s: Like the Gods with whom they have walked;


s: They shall come from the West in royal state,


s: The Singers and Thinkers for whom we wait.


s: For the way grew so lonely and troubled;


s: Then I joined the great rabble and throng


s: That frequents the moneyed world's mart;


s: But the greed, and the grasping and wrong,


s: For my soul and my spirit said straightway,


s: In the pride and the pleasure of wealth,


s: I can laugh at the world and its sages--


s: Though the green earth is fair and I love it,


s: And your life shall be glad with surprises


s: And your life shall be happy as mine is,


s: High in the heavens I saw the moon this morning,


s: Unto my soul it spoke, in voice of warning,


s: Thou Christ of mine, thy gracious ear low bending


s: To catch the countless prayers to Heaven ascending--


s: Some secret wish for fame, or gold, or power,


s: Dear, patient Christ, who listeneth hour on hour,


s: Let this young year that, silent, walks beside me,


s: To lead me up, no matter what betide me,


s: If it need be that ere I reach the fountain


s: My feet should bleed from sharp stones on the mountain,


s: If my vain soul needs blows and bitter losses


s: Then bruise it, burn it, burden it with crosses,


s: Do what thou wilt to mold me to thy pleasure,


s: Heap full of anguish yet another measure


s: Send dangers--deaths! but tell me how to dare them;


s: Send trials, tears! but give me strength to bear them--


s: Sometimes at night, when I sit and write,


s: As my brain grows hot with burning thought,


s: I can hear the beat of my swift blood's feet,


s: With my soul's fine ear I listen and hear


s: As it leans on the breast of Night to rest,


s: And the darkness turns in its sleep, and yearns


s: And I hear the hiss of a scorching kiss,


s: In its hurrying race through leagues of space,


s: As it heaves and moans, and shudders and groans,


s: Oh, sweet and strange are the sounds that range


s: And the watcher who waits by the dim, dark gates,


s: And feels his heart swell in him large enough


s: His great Creator's standard, though he dwells


s: Outside the pale of churches, and knows not


s: Is that outreaching bigness that ignores


s: All littleness of aims, or loves, or creeds,


s: And clasps all Earth and Heaven in its embrace.


s: Let the old snow be covered with the new:


s: The trampled snow, so soiled, and stained, and sodden.


s: By pure white flakes, all trackless and untrodden.


s: When Winter dies, low at the sweet Spring's feet,


s: Let him be mantled in a clean, white sheet.


s: The old past life so full of sad mistakes,


s: By deeds as white and silent as snow-flakes.


s: Ere this earth life melts in the eternal Spring


s: Let the white mantle of repentance, fling


s: Let them march once more through Georgia


s: It will live in the heart of the nation,


s: We would bring out the treasured knapsack,


s: I hold it the duty of one who is gifted,


s: And specially dowered in all men's sight,


s: He must mold the man into rare completeness,


s: He must fashion his thoughts into perfect sweetness,


s: And cast out folly and pride from his mind.


s: For he who drinks from a god's gold fountain


s: Must sift from his soul the chaff of malice,


s: And weed from his heart the roots of wrong.


s: Great gifts should be worn, like a crown befitting!


s: And the toil must be constant and unremitting


s: Which lifts up the king to the crown's demands.


s: I have been across the bridges of the years.


s: Were the ties on which I trod, going back


s: To the valley where I left, 'neath skies of Truth,


s: As I went, I dropped my burdens, one and all--


s: All my sorrows, all my wrinkles, all my care,


s: I laid down, like some lone pilgrim's heavy pack,


s: As I neared the happy valley with light feet,


s: And my spirits gushed and bubbled like a fountain


s: On the border of that valley I found you,


s: And we wandered through the golden Summer-Land


s: And my pulses beat with rapture in the blisses


s: And we met there, in those green and verdant places,


s: And sweet laughter echoed upward from the dells


s: And the world was spilling over with the glory


s: It was but a dreamer's journey of the brain;


s: I have left the happy valley far behind;


s: Time stands waiting with his burdens in a pack


s: As he speeds me, like a rough, well-meaning friend,


s: Will I find again the lost ones loved so well?


s: But the dead know what the life will be to come--


s: As some dusk mother shields from all alarms


s: The tired child she gathers to her breast,


s: The brunette Night doth fold me in her arms,


s: And hushes me to perfect peace and rest.


s: Her eyes of stars shine on me, and I hear


s: Her voice of winds low crooning on my ear.


s: O Night, O Night, how beautiful thou art!


s: Come, fold me closer to thy pulsing heart.


s: The day is full of gladness, and the light


s: And only hear the great world's voice which rings


s: The sweet Night draws me--whispers, "Look within!"


s: And looking, as one wakened from a dream,


s: I see what _is_--no longer what doth seem.


s: The Night says, "Listen!" and upon my ear


s: Revealed, as are the visions to my sight,


s: The voices known as "Beautiful" come near


s: Great, blue-eyed Truth, her sister Purity,


s: Their brother Honor, all converse with me,


s: And kiss my brow, and say, "Be brave of heart!"


s: The Night says, "Child, sleep that thou may'st arise


s: Strong for to-morrow's struggle." And I feel


s: Her shadowy fingers pressing on my eyes:


s: The Slumberland, made beautiful and bright


s: As death, by dreams of loved ones gone from sight,


s: O food for soul's, sweet dreams of pure delight,


s: The world grows green on a thousand hills--


s: By a thousand willows the bees are humming,


s: And hearing a thrush and a blue-bird singing,


s: And all for me are the joys it is bringing.


s: Thrush and blue-bird came North together.


s: The wild Wind follows and plays the lover.


s: (I have read, and heard, and do not doubt it)


s: Has burned up a thousand worlds like this,


s: And help it to grow through golden hours.


s: And laugh, if you please, at my lack of reason,


s: Can read the hearts of the crimson roses.


s: The world grows glad in your smiling weather;


s: And wept and cried with anguished breath,


s: Last night I knelt low at my lady's feet.


s: One soft, caressing hand played with my hair,


s: And one I kissed and fondled. Kneeling there,


s: She was so fair, so full of witching wiles--


s: And all my heaven was compassed by her smiles.


s: Her soft touch on my cheek and forehead sent,


s: Like little arrows, thrills of tenderness


s: Through all my frame. I trembled with excess


s: Of love, and sighed the sigh of great content.


s: Reaches a stern hand forth and deals a blow.


s: Sweet through the dusk I heard my lady's voice.


s: "My love!" she sighed, "My Carlos!" even now


s: I feel the perfumed zephyr of her breath


s: Bearing to me those words of living death,


s: And starting out the cold drops on my brow.


s: That, in the supreme hour of love's delight,


s: Veiled by the shadows of the falling night,


s: She should breathe low his name, forgetting me?


s: I will not ask her! 'twere a fruitless task,


s: For, woman-like, she would make me believe


s: Some well-told tale; and sigh, and seem to grieve,


s: Since I know he has claimed some one or all


s: He must have knelt and kissed her, in some sad


s: And tender twilight, when the day grew dim.


s: Why, reveries like these have made men mad!


s: He must have felt her soft hand on his brow.


s: If Heaven was shocked at such presumptuous wrongs,


s: And plunged him in the grave, where he belongs,


s: _Still she remembers_, though she loves me now.


s: And if he lives, and meets me to his cost,


s: Why, what avails it? I must hear and see


s: That curst name "Carlos" always haunting me--


s: There sat two glasses filled to the brim,


s: Said the glass of wine to his paler brother,


s: "Let us tell tales of the past to each other;


s: I can tell of a banquet, and revel, and mirth,


s: For the proudest and grandest souls on earth


s: Fell under my touch, as though struck with blight.


s: From the heads of kings I have torn the crown;


s: From the heights of fame I have hurled men down.


s: I have tempted the youth with a sip, a taste,


s: That has made his future a barren waste.


s: And the shrieks of the lost were sweet to me.


s: Fame, strength, wealth, genius before me fall;


s: "Can you boast of deeds as great as mine?"


s: Of a king dethroned, or a murdered host,


s: By my crystal drops made bright and glad;


s: Of thirsts I have quenched, and brows I have laved;


s: Of hands I have cooled, and souls I have saved.


s: I have leaped through the valley, dashed down the mountain,


s: Slept in the sunshine, and dripped from the fountain.


s: I have burst my cloud-fetters, and dropped from the sky.


s: And everywhere gladdened the prospect and eye;


s: I have eased the hot forehead of fever and pain;


s: I have made the parched meadows grow fertile with grain.


s: I can tell of the powerful wheel of the mill,


s: That ground out the flour, and turned at my will.


s: These are the tales they told each other,


s: The glass of wine and its paler brother,


s: As they sat together, filled to the brim,


s: His walls were ablaze with the splendors


s: Time sped. And he lived, loved, and suffered;


s: But the world? the world bowed down before it,


s: Oh, his songs were as blithe as the morning,


s: But the world? lo! it offered its homage


s: Of a world that looks on through its tears.


s: What a rest from strife and the burdens of life


s: What a way out of care, and worry and wear,


s: Should it lose its balance, and go with a leap


s: What a blest relief it would bring to the grief,


s: To be suddenly hurled from the solar world


s: We would go with a lunge and a mighty plunge


s: What a wild mad thrill our veins would fill


s: Should float through the air to God knows where,


s: No dark, damp tomb and no mourner's gloom,


s: But in one swift breath a painless death


s: What greater bliss could we ask than this,


s: Through leagues of space to a resting place,


s: Is it the world, or my eyes, that are sadder?


s: In the meadow-brook whose song was so glad, or


s: The brook runs slower--its song seems lower,


s: And the tree I admired looks weary and tired


s: Of the changeless story of heat and cold.


s: When the sun goes up, and the stars go under,


s: In that supreme hour of the breaking day,


s: That finds less of the gold, and more of the gray?


s: I see not the splendor, the tints so tender,


s: When the royal smile of that welcome comer


s: Beams on the meadow and burns in the sky,


s: Bring less of bloom than in days gone by?


s: The beauty that thrilled me, the rapture that filled me,


s: When the heart grows weary, all things seem dreary;


s: When the burden grows heavy, the way seems long.


s: Thank God for sending kind death as an ending,


s: When was it that love died? We were so fond,


s: With leaping pulses, and blood all aglow,


s: When we should dwell together as one heart,


s: And scarce could wait that happy time to come.


s: And feel ourselves a thousand miles apart.


s: How was it that love died! I do not know.


s: From our dull skies; but did not see it go.


s: Why should love die? We prized it, I am sure;


s: We thought of nothing else when it was ours;


s: We cherished it in smiling, sunlit bowers;


s: It was our all; why could it not endure?


s: This dear thing died. We only know it went,


s: And left us dull, cold, and indifferent;


s: We who found heaven once in each other's sigh.


s: That half the lovers in the world, one day,


s: Look questioning in each other's eyes this way


s: Sometimes I cannot help but think, dear heart,


s: As I look out o'er all the wide, sad earth


s: And see love's flame gone out on many a hearth,


s: That those who would keep love must dwell apart.


s: Not they who know the awful gibbet's anguish,


s: Not they who, while sad years go by them, in


s: The sunless cells of lonely prisons languish,


s: 'Tis they who walk the highways unsuspected


s: Yet with grim fear forever at their side,


s: Who hug the corpse of some sin undetected,


s: A corpse no grave or coffin-lid can hide--


s: 'Tis they who are in their own chambers haunted


s: By thoughts that like unbidden guests intrude,


s: I feel the stirrings in me of great things.


