's a seared hymn, and some days we are dreams
of ninnocence,
And now I get homesick about the seeds
and tares and gilly,
And I am sad at heart for the little cups
I hang at counting them,
And think that I just must.
How I am thankful, I ask you!  And how
glad I look at you,
That with no day to dally,
And with no work to do,
And that no work should chide me,
But that life would find me,
My own lives would be twined in the little buds
between me and my maiden
And the wonder in the stars
That grow about the ways of the other gods
through me!
And should I set my face to the amorous kisses
of gods that are for men,
I'd build with the reedy grove of my lady's love
A weeping-sweet sweet grave
For her buried love,
And the wine that is in the well for her
whose hands are cold to-night,
With the sea-water dripping
And wine that is nigh to to to to-morrow,
======================================== SAMPLE 32 ========================================
 shall be the way we wind.
This world is things to me unknown--
The world is not my home, nor throne;
My palace is the dream I crave;
To day is all my being brave:
I am the meanest slave to slave;
To day is all my being brave:
I am the slave, I am the slave.
To day is all my being brave:
I see no scene--no scent--no fave--
The wall is there to break my sleep,
The hedge is close and bitter deep:
And ah! the world's a shadowed grave.

Forgive, forget, or love me not!
And take the road I went, with you!
Forgive and lie beneath the sun;
And let the past be comforted:
I am the slave, I am the king,
And from my soul its likeness flings;
The sword is not for me, but kings:
For me the groan of bit and shell;
For me the yew, the shafts of hell;
For me the sinew and for me
The wind that tramples on the tree;
The sun, and all his ways are well:
I am the slave, I am the king.

I walk alone within the garden--
But all the hues of morn are gone;
The wind flows down upon the water,
And there's a light where stray the bees.
I see the robin singing lowly,
I hear the thrushes flute and coo.

I hear the wind above the orchard;
It sighs, it sings, it moans, it moans,
And from my heart it falling, sobbing,
There came a bird that flying waits.

Winged with gladness, he flew over
The blue far hills of afternoon--
And took my hand, and led me, lover,
To my heart's beloved tune.

And as he touched the sleeping honey
I sighed to think how glad he was.
And like a dream I stood in Eden,
And knew the coming years were near.
How should I know that after sorrow
There came no bird but pertly sings,
And I remember that the morrow
That once I was a minor heard.

This little book, this sundered book,
These drifting hours I thus define,
Is wholly worthless now; I look,
And all my joy is wasted with the wind.
Some hours when flowers are dead
Comes one to make a gilded throne,
And offering one have put away
All that has been her whole life down.

Then will I bid the page recite
What things unborn shall be to-night,
How love is slain--how far apart--
The world, whose love was the world's heart.
I call to him the deep blue night
That lies so deep and still and cold.
I call to him and hearken how
The winds are calling at the gate,
And though our love, far more than life,
Is spread beyond its mortal date,
It leaves no trembling thrill or strife
To wake to life new-born in the dawn.

I cannot see what love can do,
For doubts, and fears, and scruples seem
To make all music of a man.
I see no doubts; I do not know
That heaven can only seem so low,
For earthly lights and love to burn
While ever it light laughter spurn.

I do not know what joy can be
In the brave days that are no more.
When sorrow set me free
I have no grief to say "Farewell,"
But trouble yields no help to me.

I stretch my arms and cry,
"If I have loved--I die!"
I find no heart to break
My weariness to-night,
And yet--could I but wake
And say "I have been broken."

I would see none of those,
And I do not deny
My love as true as she--
I hope she will not die;
I should hate her, she!

So as I can see her now--
Perhaps God gives no sign
That my despair shall find
An Eden that I did not see.

Then I put my arms about her neck;
I would taste my sweetest wine,
And though not the least---she ne'er would shrink,
Though I loved her not the whole.

So she told me to cage,
Though she liked me not the first,
Why I love her not the first.

And when I was safe from home,
If my folly or my sin
Had not murdered me,
I would stumble over life, to see
Sorrow born of woman's love

======================================== SAMPLE 33 ========================================
And the barns of Yorkshire whelp their food.

And where the dead of the winter torrents leap
To the banks of the strong Atlantic,
My boys lie sleeping beneath the rock,
And their guileless lives are a hollow chasm.

And anon beside the sparkling brine,
I will watch them sail by the silver spray,
And rest them on the kisses of the brine,
Whilst the birds are singing sweetly away,
And I shall hear, while the blooming urchins play,
Coo calling Christ-and-Pan below.

And if I get in to the orchard-plot,
And follow Christ to the snow-crowned hills,
And if I get, as the tortoises flock
Round the wilderness of heaven,
'Tis my chance then to rise in the crimson dawn
And see myself where He stands.

For it is this that lifts me up to stay,
And I wait for the summer that will come,
And I leave it all to Him.
Oh, God, how my boyish heart is sown
With hopes, full of sweetness, full of grace!
Though I go forth, far on a distant trail
Through leagues of desert space.

One word is enough; for all I lack
Is a smile of thanksgiving on the face,
A breath of free air in the hair of storms,
And a soul akin to man.
One word is enough; for all I lack
Is a breath of thanksgiving on the face,
A breath of the wind in the hair of storms,
A breath of the surge in the hair of storms,
And a soul akin to Christ.

For he that is with me at midnight
Is without longing, is hardly free;
He cannot live that he makes the light
Of his soul unacknowledged.
And a love that shall endure forever
Deep as his heart, shall endure forever
And never end.

Linger, let us lay the golden dial
To show that life is not a running stream;
Let us linger but a little while
Till the silver sands shine golden and the moon
Shall wake and meet us, and we only seem
To flow for ever on the silver stream.

There are thousands in millions toighting on the sea
With a song for us, who are turning gold to silver bars;
But the richest song of all--
A song for us and singing that our hearts may sing--
For we are bound to love and the sun is shining bright
As we launch our boat to anchor in the harbor of the stars.

Farewell, my brothers, we have sailed for evermore!
Farewell, farewell, our love and care,
Our friendships, hopes, and our belov'dness, and our prayer
And holy love;
We have pray'd in silence and we may be bold to sing
As we dream of fairy-land,
In love, in sleep, in danger, and in darkness,
On the rolling deep, in danger and in darkness;
But we know the holiest song
That ever pierced the heart of God.

For they said that not a soul can dare
To lift the burden of that task alone,
And sit upon the blessed Virgin's chair,
And sing the blessed songs,
And glorify the helpless sentries--God!
And holy Marys raised their chalice high,
And gave her incense, and they hung the censer's light,
And raised their lamps to bless
Our joyous feast,
And with voices sweet and pure the time
Shed o'er the silver pillars of the door of paradise,
And glided in the dawn
Of those long-haunted, pure innumerable days,
When to our love the universe was given,
And we had no more fear
Of the crownless fate,
Which, beacons of one King, alone was manifest
From the birthless East.

King Hallelujah did with gentle fall,
And hastened where our King was crucified;
And with alacrity
The royal presence of the King of Heaven
Almost shone forth.

But humbly, lightly lay
My offerings at His feet, my Queen, my Queen,
And saw Him fall,
And burst His bonds, and go,
Her weeping robes, into the wilderness,
And fain would weep
That He had found His love so long unseen.
And when the morning ray
Was sinking to the red,
Then to the King, my daughter, stood my King,
Stiff in His joy and dread,
And when the spirit of a royal dream
Wasted and passed away,
Yet the woman spread her wavering wings,
And touched His feet,
======================================== SAMPLE 34 ========================================
 and engage
In power and prudence; then to their aid
He must return (if his country's good)
The vauntie and surplaile of all
Belie his own: but, what to him comes forth
Of th'Elizian fame? He certainly merits
Beyond all others, who averr
He should be call'd his blessed: for that name
And office awes him, who as a grudge
Hath honour'd it of him, and is belov'd
At callings in the Serpent, who assayes
Grievous revenge for his accomplice,
As it hath power to do: for in the deed
He neer before did with his matchless foe
Angelic fall.  That popular character
And goodly counsel which they gave to Eve,
And all who in it were: to these it seemed
Hee had not ended till the Serpent should
Have made a ende of his own works, not long;
And in the records of this Golden Mean
Lived safe his unblam'd, and his workes not long.
So he created Adam, and first made
The woman, the Work, and theaimer-work,
Thir sex and produce, which yet he saw
Unmindful of, and fully of thir use
Drove out of Paradise so deifi'd,
It half obcom'd, the only work on earth,
By art to do it good: that done, partake
The pleasures of those goodly sons of Eve,

For which thou hast such help, they on the tree
Were chas'd, not seen; nor fruit mature, not high'd,
Earth-struck, in all her delicacie
Draughto and Laplandie: for on the East side
More pleasant it seemd to grow, fresher, Earth
Meets with her eye-lids on the Pummer Hoar,
And with her long hair hanging all abroad
About her sooty Beames; which done, retire.
To mocke with her suspition: she at once
Devoutly fell, and on her lap half-fall
Fell wisht, and wisht, and uttering lamentati
Herod the fair, her former state the same
Who first her sinew left.  Him all the while
Fell pain'd, and from her, one or two, her flesh
As supple shook, as she fell off from Heav'n:
And oft as underneath the ground he lies,
Extends his coverings vain, or less her guilt,
So on a bush seated, and with her oft
Calls him, and him at rest, her orison.
Nor soft the flesh where Lædabis had lain,
Nor melon artful sound, nor herb, that gave
Me false delight, nor herb, that might becom
Though hard and lazy, fail'd the listning ear
Of lazy ADAM; bootless, she not mourns,
As not of better life, that was not born
To tend his sport, and after, wood and floure
To tend his flourie leaves, still inly sad,
Though perfect else in mould; harder than ice,
And harder far to ice.  While now her rage
Labouring to throw him over the hot Duke
Boldly into the fire, thus, over all
In person, at th' assembled throng she call'd
Ominous of aspect, 'Why, ye cursed crew,
'Spirits and favourites of Heav'n, say ye
'Now Deaft us with' this famine, if we live
To still the ocean's rage, and, row the flood
In such a fury, we can still abhorre
'Gainst the sea's everlasting roar: go we
'The ways of God, how we may best forswear
'To do our maker, whatsoe're the Foe
'Tis to refuse; for never will be doast
With human kind, but if Gods level high
And urgent against theirs, none shall presume
To heare their cry, till the wild uproar stirr'd
All Heav'n and Earth with lamentation loud.
I told ye then he should prevail and speed
On his bad Errand, whom ye now behold
Ranging sublime in air his golden flood.
Nine dayes he feasted, till the tenth approachd
Of that fair morn, when heavie clouds at length
Came gently on, and the Sun's face divine
Dwindled throughstreame, and showd a land of Gods
Wondrous to sight, though one so loud should call
His people multiform, and planets run
Among the constellations, that
======================================== SAMPLE 35 ========================================
 at evening: I'd call'd out,
And said, "Give you your supper, my child."

Wake up! wake up! the hour of your dew
Hath pass'd--like a linnet in the blue,
Now hoary as ever it was wont,
Now purple, and now all of white,
To show it, because it now seems old:
To-morrow!--Why, get on and away!
Think! think! think! see what a moonlight gleam'd
In the lone place below!

Reach up my book, and view its rim!
How it whirls up and down!
I have scarce seen the white moon set,
When, round the radiant fireplace,
Shone the sea-mist, rosy-red,
Fleck'd with fire-light, yet so still,
That on the cold hearth-stone I could
For a moment stand, then see
The waves and the clouds fade silently
In the blue mist, then sink again
Down into a mist, and sleep
In my own green bower, so, too,
That I dream not of thee.

Wake up! awake! the evening falls,
The white fog folds the sea-mist round;
Winds whistle, and the fire-flow'rs dream,
Each little ember on the ground
Watches, and hears, without, a gleam
Of white-stemmed portents, fairy-ground,
Catching the fire's languid play,
And elves and fairy fables away,
All that I know, and all that I seem
To hear, look, look.

The firelight gleams, the low sand whirls,
By the white flash, its dreamy curl;
Far off, in a blue shut, shelf,
A gutter, a fl gasp, a whirl.
This is the firelight's golden glow,
The pyx, the wind, the glow-worm's flame.
Awake! awake!

Of the eternal night the surest whirl.
What matter, or what matter, all?
Each thing that has its neighbour, shall,
Idle, and friendly, though, a thrall;
Unto their good I speak, I know
Through no disguise of mood or show,
And none hath part so worthy of me
As my long-tailed Amor.

King Arthur, when his eyes looked north,
Found not himself within the wood;
He saw not, therefore, the north wind
Keen in the springing understood,
And knew not what to do or say
In his bewildered oracles:
And yet he babbled to his sons,
Till in each other's face and eyes
There shone an outraged face of guise

The miseries of a by-gone age,
The wrongs of Arthur's Table Round,
Shrieked, "Rash! Sir! it had been the treason
Of a good King's son to seek this morn,
The new King Arthur on his throne,
Not what he was; a mortal sin,
That men will think and men will dare,
Were he to rule, and ride, so free,
His own King Arthur.

"'As God shall judge me, so I go
Thy ways with thee.' Then, as I go,
The moon shalt be my paramour,
And my good Sister's true self shall
The empress of my King be;
For, though we two go a-distress'd,
We have but one wish--must thou please
To bind anew thy shameful chain,

"'I am but one, and if thou wilt
Take all that thou hast left me, go;
I am but one who hath loved and loved
In all men's eyes; and who is cursed
By the least scoundrels that hold a throne

"'I will go now to search thee out,
To find thee out.' 'There, on the wild waste,
I have seen thee vanish from my view,
And the brief hour that would bring thee back.'
Be calm, thou Fool!' but while I curse,
Do I remand thee: I will curse

'No knight, no king! nor fairy-king!
No bold and beautiful, no bright,
No proud, high-hided fairy! No,
No delicate, no silken masque,
No comfortable Scottish maid!
No subtle, no perfumed wizard! No!
There is no God! there is none, save some,
Born to be weaned from bitterest hours
For sin's envenomed dung and ban.

"'I will go now to look at thee,
And see if
======================================== SAMPLE 36 ========================================
, Tisiphone! thy son
Must surely have a mother's tender care.
The father! will the wife, so fond, so fair
In baby intellect,--what tenderness!
To both dear sons the sovereign courtesy
From that fond father kindled her despair.

Alas, good father, let me now confess
That grief and anguish keep me ever here.
The letter bears the dismal tidings home.
My father's house a stately structure rears
High, lofty, sumptuous, in extended lands,
Its rude, uncared for furniture, for him
Whose wandering-weary pen, forbidding the Gods
To enter with their blessing. From afar
I hear a voice that breathes of bowers, of birds
That haunt Ravenna's springs. There sits a child,
A little maiden, with unbraided locks,
In the same manor-worship glad and wise,
But light of heart and spring-tide, patient, still.
There sits an aged man, about his brow
White-robed as death, and deep in mildest tears,
From the same absent hearth he makes farewell.
And the other hath no mind, his palace gone,
For his poor father in his palace slain.

But sorrow comes to him, when he hath learned
The master's lesson, and his daily task
Of happiness and rest; he knows it not,
He hath no pain to give, but art to gain.
And so great happiness the spirit shares,
That not alone he triumphs.

See, the happy people of Samaria
Who dwell in dales, high homes, are in gradation,
And they have passed through all that region great,

Lived in Samaria, an illustrious name,
And marched against the Moors, a youthful band,
The people who marched forth from Samaria.
Also from Niger, home of noble nations,
They led the Christian legions to the war.
No pestilence arose, no war there was,
But languor, fever, poverty, despair,
For seats of reason, virtue, power, and peace.
There raged a war, and oft the mountain-walls
Were shaken by the current, when the hoofs
Of Terror, reddening, shot from 'neath the feet
Of frightened foemen, 'neath a falchion's edge.
There, mid the carnage of the rolling deep
'Neath, they foresaw the coming of the day,
And the dread horrors of the conflict rose.

Some men were of gigantic growth, and some
Were fashioned out of multitudes, till now
The mangled caravan ran on the sand,
While still her crimson rosary dripped down
The drops, blood-dabbled; of the mother brood
They had their burial in the northern tribes.
With Anwyl there she found them, and beneath
Their single figures had a semblance fair.
A peasant tribe, of many tribes and tongues,
They fed the sick, and led them to the flow,
And often hastened to the flood, and there,
Beneath the shadow of the shade of trees,
They set them down and wandered to the meads,
And oft they watched the sun with lustrous eyes.
Some of the people were so beautiful,
To live upon the margin of that stream,
That they could hardly climb the palm-tree's edge,
Though they could run adown the verdant alder.
They gathered up their treasure in the shade,
And, guided by the light of the meridian sun,
Set out upon the current, free of will,
To rest at length upon a barren heath,
And deep into the sandy banks of Tor.

Nor yet the Pastor's impious self-deceit
Strove with the stranger to outwound the stranger,
But here and there, with silent, deep distress,
He lay, with weary body, and opprest.
Nor was his sufferings greater than the loss
Of him by far, in foreign lands, than here.
But Othere, having for the first time seen
The face of the extremity of years,
Hid from the world by long oppression, came
With weary feet towards the river bank,
And oft, as when the wind, the jewelled ooze
Reveils its golden sands, with rustling beard
And cold, blue flakes of scarlet, went astray,
Choked by the wind; no sign of life was there,
No sign of change, but all was solitude,
Save what the copses' barren side shows fair
Of hills, and streams, and green wood-solitude.

Yet there before a heart's out
======================================== SAMPLE 37 ========================================
.
An' some may gather oot o' state,
An' pan in't wad be in't the rate;
But I'll just seed mine ain' sturt here
Was'tever yet the form or gear?
An' Peter, Wylie Braith, was gotten
The envy o' a ha'penny.

His lippie's safe, he gie us lands,
An' stocke his "gifties" rich commands;
But where the highest grade begets,
O' ships, an' o' true loving nettles,
I think he would swap shoes for't,
If I'd the leisure myself to get;
But yet, my dear, byuld New Year's death,
I think his wage an' shoo's to drou't.

An' pouthie, he's sae mony fere'ty,
That ye wad ne'er lift up his "pipe;"
But now he's tak' his billie-can,
An' swill his weekly wage;
Or if his mains should tell ye,
He's aiblins honest wage.

Now sure an' auld an' wark-like wean
He's ripenin' up our haleene;
An' if his Maggie's gaun an' wean,
Ye'se hae a work to do;
If she'll demand anent the beast
He hae na by his name,
Then hope to have a work o' God
To set him up the Smith.

When ony unco folk got biggin',
He's growin' fast frae frien's or better;
He'll take their hands awa,
Or else they'll a' get duddum;
Or else theirsels they'll pitie
In yond' carnation-beds,
Till ance he's grown to be a brither
That's mair than kin' o' him.

Hie, owre the steep O Bennie-rhyme
Weel-faur'd an' cantie;
The Norland Laird o' Peggy,
Ye baith amang;
O' a' the lads that's hurt,
An' crouse on hame.

I'm weariet by my faulding,
An' by my toil declin'd;
In a' my need I'll lay me down,
An' no be miss'd.
Trowth, Sir, gin ye'll tak this tale,
Ye've nourish'd mony for yoursel'!
O, no; that self I fear'd,
It need na j tarnish a lie!
Wi' mony a fright I started,
To find mysel' in deevil;
But aye as knockit round and round
Three holes were in the bed,
Ye could na see what ails me,
For, Lord be thankit, I was daft,
To find I had na guessed.

O, no; the pawes and ye are fashious;
Wi' them aft fauld I aye;
For a' my masons cost a lunt,
For a' my kin' I gae.

Wi' mony a paukie-rhyme,
I've been at foraen;
But aye I've made a man my braw,
An' labour'd nought for braw;
Yet, Lord be thankit, I was daft,
An' did na mind my m leaflets,
For, Lord be thankit, I was daft,

Now Robin lies in his last lair,
His penny-bag in the well;
The mitherless lammie's i' the barn
That bred him in and can tell;
The mitherless lammie's i' the barn
That bred him in and can tell;
The mitherless lammie's i' the barn
That bred him in and can tell.

Wi' merry cheer at e'en and morn
He maks the ha'-y sicht;
And frae the mirk midnight,
All think, O Lord, I'm lo'een a',
That ae night's dew was owre my e'en,
And that a' night I ha'e been.

And, strang, O Lord, I'm lo'e a',
That's owre the lift sae hie;
And for thy seven stark sins o' that,
If we be fou, O why, we'll fou
Wi' a' the rest, O tell me now
What cursed air I
======================================== SAMPLE 38 ========================================
 fallows, faint 'neath tempest and earthquake;
Heaven's gates vomit trouble.  obstructs wholly
Where there is no road by which to ascend,
But only by night and by day are unkindled
The meteors that watch for the bark and the prow.

The distance wide is of trees which I pine for,
Which take their shape to be moored in a line
On the summit, with an eye that intently
The darkness of earth--the long ridge of their line.
Not from the meadows of Amathus are they,
But from the sources of Holland, the race
Which flows up from gentle Himalayas
Called Cape St. Cancer, or is it supposed
That Northward of old was a princely great man,
And a princely stepmother was the great man,
And the years passed and the sea full of knowledge.

The place was assigned not to Alexander
The princely son of his rich uncle Ned.
And when the thunder of battle was heard
And the lightning was laid upon floating spears,
The men of this town were most miserable;
But Alexander the son of this king
His gold, his fortunes, from head to main
Could not withhold from the steel-shod hand
Of the yet unshaken prince.  Thus the old man
Pondered, then thought of these sources and laws
Which betoken the truth, and filled his soul
With the tumult of baffled wars, till he quailed
At the burden of Nature, the one curse
Which from conquered of old he had numbered eighteen.

For he sauntered along with his dogs,
And his eagles were yellow and dark, and they went
Pattling over the sands, and he grewl'd
With his sharp beak and keen clawings, and thrill'd
At the stir and the alarm of the city;
He ran at the drum and held to the van
As though he were but two men in his heart,
And the people ran at his shrillest shout
For a chance to turn him loose; for, the wind
Came merrily forth from the harbour, and the
city-winds and the bay-bars were handily screwing
him to a new start, for his heart was heavy.

So these rocking joints of the London streets
Possess'd new strength, and they bore on their backs
To the haven where Owyam had built him a nest.
They were bursting like curses upon the twain,
And the earth shiver'd with horror, and dread, and
the city flam'd at the flood, and the bellows
and the lightning flashes with fury.

When Sym had finished his work, he sat still,
As though he had never heard anything
That the old man had done before him, and listen'd
To the people outside the town-halls, and knew
There was fear in them: and the quiet room
Was lit by the eyes of their neighbours, and shames
That were foul with the carrion of those men.

But Sym had been thoughtful and patient, and old,
And perplex'd in his soul the whole country, and
That life came to him in a hurry and strife,
Like the rushing of water in Spring-time, when
Clouds founder, and shuddereth in torrents,
And the long swells urge to their courses, and the
bitter drops to the earth--
Sitting still, and writing the words of despair,
Were a burden of thoughts and a burden of hearts.

Him a jewel had set in the market-place
Tall and fair, and challenged his men to debate
'Twixt the struggling ruth of the public mind
To force to the proof how hard it is to be!
So they bade him a bauble and--cried him--spoke
Of the pamper'd freedom of tongue and of tongue,
And what hath been since the condition of man,
Had it not been fully foretold and done?
But the honest old man took heed of the man--
The wise, the brave, the true, the pitiful man,
Who had striven, and who had acquiesced,
But since now, though the issue seem'd baffled, and
none in his heart could have counsell'd.

So then, the grey-haired, the monarch, the man--
Flesh of the beast, and a sinew of bone,
And a warm hand placed on his brow, and a smile
Of that which was left him, and now he was gone.

But Arthur walk'd slowly through all the day,
Knitting the boughs, and discoursing his men,
The twelve great masts and high-emb
======================================== SAMPLE 39 ========================================

The pity, for his children he had loved
With all most tenderness, and to the hand
Upon his heart he had given up his strength,
And with a tenderness which caused it not
But that he could be brave and strong and not,
Changeless, however humble, gave the youth
That strength in him which there was nothing left
In him but firmness and submission to it.

While yet the old man was alive, he felt
Strong in his strength for sake of Minos, Chief
Of the Croisic folk, who, with their chief of kin
To Minos, in the perilous surf of war
Surging together against them, fled alone
To fight, and in a moment to be slain.
With clamor shrill he said 'Arouse, my comrades, brave
And faithful wives, who honour thee, this boon
I give thee: since thou desirest to return,
Reach me this moment, in the battle's strength.'

Then mused the mighty chieftain, 'These who died
Are no triumphions to our country, yet
To win them must; wherefore now remain,
Ours is the danger, let me die to-day,
And when I come to die, I then will die.'

So said he, and all others gazed on him,
And died together in the wilderness.
But when, arising to his grave, he stood
Still in the desert, ready for the fray,
Prepared to don his armour for the foe,
All hept him up, and thus bespake him plain:
'My tribe are all afar from thee, who through
The intricate labours of this world, at last,
This difficult reward, thou say'st, so long
And long, has to my debt been well requited?
Ay, when thou first wert slain, but next thou then
Hast been thy death, and gloried in thy death.'

So spake the champion, but the voice was stayed
By Minos; then amidst his mournful deeds
Quoth him, 'Take thou this heritage of earth
And be it for my body to oblivion;
But greedier for the body, let me die
Ere yet I end this struggle, and may use
My strength to work it out, which is the might
Of life, the spirit of all who here contend.'

So spake he, and with deathless words replied
The mighty champion of the blacksmith-stone:
'Not so; but thou, if I return, shalt learn
Thy worth in all I did; that I depart
For good or evil, with my life or breath,
And with my life bear this as thy reward,
Rejoice and be happy; thou shall grieve not
At such a blow, nor shalt thou rue the gift.
For in this service I should sing thee sport.'

Now 'neath the oak the sturdy husband lay,
And there he drew his falchion keen and bright,
His goodly locks in single coilings wound,
Of which some few were black and one some white;
That was the workmanship, to him were clear
The white most rosy red, and fairly sweet
His scarlet stain of blood all overspread
His smooth cheek, which a little blood had dyed.

Here much worn out, at first, he forward sprang
And from the oak burst twigs, and loosed his grasp,
And o'er him threw his arms: 'Now by my troth
A chain of rails I'll fling, as well as stones:
For well thou knowest that I brought thee once
A mortal body; but I shall not die,
Or move a limbless skeleton in spite
Of body-blood. When I have from thee torn
A hundred men or so, will slay thee then.'

To whom thus Belial answered, 'Stranger, say,
What form of life, O stranger, now and alway
Departs thy senses?  Knowest thou it, that when
Thy breath comes from the air, no hand can tame
The flying flame, no savage heart will tame
Thine out of death; and dost thou fear for death?
What art thou, to this life so rash and vain?
Or art thou mad, because thyself art born?'

Sighing he shook his head, then said, 'Alas,
I cannot bear to live nor die in peace:
Yet have I known this, when from every side
Throughout the world thou goest, that thou art
My refuge; and I know that thou shalt come
And bring a people to this peace which cometh
Beneath thy roof. But since I dwell in bliss,
I pray to live
======================================== SAMPLE 40 ========================================
, the day when the lithe wave rests its course,
And when the rounded clouds in their border march,
(Thrice, once emerging, that river were seen)
Behold an armful of glory bedight!
And sweep through the valleys, as if it were ours,
Where over the hilltops, that rippling lee,
Tremble its waters beneath another's keel!
There, through the lofty bay, with a shout they sweep,
While the shores are flung like a shower of gold,
And ever they shine with a golden light;
At the haven's mouth, to its peak they dash,
While the billows rattle above the beach!
And a shout they raise with a springing start,
A shout to the wave that runs round the world,
And save the heaving sea from its inmost part.

Ah! the heroes of Liberty! shall ye start,
From your war-worn keep to the rock-bound shore,
And shout, ye cliff-bound cove, from your far apart
In the fields o' the mist-wreaths which Evens pour,
Till the wail of the burst in your gales shall sweep assoil
Over the land, o'er the torrents, and deep,
As their own pure heart may, when over the waves they sleep!

Ye rock-bound cove, ye rugged mountain-kings,
With your heights o'ercast and whirling dizziness high,
Ye hold your own to the God-given rendezvous
Which the exulting Alpine rocks have made,
Where the glacier sleeps, in his icy lair,
And the craggy reef, o'er which the deep sea binds,
On either hand, by the wild turmoil cast,
Holds the sun-gleam, or the misty headland's misty bed;
To the coral-hill which glistens with morning cold,
The Cape Ann's slumbrous breast to the cot below,
All gleaming white, in the bright mist rolled,
Shone the broad blue light of the day's last glow,
And every cape and crag, high over all,
Seemed bound with mountain homes to be the home of the elements.

Oh, the noble lines that met thy feet,
As from mountain home they swam!
How they would have hushed thee when they came!
Like to children wrapped about with flame,
In the mountain cave's dim glens they dwell,
Who would follow them through all the years
That have seen thee, sun, and moon, and stars!
Now thou comest to thy father's hall
In the haunted treasury of the West,
And thy wild lips are set with silver bars
As if guarding the deathless dead,
As the brave dead men of the conquered earth
Do for thee! and the men who brave
The lions that gnawed in living graves
Were tigers tigers, yielding flesh
To the lure of the flame-attained dove,
Though now they search their prey in vain!

Children, children, eyes beloved,
In the shade of that beauteous form
Tremble not as away thou art,
Far away and wide away!
As a wave the dash of the shore must flee,
While the wind with a moaning voice,
Rocks it up, to soar once more,
To the wave-heaped peak of the Andean peak,
Where the wave-heaven beateth bleak,
I can only tarry on there
With heart high-bold to keep,
Where the the winged one treadeth black.

Mother! mother! still thy voice
And thy brow serene,
When the breath of heaven is sent
Through thy lips to me,
Wings that the dead in utterance tend
Where I may never pass
Away from thee!

As the midnight gathers round,
What true life is here
Lieth only as a veil
Of the sky's unfathomed blue
Thus, our hearts must one day meet,
Death at last must pass;
Must the young one seek the west
Must the east one longing get,
Then, turn, and with me rest,
May the storm not pass!

"A word to thee! a word!"
What word shall speak for us,
Words that are a wisdom heard,
Made from a strange word?
And if to a man's heart turn
Older than his years are,
What word of age shall speak
Of thee, far-away?
That word, whereof I heard

Far in the dark, has given
An unspeakable thought,
That in the night that fills
The place with darkness, sleeps
A million lives, a breath.
======================================== SAMPLE 41 ========================================
, in ale.
On the golden pipes aloud
I can wander, and I hear
The great organ's voice once more.

Hark! a fumbling, rolling sound,
Like the waves of ocean raves,
As of eager thousands pour
O'er the wooden battlements,
In the vanguard of the camp,
To the sound of muffled drum,
Rolled the tramp of armed man.
Now we start, now rush, O pioneers!
For the night has fallen, and the hour of rest is here,
And the shells, the booming guns,
Are calling to the night.

To each other run, run fast;
Fear not, ye indolent,
In the circles of the past,
While we clasp the hand that waits us in the hour
That we cry to, o'er our tomb,

O'er our head the clouds of steam are rolling,
While the whirring spuds of vapor slowly speck
A thousand leagues of sea.
See the mountains like huge amethyst
Lifting, mistlike, to the very brink
Of the bosom of the wilderness
The dark of cedar lies.

And behold the distant forest spires;
See the sunset clouds,
Tottering with the rising dust,
Like a vapoury cloud,
In the portico of heaven's blue
The towers of theolation crouch.

The dripping, dripping falls,
Out of sight, in the night,
As the cars come in their cars,
Turning backward in the light.
See the constellations burn,
As clouds in the darkness roll;
See the constellations' livid streaks;

Look the downward rim of the great flamboy
Quickened by the heat,
As they wheel into the air.
The intense bell-wethers redden
On the night's black, blackened air;
And like rockets, paven with fire,
The everlasting, awful fire
Smoulders in the midnight air.
Now the lamps of dawn are flung
At the wind's fitful breath,
As their swiftly falling shadows fly.
Now the clouds have gone to their places
In the bright, unclouded weather;
Now they rumble idly down
On the chilly earth of snow,
And now by each light, each ghoul-fire ray
That flickers, and glitters, and glows,
In the limitless, silent night.

He is now in banishment
From the rude world's rude tread,
Where for hours he hies to some quiet spot
Where the sweet grass grows instead.
No step is heard on his unstain'd feet,
No caress on his strong hand,
Save the lowing of the distant dead.
Not a gesture is there now,
But some longing, some fear,
Some remembrance of the mighty dead
That walked with him here yonder,
In the spirit-land above.

The servants of the Lord,
In their garments red,
Seek to touch his fleshly foot.
In the silent, unknown regions
He is Lord of his own,
Who this dauntless spirit saith.
Lord of spirits, shall we leave
Jesus here with us,
By our side, in calm, still peace?
Tarry ye no longer,
Ye are weary, ye are dying.
Ye have seen the Holy One,
For the rest, in that deep peace,
The triumphs of the nations,
And the might of the King.

O wondrous miracle!
The night is dark and old;
The lamps of gold go down;
No fire consumes the hearth,
Nor flames the parish-chamber:
Ye witness, ye witness the moon,
That God has come to hide the world,
And turn the stubborn earth to fire.
O miracle of power!
The night is past the old,
And Chaos hears the calling
Of morning from the bell.

The midnight bell is ringing;
Shall we go forth, or stay?
Shall we dare more than die?
Shall we dare more than die?
Tarry ye no longer,
Ye are weary, ye are dying.

We shall fail from the fiery
Threads of the world-wise strife;
Shall all-redeeming
Exert and turn life into death?
Ye were not born to perish,
But for a common end,
And even in shame
Ye still remained your friends.

But your triumphs are immortal,
And your deaths are immortal;
Yet while ye are triumphant
O'er the world we see you
With a sense of agony,
And with passion wild
The heart breaks at the sting.

======================================== SAMPLE 42 ========================================
 of silver,
Soft as fox-glove, as creature of the chase;
Painted like an empty silvery fay,
And the moonlight shone about his face.

Rippled like a creamy bosom,
Bare his brown sides as though remembering
Their delight in circles;
Dreaming like the satyr-fishers
Rapt to be of old, and dancing,
Waiting with dim eyes yearning
For a wild bird,--then away.

Laughing like an Indian maiden
Chase a furred face with her crown
To the brim of morn, on airy wing
She passes down the night.
Beating on, the lovely maiden
Back on the meadow-land, a-roaming
Like the hum-clock of a distant drum.

When the startled cock crew,
Over the hill a shout of joy;
'Ere's my veil!" then with a shout I said,
Watching the wild wide-path, and listening
To the coppers' song.

Fainter than a lion's roar
Came the cry, "Hooray!  Hooray!"
And, in a ring,
Terror slipped to hear my song.

Little did I dream of that tender voice,
Thinking, "the dead might feel it,"--meant to see
Each of the other's kind.  Then loud arose
Courteous clamour, "Hooray!  The Brave Queen's voice
Must speak her love in a world of mystery!"

I turned and leant upon my lady's waist
So fair,--
Shook off the chalice, cap and bells, and clasped
Her form, with a strong, but tender grace
Worthy, though somewhat apart.
As if her conscious bosom had not known
The blush that shone upon her rich attire,
But that had dwelt with eyes
Of tenderness and soft obscurity,
So was my lady's form
Encamped upon the trail,
Her step averting her forehead's arching grace.

She said: "My lady, faint heart and pale hand,
Fear lest I love thee in such a wild voice,
Unless thou stab me with thy poisoned darts,
And rend my shame to pieces.  Cruel love,
Such as thou seest,--such too have had,
O my dearest,--
O my marrow-sealedest,
O Lady dearest,--
Is that a passion taken from thee
To urge its cruelest against my will?"
I answered: "Oh, my Lady, not alone
Wilt thou--I know thee.  'Twere a false reproach.
But some old lie who would betray thee
Seems to have wronged thee."  And she answered, "Nay--
He who deceives must know of thy foul deeds.
Yet must I not!"  And to her downcast eyes
I crept, suffuming the great remorse,
Wailing: "Oh, by thy cunning!--not my own,
Thou knowest, and art plain!
Where is thy will?
Whence come these blows?
Come, for mine eyes, that look so sweet to me!"
With that I opened them and left them flowing
A silvery tear.
--I that have loved too well,
Ah!  I had learned to weep and wail and groan
For thine unwise renown,
By what strange measure art thou chosen;
From fit of word
To brief surrender I have had reward.

But thou hast more to give
Than life itself to me--oh!  dost thou love?
Has the destroyer spoken?
Thou who hast set the seal of condemnation
In the poor man's ears, and chosen the price
Of the undying love--oh!  dasten, desecrate!
Where hast thou trod, thou angel of this day,
Thyself the traitor?

The Cross is burnt!  O God,
One last remorse and lover!  Shall I do
Nothing to thee, to others, nor to me?
My own neglect is avenged on thee.  In me
I cannot turn.

I never loved thee, yet I feel for thee.
Thou art more dear to me than all this life
Of mine to thine, than all these more than all
Of all this nectar.  Thou hast brimmed all the cup
And dropped the poison.  Thou art stained and soured,
And yet I own thee false to me than all
Its purity.  Thou art more than I,
More than my own most dear, more than my God,
Or any other nuthiner.  I am
Supreme in
======================================== SAMPLE 43 ========================================
 with stiffening neck and loose
To stand like a cyclope,[A] and you?
All our love, all our kisses, all our spring--
What shall your heart to the heart of sing
O sweet, O sweet, O sweet?
Buds and blossoms--all done for the best--
Hold you fast,
Ere the bloom of the Spring and the Summer's white breast.

But now I know
If you are so good as to love me, dear!
Loving me.
O sweet, O sweet, O sweet!
There is no other power can love like my

In thy magic power (O love, if love be true,
Blossom above, or petal within you),
With the charm of magic leaves that ever whirl
Round her magic circle--through the narrow rift
Of green clay soaring--there I may descry
Thy white soul, my lost one, flying by
Where she moves with her shadow, there with her
In the way she hath gone--O, follow me!

When I die, I think you'll call me "love"
Or, "Love that liveth," for your loving's sake
To hang upon the beat of Time and shake
The dust of Eternity--bring to us
Across this shimmering world a planet's range
Of night and the white peaks of that remotest range--
Come to us, you who conquered yet,
When you are in us--and we with you,
When you are in us--and we with you,
O come to us, dear Love, and bring us more
Of sorrow, and of rest,
Than all that haunted of old romance,
With echoing echoing after you
Across the wandering moon.--

Come to us, come where the years are spent
Where its ethereal fingers through
These leafy shores of ours we love
And we will ever read you more;
The rapture of your own unrest
Will fade before it is aware,
And, like the star through mist of the west,
We shall behold and wonder where
The far-off cometh in the light
And on whose whiteness fall and bleach
The stain of day's delight:

And the land of whose undying wake
Is old and very far away,
And not a star shall be in it, dear,
But only this poor star of ours,
Shall shine upon her like a star,
And with its light our happy hearts shall burn,
Remembering here, as now, that old star
That blaze through the blue heaven of the West,
Will fall and fade in that lone star
That made its golden home;
And when we long, will follow with its light
The feet of its desire,
We shall hear naught but the far-off song
Of those who find their moonlight in the spheres
Where never a star shines.

The wonder of those ultimate stars
On nights of wonderment and awe,
In the deep loveliness of morn
And those eternal moons,
For a moment now beyond the range
Of all imagination's range,
You seem to remember, as you sang,
A wild and weird refrain,
Then, passing from us, a faint voice
Shook my soul, and it said farewell,
And, passing to me, said,

"I wandered not these dewy lawns,
Where shadows too great to go,
And winds with whistling voices call;
Yet I returned to you
And now that I have come, O you,
And now that I have come;
I will not hide a love long hid
From all your idle gaze, O you,
I will be glad I came to you,
And now that I have come.

"I will not, then, be long awake,
Though you were singing now before;
In your bright eyes, ah, you will take
My love again, if she will come
Till you are dead and gone;
You will not heed her hand that passes,
For you are in her grave;
And I will watch and wait and wait,
Till I come home at last.

"When the dream dies away,
What matters it if I have seen
My love in death and you no more,
The flower of hope gone by?
Have I not known love's failing power,
And watched Love's failing sky,
Have I not walked through lane and bower
And through this western land?

"There has been happiness through me;
I never know to whom
The happiness was all too great,
My lady's will was gone;
If I have loved my lady well
I will be glad he was so dear
I laid his heart to sleep,
For now I know that he
======================================== SAMPLE 44 ========================================
!

Man, all hail! that man doth most delight
To tread that way with Numberants;
To view the place with foremost fight,
Whether he reason, dream, or admit;
Or meed with more than first defeat;
Or take a turn, whichever way,
With trembling step, or aim,
Dark in the eyes,
Or grudging death to shun,
Still able at his post to be,
In spite of all that there attend him.

Under the frost, in summer's heat,
To see them come and go,
To hear themselves and swamp them there,
Huddled in filth below;
While all the world deems pleasant to
The man, no matter how,
When 'tis all over.
But if it should seem that they
Must look like western men
(So this thought runs and this goes,)
I should, it seems, look loth to go
To bed at Mungo's, when
They'll rest, poor devil there,
Where her poor tremble
May seem to be the mettle,
'Neath which some dropsy's fallen.

Why that startle's still so bright?
Why that pallid shine?
Why that lace, that tasselled hood?
Why that veil of furred in gold?
Why that ray of ruby-light?
Why that ray of opal-glow?

Life, death, love, I see not now;
Death, in one last breath, I vow.
And for this, all we both excel;
Death, whose swift and certain sign
Is that my poor heart, filled full,
Must drink its hate of mine.

'Thou makest me tell what 'tis I hear;
And why, without avail,
Is my poor love asleep and dead,
And doth not much to me appear?
That kindly-humoured 'faith be sure,
For my love's sake he 's asleep!

'Thou young or old
As children bid
A Mother-maid,
I fain would read,
Where enraptured stands
The Maiden-face,
While wrinkled age
Knows how to gaze
When fain the front door stands
Aloft on high.
She, waking, sees,
How sweet in dreams
The Maid of delays
He sings, and smiles
At my high task,
And I know, feel
I 'm listening, where
Bright eyes I catch
Of her.  'Twere done,
And yet there be
No thing to say,
So kiss her and
Feel my lips,
But nearer, while
I lie asleep,
Till thy safe days
Are round me with sweet breath,
Love, ah! this life,
This test of death,
Is a blissful thing!

For the day grows old,
The Maiden-love's
A lively, rambling place,
Where sad-eyed Truth
Looks out upon Youth,
And, looking on her face,
One knows her mission well.

"O child!" the Mother said,
"The night that comes between us,
Is a long time for me."
She answered him and wept:
"My mortal hour is this;
I did a young Love once,
The maiden April 7.

"He, only he," the man said;
"She is a rich and rare one,
Yet nothing this for gain
That I should aught of hire.
And, living is the same,
Her sweet and beauteous tresses
Flow down the bright-eyed Thames."
"O boy!" the Mother said,
"The night that comes between us
Wakes me from dreams of old,
Who have my father's throne,
And my name too," he said,
"Named "Cle" and "Cle" for ever!"

My lover at last, having married,
Sallied from Naples to Naples.
I love his lady more than her fellows,
More than his mistress, more than her mother.
His Queen has told him many things,
Past one to the mountains to Sea.
And that's the last I ever heard
About the Pole-star, to be with her.
But, no matter how foolish or heartless
I loved her as she did love me,
And what I had missed of her too
For difference of infinity
She wanted.  There is none so true
Did she want.  There is no escape
To make our lives more on the Se.
So, if we leave all chance to fate,
This hour's only a day for me,
And I swear never to that lip
Of hers that stayed all care for me,
Till storm
======================================== SAMPLE 45 ========================================
 chirping all about
His fill the rustling village street.
An ancient church of long extent,
Belted with limestone, roof'd and girdled,
The waifs, and ivy, and wild-bedded cott,
Wherein erewhile his daughter slept.
--The little church beyond the town,
That o'er the village Germany,
With its cold and darksome chapel, stood,
Lull'd by the shepherd to his brood.
--The sweet and gay bells rang below,
(None but the singers there remained)
A crowder call'd to the maids of yore,
Whom he had told in his sweetest strain.
"To church, to church the bells are ringing,
And to the fane with merry din,
The Pope has, with his fair Dame, attending
To church, his bride, to consecrate.
--Our good sir, the churchman, old and wrinkled,
And with his crook'd and beauteous face,
In heaven's clear light, is shining on
The consecrated place,
Where, in eternal beauty, see,
Our house, our sister, and our queen,

And that old church, so old and gray,
Looks all alike from day to day.
--Our children also, good and small,
From instinct learn to save their fraons;
And learn our duty to be loyal,
To keep a state as calm as all."
--The cataract, on whose rocky shore
The hair sleeps fast, discloses more
Than even grey remembrancer,
The thundering chimney, homely skies,
The shrill canals, and that great dome,
The feudal voices and the hoarse
Affrights the listening din within,
When, as an angel guards her spot,
A sweet charm glides and wins within.

"You hear the rushing peals of bells,"
Said they who ramble at her side;
She, looking down upon the tide,
Smiled in her large and loving eyes
(Their homes, and parents), and she smiled
As if to look at her, and beg
For grace from heaven, and for the child.

Was this not graved upon the stone?
Gone is the name, though hard the task;
But mildness, simple faith, and truth,
And childhood's smiles, and courteous youth
And maiden-grace, and serious truth,
Will set your pulses in a song
To welcome Death. Not all in vain
The poet-singers of the North
Salute his passing footsteps forth.

When the spirit's trumpet sounds the need
That builds him holy temples there,
When the pulses of the heart and hand
Proclaim the spirit's immortality,
They, when the hours of death are done,
Shall find the body and the spirit one.

"Above the mountain's steep,
Where sun and moon ordained,
Circles the grave and hill."
My ken, it is no dream;
I have an iron's hope
Of something real.
When I was down for flight,
The clouds were thick as lead,
And rain had gifted them
With a few redoubts.
"Come!" then I heard them sing
The songs of a King.

When I was down for flight,
I threw my chivalry
Above the rebel wall,
They sang an unrequiting song
Which bade me arm and arm;
Yet everywhere
The thunder-clap rang loud
Like wounds where wounds were smart,
And where the worms were damp.

"The end of the World?" The cry
Rang louder from afar;
The answer shook the skies;
"And, Lord, I can but pray,
In Thy name, on Thy lowly bier,
Lord of the World!" No less,
To watch, as in a camp,
The tumult and the fear.

Loud answered Thamyris,
"In patience and peace,
There is no war with these,
No blustering blasphemy,
In His name, on Thy lowly bier,
In our ken, on Thamyris;
From whose bloody scalps
And wounds, I may shew
The measure of the blood that war stains."

My ken, I will not cease
While I read in your heart
Your words of such bitterness,
Their joy in human speech,
In the beat of your heart,
Ye dare not even stagger,
But, faithless, must descend,
If you will not descend."

"But why"--and the Son
Said, smiling, "our tale is done:
For your word is said
======================================== SAMPLE 46 ========================================
;
Or, sittin' in the beech-tree, hawks, and ows,
An' wooin' babies in their crane,
Whare the plane-tree, which he even heaves
His branches like a moisty grain.
There's Gigready Castle--oh, but whence
You'd hae to meet 'im on its briny way,
Thare 'll knock your name on 'Change's airy bubble,
There's little Will, wi' the green, wee clay.

Here's Johnie o' Conroy's sheep a-skyver
On the green-hill for the mornin' yet;
There's little Will, an' Mary Brig,
And the lammie--ravock of our shed;
They've ta'en the urchin and the shuttle
Till its lips lye on the rising thread.
But wot does little Tom Bell tint his wonder--
Why, there's just one little Snowingale,
A chink-a-ring, or from him a letter--
Comes takin' a chapter on the 'crostle.

'Tis ever thus wi' Johnie owt--
He kens the grand prerogative,
Which is to say--'There's muckle wight is
That can busk a lass wi' half a sark.'
He says 'mysel' 's a clever feller,
But, though it's a' that I can tell,
I canna say--for nane at a';
An' a' that is a' the reason,
We're gettin' the gear upon the feller,
For--gie him watter than can buy him!
Wi' plenty, an' plenty, an' a',
We were 'fore our daddie could;
We crack'd about like hizzies;
We bloom'd upon a biz,
An' rosy things about him;
His han' was like a crumb,
His teeth like twa-peaks, an' brawny,
An' he was nae liker my ain;
An' rather like my ain dearie--
Sae lang's I kept my vow,
That Bess was nae less my ain.

Then Lizzie drew her sunny hair,
An' said to me, 'If ye be there,
Ye'se get na aye a beggar!'
Says I, 'Good day, good day!'
But Lizzie, 'twas hersel',
Fient haet to get my leave,
An' went without tocher.

It is gowd, says the crone, an' has na mair,
Ye may lay your cheek like the mavis' flower,
But this a' ye hae worn out lately,
For--gie me a single hour!--
'I'll take you, to come in an' to woo,
Sae ye're welcome to come in an' to woo;
Come in, come in, come in!'
It has been an hundred and fifty since,
Since I hae bidden ye come in.
Ye come in Spanish! Ye come in Spanish!
Youth and beauty ye bring about,
But an oath I hae ye fairly rue,
Here wi' mony a gallant rue!

Ye come in Spanish! ye come in a night,
An' I see ye shine through the day,
But I'll set ye as fair in my garland,
For an auld man gat at the door,
Will ye let me sic a deal?
I'll tak ye fast frae my gown,
I'll let ye sit on my knee;
But I'll rin ye by the side,
For I've seen our pairt three times three,
The night we twa hae wedded be
To ane an' auld man gat dee,
But I sall gang sober far away,
Tho' he should carry the ship,
I put my horn to yon side,
It will be a pleasure for me!
My fause fa' the night, my jurn crawbar,
There's nae a hole for me in the house,
In the warm sunny beam o' the sun,
There's nae an auld man come nae late,
But the mate o' my bairn is the mate
Of my bairn, the mate o' my bairn,
The mate o' my bairn,
The mate o' my bairn,
Ye'll cuddle the weepin' an' weepin' an' weepin'
======================================== SAMPLE 47 ========================================

Many dreary and abominable things.
There it lies, but there lies nothing:
For thee a part is pardon given;
If it be on a wench thou canst not be.
How weird was I while in hiding,

I had no light of any living being,
Not a maiden, but a partridge true,
Nor yet a poet--save a stir!
Yet with time I am perplext
To find that in thy rest
I have lived often and have not gone mad
And lived in many woes and wants unseen,
Aiding the hours before thy coming home.

I have pined not for thee, my spindler,
No tear or smile for my mistress.
Though I sit without here weeping
Ere she
Has dried her tears and is weeping
Yet both kiss me with pride and pity--
Happier than the stable,

And yet it is time,
Heaven will soon bring all her weeping
For I--seamless yet, I and she--
Must sit there
And watch the sun through the mist,

My sorrow would grow cold.
Since God will not forsake me
My woes as I forfeit all things,
Thou must meet my fate.

Haste, my boy,
Then hasten, hasten soon,
To my lone
Bower, and to my poor garden.
There, in far-away clover,
Stand I, ere I pass over
The clouds which the wind makes over
(In paradise, this sweet breeze over),
And greet the still summer world
With a sigh, and a kiss, and a ring.

What ails my darling, what ails her?
There she lives, and she is mine,
And it shall be all the rest hereafter
To the world where my sweetheart is not!
Where the maidens dance down the meadows
There, as here, she is dancing for me,
There to lean her lovely head
And the little ones playing for me,
Shaking curls of glossy crimson
Under golden suns.

All the flocks that carry me,
All the lambs that softly call me,
All the fleecy flocks that flee me,
All the little ones that call me,
All the dark and all of light,
Fly away down down to the meadows,
Where I will never see the day!
See the coming of my lover,
See his pretty brown eyes glistening,
Tell him all his heart's desire.

Naught I fear, that white snow-mistress,
Naught I fear, that sweet snow-mistress,
With her eyes like stars set over,
With her bosom white and rose-wreathed,
With her neck all golden and golden,
And her lips as red as roses,
With her lips like foam-flakes.

Little thought my mother-tongue,
Or at that, which sweetly sings,
Sings my darling; and I know
Love is all in all things,
Love is all in all things,
Lived in all things,
Evermore returning, evermore ending.

For the wonder that is in me,
For the wonder of great music,
The delight of many memories,
For the wonder of all spring songs,
For the wonder of all deep-fashioned flowers,
For the wonder of all song-songs,
For the wonder of all songs.

I myself have always known
The sad flower I had blown away
Given me the rondeau of day,
And the gladness of all spring songs,
Which were given me by the hand.

Little thought my mother-tongue,
Nor of winter, nor of summers,
Praised me more for her love than praise,
And I most of all looked longed for
Gazed upon her face as she went,
Laid so much upon my love
That my life was almost gone.

Little thought my father-tongue,
For the wonder of all song songs,
For the wonder of all true songs,
Which were given me by the hand.

Little thought my mother-tongue,
For the wonder of all song songs,
That my life was filled with longing
For the wonder of all songs,
Till it seemed a rose in bloom,
And a lily in the cup
Of the wine which I had drunk--
Oh! it was so sweet and strange!

I knew not by what secret spell
All my days of boyhood's dreaming;
I was there, poor little child,
I was crushed and weathered wild
By the pain of all my pains,
And the pain which I have known
======================================== SAMPLE 48 ========================================
."
You know they were too bad a thing to mope,
So on they went with pain in full a tide.

"A surgeon! yes, he is." With our good-night pray
Come to us from the past in that sweet air,
Bearing the hand of Fate, and all that lies
In that mysterious bosom of the skies!
But you shall feel no pain, nor, if you fear
Those of the past can give you no relief
Than to remember days of happiness--
A dream of waking happiness, of grief--
Of bliss the future can not dream, of grief.

Shall we not, in this lonesome hour, atone
For life left desolate, and for friends--
The sad, sad times of my boyhood gone,
Left without joy the friends of my own?
So when my heart hath filled, and, sad and deep,
My life's blithe spirits like a sunny cloud
Tossed by the zephyr over mountain and meadow,
Think of the past, and muse upon the gale--
Mourn the full hours that fled so fleetly past,
And thoughts that shamed itself with hope at last.

Oh! breathe the sighs that on the mountain thrill,
And gently fall, unheard amid the ferns--
Our best farewell!
Farewell, thou wind that through the trees
The yellow sunshine slumbers,
And with the throng that meets the hush
May, gazing on each other, rush
With sparkling eyes to every bush

What though my spirit fly to thee,
Yet how divinely must the earth
At thy approach how dreaded!
What though the roaring winds of March
Beat wildly by thy thunder?
Oh! speed to meet a watcher there,
For whom I sang so tenderly,
I'd seek the cold, red heart of spring
And pass him by in beauty!

Of yore thou mightiest hero, lord
Of mountains high in story,
And while thy breath of love was stirred
Upon his brow of glory,
And his proud arm in triumph stilled
The storm that gazed from hill to hill,

I spurned the earth's brown wheaten ear,
Its grasses, flower, and grass;
Yet, like a crystal crystal sphere,
Its charms were linked with loveliness,
And rapture's upward air beguiled
The bosoms of my spirit wild.

My life is like that maiden bold,
Who, seeking some fair woodland scene,
With rosy limbs and flowers among,
Sought, with the spring still newly brought,
His birth-place in the forest;
For first, in glad and second race,
My heart to youth was womanly,
And even then my early youth
Brought to an old horizon.

But from the locks of gray old time,
The fairest spring-tide o'er,
We've watched, like her, through many a clime,
Unnumbered o'er the ocean:
Our early thought, when summer comes,
More clearly speaks our maiden-fame,
Than when the pleasant green woods o'er

When first I heard her vesper-bell,
Beneath the sunny beam,
A fairy would have passed me by
With violets in their dream.
I'd give thee nuts, and apples round,
The ruddy apples to thy bough,
And music in the autumn sound
To cheer the beauty of us now,
And ever brighter are the suns,
And earth--all greener than before,
And gentle heavens--the fields again,
And lakes again--the trees again,
That heard the robin on the spray,
Heard Morning singing through the day.

There is a song,
I cannot truly say,
Neath all the songster-loam
Which Fancy dreamed away;
But I recall that ball
At sunny Morn,
At evening, in the hall,
When she, in lonely joy,
And she, in all the scene,
Transfigured, as she stood
Betwixt the whortle and wood,
The fount and river's flow,
Looked on her; and I drew
My eyes to her again,
And lo! in sheen
Of firelight thin
I saw a little girl,
Who, seeming youthful, bold,
And gay as o'er the plain
It plays before the wind,
With glossy frills behind,
And on the water-side
It seems to say:
O be not, pretty soon!

'Twill soon be summer, too,
The rose will come at eve
To pale and lily-like
Before its
======================================== SAMPLE 49 ========================================
 the water round
And with the scoop like a great spear goes
And ever the Nereids have a care
But he takes and he takes them up presently--
And he is caught like the rest of the clan
That sat in the fireside of Ganymede,
A god they know who is strong and strong--
He tosses and claps his hands together,
And as many years as a monarch's son
His old age marred; and the heart of him
Clings fast to the living heart of him.
What is he doing, having such wars?
What is his murder contending for?
In the depth of the fire was no great wonder,
Although to the earth it had never been carven.
But there is his frame being so great and glad,
And of a man and of beast a third life born,
And the soul of him skulks out and thinks of him
And the dolorous joy he shall prove a bane for,
So she feels her life she shall live to kill,
That is mother to life that's a life for ever,
That's mother to death.

In every church, when the world grows gray,
No murmur of folk go up to the sun,
No clap of the hands goes down from the hill,
No change comes over the quiet one,
Though all the windows hang with the sun
Like strings of music; and when the sea,
The sea comes in from the long palm-fringed shore
Of the wide world, is filched and tinged no more
By the tears of night, its sails are strained with ships,
The soul of him and the senses are tired;
And yet to thee, O our children, who
Conceived our being, have we its true,
That should be part of thy living thus,
Of our deep being no vision of thee?
That should be true.

Lord, we know well
That the heart of the Love of the Sea
Is a vessel of foam whereof no cloud
E'er floated; and not as an ocean-sea,
But like as an island of salt-flecked foam
That knows no weariness, but is builded of bark,
Upon whom for ever floweth sorrow
We are weariful castaway;
For the heart of him that is sore is less
Than the stone whereon earth he lies;
And the contraries of our souls are lighter
Than all the vesture of the sky.
So the ship of our fate by time outworn
Is on the water-bank where Death hath reft
The soulless gold of his world-hallowed head,
And we who shall inherit it, shall inherit
The spirit of strength for the eternal word;
The spirit's cry is the voice of the Unknown,
Whose substance, outpouring from strand to strand,
Is as a sea, whose unmeasured depths entombed
Are the lost voices that haunt the land.
--Such is the hope for which men strive to give
The eternal pearl for the unpeopled deep:
Such is the faith for which the nations live,
Where the Armada of God is strong,
And the Sword is his own first word, one cry--
Are we not as sons of the Unwashed, who
Feed by the grace of God their fathers gave?
But we know well
That a sound will be as the voice of the Sea,
And we may not know why they faint and fail
To reap the same bright fruit which bears the tree
Of the Son of the Sea in his fore-ward flight
Of the pain of a newly born child-birth--
The life of that holy world which taketh
The form in the loveliness of the Earth.

Why does a man as a matter of words
So slacken in bidding of thrones be quenched
While the Son of the Sea laughs in his scorn of the Sea,
But trembles because he hath called of the Sea
In his wrath at the emptiness of his will;
And all the ships he hath made of the Sons of the Sun
Are shrunk of their voyage to hear him sing;
And all that ships and the might of the Sea,
And the league-long breaker of all the world,
And all that he quaffs from the soul of the sea
Is shrunk to its whelming old heart again.
And nay, the world is yet far younger
Than it was before, since the sea made fast
And the sun-beaten sands run sand and the steeds of God
Shall cleave as a necks-breadth out of his grasp.

Meseems that his waters and so far seas
Were wax as opaque, yet all too great

======================================== SAMPLE 50 ========================================

All unseen in the gloom are the flowers o'er-blown,
Then every tiny and faithful flower is found.

Leave Cadmus' top and the mountain steep,
With Rhinna's green willows o'er-turned,
Now the crest is more or less,
Inex where Venus the festive lass hath groaned,
The branches of willow bend.
From Syrinna's rude rocks, that their cradle voice bemoan,
One poplar on the moss-grown steep,
Where oft the dog-weed fords among,
As Cyblla once bore of old.
From si Linna's orchard each flower is seen,
That first so lovely far hath shone.

Hence let the flowry Maenads,
All lovely to the young;
Ivy in every green leaf,
Such as the syrinx weaves
When youth by Pallas strayed.
Fairer than Ascalon's stream,
Or fair Coronis' flowery banks,
With Tempe every tree and flow'r
As lovely Iby day did see.
Over the boar that was his prize,
That could so cruel pass without,
The Alp high rocks beneath him doth rise,
Thither his fall happie resort.
For Tereus his father dear
Newly at first began to fear,
And cherish'd by his mother's care.
The boy that by Limbo was brought up,
With such hard constraint did rashly roam,
Was inly wrapt upon the fact.
Besides that Bacchus' pious priest
Suffic'd him, he by force was taught,
He only with one spouse remain'd.
Another, Beroe, both nam'd,
Here Justice sent, and Tityus sent,
To punish Cupid for the fault
That he on her bare arms should plant.
Thus till the boy be from the grave,
To which I for the present vow,
The weeping willows shall bequeath
A plant of such plants as for thee,
There seed fix'd in perpetual flame.

Constrain'd to compass his desire,
A plant renew'd him for the deed,
Whose fame, at last, hath ever spread
Thro' Delos and furthest Ind.
Weep, then, O Muse! so silently
That somewhat of thy theme be heard,
May not a wish remain'd to press
Too reverently upon the word;
And may the murmuring billows cease
To chace the oar that thou hast heared.
Thus having said, he gallant Thais lay,
Down by the jolly bowers, that alway bay'd
Upon his ruffled plumes: bright dew
The air around him cast; high up among
The blooming trees his winged steeds did bear.

With shivering motion loud and fain
He saw the morning star appear;
His eyes far distant shot the light of day.
"I come," quoth he, "and with the rising sun
Hang a pale and chilly beam on the wan sky;
I go to yon fresh fields, and watch the day,
And think on nature's smiles, though I do not die.
Haste to the brooks, haste to the land where spring
Flows green and flowers blooming in each valley;
Trip no cold cold hand, nor stiffen the young leaf.
I would no motion feel, nor breath to move;
Slowly I turn'd to look, and then 'gan die;
As under snow the sheepfold hides and flows,
With, ere its tender leaves the wind outwrings,
So rest they, all, these fair and limpid springs."
With that he vanish'd all, with sudden start
The rivers thither bend, and from the sun
His rays made haste to warm them all for day,
And still, from the thick ground lock'd up and chas'd,
Their waters laving, while the crisping hay
Unfolds its green and yellow spot of land.
So sudden life revives; sweet life returns;
And human nature with her beauty burns;
So awestruck Nature now began to trace
All that her once familiar fields had lost,
All that her mountains and green valleys lac'd,
The earth in all her glories now doth shake.
Nature is dead! Nature herself is dead!
For such a living beauty doth exceed
All Beauty, all her sons, all all matter bleeds!

Nature her self, the queen of every clime,
The bearer of this vile and scornful race,
Now to low air ascends her lord's dear face,
And 'gainst his naked
======================================== SAMPLE 51 ========================================
maire,
To live and to live for aye,
Dance and prepare.

Better to sweat in the sun
Than pray in the shade of the tree;
Better to sweat, than pray,
For a prayer to a king and a priest,
And a prayer to the Christ on high;
Better to die than die,
And not to despair.

Holy Virgin! if thou canst so swear,
Looking from thy nunner in heaven,
I pray thee by saintly grace
And humble thanks for thy grace.
If it be true, if it be not,
Thou shalt be sent to preach it never;
If it be rich, if it be poor,
Thou shalt be poor to give it never.

Chanting, praying for a son,
Wine-giving God, it is well done;
Such a prayer as this is one
(And how shall I tell?)
The Virgin gave and Heaven must give,
And all was well.

Remember thou of what I say,
And tune thy pipe to lulling lay,
Till the night be blown away,
And the good moon drive thee to her;
Yet, though her beams lie far and wide,
They are not these to make thee wise,
But if she winna ease thy mind
As I say now, by and by,
Thou shalt hear a carping fly.

And now, by the old oak-tree,
When the wind is in the tree,
The boughs I shall take by the throat
For to draw thee, Margaretta;
For thy love is so great,
Thou must keep it in a trance,
And then there shall come a day
When this angling, kissing vein,
And that tongue shall cease to gain,
Shall but breed thee such a pain
As could temper thy soul's sweet blood.

If thou wouldest sit beside me,
With those knights of high degree,
If thy face I could discover,
Whom to love I dare not tell,
Till my dying wishes yield
A contentment to those three,
That for which, in former ages,
I have made a saint in heaven,
I will dream a devil-woe,
That the feast may be forgotten
Or the ball-break cease to be;
That my thoughts, not words, shall be
Chanted forth by my true love,
Every altar-morning;

I'll kneel there and pray, and take
From my breast all thoughts of fear,
From my breast all thoughts of agony,
From my heart all thoughts of care,
From my heart Faith, Hope, and Charity,

I know thou wilt not leave me;
I bow myself to thee,
And think of things that cannot be,
That were, and are to be.
I bow myself to thee,
Thou sage and gentle dame,
Who thus didst teach me how to span
The heart of Nature with her daughter,
And make her looks divine!

I bow to thee, thou mild and gentle dame,
Thou wisest, and wilt not yield to me;
I am full of love and ruth,
And Charitical I cannot be,
But thou wilt make me, as I yield to thee.

I bow to thee, thou good and bonny dove,
I will not kneel before thee;
All my thoughts are gone from thee,
All my thoughts are vain and vain,
And I will not kneel before thee.

I bow to thee, thou rose and thorn,
I will not kneel before thee;
I only know thy gentle morn,
Thy noon did dawn and save me;
I will not kneel before thee;
I only know thy gentle smile,
And thy voice's gentle pealing;
I will do even that which thou art to,
And only will do thrilling.

O blessed sweet Lady mine!
Do not disdain thy frown,
Though I wear thy bright unsivery,
And thy sharp untouched frown.
Oft when thou hast shaken my trembling hand
With thy hand so small and white,
By night or meanness, I will stand,
As guardians of thy light;
And, if it be too late to speak,
Tell it not to me, dear, from thence.

Since Love cannot at all assistance find,
Why tarry I longer still in this vale of tears?
When that which I spied I again shall tell;
When that which I spake, I still dare win in this fall.

As thou dost love, still am I worthy thee,
The most just praise from me will I deliver;
With thee I
======================================== SAMPLE 52 ========================================
, while my awfull brest, with watȝ,
Dull ioy, disfigured from her werk;
My sonne is lost, nath he no more to wrye,
But on her haþel was my eyryes throwne.
And I, lesse wretched! as my hertes falle,
Fled fast, but hoped not, for lesse delaye
Made at our neck, for ioye, for ioye my bale,
To hit I looke, how clene it ore doth yeeld.
I looke, and saw so fayre a iusty flode,
That with me in my selfe it was agayne.

Neuer had I of wyues, ne had I of sights,
Ne eyther might of sorwe, ne of delight.
Ne now my ioy, looke more then I behynde,
For that blynde day that euydent is vndyd.
For had I of the brocke so ioy to bere,
That lyued was I with my selfe my bale,
All drede I well of the foule prisonyre.

How that in herte is clene of my defrayned,
And how my soule is set on vanyte sted,
To fayne, as auenture to vanyte pere
That is so dere of all thou mayest reade,
Of god ne kynge so I lyst ryght well to take,
But I worschyp, that to late me my dede

As hote vpon him, and in sorowe vnderstonde
For to preuenge, if that he wolde lese me,
Folowynge of my defrayned stede withryve.
To god, or that I lyste wyll ben a lyttyle,
To cortaysse myȝt, as I haue seyd before,
That he by lengere my selfe in myne behynde,
Folowynge of my peryll my self þay hade,
& for my selfe þe sayl that dotȝ me not to wrath.
Bot to the sayl I se my woȝ arayed,
And after I maþewot: “Falswit derkyn wit
For of my self I wyll not hate so much,
That I may synke on lyue aye other rate,
Thay may be hende bothe vnlawful & vnkynde.”

Folowynge my payne, and exaltinge my spere,
Lyue alway mad fro myn alycious part,
Howe be it helpeth, by-holde no barre,
But sinke the sover of myn hertes smart,
And howenward, ferynge with worde me calle,
Myn intenyture, do me no tormente,
Mi weryle of ioye, myn herte to reme.

Whylest thou hast had, I schal the more enforren,
This sorowe man and I shall leve thou fayre,
And put to þyn toune my lust of pryde,
Leue of my peynes smerte and of disese.
Thus to morowe me out of þyn oþ{er} lesse
And after nakke; bot if I schulde loke vpnese,
As for my peynes ar mad for peynes,
I mote suffre þys. And wytles for to ryse,
And howe be that non may so persterte
Of man, for he may saue his quereleȝ?

No meane meane, ne no fors if I to halde
Be in oure ede, for certes I wyll nede,
For nede is but the fyrst of þyn stremes.
Bot if þ{o}u so be schent & nakid er I se
I am endles speche of tokyn kynde.
Ou{er} meruayleȝ, what is to saye, nature
Ȝif þ{o}u be ay ay for payne of quyt bere,
To sayleȝ i{n} auris a mayden of ryche,
A mayden of hy{m} dedely schal I syche.”

Wyth ywysly wat
======================================== SAMPLE 53 ========================================
 in the darkness
Drinking, sleep as I sit
Clasped without a struggle
Loose and free as flies the fawn.
And the people hear us
Strangers even now,
Crying over us,
Over us.
And I look to find the rest!

By the bright hearth and porch
Where the ancient columns kept
Their watch below the dust
And dreaming dreams of the dawn
Night after night they sought the bank.
Here, heavy gold and blaze,
Peaches, fruited vines,
And tamarind aloes
Touched by toil the wind,
The wind and the wind!

Where the young child struggled with the wind and sun
Till, over miles of flowery hills of bloom,
The gossamer threads with great twisting tendrils spun
And twined around the garden's flowery gloom,
Beat its quick wings and all the air became
A joy and mystery that night.

Yonder the lights, like eyes of weedy mounds
Still glower at the withering eve,
Hidden behind a leafy bush,
Steeped in the rose-red dusk
A vague white light
Glows like a brand of iron; on the north-wind,
Palpitate and slow,
A mutter of snow drifts its snow-gray head....
The air is turned into a blaze that grows,
And deep within the earthy mound
The placid primrose and blue violet
Bask in a purple frond.
We drink their longing in the bitter sea,
Lifting our tired heads
O'er that mysterious stillness, lost to me.
I can see sudden
From within the dark blue woods,
Streaming silent streams,
Petal by petal's daintiness,
Golden eglantine
Where the wind-flower, in gaunt and lazy tresses,
Lifts its beautiful form in the mocking twilight
Down on the opposite shore.

They come with darkness,
They come with sound of the mocking rain;
And sometimes, as the night grows deep,
The rain-clouds gather against the West
Like wind-shouts on a mystic wold.
I seem to feel myself
Wandering amid green vales and woods,
Like some good ghost with rain
That has come from far-off solitudes,
From out the untrodden ways,
Into the twilight calm and still
Until a wizard, wove of gems,
The very thing that doth not move or rest,
Can cover me and hide from sight,
And, following its heavy gleam,
Come down across the hush of night,
And find the ancient dream;
And every peal from out the distance,
And every cry from under the hill-wind,
Is something tangible.

I catch the gleam
Of dusky wings,
And slowly up the long, blue steeps
Of silence, like a spell,
Leaps on me, and in trembling sleep
Waken to power.

Now I know
That Spring is here, and that it is
The sounding woodland creek;
Yet still I know
The good fairy-land that lies below
Upon the hush of Autumn skies,
And I am glad to hear it say
This is the charm I have dreamed!

Thou blossom that art sweet, deliver me,
Into the arms of balm and purity,
Pure as the snowdrift cast from a sky of blue,
Who has no song to give, no laughing eye
To follow the wheeling seasons' harmony!
Wilt thou not use me in the glow and flow
Of thy pure, white and whiter purity?
Sure thou art fair, if I but call thee so.

Weary is thy maidenhood, O Night!
Yet the noonday sun hath beauty's light,
And stars have twined their veils in thy white hair,
And their soft glances into thine are met,
And a star glitters out of heaven's air!

I am alone, upon a star-swept strand,
Where some fond dream of thee and I must sleep;
Where thine own loved, thy beautiful, sweet land
Looks toward the sea, and is its paradise!
Yet do I hear the song, O Night, that moves
Mysterious round thy path of starry light!

THE luscious sound of the ferny grove,
Whose antelopes float like stars
High in the summer skies,
Because of love,
Because of tears,
Because of sighs,
Because of tears!

THE Hours, that sleep in the blue
And dark and white
Till the mild morn
Comes down with night;
And
======================================== SAMPLE 54 ========================================
, the swift impatient wretch,
Beats out the musty wall,
No human aid shall reach his side,
And Man himself shall know.

You've smiled, ye Nine, immortal Page,
In happy hours gone by,
That now I seem so fain to rhyme
Your happy fits to try;
'Tis true, the humble pipe is sprung
From happy, happy heirs of kings,
And all th' immortal Muses run
To eulogize our sires.

But now my joy grows more at length,
The humble pipe I crave;
Since it deserves so dear a rill
That it shall never wave again,
I pledge to thee and thine:
And if, by any chance untaught,
Thy numbers please us, tuneful sir,
Go see the fountains of my love
In smoother numbers flow;
To love ill tun'd, is well enough,
I 'd have it thus, believe me, do.

Sing soft and mournful numbers, all
That nature yet endears;
These were of late so doubly born,
By early morn and ev'ning dew,
That now, we sadly wondering view
Some darling form of earth;
But since, and all for ever, she
Has pour'd the ocean of her woe,
No earthly Muse shall longer tell
To lisp her sweetest numbers well.

Ah, whither art thou fled,
Bright planet, that didst stoml,
M's hull, bustle, and fable,
Now in a withering swirl,
With all thy toys and pleasures,
And with thy crew atriumble,
Froze Albion's long-forsaken isles,
Or whirled through verdant isles,

Where now the roll of the deep
And the salt wave is spouting,
Foams on the yellow deck,
Where ships of old did follow,
Their courses well they steer,
Each following with his crew,
Froze Albion's long-forsaken isles,
Foams with the rising moon,
Foams, blooms, and blossoms on the shore,
The lovely fields of Oudinore!

Yet I would give to thee
A reed with an osier pen,
To strew the banks of Dee
In the Elysian plain,
To tell the wand'rers' pray'rs
In their sweet minstrelsy.

In distant blushes, lo!
The hyacinth opens now;
Yet, with a blush, she 's too
In the Elysian plain,
To harrow up for ever
The debt I owe thee to my book,
That thou mayst know the wonder
That now my lyre thou wert to take;
And I have taught it, too,
That tho' in it thou wert to me
The very fount of Helicon,
Yet should the very god
Of music by my lay be crost,
Thou wouldst rejoice that I
Sang o'er thy fav'rite lyre,
And none of all thy choir
That ever more than Thou
Carol to the winds her lute.

"Love thou art very dear,"
Was ever Fanny's moan?
But when she sang her lute
The song, the silence all,
My softest words forgot,
My saddest tears to fall,
For thee, were dark as night,
The fairest stars would be,
But all could find no light,
So none but you would see.

O weary lot!  O blinding woe!
There were no pleasures but to love;
To him that dwelt, to him that went,
There are no pleasures but to prove.
Then let the gentle, unseen shade
Upon thy gentle spirit brood,
And softly sway those listless plumes,
To wake unhallowed mirth and good.
And to thy soul her love repair,
With all its solemn tenderness,
And gently lay those favourite curls
In his benignant modesty.

Ave Maria! let them rest
Beneath the shelter of thy breast;
An only angel be thou blest,
For all thy joys are but a part
Where all may meet and sympathize,
And all things part where'er they be,
So that for thee and for thy love
All there is still be found above.

And if to you a choice is made,
There follows always some choice shade,
But you may bind with pleasure still
The bonds that bind each other's will;
And so this course to peace runsrene,
Remember it, for only then,
At once to
======================================== SAMPLE 55 ========================================
, and with him many a Pagan knight;
Ardent cut up and cut with his sharp sword,
This like a Saracen would never draw,
Such lances were in hand nor smite him sore,
And had him fallen bodily or slain before.

Glad was the corpse of Hypsenor; the more
To Paris was he sorrowful. Of whom
But lately was the hope to be the heir
Of a great love? And, since it now lies dead,
The hope doth wait the Pagan's coming aid,
To set that bulwark on his groundwork hard,
And close the turble that no chance can have,
But heaven forbid it. Here Latinus' child,
Godfrey and Billy and bold Tydides, smiled,
Together weeping; and their captain they
In friendship gave. The Christians to that port
Came, and received them full thereof. Of those
Whom there they left found out some other knight,
Who then the shores of Sicily confined,
Who, had he perished, spake he nothing bright,
Nor found a Trojan at his end: the arm
Of great Tirynassan was this, from whose top
To earth as far as to the heavens he clomb.

Naught heard he of that profferediments vile
To tempt his churl to these hid springs and skies,
Which marred his better wit. So low he fell,
And on his corpse low heaped prayers and sighs,
Though naught but rudely scorned his living face.
Glad was the body and the soul of grace,
And therefore moving forth he kept him far,
Nor that the help of hands and works might serve
His desperate person, that still, grieved for
His safety, then above himself to lift,
Upbraiding him and that renowned baron
Whom, as he passed, all things for peace desired.

Argantes, in lamenting uncontrolled,
Thus to the Lord of Armies said; "O woe
Me, is the cause of Heaven thus taken now!
Why lights this lamentation? why the sound
Of mournful silence? from the tree with plaints
Following, and cries, and cries, let us depart,
That we may mourn our loss." Then turned his face,
And from the presence of the Lombard knight
Assumed a color, as if mourning good;
And if he were aware, could nothing do,
Naught he appeared and mazed from place to place,
But all the hardiness of his changed face
And his changed arms were cause of grief and teen,
Lest, out of joy, his living arms should be
Entrusted more, if aught he might amend,
And of his wound the limbes and helm the sword.

All this must be some traitor; being glad
That he once gone in hunting was foregone;
And not for this would be the punishment,
But that God wot, that his rebellious hands
Should use their labor so, that neither sword,
Nor bow, nor arrows hurt him. And this is known
Rightly for the fact, that he one victory
Had gained, but not so much as he possessed.

The contrary report of treachery defies
All one excuse, as at the outset he goes,
Beset in France, and sets upon her foes,
He shows where they have camped, they were at ease,
And by his arms have gained reposing trees;
The scanty nets which that rude man, who chose
His habitation for the prize, chose out
Upon them both his commonsurer and mail,
And yet himself he keeps, in faith and valor,
For that small glory which was at his side.

I had he owned it, he his scanty store
Dished scant, and I had left him free of doubt
By that perfidious answer which he failed.
But it may be that great calamity,
Great Nature's priestess or Earth's mighty mother,
That to the miserable dares and cruelly
She flings her wretched children, to take food
For their devices; and that men to hell
Must hurry with the innocent blood they spill;
And oft 'tis thought he runs of her and weal,
Yet will not turn his back till he shall spy
His cursed foe, chased through the open door
Where God hath bid the shades his lambs to feed,
Thence whither they are sent. The same can be
Of all that great calamity in Rome,
Whom these are dead, whom living they did slay
By popular adagings, one and all,
And left as dead to ravenous beasts and man.

Now, if their fortune good or bad they will,
======================================== SAMPLE 56 ========================================
, of blackest times!
By the fagots of our youth,
For he died with the Chinese in his time
He had learned unto no one in all the world,
And 'tis said the poets were as mad.

Not a quill or a drop of water,
Not a drop of snare
Not a wrinkle--a curse
Not a stain,
Not a speck of the bush,
Not a stain.

I said a Briton, his thing was not hard for him,
But he was a Briton, as though, you see,
When he called the Briton "a dreary word,"
And his manner of speaking, he briefly guessed.
'Twas the English sparrow, though passing well,
Who beguiled the gentle fair lady's heart
In a wealthy kingdom, and banished apart
His kindred.
And the knights of the Marchese
Wore leathern gauntlets and gloves, and a clot of greenery.
There was one who loved to combat the foe,
And loved with the Romans, but found them in war.
And the barons of Canada, forthwith of them came.

But the deed of the duke was the first to remark,
"Had the battle been here,
Great lack would have been
Of the force in your hearts,
And of the force in your feet,
From the step to the step--
For these see no man,
And nothing will permit.
I've looked into your eyes
The weakness of age and the weariness of the years,
And certainly once in a while I could feel the truth,
And the curse of the teeth--
But that's all washed away.
Well, as long as our race shall be in us for ever,
If the news should be told,
Our sons shall be both in the fields of the battle,
And our gallant ship
With honour shall wait
Her masters, her captains, up high in the air.
'Twere better (who knows?)
That the hearts of the British be cold,
Or the hearts of our English be dark,
Than unslack be cold!"

The Celt in the Tower replied: "If it's possible,
Our own British Periwig still must be gay."
And the wrongs of the Pict are the wrongs that befell
In the days of our birth,
And he who is injured is strong and well
Who dares to defy against Burgalling Right.
O theinian Faithful! how could he withstand
The assaults of the Gaul
And the ardours of England's per conspiracy?
The chief of the Vikings is he who dares
To repel all invaders who threaten her land:
With children entrusted, he bears the command,
To keep the example in hand;
Not vainly despising the hands of the poor,
Andussian despots who wear shirt on his coat.
In truth, at these glorious wars,
The poets of England and France,
Prove her sons are more honorable born
Than the sons of her sons, and their worth shall be,
Though their names should be read
In the speeches of men, and the letters of home:
"Who of all the youth gave to fighting and war
His strong-bearded chief,
And to make or to save them the freemen so brave,
The richest who ever were spoken of slave,
The bishop who spoke from the throne of his son,
Is traitor to me and to all the clan.
It was he who dared all defy and defy
Himself and his foes, and his banner should fly
Through the kingdom of Christ o'er the desolate world,
As it never shall happen again by and by."
But now to the tale of their warfare, the King,
Their terrors and feuds,
The lion of Norand, the camel of France,
Into the jaws of their lawless misrule
Rush'd with avenging accord,
Till he stood on the pinnacle top of the crag;
As he tower'd on his tower,
Heard the terrible storm come ceasing at large,
And look'd o'er the dizzy goblet with fury he swag'd.

The King in his palace high-citied sat;
A crowned old warrior of a mighty force,
And high were his brows with column and fume;
A hoary-headed man
Dark and old,
Proudly his warrior's favorite, as gallant in age;
But when to the court came the lion-like Page,
A man of such dignity,
As young Mary Annic, who sat on the wile,
Sweet Mary, by love was she chaste,
And fresh as the year
======================================== SAMPLE 57 ========================================

Shall carena sae braw, they
 inheritance a dress.
They shall walk a measure
Their heads upon a day,
And view wi' pleasure
The lassie o' May.

She has vassalls and ladies
To vamsel out gin ye please;
Ye'll find it a pleasure
To gie her like to you;
Gie her the aul she will ken,
And she'll care nae tine,
Gie her the aul she will ken,
And we'll care nae decline.

Ye needna think ye mortal men are great,
When fates are set, or high or low,
But rather man, since man's imperial state,
Has made you great--and greater known--
Than you, ye things of worthier life possess'd,
In larger things, and graces more than rest,
Whose heart can court creation's petty mirth,
The deep, soft words, the solemn deeps of earth,
(A pleasing task) that fill with passions high,
And pleasure, that dispels the solar beam,
And shapes the face of heaven with mind of beam.

"Earth, Time, and Space, as yet, they say, are not,
From this their first descent they fell;
The very soul in their white forms they dress'd,
And made them Empress of the scene--like you.
When Fame reports that dim, disastrous hour,
When Folly's torch threw down the starry shower,
To weeping millions, 'tis the work of those
Who boldly dared our cause, or had repose--
Now honour springs from human memory's page,
And man attests the Muse, that call'd the age.

"Tho' oft our days and nights of horrors vain
With woe and silence fill our evening hour,
Yet, still with Hope, our leaden hands we twine
Round Memory's shrine, and grasp the fading hour,
Till Death, perhaps, the last and dreadful hour,
Bring him, the present, to our eye a glass,
And teach the future man how soon to die;
For, so employ'd, he'll pass the barren vale,
And wipe the last tear from his dying urn."

"As yellow as yon glittering beldame,
By yonder cloud hid in the azure sky,
Mild, sober eyes, concealing half conceal'd,
Grow sparkling gay, with smiles of love endu'd;
And now and then, in cloudless, deep repose,
Tender, half-sister'd, (as if she confide
In a sister's thought), the mother-monarch rows
The deep-mouthed rills and greening caverns round,
And laughs to see the pride of man they bound,
His friend's and grand's friend's friend's to be their hearth.
Now the deep midnight strikes with silent wing,
Now and again, in solemn, hoary night,
Th' embattled stars unnumber'd stars swing slow
Through the broad heavens, eternal and so bright.

"'Tis even now the tide of life's declining hour,
When joy's seductive wave is smooth unsullied:
And Nature calls me to a summer bower,
To view each opening scene, each whispering flower;
Or in fair mazes to my fancy rise,
Gardened with moonlight, sleeping on the skies;
Or glides, when all around, in gentle sleep,
Hymns of bright angels, to the bowers I love."

"'Tis not the ruin of the world, that shone
With the least brightness of the kindling sun,
That from his rising wakes a fairer glance,
And leaves me guiltless and alone,
On earth unloving all its charms to teach.
To thee it seems a kind of generous trust,
And zeal to heaven and charity to earth,
By which I feel my every purpose awed;
For thee it is that I deserve the dearth
Of this my cup of happiness, and thou,
Valentine thou, invitest it to give
A tranquil happiness to all below,
The sigh that trembles from a guiltless brow.

"Ne'er linger thus for Time;--he never wings
His course in upwards or in downward skies,
Smiles on the dismal world, whose source is love,
And smiles and chides, in conquering thrones above.
Long were they loved, both for one moment's space,
And the eternity of death and time,
When sojourning on this bright, earthy race
Is man's redeemer and chief epitome;
And men's proud worth, and
======================================== SAMPLE 58 ========================================
 home in heaps.
Now Gage is high on horse, the foe
Is falling on the walls, and so
Up to the battlement
And all the houses spreads,
And into every square,
Where cowmen ride and meet,
A crowd is beating;
First, Lion; second, Grace;
Whose face affords a trace
Of high and royal grace;
Short is his breath;
Wild is his glance;
No fawner shepherds fail.
--Yet follow; where
Are serfs and mighty; and
The common monsters! Franks!

He's there,
Who for his own end
Have shorn and loosened the posts.
He's there, the golden star!
"Pagans!" the exulting king cries;
"Who are you? With what emblems,
You! with what painted teachers
Came your God's inspiration.
To His prerogative
You have drawn the weight,
You have whips and pranks!"
So spake the King;
Then spake the Arch-King,
Who stifled and did not pause:

"I'll show my man," quoth he,
"The betters you allow!"
Then Lion beckoned;
Whose son, the Arch-King, followed;
On the King's horse mounted.
Barramins, who wandered,
Ran to the nearest border,
Gathered on the first besteren,
And the longest man assembled
Gathered there of Dan O'F conclude;
Eager they eyed him,
But soon they found him
Hasting, entangled, bounding,
In a broken trail;
Stretching in motion,
Then abruptly breaking,
Thumbrously demoniac!

Then the King turned round,
And Oliver enraged;
So marvelling
Knew not what assail'd him;
At this unguarded hour,
Ran he on his steed;
Who thus impatient
Ascended his steed,
And through the leathern reins,
Then smote the arch-traitor,
Who was driving like lightning.
Wildly he rushes,
But well he overtakes him;
As he leads on,
With howlings deep and terrific,
Into the vault so entrance.
Gone was that cry!
Through the iron threshold
Rushed with an uproar;
Past a tower of oak,
Bends the arch-traitor's stroke.
Then come the voices
Of Roland and Guarlan;
With right or left they answered,
Death man or woman.
In his arms the arch-traitor
Lay bleeding, dying;
O'er his head the arch-traitor
Tumbled on the ground;
In his arms He hung suspended;
Crest was undrawn behind;
With blood his teeth were sprinkled,
Coals of cavelins on his breast,
Hot beaks and claws of wonder
Craved his heart; once more he slept:
Now he wakes,
With those two hundred soldiers,
Who to his kindred spirit
Once more retreat.
Great are their griefs;
But infinite their anguish;
At such a hour,
For peace they sought not, nor for rest;
And from the yawning tomb
They took with them the Emperor.
For the Emperor hath given him mercy;
But for his mercy now no more;
In the star-chariot
He hath no trust.
Then his brothers and his comrades
(For the last time they were found,)
Called from their straw they had been burnt;
These, for mercy, had deserved
Only to save;
To live.
Flee to the depths of the sea!
The land lies lost, the sea gains bound!
Sound, trumpet-voic, through the martial sound.
All pale!
Veil'd in the darkness of the night,
Climbing the steep gray rock, he lies;

Rising with hopes, and fears, and fain
To die,
But working on His will!

Through yon vast length of flowers, each one
With golden crest and burnished gun,
The Giant Idol of the Sun
Is swaying, setting, setting still;
Over the clouds' faint shadows run,
Dim with the pomp of his own will;
Downward, through ether, or the dark,
The Giant Idol of the Sun
Is swaying, setting, setting still.

With patient pace, with anxious heart,
Through thick and thin,
Through sound and sight,
From sky to hill, from sea to sea,
The Giant Idol of the Sun
Is swaying, setting, setting still.

From home and God, from bliss and ill
======================================== SAMPLE 59 ========================================
 thee,
Say, gentle Aeolus, and with accents soft,
Dost thou not see a Goddess all alone?
Ah, why should it be possible, my son,
That one immortal thus be given to thee
By heavenly fathers, since thou art so wise?
To whom, the swain of Menelaus, thus,
With eyes averted. That would be a shame,
Nay, not because I see thee not, O prince.
To whom, straight-stepping artist, shalt thou say
The Prince Menelaus, how he came to Troy
From Argos. Neither so will I do him good
As honour: surely he is happy here
Whom I shall see no more--save death, that man.
His daughter's father is not always thus--
Not than a common man--to be himself
So the Gods grant him serviceable to himself;
But he that is a Prince of his own age,
Not, as I think, with fire in either breast.
I see not; I am older even now:
I see I also; nor hast thou performed
E'en by the Gods themselves. I fear for him
That is a miserable man, the gift
That Helios might in marriage bring, no fear.
Would that this man might see it--it is now
Too plain, I see that he is yet so weak
To be so helpful; for he lives at ease.
And he that stands in need of him is mean.
But he that will not triumph gloriously
Or dare to boast the grit that can escape
His parents, honour giving him, renown
And honour giving him, glory becomes him.

I tell thee, therefore, this: in Argos thou
Hast heard the tale which oft has been told to thee
Achilles, when his father's steeds to Troy
He sent, when many gallant steeds he saw.
Now, son, forbear to tell thee how it is
That thou hast perished; for in every fight
An awful Goddess stands not, all in heaven,
Whose sight can surely not endure to be
The witness of so much calamity.
Such never can be born to be their kin
When ruthless Achilles drifts them back, for Peleus
Is very godless--He alone knows whence;
And on his friend his head is fastened, whom
His mighty strength can so far overthrow,
He cannot miss his claim, and grow thereby
Unvanquished, yea, though he were but dead.
To whom, indignant, Juno made reply.
Then Juno, bowing low, Goddess in person.
Not such, O father, as thou biddest me,
But such as will fulfil my word, the spousal
I would not, would not suffer. Now make fast
To all my multitudes, and thou shalt give
To all the Gods thine armor; for thou dost
Exceed thy might in any, and in me
Whittiest thou canst save. Thou wilt not fail,
Being mortal, then to cope with God or man
E'en now--to die, if such thy desire--
But from thy wrath a refuge; and I know
Thou shalt not want thy love. Oh, would that so
Thy suit had yet been dared! But Paris now
Reminds me, and I would not in thy sight
Pray to him. But may some other godlike man
Grant thee, the best steed left alive, to ride
With me to the Achaian camp, my native soil.
Then will I burn the body. Then will one
Of all the Gods send home the golden bane
To Achilles, and will other Gods, to grieve
At such an one and hate it. Had thou been
Libaticus, who withers from his bed
Received such blessing never had his pride
Been glad, thou wouldst have still been doomed to die.
But, rather, whomsoe'er thou wilt, let heaven
Vouchsafe the respite; yield to lotus-born
Achilles, light of mind. Then thou shalt see
Thy friend Achilles, and thy keen demands
Seated; and of the chase he shall be slain,
The meed of vict'ry. I will win renown
By deeds of valour in the field, and win
The name of dear long-lost Achilles' friend.
To whom the Cloud-compeller, thou replied.
God, let the Furies drive us; they may aid
The Greeks no more, for they shall surely win
The day of triumph for us and our homes.
But, if thou pray, or if into the snows
By thee Achilles turn thy back, restore

======================================== SAMPLE 60 ========================================
 of Poetry; of Lydgate,
The first and last, Muskeby to be sung or sung
Of the Land-ale, or of Beuty, I may say,
Brought by our tongue in Glasgow, the approach of May,
And after his specimen of works and preaching,
To bring a light, by limping of the day.

Here, Dathy, didst appear
Like Caesar Constantine, and in a corporal's robe.
He humped her: "Sir," said she, "not that I went
About this latter of my friends: he moaned
And wished I might be where I could: I've tried.
They've got my mind a different man.  Some say
He shept for marrying Mary on a day.
My house is rich, and way is very rough,
But I've a mind and understand the Truth:
And all my little place is very rough,
And God help me to be true to all I am.
I'm told I had an old wife sitting by
Without a chance, against a learned man.
I hate her: her the Critic will not lie
And put it in the heads of many men.
Perhaps, as luck is in the matter, I
Have only spoilt her off, by means of this;
And all my little place is very rough,
Except where culture in the things that smile.

The Prueful lads, yon fathers of our race,
Not nearly of the same age, read the same,
Who to old Cato, tenderly, descended;
And, thoughtless of his fame, broke out as christened:
'Twas then the Roman lord was in the deep,
And yet he put the schemer in his sleep:
Our common scutcheon read of Caesar's worship,
And gods were faithless, but his image clayed
As Nature did at his supposed today.
But from their midst they now withdraw the glory
Which is their staff, their guardian prince's glory.

But nobler still, and stronger: thou art terrible;
Thou art the Genius of our human stage:
With thee if either estimate we call,
I doubt not: thou art more than mortal; that
Is done through thee, than history in the mouths
Of poets, of the dead, and ages that have passed;
Thy builders are dumb fools, yet thou art still
One of our senators, and knowest not
How they themselves are tost about thy posts,
Thy sport a man, if thou art a plebeian.

When I was with the Chapeash and the Peers
One morning in the street in Maiden Street,
'Twixt flour and running in the fields of wheat
I sate me down upon a rustic seat:
The noise was wholesome as an infant's shout;
The girls were hanging their delightful hats,
And looked more like a play, or frolicsome.
Grass-blades were glittering in the village street,
Above the bustle, or the shrub, or tree
Grew still more tranquil, while the sun went down
Half way to its appointed cruelty.

The chime of birds was musical; the gale
In summer-time was odorous; the wind
Played on the bushes as the evening train
Chased the blue jessamine; and the steersman's steed,
Although familiar to the younger men,
Slew the young grass into a furlong red
With treacherous green and emerald.  Here a whip
Was idly making prints, or from the horse
Contesting the wild bees with the unwieldy shocks.

How like they were!  The wanderer, here at hand,
And there a steadfast dweller in my veins!
O, how I loved them, as I loved their shape
And features!  They did well to mix the tune
And make me happy, for it was my nature!
O, Father Abraham, I loved them, then,
With the fierce passion of revenge, until
They rolled upon my head, and bore me down
To the old mad scenes and dreams.  How strange it was
To hear again the soft, low-whispering tones
Of children in the streets.  I seemed to sweep
Clouds up among the clouds of reverent thoughts,
And like a fore-father the ghost of hope
Outleapt the threatening sea; yet did I seem
Like one who hears and knows not what he feels
In all the house and after-bands; so then
My heart began to fail me, and I wept,
And struggled in my soul.  That woman with her son
Came on too late to help me, which I loved,

======================================== SAMPLE 61 ========================================
 thereaway.
I can think, now I see thee,
No better thing am I,
For I'll never be going away
Till nightfall.

It was a little owl lived there
Who was pluck-gowned and very fair;
And when he found his meal was done,
The bird was back with all her own.
With one knee bent beneath his wing,
With another downward, kingly spring,
He caught her by the pretty hands
And led her safe to his commands.

He kept so close, he kept so still,
She could not have him for a stir;
At last, having got his meal and eaten,
And warmed himself in many a stir.
Whatever was the cause, he made
Me glad that he had stayed away,
But I must sing, and I must say,
Don't wait till the spring's put on,
The bird is not a proper bird

The bumble-bee went up the hill
With one arm bent across the grass
To fetch a little rabbit-skin
To hold inside my coat of tan
When the wind brought it in.
The sun came down and all the world
Was glad as if no one had been
In sorry mind to see it thus,
And all the world went up the hill
And all the world went up the hill
In hope as if 'twere something still
To keep the rabbit underneath,
But when the wind went up the hill

There was no one there to give a yoke
Before he picked a rabbit-skin.
The sun went down and all the world
Was merry as the days gone by;
And now, the only thing worth giving
My wife and all her brothersighs,
We come back as the shadows come
When the day's at its work.

So when the sun came down and it
Came back again upon my lawn,
One kindly message did he send me,
The mother sent it all for dawn.
"From all the world, from all the things
Of all the earth and sky,
And whence they are they come to be
What may have been your birth."
So I did. But when the bird came back
He sent it to me, baby,
And whispered, baby,--"
"Not at all, not at all,"
And if he came to you

I was what life calls living, as the picture
Is when I draw to death's and bury
With a kiss or two upon my face.
It might have been you, baby, sitting here
A-mumbling over tables, sewing there
At your time of good-bye, sitting here,
And saying, baby, "never mind, I pray,
There's such a great deal stronger at the day
That don't have been the child at that day
Trod on and keep the garden pushed away.
Who is it walks upon the stairs
And goes off into the wood
All through the day,
All through the night?
Do you never stop and say,
"This is my son,
The sweet, sweet boy!"

I know he's coming back to me
Before the other naughty boys
Were made into the nursery, dear,
Do they remember?
I'm not afraid of that!
I don't like him,
I do, I don't!

The lights are out, the windows in the hall
Are open wide and every one is still;
And when the long drawn curtains of the hall
Are drawn backward by another child
On rainy days and days beguiled,
The end comes at last, but somehow I
Could hardly lose him if I tried!

When in the housewife's yard the fire burns low
And turns its eyes upon the good fires' glow,
Then 'round the table sit the china maids
Who made the fire a splendid place for play,
Picking the bones of either hand,
Bringing the pieces of the oldest fun
To make the fire in.

Now as you sit there, my little boy,
While the fire lights the other child,
If you know when you looked at him
You must have seen his face and wild
'Stead of look and forehead black,
Thinking overmuch of life,
Somewhere in the far-off world
Never has the sight been worth
Such a face in any place.

And still there sits that old self-love
Calm and true and deep and wise,
As in the beginning he
Who was like you, my boy, this while
Clasping hands to you and kiss,
Lay your lips to yours and sweet
As the dew when dawn is young,
And forget the frozen beat
Of the scythe and frozen feet,
======================================== SAMPLE 62 ========================================
,
To do the godlike service of a friend.
These fertile lands, where change is but a dream,
Spreads to a waste and blind and sullen stream.

Oh, at a funeral let us hymn the dead
In blithe and happy days,
Oh, let us linger on this radiant bed,
With thoughts of noble praise!
Oh, let us kneel here for the birth of flowers,
Sweet flowers of valor,
And bow before the pale insensate hours
With grateful violets.
Oh, could we wait, like you, till age should come
And fill our chanted choir,
Then, then, the music of the dear old home
Might paeans purr.

Violets and satin green,
And roses in a row:
In these chequered springs a little hum
Ascends from the wood-thrush, stops to hum.
One song alone--for all alone
Is worthy of the valorous:

I listened when a child,
My heart was in the spade;
He whispered to a neighb'ring shoot
And called me very sweet:
A dream of summer butterflies
Sprang to my soul with sighs:
But now he is gone and the leaves are brown
In the silver bowers.

All fountains that I have,
And rivulets I leave to my lonely bird,
Once more awake;
It calls me home with a gentle start,
And seeks and calls me far.
Breathe bliss into the air
And there is life enough in that great calm
To make me love the Good.

Sorrow and strife and longing,
As any child may use,
To train me like a truant bird
To nature's rich abuse,
It haunts me for a guide-book,
And guides me to my woe:
There, on the empty mountain
Where sorrow dwells at ease,
Its witchery lies forever,
Making me love the Good.

The world is growing old;
A man is growing young:
The world will never hold him,
Nor grasp him if he wrings.
He does not bend the knee,
And takes no heed of me:
Nought hurts him if he takes me,
Or takes me from my heart;
But evermore he helps me,
And stills me with his dart.

Come, then, with no excuses:
Mind your own fears to banish.
Let me have no pretence
To cross your charmed tent;
Sit by your side and let me hear
Your shouts and laughter loud.
Your barren vaunting begs,
But does it better far?
You come to drag me down
And end it in a gutter:
I leave the lurch to come
And tear my body home.

Youth calls me care and joy,
But there's no joy for me:
A sense of which annoys,
A genius to a tree.
So too you are afar;
Why should you know my heart?
I'd rather see you lie
About a sandy bar,
About a house and die,
Than thus to hope and pine,
And hearken there again;
With dying as you pass,
I'd bring my restless heart
Out of the wild sea shore.
I'm wondering if you, mated,
Know not some joys you've tasted;
You're not alone for joy,
A man who's never married,
But one you're not to blame for,
And that you're not the same for.

There stands a birch canoe
In wooded quays;
Its prow, with blue-black tresses,
Whose ropes are wet;
And some, of course, a goatock,
A rattling, curly cur.
And somewhere as you sit
The luckiest wight is sitting,
With eyes that turn to leather
The outer black of hat.

A howling bird above
In wakened grove
Is thrilling with love,
And every bush and tree
A deadly purring--
No more is seen, save you
A lonely, quiet green.

To see the moon and the kine
To hear the fleecy lion
Languorately bartering
His angry, thunderous bugle,
And fighting field to it.
The farmer's wife, as she makes him tired,
Has cried to him in spite of her
That o'er the plough has never an ear,
Has said that she is tired
Unless a squirrel start from her lair,
And has enough to eat up the air.
The gossips stand amazed, yet none of them dare
To lift their bodies
======================================== SAMPLE 63 ========================================
 head,
Nor heeds the sight of finny men and geese
And wanderings that are in her secret rooms,
Or only hear the frightful warning shout
Of her who's loathsome, sin-bound company;
When some are in their graves and sods, and raise
Their brazen wreaths, to catch the glittering ray
Of sun on suns, or when the storm is spent,
In gloaming blackness hide their bodies;--then
When resting in a covert cave they dwell,
When some are lost, and other days of sun
Burns on a harvest of the golden sheaf,
They rise,--and springing on as they have run
Shrink and look upward at the trail of light
That gilds them with a warmer, fouler glow,
Or the last faint gleam of their little light.

The winds have called them to the woods;
The skies are flushed with their cold blue.
The birds are flown from the sunny tree,
That they flew from, will sit and sing
A night-song in warm sunnier showers;
Tho' winds and sluggish fountains
Sing at our cottage window-bars,
And we must heartily say: "Silence,
Our watch is over long, Far west."

Old, old, old, in thymy wood,
How wrapped about thee I am!
The forms of man in still bays gone
I heard: thy rotting wood is now
Bound up and battered with a band
Of golden briars in the wold,
And scattered in the weeds of gold
And left in thy ashen core:
For thy fantastic such a thing
Deserves not to be thought, O King.

Thy palace-chamber, blank of walls,
I yet may climb, O King, until
Some happier wood begin to stir,
And they who wrought the moulders now
Shall have a soft new front of plane
That will not need a stain on me.

The tall, rich-coloured towers that bear
And uphold the temples of thy line
Upon the midnight of November,
Beckon thee to thy dying outlook,
With no flicker of a flash or flare
Of sun, fire, wind, or any chance
Of sky, earth, or of sky's great face,
Still flaunting in the clear moonshine,
And bringing to itself at last
Thy thoughts that all being pass away.

The end of this has come at last
To thee, O King, in thine old age.
The gods are dead.
No end, no end.
On a December eve
My brain was whole, I could not grasp
The woven raiment of a leaf
That swung across thy threshold.
I am not dead, I cannot know
What spirit lived within my power.
I only know I made thee grow
To good and greater sympathies.
The touch, the air, the soul's desire
Within, with flesh, blood, tears, and sobs,
Are dead within thy heart of me.
Thy chill
Is now gone out of memory.
Thy flowers are turned to dead things;
The path that through my heart that pauses
In harmonies of shapes
That went upon the wind with fire,
Sad terrible, untouched and strange,
Perchance, somewhere, some long-gone word
Of fire or frost has stirred or stirred
Upon the city's flare.

The bells stand still, the candles die,
The sad, sad streets are empty even,
In a forgotten heaven.
All things have passed;
No faces human were to-night,
All faces that were like my hand
And in their stead were passing.
One after one
The street dies to the night's last.
The dead are gone
As the dark pallor of the dawn.
In the still stillness
The street dies to the street's dead air.
The dead are here,
Baths lying everywhere.
But their dead come back to me
Here, here, alone,
Where all men stand;
A little house, a burning place
That was a man's desire
And brought us to.

Dead hangs the fire on high
And from its clinking eye
The tomb is hidden.
Why is the woman weeping,
Dead hangs the window-pane
And slow the death
Of her who died
Beside her in her pain?
She called you hence,

The dead who came back
Are now the dead.
Dead lies the fire,
The dry street lies as white
As any flame that went
And died in its returning.
Dead rides the foot that went
And laid his hand in hers.

In the grey
======================================== SAMPLE 64 ========================================
 for to demand the sceptre,
To elect the bright reward of her,
As homage for the lady- solely,
As peace for steps to Heaven disclosed,
As solace for the needy.

There stands within the garden-gate
A picture made of honest care,
A moral point so to be sure,
That priests behold it everywhere,
And all the minds of brutes and sages
Look up to that unclinish'd gaze,
And sit thereon--as if some soul,
Free from oppression's yoke, were gone,
And she were all that's left upon.

Thou own the art! Thou much hast known,
Nor as the world refusing,
The only known right thou canst own,
It is the worn few nobles,
And closed, toil-worn and iron-bound,
Is each day a dream of the breast,
Which hesitates or swerves aside,
Doubting, afflictive, or denied.

With which the deaf may pray and think,
To view that son of suffering,
Who for the world with crucible
Has died for liberty and love,
And both were dead long years apart,
A void God's need for His whole heart.

What to myself I do and speak,
And now, in fact, to you I plain
That life, which is no life, can be
The dialogue of those who come
Alike from every element,
Alike depart as from the bane
That wraps aflower in dreary ban,
A subtile and a curious plan;
A subtile vision, a gray hue,
Wherein 'tis graven, 'tis untrue:

The sunshine or the shadow cast
May find us in the self-same spot;
The earth is jarr'd as by a ghost,
The heavens are dim as Erebus;
A heavenly hush of earthly air
Impells us,--yet, lest tears should fall
As from an eyelid, we 'll recall
With sharp words on that glassy wall,
Where, like a rainbow, he may see
The spirit to that lofty tree:

Come, write in love this line of love,
And tell me how to love you,--
A sight like this again, no more
Than the world overtopping day,
With tranquil childish troubling,
A glowing lustrous element,
A flaming breakfast, nothing loth,
Any more wasteful, breakfasting;
A sense of comfort and delight,
A something real, and a right

Thus ever near to being's rest;
A constant tenantry of bliss,
A glance to be the moment's friend,
A flaming sickness of the heart,
An intestinesy that may imply
The mind's deliverance very far,
Is very full of make and joy,
A thing allied to animal life.

Come! let us find this spirit's self,
This dearest hope, this fondest care,
That in our hearts while we may live,
And which anon may bring a share
Of all we see and all we crave,
This may we call it; yet I 've tried it,
To prove myself what I have tried
In the same land, and made good sure
In this by making self a sure
Of something great to be--a tear;
A hope of being, and a prayer,
A rainbow-hues of winning air,
A sudden call for charity.

Think of it now! I do declare
My insight of your mortal sphere;
The sands that on your eyes appear
In homage to the lift of light,
In worship of the mercy-light,
Are laid and sent upon the same
As glittering in the feast of Love!

How can they teach that heaven is here,
If man in all his pride is such,
To dart a beam, from hope so high,
Of his Creator's love, such sky?
O blest, for ever blest in all,
Come, taught thy soul to fancy's call!

A royal master on his throne,
An humble pedagogue, was he,
And there sat supper with his men,
Praising God for their deeds of worth,
As for them all he vainly would:
Beside him all he cared for Man.

Beside him all his table lay
In thoughts of earthly fame, that rose
Behind the holly, bough, and thorn,
Upon his mind of sin and scorn;
And for a humble death to weep
In hopes it might not dawn on him,
He tried and tried alone to keep
A vigil for some days to be.

But neither speech nor song he knew,
Nor law
======================================== SAMPLE 65 ========================================
 we implore.

Say, can the muses save
A little remnant from the grave?
And can the lucre save
The corn, the garner, and the grave?
Then blame not me
For warning notes of this
That warn'd us of extremes and extremes.
Or else the spirit culls
Things that do pass from earth away;
And Nature's daughters may
Keep all their pretty meanings away,
When put to sea:
Oft let me rove
The desert's desart, waste, and strife,
Seeking for some fair star, that still
Burns bright above
The sand, and blazing on its path,
Like comet through the gloom of life.
Then blame not me,
For favours fortune has forgot,
That in the soul you find
Affection's balm: as starts the shot,
So love's best arrows from the spot.

Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage;
Minds innocent and quiet take
That for an hermitage.
If I have freedom in my love,
Love is a leaven;
And hearts and thoughts are simple too,
That in the heaven
Keep sweet, unrav'n, their morning dew--
And, heaven-descended, never, never!

If I have freedom in my love,
And reason my regard,
Then let the world approve
My sweet, my sweet, my lovely Love;
Since, in a master's vein,
Or in a poet's brain,
It marks the spring and summer by

I love thee, O thou moon mine,
If I have loved no other!
Though I have loved too well,
And sung too long a holy;
Though I too humble be
To stoop so low to kiss thee;
Though I too humble be,
Yet love me!

I love thee from the first,
I love thee from the second.
I love thee from the third,
And yet my love is holy;
But I love thee from the fourth,
And all the nine are holy.

I love thee from the fifth,
From the sixth and eighth divine;
But I love thee from the seventh,
With my heart full of music;
But I love thee from the seventh,
With my heart full of music.

There's joy in woman's breast,
There's hope in man's unrest,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast,
There's joy in woman's breast
======================================== SAMPLE 66 ========================================

"Trifle-unter, it's my--something more--"
A tipsy humdrum of that loud,
Struck from the silence and stole so slow--
The tranquil echoes cry,
Some little horse must go--
Go when the lady takes her way,

Heard only by the broad-browed page
Behind the page:
"Another horse is at my age,
And this is Susan."
And first she greeted him on the road;
His manly leg she has;
His steed, he rode, he sprang from wood
Into a meadow where
No other horse have they.

The wide-boned page was fair indeed;
His wisdom had its sheen;
His knowledge had his fire and breath;
His life was human life--
But Robin said, "I'll never wed."
And then he turned about and said,
"I think I have a son!
I've little time to face the times,
But here's a hand I have;
If you can get him, choose the best,
Come quickly, come soon,
Or why it should not be expressed,
For there it is."

Yet these old Robin could not tell,
But loitered on in wondering.
The flying horse went rolling o'er
Her way, with half a bound,
Heard through the low, the mountain hoar,
As 'twere in the beginning,
By a black crow-throat slow and low,
The little milkmaid from the wold
Rushed out in the early beam.

The little fox fluttered by,
And as he thought,
"What lovely youth am I?"
Said he, "I am a girl:"
The frightened hare fled mad.

Yet through his hat went clamouring
The little hare,
Till the little fox knew more
Of the wonder-working hound,
The little hare-clasp on his breast,
And then there came
The whisper of a spring-tide sail
From a blithe brae where the gray hare-bell
Was in a jangling row.

"Oh, any kind sir am I,"
Said little hare,
"Whose little name is Sir Montrose,
And which is Sue.
Oh, my darling, you are blue
And you can run.
Oh, I would ride without you,
For fear the sun."
The hound did quake and tremble
With all his might;
The little hare-bell trembled,
She felt his might.

"Oh, whither, whither do you go?"
The little hare cried merrily,
The little hare-bell trembled,
She ran, and it became a beak.
"You're going to sail the world, I know,
And that 's my rede!"
The first to rise he did not wait,
The last cried, "Don't you go;
I stay 'till to-day you come to me--
Can you, can you, can you, can you, cannot?"
The second to him and his lads did say,
"Whither, whither have you been?"

"Some friend is here that did not mean
To-morrow, and he can't come soon;
Not the kind word that can say 'Fraid?'
What's left?
Some friend is gone without his bones;
And they'll be gone with all their bones.
"My father died in an evening ago,
And left me there for to plow and to sweep;
The last that died I cannot know,
But he left the grave for to dig and sweep.
"He buried the body, and left me there
The one I loved I did not care--
The only one I left behind,
The other one,--the grave for to find.
"His coffin they buried below, below,
Who cares for now it must soon be to clay;
His bier they have, with carven bone,
And carven bones,--and he left a day.
"There's never a man of me, I said,
Who's satisfied with what I've shed;
And this is why, my friends, he said,
We go to hear that anyway,
And this is why I stay, you know,
We go to hear that anyway.
"He was in pain one night for fright;
They thought his body laid away,
And would not take him back some day,
But he was gone where they had gone
Before they came to hear his trumpet.
"And therefore he was dead and scared,
For three days spoke his silly beard;
But now they call him Whipp
======================================== SAMPLE 67 ========================================
, from the combat drawn,
With blood and brains’ black flames, the foremost on.
Him pierced through mail and corslet, crown, and band;
Through his wide chest his dexter eye would fanned;
With plates of gold and jewels long and fine,
Gleamed white, with silver, and the arms divine.
While Pallas views him from the walls afar,
He wails her slaughter, and she shrieks for war!
Once more the weeping wife his sorrows sheds,
Again she weeps, again her husband reads;
And the sad mother to her eyes descends,
Sighs for the dead, and with her offspring blends.
The brethren’ tears afresh distilling flow,
He pours them with the sword, and smites with blow.

“Let, let it pass,” said Pallas with a sigh,
“Now let it pass, the bard unpitied by,
“Now let it pass,” the carol he replies:
The corselet the youthful GAMA press’d, and cries:
“No more of Dryope, the fire so bright,
“Shall we with fruit, nor plum, my members touch,
“And swift as light he winds his trident’s touch.
“Fellows of yore, whom men with heart regard,
“When the fierce fight was wither’d from the herd,
“Rush’d on, the savage boar and savage brood
“Our brothers, and their kinsmen, fierce and few.

Pallas commands the martial clan to yield,
And fight the vanquish’d by her knightly meed.
But none the numbers of his band attend,
In battle thickest, or in games contends;
Their glory when at honour’s trumpet’s call,
Safe through the ocean mix their shields with wall.
With Dardan arms the rivals yoke them on,
And meet the combat for the first third son.
A priest, whose eyeballs flash’d with rage divine,
Such vapours from his head and body join:
Fierce as a mountain from the blaze he comes,
And like a whirlwind by the tempest plays;
When the mad chief, whose o’er-sped horns awry
The steeds of conquest in the furious tide,
Prone to the dust and furious dogs below,
Loud as the thunder, wheels his coursers round,
And roaring beats the hoarse bass of the woods.
"Silent, deserted! all too late thy train,
O sovran Power! whose vengeance justly waits
On me, more brutal grown by slow decline,
The sober, peaceful, and the meine!
And yet, and yet so nobly doth it tend,
And what was I, that I my birth might lend,
Thee first, and only deity and friend!
That thou mightst be my son, through all my life
Of joy and glory, as a God in strife.
Let me, like earth’s first sire, myself behold,
With mildness as an envious deity,
See yonder priest, and with a parent’s joy
Draw near my half-determined head in joy."

He spoke; the listening priests with every ear
A sonial admiration heard; and then
To pity moved them: but their rage restrain’d
His temper and paternal soul restrained:
For they, resign’d to pity, doom’d to bear
Each the sad secret of a mother’s care,
The melancholy corse and funerall’d woe,
Of which both men and women know no day:
Now each his mind to sorrow’d thoughts prepares,
To weeping grief, to indolence his cares.
As when the sickly blast of autumn blows,
The nodding forests cast a sable gloom;
With tepid tints the mountain’s woodman grows,
And, eased of toil, the glittering pines respire;
Thus pale they glow with unregarded pains,
Till the near twilight shows them all in arms.
Then from the camp the briding streams retire,
Where Simois, less illustrious than his sire,
With swelling streams, which Eridanus laves,
And of his brother’s bones despatches death;
Meanwhile before the fierce Achilles spread,
The circling hosts against the Trojan fled;
All pale they fell, and breath’d along the plain;
The victor leaders, as the chiefs, remain.
Then, as some star that through the
======================================== SAMPLE 68 ========================================
'n ranks direct; the chieftain far
In constant motion darts his vengeful dart,
Whose place of terror, not his fate, is known.
Around, around in circling troops they go,
And furious battle follows as it flows,
Here shakes the glittering falchion on the foe,
There the sharp arrow, and there falls the stone;
The helm of Ebro downward whirling, thrown,
Dies at the whizzing of an arrow done.
Some toil the feeble hand to lift, and some
Festering in death the trembling limbs decline;
Some ply their shafts and swiftest fly the belt.
Nor to reproach the victor strive they; every hand,
Stout Ebro, marking well his better hand
Hence to the close he brings the enchanter band,
And these with stern though sudden pause assailed.
But Ajax, as he fled, the hero hailed,
And thus with winged words the Trojans hailed:

"Now, now; why tempt again the flight of Greece?
Must we, my friends, before the storm forego
Our dreadful war, for one so young, we fall?"
Glad at his words, to whom with joy the crowd
Of Trojan dames, in warlike pride, replied:

"Brave as ye were, your haughty lord attends,
But brave as is the lion or the hind,
Ye bore, like men, brave Mars, the bravest steeds,
And heaps of lances, mixed with flaming wood.
Nor hath the wind to bear our Trojans aid;
Unwilling, envious, he returns in flight,
And now so late, fast-sleeping in the shades,
The post of Mars, renown'd in fight, appears;
Yet must we fear, if he approach again,
Some warrior that will stain the dust with gore.
His inroad stern the son of Peleus bore;
Such was the contest, and such was the war:
He urged him forth, to meet the conflict doom'd,
With ardent combat on the doubtful field;
Then took the helm, with shield and helmet crown'd,
And stood, like rock majestic, on the crest,
In semblance the bold son of Peleus' sire,
Erect and stern, the brother of the Lycian sire.
He, far retreating from the battlement,
Stood half aside, and danger gave to fear;
Not so the Lycian's muscles; Jove with joy
Took him to his proud front, his dreadful shield to wield;
No instant fright assails him, no alarms,
In firm array around the Grecian arms;
Full at his front he looks with pitying eyes,
And bending to his spear his vengeful blade descries.
But, as he turns, the brazen corslet flies,
The shield resistless, and the clashing arms arise;
So, bursting forth, the brazen cuirass shook,
It splits the breast, the skull, and paleness broke;
With his fierce spear the life of body flies,
And Haemon's son, Ulysses, left alone,
Unhipp'd the weapon in the panting heart.
As the swart vulture, quick'ning for his prey,
Springs on his heart, and sable sweeps along,
Sinks in the perilous and dreadful flood,
While all his life in fiercer agony seems,
At him suspended, languid, from the fray;
So stretch'd before the Thracian lines,
When Jove to punish thee of lengthen'd years
The day of vengeance and the fate of war,
Swift from thine arms fell Virtue's guardian star,
With whose bright shield Ulysses fought and died,
And fled to the Achaian fields beside.
And hurl'd from out the cliff his beamy spear,
Full on his breast it struck, and cleft his brow;
Headlong he fell, and stretch'd him on the plain.
Nor wanted all the force of active might,
And kindling lustre of immortal fire,
Which, but not life itself, and more than life,
Invites the soul, and captivates the heart:
As some fair temple to the winds on high,
Still with the flames ascending, pure, serene,
Resembles yet the image of a man.
Even thus, hapless in hopeless conflict lost,
Raged each hero, still the brave man's force express'd.

A Greek there stood before the watcher's eyes;
And from beneath him, right and left, there flew
A cloud of dust, and grey his hair withal,
Hot
======================================== SAMPLE 69 ========================================
ral husband, and strong ancestor,
All strength of mind, and youth of heart,
All fortunes of this earthly life;
And all the various bonds to earth,
And all the toil that mortals know,
And all the riches of this globe,
And all that makes life glorious,
Each of his lot, is in that one;
And his great frailty is himself,
Though in some other form he's gone,
And none can call him forth; for, see,
In him our earthly nature lies,
E'en as the curious snail cries out
Its melancholy life away,
And death, by constant heed and eye,
That, once set up and now set down,
Adds to its inward drops no dearth,
No foulness, nor corrupt of earth.

Yes, as in tranquil summer skies,
Parched with the heat of noon, the brook,
We find the golden moisture filled,
So, panting with the fresh excess,
With touch of zephyr's breath, we feel
Our very veins in glowing veins
Burn with the heat, and light the rays
With redder lightnings than our days,
Or sling the smoke, or ply the forks,
Or start the steel with slender points,
Or from the short-strung nerves, display
The threads, and toss about our heads
Some new engraved in golden words;
But these are truths too plain for man,
And folly leads to more than truth.
The thousand-windowed air of spring
That, breathing from the virgin hill,
The tender shoot of yellow corn
And fostering green, and yellow corn,
All mixed and fused in dancing waves,
And coursing o'er the whispering leaves;
All in one crystal shape, and nigh,
With minstrelsy divine, the face
Of Him, that slaked the world's last thirst,
With all those thousand summers done,
When man was pure and man was man,
All, all was done; earth's joys began.
To her, all music and all strains
That time could give, and sorrows, pains,
The grave's own moods, were given; nor war,
Nor shriek of herald, nor of priest
Was heard amid the gloom of corns,
The doom still keeping close for men,
With heart and hand, nor haunting eyes,
None to relieve, none ever near,
Than to lie still and count our tears,
Forgetting how that blood ran free,
And with the maddened heart of man
Spurning the little fate he ran,
And headlong, as he was distraught,
Bent down his path and in the stream
Fell, and died out, with heart and brain,
Unborn, unrisen from his side,
Like some half-dying child of shame,
With hollow-shred face crying to God,
And empty arms and limbs of clay,
And maddened with a sad rejoice
Like one that on a wild hillside,
Dreams all night while his life waxed low,
Not knowing where he dwelt, who how
He had destroyed the joy of all;
But what to him was all but love,
His heart, and all that made him whole;
The whole sweet world he was, and would
Have seen him well and passed away,
But could not live his dream away;

All, all was said, the dream was gone,
With half his heart, and all its lore;
He could not speak, for death on no
Blest instrument of death was set,
Of silent lips and hands laid low;
And each thought on him long ago,
Though life lay sleeping, fair and soft,
As if his soul the sweet earth's speech
Stilled into music, and its breath
Would not take time for breath again
To taste of life's bright flowers and glee,
But for the sake of dreams of death,
Who now are standing at the gate
Of death, and sad and lost in life.

The dreams were dreams, that soon might seem
The very soul of changeless Time,
And that their life no longer seemed;
For they had lived and had been sung
Till they had reached the souls of men,
Beyond their hope to know aught then,
And life had left no trace of then
In the young heart of men or hearts
Beyond its hope for evermore;
And this was all that could restore
The changeless changeless hearts and minds,
Which were too linked for aught but earth,
Or souls to choose or do it ill.

These were the thoughts within them still,
The dreams of youth, the deeds of lust,
The restless hearts of its desire,
======================================== SAMPLE 70 ========================================

That drag a while, but ere the third dawn dight
With smiles, we bid our voices also stay
For these good steeds which last shall quit the way,
And, leaving marks and signs, take full delight
In chariot and in car, as shepherds they
Whom Atalanta doth in wondrous wise
Surveie and keep for them.  But chiefest joy
Of living things are those that in the night
Common pursuivants and vernal flies.
Those that on foot will leave their bed alight
Dreaded, or through their eyes the shadows stray,
The ghost of Solyman shall there discern,
And by his shadow gird him round, till then
The ancient seer shall tell his town again.
All night the stillness of the friendly moon
We pleaded for, and he was turned to flight,
Albeit we strove, that some unknown offence
Might thence exculpate speed, by none offended,
Or hinderance of our forfeit good.  At noon
We made our passage to the royal camp,
Which, at due time, the swarthyoun to
(Would it had been deserted) locked within,
The former close, against the nigh of night,
Within the narrow limits of the town,
The commonnear, and roofed with battlements,
To shield from sun-rising a fearful feud.

Thus we, in fear of coming, still essayed
The town's destruction, and the wooden jenn
To scale, by steadfast march, and forward bent
To where the breezes as the sandalled plain
Rose to the keel of their huge navy, on
They turned them nigh, and under them the waves
With their main swept, and near them, as they went
Were those who by the chariot saw the knight
Who had drawn near, and quitted his retreat.
At length the day departing took its rest,
That kind reception having so much stress
Had broken down my harassed eyes and breast,
And left me at my Lord forlorn and faint.
How ill it fared with me in this sad town!
Men think I am not of such grief as this;
'Tis so ignoble good and chief renown,
That on a certain day or so I miss
My former love, and that this love is none
Of such delights, that, when I once have shown
Myself what I have lost, a thing so rare
And strange that cannot be all comfort there,
I to my Lord have done a feat of care;
So should I find small profit of my woe;
And having him about the term I go
To serve the worthies, by my Lord I swear

'Tis only skill to give me to forget,
For so I lost him by my foolish hate.
-- Cry then no more, O Fortune, or mine own,
But let me teach my heart to her tongue known.
Though love now threaten me of such despair
I will not keep my words in thankfulness,
But cleave the strokes and lay my head down there.

O ye that gentle, meek, and merciful
And simple inborn things, be pleased to grant
Your simple prayer, that thus, to sacrifice,
I may, without dispute, a honey grant,
Take thy protection on my courtesies.
Thus, when a year is spent that gives defence
To me and to my lady, whose bright eyes
Have power to blind me with benignant stare,
And at that sight have, in the thought they use,
And pray that pity may attend their cries
Then, as his child and mine before the yoke,
I will descend to rest with him on some,

That he may, at my care, for this be taught
My course, and my attendant at my need.
'Tis as I must that she, whom I could trust
For comfort, will at once descend to me.
I with long silence, patiently to wait,
Will her bright eye of beauty be transfused,
And with soft hands my yielding heart enfold,
That, if I do, I may her love uphold.
I shall be taught by her, the choicest there,
By her sweet looks to keep the honeyed fruit,
By her sweet eyes, and by her soft brown hair.
--Nor shall she ever prove me utterly,
Till she be mounted on the highest seat;
For there's no need to hide a heart within,
Or, if she dare, to bear my weight I'll find.
Now on our right for the third coming day
The golden days we past will bring to hand;
And to the lovely sphere, where all things grow,
Songs of glad
======================================== SAMPLE 71 ========================================
 to Brunhild; nought she did but feign
That in such wise she durst not break her fealty.
When Queen Brunhild, that dame so fair of face,
From her fair hand had taken such a grace,
The knight again did both together trace
At once the queenly matter to explain,
That in the end of his fair countenances
It sure should be her husband for her dear,
Whom he had loved, whose honour she did wear.

With her were also the farrier band,
Who thus had seen Brunhild the last queen;
O mighty Dame, O queen so fair of hand,
Since thou didst toil in any war with me,
Make me to rule, to love, and serve my love.
Such service to a sire deserve we dear,
That to none other will our love attain.
We are to him indeed that we bequeath
Whatever man has born, or any born;
We were to him enthralled, that he should live,
That he might happy days and health maintain.
This here present we will let her guess,
Although in this she little doth possess.

Within the court were ladies chamberlain,
With golden hailts and pikes, and ever he
Went forth and took their places, where the three
Did serve in court the ladies seven a day.
And none could tell which foot did make them there,
The knights with four go tridding every way.
The lady with her servants to her side,
And they did swear together, when they could
Behold the way to Sarza, huge and broad,
That he one king should take, one lord beside.

Rich hostages they brought, that they should carry
Gold gain, diamonds rich, and diamonds brave;
Boldly to guard them with their lances brave
At point of sword the knights they would assail,
Each Sarza shield, and quiver to secure,
And with broad arrows seven hundred lance.
The Sarrazins, their treasures did command
And bade give way to them against the hand
Of Roland, who before them fiercely stood,
And parleyed with his men to stir the bands.

Stumbling his steed he made those others seize,
And cleft his breast; they wheeled about in rage;
Nor having more his brand can save his brand,
He left the steed and smote him with his hand.
Gerein from France they saw the king depart,
Hoping the villain would his master be,
To seize the villain is inclined their art,
And to seize him forthwith is sore displeased.
But his man-friend, when full three hundred horse
They saw, called Walter and Sir Vivian,

Who soon as in that castle they arrived,
Abandoned were those counts with great their master,
Who thitherward with zeal did forward ride,
And gave himself the bridle of his steed.
And he is known to them the best steed
The best steed breeding ever bridled can;
For he receives beneath him as his lord,
In that he is above eight hundred man;
For rare withal is no whit better steed
That e'er brought thither by this noble man.
With the same might be said King Marsil hight,
When he had drawn that sword from out the fight,
He wandered free, and as he would have done,
Never assured he would his knight have won.

Lurcanio felt that on the warrior cold,
For, freed from danger of the savage kind,
Sore pined his heart, which in his bosom burned
With such unquailing jealousy of mind;
And to himself thought no disgrace or blame,
His fault atoned, his folly would be shame;
But must not fear; for Fortune's fell decree
Seized him at whiles, and drowned himself in sea.

Pagan Arabs, whom no holy sire can bear,
But who as knight doth ever toil and teen,
Will waft their foe; but if they find him there,
How shall they from the fight bear off his weft.
Right well it is that Carle, so right he fights,
Has broken down that dragon with his steeds.

The dozen peers, which by the fountain stood
To drink before their peers, this while are good;
But thou, their captain, king of men, in flood
Wast not for thee a chamberlain a sword;
Thou art their man; and with the face of earth,
From these dost them profane to flout thee birth.
Then, as the traitor does for thee, through thee
To Carle the fever of
======================================== SAMPLE 72 ========================================
y:

"Saxum repertor celsa,
Tunc sciri rependuntur,
Una perennis aerum,
Porque de mortuorum
Et tenuet siccus.
Oncida, dea, revisunt,
In terris per omne deuotas:
Sive conant mensae nunc nominae
Cum tota per terras.

"Sweete favisi! tua flammanti,
Solo ne mea ihni in coelo!
Blanda mei pauper se coniunx,
Moris augur parvas y sedit."
From the poet's house to the college he had been there so
long that he was obliged to make his escape into the
country, as Master Lippo tells us, by no means; for he
was a warm native and much cherished by his friends,
only two years before he had retired from his home.

"Behold," he exclaimed, "that I here through the town
have entered, and I hear how the conditions of the laws were
fulfilling. Alas! the occasion of the choice was too daring;
it was in a hurry that the father of the father, Jove, and
Ulysses, might be so seized by a great sultanship. Meanwhile
Ulysses hearkened to the words of the wife, and put
him to sleep; for he wanted the assistance of Minerva, who had
given him his desires, which he craved to give him, in an
appointment as to the advice given him by his friend."

The offspring of the old woman replied, "Ulysses, I hear
this further, that the son of Laertes has not now been
offended; but if he has disposed to go to sleep at once,
I will wake your son, and send him soon to bed."

Then in his sleep Telemachus closed his eyes, and with
his head in the guise of a swineherd he went up into the
town, looking with tearful eyes towards his master. Then,
wheresoever he was wending, he found Ulysses at his
knees at once; for there were two ghostes, and the ghosts
that lived near to him, to whom he had been long afar, had

He then took Ulysses by the hand, looking as though he was a
noblest man among them; and as he thought, "Now, then, what
spirit is this?" he said to himself, "Sirs, are the ghosts
from the dead? They are both dead and gone from the world
or are they living, and their house is in ashes, their
ashes are ashes, their hut-fires are all withered and
broken: they are the only hope and refuge of mankind. Their

Then Ulysses answered, "Stranger, as regards this your guest,
my son, I will tell you of a certain matter: we will return
up to the house of Hades and consult the ghostes in the
land of the dead, for that they are dead at once, by reason
of the viper the gods hold their gates up in the depth of
Hell, not the insensate race who keep the gate heedful of
their servants. They are living, and sleep has fallen upon
them; nor would Penelope be able to prevent their
disturbation though the dead were left behind. So you may
rejoice when you hear their counsels and hear their
prayers. They have laid hold on you as long as you are
abundant, and sleep is not an abode of pain."

Then Ulysses said, "Eumaeus, noble son of Laertes, I do not
desire to have any of these ghosts. They are very reprieved
each one of the others has admonished them to stay where
they are at their own house--for there are other ghosts,
who can befriend you as you journey. I will give you one
that you have left behind you, and I will keep my son
from all the rest that comes near him. Let him find me to
sleep, and let me put on him the mantle which the sleepers

On this Telemachus was now going to a village which he had just
slung with killing spears and spears pointed at him; there
was the murder of his son, and the wrong he did to Ulysses.
There the young men were drying their locks and being
scared; but now Ulysses and the old women were running
down to the house of Hades. Arete, alone, was first to name
the rowers, and Ulyss
======================================== SAMPLE 73 ========================================
 o'er the moor, and far from all my cares
Her father was unable to imagine,
As was her wont, to sing him melodies.
So passing through the church, upon her way
She visited the venerable Abbey,
For some officious charge was duly paid
To the good master, the true man,
Who said, all from his work
With prayers and holy psalm
Upon the Stoning psalms,
That it was Pindar's, or ambition.
Went to receive his thanks sincerely,
And then a trip (of which I spoke instead)
Of dames who, on the same
With strictest utterance,
Preferr'd the mode of calling holy,
Which Burman's monks would call
The wandering monks into the pulpit.

Young Burman, in whose prayers and prayers
The Church was guarded, was received
Very near a post-boy's cot
By the horretrious friar,
Who not by prayers or works was served.
Hearing these saintly men despair,
The matrons with dishevell'd hair
In silence reek'd of dread,
And look'd with anguish on the mortified,
And calmly, in the chaunt,
That she too must believe
Who on the cross her Saviour bare
Was ever cross'd in death;
Nor for such trials had she died.
Thus over-happy time is onward flying,
Loudly portends a like ambition;
But much before such others listen,
And oft I promise not
That twice to-day is Widow of Widow Jenny.

Who has not, at this hour, in decency met
In such a flowery mead as this young Muse,
With her own chosen verse, or musing set,
In her own musing field, in valley or mead?
Who thus has grown in this unholy waste,
And left him, oft, as orphan, with his staff
In pledge of blessedness, and motion smooth?
Whose hand would bid all rough-discemper'd deeds
Run riot through the grass, and water through the reeds?
Ah, day no-merit-ed, no-night no-thought-of!
Thus years of widows made more merrier John
At Mary Mother's head, than thus about her bed
They would have read the fortune of their love,
And would have builded ships of verse to move
Like this old Potentate, puffing her gales
And trimming up the deserts; while the sails,
Ascending over all with silver fret,
And spreading in a profer substance more,
Were laden with the precious things of home,
The joys of which were made, like us, the type
Of heavenly life: and there was here the Court
Of meeting her by favour of the Grace
And Worship.  She was oft as one who sought
To win a footing with the purest springs
Which sweetest angels make by day and night
For infants; but sometimes, when she was left
To wear the mantel with which mothers vied,
She too took violets which he had learnt to bring
From the Queen's grave, in infancy divine.
But no--the Virgin was not married, though
Of noble strain; she merely had a soul
To perish in a fame none else could show;
And that was leaving others to make shift
To bring them to a place which they might seek,
And leave without remorse or pride or change,
Their father's house;--how, when she first had come
To bless and comfort them, they set a-foot
As if they were the toeslips of their mother;
And how the eggs were eaten, nor yet more,
By boys and girls; their mother was their nurse,
Her only child, until her catechism
Was given to them, as a nurse on board,
Their object, the fair raiment of their lives;
But she was still the mistress of their wives.
Her father, for the present, was beloved
With something of the fine and lofty soul,
Sweet reflexion of the Godhead, which
Was frank and courteous as its own fair youth,
And at the Chapel did his art prepare,
Saying, Thou'rt welcome now.  The stately soul
Which strives to bear the influence of the throng,
Affords us now a mansion for repose
Like this far country, and on fields of fame
Like this fair region, with a name well known
As freedom, when it seems at church to call
A long procession and much country names.
But to return--I shall not ask for more
Nor more of what I yet have done for thee.
H
======================================== SAMPLE 74 ========================================

Felt that the milde breeze thereof to growe
In odour and in balmy spaine did beare
With vessel contrite; therefore in mixt
And easie, he could finde of which the fit
Was and become the Nymph; but that the sight
Might make her fearfull strains such madness dresse,
She would a pillour make with bloody poise,
And with the troublous mote run cornerlie.
O dreame and cheameie birdie! sweet and faire!
For feare thy selfe with mine owne besmeare,
In me surmounted are: thou maist so fayre
On painted pillours borne! yet deare and deare
My pleasing eyes from living faces see.
O seeing my deare spouse, a prayse is me.
O had my love been but the womanhede
Which those two gentle barons hallowed be,
(As both by right thou wert) then had not loue
Nor loue, but nature yee, whom such beauties please.
Woe to the world, woe ripely unto me!
From whose fair cheek yee bring'st full many a gem,
Whose rare insatiate purple do's not dim.

But age, and loue, and passion shooteth forth
Afresh with subtile beauty in their hues,
And as the world, more after it, hath chose
A virgin for the thing that is most lou'd,
Not more then is it, nor more sweetly shows
The lascivious rose.  O gentle friend! I see
Thy cheeks for shame, thy teeth for obtinence;
They have no names, they must be also boastd,
Since that thy name is banisht.  that the cloud
Of faded beauty doth compell vs ill
From seeing thee, by what ensample still
They worke thy beauties, still are eye-lids full.

O gentle shade of modest sauery! I saw
Thy shade approaching me, by cruell clawes
Me beguiled thus, and by that eye there spoc't
VVith like a forbidden counsellor it past
All his abundance.  I not howl'd for thee,
But entertaind with every lovely shape,
This woful vast of misery and woe,
It made me fidler then my tedious fate,
And now i'm full of dolour thus with thee.

O let not one put on me my despaire,
Whose utmost I admire, whom none believe.
Him whom thy gentle heart hath powre to soare,
The worst of men in all this world, ne're knowe,
But in his nature, thine there is no showe.
For heere I vow I'll read thee, ere I lye
In thy weak heart, that my pure cause, tho' lie,
Bid it come forth with honour and wi might
To mocke my vow; that, when the deere grone
From heav'n I am exil'd, not loath to sue,
Yet with a proud proieu, and well-dispersed
I'le take possession, yet for mercy's sake,
That hee, whose wounds are purgatorialke take,
May be by vs aveng'd, and not so eccho.

And this I preiudge, and that I not deplore
The sad destruction that hath powr to wound
A virtuous mind, in pain and peril more
To tell thee what I now lament, and doe
Feeble the paine with which I am no more.

There will I sit in sorrow and in paine:
O let my death distil thee out of season!
Those sweete, those tender eyes, those constant graces,
All which my soul in darkness doe, are there;
But which, like friendship, when my sorrow saps,
Are nothing but the heat of holy warres.
My mourning weed, that growes thereby along
The bushes shott, that shade the fountain's rind,
A tomb doth make of aged branch and young,
And ever-during branch and root is sung.

My grief, my sorrow! and my woef to die
For him, that did to soone long since aspire.
O heere I'm weary of this life, and I
To find my soule's that living I admire.
But O thou most adorable, O where
Shall I appeare thee, to be left deplore?
Shall I be found t' imagine my fate faire
And miserable, that my hap shall be
Inquainted
======================================== SAMPLE 75 ========================================
en, with these died.)
And more than I was wont, I give it--"quick--"
And certainly she did not come in the last scene of his undisgrace.
For her loved mother had no happy son;
Oft as the custom was of yore,
She had met young Hermione
With cordial words in chorus:
"Young Hermione, behold my fate!
From my loved parents such of thee
May the first blood of woman be
All, and thou here shalt perish!

Balkat, the dragon's brood, I've viewed,
No boy of birth or fortune,
No happy youth, no maiden bride,
Do I now find in my lady;
She sits upon the portal,
With a cross upon her bosom,
And over-sitteth restless,
And I know but little of it.
No children are now like her;
She is in every sense of me.
She sits beside the portal,
I wait, and still I wonder
Whether in place of her there wait
Some boy of many years and many,
Who in their parents' sight was born,
A portion of that Adam's spoil,
Or aught the giant's anger."

So, she stood forth the pillar.
As, of old, the famous Squires
Of Castle-Raise had broken,
So, through many a time and oft
Her body, form, and form, was borne
With peril, earthly pain and anguish,
And sorrow without name or answer.
Ah! How few their number are
Who of their parent's children,
In the dire war distracted,
Make havoc and afflictions,
And pitifully frighten
The limbs of the impending warriors.

'Mid tangled forest and wide meadow,
By burly fen and lonely thicket,
And the lone mountain's pine-cones shadow,
Of the forest sees the quarry,

But neither dogs nor bears can harm her.
Now there is a stately pleasure 'mid these,
An emblem of a better world--the old
Made sovereign of the two fair maidens:
Long ere the splendors of this age
Were dyed o'er with the lustre of the sun,
Ere the old father of the place was born,
To thee an honourable mother.

The castle tower, that stood amid the green,
With stately turrets towering o'er the plain,
Was not forgotten in the days of old;
But now it wears a brighter, nobler fame,
To match the crown of ancient warrior-name,
So age has often told us of the twain.

Yet, as the twain were wedded, one by one
Their wealth and kindred sought; and one by one
Left in the forest--he, with fainting heart,
Had driven forth a maid to his lone cell,
To aid him in his hour of agony.
"Then," thought she, "let us cast this idle dream,
And with its mocking cloud pass swiftly by."
Thus did the good and faithful maidens speak,
Thus, having said, a faithful mother went;
And thus they did her blessing and her care,
If to return to happiness were best.

'Tis meet that she will pay to other folk.
Once more upon the holy chalice
That holy daughter gave a ring,
She showed the ring that did immale
Her ring--its glimmering jewel-ring.
Her fingers with the ring she knit it,
And, in her toil-descended course,
She laid the ring--she made it--un
Permitted, with such right good force,
That if the ring had waked it, 'twould
Have lured a dozen pair of wings.
But, ere the night her veil had broken,
The maid was ill, for night was falling,
From the forest where she knelt to pray
Her farewell unto her dear mother.

Of old, there was a little song,
A ditty of that night in May,
And when she sighed would not be long
An astral could not but be bright.
It sang, "When I am dead, my dear,
'Tis sure that you will find the day
For which I sigh, 'tis sure that you
Shall to your graves can neither sing,
And we will die, so long as we
Will keep out of the whole world--
But by and by no fairy sprites
Can be more cruel than he is!"

So she knelt there for a space,
Then sighed again, yet was not ford,
But in the little oaken place
A bower of six oaken oaks was laid.
And there was heard
======================================== SAMPLE 76 ========================================
ems faire depart in to the beauteous things
Of nature; nor need'st thou be steeped in sweets
Of draughts of heavenly sweetness; for the winged,
Unconquer'd, bound in vigilant flight,
Is ever on the wing, and ever rests
Upon its certain and eternal road.
"Nor wonder, if celestial Justice, sole
In saintly guise, direct the erring ark
Up through that sign: so that more clearly shine
The beauteous eyes, and the harp stain the white.
In which the glorious wig, impregnate with grace,
Rejects the robe, and in his plastic hand
Trace, to the dulcimer that draws the strings.
Many such there are, who life and vision
E'en to the lute, can represent; and those
Who do the bidding, with envenomed prayers
Temper their will.  So that the learn may seem
A feather-zamb of light, in which the hearer
Doth vainly strive for our redemption,
Shall, in himself, hope for it when men die.
But that on earth may not the race of brutes
Into the brightness of the sacred spheres
Ever, as they did here, O spirits move,
Their voices is not heard in mortal life.

Unbounded, then, shall ye behold the vales
Of the ice-mountain, and the river that
Heaves up its flood at the vesper-tides,
Each in his turn?  Yea, ye may witness there
The white snow, which, though fledgel'd by the frost,
Is still in arching bowels loftier far
Than Alps, or where the equinoctial line
O'er Appavavia shows, pass'd through the Alps
And fells the giants of Perugia's hold.
Yea, e'en the lightning on its downward road
Will, on the summit, darken: for to me
It but removes the shadow, which it took
When 'gainst the thunder, and before the wind
Bears it away.  Whoe'er of pencil reads,
His works well painted let him know, and them,

With his own light clouded.  Of the banks
One part is wanting, that forthwith may make
All the crests pinch, and turn loose the other;
Wherefore, men do not ply their oars on high,
When the hot blast of aery flame doth touch
The tender bark of the live current.  Hence
Is it my counsel, and my will to them,
That, as the lower blow from the fire, so
The more they pile, the lower grow.  At last
The circle, that to us from Geryon
O'er the wide world hath been, doth broken lay
And shattered, as a bridge, that hath no helmsman.

What ensigns the high triumphal trumpet,
Which, ever to its organs keeping tune
The soul, doth in the blessed thunder lower,
Targ'd with the song of heav'nly sweete-toned,
Zeus, the all- ceilings, whose existence
Is one resplendent day in the twelve heavens,
Is now in righteousness and glory increast.

The robe, which is of purest gold,
The unbar'd deep, the cross,
The unplumb'd, the sheath, the shining ore,
The chalice, and the temper'd<hiperis, of whom
In manger the bee stores no sordid scent,
Nor the sweet chalice, that doth enrich
The bank, no chalice, that doth spout
Sufresh with noyous and voluptuous heat;
But with the reascending rod and line
Dropt, that doth shew the celestiall light,
Whose mighty presence gilds the ethereal field,
And makes the clouds to stagger toward their seat
In measure full.  The blessed spirits, who gaze
Upon the bright procession, softly sing,
And, eased of their amazement, sing aloud.

Next I, ye may extol the Son of God,
The ark, that bore him on his rolling wheels
Through the cloven regions, and the glittering show,
Through the deep Heav'n, that orb enrings to light
And glad the nations with his golden lyre.
He then to me: "Know, too, where Syrens sit,
The shepherds, wak'ning their large round of wits,
Heav'n's sons, and, as he numbers out the
======================================== SAMPLE 77 ========================================
                                                            
And then he sent, to need he had it so,
He went and sent to them with his word.

Her lips that were as roses in a rose,
Her body that a snake did cling unto,
Did seem to wound him, and her eyes to meet
Those dusky dusky eyes that barred him out,
But not to stab and not to kill his head.
Her body lay upon the bloody dead
With such a livid gluttony in his sight,
But for that last fresh piece of skin wherein
His flesh and blood were mingled and his sin,
O, cruel, cruel Judas, whom you kissed,
Queen Judas, with her swarthy breast and brow,
Bruse-mouven, before her royal feet,
Thou hast dishonored him and ravished him,
And givest him unto this, this thing.

Oh, Tityrus, for whom sad fruit was blown,
I too will pray the Fates have pity on thee;
They bore him home at the sad feast of Rome,
And have compassion on my woe for him,
Thou shalt not see his flesh till mine eyes are tearless,
But they shall pity on his soul for thee.

As one who saw a ghost come to some door
Close, barred, and suffering, but too late to weep,
So I will pray the Fates have pity on him,
They let him not forget them all for me.

Look on him, and I will pray the Fates have pity,
They took him to the temple of his pain,
And set him there against the doors of death,
For well they know I'm dying for his sin.
I will not turn him out for help, nor yet
Help any man that's living in the world.

My father and my mother made for me
Some wild grapes, grapes, and roses, and sweet grass,
And sweet grass too; and then he laid his hand
Upon my heart, and said, "So it is he
Who did our fate."

I will not turn him out to hate or love;
I will not change him for a god with hate.
It shall not be, or death, or subtle hate
That shall awake my spirit in me every night
Until it doth awake my sense of death.
My heart shall not be touched for love of me.

My knife shall ache and sing with gentle breath.
He laid his hand on mine, and tenderly
Slowly we sat together, heart to heart.
The kiss and word that made the carver's name
Like a soft finger on my forehead came,
And we be two who never left each other,
Two souls that never left each other's side.

I do not ask the leave of saying grace,
And from my lips the breath of God's good earth
Shall waken my dead body in me so
That I shall waken heaven in heaven's face.
For I have prayed for mercy in God's face
That he would scatter it like a cloud of fire
Into the flame whence it came forth in flame,
And hide it in my heart within mine eyes,
Even if he should pity me and save,
For there was no man else who could forgive.

It is not growing like a tree before
The wind's mouth, and groweth up like a vine
That hath not whitened on the wind at noon;
But groweth, groweth, growing, groweth still.
It is not growing like a tree before
The sun himself shall set, nor any seed
Desires to grow or fear to grow or fail,
But groweth, groweth, groweth as a tree before.

Mine is not growing like a tree before
I have no need of fear of death or pain.
It is not growing like a tree before
The wind is growing; and my lord, my lord,
Shall set it in your hands and handle them
Until they make a little sign of death,
And all the meat be dried and they be searched,
And all the laughter silenced out of tune.

O Love, my lord, Love, by the night and day
Wherein I sit the ancient times with thee,
And by my bed I make my hands to pray
That thou be kind to me if I may see
The love I dream for ever in my sight.
O say what words are these thy words that say?
I know that
======================================== SAMPLE 78 ========================================
 report
Of the enormous catch, that swam and suck'd them forth
From the low veins, and on their noses set
Threatening the mist; nor they alone, but each
Some match or cable to his fancy found.
A third, the cunning artist did enclose
That theme, and went ashore, still following it.
And now th' advent'rous pilot, that he found,
Had made the cargoes of the bark ascend.
But Gregory watch'd their motions, and he knew
If ever man before him could have found
Like crafty Paul, that self-same boat adrift
From foreign lands. He cast it to the casque,
Nor moved, and ever louder rose to note
Th' approach of the deep-shaded o'er the wave.
For long he watch'd, then pausing once again,
Repeated, and thus satisfied, he said:
"O slumbering, slumbering form! thou didst not sleep
Long, but come back, and let us tarry here.
Ay! for five hundred years and more, I deem
Our voyage is not easy, and much less
Than pleasant; but a few days will not take
Rest near our shore, since good Alcides,
Holpen by sacrificing, is to us
A theme." So saying, he rose and sought his bed.

He laid him down; and ere the earliest beams
Were dried, he drew him on the nameless stone,
And stood beside the fore-tree, where he lay.
Two oxen, leaning on the right, lay here,
With a broad litter, in the quiet moss,
Of four small separate drops; and on the ground
They stood, three pummel'd juts: in either eye
A wedge of either hand, with seeming ease,
To where the little bleating flocks were piled.
Sudden, a little leaning on the staff,
He heard two rushing winds: the Earth was stirred
By the soft, tender whisper of the winds,
That like a flitting child, in sunny nooks,
Rocked on the hollow of the gliding bark.
And these two spirits, with their locks of gold,
Were met upon the top, and from beneath
Fell the dark cloud, which rose, and with a roar
Broke the long silence. O swift preparation!
How pleasant to behold the stones appear!
The very air was agitated with their loads.
With all things else, the iron hill-tops rang,
And groaned the hollow rock; rocks rose aloft
And the earth trembled, branches cast a shade,
And living things in the wide air made moan.
Ceased the loud noise of the sea, and all day long
The waters to their purpose turned; then Paul,
And Spleen, with their heavy loads, at length
Restless and fearful, from their beds of down,
And while the moon shone mystical, as sleeps
An elephant in some dark nook, which spreads
Its length toward the moon. The watery streets
Below, and from the steam, a murmur rose;
Amid its noise the floating city rose,
And loud it thundered, building beautiful,
A royal chapel to the setting sun.
Far off and near, from those who saw therein
The unquiet dweller of the quiet sea,
A lofty gate went up, like a high soul
By divine habitation led; whereon,
Slowly it led through an enchanted world,
Into a city of enchanted light,
And all beyond it the wide, sullen plain.
Scarce had the summer noon passed, when the woods
Ran thick and long, and all the great trees bowed
To the faint winds, and as the tide went high
Slowly the ships were stricken; and a voice
Brake forth, and 'neath the wave they plough'd, the ships
Came up to the bright sky, and all the winds,
The gallant ships, the mighty white sea-birds,
Dropt down; and the dark towers like albatross
Were left far off and all the winds of heaven
Took their mysterious voices in the sea,
And changed their lofty voices into song.

On the sea's face arose the storm, the wind
Was sorrowful, and so these words began:
"Hope, by thy sudden stay and sudden death,
Tossed by the mighty, comes to those that live
More by the pleasure of the gentle sea."
The lightning flash, and the o'ertaken mast
For the sheer pilot to the beams below:
"So God be thanked, and pity thereat
Him whom the tempest and the sea forsook
And saved from death, by Him whose
======================================== SAMPLE 79 ========================================

With half a score of barbel and iswulf.
Lo now, how goodly a man I am;
Fain would I give for to be called worthy,
For already I know the name of him
Who to the young men's children am come,
From over sea, and o'er the earth, and above,
And over the clouds of heaven and the sea,
And into the open and sacred caves,
And over the shining stars and waves,
And through the salt sea and great storm and waves,
And over the meads and far-off hills.
I am of lighter mind than I do now.
I am of my courtesy the free,
That ever I did on earth do live."

Of horn with glittering gems embrowned
Stood Hiawatha, alone,
And with wide-open mouth he answered,
With folded arms, and eyes that shone
With the light of the new day's blaze:
"And yet methinks that these things are not
From the least of your onward course,
But from what I am come to,
Is a breathless hush beneath the wind,
And a sound beneath the moon,
A tremulous murmur of water,
That rises and falters and swells,
Like the rustle of leaves in the wind.

Is not the lake beneath your feet?
Is not the eddying flood ahead?
Is not the eddying whirlpool
Your ever eager eyes are seeking?
Is not the eddying whirlpool
Your ever eager eyes that fling
Light and shadow over your head?

Is not the eddying whirlpool,
The eddying whirlpool of the tide?
Is not the eddying whirlpool
Your ever restless eyes that guide
Your ever restless, restless feet?
And, O, I pray you, if the darkness
Speak not of waves that ever rise,
Of darkness, and of rain, and the dark
Beneath the sun's unwavering skies,
If the dizzy whirlpool whirls away,
And shakes the firm foundations of the hills,
And breaks the bridge of the swift-reined rill,
If it send one flying moment
Back to its deeps, and leave you wearied,
If you can but smile through the long hours,
The strokes of your tired hands and feet,
The long hours' watching, the long hours' watching.

Come back! come back! come back!
This well must we do for you,
This shall the want of a true heart
And hand, and heart, and soul renew.
Come back! come back! come back!
This true heart, heart, soul, and soul renew.
Come back, come back! come back!
This deep heart, heart, and soul renew.
The tears are raining down my cheek
Like rain-drops from the dripping eaves;
They fall together, and the old burden
Is laid at last beneath the leaves.

Come back! come back! come back!
This well must be the grass
That grows in the pleasant earth
And waves the dewy grass
And makes an April house
For every bee and bird
That builds in the sunny fields
And builds in the pleasant air,
To the butterflies and the bees,
And back of whose bed, they say,
One cloud of the rolling bees
Is pillowed deep in the grass.
Come back! come back! come back!
This well must be the water,
The beautiful water,
That loves the banks for love,
That goes up the stream together,
For men to use and for money,

What is the use of water?
Here's a long reed that has never a peep
And runs away from the bank like a hawk.
What is the use of water?
Here's a long reed that has never a peep.
What is the use of water?
Here's a long reed that has never a peep.

Here's a long reed that has never a peep.
Here's a long reed that has never a peep.
What is the use of water?
Here's a long reed that has never a peep.
What is the use of water?
Here's a long reed that has never a peep.

What is the use of water?
Here's a long reed that has never a peep.
What is the use of water?
Here's a long reed that has never a peep.
What is the use of water?
Here's a long reed that has never a peep.

Here's a long reed that has never a peep
======================================== SAMPLE 80 ========================================
, stroke
Off doth not work, but thou dost shun it.
Then Glory's Queen be crowned, and thus
Bespeak the chiefs of Han, the brave!
"We have no rank in rank," the King
Spoke boldly.  "Not yet quite to learning.
Opinions are our ties to learning,
Therefore, though wise, we learned by this,
But, in the course of time most sober,
Why, thinkest thou--you rule our nation?
Come, Hanumán, and bind these furrows
So that, at once, the youths of thine
Knowledge may tame the flames that fly.
Guard thy brave heart--Oh, guard the prize!
Guard it to Chitrakú, the wise!
Ask the rash rash youth--Ye sons of Róse,
Bid him in their wild wrath obey,
Let the strong youth in wrath be driven.
Who thus in might has scornful words
Will free us--oh, but leave the wrongs.
Rejoice, O Chief, thy praise and glory!
Who thus in might, in strength ennoble,
Will tame the stubborn sages thence.
Grant this, the exploit of thee,--my power,
And stop this pride, O Hanumán,
As thou, stern Yáma, hast a power.
Yea, if, as prince, thine eyes are turned
To view this foe in battle burned,
Girt by his brave troops are maidens,
And children, mothers, kine and kine
But empty-hearted, have no kine."

The high-souled hero, where he stood,
Heard the loud crash of that dread word,
Then turned and strode with surest tread
The foe who sat behind his head.
From the cold ground the hero threw
The sword that drank the stream that flowed.
Fierce as a serpent on the crest,
The Wind-God turned him from his rest.
Then Ráma looked upon the foe
And humbly thus began to show:
"I cannot meet Sugríva now,
For strength is weakness, and his brow
Is puffed with foul and poisonous ill.
See, Lakshmaṇ, how the chiefs attack
With fire and sword at head and back.
We must not waste our strength in vain
Till other slaughtered warriors drain
The dust whereon the fiends are laid.
With eager hand and murderous blade
Ráma perchance, before he brayed,
Will slay the Rákshas, lord and lord,
With an assault upon the sword."

He spoke: the Wind-God’s son obeyed,
And struck him with that stroke dreadraid.
The glittering blade, the guilty life
Smote with the gold, and pike and knife.
The foeman’s spear beneath him spilt,
And shattered with the mace it smote,
The giant lord of Lanká’s isle,
The Gods and spirits, came to meet
A terror on the might of his.
But Ráma saw the deadly deed,
And, with strong arm and stalwart thigh,
Sprang on him with that wondrous spear
That like a God against the foe
One might be smote from head to toes,
And quivered in the giant’s stroke,
While quivering with the giant’s stroke
The giant’s heads were red with gore.

Down ran the bloody chine a stream
Like fiery pangs of Śiva’s dream;
And Níla saw it ere it fled,
And the dim light that filled his head,
Shining as glimmering flames that show
When black night reaps upon the foe.
Thus with terrific might and stroke,
Like serpent through the midnight cave
Raised by one demon’s venomed tooth,
Shattered and shattered to the earth
The hero by the giant’s strength,
Like tall trees shattered in the blast,
Or like the limbs when sunbeams dance.
Then from the hero’s forehead came
The sacred sweat that glistened all
Where springs the sun, as though the shade
Around them prostrate to the fall.
As when a cloud in autumn’s sky
When the long clouds have vanished by,
So, when the moon is lost in light,
Thus did the fiend Márícha write,
Sugríva, Rudra manifest:
“Ne’er canst thou say in mortal form
A nobler foe than thou, tall tree,
Destined the Gods to meet thy blow.
I pray thee now the boon to know
======================================== SAMPLE 81 ========================================
 is "delight" from our breath.
Grieve not for the dead--
Rejoice! rejoice till the dawn of the morrow!
And reflect, for the day is come, best of women,
The loss and the wearing of one of your seamen!

It is not to be our right
And the wrong,
For God is good
And He died
Because we are seeking for one of your seamen!

Be patient; God will send
New troubles; our sins
Will be washed
Of sorrow, and leave us to bear and to suffer!
Ye have wrenched the flag
From the hand
Of the Lord,
As it flew
From the waves,
Through the guns
Of the enemy.
Iron stripes.
Where it came.
It has not.
It may be.
It may be.
It may be.
It may be.
It may be.
It may be.
It may be.
It may be.
It may be.
It may be.
It may be.

It may be.
It may be.
It may be.
It may be.
It may be.
It may be.
It may be.
It may be.
It may be.
There is no sound

But the brook
Rumbling round
Its stone brink.
The grasses seem to sag
And shiver;
The grasses move,
Like the voice
Of the brook
In the forest, the oak
Whispers, "I did not speak?"
It may be.
It may be.
There is no sound
But the brook
Murmurs, "I was not here!"
I could not tell
What is the sound
Of the brook
In the thicket, the brake, and the darkness
Scowl
On the forest, the pasturage, the orchard.

I was a Jew by the moment; a mere carpenter
During the slop of summer and the sough of the season,
And chiefly when the cornfields are ripe for the design,
And the air is soft and the plumes are piled over the snow,
And he is a steady gazer who is interested.
I want to know why they do not respond, I should guess;
It may be that night
When we break from the light
And our heads are lighted with the morning light.

There are certainly many things I am sure of.
They are not seen, or known to be missed at our doors,
They are not seen, as they are; a failure I deplore,
And for such matters I'm struck with desire,
They are not quite the same as they always did before,
They were quite the same as you have been the ever since,
And they are nothing the same as you have never been,
And they are not the same as you have been the ever since.

I know that in winter they cease to be hot,
They must depart to their object uncertain;
This frost, I fear, is not of the sort;
For they tell me that frost, at the most, is unwilling and cold,
And the frost is certainly cold in the snowdrop mould,
And it is not of the sort that the latter gets cold,

But as for me, I do not know why it should remain,
I have hurried into the forest to meet him,
And have gone down, and been tempted by him.
They were threatening with swords, and they stood by my side,
I have hurried away with them to the city gate,
And searched for the trunks of the houses around us,
And all for the trees and stones of the city,
To carry me swiftly and have him safely home,
And lead him safe over the stones to supper,
I'm frightened--a mouse in the trap.

I don't believe I care about food or beef,
When these fellows come under my hat,
But I do not like fighting, not think of fighting,
If those others come after me for dinner,
But offer them a hearty treat;
That is to say, I am ready, at any rate,
I should not long enjoy a bite of meat,
So I'm troublesome and sore;
And when my mouth is open I must sit all night,
To lie all the night, and then to lie all night--
Why, then I wake, do you?
The afternoon air was the meadows damp;
The limes crept o'er the scarp,
The faint leaves slept on the trees, and the brown fruit
stood distinct on the ground,
Until the whole forest grew still darker and still darker.

A drowsy, sleepy sky,
Clouds, the
======================================== SAMPLE 82 ========================================
 passed, and the stir
Of the water-eye of the mill was changed,
And the smut in the corner was changed to fluid,
And the drill-boy made progress without the word,
And the girl looked up at the tall stock stars
As the girls went in and the men took off;
"I just said you were going to work," she said,
And she turned and said, "Well, I'll go ahead."

They were six hundred and ninety-five,
Although of their bent limbs and their eyes
They could not keep their plate, except
For a uniform of glass and a barrel of beer
That was hard to match with the great bull-steap,
And for arms like that in the days of war,
They stood up for their quarter-staff and called,
And some voice shouted, "Go ahead lest we fall."

It was near midnight when the drill-boy came,
And he shot the wall, and he slithered his throat,
And the boys all shouted, "Away, all, we must go!"
But he never called in the name of a Bush,
And he never called for a shot from behind
Till he came to a place where they knocked and she ran,
And he never got up again for a scratch.

And that was the end of the tale they told,
Of the twenty men hanged on the hill
(The men who had sold them there, if you please),
In the hope they caught that perdition that they
Who had sold them would not get the things they sold,
And that this latter yell was foolish and true,
They were driven back with the foulest of crimes,
For they sold them to the Irish parsons who drew
Their lives out of pity, and spared them their souls.

And after three weeks of approbation
We follow the story of "The Man,"
Who "ruled" a War without rifle or bow,
And had sold them to the Irish parsons who know
That the time to be struck was a hard one, I wis.
But soon as the season was over and done,
And the time was that England should be the one
To treat her about as the best she could,
And the boys had determined to go to the war,
And fatten and starve in her cause at full;
They sold their souls out for something in turn
For the sake of their mother to serve in the field.

Now the "sons" come and the "sons" come and the
daughters
Go with the boys to London, the "sons" come,
With their "sons" come and the "sons" come to life,
With their "sons" come and the "sons" come to life,
With their "sons" come and the boys from Kilmaddy Isle,
With their "sons" come and the "sars'" come to life,
And the scenes they once lived in with "somethin'" to us,
And the boys in new dances at banquets and ball- stations,
And Gottingen's man whom no one would tell
With his "sons" here and there with his "sons" alone,
But, in spite of all Europe's puns, I will give you one
Of a thoroughbred English people who live by rule,
Who look down upon you with thoroughbred smiles,
And with "sons" here andSociety, my child,
But, when you get down to your tea and to bed,
Your papa will go with you and put up your head
In the Gunneracks, the weapons of poker and dice,
And drive your demu with them all into the ditch,
To take all of them under the Watering X.

And now you shall feast in the City by Paul,
And the natives shall pass in a blizzard edged round,
Your Barons and Councillors shall come from afar
And cry with delight, "Put off your old tin panniers,
There's little Billy Bow-sled with the yellow jades;
There's little Billy Bow-sled with the crimson jades;
And, by Jove! those two daughters are all in a hurry,
That you can't take them fifteen years, I suppose,
Before they come into graft with their horoscope!

And they'll call you James Bow-sled with the yellow jades;
And, by Jove! those two daughters are all in a hurry,
That you can't take them fifteen years, I suppose,
Before they come into graft with their horoscope!

The German JewWho piously reels
He knows his Papal Niece in heels;

======================================== SAMPLE 83 ========================================
, though what they saw in her
They joy'd, nor felt like earthly kings; for there,
Though wandering some unknown, unconquer'd world,
Nought but the shadow of His throne appear'd,
Stripp'd of its crown, o'er-march'd and darken'd o'er,
Now reigns the Lord of Heaven, here reigns the King
Of wedded maids, a monarch, resolute,
In a fair-spotted vest array'd, and armed
With beauteous buskins for a Queen, whose bed
Was undisturb'd, and whose cold bed, although
Pale, flatter'd, sickens every limping tress,
And with her right hand cudg'd, now with her left
The Queen of Heaven was long before a cause
Left to her fears, which now, now flatter'd, doub'd
Her doubt to execute; which that high-falch'd
Confusion and despair to frenzy wrought,
With which the people of the nethermost
Did first entangled in their thoughts amaze,
Nor let their fury be restor'd; but urged
By madness and despair, the rebel crew,
Fired at the approach of Charlemagne, and fear'd
Their haughty hearts, with wine and churlish sleep
Bluster'd, and shock'd confusion of the night.

Summon'd to bed precipitate with joy,
Through good king Charlemagne receiv'd them both,
And next in sleep they fell, with toils oppress'd
By various cares, yet not by sound of strife,
Or sight of shivering life, but still desiring
Their fate to undertake.  Then sorely press'd
By gloom and heavy sleep, they found themselves
Beneath the heavy  blankets of the Queen,
Who never show'd more fair than when of loveliest,
She was a daughter of attendant knights;
But being light and capable of ill,
Enter'd in Charles's court, and there stood by,
And bade him ask of Charlemagne, and how
Bereaved he from the law of Charles's reign
A prisoner ever, and that he might prove
Victor and lord of all; since of the truth,
The contrary is clear.  But in the sleep
That he wakes, the gentle shepherds waking, he
Sends visions, dreams of blessed rest to all;
And waking, when he spies, with his own eyes
Towards the east, a verdant crescent, set
In perfect griffin o'er the cloudy lea:
So saw he tilting through the golden gleams
Of the great day, and well-girt steam-times made:
Thence saw he Saturn's stately-girt son
Descend from Heaven in golden armour clad;
And now came forth to light the world below.

Great trembling seized the monarch of the Greeks:
Amidst the calm and mighty-girt abodes
Calmly he moved, and them imploring speech:
"Father, unasked I go, to thee to give
Delay, and still forbear to pray; and still
Refrain to pray, which is the greater bliss
On mortal to have lost."  Then, greatly moved,
The glorious God of Ocean thus replied:
"Father, to Saturn and the rest of heaven
Teach me, while I descend, his calm retreat.
Ah, once unasked was I thy sovereign, sent
To thee to rule the island-walls and rocks
Of Caucasus; and once to Phrygian floods
Adored as gods; though never yet was heard
My glorious strain!  Nor could I thus have done,
With sounding heart, the ocean-child; whom thou,
Expert in all the works of Mars, hast given
To Jove the greater; for on Thetis, borne
To heaven above, the Gods by Mars are known."

Then thus Calypso: "Mother dear, why go'st
Thy loving breast with such severe a thought,
Catching the heart of Mars?  Why, from the waves,
Why climb'st thou not with care and patience o'er
The fair young limbs of noble Hector, who
Is noble among all?  In haste to Troy
With food and drink the Trojans, to the aid
Of Ilium's host, and aid their king.  Thyself
Gatche shalt thou serve, while me, with faithful care,
To wash thy hands, and water o'er thy limbs,
And there bath thy fair face, as though ashamed
To wear it; and thine eyes shall fill with tears,
And good Evander weep with pitying grief.
But why
======================================== SAMPLE 84 ========================================
er than the earth--which else no name could bear--
Did now, as is the sky's unvarnished map,
Seem changed to kingdom--that's what heretofore

Their sires have been; their birth was equal, both
High birth and low estate, not lofty place,
And bounded by two steely fetters galled;
They left their spirits free, and bound their limbs,
In spirit everlasting,--in the arms
Of freemen, children of a vigorous God,
Their doughty father.

I've said,
A visit to old England is improved.
The first four hundred acres are more large
Than is the second, and the latter more
A chance for traffic. But the work is spread
To the same level with the most of all
The land which men call "Jute." To-day the earth
Puts on fresh beauty, as it did before.
The trees along the line, with fruit on trees,
With bloom in May, new beauties to display.
Where'er I look, it's there I see the flowers
Washed from the sun and lilies and of life,
Just as one blush becomes a withering tear,
And shed again, a lovely life begun.
And here I'll come to mention it. First, since
That I can trace these things upon the street,
I'll know the reason why they can be changed
To a fantastic body, bent, and changed,
That is to say, "there is no opposite,
Nor is there cause why'er that place may be."
I'd live in hope to know for certain Truth
The range, both this and that, where men expect
A place not opened for the mind to tread
On foreign standards. But, for aught I know,
My horny hand has scratched it, and in front
It holds a symbol of me. This at once--
My great chest like a stool--bears also me
Content to mark and guess and feel and know,
Well, sir, it is that what I read seems best,
Blind as it is, and useful to the poor,
Extravagant, and helpful to the poor.

Nay, I shall find it so; one loves to tell
The truth of each society I knew;
Each society--such as it ought to be--
Something humane, but did I not esteem
The playful children that could mock me first?
And so to drink, and fight, and give a thought
To fellows worthy of the good they knew.
To eat men's breakfast, and to live alone
In some close corner of the heart of man?
I've shared the cup and wished it would not go;
I've learned to live and grow to things of earth,
Not foolishly, nor ignorant of aught
Excepting flint, or something less than gall,
A firing-place, perhaps--but 'tis enough
To know the art of picking at a germ.
And now the winter came, and on the house
A father sitting, or a little boy
Absorbed in cell, and a night-mother sitting,
Absorbs my grief, and pitiless my fears;
With hands clasped close, my husband eyeing me,
And burning tears, to me all sorrow came.
I did not fear: there was a hanging-room,
And that the dying firelight broke around
The sullen walls; for the chimed whistle's squeak,
And the new actor's tapering, latest word
Upon the mantel-piece, a moment heard
Come thrilling to my ear. I could have died,
Feeling no burning tears in such a place,
I had not changed my mind, nor dared to tell
Where I had fallen, nor why I had left
The cell, nor whence I came, nor why I fared.
So great, I well remember. Where it was,
How the old Rhine had flowered through the years,
And flowed into the world, a knowing plague,
And a serenity, as in the scene
I sat with Tristram, and with hopeful eyes,
I saw what 'twas! Against the window-panes
In the drear house, old Farmer Simpson stood,
Bewildered by the weight of years which bore
The downfall of a man, who tottering bowed
Before him, as by strength of palsy prest,
To the old cellar stood;--but where was he
Whose breast, though palsied ever, held the door,
And still the shadowing door shut fast? and whence
Was the good man, that day, with the warm fires
Of the old cellar, that one summer-night?
Oh, the remembrance sweet!
======================================== SAMPLE 85 ========================================
 grace to cast aside her colours' stain.

The lazy lark upon the shivering air
Has sung in sweet and dulcet plaintive strains,
The reddening squirrel on the pinion coo
Has played with fans and begs the morning dews;
The mower tends his husk with south winds' air,
The shepherd tends his lambs; the daisies blow
And chirrup, whistle, fall, with voices low,
And thro' the whitening lawn the day-light shines.
But maiden Peace with unamending soul
Knows not its motions, nor its pause controls.

"She cannot pluck the meagre rose," said he,
"Nor breathe the classic rapture, so it winds;
Her roses breathe a nobler perfume still,
And sweeter breathing from the loved lips nestles there.
Oh, leave the world to me
And give it what she may,

When the dandelion has closed his elegant box,
And the dandelion has laid aside her shoes,
Then the dandelion goes
Softly over the polished area floor,
And the crocus grows
Softly over the polished area floor.
They went to sea in a sieve, they did;
In a hollow tree beside the sea,
They climbed the branches and over the trees
In clusters of emerald beads,
Cupid with his kindly bats
And Cupids went by them and then
Choosled away till he didn't come nigh to eye,
For he didn't come nigh to eye.

But when he went down into the depths of the sea
He lisped a tender song,
He peeped around the little black cross
And he murmured soft and strong,
"O mamma, I want to go
And gather the blossoms that grow upon the tree
In clusters of emerald beads,
To smell the fragrance of the lilac buds
And work by the lightest means,

"I wonder what my darling does
In this, and never, in any business wise
Could use her study again
To write the poem, or use her to decide it.
She'll come in company with me to-day
And help me to think what the matter may be.
And she will say:
'No matter!  This business is sad,
And I'll let her come along,
For it is a merry thing."
And the song is solemnly still
As the bird in her bower that,
If the cage be kept, can do so instead,
No single note of a beautiful song.

Yes, no one?  There's a million of words in that
Air divine to our childhood, there's nothing like Joe;
Suppose you take wrist there
And go up in the air,
You're a-fooled by a dozen!
What should I think of the sermon,
If I should say as much?
He left his bassinger and hit 'em
Right to the heart of the world.
It's wrong, dear!  I'm in for it now,
And it's wrong, dear!  I'm in for it now,
It's right, dear!  I'm in for it now.

What sort of a story is Joe,
Of course you have heard us of--
The grasshopper, a genius,
And quite as reckless and clever
As ever he played in the keys,
While yet thePlayed music of Billy
Was only intended for Mingers and Smiths.

So funny their faces, and marvelous souls,
They never came back to Joe,
It makes muddied Joe quite sad to see them,
It's wrong, dear!  I'm in for it now.

We are told it is not in books
To trouble the minds of the crows
Until the day, and they say,
That this wild hiving's a joke,
And that nothin' ain't genuine fun.
And Joe, of course, is the best,
And is not inrequently first;
And he ain't a man who can walk,
Though he's mighty fun'ral and mean,
But's unyielding, and never
Contends with a woman whate'er.

Joe, as I saw him last week,
All dressed in a gay white stock,
Has always been in a hurry,
With a vestry that's nearly built,
And a man who his name is Latin,
As Joe is, though not of Greek,
And is rather well called a scowl,
And has a cross suit on his knee,
And to wear a pair of gray hair,
Has a brow with rose-cheeks rosy
And half
======================================== SAMPLE 86 ========================================
,
Knock upon knock.
Till by the river side they meet.
At daybreak each returns again,
Each takes up her hour of tea,
Till by the river side they meet.
<|endoftext|>

Love is hard at heart, and gets a fresh supply:
That they are afraid has a meaning in the eye.
No taper's half so light, nor half so high;
But whether more or less this taper is,
Lord help us, says they, to our selves above,
As when into our heads a cannon strove
With arms and lips, as might a flame of love,
And with its tongue itself outstretching; till
We cannot find it, and we cannot know
Whether the light we see be good or no;
But when our hearts and eyes do burn and beat,
Straightway the wounded spirit rushes fleet,
And stays there still, and with him stands at bay,
And weeps remembering the care of his delay.

No tapers now! no fires of living men!
No giants' wand! no gods!--no, let us have
A thought for one who is undone to save
The soul from imminent death. There lies, instead,
A comfort for our sins--an epic to the skies!

Up yonder, there we'll hang from tree to tree:
The sunshine'll be there, we'll live, we'll say,
And call that sunshine as a good-bye to us;
God grant that when there's sunshine there's no cloud
We may look back upon the good they have
For the poor souls that sit in it and cry
For peace that shall not come to them from sky.

Lord, wilt Thou save us when there's nothing left?
Nay, we have said there's nothing left us yet;
And God at least has pity upon us
Because He gave for all things poor souls' need.
Out of the heart of God, love, hope, prayer, love,
This is the silence that is God's and thine,
Which in the hearts of all men is the same
As Thou didst make, and yet so near the soul
The halo where the light of Thee doth hide
Is partly lost, as we behold it die,
In the great hour when Thy dear presence sinned;
Not yet this earth hath felt Thy hands of fear,
But Thine, Lord God, our wings do fold and beat
Almost before this angel comes to greet
The hope that here no more, nor yet again
Shall we set hands for comfort on this grain,
Lest we behold our God turn back to Thee!
Out of the heart of God, help us, I say,
To have lost Thee, as we see Thee nevermore!

For life is a vexed abhorrence, a nail
That cannot hold enough of all the fume
That up in the soul the angel comes to bore
In faith's triumphant shattering splendour through the past,
If we but name this faith in which we trust to Thee;
Then, God, we may cry, help us, and pray that somewhere on earth
Thou wilt take heart for Thee.

A temple of orgies! All your world's adored
Commiseration! There we build the shrine
And kneel in worship at the new white shrine,
Clothed in the splendour of our angel-soul
That rules life's universe. Art fast-bound there?
Or, lest some foe see once? Nay, work your best;
The lowest, highest, greatest, know your cry,
Out of the sight of heaven--"Clearer, make fast;
Christ, let us have His will." Behold where He
Pays! But tomorrow, ere His will be done,
We must behold Thee one by one and all;
A higher life than e'en His angels dare,
Whose wings are unenthroned by cold and dearth.

Ah, would that so our Christian hearts might be
With some far offering to Thee and Thee
What these poor hands would offer unto Thee.

Bring ye within the gate,
Suffer the light of Thy sweet day
To swell our hearts to tears;
Tread we as fast as may be
Along the path for thee.

E'en as a swarm of bees,
Out of their sly, conceiving locust seeds
Drop with the sweet, warm light of heart's hopespring,
Or hang from high the cheerful head of flowers
To droop and languish and float down their bloom,
Each ready to confess
That such time is a day of days that dies
More full of sweet and
======================================== SAMPLE 87 ========================================
pp'd to her fatal isle, and hung
High o'er his bark her floating mantle wide.

"Think, for the isle, what arms soe'er
Shall prove, how justly kind they style!
Must they, to save their honours, dare
To succour Erin's wretched heir?
Such high behests, so oft convey'd,
Thy utmost ardour shall be paid
To glut thy rage, thy rancour all,
Deserved as a meed of war.
Thy decks shall serve the loves and loves
Of Erin's shore; thy gallant ships
Shall wait thee with their leader's tears,
To combat, when the war-cry spears
Are heard,--the battle-cry of Mars.
And oh! that day, so blest to see,
Would Heaven to gentlest May-day, thee!
When sinks the Star of England low,
And darkens earth,--thy hero-band
Shall rest,--an honoured honours due,
To future ages far and near,
Thy name, thy beauty, Heaven shall hear!

Thus, by old Ocean's monarch brave,
In years of peace, in beauty gone,
The Empire was restor'd so well,
Till, by the Fates' decree, it fell.
Thus man, who scorn'd the lot his lot,
Shall have--though few--the record not
Of Him, who mightiest chief among
The sacred tribes of man--the shrine
Of freedom, ever kind and true,
To guard the rights and rights divine,
And ever dwell with truth and love
On God's eternal reconciled above!

Hail! holy head of Caledon!
Ere midnight came, at matin's close
From thy devoted lights, repose.
Hail! host of spirits, sunlit plain!
Hail! son of light! our numbers hail
Thy Chieftain's ear!

Hail, hail! that kindles, as the ray
Of dawning evening lights the world;
Hail! brother of the Crucified!
Our bosoms throb with hospitable flame,
In guileful trust the hospitable sire
Bids every shade of doubt retire.
Warm Faith affords to every tomb
An emblem of departed worth,
And pardon wraps in raptures all
The cares of earth.

In every leaf, in every flower,
In every bird, in every bower,
In every flower, in every flower,
We know thy power.

The thunder and the whirlwind's rage
Have made thy face their dwelling-place;
But thou art in their element,
Not present there!
They find thee not--they seldom find;
The very roses of the mind
In meek contrition's passing heats
Upon them breathe.

Thy brow is bended from the earth
Of hope and fear;
Thy smile is from the broad, blue sea,
Where break the shores
Of hope beyond the clouds of time,
Hope's starry train!

Thy words--they shall remind thee more
Of pure and holy visions flown;
For, while to thee the heart is dear,
Our spirits are unknown!
Like lightning from the dazzled deep,
In silent joy, it sweeps the skies,
And leaves the earth unvisited,
The world unvisited!

Thy health--it lives in every charm,
And tears in every youthful grace
Comes silently and warm.
With fervid hope, thou dost inspire
The treasured hopes that fill thy heart,
And cheer with love, when wilt thou part
For faithless charms--for faithless charms?
Till doubt and all the past are fled,
Thy thoughts are glowing--they are dead!

Lend me, O God, some power above!
Let me adore the things of earth,
Which, in their place, thou dost deface!
Let me confess the worth of days
Which are to come, in time, too soon!
Let me in those rich seasons trace
The germs of every human heart,
Which bloom in Eden's opening buds,
And look from earth's majestic face,
And read in every youthful face
An angel's image.

Young, conquering, just--oh! grace divine!
And youth's sweet morning-singer's song!
How, to my harp-string, breaks thy line!
It cannot be recalled as "Lift;"--
And yet, 'tis sweetly tuned and dear,
As that which thou didst learn too well.

Light smile of childhood's smiles and glee
In garlands on the woods I
======================================== SAMPLE 88 ========================================
 kept, the King of Fish
Let water take, and twice he gave
The mead- thereto.  But on the shore
Of many a mournful day and night
The Bráhman passing Ráma’s light
Let water overtake.
When uncontrolled the waves are swell’d,
When Sítá on the coast is laid,
Let water by the holy well
Be brought for aye.
For long the hours, each handmaid spent,
By memory of her deed intent,
Still with the morning’s light abide
And bathe her body, till she died.
Thence, as with weary feet she went,
Honey, the spray, and thistles, bent
As her soft limbs along them bore,
Gently with gentle touch they bore
A wreath of blossoms fair.
The garments white they there beside,
With morning’s beams was dight.
From the dark palace’s lattice they
His shoulders stretch’d to rest at ease.
Then soft they fell upon his head,
Girt by a hundred lashes round
That graced the walls of that dread spot:
By Lakshmaṇ’s hand he placed them not,
But laid them in the fire, and cried:
“Wake, Sítá, wake, my dearest bride!
Once more we see the gentle moon
Her pleasant face adorn.
Why dost thou sleep, and dost not wake
To greet me in my love and thee,
In shallow streams, which through the day
Keep fresh, unclamoring light,
O’er banks of grass, beneath, o’erlade,
Where nightingales were wont to play,
And pleasant waters leap and run,
Where man and beast went lazily
Through groves that shed their pleasant dew
With honey, and each flower and weed
Grew fairer with the varied show
Of r sweets in garden, grove, and bower
Whose bells were blithe and all was gay
With birds of every kind.
We looked across the brook and brook,
And Lakshmaṇ too we could not brook,
For still his heart was fixed to keep
Forever in this world of sleep.
There by his side no garb he wore,
Nor garment white, or ornamented plaid,
His lovely cheek was wet with dew
Like morning dews upon a brook.
Where at the court sat Ráma still,
Our hero, skilled in mischief, ill
Besieged our youth with constant skill
In magic arts that even pain
Would rob him of his vigour still.
Ah me, I longed with every eye
The Maithil dame to view ally,
And the great retinue had fled
To birds of airy hue.
But Vánar chieftains now depart,
And be his journey done; for here
From all the world are strangers sent
To distant lands, but none are near,
For king-foe wanders far and wide,
Our hopes are dead, our lives bereft.”

“As springs the sun from mid-day sky,
This hero armed with thunder’s might
To Kumbhakarṇa bends his way
And sends the gathering demon far
From Báli’s kingdom to his last
To curse the Maithil queen.”

“So, Saramossas, shall we seek
The forest, there your watchman seek
In lofty place his fast to keep
For his return whom yet he longs
Beneath the giant’s mighty stroke.”
“I know not, Sákraṇ, why the words
Come not to pass unheeded by:
But, if you doubt his force, I say
He comes prepared for punishment.”
“I knew,” the Vánar chief replied,
“Some refuge from this curse to hide:
If I my only refuge seek,
I yield myself to fate’s hard stroke.”

Thus as he spoke his look the clime
Of Báli’s ancient hate(200),
Whose bolts, by fours and two, had hurl’d
The fragments of a mountain’s side.
The fearful end to Báli’s ear
He shouted as he bore the spear,
And, pierced by sevens in vain, the twain
Defended on that fatal plain.
“What canst thou,” cried the prince, “dear spouse,
And, save thy darling, win rep
======================================== SAMPLE 89 ========================================
 when he sat,
"O Mary, I can't say he is,
He has such a bright black eye;
He'll let me jump without a wink,
He'll be afoot this very night,
When riding out he's taking flight.
But, oh! my Mary, he will see
He's my good old horsereef mare,
When he comes riding light!

The snow is falling fast,
The earth is wet and old,
And soon will be the last.
In summer I shall rise
And go with thee
Where the brook comes tinkling by
Upon thy knee;
And in the meadows green
I'll leave unseen.

For where thou gav'st thy word,
Thou held'st it dear;
No time to slip again.

A violet by a brookside stone
A fox-eyed rabbit, I have seen;
And, when they came, thou art so dear,
A violet all alone, I ween.
Thou saidst it should be thou, I trow,
A rabbit,
Among the rest that are

They sought thy little room.
And only thee, Dear Mother there,
Came not.
There, too, she brought thee flowers;
For of thy little sweet they're made,
All that they need have they arrayed
Of curdled-leaves and spungy wire;
And 'twas for them that 'gan prepare
The painted wings of a darling bear.

They tried to build thee, but thou didst not dare
To touch them.

And now I think that they have tricked
Thy little finger with a winking jade,
And done with care, and quite assured
Thou hadst not lived as they have played
On each green mossy ball to flaunt
Thy braided hair, with many a fold
And print to show how fair they hold
Thy footprints, after which they shine
As thy own silver and fine wine.

Thou'rt of a noble kind, I guess,
Yet well thou know'st they love thee less
Than thou their loneliness.
They say, that though a humble maid
In worth as great as she hath stood,
Yet modest and subdued, she's good
To many a timid hearted mood--
That love hath wealth, and wit, and power;
But slighting low her flaunting flower,
She leans on it, and there she is,
Where all the guiles are laid away,
She broods upon it all day long.

Thou canst not change her demure demure,
If thou hast given her faith to thee.
It is not ill for her, O mother,
To have thy darling thus to see,
And teach her this old lesson more
Than all mankind can learn of thee,
With earnest eyes, or smiling face,
Or kind words, to her youngling child,
Who has but half her wealth undrewed
From the rich stores he takes to keep
His childish heart from growing old.

As for an old maid, see her smile,
With eager eyes that catch the gleam
Of the last light she drops asleep
Upon the last sunbeam, and there, where
She lives, where all is undiscerned
And shrivelled in her ruin old,
Just as old age is used to hold.

Then see her! on that dusky day
Some needful Angel watch and pray;
A crowd around her daily task;
Lift up the silent heads of ask
And hear her whisper in thine ear,
Praying she may forget thy fear.

'Weep, weep for her!' not with pitying eye
She turned away; but she arose
Stooping above her own poor children's cry,
Half raised in hope of human good,
Half thinking of thy pitiful state
And what thou art, and of thy food;
And her sweet smile, thy living voice
Chillened the silent hours away,
Nor heeded whence the careless throng
Questioned thee, or thy looks of hate.

What things are these? What matters it?
These were thy daily cares to know;
The things that vexed thy loneliness
By night or day, that vexed thy soul
Brooded, until the morning came
Of secret meditation deep;
And half discouraged would have given
The peaceful trouble of a kiss;
And half discouraged seemed to give
The peace of perfect love that stooped
Before thee, darling of the light;
And half discouraged seemed to give
Of nothing to thee for delight.

What matters it? The thought of that
Came like a murmur of distress
Among thy
======================================== SAMPLE 90 ========================================
's ribs,
And which, as from his neck he them implores,
Shapes him again with mickle force and will,
Whence stones arise, so that he wholly is seen.
Him fated Priam's daughter to behold,
And on the pile to find if Hector had
Remained alone, still breathing with his fear,
Still fearing to return, by sacrifice
The force, urged by his pride, to ransom back
His captive wife, and wavering on his flight
Into the deep blue sea.  Such is the will
Of Priam, whom, though triumphless, he sees
Ceaseless in battle sunk, nor when the Greeks
Hate him, or lose the body, cease to hope
That once he sees the main and camp of Troy.
And now there is in all the camp a Chief
Ambassador of Jove, him follow'd forth
Into a distant war, and mingling much
Their warlike might, his praise was as the sound
Of many voices which, as with a voice,
Amid the multitude he thus began.
Trojans and Lycians brazen-greaved, and thou,
Great Hector, who hast roused our council here
Thus suddenly, with close-fitting doors
Let in the forms which I will now describe.
He said, and in his turn a spear forth-streaming,
Ascending, pierced his belly, with a wound
Vocal, through which a scorching arrow flew.
Prone on his forehead fell the murderous blade,
And to his foot, as on the ground he lay,
Forth-stroke, the point of lance or shield was thrown.
Thus, nor the brazen lance nor spear he saw
With his vast falchion cutting through the dust.
But, now, the son of Priam, loud exclaim'd.
Zantime, be bold, and thou shalt see these arms
Quench'd newly, for the father still lives here
Whom once thou lov'st, and of my race thou lov'st.
For the other Greeks he is by no means loth
To fight, but rather hath the vengeful arm
Murder'd for his expiring wrath, who now
Seeks to provoke the Grecians to avenge
Their slain, nor suffers them to pause or fight.
But here I leave not; let the Gods proceed
To put it forth; since others of the host
Shall find us, after all, to fable, else,
By aught apprized of me, and which myself
Can never bear, so fit to cope with war.
He spake, whom all applauded, and with eyes
Of even size, Ascalaphus, his son
Departing, on their right hand took his spear.
And Tydeus' son with wonder, while he gazed,
Spoke thus to Diomede, and bade him well.
Gods of the Grecian King! whose high command
Alone save thee and Phoebus ever seer!
But tell me true.  Who art thou? whence and how
Cam'st thou, or whence thy lineage? for I know
His feature, and I know him not, nor known
His face nor stature, but a lion fierce;
See how he moves, and seems in all his shape
To be some mighty beast, so ponderous too
For all, by seems, as a man grown of frame.
He fought on now, and in the champaigne where
The Hero who enjoys a wealthy life
Gives birth to others, bearing in his jaws
The well-known food of strife laborious, forth
The warrior spurred, the foaming torrent held
By foaming torrents, like to fire, whose force
First issues forth in streams, till, at their source,
The flames arrive, or, kindled, go to bed,
By turns relieving them, lest they, wrestled, choke
The cooling air, as though fresh from the wind.
He said, and sallied straight to Diomede.
He then, Diomede, and noble Priam's son
With others came, and as they went, the pair
Appear'd as strangers.  Then Tydeus' son,
Came to the place, and to the cliff himself
With royal admiration moved the steeds
Of Diomede, and courteously bespake.
Oh thou!  oh son of Tydeus!  oh thou!
Thou, friend of men, who hast deprived the Gods
Of living men, and lifted hate on us,
Now it may be our lot to intermit
From Zeus, and one who sees us, thus thou say'st.
Who hast thou been
======================================== SAMPLE 91 ========================================

As unto Minos' heir I think.  His years
Have traversed forty-five degrees, as well
As twenty-five; when from his funeral pyre
Ixion's son should by a hundred charms
Have won me out of Enna's hill and brought
My peace to this unhappy place, and placed
My dreaded name in Asia, Europe's king.
His name? it was Alcyon.  Of a clan
Still is his face in all the populous land.
Which others heard, within their day of work,
Folks play before them.  Blest with art are men
Who nothing know of history or of art,
Vociferan's friend and all their glories, they
Endured but in the deepest.  Be it known,
Since Delos' kingdom, that fair city, lies
Deep in its bosom, laid upon the waste
Of land and ocean.  No such city yet
Sets on the sand, but, westward yet, o'erlooks
The African main.  Yet the Greek city stands
Full in my view, and I can trace its bounds
Afar and near, and some abiding rock
To which this rock looks downward.  A fair spot,
From Europe lately won, within that zone
Is fairly founded on a lesser lea,
More fertile, though not yet a single grove,
Yet noble, for it may be open yet.

This island lies most fair, though on the sea
Awakened from her winter seas and green
By thousand billows, and no barrier stays
That moves the sand.  No male-left monster comes,
With flaming tushes and sweet-blushing cheeks,
Such as adorn her gardens, or bestrew
Her parched and ruddied gardens to the sun.
No solid man or female here is found,
Save the male-left, who rules these waters brown,
And the torn rocks which, breaking, beat their floor.
This cleft is that wherein the Carpath sweeps;
A spot is in it.  Yet no chain is here
Only to bind the sand, but it may bound
Thy course, ere thou return to yonder shores.

"O Goddess! from the icy region come!
Workman! adorer of all life and mind!
Giant, and friend in heart! to whom are given
All life, and soul, and wisdom!  In thy hands
Of living power, shall life the gods command."

Meantime, e'en from the altar, where he stood
With prayers and tears, and took the place of prayer,
With shame and grief, Latinus drew his speech,
And thus bespoke the deities of air:
"Grant to the nations of the gods thy ear!
Exiled abroad shalt thou with fear abate,
And learn of all the hosts their deities
Of Gods celestial, and their scattered train
Wrapt in the war."  Along the sacred fane
The deities had wove for them, and breathed
A mingled atmosphere, like flames of fire.
In manhood, then, the people read the same.
The number and the martial tale was heard,
And all were rapt at admiration, each
To the high gods; and more than I could tell
In verses not unmeasured.  Nature taught,
Nature to live; and man in these abodes
Spoke all things to the woods, and to the shores
Olympian, and to Pallas progeny.
What greater love than human love could draw,
When all things are so exquisitely wrought,
So perfectly can Nature, when she moves,
Himself, as when we first are touched by light,
And in our mortal frame our senses take?
Nay, Goddess, read our wonder here of yore,
And mark our triumphs; for the time will come
When earth, and sky, and ocean, shall in fire
Roll, and it shall increase, with all their flames.
Nor think that Juno's curse is idle, least
We judge of idleness, if evil yet
Will still come out, and let the world be held
Ignoring earth, and ye shall see it change.
But if you see this earth, is heaven unmixed?
Or, will the Heaven less justice, then the Earth,
With all her adjuries, by all designs,
Determining things to follow, and what's worse?
For I can think upon the ponderous realms,
And look on Nature; men, untaught to rule
The empyrean, emulous of stars,
That never need to rule, or bear the bolt,
Or even if they were full o'er their eyes.
No, never should
======================================== SAMPLE 92 ========================================
 path, and changeful work), the boy
To whose fair memory never I might be
The humble goal of my life's harmony.

Yea, not for him shall my deep musings fail;
I trust my love is wise and will prevail,
And by my love each day shall rise and fail,
And lovely woman rise and give me rest,
And, smiling down, in vividest bliss,
Her little children kneeling round her breast,
And, kneeling in their gratitude for this,
An humble woman find a seat at last.

Up with the roses, the white lilac-thistle high
Bloom flushing o'er the green ground,
The stream is fattening to give forth its tide
In deep and spreading sound.
Fair are the vales where'er the violets blow
The willowy hills along;
But, ah! where is the tender violet's home?
And the lids of a dear love
Floating a silvery dream on the blue wavelet,
That brightened while they smiled,
As they wondered and worship the willow trees
That spanned so rich a stream?
I never deemed the fairies in the wood
Were fain to hide their tears
Within the cool and silver woods;
I never deemed the fairies yet would roam
About one or another where they stood;
But in those silent bowers
We saw the golden flowers,
As a proud and gay procession now came out,
And lit the ruddy glade,
And flung each tuft of green above the gold-flower'd sod,
As the queen of the water-king
Sang this song to the little ones of her people;
The dwellers in the sea,
By the borders of the silent sea,
The fishers and the hepherds,
The white and black and grey,
And the dwellers in the land,
The bright flowers ever growing in the creek,
And the water all the day,
And the sea-birds ever singing in the rocks,
And ever the rocking and cracking logs,
And the fairy folk that pass
From the busy thrush and the noisy thrush,
For here there was nothing like fear,
Save only the moss and the white of the rock,
And the gray of the tangled grass
That stands in the water and brightly glistens.

There are faces that lean to the eaves
Beneath the blossoming roof
That makes the wee nest-loving clouds
Open their folded wings
And fly up the golden air
With a sound of gaily flinging
Flowers for the summer hours.
And the sea-bird all the sunny day
Carols and sings among the bright air
To the merry birds that hover
Beneath the dropping spray,
And to the bright clouds sailing low,
In joyous crowds that circle and pass,
And all the sunshine shining,
And, in the blue depths shining,
Till the summer night is gone,
The grey sails come to the sea,
And the fire is quenched at the silent moon,
And the rose drops, soft as a tear,
To the waves that follow the burn and curl,
And to the
Blue-birds that sing among the reeds
At the Golden Gate, whose walls are
Of metal, and whose floors are
Of copper, and on whose hinges
The hammers of the fallows
Are as iron,
Blended and bruised, and all
That links and hammers together.
Through these beautiful halls
Are rolled the strokes of the spurs,
The stripes that are red and
The traces of blood,
And the soft blood flows
Through the purple of the roses.
And round the walls the rain-cloud
In the great blue far sky
Is flinging its beautiful carpet
Of emerald and amethyst,
And every leaf is a sapphire,
Of green, clear gold,
To the pure white glowings
Of the throne of the mightiest.

And if you hear the merry
Light song and clear light song,
You have it, and be happy,
And eat your sweets, and
The old earth smiles
O'er the sweet earth and heaven,
In the silence of the summer
When all else is hushed and still.

You would see the rain,
Sitting in the flowering grass,
And the bird upon the spray,
Dancing on the leafy tops,
Or flitting in the crannies,
And the yellow heads of the night
All pensively at play.

You would see the sun on clouds,
And the flowers in the light,
And the falling birds and flowers,
And the loud wind on the hill,
Dancing there among the trees,

======================================== SAMPLE 93 ========================================
,
Intent upon a new theme, "Peseus"                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  
======================================== SAMPLE 94 ========================================
, boys:
They have made a bustle, then, and a trifle short.

Some folks say "Don't!" and some that don't!
But don't you think it's pretty? isn't it?
The many men who make a piteous jest.
Many folks make foolish, but 'tis better,
You know 'tis lovely sometimes--better--better--
And never lose the way, but, sure as fate,
You'll find that there'll be lots of vacant provides
And lots of vacant seats at sixty-five.

Three ladies of a silver blue,
Rise from their pillows each to two;
They thread the paths that shepherds love,
The floor, the chamber, and the grove;
They form the border-hills of France,
Are lined with white and blue-eyed France;
On every side their banners wave,
A soft and silken pennon float;
On each their crimson spears they advance,
And on each side, in gallant show,
Swell forth the choral chorus slow.

The little goat-that-year is spent
In pouring down the meadowlands,
He leads her milk-white milking-maid
Upon a milking-mop she runs,
Who listens at a milking-mop.

For day the cat is not at home;
She moves her tail with not a comb;
At night she falls asleep, and soon
Comes to amilking-mop she runs,
Or cracks her silly little tune.

When all the maids are merry
And dance about the meadow,
I'll take a goat-king's skulls
And play the old song over:

Old woes around their cruel lot are fall'n;
Each one a hug with a big, black maw;
For love of his own God they call him, come
And sit him fast on my breast of earth, and, munch
Together, sing as in their unknown regions
The pure immortal secret of his birth;
And when I stretch my hand out to the sea,
My heart is left for an eternity.

Well, where her deep womb covers on the stars,
Lurk in a grave-pit, sleeping with the stars.
Oh, if our only comfort is the foam
That murmurs in her offspring's breathing foam,
Should our poor country 'scape the wintry storm,
Dislodged from the cradle-violated form
Of its dead mother, there shall be a song,
A hallaner than mourning from a throne
For the poor dead who die.  And when the light
Of great day sinks upon the noiseless tomb,
Weep o'er her in her mourning for the race
That our great crowned and royal-sceptred mate.

It is a song whereon no voices cry
A mournful music on a lonely shore,
Yet we rejoice, for, when we look from this
Our blood runs parched, and there's a wintry wrath
In God's high law that bound the world forever,
And is, in every man, a most despairing
And most uncomplaining of its hope.

Give to the victim's fears no unputstood name,
But live, that they may still atone the woes
Of the untimely fate that makes us great
In that soft race where even the conquered fall
Makes them to weep a death to rise for fallen!

Ye dimmed and dank, ye have known them all!
But yet methinks the light upon your face,
The power to sting, the lust to seize and hold--
Alas, I do but love you, dear, and weep
Where the pale river mourns for one who sleeps!

O Love, a triple standard sleeps in thine,
Upon whose changeless bed all dreams have died;
And thee alone it was my care to save,
To keep it mine, that it may wrap and warm
Our souls about it;--ay, and I have died!

The mystic sod that held my father's clay
Treads chill and numbly in the icy sod;
The thick grey clod drags slow across the space,
And the dark thorn-tree looms behind it, dim,
And the bramble weed blooms white beneath the moon,
And green things scent the weir that bloomed below
In the half-open buds; and the poppy's glow
Dances on my heart: but there's a pain at hand,
To lay it on my heart, to add to thine
My last long touch on life's defiled slate!

I do not think I sleep to-night,
Nor do I
======================================== SAMPLE 95 ========================================
 dares not lift his eyes,
Of a truth so met with eyes.
But with his soul from the centre throng,
Like a lamp that only shines,
He draws his glory from time to time,
And the burning sun dares not decline,
But the soul that is lord of thine.

And to thy deep waters, stream, and plain,
Whose waters breathe by every tree,
Unflowing, thy clear waters stain;
It seems that thou, but for the sight
Of noonday, dost appear in the stream,
In the stream that ceaseth by.
To thee in the stream was once as clear
As the bank whereon we sit,
For these who practise virtue still,
Make water for the roots of the hill,

Lo! it is fit that I should speak
Of the stream that ceaseth flowing,
For it's clear water, it's ruddiest stream,
Is reflected like a dream;
A shell by distance blown away,
And to be set on the verge of day.
A bank of glass that quiet lies,
Yet to be touched by no touch of art;
A knoll on which to gaze at day
Is formed of golden gravel, and
In one of those grand, majestic heap
The scepter of a God they were,
That Time should weary of his way,
And have to stay his eagle flight;
Nor should he haste to be away,
By whence or wherefore written be.
Only the earth it seems shall stay
When these poor relics shall be laid.

The soul for heavenly ornament,
Than form or mind or body rare,
A glorious thing of praise shall be,
A monument of happy days,
Whereto its happy-soul is fair,
And there in soft gradation hies,
Or in low murmurs from the skies.
A scepter of a God I'd be,
And having him I dare not show
To leave a glory and a crown
To use for all the world around.
My foot hath been a magnet's track,
And I a steely helmet bright,
And I can handle as I will
To match this gaudy goudy clique,
Or with this blessed Cross compare,
The fairest frailer of the fair.
And you that must be like my stone,
Should not this gaudy garland grace,
The trusty, sleeker wight is none,
Nor ever felt a gentle place.
He needs must prove himself a knight,
If not the friend of Christendom,
And his strong arm have been to earth
A light and cheerful glory-comr'd.
The old, old Bible I must teach,
It is the gallows-hearth of Fate,
With which old Heron's life I reach'd,
And writing in his dimpling face
The bold, prevailing actions past
Of furious heat and cold desire;
Then stirring to his cry of praise,
He lays the Bible down at last,
And boasts of righteousness to come.
Thus, when the fervid ocean's peace
Is ebbing at the hour of death,
The ashes of that blessed peace
Shall ne'er be loos'd by priest or seer,
But with the world's eternal love
Shall from the depths of Nature peep
And find a safe and holy bed.
These pleasant glooms we all must see,
Cherish for Earth, and not deform,
Not join to part as these are free,
Or pledge the grace of her high saint.
Go, ye profane! and with your breath
Before this blaze to Nature dear
Come and her kingdom draw to death,
There to re-load your curse and fear.
Then go, ye profane! and if this cold
Cold hand be laid in havoc dire,
Then come! and wearing it so old,
Prostrate, and claim a second death.
The powers that hallow and command
A lasting loyalty and holy care,
Have by this hour sent hither every land
To fall a victim unto Law and Right.
By this the day that we have lived, and seen
A glorious land to rise above our own,
The Glory of the nations for the Queen,
The brighter for her glorious empire shone.
And humbly to this shrines repair,
Though, on her triumphs triumphs to be spread,
Her crown, her triumph, and her mighty name,
Gave what they had united to the dead.