s: New half-fledged thoughts rise up and beat their wings,


s: And tremble on the margin of their nest,


s: Then flutter back, and hide within my breast.


s: Beholding space, they doubt their untried strength.


s: Beholding men, they fear them. But at length


s: Grown all too great and active for the heart


s: That broods them with such tender mother art,


s: Forgetting fear, and men, and all, that hour,


s: Save the impelling consciousness of power


s: That stirs within them--they shall soar away


s: Oh, what exultant rapture thrills me through


s: When I contemplate all those thoughts may do;


s: Like snow-white eagles penetrating space,


s: They may explore full many an unknown place,


s: And build their nests on mountain heights unseen,


s: Whereon doth lie that dreamed-of rest serene.


s: Till my fond heart shall push thee from the nest,


s: Anxious to see thee soar to heights divine--


s: Oh, beautiful but half-fledged thoughts of mine.


s: Are quick to see all beauty and all worth;


s: And by his own discreet, well-ordered life,


s: Turns it on thine own soul, be most severe.


s: From that belittling censure that springs forth


s: From common lips like weeds from marshy soil.


s: Of hopes fulfilled, ambitions gratified.


s: The eager joy felt climbing up the mountain


s: Has left me now the highest point is gained.


s: The crystal spray that fell from Fame's fair fountain


s: Was sweeter than the waters were when drained.


s: The gilded apple which the world calls pleasure,


s: And which I purchased with my youth and strength,


s: Pleased me a moment. But the empty treasure


s: Lost all its lustre, and grew dim at length.


s: And love, all glowing with a golden glory,


s: It pleased the longest, but at last the story


s: So oft repeated, to my heart grew stale.


s: I lived for self, and all I asked was given,


s: I have had all, and now am sick of bliss,


s: Could strike me half so forcibly as this.


s: In all the joys my selfish aims have brought,


s: Since that would give me freedom from the thought.


s: Oh, blest is he who has some aim defeated;


s: Some mighty loss to balance all his gain.


s: For him there is a hope not yet completed;


s: For him hath life yet draughts of joy and pain.


s: But cursed is he who has no balked ambition,


s: No hopeless hope, no loss beyond repair,


s: But sick and sated with complete fruition,


s: We wreathe our brides, we sheet our dead.


s: With heavenly eyes and tresses streaming,


s: "I've sought thee long! I claim thee now--


s: I am the voice that says, 'Come higher,'


s: That leads and cheers thy farmer neighbor,


s: All shall pursue, but none shall claim me."


s: How they bow, how they bend, how they flutter,


s: How they glow, and what _bon mots_ they utter!


s: But a strange thought has found me the while!


s: What a hush would come over the laughter!


s: As the night-wind sweeps over the earth.


s: Old friends of long standing and years--


s: That girl with Spring's freshness upon her,


s: Though the world is deceived and completely,


s: Alas! I murmured, that the Year should borrow


s: Just then the sunlight fell with sudden flame:


s: A wond'rous diamond sparkling in the light--


s: Upon my soul there fell such woeful loss,


s: Is grievous for a life as young as mine."


s: God's sunlight shone from His high Heavens down;


s: Gleamed in the place of what I thought a burden--


s: Of a thousand things that the Year snowed under--


s: How many will rise in the Spring, I wonder,


s: Will the rose-tree branches, so wholly hidden


s: At the sweet Spring's call come forth unbidden,


s: Will the fair, green Earth, whose throbbing bosom


s: Is hid like a maid's in her gown at night,


s: Wake out of her sleep, and with blade and blossom


s: The loveliest buttercups bloomed and grew;


s: When the snow has gone that drifted them under,


s: Will they shoot up sunward, and bloom anew?


s: When wild winds blew, and a sleet-storm pelted,


s: If I walk that way when snows have melted,


s: Will the gem gleam up from the bare, brown Earth?


s: For the year to bury and hide from sight;


s: But out of a trance will it waken, crying,


s: And push to my heart, like a leaf to the light?


s: Under the snow lie things so cherished--


s: Faces that vanished, and trusts that perished,


s: The Old Year greedily grasped his plunder,


s: Of the thousand things that he did, I wonder


s: O wise Young Year, with your hands held under


s: But our talk was tinctured with science,


s: But I fought with my heart and conquered:


s: What does our country need? Not armies standing


s: With sabres gleaming ready for the fight.


s: Not increased navies, skillful and commanding,


s: Not haughty men with glutted purses trying


s: To purchase souls, and keep the power of place.


s: For palms of beauty, elegance and grace.


s: But we want women, strong of soul, yet lowly,


s: With that rare meekness, born of gentleness,


s: Women whose lives are pure and clean and holy,


s: The women whom all little children bless.


s: Brave, earnest women, helpful to each other,


s: With finest scorn for all things low and mean.


s: Women who hold the names of wife and mother,


s: O these are they who mold the men of story,


s: These mothers, ofttimes shorn of grace and youth,


s: Who, worn and weary, ask no greater glory


s: Than making some young soul the home of truth,


s: Who sow in hearts all fallow for the sowing


s: The seeds of virtue and of scorn for sin,


s: And, patient, watch the beauteous harvest growing


s: And weed out tares which crafty hands cast in.


s: Women who do not hold the gift of beauty


s: As some rare treasure to be bought and sold,


s: But guard it as a precious aid to duty--


s: Women who, low above their cradles bending,


s: Let flattery's voice go by, and give no heed,


s: While their pure prayers like incense are ascending:


s: _These_ are our country's pride, our country's need.


s: While faint--and yet more faint is heard


s: Were hearts more free from care than when


s: We wandered through those walks, we ten,


s: We'll pluck two leaves, dear friend, to-day.


s: So soon, so soon, the leaves can change!


s: This night wind chills me, and I shiver;


s: In the long run fame finds the deserving man.


s: But in good time true merit leads the van,


s: And vain pretense, unnoticed, goes its way.


s: But Fortune smiles on those who work and wait,


s: There is no better thing than righteous pain,


s: The sleepless nights, the awful thorn-crowned days,


s: Bring sure reward to tortured soul and brain.


s: In the long run all hidden things are known,


s: The eye of truth will penetrate the night,


s: And good or ill, thy secret shall be known,


s: However well 'tis guarded from the light.


s: Are fathomed by the years and stand confest


s: In the long run all love is paid by love,


s: Though undervalued by the hosts of earth;


s: Keeps strict account and will redeem its worth.


s: Give thy love freely; do not count the cost;


s: O Science reaching backward through the distance,


s: I bid thee speed up to the heights supernal,


s: Go seek and bind the laws and truths eternal,


s: Break down the superstitions of all ages--


s: Stride on, and bid all stubborn foes defiance


s: What canst thou give to help me bear my crosses,


s: And what to recompense for all my losses,


s: _Thou_ couldst not with thy clear, cold eyes of reason,


s: Like one who passed through that tear-blotted season,


s: Through all the weary, wearing hour of sorrow,


s: Would make me strong to wait for some to-morrow


s: When I am weak, and desolate, and lonely--


s: Not thou, O Science--Christ, my Savior, only


s: Thou are so cold, so lofty and so distant,


s: No prayer, however constant and persistent,


s: Christ stands so near, to help me through each hour,


s: O Science, sweeping all before thy power


s: There passes our window near the street,


s: And a cheek so round and a lip so sweet;


s: And her look is wholesome and clean, and good.


s: And so we call her our "Little Blue Hood,"


s: For we know not the name of the dear little lass,


s: But we call to each other to see her pass.


s: And we watch from the window while she goes by,


s: She has such a bonny, smooth, white brow,


s: And a fearless look in her long-lashed eye;


s: She walks by the window with sweet, grave air,


s: We two are watching and thinking her fair;


s: Dear little Blue Hood, bright and sweet.


s: Are you glad we love you, or don't you care?


s: Up from the South come the birds that were banished,


s: Frightened away by the presence of frost.


s: Back to the vale comes the verdure that vanished,


s: Back to the forest the leaves that were lost.


s: Over the hillside the carpet of splendor,


s: Folded through Winter, Spring spreads down again;


s: Along the horizon, the tints that were tender,


s: Lost hues of Summer time, burn bright as then.


s: Only the mountains' high summits are hoary,


s: To the ice-fettered river the sun gives a key.


s: Once more the gleaming shore lists to the story


s: All things revive that in Winter time perished,


s: The rose buds again in the light o' the sun,


s: All that was beautiful, all that was cherished,


s: Sweet things and dear things and all things--save one.


s: Late, when the year and the roses were lying


s: Down in the dust fell a love that was dying,


s: And the snow piled above it, and made it a tomb.


s: Lo! now! the roses are budded for blossom--


s: Why dost thou bud not, O Love of my bosom?


s: Why dost thou rise not, and thrill me as then?


s: Life without love, is a year without Summer,


s: Heart without love, is a wood without song.


s: Rise then, revive then, thou indolent comer,


s: Why dost thou lie in the dark earth so long?


s: Rise! ah, thou canst not! the rose-tree that sheddest


s: Its beautiful leaves, in the Spring time may bloom,


s: But of cold things the coldest, of dead things the deadest,


s: Love buried once, rises not from the tomb.


s: Green things may grow on the hillside and heather,


s: Birds seek the forest and build there and sing.


s: All things revive in the beautiful weather,


s: But unto a dead love there cometh no Spring.


s: I grieve to see thy sudden pained surprise;


s: Gaze not on me with such accusing eyes--


s: 'T was thine own hand which dealt dear Love's death-blow.


s: I loved thee fondly yesterday. Till then


s: I knew that heart was filled with Love's sweet wine,


s: Pressed wholly for my drinking. And my lip


s: Grew parched with thirsting for one nectared sip


s: Of what, denied me, seemed a draught divine.


s: Last evening, in the gloaming, that cup spilled


s: Were offered to me, saying, "Drink of these!"


s: And when I saw it empty, Love was killed.


s: To prove to me thou wert my abject slave.


s: Ah, Love! hadst thou been wise enough to save


s: One little drop of that sweet wine--but one--


s: I still had loved thee, longing for it then.


s: But even the cup is mine. I look within,


s: And find it holds not one last drop to win,


s: And cast it down.--Thou art as other men.


s: After the May time, and after the June time


s: Cometh the round world's royal noon time,


s: When the sun, like an eye that never closes,


s: And the winds are still, and the crimson roses


s: Like a great red ball in my bosom burning


s: With fires that nothing can quench or tame.


s: It glows till my heart itself seems turning


s: The hopes half shy, and the sighs all tender,


s: From the hills of doubt no winds are blowing,


s: From the isle of pain no breeze is sent.


s: For the Autumn must come with its mournful story,


s: And Love's midsummer will fade too soon.


s: Down low on the bush, where her sisters above


s: Nor hear all the whispers and murmurs of love.


s: They flaunt out their beautiful leaves in the sun,


s: With the wild bees who pass, and the gay butterflies.


s: That she's won a lover right under their eyes.


s: It reminded me, Kate, of a time--you know when!


s: Your dresses were short, and your feet were so small.


s: They _both_ set their caps for me, after that ball.


s: How the blue eyes and black eyes smiled up in my face!


s: Till that day when you opened the door in the hall,


s: And _you_ seemed so tiny, and _I_ felt so tall.