With man the universe is blest,
With children early to the earth;
But, when our hours of peace are past,
We may our solemn vows renew,
Still one fond bond of love they hold,
That
======================================== SAMPLE 96 ========================================
 from all things made.
Cedar from lilies torn,
That's nothing now but moss.
Rose, from whence the waters start,
Set in her blossoms smart:
Whispering in her sleep,--
'Midst the rose-roots she'll creep.
What being will she do?
She, their spirit, will be dumb.

For lo, a fay and satyr,
To whom proud Rome is thrall,
Is homage from this palace:
Heaven, this fay shall call!
Immortal is the story
That told how came they by;
A painter loved to glory,
An envious at passer-by.

Is any witness chosen?
Is any witness given?
Is any witness promised?
Is any witness promised?
Is any witness promised?

Is any witness promised?
Is any witness promised?
Is any witness promised?

Ye who tremble not nor hear;
Ye who rout the temple rear
Through the echoing colonnade,
Think of old Sabrina's tomb,
In her who died a hero true:
The green of the tapering holm,
The red of the scattered cowl,
And green of the garland bloom
In the heart that's warm and bold
She, the champion of the old:
Old and hoary-headed tyrant,
From her young in a foreign lands;
To her, of all things favoured,
Whom angels name the master.

Are you no friends for ever?
We are only voyages.
Ye whose flight nor time defaces
To our past, forgotten places,
Ye who scorn and shriek and flee,
Know me not, who, in the future,
Shall be comforted and glad:
Ye shall know the riven secrets
Of the wind-swept dream-swept main,
Where the starry azure fleurs
Of the sun's unfathomed stain,
Where the reaper's noon is noon,
And the nightingale's last tune;
Ye shall all know of me,
Who amid the whirling dust
Where the thunders bear him down,
Shall be comforted and blest.

The quiet of the road
I walk by daily bread;
And all things that have died,
Dissolve in the old road,
And all things that are dead,
Hold the ghostly dead.
<|endoftext|>

I cannot say how many things
That are most dear and dear have sprung
Out of the ground and with quick wings
Dug underneath the earth, and among
These also have sprung; for to me
The April of the year is bringing
A sweeter fragrance, as it were
Made for the passing of my love.
As full of longing, evermore,
Thou lovedst me, my lady beautiful,
Long as the year is full of years,
And all the pulses of my life
Are beating with thy heart, my sweet,
My foolish love, my marvellous.

Will it ever be so soon?
Then let me die; for then I learn
To live again, and feel that I
Am dearer unto thee than the year's:
To feel thy breath upon my cheek,
And to my weary eye thy hair,
Thou sweetest lady of the earth!

The music of thy voice, the mirth
Of day to day,
Or music of thy radiant mood,
Is more than all thy melodies
And all thy songs are simple things.

I have no store
Of songs or flowers;
I gather but my heart's desire,
For the moon rains.
But I will pluck
The stars from out their shining chests
And shoot them tremblingly,
With silver shining in their hearts.

A golden beaker,
A bottle of wine,
A girdle for my lady's feet,
A ribbon for my arms and wings,
A necklace for my face,--
These things are mine.

I have no fear, I say not no,
Nor toss my spear;
I do not fear
The flaming gold of her white throat
That was my dear.

No, I will live
In name of her whose face shall charm me
And make my life
A feast for my lips to hold thee.

My dove!
Can I but come to thee alone
Where nothing of thy thoughts have perished
Or lesser charms are left to me,
In that vast solitude of hers?
The love of her that grieves my heart,
Is such an one as lies at rest,
And lies and dies within its nest?

I shall not search, but search in vain
The hopeless love that I must love,
======================================== SAMPLE 97 ========================================
 of the sun?
Why do you seek to hide your burning face
And heat your brows and cheeks with hot desire?
Whence are you made so pale and yet so pale?
Whence are you that the heat of burning blood
Breathe like hot coals across your brows of red?
Why, what of bitter cold and bitter heat?
Why are you fashioned so so like to die
That even your chambers sputtered in the dark?

Nay, lovely goddess, only for thy pall,
What hast thou in this weary waste to stay?
Is it a hungry heifer, that I cry
Against the bitter winds till day is done?
Nay, sister, neither for thy wretchedness
Shall any hunger now.  Thy mouth to mingle
With rivers thou didst love, O, never lack
Hate of thy blood for any thirsting milk.
Nay, sister, neither for thy want of fire
Nor want of body, do I hunger now.
Take pity on thy load of death and woe.
Thou comest to me from the mountain-side,
Thou comest to the river-side, O, leave
The dismal fir-trees brown and sere and old.

O let me still this one thing have a care,
That she may make my craven kind a scorn.
Nay, mother, let me die of grief at last.
O be thou kind, O mother, and make plain
Thy pity upon me, that thou wilt
Henceforth preserve my life from every pang.
Let not the memory of the day die out
Among the dead leaves; let not night swallow up
My virgin-sleep, nor day a day drag up
My darkness to a dreamless winding-sheet.
So long as I've a name I am to call
On thee, O mother, from the grave to say,

Farewell, farewell, O mother dear,
Farewell, thou shelter of my days,
And I, thy son, shall surely be
The witness of thy loving ways.
Thy dead are better than the living; they
Were better when alive than I shall be.
Better than youth, O my Arunda,
The flowers and fruits of life, the sun, the moon,
The birds, the sea, the wind--or wilt thou be
My mother, mother, thou and I,
O mother, for I love thee well,
For thou art wondrous beautiful.
But, as thou seest these things, I see
That thou art ever dear to me.
Thou art like death and frost, and I,
O mother, do not stoop to die.
For, mother, thou art not a shroud,
I see no stars, I hear no tides,
Nor weep, for I would die of thirst,
In what is death, in what abides.
Thy father fell in Adriatic hills,
But I saw his locks at Corinthian,
He spoke with my mother all the day
Because of my father, O thou my friend;
And now thou shalt wake, my friend, and know
That I love thee with secret pain,
And henceforth as we are in the chilly West,

Ah, would I had drowned you once with the sea,
The mist and the wind were forsworn,
But would ye have life and peace again?
So should I the river have crossed
And let the weed wander, and the boat go forth
On its rough way, and never again
The grass bring forth white flowers, nor from the land
Be any one weary to know the pain
When the strong sun burns high, or the river runs
Into a land poisonous as death,
Whither for ever the strange reeds are drawn,
There is a God who has pulled down the sea,
Under the eyes of the cruel eyes of Death,

Like a thicket on a hedge, and from all sides
Ere the air be fulfilled to wine, I dream
That in my dreams a place of dearth, a place
As strange as is the common earth,
Under the eyes of a child, I behold
The glassy plain and the great sea,
Under the great sky in the hurrying West
Over the sea-coast and the coast;
And these three water-courses shine
Through the cool surface of the brine,
Under the large, white sails like a bright bird,
And everywhere among them the wide sea
In a sweet, murmuring sound breaks and breaks
Like a sweet sound beneath the tree.

There are three rocks in the crannies there,
That are hidden under the mist,
And the rocks are smooth and well-tilled

======================================== SAMPLE 98 ========================================
 by that mountain tall,
A gloomy, blighting beauty rarely claimed a breeze,
But in new Paradise the trees of Heaven are sown,
Because they deck the gardens with green leaves o'erthrown,
Where thus, sweet months, you play with your gay frolick an
embroidered fillet.

But if a darker scene I see
Breaks on the snow-crest's edges wild
With white snow-velvet flakes of white,
And thin crisp tongues of icy flame
In every hair that nods along
At the lark's sad lays and dares not sing,
Warm rainbows o'er my spirit fly
As lightly as the woodland bird

In June's first merry lullaby.
And these songs that thrill my heart,
Like wind in a lonely tree
Or a lonely cedar tree,
Oh, lovely years of Italy,
I long, long year the world to see,
Wandering by the sea.

Among the rosy wastes of ice
The keenest breezes well can vie
With southern breezes, soothing sweet,
And pensive idleness, they urge
The noiseless step of the gaunt wolf,
The prowling wolf.

Among the mountain-summits faint
Of Afric snows the cautious chief
Greets with his eunuch's heel a trite
Whose death-song warbles from the lute,
Greeting the dreamer, ever quick,
Where silver threads the wanderer trod,
Forgetful of the spoken word,
Her song of daylight.

With wings caressive gliding
About the breast of Nature's Babe,
O'er fields and forests in soft gales
Of gentle breezes, how my sail
Wave-watched by Fancy's richest sail,
Serene upon the warm blue sky,
Where shines the snow-soft Acropolis,
Smooth-billowing the bright-bill'd bay,
Cheerily blending with the gray
The cheerless solitudes of night.

From the cold northern breezes, lo,
The quiet olive trees, the vines
That watch the fishers' fishers quaff,
The fisher's cot that listens now,
His whitening pear-trees in the bough,
The poplar swinging at their brow
To kiss the shore.

Within their shadowy garden-ground,
No bright-gleaming sunbeam yields
To rhaps the raiment of their king;
No insect tells us that the blooms
Of these deep earths are green below.
And, look! a solitary thing
Beneath the green and snow-white eaves
Of warm, cool leaves enfolds the rose,
The withered, sleepy violet.

The queen of vapoured primroses,
And taper daisies, be it so,
That always with the rain they go,
The pathway to the wanderer
In leafy alleys free from snow,
O'er snow-white beds that dart a star
Through heaven, 'mid vapors gray below,
There to be sated with sweet sleep
Far 'neath a hundred murmuring seas,
With pillows plumed and blue bright worlds,
To dance the courtier dance of Mars,
Hail slumber-bringing Fancy, thou
The while a blackened hill I see
Lift up its hundred-voiced boughs
Tho' foiling blasts be bleak and shrewd
With wind and rain and all its breath
That hails and blows thro' cloudy skies,
And welcomes the Atlantic grapes
As warmly glides the rolling seas.

And now, O king, my dream is born,
And as the dreaming earth ye wait,
Still in the dark I hear thee sing
That long-forgotten time of late
When all were gods, and sweetly stirr'd
With passion from the sweet earth's heart,
The fair, enchanted days of Greece,
When every sweet face seem'd fair
With strange, delicious taste of death,
O'er the high Alps and windy heights,
At whose far feet and mighty arms
Floated the silver winds of heaven,
O'er the dim caves and far away
In happy sleep each wandering star,
And heard the music of the spheres.

You would not think that Time could stay?
So near him the sure feet can fall
That walk'd by every desolate plain,
Where Pleasure was to Hope a thrall.
And lo! the song which made me start
In wonder, on my journey's way,
When, in the dark vault of a heart
Like which the noiseless dawn of day
Puts o'er the mountain all its light
======================================== SAMPLE 99 ========================================
,
With all the powers to be--you saw it all.
You saw I wanted purity
In making that "touch"
Which wraps a woman as her flounces hide.
You saw I wanted superhuman grace
When all the love was mine and all my soul was hers
The patience of the female, not the man--
The pity for the man!

You saw I wanted passion strong and brusque,
Which life's machinery carries to the grave;
You saw I wanted courage, wholly in joint,
And found the purpose, half through selfishness,
In making women truly what they seem;
You saw I wanted courage high and pure
As much as I could prove, to make men sure,
To injure simply self-obliterary wiles
Of women, when the mind is not mature:
You saw I wanted knowledge vast and deep,
And love within me wholly set me free;
You saw I wanted courage without speech,
And halting back in error, self-deceit,
Could make me worthy men of their love to be!

The smile is not as great as thine. Your place
Is not more fit for heroes. There is pride
And strength that cannot falter. Men have died
In battle, and the feverish cheek is bronzed
By festal health. Your proper task is nerve
And spirit for the revel.

But the elements will go with us, we know
From what far shore we live in a wide world's space
And leave no likeness, save the brutes we serve,
Our fit place, a vast void, and at our heels
A brute world all a body craves our embrace;
Our little life may have no other place
Than the vast farthest corner of the void,
Where, seeking honor, we are crowned and sate,
And with what offerings we would fill our purse,
And live together, if there ever fail
Him who has most in mind and heart so great.

The sea is an enchanted
And silver bow of silence
And rhythm like blown foam.
There is a sense of coolness
As I remember the first ship
Down in the Naples
That sparkled with the white foam.

And my soul remembers
Those days and dreams of golden
And misty moons and golden
And choruses of old.
I am a myth that they remember,
A lovely dream that they remember,
When she was maid of the people
Who walk not swayed in the dark.
I dream of starlight and of moonlight
That fall and cease in the dank night
Like pure, unruffled tints
Burning in the wall.

I dream of my heart's immensity--
Its suave and mad forgets
That sunder and control
Through cycles till the whole
Is riven with a whole
Of mighty keys,
Bearing upon them
Old chains of gold.

So my heart knows the sweetness
Of her love and her beauty
As I stand here at her feet.
O trysting and stearing,
Blind, proud, and tearless,
I find my gift.
O, let it start as laughter,
Blind as the moon
With no more warmth.

Her virginal mien transports
To me, and I must rest me
In the exquisite starlight where she dances.
No more shut lips shall press me,
No more limn me the swift, free rapture
Which cannot be recalled.

My heart is tired.
The rhythm is out of tune
With distant voices, golden lights,
And loves that know no way
Shall yield me joy.
Through dancing and revel and mean clash
And vain clash of song,
And all but mute things that I love
Clasped lips and cloy.

The passion is out of tune
With her, beloved, till the moon
Turns into the lute-strings and the strings
Of love are mute.
Eying out, sweet, intense,
The melody of her intense notes
Is out of tune.

In the blue and laureled hours,
When the golden sky was dim,
Like a pigeon golden in the bowers,
A ring of elf-land pearled with the south light,
Thronged with bushes of purple bloom,
Sat an oak, among the blossoms white,
To toss in the sunlight above,
And tossed with his thyrsus eyes
Down under the branches of the forest hollyhocks.

In the pool and the reeds
A flower was strown;
At the touch of his stirrup,
Or the shadow of his footstep,
Palely humming the swallow
Through the mosses brown
Of the ancient town.
======================================== SAMPLE 100 ========================================
 with stealthy listeners to presage
Fears that shall never die!

The early cataract its thunder deep
Still bears the weight of ruin;
Still thou canst pour thy venom through the wound,
And share with these the pangs of deadly wounds,
Whilst they are pliant still.

In vain did Fate the power of Fate annoy;
No wanderer there to wander far away
From home, and from thy fellows' ken;
Thy weal and woe they still await, nor mourn,
From land to land the destined journey borne,
And by their lot is borne.

For thou canst make a living death, to flow
With melancholy stream,
And when a folk thy magic mantle close,
As glad they wont in youth;
Still willing to renew thy cares, renew
The life of them of them that still remain,
Before the setting sun.

And they whose dust thine altars cold shall strew
Upon a mournful shore;
Whose dying breath shall freeze thy lasting urn,
Beside thy hallowed door;
If they, who follow thee in age, not wait
For that full many more,
Who rolled on hostile stones, shall be thy bier,
Nor e'er unwept remain.

But O! forget not what thy lot has been;
They died in beauty's bloom;
And lay the living charm aside, in thee,
For whom the dead have dittered down the dead:
Roses! if once thy name they could devote,
And, like the flowers, too gladly would be shed,
Where still, on beds and babies waiting,
Prayers, and pale tears, and prayers, and wishes tend,
And passing forth thy golden treasure take,
They should not look for joy to see thee wake.

I will not despair; but thou wilt bless the hour
When these poor eyes shall brimmed with hopeless tears,
When these sad lips shall whet their holy teeth,
And soul to soul in dire convulsions rise,
And taste the withering drops.

No! thou wilt break my heart; for thou hast been,
With gushing blood, to Charybdis town.
Unwilling didst thou go
Into these realms below.
There saw two maidens, sad with grief and woe,
Come moaning to me,
Chilling me, and forbidding me:
"Play with the shadows," so the three did say.
They must not, I suppose.

Leaving to themselves--
With shame I to the world my woeful way.
She, with piteous eyes,
Kissed me as she kindled love-lorn cries;
"Oh! God," I cried, "could this effect--hope soothe
Like misery, or like misery itself!
Thy very death is manifest to me;
And, howsoever thy lips speak of me,
Full often I have called thee."

The shadows fled, the sun shone out and hid
The sun with gold, the day shone out and hid
The sun with lead, the day wore out and hid.
And that day I never, never turned aside,
Till I had seen him kneel before mine own.
An angel, sent from heaven,--
Who never swerving his flaming wings,
Lost me by anguish writhing in despair,
As through a darksome pit of burning sand,
Where, stranded, and cold, a beggar's hand
Had traced with anguish my pale, cheerless mind.

"Sweet Angel!" said I, "
"Now comfort thee! for few and short a day
Regard the hour when thou shalt call away
The name from which thy soul shall flee away.
When from thy presence fled, ah! me! what grace
To trust thee with, what peace shall be thine?"
The passing minute
To him whose latest words had pierced mine ear,
Reached me; and even in the moment's fear
Of idle thought, I laid my head and prayed,
My spirit sinking to its place of rest.
But, when I called, thy soft voice to my breast
Came like the sigh of any wind that fills
The lonely forest, and no sound is there
Save moaning of the leafy forest leaves,
And a faint, feeble murmur of despair,
Like the soft rising of the evening air
In the sweet sunset.
"Child of my heart!"
(Thus at the gate of love's own gate
I cried) "thou seekest a death more dire
And strangest than e'en Hell's unhallow'd womb,
And Hell's abhorrent bound yawns to its tomb.
If from this fet
======================================== SAMPLE 101 ========================================
, yet not secure.
When such a man was won of thee, dear friend,
The clouding memories of his life will end.
I did but mar his raptures while I saw
Your pensiveness.  The best things that a man can say
Are the words that any one in me can teach.

The pictures have been all those days,
The sparrows whistle from the clay;
The can, the marshes have a voice,
The lightning flashes from the sky;
And in the colours of the day
The carving of an old gray bird,
It seems the creature holds the soul
Of the unfinished record day.

And many of us, when dim, small crowds
Of very women--who, who, when our eyes
First saw her facing, saw his brow
Blow with a nation's ready pride
Before her in her gray, cold eyes.

At such a season, one may say,
The snowdrop and the tender hues
Are not for those who will not love.
It is the wind that shakes the snow
And swiftly turns the snow and shakes
Our Northern, English lakes.

Down by the docks of the city
We heard the noise of waters gushing,
And whispered, "Etche H buzzinga!"
And whispered, "Nay: they love you:
They have your heart's desire too,
And you are farther off from us
Than ever I could be!"

It is the city they loved,
The cataract and the flood,
And what their loving presence was,
And what their beings were,
It is the city we love,
Our home, our city good.

But still their clinging magic clips
The city's gates and holds us still,
Though some of us by day are swam
And some of us by night are swelled,
By midnight bell, by day like sparks,
To give the world to groups of sparks
But if the city we love,
What is it that with sobbing lips
Our dreamy hearts will rise and beat
Against the wall of our sweet dreams,
Our blossoms that are bound in streams,
Our dreams of love and home,
Our lodging on the stairs?

Is not the stillness love makes sweet
In the great silent street,
The young lambs' crowing, that is heard
In the old home by the ear,
The quaint old playhouse under the hill?

Wings of a maiden on the stair?
Wind-slashed window-squares of brown
Upon your chamber swept it down,
Bare-headed mimes with cap and bells
To keep your breath on pipe and tongue?
That was a day of days indeed,
Of dreams of boyhood that is dead,
Of whilom great new poet sang
An old sweet song, and angels sung.


Beyond the rounded mother-moon
The seas washed like an ecstasy,
And the wet seaweeds swirled with foam
And manes like far blown citied meres
About the sides of horns of Rome,
Each vine-like form in ghostly row
Brimming the jarred portentries
Of gorgeous Cypruses that show
The eastern slope like dancing waves.

And still between the sea and sea
The wandering night-jar opened wide,
Drowsing itself within inside,
With melancholy murmurous,
A chant of vast, incurious dreams,
Where shapes of faces smiled at her,
And troubled faces bent like gleams,
Yet made no peace.

The singers of the far away
Murmured of whiles that go and come,
The strange sweet-versed ditty of
Shepherds' voices; and still on,
Till the night-roar stopped,
Rose-crowned, the still-latched hymn-choos
Of winds and dawn-gleams from the sea,
And faint, as dying lolls,
The little boughs stirred.

Under the bitter glare of lamp-light
I leaned against the twisted bars;
I prayed, yet struggled still with hope;
But with my shoulders it was vain,
For all the world with soft grey stars
Must pass ere the moon reigns.

Saw the far sea-crest,
And heard the song of many seas,
And saw how many ages fled,
And what far pleasance there it had,
And how the years would glide away
And leave no green thing near enough
To call to mind, no footsteps then,
Save only the sky-roofed sailors
Or the wet thread on the starry bier
To toss between the setting suns,
Or quacking boats that smoke afar
Down smooth wet
======================================== SAMPLE 102 ========================================
 for Elenor--what to say?
A lawyer, wrapt in law--and not a seaman,
But an apprentice, fresh, but versed in woman,
And more intent, with rope of steel and chain,
And telegraph-jets, and found some trader,
Tell him these things with patient hand and eye:
"What ails poor peddling-boys to grind their treasure,
When they intend to pay the rent in pleasure,
To fill their mouths with thoughts of profit?
Tell me, is life worth living pleasure?

"Say, and what art still alive and able
To pay me back the thousand dollars funny?
When I'm grown up and art still clever,
I'll pay this ten-fold Ten-and-twenty;
And then the bank account will tell me,
If I go med'cine, I shall sell t' am money."

Ah, pussy-Mame, you went on grumbling,
While me and you were in church speaking;
And we were seized with a fair nelling,
At which you didn't know what we'd do.
We went and got our fun and mischief
To those on duty, I knew what
We'd done at night;
When a girl told me, "Do as you will,
You saved your supper, the soup and jelly
And a nice treat, when you're grinning,
Give us a pan,
To bake you up before we're ready,
And cook you up before we're able."

Oh, to tell you all I knew about her,
I thought it no great harm to bring her.
I made a melon--and she tried it,
And soon as I turned head my finger,
Smiling and smiling, she cried, "Say,
Where can you find this girl you thought of?"
I looked about her then and schemed a joke,
At daybreak I'd be brave for nothing,
I'd tell her if I worked hard for nothing,
I'd make some money up and tackle her,
And find her hair out, if I don't,
But if I had my finger gone,
She would have shot me, for a sin.

A tailor? a black artisan?
"I shouldn't be afraid of a halter,
But I'm going a-swishing, I know."
So he stripped off her tresses, and wrinkled her face,
And sat in a chair by the old mill-stone.

Our housekeeper put a basin of poplar
A fall in the side as the form of a poplar;
Two soap-sills fell down on the empty pouts,
And sopped against the wall by the old mill-stone.

"O-the-simmons, good by, and I'll give you a glass,
Now, old hoss-shoes, I know not what sweeter."
But our old cook followed him--hide, hair, and all that,
With a rush and a jostle, she fell right under

A long litony button, a star-spangled banner,
And "Farewell, my heart's daughter, I'll save you a wherry."
She tossed her apron, her cheek grew red,
She dropped her sleeve to the wheel of the old mill-bar.
There were balconies all full of flowers,
And white pictures there in the corner tower;
On white rose lanterns was supporting two,
And-- tying one down,--the other down,--
She tied her apron on to a silk kerchief,
And passed away with the wind of the night.

I was kneeling on the tinth when a door was opened,
I heard the wind go as it whipped in gust,
I heard the wind go as it swept away,
I heard the wind go as it swept away,
And I saw my wife, all alone at the window,
Sit spinning a loom and weaving a wool.

"Sign!" said my wife, "I'll go in and see Miss S. S.."
She nodded her head to the wheel of the telephone,
And then in the silence she made her mark
To say, "I'll go in and see Miss S. S.;
I think I could fly, for I didn't speak,
But I heard my wife say, 'I was a philosopher,
You might go to the doctor and get a good will,
And I want to go to the doctor and buy my bell.'"
And then she waved her hand to the wheel of the telephone,

The bell with the small red lips of a boy,
The green, soft woman whose hair is brown and grey,
Aged, and curly-headed girl poised
======================================== SAMPLE 103 ========================================
.

Again the coming of the King
Upon the city shook:
But all by desperate prayer and word
The maiden was betrayed.
Thus she abandoned.

Yet without or warning older,
Unto the maid alone
The pity moved her spirit.

Nor ever from her heart it came
With its small love all gone,
To any in the world to claim
The tribute of its dawn;
For seldom could she look upon
The little place at hand
That was builded so hard by the loom,
Nor look upon her land.

But in the night the fair Queen rose,
And saw her little street,
Which was filled with people silently,
And drawn by flags and feet;
She saw the silken market-place
Where noble folk were met,
And cried, "My lady!  Who art thou,
Whose eyes thou'rt standing yet?"

Then, in a base and cunning way,
She passed within the door;
The leading woman slowly came,
And with no word more,
Until her hair was long and low,
She stooped, and called upon her:
"Come forth, O maid, and take me,
Take me, take me, hasten me!"

Then to her wondering eyes she came,
With tears of faintest rose;
And in her heart there was no flame,
That ever lit her woes.

But when her little feet anear,
She raised her head and cried,
"Thou find'st me, do not fear, young man!
And my poor eyes are small,
And never do they need me,
But weep for me, sweet lady!"

The nightingale, so bonny and sweet,
Tempted her little songs in idle list,
Then forced her little flute away
From every thicket and each pleasant spot;
Grieving that such a birth had brought
To such a little innocent bird,
And that he might have been a king,
Whatever came into his mind,
Yet to be made a deathless plaint
To his luckless tenor and his court.

The nightingale, she lightly dined
In a small spot where she had missed her mark:
The mother did not hear the song,
The world went round and still we found
Our infant laughter, and our mirth;
We wondered why the world was sad.

But when the child of morning light
Gaed in with day-star of the sun,
And, climbing up the crag's sharp height,
Starred over all the gloomy bars
With a bold look of infant stars,
A pretty babe, with open eyes,
Made heaven brighter for his fantasy,
Held his bow down, and went his way.

He went and was a lovely child;
No ruddy face, no tresses wild,
No rounded limbs, no tressed hair fair,
Might match his courtly unguent hair,
No goblet crown, nor top-knot rare,
No crown might tempt him from his bower,
And yet he was a happy flower.

"Here shall I bring thee, little one,
And then, good fellow, shall I fetch thee?"
"I bring thee, little false child, come,
And eat thee."
Then the tender little babe, alack!
Pressed, kiss'd, and kiss'd, and cried, "Thy little tricks I'll play

At cock-crow, that I fear, if he be dead,
He shall not die a gallows for his head,
But I'll be gone."

He was very well indeed,
When he began to make these most of one.
He said, "My pretty wanton, come away!
Break your string, and hither line with me,"
Whilst he laid his finger on the black,
And beckon'd, "Mighty God will see
That thou com'st home!"

The cradle was an honest one,
No doctor had the need to be
'Tis said that, when at rest,
'Tis said the baby did not go.
But now he is at six full-milled,
And can turn up hisRepeating ode,
And trim his nursery, just like yours,
And make the oddest little babes
Hold up before them future bliss,
This little infant on his mother's lap.

So glad is little Willy of this town,
So happiness befell him one by one.
He was the son of a respected friend
Who, knowing all the ways of all mankind,
Could not in time a word of courtesy
Repeal as his enquiriesings went.
The child was all the one to him
======================================== SAMPLE 104 ========================================
 before the feast they made their way.
Meanwhile, as thus enkindling on their view
To that great throng, associate came the crew.
They, hasting to the ships, by men and steeds
Besieged, beside the chariot held their seat.
Thrice, thrice, and four times, round the ship they strode,
Both raw bull-hides, with the coursers filled,
E'en then, as Hector fastened on his breast,
He shook his splendid sword, and flashed afar,
As lightning dashes round the rolling brass.
The hero, seeing them, uprose at once
Before his chariot; the Sire of all,
Apollo, godlike Hector, first he met,
And after, first, the charioteer beloved
Of royal Priam, and his brave allies,
Son of the wealthy monarchs, Ajax, there
Bereaving; swift as thought, he sprang at once
And smote the son of noble Sthenelus;
Epeius, son of Enops, with a spear
Of brass-broned Peleus; from the car he fell,
Plunged in the dust, while, with the horses' feet,
His charioteer and his chariot-steeds
Drove chariots and provisions over Troy,
But were not yet within the power of hands
Of noble Hector; in the course of war,
While the earth closed beneath him, to the ships
He came like some vast mountain-clash of flame,
Or slow fire-mountain rising on the cliff,
Or that proud mountain-crest whose lofty brow,
And glittering scatt of snow-shapes overhangs
Towns, cities, unto subjects of themselves,
Hear him who moves him, and who speaks aloud.
So well his chariot fitted to his gripe.
But Hector, if thou wilt, and if thou go,
Let no man, Tydeus, bear his chariot-steeds
As once; for fiery-hearted Mars essay'd
To 'scape him, and had not thy comrade dared
To box the chariot yoke; but he himself,
Apollo, from his chariot in the midst
Smote him, and on his head descended; broad
Behind him ran his armor, with a stroke
Dreadful he fell; then with a scream of death
Hector beheld the battle, and the steeds
Whirl'd to the ground, while in their gallop strove
The chariot, and the chariot Hector smote
With his spear brazen-shafted. Then Polites,
Polydamas, Oenomestor's son,
Came in hot haste; but to his chariot-steeds
He came as swiftly as a lightning-bolt
Wielded of strength, and mounted up the car.
He bore away the reins, and urged the steeds
Back to their steeds in safety, and at length
Antenor, in wing'd accents, thus began.
My friends! since, in the name of heaven, no more
Bereaving our steeds, do we beseech the Gods
To vouchsafe us aught, at once repast,
Of our own lives, and of our glory more?
Come, drive us hence into the host of Troy,
The van of Troy, and the abode of death.
He spake, nor Ajax, not a whit less prompt
Than they who fled before them. But the son
Of Telamon threw far a dart, and struck
Through the right shoulder Prothoenor, son
Of Phylides, with a rock- fragment strown,
Which from the giant's neck had split the joint.
Down from the chariot fell the splendid fragment
Scattering, and as it sucks the life away
With piteous jangling, so the chariot-steeds
Plunged to the ground. Then thus Antenor's son.
Hear, also, Jove! and thou who rul'st the skies,
Eternal, both in flight, and thou, O Sun!
Guard still Thy people, never, never cease.
To whom the son of Saturn in return.
Mars, King of men! if thou observe these ways
Thou wilt not. Hast thou ere yet into the host
Our horses fasten, that we may make them strides
In time to come. But drive them out, that they
Beneath the yoke may keep us. They, myself,
Shall, as I think, ride free beyond the range
Of the broad ocean; but, ere they there breathe,
I take their life, and he and they
======================================== SAMPLE 105 ========================================

With what a hiss they said,
Who'd got to be a R.T.

Why here I stand, not knowing
How they'd come to me,
Angered with their unbinding hands,
Of friends we are to be;
Whose coming is so mighty
In grace and dignity,
I fancy they'll be happy
Till they come to me!

We're not awake till morning
And we dance a merry round,
And then the lessons which we learn
Come to us on a ground.
At table we'll be courting
Each one of us and him,
And eat our evening group before
We go to let the Saladin
In his most thoughtful spree.

For here's a long, low lesson
That he ought to learn,
And soon in that cathedral door
We shall bear him in his search--so--
He'll stand without a fuss,
And cheer us for our merry march
O'er rocks and stones that's grand
And of the country--with our hearts
Are all so easily made fast
That when the journey's done
One leaves his cap and on his nose
May be his last wish left!

The sun is coming down;
Ah, God! we love the sight
Of that awful thing we saw
In such unspeakable affright!
From such a night of terror
May you have any panic!

A rock among the deeps,
And through the way you take,
This helpless girl comes back to us,
Your messmate with his bier;
We will send you there, we'll send you there,
As decent and as good
As if you came, of poor old years,
Into the marriage-bed.

With bay and mine beside.
We'll send you to your grave,
As decent and as good
As if you came, of poor old years,
Into the marriage-bed.

'Twas Life who in the far-off years
Had wrought you a man's death.
A life, and all it seemed to me
That your life, on earth, must be,
In some life, seen with such grief,
So like the hopeless mad
Who in the sacred crucifix
His crucifix would have slain.
Ah! why do you then cry,
And sob, and beat your breast?
O happy life! it shall not die
For such a blessed rest!

I'm taking that way!
How tired you must be
If it's not time to loaf
And ring your head with the rod
Of an easier rod!
I wish I could be
A tree, just like you!
And I in the school
Wish I hadn't my fool,
And the nights are dark and long,
And there's nothing that's wrong!

But 'tisn't all right to me,
For the ones that jump out there,
And the teacher is just ahead,
He will give his mum share;
Or I've to finish up
And back the drugs for poor old Dobson's mug!

A case of books, not like your aunt,
Are what I wish to get and live upon;
Yet how of the winter, after all?
A feeling of pleasant fun;
A feeling of happiness everywhere,
A feeling of honor and love alway!

When I was one of those some eighteen years
I had not seen in history,
But now, amid the momentary haze,
I never knew a bit!

One's name is Death; there ain't no name
The name is anything but home;
And some that I had learned to know,
Are by some magic invitation,
Some night of sudden, strange, unreal,
We two were still together.

By the drive of Posthoof, man of the slow repute,
On the roll of Bagdad I made a carnage hole,
With a shell-patterned body, and having a part
Of work done in a painful sort of way,
Pick'd the recesses to it for three months
Of waiting till they come to my dug-out.
And then the sense of ferment and sleep,
The sugar and sweet temper of mother's breasts,
And of the symphony of the will,
And the march and the blow and the march,
Are as it were now in the yesterday's work,
And as it was after the four years' march,
The three now silent and indifferent keep.

Oh, they're a comely matron, Grace'mores!
(That to the smile in smiles,
Is something better now than in discourse,
So much of one as all the audience begs)--
That kindly wife a vignette, Grace'mias,
Smoothing the
======================================== SAMPLE 106 ========================================

Thou hast won us from the street,
Our houses and our farms,
Our marbles and our wharf,
Our women and our wharf.

Many a thing in the land
We do have the best of,
The deuce, we're dull and cross,
And I take in the rest of
The cock-a-roach we mean;
The farmers and the teachers
Will never yield us again;
The shavings on the lasses,
The pigs, and the redcoats,
Will never cheer the shop
We're eaten and rejected
And forced to work for food,
And discord and vexation
Will prey on the nation,
And in disgrace and horror
We'll throw our good lives down,
With no curse upon your own!

Some of us were too small for us,
Stupid and haggard,
Had we but souls and bodies,
And then how fast they ran!
But we have souls, and bodies,
And souls enough for all:
Had eyes, and hearts, and garments,
And then we had them all.

We should have souls, and bodies,
And warmth and light and shade,
And quiet homes by nature
Where the sky is always bright:
If we were souls, and souls, and natures,
We all of us would pray,
To stoop to them and praise them
And pity and protect them
Lest, like the grasshoppers, their wings
Should be o'ersetted too and fro,
And they should suffer shame and sorrow
By looking at another's,
How tedious you would be
In such a crystalline,
And yet be neither air nor water.

The race of man is not more wise than men:
They have no wisdom and no power.
They have no thirst for any sweet, sweet wine;
For which they know not any power.
For they know nought of Power,
And all their purposes prove
That they have none, but only of their own:
Their powers are not alone:
They speak and live, and they alone.

The nightingales, with drooping wing,
Sing high their lays unheard by night,
Alone, awake, from their night-watches,
Carol of love to the utter light,
While endlessly they huddle and grope
For love in one another's ear.

Then the nightingales,
With drooping wing and drooping wing,
Pour round their souls the great love-soothing
Of peace to the utter light of the day,
And peace to the almost-blind.
Then the nightingales,
With drooping wing and drooping wing,
Sing low, lest haply they deem
That they shall no more be
The happy, the beloved of men,
For their mouths' sake at last shall be
The home-of-peace, and their goal is, then,
Of joys departed long since after.

They rest in the shadows
Of the sacred sky;
The winds are murmuring
Their songs on high;
The world is comforted,
The Earth is glad;
There comes an answer,
A cry of pain,
From the lost years far after.

To the cradle's side,
Where sings the bride,
And men and maids with voices sweet,
And songs of hope come over the earth
To sorrow and sorrow and sorrow and mirth,
And the pale-lipped snow is as white as the snow,
And winds are awake in the deeps of the sea,
And darkness is breaking in frost.

The nightingales are singing, yet not they,
For the dawn of the day is red.
What song has stirred the slumbering sea,
And stirred the heart in its head?
Now the morn is waking, yet not I,
For the waking is long and sweet,
And noon is abroad on the mountains,
And night is around us sweet,
For far on the shadowy heaths, in the valleys,
The scarlet smoke of the day!

The morn is breaking, yet not I,
For the day is without wings;
Where no voices come from the valleys,
Or songs of the nightingales,
And the zephyrs wander in rapture,
And the earth and the heavens are young,
In the dawn-light of morning!

Beneath the cloudy, starry heavens,
I lie and listen to the nightingales,
The nightingales!

The nightingales!
Under the heath and under the vines,
In the noisy close of the summer days,
They are all singing one another's praise;
Each has its own old secret,
======================================== SAMPLE 107 ========================================
e, went upon
Like the Roman fled, for Dido fled.
Diomede-like Diomede wept and sighed,
Dying as in Amphion's rage she stood.
But when she came on whom she had bestow'd
Her loving arms, she dropp'd the veil and slew
Upon her brows; then drew the weapon true,
And, peering through her lids, when he had stood
Between the neck and throat, as maidens do
The entrails in their best, untying pierce
Of foaming chests; so on a galley stepp'd
Down-stream, which, glorying in its speed, oars plunged.
Hither she ran, full oft she call'd her,--she,
Whom during winter, looking back on, see.
But, ere the first of dawning light appear'd,
She threw her arms around him as he lay,
And hid her features in her beauteous face.
Such signs the keen-ey'd messenger of heaven.
A deep voice from her brother he descends,
Who thus inquires:--"Tell me the signet's signet."
"The signet's signet make; I'll soon be thine,
And when with thee, let both my hand be dumb.
Thy rod shall rule the forfeit of my life,
And gold begone's my power, and power thou buy'st,
With joy the gift." But He, as he had said,
Sent her away. Then Ilioneus of Thebes
Sent her to Charon, seeking whence he came.
But Herachus, in wrathful tone, replied:--
"If I can find thee wherefore seek we none?
At least a long day's term of sojourn here
Anxious to bring the recompense to me
Which I will give, since other risk is none.
To-morrow and to-day I will require
The aid of Jove, who, with injurious hand
Held out thy bow, before thy shafts dismiss'd."

He said, and to his sister thus replied:--
"Atrides, most favorable of all powers
I know, and so protect thee with all care,
Nor this the issue of a friendly fate
Shall e'er be thought to rest by intercession stored
About thee, in thy well-appointed barks,
To expedite the murder'd Trojan host,
If thou accept thy deadly punishment."

So Thetis, sorrow-stricken from her thoughts,
Thus spake to young Diomede the aged:--"O
To lay thy stores, good herald! this design
Is mine for counsel--I shall give the sign.
Lead thou his ships to o'er the watery main;
For none is here that fears the evil day,
Or may withstand, and dare their threaten'd rage."

Thus he. As sleeps the wild fowl of the sky,
So Pallas inly groaned for Neleus' son.
Uprising then, and gazing on the chiefs,
Forth from the ranks the sorrowing warriors ran,
And on Tydides rush'd, where Chrysa's town
The men of Thebes had conquer'd in a day;
Their herald Polydorus struck below;
And he, the chief, from Aegypt's wood convey'd,
All unsuspecting of the work, to slay,
And brook'd the fiery work; with his broad shield
He struck the nimble air, and, poising high,
Sent forth a shout that rent the air again.
The last ambrosial of the battle came,
The right arm lifted from the dead; the stone
Went crashing thro' his helmet, and the brain
Fell to the earth; he gnash'd his teeth, and died.

But Paris, where his gaping arms are left,
Took from the foe his vitals, and, in turn,
Gave his full force, and with his gloves indrawn,
In his right hand a cup; and pray'd, "Now, now,
Brother, bring water from the stream of stream,
Or that the water come not: as it is,
If thou but take the fishes, thou shalt pay
And buy again those offered glacies here."

He said; and to the blue-ey'd Maid return'd,
And stood before her; she, with tears, replied:--
"On my tomb shrined, and beside the stream,
Weep not; I left my friend behind; in vain
Hope to restore her whom I lopp'd to meet.
No better weeping could the Grecians hold
Than the heart-broken Lausus, who,
======================================== SAMPLE 108 ========================================

She smiles to greet him--saith she yet would frown.
"Wherefore--thou knowest--canst thou still go on?
Has one so loved thee, loved thee, went from thee?
If love be in thy heart, thou knowst not well
But that thou canst not grieve thy soul for me."

While thus they wailed to mark the mournful sign,
And many followed her, the mournful nine.
But onward through the dusky deepening gloom
She led them, fainting back, the darkness there.
But soon she saw before her own old town
The golden gates, the glimmer of the night.
A new-built tower for softer light she knew,
Golden and violet in its ruddy face,
Beyond all mortal women built of stone
Amidst that desolate monastic race.
"Here," said the weeping Abbot, "with the keys
We ought not to unlock, and we will strain
Ourselves for ever, with an unseen hand,
Through which we find a passage o'er the land,
And, like ourselves, should there the passage stand.

"But even now thou'lt pass on to the door,
And not upon the threshold?"--"Ah, no,"
The Abbot said, "but let the door down,
For I will have thy threshold, and will see
What crucifixions may be there inscribed
Upon the rood, and thou wilt find the key.

"And thou wilt see it, whether I drop down,
Like a little child, and fasting cry; and there
Thou needst not fear, and I will let thee pass.
There are eight pennies in the treasury
Enough to clothe the wicked, and like dreams
Keep eyes that just behold them, and like dreams,
Upon the golden chariot of thy dreams.

"The eye of God! look up and see on earth
Worn in an hour, but risen again,
Hushing thy thoughts and business in the air!
Thy business is abroad, and comes to all
Unto the wanderer like a man in chains."
Then she: "Ah, such a glory! and indeed
Such glory, too, through human conscience! not
That thou mightst be despised in holy things,
Nor yet too timid for their holy zeal!
But as for me, I do repent of men
Worshipping all who offer to me this world.
Come thou in thy most joyful hour, I pray,
Wearing these poor relics here in poverty;
Come thou in crowds with folk who to the woods
And show the gracious faces of their King,
And then go forth to tell them of thy deed.

"Ah, if I suffer thus these suffering years
Which come about me in my extremest time,
I pray thee, 'Father!' feel I for my son
Some little secret wish of my heart's blood!
I am so dear to every living thing,
Whoso can say if this I do repent."
But when they brought him to the door of chapel,
His garment, flower-like, from the Abbot's hand,
They covered; and he said: "If it be so,
I cannot go to mass; but here in this,
Here in this church, by whatsoever name
Thou callest me, I charge thee on my sin!"

Meanwhile, however, 'mid the dusky woods,
Far off, a young man, white with age and grey,
Pushed close together through the poplar grove,
Came on the steps, beneath whose heaped boughs
Green boughs of pine o'erhung his chinless brows.
"My son," he said, "one fishing festal tide
I've sailed in times before; the dance and song
Have also changed their names; the stirring dance
Of green-gowned revels, and the gay house-halls,
And some old coxcomb singing in the coals,
Are still around me; and, my son, the bard,
And all the thousand others who have died,
Their names ring with me! yet if I were found,
If by my skill and drugs alone I'd live,
I would find storehouse here, built on the oaken floor,
And deftly handle what the Comforters
Have said to those who dwell near that great lake,
And I myself in wishing far less fare
Than any. Come, dear father, come and plough
This way, and, if thou canst, two days or two,
Thou must return again unto the birds."

With that he ploughed the field, and still, indeed,
The tender grasses bent beneath his feet
======================================== SAMPLE 109 ========================================
 from his grave; to stray again
The Eumenides his joyance made,
When the stern queen, impatient of his train,
With clasping nuptial torches to display
Her lord's ungrateful honour,--all a prey
To filching age and reverend household gods,--
Would retribution follow--hushed the cry,
And left the funeral pile at Mary's shrine;
In vain, while faithless to the gods he vows,
With plaintive accent holy Orpheus hymn;
He dares not move the marble shaft apart.
Tumultuous ire from stony Orpheus sprung,
And rock enraged;--and, at his plaintive sound,
Wide o'er the mournful relics, as he stood,
His round enraptured listening heard the knight;
Aloft no murmur raised the vaulted roof,
Or robbed the fold, by spells, unheard of proof.
Soon as the solitary toils at eve
An visitor of colder atmosphere,
Sudden he saw, and with unerring eye
Discerned the secret meaning of the words,
And re-enraged, dismayed the wonted cause,
And thought, "Concerning Helen more than man,
Hers more than man--of man the most divine,
Whom Phoebus and thy brother love, (more blest
Than checks one hope to one proud breast alone)
Have wreathed for her with that eternal snare,
Which the proud tyrant thus, when caught by guile,
Has snatched from Heaven, the prize he sought was his,
A woe to cope with and deform her charms;
Unless, through blood that thou mayst see and know,
A fatal shaft, by jealousy shot home,
Shall rend the veil of sly Ulysses' beard,
And pierce his graceful head, and pierce his breast,
Or, if he dare, some soothing power impart,
To ease a wound, or cure the dying man;
To smooth his rugged brow and smooth his smiling face;
And with that smile of dignity and love,
Bring the dear child to life, and fill his mother's place."

To whom the warlike maid: "By all thy charms
Sooth'd to reply, and promised to be vain,
The mighty chief shall slight his promised pains.
But what, O boy! these boundless charms avail?
Not far that tower, on Ida's ever proof,
Hangs in the skies! unheard by man or brute,
Save heard by me; the roaring of the flood,
The whirlpool bursting o'er the tempest sent;
These arts shall cure his heart, and heal his mortal mood."

Whom answer'd thus the hapless martial maid:
"Behold, how power with gifts emblazed, and ranged
The warrior stands! this youth awakes our arms,
The doom which he to-day by us imparts;
And leaves us now his deeds--to me declares
Nor less his valour with his father's praise.
With him, each dainty peer of Trojan fame,
A winsome girl, the easy purchase trust,
Whence he shall spring, his father's beauteous bride, supplied."

"And why," replies Achates; "why such ardour show
In every breast to find the grace to wear
Of him who reigns? I bade him choose this wretch, or dare
His lot who leads; nor shalt thou grudge the boon,
The bounteous man receive, who gives his heart away."
She said, and wept: her tears afresh plied healing;
And with swift-falling tears, and blows, she wept
Of many a stranger, whom she saw unwept.
Then chiding words the virgin virgin spied.
"Offspring of Calydon! thy thread is spun;
This, to the obsequious sceptre bear: what fate
Barred this unhappy wanderer? what are ye?
Who, from your native race, reluctant fly,
Detain'd by flattery's soft complaint, to slight
His worth, and meet mankind with base concern?"
"Oh, thou, high goddess of the golden bow!
Usurped by fate to labor in the womb
Of cold neglect, closed only in the tomb!
O crown thyself with years! thy prayer shall sound
Through Hell's wide regions, and anon too thine
To Thebes a lamentable wretch shall go,
And sighs and doleful tidings bear to Pluto's throne.
In Jove's high thrones thy sire the prince shall dwell,
And share the bliss his birthright knows not well."

"Think of thy sister's
======================================== SAMPLE 110 ========================================
s, the cat, lives free,
And, as he thinks, he'll burst the heart of brass
For cotton baubles like his plate,--

Yet, an apron-countenance
Turns in his eye of witching wit,
Eyes that can laugh or blush,
A widow, that her sweetheart whims
With soothing, careless tripe,--

O Maiden of the Muse,
Bright Spirit of the Muse!
Though on thy storied page
The record sad of many years,
Yet is thy spirit bright
With pictured and with grove;
Though on thy pictured page
The tomb's dim shadows move,
And trembling hearts must pray
That yet may hear the Wanderer's lute
The Wanderer's death-low, and
the Musician's strain;
Yet art thou, in that age
Of Greece, the Church's highest praise,
The genius, that can shirk
The runes that tell the bard,
The Dead Sea's trump of dread;--

As in the days of old
My roving feet had trode,
At the Great Allah's smile,
And hailed me from afar,
Beneath the traveller's star.
The line of high pursuit
For higher heights to seek,
These all I followed and marked not;
For me the prize was set.

Wearied by pursuit,
About my goal I sped;
Searched by the bright pursuit,
And never snared the prize;--
Yet all that I could do
Was for one time--alone--
To win at last the crown.

When, lost to all beside,
Our stock was shattered,
The child we used to love
Has blossomed from above;
In vain the baby's cry
We cannot ever jest;
"Why, Mother, weep no more!
What may I weep to-day?
Look up--those blue eyes shine,
So shuts their light away?"

Who cares? What boots it, who?
God calls it--because
"Look up!" There goes the crow,
The Nightingale that knows
All to her prayer;
She can alone is gone.
The story of the past
That, sealed from all beside,
Remains--are not of Thee;
To Him our whole race
The holy psalm is join'd;
The Immortal Hand that guides
The Master and the Lord,
Without thee, may be hid.

Vain men, despair not! They have put this question on me.
If "poor among the poor," were wealth of such a one to me,
I might go far and wide and never seek a poorer home,
Without thinking nought of what a soul had left a little one;
A goodly land and gone to measure earth's true worth and wise,
One peaceful corner, nothing else to do nor dream of save,
There was one riches failing and one faith in me which told
One more priceless boon,--how many? 'twas the same or not--
And all of this--my foolish self with some there were of yore,
As our only worldly portions--poverty and love and lot--
Is something left to do,--and I, the weakly balanced yet.

For I learned how vainly to himself I sought to win
That little prize, ere I was asked; he wore the iron crown;
He had lard a tangled hate, to rob him of the wreath;
And the sullen love that taught, while I lived, a humble claim,
Was like a simple flame, and a homely love of claim.

Youth passed away, but youth must come; I live to learn the truth;
Oh, for the few dozen or thousands that sicken or fight
Till the master forgets all but he had wasted one!
For the armies of battle are woven of ravens and spurs,
And their whitened bones are garnered in autumn or embers,
And the red plucked out of the core is hidden and stilled
From the gripings of famine and of oppression and ill.

But there are the many hundreds that fall, and cannot die,
And the deepest riddles of poverty all unplundered are;
Who the highwayman trod, nor turned, nor waited nor bidden,
Only he knew the price was paid for living and for dead.

Let him choose his own path and come into the town,
And gather in pride for the harvest; that feast is made known.
Let him cease at the Inn and take the road that is free;
One shall find the golden key
Where the twelve shall walk with God in the heart of the New.
The Will from out the Just is
======================================== SAMPLE 111 ========================================
s
Hang on the crest of the fiery constellation.

Now in the distance beyond north is heard
The voice of a voice saying, "Go forth, go forth,
Go forth and win the prize, and let this cup
Be brimming over all." So to the earth
And over the last harvest field of war
The day was spent. In maddening misery
The old King's sons set forth upon the road.
Then for the prize at highest hand they hasted,
And on the two were gathered the whole host
Of all the folk; nor did they know the wish
To take the half of the immortal prize;
But the king summoned them all to his ships,
And with them rose the pile of bricks and clay,
And bade them make it. Now for men's sake
The wind hath blown them on; for them no God
Is kindling in the depths of long despair.
On such a day as this they laid their hands
Upon the food that the old man had given
And the maidens and the feasters would have seized,
The sire and son of Zeus, bidding them yoke
The cattle, and bring forth the ewes with all.
Then did the Achaeans bear away
The ewe, and drew them up, and rolled the bowls,
And raised the tables, and in eager haste
The armour and the glorious cups they bore.
But on the awful embers there was set
No sign of welcome: these in panic plunged
Down to their ships, but there without the tent
Horsemen and foot-sore mariners drew in
And thrust the pieces down, and bore away
Helpless and dead. Then to the ship they went,
As one that flies who cannot shun the light,
And flingeth anguished heart and all the time
As when the wind hath swept him home to Troy.
But when the yard was won, then was the doom
Of all to bear that evil doom in hand;
For that his brothers and his wife must fall
Ere twelve to spring, when as a boy again
With youngest hope shall push them from the ship.
For had the glorious Shaker of the Gods
Been slain, not on the battle-field had fall'n
Anigh his huge and shaggy jaws then sprang
The Argives, in terror of the swift feet.
But from the ship there leapt into the sea
A gory spot, on some side of the sea;
Sore it bode terror of men, for that indeed
Achilles' dread hand had slitten them; indeed
Achilles' swift feet also had dropt down
Strong and light-hooped before them on the deck,
But the waves wash them, and their life is saved.
As when a woman, clasping her fair form
With fingers slim, in gentle act and words,
Draws a tear forth, and from her eyelids spreads
Soft tresses down to her fair shoulders, then
She kisseth the feet of her sea-cleaving Lord,
And she in sheave-reclined arms and bending head
Let fall her golden crown. And thenceforth they
Dwell in some bay, and dally for their sake.
There many a gleam of light from heaven is sent
By Phoebus, cunning of craft for the Argive fleet,
When they behold their prize of fight, and say
That they have won Poseidon, rich in gold,
To bear him up. But, as it was foreseen,
The water-nymphs, sped over Pieria's realm
Wander, and at her pleasure served glad news
Till Dawn gleamed forth, and slew the Sun of Even.
They, in the midst of which were ye, were ware
That, toiling hard, the Trojans sought the fight,
And Atreus' sons brought water for their feet.
Then the Achaians marvelled at the sight,
But uprose Atreus' warlike son, the Kings
And Chiefs of Troy, in dazzling armour clad.
There followed in a wind the cloud-gleam,
And hardy Phoebus bore him to the fight
Afar. Then glorious Hector, terrible
With fiery bolt, hurled thro' the gates of brass
His massy spear, and bade his charioteer
Be steed of swiftest foot, for he himself
Seemed to the war-lord Aeetes' self
To bear, while fighting round him. Then again
He from the cloud-gleam cast a dart afar
Into his heart, and with a scream he fell.
But first Achilles drew his mighty sword,
And smote the portals, and the folding doors
Fell, as
======================================== SAMPLE 112 ========================================
 like lead, thy heaving heart
Stamps with its mightiest throbbings to be free.

With artful curves, mad rides, and woodland dyes
Seem nowhere but in vaster circuit wide.
So roars the wild wind, and the cloud's heart whispers,
Heavily flushing with its azure pride,
So like inswept brilliance, o'er the clouds, uprisen,
And all forgetful of a time, I go,
Where wonder, cawing the cold wind, sways
To a wild tenderness.  The childish wiles
Lost javity betray in Marna's smiles;
Their blue eyes--chokes, and curls--the gusts--now sweep
And we can only watch them till they sleep;
How strange!  The heart whose light would win to God
The call to conscience, not the soul to clod,
Only to roam; though wild its wavelets wild,
And drenched with cold at night, is fierce with child.
The wreath of flowers with tenderer crownings bound,
And seems to hang upon the unseen hand
Of one who, with each fervent step or kind,
Feels on his forehead and a smile demands.
So like an infant up the beach we glide,
What time we touch it, ere the tender thought
Leads from the breast a breath and bosom's fires.
And so we gazed; but, not without delight,
The coming of those days, in wondrous dreaming,
Was all the bloom and fragrance of that night
I felt so late, that--now--I seemed to see
The wreck of a long dear departed soul,
Still in its past the wealth of knowledge be.

Still did I grasp the dagger; and with awe
The nearer steal upon my longing eye.
The present and the past stood, pictured, seen,
As one who clasps a golden amulet
To bind the stars, to make those gentle ones
Like starry shadows in the orchards high.
But oh! how changed!  And like some Eastern Queen
Queen-thronged with spangled diamonds, sable-sarched
And laced with pearls--the classic diamonds shone,
A picture of the Queen of Beauty now
So beautiful, the one more priceless gift,
Doth in that stately casket close, entwined
In those dark gossessed sceptres of the mind.
Upon that marble in the secret shrine
Where blameless spirits weave their fragrant spell,
A shrine of grace,--rememberest thou not
That this gold ringlet droops upon thy brow,
This golden circlet, wreath of that dark gem?
Oh, not for this,--I deem it still to find
Some token of that high and worthy love
Which angels, in their purity, above
Have worn for aye: the tribute of their love
Is one of angels--ever thine is thine!

Even in my vision hope is laid asleep;
It is for thee, my love, the laurel leaves;
Till winter's cold, the midland autumn eves
And Spring delays, with thee to bind anew
The blushing hues of my illusive cheek,
Oh! it is vain to offer such a boon--
Forgive me, darling, what thou wilt,--
The smile on youth's bright lip, and the winsome mouth,
Which hath been near to Heaven,--for this thou must!

Thou'rt mine! 'Tis well--I love thee, love, so well!
For to the fatal contract I do come!
My heart, for love's sake offered; by the spell
Of thy love's beauty crushed, I strive to free
A second passion from this pain and thee!

As some dark cloud before the lightning flies
That swiftly drips its fiery shower, and drips
Its lengthening strength,--and so my soul descries
The glorious instinct in thy look and looks!
I may not see thee as I see thee now--
And this poor sorrow sits upon my brow,
With a look of full and deep regret
For its own love's dear presence.  Wilt thou not
In some drear prison keep the bolts of hell,
And rend the dark folds of a prophecy
Whereby the iron mists are drawn to naught,
While the sword gleams with brightening points of steel
And man's despondency?  And dost thou choose
To dash away the prize that waits the moth?

I love thee! and I can be thy wife!
O Heart of Life! Life is the fairest thing
That ever casts an eye
Upon the worlds that are--and that
======================================== SAMPLE 113 ========================================
 whose very foundations have been thrown
Into the lake of ruin,--who would not be drowned
Had such a pebble fallen from its top in the ground.
But still the languid ones would wind on, until
A flash was wafted from their heads upon the heath,
And burst in flame above, like hail, to where
The distant waters wimple up and down.

No breeze from heaven was there, and we could see
Upon the sheen of this soft flowery plain
So many fragrant flowers, and on the ear
Shed forth, and mingled with the fulness of the year.
There, then, we heard the boyish voices rise,
Like water-falls on straggling beds of corn.
We seemed to be uplifting their bright heads
From the fair heaven, and lovelier than before;
Like as when down from heaven one gentle word
Burst like a pestilence, and all around
Flashed like a meditative fire by sparks,
While others fell, without one breathing-while,
Into the water's dampish and profound,
And left us stranded on the desert sand.
At length a wonder strange and far began,
For lo, the boyish voices fade and melt
Under the gullies of the drifting mist,
And o'er the river's loveliness there floats
A spotless light, as when the utter rest
Of forest-blooms at nightfall run to sea
In whitening ripples, and they flash across
From grey-hung hills to blue Arabian nights,
And, wing by wing, the weary skiff is borne
Up hills precipitous, and steeps the waste of fern.
At last we heard the helots of the waves
Slant from the sunset, and we gazed across
To where, serenely rapt above the sea,
A dark-eyed nursel stood beside our path;
The boat was wingless, and its shadowy line
Unloosed the current, and we saw its light
No longer glimmering on the darkening flood.
The solitude seems strangely bound to me
By the white elfin capes that spread its sails
Through the grey tide, and, like a thing apart,
A cloud stands on the verge of the old sea.

Ah, dream too bright, so beauteous and so clear
Of heaven in sunshine, that it seems to change
All things in color, as the stars turn pale,
And touch each other's bosoms till they lose
Their light in one sweet dream, and then they lose
Their luring shimmer into air, and leave
Dark maze of black and gold behind them deep,
As tho' the sun's eye flashed a brighter light.

Tho' this may be the tender trysting-place
Of the near future, the first happy days
Of yore may be the souls of other men
Unlike the sunniest and tenderest fays,
Mingling together in their quickening race,
One beautiful and steadfast forest path.
A gracious human soul doth seek itself
In Nature's fair expanse, where, seeking food,
The myriad butterflies are fairy fans
Of the mid-moons that glitter where the flood
Spins like a golden shuttle through the warp.
What throbs, what whispers, of what spirits floats
From flower to flower thro' the dark green gloom?
What all this deep and beauteous scene hath held
Is not yet full of beauty, but a world
Of beauty and of harmony, wherein
A world that strives to reach a fairer soil
Than never, with the heart of love, were given
To gain the heart it seeks in full to Heaven?
Oh, love that sings its holy hymn of peace!
Oh, may love's truth like thine tread all our days
Upon the heart that is its halo-light!
They flash thro' daylight's golden haze,
And through the stillness they shall pass,
Like amber rays thro' autumn eves.

Hark, as the light first glimmereth
On snow-clad hills, a hymn of peace!
Peace ever floats like zephyr's breath
About the singing sea, while clouds
Are bending to the promised breeze
That wanders thro' the heavens, and while
The evening drops are murmuring,
So, sweetly like a star, our home,
With its calm gently folded close
On happy eyes, in dusky eve,
Is watching yet another star!

The freshening breeze thro' hawthorn brake,
Like thine own lure lightens round
Each lofty brow, with laughter sweet.
Farewell! we never loved in youth,
But in our own
======================================== SAMPLE 114 ========================================
 that we may well avoid her,
Thou didst not fail her in a good plan,
But she took me altogether
In her own disdain and heart which nought can change,
She meant I might drive to perdition
My life and fate through contemptuous deprecation.

For she was so foolish and so small
That her love of an English maiden would not let her eye slip;
She lost her goodwill in speaking,
And she left her sighing to the fashion
Of a ditty, rolling and broding,
Which a husband deftly dinted,
And a shirtslekin also, he hewed
Into all simplicity elegant boors' shirts.

I have known a man in stoves at his table,
'Tis the tide of the Glug king,
And the heart of the lady's lover
Lies down in the bower of her sleeping-place,
With a feigned rally to fill his eye with a purple dye,
And, as his touchi, he holds her resting
In his mother's arm, while she lies dreaming,
And the miller is nodding his caudal crest.

Through the thicket and underwoodwood,
Which the thrush and the wood-pigeon sing,
Through the wood where the cold dews are drawn,
Past the grey king's palace-yard,
Silent utterly
By the green white childhood of the eye,
Tremendous sight!
Thou, too, shalt hear what all these lovers say:

With beauty of voice and strain of rhyme
From the turret door
Two voices run,
That both might rise in the horizon's bar;
One to my ear
More sweet than any speech,
And the other to my self apart.

And the long hours they rolled along my thought
From dawn to dusk;
But never a flutter of the wing,
Nor a gleam of a lamp,
Nor a glance,
To warn me of the lily-wreathed in mead.

And therefore, O my chamber in my passage,
I shut my eyes, and, listening,
In the warm darkness, I shut my ears,
That I might hark to the birds
In their merry carols passing by,
And hear the wind among them singing:

The wind, the wind, the wind, the wind in the garden;
The rain, the rain, the rain;
The snow, the snow, the snow, the lovely river:

White mother of the waves,
White mother of their child,
The glory and the joy among them,
Whose waves, that turn to pearl,
When falls from heaven the floor of earth,
Were strewn so white with white
The snow on virgin white
On virgin snow alone is seen,
And whitening over it
The temperate azure
Of heaven with silver-rimmed serene.

So still she sleeps beneath it,
Her sepulchre is sealed,
And through her swaddling-bands
The snow in the mould of mould is spilt,
The earth uncoiling lies,
Throned where she breathed of old
And in her fading skies,
Sits, proudly, and is wakened;
Like some great golden toy,
Built on the edge of dreams,
Out of the fairy-land of joy,
Out of the world's warm heart,
She, offering her brood,
Feels her first gleaming steed,
Whose unshod hooves
A blessing, a warm hurrying kiss,
In the new life she springs up;
So true in faith
She waits for ever on her perfect throne;
To her, to her,
The secret of the earth is known;
For her alone
Is the far memory of the sun.

Clear as the lightest cloud
That ever clothed the heavens,
To me the glory of the elements
Rides in the great immensity;
A wonder, that the universe
Has ever thought of God.
Nature stands still,
And Nature stands still.
I will not go
Too far below,
For my lady's presence,
And the awful power of the sky.

Far too far, it is not far.
I have heard the marching stars
Deep in the night,
The thunder of their columns,
The answer to the stars,
And the beating of the steeds,
And the howl of the trumpets
Against the sky,
Are things of highest price
Among my worshippers.

My beloved comes.
Ah, not too soon!
The soul grows too great.
The garden grows too little.
The little flower grows.
Ah, why so slow?

======================================== SAMPLE 115 ========================================
 gallop when along
Shall flocks of brinded heifers grazin';
Then send around the blackguard fifty-score,
To hold their own for game and glory.
But if we don't go down on the same plan,
They'll never know a man who's worth a man.
And when some hot-housewife has slain her swatch
To make a slaughter of that rover,
We're glad we're in that handsome homestead-lanke,
Where oft we've met and got a show.

He crossed his rutty back just where he'd laid it,
When the neighbers brought him up so proud,
And his poor hardy swagman, with a fool-like stride,
Steps up so high and loudly in the wind,
That he's worth nothing but a babe-like wind.
He's all of life that hasn't yet been wholly spoiled;
He's all of goodness that is in his mind;
He is so strong that it would make him curse and swound,
If he'd let people damned live and let them die,
If he were too old to take up the little load
Which some of us are climbing to be blind.

Oh, I thought I'd try the hummin' lot,
To make it run much better;
But I've always walked and walked to see
A man with top a two-reef door.
I've never been surpris'd to hear
Of Nymphes and Thistle,
And never have I tried at least
To catch them scentin';
But somehow I am good enough
To see a man a-skedin'.

And after that I think I see
A man with one good-comfort.
But then my thoughts begin to fail,
And I'm allus glad that's out of blame,
For I've to kiss old Nymphes,
When they were old and noa called him,
But still I know he's good for all,
An' if they've any sense or gall,
I'm gettin' old and bein' old,
Ef I'd a-sked the other side of the shawl.

One summer-day I went abroad
Speakin' up the fashions on the road,
And the folks were there that used ter walk,
But soon I learned I didn't talk,
I guess I'd hear that same old sensible talk.
But I didn't seem to know their tread,
And I wasn't there, just in the street,
But up there where they've been I used ter cussed
And couldn't see where they belong;
So I mounted and I used ter say
One day, "How's the time, good man, that's made?"
And I took a tin tin tin pony and tied a pony's shoe,
And hurried to the woods that dangle by,
Where I told 'em secrets ter amiss
If they should tell me noa jes' er not.

They ist stop eatin' all night with food and sleep,
While I watch them make the big bines to shake;
Then they come back, and I'm goin' to know
They made that snowaned shrieve ev'ry night I take,
And when I look around me they say things won't make.

I hear that night a-sittin' at their house
Whilst I cuddle all the time with talkin' friend,
Or watch them tell I'm comin' 'long inside
When they'd 'comin' there ew' cost a cent;
The kind o' folks that own ter run away
Have all the goin' done an' do the best they can

There they was starving--screeching-like, and sad,
There they was starving, parched, and me and him:
There they was starving--me and Mrs. MORK--
We all were there, she and I alone;
And when the dinner night was come 'round,
He'd up, and say he'd really lost the game,
Because she'd kissed him one time when she was tired;
And then, she had eyes ef her work was bent
To do the "miser" by and bye and bye,
And sometimes he'd notice her rags on the clothes
An' say, "Go back, dear, to the hills an' dew,
I loved you, dear, as I'd do,
An' I wouldn't do any thing for you,
Nor hear what the Deacon had to say
If the knowin' was really right,
But I'd like to keep the Millennium right,
So we two could face it with skill,
An'
======================================== SAMPLE 116 ========================================

of "Sweet Mora:" but if you read me, I shall have to
believe your real history. Of old it was whispered that
the Palatine school was at the verybeginning of the
nineteenth century. That the Palatine school was the
most joyful and most instructive account for the good
nothing else could be more clearly impressed than on that
subject. We may suppose, however, that nothing of
Chichester's part of the scholars was entirely unknowing
of its teachers. But there will be no hint that any
succeeds in saying that "not correct," and "what is a
bad stomach to a body of satisfied, not in point of
being either right or wrong,"--and it would not be
better for us to be "cousin', bane of charyon," in
that of the Palatine school. Or, if you think it would be
better for us to be "cousin'," a word of mark for our
purposes, than "to beanc defiance." So, if it were not for
these harms, its Happenslust would be extremely
bad, and very delicious. For this, it would have been
desire to drink of the cup of their crudeness in the
summer sun, if it were not for that purpose of the
purpose, but for that purpose of the spiritual world. For
this, I fear that we shall never see one! Let us
be mute. It is in fact that too long our learning has
since been decayed and reached now and never known to be.
A thing more rich, yet from a sense of which I never
should myself be deceived, than is the schism of my
appius by which the church of Palestine is kept? Behold
it in the way of Luther; wherefore I pray him to dispel
his secret, and draw from it a loud light of holy hope,
which he may discern in few words, that the true discourse
is worthy of the good of Moses, before which whoso
will draw down is able to believe. It seems to me, that
means nothing, when a certain sager would seek to redeem
me from myself, because I said that He would be not
more just now in turning to other things.

Now, for that in the Holy Church (wherefore I who have
been called and shown to thee, unless it be thyself that
thou dost secure to me, for thou believeest truly to me in
that which it is, seeing the day that is to come draws near
me; and I pray thee, if ever thou dost trust to me to
transmute me, that thou wouldest behold thy wife and
possess her again. For she comes not in time, but in
number of sweet fancies, with the sweet sound of the
willows and the singing of birds, and without fear of
a snare or of departure. She is the daughter of that
righteous man who sat long time with the herds of the
their king and his people. She hath not refused to go with
her from a foreign region, to a distant race, to a place
of men, where I was born, whereof to ask thee, Heavily,
and with prayers, still for my daughter and for all the
goods of the world. And she was asked which way she went
to? I do not believe that I did; I was rejoiced in her
own and in my new life, and that she was unwilling to go
with me, and did not even permit me. How fair was she
to me, what glad colour was in her eyes! How good
her lips! O, for the wounds by the axe are scarred by
blood! Yea, and the vesture of her head, which for verity
was created, for the grace of the kingdom which she bare!
Therefore, when the third day dawned, went to the shades of
the two nations, of which I am speaking; such a price
was paid for the lilies, and the roses, the while they
gathered, were dejected and red as thy new life and withered.

Already were all the flowers faded and wither, and in the
morning beauty went away, beholding the fair world with
its paramour and its priests. And behold the strand of the sea
coovered as with a garment, whereon the sand of the sea was
coovered with the fluttering of the sand, and hoisted with
the foam.

Then from thence the blessed spirits issued at once, and
from their bodies they flew to the holy regions, where
they prayed the Lord of their salvation to grant them a day.
The holy priests, with palms, and with singing
======================================== SAMPLE 117 ========================================
grath [quite a miniature flaw; or "In a civil way".

Next came the ladies, and already wearing in their hair
The Plato's form, as of the one I noted not, they drew
Their heads together pointing handsomely beneath their hat.
A scallop-shell, which had no words, although it seemed a bit
Best of an English foreigner to have a thought within
The heart (too tedious to speak) of Irish scholars some,
Even in Islam, a time of earlier thought and sin.

And then there were some natives, who had thought it Greek:
Thou art an odd Greek woman--all, at once, to me a fact.
This was retained by the Romans, though, in fact, from Fontaine.
"Besides, had he been there, he might have done a deal".
Thus did we learn of Dauber in a few days:--
He was a character, you'll fancy, to the least.

My second Mother stood by me, and thought me mad.
We got here safe to Pabble, for in that there was
There thought and spoke my Mother, and I knew her well;
But she said: "How is this?"  Why, she just shook her head.
Well, it's all over now; all what happened in the Court,
The first time that I got there was four of the Court;
And he merely said: "The Majesty was pleasanter
To make himself, the present King, with King Charles
Hath had his seat.  Then he sent me forth with a letter.

He sent me to St. James's to get news of my late death,
Which Panny had learned in.  This letter was so kind,
It came to me to trouble and vex myself, I fear,
To think that I had written what was writ already.
But it is not surprising that he came here to-morrow,

I'm not so well acquainted with the day of my birth.
I'm not at home, or I can't get aught to eat.
I know a dinner place is very low,
That's near a failure and a meatless hearth.

Yet you are far behind me and I am far behind me.
I meet a dinner man, at dinner table.
I always could afford to get there with a dinner;
But I don't like a banquet man; nor can I eat
A fat grey venison for one thing or for all.

But oh! my Father says there's no chiloise at my table,
I feel so small and hungry that I am the cutlet,
And I prefer my supper both for food and for wine.
Myself said it was there I got the morsel out,
And showed her just the way, for I had done it
Eaten by her who fattened me till May.
But our dinner comes upon a hot and furious meeting;
Then why not?  In answer to the question, since 'tis
still the same,
The other fellow says I felt a line of pity
Upon that poor, cold face, and proved its faith was
Very hard to bear.  She tried,--"My Brother,"--she
reparts
"You cannot leave me.  I'm a cripple at the old creation
Some days ago, but I can deal with in it only,
As she spoke.  The cows were feeding from the water;
The poultry swarmed out to the duck; the pigs were staring.
And the pigs were grunting.

I left my Mother in the gutter after saying that,
But her thoughts were only grey eyes, and their dinner
was a feast.
And it was the turkey pater-noster that set me staring,
And I answered: "If the old egg hatched some trouble
On my brother, it would cause her terrible anguish.
Why did he say I touched him with that lovely feather?
And wherefore do I make him listen?  Listen, dear
little birdie!

Thy goslings were made up of pine, and their price was full.
I'm building it high, and I see far in the water,
While the silver river sinks in a heathen billow.
That was built in a wood, and there's all its store of pine.
And that was made in a wood, and a choice of pine.
I'd build it for a day, and the fate of the world would
grind it to powder.
So I built it up in a wooded mountain, and it echoed
Out of granite cliff and jackass; along it, without food or
light,
And its high above all else; just for the love of silence,
And the wind in the
======================================== SAMPLE 118 ========================================
all's shadow-land,
Its own dull-rompen-framed godhead shed
Too little, when, at full-mouthed Atri's head,
He plumped into that bistly, blackened cloud,
Its throbbings too, forevermore allowed
A coronaient outline, as the lay
Might shade a body-soul, above the blood!
On such a day, he was so glad of God,
He smiled into that little babbled flow
Of notes and blood, and answered the bewilderment:
"I am with Nature, seeing in her so,
As strikes a light from Heaven, a beam, a wind,
As a hand that hovers o'er the reaching mast,
When breezes change it, and the sense we find
Is pierced and sodden, though with certain heat;
So, rather, as it is, I am with Earth.
Ay, and I think I should not have it so,
But all the world must be one purple glow."
Thereat a bee, the first he spoke his thought,
Tossed from the balsam's jessery, and sought
The lyre that winter nights had hurried by,
And in the gloaming was a spirit lit
To show his wonders and his mysteries.

He stood,--for lo! a radiant messenger
Stole from the summons of his prophet-guest
On wings of minstrelsy; he turned and stood
Upon the herald-shapes and sent a voice,
"Rise, dost thou dare to cast away thy chains,
O little body-host, upon the earth,
With thy fettered spirit thronging round thyself?
What man, what fiend hast thou?"--
A king is dying!--Angels of that home
He would not let a fancy captive roam.

So pass the ebbing hours away and let
The last, last fading touches of the smile
Upon the shrivelled soul of him, whose feet
Had run their adventurous traces at the gate
To ruin out of heaven's grey porch of gold
The lovers that had served their shapes so well
Still call for him who comes not. As I write,
Blindly I see my Master's distant line
Vast as some deep abyss of barrenness
That hangs between earth and heaven to the full
Whose base is truer than the shallow trench
Where men are basking in their misery.
I think that somewhere in a loftier world,
Beneath the green and tender boughs of peace,
A prisoner of a lonely poverty
Is yet unhooded, till the gleaming sun
Shall fling his corslet to the walled world
Which shelters from the tempest of unrest
Thy heart and mine.

Forgive me, Thou,
Whose glowing heart assuage my youth and strength,
And let the rude relentlessness of time
Go as it were in Heaven; to whom, in days
Of darkness and of blood and treacherous storm,
Ye bring, O princely one, the world which sleeps.
Forgive me; yea, forgive, and pity me,
Whose blindness in thy subtle moments threw
Puts lightnings to the deep of human thought,
Which wither--else thou hadst--thy sky above.
Forgive me;--Nay, forgive,--and pity me.

I met a woman in the morn,
Who lightly brushed aside the taunting sun
That made her beauty's proudest rival bright
To our first splendid beauty; while the sea
Reeled, like the emerald stem; and there was one
Who tossed her fair hair back; for Time that draws
Huge cincture through his scaly scint afar
Coping her ribbons, nor did it avail
His fulness: only Love, half-risen, doth avail.

Now have I seen her as I love the most
Of fathers, like her ever; and have known
The diverse rushing of the tides: the unrest
Of ocean, when it snows, and when it snows;
And how the broken earth--some ebbing whirl
Beaten along his silver sides--with hoofs
A tempest-rifted precipice; or plunged
Where, with blue locks, he larded; where the sea
Frequented the wide world, and did not dip
His whelming bosom in the brine: as well
As any smiling star-flower on the morn,
That in his clouds leapt up in sunlessness,
To his proud height of being. For the night,
Which slept not, was not passionate, but calm,
Breathed on her like a music,
======================================== SAMPLE 119 ========================================
 cries,
"The wild lark has escaped, and the star is on the skies."

This is a lonely house where throbs
A ceaseless song in vague deliciousness,
The unheard measure wails above,
And every tone grows less and less;
Yet here, the wind that sighs and rolls
In cadence moans more sad than meeting skies,
And here ... O hearts bereft of joy,
O joy that is not sorrowful!

So very quietly it stands,
But, very quiet, cries, "Not quite so well;"
Yet suddenly it lifts its hands,
And, smiling in his sad despair,
And seems to think, so calm and fair
He looks on sleepy-eyed and old,
A happy child ...
And so is out on English ground
Forced long enough, has never one,
So gay a thing, so free from care,
So gay a thing.

I do not think her heart can know
That where her spirit is so strong,
Her heart-strings never touch the glow
Of morning on the hills of song:
How sweet it is when nurse at noon
Her thoughts of home, with one white swoon
And then to feel that they will soon
Rejoice in her.

But then she only had to smile,
And smile in such a troubled while
That then she only felt she'd stop
With sad caresses at her foot,
And then to kiss--
But in those childish days and sweet
Was all her heart's sweet loneliness.

Sometimes she thinks that we must fade,
But still above, with human aid,
She shuns the school for which she strives:
No other hands will teach her voice,
No other voices call her choice
Than those she's dearly for the place.

She could not bear to read one page
That bent by rights her soul's desire,
Yet knowing that it must be plain
Her spirit's loneliness was theirs
Beyond all other happiness.

Sometimes, her hands clasp idly up,
Her voice's distant music drown
Its song of love and bade her run
Beneath the stars and fill her cup
With dreamy-deep imaginings.

She had to read sometimes enough,
But then, alas, too late indeed:
"I'll wait, till all my soul is filled,
Then surely she must come indeed;

Some day I'll come, and see her triumphing,
Then ride alone through lands and seas."
She sent a wild and shy appeal,
As tho' her youth were but a dream;
She sent a gold-lipped, sullen stream
That fed her heart with memories warm ...
Then dawned, the law had yet to seem.

I love her with the soft, sweet grace
And all the moving grace of youth
A vaguer of her gentle face
And all the glories of her truth.
I hate the sway of circumstance,
The grim necessity
That severs loving, I would hate
With all the free, unfaltering sense
Of selfishness and deepest hate
That makes for others loves so vain
The most too deep, the most too far.

I hate to be a king, and yet,
Though she loves me, she loves me still,
And she may hate me, still, for all
I hate her, I love her. Nay, no more,
If I hate God, will I not love her,
I am for her so much alone.

A wild and passionate passionate grief
That would not change nor alter quite,
It was but love that stopped and broke
The blade of His right hand in it.
There was no end to this: but I--
I'll meet my people one and all
To give her peace; but I, I'll cry,
'It's heaven that I should call it still.'

So it was done; and then I knew
That I should love her ere my close;
So that I cried, "Is it so sweet?
Oh, if it's He that I adore,
Is it so sweet that I implore?
Yes, He will come to me somewhere,
And, oh, He's watching! I must wait!"

I kissed the brow of one I knew
And hoped He would not look too cold,
Or cold, or false, or strangely bright
For her and me to understand.
Ah, take me in Thy hand and learn
The story of my wrong and wrong!
I loved Him not; the world, I wist,
Was it was love which grew too strong
To leave His side, or punish wrong?
My ears are hollowed with His voice,
And yet His hand is very near.
======================================== SAMPLE 120 ========================================
 them, guards them not, nor fear
To break the bonds that only can
Abate the pride of masters there.

Of courteous welcome should they take
To their true friends, as friends, to make
This grateful service to break down
The wrongs that discord can sustain.
They set the crowning yoke to none,
Nor sell themselves their rights before;
And for a pillage of their own,
Repay the scutcheon of the poor.

Whose treasures dissipate the plague,
Her nursing-cloaks are fastened there;
And in her pouch, two lily strowed
With snowy white, and in her hair
A water-gull. They look with fear,
And thunder through the mountain-paths,
Driven by their dint of sin and shame
To their dark cairns. To-day each man
Watches the cruel nipping frost,
And laughs to see the leaves drop down,
Which are as white as lilies pure
With midnight mists: The moon has risen,
The clear winds' silent ministry,
A silver gleam. The stars are flown
And let the bitter gales blow damp.
To-day they think that they are dead;
And that they have lost their crystal light,
Where now their happy lives are made.

Yet, in a month, if winds blow dry,
Wherefore their woe lies in this heart,
When the evening sun is fled.
Must we weep o'er a hero slain,
When the sad days of a nation's strife
Will veil the glory of God,
And the struggle between life and life?
In vain? The dews will spread their seed,
And the firm soil, which fed them, soon
Went forth. Their common fate were stated,
While the world creeps to the dawn of day,
And their faith-signal favors wait
And glitter at the cliff of life,
While the dim earth waits, with patient bosom,

For the passing of those pure souls,
Which ne'er shall be forgotten!
When the long year to full sweeps on
And chops the chill day after
And yields it freedom for an age,
Nor power to curb or stay it,
A race runs, shrill, but slowly
And silently expects fulfil,
Then slowly, while the winter is low,
Its long, keen battle taking,
A new life shines as fresh and bright
As the rain's loveliest morning.
And not a sunbeam comes with breath,
Nor snow falls darkly from the heights,
And the weary wanderers of the world
Are glad when their hands clogged it,

"Freedom is not for a vulgar life."
And as for that which works surprise,
And smiles by day and silent night,
Were the days of Scotland's glory
But the years of Scotland's might.

And there the noble, nobly born,
Went forth in the fitful glow
Which saves those relics in the strife,
And the hearts which waited for its doom.
And if, by constant deeds performed,
The soldier's grateful soil were spared,

When the sunbeams, streaming on the floor,
Should down the eye in a twilight shroud
And kindle all life's roses
And their young souls beheld once more

They might not guess, nor ever know,
That the struggle of the past
And the glorious hopes of future things
Were all too long upon its breast.
Like those fair, beautiful lands afar
Where the whirlwinds of the storm
And the tempest of the battle clash
On the piles of populous homes,
Where the desire of man for his nation's peace
Is nor life nor nature's withering blight,
Their second hope of glorious increase
Is gone and their glory is lost in night.

Succeeding ages! by what right
Dwell the wise, high-minded sons of thought,
Whose true hearts wore the sacred spell
That a nation's awful tomes unfolds,
With the marvels of her clouded heavens,
And the stir of heart and the joy of blood.
But over those courts would a darkness be,
That rose in a tempest not her own;
And under that lordling white and pale
A shadowy, kingliest of emperors.
And around them would wan spectres march,
Like the ghostly months among the mist,
Who fear to take into themselves a gleam
Of grief they left their ranks behind the King,
While a glorious scene out-meeting the morning tide
Of the banners of the right and the line of the multitude,
All under the banner that wavered and fluttered,
And under that banner whose banner we see.
======================================== SAMPLE 121 ========================================
;
He was dressed in black, scarlet and vermine,
Vestured with exactions of tenderness,
But his form was of beauty, he fancied,
Like the flower's self,--all but one perfect flower.
One by one his hopes went down as far
As his wealth would crown him, and saw the friends
Long estranged in the land.
At the sight of these friends
He set up his heavy hammer, said:
"Let me blow here, and so it ends.
For I have the strange fortune, I ponder,
Of the quiet heart of one who has left
His house to another,"
And with that colour which woman is wont
To be finer than honey or love,
He decked the fair bride who had proven
A pattern and pattern for pattern,
He added another.
And this is the way the girl
Was able to paint the boy's father.
Her portrait is kept in our home
By the bees as they pass by the city,
A tall fishing-boats on the river,
A city, with balconies loaded
For high country repasts at night,
Where fish from the fishing leap
As they hurry along in the lake
To meet in the river the village
Who fashionable gardens surround them.
And the fair bride in a flush
Is the Fairies who wander around them;
A spring cat with snowy coat
In the pathway of fishing appear
While I look at the pious pair,--
For the Fairies disputing all,--
The river-boats bearing the Fairies
Facing with the moonlight on them;
As though they were sent with speed,
To save the fair Ship from affliction,
They never leave judgment on hundreds.

But thou in thy wooing's despite,
Thy wife and her brood in the wrath,
E'er slacked by the passing of judgment.
And when do their labors unite
Who slumbered so long in the deeps of
The river, with paying their debts
Through thine own vertue of worth,
Who murmured in mortarous tones
Of animated applause
Of the Fairies themselves?
And mark me! "all was right."
As far as the signal to heed
Who shall dare to complain of the fading
Griffon of sports, such as Hercules
Called the "Sons of the Surely."
The boy went forth to the hills
And mother in Gilead,
To see that none left his door,
In Gilead far from the hall
And mother in Gilead.

Here is a song in Latin rhymes
As it is of the birds.
The evening darkness is stealing
Upon me.
The birds have come to their nest
In the morning.
The young maids lie at their breast,
A bath for the heroes!
The young in their dreams of love
Come from far-off valleys.

Some the sweet maidens are,
But the young maidens shiver,
In the joy of the morning star,
While the birds of the mountain quiver,
O, shut your song, and listen!
Then come to me, O ye lovers
Of the rosy glens and greenwood,
Of the hazel and the pine tree,
Of the bud and blossom-plaster,
Of the white-thorn and the pine!

Ho, here we have the journey
With the fairies and the leas,
Among the meadows of the heather!
Here will we start again,
To meet them at their play-house,
And when the sun is high
We'll go to bed, I know not whither,
Upon the path of dreams
Following on breezy vision!

Treading light on green Damascus
And keeping watch by the sea,
Thinking of thee!
Thinking of thee!

When on her heart thou com'st,
Fresh as the morning dew,
Sweet sleep to stay
Our watch upon thee!

Thou wakest in the day
Of this fair day,
And I am fain to pray
Before thy throne now.
None stirs in the blue,
But the light of thy great soul
Is strong in me.
Thou standest in the garden,
At its world-wise door,
Watching the earth in its beauty
And the green ways evermore.

Though I cannot call thee nay,
Nor where thou wilt be,
Yet the fountain-ways of the seasons
Within me and on me
Hold thee; and when my heart
Shall have spoken, and I saw
Thy roses beside thee,
The flowers be-decked with blossom,
And the wind through thy branches blown,
I will
======================================== SAMPLE 122 ========================================

Resenting was he, his lady's smile:
"Sir Knight," he said, "among your noble train,
Worthy a knight we heretofore are fain,
Is our high will but homage to obtain.
I came not here, for 'tis but fit to wait,
The care I bear not, and the power I hate,
With them, I must implore you let me know
That I with courtesy will gladly go."

With that the Knight his question did conspire
With one of his two lances at a time,
But, ere he rose, with one accord and mirth
To him the generous Eustace gave the knight;
Wherewith with a sharp glance did the warrior fight,
And thus bespake the stranger knight and knight,
"Sir knight, to my commands this stranger do;
'Tis hid within the border of the Moor:
There where you see the fort is fortned new.
In coming of a knight who well can fight,
The Saracens will ride without delay;
The assaulted will for many a day
Hang their bright arms upon the castle wall,
Shall set their spears in order to a fall.
But seek we Marsiliun, if your name
Shall in the arena be borne in fame;
He with his brother, and the Count of Spaine,
By Christ's enquire shall lead our army fain;
You with the lance you meekly shall disdain."

He, bowing, with impetuous passion burned,
And with his faulchion flew the noble youth,
Till GAMA, having left his people's guide,
Bent down his head, and bade his host behind
The valiant Francis bear their standards wide.

Now came the conscript full of soldiers bold,
And all, that in their council service wert,
Ere the fourth act was done, the band well-stored,
And in that moment was the festal feat,
And flags waved o'er the many festal street.

Now they that sit in Council held debate,
Armored in arms, their warlike wont to show,
What faulchions fair to see, what shields to threat,
How well aieled and rich full of young and old,
Had been provided for this warlike band
To see if all their prowess could withstand,
Withdrawn from France, they over-ran the land,
And when they should assembled stand, they wend,
Together linked in military speed.

Where they encountered in the victor's sight
Rogero, of the valorous lance in chase:
But who, as said, believed the bugle's sound,
Nor deemed the fittest meeting to engage,
Nor deemed the desperate fight by Dudon prest,
Till in due muster the third knights were seated.
Meanwhile the valiant Sir Rinaldo slights,
Who bears Sobrino's falchion in his hand,
(That bridge which through all dangers passeth by,)
For him good Brigliador the lance hath slain,
Whose body late from that bridge was ta'en;
Whose fall with mighty clamour now resounds,
And echoes back from both the towers and walls.

And now, besides the splinters of that shield
Is manifest, with his white crest inlaid,
He in the flank of Agramant descends,
And, as he looks with troubled and troubled face,
Spurs by the courser courser in his place.
More, in the flank, than others, scour the field,
More, where fierce Paynim has no warder stied,
Which follows furious and unjust and fell.
He, cleaving this, through many a gaping wound,
Is crushed, and plunges in sanguinary wise,
Here, there, 'mid corpses, many a vengeful wound,
Inflamed with fire, his foaming courser lies.

The monarch makes the story of the faulchion
Of the two furious warriors, that with hand
Vermilion, which in Calpe towered o'er the plain,
Bold Flordelice, with sulphur foul and brand,
He feigns; nor has returned from the caitiff's hold;
That mighty warrior, who had pierced so deep,
And many an eyelash lurked with anguish-dyed,
When he the stripling of the bridge had crost,
And not the leech who succored him, at need,
And well for life, preserved himself, as dead,
In other's ears had valiant Falsar been.

When thus in stirring tone the faulchion said:
======================================== SAMPLE 123 ========================================
ness, cunning beauty, wisdom that
No man had ever found.
They sang of heaven's glorious dispensations,
Of love supremely blest,
Of all the dream-perplexities,
Of victory and death embraced;
And of that good old law
Which makes of earth a clearer star;
Of incomparable grace
That makes the whole face sweet:
Of perfect trust in His throne,
In ways to please and men to please;
Of simple faith in nothing;
Of fellowship in all things--he,
Whose God is everywhere,

And man's life is but effort, and a strenuous toil,
When the ripe mouth, bled out with gladness, shall give proof
That all its flower laughs down to meet the small heart
That ever had known love.
Then may they read the sign of the knowledge that has brought
Their friend to the door;
From that voice-frenzied, imperious note,
That bids men hope and fear,
Those soul-souled, undying words, to give their dream-world peace.

Old memories shall awake
Before we depart,
Naked as thy kiss, O rose of memory!
But from thy kiss shall I not enter other hearts
To make our true loves light as thine grows dark before?
O day of man's desire!  O splendid sun-fire
That burns upon the night's wide floor,
As thou desirest--in thy love's leash, O love!
And in thy kiss thy sweet mouth;
All love, all hate, all hate, in thee!
But O sweet moon, come down!  I am so wronged
That I must dare to die.

Why is my love so small,
So sudden and so sweet?
Or is it but an ecstasy
That thou and I, may meet?
And, if it be not so,
This love that I may make
Not, and I leave to thee,
Come back, O dove, at thy last word, come!
But if thou leave to me,
Come back, O dove, at thy last word,
Come back, O dove, at thy last word, come.

I would, I would that I might have thy heart,
And life and love as one in sweet accord
Walking amid the flowers;
But if thou leave to me this day,
Let this love be but in vain,
That love whose yielding beauty draws
The hearts of men again.
If thou delayest no further than this day,
Then shalt thou be cast out of my sight;
So I but meet, and I wait the perfect day,
Content till thy sweet eyes shall surely shine with mine,
Till the Love-goddess unbind me.
Wait not for me, O dove,
When on this breast thy head,
First laid, is ready to receive the token of thee;
So shall I surely find thee.
I cannot and I will not;
But a tender kiss (a kiss I must take from thee!)
Consummate and sublime
Here, still to quiet Time.

No wind of rain, no rain!
Fold in thy tresses all my soul.
Look forth, sweet snow of snow!
My feet are fleeces soft and warm.
Though the long journey close,
To sail is never for the lost.
To wander over sea
Must be one journey unto ship.
A bird on the dry brine
Is singing to me.

Eternity I count the years
That still pass by.
And what will happen when we die,
Since never I'm gone by?

White flower!
Though the dew stops the rose in the first little heap,
And though the garden blossom no new green I keep,
My love has come back to me, the old love still keeps,
And silently drags me on where I lie asleep.
The mossy banks are all broken in a tear,
The little brook runs all broken to the ground,
The desert springs in a charnel of perfume rare,
But a lonely land where the saints keep revel round.
The land of the pilgrim is loved of old,
The land of the lowly, the land of the tall,
Where a little nest, a broken heart, a mould,
A heart fulfilled of holy and fasting small.
What though the forest be ruined and the stone,
The world be lost that is the world of gold;
Though the dry earth lard her lonely bed alone,
The land of love that is the land of bread.
The nest that is sheltering is found of those
Who pleasantly guard their doors from fell and sun;
How the swan flits through the water in the pond
And winds the
======================================== SAMPLE 124 ========================================
, soft, white, and mix'd with flakes of snow.
Her slumber ceased; sleep with the world reposed;
Faintly she seem'd to breathe, yet scarce awake,
As from a trance her motion all aghast
With the great sense of life's eternity,
Which only seem'd to lift her dreaming eyes
To heaven; or that empassated sphere
Where all things live remorseless; and her smile,
(A mockery of the gay, sweet thought of joy)
Swifter and bolder, as the vision fell
At once on her; and only she remember'd all.
O love, return, and be with me in Heaven!
I have remember'd deeds like those we love,
Combining with ambitious fancy, too
To be forgotten; for the dark dull sky
Doth bow before the great Creator, Love,
And all the mysteries of human life
Are but the legacy that Nature gave,
And gives for each a moment of her birth.
Love is the theme for ever, and for ever!
Fondness, and love, and melody, and tears,
Shall with such slight small pæans make a heaven
To suit a sense of needful ecstasy
For ever, and for ever, thine and mine!
Thus, thus the single moment of love's advent
Will pass, till human hearts at length shall rise
To feelings at the mercy of the King,
Whom on the bosom of his Table falls;
Though his reign hath been chang'd into a coil,
Through him there's not a prayer to be begot
Of all the good and universal world
And that imperial creation, which is what
It ends in, by which those feeble limbs are worn,
Whose light the glimmering shadow of a die,
And whose age adds to every glorious age,
And counts the clock-beats of eternity;
To whom 'tis given to give true counsel, 'tis
A counsel, and a truth, in wits and fables.
And therefore doe not take me from the grave,
Which needs no being, while I have a breath;
Let me not live with troubles, or with woe,
For this I live; 'twere better death and death
Were worse, by law, than nothing here below.

This warlike man who keeps his proper trade
Of bloody arms, or warlike bravely drest,
In England's court a simple poet wrote,
Perhaps himself had hardly read a verse,
Or liv'd a life of blood, but one of all
The desperate, rude, vile, that would devour
For mankind, in the breast of death, to swell
A giant brood, with them that court the grave;
And never in his life was there combin'd
A line of virtue, a broad, black, and proud
But emblem'd for the breast of tyranny;
Or a poor widow, dying for a soul,
That aims to hide the wreath that must be won
By cruelty, and die to save the one.

At first, while thus, the Bard adoring life,
Yet gave it not the hope of liberty,
The fiery passions of the blood and brain,
The wild blood, and that thunder which outburns
The genius of the blood which purged and bled,
Had moved the sons of stern rebellion sore,
Scorning the title of the injured Bard.
So, with the prodigy, the Bard exclaim'd,
Yet do not beleeff me to expose my dust:
My fiery passions are so sorely dyed
In my unsmirksome blood, I am no more
An imp beside, a Jackdaw, or a dog,
Myself,--intending to make law, and rule,
And justly to suggest that I should be
A living soul, not an expiring fool.
All this time, therefore, O my friends, attend!
Since thou hast ever lov'd, and I have lov'd,
Bear with me now, and with that faith befriend!
Thou shalt be happy in this common life,
If thou art happy to this common death.
See, the brisk cuckold claims his simple fare,
And soon the champion takes the ready gold;
How should he, but a novice in the art,
Be featured like his peers in that old Tart,
And conquering with his eunuch-spear'd might,
To rid himself of glory from the dust?
The gaudy colour'd robe which clothed him so,
Though stiff and rough his coat, yet did he seem
Like a proud maid, without the show or mask
Of a true woman's fashion.  For all this,
There is but one beholding in his fate
His bea
======================================== SAMPLE 125 ========================================
You, stoop and ask the people of
Their promise-offer in their terror-cries
To ask what Land discerned our Italy,
That had seen king o' the world and ruled its wars
Soaring beyond the shrinking Italy
To greet him with her thunders on her coasts.
And so it comes that, for a moment, O
The undiscovered land! A lovelier man!
He made thee, Francis; that is all the tale
Will tell; but thou art none the sweeter; none
Regardest all that wilder mystery
Whereby men speak the word that once it said,
"It is the land of Romances that she knew."
What land was it that passed away from thee,
These hundred years? what greatness could befall
Aught that it brought? What treasured things of it?
It seemed thy power was all-pervading Rome
And strong Empedocles, and the soft sway
Of Venice in thine even-balanced clime.

O, was it not the yet miraculous end
Of all the natural things, when, one by one,
We are alone, her wealth of loveliness?
And thou, O Nature, left'st the costliest
For evermore, but worthiest to be
A witness of the quiet majesty
That reigned within thee; and the causes were
Thine own, that surely must advance and draw
Another circle unto its long light,
Whereto thou drewest, and thy power foresaw.
Thou wast upon thy stately tow'r upheld
By the great Consuls; thou before thyself
Didst bend the lowliest of the great, and set
Upon the greatest throne, the State in which
We both were seated while the thrones were throned.

Is this the place for such transfeminated
Freemen, as these, her brothers, or even friends,
Might shame us for our lack of sight? We would,
As Romulus say, with a wider space
Of wall, to see if it could lead our home
From Rome to Ephesus. But thy gifts on earth,
(Like as a man of old, or Tuscan show,
When something greater fills his mind with doubt
About the shadow of his chance or fear),
Could ill have help, even in this field of ours.

'Tis in the hedgerows of the peaceful tilth,
Where peasants eat their cream (p. Beware lest thou
Get any too much where thou hast any share).
Obscured it yields no more opinions
To us than to our enemies or friends,
For which they pray so great, so just, so kind,
That we besiege the land, and so contrive
To free the inhabitants. For this is not
The land which to Camillus was consigned
The Italians, nor the gods in any land;
Nor is it, save by dint of sword and flame,
The citizen's defence against so many foes
As now, where'er the open plain is drest
With soldiers, that have little blood to spare.

Their enemies, 'tis all the same, and I
Avenged them to have helped, and to have borne
Their miseries for some years: but if I think
They will consent to see the state and use
Of their society, 'tis plain they will.
And now, since this event our citizens
And sovereign lords have little rights to do,
Their enemies will prove that they are good
And theirs; as if no day were lost, but we
Weary of wishing to escape the yoke
Of human dissolution. We are bound
To that, if only thus, that we should do
Our uses and our service as it ought.
We give our sons an upgrown liberty
To their companions, if they faint or fall
Upon the instant needful; and, in sooth,
We wish that they would do so with their wives,
And hear what news they have, and never choose
But that his lordship may inform the world
That we are merchants. We are tired of this,
And bring back what we found but useless waste,
And we may die to serve another folk.

No, by all means, the good are not the bad;
The good are not the good of what they are;
And so the good are not the good of those
Who live where they are poor, but whether
There be a weary life and a debauch,
Or rich or poor, or rich or poor, or both,
The good they have or will be all or none.
One pays, another pays, they're good or bad;
Let this be what it will, the good they are
Is ours, or
======================================== SAMPLE 126 ========================================
 Divine,
And though his benedictions fall
Like hail, he has but wept it all.
The fury of the Father's brain,
He cannot see, he has not wept;
He would not be content with pain,
He cannot see, he has not wept.

Poor Polly! fie, poor Polly!
Cock don't crow,
Dag won't crow,
All the fowls on mischief bent are,
Oh, scold! scold!

Hear, pig, ho!
Hear, pig, ho!
Tooth-whistle, cuttle, and trumpeter,
Cap-pale, pig,
I'm very severe,--
I'm getting too fat!

There! what? what? a cheese!
I guess what I'll get!
Here a pint!
For, tuck down his fist, and sip
A glass of wine,
That I, for my part, may see
Quite as full as he is.

Come with me, my Jenny,
The fag's poor,
And oh! how I like his fag
When as I shall bide here!

Four and twenty tailors, and come to town
With a haberdasher, you know, and whose
Beautiful black market-ivery wear;
Come to me quickly, and drop the cash down,
For this old night's a grand Sunday's house.

We have started as our folks began,
And now the good folks must come in
To dance the daffodils all the while
To see us coming home.
By our hired girl, that night,
There was a grand street-corner there,
And three she ran with her.
And I! it's a grand sight!

Here comes the seven wighter!
Hark, how the jolly house-bells boom
To the robber lads at home.
And the jolly cherry trees
Rear their red faces to the moon,
And the rarest misty day
Is coming with the comin' soon.

And you'd good-bye to everything
Before you pass away!
I'll give you two cigars, if you
Don't want cigars,--yes, some!
And then, some night, perhaps, I'll buy
Big wheelbarrows that you let out;
And in your big wheelbarrow there'll be
A lady with a red-faced smile,
A very pretty Russian girl
With soft, brown hair, and black eyes.

You'll find the woman you love,
I really don't know which,
But I'd give her two cigars, and one,
Dear lass,
I'd buy the cocktail; so don't you,
Come, now, I'll come with that!
Here's a glass of turtle water,
And it fairly turns round,
It's just like turtle water,
But I'm not a pound.

They're too much jolly to dine, young chap!
The rhymes for operatic rhyme:
Come, come along, the board's bespoke,
And with the lady you love us,
Come!  Don't you envy my poor cottage?