s: Your sisters had sent you to keep me, my dear,


s: Then you were dismissed like a child in disgrace.


s: A thrill to my heart, and a flush to my face.


s: We always were meeting some way after that.


s: And got it again, when I finished my call.


s: Shall I ever forget how they tripped down the hall?


s: Shall I ever forget the first kiss by the door,


s: Or the rage and surprise of Maud-Belle? Well-a-day,


s: That a _bee_ could have carried me so far away.


s: The mighty conflict, which we call existence,


s: So much there is to conquer and control.


s: The rock which meets the billows with defiance.


s: In spite of its unyielding self-reliance,


s: And there are depths and heights of strong emotions


s: That surge at times within the human breast,


s: More fierce than all the tides of all the oceans


s: I sometimes think the rock worn with adventures,


s: And sad with thoughts of conflicts yet to be,


s: Must envy the frail reed which no one censures,


s: When overcome 'tis swallowed by the sea.


s: This life is all resistance and repression,


s: Dear God, if in that other world unseen,


s: Not rest, we find, but new life and progression,


s: Grant us a respite in the grave between.


s: Which yet doth make my world more bright.


s: What though fate leads us separate ways,


s: While suns shall blaze, or stars shall gleam,


s: Life like a star shall climb the height,


s: One leaned on velvet cushions like a queen--


s: Whom men called great. She bowed with languid mien,


s: And smiled, and blushed, and knew her beauty's power.


s: One trailed her tinseled garments through the street,


s: And thrust aside the crowd, and found a place


s: So near, the blooded courser's praning feet


s: Cast sparks of fire upon her painted face.


s: One took the hot-house blossoms from her breast,


s: And tossed them down, as he went riding by.


s: And blushed rose-red to see them fondly pressed


s: To bearded lips, while eye spoke unto eye.


s: One, bold and hardened with her sinful life,


s: Yet shrank and shivered painfully, because


s: His cruel glance cut keener than a knife,


s: The glance of him who made her what she was.


s: One was observed, and lifted up to fame,


s: One who was shunned and hated, found her shame


s: In basking in the death-light of his smile.


s: And the days are short, and the nights are long;


s: It has lost its rhythm and lilting rhyme--


s: For the grace goes out of the day so soon,


s: And the tired head aches in the glare of noon,


s: And the way seems long to the hills that lie


s: Slipping away are the friends whose worth


s: Or we count them lost by the crueler death


s: Of a trust betrayed, or a murdered faith.


s: Bliss out of sorrow, and sun out of shade.


s: And out of the struggle and wearing strife,


s: From joys that diminish, and woes that increase,


s: We are slipping away to the shores of Peace.


s: It is done! in the fire's fitful flashes,


s: There were mad foolish vows in each letter,


s: It is well they have shriveled and burned,


s: And the ring! oh, the ring was a fetter,


s: Have you burned up the heart that remembers,


s: Do you think in this swift reckless fashion


s: The months that were freighted with passion,


s: Or the heart that grows sick for lost blisses


s: Have you burned up the touch of warm fingers


s: That thrilled through each pulse and each vein,


s: Or the sound of a voice that still lingers


s: You have put all the lights out, and yet,


s: Though the curtain, rung down, has descended,


s: Ah, no! they will turn in their sleeping


s: With a strange restless pain in their hearts,


s: And in darkness, and anguish and weeping,


s: Will dream they are playing their parts.


s: Five long Summers have passed since then--


s: Who have played the suitor a Summer day.


s: But, nevertheless, when I heard your name,


s: There burned in my bosom a sudden flame,


s: That carried me back to the day that is flown.


s: I was sitting again by the laughing brook,


s: And my heart was fluttering under your look--


s: Again your breath, like a South wind, fanned


s: My cheek, where the blushes came and went;


s: And the tender clasp of your strong, warm hand


s: Again you were mine by Love's own right--


s: When somebody mentioned your name to me.


s: Just for the moment I thought you mine--


s: The tale remembered seemed half divine--


s: Though I held it lightly enough when told.


s: The past seemed fairer than when it was near,


s: As "Blessings brighten when taking flight;"


s: And just for the moment I held you dear--


s: When somebody mentioned your name last night.


s: The folds of her garment fell round her,


s: Well proportioned and graceful I found her,


s: From the hem of her robe peeped one sandal--


s: She looked--said its curve was "æsthetic."


s: Woke thoughts that were daring and tender:


s: "Well, yes," she said over her shoulder:


s: Lie still and rest, in that serene repose


s: That on this holy morning comes to those


s: Who have been burdened with the cares which make


s: The sad heart weary and the tired head ache.


s: Awake! arise! Cast off thy drowsy dreams!


s: Red in the East, behold the Morning gleams.


s: "As Monday goes, so goes the week," dames say.


s: Refreshed, renewed, use well the initial day.


s: Another morning's banners are unfurled--


s: It holds new laurels for thy soul to win:


s: Mar not its grace by slothfulness or sin,


s: Half-way unto the end--the week's high noon.


s: The morning hours do speed away so soon!


s: And, when the noon is reached, however bright,


s: So well the week has sped, hast thou a friend


s: Go spend an hour in converse. It will lend


s: To pause a little sometimes in the strife.


s: From feasts abstain; be temperate, and pray;


s: Fast if thou wilt; and yet, throughout the day,


s: Not many hours are left thee for thy work--


s: Now with the almost finished task make haste;


s: So near the night thou hast no time to waste.


s: Post up accounts, and let thy Soul's eyes look


s: For flaws and errors in Life's ledger-book.


s: As I sit here alone, from the dark corners there


s: And they stand at my side and they lean on my chair.


s: That lighted my days with a fanciful glow,


s: That strangled her life out. Hope was slain long ago.


s: With its skeleton face and expressionless eyes,


s: And mocks me, and jeers me with sobs and with sighs.


s: A frail, fragile thing, and I prized it too much,


s: Clasped it close, and it died at the withering touch.


s: Born with joy, reared with hope, died in pain and unrest,


s: All the others--this ghost: yet a ghost at the best.


s: Would forget all these dead: but the gibbering host


s: In each shadowy corner there lurketh a ghost.


s: My thoughts soar not as they ought to soar,


s: They are dragged down earthward by little things,


s: As a lark might be tangled among the weeds.


s: But more like a fisherman's light at sea;


s: Then suddenly lost in the gloom of night.


s: It is always troubled, and ofttimes sad--


s: And the heights I had thought I should reach one day


s: Grow dimmer and dimmer, and farther away.


s: My heart finds never the longed-for rest;


s: Its worldly striving, its greed for gold,


s: Chilled and frightened the calm-eyed guest,


s: The spendthrift who wastes them too soon,


s: The youth who goes seeking for pleasure,


s: All priests with their creeds and their croaking,


s: The gay who find aught to wake laughter,


s: We know not what lies in us, till we seek;


s: Men dive for pearls--they are not found on shore,


s: The hillsides most unpromising and bleak


s: Down in the depths and silence thou mayst find


s: Sink thou a shaft into the mine of thought;


s: Be patient, like the seekers after gold;


s: However dulled by earth, each human mind


s: Holds somewhere gems of beauty and of light


s: "By-and-by," the maiden sighed--"by-and-by


s: He will come back by-and-by--by-and-by."


s: When she greets me by-and-by--by-and-by."


s: Fleeting years of time have sped--hurried by--


s: All through the night time, and all through the day time,


s: Dreading the morning and dreading the night,


s: Nearer and nearer we drift to the May time


s: Leaves on the linden, and sun on the meadow,


s: Green in the garden, and bloom everywhere,


s: Gloom in my heart, and a terrible shadow,


s: Walks by me, sits by me, stands by my chair.


s: Oh, but the birds by the brooklet are cheery,


s: Oh, but the woods show such delicate greens,


s: Strange how you droop and how soon you are weary--


s: Too well I know what that weariness means.


s: But how could I know in the crisp winter weather


s: (Though sometimes I noticed a catch in your breath),


s: Riding and singing and dancing together,


s: How could I know you were racing with death?


s: How could I know when we danced until morning,


s: And you were the gayest of all the gay crowd--


s: With only that shortness of breath for a warning,


s: How could I know that you danced for a shroud?


s: Whirling and whirling through moonlight and starlight,


s: Rocking as lightly as boats on the wave,


s: Down in your eyes shone a deep light--a far light,


s: How could I know 'twas the light to your grave?


s: Day by day, day by day, nearing and nearing,


s: Hid under greenness, and beauty and bloom,


s: Cometh the shape and the shadow I'm fearing,


s: "Over the May hill" is waiting your tomb.


s: The season of mirth and of music is over--


s: I have danced my last dance, I have sung my last song,


s: My heart and my love will be lying ere long.


s: With the sun above, and the green earth under?


s: With the sun, and the skies, and the birds above me,


s: With the winds to follow and say they love me--


s: Somebody said, in the street this morning,


s: As I opened my window to let in the light,


s: That the darkest day of the world was dawning;


s: But I looked, and the East was a gorgeous sight.


s: But I and the bees and the birds--we doubt it,


s: And the reaper Death, with his shining sickle,


s: I told the thrush, and we laughed together,


s: And he said to me, as he plumed each feather,


s: "Well, people must croak, if they cannot sing."


s: And silenced the voices of weak complaining,


s: O world of light, and O world of beauty!


s: Where are there pleasures so sweet as thine?


s: Dear friend, I pray thee, if thou wouldst be proving


s: Make me no vows. Lip-service is not loving;


s: Swear not to me that nothing can divide us--


s: But when distrust and envy creep beside us


s: Say not to me the depths of thy devotion


s: But watch, lest doubt or some unkind emotion


s: I'm sick of words: they are so lightly spoken,


s: I'd rather feel thy trust in me unbroken


s: If all the little proofs of trust are heeded,


s: “_Izaak Walton and his Friends_,” _etc._


s: “As long as the names of Garrick, of Johnson, and of Seward shall


s: “Biography, the most interesting perhaps of every species of


s: composition, loses all its interest with me when the shades and


s: _Extract from a letter of Sir Walter Scott to Anna Seward_.


s: The derivation of the word “Lichfield” has excited a good deal of


s: In emblematic white, their duteous maid;


s: But ne’er for them arrived that festal day;


s: Their sweet, crush’d lily low in earth is laid.


s: celebrated, and where a monument was erected to his memory.


s: Washington, Anna Seward records, did her the honour to charge his


s: In 1765 Richard Lovell Edgeworth, the well-known author, visited


s: “When first this month, stealing from half-blown bowers,


s: Bathed the young cowslip in her sunny showers,


s: Pensive I travell’d, and approach’d the plains,


s: That met the bounds of Severn’s wide domains.


s: As up the hill I rose, from whose green brow


s: The village church o’erlooks the vale below,


s: O! when its rustic form first met my eyes,


s: What wild emotions swell’d the rising sighs!


s: Stretch’d the pain’d heart-strings with the utmost force


s: Grief knows to feel, that knows not dire remorse;


s: For there—yes there,—its narrow porch contains


s: Whose lavish’d health, in youth, and beauty’s bloom,


s: “I have every blessing, and I am happy.  The conversation of my


s: thought he should, contrives for me everything that can ease and


s: “Bright glows the list with many an honour’d name.”


s: “Triumphant first see Temper’s Triumph shine,


s: At least I’m sure they triumphed over mine.


s: Of ‘Music’s Triumphs’ all who read may swear


s: That luckless music never triumphed there.”


s: She did not care for “eternal card-parties,” and considered the


s: established in after years, when no one will ask, ‘What said the


s: The following are three of more beautiful stanzas:—


s: “Has GOD decreed this helpless, suffering train


s: Shall, groaning yield the vital breath he gave,


s: Unrecompens’d for years of want, and pain,


s: And close on them the portals of the grave?


s: Will recompense, and may, perhaps, ordain


s: Than ours, less sullied with inherent stain;


s: Less torn by passion, and less prone to sin,


s: Till their firm faith, and virtue prov’d, may win


s: The wreaths of life in yon Eternal Sphere.


s: And nothing greater can succeed.’” . . .


s: be-deaned—which is nearly the same thing.”


s: interesting Lichfield, where the sweetest days of my youth have


s: frontispiece to “The Lady’s Monthly Museum” for March, 1799.


s: The _Staffordshire Advertiser_ for July 8th, 1809, contained the


s: A monument, the work of Bacon, was erected in the Cathedral,


s: Amid these Aisles, where once his precepts showed,


s: The heavenward pathway which in life he trode,


s: This simple tablet marks a Father’s bier;


s: And those he loved in life, in death are near.


s: For him, for them, a daughter bade it rise,


s: Still would you know why o’er the marble spread,


s: In female grace the willow droops her head;


s: Why on her branches, silent and unstrung,


s: What Poet’s voice is smother’d here in dust,


s: Till waked to join the chorus of the just;


s: Lo! one brief line an answer sad supplies—


s: Honour’d, belov’d, and mourn’d, here Seward lies:


s: Her worth, her warmth of heart, our sorrows say:


s: _For ANÆMIA (shown by breathlessness on slight exertion, pallor,


s: depression and weakness) Doctors prescribe the well-known Iron


s: Jelloids No. 2.--there is nothing better._


s: _For DEBILITY, WEAKNESS and NERVINESS, Men find the Ideal Tonic


s: _A Ten Days Treatment (price 1/3) will convince you._


s: _Of all Chemists. A Ten Days Treatment 1/3. Large size 3/-_


s: Preface        _"Arms and the man" was Virgil's strain;


s: To browse a crop from pastures (Green's)


s: Prehistoric     Historians erudite and sage,


s: Druids          We read of priests of Celtic day,


s: Stonehenge      They used Stonehenge on Salisbury Plain


s: Phoenicians     Merchant explorers of that day,


s: Three thousand years before these lines.


s: Man lived what's termed the 'simple life'


s: Julius Cæsar    Till Julius Cæsar in five-five


s: B.C. 55         With his galleys did arrive.


s: Boadicea        Boadicea earns our praise.


s: A.D. 62         First woman leader in those days;


s: Agricola        Then came Agricola one day


s: East, North, South, West, it's safe to say


s: Romans left     About four hundred-ten A.D.


s: A.D. 410        The Romans left sans cérémonie.


s: Anglo-Saxons    And so we run our flippant rhymes


s: A.D. 430        Right on to Anglo-Saxon times.


s: Jutes           And paid us visits in their ships


s: They plundered morning, noon, and night,


s: Horsa           Horsa was slain in four-five-five,


s: King Arthur     Time has many a fable wound


s: Where Knights quaffed cordials, wines and ales,


s: Augustine       About six hundred years A.D.


s: Heptarchy       Called 'Heptarchy' the seven Saxon


s: Alfred          Of good King Alfred we've all heard


s: Danes           In seven-eight-three first came the Danes


s: "Danegeld"      For centuries our sadly fated


s: Canute          Two hundred years the raiding Danes


s: Hardicanute     Hardicanute, sad to confess,


s: Edward          Edward the Confessor staid


s: the Confessor   The Saxon line renewed. Remade


s: And signed the first 'Will' in this land.


s: Harold          Harold last of the Saxon line


s: William the     Whence William spying out our shore,


s: Conqueror       Oliver-Twist-like, wanted more.


s: William the     But one thing's certain. Camera men,


s: Conqueror       If only they'd existed then,


s: Curfew          And p'raps it's just as well to tell


s: Each doused his glim, raked out his grate.


s: Feudalism       These were the well known Feudal days,


s: Crusades        The first Crusade in ten-nine-five,


s: Henry I.        Henry the First, of wisdom rife,


s: Stephen         Stephen of Blois ascends the throne


s: Henry II.       Henry the Second claims our rhyme


s: Becket          This the first 'Plantagenet' King


s: Church v.       Which should be Master, Church or Crown


s: Crown           Pull-King Pull-Bishop; both went down.


s: Law             Trial by jury further grows;


s: Linen           Linen's first used in twelve-five


s: Glass Windows   In eleven-eight-nought first came to pass


s: Richard         Coeur de Lion from one Crusade


s: Coeur de Lion   Returning was a prisoner made.


s: John            And so we'll quickly journey on


s: Magna Charta    He signed the Magna Charta. Yes;


s: Robin Hood      And now we come to Robin Hood,


s: Henry III.      And what of Henry number Three,


s: Coinage         In twelve-five-seven it is stated


s: Langton         The Bible which from over seas


s: Died 1228       Had no chapters and no verses


s: Astrology       Many simple folk, (it's queer)


s: Montfort        Who 'engineered' this useful plan.


s: Edward I.       Edward First 'Longshanks' nicknamed


s: That England, Scotland, Wales all three,


s: First Prince    In twelve-eight-two annexes Wales;


s: of Wales        Where afterwards no strife prevails.


s: Edward I.       Next Scotland Edward tries to tackle


s: (continued)     Wallace and Bruce resistance make,


s: Roger Bacon     Roger Bacon (ob. twelve-nine-three)


s: Lollards        Lollards in thirteen-seven arose


s: He dared to preach 'gainst cleric wrong;


s: Edward II.      Edward the Second with his minions


s: Edward III.     Was Edward Three, both wise and bold.


s: Our Kings are French through many reigns


s: French Wars     Commenced a hundred years of Wars.


s: Weaving         In thirteen-three-one England's taught


s: Edward 'Black Prince' One-three-four-six,


s: Crecy           The valiant French in Crecy's fray;


s: Parliament      Lords and Commons from this date


s: While Church and Barons have their squabbles


s: The House of Commons more power nobbles;


s: Leasing         Leasing or Farming, we are taught,


s: Was introduced 'bout twelve-nought-nought;


s: These movements preached by one John Ball,


s: Richard II.     Now comes the Second Richard's reign.


s: Poll Tax        With his taxes super-sated


s: Chaucer         Chaucer the Poet this same year


s: Age of          This was the age, aye verily,


s: Chivalry        Of ryghte goode noble chivalry,


s: When Knights went forth through storm and stress


s: Henry IV.       Henry Four, called 'Bolingbroke'


s: Through John of Gaunt, Lancastrian famed,


s: Lollards        Against the Lollards--Cobham's burned.


s: Henry V.        From fourteen-thirteen, Henry Five,


s: Henry VI.       Henry Six, next in our rhymes,


s: Joan of Arc     Joan of Arc the peasant Maid


s: Constantinople  Constantinople's seized by Turks


s: Edward IV.      In Edward Fourth, fourteen-six-one


s: Barnet          On Barnet Field he met his doom


s: Earl of         'Kingmaker' was Earl Warwick styled


s: Warwick         With his manner scarcely mild


s: Wars of Roses   White and Red Rose warring madly


s: Printing        First in fourteen-seventy-three


s: Richard III.    Richard (Crookback) in fateful hour


s: Henry VII.      Lancastrian Richmond wins the fight


s: Star Chamber    Much he managed to extort


s: Columbus        Columbus, full of travellers' lore,


s: Henry VIII.     Now Henry Eight comes on the screen,


s: Henry VIII.     This King Henry number Eight


s: (continued)     And certainly of all the Kings


s: Reformation     Martin Luther, fifteen-one-seven,


s: 'Cut not my beard, that's done no harm.'


s: Wolsey          In fifteen-thirty Wolsey great,


s: Thomas          And Thomas Cromwell followed suit


s: Cromwell        To make his master absolute


s: Edward VI.      Edward Six to the throne succeeds


s: The Blue Coat School (Christ's Hospital).


s: Elizabeth       Hail now to thee our good Queen Bess,


s: Drake           Drake at bowls on Plymouth Hoe


s: Armada          In fifteen-eight-eight Armada strong


s: Shakespeare     And in these epoch making days


s: Poor Law        A law was passed about this date


s: Sir Walter      Sir Walter Raleigh, best of Knights,


s: Raleigh         The first to taste the keen delights


s: Tobacco         Was it coarse-cut shag which burns


s: Queen           Good Queen Bess we understand


s: Elizabeth       Had crowds of suitors for her hand;


s: Queen           As time rolled on this Good Queen Bess


s: Elizabeth       Lost somewhat of her sprightliness;


s: (continued)     She got into a nervous state


s: East India      The great 'John Comp'ny' now began


s: Company         Its fine career without a plan.


s: James I.        James Six of Scotland, miscalled a 'fule'


s: Pilgrim Fathers His persecution to escape


s: And divers meats, roast, boiled and sliced.


s: Harvey          Yet a learned time; for Harvey shows


s: That blood's not stagnant, but it flows;


s: Lord Bacon      'Experiment!' Lord Bacon cries


s: Charles I.      His son Charles One we understand


s: Petition of     The 'Petition of Right' a famous Act,


s: Right--1628     The Commons from the King exact;


s: First           In sixteen-hundred-twenty-one


s: Newspaper       Our first news-sheet began its run;


s: Cotton          Cotton first came from India's shore


s: Ship Money      Charles raises the ship money tax;


s: Strafford       Earl Strafford ('Thorough') in his pride


s: Civil Wars      Cromwell greatest of the foemen


s: These 'Roundheads' sober, grim, religious


s: Naseby          The Cavaliers and Roundheads fought


s: Dunbar          In sixteen-fifty Dunbar sees


s: Worcester       And in the second Worcester fight


s: Commonwealth    Oliver Cromwell bluff and bold,


s: Commonwealth    He seemed to like bold argument


s: (continued)     And wordy wars with Parliament;


s: Charles II.     Cromwell's death brings Restoration


s: John Bunyan     The tinker preacher Bunyan wrote


s: The 'Pilgrim's Progress' we still quote,


s: Milton          In stately language Milton's muse


s: Habeas Corpus   The 'Habeas Corpus' best of laws


s: Van Tromp       Admiral Van Tromp, Dutchman bold,


s: Blake           But Blake laughed loud and spread his sails


s: Peace of Breda  For fifteen years these Navies fought,


s: Plague          In sixty-five the Plague appears


s: Fire of London  And then the Fire; two awful years


s: James II.       When Charles Two died his brother James


s: And for that purpose leagued with France.


s: William III.    His place is filled by William Three


s: And hanged the 'Bill Sykes' of that day.