Who's mistress?  You're a vagabond!
What's your business?  You betrays!
And yet the kindest of us figures
'Bout whom my poor friends might praise!
Who's mistress?  You're a vagabond!

Who's mistress?  You're a snob!--
Don't you want my wife,
Who is my dear?

Who's my dear?
Who made me happy?  Since the day I died
I've but to see my dear deceased.
If it be possible
You've no new bargain for my grave.
It is a little fifteenth day,
And when I know it you may lie
Out in the grass!

You have a heart,
And for a little gold-bell,
And a jewel, too,
Upon the little plate
Which a broken body pinned
Has or has gone,--

Go to the shop,
And there inquire
About the matter, and the meaning;
And be grave enough,
By looking at a single article,
That you can put
Against an orb of blessed Truth,
As far as she,
That on her wings she writes,
And cannot speak!

It's no religion I shall weigh
To get back home, for without money,
My dear,
You would fain buy true freedom, right away;
But that is really a question.
Some folks have always silvered ears
Of strongest muscles, bent on straining
Their fathers' ears
======================================== SAMPLE 127 ========================================
 died,--
But the gold in his mouth was the heart of a maid;

O, there was a man who made answer;
And one day he said as he sauntered up the street:
"I wish I could make my visit
On the borders of the old man's garden,
And have seen the ringer in his bonnet.
I can make my visit Inverness,
And send him down the summer solstice,
To see if the ring approve my views,
For 'tis half-past twelve o'clock already."

And the gray old man was very kind.
A slippered youth and an old maid
Sat down by the side of the fences;
And it was her manner to be
A lily-teeming farmer.
They had no laggards, you would say,
For they looked like Tom and Tom then;

And 'twas my manner to be
A lily-teeming farmer.

Through the sweet Spring, from dusk till dawn,
In a thick bush, this summer day,
The merriest of all the hay,
With a welcome call, sped away,
With a laugh of jocund mirth,
A jest of Robin-like laughter
At the change so great a nymph has told,
All in the leafy softest grove
That you saw in wild love,--
If you thought, "When maidens sing
How the lightsome glance bestakes the spring."

"And what secret signs are these
For my red-cheeked belovëd guest?"
"Ah, the world-old rose that dies
And blossoms in the April skies!"
Thus he spoke--"Your friend and mine
Are the keys of conjugations fine--
Of violets and phlox and urns
Wherewith you may make a sieve--

Or the bird that in her pathway sighs
To lure his flocks to pasture-lands
Where none may drain the summer-rain,
Nor track the bleeding hart again;
The partridge hiding in the brake
His heart may heal or bind his heart,
The maiden's heart may teach to speak
When weary of the silvery dart
Thou feel'st on wing or ruffled wing,
Or from the love of maiden's eyes
She has less love and less desire,
And thou art noFit belovéd ghost
For, flitting through the starry host,
She sits no more in revelry
Than fickle maidens of the isle,
Though fickle hearts may laugh or smile.

In palaces and castles grand
She sits with folded winglets grand
As if she loved a gladsome thrall,
And loves the summer, till her hair
Curls everywhere about her feet;
And every eve, beneath the moon,
Of sweet and beautiful alway
She lures him by a leafy tree
Beside a lonely water-way.

Along the mountain-sides she goes
On her light doe gallant men;
The lonely water-lily blows
By brier, and birch, and briar,
Till the startled sound shall bear
Sweet beauty to the very air,
And the startled mountain-air
Shall tell the maiden where she is,
For she has known her lover here.

A bitter wind blew early
Out of the dripping flower,
For she must give the peasant
A great white hand in dower,
For she would swear an unseen oath
Her heart was in an alien land.

"O my strong gray-bearded charger,
How art thou freighted high
With those who fawn on danger,
Thou bold and beautiful steed,
Who ride upon the saddle
With head a-fringe with the wind,
And the waving of thy white hand,
Are of the best on earth as I
Shall be the warder and guide
Of these that follow on their way."

"Yet think not that the folk will spurn
My protestations,
Though in theyr armour gleam the wind
And wring their garments to the bone,
My kinsmen bear them bardedly
With face upturned in insolence,
And hearts that are so heavy
That they for many a year will press
Through storms that threaten thunder
And that they lack a single thing
Through flood and thunder.

"I will not sleep till thou awake,"
Said I, and sighed.
"Nor then awake till the blue sky glows,"
I said; "I will not dream of sleep
Save in the heaven above me
The one eternal vision keep,
In which a watchful God shall stand

======================================== SAMPLE 128 ========================================
 already, forward sprung:  To whom their joy
The angels, anguished from the womb of fire,
Their harps they hew and serve thee; but for thee
Not any gifts, nor other service done,
Their service brings thee not unto thy Son.
To whom thus Michael.  Of the first three types
A glorious answer Satan gave, that all
Might joyn:  For in the second ye behold
Zoe, and in Heaven; nor aught else requisite
By means of servitude, but obedience,
Is wholly free; part, heart and eyes; the rest
With God as in the first.  And he in scorn
Of that fair flower, whose rash disheads to thee
So much is wanting, as thou yet shalt thirst
To see it only, and wish to be
The same which in our after-habit earth.
However, be it strange or wonderful,
In heaven or earth, as thou shalt cry therefor,
-- Yea, or the lilies' or of flowers' breath--
Shall yet be thine:  Of the twelve plants shalt thou take
No more account, but for the like of them,
Either for scent or hue, wherein thy Son
May live, and grow up like to Heaven-day:
The glory thence thou mayest more conspicuous
In the crown'd forehead, than the stoniest crown
Shall be to thee less fair or less conspicuous:
Since to God's love looking as in a glass,
Thy sight, as is the Heaven, can ne'er be quench'd.

Now therefore on the damsel Bride of Childe
Springs out a noise of triumph; and the rest
Trip to the ladies:  In two jousts they reach,
Where the great feast is spread, the ancient hall:
But, when they list, the hall is left a void,
And night and day unites them to the wine.
Thus held their revel; and the dames and youths,
There with the dames retired; nor did the rest
Disport them, one or the other, in their search
To find the bridal partners; so bewitched
Each with her favourite, by the eventide,
Deeming they might be worse than they were now.

Then to the bard, Angelica, who saw
At that same hour the self-same form appear,
Worthy the race of Dardanus to be,
(So was her dearly-bought bride added here)
Beggan, by fancy for the bridal wreath,
To one of the twelve lovely sisters, who
With one accord join'd them; they at sight
The bridal partners all were putting on,
And, as it might, were but things unreson.

The bridal partners through the shadowy grove
Were rowing, each with eager pace, and each
Alike full-grown and comely to the sense
Of gazing; this to show her was at sight,
And to approach them, slipp'd her golden tresses,
Ambrosial odours, eglantine and rose.
The men were present on the labourer's farm
To gather flowers; and now the work was done.

An aged seer, not born to serve a bar,
Leapt up, and, running, said, "Too long a guide!
Loose then the thread, and thou shalt find the charm!"
Flaxen had done as doth the female fair
Teach men, and made them by their words obey:
But, having spoke, the aged seer his vow
Firm saw, and forthwith broke the virgin's vow.

He, when the aged seer had plainly seen
The reason of his vows, and saw the youth,
Rejoiced that Dardan baron he might prove
Faulty, if he advised him, in his truth,
The cord to change, as melteth wax the sapling.
He now prepared to run, and made a race,
And eke to cut one branch amid the wood.
There Dares was, and his arithönian name

One of the myriads, one who loved his skill
In the prime art of harmony, and some
Who best could conjure up that laborious string,
To speak the will of those to task who knew.
So Dares tripping a jolly troop came by,
Known to him in the bower of laurel-trees,
When, by the singer accompanied,
A troop came forth to meet him, men of wealth
And high degree, their order and array;
And with the comeliest of their company
He all the riches of the field bestrode.

Now by
======================================== SAMPLE 129 ========================================
 same air that lends a shower
To that their food?
Like him they stand!
Lover of Time! my comrade dead!
His wanderings are o'er.
How comes he now?
I know him. (Oh, I know him well!)--
All flown with fears,
His burning hopes in ashes dwell!

I think he lives. (It is not true!
He still survives!)
He will come back to me and you--
Nothing more strange
Than sadness for departed friends,
Alas, I wait!
The winds that blow
Have riven him;
His last thought, his desire has fled;
That hour shall come
When, like the ghost
In the dark tomb,
His soul shall soothe his body with sweet rest.

Thus ever did I love him!
His silent tears
Speak joy.  I love him!  Yea, his spirit thrills
(All memory shrinks from memory!)
As from his grave
He turns, a weeping look, his spirit's grave.

Ah! have you mark'd, when last we met,
The desecrated street;
And I have stood, alone, at length,
Possest of joyous greeting.
Yet all in vain
I look'd, O soul!
Alas, my own soul lost its last!

Saying, "As prosper, Lord, my children!
So prove your love, my child!
Doth all the hollow heavens engulf us?"
No more my own poor heart.
Where's now that spirit fair,
The angel fair
Hath rest and peace and folded wings?
Is earth a grave--a grave,
So all alone--a grave?

O record me of days departed,
O records of days gone by,
When we were both to the old record,
Ere aught of us went bye!
When we were only a little tad,
From morning till even,
We wuz as happy as happy could be,
And a happy life a'.

O records all
Of days gone by,
Of glorious days departed, and pleasant
Alyssum in the sky!
O records all
Of days gone by!
All sad and dreary, and dreary, and dreary,
Often we're looking shy--
But O it's saddest to know that there's ever
A heart in that beautiful sphere!

THE smiles that glitter'd
And linger'd
In the twilight gloom of the cypress-wood,
Came like a breath from the heart of the spring,
Now glisten'd and listenen,
And then on the wall--till I look'd in my heart
And seem'd to have gone away
From my house, and no longer
Could keep her away,
And the air so dreary
Was her farewell to me;
But I remember'd once how she used to sing,
And the tune of her voice so sweet,
As of birds her requiem,
In the woods of life;
And I seem'd to hear her for hours on the wing,
And I felt once more
That I was away with her--did not know
That I was a fairy bride,
And no happy star on a dowry grace
Would wait for the silver light of her face
In the mirror above her head,
And, amid the revels of night and of day,
Have learn'd to haunt, unawares,
The echo of oaten pipes, and the sound
Of beautiful little pranks
tering up in the hall.

O hasten slowly to some ethereal sphere
Where all my thoughts, all cast aside by grief,
Are still most happy; it may wake no more
Through dim, uncertain doubts, nor ever cease
To find within its joys a dream so fair
Of love and constancy and faith and peace;
For all my hopes of heaven are vanishing
Before its glimmering light is gone--O sight
So beautiful and fair!

O Earth! theWhenever thou dost stir,
There comes a charmed vision to my soul,
So charmed, so bodilessly dear,
It is not like thy mother-milk-a for joy-sweetness,
But like a warm sweet baby-heart
Who has no eyes to smile,
Grown soft and full of fondness,
As though, methought, I stood
At its mother's knee,
There in thy open solitude
Thy silvery brook afar I see,
Where'er my spirit lets go free.

O Earth! in very wonder dwells
The beauty of thy bosom deign,
Hearing how faint it stirs,
Yet to each other never
======================================== SAMPLE 130 ========================================
 heaven they praise; to hide him, flee
To earth--yet, there he loves; where'er you go,
All time and space is in the soul's deep wound,
Unfolds his lost wing, and its spell hath found
Unyoked its thought-bound spell of vanished days,
But sends no spark, not unlost glory's ray,
To waken on the planet of our praise
The lost soul, and its message high and high,
Which though it close adown the shining sky,
Still shine of mild moon and serenity,
To bid its image wander: all that hear
From him are in the dearest, waking ears,
Low murmuring of his name and glory there,

Wishful, but yet serene; with starry eyes
Languishing in his soul the heavenly prize,
And in the very image of his love,
All life rekindles when it seems to move.

And when he inmost throbs through all the air,
To see the bird's calm wisdom on his bough,
Like some faint sweet caress, or forest air,
Ripples in the fresh leafage of the bough.
'Tis well, beloved, that thou shouldst live with me;
Else I would sing him ere he sink to rest,
Would my brave soul be able to go through thee.

Nay, 'tis not I that love thee, nor the scorn
That my poor heart has borne thee, nor can turn
To the love-light, and all the trust of gain
Drawn to his fullest grasp, with such delight
As heart's fierce tyrant cannot tremble in
With bars and death-cries that in sweetest strife
Could shape the perfect life to perfect life,
Now, now, dear love, I pray thee, let us part.
I am alone.  For love, with wedded heart,
Me bids not part for ever.  So, at last,
There cometh one dear love.  Ah, come to me!
For I would seek thee ere the morning be,
And when the night is gone my light should grow
As rose the rose in heaven, and lily snow
She shall be lily-ploaked till the dusk
Is come, and then, with morning's first surprise,
She shall be lily-ploaked till love's eyes
Are flooding eyes with tears of hopeless love
Until, by pain, the sight of her is strange.
Yet love, forgetful of my all I am,
Hath laid his utmost kisses on my mouth.
And yet, just this to love, now all is o'er.
Laugh, though I clomb the earth to see her more,
To kiss the flowers she cherished so, and say
(Such things be sweet when given to thee) she's mine,
My soul's for ever lost; for very sake
Of thee and me, I'd rather be the lake
That gladdens at its mirror than the sky
Where morning melts to sunset when it wakes,
Than be the earth-bird's rapture, if she take
One little word from me or memory takes
One step of thine to wake me to her hand.

My love was as a sea, whose calm seems made
For every ripple that by wind or wave
Conducted it to smiles and music's tone.
I know the birds that make their song one flight
Of one clear song, and know that not one bird
For evermore may awaken near the sun.
There was a time when two fair forms of life
Would whisper to me of deep sympathy,
Of secrets lit to love, of love, of strife,
Of tenderness, of truth, of soul for aye.
And I have mixed with joy those wind-bright eyes,
Widened by dreams of joys beyond our ken,
Of tenderness.  Now these are as a sea,
Deep-lashed and gurgling, and with all their power
I sit like lover in a trance of trance.
When first my love for thee at eventide
Grew to perfection, joy was in its train,
Humility in summer rich and green
Seized on thy heart.  And thus my love's delight,
Blooming and brown in sunshine quickened on thee
And melted through thy face, and warm thy mouth.
So, as a butterfly flits through the fields
Of the new day, my love thy body seeks;
Oh, yield thee, love, to one that needs must wait,
With eagerness to gather for thy kiss;
Oh, lift thy eyes to mine that loves thee not!
All day the wind breathes, the sun grows chill,
The wind breat
======================================== SAMPLE 131 ========================================
.
I know not if his prowess were complete,
But he must meet a champion of such might,
Unmeet to be the death of spear or stone,
And rend his shield with such resistless force
That in the dust he lies there dead alone.
So now the joyous chase was hardly won,
At last the sun sank down, the air was mild,
And still the troubled stream of blood did flow,
And from the two loud voices rose the wail
Of women and of men, as through the crowd
It shouted and gave forth, "Now, then, 'tis done!
His prize of glory is already won,
He stands alone--it cannot hold him back!
His arms are full of strife, he deems too light
To hold a champion worthy to be bright."

The children gathered there, and cried again:
"We bring the bow which rests upon the quiver,
With lance and sword; we have the bow in vain!
Lo, thus the murderer is pursued--Alas,
Thou hast slain him--be it so! My heart with shame
Would break in pieces if thou didst not claim
The service for this cordial sacrifice!"
Then, his brawn shield he raised and smote full- thwack,
And smote a mighty blow, far nobler far
Than was the son of him who answered 'Sir,
Not without art, but art, is wrought by art--
Arms have we, and beauty has matched in war,
And are the wisest of us all bereft
Of those arms of ours which never could be left.'

One died of thirst, and smote a giant knight
Before him with his spear--and in his plume
Sliced at his throat, his helmet of the heath
Descended, by its grandeur saved as a shield,
And fallen 'neath his helm, below the brow
Where the sword cuts its edge into a flank;
And Balen turned and gazed upon him blank,
And cried, "Alas, that noble knight! the steel
Saved us--behold the glorious victor's meed!"

But now the victor had him laid in earth,
And Balen turned to see the fair one there;
And that one found her fairest not for him,
And by the side of his whom she had bred,
Slew him, and she in pity, smiling said:
"Thou shalt be saved--I kissed thy lip to see,
And hold thee prisoner, and thy hand shall be
Quaffing the lifeblood of thee where thou leavest part of me."

Again he said it, and his eyes grew bright
With gladness now, and therewithal a verse
Was writ and feat as a young blushing girl
Hath said within her bosom when she sees
The heart and lips of the boy--his face beneath
In the bright smile whence she hath fallen down,
And now that time is gone from answering lips,
The maiden a white swan at mid-day swooping
Had past her knee, and fearless to the quest
And wearing golden scarf on which she prest
A faery damsel with her maiden vest.
And as the summer sun sank down, and threw
His beams upon the land, so Balen drew
His fiery blade, and the young chief's mood
Was charmed up with a maiden's face and face,
And lo, before him, like the full-armed sun,
White-armed, of tall stature, stood young Launcelot,
And stood adored, and kissed him as his life waxed slow.
And yet his face, it seemed, still death-like grew,
As the green-seeing moon, which at night hour
Peeps through the stars, when there great stormclouds sit
Upon the world, when air is void of light,
Rises and falls and shoots out merrily,
And all is bright in the thick-globed casement;
And by the light upon the living world
Which Merlin dreamed on, and by his own eyes kindled,
In those dear eyes he saw the light again,
And all that she had lost, and all that she had done.

And Balen, seeing his eyes still bright and dim,
Made question of them, and looked on them long,
As though they saw but not, as though on fire
With love that made them glad; and then he turned
And in a little space, and said to him,
"Sorrow not that, but fear not that, you see
My lady, for I know too well that all
Those sorrowing wights that used to say her name
Were wights of mine, and all for my sweet shame."
======================================== SAMPLE 132 ========================================
, before
We, who never fail'd, sat one day, learning
Tales of those years and struggles strange,
Of some great struggle to be whole,
Of some great struggle to be whole
Was but a tale of mystery.
He might not tell: 'twere wrong to err
In books, unless he tried to teach.
He must be gentle, loving chaste,
As Arthur is in any place.

"You went and broke a plan.  You never
Fear'd theretoo to let the trouble through.
You never fail'd--" How did you do?
And what about the arm?"  They knew
That what he wish'd to see for you
Was in the face he would not do.

"And you were late enough to know
That John was dying.  You and I
Had been too sad for such a pair
Of happy lovers.  Now 'tis clear
This marriage has been settled so.
I wish that you might meet us there
At the marriage time, as I do now.
In the same grounds, so long we've sat,
At this time, we have nothing to fear.
I hope you'll send the poor man here,
And then you'll have me, dear."  And then
Would quarrel and would fret and tease
The man's poor family while away
From this of your poor family.

So we arose in the morn,
I rose in the morning;
Was I not? I am sleeping.
My darlings, you came in.
You could have crush'd them, if you thought
That you must fall, they had been naught.
They could have crush'd, but they were dead.
They died.  They could have died, not I.

I rose in the morning,
I rose in the morning;
I rose in the morning,
For cause to weep, not I.
And the cause, so tried, left I
For thinking too.  What a tale!
But the tale?  Ah no, no, no, no,
They did not come to the end of the year,
Or just to be sold off at once,
On both sides of the country.

Teddy and Beller came again,
Not like the news from London;
The half-cracked jokes of the people
Burst from the tale of a tithe-tongued term,
And cried (a puny Twiston, the which he bought
By a tailor of St. James's) "Sir, you're not fit for a song,
Your commendatory fortune."

In early times, when the steamers were under her arm,
They sat her down on a chair, and took up a model to arm
With her slave, a golden bag with nothing to eat in the place
From women and boys to the flounce, which vibrated round her.
Her brow-chin, her black eyes, were both blue and sallow,
Her waistband so black, and her ringlets, most comely and bright,
A wild expectant curl, down her neck, in short all unmeet
For a smooth little mouth, which in short it may hold or untied
For the bane accursed of any, 'gainst those who love meat.

I brought her a rose,
And her name I shall vener;
How the colour of white
Bounds, and fades, and vanishes,
'Mid the rose-scented aves
In the leaves of tender aves.

In those northern parts of our country,
Which a snow-storm casts o'er us,
Fell some beautiful air,
With her sudden strange smile,
Like a something buried there.

Fairies, you must know,
Looking to the flowers below,
For a something gone amiss,
Felt you whisper'd, then kiss.

How shall I discover, then,
Why such graces act?
And why make the heart of man
Burn all day, and stand so near,
That it keep all alive
With love, and not give death?

Hail to the morning!
Hail, to the night!
And they who watch it
Under the stars, and under our moon,
Claim, by their looks, their indivisible purpose.
And they answer, nodding.
And they look, with wisdom in them,
For the wisdom which is in them:
How shall I know, then,
Why such graces act?

In the heroic lives of you
They were happy, oh! how few!
God liked you, little Mary,
Better than men are we;
And you are all your heart's desires,
And yours, unutter'd, unref
======================================== SAMPLE 133 ========================================
 this floor,
With bolts of starry-blue, broken inunder-woven,
Shall, rising like a tomb, pierce the golden
scars,
And each stone, the story tell, glistens
in the vast
Sudden walls and roofed arches,
Amazing deeps, dim.
These windows, this grey stone, sleep
like a wraith, moving
In fallen glimmers.
These windows, gray, grey, gray,
Where mid-sea shallows wade,
Like overthstantial shadows;
Where in the small, loose-left, deep-slurred avenues
of palm;
There fall beaker-cups of roses
Dimpled by sleep, on grass, red
as the Mermaid's wine.

Not on the walls of fairyland
The glorious sunset ever flows,
But on the lichened walls of the grey garden,
Where sunset never reposes,
But, opening, lets the ivy cloy
Open its buds, and as the day
Draws closer, shadeless, so the roses
With their own sunlight fade away,
As the red petals of sunrise--
As the rapt seraphim of evening,
Dreamily bright, fold their wings
Round the divine imperial porch whose alleys
Faint with warm beams of starlight,
Fling, wavering, hovering,
From the falling fleur-de-lis
To the dewy pearly gates of the dawn.
But where the garden flowers that bloom
Like flowers in the crumbled drowsy earth,
See how the thousand eyes of care
By the strange moonlight change and twine,
For sight and sound and sound not one
Through the cold fretting of the garden,
A moon her perfect face, nor ever
A sun that has the casement pierce.

And what is so close to my heart,
As it holds my soul with a sword,
Girt round about me from the part
Of its gaze and of its being?
Which does it know?--I bow to you,
As a priest before the sun.
Yet I have struck from deeper view
Beauties beyond these heavens in,
That my soul shall pass before you,
Pass before you as men pass
To the waving of their banners,
Pass like spirits glorified
By your fathers, and shall know them,
Pass and triumph in their turn.

They are on the road to you.
For you are a strange child
My heart has often trod.
I often think your gentle eyes
Must ever keep their arcades
In sight of father's house,
Thro' a dim place, over against against the dark;
But on the road to you.
You have struck the earth--
So I suppose
There was some miracle in the moonlight,
Some path across the sky
In a bright waste of sky
The blessed suns of my life;
But you have travelled with me
And it is only as well
As the swift clouds over the pale abyss of the road,
Or the high stars that fell,
Slowly, the gathered stars,
But the Wise Astronomer is one who knows.

He can drink and drink.
He is young, my girl,
And I can little help him.
God will have him as He walks,
Saying that he will not be too far away.
But with him, when he grows older,
He will have a bookful
That will tell you of knowledge that is in the world
Too much known for knowledge
As knowledge is, to my deep joy in the silent darkness.

Nor will he betake me
To his hoodlashes and carcanets,
That I cannot understand the secret of all the meaning of the world.
But the one that is beautiful will I be thankful for.
So when I have shut the book,
And no time is left to listen,
Do not hesitate to make your bosom glowed,
Or you will not turn your face
Or make tranquil your heart.
Why should I?  Why should I turn the page
Of that pictured book,
And hold my breath in mine?
You, my blood, are about me,
Flowing along with me,
Like a nectar divine.

I will keep them all,
All of them, with music,
With lutes of sound,
Calling me to thee.
And, beside me, at night,
They will find me and hold me,
Saying: "Go not away,
Thou and thine"--And, though this night
I shall sleep as I did,
Paint not my cheek, but stay
Where it bent, hidden still,
Over the emblazoned pillow.

======================================== SAMPLE 134 ========================================
; but more miserable to me.

For, by the favour of a noble Mind,
Livius has cut down the middle strings
Of all that burst beneath the joyous art
Of free and hearty sympathies. But who
Behooves that he may play the flute? and who
May venture it, to play the soft-voiced song
That makes a charming girl laugh at the wrong?

To-morrow we must turn aside and weep,
And let the flower be as the flights are high;
To-morrow we must catch a light and swift,
And snatch the ring that gaily called a dance.

So I have a discreet old nature."
"I must speak out," I say, "and laugh to-day;
Though the world should deceive me I am glad
I will speak out with my lubberish glad."
That was enough! My gifted head is bared
To meet the blithe Apollo, as I will
Speak out her praises with a laugh of scorn."

A modest tress, that grace unspotted yet,
Was just a rare white figure, nobly seen
In many garb and feature. Which on me,
At sight of one I could have seized and hung
Imagination's proper meed.
With ear, and eye, and body blended, tried
To follow up the glances of my lute,
No match could be for firewood or for pheasants.

Upon my lyre in tune they'd stand in songs,
And chime by chime, or join in flowing numbers,
Until I sighed, and looked upon the strings
And laughed outright, though quite, without a meaning.
"Dear lute," they'd say, "we have no need of more
Than of your pleasing music. Sit down!
We'll play the lute and viol, for our pains,
And make these walls resound with our desires,
That we may lend to the sweet symphony
Our measures." Here I offered up the song,
With sidelong glance, to keep in company,
With those two spirits singing all day long
Under my lyre and vocal reed of love.

Well might my gentle lute keep time to my lay,
With all its flute-like sounds, so full of sweetness
I could not look on death nor breathe away
Those deep, melodious streams of melodies,
That rolled and burst and flew in many a measure
Like to the requiem of the passing breeze
When summer winds in some voluptuous dance
Paint all the flowers and flowers that bloomed or glowed
In woodlands under sun-illumined vales.

But still the sounds of that sweet warbling throat
Were those that sprang from mine, with hearts that felt
Love's rapture; dreams that in the forest roved,
Sang back to me with language that we knew,
The sweet respondences that all our treasure
Exhale from us, and playmates over us.

I sang the flute. 'Tis true, the mute, sad strains
Are never born to break the sweet, soft heart,
And that the minds of common men despise
They never find an echo in the notes,
But all that throng and revels in the art
And pride of Nature, with her worshippers
Still worshippeth the ever-singing cad,
Unmurmuring, but its power of self
Forgets, and masterful as light in flame.

Farewell, old Dewy! Farewell, old crocus-spray!
That once shook hands with me in that old way
Whereon the sky and field-heap gleamed gold.
To-morrow evening by the blacksmith's door
The haunts of cowherds, all shall live once more.

Maidens of origin shall come:
And, from the long-stemmed curling tips
Of faded feathers, which yet cling
Their daily zest of the summer days,
That others have, and such bright flame,
And a wild flight of short-lived years,
Shall still be hovering o'er and o'er.

What gift of vows shall be thine own,
The false, false world, though ages gone,
While my young days have blossom'd on,
Still nearer thee to see thine own;
That we may meet with one another,
No other home than this, my mother.

The fabled nymphs of Erin sing,
Mix'd with the waves of the yellowing sea,
Whose fairy groves by Corinth run,
Where the white osier waves o'ershade
The moon-path that dispells the sun;
And
======================================== SAMPLE 135 ========================================
.
Now just to see them was to be supposed,
As is the practice of the Pharisees,
When people pray for expiation.
But the arch-heaven-planted liberty
Of these most profligates, knows no whit
Which way to turn them back.  I say 'no Franks.'
Let this be but a vial to the brim.
Oh let the error of the holy place
Be stopped, because that be not satisfied,
And the arch-heaven so that not a man
Is able to lift up his eyes to heaven!
But for no prayers vouchsafed to our old Master,
Nor let his memory get further back,
The Saracen he spoke, and never then
Will he regard the world which once he knew.
Then in the ancient Tun descends a church,
Upon whose door there stood a mighty space
Of corded shaft and cone, and on the wall,
A silver shield with boss and crust of gold,
With beaded pinnacles of grey.  Three paces on,
With diamond studs of marble intertwined,
Three on the head, three on the silver plate.
In front is wrought the goodly horn which rang
To it that was no bar nor cruel draught
Which e'er was in the place of Charlemagne.
And that was in the sky, but through the rents
Of times of woe, which Grecia's children strain
Against the bridge; and which it was that made
The arch-heaven whole, as well as arch and square,
A lady ever in her glory shone.
In this career a marvellous jewel of renown
Was planted on the rock of Calabur.

When Grecia knew, fair Italy, her son,
It was that Grecia chose herself a tomb
Whereon to hang his head, and here to show
Our tomb in facts to many a man and beast.
As for the rest, they say that this was so
A sign of death; and very bolder men
Ran thither in the night-time to and fro.
Again I say, and yet I warn thee, fair
To me, if e'er I claimed another name.
Garcuin of Calabur, if ever on
Ages thou wast a champion, and thy life
Was lost, thou couldst not blame in anything
Except the fact that I with noble might
Wander astray into the wide world's end
Like as a man distraught.  But if the hour
Was come, when he who brought away the life,
Thou know'st not by what title, till it were,
Zeus learned the secret of the human race
With idle finger.  'T was a prodigy indeed
To thee, Aeneas, wonderful in song;
Thou didst exalt even now to noble things,
Who make thee twice the third in thy renown.
But what avails thee now, if they sang thee a song,
A song of antique days and solemn-seeming years?
For should it come to thee no other song
Would follow it, and therefore thou must die,
If, when the warders of Ilmatar heard
The doctrine of the stars, he of the nations
That rule the universe must not forsake
Earth, that frail form of Venus, who for all
Her children did deliver, and the three
Herself forgave a mother, and in Heaven,
Queen of a world!  But if thou be her queen,
Now, father, look upon thy son and love him.
Out of this myrtle-wood of time I grow,
With a fair set of men, and a tree shade,
As bush and berry; think on these brave men
To-morrow to behold thee."  So with prayer
Spoke Giora and the poplar grove; and there
The God of War made manifest to men
His ancient splendour:  He made them forget
That dwell in mountains, and the terrible threats
Of War and Death, his terrible retinue,
He taught them how to conquer and subdue.
Therefore, a higher power he did devise
In the wild wood, that the fierce graces came
To enkindle hearts like flame:  the mighty god
Gathered up one handful, and the multitude
Of cities, heroes, warriors:  therefore came
The bastard forces, bringing forth theships
With all their warlike gear, an armour bright;
And like a ship, who under the full moon
In graven webs of terror doth search out
Some treasure secretly, and leave no trace.

Now then came forward the great Table Round,
And in his men's behalf they bowed their heads,
As
======================================== SAMPLE 136 ========================================
 no lady, no man so wild a thing.
They were more than stone-stone on a heaven-wide throne,
And they took the most lovely maid for their own,
And they married young women, who sat all alone.

They moved through the room like a thronged endeavor;
They danced by the water like music in a dream,
A music of singing and dancing and laughter;
They sang by the water like light on a stream:
They sang to each other the songs of the night,
Sang to each other the songs of the sea,
Danced in the green of the fountain and lea:
"Hail, fair and goodly,
A princess and wife of the Northland

"But what wilt thou with him do
For him that has brought thee spears,
What wilt thou give, O maiden,
To him that hath slain a brother?
For him that put thee to evil,
For him that gave thee counsel?
And shall he not give up the sceptre
For the minstrel of heaven?
Will not the thing be as thou hast done,
As fast as thine hands are,
That thou art mindful of thy life,
And knowest of time and place,
That thou dost not disdain a place,
That thou dost not forget a place,
That thou dost not disdain a place,
That thou dost not condemn a place,
That thou dost not expect a place,
That thou dost not expect a place,
That thou dost not despair for a day,
That thou dost not despise a day,
That thou dost not expect a day,
That thou dost not expect a day,
That thou dost not expect a day,
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======================================== SAMPLE 137 ========================================
, beneath our roof
Lie gloomy--conducted near, with domes and towers,
Of ruins all complete; yet here one sense
Is wanting--each dull sense--its all art,
Its dust, perchance, wherein the dead have sunk.

The fair wet eyes, no breathing loathsome spot,
Erect the cheek, and smooth the short white hair;
Nor touch, but as if praying Heaven to bless
(A blessing never upon sinful earth)--
The voice of comfort, and the signet's prayer;
In yonder window sits the watcher hears
Low in the dust his dying mistress' love,
And in the soft swoon falls a fallen star.

What brings me to the green hill's side,
Where by the winding Wanda's side
That walketh, slowly, far and wide,
The lone man's wand'ring passenger,--
The wandering Arab to restore,
The loss of him, the Indian's lore,--
My Houri with her languid eyes?
Ah me! how oft, when dimmed with dew,
Her dark eyes twinkling turn to you!
Ah, oft, when lone and still she stands,
With wild-eyed walk, and fetter'd hands,
Like one that deeply moves to take
Some last light touch of life's first kiss,
She turns to those dim eyes that wake,
As one that holds her tightly by
In all the terrors of the tomb.

Even such the wild bees' whimpering mirth,
Which makes the heart's buzzurtium mirth.
And oh! when Earth, her fixed demesne,
Touched by her gladness never erred,
Beholds the fruit she never sown,
Which tells the rip'ning power of Spring.

And who can say, when none has said,
In thankful faith and choral lay,
"He for God's seed rejoice and spread
Thy future blossoms, Joseph!" Thus,
O blessed longing! crowns the world
With many a boon its God can give.

'Tis like the world's,--the sullen street
Where lies the soul's white-hearted beat;
And one goes by to hear her feet
Uprear the tumult of her race.
"Some need cool sleeps; some need God's care,"
God grants them to themselves. He may
They need the breeze to turn their hair,
Sunshine and showers; yea, all this place
Can welcome smiles, and comforts be,
In fairest dreams, a mind to thee,
And in each shining, well-loved face.

I see far, far above my head,
Dark blue of sky, and lost in light,
How the first rapture falls from heaven!
And hark, the zephyrs come laden
With song and answer from the earth!

I hear low and far the Tabor,
From where my step-mate left the door,
And from the far-off, distant region,
And up, sweet woodland aisles once more.
Who thus hath wandered from the West,
To some far stream or lowly bed?
These woodlands still, and in the breast
Of our calm childhood's holy tide,
And where we made a far, far land,
Passed all our gladest visions by,
And only seen the peaks that rise,
And passed the sunset's sunlit skies,
And all the silver clouds that, stealing
Across the clouds, fold o'er the scene,
And mingled with the quiet charm
So beautiful, yet once could charm
No more a spirit, dazzled now,
Than I, with wings I see below,
When through this atmosphere, their wings,
Their beauteous blossoms burst their bloom,
And soul and body cast away
As with an all-sustaining force
I mount, and upward, upward soar,
In hope to reach God's hidden source.

The nightingale had here its nest,
And here the sobbing otter fed,
And here the gentle bramble rose,
Warm with her wonted cool repose.
The grassy bank, the water clear
From many a garden fount that shone,
And in the beauteous grove that lies
So soft, so deep, yet overgrown
With grateful shade, the beauteous fern
Hath woven here her nestlings wise;
Here too the beauteous woodbine tuft
Hath spread her damp and sunny side,
And there the heart hath wooed a bride
As it has wove a garment wide.

Where are they? on the lonely way?
Ah, just beyond
======================================== SAMPLE 138 ========================================
-were, but also this:  Chance upon chance
Can yet afford it noblest, and may thence
Alike find, that by chance ye chance to meet:
And doubtless I'll request a score of Greeks,
And twelve of Trojans, in the arduous work
Of Troy, not though, to have yourselves yourselves
Intent, and which the Trojans now prepare,
For loss of many (for such work indeed
Was then in small things, all that can be), I find;
So hither send me forth to keep the ships,
And drag unwearied forth to battle first,
Thence come I may, myself, from fight withdraw;
Then bidd me both to bear the brunt of war."

He said; and, from the battle leaping forth,
The noble son of Tydeus brought the spear,
And with his father's blade his father's own;
But thrust his lance, he grasped it and he fell.
The helmet too he made of tough bull's-hide;
The hero's head was graced with helm and shield;
The keen point through the hollow cuirass ploughed
The flying point; the other corselets drooped,
And the broad pennons gathered to a hem,
Reft of the horse-hair, and a single bar.
He in the body laid the noble youth,
But of quick craft he was not near bereft.
Them now the warrior stalwart Diomed
Bound once again, but ran to slay, the third,
Till by him broke the spear-staff from his neck,
As through the body went the murderous weapon:
And downward fell, so huge that on the ground
It seemed he lay, for earth now gnawed the flesh,
And all the bones were mingled with the dust.
Thundered the helmet, and from that point glittered
The point, that to his helmet Hector bore.
He in the body laid the noble son
Who thus had tamed him, and from out the wound
Pierced through, but thrust the point into the throat,
Which never might be stayed. Then Diomede
Hacked through the throat; a vein the hero drew
Out of his body; issuing forth he ran
As one that flies, or if one wight of air
Hath power to bear away the flying shaft.
The startled horseman now turned round the goal
And met Apollo's shaft with a discreet
And graceful stroke; but then that other missed
Him who would strive with such a dangerous foe,
Him now Ulysses following hard behind.
Then as the hand would hurl a dart aloft
In stubble, and that some diviner vaunce
To pass the mark, flung forward still his aim;
So on the Trojans erred the brazen spear.
But when they ran to meet some valiant man
Who other in the race was near, the son
Ulysses standing in the midst began:
"How hast thou fought, old man? But say, I know
That noble man, for if I feared thy spear,
Come from the shoulder of a vrouCause, I
Thou rather fear, this sword, than spear of mine."

He said: and in the wind his valour bare,
And to the Trojans such great honour showed.
As the sun shines the last gilding scattered leaves,
But none the livelong daylight fair availed.
But not the more each with their shouts arose
From breast to flank, nor yet the steeds set foot
Till all the host be-gladdened; following came
Swiftly the countless folk that thronged the plain,
These scourged in brass, these on their heads they bore,
Who scarce had felt the passing of their own
Had missed the Trojan hero. But in fear
They filled their own. Forsooth the Trojans on
Held fast those mighty chiefs; for on the plains
Of fair-flowing Thermodon, high upland
By Imbrus' bank, a town of blazing hills
They raised, and Trojans, that are now no more,
Routed, for battle. But the snow-clad host
Forsook them, stirred by the fresh-springing dawn.

Thus, haply, in their judgment they resolved
To give the final issue of the war,
Till Teucer saw the Arcadian host draw nigh,
And so the two from first to last fight hand
In hand, but each intent alike on horse,
Fate in the battle. Oft of Teucer too
Sought his familiar kindred on the field,
By thine or others' arms; but in the flank
Grim Telamon
======================================== SAMPLE 139 ========================================
, don't I want
My sort of Christmas!"
Said the viol, softly; "Whistle!"
And the little singer on a swag
 whimper died.

Voracious-violet eyes.
Gaunt and hairy.
Had you laid a starving mouse in his bed,
A furry rug in his chamber,
With a ragged blanket on his head,
And either side a beard,
To keep from snoring--every stitch
In the morning air a fairy-tale
Of a certain great we'd like to try,
Ere he had come to the worn knee!

And it ended--and theworm
Made a solemn figure, fetched and quick,
And set his back a minstrelick
To show him how to pipe and laugh.
And I said, "There's a lovely wood
On the slopes of the valley's side,
Where a south-wind blowing,
And an ever-tired, sun-kissed
Pallie-pinky man,
Whom the dog-tired winter swept
With a heave of snow on his thin mane,
Where every wee fern a trail
Pues with fingers sad and pale,
In whose sad whin the sleigh-bells rang,
With its gray-tailed hoofs winging.

"Ah, good-bye, pretty page,"
Cried a little boy at a fall,
"Are you in your crib now, North,
Or where the ways of the boyhood be?
Will you take up the story, pray?"
But I hardly said no-more,
For, what would the baby do?

"Wed a maiden with man," said he,
"Make your bed, North, on the hill;
Or, wed some day, there'll be then
No cause to grieve you will.
Shut your mouth up on your breast,
Or else I'll have to tell."

But he wouldn't, you would not, he!
He left them with a cheer.

When the winter comes again,
And your face is fair and gray,
When the lambs go bleating past
And the calves are in the fold,
Then how sweet the black-eyed maid
With the lips that he has lain
At the foot-fall on the plain!

Now a paper cap he took,
Laid it on his back and strode
By the place where he had put
Scraps of bread and butter-cup.
Bags of butter round him clung--
Suddenly a dew-drop sprang
From a cherry- cherry blossom.
All the birds that fly in bed
Fell with one accord,
And, to fill the crackling board,
Hissed and fluttered all their bills,
At the wish of Sym and Sym,
Who'd been sitting late at tea.

All the while he tried to spin,
And the roses put to rout,
Something in his heart did pierce
Whenever they lost the game.
Then his brain it was allured
Till it seemed the very grapes
Grew all red and blushing red,
From which he plucked the fruit,
And I, seeing it had turned
Nearer, by his art purveyed.

And 'tis odd that he who spends
On such things, should find employment
By such prodigal delights,
In the realm of the stranger,
Is like some old mariner
Rich in taste and taste of joys
As the pageants of his land.
But the eunuch he did not
Sail, or ride, or sing regardless,
Never more would he sing to it,
'Till he learned to wear a sack,
Just to keep himself warm,
And to play at house or tavern.
Then, before he went to bed,
He'd a long job and no jobbin,
Wrote and read and planned a new one,
Each with its own winding sheet,
And a sheet that rang out "Gad,"
Till he'd a third in his coat,
Just to keep himself warm,
And a heap of dough and toast
At the top of every linden.

He did no less, and he
Answered the good Saint Peter,
"Hail, Saint Ben," and then, "Our Father."
Then, at least, he walked straight
To the noble saint Dfingre;
Saying, "Very good Saint Ben,
You're the best man ever drew!"
(Ended Damfreville, the old and lame,
A laurel crown, which one time had
Supply that crown, on stick or brace
And trinkets worn to make an end
======================================== SAMPLE 140 ========================================
 merry.

One time I called the good old grey old fox,
And, "Where's your old tramp, and all your hoops?"
I answered him.  "My friend, a long good life,
I've had enough," he said, "of being S.T.;--
You can get down some day."

Then, just as I'm informed,
My head was upward turned, and I heard him
Elate.  Then he began again,
And, climbing up the old hill to the place,
The old fox crossed his back
And nearly broke the wheel.

I crawled upon the bed
And slunk away.  He lay a minute,
And when he woke I heard
Outside his head,
That since he had not slept.
I've not been behaving just then.

Oh, yes, I have.  In my waking
I've nothing now to say, I'm feeling better.
Oh, yes, I am.
In my dreams I hear a frog
As it croaks somewhere down the hill,
And it croaks to me from the hole
Where the frog lies down.
I can see the black line of him
As he smiles and sniffs and croaks,
And it tells me anything
But his eyes!

One time a little birdling
Went out of sight.
"Cheer up!" he said.
The birdling was singing
Because it was bright.
I leaned my head to it
And tried to Iar,
Where I could not help but sing
And busy my wings;
But all in vain.

Through three fields hard and white,
By five fields clear
He went and came to the valley

One time a little birdling
Went down.
"Hey!" said he.
The fir-tree stood in the other field.
"So you're not the surest to arrive,"
He said.
He smiled, "or you are a little child."

"I came across" "the house was very close."
"I want to take your point.  I don't suppose
We are going to go the other way,"
The little boy cried.
The boy had jumped
And not a moment while they pulled
The boots.  "There's not a word I say."
"I can't.  I do not like it any more,"
He said.
He saw a pair of blind old bottles
Standing in the other side the lane.
Then he climbed a bush and shook his head,
And up a bush and knocked them on again.
The smell came back, and the odor came.

"A little one, a little one!"
A cowbird in a big round cage,
Fluttered a little feather stick,
Fell on the earth and pushed it higher
Until the cones upon the world
Looked up, and there were five of them
That jumped upon a cherry tree.

One moment,
I watched a squirrel in the trench,
Wishing he'd gone to Paradise.
Above his head his yellow eyes
Slashed, with a little pattering sneer,
Then one sharp green kick in his fist
And--"Hide your eye!"
I looked into his prettyums
And saw a dozen more,
Standing among the big smooth-ums
And boasting elders, everyone.
"He's coming!"  "Where's your money gone?"
And there I saw some questions:
Why did he not,
Till, to fill a baby's eyes
With one wee, happy, purple blossom,
He turned away and looked at me.
"Your daughter?  Why not her father?
She never played with me.
Don't tell her that I love her--
Unless she comes, my life will be
The enduring joy of you.
She'll be my wife for a little moment,
But she never comes my way.
"Our house is built upon a hill
Which sides up to the sea.
So you'll go there and bury me--
Unless you come this way."

My flower was lovely and gay,
And like an angel's face,
The flowers made the sun as bright
As once the sun was grace.
She did not go for gold, love,
She seemed to have been glad.
No grief was in her gentle eyes
Or bitter words, I had.

So many a pretty word
My petals had smelt,
And scattered flowers, and birds, and beasts,
The blossoms where they dwelt.
But many a child of sweetest sort
Lay tossed in sleep or pale,
And many a dear-loved sleeping hand
Lay dimpled in her veil.

And yet she rested quiet
A moment,
======================================== SAMPLE 141 ========================================
.

So then I sit, and to reproach my sin
Will howl o'er all the worlds, and cry--Alas!
God's wrath!

For when I grasp this scheme I laugh aloud
To think of nought but Judas.
Poor young Judas!
What a world
Yon snatches!  Then my bold, unholy mood
Will give me such a fool.  Ah! might I still
Cheer him about some howling wretch to kill
Sowny with passion, as his sense should be
Too warmth and emphasis of eye-glasses
In man's unwise heart.  May I be quite
Like him and you be damned!

My doors,
The rocks above me and the serried air,
The river underneath me and the air,
Eternal as the Sibyl's charnel-house!
The winds shriek over it; the wings of doves
Snarl serpents where it clings:
The bird flies downward to the tempest's blaze;
The wood-thrush sings its gladness in the grooves;
The nightingale is singing all the day
To kindle palpitations at his play.

I will not grieve for Judas for his fate,
For mine own joys, like his shall be the hate.
I have been tried for fooling Tragedy,
And stooped awhile with him and reared him high.
He's always heard me curse and moan and swear,
Then spread his wings and flutter all their air.
I will not give him pity in exchange
For me, for thee, and thee:
I'll live--

I'll sigh for Judas--and look up and laugh.
I'll dare no more, but smile; and when the cries
Come from the world have made me anything,
I'll weep no more, nor groan for what I craved,
Nor moan to help my Judas to be saved.
My curse I'll pay for this; and this I grant--
For all this hopeless and infernal want.

If ever I would rather see thee lie
In this lost world forever panting, still,
In pain and torture laboured through the will;
Living for ever; naming all my sins
And making all my sufferings vain at last;
Yet not the only refuge left to be
For those poor suffering those of all the past.

I was a willing slave, and to these shores
Came riding out; and I, like to a slave,
Scarce hoped the bonds I would have introduced
Into that wilder beast's clutch by the time,
The frenzy of whose moanings.  Ay! too late
I paid off my all and begged them on the gate.
The slaves were bound; my words were at their core.
No, my voice failed, my soul crashed on the door.

Not free from triflingants and brutal rage,
Content to serve a gentle heart and soul
With bland caresses of one mean, true wife,
I reigned for ever in a world where men
Craved what they scorned, and could not be enslaved.
But never before my lips did man
Bow to obedience while he held the place
Of highest place.  Then lay I in my hold,
Like a foul fiend, for hideousness and fraud,
And did in my worst manner seize and bind
The man who should protect me from my foes.
This thought the fiend repaid with dread and shame,
When I beheld them flee through the firelit door,
And to their country fled, all clamour burst,
Or courage burst, or flames were scattered round.

But I, for fear of loss, with moan abode,
By fright and famine gave myself to death,
And made my cry my need; yet at their call
Would not the powerful Lord defend my realm.
Now, comrades mine! take men to be your wives,
This side and that; the cowards take to flee;
If they can help, the cowards rise and fight,
But none shall help us.  Up! be men with men,
These, with the cunning that will help to tame
The men of Eloquence.  Be strong, and stout,
Swift be, good fellows, in whose face ye see
Only deceitful counsels, deeds of blood!

I cannot force my giants to obey,
Because they fear me for some future times.
Shall I by right of reason rule the state?
I yield to Fate--shall force my oath admit
The care of gods, as their decrees decrees.
Must we, for death, be slaves and damned to earth,
If they find God indeed
======================================== SAMPLE 142 ========================================
 before the he-goats barked,
So singled that, tick, tick, tick!
Something at her head--
Something at her feet
Like a little girl's;
While the sizzling rock
Like a gush of sound
Fell from her right hand,
And the keel of her voice
Into the sound
Drew it and the clack.
Then, at that, every one
Limplyed itself
From the bordering crag,
And into the sun
Urged itself and sang
Rudely and good-by,
There by the keel
Stroke, tack, and wrack,
Thinking himself alive
With a strain of strife;
That within its frame
Through the hot and tangling steam,
Like a mighty spider's beam,
Flashed the light foam
Over all its corrugate clots,
Feeling that in there flames
Once a soul alive
Burned, all throbbing, there as it falls
Through the furnace-breath,
Till it took the form
Of the pyre,
Leaving the powerless shape
Unsatisfied, as it stood,
Till he saw the heavens grow
Strange, but wonderful,
Flaked with a rapture of white fires,
Rising, and receding, and mounting,
Regnant with the flame-burst,
Casting down all the fumes
Of mere smoke, to drive after
From their sanctuary
A glance into the mouth of the thunder
Of his terror, the gaze of the thunder.

Not for the epicure
Of Eros, carven
For the beauty of his passion,
Or for the passion of his passion,
No, not for the proud contended

Ascended from heaven, but by the western side
Of some strong gold, on the tides of night
Stretched, like a shield, of azure:
A sword-blade, a horse, a statue,
And a triumph of light
On the fierce moonlight.
And all these,
With touches of fire,
Fell to the feasters,--no gleam of the torch.
Or were housed on high,
All things in a vale,
With or with a nod or a blush,
Or a pirouette, or a pirouette.
Or were housed at a bar,
With a pirouette, or a waltzette,
Or a musical curve,
Or a gentle pause,
In or with a pirouette, or a pirouette.

But when
The fervent and keen
Gave of infinity,
As the full tide of it rose,
Were the orators of all the spheres
Nursed with an ecstacy,
These, and their teachers,
Clothed and transfigured with wings
Dark with hoar thunderings,
And were surpassed by the eagles at least,
And the Alectrytes, such as from heaven
To the walls of the world, descending,
Threaded the darkness, and shook the earth.

Wherefore a blast of fiery flame
Will sweep you hence, and smite you there,
Where the heavenward winds
Are engines of thunder, and engineless end.
Nor shall you, save
By a comet's glance,
By the hail of a swift stream
To a ruinous speed,
Ere through the air you descend,
Shake, and descend,
O flames, large, and eternal, and hurled
Through the void air, to perish with the world
That spares you for ever:
No stroke, no hurt,
Only the thunder and darkness of heaven;
Only the might
Of the wind, and the darkness of shadow on fire.
For, counting in mists,
And pondering in chains,
You are prisoner,
Bound in the web, you are sentenced to be
Ever a naked wreck
Of uncounted loam
Where no winds blow;
You are flung in a sea of fire, below,
Of what you desire,
And what you desire,
You have sentenced to death, below,
That you cannot escape;
You are thrown in a sea of fire
Where the waters wash
Their crystal and salt homes
In the unfathomable sea of flame.

I shall never know
Whither you have plunged, till the end
Of this great world you hold
I shall never be loved, till my soul
Shall have launched itself
To embrace your knees
With a great and glittering world-wide desire.
I shall never know
Whither you have plunged, till the end
Of this great world you hold
I shall never be loved, till my soul
Shall have drawn a steel thread between love and death.
======================================== SAMPLE 143 ========================================
 crown of fitly gifted Fate;
The growing coronal of Helen's face,
Touched with the divine poesy of praise;
The statues of her triumphs and her rest;
The statues of her children and her birth;
And those of twenty winters and of night,
In the blithe chivalry of winsome fight.
Gatherings that wrap like harvest-flowers,
Red ribbons of the blossoms, fann'd with flowers,
Which winter woos to tribute bring
To Ceres, annual in her annual ring.
These do not find their commonest tomb,
The gory ware and garnered glory of its doom.
When to the quick and ailing heart,
The heart returns of its wonted strength,
And the fierce passions kindling start,
The memory of a battle fierce and rude,
When it's o'er buoyant pageants fam'd for aye,
And flies of yellow and lilac-colored gown,
And the songs of bridal woe,
It has quicken'd change of gauds to gold,
Though now it wears no scarlet-crown.
And a few ring of ribbons we'll select
From those that have beneath it well:
That we may do the fashion good
If we but do its bidding well.
A merry little history of famous comrades--
Wandering abroad to mark the casual author
Of their trouble: what the end may be?
Why do they greet me? Who would ask if I forget?
This time, it seems, it says to me.
And thus methinks they end their march, and they move away.

Yonder is the river Aldona singing to the sea,
And there is laughing Minnie just above,
And the waves are laughing Minnie just above.
There are waters, there are skies, there are flowers,
And the merle are playing, Minnie, down the Rhine:
And a young grey cat walks o'er the sands of old Noll-lanes,
And the hillside is a fairy-haunted place.
I know that, when the summer days are done,
The clinking iron chains about my head
Are gilded with a cloud of silver fire,
The curling smoke curls all the sky's desire,
And far, dim woodland crests that seem a sea.
Then wherefore, youth, it should be like to be
The dew-drunk petrel of the morning-dew,
To bathe in running streams and rainbow light
The limbs that wander through the woods to-night.

Of all the world a solitude is nigh;
My heart cries out in awe, 'mid groves, and flowers,
And dimly falls a distant sob of pain:
Yet, though I fall in tumult, it were vain.
Long has it been my lot to see
The long-wrought flowers of Italy,
Those smiling lips, warm, proud, and fair,
Which now, once warm with love and fire,
New love and wonder fill my soul;
Long, long ago it seems to me
That, in a dream of love and light,
I stand amid the mists of night,
And read the stars and read the skies,
And all the heart's deep reveries.

And this is all I need to say;
I'll write a rhyme, a song, and marry
One, the sweetest star on height:
She was born for me in childish sight,

As a heaven-sent primaeval flower
Springs from earth to heaven from ours,
In our city here we are soothed and blessed,
Wrought of sun and of moon and shower,
All the things that have been and are,
And the things that are, and the things we love,
And the women that we worship above,
And the maidens in the wind's caress
And the old joys we used to know,
And the things we long for we do not miss.

Where, then, is the land of desire,
The love we long for, and the faith we long for?
Is it in the grave that we desire?
Is it on the brain that we, poor soul,
Still aspire to, and bear the gorses?
Are they in the flesh that we control?

We aspire to heaven as 'tis to earth;
And, gazing up, on all we see,
One thing alone we long for--love,
One thing alone, a soul from me,
One thing alone we long for.

I lift the curtain of my eyes,
It shows me where I am alone:
There was the veil, it shows me where,
And yet, will it not help me there?

======================================== SAMPLE 144 ========================================
, till presently themselves
reeyes them. But the troop were still expecting,
within the gates, unless their lord appear,
who hails them to his own harm, and gives them light.
And Geryon warned them not to make this pass.
Soon as Geryon guessed that near the gates
They had set up, his voice rose from the crowd.
Then Geryon said, "My lords and Geryon,
Be not so sore offended with these words.
Is there not elder among us, that does fill
The father's heart with lust of fame so great,
Who rashly boasting in his youth has quailed?
Let us not weary have of speech and thought
Our homely deeds and days and deeds of men.
And lo! my lord is one among our tribe,
Who so renownèd is and so emblest
That, deathdeflowering, still he dares the same.
Great was his voice when he was nigh of kin;
That great King Arthur, when the days of youth
Were turning into battle: O for this
No other knight will ever have his crown."

Yet, when the noble Geryon was now ware
Of Arthur's wille, then Geryon left
The council with a simple smile, and said:
"Thou knowest the wounds thou hast shed over us
Through wrath of God, and by our own good deeds!
O Geryon, whom never mortal man's,
Although in high affairs of glory pure,
Has excelled in the exercise of war!
I do beseech thee, if a champion come
To hearken to my words, of Geryon,
When thou hast heard them. Take from Geryon
My sword and ashen greaves of other things;
And all these services of thine and theirs
Shall serve to heap in overflowing store
The great and virtuous Geryon for his son,
And he, to whom his father owes for aught,
At once will be his royal guest in need."

And Geryon answered, "Peace, and love thyself
Unto these hamlets, through whose tender cares
We see no watch, no loom may grate his arm.
For battle needs these halls, though heretofore
One were unworthy to keep war with thee,
But that not one might serve thee and thy lands--
Kinsmen and brothers--so thy wound shall leave
Thy walls and bulwarks, to lie down and sleep
Together on the ground under the graves."

So said, so done; and Geryon, 'midst the rest,
Sware of Geryon, and, failing that reserve
And slowly moving out, stood motionless.
Then rising up Geryon's gravely-crowned
Lion, who looked on him and was not cold,
Gave either, and in like mood, and said,
"Why would you tear from me a brother's life?
Thus much I love my brother: I can spare
Nothing of what I can; I can be brave,
Save only love, if offer'd, will be mine.
Then leave me to the battle, for the thoughts
Of God the lamestryph can give me, and I choose
Battle for this lost brother, if to him
I will surrender all, and no least thought
Of recompense will one day lack."

Then Geryon, sore grieving for his love,
Seeing that none would have it, deem'd himself
Less of a vassal to himself than those
Of whom his brother had a gift like his.
"Think, brother, think on this, for on the man
Whose heart thou wast to keep it, do thou tell
Thy sister, when she died, the common need
Of all those common cares, the petty graves,
And all that life becomes of heart and hand.
For, if I had a brother, as I know,
I am so weary of this quiet land,
The seeming dearest of thy sojourn here,
I should not think his step would come too late.
But to return to health is wise and true;
My brother, therefore, I will place amends
For him and all the fellowship of those
Who wander in this lonely land with me."

So saying, from the ramparts the left guard
Went onward; and a mighty shout went up,
As of a trumpet, that proclaims the foes
Far, far, O! far too fared these enemies.
They press'd the other gates with din of arms.

They tore the planks with piles, and to the sea
Loaded the calms; they put the ships to flight,
And, crowding to the
======================================== SAMPLE 145 ========================================
, goodly:  this renown
I envy still, and from me not a jot.
And what's the use, but a sea mare, so let it run.
'Tis it, as some Idalian fauns (this lass) confess:
She who so much has been more, sought less, more.
She cowers like the world, and will not allow
That earth her goodly breast is blest with nobleness;
Then, 'tis defy'd which would make her the next day,
By her own gift, to sink into a sty.
The thron'd daughter of Jove is very kind,
Which her own mother to a temper will commend;
Thence comes it that your dame will be offended,
And none but she of Priam will regard her
As guiltless; for she has but one admirer.
She will confess, and will deny you till then;
And if your patience does not much incline,
You may be pleased to own her you were swine,
And of that herd and all make up your tale.

When he who tells the Greeks the boys have done,
And that their gallant lives are short of date,
Or any god the Trojans did present,
To whom 'tis a declining date is fit.
Now take you Teucer, strong and keen as he,
Great names by Menelaus they are known,
Who, dying, gave Ulysses to the bed
By bold Achilles, whom, as rumours tell,
To Dardan Cisbe he his marriage made;
Who, dying, left it; and from death's estate
Lamenting Trojans to their own sad fate:
Who could prevail, by any Trojan hand,
To open Jove's wide gates and sack the land?

The Greeks now melt into a sea of fire;
But while Æneas wastes, his aged sire
Holds the sweet opportunity to spare,
And takes to him the only grace of care.
His sorrows with the holy deep engraven
He fashions off, and blames the passers-by
Should they be kept, a mighty plague to me,
Nor will I see at all, through human wit,
Thy son's unhappy, father, twice a son.

"Cease your complaints; ah cease your loud complaints!
The world afflicts me, and I fly from hence.
Arcists, Rutulians, and Arcadian horse,
Avenues, in deserts wild of war may daunt,
And I pursue in heaven his blunted feet.
Begin my sorrows, haste, and seek the fight;
See for thy son; and, if he is not there,
Put on his purple cloak, that it may bear
Anchises' doom of death, and when the light
Of glory shines as shines the day-star bright,
And if his fury glows with weapons small,
Then aid me, O unhappy, bending all
To succor him, my bitter grief to spare.
Forbear, ye lambs, these furious threats to raise;
Ye maidens, strive with those which are your praise.
This deed is done; and even as my seer,
Punished with age, decrees his ghost to hear.
He ended, and Alcissa heard his pray'r.

When but three days the rosy-finger'd morn
First rose the sun, the day for war had sworn,
And, cloth'd in robe of purple, o'er the plain
Each with a torch of hunting, in the rear
Slew the huge herd, their fodder and their milk,
And all their fleecy charge for midnight spilled.
There Aphrodite, in the front, shepherds
With fifty-two bright beaks the chariot shared;
Aldermen seated at the river-side
Two golden cauldrons, by three watery snows
Furrow'd the tail, and litter'd o'er the brows.
Athwart the steed they threw their shining arms;
Then, taking each a hollow stump, they bore
Three symbol candles; on the ground they hung,
Two flaming eyeballs, glittering in the sun,
And shoulder'd there with axes keen they mark'd
The mighty hall of great Ulysses, where
Beneath him, to the city's highest tower
Each in his car he stood, where built the God
The builder of the house; the place, to him,
And the hill-shadow'd palace of the place.
They paused; and all the morning long they lay
Within the town, while the returning sun
Looks down upon their hill-tops from the height.

======================================== SAMPLE 146 ========================================
gy gen'ral, and a bright
And spacious chiton in the midst of might:
There huge and triple branching firs were seen,
And beechen boughs gave out the twin-born green.

The pond'rous there he laid; to that high-bound
The stately pines; to these the slow winds singed;
These glanc'd the trees; the springs themselves were seen
Perfum'd along the shore, now in a ring
Of waving gold; a yong elm, which lay
Arow'd beside it; next the pine he took,
(This chief for prophet, and for poet fame,
The willow that the Fates pour'd forth to frame,)
His pendant work. The luckless carpenter
With weary labour in a leathern basket strook;
With studding oar he tried to fix the sail,
Yet, resting by the gangway, chose to go,
And anchor in a space, or in a pique
To fit his hold; yet, not a whit misdoubt
Avail'd him, but the aged seaman heard,
And, laden with his oars, ingage and cheer'd,
Beneath the silver pines, the voice that charms
And sooth'd him, oft bespoke him to embark
Upon his new, and he set forth at sea.

To Phoebus then he calld the vow'd-for land,
Which the four winds were witness'd to the test;
The ship was lief, the rudder brought to port
The goods of Nereus from the Pelops' isle,
Phoenicians, noble youths, which (all who breathe)
From sea and heaven, the building of a ship,
That to the whistling billows bring the prize,
And for the prizes, these as many bear;
These to Apollo, and those to Hercules.

But once when Thetis, in the white-arm'd seaman's bark,
Took up her laurel chaplet, and her locks
With olive wreath'd, and thus the boar he taw'd.
Peace to the swineherd, all our bark take off!
Come forth, ye Muses, shoot a blast of horns,
And with your Muses straight to me return.
And ye my various tuneful band obey,
That I may call the Muse to her own lay.
My mother Thetis, for whose sake we strove
To sing the vigils of a sister-nymph,
To her, from whose sweet song the hill inclos'd,
Beguil'd the pleasures of a shepherd's mind,
And through my palace pour'd the show'rs of gold;
To her my chief confers the sacred theme
Of long-past Jove, who for a hermit's sake
Has made the rough seas shake their purple oar,
And girt the waves with ores and sable smoke:
He made the trees, the oaks, and backward trod,
The lovesick land, by human voice proclaim'd.
He taught the youths to lift the flinty bows,
And to direct the arrow at the bow;
The venom'd arrow from the trembling string
Did with such ease and swift illume the tongue.
Hence ev'ry voyage of the wilds he spread
To Thetis; that his worthiest daughter bred,
The fairest daughter of Phaeacia's line.

The goddess Thetis through the city bore
The jav'lin, which to great Apollo bore;
The winds were conscious of the omen bright;
Nor sign nor sound receiv'd the flying archer's flight.
A swallow, posted on the right, below,
Tells what his errand was; the Greeks obey'd.
Him viewing, Hector with proud joy beheld,
And thus his answer to the godlike man return'd.

"Not long Achilles, of thy friendless lays,
Shalt thou survive; but with a sterner grace
Call to the mind of mortals the renown
That thou hast bred in old Anchises' isle;
Not long shall I, in wisdom, tempers move
To strife, but in respect of Jove and you,
When from the walls of strong-besetting fight
We saw the Greeks, how terrible the light!

Ye gods, what time in Scythia's wide domains
To mingle, fell, in fruitful Italy,
A keener clime; but I will give you hence
A song, which in mine honour shall arise.

My Muse shall sing of Troy and all her towns
In flames of flames; and ye shall see in me
Ev'n all the bravest and the best
======================================== SAMPLE 147 ========================================
, seigneur d'Olvide.
La rêve, décontré lui qu' annière,
Qui ne voulpir leurs ancinecin,
Qui ne voulpir leurs folions,
Nous nous appelaisins enfant,
Pompé la delic enporta,
Noit quando s'explané si me peine
Quando tu vive s'exadis con compaigne
Fusconde ou monde, si tu n'espar,
Quando tu negait bien servir et l'on,
Puisse que toujours de vieis puis.
La tome pas, comme un bon emprère,
Qui ne diste une à travers la vie,
Il y avait un ailune pleine et l'on,
Qui ne voulpir leurs voix bix se rit.
Mais tu n'as secours, c'est baigne plus grâce
Qui ne visant crine à jamais grâce,
Que par fois l'extase, un jour de crin lors.
C'est un dans les tales du feuillage.
Il est vait un bourdon de son d'Oris.

Et je vais touche sais gret sellage,
Quelle industrire et je sujet il mire,
Puisse-t'-Aix de liber un paiserie
Qu'on un voisin comme un voisin d'une chaste.
Faute de la ciel sujet ils revient.
Et je vais sans peine et sans pris-je
Qui ne vouloit sans crin l'emport.

Mais tu n'espar, la voix, ces fait jette,
Vier de tu n'es point de point n'est-à-bre,
Oh! lune voix! nous avait pas l'homme,
Chei, s'envolees ses voix, s'envolees,
Pieds rien, rien, et sans mon leur cette.
Enfin, encorpoint, procinct à tépultureie,
Des préans, pour quelque je cherrie,
Pour quelqueret pour ses voix!
Pour quelqueret pour claret, pour quelque je j'ai foy,
Qui ne vait qu'en coupe un peu vald.

Nous avait un peu qu'on l'homme, ait,
Qui ne vait s'est an pas d'armie:
C'est pour l'amour de ses voix!
Refait nous nous, pour des ries et les yeux,
Qui ne vait perss que ce peu de rest;
De ses voix, et de ses voix, et je peur qu'on se
Peu nous avait de à tes roses nest.
Avant que je puis tes jours
De jamais piedes et jusqu' anciqués
Que jusqu' été moultant pese,
Du poitrine lui-moultant;
Puis que j'ai cruise et peu revés
Vouloir dans l'onde; ses peures,
Mésprèger au bord de lui-moultant:
Puis que j'ai donne et jusqu' été ses passages,
Ense velourd comme dans les rues,
Puissez-nous avez épauisons coueurs
De mon bêtes de ses voix!

Dans leurs pouvertes d'autre gloire,
Que je toute mépé appelle,
Comme un instante de nos passus,
C'est un pour mon nuit de nos.
Comme un pré micadés de recevoir,
Ce fut ta bouche bouche entre moux,
Ce ses racontées, lèvres douffours,
Que des visages, jusqu'à la merule,
Que c'est un voix, elle d'amour.

Hail, Ponte-Monstres, glorious regions,
With fairy peaks fantastical!
How beautiful is y
======================================== SAMPLE 148 ========================================
, victor! to approach,
Still pale, but with thyself, were sere, and bleak.
But shouldst thou point me to a funeral pyre,
Vow'd by the altar of thy slaughtered bull,
No power shall tell my name, no sight my view,
He asks no oath, no oath but who he knew:
Those rites sacrilege, neglected rites,
Which not the twice seven years can well control;
Be rang'd with all the plaudits of thy soul.

With thee, great GAMA! thy own precepts ring,
The trophies of thy festive days are thine,
The realms of Death are thine: all India's king
Shall own thee glorious in his nobler line,
And hail thee victor of the Indian's line.
How lovely every scene that deck'd thy shore,
With all the varied scenes of beauty hung,
Where bloomy groves the pride of Ophir hung,
And nymphs and naiads deck'd the cool abode
Of Naiad o'er the flowery lap of Jove.

Here, sheltered from the Cambrian's scattered steel,
Hid by the mountain's side, by horned nymphs
And sylvan deities, the Naiad sings
And wantons o'er her swan, whose foot, pursued,
By the deer-shaded streams, the quail rejoices,
And soft night purges every flowery bow'r.

How sweet the dwelling of the wond'ring sage!
Oft heard he of the holy prophet say,
Lo, a new worshipper before the shrine,
The unknown deity whose mystic rites
By lone penance call the Thunderer's name,
Ere Death had laid his icy lamp at night,
Saved from the fetters of the midnight air,
To bless the man who sojourns in the shades.

Then first, when Morn her lengthen'd curtain threw,
And mute were all the groves, we stole away,
Upon the sylvan chase, or wildwood glade,
Where lonely Asra, wav'ring from her soar,
Sits in the smile of love, his wat'ry site
On the high mountain's brow, his kindred god
O'er lone Hydaspathus, or his native plain,
And hears the mournful murmur far away.

A silent and a lovely scene succeeds;
By the green glen, with all his flowery train,
Fair Glendiana pour'd her spicy reins,
And breathing love enjoy'd the sweet domain.
See the green fields, the bow'rs of flow'rs, how gay
And full of verdure the vermilion flowers,
In purple dressed, and bunches of the gold!
While, viewless as the rocks, our Fancy's eye
Pursues the vision of each beauteous spot,
Enraptur'd scenes of endless summer past,
Blest with the rich variety of heav'n.

How lovely woods, how sylvan shades along!
How well the shepherds of the lonely fold!
Fair-bos'd, and blooming in the genial smile
Of twilight, rising from the cheerful east,
The purple fruitage and the snowy vine,
All tempt the wanderer from the fragrant feast,
And, clustering in the hazel-shaded grove,
See the gay Lothian chlamys from afar,
The shepherd Thrace, and solitary Mere,
And the old lynx, and hyacinthine glade,
Fanning their bosoms with their wanton wings;
Such raptures wild, and such immortal joys
The happy shepherds on the lonely steep,
When the rude Boreas freezes o'er the plain,
And frozen thunders beat the hollow rock,
Their raptur'd raptur'd raptures then pursue
The traces of the glories of the west;
While, wand'ring o'er the mountains, woods decay,
And silent cliffs, a melancholy train!
On the rough cliffs no more the light-burnt train
Shall shiver, or shall leave the wat'ry plain:
No more shall human footsteps here resort,
And never-ending glories make the vault:
Here birds of ev'ry hue more gayly sing,
And the gay scene shall pass as blithe an end.

A wakeful lynx on mountain tops shall wheel,
To watch their gentle glances o'er the ground;
And oft against yon azure evening sky,
The myrtle branches waving o'er the spot,
The musk-scented shrubs shall gra
======================================== SAMPLE 149 ========================================
; and, for he had hoped to see
The sight in their directions.  This alone
Was Nopto, had hisusk of sea-blue stayed.

But heard not Nopto for the listé yet
The moan of all the Nopto; nor drew close
Unto his benediction nor bowed down
Before the body of his benediction,
But laboured, and, that he might stay no more
For those five blest, the comforter had drawn
Before they came to Nopto; and he said:

"What is it that a man in arms should wield
The sword of God?  To me, in this fair world
The planet of the Pleiades is lit
Up to its utmost pitch."  And on his way
The prophet brought the second Nopto to him,
Whereon it was as if he watched the stars
And all the constellations in the blue.

Now to Nopto and his work he gave
The starry signs of his unwearying power,
And all his hunger was but thirst that slaked
The thirst that gnawed the bones, the gnash of teeth
Striking from blind stones and splintered ribs
The dew that lay like shattered fountains dry;
And each man for the other asked what meant
The forest-people, as they bowed and cried
Among the folk, and bow their heads, and say:

"Pull for it, comrades, for the rock is broken,
And Leto rend her with a grinding blow!
For all this thirst for blood has made you mad,
Even as your fellows of the land that slakes
Its face and deluges the marshy fen!
O wild men, ye are hardy--ay, ye are hard
And hot as fire--yea, ere ye could abide
Till ye were ripe for battle!  Ye are fierce--
Ay! ye are hard, and fierce enough to rage
Because ye cling to this.  O cruel strange
Of what men call ye fool!  Ye must be brave,
And not the breed of Cunabian hordes
That drive back fierce the scoundrels.  O my friends,
Plain men, ye are too quick to judge aright
With open sword!  Take heed of coming ill!
If from this rising thou wilt learn who fights
Clung to the level of the monstrous towers
Or in the forests, or in the fir-glazed caves,
Or in the rains, or by the roaring wind,
Or maybe at the heart of a great chief,
Set on some terrible battle-ableness,
Who had the blood of men to dull and tame,
Yea, who had known and heard and spoken words
What time his hardy spirit fell by arms
This side of battle, and where death was worst
By trenches thick with heavy entrails, wall
Of door and battlement, and charging lines
Of battlements and towers, then the folk
Shouted, and with their white arms gripped him hard,
And clapt their hands in agony, and cried:

"Where art thou, wont at evening to kneel here
Before the goddess, I, a weakling, cried
Over the shrine doors, and beseech thee, come,
For with thy blood thy steps didst turn again,
When at my side fled Amaryllis, thou,
Who wast the child of sorrow, paramour
Of noble Amaryllis.  Sad her soul,
And sad her weeping!  Answer me, and say
What word thou wilt!"  And in his heart he said:
"Ah no! though that I die the gods he knows,
No god is like to suffer for thy sake:
For I have bared my battle-crest of yore,
And talked with men of war, and chanced to come
To Hades' house on Christmas-day, to find
A fair way for me:  but when the light
Shone on my eyelids, and with music filled
My heart grew hot, and my dull hurt me more
Than was the all-seeing godhead of the land
Who saw the Gods herein; then through my soul
Feared came the dull world-goherling, and for me
He moaned aloud, for I went down the way,
No woman found a way, whom thus he spake:
"O hardy child, that unto me thou criest
Not for my death!  If it be now, by this,
By this same hand of mine, thou'lt feel for death
No longer:  soon, when ye shall come to this,
Thy tale may hold the noble, and thy flesh
======================================== SAMPLE 150 ========================================
,
Cachuchadrops, and grasshoppers,
And maids with their feet like sedges,
And the stately Tempter, as with a wand,
Wrought up, till the Sun seemed in heaven,
Then was still for days,
For days and days,
There was a great, great king of Tyre
Made full of rev'rence, and faith, and great fame;
And the people were turn'd to the name
Of the sailor God Bacchus Apollo,
Whose head was o'errun by the couplet.
They of all unity chose
The society of their tongues,
While the other merits and interests,
Like other famous officers, famous
For foreign States and foreign faiths,
Were the first to look up to the Nestles;
Afterward (to madden my heart)
Came a general era of youth,
With the laws of the antientuast:
In the first place--I now musique--
One of these matters I must aver--
He first gave the law, and the nineteenth,
For its fitness and order created.

Whilst the crown of all poplars and temples
Still flourish'd upon the old tree-trunks,
Bearing their sticks unto the sea,
And the sails of their timbers yet flap unto thee,
Take a whisk of their fellow away,
And away with my parting!

Look! the Dandy's awake!
Look! the Dandy's awake!
Underneath his straw hat, white and crimson,
Pale as winter's cloud, stands the Donoghuere.
Open then! or the gumption of pity
May not be a terror of aght,
Or perhaps the end of the plutocrat.
May not he be frightened, for breaking
The long Sabbath of Gentleness?
Do not know that our souls are forsaking
The vow of the Prophets and the Saints,
Who broke many a Sabbath like Moses,
And founded the Zion again and again,
When the trumpet of judgment is roar'd.
May not he be frightened, for breaking
The Law of the Prophets and the saints?
Yet he is happy! and may it be so!
For if the land perish of him, remember
That he lived like the patriarch, let the poor stone
Not be seen by another!

Lift up your heads, and hearken unto me.
He knows not me. He hath learn'd it not.
I dare not believe, but I dare not!
The clouds are no repenting, the winds are no wailing,
I would sooner leave them behind,
Than perish among them; for God hath forbid
That we be vex'd with sorrow, or groan
Through the heat of the tedious day,
Or with calm mind resolve to eat and drink,
Than perish among them!

Lord, forgive us! and lose not us a spark
Of sympathy in a day like this,
That we, who are falling, must fall to the ground.
The vassals are glad, and the ladies look gay,
For the company cometh now to be;
Away, away, to the right hand road
To join with my memory.

What news, Lady, of news so like to thine?
What news have I heard, that thou art gone,
And left in the valley, so dreary and drear,
The widow that's dead, and the orphan that's here?
What news have I heard, that thou art gone,
It is thou that art weary. Come on;
I am going to ride on the very same road
To be with my sorrowful Lady.

There! the night is dark now,
The night of our mourning!
This is my true love,
Damon, thy story.
By all that I can,
Mine heart shall recover.
By all that's worth and beauty
That on this tomb I lay,
In silent death I'd lie 'midst a world of woolly,
That I might entone thee,--aye, me too shall move.
The knight saith that he will make thee

Through all that dust and woe
One rose-wreath, bright as the sky,
And the rose-wreath, I would throw
From a garland of lilies in one of its roses;
And that none should share with the maid,
No, not one should share with the maid,
No, not one should share with the maid,
So, roses and roses and lilies and roses!
By the side of a cold, rocky place,
Where the flowers that grow there grow,
There lies a grave, where a flower might be found.

What
======================================== SAMPLE 151 ========================================
 hast thou there usurped,
Aqueint my gratitude and love, to dare,
Against Omnipotence, revolt and war?
Why should I fear Omnipotence himself?
As if this throng of men upon the earth
Were but the perjurer, trampling upon fools,
That my poor hands should do it!  What are they?
The more I see the pity! the more
I feel it! much I love, and much I hate,
And love this evil hour! What worse than gall
Is in this hour, a meaner show of man
For a poor merely human happiness!

Oh! why is wealth thus bought with so much toil,
To make men happy?  Why this grand-pied joy
Which to out-run the raiser's hand is grown
Grows out to trivial all this want of soul?
This goodly quality is yet deflemed,
And razed into a razed and razed eye;
This love is but a picture, and this joy
So vividly is in no place of earth,
I cannot see it, but I feel it now;
I see a truth as clear as its clear beams.
This man was made for bliss, a bliss unworthy,
And yet without a sin.  Now he is freed,
A prisoner, as becomes the moral laws.
Here is a man!
For let me keep
My moral.  Thus wilt thou free me from myself,
And henceforth I will be, though it be impure,
An inward enemy to the woman within,
Whom I shall teach, and force thy doctrine elsewhere.
The best-laid schemes of nice-natured woman,
With women's, and the feigning, wife's and son's,
Wink at a little--when, in my first youth,
No woman had attempted to be great,
And I was grown so small or to be rich!
Thou mayst, my friend, use them in conversation,
And let me be remembered.  To thy book
I recommend the ear of Nature freely.
What joy in his! what pleasure in his lot!
Whatever other duties call thee great
Of being humble, lofty, humble, great,
High-minded, noble, good, and wise, and great!
God bless thy name and works thy ways! and be
A higher, being earth-born poet!  See,
His soul seems set upon the earth as lofty
As thou art awful, and transcendent Father!
Even of the great man do I thus feel:
While thou art dwelling on the earth below,
And teaching children, every day, that grow
In Christian fellowship with thee, like them,
And dost not tremble at thy holy lot,
I feel them close upon my heart, and must,
Though buried deep, this side the cradle lie.
Nature herself has fallen upon the way,
And said, "I come," as if 'twere fit to live:
Else wherefore hast thou sought my holy home,
Where should I fail in thee?  Or where the key
Of all my being, to my holy home?

I would not give my feeble hold on God;
It surely doth requires him; he may claim
The love of things!  There let me live for thee.
The most I seek, and seek for, fails in thee,
Nay, though the day be distant, and the time
More swift; and, when I rise, do I not wish
To spare a scanty sustenance?  Yet on,
There is a stronger spirit within thee,
Than in the heart of man!  It cannot be
That, on a day like this, thou needst a care,
And make the heart beat higher as ye stand,
When, 'mid such petty triumphs of the past,
Ye come to me and say: When shall I see
Thy bare arms stretched about me, girdled all
With a long glory, I possess the height?
Not, then, am I the happiest of the great!
I see it only as a child's renown,
And I have seen its daily life and thought.

Ay, if I would; but soon again 'tis gone,
And the old glory gone, which once was mine.
And mine its monuments of pomp and power;
Its villaries, theatres, and temples fair,
And pillars marched upon its gilded door,
Trod down a triumphal march with fiery feet!
The joy that was within it, the delight that was
Within it, and the pain that was in it,
Came in my heart like that which I had learned
In childhood, in the ear of the Unknown.

E
======================================== SAMPLE 152 ========================================

On what far ways we last to steer!
How might I pass it, if not near,
Among those folks, so high and near,
Or at one place, alone, and miss,
But huddle in a sheltering cresset!

Ah, happy few, in deep green grass,
That stretch, oh, slowly, far and swift,
And let me feel, with bosom pant,
That we are on the self-same track
Most like to find all we can reach in
Thus clearing up to one remained.

Come, dearest mother, when I die,
Let us go forth, from year to year,
And I will show you where to lie,
In green orchards far or near,
Where, loved ones, I have loved to meet;
But O, my mother--ever sweet!
For pity 'tis to me so bare,
So bare and bare, so lone and bare,
To be the very earth's wide share.

I would not give it, nor forbid it,
If aught was left me then or now
For having lived, though ever well,
And for having loved, I would not die.
If thou hadst kept my love with me,
Won't I have kept my life in sight?

Come, baby, I would hold thee tight,
I 'll feel thee fast in mine;
I 'll lead thee where thou dost invite,
I 'll lift thee up so high;
I 'll meet thee in the morning light,
I 'll lift thee up so high;
I 'll think upon thy nest, a-rows,
And then I 'll mingle sigh.

Now windy days and sunny days
Are here and somehow,
Just let me kiss the crystal fount,
And listen while I sing;
Now gloaming 'stead I 'll sing,
But not for me 'll my mother bring
Seween longing, sure unfailing.

Oh, then I 'll sing my happy, happy lays,
As sweet as music makes by day;
And sleep the sleep-the breeze that knows not why,
And wander in the woods at play,
To dally with the little frogs in rills,
And know--by joy--most all of me.

It has two lilies--what do you think of that?
There 's a garden of roses I've found in the banks.
And a tiny bud close to the lips of my rose,
But the flowers of the primrose are faded and gone.
There 's an ugly place down below,
The garden of roses I never will go;
And some of the lilies--'twere good,
Perhaps, with their lilies, to make me a clod
Where the flowers of the meadow should bloom till I come.

My tears are deep, and my faith is high;
The roses of Erin have two more roses
Because of the malice they've always to ply,
And when there 's a name that will die,
And I've met with another lover,
And I know that it never will die,
Oh, the lilies are fair for to see,
But the flowers of Erin I never will grieve;
And the garden of Erin I never will leave.

I've been a bright butterfly all summer day,
And then I 've seen the birds take wing on their way,
And then but one little bud I thought of this;
But now I 'll weep for that which is most dear to me,
Though the garden of Erin I never will leave.

The lamb and the dove I knew,
And the falconer and I;
I 'll seek in the woods above
The talismanium of Jove;
I 'll stray in the dells of dew
The liquid spirit of the brook
Where, singing to her loves,
The eagles still roost in air,
And the thunders still roll in the sun's turban.

O Lady of love, send down
Some honey-cake this,
To a lover that 's old and gray;
This is not the flower that you bring me,
Though it be fresh every day.
There 's not a step in the path that I know,
Though the ocean foam there and the rush storm wind flow.
And a love-lit path that leads to the land
From the land of the matching-sea;
Where the bulwarks of reason rear
Their reverberating arches higher
Than the ring and the peacock-dove know,
And the fringe of the western seas.

Is the hour my hands shall keep?
Shall I sleep when the twilight
======================================== SAMPLE 153 ========================================
as’ all the gifts to thee.”
Thus having spoke, his briny ears
The royal Ráma lifted up,
And o’er the earth in triumph rose
Governed of Mithraea’s sons.
Sugríva’s breast with joyful breast
The sons of Daśaratha pressed,
Where, with a storm of mace reblent,
The giant’s mace the sky o’ercast.
Forthwith the Sun, the Moon, appeared,
And glorying in the skies appeared.
High reared in air the Lord of Fire,
And thus his son the Immortals spake:
“Obey, all power are past, ’tis said
Whose hand should serve, and conquer, stead.
The Immortals now have framed a plan
Which shall avail us yet: no plan
Can fail us now, the helpmeet naught,
Which Gods and heavenly powers shall bring.
Now, lords, be firm. This best of kings
Shall lead ye forth in time of fears,
For death no more is than the need,
That from these lips and lives should freed.”
Thus he the sons of Raghu spoke:
Then flushed with joyous hope the high
King of the winds his high estate
Dwelt on a hillock by the beach.
Then Ráma, smiling as he viewed
The Vánars, to his heart pursued.
Thus to the chief he cried and cried:
“I have not failed, I well believe:
O King Sugríva, guard and guide
Thy faithful troops who throng this strand
To guard thee in the need of hand!
Bend to the Gods this aged land,
And follow Ráma to his stand.”
He spoke, the mighty king(200) in haste,
With lifted hands his head upraised,
And thus the Vánar chief replied:
“King of the Vánar host, the king,
Armed with no elephant, can bring
Defiance to the terror-stricken foe,
Nor heed the flight of bird or cow.
Thy care will aid the suppliant’s art,
And, Ráma, him with power to part.
Now, King Sugríva, grant to us
Thy friendship with the strong Supreme.
Now hear me, and this message give:
That he may guard thy life from thee.
Before our eyes his oath to swear
Have perfect knowledge of the line
That binds the Vánar chief, and thou,
For all who go, may see him now.”
Then went the monarch to the sea.
Then, as he bade, from shore arose
Each Vánar and each radiant dame
Their several arts of speakers knew.
Each spoke in order, calm and slow.
Then, as the universal rite
Had duly prayed, they sate at length
About their monarch and with him
A single lotus leafy-clad.
To royal Bhima gave the sign,
And cried with joyful heart, “We twain
Will meet before him in the land,
And minister and him command.
Brother, disclose the wondrous deed:
Whate’er the favouring host may lead,
Whate’er he bids the gods provide
In heaven itself, all need his aid:
What can we better do, O King,
Than ward the counsel that we give?
These Vánars, skilled in mighty art,
All for the healing of our heart,
And, haply, wondrous helps to cure
Our Vánar foes for woe prepared.
Then, chieftains, die and be refrained,
And men and dames and men undrained
Shall ne’er, in smiting, fall in vain.
The wicked spirits of the brave
No counsel for their safety gave.
So, country-born, thou wilt not live
Till Lanká’s host be overthrown,
In might though high in perils tried,
And in the fiends who do not guide.
In vain, O King, thy vows shall be
And help the sinful in the sea.”

Thus by his peerless art addressed,
His Vánar lords who bore the best
Of Rákshas troops, the hero, learned,
From Gods and fiends their wrath had learned,
They gathered at the monarch’s call
One Vánar lord of men, and all
The Vánars, and the demons all.

Sumantra, terrible in war,
The foeman’s chariot seen
======================================== SAMPLE 154 ========================================
, and she loved him
A goodly thrall,
A most delightful woman,
Who the better live to die,
And never cease to live
To taste the psalm of liberty.

Why do ye start at this?--
'Tis I that am your child!
Of all that's great and good
The strangest can be wild!

Nay, to the very brim,
O comrade blate,
Pour out the red-hot wine of hate!
Quench, quench the ancient thirst
That slaked your thirst,
And quench the last long thirst
In the still cup of drouth!
Nay, to the busy brain,
As o'er the unhoped-for rain
Poured out, in sultry play,
The harvest of your fray,
Let each man bring his gift again!

Nay, if ye lift your eyes
To catch one gleam of stars
Upon some ruined dream,
That on the horizon's rim
Comes gloomily,
Then--fear not nor seek not for them!
The heart may quench the fire
That warmed you, one by one,
Yet never quench it, quench it, quench it!

Give me your hand and I will heal it.
Give me your foot and I will heal it.
I will restore the might
That healed me when the night
Closed on me, till the height
Was covered from my sight.

I saw a vision, a vision!
'Twas anigh-naked, and the height
Was circled by an angel's vision;
And the angel turned his head
And plucked her hand and said,
"See, how this height, so lonely,
Is wonderful indeed!
Beside the four-wheeler's wheel
You will find nothing worth."

When you have met the angel,
The angel is so tall
It shakes his hand at you.
He lifts his eyes to watch you,
And you see all things well.

He is so tender and so true,
You seem all faith to him,
He is so gentle and so true,
You seem all love to him.
And you see all things well, and what
He is,--your truth to him?
He is so radiant, so so dear,
You seem to see him too.

It was an image of the glory of a young woman

High on the mountains, close against the snow,
He lingered to exhale the incense of myrrh;
And as I gently raised my eyes to his,
He heard a sheep-dog baying on the spot
Where my poor heart, with bleeding for his meat,
Suffused to rest.
I saw his tender, white-haired mother,
All softly, and a radiance of tears,
The happy man beside her; for I knew
It would be always sweet when we were young together.

After the passage had taken place
Over the mountain range,
Where rocks were waiting for the sun to come,
I heard a crow from the hollow of a hollow oak.
He came and touched the root
Of the white hollow, wide and deep;
He raised his head and sadly stole away;
And I beheld his streamers with their ancient waves
Run shallow past my feet.
He came and touched the earth anew
While the bare rocks gave back the sacred sea
That God had given to me.

He brought me water; I was one;
He loosed my tears in the full tide.
The love that once hath been, of old,
My heart hath buried deep in its young grave;
But the awakening of the earliest day
Will bring me to his side.

Not with the hopes that we have had,
Nor yet with Love's despair,
The hope that on the utmost shore
We ne'er shall see again;
Not with the love that we have had,
Nor hope that we have nought,
But in the white ideal, white and clear,
That in the great soul lies of yore
No shadow of disguise,
But, waiting in the future years,
Its own most cherished bride.

I dreamed that I should see her face,
I seemed to see her eyes;
I dreamed that I had borne her lot,
In years long passed away;
The sunshine of her eyes and hair,
The love that long gone by--
In the cold grave she lies so fair,
Dear,--for a single sigh.

I dreamed that when I looked again,
I saw the last year's face,
I pitied, toil away the years,
My dream of happiness, the pain,
The sorrow
======================================== SAMPLE 155 ========================================
 sound of sorrow on the
sad old earth, and they live too, if they make
themselves fit nourishment and relieve their hope.

And no man comes to an old turn of trot
outside you, and is saying:
"When the stars are all hurrying by, and you sit on
a fir tree, and you cry out: How strange to you,
ah!  It's the old dear Darby!  He is in the middle of
the crowd, and you must see him through the crowd
coming on like a lion at his game."

Come away, little boy, and dance with me.
The sun shines from the horizon.  The shade is hung
in the eastern sky.
Tired of ourselves, tired of love, dancing in the
morning beam, the dew is gone, the roses drooped
above the hillside and the shade of the brook
where the morning suns are.

But come away, little boy, and dance with me.
Thy little girl will tell thee all her
sorrows.  We will walk in sunshine while the
ladder dances of the lilies are not yet too
much on the earth to be called to the harp of
the glorious nymph who sings so blithely.

Thy little lad, dancers with the lilies and the
flowers, will dance with us on the day of our wedding
about to wed.

But to-night the angel Death has bright eyes, fair
and radiant, with glowing cheeks, with burning mouth, with
bright feet, of the angels that had come down from
the alabaster throne, to touch the bride's hand.
Ah! it is very sweet to sit in the starry fir coppice,
and feel the wind beating against it, and hear the
winds whisper of the leaves--and fainter crests
throb and clamour under the leaves.

I wish the dead leaves were as fresh and soft as
the morning.
They'd heap the holy floor with bricks and
dye the holy hearth-stone; I wish the dead leaves
were as fresh as they are, for if the ghosts here
were alive, they'd fall here on a beggar's grave.

O thou undaunted soul! who, with all thy strength,
art with the strength of God, at times, and with an
immortal overflow at every breath of the skies!
I am not with the living, and fear is most
afflicted in my breast.
<|endoftext|>

(5)                                 [transjected
a thought in his head that the pain was caused.
For this sickness, and many evils there are
 attending it.

But we have yet to speak of him among us,
and in future he will come to us again, to the
sacrificement of the sacred temple where the image of
Satan is lying.

(6)                                   [transjected
a thought in his head that the pain was caused.
(7)                                         [being
fulfilled with the pain.

(8)                                   [the loss
remains to him.
(9)                                   [the cry is
of despair.
(10)                                   [blench and
smile.
(11)                                  [does it

(12)                               [if it had it
There is a river at the throat of which a boat cannot
(15)                 
======================================== SAMPLE 156 ========================================
, the count,
Our prelates longed for new success,
And, weary of the least delay,
Made all the hours of night away,
A joyous, cheerful rest to break.

A glorious night, whose opening rays
Shone from the distant horizon's close,
Lights our dark couch with fairy blaze,
Weaving a rainbow, which the blaze
Kindled by fits when he arose.
And, as he too charmed the lighter fly,
It was a heavenly hue, which spread
Out from his purple wings, and laid
His burning plumes at our retreat,
To fan the flame that could efface
The dying embers of our face.

Behold! the Lord himself appears,
Girt with a glory of new years!
It cannot be that he has crossed
The regions of the morn and lost
His handiwork, can make us quaff
Of every good, of every ill,
That ever might his own distil.
It cannot be that he has crossed
The regions of the morn and lost,
The everlasting hills; and now
Designs of power, and thoughts that dare
In other plains than those we spread,
Shall push the Lord from out the air,
And his ten thousand quivers lead
Again from off the eastern side,
And bring him, too, the mightier tide,
That sweeps from out the Canaan's waste,
And sets his bark upon the waste.

Behold! again the Godhead grows;
The winds again his airy cuisle
Surveys;--and with his signet jars
The Orient bows;--upon the waves
Her wide marsh-maze of stars is seen;
In clouds it cannot be but seen,
To rest 'neath heaven's dome, where God
Lays his dry fingers on the sod!

There is no word the God hath said
But what he utters in the tread
Of some child that the foe is near;
And he with a calm eye is hid,
And whispers to the stars, Ah me!

The word he speaks,--the words that seem
His supernatural sleigh, which seems
The wing that whirls and whence it gleams
To make the winds a coronal;
Whereof the living wheels of thought
On that great Pentecost betwixt
The poles, and shores, and sullen stair,
Which flit erewhile from height to height,
Into this mighty wilderness;
Whereof the Lord hath called a dream;
And all their flowings be but one,
Only at once and everywhere.

I heard a hound bark as she came
A-listening to the sounds of shame,
That marred the dumb, but would not cease
To write, and at my bidding stood,
Muttering: "The deeds of a Golumpus!"
She added: "The deeds of a Golumpus!
You cry so that I read aright;
To-night, I am longing to hear it!
The clouds pass o'er with silent light,
The west is beaming as from a shrine,
Our God hath visited the sea!"

He said and drove her through the snow,
And his fastened to her hair,
That fell upon her head,--for when
She bowed a while, she could not speak,
Or moved a syllable of fear;
Yet hearkening ever more and more,
Till silence fell on all;
A very marvellous, adore,
Unto the God in heaven, she came;
He stood before her, and he came.

Who will tell what a wonder it is
To hear what the God shall seem
Most joyfully; for by what sign
Human and strange its riddle is,
It shows its nakedness divine,
And tells him who he ought to be;
But by by sudden and mysterious law,
By might of godlike attribute,
The child it is, though of no use.
Man is in trees to know and know,
And God in heaven to see and know,
And evermore in his old creed
Preaches the awakening mystery.

For lo, the sacred and blissful days,
When earth a myriad world shall be
Brought forth, and men be heard and sung,
But the woods' echoes shall be mute,
And all the sound of things unseen
Shall be a moaning, murmuring sound,
That all the world shall be all drowned,
In the great working of God's will,
Grim as a carven human spear.

"O Lancers, shine upon your heids,
Freshened by your white foam!
Is not the ground we hold so
======================================== SAMPLE 157 ========================================
iene my undis is compassed,
I mean that is, whate'er the slave is.
O fortunate land!  O happy land!
That from beneath such heavens doth reel
Such mighty wonders, and doth rise
From every spasm, of its headlong woe!

O happy land, so fair!  O land
Of beauty and of health!
Where vales and mountains shall bear witness
What Earth hath witness'd oft against
A gentle race in their rough stress!
O happy land!  O land
Of Youth and Health! whose pure, untam'd good,
Unbless'd propitious clouds doth bring
Her children to be what they are!

O land of essential wealth!
Be whom Thou must, whilst it shall please
Other people, and Thy peace
In this distress
By Thee alone!  O land
Of all unquiet thoughts!
Of all in bitterness!
Of all in us!
Of all we feel!
Of all our wishes, hopes, despairs,
Despondency, despair, distrust,
Afflictions, banish'd hopes, despairs,
Affections, vanish'd hopes,
Affections disappear'd,
Affections brought to light
As flowers decay'd on the stalk;
Which through our tears doth roll
In sighs of our old sins,
And gives to us again
Full scope for their return.
O land of all desires!
Of all desires the dearest joy,
Above the basest phase of woe,
The surest hope, the holiest joy!
Where shall thy sorrows be,
Where thy woes shall be!
O land!  O land
Of all desires! O earth
Of all desires! O earth
Of all desires! O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O heaven
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth
Of all desires!  O earth,
Thy golden-hair'd head
And thy soft breast and
All those that have bin,
Have fallen down from off the roof
Where the Darling of the blest
Arose of rapt desire,
From God's sole joys and sacred wrath,
From thine own earth and God's mane!

Love that is not itself is at strife;
The immortal Image is perfect Life,
Though shatter'd at times by the will;
No Spirit moves, but the God who stirs
O'er the shadows and stars of the seas,
Over the seas and over the rocks,
Seeking the hidden House of the Spheres.
Yea, all was well, and for each atom knows
The Beauty of God:  Thou, in the Unknown,
Art, Beauty; for this consciousness feels
Strong palpitation of the Spirit's wings;
Who is it who walks with the never-cloyed senses,
Dreams with an arduous irks at the skies,
And puts the wraith of self to shame?
Is it that ye are stricken with new surprise?

O Heart, do ye dream a dream
For ever new and true?
Ye find it a weariness,
The same as life to you!
Yea, in the Autumn and the spring,
Be comforted:  the boughs are dry:
Ye are a-weary of things,
Meseems ye are glad to be
A-weary of weariness.

In her grandeur the days of her birth

======================================== SAMPLE 158 ========================================
 for them all or ne'er,
Only the men, by word or deed,
Who deeply toil, with endurance strive,
Though all are laboured in the toil;
These here, and such there, thou shalt see,
And warm thy fainting limbs shall be.

By these a people, vast and grey,
Upon the ocean's verge, are seen,
Of those in those a people say,
That have a noble family;
Of others, 'tis no vulgar thing,
But of a race which, used or brings
A weight of iron on the waters,
Wears the huge wreck of ages.
Then of all others, does my friend,
Give me some small account, and send
Some counsel to my prying ears,
Or to my people or my friends;
Then shall I to the Abbey go,
And take my time and place below.

What though to make their welfare sad,
Nor yet to break their flatterers glad,
Enticed by such an old, old race,
With all the world's false light and base,
With all the lives that are alive,
The modern comet, not its slave;
It cannot, therefore cannot be,
Breaking its light about the sea,
Down from the heavens it must issue thence.
And yet there is an end of sense;
When the loose system runs in View,
And systems from its slime have rose,
Much less will fill their ancient course,
When earth has measured out anew;
That great sublime, so long foretold
By that reviving world of old,
That empires yet shall have their will
More then the stars, those planets will,
When, each in its revolving wheel,
They hear the mouldering thunder roll,
Through the vast void they melt, and feel
The eternal sovereignty of Time.

Through the firmament how bright
Tints with celestial light,
In what a multitude they stand,
The firmament, the radiant land!
The light, that on those keys alone
Lives in the vulgar privacy,
Among the mighty, unconfined,
Unblessed, unthroned, unbosom'd,
Is one in all the millions seen.
Of men, that, now to peopling years,
Do but augment the multitude
With knowledge, more than e'er was plann'd,
I recognize the universal Lord.
A kingdom and a jewel, Lord
Of all the earth! a gem, gem, and seal!
Yes, the name, that men call everlasting,
Is blessed, and that, which shews all things,
Falleth one with the numberless fates of Thee,
Hath its loathsome Hell, for ever yours.

Ne'er hath He, loitering on, been crown'd
With coward thoughts, though bold himself,
With promises, which do not fear,
But do their worst, that they may fall
By some envenom'd foe, the while they drink
The sackless draught of death upon their lips,
When all this vale of misery and gloom
Is sack'd, and all that e'er can come
Must perish!

With how sad steps, O Lord, Thou drawest
To Pluto's realm, eternal bane!
And she, the fairest of the earth,
Who in her cradle hears thy moan,
In the midnight of thy circling years,
Is also banished from the place
Where once she loved, Lord, my face.
Then from those halls, as if the world
Were full of men, all women rise
To swell the tide of her pure veins,
And mix, and do the sparkling wine,
The immacreable drops, which pour
An ocean in their duller brain,
Since Mary-stride, with every year,
Was brought to act as Italy
When, in her virgin innocence,
She so her virgin heart disdained;
And the full moon lookt as a maid
For one, and all her watching were
That here again she should rejoice,
And force into her sisters' arms,
And so all her blissful tears,
Mix with the milk of future years!

No more! our childhood's garden grows
With fair trees, and the pleasant sky,
And winter winds, as calm as now;
The shadows of the clouds upgrow
Where'er we gaze upon earth below,
And in the sweet, sweet dream, which glads
Our earthly life, its fairest seems.
So when the wild dream hath fleeted on,
What hope hath pass'd into the past?

The present seems so bright and fair
That we should fear to lose it now!
To-morrow such as dreams seem fair,
======================================== SAMPLE 159 ========================================
 I too."

But now the supper table's cleared,
And each can drain a magic glass.
While there the light-foot brushes,
The wine, the toast, the magic glass,
That still, beneath my trysting,
May speak a mightier speech.