s: National Debt   In sixteen-nine-four we have heard


s: Bill of Rights  The 'Bill of Rights,' a Charter grand,


s: Queen Anne      Good Queen Anne we know is dead;


s: Marlborough     This was the Duke of Marlborough's day,


s: Dr. Watts       Good Dr. Watts' moral lays


s: Pope            Pope, letter-writer and great poet,


s: George I.       The House of Stuart being ended,


s: George II.      His son George Two succeeding then


s: Wesleys         John and Charles Wesley, men of mind,


s: Clive           As soldier Clive soon made his mark,


s: Canals          Useful canals in England made,


s: Quebec          General Wolfe seventeen-five-nine


s: George III.     And now of Georgey number Three:


s: Georgian        We will but very lightly scan


s: Times           The customs known as 'Georgian';


s: 'Iron Jelloids' priced at 'One and Three.'


s: Whose vests were poems, whose coats were dreams


s: Dr. Johnson     And Dr. Johnson at his ease


s: Mrs. Siddons    Sarah Siddons was all the rage


s: Capt. Cook      It's only right a History book


s: That round the World he sailed three times.


s: Inventions      These are the days of much invention


s: For Authors' names there's lack of room.


s: Adam Smith      In his book 'The Wealth of Nations'


s: Jenner          Jenner brings in vaccination,


s: American War    In seventeen-sixty and fifteen


s: We've long been friends. Let us rejoice;


s: French          In France in times of Louis Seize (says)


s: Revolution      Oppression dire through countless days


s: Napoleon I.     From Revolution's putrid mess


s: Nelson 1805     Here we must our homage pay


s: Wellington      To Wellington the same is due,


s: Discovery of    About this date Electric Force


s: Electric Force  Dawns on mankind. Before, of course,


s: Ireland         Of Ireland but a word or two.


s: Danes and       Two hundred years from nine-nought-nought


s: Ireland         Danes raiding Erin trouble brought;


s: Cromwell        Sees Cromwell with them battle join


s: Boyne           And William beat them at the Boyne.


s: Act of Union    By 'Act of Union' which he passed;


s: George IV.      Now come George Four and Will his brother;


s: William IV.     With these two kings we need not bother;


s: Steam           By eighteen-thirty man has tamed


s: Reform Act      In eighteen-three-two, happy year,


s: And double knocks bring joys and thrills


s: Corn Law        The Corn Law duty's brushed away,


s: Repeal 18       Hence we enjoy cheap bread to-day.


s: Victoria        Since Queen Victoria's palmy days


s: Woman's         But now the 'Franchise' she obtains,


s: Status          And her own property retains.


s: Darwin          Charles Darwin offers us a Key


s: Livingstone     The traveller, great Scotch Livingstone,


s: Crimean War     English, French and Turks unite


s: Indian Mutiny   The Indian Mutiny now arose,


s: Atlantic Cable  With efforts many men most able


s: Suez Canal      Lesseps unites for you and me


s: Education Act   The Education Act proposes


s: Ballot Act      A couple of years from this we note


s: Folks sold their votes for draughts of beer.


s: Edward VII.     Edward Seven, 'Peacemaker' named,


s: Wars with       Our nearest neighbour o'er the Sea


s: France          Whose 'No' is 'Non'; whose 'Yes' is 'Oui';


s: We've reached the present stirring times,


s: The             We seem to have subdued the Hun


s: Present Time    And so farewell (our task is done)


s: _For DEBILITY, WEAKNESS and NERVINESS, Men find the Ideal Tonic


s: _For ANÆMIA in Men and Women (shown by breathlessness on slight


s: exertion, pallor, depression and weakness) Doctors have for many


s: years prescribed the well-known Iron Jelloids No. 2.--there is


s: _A Ten Days Treatment (price 1/3) will convince you._


s: Reliable Tonic for Men            IRON JELLOIDS No. 2A.


s: For Anæmia in Men & Women         IRON JELLOIDS No. 2.


s: For Growing Children              IRON JELLOIDS No. 1.


s: _Of all Chemists. A Ten Days Treatment 1/3. Large size 3/-_


s: Of the Elizabethan amatory verses only a small portion has been


s: furnishing these best examples of the love verses of the numerous


s: The shepherd's commendation of his nymph


s: And, if that ye have found it, ye that be here,


s: Or else it will 'plain, and then appair.


s: Love, that liveth and reigneth in my thought,


s: That built his seat within my captive breast,


s: Clad in the arms wherein with me he fought,


s: She that me taught to love and suffer pain,


s: With shamefaced cloak to shadow and restrain,


s: Her smiling grace converteth straight to ire:


s: Taketh his flight, whereas he lurks and plains


s: His purpose lost, and dare not show his face.


s: For my lord's guilt, thus faultless, bide I pains:


s: Yet from my lord shall not my foot remove;


s: Sweet is his death that takes his end by love!


s: Set me whereas the sun doth parch the green,


s: Or where his beams do not dissolve the ice,


s: In temperate heat where he is felt and seen,


s: In presence pressed of people mad or wise,


s: In longest night, or in the shortest day,


s: In clearest sky, or where clouds thickest be,


s: In lusty youth, or when my hairs are gray,


s: Set me in heaven, in earth, or else in hell,


s: In hill or dale, or in the foaming flood,


s: Thrall, or at large, alive whereso I dwell,


s: Sick, or in health, in evil fame or good:


s: Hers will I be, and only with this thought


s: Content myself, although my chance be nought.


s: If women could be fair, and yet not fond,


s: Or that their love were firm, not fickle still,


s: I would not marvel that they make men bond


s: By service long to purchase their good will;


s: But when I see how frail those creatures are,


s: I muse that men forget themselves so far.


s: To mark the choice they make, and how they change,


s: How oft from Phoebus they do flee to Pan;


s: Unsettled still, like haggards wild they range,


s: These gentle birds that fly from man to man;


s: Who would not scorn and shake them from the fist,


s: And let them fly, fair fools, which way they list?


s: Yet for disport we fawn and flatter both,


s: To pass the time when nothing else can please,


s: And train them to our lure with subtle oath,


s: Till, weary of their wiles, ourselves we ease;


s: And then we say when we their fancy try,


s: To play with fools, O what a fool was I!


s: And thus, with sighs and sorrows shrill,


s: Then like the lark that passed the night


s: She sends sweet notes from out her breast;


s: And if in life her love she'll not agree me,


s: Pray her before I die, she will come see me.


s: Shoot soft, sweet Love! for fear thou shoot amiss,


s: That Love shall seize on her by sympathy.


s: Then since with Love my prayers bear no boot,


s: I take the wound, and die at Venus' foot.


s: "Shepherd, what's love? I pray thee tell!"--


s: "Yet, what is love? good shepherd, saine!"--


s: "Yet, shepherd, what is love, I pray?"--


s: Then, nymphs, take vantage while ye may,


s: "Yet what is love? good shepherd, show!"--


s: But time drives flocks from field to fold,


s: Soon break, soon wither, soon forgotten;--


s: Which God hath bless'd and sent for food.


s: But could youth last, and love still breed;


s: His mother's doves and team of sparrows;


s: Growing on 's cheek, but none knows how;


s: My true-love hath my heart, and I have his,


s: By just exchange one to the other given:


s: I hold his dear, and mine he cannot miss,


s: There never was a better bargain driven:


s: My true-love hath my heart, and I have his.


s: His heart in me keeps him and me in one,


s: My heart in him his thoughts and senses guides:


s: He loves my heart, for once it was his own,


s: Ring out your bells, let mourning shews be spread;


s: Weep, neighbours, weep; do you not hear it said


s: Let dirge be sung, and trentals rightly read,


s: Love in thine eyes doth build his bower,


s: And from their orbs shoot shafts divine.


s: Make soft her heart, dissolve her lowers,


s: But if thou do not, Love, I'll truly serve her


s: In spite of thee, and by firm faith deserve her.


s: Heigh ho, my heart! would God that she were mine!


s: For though this clime were blest of yore,


s: They look like rose-buds fill'd with snow.


s: Threat'ning with piercing frowns to kill


s: Girt with a crimson robe of brightest dye,


s: Whiter than be the flocks that straggling feed,


s: When wash'd by Arethusa's fount they lie,


s: Deck'd with the ruddy glister of her love,


s: Whenas her brightness Neptune's fancy move,


s: Her tresses gold, her eyes like glassy streams,


s: Her teeth are pearl, the breasts are ivory


s: Her cheeks, like rose and lily, yield forth gleams,


s: Her brows, bright arches fram'd of ebony;


s: Pallas in wit,--all three, if you well view,


s: Whence comes my love? O heart, disclose!


s: From eyes that mock the diamond's blaze:


s: Since nought doth say the heart of stone.


s: Sweet eye, sweet lip, sweet blushing cheek,--


s: How blest I were if thou would'st prove me!


s: For, dead, thy breath to life might move me.


s: Then, in requite, sweet virgin, love me!


s: Look, Delia, how we esteem the half-blown rose,


s: The image of thy blush, and summer's honour!


s: Whilst yet her tender bud doth undisclose


s: That full of beauty Time bestows upon her:


s: But straight her wide-blown pomp comes to decline;


s: She then is scorn'd, that late adorn'd the fair.


s: So fade the roses of those cheeks of thine!


s: No April can revive thy withered flowers,


s: Whose springing grace adorns thy glory now:


s: Swift speedy Time, feathered with flying hours,


s: Dissolves the beauty of the fairest brow.


s: Then do not thou such treasure waste in vain,


s: But love now, whilst thou may'st be loved again.


s: Our flame began, when scarce we knew what was


s: The flame we felt; when as we sat and sigh'd


s: And look'd upon each other, and conceived


s: Not what we ail'd--yet something we did ail;


s: And yet were well, and yet we were not well,


s: And what was our disease we could not tell.


s: Then would we kiss, then sigh, then look; and thus


s: We spent our childhood. But when years began


s: To reap the fruit of knowledge, ah, how then


s: Would she with graver looks, with sweet, stern brow,


s: Check my presumption and my forwardness;


s: Yet still would give me flowers, still would me show


s: What she would have me, yet not have me know.


s: That valleys, groves, and hills, and fields,


s: The shepherd swains shall dance and sing


s: And you, my Love, as high as heaven above,


s: Yet should the thoughts of me your humble swain


s: Were I as high as heaven above the plain,


s: Whereso'er you were, with you my love should go.


s: Were you the earth, dear Love, and I the skies,


s: My love should shine on you like to the sun,


s: And look upon you with ten thousand eyes


s: Till heaven wax'd blind, and till the world were done.


s: Whereso'er I am, below, or else above you,


s: Whereso'er you are, my heart shall truly love you.


s: Since there's no help, come let us kiss and part:


s: Nay, I have done, you get no more of me;


s: And I am glad, yea, glad with all my heart,


s: Shake hands for ever, cancel all our vows,


s: Now, at the last gasp of Love's latest breath,


s: When, his pulse failing, Passion speechless lies,


s: When Faith is kneeling by his bed of death,


s: Now, if thou wouldst, when all have given him over,


s: From death to life thou mightst him yet recover.


s: Hark! hark! the lark at heaven's gate sings,


s: Scorchèd the fruits in vale and mountain,


s: Your mind is light, soon lost for new love.


s: I was your heart, your soul, and treasure;


s: Your breasts, where Cupid tumbling lies,


s: These are but gauds: nay, what are lips?


s: Did Helen's breast, though ne'er so soft,


s: For crystal brows there's nought within,


s: And I might have gone near to love thee,


s: That lips could speak, had power to move thee;


s: Arm'd with her briars, how sweetly smells;


s: But, pluck'd and strain'd through ruder hands,


s: O, I shall see thee never, never, never!