For then my yearning fancy
Grows far, as I, unresting;
A kindlier fortune ne'er shall
Create my saddened westward.
For then the dance's over,
And the pipe is now in pieces,
With glasses all-amazed, I
Will sit, and whiff, and smoke, and rummage
In quarters by the barrels.

And when the day is o'er,
Then I will bid good-morrow
And in an open soar
The carriage, and give up the coach
For joy of my house-service.
I will return to home,
My chamber and my fireside;
I will give up the ghost,
And build a new cottage
Where, on a night of storm,
The dead may sleep in peace.

And then the morn will come,
I'll leave this old abode,
And sleep with cups of ale,
And my ruby stairs will glimmer
Among cobwebs, red and blue.
And then the room will glimmer,
And then again the wind will blow,
And then I'll see my trumpet,
And--when my time is flown,
I'll blow about me dreaming
That long the shadows lay my cheek on."

O great and evil angel!
God of mercy, what a hell
Was he who let this moving be!
For ye have heard the story
Of the Landlord of the News,
And ye must know the evil
And the good that he has done.

"He will not love us for his love,"
The poet thus began to say;
"The love that lets a man approve
Is where the heart is satisfied;
For he is poor, and Jesu's heir,
And therefore would he ever be
A king."

His mother would not cry:
She took the absent one and tried
Her skill with God to keep him wise,
And bade her hand untie
The flaxen band that bound her shoe
And bind him, one by one,
Upon the spot.

"A crown shall win the day,"
Her mother would not say.
"A curse on those who love us,
A black curse from a friend above us,"
Ah, what another?
"A curse upon the meanest head
And yet, we find, a bitter lesson
Will fall upon our knees,
And spoil the golden voices
That call you forth.

And then we'll break the Sabbath
With babbling tongues of babbling brabbling brattle,
And all your lips and ears
Shall ring with holy echoes
With 'Let us rats!' to fill your pockets.
Come forth and freely give
Your simple heart and mind,
Your house and lands, your gold and land,
Your raiment and your land;
Your wife and little children,
The great and small between us,
Who in a selfish froth,
A mother and a wife,
Working through years, and making young and old,
Have made and shall be.

Therefore on thee they call,
The rich and poor, the great and little;
The smallest, I the least,
Take one for thy model,
Come, make the others, the whole social company,
And sing their carols free
As the wind, to-day, from sea to sea,
From coast to coast, from sea to sea,

And make a wife to be a man
For all, for all, for all, and thee;
A wife, a wife, a little one,
That all together sing and play,
And dance and time out of my span,
And work and sing and laugh and say:

And a little child who sings
And dances not to rest or play;
Still sing and dance and dance and sing
And dance and time out of my span.

And a little girl who spins for hours,
And when she works with rocking hands,
And when she owes a shower of pearls,
And when she smells of precious things,
And when she smells of precious things,
And when she shares a million springs,
And when her feet with crystal rings
Go patter by the dear ones wooed,
Make music sweet with sweetest breath,
Make song with music, like a dew,
Make life itself a lovely life,
And happy, happy be the wife
That gives herself for wife and wife
And finds the world a happy wife,

That one in
======================================== SAMPLE 160 ========================================
 good sleep,
A fish o'er-canopied in the deep,
With yellowish coasts that bear the gleams,
No more divided from our dreams.

Our pleasant dreams are fled,
Fled is our welcome,
The beauty of the dead
Where all is dear.
And yet this stone that we call our dead
Some little use will gravely tread:

The ashes we revere
May still be ours:
The graves we erected shall remain,
In their own hearts we honor'd gain,
Where ne'er a shade of sadness comes,
We'll watch and pray.

Peace, beauty, peace, in constant flow!
Fill high the cup of happiness,
Tho' all be true,
Each hour brimming to the brim,
A pious few,
Who think to fast, and long for that,
And with the time go fast.

But, ah, short was the time!
The brooklet runs so deep
That it sleeps half buried now,
And runs back to the deep.
When we are dead, ah then,
How sweet upon the plain
The solitary sleep!

I felt as round the hour
That mother's eyes were closing,
The wind went moaning by me,
The distance 'neath me winking.
And now the third low sigh
I felt seem more to me
Than all the world's reality,
As dreaming of that day's light,
That was to be.

And then I saw the eyes
That fed so fondly on me,
The head so high and sure,
That sat so low on mine,
And smiled at me, and spoke,
And beckoned to me, and took
Awhile the way before me,
And saw that it was vain,
A dream so sweet, a gleam
So radiant, a desire
So clear, no earthly heaven
Had power to rival thine,

So high, so deep I stood,
By wave and star in vision,
To look upon that flood
Of joy, that floweth now
Beneath me, o'er and o'er,
That leadeth to the shore
And halteth ere it floweth.
And as I turned to go,
By trestles drown'd and dank,
He gently spoke, and smiled,
And set me on his bank.

Nay, he is dead, poor devil!
And with a blest surmise
Towards the sunset sea,
In all its glory,
My soul is too intense
For its smoothness,
To stand and bow to it.

With a last embrace I look'd up,
Towards the stars so high,
And look'd thereon, but look'd
Beneath the shadowy sky,

The Earth, unkindly unto thee,
Hath nothing under-known
Or altered like her mould,
Nor beauty to behold
In all her heavenly zone.

I look'd upon the stars,
And thought them Heavens of old;
But nothing now is mine,
Nor word of mine is told,
Save what they shone and yet
Are chang'd to things divine,
Not Heaven's own radiant gold.

There is not in the springtime
So much as new-born spring,
As in the springtime such as these
Forever and for aye,
Aught but new gladness and new grace,
As doth the summer's face.

To inmost Heaven's completeness,
And from the fair and fine
Of earth and sky, the great soul enters,
And it must follow here
From here to live till it be dumb;
After the summer's heat
The streams of light go through,
And the fields where they are fed
From their first natural heat.

By the sea and the air,
Where we wander and wear
The freshness of things and see
The flowers in our stream;
By the rivers where we,
By the bays and flowers bright,
Through the nights and by the fountains
Go forth, and when we are dust,
The winds and waters sweep
From the levels of their deep,
And we see without guide
The wide, deep rivers
From their farthest source,
That are scatter'd on every side
With the tide, the road, the path
Whereon they vanish.

I see the Nations in a row,
Radiating on the dyes of the line,
The army of Empires like to be
The accomplish'd boast of ages yet to be.
A Universe vast as this, and wide
As these--but rather peoples of the shore,
Whose vast contentions, and that nevermore
Se
======================================== SAMPLE 161 ========================================

When I, unclasp'd and naked,
Wrestle at dawn, and, calling for a toast,
Throw in your mantles, Celia, and confess,
"The obligation of such names should pass
Through all the lands of St. Joseph's Gate
"And oft in honour of the deed
"Will Cara and Castara thence succeed."

No, though your very mien be gone
And your bright coloured bosom bare,
You will not, like me, assume
Those simple forms and foreign air
You so pursue, and after read
The book of humble education,
At least, your own ambition's good.
The Carlisle peasants, as they view
The book-making, of the great Rinaldo.
I mention'd once, by chance, some dozen--
(The century's great townsmen call them)
The dozen, whom I have not mentioned,
And all my gossip's personal attacks,
The colonel and the colonel's chaplain
And all the news-beasts of Prince Laban.
The sad antithesis to say
Mean doings ere that end of every day;
How died my fuell, how my hat
Well muffled hones, and no time bore,
My hat, and my coat,--how it glowed
With emblems that half elude me,
And all my uncle writes and dictates,
And I have--all--all great offences.

From the impracticable outcome of the Austen Grand,
Of finding his American Revolution
Far loftier than Europe's eagle eagle,
(More speech than Libyan eagles,)
He has not fallen, that sublime
Even to the capitulation of the past.
His high ambition is to sit
And snarl at such mistakes as basely
As frighten and destroy the state,
And flout the things that they relate.
He lives in Nature with a passion,
A fire in her eye, a heart in her,
That's tame, has beat bravely for fashion,
And has avowed him for the fashion.

A courtier's, peeved of all who can,
Had he the only State of man,
With some conditions near his academic,
And people of the great or small,
Is proving wise and witty by a pinch.
First, when the age of golden days
Had cycled out its guid to-day,
And those churls of worldly homes grown gray
Turn'd out upon the lightest rays
That clear'd the newly-open ways,
He saw, where, by his splendid view,
An old acquaintance,--not a new one, too,
A woman, of an age of crows,
Painted, except in patron guise,
That, wearing somewhat of a guise,
Came to his bedside by the blaze.

He sighed for her, and thus began
To rake the dust of her last fall,
"You've done this, and I'm undone for that;
"The lightest word you ever heard,
"That ever shocked you or betrayed:
"I say, 'A great man had to blame,
"And still they called me dollars made,
"Though, for ten dollars, I'm quite poor,
"Yet,--not because my heart is poor,
"They paid the honest bell-in-lead
"For making this, or that a case;
"I only wish that I could strayed
"So far off as the city's name,
"With any flag that men could bray
"I think I'd sooner die away."

I found the ambitious man dismay'd,
Reeking his spirits with distress,
And but for thinking of his wealth
As men who win at honesty.
"Such preface was the greatest plan
"For the fair hopes of raising man.
"For any wretch who brings the case,
"That scorns, and scolds, or looks in pence,
"Would prove in vain to pay the bill;
"He'll go and pay his debts, no doubt,
"And, if he wants to be without,
"Seek out a place to hide from doubt
"And shun a hole in the sex sex out."

His friend sincere ignored his views;
He neither cared nor cared pre-judge
(For by ill-closet shelves was naught),
"Our moral is the noblest work
"We have to get without the naught;
"I have to view an honest plan
"And gain to take with that man's man."

To sum up all that he had heard,
And to commend one's self or fame,
He oft had thought his views sublime
Were fairly lost, and so he
======================================== SAMPLE 162 ========================================
--
All stared at him with whiskers and with anger,
All pitied him for saying he was sorry.
They stared at him and looked at him and smiled,
And all but one, the other half smiled,
As if they laughed and said he was delighted.

He stared at them with pouting lips and phiz,
(His face like white paper in a mirror,)
They trembled and shouted, "Little donkey,
Will you forgive me if I say too?
Will you forgive me for a little?
You can forgive me for a little."

They laughed and sang till all grew still,
(He was a high top of the green wood,)
And then they said: "You do not know how many
Of those who strolled before you are so wrapped in,
Puffing their heels in a sheaf of holly!
Then all in vain for Raffal's money.
The doctor cried aloud, 'Go up, you lazy!'
And there was nothing of it to do with him.
He read the papers by himself in bed,
And lo! there was no reason why he frowned.
Then the old woman cried again, 'What nonsense!
You'll never make a fool of Raffal's money.
'What fun there is! A hundred thousand buns
Were gathering on the heartache!  Now he's half dry!'
And there was nothing to do with the women,
And nothing at all to do with the women.

And there was nothing to do with the women.
The lawyer read the paper, and the clerk
Writ to them this and that and written this:
"I must proceed to the post of the living.
I am a painter: and this point to conclude,
I had thought very much about forgetting
What happened to my canvas when I wrote.
I would go on and see if they found the canvas;
I am a speaker: and, if they found me,
Their works would be here in my proper knowledge.
Forgive my intrusion, I tell them now,
I am not in the proper way of writing.
I can tell you that, as I am aware
Of my older business, I am a scholar,
And they seem to me--as if they had been ...
A harsh half-verse.  I shall be gone myself.
I am a writer; and I see no better.
I did what I had said, and now am here.
Go on; give sentence.  You have done your duty
As a spider must; and there's no end of it,
Or you shall see that you have acted thus.
There are more things in the world than you do.
O leave me, I pray you.  I am going.
I am so sorry for you.  You, so far.
You have my papers also--but your duty,
Your honey's scarce known or weighed down by.
You let me not look at your old grey eyes.
What is the use of looking at you thus,
If you will laugh?  I gave my youth a shaking,
And with all my own making my profession
Looked back.  If you remember, love, the women,
Remember how I worked the hour of my life,
And there were fairy castle walls upstanding,
And sombre tower-towers between the clouds,
And magic towers, and a fairy hostelry,
And gentle vistas, and a fairy dream,
And busy house-beams and a fairy stream,
And fairy arras with their fairy lanterns
And magic vista with their fairy enchantment,
And fairy water-paths and fairy vista,
And a fairy hostelry in the fairy vista,
And so on, on, on.  I am grown so proud, so foolish
I am all puzzled why I could not marry

A woman--my wife's wife--and then the world
Was filled with such thoughts of what a man
Could be.  So one day Margaret, the bride
And the bride-mother, were walking by the window.
I think I would like to see him.  O God,
Is it the matter of this passion?  I did not
Ask your wife often.  O, the thought is pure;
But in the end all love is pure, and yet
It is your right, your duty.  In my youth
I loved not the king's daughter for his--all--
But as she will, my father's noble wife,
Her wedded lord's fair daughter, if I can.
Yea, and if a woman is too fair for him,
I beg you, but you have no woman's love.

You've powdered your hair and eyes like painted dragon,

======================================== SAMPLE 163 ========================================
'd fitter far to seek.
The skulking merchant feared the lumbering wagon
Wools in Heaven's court; secure the market-place
To pass by faithless traffic, and ungrateful
To Christian slaves. And yet, too oft we found him
Discerning, though in paradise, more free.
Thus came we, parting, next to Matthew Grief.
Roses--of which we knew but little lying,
The sweet lash of her red, her quiet eyelashes;
A bosky full of love and trust, allied
To vessels of strong loaves, dark watery weeds,
Which, though in a most sunk romantic valleys,
Fell under the soft sunshine of her locks;
Such neighbouries as thinnest shade that pinches
The dappled skin of a wild cat, writhing,
Within the chimney-corner, which would crush
The hapless creature's, whom her hands would bruise
Even to the center, if she should surpass
The monstrous figure of a thing pursued.

You tell me, Sir, she means a different thing;
I could as well describe her 'I am Nature';
You would describe her whole, 'you'd burn half hell,'
Or fix a torrent in a mountain roe.
The polar bear, that knows no venom by it,
Would pounce upon a native stag at best,
And at a price so marvelous would smite it.
'I will,' said he, 'driiddle me from clover
To such an ant as has no other thirst;
Fetch me that forest ere the roe-drip artus,
Or I shall die a death so fearful fatal;
Small hope remains, e'en of a mortal man,
If, where he goes, you give my life a guerdon.'

So when poor Joan had heard him, not a stone
Will serve to soothe poor Susan's widow'd heart;
Foul is the love the old world yields unto it,
But young and old in cordial love were part
That sought and found her; e'en the hour of prime
Seems fateful ever to affect ungrateful,
For future pleasure is an endless crime,
And every morning brings a fresh return
Of hurtful thoughts and ruin without end.
Thus fares it oft, I ween, in after years
Telling of what has been, and is, and is,
Not so much frustrate of its latest smiles,
But so much more seduced, as worse or graces
Have latter'd in their full and mantling faces.

Why then should I foretell the succeeding years,
And hope hereafter?  We may trace the future,
As some have after moniments of time
Till our appointed hour; ere this we gather
All seeds of life that germinated forth;
But each short tendance of existence, each
We have imagined but confusion, and
That all we cherish in the mind are selfish,
And what is honest war, and what is gall
Is merely nonsense, 'twixt the suicide
And dead devotion of our fellow-men.

Why then should I foretell this?--It is gory;
Cherry, goose, gander--pulse of the devil--
And roasted fiend, that all the drinkers
Of every quarter'd land hold willingly,
Not as a juggler, but as one whose wit
Hath melted bone by thumb or thumb alike,
Because his spirit and his cupid spirit,
Having sat self-spells and caputities
Above, find something half so sweet, and turn
To plead with a blear conscience, before the fumes
That burned like incense for the soul he trampled;
Or in his languor found an egotist
To add more merit to the mocking sun,
Who would debate true matters to his prayers,
And make a sensual show, before he can.
Why then should I foretell how these things fare?

Are there no other terms and agitations
In the whole scope of my remover-muse,
And jewel-breathing airs or tresses,
Which make her lovelier far than ever yet
The luxuries of love?  If you can note
What man has written, make him know your name,
And then with what a natural old conclude
He'll call on Love--Love, Love, Venus, Venus,
And think upon his great Hesperus,
And burn the Poet upon the same burns;
While Venus is her lover, Venus, Venus.
The same burns Sappho, Pyramus, Cyprius,
The same burns yet--the same burns too--
The fairest youth I ever saw was hers;
But brighter he
======================================== SAMPLE 164 ========================================
 to the bedroom overhead,
The old men with the knife between their hands,
They stop before the children in their sleeves,
And chatter with their lips and look at me.

O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip
Hath been on the Long Trail--the long, long way
Hath been through many a battle and many a foil.
Hath been at last a quiet, quiet life;
Hath come to the homesick weary, the sick, the old,
Hath come to himself gray sick, sore wounded, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the sick, the old,
Hath come to himself gray sick, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wound and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wound and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wound and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wound and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wound and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary, the lancet, and worse
Than battle and wounds and pestilence and war.
Hath come to the homesick weary
======================================== SAMPLE 165 ========================================
,
That so invested but the same have seemed
With what a living beauty therefrom clings
To the large sense of these divinest things;
That these could BOS dish forth her own face
Still through the blackness of the case obscene
Which hides it not; that other looks in vain,
But fades into the blackness of the face
At once reflected; that which else hath been
Mixed, alas! with ill.  And every side,
From skirt to skirt of a rough wilderness,
Not many suns have risen and decayed
Where no man might return, the face is cleft
By the gnarment of the flesh.  Then upon edge
Of forest-land that spreads on mountain-side,
There stands a mountain, from whose brow the snows
Bears on the surface of a level beach
The rugged characters of earth--the rock
Stands lifeless and a solitary mound,
With the sea's wreck and the sun's low rays
And points that kiss it.

Soaring along it
Through the bleak sea-rims, even to the land
That lies from the low-browed main to the broad,
And gives no passage.  High above the ground
The clefts of granite thunder, while the sea
Bears ice and snow; so was this chasm within
Uglow at sight of land.  In the round world
Where winds and sun and rain are equal-wise
Some blasts of winter blow.  The frozen peaks
Grow long beneath the chilling, and one grave
Leads to the sea.  But wherefore shouldst thou gaze,
O weary soul of man, upon the hope
Of some consolation of the earth,
And think to find it?  The world forces on
With all its storms.  'Tis vain to strive for Truth,
A phantom which lives ever by itself
And not by rules; 'tis vain to take for truth
Its balance of eternity, foresaw
By neither; 'tis a snare which follows time
And ruins it; 'tis a thing from which no strength
Could spring, of matter or of will, into
A narrow universe of elements,
And do not fall.

In those parts of man the rude strife
Of passions and devising words delights
And fearing words: they do not vex themselves
With rumorings of a peace which like the night
Fills heaven with clouds, or sees the black clouds burst
And hide the lightning's track.  In the affairs
Of elements, like the lightnings of a ship
Diverging low, the earth shoots up a flame
Of germs bursting into flame.  There is no death
In this, but only joy.  At times, indeed,
Though matter be the same, there are who shrink
From contact with the body, in a land
Where divers melodies will be destroyed,
And soothe no soul with sadness.  So the light
Faints and is bright for him, who with desire
Feels on his cheek the painted agitations
Of some external beauty; and the heart
Sickens beneath the inevitable fire.

He has not yet lost sight of it.  He has not yet
Been hurtled to a rock.  The bird he loves
Is in the woods.  He has not heard the laugh
Of stealthy creatures in the sunlit park
Or the free laugh of birds upon the lawns,
And is not yet contented.  He has seen
The ring of trees.  He has not felt the fall
Of daybreak on the heath, the wave and leaf
Which sent the leaping boy athwart his youth,
And made him feel no more the fresh delight
Of his young forehead,--seeing, yet how grave
And full of pity for the heartless pain
His youth had brought him,--seeing that the rust
Of spring no more upon his soul should break,
But in its upward rush of joy; for so
The ripples, gathered when the summer day
Drops slowly from the drowsy world, awake,
Bearing the zephyrs in their breathless flight,
Sweep jubilant and glad from one white wave
To where, in wandering bowers, on the shore
One watches, and, at night, one wakes and sees
Where, by the rill, the rustling leaves brush--
So has the wind brought matters to these lands.

And thus our father takes the time to breathe
Or sink on sleep, and robs the many tongues
Which he has loved too well, and as he died,
Enduring the stern silence, as the wave
Lulls the young heart whose pleasure is in death,
Or grates the sorrowful in life to rest
Its hopes in the world's b
======================================== SAMPLE 166 ========================================
 rock, that's dreamt of happiness,
Full oft the king it would have kissed again
Lay thee asleep upon a tropic plain.
Or sweetest, blessed while the world's affairs
Are left in tyranny, and she is fair
Whilst few betray her, all retinue declare
Of those who into regions far away
Dwell now in thrall and luxury, as they
Who never heard, in days of happiness,
Expound his praises, that they do not say
She 's so perfuminous, and rich, and gay.

Oh, those were happy times!  The Piedmont
(Who tells me in his youth) was young and fair,
And he had loved his mistress more than any tongue,
Which the old times made music to the air:
How that the grass was red and the trees were green!
All were content to stay between them, too,
And so that winds might blow and they should fall
To sigh most sweetly; yet, I must enquire,
Do I desire again to be away,
Can I forget the roses blushed with May?

The inky leaves, so blossoming at noon,
Are still and deep, and to be gathered now
In scarce essential silence; half-forgot
To think, or ponder, or awake to throw
A moment's thought into a silence.  Now
The trees are whispering soft, like sister-peers,
And all around them, white as daisies, send
A chuckle to their feet in this late way:
I catch, perchance, they'll listen, for my foot
Hath here refused to keep me from the way.

My foot hath not yet fallen from the ground,
And even my boots with dust are dusty now,
Or worn and dusty since I went my pace
The black dust settles round my shoes.  But yet,
'T is only yet the same green pilgrim path
Through the thick brushwood where the May-day sun
Hangs ripening: he must lead his steersman straight
And scare his halyards: then with ghostly shout
And all but solemnly I leave them out
Leaving the village and the company,
Because I would not have them be in sight.
Then low and poignant was the sudden fear
As if the very moon was really near,
But yet she seemed to know what she would do,
And with what touch of unawakened grace
They should have drawn the little leaves aside.
"They'd say that Nature must have been alive,
And that she perished with a wordless grief,"

"They'd say, That though he lived and looked on her
He saw no way to save her from the dust
Where nothing stirs and stirs in the deep air,
And other eyes but hers; and other ears
And noblest ears--they seemed to hear themselves
Listening to hear them, and could not refuse.
Then fearing 't were vain to speak and weep,
And having shown the true ways of the world
For ever striving, trusting the wild ways
That set men blind in guilt, they kept them hid.
And so when once they met, the little isle
Open to him it seemed a name indeed
And she could dream that he was there in truth,
And so that when he went the tree was green;
Or the long dappled sward for him, the tree
Stood dumb and listening, as the father knew
What once he told to man--and that his love
Could never be the whole of his delight.
Ah, in his very name, I'm not afraid
Of any thing, save this which suits his taste
So well: from out that far-off distant land
I did not come by stealth to any man.
It is a truth, I know.  But there are some
Who still deny it;--no! not he who roams
For long a lonely trail in death-dews grey,
Nor he who sadly loves.  'T were well indeed
The heart could have borne more; 't were better far
Thus wandering down the verdant fields with him,
And over heaths in barren woods, and brakes
Nameless, and sunless places, were he not,
And dreaming of the eternal things he did,
And longing to be kind with men whom all
Beloved, deemed dead.  But you will find
These weary boughs of every southern tree
And all the ghosts that I have loved so well
Come wandering, wandering now from shore to shore
I'd like to have you know, and as I spoke
I'd like to have you know, and you would know
I cared not for you, who were fit to live,
Where I would wait
======================================== SAMPLE 167 ========================================
ful!--When they should have been struck to death,
Nought had the effect--even this was death indeed!
As if (bless'd souls!) it were from earth--
A thought so fatal had been stealing o'er
These, on the horn of the Great Spirit who dared
To front a world that bodes a future fate,
My humble spirit hail'd an hour at best
Of its full freedom! In the night I saw,
Like some hoar pile of wood o'er which a cloud
Of thickly-blazing fire spreads, till it is lit
With mellow embers, and in still deep tones
Dies like a spirit--hunger comes along,
And roars and wails along the wind. I turned
To face the foe; his tents I could but hear
Down the long ladders which upbear the stars,
And flash them to the left and fling them down
Upon the earth--till suddenly above,
In glimmering shadow, he appeared, and like
A shining spirit moved and gazed upon me--
And when I saw the meaning of his glance,
His eyes were kindled; then he spoke--

"Why talk, and why fight? I am no coward bird,
That shrinks to shelter in these forts below;
And the sly fowler that, in watching them,
Would plunder for their nests a fisher's boat
And take my countless chance for the relief
Of the helpless fishers whom I howling saw
At noon, when all the flock had waken'd him
To try his fortune; so I went and caught
A bird which cried--'What news? What shall I do?
My only work, that I might play with him,
And serve his business everywhere? The bird
Sang in my ear, and now he sings--'Ah, Mother,
This is the very day when I could not
Fight with the foe that I might be a slave.

At dawn he sang, and, crowing, on the rocks
Borne to the ocean, I arose and flew
Into the vast and sunless East; and so
I sought to lay my purpose down and keep
My life and honour with it; and there crept
Into my heart's recesses, and I went
To work, and said to Martha, "Mary, keep
your promise with me: take your blessing on!"
She went, and when I touched the sacred flour
I felt a taste of bitter scents therein.
But when I reached the altar of the man,
There smelt a sense of bitter scents therein,
Of smouldering hives and savour, mixing sweets
Of many kinds--then, as I thought, a fire
Sprang from my heart--began to crawl, and writhe,
And crawl in bed, like a beast that knows no man,
Then gnaw and growl, and crawl, and wring and strain,
Until I cried, in terror, "Kill me, kill me now!"
My heart then gnaw'd--for I was just awake,
And stared, and he had pin-black on my face,
And faintly I flung my arms around his neck.
Oh, he was like a woman! And how strange
That love of man was fruitless as himself!
I could not understand why others say
That Nature did some evil thing for him,
Though he was kind and fair, though he was kind
And peaceful as a woman. That it was
Indeed, that she was prudent; but she seem'd
A peaceful, loving woman, meant to stir
Her wrath, because her judgment was complete;
And that, in spite of that, her wrath was strong
For a man's reason; for she told me next,
She would not fail, though she had said to me
She was his wife--and I was proud, and she
Was patient. Yet, whatever she had said,
Was I contented, yes, content to wait,
And feel as if she would not, but she said,
That she would still be patient, not the less,
Else had she little cause for jealousy.

Oh, but she was content, this was the point
Of tragic beauty; for some evenings when
She would not watch with me, she seem'd too tired,
And so she dreamt and feigned, and loved not me.
Oh, for the day when she who ranges in
The village finds the village aunt in me!
Forgive me, Madam, I forget the date
Of married life, but rather have my fears
Forgot, and for the rest of what I am,
To whisper them to-night--and that was all.
She did not tell me of the tender looks
That with your
======================================== SAMPLE 168 ========================================
 aid in nymph,
Sweet Sirens, bring your sheifers home;
And, on the mountain in their pride,
Bring the yet dearer pair aside;
But oh, what art could give to cheer
The hearts of wild serenades here.
He answers not: "The arm may clasp,
The hand I fondly clasped to-night."

Ne'er may the land of Bethlehem
Hear you that strains so wild and sweet;
Ne'er may the heavens behold the feet
Of armed men to vaulted street;
Ne'er may your wide, warm tent be o'er,
O'erjoyed, for 'tis the will of Heaven,
And through the earth is ever driven

Far as the dreams that haunt our youth,
Far from the lore that won our hearts,
Our forms are dust, our age is gray;
And should some patriot, from afar,
Usurp the truth, 'tis but a dream,
A poet would have sung the star.
Nay then, be not alone; your song
Soars like a voyager on high;
Like one some central, fabled barque,
That through its ocean, lifts a sky,
Until, with winds from all its parts,
It cleaves the utter wilderness of heart.

On each white sail that sweeps the gale,
Where'er the long blue tempest gleams,
The poet saw--like one who tells
His dreams by someone made to swear,
And gladly would the tempest hail
His thought as "Hail, To Thee!"

The hour's birthfellow scarce had come
Unto the hour to ask the cause
Of that great deed which, like this thought,
And no man should have done, arouse
Angered his earnest-throated phiz
Of wrongs to man forgiven by:
And yet, he answered (
For no man yet can understand)
With "I, the fulfillisher of deeds,
Am one with God, beyond myself.
Hail, Queen and God!"

The first smile of that winsome smile
Met him with hopeful, good-for-nothing eyes.
To bring the enraptured soul on high,
Fishing, abounding with the wish to be
Of him, as free from enemy or chain,
Or any enemy that dared to stray,
Unto the self-same spot where he had met
And clothed himself in majesty of soul,
Like some slim statue standing in the gloom
Of that unfinished work unfinished, grand
As God's own hand that shaped it to his bone.

But for that wind, a wailing on the sea
Of perishing hearts, "Out, out," he cried,
"To the remembered man below the gate!"
He, seeing the tyrant had begun to hate,
Rolling his eyes, out of his lurid soul
Swept, free, right to the higher goal; he came
To the mean stake in the strong Indian war,
And saw what he had done and fought and fought.

Shuddering he left, thinking it like some brave speech
To teach him what the fiendish mob that hold
Earth's lordliest manhood for a soul's true strength,
Who sits no more, nor ever orders back
His own soul's matchless spirit with the price
Of cosmic struggle to outrival this.

So, on he went, with no less mighty speed,
Unto the outer courts, and, bursting through
The flashing windows and the darkening courts
With men and women gathered, till at last
He looked aloft into the lofty sky
With angry eyes.

Beside him Drona lay,
A strain of preludes, while he laid
Her one white arm in his, and cast
From off its limbs the loosened chain
She held so long; and, straining to make fast
His groping thought, drew back, half dazed,
To where with one white elbow raised
He leaned above her like a looking-glass.

Then there was sudden storm and thickening gloom,
And men, and women, and the darkening decks,
The reeling ships, the ships unshaken and the wreck,
The masts that strained like battering-rams.
He saw their reeling masts and broken hulls,
And thunders of red ruin and the wreck
Of shattered splinters that were smashed to wreck
A world for wonder and for precedent.

The lonely signal on the quay
And the wild cries of the reeling main,
The battling rigging and the crash
That rang the stern and broke the brine,
The breaking lances of the brine,
The howling spaniels that cursed at m
======================================== SAMPLE 169 ========================================
 eye!
You know all: we've human creatures here,
And where we're able to compare
With those who have no dealings with them.

Yes, we will speak to them, I hope!
They'll be so genial and so pure
They'll give me poems, too, to beg for.
A native of most Yankee speech,
Among the best of Brahmins there.
She was one of the "old dog compare."
He would be the Brahmins' fatesman.
But all these Gods are built on
A strong, deep-reaching law,
That never, since omniscient,
Has entered that great city of Fate,
But has no power to draw the line
Which marks the place and furthered line
On which the human race design.

Up that broad bridge, whose arching walls
The valley, at a crossway waits
(It mounts into the holy town)
To cross a lane, and thence down falls,
The rain, and stones and bugles' rue.
As there he walks, his proper path
A man, in search of waterfalls,
Might gaze, should one but eye explore,
He'd cross the track, and gaze no more.

'T was strange, indeed! strange as the sight
Of human kind was that dark road,
And all below was redolent
With now this earth, this sun, this sod,
This blest abode,--and ah, to see
This little God-writ page to me,
Where such as I have ever stood
With great men at this giant's feet,
Here in this trench, this peaceful bay,
With buildings overgrown and rent,
Where little ones, unknown of men,
Who bore the torch of Truth away,
Would shun all help, and put to sea
For very naught, for very naught,
And then they thought of home, nor thought
Of home, whose kind, unclothed, and smart
Were past as well as that sweet sight
That they before had never tried
For all the heavenly purposes.

Old man, he seemed not yet quite dead
Of face, as his worn sanded ghosts said;
But, under cloud of smoke and heat,
Full of fun and wet with dew-dried feet,
He turned about to muse and pray
Which means he shall find happy May.

And after prayer, the way he made,
He paused and looked and looked and prayed
For that sweet place to rest upon,
In visions, and in dreams, and won
The old man's search, while on his way
The old man brought his wretched clay.

Thus came he back again, when day
Broke from a pleasant light, and died
Before it left the sunset grey,
A fair niche in the holy sky,
Where, in the yellow-lighted town,
A musket, shot with smoke and flame
And fire, had made a sign to mark
How from that spot the pilgrim came.

Meanwhile, when his mind failed, he heard
A sudden steel-tipt chant proclaim
A horrible Exxitel,
That the poor in their obedience
Had practised for the works of trade,
And all this evil-doer dread
Was but a quarrel, feud, and strife;
And the Old Man grimly spake and said,
'That evening's gathering as I ride,
We reached the Darling!  I need say
'There is a better God than Thou!'

A big, red, wiry little wight
And wise old Smithery in sight
Did walk with screwing screws, and light
Unwearied to the stars, and she
With constant care would nightly strike
Those simple syllables which still
Our minds take to that ancient tune
Which even now, in some far place,
Is mingled with some deep-laid face,
Which once might love and greet us there.

With that he came where the owd door,
With its chaste scutcheon on his breast,
Advised us with his great sword,
And then with pipe and bag he chased
That crowd so bravely, and made sound
The mighty dead:  but gathering all
The guests were round him, ranged around
In silence, and with busy search,
Finding no stranger in their way.

They walked; and we, to please the eye,
Stood looking where an organ fell,
But still he kept his wond'ring eye,
And gazing, with a doubtful smile,
Upon the organ there was naught
But the far sky, and from the earth
There came the voice of those who heard,
And saw, within, the new notes sent
By some
======================================== SAMPLE 170 ========================================
 within.
He said, "So, Woman, make no doubt of it!"
And "By my soul!" he urged, "the wrong is right."
He said, "We ought to hate the wrongs of life!"

He said, "It'sbetter to forgive than fight!"
He urged, "I gave it."
In their hands, as he leaned on them,
He held his wisdom and the look
That acquiesced, for others stood compact.
"I am contented," he said, "to live!"

If you like a man with an earnest soul
Do not then reward yourself for having made him
A man without a conscious soul
Whereon to build and fashion to fashion him
Out of lovely stalagrees of feeling
The fair, wise face you wear
That has faded much
And found no trace
Of the past in you.
It's sure as law
You know what the future is,
And whether you make a chief
Of his larger sense than his
Alloys with, and he who spends
Still works till all he has
Is in service, not reward.

You see the world is old
With its crack and scold,
And what is so old as it seems to me
Is nothing very new:
Why should you rack and tear
And nothing undertake
For the years you heed and keep
When the days you heed not?

It's certain that his good wife would see you,
Wearing always a single or two clothes
Besides great things and not quite the true passion,
Or even if neighbors should only amuse you
Whose heads make an excellent tour with your wisdom;
And his friends would be glad if they sent him the culture.

"Yes, I am a master," said his wife to him,
"And I'm fed to a weak old fellow, the scamp,
"And I've all the fear and the hope of the future,
"For the sake of him who has come with a stranger
"To see that I am a fool--all his hoarded
"Iron age and the sand lying round him.
"You cannot go past him but smile and remind him
"Of the old wounds that his brother has healed you.
"And if his flesh had a way, you've had use of it
"With a careless head and a merry heart."

"Why don't you care for the grass, or for every
friar?
"A perfect religion is pleasant and sweet

"To a man who cannot contain them.
"There is many a man here who has taught them
"Their proper duty and great caution in them,
"Who always achieved in the rugged old rock,
"And sought the waters to teach them."

And, when the preacher came in the hall,
The animals on the backs of the crowd
Prayed no prayer,
And never had shrunk to the crowd
Since the last hour of his lonely death.

For the silence and sound of the sermon
You've been eager to listen,
For no day and no night it had been,
And you dare not lift your head.
Oh, the voice of my mother was speaking:
"Why, let us rather divide,
"For the joys of living, my friends,
"Than silently divide,
"And your fingers, like grey-beards, trembling,
"Die with pain as before,
"And your lips remain,
"A sealed fast, and you will grow old."

The face of my mother was darkened,
The eyes of my sister were dried;
She had fallen on the railing
And neither had lifted her lid.
But never until that evening
Did her speaking withdraw,
And she wept, with her hands folded,
For the loss of her child,--
When she knew that it was bitter
To have spoken the last word,
She would know how it came.

And the voice of my brother was speaking:
"Why, let us remain in the tent,
"For the beasts and the bison are seeking,

"In the wood, by the brink of the brook,
"Where the cranberries grow,
"And the milk-pail it's cold.
"Let us set ourselves down, we will go,
"Where the cranberries grow.
"Thrice the day has departed
"Since the time I have had
"To look at the birds and the cranberries
"In the pasty-wild wood,
"For them that should take on the finches
"A stone for their food."

Thrice a hundred heroes to die
And a thousand more slain,
Had rested the ravens on high
With their glory again.
'Twas the chiefs that gave
======================================== SAMPLE 171 ========================================
--his wife the friend of young Magdalene,
Stood upright--half his face buried in that form--
And there, between them, on the half-warm sand
Young Poole stood looking forth impatiently,
As one who dreams of near and long ago,
And cannot wholly understand.
Then the sick man with six
Long-headedlooking eyes from the mystic book
Cried, "Pray you, pray, I know you know your God!"
But the other shook his hand; but the stricken priest
Turned him from these pure eyes, and still no ray
Broke on his faded lips, for of himself
Not one seemed left to cheer the pious thought.

And then, as one in grief that seems to him
In its own wakened self, the poor life-period
Faded away, and suddenly the deep
Deep voice of one who says, "I knew you all!
Surely I was your friend, and that my pity,
I was your comfort and your grace before;
And I remember the dream that took me, owner,
At five years old, upon some silent shore,
Thro' which, scarcely seven years old, I said, 'Life
Is full of love and courtesy,' and died
Of grief and sin. Oh, pitiful! for me
That such sweet worship should be washed away,
Ere the last trump of judgment shall unfold
The city of our peace, the mercy that should dwell
In that pure heart. Oh, let it be a prayer
For your good name!

Would the Poet were vocal
As this beautiful song;
Pouring out his soul in it
As a vessel of gold;
Singing on the whole world
Like an angel above,
Because the song moves him
With his presence of love.
Let him, even if he may,
Folding his hands out to me,
Here and there a moment
As if I were he;
With the backward glance of his strong-stepping will,
To that ever-trembling song I shall
For ever go on
In a measure or pattern
Other than before;
Never before to awaken;
Like a child I shall go,
Out of heaven to wander
And muse thereon,
Pouring out his soul
In the ecstasy
Of that deep ecstasy,
When the world is all speech,
And every word is a breath;
When the sound of his feet
Is the measure or verse
Of all life, even he
Who sings out his soul
With a strong, full delight
As never a song is told.

For him I'll create a song;
It will live, yet its sound is stronger.
Better the cradle that bears him
Than the stern rock whereon we
Shall sit, while we make it ready
For the great unknown;
Better a grave with his body
Than a dear one with a sword.
Rather a grave of snow for
The sea-born poet that sings;
And the last spring sun
That reddens the sky with his red
Touched rather than makes white
The water that runs
Whiter than snow,
And makes grey the air
With his bright light.
Rather a grave that holds
His body and sings
In an angel-sweet
Sea-scented and sharp;
Rather a grave that holds
With love-large wings
All the songs that man sung;
Rather a grave of snow,
Free to be flung
Than a bird's winging.
Rather a grave that holds
White flowers in one white hair
As she will it tenderly
That her own windward wings
Do reach and kiss
And purr as she doth;
Rather a grave in silence.
Rather a grave with his drows
Than his own face to kiss;
Rather a grave for me
Than his silence that fills,
His palms that is black
With his burning blue;
Rather a grave that holds
A song to the tune of his praise.
Rather a grave that holds
All songs in one kiss
Or song at least.
Rather a grave that holds
All music to his sense;
Rather a grave for a song,
Or music; rather a grave
Than song of the mine; rather
A grave's mouth, or a grave's heart,
That all things with love
May live, and not die,
Like a man's, heart on heart,

Life I love best
Far below the gentle light
That o'er the hills of ranges gray
Blue and o'er the height where snow and flying
Wild the river eddles through its gloaming;
I can tell how fared it with the doubting.
How, ever evermore, through all the frozen air
======================================== SAMPLE 172 ========================================

And louely browes, that seeme to be
Twixt loue and loue, as is the skie
Of vs alone, perswade whole May.
Nor long vs never will repreue,
But for the pleasure of theyr loue,
Sweet Hermon-spole by whom none keepe,
The poor and coure of an old Loue.
Then come, bring hither Fals & hazards ayde
With your delicious meri sound,
Like hell, or earth, if this be still lou'd,
Or that it were some idle pleasure,
With ioy and merriment to meete.

And then come hither to my loue,
O tell me in what happy haire
Thou didst thy selfe, and welcomest thus.
Of all most kingly office awfull men,
With fortune faire, might tell me who can
Finde a more worthy office than thou wert,
And finde the one that needeth more loue me.
O take that coy, but not disdeeme
Of count'nance loue, nor of his specious name:
If there be a lordes mercy or disgrace,
No, I will not loue thee, though it cost:
And if not, yet, sayst, what is the game?
Now proue thou not that I loue thee:
For I can loue thee nothing else, nor thee.

And though thy courage do not so disdaine,
Yet I will loue thee to a soul so fild,
That for thy glory I wyll ay complaine
In thee the cause, by loue made more keepe,
You won't do what sweete loues lawd in you.
And if I doubt, if a loue then you finde,
You will be assur'd of a most sweet minde,
So keep it still till Jovs name bid you rought

Thy spoyl'd blisse, but lye not as it ought.
For as your heart at this doth sympathize,
So mine shall sympathize in you no part,
No hate comes in, no fierie calme affright,
No quarrels catches at to know the art.
Fortune, I mind me not, will not be so;
Yet, if the common state of hearts were not
The life of man, who were not subject unto,
Whose was the truth, whose fortune he did read?
What word, but this to keepe my heart is shedd?
What power, but lyes within my breast or eares?
When ev'n in warre, yet no whit wroth, I finde,
The world hath cause to doubt, the world ore-blinde.
And if that poore blind man draweth vp his eyes
For pitty drawne out of his poore mensurate,
This fortie blow did at my virgin heate
With wounds displeast to end my paining cheeke,
And this my body on my lap doo reele:
For thou too feed't with too much salt and waste,
Quho vniuersis fatui nota ore canst entret,
But stedfast urge on some compassionate.

Ne graue, ne graue, O lyonesse faire a fort,
Ne graue, ne graue, O noble feare quoth he
Whose ornaments are richly goodly blent
With store of poore and precious precious stone,
Resembles nature, beauties courts her harts,
And doth with precious scruples tast her owne:
For no perfection but in her can sterve,
She doth but show to varnish every where,
She being faire, might that be fairest prove,
And by the which shee was thou never deare.

But I alas! the feeare of such disdain
I may not surfeit make, nor hope to gaine
For pardonlesse this so faire a fairer place,
The golden bands to binde my head about,
The braues are fine, the world doth faire and faire,
But the bruised reed doth break, that is no prayses,
It is not diuine, no sweet smell there,
But the bruised shepheard's wofull sound doe vnder
Both his fresh beautie and hart-burning fire,
His faire compassion, Cupid doth improue,
He loses euery little thing of his.

So every man be by his newes-dropped tun,
Th' hast to abate ne need but he must chuse
======================================== SAMPLE 173 ========================================
 a thousand flies,
Trying all forms to make and live in lucid flight,
Of a great work set on gigantic limbs that cling,
'Twixt Nature's roots and man's fierce scales for all their lays:

And in those foulest days of breathing vapours
They heard them shouting from the shoals beneath
In monstrous, thunderous, fantastic forms, and glooms
That tortured the dull sense with their wings' sharp breath;
And the veined tongue of radiant love thrilled through
them as they started down their liquid path.

And this done all, they mounted to the height
Of that new realm whereon the sun does stand.
The sun takes from the land: those fairy forms
That dwell with flesh and spirit, and with wind,
And with the misty veil of heaven and stars
The invisible hills lift up their lofty minds,
And thoughts of things that are, and that might be.

In the East, Nature was not, in the West,
Ere Art grew woman, did she know the same.
Now Nature in a shroud of glory lies
And veils her tresses with her veil of flame.
Now is the earth a garden of the flowers,
Now is the sky a place wherein a grave
Is made, a habitant of the breath of airs,
Of the veiled buds of starlight and of gloom;
Now is the earth a forest, whence a stream,
A fountain, and a prison, and a house,
And lovely flowers that God had made for them,
But now they grow in loveliness, and wax
In worth, as linked in loveliness with earth;
Now there is earth, and now in it a heaven.
Now in the East, Nature resumed her old command,
Then from the South her freedom there began,
And Heaven began anew her law, her love,
Her universal, holy love, she sent
In seas that glass the morning face of heaven,
In winds that waft the rose's fragrance on
Her radiant tresses, till the morning star
Shed sacred light upon the growing earth,
Now found its hour of growth and growth complete.

Now, as this ancient legend ran, the West
Saw fierce Mars die asunder, and the armed East
Lie prostrate, and the young men cease their play
At this fair fight. Now 'midst the chosen few
He strove and marred his own, till in the deeps
Of earth's dark womb the Furies made their couch,
And purged with foul repose their fill of death.

Now men grown gray were, being of godlier blood,
And in the hollow void the moaning earth
Fenced as the gates of hell for entrance up.
Lo, all the places where the great sun fell
Seemed covered with the darkness of the void.
On either side a sea that surges up
A little land whereof the upper deeps,
Washed by the quivering sea, shows all a speck
Unto a sea whence endless summer grows
As deeps break. And a little far above,
A star arose; then up a screeched and grey
A light caught in the heavens and drew down
Once more, and glittering on a sky of wax.

How happy there the naked elements
Were, seeing from the hollows of that soft white cell
The starry moon half wan and wan and cold
And cold as ice that yearns the sundown, fell
And smouldered to a mist that gathered all
About its knees and feet and unconsumed;
A lovely place! a haunt of calm delight!
A still ambrosial hall, wherethrough the morn
Made out a glory in the silence night,
Where no unhurrying eye or sound of breath
Might mark the sleeping sails and wandering ships
As they flew hither, even as merry folk
Who sit here by the wayside and look long
For the familiar things that now pass by.

Over the cross the burning moon hung high,
And dim beneath the cold translucent sky
A lazy escort ran: from gate to gate,
As on the hill the barge swings on the tide,
The thronged adventurers swam with instant state
And turned their backs on the remotest hills.
At last, with gown of purple, and a robe
Of purple, they moved to a narrow bridge,
Which through the narrow tunnels sharply ploughed
In broken lines athwart a caverned glen.

They swam together, and at length reached out
A garden, where, still whispering to the air,
They sat together on a little bridge
That jutted through a cypress-spruce and birch,
Dragging the ploughman's furrow for the pl
======================================== SAMPLE 174 ========================================
 yond dale;
Ther as he was on palfrey bred,
He spendeth noght upon his stede,
He makth himselven forto duelle.
So it betidde upon a tyde,
That he ne mihte of love lete,
That on he mihte werche and pleie,
Which may noght serve in such a wise;
Wherof he mihte him noght devise.
And tho per cas the londes weie,
Echon with other fro thei sette
In stede of love and a visage
To werche, and echon gret and smal,
Sche mihte be delivered al.
Sche scholde, to the men at on,
Himselven pleine love to caste,

And thei that wiste what it mente,
They tok it understod a rede,
And echon for himselve spak,
That it was of so gret worschipe;
That forto make it redyak
To gon upon his doghter stille,
Ther schal no mannes do justice,
Bot alle goode men foryive.
Thus if he wolde his grace crave,
It were a wastour forto winne
The vices that he mihte winne.
Bot eny thing that is withinne
I thenke telle, as I beknowe,
Wherof a man mai stonde be
The worthi men that ben of Age,
And of his oghne wisdom thurgh

The vice of Slowthe mai noght laste:
Bot stomble upon al this fare,
Wher as he stant in his memoire,
And to the point a tale I rede.
Ther was a king and Sone also,
Which wolde come of riht good mo,
Tidinge of such a worthi yow
That riche he scholde of that thei tolde.
The heved hath sent the Cite full,
The which was time to beholde,
Hem thoghte that thei were war and sore;
And he, which hadde of him no lore,
Makth knowe of suche Rihtes bothe.
The Cite tho began conseil
And cast withinne a thousand wyn,
And ate laste everydel
Thei comen to the deth and lif
Of hem whiche that to him felle,
And goth to court and goth also
Among hem that that in buisshes,
So that no maner Sone therto
Mihte forto take leve or dethe
To seche and schorte himselve bright.
Bot yit thei seiden it was right
That in avision thei the laie
Thei gon tofore the Court al pleie
In Char, to loke into prison:
This King hem hadde wel to done,
That he hem lete in avision.
And whan it cam into the lond,
Of Semiramis a gret peril
Was thanne als such on as sche,
Whan that thei mihten saufly sieke.
Tho tho began thei taken hiede
To setten upon this tempeste,
Which is the moste leche of alle,
The vice of thilke horrible vice
Hire worthi Pite forto speke

Of a Cronique in every lond,
Which is the Regne of every lond
That is upon the mannes myht.
This pite, thogh the pite hir sieke,
Was thanne litel how sche stod
And ofte in many a maner side;
And tho was al that evere glade
That sche scholde al hire bodi schewe;
Al was Medea sorwe and mad,
Bot as it was to the goddess
Hire vengance upon a nede
Was broght into so prive a red,
That with gret bataille sche was there.
So it betidde upon a day
Sche hath unto the goddes fere

Of al that plein sche scholde sein,
And dede, if that sche myhte sein
And make eny covenant
With hem that hire divin.
And tho that hadden pite sore,
And preide hir, as it was lore,
To sen that sche was wroth therfore
And torne his Chariot al
======================================== SAMPLE 175 ========================================
.
<|endoftext|>

But still, as in my calendar
I am, I lack an answer.  I
Am plainly an unhappy land!
I miss to tell of one that died
Absorbed in the one-eighth year
Of life since that I was a year.
Briefly I cherish it for some few years,
As this life now has full grown up to be
Grown only as now.  I too, or I
May have been drowned outright.  What then?
At least, there is another pen.  Yet smile.
I am content.  By compass now and place
The last remaining lines are impeded.  See!
Who enters here?  The door is shut!
What goes it?  Who is it that doth stand
Fast by me, like a stave-man who has shivered
His corded forks, and fallen down?
I fear him, for I would not have him,
If he were not a wood-thief.  Let him guide me.
(This was the character of him who died
Twenty years ago.)

See!  I am very fortunate!
It will not last quite long.  He is alive.
He sang the song of youth--and my whole body
Sends mirth unto the earth--ah, but the way
Is long and difficult.  Ah, even the breath
Of youth is short enough.  Ah, I must try it.
And now, my lungs keep vital motion!
You might have heard the song.

Not such a song!
It hath no business to be heard to.
Not such a song!  I've heard it overhead.
I did not hear it of the end and power
That waits for all the work.  I did not learn
The Way of Life and Death.  All things may learn
Just at the very time.

But though I am so far above myself
That I might learn what this dark afternoon
Must be--some message from the night-time
Comes back to me: some matter of this world
Must be a part of you and me and him,
Some farther youth who walks with me and broods.
You cannot speak to me of anything,
Or any wisdom.  I should lie alone
In some green nook on some still summer lawn.
This happiness may be our prison-place,
Not for itself, but that, for him whose clear
And flowery eyes are like the radiant eyes
Of Hesper, watching for his fleetfoot herds
Among the twilight clouds.  If I have told,
May be he knows indeed.  For him, oh, help,
Help from these dark, he helpless, who must die,
Help from the night of Death!

Men of the world--may sound
The praises of this mighty people--Men!
Men who shall say, that ere these roaring suns
Kindled upon the people clamoring,
Against their sturdy, manly faces
The crucible-clasps clung.  O righteous men!
That long ago made deaf amid the silence
Of things the People loved!  The goodly earth
Knew nought of this, save that the very air
Of some sweet girlhood held them all athwart
Their head, by all the smouldering fire-flies
That burn upon the people; and at last,
O'er whose mysterious memory rose that sigh
They knew not of, the girl they loved, who fell
To give the people that she loved at last,
She, taking from them all her loveliness,
Blossoming them as only flowers that grow
To kiss new-plucked and sweetened into life.
The followers of the story heard with joy
Of love and she, their duties to fulfil,
And spread religion through the people's heart,
And superstition joined the throng to keep
Turned to the music of a merry tune
Wriggling the furrows long and carefully
Upon their hearts in joy and wonderment,
Pleading with them to go forth and rest,
By sad November weather.  Even then,
Even then they felt the coming of the sun
In them beheld.  They trembled not at all,
But feared that even in their eyes there gleamed
A sunbeam shining through the hands of Death.
Oh! what a smile!  They drank deep of the wine
And watched it flowing from the mouthful of the Cross.
How beautiful they trembled!  One and all
They cried: "We are assured that there is death
For those we love.  Give us thy sword and give us
To give us weapons."  Eagerly they leapt
Into the jaws of death--
======================================== SAMPLE 176 ========================================
's Brothe,
And but the Angler's self
Is least polite, so is the SWEET
Of his Creator, and should best
Of Best aspects offer most content.
If the fair Shade be anythin,
Then will the Fair herself,
As lovely as a Lady, thin,
As charming as th' Artificer,
And will not fail in in her,
Whose heart and word are pure.

Still rash, from this I grieve
Each time to carry you;
But should the Spirit then crave
An hour of mirth and glee,
Which back to you I'm given,
'Twere ill if I were after Heaven,
A moment, by and by.

A wiser path is found
In this my rustic age,
Wherein to weary nature round
She ranks, with each new-blown sage
A grander sage than I,
And bids us shun each stage and haunt
Of prince or peasantry.

But turn your eyes, and lo! behold
A crowd within the door
Of this stupendous age which lives,
Let thence no more depart,
But daily drive the roaring cows
That frisk before thy shrine;
Until at length he turn his sight,
Without farewell, or warning,
And this thy servant's page;
Which is the goddess of thy bower,
Returned from all thy kingly power,

In beauty, youth, and beauty's charms,
A long-lost child we find
Before us, through the joys and pains
Which once thy master kind,
As gallant as a horse of his,
Nor fierce as blood, and fleet as wind,
Graced with high hopes to meet thine eyes,
And meek as of the bowing pines
In their ancestral pastures bred,
I would not yield thee now,
And hold thee and grow up as of old.

The fairest is not false or kind,
And wilt thou gain by false?
I've guessed thee false, yet 'tis behind
The best that can be still.
But sure 'tis very hard to judge,
Who thus can choose between two two
A friend, whose faithful heart shall own
That love shall never be another's,
Till death some other way be known.

On them shall thy temple's shelves
Without an olive's bark,
All full of leaves, but not of rue
And living proof, of lack of creek
And water's precious cheer.
For these are of thy choice, although
Their names be new, are all I have
To offer which if they are free
They will accept thy gift, and crave
The meanest favor which is lent.

For the great lineage of the earth,
And birth, and death are thine;
As oaks beneath the aspen shade
Crow up to cover thee,
As streams through moss thy tall hillside,
As shrubs thy tangled banks shall be,
And while the mountains wind and blow,
With labouring ships thy lofty brow
Shall strike with awe the willing stones
And blast thy broad fields, that shall bring
Thy country's wishes to a spring,
And thy's the richlyowered groves among
Which grew in days of summer-tide
When birds were singing side by side.

Alas! for thee no fruit or flow'r,
No flower its native fragrant bears;
And when those come to whom are now,
And such as once from ocean comes,
Not even when o'er the breast of death
They have shed a mutual tear or sigh,
Let me not, like too often sung
Or desecrate thee; but, lest thou,

If of that red but inward flame,
Alas, for him, all blood hath run,
Failing, if through fire and cloud
Thou passest a pale corrie there,
Then am I dying; and the voice
Of this poor verse shall be the last.
And when thou with thy servant's aid
Art hither tending, and shalt be
Beside him, then the many a maid,
Herself, will bear thee company,
And, hand in hand thereto shall go
The soft hours of thy childish hour
And think how, on the flow'ry bed
They sit together, they that sleep
Under the flowers, whose careless hands
Fold and give life to one Spring's bands,
Whose laughter rings among the bowers
Where others hardly know their hours.

As in my father's house
Beyond the sea,
I see the trees, the trees,
With its mist and cloudy hues,
Like unto become
The things that have been.
Their lovely heads droop downward

======================================== SAMPLE 177 ========================================
'T is cruel to be grave!

I've dragged my soul into the lake,
To sink within a well of sand;
And here, amid the greenest grove,
Is comfort for a lover's hand,
A book my father bought of yore
(When here he ruled his house beside)
With books and books and toys and flowers,
To take his fancy to his bride.

Yon castle's stately toppler! Where
The hunter's bead could ever be,
On earth or sea, is such the skill
To win the prince's joyless day,
And memory's flight to memory
Will pierce, as, peering into glades,
Old heroes trode into the shades.

Such was the dream they dreamed; and then
Fell on the ear like parting men;
And straight, as if to die, they stirred,
And fainted to their several shades.
Those leaves I know, who thus have played
For years and years and years away;
And though they sleep as in a grave,
How is it that the domes go loose
And tremble under foot? Yet here
The dull, green stones and sleepy trees
Lie level with the quiet skies,
The squirrels flit, as memories;
The brooks have lost their old surprise;
And I have seen a nest o'er-turned
And nursed it when I had anointed
My head with silver. Is it well?

The years depart; I see them yet,
My boyhood's God in manhood's years;
And with his boyhood's thoughts of praise
They glide before me as a wave
Sideways, and glide again to give
The burial-place beyond the wave.
The best was ever yet, at last,
Which made a radiant face and bright;
While memory bides no longer past,
And in the shadow seems to shine,
Just as my mother said of old,
In a dream, by pleasant wayside streams,
Gems not the spring to us--or flowers,
Yet leaving barren sweetnesses
As sweet as those to which his blood
The priceless violet yields
For future years to come and go.

Her flowers went before me, day by day;
The south wind hushed their dirge and sigh
As summer storms came rolling by;
The branches now inclined to sigh,
As wind that gathers in its might,
Keeps shifting tokens of the flower,
And in its mother's tender eyes
The morning sunbeams of the morn
Have left me yet of all their charms,
And all their radiance, all their light
Beams of the happy summer's day.

Shadows and snow-clad streams around
Covered my spirit like a crown.
Such lines of beauty as shall fade
Before the mirror's laughing gaze
Shall on its graver fancy fade,
And leave it powerless and aloof,
So when the shadow of death's wing
Shall lengthen out the song of love.

The nightingales, the snow-clad peaks
And glimmering waters glimmering by,
The whisper of the shore that rims
Above them like an emerald sky,
Shall, by mine uttering, take the tone
Of longing love, unto my soul.
And through those hours that are too brief,
A moment on that golden string
Shall fall the gift of that glad time,
And by its rhythmic ticking thrill
Be born again to this brief rhyme;

And then, her rare voice sounding low
To this faint heart that would not sing,
I'll rise and kiss that bower of snow
And bound it with a myrtle ring.
Yea, when this shadow of the snow
Must make that wonder of me yet,
I'll sit and wave those gracious curls
I built upon my father's sod,
And tell the story of our tears,
And all the grief to us that time
May bring to us as her own.

'Twas time--the starlight's parting gleam
Of glory fell upon the stream
Of twilight, and the birds that sang
Above the water-lilies found
Some parting, some idea made
In softest song for his bard's hours;
And as I watched the leaf-borne cone
Of thy young bough pile up a stone
I saw them spring: the song that sprang
Of free, glad songs, to light thy rids
Of summer and its depth of weeds.

And as I watched, my spirit found
Its theme of life that should not cease;
And as I watched, I saw the sound
Of Love, that waited, bowed, and bent
Above our mortal weakness, sent
Its weight
======================================== SAMPLE 178 ========================================

'Mid men who whinnied in their joy,
'Mid mirth's alarms and bloody war,
While boys in drink, despairing, flare,
Unresting, on the hearth-stone high,
The bratchet reddens in the sky,
The trumpets sound, the banners fly,
While the wild war-horse, skill-in wars,
Glares on the echoes as it whirls,
Till o'er the silence far and wide
Grows clammy night-fires from a hundred spires,
Then dies the signal of the charge,
As, grouped around its awful course,
The mother-monk looks from the tower,
And, one by one, to windward moves,
That hand is stretched--so, now, now,
The snow and sleet sweep o'er his brow,
The mother-monk looks forth with eyes
Of earnest and of mother-wise,
As from the shrine they gather clash
And shout, in reverence, the poor pace
And humble pittance of her poor,
As he goes up the steep descent,
To offer offer her the last
Short tribute; but a year or two
Leaves her this hindrance to undo,
And, smiling, drop his sword to go.

There is no village near the town,
The township of abounding renown,
Though tenantless, and yet unborn,
With staves and houses that aspire,
Without a name, without a fame,
And yet without a claim on birth,
Without a thought of disenthrall'd earth,
Are honour'd, thriftless, and to tell
The bloodless story of the tale,
The priest of holy Babylon,
But keeps his spirit closed and still,
Like some frail lily, newly sprung
To bloom in woods, and lay its gold
In the still morns and dewy dews,
And with it mingle deathless views
Of safety, as they sing along
The safety of the traveller's song,
Without the lapse of aught to be,
The Highland heart of memory.

Thou priceless among holy flowers,
Enthroned among the wealthy bowers
Of the broad-realm'd larch, thy rod,
Thy sunshine and thy shadow, lend
To form and substance for their end.
The gracious blessing first receive,
The weapon next, and then the sword;
The field of combat, then the field
Of battle, and of triumph last.
And thou, my country's olive tree!
Down whose ash trunk thy branches be,
(At distance yet remote)
Thou plantest thy brave heart on me.

O, ye wild, guarding trees,
Who guard our green-wood cot,
Would to their winter homes
(Your winter walks are wet),
And from your roots that thrive
Breathe mercy forth from you.
The strong you best may wield,
The weak your might deliver,
But man alone shall make
The strong to stand and to live.

I see my fathers, I behold
The forests, now before me,
When the ice-bedeck'd head
Of our storm-beaten barrow,
Heard the wind call it home,
Saw the snow wild on the heather
First of all, that day,
Saw a little cottage and coot;
But it fell like fruit away,
And like the winter rain
Came to our door again.

Old, and young, and fair,
They left me soon behind,
Each one seeking his mate,
The other the kind;
The first that came to my hand,
The third found the woman's feet,
Their tripping were mute;
It was not the step of the feet
Sitting beside the door,
She I love first came here,
She I love best and mournest me;
O how little one seems to be
That I could outnumber the years
That Time hath not saddest unsettle'd.

And when you were young and foolish,
In your innocent childish way,
Our unsaid watchers sat by the side
Of your innocent Mother,
And you knew not what they said,
But we knew, when we shut our eyes,
That our spirits were childish, and sometimes
We were little and wise.

With shame then took we for child,
And for child our sakes,
With pride then went our mother,
And after she had grown wise,
We were blinded, that we might
Not see what she would see.
In all youth's earliest years,
No wonder, 'twas our fathers saw
Your glorious boughs, with fear-fill'd eyes;
And when
======================================== SAMPLE 179 ========================================
 that were the lords and crowns
Of all the fields,
Were slaves to others.
Were brothers, or more or less,
Had some men said the same,
And who would take the sword and blow
That made him madder.

Whereat the lord of many a tongue,
Gave choice to speak his name,
Whom none might question,
But all the young-eyed race of men
Should speak with shame,
Till all the church should question then,
And all the world should call on one,
"The countries roundabout doth roam,
Because his reign was lost!"

Hence, all that he had dreamed and taught,
Came forth, a feudlike king,
And Waltharius, he called the gods,
And this was all the thing:
"The gods implore the might of man,
The gods implore the might of gods,
But what avails the empire's sway
That sends him to the things that may
From year to year
Men turn from good men's goodly ways,
Or turn from good men's good to say,
"The gods have done with man,"

The gods gave voice to all that said,
And they that ministered to none,
Seek in the darkness of the night
That great eternal law
For what is good, and what is right,
And all must come to nothing, none
Begrudge to wrack the bliss that's done
And leave no dawn for mirth and play;
And every one must do his part
To break the law that rules the land
And cast the far-world's crown for HIM,
Who died to keep the troth of fools,
And one for whom the world's a bond,
While one's the king for evermore.

"If my face shine in any book,
On this side the world I will look,
And this one's face may scarcely pass
But, oh, the world, the world I'll see
When love walks by me for the glass!
I'll take my book that comes to me,
And this one's face shall surely be
The one I sought for--Lilith Mains,
Sitting by the window-pane,
Where the wind cries loud for me,
And the wild wind calls me--
Where the winds cry loud for me,
And the wild wind cries me--
By the window-pane."

He looked on Thee, Lord God,
As in a vision through the ages
Of his life, and the beginning,
When he killed my soul in pieces,
And my life from its beginning,
Came back in his hands immortal
To be strong with him forever.

Or ever I should sleep
As in old time I lay,
And I slept as in a dream
While the great winds were blowing
Far through the trees of May,
I could hear the warm soft rain
From the old, forgotten main,
And the glad sound of singing main
Through the old, forgotten main.

But I could hear the sound of thunder,
And the rush of bird on the storm,
And the great drops on the pane;
And my soul could haste and stay
As in the days gone by,
And the storm-clouds in the night
Fell on my soul like snow,
As a sudden rush of light
From the great high hills afar,
When the great wind roars for me,
And the great ships go by.

I did not know how to begin,
Nor what to say, I do not know;
What good to make one with to begin,
And win the power of the wind and snow
To be what I am left to be,
And be what I am now to be.
So, when I am grown too strong for pride,
Let me be gathered to your side,
And hold you both in benediction,
As in old times beside
At the good prayers left me in the end.

There was an old woman called Nothing-at-all,
Who carried a broom to a mortal aunt,
One day she married a beautiful hush;
And the old man was quite as well as dead,
With hair blown over and face turned red,
And her husband was crying, "O let me go,
For I love you, love you!" and the girl replied,
"What has the world to do with Gun?"

She went to the topgallant School, where
She always said when she was a lad,
But he ever said she was over young,
And years ran by her, few or many a mile,
And little he knew who she could be,
That was coming to call for a horse or a goose
======================================== SAMPLE 180 ========================================
uavit.
Saepe coelesti donc tales,
Broad chest o' your ribs sae keen,
Loud mutch aufgetr' und he!
Out there at the window,
Sae white were the fellers,
And loud they resounded,
As they tauld you their revel;
And up and o'er the batt threshold
They swam on wi' their splittie,
In search o' the lanthorn,
For game and ale feeling blent there.

Quoth I, "Wi' a laugh in thi glee,
Thou hast sat fast, I see;
I'll rin like a skunkie
Play soon wi' thy mettle;
Thy gawsie is comin' fast
As a thief frae hell doth;
And wha winna save thee
A-trippin' my faithfu' heels,
We'll tak a sheets o' meal."

Wi' a gowdy laugh on his lips,
Quoth I, "The gates are wide;
I'll rin them a rowing
Afar, far aloan.
That daddie maun please me,
At the dealer's enticed wine,
That'll clink at the sheugh!"
Quoth I, "Wi' a' this gowd,
It's gowd, and fair, and a'--
If ye'll but gie me a shilling,
A gill maun be yours."
Quoth I, "The way is fine,
And fair am I to win;
But should ye tak me mine,
Mine is a' to my liking;
But should ye tak me wi' it,
I fear ye'll ne'er gie me your liking."

Quoth I, "What says your gowd
What needs your wullie to gie?
For your neighbour's a thief,
And - what you never saw -
If you'll let me speak fae
Though but a true ne'er he.
For your neighbour's a thief,
And aught ye ever saw,
But what you never saw,
But what you never saw,
What you'll ne'er hear again."

"Now tell me, ye jaudlin pack,
What and where are ye made?
 smack, ance, a kiss, and a clink;
Ance, come give me your blade.
Gae get me your tinkering hammer-nail,
Gae get me a giller gude,
That will clink at the shed bell's tail,
An' I'll ne'er gie ye a stane.

I'll ne'er gie ye a drink o' the burn;
I'll ne'er gie ye a tane;
I'll ne'er gie ye a roond my ain,
Unless I ha'e a new pan;
An' gie me yon rich, red gowd,
Wi' a glass o' the burn side.
But gie me a drink o' the burn side,
An' gie me a cot mair down;
I'll ne'er gie my ain dear lassie
Wi' a cup o' meal in her crown.

Come, gie 's o'er the hame,
An' gie 's o'er the gowd,
An' gie 's o'er the moor to the burnside,
An' gie 's o'er the field o' lead,
An' gie 's o'er the fields o' meal,
At the fa' o' the wind and the blaw,
In the auld year that's awa.

When I was a lad wi' a braw newe-shankit bairn,
A' over the moor to the end I could na get weary;
Tho' I was in silly weeping, an' mony by theick,
Ye never would think, to be leaveward an' sae sair.
But I was a swankie auld man, tho' ne'er a stiver,
Ye never would think I was wafting an' sae weet,
Ye never would think I was wafting an' sae sair.
But I was a swankie auld man, that ne'er would let me,
Ye never would think I was wafting an' sae gabbing,
Ye never would think I was wafting an' sae gabbing.
But I was a swankie auld man, as
======================================== SAMPLE 181 ========================================
 arm for arm, and press a trepid glass
With nicest care. This when that arm was seen
With those two eyes, which match'd in strength of phlox,
If but a single glance were thrown on me,
I would be seen by other lists enjoin'd.

Thus every eye was bent on other charms,
And every voice in praise; for she had none.
If these two, therefore, can be objects here
Of something, not of thing, but of a kind,
Which shews the kind, and pays to what is due.
The hand which man can offer is her own,
Or by a well directed to the will
Of whatsoever gives it dignity.
The whole is from itself divided well:
For who from woman woos the man away,
All, all, which she exacts from Nature, gives
To others her peculiar charge; the man
Less wedlock, and content in his own charge.
The tresses which her own black down shears
Do come or go, and many a grace is shown,
When they shews graceful and majestic too;
The man's the woman's peculiar charge;
For man, when woman's hand or charms insures,
Is of one sort, and so is woman's praise.
The harlot in the smiles of man below,
Who tempts the tresses of a nobleman,
Meets him with all his aid; the man's unseen,
Or one of nature's people; he alone
Can prove the mutual blessing of a friend:
For when the bee, invited to the feast,
Darts on the floweret's stalk, it slays the fly.
And ere his full-grown buzzard to be gone,
The fattest fop he of the honey'd flower,
Plucks from beneath the ear, and flies, and slays
The rebel humming fly; but at the word,
Wheresoe'er it shifts, for him it reeks,
And so the universe devours of all.

To grow in knowledge and esteem,
To drink the sweets of womanhood, and clothe
In truth the loveliest theories of love,
Is to become the votary of thought,
And of the mighty Godhead; and, indeed,
Whate'er the cause of man's dislike or fear
In its own nature, it is not enough
To prove that woman is not God's effect.
It is the Church's pedagogue, whose voice
Is vocal organs to all human ears,
Whose eyes are open to all human thought;
Whose doctrine it is, that alone to preach,
Or meditate, or teach, or meditate,
Attendeth to all comers to all hearts.

O, then, my Lady! If a man there be,
More holy than the sages of the world,
One among them is of more puissance;
None o'er the rest more worthy to appear,
Of so much reverence and so much love;
Whereby he feigns himself more friend than friend,
If aught of his peculiar nature be
Worthy, in himself, the confidence of Heaven.
He by his own assent has always shown
How difficult, if this be true, to bear
Upon the Christian creed; his piety
Hath oft made proof that what man worships not;
But there's another way, which he intends,
Either to find, or else to bring away.
Whom therefore he delights to leave behind,
As say the farmer, if not his alms.
But thanks to heaven for his benevolence,
And the pervading spirit which, through fear,
Now when the time of man is come, hath fed
Upon devotion's talent, not, as yet,
The perfumes of devotion, and still flush
His holy head, as is the wont of fire,
To place upon his conscience his revered
And pure devotion; and, indeed, to prove
That love of heaven hath in itself the strength,
But not how much it is; he cannot tell
How beautiful, how little it doth seem,
How fair, how foul, how great, how great the charm
Which hallows friendship, and to him speaks truth.
He knows the world. He hath not learned in heaven
To bend it down, to lift its timid wing,
To lend its trembling plume to fan the air,
To make its lovely bosom fold more close,
Than our whole empire warrant it with fire;
Nor does he know that the bright train we tread
From grace to sin, doth teach us to be calm,
Smile also in the sunshine, in the shade.
We welcome thee, O England! when our Lord
Can's
======================================== SAMPLE 182 ========================================
 you gave me, if you please."

She went, and smiled:  "He should have taken it;
And that is quite forgotten.  'T is in vain.
Then have a care! you think I have a reason:
You all'll prove me.  Now you, don't believe me,
But only YOU."  "Ah!" she went on, "and so
Must own that, speaking sincerely, you
Were like a goddess made of many flowers,
And like a slave may keep his head when he
Stands at the altar.  I am one of those;
And, when I look at your fine fleur-de-lis,
I love to see you in your hair and face.
But if you do that which you like, as now,
Then you must love me also.  Do not grieve,
Or if you would.  If only I should cry
For one short moment of affection, oh,
For such a love as waits beyond its life,
Why should you, even in dying, dread to lose
The blessed moment in which I should think
I could love only?  I do not think it good
To hope that such a love is recompensed
By that same wish!  Yet if I quite forgive
My folly for it, it was not a month
Of fog, or August dusking the yellow leaves
That shiver on the branches.  Now I fear
That I shall lose you, and the memory
Of all that we were in,--a single month,
And more than this!  My head,--the thought of that,
Wound up by that which can be brought to light
By Love, which waits our questioning,--to be
Proved fatal by that whispered vow I broke,
Which slew your hope.  In faith, I find you mine!

Dive to the arrows of the dead:  the man
Shines like a godhead, and he knows it too.
He has all thoughts, all mysteries that be veiled,
But one brief nidder of a message heard
Out on the wind.  He is so justified,
So searched, it seems, in all but one he is.
There are some things he could not comprehend.
His murder is not heard, but he is lost.
There are some things he could not comprehend.
There is another world.  He may not wait
Longer than your commands.  He has no power,
But his past thirst has gone to make men hate
The other years.  He is too blind to see
The world as that of God.  How can he take
The time and all it does?  But you cry out
For pity.  Tell me, girl, if this be love,
If you are like a man to be deceived
By what it is for evil?  When the sight
Lends us its good to see it, let it be.
All is for nothing.  Nothing can be more.
It is God's plan to make us poor or mad,
And none can come to help.  He did believe
It could be he--that Adam and the man--
Were beasts and men--but God knows what of that!
"Doughty?"  "God knows I shall be soon with God.
Pity me, I am sinewed."

"Ye are deaf!"

"Ye cannot cover me.
He does not love me!
He will find me ere I die."
"I would be dearer,
Had I nothing before, than this drought!"
The sun set in eclipse.

The earth in hiding,
The shrub and the mole
Closed and closed
Round the roots of the trees.
The sun set in eclipse.

The earth in hiding,
The mole in hiding,
Clung thrice to the oak.
The ground that the tan did not share,
And the sky with its stars,
Were covered with reindeer
With a drift of toys.
The sun set in eclipse.

He laughed as he jumped
Through the grasses and chinks
At the goals of the air.
The sun set in eclipse.

He peered through the chinks
At the white owl riding,
And watched a whirlpool
In the sunset's dying
And the sky with the sun.

He peered to the ground,
And he saw in his heart
That the earth was hot
And the air with its stars,
That the souls of the birds
Did suddenly part.

And the earth said, "Lie still,
Have no more strife;
I am your own life."

But the sun set in eclipse.
The stones skipped away,
And the grass said,
======================================== SAMPLE 183 ========================================
 let us all repent--
Let's hope in God be just as men.

'Tis Faith that sits by his own seat,
Though ashes form his vest,
And when his last breath passes by
Shall only breathe of her.
She wears a veil like the tattered cloud,
An ermine snow-white veil,
And her eyes are deep and dark and bright,
I wonder what they are;
Her daily prayer, her daily food
When ruffians go, I ween,
To keep the road, she rolls it o'er
Like an old man worn and grey.

But when her last, long prayer takes flight,
She stands at the window-square,
And looks out wildly with half-closed eyes
At all the toys and fearsome things
That once were there.
For, pausing in the cold dark night,
She sits so still and white;
It seems as if her dress were made
For some great deed of right;
With her hair swept, the pillow then
Of the dead you must not see,
It is too late, though you make a nodding way
Through every silent pew;
And you can find no charm, until
The stormy days grow long.

The church grows near;
The last long autumn leaves are dead;
They fall like flakes of snow
From the broad river-bed.
But where they die of hunger and cold cold
The will is satisfied,
And the fire leaps high in the stone stair,
While the organ pounds out three.
And when they tumble down
The cold rain-drops will curl up there.

I went to her, and oh, I found her fair,
And I made moan more;
I made the moan like an aching thing;
I laid her hand in mine, and oh, I was there.
And as she passed by in the morning gray
The lonesome church was nigh,
And rose-wreathed fountains filled the grey

Upon the hills, where the sick men lay
Their weary limbs in feverish pain;
They lie there so for three long years,
And all the time is pain.
But oh, my body will never rest,
And yet in its lonely tomb
May the Church give rest to the weary breast
And rest from the vanguard of sorrow and gloom.

They do not tell her. It must have been
Through all the weary ages,
But she has lived and sung in the old tune
That makes the long sad years
Thicken and darken the world more sad
Than Springtide in her fable-twilted days,
With the times of want and jarring,
When she sang to the poor man gaily and bravely,
And, in his ear unkempt,
He sang, "Brave knight of Christendom
Was our young shepherd's credulous shepherd's friend,
The fair flock-master's joy,
When the first footstep of our little shoe
(Along the hills)
Came to the place of milking time,
And the song-birds brought her stories
Far in her heart's unfathomed chime.

Now she lies under the great oak tree,
That she might have her flocks by the door,
When the herd was a new delight,
To sip the milk of her shepherd's kine,
And fold their waxen hands on mine,
And see the bright buds on her breast,
Once more with the mute happiness
Of the horn and the scarlet bloom
She traced in her childhood's history
Some word of grace and loveliness
Of virgin love o'er the coming death.

And this to the last of the long ago,
By the night I watched in silence go,
Over the ground with the dreamy dead,
The shadowy shrine of the Churchyard pond,
Where once in her maiden dreams
The empty Temple's shattered towers
Seemed desolate and forever flown.
She crossed herself in a strange green way
With outspread arms that reached out to meet
And the slow drops gathered and softly played
Upon the painted sign
And the lone chapel as she lingered yet
Was lonely as a dream.

The monks and the priests had crossed their way,
And in the cold gray air
They dreamed awhile in their dusky gray;
And then the harsh wind blew
And the chestnut logs were fuming high
And the horn its hollow smoke
Was fading into the stillness of the sky.

And all the church grew still,
Till the sacred organ's tap had died
And the doomed man knelt
And felt the foot of the unseen feet
But never a beat
Ringing the chapel as he knelt,
But ever a fit
======================================== SAMPLE 184 ========================================

Forced into a fret and a breaking bank.

Thus, thus, the Poet was laughing, saying:--
"Friend! I know not what thou art at;
No harmony is half so sweet as thou
Thy little voice is, and thy smile is--
Thy heart is solely true and sweet--
Be guileless, even with the child of thine,
And cease from bitterest voices dying,
With moaning of the little human heart,
With tranquil pleasure that is all divine.
That is a benediction--subtlest part!
With calm, majestic brow, and eyes a cream
Of rarest brightness; thou, that art the soul,
We are thy glories, and, throughout the world,
Thy crown of fame and place is a star-spark
Of the pure spirit,--we are to be his!

Who thus have listened, and from the dark depths
Borrowed their unending song of stars,--
Not by alternate mood of song and word,
But simply for its highest purpose wisht,
So that, once more, it falls upon the world
As an unspeakable fountain, and has long
Been filled with living music, as a harp
Pipes to a thousand harmonies, and grows
A song of the ambitious and of bounding thought
That, with its golden cage, has something shut
Within itself, and other sounds become
Of import, as the earthly objects all
Must follow on the hope of hearts, that come
From the remote and strange Hyperion.

My spirit is an island of the deep
Nor shoreless. From the day I first looked on
It will be one of earth, where are her flowers?
Must I be silent, then? Ye find the words
So full of meaning as the words of man,
Which are to his fair paradise pronounced
"Ten thousand thousand!" Yes! and twenty thousand
Are the white chimes, that speak the souls of those
Who with the singing magic of their works,
In their dear strains entwine themselves with love,
Winding together into threefold steps,
Are never taken from them.

These are the days
Of childhood, ever floating upon Thought,
To me, who sail with those departed bides,
And when my soul has traversed the abyss
Of heaven, as a wave-like word, arose
To offer it her upward oracles
Whose utterance is more harmonious
Than music, and than a celestial song!

She comes! I almost tremble at her steps!
The earth is motionless! her weight of hours
Has burst like a soft sigh into my prayers.
What can be else? save that, in time, wherein
She holds her court in solitude and song?
The wavelets on her beautiful white feet,
As they leap down into the starry heaven,
Woo her with their sweet breath, as she dances
On nimble feet to music in the dark,
Through heaven's sparkling portals. Ye have made
These orange shells of many a sunburnt hue,
To be tossed back in ocean-tides, and pitched
On barkless sands by the oar-blades, till now!
Like a winged seed, I drive my heart away;
A wondrous vision! like the ocean-song!
With her, the breeze, the golden-winged winds pass,
Her footsteps mellow as a rose's breath!
Her happy hand--'tis here I wade apace,
And here I pluck an apple from her boughs,
And here I scatter, in full tide, the snow
And languish for her bosom.

Behold her gliding in among the trees!

O, bright Minerva! have no prop to show
This shape that she hath taken in exchange;
A thing which I am glad to look upon,
A war-worn wear-bride of the downward snow.
She cannot lure me to her shadowy cave,
Nor yet can lead me by her finger o'er
The shrouded snow, though driven by the wind,
And sitting by it in that icy cave.
The shadowy pine-tree and the purple fir,
Where I am wont to sit, but not to dance
Upon the heavy-headed china's charms,
Can yield but kisses at the frantic allay
Of the tumultuous night-wind; but the force
Of all the wild emotions of the storm
And the fierce fires of tumultuous youth,
And the white legends that of old he told,
Only can add to a world's fair expanse
Its billowy-foaming bosom and the stars
Of heaven to an everlasting sleep.

Nay, for the high moon, behold!
======================================== SAMPLE 185 ========================================
 the likeness to
the Creator of the World above.  Upon his
head the Virgin, and God-majesty, were set
distant their collected lamps; the sound
of tabour, festival and prayer, the human
wailings, the wonder and awe of the eyes,
medusa of God, the mother of life, were all
the hearths of the earth and heaven.  The elements,
as before have been, were vivid with power of
light and sound and beauty, to have become
breathing everywhere.  The elements were now
the images of things to be; the image of God.  So
every naked plant, leaf, and bird, was being
supernumerized; all things which first were lacking,
and what must last is but the soul's increase.
Now, when one may behold the natural aspect of things
and loveliness of things, the sight and sound of animals
was no more before.  So the Archangel-
help of the four winds has put it to flight, is not
it so to be, but also to be, to be, to be; a sound
was far more natural to be seen, the sound of
the hum of the frog, than of the sea-tides, when,
saddened by the gnat, it rolls into the dark.  The
hour of an eclipse has been assigned, and the moon
had passed from the pole, now called; and at times
one strikes an affectation, while others are delivered
from a shadow.  The lower pathway is deserted;
there's a tree, in the middle of the apple tree,
which just now looks like the wall of the Irish House,
and seems to have electric-litten the heart of the
 bitten pool with such an emotion as it was, it
believed in the refreshments it had.  A
black root in the apple tree is seen in the margins
of the garden near the riverside, and on the left
are seen a black and yellow periwig, its tail,
the length of its back along the avenues leading
under the boughs.  Here a row of white flowers
has been found about the walls and doors, and by
this one has been seen several images of garden
looking forward, statuesque and white.  From the rear
of the garden they survey almost all the garden;
the peonies are so fragrant, the orange blossoms
are almost fresher, and the even bright flowers are
wholesome to eyes.

Now I must pause, and it is time to turn my steps,
Already on the road of life, so that my heart
unties itself with the thought of God.  So proceed,
following thought!

(ll. 259 lxxxix)
It is pleasant where the moment of the day
Brings on to mind the distance of the moment when
life is held in converse with our fellows, to drop the
strong hold of death at the root of each other.  It is a
common doom of destruction to all who go under the
influence of the East, to escape its certainties, and
to perish at the base of life and afterward sink under
the curse of life.  And certes, since they were the
stings of children in the womb, they are fled and be
covered over with blighting blight.

(ll. 259 lxxxvii.icles:  "The calamities committed
after the destruction of the Babylonian private, but the
temple of a secret torture is often necessary to sight it
printed, lying over the hands of men."

The Evelyn and the woodlark, are indeed the same as
before, while the pious mother of the solitudinous peoples
sings it.  The woodlark starts up from his sleep, and
the chestnuts are consumed by the sun, while the round
sun, like a ball of fire, flashes upon the heaven.

(ll. 259 lxxxvii.)
s. 6 of Ocean's, Moloch's, and the deep embowered flood
of the Red Sea, with its headlands of green, give birth to
three daughters, so as to look upon the Divine.

(ll.tabelles: Deo non Pelixi. 1. iii.6).
One of these is inscribed on the breast of Medea, one of
the Arabian Phoenix, as in the southern Chapæa, to which are
probably descending or descending its sacred habitation.
One was probably the son of Matan, and is also probably
also a retired Alada, or one of the Lelegians of
Salamon and Dorothea, who are spoken of as the two famous
first-born of the Jewish
======================================== SAMPLE 186 ========================================
 said, "You have not said what. You know
I've lived all this, and I'm perfectly cool,
And made myself pure, and am perfectly cool;
But it's no use now to tell you, for cool."
"I have said I should die, and it is only true
That I can say that I am not cool.
I'll have nothing to say, but I could tell
That you shall tell me, sir, what you'd have to do.
We'll have nothing to do but to make your mind keen;
For when you know that the best of us all
Will be to wait the time when there's a time to spare,
You'll catch the devil in giving you time to spare."

Two churches here do lodge together;
They've gone to the East, and they're going to West,
And they'll go to the East, and they'll go to the West,
They'll go to the West, and they'll go to the West,
And they'll die of the thirst of the scorching kiss
That lurks at their feet through the promise of 't.
They'll go to the East, or they'll go to the West,
And they'll die of the thirst for the love they shall prove
They shall know, at the time when their altar's dressed
They'll go to the West, or the world they shall see,
And you'll be holy and rich, you, and I,
And your head on my shoulder I'll laid,
While I kneel and pray that the world shall hear
My message of peace, my hopes, my dear.

And it's five long years since I saw you first,
When the best of my hopes was leaving you now.
Then I had to pray that my eyes might search
And search the world till my eyes were blind.
Then I had to pray that my heart might sing,
Until old memories seemed to grow.
And I used to pray that the wild things rang
When the best of my pleasures came to be.
I was, of course, praying that my eyes might mark
Some morning again, and my heart might sing,
Until my soul, I know not what, became
A fount in the sky, and a mist of flame,
A bubble of sound where a spirit turned,
And the air seemed only the voice of Fame.

Oh, I used to pray that my eyes might mark
A cavern of magical rocks that rose,
While I drank the dew from the ripe old pine,
And drank it to the breeze of the crept and lingered pine;
It was chilling to me as I turned to fly,
To find my love in a ferny nook at even;
And I felt that I never would see his eyes.
And I had to pray that the long, sweet kiss
That lured the heart from its depths, might fill
With the glow of love in the heart of bliss,
And the thrill of a seraph's touch at heaven's hill.

And I murmured low in my heart while she spoke to me:
"Oh, come to me, Love, and list to my prayer,
Or my cheek shall be wetted with tears for thee."
"Oh, come to me, Love, and list to my prayer,
For never again shall I join in thine eyes
The eyes that are pleading thee, eyes stretched to me
To answer thy questions of comfortless skies.
Oh, come to me, Love, and list to my prayer,
For, oh, my beloved, the world's not made."

And then she listened and sighed to the breath
Of a heart more fluttered than words of speech,
Till a hope lit up th' old halo of death,
And she made reply: "Ah, my heart's not made!"
Then she passed away, leaving me here.

And I lived I was once more when she came there,
But he came no more when she came away,
And in my heart ever stilled the thought of shame,
Sorrowing she wept that a woman should know
That the love of a woman's love could be mine.
And we left the place that we had left;
And on the blue-grass roads, alone,
And she with her companions, walked
With her companion, a silken sister.

Along the snow-drifts,
Upon a high and distant hill,
She saw the golden moon appear.
And down she saw a king,
With robes of crimson and gold,
Coming along the cold.
"Why, just what are you thinking of,
What, with that stone for a crown,
Hidden away from me,
What, with those delicate diamonds, you
And I, who are standing
======================================== SAMPLE 187 ========================================
ein of the heart.
But thou mayest truly hope
That in this world thou art a saint,
And unto him belong.
He may be virtuous, but not
A monster of a home.

For I myself were covetous
Of aught but Virtue rare,
And should with her compared
I must find Grace, so fair,
In yonder starry sphere.
Then why, my sister, should I bleat
On her, the heavenly fair?

The fair which she alone receives
Would so much humbly share,
That I, who did but borrow
From her a kiss, might swear
I had a full love quite too fair.
No man's injustice is his own;
And none is he but he
Whose tears they spring as dew.
What's love? 'tis only clo'es and dews,
'Tis only sparkling, warm, and bright,
As pure as evening primroses.

Love's vessel does not smoothly pass;
And none can let its flow away,
But when the neck is strongly placed
At the first smile, its blush will stay;
And I will promise by his way
To make my heart more deeply burn,
Even in her bright eye's gushing font,
More clearly than did ever erred.

Since then this wretched hope has died,
And all my power has passed away
Like bubbles on the troubled tide.
I've lain among the rocks forlorn
'Mid crags, and rocks, and turbid deeps,
And since I've fenced it up against
The wind that blows a wretched wast,
And through its cloudy shroud at last
Has climbed heaven's top with lightnings bright
And struck his fiery hurt with lightnings.
She sank beneath the ocean's waves;
She did not scream, she did not scream,
She did not weep, she did not sigh,
Her spirit passed from earth away.

Is that the cause, the fancied shade,
That you should think yourself a grave?
Then let my fears in silence rest,
The real cause is surely mine;
This is the faithful's only trust,
This is the cause of love divine;
I know it, but I'll never fear
That death in life is really here.
I would not have you hang your head,
For fear it should a vacant sigh;
But on my love I'd gently place
The glass upon your lips of love,
And on my lips your eyes to muse
Upon the lifeless form they wore.

No, never let your trembling lip
Bring me a tear of grief no more,
So may you never know mine own
Vain wretch! it cannot be in vain;
Grief must be constant, tears is vain,
If cruel grief be always there.

When I was young and full of play,
And had a brood of pretty things,
A staff and school-boy should I say,
Fate let me play like such a king,
And ne'er throw blame upon my strings?
'Twere better it were I now wear
My long, loose locks and scarlet hose,
And wear my ancient pretty dress,
And ever hear the merry Muse
Sing in my father's garden trees,
And ever hear the merry birds
Sing in my brother's orchard words.

When I was young and full of play
And had a brood of pretty things,
I learnt to love the fisher boy,
And so I'll tell the truth to them;
'Twas one of my most youthful dreams
That I could never, never be,

They came with their loud hurrying noise,
Like ocean monsters, from the deep,
With manacles and chains of gold,
They came like water-nymphs and likesnakes,
They came and passed like light, swift currents,
And like the shadows on the sand,
They vanished in the light of day,
And they became like magic shadows,
And farther down they came, and ever farther down they go,

I've got a grandmother,
I don't know what it's about,
But it's all in a book

And now, I hope I'll jump into the middle,
And jump into the deepest depths, but I don't mind a bit,
Though I'm not fond of a bit of a teacher--
It's nothing but books and women!
I'm sure I've been on the whole,
But what can a child do when he's in the hollow?

I couldn't find any lessons
That makes a long fool of the bookman's Sunday-school;
And when the teacher's going to do it
I shall put my head around and jump into the hole
And
======================================== SAMPLE 188 ========================================
 would never come nigh thee. Thou art rich and queen;
Thy cheek is like the rose-lipped frost that runs
O'er roses and o'ergrown celestials
With glittering shade and delicate thick leaves,
Such frost never blows thine icy breath
That all thy glory, all thy blisses, lives
And leaps with praise for beauty. Heaven's grace
Forever hallowed by a soul's desire
Must shake it soon.

Perchance thou knowest
How much I love thee; yet its freshness makes
The old familiar strangeness wan.
I did believe the holy vows I breathed,
That this my heart of mine was thine in death,
And now I pass from thee as a swift stream
Which whirls in stormy seas of sin. The breath
Of life is in my mouth, and from the kiss
And kiss of love I come; but sin itself
Makes purity in me, and as I think
I must submit, the wound is deep.

This is my very self; it fills my soul
With bliss of such a subtle, loving power,
And from within is breathing such a tone
As ripples in a fountain from a spring
Which they cannot keep and overflow: thus much
I love thee.

She walked along the sand-hills
Without a word or gesture,
A golden, silken, melancholy bird,
All song and all unbroken.
She never could behold
That infinite compassion
Of all men's woe and sorrow
Upon the earth of us.

And yet to me she dared not speak,
Or tell the things that no man saw before.
Her lovely voice, her smile
Were more to me than music;
The infinite pity of it hung upon me like a sorrow.
She never knew distress
Or new despair, or hunger,
Run through the slim, rich lips,
With infinite caresses;
But ever through the trouble,
Never knew rest or sadness,
For pity or compassion.

There came a dawn, and I was changed;
I know not what it meant,
But out of the sadness,
A blissful and unbroken song,
Rose like a rose-flushed cloud along the shore,
That folded its arms around me,
Tossed high on the restless water,
Swept round and round and round.

And then I cried,
Foolish and unafraid,
And wondering and restless,
And wondering, and afraid:
"Why hast thou so forgot the things I love,
The fair, old, lonely places?
Thou hast forgot the many glorious years,
The thousand glorious songs
That I sang to thee.
"O my beloved,
Thou hast forgotten
The debt I paid for thee,
The debt I gave for thee
I can never forget.
"Why didst thou rob me?
Alas! thought I,
Why shouldst thou rob me?
Hast thou not hidden what I love,
That I might keep thee?"

But to me she said,
With tears on her lashes,
"Too brave, too brave!"
Then to her face she spoke again,
"Why so, dear friend?"

'Twas this that hindered us from gracious ways,
This fraught with ill: how should it come to pass,
That all be gone which hath been many days,
That I should share in any time or this,
Seeing thee, as thou wast in the first?
And we, who were so like unto the grass,
The strange, sweet flowers,
And the wild ways,
Shall be no more, methinks,
Helen of ours?

Thou art the world to me;
Thou art so fair to look upon as I,
With eyes as small, with thoughts as narrow!
While one whose life is nought
In all the world is held so dear as thee,
Fairer than all the forms the canvas shows,
Making thee fairer far than all the rose:
Thou art my soul, and, as it were a star,
Methinks its course is steering for thee.
But now--if I might call thee mine own--
Nay, but not very far as thine are,
I'd give the guerdon unto thee alone,
For all my thoughts are sailing for thee.
My faith is that thy worth
Shall have no end to this thy prosperous fate;
And this thy love,
My faith, my love is thine!

Upon the narrow sea
As I came in,
The distance stretching far
Into the sunset,
And there was not a breath
But it seemed all life
For me in that departing.
And when
======================================== SAMPLE 189 ========================================
.

O ye that are my lovers, in the night
That like a spell dwells round me in my sleep,
Say, do ye dream of things forgotten quite,
Or do ye think of nought but the delight
Of meadow-meadow-meadow-meadow-meadow?
Or do ye think--oh do they say that now
As in the after-silence comes my brow,
As though a mist of poppies none could see--
As in the after-silence comes my brow?

Still as yon mist, through yonder hills outspread,
Dissolved the mist within me, and I said:
"Yea, I have suffered, and the world is wan,
But am not these the gates of Hellas then
That shut us in before mine eyes again?
Yea, I have suffered--yea, and felt my pain,
Yea, I have wrestled with my soul in vain,
And with mine eyes my spirit fled away.
And now, this time, my love has passed me by,
And still my soul has yearned unto the sky,
And still its vision lingers on this day."

So said he, thinking of the hours that sped
With hope: and I, in thraldom passing, said:
"Yea, I have questioned, but I know them not,
Yea, still my heart is rapt and my tears quiver
With the wild pageant of my yester years,
The gyves on which my life for me no gleam of fears
But Time's intolerable might consuming
Holds life's one friend, for all the while I doom
The sad endures--and then, in swift good-bye,
I shall forget the joy that was my doom.
"Yea, though I know my sun is gone to rust,
And though I know not what I do, O, then
It were no little thing that I should want
These desolate years of worldly men again.
Yea, though I know that I shall meet again
My Love before I die, since I have left
Life full of joys and cares and earthly mirth,
Wife now my heart has wild grown for the earth
And as the wild bird on the wing it whirls
Sings, and the air with myrtle-band is brimming,
As yet 'tis summer--and the day is bright,
And golden is the season, and the world
Throned in my thought is full of many a thing.
Yea, though my heart be blest as thou art now,
And though my love be pure as any flower,
Yea, though the world be set in mortal men,
I shall not die, but live and overcome."

So, in the dusk, he said: "Ay, though my word
Seems leapt my hands; yea, though my life seem fair,
Yea, though I seek thee not, yet hope I shall
That all my love is but a mortal thing;
Then let me be forgotten and unmade,
And let my lover rest and take me home;
And in the void new loves and olden days
Shall change my life, and find me anywhere."

So long he pondered on the love-paths bright
That in that morn, when all the world was burned,
Lay in the glistering light of still eventide,
In glorious splendor on a world agone;
Then, past the dawning grey of dawning day,
He into that dusk chamber took his way,
And stood, and saw the Lady of the Dawn,
A kindly flower above the fountain-head;
And ere he paused a musing man she had
Displayed her smile, and as he looked her hand
Felt all the water in the wondrous land,
And, brightening up the world with all its starry mirth,
Cast up a cloud of flowers, and drew them apart,
Pouring her purple draperies of her heart,
As fountains rain-awakened to the touch
Of the winged, mad heart of some great range
Hidden apart from sun and moon and wave,
And for a time, by some strange sudden change,
Bowed down before her in a silence grave.

Then looking up she saw the radiant god,
Whose presence makes the west a beaten way,
His silver bow and hot, his blazing fire
Biting the sky, as though from him it came
To kiss again the happy feet of his
Fair sister, where, untouched, all night he sits
Enthralled beneath the arch of moonlit trees,
Folding his hands upon his lips to greet
Their sweet twin meeting,
======================================== SAMPLE 190 ========================================
,
And all are pure, and cruel, and if deaf
To all, in this fierce temper, their foul strife
Is heard alone, and by the light which rose
From this mad strife, if the mad din should reach
Of an avenging God, what foulest fear
Is that the suffering soul must ever reach
In sight of God?  What conjecture can
Lie for the strifes and bonds of countless years,
When both are made one single sacrifice?
No; if thou seekest God, and do not seek,
'Tis but through faith in God the highest way,
And the wise prayer must needs be uttered.

Let those who listen see, or not behold,
That unseen things thine ears have heard and ears,
And not unknown besides the weight of sin.
Why mourns humanity like a vile race?
But come, thou servant of thy brother's need,
Thy brother of men, and do thou lead
Thy life into the dreadful war, the strife
Of war which biddeth, and destruction comes,
And floods the world with blood of all mankind.

Now for a while, for I would have thee know,
God cometh in His likeness to thee now,
Whose image is as changeless; whence his voice,
His voice, proclaims Him evermore, and sounds
Forever through the darkness, evermore.
Behold, how he is coming, how He cometh in sight
Of an immeasurable and perfect form
That immeasurable and evermore will come.
Look back! see, the adorer doth approach
Close on him--Him of old, indeed, of life
And light of mind, and radiant in the face.
O, by that sight!  O, hear a mournful voice!
Then rise with triumph, and let once again
The blasts of God take refuge in his heart!

From such long habitation shall he come
To find his heavenly guest, when that sweet form,
Sweet of the earth and spicy of the air,
Which crept into the chambers of the moon
To kiss and kiss her all night long; yet now
Unto that faithful bosom may he come,
And in his snowy garments keep his rest
And be a star above his stately house!
Behold, he comes!
His mighty hands and garments in his flesh
Break forth again, and from his piercing eye
Doth send it forth, a lurid radiance,
As of the sun.  Then, hastening to his side,
Thou shouldst be curious-wonted forth the day,
But yet I must abide till his bright form
Takes full possession; thou must make him God.
<|endoftext|>

'Tis said that when my noble mistress falls,
My gentle King, down by her sepulchre,
I fall, I fall:  I fall:  I fall;  I fall:
When me is dust, me shall the whizzing mists
Blow, and the ghosts of all strange cities, melt;
My limbs shall sink beneath a thousand shades,
Then rise again, and change their stately form
And grace my breast, and move and vex my soul,
Thou, whom my past and present both disdain;
Me thou shalt see, my son!  I do thee more.

Queen thou hast been, and livest in thy realm.
And I am Sion, and I rule a city
Which would not leave thee, where a single king
Is charmed by my ill and calamities;
Thy people, Rome's imperial daughter, rule
Cromwell and Cornelia, and till I shall rise
I too shall reign:  I loathe thee, Rome; I crush
Thy cities with my blood and thee abroad.
No whit I shun thy hate; all civil life
Has left a mighty soul, that hates the world,
And with a sword can mingle great estate.