s: O, happy is the maid whose life takes end


s: Ere it knows parent's frown or loss of friend!


s: Since when it grows, and smells, I swear,


s: To-morrow, when thou leav'st, what wilt thou say?


s: Wilt thou then ante-date some new-made vow?


s: We are not just those persons which we were?


s: Or, as true deaths true marriages untie,


s: Bind but till Sleep, Death's image, them unloose?


s: For having purposed change and falsehood, you


s: Can have no way but falsehood to be true?


s: O if thou knew'st how thou thyself dost harm,


s: And dost prejudge thy bliss, and spoil my rest;


s: Then would'st thou melt the ice out of thy breast,


s: And thy relenting heart would kindly warm.


s: O, if thy pride did not our joys control,


s: What world of loving wonders should'st thou see!


s: For if I saw thee once transform'd in me,


s: Then all my thoughts should in thy visage shine,


s: And if that aught mischanced thou should'st not moan


s: Nor bear the burthen of thy griefs alone:


s: No, I would have my share in what were thine:


s: And whilst we thus should make our sorrows one,


s: This happy harmony would make them none.


s: 'Mongst that sweet-strained moisture, rare delight!


s: Her hand seem'd milk, in milk it was so white.


s: Seals of love, but sealed in vain, sealed in vain.


s: Shall the sails of my heart stand still?


s: Shall the grists of my hope be unground?


s: Love was not meant for people in their wits,


s: Betray the straw, and features in their brain,


s: Fill earth with sound, and airy heavens above,


s: Her tresses are like wires of beaten gold,


s: Like Nisus' golden hair that Scylla poll'd,


s: Her eyes like shining lamps in midst of night,


s: Or as the stars that give the seamen light,


s: Amidst her cheeks the rose and lily strive,


s: When their contést doth make their colour thrive,


s: Her lips like scarlet of the finest dye,


s: Teeth white as snow, which on the hills do lie,


s: When yelping hounds pursue her to and fro,


s: Daphnis' deserts and beauty are too rare:


s: For the gray morn breaks from thine eyes.


s: Some asked how pearls did grow, and where;


s: And this same flower that smiles to-day,


s: To drown their banks! Grief's sullen brooks


s: Dear, if you change, I'll never choose again;


s: Sweet, if you shrink, I'll never think of love;


s: Fair, if you fail, I'll judge all beauty vain;


s: Wise, if too weak, more wits I'll never prove.


s: Dear, sweet, fair, wise,--change, shrink, nor be not weak;


s: And, on my faith, my faith shall never break.


s: Earth with her flowers shall sooner heaven adorn;


s: Heaven her bright stars through earth's dim globe shall move;


s: Fire heat shall lose, and frosts of flames be born;


s: Air, made to shine, as black as hell shall prove:


s: Earth, heaven, fire, air, the world transformed shall view,


s: Ere I prove false to faith, or strange to you.


s: Till she can dress her beauty at your eyes.


s: The merchant bows unto the seaman's star,


s: The ploughman from the sun his season takes;


s: But still the lover wonders what they are,


s: Who look for day before his mistress wakes.


s: Awake, awake, break through your veils of lawn,


s: Then draw your curtains, and begin the dawn.


s: In every eye, but in my thoughts most fair.


s: Like tapers on the altar shine her eyes;


s: We sit and talk, and kiss away the hours


s: As chastely as the morning dews kiss flowers.


s: I touch her, like my beads, with devout care,


s: And come unto my courtship as my prayer.


s: Thou sing'st to her, and so do I address


s: Thou singing livest, and I must singing die.


s: Temp. Jas. I. (condensed by T. Oxenford).


s: Why should two hearts in one breast lie,


s: Quit, quit, for shame, this will not move,


s: I Wonder what those lovers mean, who say


s: If so it be one place both hearts contain,


s: Than to join hearts that parted were before?


s: Woe to her stubborn heart, if once mine come


s: Then shall Love keep the ashes and torn parts


s: From hers th' alloy, from mine the metal take.


s: For of her heart he from the flames will find


s: No dross was there to perish in the fire.


s: Scorch'd his wings, and spoiled his sight.


s: The air which thy smooth voice doth break,


s: But that which from these accents flows.


s: Pains not the heart, but hurts the sight.


s: For, oh! thy fancy at all games does fly,


s: Vain are our hopes, and endless is our care;


s: Since the poor swain that sighs for you,


s: If not in joy, I'll live at least in peace;


s: From his bright beams, than her fair eyes.


s: Whose yielding hearts, and joining hands,


s: 'Tis friendship makes the bondage sweet,


s: All bright as an angel new dropt from the sky;


s: At a distance I gaze, and am aw'd by my fears,


s: When your love runs in blushes through every vein;


s: When it darts from your eyes, when it pants in your heart,


s: And thus, might I gratify both, would I do:


s: Still an angel appear to each lover beside,


s: Dear, if you change, I'll never choose again. 95.


s: Diaphenia, like the daffa-down-dilly. 46.


s: False though she be to me and love. 129.


s: Fame of Dorinda's conquest brought. 133.


s: Hark! hark! the lark at heaven's gate sings. 56.


s: Help me to seek! For I lost it there. 1.


s: Here end my chains, and thraldom cease, 127.


s: How bless'd are lovers in disguise! 134.


s: I do confess thou'rt smooth and fair. 67.


s: I have a mistress, for perfections rare. 99.


s: I lately vow'd, but 'twas in haste. 131.


s: I lov'd thee once, I'll love no more. 69.


s: I wonder what those lovers mean, who say. 110.


s: If all the world and Love were young. 22.


s: If women could be fair, and yet not fond. 11.


s: Ladies, though to your conquering eyes. 116.


s: Like to the clear in highest sphere. 32.


s: Look, Delia, how we esteem the half-blown rose. 47.


s: Love, that liveth and reigneth in my thought. 3.


s: Love, when 'tis true, needs not the aid. 119.


s: My true-love hath my heart, and I have his. 27.


s: Now fie on foolish love, it not befits. 82.


s: Now thou hast loved me one whole day. 75.


s: O gentle Love, ungentle for thy deed! 17.


s: O if thou knew'st how thou thyself dost harm. 77.


s: Ring out your bells, let mourning shews be spread. 28.


s: Say, mighty Love, and teach my song. 132.


s: Set me whereas the sun doth parch the green. 4.


s: Shepherd, what's love? I pray thee tell! 20.


s: Since first I saw your face I resolved. 108.


s: Since there's no help, come let us kiss and part. 53.


s: Some asked me where the rubies grew. 90.


s: The air which thy smooth voice doth break. 115.


s: The lark now leaves his wat'ry nest. 97.


s: Tune on my pipe the praises of my love. 83.


s: Were I as base as is the lowly plain. 52.


s: Whence comes my love? O heart, disclose! 45.


s: While that the sun with his beams hot. 57.


s: With fragrant flowers we strew the way. 34.


s: A morning full of happiness any boy may find


s: By sailing boats upon the lake, if he is so inclined;


s: The wind it drives them out to sea, he pulls them back, and then


s: They jerk and struggle to be free--away they go again!


s: They wibble-wobble as they sail, and sometimes they upset,--


s: Of course he reaches out for them,--of course he gets quite wet.


s: But Aged Grandsires, if you must sail boats in Central Park,


s: Play properly, don't splash yourself, and run back home ere dark.


s: Look backward and with me enjoy this page.


s: Ah, me, the long-lost joys of being young!


s: To make up faces, and stick out one's tongue;


s: How those occasions of Xantippish strife


s: Gave zip and zest to our dull childish life.


s: Ah, truly, as the tree is bent the tiny twig's inclined,


s: The contradictious tendencies of woman's wayward mind


s: For instance, when some little girls just hate to go to school


s: And beg that they may stay at home and play;


s: And then, permission given, these same children, as a rule,


s: Delight in _playing school_ the livelong day!


s: And rush out with their skates and sleds.


s: The great steam-whistle's fearful squeaks.


s: The babies with their screams and shrieks,


s: Well, there you're wrong! you have forgot.


s: They hang around him eagerly and offer him advice.


s: And butterscotch is awful good and chocolates is nice.


s: While Billy Barlow's heart beat high inside his chubby shape.


s: Until your purse is empty from your friends you can't escape.


s: Shows a fat little maiden skipping rope.


s: She can jump "highwater" and "pepper" too,


s: If you jump "highwater" you'll lose your breath,


s: And to jump "pepper" might cause your death.


s: "You think you're smart!" Miss Essie said,


s: While no one 'neath the May-bower walked.


s: These boisterous boys, with bang and fizz,


s: But you, whose locks are bleached by Time,


s: And says, "Gee! fellers, ain't it prime?


s: I wake, the Sun does scatter into Flight


s: The Dreams of Happiness I have each Night,


s: O blessèd Dreams--full of Domestic Bliss,


s: Too soon alas! They're banished with the Light.


s: I'm going to tell in just the Briefest way


s: Then one and all will know the Reason why


s: On Christmas day a good Friend did present


s: My Wife a Book; no doubt with best intent.


s: And things had settled back in Place once more,


s: Wife found the Time to revel in that Book,


s: And told me how she loved its Ancient Lore.


s: She soon possessed the dreadful Omar Fad,


s: Which other Husbands, I have learned, think Bad.


s: But unlike other Fads which now are Past,


s: The others which she tired of years before,--


s: Collecting Vases, Fans, and Spoons galore,--


s: Therefore there was no reason to be Sore.


s: But now each time I come back to the House


s: She reads right on, and scarcely does Arouse.


s: Or else I find her with her Pen in Hand,


s: Grinding out Quatrains which mayhap are Grand,


s: She tries to make me Listen: Rest assured


s: Had I but known just what my Fate would be,


s: Inside a Drawer to which I hold the Key,


s: That Book forever would have Disappeared


s: And thereby would have gained some Peace for Me.


s: Sometimes when I am very tired, and Plead


s: To be amused, My Wife says, "I will read."


s: And this is what she tries to make me Hear,


s: "With Earth's first Clay they did the Last man knead."


s: But don't imagine while Possessed of Wit,


s: That I assent, and therefore Calmly sit.


s: I take my hat, and hasten from the House,


s: And come not back till think she's through with It.


s: I might have Prayed, and possibly thereby


s: Have gained relief from Somewhere in the Sky.


s: But Wife says, Omar's reckoning proves it


s: At least that is the Doctrine he presents,


s: My Wife's Love for him only more Intense.


s: And thus it is--the Rubaiyat's her Creed.


s: I tear my hair--I storm--I swear, and yet,


s: "Some for the Glories of this world; and some


s: Sigh for the Prophet's Paradise to Come;"


s: Now all the Years that we have Wedded been,


s: Until this Omar--dead eight Hundred Years,


s: I feel chagrined to Think, at this late Date,


s: The fond Devotion that's been mine alone.


s: No Wonder I cry out 'gainst such a Fate.


s: "The Worldly Hope men set their Hearts upon


s: Were Mine, for one sweet space of Time then gone.


s: Regarding Wives, and how to manage them.


s: Strange, is it not? Of all the Husbands who


s: Before me passed this Door of Trouble through


s: My Friends can't help me, yet they laugh to Scorn


s: My downcast looks, and at the way I Mourn.


s: They do not know the Anguish of my Soul,


s: But this I know, whether the one True Light


s: Kindle to Love, or wrath consume me quite,


s: Than to Possess the Whole great World outright.