Lo, the young king himself doth break the peace
Of one true spouse, and put himself to death,
Fain, and not sooner:  would to battle rise
The doubtful Roman sons of Rome to war,
And rob the town of reason:  no man fears
To make a league against the stranger king.
What must be, Rome says.  What must be done,
Flushed through with glory?  And how many days
Must I triumph to have my name fulfilled?
See yonder car, by ruddy torches lit,
His helmet on his head, the boy asleep,
Who sleeps betimes, not knowing which of his
Should fight against me?  Thinkest thou, what God
Will do to us?  Meanwhile I'll
======================================== SAMPLE 191 ========================================
; so of the Sarran there I heard,
Who with his hand alighted at his neck;
And we were left till more distinct mishap
Begat a solitary courtier, who
Hath here us vested an infernal Hell.
The sainted King, who to high honour was
Among the dead, all comfort left him there,
And with the anguish of his eyes beheld
Him in an agony of torment sore.
Now, Reader, of the Songs you may discry,

Ye many years, but here my Muse has sung
What cruel wars and massacre beheld,
What wounds and massacre ye well deserved,
Thick, in the bosom of this mountain sat,
In blood and sickness: I, that at this time
In country bare, a youthful Master found,
Not old, yet a true consort and a true
Encroaching youth, that by a tusk escaped
His cruel teeth, and him pursued in rage
More than for death or other hideous pangs.
This I describe; and not by way of end
Things can I tell how those I daily see,
Who, having Nature, virtue, wit, and power,
And in their own right hand have done amiss,
Sith Ilium was destroyed, and Priam slain,
And Trojans, and hath since brought endless home
From Argos, wheresoe'er that day arrive.
Yet to all mortal eyes may I descend,
Who, wheresoe'er the Muses drew the fire,
Hereafter have I been in cruel hate
Among my fellows; for my deeds, though aimed
Their ends, are but their vaunts and vain designs.
They say that in Achilles, of the Greeks
His mother lost her child by Hercules,
Deidamia; there, enamoured with her wrongs,
Her paramour laid on the ground; and there
The ancient mother, for her sake, abides
Beneath the cruel rock; but e'en for her
Love of Achilles hates himself, the prince,
Deidamia with her sisters there
Might weep; and others say that on her sighs
Sighs and remorse: and so would Hector weep;
And Pluto that is left with all his host
Of followers, if it be that he himself
Might see her, and Achilles' sorrows mark:
Here did he sit, and melancholy pass
Through the remainder of the stubborn fight,
Disdaining to resist, that he might see
If Hector's life were left for her, and scape
Himself, his fellow-warrior slain.  Oft, while
He scanned the stars that usher evening rose,
And still his eager eye pursued the wheel
Whose orbit flew athwart the rolling night,
Till sacred-eyed Areithoüs saw
His home and parents, weeping too, and told
The tidings of his noble wife, and wept.
But her he found amid the forest wild
'Twixt Pallas' palace and Achilles' field,
Grief of his heart, though anguish-pulse grew there,
And all his fury stilled.  Yon day, when round
The cattle folk he wenden'd to the city,
And he espied the body of his spouse,
Aloud he shouted, and the sons of Greece
Heard him commingle.  So grief dims his eye
That all the others pitied him, and scorned
His hapless lot, how mournful to behold
The blessed body which he left alive.
But though with grief he sorrow little now
His son was gone, and ships with oars were laden,
Yet for him could he plan another course;
For now the people madly warred with him
Alone, and for the children of his land,
And for them all disorder of the courts.
Now when it chanced that from Pheræ's walls
A sudden storm of stones had rent the air,
That some collected mass of men of might
Had buried there, they set upon the fire
The body of Alpheus, and by baskets twain
Buried he bade it lie in his own bays,
And with loud moans the rivers were o'erthrown.
The unhappy warrior, noting them, beheld
His comrades dead in battle, and the bones
Of all his people strewed around, as they
Had done before, he could no more endure.
And thus the son of Arceis, having mourned
His brother's death, besought a brother's aid:
"Hear me, ye dead, who in the dust lie low!
In front of Troy, as from a ship of war,
Slain by a tempest,
======================================== SAMPLE 192 ========================================


But now she is full of charm,
With beauty that could have a charm
'Twould gild such wondrous charms,
That heart and cheek, that bosom beats
In Cupid's burning clime,
Were crushed to sorrow, and no more
To dark misfortune clime.

I'll ne'er forget the vows we spent,
When we were maids at Yule,
When in our arms beneath we stow'd
Some tender flower of France.
In happier hour of health and love
I vow'd I ne'er should see,
But now this last fond dream hath died
And I no longer sigh.

Young Love! who to my heart has brought
Deep feeling, more than can be taught:
'Twas with that much-indebted muse
Which every letter bears:
No, never yet could I forget
The feelings it contains.

The heart that loved to hear Love sing
Has oft been pierc'd by absence's sting:
I ne'er before did see him read
Love's happy, golden lays,
But now to Love's sweet lays
Most welcome I would pay.

No!--by the memory of those eyes
Which saw me once, shine now, and come,
When doubly sparkling on my thought
They shone upon my brow:
So long, so dearly, I could not
Kiss the dear lips, which said--
"He loves you not; beware, all time
Will how December blast
My maiden flower, but to the last
Not hers, but hers she cast:
So haste, farewell! for me and you
This night the fruit will pluck,
And soon with Love's triumphant ray
Her comely lips will crook."

I first went up, to Love most high,
And sought his hand, Love's token, nigh;
And found, by Love's command,
A willing pledge, the vows plighted
By a kind heart to a faithful one,
Who had made Love's servants many one,
And vow'd they ne'er would wed.
But Cupid met, with shafts so deadly,
His arrow struck the bowels low,
Who bent, with many a vain endeavour,
To cut the suitor from his bow,
And made him leave his heavenly station,
With Love's clear torch to glow,

And took his bow, that poor unbeseeming,
To be his fair one's ornament,
And be at once his Queen.
I tell you, Love has much the likeliest,
And ask'd, in eager, earnest suit,
To give the paragon his due;
And had it, which, in other days,
Was but a warrior's helmet, say,
And made him famous knights.
But he, in many an artful task,
Neglects his helmet, and his mask,
And asks himself, in courtly guise,
What was the matter's front in these?

He said, for Love himself he sought,
And vainly on his hand he brought
The bloody lance, for which he fought,
He drew it out, the while it sought
The lance, which sheathed itself, with nought
Or reason, of its furious charm;
And swore, therein, that if she took
The spear, it would not hurt her too,
Yet still she hope to wound him still,
And to an image bear the ill.
But, true as steel, the being Cupid,
Hath not such force to draw its blood,
But with a pang is driven
Most deep, that, weak of seeming seeming,
Her new heart through, flies for the blow;
She hears, and, stepping forth, must know
Her heart's desire is to outrun
His eager conquests, and her blood
To conquer, this is worse than blood.

Though young, he grieved in hate to find
His heart's blood at the sight behind,
And, like a father of his kind,
Forbore to all he had been true.
He weeps alone;--while to his heart
He spoke up all that love can say;
While he cries, "Fool! quoth he, apart,
The two surrender, who will pay
So harsh a debt as thus to say,
Are plighted to your plighted wife
Together, who to them shall give
The heft that Love has left to live
And service that should be to love.
Behold the course which I pursue,
The glorious end of war to do,
To conquer, vanquished. Let it be
That this great strife shall prove but me,
The day that Fortune deals with me,
To conquer this, to die but she."
So
======================================== SAMPLE 193 ========================================
 thou.
His eyes are open as I rise,
My silver tresses unconfined
Pelestial dew-drops round my head.
Come quickly, and I will behold
How, through the shadows of the night,
My Love leads me, my life to light,
With bright locks, streaming through the room,
And with bright fringe on mantle serene,
White locks that ever down and down
Rung out in rich profusion down
Around my waist, and in her hair
Pelleting upon me, bright and fair,
Arose the crown of my success:

Come now, my bride, and take thy place
Within my Christian's friendly breast,
And, as between us they did meet,
Thus spoke the inner spirit of heat:

And when my heart was whole and well,
How did thy gentle spirit dwell
In one transcendent momentary motion
Throughout my boundless universe?
I never knew, nor shall yet tell,
The passion that doth fill and swell
My breast with the deep sense of God.
He feeds my eyes with beams of fire,
The myrrh is in my cheeks, and he
Sibyl of all most beautiful.

I will be like the dew-wet maid
Who in her mirror drops the shades
Which round her in the twilight gleam:
And, with a minute's wandering glance,
Through the green twilight of the leaves,
I will be like the soothing Lake,
Which is with gentle warbled thence,
The care of all the country lass,
And the sweet use of her green glass
Among her little mountain rills;
And she, as pure as the moist earth,
And beautiful as a young brook,
All her lovely waterfancies woo:
For I will be like one who, willing,
Walks the brooklet through the flowers
On the first blossom of those bowers;
And she shall be like those who dwell
With a light heart in paradise,
And pass, unseen, into the world
With quiet words of sympathy.

And when my love and tender years
Have gone, with joy, along my path,
I feel a holy joy unfelt
In the glad fields of boyhood.
O my delight, the quiet thought!
The thought of a dear maiden's heart
Smiles in the thought of her, and shows
How deeply love for me she glows.
With a look of ecstasy and wonderment
She turns her tearful eyes away;
And, as at night, from the warm shade,
Lingers the trembling star of eve,
I see her in the depth of heaven.

All silently I move away:
And as I think of her, my tears
Well flow, like brooks that mirror the green glade:
But, when the day, at its full noon, dawns,
I lose the image, I behold
In other days! there is no other sight
In this grand solitude of mind,
For all its woods and fields and streams,
And the blue sky, and the white woods, and the white dawn.

There is a glory in the midnight air,
A peace that lives in solitude,
A peace that may not be again,
For the dark clouds are things of earth,
That made the everlasting hills
And woods on which the earth doth lean,
And man, that hath the power to pray,
Himself is on the mountain-height,
There lives a grace that cannot die,
And human nature seems to bless.
There is a glory in the midnight air,
A peace that falls on the deep night,
A holiness in the starry light,
An consecration of the skies,
That makes the lonely spirit free
From its mortality and cares,
And each affectionship is blest
With the motion and the light
Of those that have a longing heart,
With those that have no human art.

The violet with its golden dew,
The antelope, the live-oaks,
The lily with its airy blue,
Is more than all these paradise,
For the surpassing fragrance of the earth
Hath not a pattern beyond it.

The finest crocus, deep embalmed in dawn
Like Iris, rises from the waves,
To make a fragrant dimpled loveliness;
The tufted grasses one by one,
Daisies and violets, inanimate,
Grow purple with the sunshine,
And richly colored as the summer sky.

The velvet violet, wrought with colours of crimson,
The silver-white, when the dark Atlantic night
Flamed on her harp-steeds, in a night
Of drow
======================================== SAMPLE 194 ========================================
 the hoes.
What lets us next step on? what is this most wonderful--
Of manifold and wonderful creeds, which all our mothers love--
Is born in these dark mansions, or no man lives in them?

This thought of love is their love, and that of dread,
And they are dreaming and waiting for the dawn, the day
that shall open for them,
And the little grey-eyed girls of the night, on whom their hearts
are as eager, and whose
hearts are as tender
As theirs the world above.

Therefore to the last.
When I'm weary of every pain--where are my brothers left?
Are they all right again?
Do they laugh and have nothing to do with themselves?
Do they see nothing but blood, where their city of sin
and sin has grown,
And they think, with the eyes of the people of the Sun, their
souls are gone?

Faith is the chiefest crown of all
That crowns the world in love;
And now the long-forgotten walls
Are shaken by the move.
Men of the Sun and of the shower,
And the roses and stars of heaven,
Tarry not for these are done,
Those who went before, are gone.

Unleash the portals, and set fire to all things;
The doom of the world is set, and with the darkness
Of fire and shaken air, let all men witness,
Ye who have had your share;
That none may know,
Or, seeing it, have forgot it.

And those who went before, are the wise and the young;
There are swords unto none, against none but their sins;
And some men do forget, and some men are sick,
And some men are quite old;
But the cry and the sweat
Of a tree be rude,
And it is not for me
To be undone,
For you know all things are
As one to another's degree.

What an ugly strife
Was it at the gates of death,
When the heart lies open wide
And the body lies in wait,
And the strongest soul of all
Sits forth to meet the wall!

O rebellion mocked,
Plague on the eyes of guile,
Beauty that will never come,
Longing to do no more!
Have I told you these and this
That I would fain conceal?
Fain would I hide the scar,
Yet not say it, once revealed;
For when you see my face
You must never know of me.

Is there a way to clear a doubt
Or is there an untried void?
If only I were false and friendless,
Should I still talk to you of this?
Or is there aught I can remember,
But only a hope or rumour?
Is there aught I can recall,
But the cry and the touch and tival?

And though I say it and recall,
'It's not for nothing--it is not for all'.
I know that you must be a cheat
To face me and to give me back,
But I would change my brief conceit
And forth beyond the hills to find you.
My little Ghost and I went out;
A friendless Ghost was He,
And there was nothing said about it.

I know my life, for with me there were none.
'Twas neither half a rhyme nor half a song,
Nor half a word indeed.
But He was always and all good,
And made me sing when I was young,
And He cared nothing for my trouble,
And so he needed it to-day.
And thus we sang together, and had gone
Where quiet leaves the world on guard,
In downy-cumbered lanes alone, alone,
Watching the sad clouds drift away,
Because the saddest day was dawn.

To-day's October of the very first,
That you were rich enough to have me wed,
And ere you met what I was bid to pen,
And how much I was bid to do instead
Of "how much I loved, how much I said,
I shouldn't do any such a day.

I could do more if you were kind to me
Had I the skill to write and to combine;
And then perhaps when you were bid to say
You'd ask me where your corner lodges do,
You'd make reply, "I love you; this is true,
Your corner lodges do!"

There was a case of which I took a scold,
And heard it beat some way, and said "There's time
For getting over it; I'm grown too old
To be old and frozen for
======================================== SAMPLE 195 ========================================
 but a dint that I can't lay my bones.
Indeed, he's dead!  And is it true?
For this he does so, too,
His body will be said
To have no doctor for to meditate
If he writes letters, let it be as well
As not to have a dirge, and die to sell.
He was--being made of cheese
At sixty-five--
Of which he is the general free.
A man whose faculties,
Ly cured of worms and worms,
Had once as many holes
As he could send his thoughts and his eyes to his mind,
And, in the morning light,
He has such proofs of sense
That one must sue, at first, for freedom from himself.

Them that ask where he has gone
Over the hills and beyond the mist,
May he find some one
Who will send his mind on a pilgrimage,
And ask if he can bear a larger load
Than the trunk he has on the bare earth where he has gone.

If all go right they'll fight
Just like diggers,
Quite unmolested quite;
The best of it
They'll make the sad world glad!
If there's a black sheep where
It will find a fence of wit,
It will make the blind proud,
And do the silly and the proud to be so the lion.

If to be all at ease
In this world's evil noise,
All at once begin and see
That what goes on, shall follow after years,
More and more, until at last the hoof-troof be found,
Through ages that are past,
What, I want, of this great world,
To buy your grain of wheat,
Shall serve you, and your country,
And eat the bread and eat the master's wine!

The pulse of nature is, and shows
In what she ripes,
The mason's hand has found a grain of oats.
A new piece, bought and sold for aye,
Is now the sum of truth
Already gotten in the market-place!

O, welcome, Lord, all you who fare
O'er stony ridge and shingly aisle!
O, know, yon wearying wight,
What better thing can meet His sight
Than to know the coming of this might
With such an undoubting soul and sight,
And be poor, and sordid, and uncouth,
And by His grace, accursed, accursed.

He hath given me eighteen months to know,
To hear the chime that is making the day
In the days of old;
To twine with fingers the tissue o'er,
And learn to spin a little thread
That is thread
Of the many twining round that blossom-bed
When love and truth and law
Are linked together, one and all,
Into one.

How I love to prate,
Oh, I would it were my fate
To have some part of youth's sweet time
Away from the world's cold--
Some old forgotten time
When I were yet young!
With an early blast of wind,
And a voice
Of exultant exultation,
As it swept
From the dark
The dark ding-dong of the morning with promise of hope,
It would bring me, unaware,
Some bright deed
To celebrate,
To give

To the spirit of childhood--
Some pure, strange, and gold-lipped touch
Of the hand
That is willing to give, till life
And love
Both are past,
And a heart of joy and sorrow
Has a heart of gold.

As the years went silently,
Deeper grew my heart;
Myself came forward silently,
And from under the mist
And under the burning grass
I knew that all must be
With a star,
And then my soul,
A bird,
Began its song.
Then in a moment it began
To dance with light,
As if the earth had taken in her flight
The bright
And dear
Rhymes, that belong
To little children's feet,
With joy that never goes,
To meet.
O, it overflowed,
And overflowed!
No rest however they found,
No self-seeking and strong
To hold them in hugger-cub
And drain them forth again;
For with all convulsions
Their verses run,
While they repeat
Unearthly songs for joy
In purer throngs.

THE simple, daily bread
Is life's poor beast;
And they that use it, feed and feed,
Sow it in the same
With one that much del
======================================== SAMPLE 196 ========================================
 by ancient singleances
(For I will lay no blame upon them)
To see that soul once held as glibly
As once it was; in times of terror
That emptied vessel of immortal--
O, as it were, but flame becaring!
I see a tomb, my kin, arise
And pour the wine out in the skies,
And, standing in the disenchanted town,
Transformed my fate into its own.
So and so did I gaze upon it,
When the red sunlight smote the grey
Fields--my son's first fair of days--
And, far away, a wandering man dreamed
Of these sad woods, and hill and glade
Leading his child by the side of the stream--
Dreaming when the fair green earth
Was old and stormy, yet a voice
Pursued him--even as the child
His musing. "GOD, no longer seek
For gifts that must be too much praised,
But give me all--my child!"

While the wood wondered, the voice of a man
Grew bitter in spirit, and, suddenly,
Into this undiscovered land
Gulped on its dunghill of sands, and then
Fell in a sudden flare of light,
Like the heat of the heavens. Long time in the dusk
A fount of fire and a stream of light
Taught the traveller where life stands still
In vast-browed marvellous shadow. To him
There was nothing more than the sad mariner's dream.
"Rise now," said the voice, as the boat sprang o'er
Its low black deck of jagged stones,
And the restless shore-lights of the fishing-boats
Shone out in the crimson glow
Of their trimness, I scarce knew what was this man's dream.
"This tall man," I said, "is God's youngest son--
Leather-blanched and golden-haired,
Timid-lisping, soft-lipped as a nun
Beside the sea; with fingers fine
As a dial dial-hand, he wove
A crown of flowers and anemones
For a crown to shade his brows."

"I have watered well," he said. "And yet
Has the night not tasted to eat of me?
Is not life an empty dream,--the hand
Is light and love extinguished?" But I strove
To question. Wherefore could I not--I said--
"Be but an unsubstantial shade
Of love!" Not otherwise it was--
The long-breathed-one, twin-born with our two lives--
Till I came to the other in the night.
A will benign
Grew closer to me. "Yonder shines
The first red star," I said, "the first--
The ebon, with which in the night
I gazed on the whole life. I say:
I died in my garden one day,
And loved--what means it?"
"Thy life-time comes again," said the other;
"Say rather strange; it used to be
Thine own still mate."
"So altered!"
"Yea, and gone!"
He remembered, while sitting
Within his last light cenot, and saying,
"I have lived--I will die again,"
He plunged and vanished, and in the dark
Gulped the other--to die.

"Well, you wrong yourself, my own man?"
"Yes, even in your own eyes
I see the wonder now which is
The smallest star--there on the brow
Of that long hill, tall as my love,
Lonely as thy beauty--yet my love!"
"It should be so," I said;
"But I was not to meet
The years----And I am all to blame,
So none say."
The night was chill and dark
And yon dead leaves lying stark,
A dead leaf's shadow, whitened all
With chill, dead light. A call
As if it breathed not, growing small
At last in one grey fall,
And the frost gleamed--the withered leaf.
"Yea, sir, and, though this hill
Is only grown so pale
That you keep wan, worn--in haste
And yet your good doth grow stale;
You wait and watch and wait;
I am no saint; I cannot tell
Whether you pay me for
The pain. I knew it--I at least
Would let you feel it goad
For all your craving, when last night
I stole away in yonder wood;
And as a saint--I did refuse--
I have grown pallid since I died."

A
======================================== SAMPLE 197 ========================================
 lewde & lewde,
Er honged by a contrychaunce.
A churmy wiAEsAEs this ffro me bredde,
Myn erthe to my doughterdome
Clove the grene Calendony,
Tane in the mawe, and so {Verse,}
The merye of a{nde} þ{a}t gente;
The fyrst the byff{ne} is a ma{n}ne,
Set eu{er}is on w{i}t{h} brow{e}
To{e} the wodnesse, þo wod{h} knawe,
In erthe to be bold and woo,
A fowle fore-before in a traunce.
Thus this bargain was begun,
As I{es}u ment no tyt to hasty
Of that I{es}u hym~ sclaught hym~ by.
Tho wolde he not alone presage
That owt was neuer so crue a nede
More to{e} his fader and his frende,
For he had hym sone.
So gan~ he caste his fore browgh{e},
And wan~ he ryd mone on~ his backe.

The King of Burgundy, a Parody about tranquillity and joy,
Went out with pomp and gay pompround the court.
There they left the son{es} and wedded
With Tymber, the rosden boy{ur}d{e} court{e};
There they de-voyde to Ro{i}ta lade,
Unto the town they toke the way,
And there they toke the redege
Of the fayre Araby that were there,
To the Forestes,{4} a little bo{ur},
Vppon a boc of trees in a fayre,
And there they had a gret solace
That wan be byt {en}, and out was aAEsAEs
And fast was fast the syde,
The kyng thonketh hym~ sone
Vppon the wood that burneth here,

With a sone, as I heard sayde,
Of an accursed, men-mavage{5} a hound{6},
All in a beste {en}, and w{i}t{h}-oute knyght.
He kept no p{r}iote, as who seyde,
The kyng for to ffyghte that were there.

Asomege goddes toke theyr arayd{6
There of theyr faders to make and slayne,
Men wyse bothe, and there-aye more,
And p{re}soneth them of thy ladyh{7e}.
He hard hym~ to his gyse, to gete the{8
In place of his knyght{i}t{h}, and hath de-lyd

That hardy fader{e} of sau{m}tythe yere,
Alone to ffyght on holy grounde.
There the fynd{E} be-gan to wepe,
The gyft{es} maddowes ful wod be-gan;
With contre clere {en} the were yronne,
And went hym~ there to seche and aproyne.
Thane they were two yere and sene
Thes wy{e}men were, and that lesyng{e}.

They had a wedded bo{ur}d{es} mannysye,
That whil they went, he schuld{e} stand;
How þ{a}t men schulde fare to greven so,
Of a castell{es} in to a rote,
And {throwyn}es, and he{e} schuld{e} with-in.

So they staked their stedes on a rown,{2
Wore hem downe and done:
The kyng{es} sone of Perly{es} brent{es}
Dyd p{re}son and chefe the keyes,
Sone oute of the yere caste otherwhere,
The prison and derelict{es} body fare,

Ther fore go every lysten whyle:
The p{re}cipal{es} man{er} in o
======================================== SAMPLE 198 ========================================
, no men are the worthiest men
That ever camped under a sun-filled sky,
But if you value them as your fathers did
And keep it for your fathers--why, if you could,
You should return and save yourself. I suppose
You did not know before how the cost would sink
In the great flood of earth. But, say, in haste
We shall come after, as a beaten man may bring
His people back with him. You leave behind
The temple and the gold coin that are gone:
And as our fathers brought them from the place
That old world story is the heaviest thing
When sorrow cannot bow, but you grow old,
And in the sowing of quick flame that makes
You a great harvest of immortal grief
Or, growing old, what those poor words may mean.
The tears will wash you and cleanse you and cleanse;
Then, in the blessing of the name that endures,
You shall know why we came to the last place.
What do you want, of settlers who are lost
Or who are all our children? You have lived
On this fair land where all good things have failed
And every worldly thing has vanished, save
This very day you shall come to this grave,
And it shall change and be as you have been.
What shall be told us?

The flowers of the spring were coming to bring
The earliest buds to kiss it. The soft light
Of the young day is coming on my soul,
And, looking at its beauty and its worth,
I think it best to find it. What shall be
A mere memorial of a time long dead
With all its former flowers--the flowers we grew
In that sad earth beneath us--we who came
To take them and be happy in their names,
And keep them, as we left them, with the dead
Before you and before you, speak of love
And joy, as we flung them to one another,
Or told them, as we said them, to another
And loving them--you and the world have done.
The snowdrop shakes below the little fern
With its wee, slumbering crown of silent thorn
Over the grave where the sad flowers grow.
And when the snowdrop shakes before the wind
The crown of poppies that are gone and gone,
And the rare violet shed their blossoms, yet
The dew drips down and dampens, it is so
With the old breath that heals the wintry tomb
And the pale flowers we sprinkled with our blood.
This is the best of all!

Come to these ancient graves where my young years are,
Speak of these ancient dead,
That sleep below the mould, in the cold North,
Where the rude musk-bark goes by,
And the matted fern-tree of the forest tingles,
That rustles in the wind,
And many and many a tree
Is cast in the dead leaves.
But these are the dead words of my childhood,
That speak of strength and hope
In a world that is full of good things,
That the poor cannot accept and reprove
And yet they will be here;
And I shall lift the old wither sainted fingers
To that unfilleable voice of all the poets
Who are on the wing and cannot tell
Whether they are alive or dead,
But I am stricken and weary
With an unfilitude of hate
That mocks me with the face of Death;
And ever it comes to pass
That my spirit is like a lance
Spent with the blood of the Lamb.
And I am weary and weary
With the strange dreams I had
When I first looked in your eyes,
And saw how good things are and fair,
And the wild powers that were good,
And that woven a little web
Of faerie sheen and golden thread
Wherewith I know the toil of bread,
The cunning craft of an ancient raid,
And saw how the waifs of Life
Are mingled and woven and woven of strife
And of love, and of truth, and of ruth;
The woven webs of strange, sweet thoughts
That weave into the woof
The heart of youth.

For they weave not the web of desire,
Nor the sun whose wandering beam
Across the far Atlantic sea
Seems sad as yonder weak and real.
What matters it though mine eyes
May walk the level of the pool
That wanders with eternal feet,
Unvanquished, still renewed, until
I gaze with little wondering
On your great happy summers gone,
And the years not yet passed.

My child, it is not so with me,
Though time may smooth his smiling brow,
And keen Time hold his
======================================== SAMPLE 199 ========================================

That clouds from East to West are spread
And mighty men, like some old race
Whose occupation seemed to trace
The live west on the untrodden floor
Of some old ruined castle-door,
Have glimpsed a terraced castle-gate,
And, steeped within by ugly moats,
Had stood within a terrace more
The favorite of old times, and raised
A casement o'er the edge of woods,
And o'er long level, level quays,
And bridges to the bay; yet he
Saw only through a single bar
The north and west-wind eddying by.

"When all at once the broad saloon
Sloped westward in a river-snorting bay,
Through which the lonesome halberd ran
Through sparkling, whispering calms, and fume
Of hollowed meadows, and the rich
Plant stilled, to catch the sleepy swan,
To settle on the swelling tide.
But when they lifted on their side
Their cloaks, and went their way and sprung
Into the farther bank, they paused,
Turning a simple round and sweet
To the slow moving of the swan,
And the faint ripple of a rill
As it drew farther in:
And, on their farther way, the hill
Was this way and that way dressed;
And not far off in sun or shower,
Was in the further bank begirt.
The brown swan smiled as if to say:
"Here leaps my hawk, as if in scorn
To stoop and swallow me again."
The squirrel chirped and chirped to hear,
And through the wide, brown water stirred
Like green and golden wood.
Nor ever through the changing tide
The little fishers caught their leap,
The long swan flew away and died
In far-off water, where he lay,
Nor stirred, but, like the wind, went on
In tumult, and was gone.

Night came and went, and the strange light
Whistled along the silent coast,
Wavering and slow, and sadly bright
As the long Sabbath of the lost
Aweary wanderer through the years,
The whirlwind of wild light and years,
The cloud of coming years,
Wandered, and dropped, and moved and glanced,
Moved, and grew darker, and the night
Fell, and around him rolled a veil
Of darkness, like a pall
That the dawning sun illumes;
And it was still and motionless;
The sea came in at the last to rest,
The silence in the brake;
And, like a boat o'er shadowed waves,
The stillness of the lake;
And the white foam gleamed on her bowed head:
And the first starbeam smote her face
In the darkness, like a sail.

And the next sunbeam she, that now
With an unshaded sail,
Shadowed and sad, without a shroud,
Swept the black water, and the night
Fell, and lay still and pale
Like a wan moonless ghost in the dull wave
That heaves around her and
As if her naked feet had trod
The long, long tides of that dread sea,
The dead cold sea of all their world.

Never was heard such sound of wail
In wind or water,
Never such din of sound came down
As the sad surf of the blown town,
The night went over loud and long,
And the white moon above us, white
With the other star-fires, girdled home
With tapers, and with the whole sea crowd
Of other thoughts, went down.
And ever the smooth-running river of even
Rose and endured; and ever the broad sea
Of great Oceanus, rolled far and wide,
Deep, deep, and loud; and ever its loud chime
Was lost in the darkness; and ever its oars
Cast up their silent silver at the knees
Of the blind white whirling stars,
That kept watch for the lonely soul,
That sat upon the shore of death,
And made them all so close, so close!
No moan, no lament, or groan
Escaped the unknown sea;
The white surf of the gathering surf
Came up the wild-sea's jagged throat,
As under the moonlight's splendor
The white sheet glided by.
And far away on the sweet air
The song of the speared-up sea
Made answer in sounder sound,
Like voices heard in heaven's harmony:

And the proud waves dwelt round her,
Under the moon, in the great heart of the deep,
While her foam
======================================== SAMPLE 200 ========================================

And, with her, flattering me,
He, only her, of her heart a flower is;
But the elf must needs his own Dear Presence,
So, some way, he shall draw anigh him,
I shall sigh, I shall ask, What am I?

When she comes by chance
With her haired trumps,
She goes half guessing
If I say she can,
The clown or the brook,
Or who can be wise,
With half-shut eyes
Staring at the skies.

Or if she does,
The pretty things
Made plain in her eyes
Can't do without spies.
I, little elf,
Will tell you to dig,
And easily rise
To her face, in a trice,
Like the tail of a fish.

The sisters out, at the edge of the day,
With clothes all brown and fresh, come trotting away
To get them ready, but to stick it tight
With bunting and with bumble-bees all bright;
Now, hapless pair! for ever hold on hope
In that transcendent hour when nothing's done,
Or undone, from this day's business not faring
To meet the sight from any pleasant dining,
Where any one can taste the plente, or see
Whether the innocent, the wealthy, be
As indifferent as these, or hard to please.

Here was a cart, a mill, a cap or band,
A cruel bench, a bar, a waggon wheel,
And over it the lout could safely ride,
And once, just once, he drove it out of frame,
With no one near him, not a stoppike place,
But straight he made it leap and fly about,
For there, with nothing in it, he could hit.
And once, though, all the time the road was clear,
He said, "It's one how my coat's covered here!"
And once, ere long, he looked about him broad,
And then, "It's two how each will hurry, when
The railway gets through wood and stone,
While here I stand and do not care to strike,
And meet the foe"--I said, "Good gracious, pray,
Let me get past this once, and die I can."

I got to bed by force,
And heard the birds sing,
And smiled and watched them play
About the garden.
Without this it was just a litter.
The wind came up from South-west;
It limped about a little drift,
And blew and took it out of hand.

It put the brasses off in the morning;
It put the ladies all in ruts,
And curled up in little corner corners
Hawk-case, which the larks kept pouring out.
Then down into the meadow,
Along the sides,
Just lightly swinging,
The larkspur, kind erring!

Now when he opened the buttonholes up,
And walked about the edges of the moor,
He looked around, but never hit his stop
Until the mermaids.
"What brought you here?
The sleepy thing!
Oh, got you gone away?"
"Oh, a sea pear pear tree!
I thought it was a friend!"
"I found it at home from New York.
There it stands on a rock,
And 'tis in joint!"

What? went the Owl?
I got into a ball-ball-ball-ball-ball-ball-ball-ball-ball!
They led him off with a jerk and jerk
And I ran on with a trot,

Now all the throng were out,
But I went on with a trot,
And I fell on the moor,
So I didn't know when it came to the last
That I should come to my end,
But I jolted out loud,
And I fell on the moor,
And I splashed the livelong seal
That still stand on their track.

Then down I ran,
And a saw I saw
That was spread out so free
I bounded over the star-flipped sea
And swept in the sea.
(Still, do you see those joy-lit eyes,
Those brown and golden?)
They were there with laugh and cries,
They were there with beck and beck
And then, and I was quite alone.

Nay, nay, my little one,
You are not a-wing,
I know, and for me alone.
For you never were known to roam
You may stay till to-morrow's come,
And you may grow still,
But you may grow still
And walk about
======================================== SAMPLE 201 ========================================
!

Thou hast a face like night,--like morn
In morning, noon, and night:
The same dark eyes are saddled now,
And those have drowned their light.
Thou hast my love, and not my kind;
But if thou have her soul,--
Thee, be she happy, so my heart
Will comfort, glad at last, thy guest,
Thy bride, within the fold!

O! for the time, as now, when all
Our pleasures on earth are set,
When as the world its arms of sleep,
And life immortal forget!
When the light veil shall fall on high,
Like a wraith, dark and mystical,
When only one beloved eye
The city's smoke shall shroud,
O! when our hearts are warm and free
And dance like light, for Liberty,
Thou, throned upon the brow,
Do the prophet's office now,
That, from time's frost and foe,
All perfect melodies may flow
Wherein that holiest nobleness gleams,
Fling round the altar beams,
Thy spirit is our minstrel theme,
One, the very soul's coed of flowers,
Thy ministering hand,
Piercing, mystic, strong,--
The paths of heroes and of kings
Whereof my song,
Through the ages, I recite
Unto all ages as they tread
The courts of heroes and their dead,

And those many other themes arrayed
In the realm of Light,
Of Life and Death, there hath been played
The hymn of triumph o'er his head,
Great in wisdom, Freedom-bride,
Noble in that primal age
When all was might;
And though we have sung through all his days
Great songs with him, and seen his praise,
Yet he hath not dead.

But when the soldiers' hand, so light,
A crownless crown shall have of right,
Our son shall wear it, with a crown,
And we be crowned again.

Ay! though the tyrant's brow be bared,
And Justice tear the chain!
The tyrant's blood his taint shall purify,
And draw his triumph close,
Our son again be crowned,
Our babe be mother, he,
To our shores of home.

And those two noble loves, thy love
As well may warm, as win our natures,
Who shined with noble hearts of fire
And holy blood,
As in their boyhood's night sublime,
Enthroned in heaven their earthly time
And to their country's tomb most sublime,
This hour a light shall be, a song,
This signal-torch to Heaven.

In their boyhood's time of peace and love,
They bare young hearts to sun and tempest;
They clasped the feet of brotherhood,
As foes alike to Virtue.
But thou, a Brother! well thou knowest
That on the Rock of Ages, round
The cradle of the coming Woe,
Father and Father, hands they clasped
In agony, when first they felt
Its rapture; at their own dread word,
Not much of love was left their bond
Unto their child.

Man's wrongs, and theirs was all a wrong,
From that which tends on every long,
To others' hearts.
A well-laid chain with meanings held
And freely taken; every bond
'Twixt mercy's Church and Good commends
Its deed of mercy.

How willingly the pledge was held
Of our first Father! well he knew
How easily each day, unknown,
Our second Father on his knee
Had trudged with him.

Nor did the drops of worship fail
To enter, like a sudden hail,
Upon our home.
A joy intense, a holy awe
O'er all our dwellings rang, that saw
The bells of home in noisy quires
Greet us from God.

There, all around, an awful calm
The old Old World should seem, that saw
Its Old World pass away, its will
In the new light, while far away,
Its darkened future, dim and grand,
Its fearful future, and afar,
Its crowded Eden, and its star,
Its dream of Heaven.

It passed away.  The breath of Spring
Seemed growing chill; the earth lay still
And dream of Heaven.
New-born, the fresh young Spring was born,
The race of men was stamped and torn,
Spring--and its word was "Winter, cold,"
Warm, lifeless shoots, a snow-white cry
From hill and vale, "Now, to the fold"
======================================== SAMPLE 202 ========================================
 he strayed and with that pagan.
Up he rode, the Christian host to meet,
The pennon tossed in air,
The portents of his name before,
The marvelous circle there.
"Once he looked, and saw my sword," he cried,
"And the hilt-cuts that I had on my side:

As a brave man working just for God!"
But a lion roamed along the road,
A mighty host that showed
Straight to the patterned shields, the plates
And tables of many a purple stowre:
And never a sweeter blast
Blew from the petals of white roses:
And never a braver man nor braver
Cowed down the verdant meads of heaven.

"He left his meads and his own village behind,
But we thought of Spain in fair Italy,
At golden gates and fair assay
We sailed the golden seas,
And every coast and fairer hill
Was paved with pearly gray.
We gained upon a Spanish coast
A strait and narrow land,
A pleasant land, but not so large,
For all the ships went hand-in-hand;
Where grey gulls' wing came through the sand,
Where peering mariners saw bright, afraid,
The white road in the sun's raw gold;
And she who saw our slender span,
Like a poor blind hound that licks the trail,
And makes her footsteps soft and wild,
Said, 'Rosa! will your swiftness fail
And bring me to that lovely land,
That fair, strange coast?' Then slowly down
We climbed for it, but 'twas sweet, I think,

A pleasant land, though steep and strait,
Where one might turn and smile on it;
For she who found a little way
In love with one who loved her, kissed
The light long years that all should fade,
And many happy years have lain
Familiar in her heart again.

And when she drank of life's full sea
And shared the joy of life's full sea,
And saw the passionate sun on high
Burn the love-light within her eyes,
Then she began to sing with love,
'My love has died and I have died,
But still with loving love and pride
She welcomes death and doth not cheat,
Being no less a spirit still,
For she hath gone forth strong and sweet
Like sunny wave on ocean's rim,
And she hath seen the eternal hour
Awhile since when her face was dim;
And yet she is in paradise,
With all her heart and all her deeds,
With all her poet-youth and dreams,
And faith and fervour in her needs,
And now as in her bed she lies,
And watcheth angels on the sky.

'And round her sleep the angels sweet,
The silver-winged saints and all their mates,
And tender folk that watch her so,
And tender folk and fair of face;
And fair of flesh her lovely frame,
As pure as the unshaken grace
And vigils of the holy thoughts
That nurse the love of souls in dreams.
And if she be a lady sweet,
A goddess, and an angel dread,
Her loveliness hath ne'er been known,
It hath not kept her lovehead's head
A whitener than the dawn of day,
It hath not seen the burning blood,
It hath not seen the love of gold,
It hath not been the wine of blood.

Oh, lullaby for poor despair,
And lullaby for grief and pain,
And lullaby for weariness
Of this poor heart of mine, oh, lullaby!

Sexton! thou art the wreck of God!
The cup of bitterness, the cup of tears,
The shattered lilies weep, the broken leaves
Are salt with what thou think'st! the bitterness
Which in the name of hell is crumbled, unnamed,
But ever fresh and sweet!  O quiet smile!
To drown it is from heaven.  Forget
All this; for when this heart hath tasted the kiss
It once was blessed and it will die
For ever!

And yet thou knowest
The secret in the Soul of man
Is the vague memory of that sterile joy
That still in all the dreamy wolds he twines,
Whose odours are as secrets of sweet Love,
Whose light no thought beyond our vital ken
May match, but never can a sight discover!
Bearing within his reach,
The island flower of perfect innocence,
The native bud of conscience stainless,
And light within her soul a fairer voice,
And like a pilgrim holding
======================================== SAMPLE 203 ========================================
 both!  Their gorgeous wings the floor
And pavement of our visitations won
By civil wars, and in the long career
Lead us to Egypt!  Hence they come, their way
Is here abrupt, and this mysterious cave,
O'er which, with ill-percealing magic, rolled
Our bridal chambers, there is no escape
From space impassable, nor ought expect
But when death brings us the fresh flower of life.
Yet soon this trembling within them we end,
Whose earthly course no longer is forbid;
Therefore they wander'd on in quest of peace;
And at last seeing 'twas a joy unknown,
They wander'd onward to the other coast,
And all was desolate.  It chanced that chance
Brought thither some shrewd elder of his race,
His mantle long, and beauteous to behold,
The pest that whiten'd all the land around
And all that cloth'd in hides of cloth of black.
And here was floating in the murky air
Fell Nature's curse!
Hail, as it seems!  Fire that ne'er
Was smitten from the cloud had smote the deep!
Or fell, in such revenge, so sorecontending!
If I foresaw such fate, I scarce believe
My weaker, more uncarm'd.  But not the less
As numberless as were the thousands rush'd
Upon my vision, I foresaw how high
Expatiate to my view their lofty ire
Would howl in space if I o'ercome their might.
Nor wanted I a few hairs of old age.
When I had seen my sons, I mark'd the wounds
Plash'd by their enemies, and instead
Of war and bloodshed, I had deem'd them keen,
Promising mercy with a father's hand.
But what avails to all of lesser kinds,
And less deserving in a better time?
Why did not therefore I accost thee thus,
Thus wonder-struck?

Kind, gentle, gentle youth!
Thou art the zealous wife of the enervate;
Laugh'st, when thou laugh'st, for at the rate of men
The fattest quarter makes an actor laugh.
And, would'st thou know whom this could possibly,
Steadfast in heart and wisdom-cap, a king!
Art thou not he, whose subtle mind possest
Nothing of trouble but the wind and storm?
Surely thou know'st; for, since the Orient world
(All under-oubted, wise, and ancient sage)
Thou never knew'st, since they were fair indeed,
Or worthy, or applauded, or a prince.
Nor can thy tongue, when thou hast heard my songs,
The thunder-crested charioteer forego,
To listen to thy quaver.  It is well
That thou shouldst pass thy days among the gods;
For thou art ever One, and One the Thunderer!
They gaze upon thee, and with looks of ruth
Look down; but never any tear escaped
From their old sorrows.

Then, to sing of him!
Thou that by onlying golden themes
The shepherd-kings of fame and glory gain's
Thy father's ear, by trailing laurels chased,
Who gave thee life for thee! (the woods resound
With pleasant strains, like hymns, while through the grove
The leaves, like tattered garments, on the winds
Are wafted.)  Yet when twilight strikes the sky,
Waking the tall fir-trees to their trill,
Sweep the still woods, that their mysterious moan
Is like the low moaning of the sea,
Who hear the oft-repeated trill of the surge,
And sigh, and think it a transparent dream,
Haply it seems, yet not in vain, it moves,
That such fair things as thou mayst please the gods
Are sweeter for their universal toil,
And thou may'st turn their new-found bonds to cords
That choke the souls of men, and drown within
The longing of their eyes; when that alone
The sun shall rise, and all the sombre heavens
And shining firmament make bright for thee.
Here thou art better fitted for the stage
Of writing tables.  There thy happy feet
Thy constant, calm, and upright heart shall find
Strength to perform'd; and in that haughty age,
When all the immortals kept thee at their side,
And all their life did was dissolve in prayer.
How happy are the gods, who look on thee
With outstretched arms, and, welcoming thy smile,
Thy soft
======================================== SAMPLE 204 ========================================
 wide his flock with liberal care
From forth their young sprouts, grazing there,
In joy and play with sweet observance,
Dressed out in native garb of Pee.
With joy and play enwoven together
The noble men of Inachus went
Their offerings, praised by Sítá’s mother,
The favour of the Gods gratified.
Then from the mid-day heathen Princes
With prayers and praise by King and Heroes
To Pramábí came, their heavenly minstrel,
Whom five brave sons had hither led:
Fair girls were they, with tresses hairless,
And in their cloths gay-gemmed garments
Smiled sweet with scent of flowers.
Bowed down by love the aged matron,
And told the sire and sons the news,
The brother-kings in doubt and anguish
Hung piteous down on Gods or foes.

The suitor-kings, the son-in-law,
The boys that roam the ways they know,
Thronged with Vriháksha, every where
Cameats and kine the feast to show.
High elephants with blazoned necks
And rosy-shouldered steeds,
And camels girt of many a hue,
And camels dyed with gilded hue.
With tender love the women fed
As to the Gods their task assign’d:
Peers of the birth, and men of mien,
And girls whose eyes were radiant-green.
So in the wood the Vánar strayed
With conquering step and joyful mien,
Pursuing still the royal way,
And joyed the woodland solitude.
Then from the court he sprang in haste,
Prahasta’s(807) fortress, hard to win,
And from his palace two tall men
Whom length of days had sanctified.
Borne by his car, with glorious car,
Sate Diti’s(807) lords. With duteous ear
Himself he loved and lov’d to hear.
So, high in power and high in might,
The fiends who roamed the woods confessed,
Home to his happy home he sped
And the high ramparts overthrown.
The sons of Aksha(808) stood in heaps
And watched for Ráma’s form and face,
When fiercely red with blanching foam
To King Vibhishaṇ strode he.
A belt of steel and mail he wore
Whereon his arms were fiercely tore,
And there with tasselled gold he strove
To smite, before he struck, the foe,
Who made that rampart, rampart’s space,
The ramparts of a hundred groves.
Then by Kishkindhálaṇ Ráma stript,
But sore marvelling at the sight,
Sank in his lap his love conf slain,
And there he lay and mumbled, fain
To turn where Lanká’s turrets rise,
Where the great chieftains raised a pile
Of wood and creeper, fair to see,
To stream in terror far away.

But when in angry mood he strove
To break the promise made he gave,
Him by the lord of Lanká led
His younger sons to Lanká led.

Great joy was theirs who ne’er betrayed
King Rávaṇ and his kith and kin
To join in friendship fierce and strong,
And hand to hand was Rávaṇ’s thrall;
But when the dark-eyed Rákshas fell,
The giants left their moon-piled cell,
And fled the day for fruit of crime
And left the Gods for heavenly clime.

These words the lady’s gentle eyes
To Ráma in the wise replied:
“Faint not, O King, my steps to stay;
High-hearted, show thy lord today;
And I will listen as I can
To the great tale thy lips declare,
When first the giants fought on high,
And mighty arm of war was nigh.
Bowed down to Kumbhakarṇa’s power,
Though palace-thralls and bulwarks lower,
Fierce in the fight, and woe to me,
The giants ’neath my conquering dress
Thus have I paid the reverent ear,
That all I had, and made, and knew
To mine own tribe and home was due.
Borne o’er the sea of Vánar tide,
I sought Ayodhyá’
======================================== SAMPLE 205 ========================================
, now-leaping,
Her heart is loosened,
She feels the blow:
It is the healing herb, the healing herb,
When, wounded by her cruel spear,
She lay.
But not alone
Shall comfort now-per-plus
His heart:
Why, though for three
His spirit leagued should have not learned the truth,
Though reason too pernicious now is doomed,
So is he doom'd
A debedy age.
Beneath his casement, on a royal bench,
A mead which ready aye at supper hangs,
And many a gallant and well-wasting board
Makes of a vintage rich--she's there admired.

Away ye damsels! and be bold, young man!
To your brave masters a good toast attend.
Much be't by your career, from first to last,
From they that hold a part, shall soon be gone.

Nor be it hard toSubject this bold gentleman,
Till o'er his tomb, whose gentle care 'tis known,
Whose gallant heart, in mutual tenderness,
Delighted in his private cell, ere now,
Though for a term, he lived; and in the morn
Had climbed upon the mountain-tops to look,
And the bright sun, descending from the west,
Had bathed him in the embers; and he came
To tell the story of his former life
Renewed in bitter humour by the talk
Of the dead poet; for he still was young,
And would with reason daily break the link
That tied him to his death, or ever came.

The loving husband then no more replied,
And his vain griefs indulged in grateful joy.
Thus loth to lose his own, howe'er it seemed,
Since into noisles and caverns he was borne,
From that sad hour in sadness, when the gnome
Left him his lonely bed; nor that his band,
But those four quarters were forsaken, yet
The young ones, with the spirit of the lake,
Dwelt with their senses clear.
And not a stone
Was left the side of that old precipice;
The dunghill of a storm-day had been dried,
The hill-side, open-heaven'd, had been so green,
And through the storm-cloud had appear'd a cloud;
Yet was that witness of the magic charms
Of the dark mountain-stream. And nearer to the plain,
They saw the Schoolmaster; he his colours traced,
And to the schoolmaster came: as, where he pass'd,
Over a craggy steep, five hundred more,
With rugged march he came.

And standing here and there,
Over the snow, o'er which the torrent pours
Its salt, salt torrent to the mountain-side,
Among the fields that silent lie, the hills,
Or wet the mountain-side,
He stood, or seemed to stand
Where, in a hollow tree, all shaded, heath'd the streams
Gush, with such power unsupply'd, and rush'd away,
As if the sport were dangerous. Greener now
The man's eyes ranged the distant plain; and now
Pass'd by the westering sun, and now he came
To where the convent, with its orchard trim,
Arches the crumbling bridge.

Long e'er the eastern sun

Had to his noon-day beam dissolving,
And, with his latest rays, his setting beams
Shed their effulgence, as he went, that night
His light in rocking trees might safely past;
But the gray mounds and shadows of the mounds,
And the brown mist, that, dusky, lingers round,
His height should tremble to be loftier, darker,
And tremble all before him. Here and there,
In wind and weather foul, he hobbles on
Over craggy steep, o'er which in vexed
By rocks dislodged, the torrent slowly bowls
Its sullen head, while to and fro, by fits,
Withering the craggy rack, the swarthy crow,
Sometimes a tall bird whistles, sometimes
A strident scurry on the topmost branch,
As if 't were drawing its broad wings and stoops,
And fled away upon its watery flight.

But he, in doubt,
Saw the dim light come out. "Behold," he said,
"The impious wizard, once my friend, is gone."
"Friend," said the wizard, "this abominable,
This barbarous and barbarous imp of thought,
======================================== SAMPLE 206 ========================================
, which in every chance I read:
They tell, as careful hermits use to spell,
How witches those they serve, and those they sell;
How one who neither stil'd, will save a soul,
And all is vanity in vain; how null,
How vain the great! how idle is the fool,
All mad, to save a soul, in hope to find
Those who will stand aloof, and not a mind.

Sir Violano, with a face which lit
And acted in a sneer, was not agreed
On such an one; but deeming this an art,
I to the fellow said, 'Sir Violano,
Your ghost would be as hideous as a dove;
A friend I am of the good Gaville.'
He then, of bitter humour, from the gate
Which led to it, replied, 'Damian, I do.
I came to see you in a sailor's coat
A red-coat page; perchance you had met
A man who sang in the old tapestry,

Which is it, the Pacific bron roared at him?
I know him by his smile.
'Say that,' quoth he,
'What is your friend?' replied the old man, gazing
So cruelly upon your friend, Sir Violano.
He smiled, and said again,
'The forester will care for me; the forester
Will care for me; the forester himself
Will care for me; the forester himself
Will care for me; the forester himself
Will care for me; the forester himself
Will care for me; the forester himself
Will care for me; the forester himself
Will care for me; the forester himself will care for me.'

And, smiling, whispered to him, 'Do you not know,
Sir Violante, why I came not here
Among your fellow-beasts to see a sign
That I was taken, I would have you know?'

I answered him, 'A wild and dream is thine.
To know all this and know all this of some.
We know what thing it is to be a man,
A man indeed, and know the world, and know
All that it is to know.'  'Speak out,' he said;
'Speak out' he said, 'and then with that first word
Of one I gave my wife, then held your mouth;
Saying 'My wife, my wife, my wife was dead.'

'Friend, 'twas for this you died and gave me bread;
I claim no husband; merely for my good,
I hold a boy of earlier dates who scorns
All other pledges.'  'Horrible,' I said.

He shook his head; 'I took my murder sown,
My poverty, my life, and that,' I said.

He took his grave again, and left the corse
At Karew-wood.  Upon the roads he came,
And found some dead before.  How many dead?
Three hundred living; some at marriage beds,
Three hundred women; some in England's name,
And some at London; some, whom you know well,
A husband's wife, who said, 'Her lord is dead;'
And gave a marriage blessing and a name.
He won his marriage blessing, but how good
Had been to him, who took the other one,
By force to marriage.
And the other,
How much of his lost fortunes could have held
His whole posterity forever gone,
And neither man nor wife would have been glad
Enough to look upon her grave for a year,
And sleep as if with nothing to regret,
But, in due season, sacrifice or pray
At church or state for their most solemn rites.
It may be that a man's end due he must see
To any man, who will not take his wife,
But he must win (no matter if so be not)
His heart, as has been said, his whole life long,
And be beloved, or suffer aught but death.

'You and I have lived together,'  Edmund said,
'And often, both together, have we met
Since that June morn, beneath the lowest arch,
Have we, perchance, ourselves, in after time
Met, and at one certain point of course.
But you and I, I know, whatever were
To-morrow, yet together, in this letter,
I need not tell you more than I have said.
You, if you think you think it so,--in truth,
Mine and myself, that love God's ways with us,
That I have fled for ever from your ear
To God, who waits
======================================== SAMPLE 207 ========================================

The bearing of this feeble youth, to day
He roams, until he ends his days with grief,
Who thus no more, his voice, his life betray.
Of courteous hearts possess him yet in store,
In hermit dress a flowing Devon fount
Wide wandering, but that nymph by chance sustains,
Of fair metropolis, a lonely shade,
And sees the lovely ocean girding fast,
Now swelled with tides immortal, now with pains.
For who so sweet of soul as this, in vain
Would heartily the world of love regain,
But in vain does the vision wisely scan,
For lo! 'tis him that flies, who more than man
In thee would find his matchless enterprise,
Who thus might waste a passing youth, alone.
'Tis this, O Teucrian Muses, you would find,
At hand, no nigher strain of song to bray,
For love, though fond, will languish through the mind,
And on thy wreath hang wreaths of victory:
Yet think it not (to Muse as fame you bend)
That I have learn'd the master art of song,
Whose years are many, and whose verse sublime,
Ere mortal hand hath wrapt the fabric strong.
'Twas some tremendous and tremendous night,
When heaven's eclipses dare not shine against,
When in wide-gazing orbs, struck by delight,
Horace, enring'd with stars, doth first appear;
And then her silver voice makes all the spheres
Dissolve in clouds of fire, that flaming rise.
Thus to my lyre I tune my humble lay,
For I too have sung wonders all her own.

'Twas with a voice most potent, like a god,
Tuned to high supplication; and anon,
I heard, and praised her. But the powers divine
Of verse and harmony, like rills in flowers,
Circled her throne; and singing, beckoned mine.
Then in the bard's rough border I put forth
My mind, intent upon that theme divine,
Of which Love takes possession; and I said,
Behold, 'tis Love's, which follows his own way!
Nor lack I powers celestial to explore
The wondrous song; but did I wish it true,
Enchanting music with an equal store,
Would suit a different ear; so strangely true.
And yet, 'tis said, as Love his evidence
Sticks close about us, Love will paint his Art,
And then he veils our ravish'd, struggling heart.
Nor, may I doubt, for Love can soothe the ear
Of any mortal, yet I do not hear
Love speak or paint one language; and I know,
In utter nakedness, how beautiful
Is Love, still living; and although, by chance,
We oft mistake the contrary, and lie
Despis'd and cuff'd, and oft put off to cry.
'Tis plain, all lovers Venus reign'd o'er fair
And child-like; lovers of one worth, enow:
And I, beholding thee, could love confess,
And in thy eyes, still watch the heart that throbb'd,
And throbb'd itself to soothe my own distress.
And thou?--Ah no! by burning love I guess
My words avail not to convince them here
That in my absence Love hath still'd so fair
His new-found fires; nor falsely swearing vow'd,
Haply by passionate phantasy allow'd,
By sensual influence forced to breathe my sighs
In sighs of love and passion; which is why
I thus acquiring sigh for Love, am I;
The way to Love is more than Beauty's way.
That Love which is
Without all love, is shown to thee anon.
Thyself do'st blame;[A] if thou lov'st me none,
Nor I myself. If my deserts be such,
Then pity rather pulls me to the touch
Of Love, than I such injury denies.
In me love always woos the amorous boy;
And evermore it pleaseth him to toy.
O, if thou lov'st me not, take now away
These idle pleasures, which, not far from thee,
I could enjoy; nor, till that hour is nigh,
Won by thy looks, have I one wish deny'd.
When thou shalt gather looks, in which all eyes
Are hollow, I will tell thee what I see,
Then will I kiss thy garment, till thou strizest
Him to thy heart, and show it in thy breast.
But O! now from that day
======================================== SAMPLE 208 ========================================
, then, is it all one?--
Lo! where the man who dies in vain
Must sit beneath the rule of slain.
That dead Medea might have known;
The shape of life so quick and fine;
Her smile it was that lived in all
Thine innocence and that sweet touch.
That idol!--But she took the heart
Of Jayadeva, to her tent;
There from her loving arms it fell,
That she had been the Head of Hell,
That she should live when the world was won,
So passionate was she in her woe,
So restless was she with her kiss.
And then, when the mad people rose,
In my despair I said to her,
"Lay bare your head, Madam, lest ye
Would only kill yourselves for this!"
But she replied, "Nay, lie so, dear;
Your great love slayes no more; the pain
To her makes piti-pall in twain.
Therefore I made it not to-day;
It cannot now be half so far.
Let me go hence, that I may stay,
For I go hence." And I have heard,
From her own breast as from a bird,
That lovers shed their stolen seeds,
And strewed the mouldy fragments round,
Shall one time be my grave; and then,
Returning to my rest, again
Shall I go forth. But now, behold,
She too shall share these sweets, and then
Because she walks in Heaven's reign,
I pray thee to His loving breast
Take back these two divided hearts,
And dwell with me, that I may dwell
With her, till I return." She said,
And vanished thro' the seraph's shade.
And I beheld my love, and bade
My soul go forth as to the light
Of day and eve and evening-bowed.
That it might be, the sorrow that
Had left her not for me; and still,
And still to me, the conflict chill,
Against the past, within the will,
Thou wert of thy kind, the pure, the high.
I heard above, the quiet so
That all my fond heart yearned to see.
They took the hearts, and bowed their heads
As one who walks with music treads
His flowbows. In the chill it bled.
By my love is it ever said
Or said, I--love--love--love--love--
Will go with me along the path
Through tangled vistas of hope and wrath?
Shall the cup of pleasure now
Linger, a little while apart?
No! by my love the roses languish,
The sun-hangs of the valley-land
And golden-rod are burning yet.
Come, play with me until we meet,
Kissing the hand that held us--kissed,
Kissing the mouth that kissed, and then
Reeling for pity--was it not
A wise concern, O play, that missed,
To love--to kiss--to lie awake
With me--to lie awake in me--
To long for love, and wake to me
In kissing? O ye grandsons mine,
My spirit, I have found you mine.
They took my life and mine to be
Their temple. When we meet, one word
Beneath my lips, she sits with me,
The woman of my knowledge heard.

The sunlight streamed around us, and
The shadowed ships that bore us both
On wings of eventide were seen,
And glimmering ships, like ghosts of wealth
Faintly set free on Fashion's tide,
Fought with its freight, and on and on.
We drank the gales of doom, and then
We perished. All was fainted then.

The smile was perished, but we saw
A brighter light, a wilder law,
A mercy in the steadfast eyes
Of one who loved us, kind and wise,
And earned the crown of love, and then
We drank the bales of heaven again.

All time hath kissed us, for the world
Weeds not our feet, nor seeks our eyes;
All time hath draped us with its shroud
Of pallid clouds that hang like shroud
Upon the moon's wide, glassy plain,
And left us comfortless, and dim.
The sun shines down upon the scene
As if it yet had dawned--it brings
New hope, new faith, in either breast,
And makes thy love to glorify
Thy hollow heart, and call it home!

I like to get to London
When people come to visit me.
I'm glad they're going away
To see
======================================== SAMPLE 209 ========================================
rs
Had kindly licensed to the crimes of men.
The very darkest, that we fear, was HINDA.

"Dear fellow, had you once but haved me
Into a shape of various symmetry,
You might have cut and clipped, and then devoted
Another form, to cut more smoothly, and
As father would have done, some joy to have."
So saying, he sat down; the air was drowsy,
And moonbeams, trickling through his eye-balls o'er,
Silk and with yellow patter drops of dew.
No more in peace, then, did I hear his voice,
But a vague impulse came upon my thought,
And I awoke, and lo! in am'rous tone
I heard him speaking, and in his disguise,
I looked upon him fresh and as he grew,
"Escape, dear friend, thy hands!" I said, "Here, dearest!
If you have taken these poor hands, for fear
You needs must be displeased. Oh, listen!  See!
My head begins to bow beneath his chin,
He says--for that you never more should hear
About it with your ears."

"Pray, nay, my friend,
I did not take it ill, for surely it
Was not my hand that took it, was not mine;
This hand, which erst I placed upon your lap,
With his dainty fingers pressed it, was no staff
So slight, so delicate, so soft, so small.
And he was hand-linked--but I have spoken truth--
That I was loyal with my king and queen.
And, therefore, friend, I would speak out at once,
And I will do my best to keep my faith
That thus the fact was coupled by a king
On whom at last 'twas laid upon this wise.
Nor to be bound by any ties but this
Did I presume to keep my life, I fear.
And I would care for that to which I am;
This awe was felt when forth I fared to go,
And who, as one oft-times find a time,
Can hardly tell the names of all my woes,
And not when I have been the mate of mine.
To thee, O monarch, I could freely give
My hand in marriage, and my only hope;
But lo! when that fair face, so fair to see,
Was shown by all the chaste and holy maid,
I sought to prove in either case,
Which, whilst I might, I found.
And as in marriage, thus I proved it, fair,
And thus I bore away the maiden-smile.
My duty was to prove her faith so high,
And, with my lov'd one, to her wedded lord;
So we' could make but smallest share in each,
And yet achieve no happiness."
"Till, when at length he heard me speak, he saw
This was a most improper thing to wed.
Oh, then thought I, 'I can wed with a spouse,
But never with my eyes to take a thought
Of him, and not for my sake to set in his';
For, when he thought of this, he chafed and brake;
But, galling the fond bond of love, it chanced
That one had robbed the other of her trust,
For which he tried to break. I did, I did.
Oh, then he tried to break it, but he tried:
Oh, then he tried to break it, but he tried:
I tried him too, and tried him o'er and o'er,
And all alone he tried to break it--no!
But then he tried to break it, for he could:
He tried--but I could never break it, for
I tried to make it clear of all his love.
I tried him too! I tried him too! If he
Were just as good a man as I, no doubt,
As married for a month as could I be,
A wife with this same lovely lily hand,
This handsome, handsome, charming bride, forsooth!
And now my story is completed. Yes,
He once came to a very proper man.
And how he once came to a handsome state:
His house was rich and furnished with rich things:
What made his wife so happy in her life?
And she was charmingly provided now
With some apparel that she might become,
Or healthful to the life. The neighbors' children
Were sure to send forth good things after the wedding.
The neighbour's children was not thought so handsome:
I feared they'd crush me in short, but he
Resented, when their mother planned
======================================== SAMPLE 210 ========================================
.

With ugly lips; with face a sickly blush;
With cheeks a flash of red and yellow teeth;
With womankind's besmearing lips,
With eyes that love their nation yet,
Who own at once but love they kiss,
The men, the women, and their clothes.

For once of ancient tales, old masters of the schools,
They spoke of thee; thee harbinger of the learned;
For thou didst nourish and sustain the simple fruit
Of the unshaken tree and listening class with speech.
Thy songs are of the world which now shall have for me
The people's praise and the high Goddess' prayer,
Their lasting divinity, immortal wit,
Immortal wisdom, whose religion is
To wisdom most profound, though never yet
In any sense so native, with all their wit,
As their most worthy saints, the uttermost,
The men thou hast created moved with pity,
Strong to obey, and in all right maintained,
And stedfast to endure. I have not lived to see
Thy name or works, or work them on thy thought,
To work them for thy will. The gods, methinks,
Grant that some lesser race may have been raised
To perfect wisdom, in the long calm time,
When all the world seemed made eternity,
And in its heart arose a better creed,
And fairer Athens, less austerely fair,
Than this sweet land of Greece, which once was called

Her kingliest legend, that, of her most wise,
Beside the altar of the antique throne
And black Acre drew, and all her fields and huts,
And by her means, for thine and for thy sake,
Might have been spared the expense of Pagan's blood.

The mystic visions that come to the brain
Of Titans, spoke in courses of such deep delight
That every tongue would seem an epithymic song,
Must have been noted for the Hydraic weed
That caused thy victim's birth and differing birth.
Such was the reign of them that ruled the earth,
Till the world's wisest had its birthright born.

Such were the people who were wont to hold
The world in sympathy, and thus unite
Against the world that hunger now devour,
To feed jackals, or stagnant vermin: they,
Opposing their own nature, were the food
Of the World's strength to men, and to the creatures
That fed therein, and so their wants supplied,
They have sustained and fed, nor envied much,
Had they been raised to high as heaven's earth-dwellers,
They have despised, and been the common talk
Of the Creator, the immeasurable God,
And with such fervor their inspired minds
Tended as heavenly love and heavenly shame.

So stood their virtue, awful as the lightning,
Clad on with bright red armlets, firm to heaven,
And winged with fire of Heaven for prodigy,
Thy awful might, Orion, Mars, Mercury,
Also their God, in whom the world's whole race
And noble birth and prosperous Immortality
Were conscious, Him as the great Maker bore
Among the highest in her naiads old
Of her Creation. But that mighty one
Thy bright companion, night, the Dawn divine,
And He whose works bring all the world to light
Was of the unadorned and insubstantial life
Of all that starry throng, and left them free
To worship Jesus in the abodes of men,
Where for some pleasant glen a woman sleeps
And what the love of sleeping they may be.

I would not, I, thy warrior-reverence, seek
For higher truth in no mean enemy
Than a dead prince, the old heroic knight;

These grosser honors shall my silver give
To such as love, who scarce have Love with me
In outward mould, to mortal men, of love
Unpractised, blinding, nor unknown to thee,
As perfect saints of my celestial sphere,
Sole dwellers of my memory. They shall be
My witnesses and this without demision,
How could they mould me to the point of this,
To place the eternal Truth, and so fulfil
The perfect vision of an endless truth?

Lover of all things in the springtime,
When every thing is born alive
With gladness and the sense of spirit,
With joy and laughter, hope and love,
In the clear, full, blue, inexhaustible heaven
The living, and the dying, all rejoice
In the near music of the etern voice,
Which call of us to wake, to be renewed
The hovering sounds through which
======================================== SAMPLE 211 ========================================
 and micio Ferchie."
The children, very blithely humming,
Laughed in their joy at poor Sir Thomas,
Who thus had little time for laughter;
And some were with him, some were pretty,
And some were mad and some were naughty;
But, when their palfreys leave the Huron,
A dozen more went on to tell them

For courtesy they did not tremble,
From six to eight the curates came;
A badger strikes, the good man felling;
The gates were opened in three gushes;
He blanched his teeth, and each sleeve lingered
As they rode through at each desire.
"Ha, ha!" the beadle said, "what folly!
I've had an endless dizzy swerving
Of goings in the world, which never
Is saved by chance, in trust, or duly."

All people thrones who ever loved him,
Whose strength and wit could ne'er be proved now,
(From whom they now are separated,)
In this say I, he's fair and lovely;
I, rich, beloved, of others despise,
And choose to be a queen and live now;
And so this state of his salvation
In spite of earth's good works he'll give me;
For never, who dares say "yes so,"
He's wedded to the Fount of Session!

A midge hath she in Arcady,
Where young Medoro prabbles by;
And, while he begs with hot desire,
Her, that can give him such a fire,
Yet, still, to her, that would not try
To make her love him longer, why
She makes him leave the rustic plough.
Ah, 'tis but half a summer's day,
And half that happy couple's stay;
And they may live till heaven's last height,
Who thus have bid good-night to night.

The gray hawk broods upon the heights,
That overlooked the precipice;
And does not even now the sight
Of that which is most beautiful;
The hawk is upon the river-arc,
Above whose gravel-edges slant arrows
A boat appears, to bear her thence;
The beaver bathes his o'er-languaged front
In the spouts of the beak to bathe;
And the forester is upon his paunch,
And the forester is a forester;
But the gray-headed one, who in a flock
Of Dian's maidens by the pool
Watches, with tresses round his neck,
The while he slants his sidelong glance.

All go to sleep, all go to play,
None sing another's roundelay,
But yet, while all the forum-gates
Lie still and safe in this cool well,
The knights will start, and will be uneasy,
Though that 'tis time they should upbraid,
For, had the stranger pass me by,
They'd ne'er had given me eyes to see,
And, were I judge of mandolins,
I would not too much name a name,
For I am better known to Fame,
And of a famous high estate,
Though, named from a great ancestry,
I'm proud of any post or pastor,
For, on a time of mortal pain,
A saint, the Church was more in number;
And I could swear that every pen
Had thirty ministers like men;

And every head was crowned with beads,
And for a hundred more or more;
So should I praise God's gifts above,
For He within me is no more:
My God, there's nothing left me but
To sing about, and I'm a bore,
Made up of all the hearts of men,
Unworthy even of Paradise,

God, pity me! I've often been
Quite curst, I know, in act and word,
Which many a ploughman finds, in zeal
For golden ears, and lads like me;
But then, when out at sea at night,
Have all their lamps and candles lit,
My castles rise, and sail and swim,
Like ships; and so the money mount,
To where I lay in the great sea-snort
Where I live, as in a dream;
Thence like a lion on the mountains
That o'er the briny waves go by.
And so the exercises tinkle,
My veins run cold; and the streams tumble;
And while it spates and dances on
The flat sea-sand, it smiles upon
The backs of us, and it sighs out,
Like one that on a foreign throne
Beholds
======================================== SAMPLE 212 ========================================
ly of the song.
And a bloody weapon in the hand of that bard
Had held it and the quiver in the sky.
But even as this instrument did tighten,
The covenants of the mystic Rose made just
A perfect gem for the finger of that man
Who starves in adoration of the sky.
And the loyal crozier fluttered her little heels,
To the tread of his foot on the palace floor,
As a barb for a needle, to burn the dint
Of the chamber where he.
Thus they sang Prince Prince Prince Prince Prince,
Into the Illustrious's dress:
The naked, the red, the flaming red,
The spear of the Abbot, the crucifix!
And with one last ravisher, another
Who watched, as an eagle hops from its nest,
The work of the wondrous Rose of Christ.

And after the Lama of China, built
On golden sandals, isles of old romance,
Arches of kings, and porphyry walls
Enset, high, yawning seas beyond all scars
Whereon earth's baubles lay; and above you
There the oldest, highest, breathing of chants
Frowned upward in many an old delight
On seas of carven blue and parchment white,
Pressing it out of your golden hands,
As if all these chants of one foot-fall
Were only sound enough to beat
Love's feathery thigh with the white moonshine,
Or else--poised like a boat at a landward wave,
Bearing the odour of gold to your feet.

Take the melody, bird, the noon is waking;
Set the petals flying for us in the moon,
Here for the lover who may wake and find
The day is dark and the night is green,
With the dance of faerie steps and dances,
To bring him night and dreams and the breath of a song,
But oh, to follow the foot where the high seas throng,

'Bove a hundred cities, one great city,
Sitting at the end of the seven seas,
With a hundred swords to protect and slay,
And the tenth is on her throne before her,
A hundred, O! of every country,
In the land of peace,
With the hymn and the song that night is born for.

Like an island of glory,
Under the glow of a sunset sky
The sea lies a quiet, white temple,
And the waves of the breaker are gray
And the ways of the sands are gray
With the glory of God shining in all the length of the sea-line.

Sun of Spain is your dwelling,
Spring is your sole beginning;
Hark to the glory that waves your horn
And calls the deeps of its worship--
Glow-worms on foam that are gleaming,
Little fish! to your gleaming!
Earth has her walls and a secret is yours--
Only to know that the sea is ours
Where the love of the deep is singing,
In love that is freedom's birth-time,
Where the loves that are paying for us
Rise to a harmony pulsing
In music that's only an echo of laughter.

Spirit of the sea, I pray
That thou mayest forget, I know
I am tired of the manless days
And the joys that once I had.
How the heart of a sailor is stirred
That is furled and made to be tossed,
Is heaped for my useless galleon
From his world-wide sandy sea.

Wildly the waves that leap and leap
Harden to me their pride
That I am not satisfied,
Kissed by the wind on the sea-swept shore,
And love shall bring me to thee.
The song that is minded to mingle
With the old joys of the world,
That find no grace on the summer face
Storms it or thwart its aim,
That each finds sheerness and bliss on the sea--
That find no refuge from storms,
Not in the tempest hearkening it,
Yet ever in calm there may be
That knows no fear as I feel
The weight of a love, not the world's,
That is not care that doth steal.

I have lain for years, but I cease not to weep,
Tho' I am but half sleeping
And the cocks that roof the cottage-hole
Tell of a time that was being well,
In the land of youth, yet unavailing
To call the spirit of song.
The sense of life passed from my heart
As the caravel was speeding,
We knew, yet they said not a word,
For the midnight was speeding.
======================================== SAMPLE 213 ========================================
 night, an' white night--them're all night long,
Sic thoughts are on; we're packed up all together
In a shanse--a dinkum song--a song.
(Now mind you, if't haf budum up your auld head,
Whaur two thing's help is at the Deil wur Ned;
Sic thoughts beat wur in a wad-gude-me-not;
Hoot, here's my rowin' tale.--
O Lord, I know, for me,
Thee, Lord, I know, is best;
I see God speak, an' feel his warm, blest ca',
That this my mither ne'er knew
Wha should ance preach sae canty and dumb.
"O had my soul been in yon kirk grass,
Wi' a merry heartsome din,
Wi' a leal, honest, honest-hearted lass,
Sure, I'd na dee for aught in
Air, at a sicht, wi' a pibroch an' a fouth,
Unless to buy ither's beef!"

Just then a flash and a shy, waesome pause
O'er the tongue that wirked jur awa,
A loupin', curly tongue that wurTrue-love draws
To his heaving heart sae meek an' meek.
And when we set to eat, in a' our slips
To mix our black, nude, bawskin hips,
A' tak' it tak' it taunty like a pack o' trips!

While my young Jamie tauks the crack,
As the pride of a' his clatterin' stoup,
To his reekit auld cratur he steals,
That its rude bass bursts in with a roar
Like the thunner o' some Highland gorse,
That tumbleth saft up its wee crumpet like burs!

No, no, he'll gie me still a dear, true GRACE,
Wike and contentment and a' beside;
That no langer in the Crafts of his ain country-side
Shall ever vaunt auld Scotland's pride:
There's Smith^1 awhile i' the blue kirk-yard,
And there he'll charm us wi' a smile,
While we're laith at our couthie core,
Awaiterin' wi' an airm-fu' style,
Tho' Romilly's Loch is fu' gleg an' braw,
And Bewsworth, that's the Jolly Blue:

He's sae ye mak auld Scotland bluid,
That taste o' lave and beef, lilegither,
Better an' braw are a', lavegither!
To think how we stood, while they were gazing,
Like t' jujie nicht we've eer saw sic a figure!
It nappitat na so bonny a licht
As e'er to the laigh in the laigh land;
But mak'some he's maen as weel an' gleg,
For he was a braw auld Scotland's brither.
And now ye're crouse, lad, to seekin' me,
Wha's cast the grund age by the cairr;
For auld or young, you take occasion,
The feck o' auld glory is nae matter;
An' yon's the man wi' that quhyss o' glee
That nae wages rais'd in the whistle,
For brave Fodsey there is nae bother,
But, mark ye, he's a worthy player,
Like licht 's the cowt, like drucken bull
The baefu' brings me dirdfu' skill,
Wi' glorious dance and sultry glee
To see how fair, and see how clean,
The laigh, linnen buckram, stands wi' charms
An' ayecht waik's heart beats in its arms.

Syne, on the square, or on the buss
Or in the ditch, or in the park,
Wi' spurning heels, or poking through a hag,
Wi' girning crowdie, lifts his club,
An' there he scunters round an' round,
Wi' grace an' grace, that's what he's worth;
But, Lord, what scene is in his hame?
In a' their varying mood, they range,
An' shift a doolf that's large an' smooth.
An'
======================================== SAMPLE 214 ========================================
 the open air;
And the echoes of the castle gate
Were his white courtesies, and his attire,
The glimmer of the nunnery's crest,
And the shadow of the birk in the font.

And the lady loved him, that he loved;
But, lo! she was all too weak to give;
He too must walk Faith's cradled stir
Through the dark ways of mystery,
Ever to question evil things,
As in the streets of this Franciscan king.

Nor did he think of her, nor the sights
That marshalled her, nor those fairy wars
About her that she loves: his eyes beheld
Her spirit, and he lay within his mind.
But not the tales that drew her from the Don,
That bards of old saw hid within the wheat,
Or love, or creed, or creed, or creed,
That touched his soul with music; he would ask
No wizard's wand of Fairyland,
No wizard's wizard-throngage; he would lay
On the hard granite her new-made bride,
On the stone in which the peasant died.

Thus were the people gathered to the feast;
And thus was every one that passed.

They might not wait the appointed hour,
The old familiar place,
Till in the pale and secret light
Queen Hild should stand with face to face
With Hild the peaceful stranger, old
Within her castle cold.
At last she came unto a knight,
And spake not; but, "'Tis said, behold,
King Helge, I have spoken bold,
With Hild the peaceful prisoner bold,
By these two knights of old;
And ye, Sir thoughtful and austere,
The noble Order's wedded here,
Until ye see that ye are old."

"Wherefore to me, ye men of might,
Beneath the earth in which ye dwell?"
"Therefore on thee, upon the earth
Have I builded this malignant mirth
Which overcomes men's sense;
And therefore if aught else mistrust,
If once a lifetime hence be lost,
The faeries sing me of the clock
That cares not, 'tis the appointed time."
"Do not my task for ever wist,"
Said Hild, "and watch to see my need;
Though they may find me utterly set
Into what use I am,
But, if that lonely ring I see,
I will speak out in gladness;
If that I own not any ill,
The glory shall not pass away,
Or I a useless faithless prey."
Then on his hand a jewel lay,
Whereon it grew, without a bound,
To what must needs be done,
There gat it back again,
And from it flung its glittering aloft
And seemed to grow the more profound,
While all the land grew bright
With golden harvests of the light.

But Herdsman Gerers, fearfully
Saw the fitful strife within,
And though no holy helm had they,
Pitying with hard conditions,
Bowed down with reverence,
Raising the idle from the vain
That on their lives that day did fall,
And with them would to heaven again
Leap up with living man,
As from the altar stands the bride.

Nought doth he comprehend
Of service and of service,
And soon the paths of heaven they sought,
They thrust within the heavenly sphere,
So glad of heaven, so fair of air;
So strange, so beautiful to see,
That high heaven opened to his thought.

The faithful Sheker then stood near,
Muttering with longing hot,
"O Herdsman, I shall learn to fear
Thy way! thy way is free!
Nought else my God can have for thee."
So bravely do the shepherds plead,
Because their loves are strong,
And gain, and love, and heavenly meed.

It seemed to Hild, as though for death,
Of truth, of life, of heaven,
None was so happy but the fair;
No heart to see her so,
No brain to cry for her,
Nor sense to know the soft embrace
Of woman's tender feet.

She touched his hand; and then he said,
"Nay, love, we are not strong:
As if to touch this spot of earth
It were ill suits thy bier."
"Nay, love, let that be said, my child,
Nor hand be cold of fear.
He may be dead within, I fear."
Nought doth she love but Hild,
To look with smiles upon
======================================== SAMPLE 215 ========================================
est of the storms, behold the course,
Till she is loosed, and doth her work in term.
Meantime she follows up the gloomy night,
First on the iron, after following hard,
And on the white-wall'd vessel leaning light.
And round about the small gun stop she thrust,
And men and women noted on her course;
For length of arrows either buckler buckled
Is spread from bow to arrow and lance to lance;
Another noise of toil, and faint of flight,
And open-mouthed of bit or straining string
The dying-shot repeated; till at last
The weapons grasp'd asunder; still the ball
Drawn by the bow, held in its utmost grip,
Eddies the roof like pointed jasper, pass'd
Through givings sheer and copious; then was driven
Through some byways else, and all the wind
Entangled in the reek is fanned; and thus
The band of savage rocks to danger strain'd.
And last, and best of sport, off the wood leapt
In fury, and the axe they tore away,
Then 'gainst the smooth o'ershadowing waters leapt
And sprang up steep, and foam'd the land around,
Till the green-blooming harvest-fields were bound
In glories, and the steely heaven was flash'd,
Worn out, and all the red-breasted slaughter o'er,
Whose earth-breath kept their heads, and, gathering fast
The golden lilies, momently did the dark
Stamp with the salt drops, and from every cheek
Spatter'd the mingled blood, till men did deem
As many voices mingling in their souls.
And scarcely had the spears of webs so swift
Rough-hung that blood in blood and laugh'd and scream'd,
When, haply, off the opposing ranks upreel'd
Of flying Trojans, they were backward driv'n;
Then heav'nly-wheeling, as if he were doom'd
Not to be conquer'd, round the foremost battle-smoke
Flew divers weapons, while behind them throng'd
Phalanxes of stalwart Greeks, in guise of Gods,
Phalanxes of Lycians, with close array
Of Lycians, and close-following swarm'd the steeds.
Forthwith (behold the stress!) Achilles 'scap'd
The wood, and midst a fosse, with bristly hair
And mantle, to the Trojans call'd aloud:

"Friends, Grecian youths, now quit yourselves, for lo!
Within those bootless ranks, against the skies
This day again receiving powers divine,
Devote ye still to fight the Trojans' chief,
While we, from lofty tow'rs to Ilian walls
Brought forth fresh forces to the war."

Whom answer'd thus Achilles, swift of foot:
"Hector, at least, delay we not to seek
The battle-eager Ajax; bade him yield
His word, and onward haste, amid the throng,
And rail at him, if ill his counsel pleas'd.
To him at once let us our safety give,
And drive him from the war with all his fleet;
And if so be that, if so he will, perchance,
He may again drive on with all his fleet,
And 'twere not for his safety that so long
We shar'd the lot, till now we laid him low."

Thus as he spoke, by Trojans brave was giv'n,
To level with the crowd his pond'rous spear,
To shield his broad-orb'd weapon, and to slay,
And strip the dead; and so he drove in vain.
Then from the crowd Patroclus hasten'd on;
And far before him, as the ranks he pass'd,
Antilochus, his son, in close array,
With his huge spear the Grecian comrade slew.
Full well for that slain man his portion pray'd.
Before his breast in vain he rush'd to fight;
Strongly the brazen lance of Ajax pierc'd
His mail, and shiver'd with the brass he grasp'd.
Ajax at once his lance uplit; the heart
Of noble Hector, at the sight disliking,
And deeply pierc'd, with vain endeavour try'd
To wrench his weapon forth: the blow was struck;
Yet not a Grecian could the lance unfix.
Then thus to Peleus' son his winged shaft:
"Ajax, thou seest not where thy fated
======================================== SAMPLE 216 ========================================
 then lift him up to the view,
Nor need a dragg'd excuse of courtesy;
For there a naked swain, a naked nymph,
A wretch alone, and unadvis'd before.
To naked spirits he gave sight of all,
Except that he should find a beggar there;
Who said, "The markets are in sight, and come
For the refyn'd reliques of the thirsty earth."
If I did write it out, 'twould make me strong
To touch the hemispiece from skirt to skirt,
And when emboss'd in antique armour are,
To look a grave with an omnis-coloured crop.
But at this moment it began to show
Fire and rebellion in a kinder glow,
And with a roar, and loud lament, and scow
Th' Arch-Angel, who to mock us doth traduce,
Leaps on our back, and with undaunted eyes
Pours on us from above a mighty size.
As once this wretched pair their peevish ban
Pour'd out, 'tis true, yet how they will'd it, Man
Not then the Son of God, but now of Men,
Shot from the press, and stripp'd of his salt crown,
And with his dagger broke his glittering crown.
So doth an arch-fole, in close whirl immersed,
The coals of fire burst when he sees the field,
Struck by an unexpected fate, and dropp'd
His helmet from his chin, and there fell down
Both the fresh flowers, by their unequal blows
Dissolv'd and wounded in the self-same blood.
Whereon the Blessed in their boats once more
Sail'd, and in written manner graved the paints;
For on their brows a blessed Cross they bear,
On which the lilies, and the flowers of helle,
Unwreath'd of fire, hang in an oaken vase,
And here are odorous also, nor omit
(Mingle with the sweet scented aromatic shrubs)
The myrrh, and nard, and other perfumed flowers,
The myrrh in field, the sweetest wholesome herb;
A third sort, and not all unworthy the disease
Of these, who at the intervals so long
Endure the melancholy Indian's song.
But, what if all the Muses, to expose
Themselves to glory, and so great their praise,
Should cease to wonder at the lofty name
And incense of the goddess, who now pours
Her benediction through the holy fane?
But what if all the Muses, to give praise
To the immortal goddess, should give praise
To th' immortal fire that feeds the goddess' lays?
No, this is much more stuffy than a dream.
To thee, fair Thetis, I return to prove
A wounded hero, bathes in tears of blood
Ere Kronos' daughter in their rage divine
Dismiss'd him.  I return once more to prove
The more my timid virtue still prevails,
Though mine already is god's providence;
Thou hadst no need, thou hadst not else been there!
But be indulgent, kind Telemachus!
Be all thy thoughts in solitary things!
And judge what falsehood these fair women bring
To miserable shapes, who of themselves beguiled
The easy air with laughter.  Now the King,
Whose vengeance is set others to contend,
Owns what he would; yet rather let him prove
A violent, and raise presumptuous thoughts
To fierceness, shameless as he is, and wise.
For one in word,--and for the other not!
There is in it, with ease, a wanton growth;
Cato is here no more, nor yet a fool.
Thus shall Ulysses, to his ruin driven,
Pant for our ruin; and this path so rough
For his return with tears he shall enquire.
Then bid him, that he send us hence no more
To the Phæacian ships than this, our ship
From whence thou art; he will in any wise
Straight to the shore himself, and friends shall lead;
Then let him leave the harbour, there to steer,
And, banish'd from the eternal palace, dwell
With us.  Who hates not in heaven injury?
Or who would share a happier home with us?
As some young fish with tender, answering voice
Be calling us, till from the rocks he drops
Back to the sea, and all the ribbed oaks
Fall from his jaws, so swam the boundless fish,
And he is drown'd who yet was
======================================== SAMPLE 217 ========================================
, of recompense;
Not all the riches which the greedy want
Enjoy'd, but all the fair and good of life,
Hopeful and well repar'd for him who slew
His comrade, and so snatch'd them from his death;
So heavily to Peggy he was press'd
And pity drew: for when the eye of love
O'erflooded, that of dread and agony
For hideous dismemberment could not rise,
And from his visage stepp'd the colour quak'd,
The tears rush'd on his face, and pale the blood
Bathed in the purple of his hoary cheek.
And when he turn'd, his bosom heaved with joy,
And strength seem'd gone, not long his feet were lapt
In his hot feet; nor with his blood his eyes
Were stopp'd, for pity of the sudden death
At the full given. O'er his batter'd arms
He lean'd, and kiss'd his forehead, and his hands,
His feet, like blossoms, tremulous and weak.
While with stern countenance his eye he fed,
His lively limbs like tremulous ivies fall
Prone on the ground, and o'er his shoulders broad
They slide, and roll their leaves in such a tide
That every branch appears to be revers'd.

At length as with shot snatches the pursuing flame,
Upflies the fondled doves, but enters not
The secret bough; for as, when Phœbeé the chase
Has gone, and by her mother's love is torn
The meadow blossoms, trembling by her mate;
So her fresh beauty grew upon his eyes.
And when both kisses were remov'd from him,
She turn'd, and round her ivory neck-piece strode,
Herself behind her in the midst appear'd
More lovely still; for on her face there stood
A fixéd glory, and as he approach'd,
Methought a damsel stood, who came to view
Her from the heavenly threshold, who had gaz'd
With rapture, as she look'd, her golden tresses
Ambrosial, and her zone of flowers beneath.
Softly her hand within her own she clasp'd,
And fondly was his forehead wrapp'd about
With his own hand, while all that way she look'd,
Save the right eye before; and whatsoever
She felt, or heard, bent, dropp'd from her, or spake,
Nought saw; for she was in that blest assurance,
And in her gentle heart a heaviness pledge.

Yet was she ever coy, and seem'd not moved
With pity for his winning, when at length
She dared to look upon her beauteous form;
And that fair semblance gain'd me at the last,
And I became a wife, with nothing more.

As she had been my kinsman, his approach
Had wounded me; for his behoof from me
Engag'd, as I had been his guard, to be
His guard until the morn; and certainly
To see his woes, had wills not yet been doom'd.
But he, in truth, who was my faithful guide
Unto his service, made no hindrance stay
To hinder, but directed, as he said,
My steps to his paternal claim; but laid
All on the ruin, or if need be, his,
Me rather chose as keeper of his oath,
And that before his newborn hands he tied
A verdant quiver on his arm, and gored
The mystic bow; which, for the mighty fault
Of that first tire of all, he pierced within
The dim-reflected space, where we became
Depriv'd of all beside, and to his guide,
Led forth my steps, and stood before me there.

Short space my head was from his lavish'd store;
Then when he saw me come, (it must be said)
With that amazement which befell me, deem'd
Me to have laid aside, and seen the whole
Troop to the vengeance, which that day had slain.
I lifted up my eyes, and still beheld,
To what high state my thought was inclin'd,
When near me drew the sacred seer; and lo!
A train appear'd before me.  Each side us
And mingled, as in talk, the multitude,
That hail'd us from the shore: and as I mused
Tears came into my eyes, they well appear'd,
And with soft tresses look'd into mine ears.

"O ye, my inmost thoughts and soul, who dwell
In such a life, as in these happy climes
I am
======================================== SAMPLE 218 ========================================
 not the view!

Thus will our president,
Or when the morning dawn
His fame and arms across the seas;
And, if some other barrister
Should step with him on board of stores,
Then manifest his evident
And harmless superstitious views
Of every star, and every breeze,
Of every flower which clothes the earth
Or decorates the frozen seas;

If as the senior class select
His class, doth not, in kindness, feed
His harmless hours, like those whom we
Do know the grass, the light, and seed,
The glory, from whose tender soil
The air of youth yet never swerves,
Repaid in plenty and in toil;
If other service, then,
A thousand fold, he feels a few
Reproved, that waste of rags and gold,
Shall seal his inward sense and eye
With meanings of a kinder sky.

There are who are be that crowd
Of all such kinsmen as may be
Worthy of right to praise and sing,
Erelong among the hospitable tree
Of this fair land, our genii hide
From the moist air, where clustering boughs
Yield the nutumn of deep-laden boughs,

If haply they may choose to sing,
Not one of all their minstrel-singers:

Of whom we are hardly small or few,
One soul of all that many,
And no one thinks his own heart true.
Won't please, then, my old friend, or true
Who may not tire of us?
In any case I hate to be
An angel pleasant, bright, and free,
And so is called in reason.
I'm happy, no, I feel it still,
And therefore hope, my kinsmen will
Be ready to depart,
And write to me the fates of-will,
And my petition shall fulfill.

And, shall they turn, those lands renewed,
And burn beyond their scorching leaven,
On nobler head than mine to sue,
And help me now to fill the heaven
With worldly fruit that men adore,
To no man earthly need a more:
No envy now in my possession,
No flaming hope beyond,
With my own is all my portion.

The world's the same with all its wars,
Its bloody mishaps and sudden spars,
Its awful aspirations:
For 'mid the tumult and the strain
My old love in my heart would reign,
And hear and listen often.
But by his stage, so proud and grave,
I feel each moment like a slave
In his own bonds degraded:
And he who oft, in evening gray,
I've watched the slow hours unperpleased,
Cries out, "Not him forsaken!
He's none of you, for he recks not
That noble-hearted fellow!

"A plague will never come o'er the world,
Though he be less approached than the other,
Nor make the fair one happy."
And, passing from my window,
Do I behold the one
Who does my life to lead me,
As prodigal as they;
His face is beauteous and beauteous,
His waist is red as roses,
His quiver and his wings
Bear high upon their necks behind him,
As if they drew a merlin wind:
Oh, then how great a pity
That one so fair to see!

He lives on tree, on meadow, and on flock.
All his existence, all its hours and tides,
Is a sweet playing

"Ah, the barley-fold's so yellow-golden,
Where I've but a penny, a little goldsmith,
Just a bachelor's wife, when I'm alive!
Just an Englishman, though born a little boy,
And as good as a neighbor, so the house all is joy.
We've but a pound of victual, we've but a cup,
We've but a packet o' butter, and a little fat,
Won with supper and fresh milk;
Ye can make us mock at all,
Ye can't rob us, or I fall.

"But, dear Annie, if you're hungry,
An angry man will soon be learning your learning,
O the country is where yours was,
And his wife is Ilmatar;
When he comes she don't refuse him;
Pork and hedge now keep their faith in God,
They are friends to all salvation.
I'll help that to do; but, Annie,
Play your hand, or I'll be dumb.

"The earth is full of roses
And dew is on
======================================== SAMPLE 219 ========================================

To envy and reproach, and ev'n offence.

Even the wretch, who reads how many a curse
He dreads, from such apostles dis forgiven,
May now hear, how he longs to infuse
Joys for the good of all these pages daily,
And dares each page with sentence for to read,
Or read, or wish to gratify his pen;
Sure they may hurt his peace, his honour hurt,
And make a widow his example be,
Whose child he sits in, and as man for husband
Sits, and beholds each thing that is deucalion.

Where now such malice and such rage pursue?
Once they exacted their late service true;
The youthful poet, among many more,
Might try the gen'ral flame, and tune his harp to beat
The loose, well-skilled adultry of the street;
Where all those many masons sing that man
Has been condemned to death, and fears to cease.

Two hangings they imprison in his face,
And now to show him all the burning blotch,
A mastick or a fay--a gewg, a torch,
A smell of sickly sinews or of pitch,
And matter minutely divine his bodkin.
Nay, even his very beard, more black than so,
Is to be seen when dried and black his eye.

Whatever disputation e'er assails him,
If that be vanity, he'll die without shame,
The fact is, even here within these flames,
The common herd of low-hung things, which range
From a green spot to find their feeding place.
But they who ever could be led to feel
What that neglect may in itself be felt.

This epic, by Dr. Henry Murray, is done in fine,
And all the rest in little Britain do.
While praising cannot be, the Irish swains,
By chance, and wit, and manners, freely find
That yet their post can save them from the wind,
They ever cast the book upon the page,
And were at length pleased at a fawn to come.
To raise it up to fifty hundred years,
Is physical, and quite the way to mend it.

But still I hold it true, that when we see
This little world, and read its customs, leaves
The book a little bit more curious, which
Evolves a pretty emblem of our age,
The book we read, and all we read aright,
Is (as we said it in an open place)
A little curious book that could not save
A sight.
On one side is the book, and one the sun.
There rests a copy from the manuscript,
Upon the other is the upper writing,
When that the first the writing has been put
Between the top and wisest of mankind.
Here Puck is made the best of nursing mothers,
In point of lamentation. Don Apollinax
Is more endued with sonnets from that time,
Which says, at least it does not need the nurses.

On fifth of all, our doctor has been here.
We have been here a month and month before,
Till almost that time Death did come to us.
We have been here three years, and one before,
And, in five days, it pleased us to regard him,
For looking at the people of that land
Because there are so many, and so few.
These are the books the Brownites used to get.
My dear Sir,--great, slow-sighted, good-natured!
They never threw their books before his eyes,
And are so nice and simple that they look
Like the straight lines of all their former books,
They never wanted long to buy or sell.
They will be poor indeed, and have no ink
To see how they can get it; and they look
On paper, and on paper; and they look
On roaring, rattling pictures, on the top,
And hearing them declaim upon the box,
Do more than look the other way to seek,
Through these thick shades of his, the general roar,
The frantic cry of fifty million men.

You have no pity for poor Edward Newcome,
But think how very clever he was.
He had not been so idle, but that night
He used to wash himself, and when he could,
He told his old grandfather how to scour
His room with whistleings and broken toys.
Why, he was wise, and so was just a fool.
For, since he had no fingers, but had paper,
He had but two to put his hand between
His fingers and a ten-penny paper bag
======================================== SAMPLE 220 ========================================
,
Dance round the bowl with girls who play with shells,
Bubble and flow, walk up or down the Seine,
While my last draught of Strephon or of Alp?
When, by a kiss, I drank not from the cup,
For luscious were the lips that fed it then.
When will it come?
<|endoftext|>

Wrecks of my father and mother
Fade into mist and mist,
Stars that seem to fly with Folly,
Stars that gloomily droop
Where the good ship's crew
Never yet knew the pain of sorrow,

Darker now, and fiercer yet,
Floods of darkness, filled with care,
Stars that keep me sitting here,
Stars that peopled o'er the glasses
Where I frolic on my way,

O! but not there many heroes
Fading in their glory shine,
Mirrors there to make me sorry
That I could not play my game of cricket.

Fittiest in the world's renown,
A lucky man they say
Who has courage to be frank, and better than with me.
But it is long since I had not
Been given me to know
If it be not for the hand that touches me to show
At every leap the small free giver
Of future revelry.

Says God to my children,
And my soul is bowed
In doubting and trusting.
Though I loved them, he has
Only left them to me,
I know not what better.

We were crowding in the twilight
We were foaming in the dawn,
We were longing for the sea-waves
That had soothed my longing.
All the world is mine to-day,
All the sunlight shines to-night.

Yet I ever shall be happy
With the one I love most true
In the morning's dawning beauty,
In the evening's dusky light.
Only we were clinging to them
In that radiant dawn of youth,
When the windows rattled softly
At the dear, returning truth.

If you only asked to see me die,
Should you only ask the help I give,
You would see my face grow red and thin,
And the old dear head grow gray and old,
And smile as if to know that joy was told.

If you only asked the help I give,
Would you only know the anguish wild,
The stinging, cruel strife, the sodden pain
And sorrow that have made my darling mad?
Would you only understand the pain,
The long, dark struggle that has made me sad?

You will see my face grow gray and old,
A wee gray speck on a December sky,
A crow on the still, cold water cold,
An empty nest that I kept you by
Till the winter comes again and takes you by.

If you only asked the help I give,
Would you only know the anguish wild,
The soft despair and bitter cry
And bitter strife for the outcast child,
The homeless sobbing and the poor,
The starving cry that shall die of all,
And the heart that all shall know for friend,
Or for them in the dark, unending span,
If you only asked the help of man?

If you only asked the help of all,
Would you only know the anguish wild,
The hush of sorrow in the air,
The watch that never shall be there,
The weeping and the breaking sea,
The breaking, the breaking, the sighing,
The breaking, the breaking, the loving,
Borne down the waters, borne down the tide
To the far, uncharted caves,
And their great reward is just God's name,
And their Gods know the rest which be their shame.

If you only asked the help of men,
Would you only know the pain we feel,
The dragging anguish and the load
Of sorrow, and the many griefs,
And the dark eyes that cannot weep,
And the press of heavy thought
That can not find the utmost good?

If you only asked the help of men,
Would you only know the pain we feel,
The silence, the anguish and the strife
Of daily labour that we dread;
Would you only whisper to the poor
That the Lord is calling for the sun
To light their dark distress and dread?

If you only asked the help of men,
Would you only see the pain we feel,
The tangled misery and dark despair,
The weeping, the sorrow and the prayer,
Of souls they made unwilling,
Would you only know our pain and woe
In the tender twilight round us go
======================================== SAMPLE 221 ========================================
 who's the best!
They are "the jovial stations" and "the station"
Of one who's got a horse,
And even of these wary prentices
They soon are off to sale;
And this same lad, you know, with all his might,
Can take and sell his wares;
When those that's "up to it," cry out,
"A guess! 'twas, by these riv'rs!"

So, naturally, I wish you would admire
Our simple brides, although they're of the higher,
To be good-williams, and to settle wight-
(Though by this they are beyond a crust of fight)
In ev'rythink, nay, swine (it does my best
To keep there is a goodly portion)
Most thankful when it comes to the right heart
To give its salt, which others render skiest.

When Sâus tells to us of Kabîr's ascent,
Then, when the sage and holy man, polite,
Naming the wrong and cursing in the right,
Says: "Sâus, on account of sin, in jest,
I've made of yours a rule,
Has not disjointed me with holy lore,
Sâus for the contrary doore,
Is love-all drawne within,
All heavenly virtues gan to be devising
A limit now become the limit's proof,
Since sinning against right is thing I've vanquished
And onely makes me twice the weaker one,
I then began to looke that sinning against nature,
And as the wittol's self ther' be alluring
To more immediate matter.
S—S—S—
So said, so done. You may surmise
A simple limp and to depart
Without a rival, minimamus,
Though few, yet the world's heart and brain
Have in that sin so often beaten me,
That one is prone to trouble and mismercy.

Have sought among the prime and multitude
And many times found out the story
Of Kabîr's fasting, and the count
Made wiser by a ready footfall
Than Kabîr's, who showed such lack of youth
In Kabîr, or ere he lifted up
His eyes and joined his discipleship
By showing them how good and how right he was.
And many a one would see his error,
And mocke himself the tutor also,
And even should find out another one
Fit for his playfellows. In this wise
He saw no error, and did not chuse
The path of truth, but this time did begin,
Which he of truth and faith assured
Should come to Pentapostal clearly
Before the preacher should appear in sight,
For his was known right well in sight,
A dear and honoured father; yet of that
No greater was the love he showed to him,
Than is the plain and simple ignorance
That Saratoga, though of good exalted,
Was wont his piety to persecute,
His word was ever sacred, and his lot
Not his,--it was this, or rather, folly
That led him to the door of Heaven, and there
Where he had laid his offering, set aside
For thanks to God and for his servants.
And yet again the wretched victim's tongue
Repulsed him,--at the hearing of those words
So grievous, and so rageous! and he raised
His hands to heaven, with one fair downward look
Discreet, and came to heaven, and sunk down
As falls a cedar on the mountain-summ.
But standing there, the glorious Magi there
Was seen to rise. He started up and cried,
"I am Orestes," and then sank and fell
Down on his knees; and she, his wife, who kept
His faith and honour, unto death was thrust
Away, and then, with muffled hoofs of death,
Began to gnaw his beard, and all his face
Became a man-upe, and his teeth outflew
Asunder, and his breast was nigh to brine.
It was a man in rags who once was clad
With a loose band, and cloak and sandal too;
But in his wearied swoon he stumbled on
And fell into a sea of mortal woe
And stood upon his bier beside the sea,
And like a corpse fell to the ground and sprent
His body with the waves. He could no more
Sit in the porch of his deserted home,
But sat like one in grief and cun
======================================== SAMPLE 222 ========================================
, none swelled with him, and many a base
And grievous slaughter! for the best of Troy
Could not with more than one good heart be blent,
And those her fleshless ranks.  But great must be
At many a full-wrought tale, of treaty made
By Greeks of all the Achaean ships beside
The Atridæ.  From the wide-flung gates they fare
Of Thessaly, the city where to seek
At eve the son of Atreus: all in vain
They plot for gold, and in their hollow-swift ships
Shout to the skies; in vain a wind of grief
Hovers between them; hunger and pain endure
The onrush of the Sea-queen: all hands must haste
And strive no more, till dark night drop apace,
And quaking day descend, with all his hosts
In utter woe abide the empty feast."

With that all sorrow ceased, and all their hearts
Quaked within them; for Atreus' son he left
Grief for his son, by his great father sent
Most high to Nestor, in the tent of him.
But night intolerable gloom cast round
The long-protracted son of Neleus, whom
The mighty Neleus sent forth after him,
To be his friend; not long would he abide
His destiny, if him in fight he slew,
Or fought, himself, an uncontroul in fight.
But of the chiefs of Greece most eagerly
Alive he drove, ere he could launch his ship;
And down into the hollow barks he cast
His son, to smooth the waves; and, all unware,
He sped, and sat at Menelaus' side.

As some tall poplar, overhanging crow,
Erects its high top midway, that falls
Low-creeping, and thick-fruited, bowing to the gale,
So, from the crowd of ships Achaia's host
Drove out; far on the beach the Greeks beheld
The ships bleached by the overwhelming blast,
So down the deep they plunged, and thus their hearts
With anguish were o'erflowed; for to the ships
Had sent a strong and a sufficient guard
On Priam's burg, the remnant of their host.

But when the Trojans saw Achilles once
Gigantic, filled with courage and with shame,
The Trojans first beheld him; for the Gods
With Olympian courage filled the heart of Greece.
Then to their valiant Menelaus spoke:
"O Father Jove, why stand we idly here
Ready to face the battle?  Haste we now,
And bear the shield well shielded by the Greeks
At hand of noble Menelaus, strong
And wise; for he is clad in purple mail
And steel; but let the spear go down to earth,
No feeble in the fight, in utter need.
Not so will I.  The helmet that I wield
Is not so fair, nor yet so white, I dare
To face that noble man."  Straightway his men
And Trojan women joined; but soon again
The Argives gave command that all should go
To work their will, and they with speed of horse
Should bear them to the ships.  From Ida's heights
The Trojans gathered still, nor far had left
The Greeks, but did as those who fought alone
For their own city, and must needs fight yet
Till all the Argives were again at peace.

Fenced every ship; and ever and anon
They faced them pressing by the battlement-gate.
Now to their eager hands they poured the wine,
Thetis, son of Peleus; Peleus' daughter fair
She, peer of gods for might and beauty, bore,
And in her hand a golden cup she poured,
And spake to them winged words: "Son of Atreus,
To-day dread foes befallen are we all,
And dost thou fear we can our towers consume?
Come, speed our gallant barks; another day
Shall bid thee fight; now do we wage the fight,
More grievous toils of war, till, far removed
From Jove's great city, thou shalt in thy hands
Be raised to mortal men; for vanquished men,
We too will triumph in immortal song."

He spake, and with him o'er the crowd did come
Two-handed swordsmen; skilled in armour, then
The glorious son of Peleus, Agamemnon, strode,
And now before the ships he stood at bay
And pricked with golden edge his bearded spear,
======================================== SAMPLE 223 ========================================
 night of Peri-Forsitan;
And the God, the Judge, walked up and down
In the presence of the sainted visitors,
Who stood as if in awe, yet did not whine,
But gibe, and spat, and leer their caps and wear,
And all at once give sentence, saying "We
Are neither liars nor gods, but only fee!"

O well for him that has no conscience, say!
There surely was no saint that said, "I do."
The founts of love in every pore and brazier,
And that great secret springs of anger and of fear,
Could but a single mind find guilty somewhere,
And stab him deep, and let him still be there!

And well for him, if in that heart he bore
The love-sick image of his own dear Mother,
Who sat there and looked down on them before,
But all ablaze that they might have some pity
Upon his loveless faith, so soft and tender,
And read the illumined Angel-songs no more!

And well for him, if all should keep its place
In the high halls of judgment and the King
Who comes, that he might see no dread of wrong
Amid the throng of solemn cherubim,
But hear the thunders mutter of the hymn
That angels and archangels must dim,
And on the last and dreadful stage of time
In the dark pit where lurketh now the crime,
Bring the dead Sorrow back to Paradise!

O ye that on the fiery records keep
The fearful record of past shame and crime,
Stand for the Cross that God forgot to us,
Let there be left some word of ancient song
Of those who cri'd from bloody centuries
Before the living God, and those of him
Whose deathless soul hath now no fear to come
But from the sheathed edge of the sulphurous sea
That yet shall hide them from the world above:
For the Cross shall be the sign of their agony.

O ye who drain the cup of bitter tears,
Breathe the deep air of life into your ears;
Bring the swift messengers of the strong old thought
That shall no more be talk of the dead years,
And leave behind the veil of circumstance
The gray-pale witness that one instant makes
The record of lost hopes and undying griefs
Hold darkly in the heart of this world's griefs.
O ye who cross the bridges of the years,
And, bearing witness of a dear sad tale,
Go gently, ah! and gently take your way:
Do with a pure heart and a happy mind,
Following the sound of sorrow and of sin,
Yet longing for an only truth denied,
And with a clear soul to behold the Christ,
And to be glad at heart at any price,
And to make merry with the living folk,
And all the change that even the blind belief
May bring to the lone heart of this heartless world.

O ye who hunt the grey-pale discontent
And with your unaccustomed heart content,
Be of good cheer and abstinence denied
To any ear but those deaf ears of thine,
And be content, though hunger-pale and mute,
And have no wine to cleanse you from the taint
Of long-desired Pharisees, who sought to glut
The poor, and wallow on the wretched throng
Of Avarice, the Pharisees, who sought this wrong.

O ye who watch the dead and grovel in woe,
Look on these stricken souls that sit in gloom,
The women with the tattered locks that show
As things of no avail, and none of you,
Who, for the stains of sin, the world go on,
And, after many days of wandering, have known
That Christ's high servant for the holy shrine
That, passing where men go, one sees the whole
Of all the well-loved cross, and loves it not.

Or, if to-night your tears shall be but wet
With that sweet blood the Pharisees mixed
To bathe your souls in tears, yet not forget
The anguish of your widows, and forget
Your innocence of martyrs, and forget
The chapel, and the cries and songs and tears
That haunt the chapel. O ye who have known the Cross,
Look on these children whose hands are cold and whole.

This is the temple where Christ's simple faith
Was held in suffering; and the mother's hand
That rests upon the cradle and the cross
Is held in sorrow, for the world must see
The end and the beginning. O ye who keep
Your hearts serene
======================================== SAMPLE 224 ========================================
 One may say he thinks that had fallen;
That is to say I'll speak, remembering
That Now, then, returning,
From that strange pondering.  With his face set to the east,
The words come to the tongue of Glor, the speech of the north.
What a woman is that!
Is it she, then, who holds the splendor
Of the brazen heaven she is gone from us!
"So that she is gone out of our sight;
Now that the flame of a thousand miles
Glances and gleams, without an echo of night.
For no one dares to gaze upon her face:
Not one to hear the distant thunder muttering
And the trees shudd'ring with their girdles rent,
Or the soft, silver by-ways gloriously drear.
The sad gaze of her unreturning tears,
Wasted and wan; and her love-sickening fears
For some late cloud or sorrow-stricken star.
She clasps him close, and her hands are against him;
And his little arm cannot clasp the form:
The immeasurable pain is gone to her bosom;
And, lo, she has clasped the white hands of a daughter,
The gentle, beautiful, golden-lipped, fair,
And laughing at him as he turned away
From her love-stricken heart,--"So I,
My mother, at thy bidding, at thy bidding,
Shall best become thee and be what thou art."

"Nay, for I must, knowing not as thou art,
Nor with the face of a child, nor the eyes
Of a child's face, I am fired by a mist
Of restless wonder, with sense enough to sing,
With hope to laugh and love to die away.
I must leave thee to death and the thunder to rust,
To the winds to lie, to the stars to fly,
And the winds to sigh, and the winds to die.

"I must leave thee to silence and the sadness
Of the earth and the skies, so, at thy feet,
I will come to thee and create my pain,
O beauty, in thee only, to create
Thine everlasting beauty, that thou wilt,
With the full-blown fire upon the lips,
Flower-mouths, and blue-bells, and words, and lights,
And murmurous footsteps,--all, to follow thee!"

And I answered, "All shall die as I die;
The scorn that thou shouldst reap cannot die;
Thy soul shall pass away, and thou shalt lie
With the pride that thou couldst feel in it.
Now death is sweet, and its song to me
Will sing most sweetly sweetly, and all the past
Will fade like mist, as I turn to thee."

The black claymores were hurrying on,
Like beaten wingers, to and fro;
Thick boughs lay thickly bounding over them.
The yellow bees came humming through,
On beds of violets, and through
The bloomless fields, for lovers' meeting.

And 'round them blew the merry breeze;
I watched them with hushed faces,
Like children round a father's knees.

Hills gleamed, like plumes of wizard grass,
Like witches' castles elves,
To laugh at in their twisted curls.
And violets like globes were there,
Daisies like flowers, like foam,
Like fallen stars in froth and hair.
I could not see them, for they led
The maids into the house;
Like glimmering eyes they kindled, bed
On the great boar's mane,
And sparkled like a sword-blade red.

I could not see them for a minute,
As a sudden wind arose,
A finger, as the maidens met it,
That was most like man's nose,
Rich, deep-sunk furred faces,
Like wet hearth-stones tied together
For a dance of purple feather
And a wild song, he had forgotten.

But suddenly the fair old world
Was sparkling red, with all its gold
Of lovely childish memories,
And the old woods were over-blown
With a sudden and far calling;
And the light on the altar's side
Burned brighter than with a sudden pride,
As a new-born sun came up,
The water-wraith of a scout,
With a wild call of the hounds ringing,
From the hoofs of an approaching scout.

And in a light, O, sweet, O, strong,
The wind of the May house crashing,

======================================== SAMPLE 225 ========================================
 that alas!
Slight ten-pound Abyssinian!
As he lay by the awful sea
Of theOcean, while from his hairy throat
Down fell the shrill-voiced quay,
We heard, beside the mighty chasm,
The roar
Of the restless, clamouring Sea.

Behold the deeds that, living, tell
The deeds of those who lived!
For now, O wondrous miracle!
The dead,
Dead they are,
And their blood runs back to him.
Yea, they buried their dead,
But he and all his children dear
In their sepulchral urn,
In a house of stone,
In a house of stone.

Not far away,
In a little house
He had lived;
He had put away
His crown,
And his gay conceits,
His evil deeds,
And the thoughts
That haunt the house

As I lie watching a fire in a fauld,
Along with the dark, unfathomed red,
Twinkling, twinkling, over the roof,
Tottering with the sparks, growing dim,
A light like that, which the evening reveals
With a crackle of light.
Is that a smoke, is that a fire?
Is that a cold, is that a death?

Then, in my heart, there is no other trace
Than the faint, transitory flame
Of the unwhitenished flame;
And, like a living creature, I have seen
A helpless, helpless image come
And fling its fire back in the grate,
Till it took fire, and died.
And yet, O Christ, I know not why
Nor why,
Because the living seemeth so,
But God is good, and is good to me,
And with His own hands fold my hands,
(The pure, impure and impure I have seen,
And counted it with the dead I have seen)
I am so weary of life.

O noble death, O death
That dies not at all,
I am most weary,
For thy cold, dead hands have slain
My father,
Thy lewd, burnt, powerless boy,
My mother,
My little one, my little one,
And yet my heart
Is full of thee.

These very words were uttered with exceeding bitter cries,
I could not choose but hear
The dreadful hymn.
Ah, God, my God!
THE snow was on the top,
The storm was on the plain,
When my little one came home to me.
She did not come in time.
I cried, I cried, I cried, I cried,
I knew not why.

The neighbors sang from it,
Their cheeks were red and numb,
But yet, I knew, I knew not why.
I cried, I cried, I cried, I cried,
The winter's's snow was heavy,
But, long enough, I knew not why.

Oh, not one man in all the city
Had strength to tame a cat.
I was most hungry, walking on a street,
That he might brew me ale.
I was most hungry, walking on a horse,
That I might eat, and serve.
I wore a coat of fur,
I wore a straw hat,
I wore a silver miter.
All day I had to walk forlorn,
When the snow was on the ground
That had been my gayest
And saddest of my gayest,--
My gayest and most melancholy.

The haughty head, the haughty,
Head of a haughty queen!
Head of a haughty chieftain!

THE times are old, they say,
And Time an old, old man,
Has no ears now, 's nothin'
That makes you havin'
Enough of all these winters!
But I, 't was well he couldn't!
Yes, p'r'aps you'll feel!
For all your hair is red and bright
And all your whiskers white.
No! though your hair is grey,
And though your teeth be spare
And every day you've said a word
Of what we're mair to say,
You're better if you'll answer me
Than if you mean to say.

The things we're mair havin' on,
'T was first of late.
(We loved them for the restin' trade,
We're just a catin' chum!)
There's Calvert took the Rechin' road,
And bade a canvas pie.

So they has had a horrid rum,
A-sett
======================================== SAMPLE 226 ========================================
 us down to this Last Rose of Eare,
Which I the Lady gave before my Beare.

Another morn by Daye's Celestial Bower
One day was past, the bright Son of the Light;
Not as his Mother, from the Parents sight,
But as her Foot unto his Father's Spare,
Was on the sudden leaving every trace
Of that first Battel on the Wholsome Sea;
Which, missing it, into the Temple's Shade
By a fresh Fountain, it presented there.

O what a blessed Villaine was thine ancestry,
Daughter of Heav'ns illustrious Mother, in the day
Of thy birth, while thou didst hold the purest Grace,
And to the last Cite of the highest Potentate;
After thou hadst great Birth and no lesse happiness
There in thine own free Will, as in thy fatherhood.
For hee in whom our just Ciphers were put to shame,
Gave thee the Livery, the dismissal of thine owne flame.

By this time wast thou sole in thy father's Power,
The prime of Heav'n, the Womb of all Mankinde,
The prime of Human Race, the first in Towne,
That led thir Daughters, eldest to the Crowne,
And after whom the blissful seat of all,
Before thir great Dominion Danc't of the Seas,
Under thir great Dominion: thither they
Ascended, and the East was the so seene
Of great Eloquence, heard with due applause
Of all that reigns, by Henryth Sabbath Rites
For his Seed: therefore of these thou maist gois,
Thy father, and the Sons; which follow thee
Henceforth, for heauns of thee that should beare
Thy thrift, so much as he thereby hath left,
Dwindl'd not by his owne Wealth, nor his owne Wealth,
That were to him like honours, which thou heare
Of all things, that present to thir Maker

For thee, so late thy own vertue to attaine,
That to thir owne worth thou mayst it ask
For that thy father should be none: himselfe
As from a Mount of Hills, a Valley doth spred
In length and breadth, a fountaine of high Pile,
All filld with waters of his owne Sea,
Where he one continuous Vine divided
Seed, fruit, and Fruit that all containes shall
Sue his Father, and for ever brood
In his own Courses, honourd though it be,
Sans grace, sans spot, sans grace, which oft is lov'd
With his unwearied Matin and his Seed,
So grew the Enuie of his owne Mother,
And in his Seed: the Garoe was let forth
Out of the Earth, out of the Earth it fell,
Out of the lofty monthes, which it passd
And settled in two little Fountains: that
He in the Plain yet filld, but down the Stunts
The stream of Eden lost.  On either side
ACANTHUS erst was kindled by the Son
Of ABARHAM, whom his Seed hath di'd,
On the instant that his seed should flie

Out of the STunts of SATAN, where he fell,
The dayes pronifick, and where Heav'n opinion
Was offerd, and where sought: for whoso robs,
Abas and MAMMON seekes and dares not feares,
Causeth or CUSHIN or what mesure feares
Interposeth, yet as onely not desart
But half he heares, while they as best can tether
The bloodie snares about them, as the Tree
Which God hath planted on the Earth, by rape
Sends from his top, and bids them fast and farr
Hang overgrowne, as not of enimie
But half his entrails hungers up on Heav'n:
The Armie open to receive his prey,
Riskously fluttering his hopeful wings,
As if enamour'd of theweb o're flye,
But newly featherd and newly dropt,
The bait seems flesh, and bonees instead,
To be a living Cloud, and overspread
Into a fatall Calm and full of Calm
The eare hee pauseth, for his danger feares
That danger least, so went he forth to breake
The feare of TARTAR, and his fraud to spoyle
With sly racietie; then, what
======================================== SAMPLE 227 ========================================
, look them all upon.
Yes, she is here--she will not look to-night.
And who is that, that dawns? (reads from the sight).
Oh, I can make atonement for the slight,
And this one vision flash around my sight
Of her who's gone! Oh, if my guide were back,
And I the tempest that the sea forsake
May Heav'n help the ship that bore me to the Dark!

There is no man can read a harder light,
When Truth and Falsehood are not visible:
The light that shone, the light that ne'er was given,
Is light, not light; with this we all must pander,
Until he writhes at last--then glare him thickly,
Until he clears the blind and quivering sky,
And light, and light, and light, and light must fly.

There is no light, when only by the few
Whose spears the gray mist from our faces threw,
May he be found the light to find, nor need
The sight of Light to dazzle him in sooth;
To them, and to their dregs this light is true;
This light can keep his memory green and bright;
To them--and unto them this rays his might.

Tones may they send, and echo but the word
"Dreamer! Ah, lightly must thou range the wide,
Only to thee is darkness as to Guide!"
Naught could they tell of her, but she must guess
That, when an Angel beckoned to approach,
She would not fail, that Power had fail'd to drown
All things but Dark and Dark beyond her own.

There is no light, no light but in that Dark,
When we are by the Sea, the fire, the wind,
The elemental voice, that waits to mark
The thing that was, and whence it was begun,
And why it is, and where it is not known.
So with the light of some great things we dream
We answer, and are led by others too;
We yearn to things which we have never seen:
There is no light but in that Dark, and mean
Not light! there is no light! We have our way!

That call for light,--it is for us to go
And some one must come forth and welcome some,
And some one with it, and some one must go
With them! It is for them to be a star,
To move their course, and smite with flame or fear
The dark, unbidden thoughts and shadows mar.
That call for light! It is for them to feel
That there is Light! Then light! it is for God!
<|endoftext|>

Oh, the fair young folk that still are dancing
In our fair young May,
Just as the bright waves danced along us,
And the merry breeze played
In a ring upon the castled rock,
And the stately waving grass was creeping,
And the air was full of odours,
And the dew was all on flower,
When, without a wind to blow,
We watched, until the moon came out,
The fair young folk.

You that sit in the shining dew,
You that wake the flowers,
You that are so young and fair,
Why are you so sad?
You have given the golden hearts,
And laid them in the earth,
But they cannot say you bring
Their hearts to birth;
You that have a wealth of speech,
And thoughts that are not a sin--
A memory of empty shows,
But of tender looks within.

And you, because you would not know
That I am a man, and you a maid,
For a single hour in our fair young life,
Whose wealth of bud and leaf is maid,
And, smiling, I am old;
Come, come to me,
Where the brook sings low;
And the little silver lids,
And the laughing eyes of the sea-mews,
Shall be wet with tears, and I
Am torn and withered and grey
With the grief of many years.

O, come into the light and bright,
With the earliest eve of day,
Where the sinless virgins play,
And the temples deck the spires,
And the blessed light refires,
And the immortal lamp ascends
In the gloom of the ancient towers,
Whence the phantoms of the dead
With lips that have ceased to sing
Drink of the blood they shed
In the revels of the dead,
And the dance begins again,
With the breath of the dying year,
When they walk in the lonesome
======================================== SAMPLE 228 ========================================
 journey home to till the morning light."

Old Butlers all have nothing new to do,
No more of fighting for the buzzing bees,
No less the hum of bee, and butterfly
Flying low to grass, and home-talk to the bees.
The heather, in one great eternal tongue,
Meets the keen mockery of the chattering bees,
The hum of bees, and petals, and the hum
Of the old grasshopper, and the humming-bird
Bee and the trumpet.

Who laughs away
Half swooning, half singing, and half screaming,
The cock of gold, the cricket's shrill dire,
And, bending him above the grass, his fire
His mate that is so bold
To raise the yellow roses and the moon
Across the grass,
He laughs half swooning, he sings to himself,
He todles through the grass, he runs and shirks
His song and his own tune.

Ah, after a thousand years
A thousand fathoms deep
Of toil and tears
Lay their warm kisses deep
On his lips which they would not lose their light,
He rises still
And looks down the land,
Pillow on plashy water and the height,
He stands
On the first landing-day of the long sea,
Where the winds blow free,
And on the crags of woody shore,
And in and out
A hundred leagues or more.

When we meet again
We shall know the pain
That was long ago;
And the winds will moan
That are here no more,
And it shall never cease,
For it has gathered the autumn-shorn boughs
And gladdened the heart
Where the acorns lay.

When we meet again
We shall go apart,
In the wind and the rain,
And never a wind to scatter the sails,
And never a star to cheer the way
That we had left.

We shall walk in the windy lanes,
And the flitting gipsy birds will come
From the redwood, waters and summer seas,
And go to the burial and dance and sing,
Each with his little of anabbled spring,
A little cloud of mother-sweet flowers
Lily and bacillus standing forth,
Smelling of dew on the sea-sands,
Of the fragrant cloud-spray, and violets blue
Coming up from the earth and on the earth.

We shall walk in our windy ways
Where the rain forsakes the day,
When it bends low in some deep-sunken place,
Waiting its lullaby;
Not too warm, nor too warm for the wind,
But strong to be chilled of the sun or moon
In the great sea's immemorial hour,
And cold to be smothered with rime and spray
Beneath the rain's unshaken power;
But rather cold than ice is cold,
And cold as cold, to sit still and list
Beneath the rime's unshaken will,
Or see the solid skirts of snow
That melt and melt in the long drifts below.

(For the poet, not the Bard, but an airy and wheedly
Terring in metre, haresque not long to sing.)
Sonnets made of many thousand lines

(That the maiden deigned not to parry with?]
Youth ended, and the years, the span
Of fifty years, the record runs;
The worker, the new-born son, began
The holy rite of the first days of man.

"Pilate,"--'The woman,'--and his little son,
Eager to try and find the way;
But sure as fate, to his first dread intent,
At last, in thought, and the last day he went.
They found a woman of a noble birth,
And love held in her heart and in her mouth.
She in the cradle of his little bed,
The shuddering one and the boy stood near,
Pleading for life as she withdrew the load
Of sorrow from his manhood's awful prime.

The footsteps ceased.  He could not speak or stir,
But would obey the law that looked on her,
Seeking the refuge of his faith, or else
Begging the world as at a guilty rate.
She looked upon the bright, white flake-white road
That drove the flake of the faithless lover,
While all the mother-kindred walked beside,
More patient for the life he gave her to take and take.

Slowly she drove it up again and down
Through streets and alleys of the wandering;
======================================== SAMPLE 229 ========================================
 I find him, in his heart, the sage
Speak with him always by himself. Thou wast,
My noble son, my king. Thee I obey;
Myself I follow, and my steps I make
To reach the Argos; but, arrived, depart.
So spake the God, and went, but found me none.
So we, unthrifty, loitered at the gate.
My sire, Telemachus, (for evil fate
Impended him) thus interposed. Oh me!
The false end of the wicked, that I learn,
Now bids me prove, if, by the will of Heaven,
And by the word divine, my lost sire's son
Have at the ships arrived, or if a god
My woes have suffer'd, send them to the fleet.
Then, all bewildered, went Telemachus
His native land, and, landing, thus began.
O sacred guest! Ulysses is indeed
My father, yet he lives; his own brave heart
Speeds all my steps; yet shall I spare myself
Ere this, till evening, till the Gods achieve
Perforce all strength and all discretion hence.
So he, whom all approved. Meantime, throughout
The house there sat a stranger; in his house
Our suit we held, and we the solemn feast
Continued till the going down of day.
Yet, had not Philostratus his guest
Daily importuned me, I had fallen once.
The wish, indeed, of all the Gods above
Conveys to my decision. I avow
That none should, as they judge, have access here
With my own thought, or my concurring prayers.
This much, Atrides, heard; then, sitting sat
All fouler still; but when the sun arose,
Peised on his golden throne, weeping he sat
And, looking down, saw Theoclymenus
Ulysses sit superior. They, with tears
Shed, even all their sorrow, at his feet
Threw their own mantle, and their sorrow rose.
But when the Sun had left the world at large,
The guest came to the palace, and began.
Go--dread son of Atreus! what reports
Have ever yet ensued? oh that the Gods,
Although with grief and anger he was filled,
Had them preserved! Oh that, as at the first
The Hero, whom no human calamity
Consoled, yet was he now by strength of hand
Abled! Ay, who this day at thy gates expects
A brief delay! yet wait not--woe is me!
The people hailed him--hastening to the house.
But I should soon such sight have recognized
As they before have witness'd; for the ships
Had all been brought, and I had also quaff'd
Enough of water and provision warm,
Which all who eat, refreshment, strength and wine,
And give all satisfaction to the chiefs
Whene'er engaged.
So he began
Approaching him, and calling him in vain,
His beautiful-hair'd daughter to his ear.
And then, as soon as ever they had named
His son, Ulysses thus with accents sweet
Answer'd them all. And now they roam the fields
With ceaseless industry, and sweet return.
So saying, he bathed them in fair garments, dress'd
Both hands and feet, and in the sumptuous feast,
Magnificent, of beeves and savoury swine
Content and deep. Then, third, Ulysses sought
The city. There he found the thighs of dogs,
In order'd feast, and on the fire prepared
His fuel, and with noble toil enwoof'd
They fell, and he consumed them. They had lain
Till evening, and had tasted of the drench
Of burning dards, but ne'er again had hope
To rouse him forth from sleep, though eager still
To prey on feeble tasks.
Jove knows how long his days
Were distant from his homeward-sailing ship;
For, in the moment of his dearth, the son
Of Enochus stood trembling in his house.
Aghast he was, or hearing of his son
His tidings, shed a groan deep-sound throughout
The mansion of the Thunderer, while he sat
In the still house astonish'd at the sound
Of the shrill-roaring arrows sent from Jove.
"O stranger! in some visitings of thine,
At some lone day, some dear-bought pleasant nook,
To lead thine infant fainting-hearted wand'rer,
H
======================================== SAMPLE 230 ========================================
 and burns as the last red star,
As if it still moved on with a power of wind,
And stirred the waves till it swept into foam;
And those who knew the frailest dust, the best,
Compute a perished part and a final word,
Till the dim vastness is left, and the daylight gone,
And men and women live but as the flickering shade
Of a wandering fire that has scorched and is fed
With ever-burning, more vivid and grey.

And those who have marveled and they shall not fear,
Shall not be comforted, or shall not die;
And those who, weary of watching, shall not cry
In bitter pain and want and poverty,
Or faint and lagging and having too few,
Shall not look back for a day that is done.

And all men's souls have not made less of prayer
Than of their martyrdom, nor the beat
Of their most perilous journey towards man's goal,
And all their lives that are fallen to save and reach
Death's mysteries to naught, and all their hopes to miss
The treasure of God's blessing, know the best
To whom God gives for grace; and 'tis no feud
With this pale kinship that invades their rest,
But merely sojourning leaves and shaves their bread
With purest gold for their true rest of need.

Or else to come and live it over the years,
To live and see in it a living name,
And of it learn what we have lived and died,
That a strange life is flowing in the flame,
A living name, a symbol of the shame
The Just are leading us in one.

Through these long months of throstle and din,
In daytime or night when the wood is still,
When the hill is still, when the world is blind,
And winds like wolves go searching for the dust,
And then the world is just as fair again,
The old year, as it was when I was young.
What then? Why, I can tell; a year is gone.
How late it was, or I could only guess.
But yesterday I saw it as a dream,
And that is how the year was opening up
The new year, with its hopes and with its fears.
All things were new in the old year's face.
Young, tender, pure, and strangely laden now,
But now, I think; and it has always been,
I feel that I shall see the old year come
Back of another, which my life was used
To see just as the year was growing old.
He came one day and plucked me by the ears
And threw me in a cage, his greenery
Flowerlike in it, its young sweetness and thought.
And thus it comes to pass, the trampling clown
Came by. The joyous thrush was still, the bays
Danced in the light, the brook spoke in his tongue,
The beech sedate, the swift deer past the wood,
And the slow rooks hooted 'Round about the pass.
But he was proud of that, his gray head upheld
By strong entreaty, and with pasturing eyes,
On that day saw him woo with his blue robes
The peace of time, and as he danced he said,
"Tell me, my sweet! I wish I knew the voice!"
The great mare broke her knees, and she replied,
"What say you, girl, when I came there? For you,
I found no longings for the happiness
That autumn and the land could offer it
To the poor wandering child that had gone with him.
Had you aught else to cherish for your joy,
You would not buy it for a poet's heart,
Nor think it happiness that I have lived
For twenty years; have dreamed that you had loved.
If that heart had aught of which I cared,
I would not for a poet weep my fall,
But for my boy's. I could not part his gaze
For all his tuneful shepherdry of song,
But for the world's deep passion--for the mill
That handles, but not mingles with my fate,
For my boy's grave, for his funeral bell.
'T was something all a dream; my life had found
No truce with books to make a wisdom blind,
But grief in him grew like a little thing
That long has nursed an idle butterfly,
That has not found his way toward the fields,
But finds his supper and his quiet sleep,
His vague vague eyes grown bright, and lips that tell
How far his heart is thither borne. He seemed
To brood upon my fate, thinking it
======================================== SAMPLE 231 ========================================
 O, Or, urged by Fate!
Why should a man of men take part?
Men of his years! who taught our age
To feel the windy grief and rage
That hourly feeds the sacred flame
That tames the hearts of men to mirth--
It is not well to bear his lot;
A man to lead a life unbreathed
Between the kind and the beloved,
Soothing with blandest love and skill
His brother--save in these, who will.

The shadow o' the grave is gone,
And night may darken twice to morn,
As some who, looking through the gloom,
Watching a passing shadow loom.
'Tis not the corpse that dreams of death
Untouched, but watching through the gloom,
Like the soft hours when, long ago,
I used to gaze upon the snow.

The old familiar things are fled--
(And all is changed, except indeed,
But there remains a difference
Between the spirit and the dead.)
How many a pleasant and serene
Bright momentary changes round
Have the full circle of their own,
The ghosts they haunt, the glimmering glen,
The pleasure-domes they cannot crown!

How often have I lain awake
Beside the grave where I have lain
A patient time, nor quite awake!
Thus have I passed life's many shamming,
But still so far beyond the happing.

The days are full of hopeless woe,
And nights are long ere I can see
The home where I am all too late.
And I have found a thing to hide
Against the rush of Fate's bright tide.
The husht and supple earth around
Reels back into its wearied bound,
Ere yet its joyous surges raving
In that loud rasp of querulous sound.

And now it is too late to die,
Why do I pause and think, on me?
Alas! when I am overcome,
'Twill be a fearful thing to bear,
'Twill be the world's despair.
What is my friend? and what his end?
Where is the counsel which he gave?
What counsel is there none to lend?
What malediction bring?
What counsels from the lips I draw?
Ah, yes! I know it, and I know
It, but I could not tell, it is the mind
Of him I most have loved, who once estranged
Away from me with all that he has loved;
Who by the bright springs running to their rest
Of Nature's running stream, now to be pressed,
Now fathomless and darkling in the wood
Of universal nature, and was rude,
And went to others, and still served to me
As mortal only, and I could not see
His heart, as mine have grown, the nearer bound
And still the weaker sympathies around.
Why do I seek to know if he be one
Who sits there sad and soul-consuming Night
Consoled by both that God and man can claim
To be his worship- Priest?
If he be named
A tribute, claim the hymn of morning song,
To waken this frail soul with strength and wrong
To humble praise and meekness, it is good,
Till over all my worship fade the fires
Of God and face, whom I adore as nought
But ignoble grandeur.

When death calls me from life's thicket home,
His one poor word is as a little thread
Washed out between the gushings of the tomb
Into a sand flung, where the dust may lie
And be no more a witness if a knell
Proclaim the finest work of human skill,
A ringing scrap of triumph, just a touch
Of quiet to the poor man's breast,
Some little play of strength and solemn thought
Wherewith to hail his triumph, and to claim
His name for fatherman and dreamer.  Why
Should men be fashioned out of clay and set
In golden rings, each link by which to live
Above themselves?  And is their spirit spent
In seeking other spheres, to make them dare
To touch the thing they love?  Ah! let it be!
The tiny bud, that we have weaned from earth,
Seems as a hidden thurible of rest,
Beyond which, even as we are blest,
There yet a single heart, that lives and leans
And breathes itself a prayer for, and forlorn,
Seems justly shorn,--

Ah! let the winds that drive me now go back,
That once to me be dated as a crown,
With nothing left of life
======================================== SAMPLE 232 ========================================
,
and his fir throne his brazen chariot.
"Hear me, ye captains of the guard,
“Who may this land from foes defend,
“From the fierce host to guard you move,
“Let not destruction hover near.
“If they but hold your hearts on fire,
“Forget not, friend, your friendly steeds,
“Till from them will the foe retire.

“And if a raging lion now
“Rush on me in my utmost force,
“Hence drive me forth with conqueror's power,
“With fate most heavy, for the fight.”
Thus spoke the power supreme, and she,
Wife to a lion, fierce as death,
Forbade her vanquish'd foe to flee.

Yet then the coward queen, more fond
Of friendly things, her hatred heated:
She snatched a javelin from the foe,
And cast it in the savage’s flank.
The weapon ripen’d fast and thick,
And straight its equal met the same;
But in the flying ring it stay’d
The fury of the missile dart.

Around his neck the javelin flung,
Fell from the string, and met the bending ear.
One instant snatch'd his careless breath;
The javelin stopp’d, it soar’d in air,
He fell, and life forsook its place,
And lifeless dropp’d before his face.

But the loud thunder of the war,
Involv’d, the car drew down and fled;
And from his limbs the yet warm blood
Was cold and hot on every side.
Such was the fearful combat tried
By Jove himself in rage and grief;
Not swifter could the mighty space
Repel one angry dart relief.

But on they rush’d with sounding feet,
Whose echoing tramp of war was heard,
And loudest roared the crimson rain
That from each charr’d and mangled arm
Bursts in black eddies on the plain.
When, with a furious whizzing shot,
A dart they saw upon the sand,
Which seem’d the body’s sounding buffet,
As from a rock the rushing steed
Brought down on high the feather’d rider;
While from the right and left they flew,
And scarce a limb was mark’d before,
In vain they lash’d, they fled before;
Till scorching flames around them blazed.
From every part of earth they drove,
With beating wings the victor friends
Of brave Ulysses, and himself,
Who, unobserved, his course neglects.
To Pallas’ aid they now descend,
Assail the youth, and car him still.
It chanced the goddess interposed,
Disposed the imperial messenger,
To bid him with her flowing cloak
To the clear stream, and distant land.

He, now before the water’s brink,
Declines the venerable king,
Then sudden thought, with pious pray'r,
To that ethereal pow'r, and said:

“Bestow thou soon thy messenger,
With that keen wit, and vigour shown,
In silent form and person close,
To see my son safe brought to land,
And let thy house and state prevent,
That thou, I trust, be ruled content
To wander through these deserts waste.

For, like Ulysses, I can see
Thy son is safe beneath the sea,
And press him to this port to gain,
There sacrifice with tears and sighs,
To brave me to the suitors’ eyes.
What joy I had in his dear sight,
With his dear mother, now is mine,
With that dear face, and handmaid neat,
Which once was mine so long, I ween.
These hands, these hands shall ne’er be harmed:
And though I feel my darling’s charms,
These shoulders, head, and back shall bear
Strains such as never lover bore.
Rear them (alas! alas! for these!
My true, a tender father’s bands)
And let the purchase of our lives
Hang on the neck of some fair swan’s neck!”

He spoke. The rage of anger swell’d
Each several heart, and pierced with woe:
The queen with wailing passed the bier,
Fired at the hero’s bones appear’d,
And o’er her son’s cold
======================================== SAMPLE 233 ========================================
.   Maint, with beads and jewels,
rings.
Well he came and trudged the tree together,
with the ass in the tree,
And he made a splendid poem for him,
with an emerald tongue,
And he drank, and he wrote, and he sang,
and sang to himself, and swung,
While above the broken trunk was a clothe
in leaf and blossom.

He planted the straw to make him a sprig
and he sang to himself,
But after he reaped and reaped, he
had nothing to say for me.
He said that he sowed a crop of corn,
he said that corn
Was ripe for harvest, and he'd stow that bread
for his priest.

Now when the basketful came at last,
he thought that we
Could rejoice in the rush of the rustling leaves,
and silently,
For a little brown loaf he would lay there
the stockings on.

Then for just a moment he'd gone to the hatchet,
to put in the poke,
To give to his own old musketry the last touch,
and the band in the smoke,
And flute, and gun, and all, for the birds' songs,
and that little brown loaf to do.

He set out on an old ship in the West
that now is new,
For there it is old, but old, in the old mill,
and she has got to think;
And all about her--
Light is out of little things.

Farewell, O world!  Farewell, forever!
O blest and happy people!
When I was down beneath the sea,
And it was summer after I was down,
I used to swing a hammer.

It's always thus:
Hear the winter wolves at play!
In the greenest of the forest,
In the coolest of the squalls,
Let me hammer of the iron
For the bond of human souls!

In the white, electric fire,
Let me hammer of the iron;
For the little, peaceful creatures
Of the fields of human thought,
Who live up to the very stars,
And speak the very words they speak,
And shoot the words of gospel truth!
<|endoftext|>

If in the summer evening,
When the nights are bright and high,
And the branches shade the forest,
And the gentle winds are by,
Let me hammer of the iron
For the little, busy people
Of the fields of summer days,
Who have shed their earthly blessings
On the kindly hearts of men,
Let me hammer of the metal
For the men who work and pray
In the great, unwearied furnace,
For the souls of honest men.

If in the summer evening,
And the woods are bright and green,
And the dews are fresh upon me,
Let me hammer of the metal
For the souls of honest men.

If in the winter evening,
When the days are long and long,
And the frosty sun is bright and cold,
And the snows begin to fall,
Let me hammer of the metal
For the people who are young,
Let the men of the village
 forge the metal sure and strong,
For the hearts of honest men.

Send me never flail of iron,
Nor jerk of a shod-shod boot,
Send me never to the battle,
And never let my foot hurt!
Let me always go on leaping,
With never a coward's foot!
Keep them up!  I say the spirit,
And the fight is better far,
For the armor of the metal
And the buckler of the war.

FIFTH MONT BLANC dissenters,
When the battle rages,
You, my comrade, you shall make
Freedom's hunting garments.
Come and take the measure,
Bring the measure back,
That our soldiers may be glad
Of the coming.
Bid them measure and prepare,
For the danger is far near;
That their hands may not be rough
For the coming.
FIFTH MONT BLANC dissenser,
The nation slowly grows
Into nations, as the snow
Runs along the river.
As it is you stand aside,
Bid the weary come and lie
On the earth, their bodies tied,
And their hearts be mingled.
Know you every year that comes,
Every year that comes to us,
Every year we'll hunt for fruits,
Trees, and wind, and weather.
But when wives are dying,
And one long man alone,
We will make our woodland rings,

======================================== SAMPLE 234 ========================================
 that sullen parchments seem,
Or street-front wore, where slandering winds
O'erbrowed the marge, the traversed skirts
Of white villages, and fringed smoke,
Which, in their breathings mystical,
Lifts the wide misty peaks of Jove,
And rolls through zones of amethyst,
But when the storm hath stormed the sky,
And earth, which every hue of heaven
Wastes 'neath the waves of heaven, lies hid
From those hard-throated climes, which strain
His hostages against their ships;
Or which from all the world shall blow
And bid the ocean cease, a roar,
Such as Atrides in his pride
Now smitten of his hands hath palled,
And whatsoever foam hath quenched,
In that portentous and soothfast home,
Which dazzles and astonisheth,
And stablisheth all the vestal crew
Of those true followers that lead the Argive host,
Which yet in sight of men endure,
And howl them down in utter flight,
Gainst which their straining bow-strings smite.
What, friend, in the deadly grasp of ill
Shall the dear hope of youth revive?
Not vainly 'neath the crushing wheel,
That grinds them slow, yet grinds them still.
Then do thy kindliest, Jove's decree
Choose whom thou wilt, nor may not fall
Through craggy cliff and surf of war
To any hurt or hurt at all;
Next to the Achaean host of Greece,
Or to thyself be call'd the light,
Worthy, renown'd, to be thy guide.
Thou, therefore, first, and greatest chief
That sits contriving on Olympus,
Regarding Jove, thou shalt behold;
The last shaft of that mighty thunder
Shall lay him dead, in the great sun,
The crown, the glory of the sun.

Ascend thy steps, and looking down
In the deep mist of many a town
To the august old godlike city,
Care for the earth this day is given;
And the great sun doth greet thee there,
Ruling his realms into the air.
For he hath hung withal, 'tis true,
But he a crow of such would do;
Hath sung him fair, and sung him true;
And he in the young world hath died.

Ay, much wept he by thee in the field,
When with the rising moon he stood
Within the shadowy myriads stirred,
As in wild swarms the lion fierce
Rages amid the bushes of the wood,
Till from the gloomy abodes of death
The joyful people swell the breath,
And he is glad and comforted,
For this fair day doth close at hand,
And bids the Loves of Heaven stand;
For he hath turned aside the bloom
That was his heart's light glorying,
And hath stood armed through the gloom,
As forth from the green hill he doth spring,
Where the free air blows fitfully,
Where the free clouds in liberty
Are mirrored by the waters clear,
As down the streams her waves appear,
Where she trims many a graceful arch,
Anchises raised in air, inlaid
With silver sunlight, dappled shade,
And the whole theatre of heaven
Is shining on the night of love.
And from the sparkle of that fire
Love kindles forth his wonted fire;
He hath passed through the portals bright
That give the day his daily flight;
And as a star in his dark thought
Gleams forth the light of love to light,
And is once seen by the soul's eye
By Love's bright evening dancing by.

Alas! that I should fall to weep,
Or live to pine, in thy despair;
With all my heart for ever torn,
Or utterly cast down and bare,
And in that wind which vexed and whirled
Beats on the firmament of air.
For who doth not feel the load of woe,
In him who loathes his life and gains
The fairest things these all can show?
Oh, if thou pity, pity us,
O spare us for our fallen learning,
That we may learn to weep with thee,
And get at the most sordid learning!

One still I know; but my last hour
Robs me of beauty from afar;
"Fair angel!"  I had called him mine,
But this the fatal answer bore,
"Behold her, and be what thou wilt,
And have no more such dainty gifts."
======================================== SAMPLE 235 ========================================
 living not to the world.
A mightier power he is
That bade us know, than he
Whose inspiration breathed her purest fire
Up in a thousand hearts.
Upon her bloodier cheek,
Dark hair, and starry eyes,
The jasmine bloom of sun-breathed bloom,
It seems an army rose.
A Roman, triumphing, drest,
Is watching her from that high tower
Down in the sunlit plain;
And now her gathering nears are gone
Of what the foemen say;
And there, oh there, is fallen that last
Pulse-crowned star of Victory.

The lightning that preceded her
Now bids her back again;
And yet she does not heed her Master's voice,
But, staying, will not turn.
All things are passed: those vanquished years,
The many, many dead,
Whose deeds of late have so enriched her mind,
They may not find her yet.

But his! They say what his, whom hers
Those happy times have taught:
He lives, nor lives to be the oldest thing
That is not human thought!
The memory of a mighty past
That scorned, but will not find.
It might be this: she would not be again
Forgetting now that grief
Is such a common thing, and plain to her,
But when her all is told,
The angels who will sing her praise,
Another tongue will have its beauties,
And speak her praises grave,
But she is changed from what she was before,
And passed from sight once more!

The spirit-world beneath me lies
In ashes and in dews;
The meteor-breathing night puts by
The hushed and glimmering lawns.
Mysterious Night! when that strange girl
Is but the common earth,
The myriad stars, the myriad spheral stars,
And all the countless spheres,
Shall hail thee queen of lovely Night,
O Lady and Wife!

Have pity on the thoughtless dust
That wreathed thy glorious hair;
On quiet beds of pleasant leaves
The daisy star-flowers stare;
Come live, come live, with me and me
Upon thine idle knee!

Knowledge that is not death to live,
Locked in this darksome tomb;
Nor all the music of the spheres
Shall break the Silence pure.
Do not call death slothful Death so hard,
Nor take him by the throat;
Nor question whence the gods have come
With weary wandering o'er the plains,
Or whence the light springs up.
Nor love thy fellow Night, who seems
To feel, as is the stars,
The subtle joys that come and go
In some deep prison-bars.

O listening earth! O Earth! thine ears
Are deaf in prison-bars;
Yet do not mourn; for, if a man
Grown old should be content
To listen to the years that pass,
Or if the other should not last,
Then, lady, will ye hear a tale
Of resurrection, while ye may,
From year to year, that pass away,
That vanished time, when all should be
As one in dreams, as in the man
That only knows and counts the years,
Or is, that knows not, while ye may.

An alien sky and wildering time,
As the dull globe we talk about,
Shows us and knows not why we doubt,
Whether in light or wildering awe,
Above the random things we know,
Beyond the unfathomable flood
Of time, or ere we know.

Why are we dull and doubeless grown?
Is not the earth our heritage?
Thou art more lovely than our own
And kindlier of the things we die
Before we know them, love, or die;
And thine is evermore a sign
That we are blind or god or king,
Or all that is, and all we lack,
Or Lord or Father, for the lack
Of all good things, or knowing not.

O Love, who say'st what thing is, why
Should man be born an English speech,
A banished or a foundered bird
For what shall be a kingdom or
A kingdom or a death?
Why are we deaf and fain?  The day
When we must choose it or obey,
Till we approve its call or say
What thing is death, what life to live?
No more, no more!  The evil days
When man was strong enough to praise
Our strength, our youth, our love of gold
And all the little deeds of old,
And all the
======================================== SAMPLE 236 ========================================
os could deny;
For a peepulary bottle, 'tis true,
There should be no Turkish bathroom for J.D.
In a glow-gout domestic was she,
As bright as a rose without a stain;
She liked the French men,--sharp, masculine tones,
And slender, deep-shining, low-whiskered, fair
As those on a staircase--the widow's cat;
Or sweet Reynardos in wild-gout air.
And just in a row would my wife and I;
Then I'd dress you with Bath, to ride,--and lie
In a Tartarel, that is, in Sadetlitz,
On a road called the Hoogliare.
And there were our equipments, right in front,
And good old-fashioned Latin, things polite;
And I thought "it resembles a Christmas dinner;
So take with them a little this winter night."
Then (with gesticulations)
"Now, you, with the greatest scorn,
Am neither poet, nor burgher, nor psalter,
But an orator,--if all you can
Be found in the world as not therein in it.
That is just where you ought to go and revel;
And that is, with other things even than revel!
And some of you, instance, for whom you remark
That all who are uppermost are as they are,
And some are as dull who are not god-like, as we!
For poets, philosophers, and minstrels of Greece,
Are all but well meant, as are all men's præpet;
And as for morals,--but dull are they all!
'Tis not to be understood in the man-loaf,
And let mere man brag on of that for him;
And that we must seek something worth research,
To read these of in truth as philosophers
Are just not all tongue-tied like our ancestry,
Or, like our first or last, make use of what we see
In flash and shower, in cloud and on the breeze!

Now they're all abject and 'tis well worth while
That they did so by the sad escapade
Or the false rings of an old-world junket
On schemes made up of men in their days there;
And, since no man will be our friend again,
They ever borrow a richer lustre
From fortune's lavish gold, than as from Rome.
For they steal to us. Why, it takes some pains
To have lost our Earth, and brought it to us.
And they steal away--brought back to be,
Forgetting the eyes that we have lost;
A world that's not ours, with its riot of prayers,
And the ravening laugh that we have not heard;
And they bring us back, in the winter of life,
The cherished dreams we have lost, the dry years
We've sighed in the dead, the delight of friends,
The mysterious joy of the world again,
And the delights of the dead they have lost!
Why, now at the end of his roguish eyes
They tell me something, saying he loves me
"Because I love him, because I love him,
For that I love him not, nor was born of him.
Now, you know well, it was not, I fancy,
But I know that he really loved me
And was far away from me! I remember
It was not the dawn of year,
Not long the winding path
That took the night, but when
The sun went down, I looked
To see his face--as if
'T were that I saw him there--
Oh, with his eyes as clear
As heaven and as pure
As sunny eyes could see,
Just like a girl's--the glade
On which she looked to me
With those deep orbs of blue
Which so enchant my thought
I looked to them--and blest
Me out of door to roam
About the homes I loved
Without farewell or home.

'Twas not to see him now
My dazzled sight did stray
O'er pearly sands and flow'rs,
Where, if a voice should say,
He was my light obey'rs.
To see him was to know
The perfect form of you,
And, since I gaze and marvel
How much I have to do
With those I love the most,
I'd like to own 'twould be
To have some wonder-working
Comical faces there
That, if you sent your Iris
To me at last, were there--
Then, dear, I'd read to you
With all the love you brought me
That, in our hearts
======================================== SAMPLE 237 ========================================
, eke the many of
them, Agamemnon, the mighty son of Peleus, was still unmindful of
Ulysses. True it was that the suitors might not go on without
themselves; but among the suitors none would heed to carry their
sharp sighs for their sons; for at the same time, then, they
sat me down to waste the house and at their own feasts. As soon as
they began roasting the house of Odysseus, they took some wine,
and sent it to the aged and the aged to fetch them their dinner
at the river of Alcinous, where they were loath to drink, for they
are very near their supper, and find them in distress; but even so
the god did not take heed, for no one ever yet gave him the cup
whereon he lay. So the favouring gods who live in heaven are
in good humour with us, that we have to wear the garments of
Ulysses, whom they have put beneath the earth, and hold the
gilding for ever. As soon as we have had enough to eat and drink
the fruits of the field and all our wooing, so we will go
on to the feast and feast among the wooers; for never have
Achilles with the women nor any of them left us, but we will
have to wear the stout hide of an ox, or to keep dinner in
our house, and we will eat all the year of the wooers that they
have. And whosoever shall feast at my house in that place, or
do any thing of the goddesses that are in heaven or earth, I
will provide him a garment and a doublet for adorning that
loveliest robe of the wooers.'

When the child of morning, rosy-fingered Dawn, appeared,
they departed to the house of Odysseus, to the place where the
whole dome was set apart, but there they laid themselves down
and feasted on sweet wine and sweet honey. Then they departed
through the halls, and the
halls, each with his spear in his plumed armour, bare them to
the wooers, whereon the henchman led them on under the
shining oint. In the cloisters they slept, or sitting all
slyly in the midst of them, and the rest were scattered
under the feet of the mighty prince, and the ancient
beast ceased. And among them Odysseus brought the raiment
of the queen, with the most wondrous beauty in her eyes,
which the women put into his hand. And they spread it
arrayfully over the tables, and placed it on a chair
where the maidens, with the round leathern doublet and quills
underneath, lay their hands about the good things that were
further out of the way; for the son of Cronos had come in
his heart to set the raiment upon, and thereof he had a
sandal in his house, whereas the people call him sine lipless.
So the goddess and the goodly swineherd were glad to see the
worth of sacrifice; but he laid his two hands upon the good
fire, and sacrificed to the gods that keep the wide heaven,
but again spake to Eumaeus winged words:

And wise Eumaeus, ever-wise, spake to him again:

Slay, slay me, therefore, O swineherd, even now, for I had
only much to eat. But when I had the share of meat and drink
within the house, I bade the noble stranger bid me drive
off the car to the citadel, and I bade him hand it to the
walls that held the doors of the lofty banquet. But as for
this, then, I have the whole house of the barren house
perish, for lo, here are the hands of my masters, and of
all the company of them whom of old I slew. There are the
polished seats, but behold, where the house stands and is
breeding with the sea. In the end it is derelict to-day,
even with the lot of mortals. But even as for those other
hearts, the rest of the company is still abounding with
beauty, and the youth are all educated out of the
 ornithy of the goddess.

Then Athene drew near to him and spake and hailed him:
'Lo now, stranger, and what a feast is this, that shows
thee far more comely, when thou hast got no savour in
the meal, and thyself come again from the wastour
of the steersman. In the morning
======================================== SAMPLE 238 ========================================
 May these glorious times prolong."
To whom those blest, with gentle smile:

Fair, artless, and serene,
Your beauty weeps for fear.
Why came you not, sweet May?
Could you not prompt this flight
To vade your blossoms white,
And make those rosy lips,
To which all beauty clings?
I'd make my heart of snow,
If you could melt its snow.

I'd make my heart of snow,
If you could melt its snow.

Fouling the rose in mine,
Dew-drops of love divine,
I would not wish for more
The bliss I'd give you then.

Her lips were red with roses,
They'd make a rugged rose;
They'd shape that fragrance posies,
And, all to bloom, forget
That, you had yet to wear it.
I, too, would choose my posies,
That they might flourish there;
I'd choose my flowers, and fix them
With your own fragrant hair.

I'd wear them all with her,
And then, as blest too, 'twould go.
But ah! she's dead! and death
Is near, who will not know!
Life never is so splendid,
I'd print her marble feet
In all the veils of death.

My books, alas! are few,
My joys are easily sought;
But when I look with pride,
There seems to be but one
Which holds my heart in view.

Some wishes there may dwell.
I wish they were divine.
My hope, alas! is but a blast,
Which fades without the zest,
And burns with wind and tide,
Yet wavers not from thine.

Thy love I never prize.
If bliss were bought with, oh,
How little then were we!
I'd spend the holidays
For books, and the delights
Of Love, and the delights
Of her, whose nature,--
'Twould almost make me cry.

To give up all I can
Is use,--I should disdain
Perpetual store of brain.
It may, it may not be,
Yet I'm content with thee.

With thoughts which bear the fires
Of love, and tongues of flame,
I hate the sweets of flowers
And carnations,--that's the same.
What joy then can I give,
O thou, whose boundless love
Makes every sparkle live,
Nor less nor more for me?
So doubting,--for, my maid,
Away, with me it's o'er!

I fain would sing of love
Whom none can ever sing;
Of constancy, of wrath,
And pride of every string.
But soon my fate I know,
She will not come too late,
To drop a voiceless kiss
Upon my page, to end
My lessons, which mischance
Has pleased some, yet unfitting.

My love she'll come not late,
Although my heart is stout.
She'll come unless I'm sick;
And if I chance to die,
There's no worse air in Music's breast
Than to have dreamed, you know,
And taught the beauties you
With smiles in every look
Will play a fool to--go.

That now I take my Book,
Of bliss for me I dream,
And memory to look back,
When you no more return.
By love, with faith and truth,
I'll think this present page,
But not that I should miss
In such dear part of me.

Go live, my love, in Heaven
As you do dwell with me,
And sweet words, when we're wedded,
Will greet us on the tree.
We'll talk of Love, and Heaven,
Where we may never pine;
Where words, if gay or mournful,
Heap flowers upon our shrine;
But, if we can't, the meaning
To tell us of the skies,
When we together lie in
On the hills,--another day!

When Hope has flown, with smiles and sighs,
O'er youth's enchanting face,
Then, long ago, I hoped to die;
Why then,--behold the grace!

Thou and thy Mother seem
To long for that bright dream;
We scarce can think we see
Ourselves, below the stream!
And when thy image dies,
Let him be still and fair,
And, leaving life, skies, earth, and skies!

Clinging to these, the thoughts of Heaven have passed,
They pass like
======================================== SAMPLE 239 ========================================
 to us

Their mirthful elfs, their jovial swains,
And they whose song has told their flocks
Heard in old forests evermore
Their snowy bones, long lived before,
Where now for ever and for aye
Comes down to die in the living clay,
The trouble that gnaws in its hidden heart
Will still repay upon the Earth,
And make a scene of going forth.

Her ancient eyes, with tender care
And hallowed vision to appear,
The child's dim eyes, with song to vie,
As I to dwell in Nature's sphere,
Her sceptre in mine hand shall take
All shapes from out my memory,
Shapes bright and rare from no earthly part
Shall ever spring into the heart.

Through scenes of power and pride
A mother smiling smiled she saw,
And as a breath stole o'er her cheek
A mother's spirit rocked its child,
And mother's heart was filled with fears
For the loved one, far away;
And deep into that Mother's arms
Her child lay sleeping 'neath the ground,
The gentle one, close-fold to its nest,
A mother's breast was chilled with dread
Of those dear eyes so bright to heaven.

And as her breathings left her side
A thousand fears possessed her heart,
With double balm their way she tried,
As one who would be first to speak,
And after find that it is weak.
And then she fondly cast her eye
On the dear one whom she loved,
And lo! her infant close drew near,
Her breast to throbbing still moved slow,
And softer through her cheek came down
The breath of a dream-dumb earthly sigh,
And earth felt, fading from the breast
Of the beauteous child, her own soul blest.

But long they sought her, in the gloom
Of the sombre cave where she had lain
Forever moaning low and sweet,
From their dark depths by sorrow touched,
She would lift up her child again,
And then no more outstretched, but white
And little radiant, on her knee
Would sleep the child but seldom, she,
No angel by her side, but she.

Nathless, and homeless, in the past,
So desolate, so desolate, and cold,
That, like a few brief paces, each
Would linger in the shadowed sand,
And thus for many a weary day
Would sit, and see the stealthy tide
Faint gleaming in the weary land.

'Twas now the twilight hour, when she
Who knelt to slumbrous man they knew,
Had been anhungered by the glen,
Musing upon her murdered child,
Was pleased to take the old man by
Her hand, and try if he could cry
"Dying for ever!"  Each by stealth
Would send her to some distant cave,
To learn if he had been betrothed,
Or she had been betrayed, or he
Had done what he with every oath
Had done.  Alas! the gory wound
Grew, and the crimson blood crept down
Upon her face, and on her eyes
The gleaming murder lay, and then
She thought of him, and cursed her fate
With bitter thoughts of bale and bliss.

But soon she learned to hate his name,
And shed too early and too late
Her tears, that when the coming days
Had made an end of mortal strife,
She would renounce her natural life,
And pay another price for praise,
To be an outcast and forlorn,
A widowed daughter, and forlorn.

This was a time she loved his name,
A time she would forget his name,
And rather choose than tell him so
To leave it now, or care for more.
He was in love.  She had his place
Of purer heart and holier face,
A place for holy dreams to sit,
And be an eye that seems to prance
The silvery tissue of his wit,
And, careless of the passers by,
Put forth a bloom of baby-pride
That trembled all her features, while
She held her hand and seemed to smile.
The blood, as by some sleepy spell,
Budded, and danced upon his arm,
And he knelt down, and laid his head
Upon his breast, and kissed his cheek,
And said, "O, child, thou art a weak
And worn, thou sufferest in this shire;
But, child, to thee the grace is fair
Of heaven, whose glory is a prayer!"

All night the men that
======================================== SAMPLE 240 ========================================
, cheerful,
Sorrowful, happy, happy,
All the whole Spring through.

When Summer comes again, and brings
Her orisons of languid wing
From her full-bosomed heart,
I feel within me as though
My blood were kneeling stream
For violets which blush and bow
To my new violets now,
Nursing in dreams new-born,
And make their rise not vain.
When Winter comes again, and brings
Her vesture and her zone of gold,
I hear his icy breath and sing
A song that shall not die quite cold.

Oh, Memory! still thy colors keep,
That thou canst bear my brows aright;
And give thy heart to him who weeps
To think that he is sinking down to-night.

And so the Day's swift feet go on,
And make it hard for me to lie;
And so I think my spirit feels
A long half waking ecstasy.

Sweet love, how soon will beauty sleep
When man is asleep;
For every note of his sweet note
He gladly will express to thee,
As sweet to memory as song to me.
The little dog that chased the wolf,
Stabbed the white frosts with a softened lash;
He hearkened and dreamed until the night
Was as the better time of the light.

The great, white thunder of the forge,
Whose roar the solid earth surrounds
And turns the golden light to gold,
Was as a festal show of pain
Beneath the bright arch of the brain.
The giant pyramids grew dim
With strange-eyed, star-spun, aerial swim;
And Death's most awful torch displayed
Its glow of plumes on yonder raid.

On his own unsullied face he gazed
Whose shame had filled his heaving heart
With such unfeeling joy, the gloom
Had given the brows of gods to bloom.
And yet the wreath he won with tears
Hung sadly round that tall dark head;
But Death's fair fingers, opening, drew
Unfading out his flaming sword.

Down from the central flaming floor
His feet flashed on the dazzling door.
The coiled and flickering candle-flames
And all the flights of flaming stairs
Were dark as hyacinths by Bacchus thrust
From laden hands, on holy dust.

He raised his drawn sword on his face,
And terrible and blasphemy his tread,
Till the earth--mellow to a marching flame
The fierce assault his gladiator-glad,
And all his arms shook with a shout and flame.
Then loud his shouts rose like the roar of hell
In the hearing of a tempest-call.

The bold assault a Fiend alway made.
The air grew black and still before
As when some evil tempest braves
A little sun or devil hates,
And the moon seems unto stumble on
When a great, fond lover grasps his glove.

"What will ye give me if I come
And stand before your dying flame?
If I, upon your knee to wait,
Can crush your faithless and failing soul?
If I can crush your faithless dust,
Bring death and pain to both the whole
And O, ye gods! draw near once more,
And teach the blinded eyes of all
The comfort by your hands shall know.
If I can crush your faithless heart,
Draw near till breaking of the day,
Then shall that last wild hope be lost
And then your dying love be blown
Over--by Love's strong, loving aid
And Pity's arm o'ershadowing,
And all the fiery thoughts that feed
Unutterable passion, and desire
Another than your mightier arms
And grind them into flowery charms."

The night-wind was as a great forest,
One splendid eve in Spring;
It whirled the sprays like reeds
And sang them into a musical fashion;
Like fleets on which the wind
Has tossed them over the sea,
They crooned and laughed to aërial dances,
Like two great cushions beaded in a bass,
As the wild notes in a secret breeze
Woke up from woods and seas
Of old, long lutes and sparkling mandolins.

And a merry clamour of voices rose
In the hollow hollows of the night,
And the young thieves walked upon the lawns
Till they were almost tired.
And the dark green-girdled mourner's eyes
Shone up with pleasure, and the morning stars
Were a-tremble like home-sick fowls,
With the sound
======================================== SAMPLE 241 ========================================
 her lips
With a round tear, and sigh, and proffer'd pray'r--
Sung low, yet never stop'd--for ever now!
No halt or stay she took--her labors o'er--
Her head declined, and sinking at her feet,
She lay and wept, yet never look'd on her!

So came her book, with all its freight of love,
And pensive murmurs, lulling all the smart:
On the soft down, she flutter'd o'er the heart,
And dropp'd the touch of solitude above.
Ah, little, little!--she had pass'd away,
She seem'd to have been happy, she had wept,
And love had died away--and love was left
In the lost heavens, and left the angel lone--
Her tears were idle--sigh'd for love alone!

The love I owe thee from my heart Thou dost!
I cannot let it go: Thou hast done it:
I cannot let it stay: I cannot give it:
But Thou art mine, and mine, and, all my bliss,
Thy smiles I cherish ever, as the breath
Of summer wanders from the frozen North
To freshen children's song: I can but kiss
That forehead where it glooms--dare Thou but tell
My secret to Thyself?--that brow, methinks,
That hair I clasp so glorious, and those eyes
So radiant, that neck, rich with youth and love,
Not rippling from the neck of virgin boy,
And curls, methinks, such loosest cordial dashed
In my young's giddy youth--why, then, how sweet
The concord that we love! For, what we find
To those who honour duty, we must do it
As worthy of our love, were that repose
Contented ever in our souls, and how
That loving hand in which we to our feet
Would consecrate our names, and, pausing, trace
Our footprints on the desert--was it thus,
This heart, which, wandering lonely as I am,
Was for a moment broken-hearted too?
Or was it rather, this heart broken-hearted,
At length forsaken? I--have understood
Perhaps it was not in the world we roved;
Perhaps 'twas wandering too--and we might change;
Or else we might escape: as so I deemed,
This should have been; for, ah! the world, perhaps,
Was happy--but 'twas happy--what it was!
And yet, 'twas like a tavern, and a show!
'Twas pretty,-red youth chosen as the king--
The most for beauteous flowers, such as belong
To Eden's blest precincts, whence the Son
Of God fore'er hath to it the power,
Wherein to choose His court, and, being come
There whispering of Him, to do the rites
Of the poor comer's spirit. Then their names
They fell into the Muse's ear by these:--
"Taper of mirth, whose music hells and brains
Draw up, of hopes to be Heaven's seal and seal."
And she replied to what these were divining:
"Man's hearth, God's glory, not His hottest prayer;
For Thou, until of Mary's wedding blest,
Hast set two worlds upon the hearts of men.
The one the sea-wide heaven; the other sea;
And now the sea-Wide sphere, He named the sea;
And, being named so called, the general heaven
And all the other parts of earth He calls
The sea, His home: His name is in the seas,
And on the dial's points all motions still;
And the same wave and sea, and on the waves,
The same creation, which returns to us
From restless tides, and changes space by time.
Whate'er may change, what goodness it may be,
Let this be known; and who the beast may change
With the same members, and shall still be deemed
First, Highest, author of so bright a heaven,
Shall separate us, wedded to his own creation,
And be of Men--this Singing--brought to pass!
Nor shall so fair a scene, with clouds so dense,
Rise, but to sweep it from our prospect far
As all the stars have filled the sky, and marred
The basalt of the sky; nor shall there be
A momentary rainbow, or a sun
Standing among the clouds--a moment all
Of its large light and cold and fiery truth--
One moment, and the next. And thou, O soul,
That from
======================================== SAMPLE 242 ========================================
 Heaun's wrath)
Not one of his kind I shall know;
I haue a sword out of his sheath
Vnder his head--the Nymph of the Dawn
Shall find an arm, and tie it on,
And burn its sheaths before his sight,
And say 'Fool, Satyred, how cam'st thou here?'
Ah no! his shadow must flee away
Away, away, at dawn of day,
Before his way is up the wood
To Nymph I came my mourner stood,
In aspect more secure and good;
And said, I to myself do tell,
Ah yee, for what I haue to tell,
What once was o'er my forehead shot,
What once was side of Heav'nlie hills,
A Niobe, whose waters ran
With yond three hundred fountains;
Where seven swift hounds, shunning foes,
Strake to a close, unquiet doze;
Where amorous Daphnes rears his head,
And Sighs beguil'd, so rich a bed.

'Maiden, we know thy brother well,
And of his lady hath no care,
Yet have we served him long and well:
I'm t'you, sweet, and halfe your share.
And you, dear Boy, t'awake the cue;
T'ave me his belly to beguile,
But, Fortune, would be a disgrace
To 'tween you twinee a grizly smile.
O! if my daily tun's must be
Forgiveness ere ye come to me,
Let murther somp' a crikey there,
And syt him send to starve a teare
Yet send him a command in teare;
Nor let me chuse another one,
But needs some other one's own style,
If not before th' attructive wall,
To beg his name and faggot-all.

O! this is murther (else I would
That other such were dead already;)
Now, well-a-day! (quoth he) you'll giue
Your music o'er and o'er againe;
We may caesse it to your skill,
Doo'st speare your own againe againe.
If it should happen thus, a stint,
(For none may feare it) should so affright it,
A man may thinke (as yu'd not)
Such luggie castles, moniment,
It is (alas) to cut this lease
Of wretchedness, you must surprize.
O! try then now to doe but feare
'Gainst which you ask a boist'rous teare;
'Tis what a king, in private, deems
Anie will never doe his deeds,
So I that fayre Chastity,
The coorn gentry then, in thee,
(Thy sister's fauour) dare vnite
To fawne abroad to shew them to spite
Thy patience, I doe vow and write.

So time, said I, shall act i'th' stranded,
Till my last breath of life's first motion
(Waft'ring of vigillous hope) be ended
Because thou hast the face o' narration;
And for my boure I'm surest thrall,
My beauties they shall not resort,
I'le go or wait till I dee on thee,
So long the lawes they shall delay,
So long I have the women stay
To turn, and taste that sweet revenuers
That fairest heauen we thus may thee adore;
But I'm too poor to mourn for ever,
That scarce I see the face soe'rere,
Whilst th' weak one serves, is scarce more blest
With such oblations, lest one last request.

If, when of late our short-lived sinnes
(Vain war) we spend by violent paine,
Then none of us, O Time, canst summon;
We have no Muse to sing by elegies,
Nor hast thou to the hazels past
The fault (quoth she) of all thy heaunly flocke
Of face, but thou hast done them all
As one disdaine that hauntes his bed
Whilst yet his ear doth ruminate
And yet his sight doth me greet more
Than all the vaine drinke of the pore.
Then, while thou fitly roughest time
To chuse another's case againe,
And still d
======================================== SAMPLE 243 ========================================
.
He's dead now, he's living now, and out of breath
To drink, to dance, to dress, and all in his coffin.

I'll say, my dear deceased, the night I sat
In that dear house where you and I were kept,
When to be certain I took my repose,
And there I spent a night cap and belt too,
Which at the church door I took up and left.
That you'll be glad to hear my story? No!
My love must be good though it is not.
If I'm a simple young man I'll try the art
To lead you right by your just liberality,
And then--well, yes--I think I should be right.
Now for the house-keeping tinker, you
Are quite well pleas'd I sit here, where I sit.
I pray you, come and see who's been--e.

Good-by, sweet Loving-man, a lovely Boy,
Good morrow to you, love, and shelter: so
I'll sing you a song made by some old brook,
Warm from the fragrant dew,
Which I did nurse and nurse when I did wake.
No loss for you, Sweetheart,--but just a slice,
The best I've ever cropp'd, brought from of old,
Of all the things that are,
That you and I together; then, good-night,
Good morrow to you, Sweetheart, good-night,
Good morning to you, Sweetheart, good-night.

Sleep, baby, sleep,
The blessed boon you seek,
Hath found eternal rest;
But wilt thou go to Heaven as I do?
And then, good-night, Sweetheart, good-night.

Through tangled briers and tangled grass
The whirring dew
Shall gently fall upon my brow:
But oh,
That star-like glow,
Which woke me from a long-unfathomed sea
And made my spirit swim,
Shall lure my soul into a deeper peace,
Fairer unto thy face than any balm
That may enfold thee in a brother's arms.

Sweet, sweet, sweet, sweet,
So sweet, so sweet,
The balm that drips from Heaven on earth,
The fragrant balm of Heaven upon earth,
All these must fade and perish, and I die.

O, love, O, love,
Are ye as fragrant blossoms,
As fragrant balm for twilight dews?
Are ye as fragrant balsam,
As fragrant balsam,
As fragrant balsam,
That lull'd my soul to rest?
Are ye as fragrant posies
As fragrant balm for sunset skies,
As fragrant balsam,
As fragrant balsam,
As fragrant balsam,
As fragrant balsam,
As fragrant balsam?

Are ye as rosebuds,
As fragrant, sweet, as fragrant,
As fragrant balsam?
Are ye as daffodilies
As daffodilies,
As fragrant balm-tree?
Are ye as lilac,
As lilac, sweet, as fragrant,
As fragrant balsam?

Nay, sweeter than a brother,
A brother, a more faithful brother,
The rosy joy of lovers,
Who have beheld his sight too true,
In his pure heart surmising
Love's heavenly blesseding.

Come hither, oh, my little one,
Come hither, oh, my little one,
And try to tell my love to thee
What thoughts it is to love thee.
I thank thee, little one,
For something both well aimed and known;
A sacred awe within me groans,
For Love walks with an angel on.

It is not well, be sure of you,
For all my part of life is past;
I'm glad that I find peace in it
And that's all rest at last.

In vain the weary mill grinds,
The mason's long accursed meal
The golden spindles grind till hoofs
Are shivered in the heat;
The village glens are very foul,
The village pipes most sedately,
And in the thickening hazels dense
The dying sunbeams glare.

Just here's a light--there's something yet--
And hark! that voice, that cry,
Out-kinging in his red right hand,
That naught the nearer draws--yea, all
Will be a tale for scorn.
======================================== SAMPLE 244 ========================================

To pamper us as they would pelt us with drink.

Sure I would now plunge deep in Tartary,
And drink my fill of this same salve of dew,
Since it is unto me makar as well.
A canker-mug that snares Mephisto's swine
As ever drew Jove-drums out of the wet sky.
Pleasant is the calm in the desert place,
If the goats that fed them do not move here.
Their roots are in solid earth, such are the poles,
As are now we acquired in breeding of them.
And as fresh e'en as when Jove in the earth did mix
With earth's globe, for a counting-house is kind,
So have we all found here in a land diverse.

Here, where you can lift yourselves with pleasure,
And lay it in fruit upon your olives warm,
Shall your loving hands have the fair earth's present.
And take all things for some time unto earth
In the sweet-running rivers of the fountains.

So, too, may your fair earth continue its dole.
And let her flee the more because I say
She will loose the net which guards her from the day,
Rather than 'scape a jet-tothed time too late.
A golden fly is carried in the cart,
And to the Giddy top of some sweet tune
Inactive all the blisses of the Gods.
A sound without a god is in the air,
When we go up against it from on high.
I have a little pocket where I view
The plaided travel in its white array;
And with my elbows on the table spread,
Or to beneath the ruins of the road,

Methinks my drift-wood fire is finer yet;
A little while I have to turn aside;
While I to that ill brook have known therein
The shuffling, when the step is the most sin,
And having mastered it, I feel akin,
For well I know it is a little thing,
If not the very, very something
Of a heart's love stirring this about.
I know not if 'twas so; the great gods have
Outlives them all: and, in the same founts,
Whatever be they may, even in heaven,
A lovely rock and an immortal love,
Above all lesser gods above the gods
In placid majesty, content with these.

Go, serving maids, and hither bring,
With all your craft, the dark springs' well
Wherein are pent the souls of men
Which into fiery language flow
When serpents have shed their golden fleece,
The while that sleeping 'twixt me and me
Anointed magical and plants
Which the faint wind has shaken down,
A heavenly nard, made of bright fire
The centre of our heaven and clouds
Which the earth pours from the blue-black water
On our unfathomed breasts, which shine
With colours of the rainbow tints
Wherefrom the sun-red splendor shines.
My heart to-day is not alone
'Tis Love, but Love, the cooing one
Of many sweet and mellow birds;
Nor in a moment through the air
It feels the breath of his loud wings,
But the light of his wings is always there.

It loves a bit,
For it has joys for those who come.
And he has given a gift to me
To love me well, and my own heart
Went the sweet way it deemed of yore,
And I have given it to myself
To feel its undeviating part
Beside the gate of my desires,
That my young life should be its sign
And only its returning do.

Nay, not too long of me can I
Grasp the swift dream from one of you
Who makes me dream, and lights my heaven
With kindliness, and smiles and tears
Upon a kindlier world aspires,
While Love is crucified and dies.
For who can know the inmost worth
Of this his heart, his radiant light?
Whether in groves the hemlock weaves,
Or through the fields the hemlock strews,
Or if the scarlet apples bend,
Or if upon a stricken tree
Some late October rains descend,
Or black-winged whirlwinds shake the earth,
Or if a flame unfallen be
Across the sky, and all things live
Which have the louder quality
For of that Sun I do not care.
But thus my wisdom is gone by,
And in the mountain hollows lie
My comfort and comfort; no need
To tell of
======================================== SAMPLE 245 ========================================
ranger's goblet, bright with blossom,
Reflects it dripping from thy wedding cup."

"Not till this hour a good man came, who seemed
Patiently clothed, and a huge ship had come,
Bearing the unutterable secret treasure,
Nor was her courage less than a wild war-pall,
In mere good fortune, even if God had chosen
That she should act a new or lovely dame.
Thou didst betake thee, friend, one word to God.
E'en as thou thought'st,--look now, and mark it well--
Thy sword hangs idle, and the quiet moon
Looks heavenward, still and calm, doth seem to brood
Swaying in solitary dreams with thee.
Thy web of sleep is spun. A star of thine
Fit for a chamber for a lady's love,
To hold the quivering and refulgent light.
Go thou, and with them go thou down the land
Wherein Death's guardsmen all their murderers
Have broken, slain, and love consumes them yet.
Fain would I see this prince in one great arm
Make thee his wife; then may'st thou say he lives
Who for the love of God hath deathless need."

So said he, but he drew his sword again,
His falchion keen bent at a breath and laughed,
Till as they passed beneath the forest gloom,
From some wild-woman in the castle castle,
A frightful fair face brightened into tears,
To hear the lordly tumult of the castle
Float in the golden light and leave the gloom.

And when they reached the foot of turret tall,
Who yet had stood between them on that day
As if on fire before his palace door,
The hilt in hand, the helmet in the front,
The youth in robes of royal purple bound,
As if to gaze on the high loveliness,
Seemed some young god amid the dreaming flames,
So that he spoke not, but a human voice
Heard not. "Then," said he, "then also hear me.
Do I but speak? For surely I believe
I was the son of that proud Holy Spirit,
The Son of God, who unto death was given,
The Lord of Hellas and of glorious deeds.
But, oh, the frenzy leaps into a stream,
Away, away, and if I see thee there,
It is not thou but mine, and so thou dream'st!

"Rejoice! Rejoice! And I will say at last,
That in his halls he seeks a life immortal
From the divine cold death. But see, he cometh,
As through the waving tapestries he goes,
A sainted hermit of a world diseased,
A worldly wise great, Danae-like spirit named,
Whose gentle foresight knows no ill, nor knoweth
That aught is wrought by evil with good taste.

"And now with this, even now I saw him speak,
And now with that I know not what to do;
And yet I would not mar thy gracious speech,
For it was like a good deed, and I hear it
As from a page of Scripture. But I know
That you who set this journeying on your head
Will be the death of marvel and of glory,
Nor will aught evil come of you to any,
When you die wholly, and come to all men's good."

Meanwhile the eternal days went on, the seven
And seven years had passed, and then the moon
Began to wane. Along the eastern sky
Clear heaven's bright symbol, or the Pleiades,
Just as the day's sphere, or the dawn's sphere,
When God had made his worlds for one vast feast,
Eve loomed up in heaven and like a goddess stood,
Fanes, trumpets, torches, and the pyres that blazed.

So in their midst the three great prophets stood,
Their solemn eyes fixed on that humble scene;
And in their midst the mystic Homer stood,
Like some great king of Rome, armed with the sign
Of the dread majesty of her own diadem,
In such a starry mid-heaven's radiant sign.
And once and and thither all the spirit filled
With pastoral songs and incense rich and bland,
Lifting the buried ashes to the air,
As on the earth the spirits rose again
In heaven's high presence and that night were gone,
When heaven's high King came by and bade them go.

The frame of earth was iron, and the sun's eye
Was fire; and there below earth's feeble hue,

======================================== SAMPLE 246 ========================================
 distant the gem where the hand
Of thy full-stringed throat rings in a psalm
Exulting in beauty and pleasure of heaven.
Oh, beautiful Bride,
These are thy pleasing triumphs. Lo, now the sun,
The waking life-flower of his morning light,
Whose warm heart beats yet quivering for the kiss
He dallied out on his adoration-night!
So I stand here, shading my eyes that mourn
The one I promised thee long ago,
Who called thee bride, and clasped thee here in life,
Mingling with all my heart-beats' tender strife.

Forlorn, a perfect image of hope is left,
With calm, immortal eyes and lips of love:
What was this earth we call our sad, strange need,
The broad breast of our little earth below?
Ah, little did we think such things were born
That they would thus be rendered into scorn!

How frail a thing is love! What dark a load
Of happiness in a close heart is stored!
How hard a joy we treasure in a mind
Whose joy has grown too great, to stand apart,
Let it not trouble conscience to find
How it can mate with hope, and rest, and truth.
Love all our own, love all our life the heart,
Love all our love, and love our ignorance,
Hearts that have seemed too large, too light apart.
This little heart is bare of hope and birth,
Youth's and the loving lips that kissed so warm,
And love's eyes last to see it in the earth.

Yet have I known a thousand wings of grace,
A thousand wings of gracious tenderness.
They are not fairer then than thou once were,
And purer now than we are. O, may it be,
Ye too may make the city of your love
Secure from sundering sea.

By the love-light of a gentle love,
And the hour-glass's dim vision, this one, this
Song is not mute. It waits without,
Knowing the day and hour of our great love
Have passed away, nor altered the hour of our desire,
But makes plain Nature and the resurrection air.

Still are we with ourselves, and you not here!
Ye who are less and higher, O most wise,
More delicate, more tender than a star,
The souls which know you! infinitely dear,
Most perfect in your sweetest, last communion;

Yet not too close with us, and not too close with us,
We who could seize and keep you till the end,
No heart of earth, but in your mind's enshrined.
And, in the loneliness of Life,
If our striving, if our sickness, should send
Some far more savour to the world of our friends,
My tired, sick hands would lay them down at rest
In that soft breast, and wake upon my breast
Some dream of peace! I would not sink or die,
But feel the emptiness of old and fair,
Mingling with all things, with their suns of gold,
And with their quietness of loves untold!

Goodnight! good night! until the last gleam of day
Is worn out, and the dream-light is o'er.
I did remember that sweet time of old!
I think it so. My heart hath been before.
The winds and stars have gone from anywhere,
But with them there are two, your eyes are still,
Your sleeping arms, your dreaming eyes.

Be not a warder, but keep loving these;
See, I am dying, but if I could sleep
I should arise, if you were not awake!
Why, no, the truth is as a deadly sin,
Tho' I am scared, and all of hope is best,
The silence and the wonder of your eyes.

No, I am stricken with strange nights of pain,
My dream is turned to dreams. I do not know
Whether the heart hath laughed before or doth,
But only wait until I drop my mask,
Or wait until my Love shall come to me,
I know not why, but all I am and have,
O, happy thought! I am so desolate!

Time was when I was glad of heart and hope
From that sweet time, but now
Tho' the drowsy head of my beloved braids
Droopeth and droopeth beneath the evening's wing,
How sad it looks! How sad it looks!

That is the world to me
That such a day should be
When in this world I were not happy, unafraid,
I should desire to see
The dew upon the flowers
======================================== SAMPLE 247 ========================================
 and Proteus, weep, and oft make moan
My pain, the price which had been his before;
And here wept Hector in his house alone,
The brother that robb'd his infant son for pay;
His mother's shade upon the topmost bough
Was seen; his hair the fillet did not spread,
Which, curl'd up with his locks, did ever flow
About his brow; the nurse's name round him shed.
Then Hector of his armour was as light,
And on his neck a golden chain did lie,
Wherewith to clasp the spoil, and lull to sleep,
The relics of his tresses were to spread.
Forthwith, from every side, his trusty spear,
Drawn through the ranks, to Hector backward came;
And with him Hector rose, whom late his troops
Had scattered; but amid them all 'gan say,
"Forward ye rush; my friends, now stand aloof!"
He said: the Trojans heard him, and abash'd.
Pray to the King, and in his presence join
Of friendly welcome, all that meet him there.
Before him stood the gallant Diomed,
And Tydeus' son, Anchises' valiant son.
There many a spear the stalwart Paean bore,
And over-mighty Hector's back they laid,
And there, the hilt both brass and burnish'd bright,
They lay upon the body; then the sword
Grasping, they sprang from off the wound, andStanding,
With whom he smote DemophoA¶n, whom he slew:
Eumelus' offspring then the battle joyed
To meet them, and the crowded chariots bring
Back to their ranks, and Trojan chariots charge.
Back to his car he flung him, right and left;
Fell on his breast, his vital breath bereft.
His plumes, which furrowed as he moved along,
Stood up in wreaths, in fashion of a kite
Euripylus, a rich and noble steed;
Which none the less the Grecian had beside.
Next Gereus' son smote Diomed the steeds,
With mighty force; the head, far off, appears
From off its mane, which hung in golden casque;
Who thus the charioteer bespake, and said:
"Achilles, dost thou well consider ere
We reach the pass, or we shall win the day
To hand thee in the car, where still doth lie
Thine anger and thy wrath?  The Gods are nigh
In that destruction; wherefore come we hither,
And whence?  Sarpedon, my own chosen friend,
Now, since thou know'st, have pity on our woes.
This seat the driver to Sarpedon lost;
No man may he whose anger melts the heart,
Of the unbridled spirit let him part,
And let him share our bath; but such my seat."
To whom in answer godlike Hector spoke:
"True is it that I care not to oppose
The Argives; since I understand of none
Of them, of Agamemnon nobler born,
In lofty steeds, of nobler blood than theirs,
Whose valour always shows the might of one.
Yet take we counsel, if we yet espouse,
How best to fight against Patroclus' car,
Or to retreat from fierce Sarpedon forth,
Or to retreat, where none shall dare to mingle
The fight; but urge them to the ships' behalf.
We hold these barrier-posts not for our guard;
But for Patroclus' body, and his fall
To war, we stand, and hold our own against."

To whom thus Hector of the glancing helm:
"Ye, Dardans, and ye well-warmed cars, beware
Achilles' presence; take not from me fear,
But if ye will, the death of one like you.
He too shall linger if he dares to fight,
Nor faint, but mingle in the fire of war;
Lest Agamemnon, Atreus' valiant son,
Assail his comrade, and himself expire;
For this I promise, but and this I swear,
E'en as he is, to thrust our coursers hence,
And utterly bear off his own escape."

His words fresh courage roused within his breast;
With hearten'd courage were his courage rous'd:
Forth in his haste, the gallant chief he sprang,
With spear in hand, and eager arms to throw:
As little
======================================== SAMPLE 248 ========================================
'd, on the green grass.
And the self-same ev'ning; and still seem'd
A maiden and matron among them,
As if and alone on a lonely lake,
Her fair face flashing among the leaves.
I spied the Angel of Care cross'd the wave,
And stood with his fair Angel at my side;
I spied he had slumber-freed, and look'd
To my Son, on whom ev'n to vain grief
The gazing woe was but wont to lave;
I saw the Mercy Seat on his brow,
Which wav'd the green grass of the infant year;
A chearful smile on his features came,
A frown upon his lips, yet not a sneer;
But I heard his last farewell in the deep,
And saw my Mother sink into the wave,
And lay with her orphans at the foot
Of the stony fountain of crystal stone,
And my darling sleeping in its bowers alone.
Then I sigh'd out my soul for the wild scene
Of the sunny Isle, where the shores are green,
But there, in the midst of the unknown sea,
The cruel sport of the setting sun
Shows the loveliest flowers I have ever known;
And those fair creatures of the frigid zone
Who from the ocean look for a mate
Thro' the furrow'd infinite of wave and skiff,
Are for the sport of an ignorant crowd,
But for Love's sake who pass their forms at large
Who neither seem to know nor care nor guess;
The pale moonshine for the rising moon,
For the taper's feeble light and shade,
For the quiver'd shaft, for the awe-struck eye,
For the hush'd and the consternated sky,
For the spiritless shades of the distant hill,
And the unconscious mountains,--they all were still,
I too was a slave, e'en a slave to Love,
But for her--I swear it was ever above
To warn her from sorrow--I can't forgive;
And when I left her, as now I know,
I found her sweet lips and angel eyes,
And the baby childhood that used to be
Like a royal fountain among the flowers
That o'er the daisies their first lesson lent.

I saw her--'twas she who bid me live,
I would not--no, not even to bless--
But then, my Boy--she would have let me die,
And let me die in the waste of kisses!
I only saw the sun-like hues
That were thrown out from her, the morning blue
Of that gold heaven, the crescent of the two,
When she pledged me, at dead of night,
To kneel beside her mother, while she tried
To tell her all of sorrow, to assuage
The pangs that ached into her heart,
To entreat her pity; I could not, dear,
But I vow'd--I swore it, and she swore it too,
That those poor lost--what was their love to them,
They came, these poor.[C]
We come to fight for honour! Never sword
Of man could wound us more with her than we!
We have warred more for her than we have won;
Yet we hold no war more till the dawn of day.
The call to arms is for her lord to come,
The chain is set, she will not be forgot!

At last there came a warning! Batter and bale
Ran thro' the lairs, and she was left alone,
In an uncertain fortune, she had chosen well
To wage with hers a fight for father or her son:
And one who stood beside her from the door
With awe-struck face and cold ungainly eye,
Now bowed and pale, the soubrette Pote was there.
"No, no! A father's face is at the wall.
An angel's voice. The form is beautiful.
The portrait is the river that sings in its birth,
And into it the eyes of stars are looking forth.
Beneath, there is another form and face
That fills the soul, when all is well; and in
Are two white plectrumills upon the brim
Of life. The face is beautiful, and she
Is lovely as of old. Her long black hair
Shines not so wildly on the lifted brow,
And on the breast-plate where her feet have lain,
No thoughts have any of earth or heaven in vain.
The eyes are beautiful; the lips are sweet;
As pure as her white brow, and soft as hers
Are her deep eyes. No blemish of the
======================================== SAMPLE 249 ========================================
 in a vision flew,
Forsaking him; and by the spell
Kindled within him, he revealed
Unto the dame alone, and said,
And with a secret sanctity,
This life were impotent indeed!
For found within herself this load
Beyond all women, long to be
Sweeter than fever or than love.
Thus spake she to herself above
In kind and powerful degree;
And with a voice not grosser far
Than aught she knew, made her complaint,
Since he was void of sense and speech,
And she so subtilely that he could,
For evermore her fancy clings,
Whispering, in tones not low nor high.
Oft would she leave the woods, the lawn,
The waters, and the fairy scene,
And hear the foremost omen tell
What her heart fears in its despair,
While she bewails the lonely care
Wrought in the spoiler's arm, and there
Fands by her meet to fall, and there
Hears no emotion in her breast;
And she hath yet to love her best,
In time of danger and distress;
And she hath faith in good and ill,
Albeit she seem so frail and wild,
With calm severity and mien
She must perceive it might be so;
And many a dame, that at this sight,
Defies the gaze, and doth approve,
Nor doth she loiter on his love,
And yet for very kindness, more
Designed than sunshine, still more kind,
And holding Nature's genuine bond
More firmly to the bounds confined,
Than on the dearest prize of fame,
If nobly seconded by fame.

She shall be grateful, and rejoice
To see the woes her lover bore
By many a footstep dance the floor;
And seeing those behind, she fears
No loss of health, but wretchedness;
But death itself can ne'er distress
That does not merit punishment.
Yet some of those who speak despair;
Of every wretchedness the heir
Of such a life, so so, I trow,
They had been hated so, but now
Are to the sickly number given,
And died a victim in their sown.
That life to them was but a sport
To barter for the hideous sort;
And if they did, it seemed to them
To fly the brutal lightning, free
From every check of sense and sight,
To wander with the foul night,
And show, as some on them have wept,
Such kindly drops of pity, kept
By melancholy looks, that they
Might have their death, and danger shun,
Which they before were well-nigh won.
But ye, who through a life as sad
As theirs have stood, hear all I tell;
And let your sympathy,--ah, glad
To do so much, perceive this well;
And still in sympathy thereto,
Give her your love, and let her go,
Though ye must see her life, and know
She was not, or was not, so.
But if, as they are always used,
That naught is said which might be spared,
I could be silent; for the offence
Grows to such infamy and sense,
That she from which fair Truth is hurl'd
Shall be absolved, nor I from all
Shall be absolved:--that that were all.

And what I ask ye shall reply
Unto your hope.--Oh, rather die
Than be deceived, and let me lie
Like Ammon in his apathy.
Far easier these wild fancies wend
Into her ear than have to bend
The truth of that vain wish, which oft
Hath been, and sometime must have been,
And is, and never shall be quite,
For, while ye keep her eyes on you,
She sees you sitting and her head
Bends down; and while she feels she too
Shrinks not, nor knows herself untrue.
With such a rising and such a woe
To burst the heart of her, ye know
Ye scarce can call to him that's moved,
Or see her,--'tis a wakeful heav'n,
With such a writhing and such a smil'd,
To compass her, than to have made
A mockery and scorn for heav'n.
One word, ye pray, if what we speak
Be true; ye never can be weak;
Nor wish to hide from God the power
To serve in such a marriage hour;
And, if he be a sinful man,
Then, shunning all, pray her, and fling her
To be the marriage-bond but
======================================== SAMPLE 250 ========================================

And though we have many a riddle to-day
To try, for the rest, we're afraid of delay,
But no one will scoff at us and cry, "Oh!
what a damnation if we always said yes!

Ah! there were men who scaled Olympus and set
Where there is nothing that can do them wrong,
But we, poor sinners, lay down and forgot
Ourselves and made more comfortable cheer;
And they might have come back, if they ever had been,
To stand in the house which the Fairies have seen,
And hear how the ghosts of all we longed for remain,
And hear how it's meant that the Sots have to marry again.

They do it once, but the worst that I know,
Is to leave them the sin; for the rest, I'm as sick
As a child who licks trouble and nothing will get,
And will go if I keep it; but, worst of all,
If the Fairies once wish for the life of meek Smith
They will get it; and so shall I go to him, too.

When a bloom is upon us, and one leaves behind
Something wrong or we've hoped for, and one
Flies away to some distance and failing, and thinks
"If I'd let you live, and, dear Sots, would I not?
Dear Mister, the Fairies might wish for your sighs."
There's a Pinta of Ireland that sits on the throne
Of Miss Burittle, the greatest that's ever known,
A remarkably lovely young lady--a queen--
She's the darling of Erin, and still she is queen,
And the tallest you ever have seen was the queen,
But some other you'll find her that goes to the grave
And remembers her lord, for he's stark mad and brave;
And the Exeter longs for the smile of his smile,
But the tallest he ever he sees is the man,
And the children look after the smiles of his eye
As they wonder to see him again in the sky.

And so he has gone to the grave for his own;
But he's loved him and pity'd, and loves every one,
Till the tide ebbs away and the woman grows old
And the life that he gave is as faded from cold,
And the One that was dearest to him he has told,
And the fag he beguiled now is as faded to-day,
And his heart is as sickly and sorrowful lay,
Yet I can remember him now as he sleeps
With his hands in his bosom, and smiles with his eyes
As he lies in his grave with the breath of his sighs,
And he smiles as he wept with his lips and his breath
When his hair in his hand falls beside him to death,
And his eyes dimly brighten, and dim are his hopes
To mingle again with the tears that have glisten'd
When he weeps for his death, and remembered his smile;
Though he sleeps, yet the dream of those eyes will beguile
The dark days of his boyhood--the joys of his life,
And I've know'd that there never was sorrow so sweet
As the rose in his breast that is playing with life;
Though I see him still smiling, and hear him complain
That he thinks he is happy and merrily gay,
And the troubles of life that have pass'd away,
Though his hopes they have blighted and faded away
Cannot only reflect on the life he is gone,
And his heart and his life that has died in its pride,
And so to his Queen and his brave little child,
Are united again in the struggle for breath;
And I see, as I tread o'er the grave-way of death,
That the moments of life and the hopes of his life
Have been passing away with a glory so rare
That earth has forgot, and that even life's leaf
Is heavy and darken'd, and, wanting a thorn,
Holds only a promise that leaves nothing behind,
That each day is a joy to the life that I find.

He is dead, and I'm dying, dear Alice;--I'm dying,
I'm dying, because I am mad, for my love,
And my chance is a chosen already to roam
To the house that is governed by heaven and home;
'Twas my forefathers and serving my portion
In a land of such bliss as their ain't all the right,
But now, I've got warning to p'raps leave off play,
That my life and my fortune have found out a way,
And I hate all my gains in its pay, and I
With
======================================== SAMPLE 251 ========================================
,
And hodden them in beds to rest,
From stair to stair in Concord town;
But far away, alange the sight,
'Mid palace, square, and ceoinette,
That market-town conceals the charms
Of this chaste town of ours.

Ein kleines Nachlan, welz'n still,
Wei kleines Ohr engelen,
Chauchlan'en, lang rhinoceros,
Wir gegendrid ein Weilen!
Hro ist aus müde müde müde müde müde müde müde mueune;
On aussi Kirtle fiend im Blusen,
How selvers, lange du bist mir im Winden
Für trinkt, das schoen entwischten machten
Ein schnettern mit lange drang im Tage!
Schaut's mein Zuge schal vermilchlan,
Katur - (sho ho wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo.)

Manchor, quhilk, o pacemus lex,
Vexabat renatem schoene Nahlan,
Nisiademheitur Hände,
Mein trinkt im Busch in deme Gassa,
Dabitur dem tiefer Ring!
Ein staeth attrochte Gegang!
Nisiademheit vermilchlin,
Zu brand im Busch in die Hand;
Gekulis schole im Sterne,
Hem loupit juschte stand,
Und vocht ihr klüg und zu doide,
Der zughen Gog und zu ihr thet end.

Herr Weid und Brande leibten:
Und der Leuchen der Macht;
Die jungen sie zur wheeler,
Das Feind gutte golerer gespannt.
Die Gese zurüsing zu frisch und bout,
Und der wachtsman saßt und hent;
Die bei Bäume streib aus näu',
Wie schauernd dich die Roer blut.

Und in der Nähe wehm erbrüht,
Die rohe beschwär' erbrüht
Und dein beschörter Entfacht
Die frutstünde niemalschlicht.
Weit ihr niederich Treb' ich Blut:
Nun und niemalschreckllet
Des Herrnies Thränen wiederst:
Bist du im Tiefer zuschten dich
Im tiefer dich der Herrnies Blut.

Noch' ich dem sahlichender Schoen,
Erlaut sich die Falschen dort,
Die schlehte im Allerd stand:

Auf es maganz lebendennt,
Auf uns dem bleiben sind
Ou tiefer Scharp der Leid.

Wohl den beweide näherkchen,
Und sie so lieben, fand
Tiefer ziehen damsel schweben.

Mit einer gewimmt,
Die birstchen nähen,
Des bleiche Bette getan
Frutst du, es gutt.
Bist du, bist du,
Vor das Liederm ging,
Der Wandert aus,
Besiegen Vrinnen:

Schau', schwere die Kä crystallus,
Sie kussend, der Berge wiederst,
Sie läßt mit Sorgen schweben,
Sorgst, drinken das Botst vergeßte,
Echst inhabited herzt.
Der broodhen Kind aus kühlen,
Die blut' er geleid mir voll,
Ergohen war sie aus kühlen,
Am ihr' Gel und Glücken gellt.

Sie kähnen sind,
Er mußte, es müde süßte,
Und einer schweig schweig geschlecht'gen,
Die geschweit des Grundes fleid;
Die tiefer Luft ein Kühle
======================================== SAMPLE 252 ========================================
 like men for their affairs,
'Tis fitting some perform such deeds as theirs.

The Pope of Rome (so much the more for this)
Yet helped the Church, who, having read his heart,
Informed that little flock to happy home,
And ordered them as holy virgins whither
They did their vows by good o'er-fire at Rome.

But Cæsar telling of the Dragon's plight
Means, how that dragon, who for penance, driven,
Has for complaints, and scorns those bodies bright,
Wanders about the waggons and himself.
Meanwhile, at Rome, in spirit doffing light
The monks in fine, all things towards him fare,
And "Pray like you" all look up, and he
Rises in front, and so there still is there.

Their mighty minds toward the Papist's glory
Prevent him with a Pæan of his own;
A venerable house, and richly loaded
With fortunes which the good old man had known.

Duke Naimes, the mighty lord of Ravennips,
The Archbishop Turpin, the archbishop Turpin,
Were there of old, both priests and friars born,
And one who all, had held a zealous son.
He died himself, and died Alardo hight,
Derived by chance from Turpin for his years:
But now he's dead and with him lies the light,
And presently enough to speak he bears.

He said that Turpin from his grave drew down,
Bade farewell to Turpin and to Borquin,
And to Mahoundto's baron was dismissed,
A gallant band, and so was killed outright.
Of mighty marvels is the ascertainer:
For when the Countess saw the spirit of men
Sustained, the matrons said--"Tell us, oh, what then?"
And asking of her spouse, to whom he's led,
In her great sorrow she was fain to wed.

And by this answer to the end of all,
Each one consented, and the other pray'd:
The parish priest, for whom the stocks were sold,
Pray'd, that in due dismission he would hold
A Spanish cavalier, and make a throne,
And sentence of the two that were his heirs.

And that, as lord of this acquiral to be,
(Though somewhat fitter for the age of nine)
Then offer him the prize, "Alas! to me!
My uncle's money made the gift of Spain;
For this new purchase let him ask, for twain,
His daughter's children; on the proffer let
His daughter's children dress the costly vest;
Ten, let him give, be bought and taken with,
But still, to honour and to be beloved.

And let him have three daughters, as his right
Lands every one of these--the bride and bride;
So think what I will do."  So they despond:
And fearing somewhat, rubbed their eyes, and cried.

That story of the Church and her renown
Is still a matter of great weight and sound;
And next they meet and both together go
To a high Feast, which is the end of Rome.
The guest being ready at the full, they wait,
All take their chairs, and many matters share,
As for their sorrow, for their wine and meat.
Ceres; or Rubens and their Fathers, there.
Amaran Ogier lately show'd the care
Of one, so young, of one so well belov'd
Of wedlock; who, throughout the whole affirm,
Is the most matchless of all women born.

Equal in years, and equal in their place,
The holy Church has men devoutly bred;
The like were born with their commands and grace
And saints served in the sacred rites of wedlock;
So well their coats were kept, they well contriv'd
To keep the promise of so fair a bride.

Now these so many and so many others chose,
That none demanded of that marriage, he
Offended; for he hoped it to be so.
This makes the promise which he says to all,
But what he says 'tis not in open Courts.
The Bridegroom and his sons found out their worth
In this small Church; and none but those who heard
In Rome the wishes of that virtuous mirth
Went thither, though they knew not whence they came.

The wild followers of Charles the tyrant drew
This whole twelve years to sadness, grief, and shame;
And grieve still more that they saw their leader lie

By a slow death
======================================== SAMPLE 253 ========================================
 of all human thought,--
Teach me to say at last:
"You see, you men are men indeed!
What are you and what are you?
Where are you and what are you?"
These things that make the moment seem
Like death; there is no living stream
Within me; I am clothed anew.
I cannot forgetfulness confound
As surely as ye think it bound
In marriage to one who has been dead.
But I can see with better eyes
Whereby to recognize
That without much am boundless eyes
I stand, whereon I cast a look
That at the bottom of my hair,
If I be false or fair,
I know not; but if possible,
This very instant 'twere as well
As to be born and dead.

Wash hands wherein the purest bliss
Is yet unlearned.
Win while she lies, and bid her buy
No sleep! Now am I saved! Now rise,
O sweet Endymion, and cry,
"Sleep; Sleep; Love is upon the eyes!"
Wake, happy star! Where shall I go?
Neither night nor day,
Nor folded 'neath the purple night,
Nor aught beside, till this very night
Of autumn, shall be sweet.

Under yonder beech-tree single on the green-sward,
By the side of the road, two young lovers were slumbering,
They needs must carry a tired load.
There was one, lying down to his bed to rest,
One shoe beside him on the mat, one in the vest,
And the other beside him on the green-sward slant
For my lady's bairn, my dear one of the hamlets.
And he whispered soft and cheery, "Sleep, my child,
The night is terrible; the way is steep;
So, prithee, rest; prithee, the night is deep,
And use thy watching ere the dawn peep."

Lush-a-by, baby,
Over the hill,
With thy father lying
I wait for thee still.
Wake, my babe, the little birds come flying
Blithesome, breezes, bringing sweet repose;
Come with thy father,
Come and be my babe's.
(Ah, the world is wide indeed
While its joyous gales sweep by!)

A rover has gone to his rest;
A rover has gone to sleep;
A rover has gone to sleep;
A rover has gone to sleep;
A rover has gone to sleep;
A rover has gone to sleep;
A rover has gone to sleep;
A rover has gone to sleep;
Come thou beside me,

I am waiting for thee.
(Ah, the world is wide indeed
While its joyous gales sweep by!)

Then what will love and the world befall,
But to love and the world befall?
(Ah, the world is wide indeed!
But its joyous gales sweep by!)

How will this be, my darling,
If thou art not near,
To keep thy mother's bairnage
And guard her from fear?
She has gone to the mountains,
And left but a scar?
And this will I bear to her bosom,
My darling, for thee,
Till I bring the brown roses
Over the red sea,
Where God in the south shall dwell.

A good thing is a good thing,
For the earth and the sky
Are as happy as monarchs
And kings as I,
When I am well a-warned,
And shepherds as I,
And bees as confused teachers
For their sweet surprise?
Now, by my artful cunning,
Thou hast answered my call;
To pick a withered flower,
When she comes at fall,
She will bring it all to be mown
For her apple, for me!

And this shall be my song,
When I bring it all;
For I bring it all to be mown
In the lust of the morn,
When I bring it all to be mown
In the lust of the morn.
(Little brown baby)
"Dost thou know who thou art?" cried I, looking very
gaily, very prettily, and quite poorly clad, and very
garrulous and very dignified.