s: I oft' attempt to show Wife where 'twill Lead.


s: She gets her Book, and says I must take Heed


s: That--"The first Morning of Creation wrote


s: What the last Dawn of reckoning shall Read."


s: One day I queried would she please to Say


s: How long, how long this Fad was apt to Stay?


s: She smiled and said, "My dear, don't fret about


s: "'The Moving Finger writes, and having Writ


s: Moves on.'" "And surely, dear, you have the Grit


s: When you can't help yourself a single Bit."


s: The very thought of it most drives me Mad,


s: And bows me to the very Earth with Grief.


s: "To grasp the sorry Scheme of Things entire";


s: How soon I'd shatter it to bits--and then


s: Or, would some Wingèd Angel ere too Late


s: And make the stern Recorder change the lines,


s: 'Tis midnight's holy hour, and silence now


s: The still and pulseless world. Hark! on the winds


s: The bell's deep tones are swelling; 'tis the knell


s: Is sweeping past; yet, on the stream and wood,


s: With melancholy light, the moonbeams rest


s: Like a pale, spotless shroud; the air is stirred,


s: As by a mourner's sigh; and, on yon cloud,


s: That floats so still and placidly through heaven,


s: The spirits of the Seasons seem to stand.


s: Young Spring, bright Summer, Autumn's solemn form,


s: And Winter with its aged locks--and breathe


s: Like the far windharps wild, touching wail,


s: For memory and for tears. Within the deep,


s: Still chambers of the heart, a spectre dim,


s: Whose tones are like the wizard voice of time,


s: Heard from the tomb of ages, points its cold


s: And holy visions, that have passed away,


s: On the dead waste of life. The spectre lifts


s: The coffin-lid of Hope and Joy and Love,


s: Sweet forms that slumber there, scatters dead flowers


s: Has gone, and with it many a glorious throng


s: Of happy dreams. Its mark is on each brow,


s: Its shadow in each heart. In its swift course,


s: It waved its sceptre o'er the beautiful;


s: And they are not. It laid its pallid hand


s: Upon the strong man: and the haughty form


s: It trod the hall of revelry, where thronged


s: The bright and joyous; and the tearful wail


s: Of stricken ones is heard, where erst the song


s: And reckless shout resounded. It passed o'er


s: The battle plain, where sword, and spear and shield,


s: Flashed in the light of midday; and the strength


s: Of serried hosts is shivered, and the grass,


s: Green from the soil of carnage, waves above


s: The crushed and mouldering skeleton. It came,


s: Fierce spirit of the glass and scythe! What power


s: Can stay him in his silent course, or melt


s: Through heaven's unfathomable depths, or brave


s: And bath its plumage in the thunder's home


s: Furls his broad wing at nightfall, and sinks down


s: To rest upon his mountain crag; but Time


s: Knows not the weight of sleep or weariness,


s: And Night's deep darkness has no chain to bind


s: O'er earth, like troubled visions o'er the breast


s: Of dreaming sorrow; cities rise and sink


s: Spring blazing from the ocean, and go back


s: To their mysterious caverns; mountains rear


s: To heaven their bold and blackened cliffs, and bow


s: Their tall heads to the plain; and empires rise,


s: Gathering the strength of hoary centuries,


s: And rush down, like the Alpine avalanche,


s: Startling the nations; and the very stars,


s: Yon bright and glorious blazonry of God,


s: And like the Pleiad, loveliest of their train,


s: Shoot from their glorious spheres, and pass away


s: To darkle in the trackless void; yet Time,


s: Time, the tomb-builder, holds his fierce career,


s: Dark, stern, all pitiless, and pauses not


s: Amid the mighty wrecks that strew his path,


s: Shall happy bells, from yonder ancient spire,


s: Send their glad greetings to each Christmas fire


s: Ah! Let the thought that on this holy morn


s: The Prince of Peace-the Prince of Peace was born,


s: Hath left this tortured land, and haply now


s: Holds its white court on some far mountain's brow,


s: Call its sad votaries to the shrine of God,


s: And, with the cloister and the tented sod,


s: Will watch that earth, where once, not all in vain,


s: He died to give us peace, may not disdain


s: The land, the Peace of His vast love shall fall,


s: Oh, turn the rapturous thought in every way!


s: Made rankly fertile by the blood of men,


s: Peace in the woodland, and the lonely glen,


s: Peace in the thousand fields of waving grain,


s: Peace in the highway and the flowery lane,


s: Peace in our sheltered bays and ample streams,


s: Peace whereso'er our starry garland gleams;


s: Peace where the scholar thinks--the hunter roams,


s: Peace, God of Peace! Peace, peace, in all our homes,


s: Made rankly fertile by the blood of men."]


s: With smiles the martyred daughter falls,


s: You stroll the gardener's flowery walks;


s: My heart through all these dreams endures,


s: And the light of earth that night eclipsed


s: Swelleth the hymn of the Saviour's birth.


s: Its light, fair clouds in pencilled gold and gray


s: Pause motionless above the pine-grown hill,


s: Where the pines, tranced as by a wizard's will,


s: Yea! mute and moveless; not one flickering spray


s: Flashed into sunlight, nor a gaunt bough stirred;


s: Yet, if wooed hence beneath those pines to stray,


s: A bodiless voice, by grosser ears unheard.


s: What voice is this? What low and solemn tone,


s: Which, though all wings of all the winds seemed furled,


s: Nor even the zephyr's fairy flute is blown,


s: From out the whispering pine-tops' shadowy world?


s: Ah! can it be the antique tales are true?


s: Doth some lone Dryad haunt the breezeless air,


s: And wildly breathing all her wild soul through


s: That strange unearthly music of despair?


s: Or can it be that ages since, storm-tossed,


s: And driven far inland from the roaring lea,


s: Some baffled ocean-spirit, worn and lost,


s: Here, through dry summer's dearth and winter's frost,


s: Yearns for the sharp, sweet kisses of the sea?


s: Dream-touched, and musing in the tranquil morn;


s: All woodland sounds--the pheasant's gusty drum,


s: The mock-bird's fugue, the droning insect's hum--


s: Scarce heard for that strange, sorrowful voice forlorn!


s: Beneath the drowsèd sense, from deep to deep


s: Of spiritual life its mournful minor flows,


s: Streamlike, with pensive tide, whose currents keep


s: Low murmuring 'twixt the bounds of grief and sleep,


s: Yet locked for aye for sleep's divine repose.


s: Tall, sombre, grim, against the morning sky


s: They rise, scarce touched by melancholy airs,


s: Which stir the fadeless foliage dreamfully,


s: Tall, sombre, grim, they stand with dusky gleams


s: Brightening to gold within the woodland's core,


s: Beneath the gracious noontide's tranquil beams--


s: But the weird winds of morning sigh no more.


s: A stillness, strange, divine, ineffable,


s: Broods round and o'er them in the wind's surcease,


s: And on each tinted copse and shimmering dell


s: Rests the mute rapture of deep-hearted peace.


s: Last, sunset comes--the solemn joy and might


s: Borne from the West when cloudless day declines--


s: Low, flutelike breezes sweep the waves of light,


s: And lifting dark green tresses of the pines,


s: Till every lock is luminous--gently float,


s: Fraught with hale odors up the heavens afar


s: To faint when twilight on her virginal throat


s: Wears for a gem the tremulous vesper star.


s: Brightening to gold within the woodland's core."]


s: While the calm of the tide deepens leeward,


s: Of heart-pulses throbbed thro' the river,


s: For the lights with their welcoming quiver


s: For the stress of the voyage has passed--


s: While the calm of the tide deepens leeward;


s: O don't you remember those days so divine,


s: Around which the heart-strings all tenderly twine,


s: When with sapling pole and a painted cork


s: We fished up and down the old Hanging Fork--


s: From the railroad bridge, with its single span,


s: Clear down to the mill at Dawson's old dam--


s: From early morn till the shades of night,


s: And it made no difference if fish _didn't_ bite?


s: What pleasure it gives to think and to dream


s: Of those long, happy days, and the old winding stream,


s: When we waded the creek with our pants to the knee,


s: And got our lines tangled in a sycamore tree,


s: And were most scared to death when out from the root


s: The long, wriggling snake through the water did shoot,


s: And you lost your line, your hook and your cork,


s: And I slipped and fell in the old Hanging Fork!


s: The years they have come, and the years they have fled,


s: And frosted with silver the hairs of the head,


s: But still in fond memory there lingers the joy


s: Of scenes such as these, when a bare-footed boy


s: I wandered away to the clear rippling stream--


s: No cankering care to trouble life's dream;--


s: And we spit on our bait and in whispers we'd talk,


s: As we threw out our lines in the old Hanging Fork!


s: We sat there and fished with the sun beaming down


s: On the tops of our heads through hats minus crown,


s: And when I got a bite or you caught a perch


s: We'd just give our lines a thundering lurch,


s: And land him high up on the bank in the weeds,


s: Then string him along with the pumpkin seeds!


s: O don't you remember the hot, dusky walk,


s: Along the white pike to the old Hanging Fork?


s: There's a something in the atmosphere, in sweet September days,


s: That mantles all the landscape with its languid, dreamy haze;


s: And you see the leaves a-dropping, in a lazy kind of way,


s: Where the maple trees are standing in their Summer-time array.


s: There's a yellowish tinge a-creeping over Nature's emerald sheen,


s: Where the glassy pool is shaded by the overhanging limb,


s: And the pebbly bottom's glinting where the silvery minnows swim.


s: The tasseled corn is nodding, and the crow on drowsy wing


s: Is sailing o'er the orchard where the ripening apples swing,


s: And the fleecy clouds are floating in the azure of the sky,


s: And the gentle breeze is sighing as it's idly wafted by.


s: The cantaloupes are ripening in their yellow golden rinds;


s: And the melons, round and juicy, are a-clinging to the vines;


s: And the merry, laughing children, in their happy hour of play,


s: Are a-romping in the meadow and a-sliding down the hay.


s: The busy bees are buzzing where the grapes with purple blush,


s: Where the hickory boughs are bending 'neath an extra heavy load.


s: Let your poets keep a-singing about the Springtime gay,


s: And the blossoms and the flowers in the merry month of May--


s: But the early Autumn splendor, with its sweet September days,


s: Eclipses boasted Springtime in a thousand kind of ways!


s: When the chilling winds of Winter come a-knocking at the door,


s: And the fleecy flakes are flying and the earth is covered o'er,


s: And you've supped on sweet potatoes and a 'possum frosted ripe,


s: When the fire is blazing brightly and the room is snug and warm,


s: When the old split-bottom rocker is far better than a throne,


s: And the visions of the fancy are the fairest earth has known,


s: And you watch the mystic shapes that the dancing shadows write,


s: When your dressing gown and slippers might be envied by a king,


s: When the ringlets aromatic have circled round your head,


s: And a drowsiness o'ertakes you, and you want to go to bed,


s: And the bowlful that you're smoking has burned to ashes white,


s: 'Twas a place of fifty acres, in a lonely neighborhood,


s: And near a grove of somber pines the shackly farm-house stood;


s: And all the folks, for miles around, did solemnly declare


s: That ghosts and goblins horrible held nightly revel there.


s: They said the house was "hanted," and that not a man alive,


s: In all the country round about, could own the place and thrive;


s: That the cattle died with fever, and the hogs the cholera took--


s: And every one that tried it wore a mighty troubled look.