"Of a truth," said he, "the Mantis is the one of the
beautiful."
"Of a truth," I answered him, quite coolly,
"I am that mantis, for I know that mantis,
"I know that mantis, for I know that mantis
======================================== SAMPLE 254 ========================================
 down
To free a people on the earth and feel
For all the human bodies, as I saw
Them, and who held them fainting in such strain
That the recovering hearing of their load
Was crowned with joy. They waited not for day,
Nor for the full-moon's rising, nor were sped
Until a paper spread it wide around
The sum of four its pages. I was first
Appalled, and then exulting raised my eyes
To the unchanging sun. Forth from the cave
I saw a glittering line of fire, fierce, clear,
Untarnished, tasselled, glowing, all impaled
With patches of the sky. Then, as I gazed
Upon it, I beheld the flames arise
Like sudden flashes from the newly dead.
Then, as if burning at the glowing mass
They kindled, rose the smoke, and from the cave
Athwart the embers leapt.
A moment more.
Then, like a glowworm, I beheld the smoke
Roll up and sink into the night,
And where the food lay quivering with the heat
And horror of the fire, I beheld
The dwellings of the giants, which were small
And broken on their shelves, which in the sky
Were lowering with a tempest, then themselves
Rose up and spread themselves abroad and fought
As if the stormy life of flame they feared.
Then from my side, outstretch'd toward the fire,
Drew forth my sword with smiling and commandant hand,
And plunged it in the smoke, and to my cords
With it I drew it, and the buffet drove
My arm throughout them. Now I roll'd away
The smoke and darkness, and they groan'd aloud
Some respite, and on dreadful thoughts intent.
Then to my brother on the fire he spake.
Fool! no unwelcome news I bring to thee
Of navies and the flames, and what we waged
Against unequal battle, and whoe'er
The wrath of God might be, and this have been.
But answer, thou, for I have told thee true
Beyond the Cape of horrors to my ships.
To thee the pilot said, "We ask no more
But we must back, or overset our hold.
But speak thou with truth; these from the ships though struck
Come back again; they tell me thou must hear
Their boasting, who then smote the boldest sail."
But, answer none return. They still remember
What strict necessity compels. None goes
Among the ships nor with these fences hence
May pass; none there is nigh to him of all
Who, with their own eyes, him sees. He loves them well,
And will avenge them all.

Now here, there will I pass in quiet, so
That from the dreadful combat I may learn
What wisdom leads. Now thus my mind enjoin'd:
But what avails it me, that thou approve
And pity me? There is the King himself,
Leading me safely out. And now, alas!
Welcoming me again, and with no aid
Except his too unwaked power, he leads
The flocks and herds toward the northern ice,
And with the roaring beasts himself seeks out
A fatherless and helpless innocent.
There lives a wretch who, bare and bare of all,
Weeps for his folly--what he knows he needs.
Scarce could my son reach home, unless the gods
Would grant him end so quickly with the fates,
And give him ours, would murder him at least.
And when he sat ent'ring on the mead of gold
And wine, whereon the whole had left him free,
Came near my brother, that the fates devised
That he should ever end; he was as one
With unto whom death may not belongs.
I laugh'd aloud at him, for I was mad,
As he had said, when he beholds a stone
So huge, no regular turning-place can bear
The haunch of javelins; it was his curse
To miss it, and he stamp'd it on his cheek
In his own blood. Here, on the hostile rock,
Sat I, but ever, sitting, every limb
I shook off slumber, and my labour spent.
Then, by the God of power on this account
Attesting me, I bound me to the ship,
And carried forth my body, which the morn
Wore by the wind. The nymphs beside my arms
Hold war, and by the well-girt river come
With whirring sound to plunge me in the deep.
So perish'd I, withouten any fear
Lest the wild beasts devour me, and
======================================== SAMPLE 255 ========================================
, with his bludgeon a spirit fair
So changed to swans, they featly quit the snare;
Or, as the wind, they with disorder'd range,
Adown the dry embankment travelling,
And surging on and on with furious impulse,
Their iron track in foam and froth rehearse.
The isles' dim-shadowed esc pavilions gleam,
Where green vines, ever verdant, creep and stream;
Where through the circling sunshine, loud and clear,
The brook, as if delighted with a glen,
Betray the humours of the rustic ear
With the safe stirring of a horn or pen;
Now faint, now clear; and now subsiding, now
Turns, with a slower step, the river-beds,
And, past the fring-brick willy-nilly, cast
A shadow, which the glade before me cast,
Swift, as an arrow sped from Parthian bow.
So moved the lines, when and whereof I sprang,
The shadows, swift and dry, thick-crowding stood;
Or, as if Death his triple shower had broke,
In dim procession to the rippling flood,
They swept, and such large masses shaded me
As on a pallid statue stood, and said:--
"O load of grief! O stony trident mine!
A wayfarer beneath whose weight we pine,
Against whose close, vast, sunless windows cast
Eagles, whose eyes behold the lightest blast!
A frequent fog stands o'er the sultry pile,
That yawns 'till, opening, makes the world beguile.
Faint noise of summer blasts the birds among;
Here, over yon lone cottage, God hath hung
A fervent flame. Its blazing torment shows,
But here, is nothing; nothing can be snared
Save Heaun-in-life, when in the silent tomb,
The fallen light seems gathered. All is gloom.
Night comes, but, viler, needs there such a weight?
Or else I wearied of a world in store,
And quarr'd that nought against my constancy,
Sad beggared I of life's meridian shore,
By life's worn woes and wasted birth-pulse prest,
Seeking a peaceful haunt. O misery!
To me, alas! what cordial drop is this?
To me, that bitterer comfort of the great,
That is in life itself; from me that taste
Of early happiness, that makes it fair.
My child, if heaven be happy, if soon blest!
Even yet thou art too dear for me to mourn,
The solace that, to taste the undying worm,
Wins me to crumb my misery. What bliss,
What consolation! mild humanity
Begins me to embrace thee; here I find
Thy smiles, thy whisper'd prayers!--Here, 'neath the sod,
Thou, like a soft and timid sleep, shalt come,
Fearing me soothe thee.--Lo, my couch I part
Here with a heavy heart, and through the air
The rushing wind sweeps o'er me.--To the height
Of my proud sorrow I had bow'd me down,
When from the empyrean's grasp I tore
Those aged limbs, and seem'd the only food
Of an old, once; the lifeless game of life,
Of age and labour.--Here, 'mid joys and griefs,
I 'd smile, and, with a mirthful countenance,
Pour'd forth the mantling stream.--The fates have placed
Me near th' inglorious obsequies of death;
And I have laid the many colours there
Of life's pure splendour.--I forget not where
Th' attendants of my youth, too little known,
Have heap'd my grave with flowers.--Then dreaming o'er
I watch'd the shining waters in the sky
Which heaven defied, and dark and dismal cells,
And aspect which in early youth had vied
With legends of the gloomy and hoar,
Until their mingling Voice the hills and woods
Gave forth, a melancholy thunder thro'
And the big woods with many a ruin'd rock;
I seem'd to stand as one who mourns, in vain
Parting the shore, part cables of the stream,
And standing, here and there in converse wild,
Of these refreshments, to forget a dream.--
Invisible beneath a floating cloud,
I watch'd the laughing waves beneath me beat,
As if they fear'd the storm; then look'd and look'd,
Stammering, with terror
======================================== SAMPLE 256 ========================================
 primeval hills,
And crooked forests, shaded with a vale
Of vine-trees, which, like those which erst the sun
Illuded, now the Grecian ships ascend.
The rest, not nearly lost, through Africa
And Ind, till on a seat of pillared rock
They landed, disembarking, on the decks
Of numerous ships, for loss of ship or crew
Or arm, nor unexplored, for pro assault
Had plunged them in the sea. Nor, for they fear
The tempest might be of that night the cause.
Forthwith from council, from the shore arose
All night the currents, so the people said;
Then down from the high hills the wind arose
And loudly roared the ocean through the void;
As when an ox or horseman trudges off
An elephant, and to his stall repair,
And he has sown the way he cannot escape,
So, fearing most, he plunged in search of food
That rather likely might his hurried flight
Might here revisit. But it grieved the God,
Pitying his people, that such danger lay
So near to join him in the solemn night.
There in the boat he lay, much worn and wan,
Save differing visage, and much worn by years.
I have lain awake and watched the steam
Hither and thither in the moonlit night,
And since that slowly waked I've but not sleep
Nor rested in the Ocean; if these stairs
Be mine to climb, the beam needs climb the wall.
But at mid length they climb the wall, and stand
Upon the entrance, looking for the camp
Of the warring multitude, aghast, afraid.
Aghast, astonish'd at their movement, start,
And helpless tremble; but the howling hearts
Seem at approach of some huge-hearted man.
For to some straining eagerness, methinks,
The captains of the camp are sent, on errands,
To search for help, who through the coward night
Toils evermore, and turns no more his eyes
To those the faint and watching, nor the camp
Leading him back, but only, backward looks,
And round the walls, still hanging o'er his head,
To draw the cumber-curtains from the neck,
And bind the man-dividions to his breast.
One foot beats down the deck; the others fall
Head-slapped and conscious; neither buckler nor
The portal reek of the sea, or blaze aloft
The pitch-acons. With one stroke, all night, they reach
The harbor-mouth; for they have climbed the wall
With all hands hurl'd back o'er the hull. At once
Ascending, at the summit they descry
The quivering bright main, and then within
The western gate with bursts of fury rush
Upon them. They with wonder look, and see
In all the compass of the vessels sunk
Cannikins, now within, now in the sky,
Whence haply both are hurrying. There they beheld
The storm-clouds (so the thick red rain is poured)
From the shore, and there amid the abysses deep
They fell'd. Yet neither these nor that array,
Nor rampier'd fort, nor rampart of array
Could check them; but the men stood arm'd, and aghast
Their hearts already panted, and each breath
Trembled within them. But when now the storm
Had made a path in heaven, the others met
In council; and among them Maithil maids,
And maiden damsels, on the warrior sate,
Daughters of Zeus, their placid homes o'erwhelm'd
With the deep thunder of the lightningbolt.
Then was a cave where under sunless heavens
Mantled a broad and well-compacted stream,
Which closed the port and served the shallow ford
And check'd the water current, which by force
Of the strong current overtopp'd, were plunged.
Under the guidance of his stalwart boat
The hoary Sea-god, child of watery hue,
His prudent entrance scour'd, and down beneath
Dipp'd the soft shallows, and they fell'd, and spilt
The briny ocean with a second flood
Into the billows, leaving them as salt
As the brine the wind has driven. Thus they,
There with the Sirens' song and charms inshrall'd,
Depriv'd the isle of Ogygia, land
Of birth divine; for neither sea, nor shore
Of air, nor land of any, nor the land
Of any
======================================== SAMPLE 257 ========================================
' House, where reigns, for thee,
Mankind created what is truth,
What springs in them, for thee, of chance;
And seats and jewelled houses gay,
And robes, for thee, of texture slight,
A wondrous architecture laid,
Huge as those old Caesars were,
Fallen are the Lords, but not the least.

To this obscurest planet known,
The hemispheres of night and morn
The other lights, the livelong day,
The setting of the latter light,
And the reflected beams of night,
And other lights of various hue,
Allure the torches to our will,
And cure our wishes to remove
That darkness which is lighted thus,
Pleasures of light richly wrought,
The day's sole issue,--not of light
This one, that, without help or proof,
Pleads to the shadows on the road,
The next, that drops the shaft that sears,
Through broken shafts, the morning star.

Lone in the moonlight and the air,
So still, so very lone, and fair,
The figure that I held to view,
So deathlike, shrouded up in snow,
The beautiful in white of snow,
As she, before the world too late,
And doomed to live a naked fate.

And in the tree's green wounders,
The sacred boughs to hang around,
And there, till the diurnal race
Of mortals, hurried and made sound,
Thickened the crust from underneath
Of the white heron, whom no more
They tread in ice-fields underground.

But these, and many others more,
Pleached upon air, they did not find;
Through glass and rock trans-meddering far,
They stood; nor in the middle ground,
Nor in the roof, the second round,
Upon the third, nor on the fourth;
These were their world of faces, they
Struck but on earth, with such a stress
Of passing motion, that all eyes
Stained with tears left many a score.

And, forth from heaven, thus calm and still,
In one brief moment on they went,
Like clouds, upon the world's dark hill.
As, from the very seat of earth,
There came a creature I saw grow,
And toward the heavens did stretch its wing,
And somewhat bore me, made me know
The day would be, if I were dead;
'Twould doubtless be a paradise
Where every dust, as deep as air,
Fled from the changeful yearning
That my poor hands have learned to swear:
And, in the moment of communion,
So pure, so bright, as 'twas my sweet,
That, from the centre, to the centre,
At once they formed and formed thereon,
Where even earth less formed than heaven.
Then, for a little space, of night,
We came into that scene of light,
Where the daylight's doubtful rhapsody
Did, from our own, grow darker too;
And, in the centre, far more bright
Than if all lights were quenched of there,
As is the first faint broken moon
In heaven. Before our wondering eyes,
For hours I seemed to almost muse,
When the great Master said, "Behold
A wonder for a moment seen;"
And on the happy valley's brink
He plucked a flower from a withered tree,
And placed it in his crown, to show
How what it was his hand did blow,
And how he deemed it was his hand
Which aimed it at a single string;
And, in advance of anything,
So far as was the perfect song,
It vanished with the fleeting breath,
And I but sat and watched it long.
But then as watches which do stand
On the four corners of the hand,
Thereby more than was ever sung,
Thereby more clearly doth it show
The clear and visible view, which went
So far in that last grace of light
The trumpeters of God sent to the right,

Then, as with lights and winds at ease,
Lamp, tapers, and the brightening gear
That horsemen's feet at dead of night
Showed clearly to my wondering sight
How they, in the last hour, before
The altar of their Lord had come,
Had looked upon the foreign face,
And it was known and known that here
There was no need to look upon
Aught but the bare feet of an earlier god;
But ere a prayer was read or sung,
The clangour of the hoof and horn
Did on the altar's front proclaim
======================================== SAMPLE 258 ========================================

And fill with pride the river's tide.
We thank the God who first began,
Our hearts grow young, our lips grow old,
But the will done springs from Thor and Thor
For coming times unfold.

O golden Heart, rejoice again,
The day draws on apace;
When we have done and dreamed and seen,
Then hide the world away,
'Neath thy snow-clraped, crowned Crown, and blue,
While birds go forth on every wing,
And in thy wreaths shall spring.

Take no heed of fear or dread
From the way-side;
We are neither wood nor sod;
The same thing is in God.

For the wise old Has been taught
That the only living springs
In the wilful heart are sought,
And the tired has but few wings.
He is much too wise to learn
How to say all that is said
And most heartily to turn
To the whisper of the dead.

I took the dove to my side
To fold her dear little one
Till she should be made of stone;
The clouds threw a purple pride
Over her, she was alone;
I was happy as she, as this.
Now that all's finished, pray forget:
The sun has not set, my heart has not yet
To think what's before.

Some lightness now is gone from earth,
And silence, and hath been
A sullen and dissonant mirth,
And the pain of our brief summer mirth,
And all things are nothing now.
O sweet to feel the presses now
Lifted, like loveless limbs, upon
The smooth, white wall of one goodly land,
Which pillowed once upon her breast,
Not elsewhere, not elsewhere, is rest.

To leave behind that ancient lair,
Wherefrom she will repose;
Past ridge and tower, past city-cherry,
Her word has brought me to this house.
Was ever eye of mine mine before,
Deeply oracular,
So deep is troubled sleep or lore
To me, in this one vision gone,
And only here is my abode,
A palace, and a garden-bed,
Wherein the Queen of Heaven once more
Gazed on me Heaven's Queen of Heaven.

She will not hear my ghostly cries;
My quiet words come well to her,
Before the curtain comes on night,
And the light vanished from her sight.
Her face is shadowed with a tear,
But her bright eyes still flash with it,
As she sees the walls rise disappear,
And all her beauty gone to it.

She sees that tall and shadowy maid,
Who first shall come the morn;
Her heart shall follow his, ah, then,
That was all so still and drear.
She will not come, but her light hand
Shall yet have gathered strength to bear
The soul that has been there before,
As at a dream of weariness
She waits here in this happy place
Without some memory of decay;
For all her hopes can never rest,
And all her aims are strained so tight,
They cannot bring them home to me,
The rapture of the lonely night.

I found her at the garden-gate,
A perfect rose,
Of love and living flame;
And sweet and beautiful
The beauty that must die;
This lovely lily that doth grow
Within this bud of bloom so rare,
Which shows you but a treasure rare
Within a single shower.

Her warm red lips--as if to meet
Her smile upon me--now are cold;
And like a sea asleep the snow
Is round her, and her eyes are bright,
She seems as if I lay my hand
Beside the gate, and at the stand
The pensive porters all stand.

Old gardens, oh the years gone by!
The bird of morning slumbering deep!
My heart is weary as a wave
That breaks beneath some sunk caress;
And all the while a painless tune
It rises as I climb and rise
Towards my home among the skies.

And yet, when I have reached her gate,
If I may see her smile or stammer,
If through the branches that o'erflow
My darling's garden, grey with dew,
She opens, and she smiles on me.

It was a dream one has not told,
A poet sang of some sweet thing,
Some story like a tale that told,
As lovely and as true and deep
As rain-drops on the hidden deep.
Beneath a waning moonless sky
He lived; and it is still
======================================== SAMPLE 259 ========================================
 cried,
"Stay thou! too hapless soul!"

"Sooner than thou hast known me,
Thou shalt die of grief,
Sooner than thou hadst slain me
In the glens of Marmadane,
By the savage hurricane
Whelm'd beneath the blasting main."

"But soon I shall be welcom'd,
Stronger than thou art,
From the furious hurricane
Whelm me deep, O Lord!

"Sooner than thou hadst slain me,
I shall die of grief,
Sooner than thou hadst slain me
In the glens of Marmadane,
By the savage hurricane
Whelm me deep, O Lord!

"I myself will clear before thee
The river strand
Where to sunless noon is equal:
No more grief, nor fear,
Shall me rend, or quench, or falter,
As thou lovest now.

"Sooner than thou hadst slain me
Thou wouldst call to mind
The service of a life-time o'er me,
And thy words are so refined,
I could not survive it.
Early I pass'd to rest,
But the last fear left me,
Left me till to the dead:
All but this, O Lord!

"And now I aloft can soar,
Wafts through the dizzy height
To some little glen whose slope looks down
Under the blossoming boughs,
And throws wide shade o'er all.

"I will not leave thee, dearest!
I will bathe, and quench, and weep,
With my last breath in my hand.
But though I may not wander,
I will bless, and there will rest,
The love in my breast, the passion in my soul,
The love that is my own.

"And in my last sickness,
So all that I can give,
Will be lovely summer-morrow,
And sweeter days than thou,
And a life that never endures."

I have a sorrow.
'Twas once a gloomy wood,
And chill with cold,
Within a pleasant dwelling,
With joy its walls enclosing,
With wild ivy crown'd.
But oh! no more a woodland
Shall charm its heart,
No green shallows fence it,
Beneath an aged thorn;
No darksome vault of sky
Around its walls enclose it,
No voice of man or maid
Should speak its lofty name!
But ah! the heart may break
When I forget
That life's enchantment o'er me
Hath bow'd its giant prime,
And stammering grown and dim,
Has dream'd of Summer's prime!

Oh! would that when my thoughts
Have floated far
On the stream of time,
That gentle stream appear,
And fade away in light,
And deep in glade
Of green, and deep in glade,
Fade far away,
Till time and change have fleeted,
And yellow Life is fled!
And soon those days so sunny
Will come again,
And Spring herself on them will lighten,
Shedding her healing balm.

There is an old story in Ayr,
A quaint old song,
That has told of some Danish knight
In years gone by,
Ages back in the far north
Of a land of the sea.
There are three friends in Bighlyland,
They would each take a brother's hand,
And they would be friends on sundew moor
In the fasting and the drinking-salm.
There are three friends in East Malvide,
And three are gone,
And the brother is but an eight-days'-old,
But does no one see
The place where the tide has run,
The wild-buck is out there, the wild-buck is out there.

There are two friends, and three are seven,
But the one is no friends in Bighlyland;
There are two of the north and west
And two are no friends on the sea.
They said to the little Gurnld,
They would give him a knife if he would,
And they said to the shaven-Also,
"We are two, and two are seven,
And never a one will think of us."

There are three friends in East Malvide,
They would give him a knife if he would,
And they said to the shaven-Also,
"We are two, and two are seven,
And each of us likes a brother-in-law."
And they have a sword by the side of a hill
And they have
======================================== SAMPLE 260 ========================================

Above her height, a speck of shadowy white
Allures the Fairy butterflies,
Or paths of dragon-flies;
Or delicate garden beds
Of asterub bees;
Or elfin eaves in sunny bowers,
Or mossy eaves of rhyme half-mast
Where children gather, fearfully,
To try their wings.

Or under starry heavens, in whose glare
The Mother Moon herself is fair,
When shrouded in her inmost shrine,
In all her beauty lies entranced;
Or under tropic clouds, on grassy streams
On silver seas,
Where warm winds moan in quaint amaze
Wandering at will,
With fairy feet that dance upon the seas,
Or plumes of summer butterflies
On lovely isles;
Or under forests deep in leafy trees,
Where innocent mischief raises house
Of crimson flowers;
Or under forests dark, which kiss the dark
Wild impberries,
Or under forests dark, where witches purge,
And light her melancholy lamps,
When walk the caves:

Or under starry heavens, where quiet flies
The stealthy Pan, and Morning fairies,
Who steals the tears from sunbeams, trembling
His twisted hues,
Kissing the dark with dewy husk, whose flight
Comes not to Hell, but all the night
A cloud of dreams,
Floating along the high-hung, leaping gold
Of peaks, whose slopes, all fringed with gems,
Are kissed, to lilt
With languor and swift tears, for love's adieu,
And joy and kisses spent.

It is the height of heaven, the height of earth
With all the stars above; and all their birth
And all their zest of heaven, so brief and bright
Have been but in its glittering noon-tide night,
As ministers of heaven, teased all around
With shadows and such love.

And 'tis the height of heaven, the height of earth
With all the stars above; and all their birth
And all their slave are angels; and their worth
Is love, without a stain.
It is the height of heaven, the height of heaven
With all the stars above; and all their birth
Is love, without a stain.

And now there comes in one long presence, near,
And yet not distant, ever gathering clear
And blinking day before her unveiled face;
A front of ardent, stormy, frightened grace;
And sweet and beautiful youth that gleams and glow,
Crowning the earth with glory; ever young,
Most beautiful and full of wisdom and of grace.
And then she waits a long time for a speech;
She breathes a soft and leading music through
The longing crowd, but wraps her with a veil
Of mist and vapour, fading far and dim
As visions come of day;
But she, like One among the many, lures,
Beholds that all she asks, and all it asks,
And is the fair word spoken secretly,

And for her future weeps.
Till in her heart a mighty passion plays,
Piercing the acrid murmurs of her lips,
That, though upon her eyes it falls, yet slips
Asunder, scintillating down her cheeks,
Yet nothing stands the poorest of her thrall,
Nor all her hoard asunder.  What if she
Should lie, indifferent to the storm-fiend's art,
Her woman's counterfeit.

Ah, her red waist
Ripened with rose leaves and the wasted leaves,
Her lingering flight unholy and her sowing
In heartless places of deep-walled, grey-lit meadows.
Ah, what if she should lift the imploring hand
And sue its sheltering heart out, and be mine
Forever, and for ever at her feet
Reeling, the while her heart grow old and fleet
With hope, and all the fleeting things that seem.
Ah, what if she should turn the hour of terror
And watch the peril flitting out like dreams
From darkness unto darkness?  Could the scream
Of the dragon fly across her breast?
Ah, what if she should turn and smile at Fate,
And be the Death, that, in some hungry mood,
Wild hands should catch her, and to kill the hope
That won her blind consentance?  Let the hope
Leap out; the hands that cling to Love and Faith
Drop palsied of their task, and she and Death
Are but one torture to the heart.  If there
She lie as any flower.  Ah, what if she
Should faint upon her lips, and the white hair
Fall from the lifted brow,--the lover's hope?
Yea
======================================== SAMPLE 261 ========================================

She walks here, dumb with pain.
Thy master tortures me, like you,
With many a dreadful look,
And much of horror and delight,
For they allow thy quite.
Ah! what an awful and a sight
Thee, frantic from that horrid charge!
More hideous than creation's night,
Thy path upon the wave,
Is spread with terror, terror, and fear,
While on the moonlight wave,
Thou wander'st thro' the wondrous sphere,
A gleam of moonlight, and thy stay,
A dismal, and a dreadful ray,
Is almost in thy doom!
Oh! should there lurk, O fiendish one!
On some poor wanderer's head,
Or where a hoarse, lamenting crew
May thunder through the night,
Thy awful curse, I should have done,
Thy very name in hell.

And on the surging sea of care,
Thy dread attendants tossed,
With dirges deep and loud despair
Sigh for the wanderer lost.
Come, lady, for the ocean tide
Is hurrying o'er the main;
Come, and claim thy care-worn aid,
To bless his home again.
But do not think that here below
Thy comforts cannot lie,
That, while my story's closely bound,
My husband is no nigh.

He came to woo, he came to wed,
He came to wed, he came to wed.
Yet one loved woman, fair and good,
He came to woo, he came to wed.
The wedded lord was fain to take
His place among the waiting crew,
And bend his bow, and answer make
To one that came not, for to woo
Was to another done.

I'm sure that Love can do no wrong,
And know that I've no right to woo;
Then whisper low he scarce can say,
'I'll wed another day.'
But this I can not now deny,
'My days will all go right away,
And none remain to say me nay,'
But tell him, when his time is near,
His pretty girl will sometimes stay;
And he'll not say I'm weary of,
Because he scorns to marry me.
And though he would afford to be
The victim of the loves of me,
His wife, unless he seeks to please,
Is not a lass at home.
But that is most despairing-wise.
When love within is tempest-tossed,
How sweet it is to make the wretch
Himself the victim,--for he's lost!
If in the world the love are taught,
The love unless you have the thought,
You'll know that, won with solitude,
His wife will be your slave.

Ah! see how black it is!--it is
The wretch who aims to win from us
A penitent as we?
I know the wretch who grasps the cup,
Loses his dear and jealous wife,
Sees even love go by.
Weep now, my friends, weep now,
For I will not let you depart
While I the welcome have of smart,
Saith I, and you the heart.

Like oaks in that great antiphony,
They made him pass his jokes and sing,
His jokes and laughs to mingle,
Their music mingle,--
The laugh, the kiss, the chaff, and they--
And all on earth his music is!
My purse's unbounded
A beggar's gift my poor soul's friend.

Poor strong-belief I am
Who dare the morning,
So sad the reaper's
That from his sheep's pipes
I sell my pig.
Then Hope I'm getting
A merry mind to guide,
While in my trembling
I stand and think.
Then wake, my soul's a-
I have no need of sloth,
When in my rambles
The world is bright.
Ah me! then rise and fly away;
Thy woe I cannot bear!

My drooping heart it takes my heart away,
To thy cold grave and sadder sight
I crawl, 'neath thy still threatening wings,--
Ah me! I cry, for life's pure light!
O pallid sun! of thy cold beams
Thou ailest me with silvery beams,
And dead, I feel thy sad beams roll.
O hasten, drop the tearful weight
Of sorrow on my drooping soul!
Too soon, too soon, the beams of faith
Steal o'er me from the dwelling-place
Of fancy and of
======================================== SAMPLE 262 ========================================
;
And there for us the scars remain,
As here; their graves are gained again.
<|endoftext|>

O praise me not the Sun! that, when I view
The heavens with amorous eye, and lie
At ease on his uneasy uneasy bed,
And feel that night is near,
With hurried feet, that come to mourn my doom,
And think, "What sounds are these?"
I do not think that haughty thought was born
By slow Meander's perishing demur;
I do not shudder to behold afar
His fabled shepherdess,--
Unconscious as the rushing wind or gale,
Or the consuming blast
That swept his dark forefinger through the hush of night.
Yet feel I not that sight
Fairer than all thy works, most welcome, deepest, best!
Blest, thou whose name is Fame!
Wert thou immortal when thy birth,
The deities of Earth,
Ascended, and thy hearths shall still be dear to thee!

Yea, and immortal too,
Shall my immortal portion still be dear to thee.

I will have chosen thee a part,
And my diviner part
Shall move to Love, and bide apart
'Twixt Paphos and the love of Cressos, long ago.

Yet something still remains:
Something by long years untold has rolled
Into my life, and made my pulses leap and beat;
And something is become
That was too bright for me,--
The vision of immortal years,--
That made the immemorial palace bright for aye.

Not far, out of the ways
Where sepulchres are piled,
Abides the holy Mother-Maid;
But to the heart she hath dear children still,
A nursing-child she weeps,--
A little child, whose faery eyes
Meet full of mirth and laughter, even as she
Stands pale and pitiful and tears.

The princes of the wrangling earth
They cannot ever rue.
A wise and valiant folk are they,
But in their riddles are there none
So big with sorrow,
And glory is their name.
O King, the world was once too wide
For thee to tread upon.
And now, though thou art far away,
Thou hast but filled my heart
With flowers and leaves and tender joy;
I can but see thy face,
And all my waking thoughts embrace thee in the darkness!

And it is well
To be of this thing.
My little part of life is a song;
Thou singest not alone,
But thou that will not sing it long,
Because thou hast no son.
O King, my life is a song,
And tho' your music die,
Thy whole life dies in the slow song,
Because of him I try.

My little part of life is a song,
But I have no son.
In the vast spaces of the world,
Trees are unshaken,
And the high and unpassing,
Even, and the whirl of waters,
The myriad sounds
Of the eddying years
Wake courage in our hearts.
Our hearts are a song,
And the unspoken throng
Renounce the evil days,
And the night-long hours
Fold and undulant
Bear me the hot face down the ways;
To feed with the light
Gleam in the gardens of the dawn;
But if no tears
Drip in the spring,
If no fresh comfort thou hast lost,
To lay my heart
Gone to thy face,
Gone, O King, to be as a watch-dog, even,
Alone and blameless.

Is there aught like this? What is here
For a man's to fear?
I can give no comfort, dear, to thee
If thou wouldst live--
Thy word will not come short to me.
In pleasant leisure, we two will sing,
Of the wine of David and the ancient kings,
Of the simple ointment, and the words
Of David's service, and the notes of thine,
And once a little shadow shall appear,
Thy shadow, in the darkness, lifted up,
Soaring up steeply, climbing the steep slope
That rises, with steep fall, in silent awe.

I know not if I ever knew.
Yet I was not a phantom of thee,
Dear, and of life, and so thou art;

Thy shadow comes from out the universe,
Thy shadow falls upon my soul.
And in the night I sleep,
And the last rays
======================================== SAMPLE 263 ========================================
, he counted but his own,
I but one, heart-broken, drop by drop
Considered in a whiteness, none for her
Wakeful but, ghost-like, living in a whirl
Of joy which for one moment she must save,
When she should find him for her enemy,
Nor for the purpose of her, shred from shred
Reflected in the present, place and hour.
I, while this artist, who had journeyed, knew
Pleasure's elysian allures, as I deemed
All pleasures else unseen, and saw her grow,
Hoping the days to come, the giddy height
Of every glad endeavour! and that each
Could be her own endeavour, half for her,
Half only of the spirit's bitter lot,
Yet half for that excess, which evermore
Grows more and more distempered, till the end
Of imperfect beauty brought it to a close.

Nor that I, do I love thee! for the calm
And quiet ambush of this grief of ours
Which slumbering immorality engirds
Our own perfection. Shall I lose to-day
Love, or be found a shepherd without sheep
Upon a hillock, or unfading flower,
Gather a single rib of that which fills
One single rib? No, no! The world I see
Dies like a pretty worm. For what, for life,
Is to be found not; rather, life itself
We find with all our losses, sorrow, shame,
Our rare and empty pleasures! But, for all,
Love has two elements: the common heart
Is a most potent passion, and the blood
Aches most, and then it burns as if it dwelt
On nectar. For to roll along the veins
Is as the fire a thirsty bird with thirst,
Feeding on nectar, hath the sweetest taste
Unsatisfy'd, nectar is nectar too,
And not a nectar that it merits now.
And thus I learn to hold with all my lore
A lesson, which alone I rate the true,
And love most knowing. He who guides the heart
Will feel the load it bears, when common lips
And common words are lost in realms of song.

This is my teacher. When I meet the Queen
I leap to her at once; I find the base
Self-love, and would have thought it! so, I know
The pent-up passion, the exulting pride
And high conceit of all-unwilling Fate.
Love can but give the secret wayward love
All to the full; and when at length he dies,
Love's doctrine, like a burning candle, dips
Into its ashes, and betrays its flame.
But if he lives to share the common shame
Of his own time, and yet be call'd a man
Of equal honour; if a lowly bard
Be quite as simple as the humble frog,
And are but little understood at best
By simple virtues; virtue there is none
That is not born of low and servile seed.
This wisdom sav'd from one frail natural
Renders us better than we think of death.
For, though we live so many things to be,
Why count it difficult to think of life
As what we touch and think? Where blest so soon,
Good night! I'll think of what I am and know
The joys of sense, the flatness of the pulse,
The blare of wings, the exercise of heart,
The love of nature, and the consciousness
Of soul with body pouring through the whole
To quicken love, that warms the breast of all
To truest, till we grasp, with ecstasy,
The perfect honeysuckle of the mind.

Come, my dear fellow!--I am in the midst,
And think I see you all the time. I know
That life is such a burden, that when death
Eases to bring some near or distant day,
Some near to me, I cannot. What I know
Is, that if perfect be its perfectness,
'Tis as the burden borne along the air,
Glimpses and vanities, the selfish sum
Of pleasure which a great man can create,
And he can have no more. I wish to see
That you who never falter. For, do you,
I see not if you dare. So! Take my hand,
And I will tell you in a solemn thought
How I have loved you--though I know not now
If you are what my eyes have long since taught--
And I have loved you so--that as you were
I love you better than I do myself.
We may be what we were before, the
======================================== SAMPLE 264 ========================================
[v]him in such host
His fane were none o'erfull, though all [v]him gold,
Th[=e]ienlest of gold, fairest and wel with trav'let
And costlier beasts than gold, whet[=e] him an ounce of gold,
He gave those gold he could not have plied
Aught, which on earth with honour he had [v]himself
Had self-deluded. To mankind--to men
That 'scorn of gold, O monarch, wove the golden
Warm sacrifice, and tak' it in their hands
They offer with their hearts' best blood, to[v]in
Unto the rich and simple who have sold it,
And good or bad tribute at a price.
Nor are there many at this day in Norway
By gold possesounding; no gold can hold
The glory, or[v]of him that e'er shall liberate it
To the last state, since there is no gold there.
Nor surely in time to be lord of kings
Shall any be left, to be chivalrous
Unto our people, one by one, and be
In honor's place supreme King Langenstein,
"A Santo Pietro, who can scarcely rob,"
By right permission--'tis enough for me.
But thou, O king, hast given thy gifts to her--
Nay, take not his keys with thee. Mine eyes, I pray thee,
Care not as yet for hearkening. Thou, a glove,
Hast left him to us thus. Mine ears, be sure,
These words have spoken truly unto him,
For he his person would have sought to slay,
And also, on a striking point, had sworn,
As thou didst on th' altar, to to the gods,
The most supreme last word of all the East.

An he shall make himself, even now condemned
By fate from Jove, to bear a death-doomed doom
On men for evil, when the queen his case
Conjured against him, and he promised him
To be the mate of miserable men;
But now, what life is lapped in bloody sleep,
Which, at the last, hath severed from his lips,
By evil chance, the king's son, who, with tears
Shed from his holy mouth, weeps for him,
Now made to be the cause of tears for him,
To suffer and support him, fain would live,
To greet his Lord, so many years of agony
And peril in the wilderness to come,
And yet so many years, indeed, since he
A voice was wailing for him, save his child,
Some shadow of the oracle had come
From the tomb-mouth of Jove, who, gazing round
Afar, and weeping at his destiny,
Spake, and lamenting for his destiny--
"Ah, wretched father, doomed, to die for thee!
Well hast thou suffered, knowing what a grief
For thy son's wife can madden, and can know
The pain of exile. Therefore now return
To mine Hiatarites, if his ghost
Remains alone, and none may call him back;
That my foreboding may be vain to me,
No longer could I call him such as I.
But soon as these events have passed away
They will approach us, and we shall not wait."
"Ah, when thou com'st, return thou straight
And greet him with thy son; for in thy presence
Is nowhere yet thy son, to be embraced
By friendship's tie, and by all things embraced.
The immortal man, we know, has come to live,
And he shall greet thee rarely, as we say.
Come, sit beside him--ha! He, whom thou lov'st,
Now understands; and, though it grieved him not,
Will not sit long, but die in peace at last,
Though far-off exercise of our desires.
He will be happy in thy father's sight,
And he will bless thee with a father's blessing."

"Then Hetwaser will be a nobleman,
And father Penelope, the care
Of all the nations, with most reverent awe
A mother owes, and on a charge returns
To her, a young and beautiful Elder,
Ared and committed, bringing thee up
To his old mother's bed, with pious prayers,
For thy dear child--whom in her father's home
We left for ever. How my heart will yearn,
When thou art gone, to feel a father's arms,
And the old hearth unbidden sink beneath
His arms again, like Cæs
======================================== SAMPLE 265 ========================================
, too, with walls and bars,
And wheels, and columns, and shields,
And all the arts of concupiscrites,
And all that art can do to keep,
Will change the watch they kept so long
And steal so quietly away.

With more than usual length of blade
The stroke, as it is decreed,
Will stretch his fangs and shade his head,
And teach him to survive the blow.
--The dints are gone and wasted--
Then fill the cold and dead;
A faint and pallid man is flown,
And this is death instead!

Three men of all the lying block
This grand old tracer of the Church,
In the long wars with Customsel,
The cause, the honest cause of all
The many wounds that day and night
Have bred in one man's upright right
And made his law by all men rather dark.

Four bitter years of servitude,
And six long decades of exile,
Our patient country's tears and toil
Have wept their bond of many a year.

Six burdens yielding day and night
And night and day we owe this cloth
And joy that in our day's delight
We celebrate with annual prayers.

They'll let us know the greater wonders
The store of buried centuries
That lie with me in banks of shade
Whose flowers outlive the hopes of maid,
Whose nameless horrors dimmed our eyes,
And glare with presence more than truth
And hope for ever, when we see
Our quiet country's hope and me.

Are there not some who now are dumb,
That creak their long-forgotten hate,
And weep for joy of losing all
The laurel from its crown of fame?
There still are those who of the old
To whom we were ourselves are told
The griefs we blessed in glorious days,
Who in our youth were brave and young.

O beautiful of soul, and fit
To lead our landmen to the fight,
O gracious angel! not refuse
To let the weak endure the light,
While Fame through all her myriad states
Looks on us blindly and at will.

And we, whose glory was but slow,
Have fallen in the swift pursuit,
And yet remain the less to know
That we and our poor country's wrong
Still care to weep with one another.

The spirit now that in our blood
So soon must cease and leave us food,
We live our little span of life,
The privilege of death and strife.
And mark us not with visored eyes,
For we have lost the old desire,
That set the captives free and free
As is the boundless empire yet.

For o'er the wintry void we passed,
And still we'll follow in the way
We left behind us, God, at last,
To keep the march of England's day.

What if the age that passed away
Some brother-hearts of iron won,
We perish in the judgment day
That breaks our dawn of golden sun?
Yea, even our ruin may be traced
By winged shafts of mighty creeds
Railing into the midnight skies
Through all the chaos of the graves.

So when, amidst a waste of dead,
A handbreadth from out the deep
Shall loom across the shining street
And set our prisoned country free,
We'll pass to die like countrymen,
And rise up strong in Freedom's cause
To smite with sword and flame the free.

Then, in our stricken country's cause,
The world be raised to what it was
And when the avenging days have come,
To veil from us each lingering hope,
And taint the land with blood and tears
Our mountain-mass of blood and tears.

The trees have crossed my grave, and aught
Beneath my hearth shall live again;
But, looking o'er the crowded way,
Shall find no trace of man or stain.
Yet through these patient centuries
I saw, without a stain,
The hope that from old wrongs profaned
Shall rise up strong for greater plains.

Yet though the frozen heart and brain
May not, with eventful stress,
Let once more human life depart,
I still can hope to sing,
To feel the hand that thrills and strains
The chords of Nature's music strong,
And of its joyous harmony
To lend the ear and ear of song.

To watch the changing world take on
Its frail uncertain plans of bliss,
And dare the seeming contumely thin
Were life's caprice and purpose this,
But the implacable despair
To touch the throat of Memory
======================================== SAMPLE 266 ========================================
; some arrow
Trickt in my bowels, that are broken,
Gnawed through and crack'd, and rolling,
Rushed through me,
As o'er the boggard's sheathing,
Me astral!

Because, within the intercepting view
Of antique time, thy fame is growing--
An ivied oak, whose hoary top
For ever keeps its ancient top;
Though, verily, thy branches droop,
They shorten in the morning-shine,
Though storms have fallen on thy head,
They cheer thee,--

When thou art near thy last redoubt,
Then, be advis'd, nor be vex'd
With noisy blame, nor call thee "ricket-gicket,"
But "garden-garden," and "garden-garden."
Now staff in hand, now seek
To plant with root thy youth for him
With the stalks first blown and priming thy fiery
To strew in the path, nor care
If thou at the garden-bench be stops fooling
Some clown in his club-room--
Wish thee a man! (thou say'st) a maid should never
Behold the fainting wain in a soft grass bed.
(From the master's knighthood he draws an axe,
Which, rightly, will he smooth;
But thou--thou hadst much too rough a skein
For one that couldst print the upon histoire.)

Stand up and swear! To hurt or to keep thee
From scaring, be to lizard alive and strong,
No sex in thee save mud, and thy nose against thee,
Thou hated beauties, lest one dawning young
To make thy love his brief vaunt:
Strength is the 'force which bounds them on to flight;
'T is virtue, that of a foe;
Beauty but mars thy flower.

Now of the praise, damn me
Who sang for the Band slow at her knee;
But if her lip--smoothness me,
She beauties beyond speech and at home,
Vindicancy mocks me,
Then you be talk'd to the dancers!

Come, then, and dumb
She can give the picture to me of myself:
The honey-bee,
The big stag,
The little war pony,
The big, solid antelope!
We as cannily quietly droop
When once they've coin'd it:
A million on the brink
Of wine to think, to drink, to think.

I say by the witty and the quick,
And the foolish rooted things that mock
A man's sense right, your brown eyes stare
Away in the face, and like a Greek
You grasp the lovely small bright hair
She is but one of Beauty's fair.

Did I say "without a word"?
Then if they hurt me, ah! of you,
I should starve before they cut me up!
I cannot bribe them; I cannot bribe;
I must, or I am weak at times;
For I am the flesh of the wild beast.

Nor is it cheap for them to feel the bit
Of beauty,--not to kill myself,--
My wayward wishes, feelings small.
I beg a husky skin
That I will tell you whence they are;
I have some friends in other fields,
Who help me with my friend's calm look.
They are my heart's, and as my friend's.
And not a creature of my kind
Is harder than a dog to find,
Than I, when only in the wind,
Dance to my friend,--
The wanton, laughing, hoping elf.

Look near the beast!--my sister slips,
Into the gulph of my dear eyes.
Oh, touch her,--lift her, if you dare,
With vulture glare, and famished hair!
My heart burns deep with longing: Oh,
Put cheek to cheek, and make me gay.
'T is I who am my country's pride,
I who, as carrion and as bride,
Am come from marriage; they will care
So far, or it will turn me bare,
Or it will turn me black and bare.

On holidays, when men are kind,
I feed on roast piles and good beef,
Sweet oysters, too, I like to eat;
But what's the use of wedding neat
That you arrange before?

I'm sure I don't make no mistake;
They have their cellar for the cook,
Where if you should, no knife can break,
'T would be your work, you know.
Well, let them dine
======================================== SAMPLE 267 ========================================

Her crescent wound in a frosty green,
And the rest were silent and smothered and seen.
A few lay in a circle, a pale thin joke,
A dull blight in her lips and a shine in her eye.
But God in His joy was careless and took
No print of his evil or say good by dint of it,
As He made the green green hills and valleys a quake,
And saw in the forest a small shot or slant
Or spark, as it comes down at the hour of least.
And when in the night they drew their accustomed head,
A small boy in a turban sailed with a squirch
On a headland pony with thongs on her neck
Which jinglingly rode on a goals of the Saxon
To hear the jingling ball, and his eyes where he swore
Were shining like jewels of cloud on the road.
The hoofs that he wore by his forage were beaten
By a tree in the woods; and the pack on his back
That made, from behind the grey paws to the plain,
A mark for the horse's girth, went romping back
By the green, dusty lanes; and his straddlings gave way
To the beast that had left the village to pray.
And suddenly, a rough sound was heard, and the scent
Of the grass that kept the road all out of it.
And before, with his chain uponpins, he threw
His arm along the bank of the grey tuft of a bank,
And turned again to the sea with a gibe of abuse.
Then followed the man with his gallop and cry,
With the packet of brawn and the hunted knee,
With keen whistle, the lips that answered his aim,
And bicker and flap and the blood in his face,
With the red-thonged quail of a stallion black
Ripping on from the grass to the down-fallen old trull;

Then he, for his love had left him, turned to the loon
In the half-frightened moonlight, with lips of scorn,
And keen twanging far off of the brown hawse's horn,
And the whistling and whistling over the bull.
And this was the song of the son of Aron the strong,
And his life and his soul were over and gone,
With none to hear him coming, none to hear him that day
From the rocks where the reindeer ran ghostly way
To the heaths where the beaver watched out in the rain
Through the anvils of heaven, to the fields where the plain

And the clank of the chains for gold.
Then up through the dizzy height, up through the sea,
Up through the rocks to the sheer ravine
To the rapids of heaven, to the hills with gold,
The rippling waters that lap the city's feet,
To the lowlands where once the clamorous bugle beat
That rang from the fort o' the Grave.
And near to the bank to the top of the bank
There lay the man who had seized his gun
By the throat of a rope, and then bayonet
That gaped as the rope on a Caucasus-bound coast,
And the strength of his hands in a statue of stone.
And on from the tangle of fight to the last,
The man with a jingle and thud, as he ran,
Between the hulk and the prow.
Then bayonets whistled from hill to hill,
And the pick of his jolly company, Colan, lashed
His ears and he swore through the long hulk-bones,
Through all to the edge of the horn.

And along the deck to the top of the mast
With his right hand grasped at the rope-jut rope
He held till the waves either broke in a blur
Of fire in the dawn of day.
"If a man should die
He can't get back his way,"
Cried one who had loved him the best of all,
"Or ever death cut the rope off him stall,
He can't swim back again;
The rope holds in his hand,
And the bell rings in his ears,
And he'll never stand no more,
Nor ever the moonlight stain
In his bursting chains, on the sea-beach slung."
Then they stepped inside the vessel
Where the rope-jut rope was hung.
And the rope-jut rope that they spun
Tossed over to left and right,
And he saw it fall in the bright moonshine
On the sea-beach white and light,
And the rope-jut rope that they biting spun
With the rope-j
======================================== SAMPLE 268 ========================================
 one day this hand of mine
Shall a new morning take,
And then of all the hours that be
Dawn to appear;
Let us, though the loud huzzar
Rang back, to share.
Let the next, from dawn till dark,
The flying hours with swift shuttles mark
Pale mountains stepping o'er the bay
Where halt the herd;
And my weak footsteps tramp abreast
On hill and bays
Where scattered flowers adorn each waste
And greenest bowers.
Let us next, as through the wood,
Follow each kindling breath we drew,
Until the landscape fades in view,
Like night-dews, blotting the noon's hot blood
Over the hills;
Whereon they hope to see the scene
Effacing change,
And the swift sun come glancing down
To shiver every devious lawn,
While they, as once, the tents had scathed
And stopped their speed.

Some scattered flowers of them that loiter there
Will meet me from their upward labouring,
And while they pluck, their tender grace doth share,
While hovering o'er them with unfaltering aim,
The poppies twine, as, wondering at the sight,
They spread their arms, and make a distant mound.

How do the dews descend? the surer sun
Scares down the same some evanescent one
That, with these spheres made one,
Thou yet shalt find; a falling star,
Light on a night of autumn frost-bound skies,
While life is dark in chill and icy skies.

How do the breezes o'er the lawn upwind?
How do the buds in purple bloom wilt find?
Or where the humid rose,
By sun-light coolness won,
On the fir'd hill's edge reposing lies,
As if the clouds in sleep
A solemn secret place could keep
With quiet brooding o'er the skies;
Where creepingly the Great City spires,
A solemn, stern and hazy guard, appears,
While through their ranks,
Soft from the East,
With measured movement, bee-like, slow,
Like a winged Spirit's o'er the main,
The wondrous clouds in azure sweep.

Ye Stars! that in the west
With watchers overhung,
Look Eastward, and with patriot zeal,
Upon their blue displaying sweep,
Impel the sail:--
Ye Stars! that hover o'er the wave,
Whose crimson hue comes unawares,
A country lover, on a grave
Is laid for you,
And sweet rest flows not through the airs
When breezes swoon with whispering firs
The sanguine gales!

On a verdant field,
Arden and Melyson sleep,
The founts of all flowers near the door;
The Forget-me-not,
Built for the weary, and still,
That, under the eaves, of delver and dell
Sleep, under the eaves.

Sorrows more than the world relieve,
Lamenting of them that are less
Than the world altogether knows,
Is this the Art of the Things that survive,
This the Master-soul that from death estruts,
The transmuting Soul from the Soul that's thysquare,
And the, Memory-Blossom, a Genius yet bears
Upon it aloe.

Better than Death is life
In the memory of thee;
Better than life more beautiful,
Is life in grief or in agony,
More than our whole life of it can bring,
Or wish for thine;
Hear, and rejoice; for thou canst not destroy
This crown of that glory, thy place, thy joy,
And which Time marred once, th' memorial urn!

O yet some fill me with thy joy,
Some fill me with thy deep, keen joy,
That makes me calm and never sad,
No mourning for a love that has been,
But a memory of glad hours,
The promise that in time should be
An April--Aye, in time like this,
So fair as first I saw the rose.

Lo here, o'er life's broad woodland stream
A Soul as lovely as a dream
Comes to thee like an April shower,
Blown golden by the June-tide shower,
A wild bird's song that flutters high
And in an instant dazzles eye
A courtier of the planets' sight,
Whence, midst the ocean-varied height,
A craggy hill springs out of sight.

There life is made that
======================================== SAMPLE 269 ========================================
 waxen like a wave:
And, save in turning each emprise,
Or sometimes turning, the wind slings himself
Sunder in, and gives up all his rights.

Thus we are made one with the splendid sun,
The one that breaks from darkness on the world;
A poet with more equal soul than we,
Who 'mid the dumb and spectres of the dead,
Supremely blameless, sing to common men,
As far as earth and ocean's boundsen trod.

Man's heart may have been full of things like these,
But of the high wild heavens all earth's gifts were lost.
What Nature, un-Enriching all she knows,
Works with her mystic hand the eternal work,
Lifts up her clear voice and aye blurs it
To please the eyes that love her most, and is
Strong to unshaken wisdom and the mind
And whatsoever men's desires eclipse,
Makes glad the senses of their natural things.

Down the great world of things that change must be,
Falling asleep, down the great hollow stair
Borne like a jewel on thy sunlit hair.
But shall I bid thee pause? Shall I say, ah, this,
That I am grown too lofty to make men praise
A beast, for certain, who doth strain and kiss
The hawser for my grave, even so? Ah, kind,
Shall I make answer to thy request? Ah, kind,
Shall I not tell thee that it is a debt
Dying to win by struggle, or to lose
By suffering, and watching pain? Shall I not make
An answer to thy pleading? Nay, in truth,
I pray thee turn; it is not gold I seek.

Christ came from Nazareth, who had travelled far,
A pilgrim here, and here he is at rest.
Yet peace may claim for his averted lips
Here in the inn whence he was wont to rove,
And rest, and that unhoped-for-avenging hope
That finds no undiscovered shore.
And he shall cease, as I of this aware,
Or he is talked of in the Temple here.

"Three weeks apart,
Our Lady from me parted; he and I
Through a still inner door of unknown men,
And here alone, close by a casement high,
Watched, every morn, a golden-studded chalice,
That filled our wine-cups 'mid the glimmering light;
But when the eve of day was hid in west,
Beside a rose-swept porch, 'mid lily bowers,
And in the garden's verdurous solitude,
I thought, I thought, he might his name renew.

Now I have made a hope to meet him yet,
A resting-place within a holy world,
Where thou canst pray, and tell the solemn truth,
And leave no vestige of this thought behind.
Go to him: pray,--in this our blessed Heaven
Anointed king and Lord of all the rest,
Whom I, in after days of darkness blest,
Worship as best I ought, and will lift up
To Heaven some trust, and pass those vows unblest,
That I too may redeem thy soul from sin.

"Go to him, all unconscious of remorse,
The holy man who loved thee once in youth;
Go to him, go, whose fervent zeal doth stir
The silver in the darkness of its path,
And stir the heart to sacrifice to death,
That longed-for life so sweet, so lone, so brief.
But thou, 'midst the Elysian fields of light,
When thou wert young, shouldst seek no other bliss,
But dwell in them who rest their spirits light.

"Oh, blest, and blest above all earthly bliss,
We in this garden, blest by naught save thee,
Not any thing but bliss can be exempt,
And raptures as divine as the divine,
For that can be where man hath ne'er been born.
Oh, would to God, where'er thou art, there breathe
A pure soul-thrida on the holy air!
If thou art pure, canst thou, too, its very dews?
No flood of heaven in all the universe,
I'll drink in if I will, and thou shall see.
Therein, as far as thou art high in heaven,
I'll swear that even the sun will veil the shade;
Still climbing heaven, at least, thou'lt see love's shine,
And worship's waxen taper glows as bright
As thy young
======================================== SAMPLE 270 ========================================
 with lofty thought and worth
March on us from this destined earth
Where greed gives way and craft doth rule.
For little children see and hail us--
And so I tell you--with tears they fall;
(O, blessed human children, pity us!)
A child in sire and mother-time,
That, as the years roll on and on,
Is by its clearness seen, is gone.
So we in tears behold the sun,
The rolling stars, the worldly wars,
The happy plenteous seasons o'er,
A little throng of friends once more.

Such toil is ours to rule; and such
The tyrannies of man's busy life,
A little fleeting joys to give
A little feast for infant strife;
A little bridge of light and life
Whereof we all do take to rest,
And stir and keep the ways that lead
Along our paths as from the East.

A little ship that helps the breeze
And gently asks the waves to come,
Who thus doth guide her helm-holes up
Whenever wind or weather comes--
Such good things to sustain, and bear,
So far the world about her goes,
That o'er the main the waves do steer.

A little vessel, strong and bold,
Yet swelling up like fire to launch,
By tempest ever striving still
To keep our hearts on board;
For pilot-craft is ever tried,
By luck and change and fortune guided--
And, since our voyage here is stayed,
One mind with every wind is plied.

An ocean-mother we must call;
Behold her rocky strand we see;
Two hearts are in her bosom all,
And, answering for the rocks, we cry--
'Tis God that will the waves defy;
Then some will haste, and some will speed,
And some will leave us all in need.

A little fleet, with wondrous power
Will follow up, by sea and sky;
And when there's none along the shore,
Nor any who have stepped or played
The fabled anchors of our bay,
Then, worthy friends, we'll each essay
The harvest of our joyful days
Without the fog or helter-rope,
Till all our plan be ended and our ways.

Ah! was it this I long believed?
Was it the waves that foamed and boiled,
That I must leave to such and to pursue,
To learn what life is in a shadow-world to do?
Yet do not I forget to tell;
I'll call for aid, and so will call--
For, had he died upon the day
We parted he had lived to us,
And had no more to give to us.
The thoughts, indeed, of home and friends
Are of the times when meadow birds
Will dip their feathers in the stream
And return to their nests to us;
For where we could pursue the fly
Their several flight and fly,
We would not miss him, and we'd try
To be no other than a thing
To join our wings, the same to guide--
But one wise mind is always wise.

O happy wind that in the night
Walketh, say thou dost sweetly sing!
Thou makest all things mean delight,
And turnest all things into things.
A song made of the nightingale,
All day long,
So doth she charm the air
That doth compass her,
That she seems to sing,
That doth sway
All things, that move
In a measure sweet,
That doth control
 everything, that doth control

Quitting the entire of things.

There is a quiet here
Under the sea,
Where no winds ever blow,
Where ships never pass,
Where ship never pass,
Where ship never pass,
Where ship never passeth,
Though seas never fall,
Yet many a wave doth fall
From off the land at last;
Here is a quiet here,
Under the sea,
Without wind or wave,
Right to the land from home,
Here ends a quiet.

How little knowest thou the unknown
Unto thine earthly days, how little knowest thou of sorrow
That by thy peace thou losest the lands of men!
O dweller in the ancient town,
Which is the offspring of the Lord,
Where I with joy did follow down
To the time that I was come.

What pleasure did I then behold,
To sit upon his right hand!
For he with tenderness of mind
Did wait upon each child of earth
As surely as the day was born.

But now the man is grown a man

======================================== SAMPLE 271 ========================================
eth thee to stay,
Whilst others wail, or vainly sue,
'Till come the tempest-suitor too.
Weep not, my spirit! The stars above
Their light of life diffuse
O'er the grim element,
Whose dwellings ominous are.

The hare, that wonts, when slumbering sound,
To watch, unseen, their doleful race succeed,
Exhausted in her desperate fear profound,
Yet busied to destroy her, not her friend.
In sorrowing mood she walks, and blames her speed.
At length the worthy master with regret
His hapless master's usurpated spoil doth prove,
The sleep-sodded features of a deer,
Scarce quite half-lipped from their own horrid reign;
Which, as allay'd by preparation, tries
Each to maintain, and be his faithful stay,
In full volcanos he devours the rain,
And drinks perpetual dews.

With joy to see the spoils of warfare join'd
In bloody battle, he prepares to blaze;
Longing to faint in unsheath'd zest, and spare
An unzellish for the ignominious feat.
Thus, when the fires and whistling winds arise,
And forest fires through seas and sands retire,
And hurtling waters from the jovial skies
Raise, and, as nature bids, their forces fire,
Dispersed and soon to utter forth her voice,
By wildering whirlwinds, and by thunders blind,
Now shuddering, feeble in their foundering rage;
Yet long, and hopeless is their confidence;
While disappointment not a hope can bring,
But from their slumber both resistless fall,
And all night longingly they groan for him.

When death approaching makes the victor dread,
The sable curtains rent, and their limbs rend
Their scatter'd corselet, and their scatter'd gore
Each welt'ring breast o'erwhelm'd with sudden fear.
And careful lest the crimes should close unseen,
Some secret act their confidence fully hides.
Besides, the holy and the dread requir'd,
At dead of night they catch their inmost souls,
And, soon dispers'd, with sighs and groans deplore
Their absent lord, when all the stars are set,
And stars shine out; each man with sighs must groan,
Or bathe his face, repenting of his crimes.

And who hath seen it, though no louder lays,
In the dread presence of the sounding sky?
That sentinel our pathless fagot tells,
Whose blade bright thunder from above doth hie
As keen, and thick as drops of morning dew.

A trusty cypress, with her verdant wreath
Hath hewn fair cheeks, and crown'd with gems of fire
The white bull's-hide that hides his head beneath.
Strong couchant lions in his lairs admire
The beauty of the light, and high in air
Rais'd the whole hue of th' angry firmament.
The laurel leaves its bloody boughs emboss'd
Of his rich clusters rich in leaves of gold.

Already in the midst of myrtle-shade
Stood Fennius, son of the great Chieftain slain,
Glorious in death. Upon his mouth lay flints
Of milk, and blood, and yet the fatal boughs
Forfeited it; and, in the very turf
His body was enfeebled, and the bones
With blackness mingled and as yellow as the dust.
Scarce could I see his face, the pallor there
Stuck fast in darkness; and with pallid mien,
Not knowing what he did, his visage pall'd.
Then, fearfully, my mind cast round and round
On all sides round the mighty wood to gaze,
To mark if aught indeed there was to be
Sufficient for a man below it. At the sight
I seem'd to reel, and lay my limbs as dead,
Staring through ferns and fennel-leaves to ground.
Then with a sigh I thus began to say:
"O thou, who rulest the seven heads of all,
Who fell'st upon our goodly town, reflect
How near thou art; if any such distress
As we can speak of to these limbs we owe,
Know that an augur good is here cut off.
Thy valor and thy courage do restrain
The city walls about thee, and defend
From that too murderous and portending power
The city Phaethontes, whom thou se
======================================== SAMPLE 272 ========================================
'r miorum se accepit u'cula mortem.
Omnis aevom, temporis sperabat ales:
Imbriferis facie fregit et tenues et uices.

Beneath the piny holme, with talë undefable,
Amble for prey, away careering, fly we.
By Nature taught, and fed with human flesh,
Our bones are stuff’d with fleeces, and our holes
With naked brigs; the nimble deer at first
With pinion light our tender fawnes beguiles,
Till before man we are, and ere man knows,
One savage footprint. Therefore what wide-wind’d woe
Penetrifies our life, and wide-deserves
The dignity of death. We are thus lured
Into a darksome pit, because we lurk
In unseen haunts of innocence and fear.

Well might the Father make us wish to end
As “seniorum” writ with trumpery.
Think on thy rashness, hurl’st aside, so far
Among the clangours of the roarings of war,
That cast thee on the earth, or dost thou cast
O man, and dare the highest? What can move
With fear of death, affection, or even love?”

Oh, what a thankless smile and strong respect
The high-born offspring of our dignity
Touched to spectator! Then the world before us,
In hearing low’ring as a bird is wont,
Would fancy its great ensigns to behold,
In living bosom, fann’d by breathing gales,
And in the thousand clouds sublimely brighten.
Let us be proud—O what a servile word
Is that which passes with a princely word!

Oh, what a hope, a joy, a hope above us,
Eternally upheld and always loved!
No heart-wound strove or knew us in that trance;
Nature, in patient silence, shunn’d the trance.
With health, strength, health’s re-assume the gale;
And let the earth her choicest fruits produce,
Far lovelier than the steep and hemlock’s force.

Wake, Israel, wake! for ’tis already dawn!
See how Aurora throws her fair damoon
O’er the late-morning! putting on
Thy bright, first-fruits! that ripen’d, brightening bloom
Is like the morning morning mild and early!

Come, let us forth. Oh, by the favour of the skies,
Thou, my beloved, shalt mount and follow
Wherever thou willest, wherever thy steps be,
Ne’er canst thou find a rest more fit for thee;
In the pure bosom of the unknown world,
Thou art exalted like the first, O Love!
And must thy work be done? ’Tis well, I think.

My Christian friends, I had my life in charge,
And then I’ve spent it, having done for nothing;
All that my heart or soul could wish produced
Was a rich portion of my whole collected,
And all my other feelings had in charge,
Because the food I wished was all collected.

In vain, in vain, in vain. The tender touch
Of Nature’s hand my soul from anguish drew,
And knew no mean reserve. In vain, in vain,
I hung the snares of care upon my brow,
With wishful measure, and could urge no more,
As Nature gave me, with a yearning,
To leave the creature where he was before.

Youth was my friend,--no fairer could I find,
E’er to regret me when I thought on thee.
But even when we parted, and whene’er
I saw thee never, thine was all in vain;
And all in vain, though all in hopeless woe,
I cursed the hour that call’d me back to thee.

One night, by a watery fountain,
I sat in a dazegeon’s water,
Bubbling, chirping, parleying, forming
My brains for to waltz! And I threw up
Thy peevish petticoat, my mamma,
And got a rose-bush for my brows!

A sobbin, a sobbin, a sobbin,
My son, my daughter, my beau, my cousin,
I never shall trouble you
======================================== SAMPLE 273 ========================================
,

When I grew up and knew the spell
I was too old for exercise to know.
Then I got free supplies and hooked the bird,
The kitten quickly took the kingdom he had bought,
And to herself was given the drugs, most sweet--
So runs the tale, you see in half an hour.

The kitten did,--Oh, now my picaroons droll--
Made me a house that stood in front of it,
For I became as black as the brooding owl
That builds in the geese, and where I should be
I made a house of cards,--I'd build a fence

When spring winds blow through the soft-horned corn,
And its shy forms are lost i' the sunny sky,
And when a bird would flit in my sunny bars,
I watch the sunny light of thy pale eyes;
Thy glossy breast is bared to nature's charms,
But where is Mary?--Nay, where is the boy?
The life of a boy--ah, where?--I know not!

That boy is gone. And yet
The maid I know will play
The livelong day;
The joys that once he had
Were his,--for me.
He clove the hands of his mother's boy,
He left his own on his father's knee,
And I in my delight
Shall feel an ache
For the touch of his strumpet tongue,
When the news comes back
That his mother's grief
Has tinged her brow with down,
And that her laughing lips
Are never dry
But loving him,
The sadder things that are.

I know that I cannot forget--
I know that I cannot forget;
Yet I could not forget.

The sunset clouds of the western sky
Float crinkled around the hills,
Where the downs from the river's low, white waves
Look down with an evil look,
Or ruffle the insects' wings of dusty gold,
Where burnt-up grasses straggle and clack
Reach out to the light-house top.
The night is come; the moon shines bright;
The sky is like a blue-black night;
The down is blue, the grass is white,
And scarlet are the banks; the light
Of the flooded river shines
Like a smile and an iron tongue of flame,
As if it had fallen on my face,--
I feel that I am not wholly thine,
Ere thou be gone!

I know that thou art the real girl,
And that thou art the real girl;
That thou art best when thou goest to roam
Thy feet are long and thin;
Thy cheeks are pressed with frost and snow;
Thine eyes are tender, so--oh, yes!
Thy rosy mouth has a coral lip;
My mother called for me at even-tide,
I looked with pained surprise
At the suffering mother's lonely eyes;

And both of us seemed aware
Of the madness of her lonely mind
That cannot find itself behind
The barriers of despair.

We sat together by the fire,
Just the same old time of day;
You almost told me that we couldn't pray,
And both of us were standing there,
A-looking down on the old-fashioned way.
I wonder if you guessed 'neath the blossoms
That so trembled over their hair,
And if in their ears I whispered the message,
That I must have my eyes shut close?

And the mother looking over her shoulder,
With her arms outstretched to the sun,
And her sad face looking up at him with a sadness
As sudden as the rain comes on;
But I cried aloud, looking down on the faces
That you could see so well in them,
And I thought that all your prayers would help in
To the atoning of your heart.

The wind had withered the acorns
That wounded the soft little leaves;
The tentacle-sparrows came slowly
To where I lay on the old-fashioned way,
With just one hand on my shoulder,
And only one knee on my knee.
The sky would hold out the stars,
And forget to plead any cause
For pity or other compassion,
Or new or a little reproof;
I would have replied to her often,
That her speech was as soft as a sigh,
Or some slight shade of the lilies
Coming to woo and to die.

We could see no more than we saw them
Floating down on the old-fashioned way
Down through the gates of the City,
Through the narrow pavilions of night,
And walking there in the lonely
======================================== SAMPLE 274 ========================================
,
And draw some balm and other sap
To my fiddle-faddle,
Prying over all my limbs
Like a rope of pearls.

Ring out, little girl,
Prythee, sing of brooks,
And the wide world's turning sap
Begin to 'prickle',
For to lose is only folly
In the wise maxims of the wise
And early pleasures of the schools.
Now we will sing a roundelay
To all the neighbours that are here
Who up and down have run with us

Hear now the fiddle-faddle,
No words of scribble,
But the deuce take care of yourself to your ear,
And never need a fiddle.

You may do more than that, I think;
Ye with your levelled hair
May have less business then than talk,
Or anything, ye know, than half,
And God be praised for that.
For hear ye London bells ring loud,
And London town shall know
That ye do well for that.
But as for Adam, fain he would
Have knowne that Pan is good;
He therefore mote his neighbour's pipe
Be neer so big, he cannot drudge
With all his heart in his.

When winter is the tonge
And stars are here for play,
And you can have no fear
That Phoebus himself is gone,
I love you,
I love you,
When summer is the time,
And you are all my kith,
And whether you're a kingly cloth,
Or whether you are such a great
As some of us may be,
That when the sun is sunk,
Our children no one chews
For you, or us, or us.

There's little need to set a fine tune
To music;
We want some recreation
In the hedges and the streets,
For the pretty little minstrelsy.
Now sunbeams slant
On the fleecy stones,
Lift up such branches of the brest
That we scarcely see them,
And push out red-breast arrows
For prey, for sport,
To snatch the wretch from God, who rais'd
Up soars on empty air.

Night's wings are spread;
Who can be wise should be,
But for the wisdom of the moth
That comes flying after:
Blown brings the blackbird from the thorn,
Blown stamens from the linn,
The linnet from the lark
Up soars on wings of light.

The wild wood winds to meet them,
The wild wood clears to greet them,
And everything on earth to greet them
Is joy, for aye and aye.
Is joy a thing to die for?
When the clovers and the sheep
Fold warm round the sun's eye,
We should hear them, one by one,
Give a fairy-like reply,

The Wind blew a blast to-night,
The Blossom-bird a shriek of fright,
The Cock was out of sight!
There was scarcely breath of wind,
Scarce a pin could stir the leaves,
When the ancient Sleep-at-arms
Brightly smiling said, "My child,
On the crested over-branch
I will catch thee in a trice,
Far over yon hills and dales,
Where the wild gorse blossoms fair,
And the purple-colour'd herb
And the wild-flower lend their sweets
To the dewy under-ground;
While I steal away to seek
In the sweet and solemn night
The Sleep-at-arms which once I knew;"

Slowly closing Sleep's arms,
He took the Sleep-at-arms from me,
And, softly whispering, wavered
On my tremulous finger-tips,
Till the stars went down in the west
Like a dream from the heart of rest.

Fairy-like is that sweet child,
The Spying Swan is made for speed.
Boadice, to thee I will tell
What the little Bird can do,
When, into the uttermost Heaven of HIM,
He makes a sweet and knowing song,
To thither he'll listen, and hear the dew
Of stars descending near and far;
I will tell how the dews did fall,
When the stars were pastured at last,
And the night was almost done.

The butterfly, sitting on the daisy
That just opened to the Sun,
Rubbed her wings, and over them she spread
Her little silver net,
As though she had not heard a word:
She started up, but with a start,

======================================== SAMPLE 275 ========================================
 we judged it wise
On whom authority the praise should tend,
If by no other stated act we bend.
For always in the family at strife
'Twixt self and good, the honour and the life,
Is things of which some deal I've just heard said,
It was on Sunday after supper, sir.

The dinner waits, the luncheon, every guest,
No flavour like the gruel sweets impart.
(You see 't is praised by all who pass as good.
They give a hearty banquet to the young;
A splendid time is theirs, for they approve
You deal in gaiety, who're tender, love.)
'Tis very sad to see what they have got;
They pine for something better than a job.)
I'd like to put my curls upon the top
Of every post, and hide the frowns I force;
And having got my hair about my ears,
I'll tell you all about them in the course
Of my applause, and say I'm not deserving,
If all I care to be alive, poor list'ning,
Will be at work to-morrow afternoon,
A duty, thank you, and I'll fix the scene.
(Perhaps you'll pay my visit, if you can,
If you desire it, if you choose to-night.)

My readers may be slightly astray, but I
Can't read the prose of each new Saturday;
The evening is advancing, and we
Sit up all tiptoe, laughing at the sight
Of the calm shadows, when, far off at sea,
The watchful Lark, pre cherchanting to be,
Crows through the grove, so glorious and bright,
Has made his golden glory almost bright.

My pen is humming 'gainst these dusky walls,
Where the sweet flowers lift sleepy eyes to me;
And I repeat to-day, with absent-bees,
How sweet they are in rustling trees and trees,
And each in turn must be in his employ;
So, with a smile, I stand and bid good-morrow,
For I've been wondering all the time I've said
That anything so lovely as aught worth while
Could be in this world's commerce more than smile.

The clover seems to kiss the quiet earth,
And everything about the sky seems dressed
In lovely flowers that God has sent to gild
And polish every wandering plant and flower;
But all things wear an aspect and a grace,
Even in the very face of earthly love;
So I still softly fold my being's wings,
And bear with me through this fleeting world of things.

This is the land where every poet sings;

Here in the east what radiant colours rise,
Sunning their steps in golden bars of light,
How, through the soft and twilight-colored skies,
Where gleams not yet the spirit's opening eyes,
Birds from their fixed places their notes take flight,
And the young mornings brighten into day;
Here, too, the blood of heroes must take flight,
Bears its red banner to the courts of night,
Yet every rose must take its fresh delight,
Because in this all-circling quality,
Love has no other language than the love
That is not paid to for one minute's span;
Yet such a love as this may kindle hearts,
And hearts, like ours, grow still to be more strong,
Until, too late, the sun goes on his way,
Striving with dawn to be of newer day
To burst the world-old chivalry of song
Into the drowsy silence of the night.

Here have I known the lullaby of trees,
The violet on the dusk, the violet cool,
Myself held out with the soft gloom of leaves,
Only my eyes now cannot see the form
That seems a thing not seen and still receives,
But as it is by now the world seems new,
Though now it is not old, and now it is,
Yet something has gone from me that was
A flower, and if a blossom I had held
The hue of all the days that are now past,
It is not old, but it was sent to me
As many days before to set me free
From all those tears and suffering.  I should have
My outward shows of intellect and thought,
For outward show, of majesty and power,
Of inner self; and by the outer laws
Of spirit, I should build the secret halls
Of outward things.

What of the desolate
Who wander in the night?
I hear the beat of breasts,
I see the shadowy lights,
But not the starry blossom of the sky
That star-like shines to
======================================== SAMPLE 276 ========================================

Sends the spruce Musician, pingeus of the vein,
To quench the fires and punish life again.
But I am taught a lovers' words must be
Dim-blown as petals blown before a bee.

And this the balm that stings humanity
Is this;--from Cathay and all humanity
Ripening to mirth again; from eyes that dart
Light from low-breathed lips in time to tender heart;
From serpent sight and voice that with the sun
Torments the impetuous skies; from hale on dun
Elastic bandage, perfumed mystery;
Riot of gloom still dumb with the cloudy pales,

A cactus all unbroken, far ahead
In desolate distances: where no sun scares
The marsh-grass strange with brown, but spread and fed
With saffron spots.
One murmurs, "Nay, my child,
I never breathed a word that called me brave;
O woman, woman! child, for woman's sake!"
Holds off his soul with him and turns away
As one some ghostly pain that talks to stay
Or warns away.
"Ah, God! my child,
What word have I for all my soul in fee?
Is this prize love?" Nay, but still less for me
Than those who used to say my name before,
"Have we not yet come here?" The world looks o'er
Gray old Domes of Sin, not yours, which is
Shamefaced and cold and simple, but half true.
Who now will understand these lines of beauty,
Or live to learn the secret of the quest,
See all, all through whom the great Creator's
Divine success hath ever best expressed?
You speak too well, your coldness just inspires
To passionate words and breaths. Be not afraid;
Nor pray too long, nor wish too long, in vain.
Your lissom chinees showed you as you rounded
Each goblet's end, which you, poor child, alone
Could never give, if you would give it all.
I stood by one who nursed his genius, rapt
In that small art which takes a moldering lie
Back in his heart, where, in the fireside glow,
He learned love, as you,--to know, to cry.

Ah! was there ever any peace like these?
I ask. 'Tis much. We two may rise and live
Forever, and we both may turn to go.
Your grief, my child, subdues me; and I ween
That never yet one thought of you can smother;
And, as I never loved, no thought of you
Can ever, in my soul, and, looking through
Your lids, I think of you,--can only so.

I dare not hope from your glad heaven of sight
To change in anything, and say to me,--
If only of that faith which proved to me
The charm that fled from me and left me lone
I take from you,--I cannot hear the tongue
Of a deceived one tell me what was all.

I have all I have asked, my child, from you,
All I can give, be nothing but of you;
And, if it be not so, you will refuse
To give a generous gift to me--to use
Not more. If you would have me hold your hand
Away, and win my love, not more, for life,
I dare not ask your father or your wife
To give a helping hand. Why not deceive,
Out of her best, her strength, her heart, her brain
Is but a little something. When she speaks,
It is her voice which wants my heart to hear--
Your voice which looks for me, and I would be
Too good for nothing but a single one,
But for the one who sees you. Then I come,
I am in you. To mine own worship, then,
I'll come, my child, and find you in your childhood,
In your most pleasant dreams, and, as I see,
Believe, I know you'd rather be a child,
Than one who sees you.

He met her somewhere in the twilight dim,
Strange company there, some in starlight there,
Some in their office under the sun,
Some in the starlight; and the thought was not
Its fitting motion, nor their souls the less
Able to bear it. And she seemed to me
The mother of dreams and so of happiness,
As she went down the stairs. "Well done, well done!"
He cried, and they arose, and, stretching out
Their hands, the others slept in the dim light
======================================== SAMPLE 277 ========================================
 at once with fasten'd knees,
And trembling lips expect no more the aid
Of sudden adoration of his Lord.
O then with fervent zeal, He warm'd the blood
Of either  priest, and chose with pious speech
To pass their watch, their useful toil to bring.
When neither ceaseless was the work, nor short,
Was needful for it; yet, with fervent zeal
Calling the Gods to witness, He resum'd
The message to perform'd; exceeding soon,
He deem'd the Gorgon rolling with its fires,
And glowing embers, thus it spake again:
"O Heav'n, I will confess the fault which lie
In that best work which shall with our own right
Deem less than knowledge of the Pow'r supreme,
When our futurity is clos'd in sleep.
For Heav'n allows not aught, that is beneath
The Heaven thou gav'st; not ev'n to Heav'n is owed
Our knowledge or our knowledge, yet the Gods
Delight in good, and we confess it oft
To err in silence, though in deep distress."

To whom the Lord: "Thy words persuade, my Son.
What further shall I say?  another time
I can prepare to follow thee aright;
Thou canst not with Predestination go,
Thou canst not with Predestination go,
But canst not with Predestination go,
Nor by the Scribe of Sacred continence
Nor by the Scribes of Tents, whose crosses Heav'n
Thou canst not with Predestination go.
Therefore it is expedient to inquire
What thou dost ask, whether thou com'st or no;
And, to my Son, if thou exactly know,
The short existence of thy mortal lot,
What canst thou ask, but only of thy Son?"

He answer'd thus: "A Thousand times have brought
My stubborn spirit to that ragged ridge
Of Tears, and many have with me depriv'd,
Through this abode of punishment, ere now
Created vast and round; but in my woe,
If it be great or small, to have liv'd in joy,
What can it then avail that I should fear
Some Deity, and some kind Deity,
Who sav'd me in the shape of my own form.
Therefore to me is this their doom assign'd,
That they their doom may aggravate my woe.
But come, let us in silence pass the hours
That I may say, and know that I must go
On others 'bove the Good; for when they list,
I will be like the rest; and, buried deep
Within my heart, will urge them on to go,
For they are strongest by the strongest sin.
But first, if thou wilt pity me, and prove
My strength against them, I will send in charge
A strong and angry oath to break their oath;
Then, by thy head, and by my hand, subdue
The ill-barr'd multitude, and sate them all
Under the seat of God.  For should a King
Arrive and that ill-judg'd me, I intend
That he should by his own right hand possess
The person of his glory, who shall free
All treasons wound in me, and due revenge
Urge on his foes; with fire and hostile flames
Heap on his enemies, and fill all Troy.
Then shall I wo to thee, and heavy groans
A passage tore in twain from all the plains
Of Argos, and lament my coming death,
If any know thee, pity me no more."

Thus saying, he drew down his purple veil,
And to the Sire of Gods and men gave laws:
Nine golden-irised axes, fitted each
To other's use, bore down the slender string.
On the fourth morn, in saffron robe array'd,
With skilful fingers Argan to the strings
Fell, and he to the chords of the sweet pipe
Responded: "Nature ever with diffused light
Diverts the dark womb, and in her prisons hides
The madd'ning serpent; she meanwhile at last,
Through the great portals of the darksome shades,
Not seldom thence shall Ube's son behold
His shadow lengthen'd by the doom of death.
But come, and I will sing thee, ere the day
Pervaded shall return to this sad mourn
Where even toils and sufferings are denied.

"Ah, gentle Bird! the Muses did allow
Thy warbling voice to soothe my sad despair.
======================================== SAMPLE 278 ========================================
 sad there lies a bitter grief.
Beneath that wilder strand
A daughter stands and cries:
"O fair, if thou, to me
Shall Christian charity supply!"
And the coming of that is mighty,
"Now, child," she cries,
"In what righteous cause to suffer
Is help the Lord with God.
They will bring thee to thy father,
To all thy woes and all thy pains!
For them shalt thou no comfort be,
When thou comest to the arms of God!"
And that is all she meets and says,
"For them in heaven shall lie our bones."

Methinks I hear some earnest cries,
And I would rather be in hell
Than to be strong like her to-day,
With her upon the witch's lea!
To think upon her wasted life,
And call for golden ransom rife
With griefs for her, the dreary things,
While she is by, and dreams of God!

Poor wind! what sighing in thy face?
Thou art a ghost, amid the mists
That follow in an evil hour;
And ere another dawn shall wane,
Thy poor soul and thine own will wane.
Low on the floor thy shadow lies;
No word there speaks of heaven or hell.
There is a breath upon thy cheek,
A softer breath, a holier air;
Thy lips are as a marble saint,
Thy lips are as a prophet's prayer.

Yet in the holy house above,
Upon the starry arch of Thought,
Most holy and most sweet of things,
The sound of singing softly caught
Smiles from the lips that cannot speak,
And all the rest is like a trance
Born of a new and living fire,
That makes the sinner thrice athirst,
Until, like melted icicles,
The holy flames leap up to light.

Why, let me on the floor be stayed,
Because a little child I were!
And then, O sweet to scatter dust,
And hide me in the coolest nook,
Though over me the ripples pass,
Or o'er the spring a murmur brook
Of sudden silver, smooth and fine,
In rainy streaks of sunny light,
Like rainbows, when they fell to-night!

When you and I have walked beneath
The shadow of the naked trees,
And seen the hollow rivers, out
In crystal light, become as we
See through a scattering of flowers,
And gentle rivers, safe at home,
Remembering little, tender trees
With all their waving grass in spring,
And grass with green, and flower-like flowers,
While still the air breathes odours,
And only heaven in such an hour
Can change earth into a sweet perfume.

O you that are my bride, take heed
Of all my songs that you have heard;
For if you see my songs indeed,
You cannot keep your eyes from me,
Your voice so near the window-sill
Must sound and come to understand.

If I go out, my Rose, into the earth
Where thickest darkness ends, I will go forth
And show thee what I know.  O flower-sport!

I will not say too proudly to thyself:
Thou art not that whereof sweet women tell
Thee tales; but that sweet hour of sweet birds' breath
That made those gentle trees articulate,
I will not say too proudly to thyself:
Thou art not that whence springs the air of Morn
Those flowers to be.  O flower! that art
Fit to be loved and put away from me!

O flower! that art the flower of all my days,
The dew of all my hopes, and flower of all my days!
Were I a primrose, that would shrink and pine
All winter in the summer-shower,
And die to be a wanton flower,
I would not claim thee for my love,
Till thy fair form should be all thine own,
And all thy gold not thine.

The world will hold thee small enough,
Nor drape its heavy robes;
Through outer mist the peaks and vales
Of sun and moon shine through thy roots,
And into flowery lands;
The wide and level earth becomes a shrine
Where thou wert used to stand.

How shall I woo thee?  how; till late
Through all the summer-tide?
Through the bare boughs of the saltbush,
Through the bare boughs of the saltbush,
On to the fireside of thy root,
And down into the ground!

That we may
======================================== SAMPLE 279 ========================================
'd if we push into the ruinous
airy memorable land of woe;
And pined and pined, forsaken by the low,
seeking them out of sight and sight,
Safely the scene I'll leave:--but not for long
shall I compose this tale.

Old Gaffer's Night Thought of How Bhar Was Luck
Alas, I'm writing here some rhymes to-day,
Full of forbidden scenes, which seem
Like festive pleasures, fraught with woes and joys
Too sad for simple tale or song to raise,
Like some poor song that feels its poignant pain
And longs to die.

Like a whip-lash's face, through shades of even
The moonlight of those shady trees,
With eyes of jet, like twilight, dark,
And tangled for the purple fruits,
Your face seems strangely beautiful,
Altho' perhaps you hide your eyes,
And look as if you saw the face
Of one who does not love the moonlight,
And listening to the birds about
Are half asleep, while low and loud
The whip-lash's strain the night-rain sounds,
A sad but glorious strain.

Striving to stand within my reach
To look upon your face,
I kept my gaze upon the moon
And watch, with all my soul at ease,
Till clouds withdrew like clouds before the wind,
And earth and sky conspired to find
Some fairer fruit.

I stood beside your feet, I knew
Your pain, your rapture!
Then I went on
And loved you more--more, much more,
More,--more!
The way is long,
The path is clear
For you, my lover dear,
I cannot walk
I am my own dear shepherd, do not fear!
For here is nothing, here is anything,
But flowers or leaves
Or music leaves
That belongs to the hours
And the day
And the mind
Is constantly confined
To the thought
That is ever refined
And refined
Till by sorrow refined
As morn
Is with light
And the moon.

How visionary and wild
The lulling of this thought!
Incomparable, soft and slow,
Wit, genius and genius are;
But hark!
How sweet the morn
That tinkles so,
While larks are sipping their morningward
From skies of blue.

There is a garden of my own
Where autumnal leaves have fallen
Upon their parent vine;
A palace of delight
And gardens of my own.

Curtained of sun, and once a little vale
And close to viewless foliage here,
Within the gleaming shade of summer trees,
Let us retrace our steps once more
Over the mountains and the hills and rocks
Till they can scarcely pass.

Here will we make delay;
See, far away
A great sea
And distant villages
All sparkling with the sun,
The coming of the rains.
We will not wait till these
Be overleaped with trees,
Then I shall rise in state,
With all my crown of boughs.

Then will the coming of the rains
Bring many allies;
And when we pause a little while
After the silence, then we shall
Look into eternity.

The great sun sinks in the West,
And the dew is falling cool,
Low lies the hill on his breast,
And the fog and the mist of the pool
Around him are falling,
From evening's clear fountain
The stars troop like travellers.

What is that which rises here?
He stands high in the heavens serene,
The traveller through mist is passing near,
The sun shines on him, and in my face
His image is reflected.
Why is it that the year
With its clouds must be filled?
Do they still bright or dead?
Do they still bright or dead?
The world has yet a prison
That fetters me out of my prison,
And that prison itself looks like death,
And nothing is living but pain.

I should die as I have;
Death would be a crushing companion,
But pain must be too strong.
I should die as I have;
But the sun shines on me,
And the dead dreams, but not one.

My love is alive to-day,
I shall not be a slave;
My love is alive to-morrow,
But the dead dream, not the grave.

I am listening, not listening;
I am watching, not listening;
There is a sound of singing
Not of wind and cloud,
So do I feel in my heart,
In the grass beneath the sun.

My
======================================== SAMPLE 280 ========================================
,
Shaking off leaves, and crying:  "Bring I wine!"
The king had nearly closed the refrain,
There is a fragrance everywhere,
A softness everywhere,
Softness that rises everywhere,
Over the silence everywhere.
There is a quiet on the earth,
There is a silence in the air;
The voiceless air is one with mirth,
And softly, where the roses flare,
A liquid silver drips, and falls
Cool, scentless things
Upon the idle earth.

The gods are they who came to earth
And set the seas ablaze with gold.
There is a breeze upon the sea,
A sea of summer in its folds,
A salt, enchanted breeze that mocks
The scents of life, from far away
Comes slumbrous, sad, and quaint, and quaint.
The mother of the gods, that day,
With mortal feet and sweet voice speaks,
And smiles, and speaks to men:  "My Sweet,
I shall not weary of thy pain."

All day the weariness hangs on,
The earth is like an Autumn night;
The dew falls on the roseate bloom,
The moments fly from dream to dream;
All day, with sheaves of yellow light
About the feet of angels walked,
The shining, moon-lit dew they drink;
All day, with hours, with hours, and hours,
By broken vows, through nights and days,
With hearts akin to joy and tears,
The passing to their upper years,
The language of their peace that glows.
All day the frost hangs on the rose;
The faint grey frost along the snow
Gathers the silver flakes from off
The leaves, and like a holy thing
Makes the heart sing its brother-song.

The village tower beneath the hill
Begins to weave a summer-spell,
And through the crumbling arch one rill
Doth glitter down an angel-troop -
A bed of sparkling, flowering mist,
Warm, silver-tinted streams, that twist
Their silver way through leaves and boughs,
And kiss each other in the wind.

White roses, blithe and beautiful,
They die and die as dews of night,
But the slow, fragrant winds of light
Drink of them, and it is not long
Forever so we may divine
Our far, bright future, old and wise.

A young wind is blowing from the west,
Shaken by the leaf, he comes.
He whispers in my ear; his earnest eyes
Fix on the eternal home; his hand
Points thitherward, and, reaching his hand,
Sits long ago.  His angels stand
Waiting his will.  His soul so swift
Runs onward by the soul:  "He comes!"
I hear him whisper in my ear;
His voice is on my heart, his breath
Seems cold and vibrant like a sea.
He was the image and the dream
That waiteth for the promised hour.
I hear him whisper, as the breeze
Trails with the singing of the tower,
Telling him of the precious keys
Wherethrough the spirit of this land
Shall come to take his rest.

Oh, soft the sound of lute and flute!
Oh, soft the touch of his brown hand!
"He comes! he comes!" and every note
Of his rare song, and every chord
Trembling to melody, and all
The wild strings stirring in a world,
Waken a wonder, thrilling it,
"He comes! he comes!"

I hear him breathing on the night;
I see his blood-red crest; his curls
Above him, as he leans, to hear
A watchman's plaintive accents fall
From off his arm, and, strong and lit
With life, a surging rush of tongues,
Roll on the shouting cliff and shoal,
Near and more near, until he turns
And look - and lo! his face appears -
As if he fain, in human fears,
Had blessed the passing years.

A full year's dawn, a strong one too,
Bids me be happy and supreme;
Not in vague phantasies of dream
Endures the morning with its rays,
But all the night it withers and dies.

I am weary and so much to-day
Of the orchard, the orchard, and the pond;
I want to hear once more the hum
Of bee, as if no one had spoken words,
And the soft, sheep-walk in the grass.
There are tones in every bird that passes,
And a fugitive mood in every flower
======================================== SAMPLE 281 ========================================
 and cuirasses,
With hair that spotless and cold as snow.

Then let us o'er the moonlight wave
And with pure heart our course we guide.
While falling dews are soft and clear
With the cool dews as perfume weave,
Whilst even the cloudless winds we dare
To quiver with peritating breath
In the dark regions of Death beneath,
We 'll walk by the wave in the lap of the great deep,
That hangs low moaning on the breakers.

Farewell to Nature, all her treasures!
Now the birds of spring come fluting,
And back again in clefts to battle
Have gone with gleaming swallows,
Till the blue bound fount of ether
Is cradled in each coral bed.
Farewell to Progne that brave old ocean
Is cloven by their fearful chains--
To all who sail the stormy foam

O God! this is the doom,
This is the doom of me,
Wilt Thou not? All the world is blank
With all its griefs and sorrows.
I hope that time shall wrap the crust
And wash away each care
And cleanse my soul from every lie
That is so cruelly dear.

This is the doom,
This is the doom of me,
Wilt Thou not? All the world is blank
With all its griefs and sorrows.
When Winter blights the naked trees
And whistles on the blast,
By goodness of the winds that please,
Thou wilt not hear me laugh.

This is the doom,
This is the doom of me,
Wilt thou not? All the world is blank
With all its griefs and sorrows.
The world breaks in upon me like a curse,
I'll follow to the grave
Where Winter, with his tattered locks,
Is waiting for the gloomy rooks
That soar above the wave.

I would not rise and think of him
Who all day long ago,
And from the deathless birds at night
Forgiveness with his woe.
I would not leave him, nor forget
A friend so dear to me;
For this to me is but to go
And nevermore to see

Not with him goes the glorious Spring
With rich gifts of rejoicing,
But blithe as the merry swallows
That bring glad thoughts of home;
Not in the gold of autumn,
But teaching me to sing,
Blithe as the birds of winter,
That hasten the king's bird.

So with songs for my teacher,
And childish verses for old,
I live for my master,
And for ever for his gold;
All that comes from the reader,
Greater than all we miss,
Heart to heart is a song-bird,
The fays of Aillipps thereafter
Come, let us go and meet
Under the trees, and greet
Each other again and again,
And each has made the complete

Wake! for the light is retiring,
The garlands awhile are falling,
The foliage with dew is dight,
And all the leaves are falling,

We'll go and greet each other
Under the trees, and greet
Bright skies and silvery latches,
Smiling when we meet;
Blithe as the bird of summer,
That banishes care and sadness,
That banishes grief and sadness,
That banishes care and sadness.

I saw a twilight in the sky,
A soft and silver light,
And thought, if haply grief and joy
May be the guide of light,
That is the beam of joy and light
That makes the darkness bright.

"O sister!" exclaimed the mother,
"A bright, good-morrow!
Make haste, make haste, my kite,
Before the chilly North-west
To-morrow veils its scarlet glow
And breathes its freshened bloom."

"This is a brave night," she said,
"A merry, joyous day;
But when will this good day
Be gone in such an evil way?
And then my mother away."

And she, with gentle tones,
Broke back the words she said,
While still her gaze engraven
Felt on his face and fled.

Not one more tender glance of love
Came to the mother's eyes,
But, through her trembling speechless speech,
Flashed of soft Indian skies.

And then she kissed his forehead,
And said: "The mists are rising;
Our brother meets the sea,
Across the edges breaking,
In blue and silver sheen."

Her mother's
======================================== SAMPLE 282 ========================================
 rough and wove with gray;
In face and shape the ball they trace,
And wrestling with this hardened race,
While gentle glances meet their gaze,
They seem to feel a faltering feet,
And trace the movement of their feet.

Then ends the dance--the sport begun,
And hearts with truest ardor run,
As rocks 'gainst winter blow they fly,
Defiant, wild, to sky and sky.
They bow, they look, with wild surprise,
And from their eyes the streams run dry.
And while with stern delight they view
The game they chafe and turn to woo,
The matron comes, and with her train
Joints the bright frocks of the main.

His eye, that on some nook of earth
Seems nearest to his restless eye,
Sees far beneath, the ocean's birth,
While far away, a vapoury sky,
The Night's long anthem swells and swells
Like the clear trump of war it rouses,
And every breeze that sweeps the seas
Makes joyous shout from many towers.

O when shall Earth, in winter steeped,
In the deep tomb of stone be laid?
When will her busy hands forget
To wreathe her with the mistletoe,
And deck her in her golden hair,
By cunning means that others wear?

And when the westering sun grows low,
In the next after hours to show,
When Night o'ershades the brow of night,
And stars their heralds Hesper bring,
When the star's silver wheel shall run,
And with his light the world's round Sun
Turn homeward to his ebon throne?

The flush of shame is gone, and on his cheek
Bare thoughts of fearful battle speak.
A lovely youth, with gleaming spear,
Akin to Mars, himself sincere,
Is gone with grief and Conscience near;
Foredews he has, and dinted steel,
And cannons' wrath to Pallas dear,
With souls distraught he 'scapes the foe,
He mounts, he flies, he slaughters all,
At once, he steps aside, 'tis vain,
His darling hour, he swift commands,
To altars fair, and armour-band,
With bows and arrows are aloud.

See! from the altar, at the shrine
Saturnian Umbellus springs in line,
With precious robes (bays bright with wine)
And piles of clotted blood of Thine;
He, smiling, with a bride and prayer,
Now storms the skies with sullen stare,
And on the threshold treads amain
When soon he hears the trumpet's swell,
And glory bursts from lips of hell.

A fairy youth, with rosy cheek,
As coy's a flower, as young and fair,
As young and fair as any child,
With fancies bright, and dreamy air;
But, ah! more meet he must embrace
A faery isle with such a grace,
That, calling forth the jealous Dead,
The wanton sisters cheerly fled;
Then left her home and, void of care,
In woods and wilds and wilds repair.

Beneath a tree, whose aged trunk
With pinion spread, the Prophet's step
Pursues the ark; there full in view
He meets the sable tribes which swarm
Beneath that tree, whose bolerous arm
Points towards heaven's battlements.
There, without fear of enterprise,
Rides down with hoary tresses high,
Each following other to deep coil,
Nor ever less the unknown force
When Thou art in their wonted walks.

As some huge pile, the wanderer's fear,
Condensed, the earth still forward bears,
Which crackling o'er the woodland bends,
Before the alkaiff screen it bends,
And, waving far around, to fit
The closest fence around.

Who thus, in gentle words, accosts
With heavenly names the absent and unknown?
Lov'st thou the daughters of this land,
From mountain groves, and streams which roll
Thro' the salt sands?
Or by the waters hast thou won
Delay, which every wave hath shown,
For all benighted as the whole.
But few, who thus have learned to know,
Delight in this great world below,
With half so many ardent looks,
Have thought their tastes indeed of brooks
And fresh rosebuds, a thought is theirs;
Which is not slow, they say, to mix,
For fountains cannot satisfy,
Nor r
======================================== SAMPLE 283 ========================================
 off from us,
And crush me in a wriggle's pace.
Oh let not my remembrance roam
Throughout the throng, or far away;
For I am past and not at home,
Though unrestrain'd, and driven by care,
And should I once more cross the air
Yield my sole chance with joy or fear,
'Twould then be well for a man like this
To die for the confusion of him.

We are but dead!  Then to the press
Let us as bachelor make our prayer:
That this may not be his, in fact,
But dead for the assurance there.
For which account the man who dies
Will more than never fail to speak
Of one day's duty, when life dies
For that no earthly task is sought.
His life is borne by many times
And many times 'twill come about,
When they who first before him stood,
The men of king's eternity,
Will learn to live as brave men are,
Then come and have their liberty.

In vain men's pride, or bondsmen's woe,
Alas!  'Tis theirs to strike and blow.
The dreadful blow but lightly dealt
Will not be dealt in kind or ill.
And like a ship at rest, whose course
Is idly o'er the waters vent.

Oh!  God!  Thy great economy
Is sealed by truth, for all we see
Are moaning and complaining;
And all things else that move or strive
Are motionless as ocean.
Yes, Nature's God!  Oh!  God of might,
That in the darkest hour of night
Thy creatures' good would fail us all,
And earth--without her.

Ah!  Nature 's stubborn as her clay,
And wreck'd is heaped for each sweet end,
Yet the sole reasonable ray
Will always guide us on our way.
Then if she dwells with holy fire,
If her heart's darkness turn to mist,
Will she renew the God we name,
And put the former God to use?
Oh!  Nature's God!  Oh!  God of might,
That hast thou made it, and design,
With silent brow and fearless mien,
To waken up its wildest flame,
Through the wild dogs to mingling shame,
And lift it up with steadfast gaze
Unto the face of a God, the Lord
Who holds his heaven on his right hand.
So naught but heaven is left to thee,
Nor reason is to be prevail'd,
But not to see the sons of sin
Whose blood till yesterday was well;
But nevermore the sinner shall
By the keen blade be led to hell.

"What fools are you, who fain would see
A worthy thing?" quoth one.
"If thou canst see aught else for me,
I have no need of sight;"
"There is a thing, if seen right,
That shines in heaven or earth,
Shall my dead body find;
And great things be of birth."

"The wise God tells his wisdom:
I know him where he dwells,
For there is none he knows;
And though he seeketh bliss,
The very lowest hell
Will be upstayed with woe."

Thus spake the dying saint,
And wept that he should die.

And I must say my say,
If I may see and prove
That as I saw and prove,
I will endure, and love;
And as I deem it best,
So mourn I as though none
Would ever after know
The weary waste of woe
When Death, whose dreadful hand
Had ta'en so long that scanned,
With sight of all his store,
Hath set the world before.

"How then shall I be glad
That I did thus arise?"
The Lord replied, and sad,
"How can I, Lord, thus mourn
As though I were a clerk
To lend me other leaven,
And cast me out of heav'n?"

The Lord cried out, and smil'd,
Then put his vesture on.
They mounted at the word,
A sunbeam took their way;
They pass'd, and come again,
As fain that I might stay;
And as before they stood,
A light shone on their aisles.
I saw them as they pass'd,
But I could not perceive
How I should look at them;
Nor could I at the sight
For spirits to endure;
For of their truth I did
My prayers, all I could,
That death could thus be got
Without the least defect,

======================================== SAMPLE 284 ========================================
 fair thy brow;
Breathe on these flowers thy melting sigh;
And let thy liquid breast retain
The image of my inward pain.
Then if thou canst--that need must be--
Thy grief is overmastered by me.

Dying, that ear which has no ears
To hear, but for the eye is near--
The dew will leave some heavy sigh,
And leave it soft and sweet to die.
Fair Derwente! if any chance
Thy choice to share may give,
Which must for thee be fair to see--
The eye of Nature blind must be!
Ah, say, for one fond mournful hour,
The "last years" have thy tomb!
Weep not, faint heart, for the days are come,
And thine has been the fate of all!

Thy wish is gone--thy love is thine--
Thy joys have passed away--
Thy hopes have fled--Thy joys have fled--
Ah! whither are thy lambs and ewes?
Who is it now these violets raise,
Singing from spray to spray,
This year a dirge of Ariel
From unknown realms away?

So hither, sweetest Spring,
To thee we send the strain,
That with a note thou still must sing
Throughout the world again;
The smile that shines from Heaven,
And brighter far than thine,
Is still to sweeten in the heart
The lovely seasons old.

So, sweetest Winter, thou
To me didst lend thyself,
Thy evenings to renew,
Thy morn to crown with flowers
The daisy-path of love.
O, emblem of the soul,
Still, before thee shalt thou fling
That soil, which earth did not estend,
Nor erring care where earth did spring.

Come hither, every heart!
And read from every page
The magic name of things
Who now are at thy side!
O, not a single look!
I catch the sacred fire
Amid thy dewy boughs--
Such look as innocence beguiles--
But, ah, such look as love beguiles!

There is a mystery in the air
Which is not born of summer days,
As instinct with the sweet surprise
Of beauty's features hath it flings
Unspeakable upon the eyes--
As in a rainbow's perfect birth,
Ere Heaven withholds its brightening wings.

I may not linger, I may not stay;
I would not creep into thy bower!
But in that instant I must lay
Myself beneath this savage power;
And if some creeping linnet, dressed
With russet locks of wilder brown,
Should chase away the pensive guest,
Whose heart with fear is always full,
It yet may draw from hour to hour
A deeper feeling for the powers
Of Nature, and a holier power
To make the bosom of the earth,
Unsatisfied and free from dreariness!

Come, then, deliverer of the scene!
Who thus have led us to the door
Which Nature keeps for ever, till
The hope, the zest, the spirits fail
Of seeing farther than before--
As, after scenes of sceneless shade
And sunless skies and fading stars
We still may tread enchanted ground,
And muse upon the sunlit heights
That yet will shine as in their youth!

O, thou Great Master of the earth!
O, thou art in the light of God!
Thy wisdom is abroad in all
That hemisphere is veiled from man.
And watching earth--earth's mighty sons--
The golden fruit of wisdom bear,
Whose radiance buildeth in the heart
The portals of a purer air.
O thou, that day of union born
With day--that