s: But they put it up at auction, and Tim Bluster bid the most,


s: Who always said "There want no hants nor any kind of ghost


s: That ever walked a graveyard in the middle of the night


s: So Tim got full possession, and he moved out to his home,


s: And the first night, as he sat there, within his room alone,


s: The door was softly opened, and a cat came walking in,


s: With eyes like balls of fire and a coat as black as sin.


s: Then squatting on its haunches, it said, in tones polite,


s: "There seems to be but two of us to stay in here to-night!"


s: Tim muttered in a trembling voice, as for the door he run,


s: Tim staid away the blessed night, but when the daylight came,


s: It brought him back his courage, and it filled him full of shame;


s: Could make him leave that room again--he'd bet his life on that!"


s: So when the shades of evening fell, Tim double-barred the door,


s: And took precautions that, perhaps, he hadn't night before,


s: And felt quite sure that nothing now could gain admittance there,


s: Then, all at once, he roused himself, and opening wide his eyes,


s: Beheld a figure standing there that made his hair arise


s: Like quills upon a porcupine, and froze his heart with fear,


s: And headless though it was, it spoke, and said in accents clear,


s: Tim made a bound, and took with him the sash and every light,


s: And then he jumped a nine-rail fence, and down the road he spun,


s: 'Twas seven miles before he stopped and sat down on a log


s: To catch his breath and rest awhile from his nocturnal jog


s: And then he turned his head around, and right before his face


s: The figure stood, and said to him, "I think we've had a race!"


s: Tim tried to speak, and not a word he found to utter then,


s: But as he jumped from off his seat and broke away again,


s: Away Tim flew--he left the road, and through the woods and fields


s: And that old house is tenantless, and slowly rotting down,


s: There's the rose and the lily, the daisy and pink,


s: And many rare flowers which others may think


s: Are the fairest and best, the sweetest that blow,


s: With delicious perfume, and colors that glow--


s: But go to the orchard and sniff the delight


s: Of the incense that's shed by the pink and the white,


s: On the ambient air where the apple trees bloom!


s: There's the cowslip, narcissus, and sweet mignonette,


s: The asters, verbenas, the fuschias; and yet,


s: It's the white and the pink I dream of to-day,


s: And I walk 'neath the branches that just interlace


s: And shower their blossoms right down in my face


s: When the breeze that is laden with rarest perfume


s: Is wafted along where the apple trees bloom!


s: With glad voices the birds as they flit to and fro


s: Are singing their songs where the pink and the snow


s: Of the orchard, bedecked in its garments so rare,


s: Is diffusing and sending its breath on the air;


s: And the rays of the sun sift through on the grass,


s: In Springtime at evening, at morning, at noon,


s: How sweet is the scent of the apple trees' bloom!


s: And when Summer is gone, and Autumn has shed


s: It's soft, dreamy haze through the trees overhead,


s: On each spreading branch where blossoms now cling


s: The red and the gold to the fruit it will bring,


s: And stripe with a skill and give it that blush


s: Only Nature can paint with her delicate brush!


s: O when life ebbs away, then make me a tomb


s: Right out in the orchard, where the apple trees bloom!


s: To Chattanooga's vale, where flows the winding Tennessee,


s: And rugged Lookout sentinels heroic dust of sixty-three--


s: Where Chickamauga's gory field re-echoed to the cannon's roar,


s: And shot and shell through serried ranks a bloody pathway tore,


s: And mountain slope and wood and field were lumined with the blaze


s: They come again, the gallant few, survivors of the fray,


s: The last drop of the crimson tide from ghastly wounds poured out


s: Amid the conflict's awful din and wild resounding shout;


s: And yet it seems but yesterday, or like a passing dream,


s: And circling o'er the Blue and Gray in lurid clouds it drifted!


s: And now upon the blood-soaked ground once more they stand,


s: Where the unyielding "Rock of Chickamauga" held command,


s: And strewed the field with heaps of the assaulting Gray


s: Who dauntless rushed where lines of Blue refused to give the way;


s: To fill the heart with grief and dim the eye with misty tear;


s: And spanning Time's chasm with the imagination's bridge,


s: They hear the thunder of the guns from Missionary Ridge!


s: And there the pyramid of balls is reared to tell


s: And mark the hallowed spot where tuneful genius fell;


s: The vagrant winds around it now seem sighing


s: Prophetic words by gallant LYTLE penned--


s: A laurel wreath with immortelles to blend!


s: A halo hovers round about this gifted son,


s: Whose deathless name with pen and sword was nobly won!


s: They come to mark with tokens of their love and pride


s: Each consecrated spot where bleeding heroes fell and died,


s: And gaze with reverence on some gently swelling mound


s: Which hides the dust of comrade in his sleep profound;


s: To picture to the mind--with melancholy pleasure trace


s: The unforgotten outlines of a dear, remembered face,


s: Which passed from loved ones and from life away,


s: A victim on the bloody field of fratricidal fray!


s: O gifted one of the Sunny South, with lips so eloquent,


s: In whose great heart no malice e'er was found!


s: And now thou art a messenger of Peace, by heaven sent


s: On mission of fraternity, to heal the cankering wound!


s: In that dread day when fratricidal strife


s: Convulsed with passion--crimsoned with its blood--


s: No nobler son than thou who staked his life


s: With veterans Gray withstood the overwhelming flood!


s: No sweeter tribute could be paid by mortal tongue--


s: No nobler sentiment the human heart could fill--


s: In grander strains no poet's praises e'er were sung


s: Of private soldier--than thy words that burn and thrill!


s: No treasured wrong within thy noble soul


s: Has tainted with its slimy trail of hate--


s: No broader love of country could embrace the whole,


s: Or bow more gracefully to iron hand of fate!


s: Speak on! And scatter broadcast healing seed


s: That shall a harvest of good feeling yield--


s: And Peace, no less than War, shall lend her meed


s: And crown anew this hero of the bloody field!


s: Bright visions of childhood! How dear to the heart


s: Are the scenes which from memory can never depart!


s: Undimmed by the sorrows, the grief and the tears


s: Which have shadowed the pathway of life's later years,


s: They come like the rainbow which follows the storm--


s: On remembrance reflected with colors as warm--


s: And in dreams of delight they picture the fun


s: That we had long ago when we fished in Clark's Run!


s: With a can full of worms and a heart full of joy,


s: Up and down the old stream, a bare-footed boy,


s: A truant from school, my footsteps would stray


s: To the deep-shaded pool, or where ripples at play,


s: As they flowed over beds of smooth-polished stones,


s: Sang a lullaby sweet in soft undertones!


s: From the dawn of the day to the set of the sun


s: What pleasures we've had when we fished in Clark's Run!


s: Equipped with a pole, a hook and a line,


s: And stowed in some pocket a long piece of twine


s: On which you could string, if you seined for a week,


s: Every fish that was found up and down the old creek--


s: With one "gallus" to pants that were rolled to the knee,


s: And holes in our hats through which you could see


s: Where the sunbeams had turned the light hair to dun--


s: We hied us away to the banks of Clark's Run!


s: There we baited the hook and threw out the line,


s: And watched the cork disappear with a rapture divine!


s: And felt just as proud as a prince or a king


s: When we landed high up, with a jerk and a swing,


s: A fish that would measure two inches or more,


s: Then anchored him fast with the string to the shore!


s: But unnumbered now are the silver strands spun


s: With the hair of the head since we fished in Clark's Run!


s: O who can there be with a heart in his breast


s: Would forget the dear scenes which so lovingly rest


s: In the bosom when life has grown old and cold,


s: And feel no delight when such pictures unfold,


s: And would blot out forever from memory's page


s: The records of childhood which solace old age?


s: 'Till time ends for me and with life I have done,


s: I'll dream of the days when we fished in Clark's Run!


s: Who heard the groans that rent thy breast?


s: O'erhung with wild woods, shorn of green;


s: No flowers sprang wanton to be pressed--


s: Full well I know that wishing never yet has brought


s: The things that seem to us would satisfy the heart,


s: And that anticipated pleasure, when at last 'tis caught,


s: Has naught but transitory solace to impart;


s: And yet, somehow, I've ever felt and thought


s: (As long as we are capable of feeling--wishing)--


s: And that's to leave dull care behind, and--go a-fishing!


s: Some dream of wealth--of place--of fame--


s: And fleeting shadows vainly they pursue;


s: And some have sighed to win a deathless name


s: Where fields of carnage corpses thickly strew,


s: And shrieks of agony are heard 'mid smoke and flame;


s: But these are dizzy heights attained by few;


s: So, when Dame Fortune is her favors dishing,


s: I hope that I'll get mine in ample time to--go a-fishing!


s: Or music with a tone that's more entrancing,


s: Than just to wander where some mountain stream


s: Is o'er the rocks and polished pebbles dancing?


s: And nothing short of heaven itself, I ween,


s: Is like the moment when, his scales all glancing,


s: You see the happy consummation of your wishing,


s: And catch the very fish for which you have been fishing!


s: The Raven, perched above thy chamber door,


s: Responsive croaked with a prophetic word--


s: For in the realm of song may "Nevermore"


s: Such strains as thine by mortal ear be heard!


s: Whose earthly days were clouded o'er with gloom?


s: In regions with the sweet-voiced "Israfel,"


s: Yes, "echo through the corridors of Time"


s: Will have a tone that ages yet will know,


s: And blend with all that's beautiful--sublime--


s: In the attic, unused, there they put it away;


s: What iron's about it is eaten with rust,


s: And upon and around it are cobwebs and dust;


s: The dear, loving hands that on it have spun,


s: And long is the time since I saw them unreel


s: The threads, snowy white, from the old spinning-wheel!


s: It stood on a porch where the Summer sunshine


s: Sifted down to the floor through a clambering vine,


s: Whose tendrils about the lattice-work clung


s: Like my heart-strings round her, and the song that she sung;


s: And the pictures of fancy I con o'er and o'er,


s: Till, raptured, I see the dear features once more,


s: And thrill with the touch when her lips set the seal


s: Of her love, as she spun on the old spinning-wheel!


s: Then through the shadows and mists of many long years


s: The old cottage home to the vision appears;


s: And though youth it has fled, and the hair it is gray,


s: I'm a bare-footed boy returned to his play--


s: Forgetting the present to dream once again


s: That life had no anguish, no sorrow, no pain;


s: And sweetly the bells of the memory peal


s: When communing up there with the old spinning-wheel!


s: And back from the past, with its grief and its joy,


s: Come the tones of a voice I heard when a boy,


s: And I see once again, as it moved to and fro,


s: A form that now rests where the wild roses blow,


s: And the sentinel stars their love vigils keep


s: Above the dear one in her long, dreamless sleep;


s: But memories sweet to a heart that can feel


s: Still cluster around the old spinning-wheel.


s: Some spokes from the rim are broken and gone,


s: And it stands there forsaken, neglected, alone;


s: It knows naught of language, but a story can tell


s: With a charm that for me time cannot dispel;


s: The love of my childhood with it to share,


s: And emotions possess me I cannot conceal


s: When fondly I gaze on the old spinning-wheel!


s: The distaff is worn and smooth with the touch


s: Of the now folded hands that used it so much;


s: The sweet smile of love from a well-cherished face,


s: Which sheds round about it a halo divine


s: When thus I am kneeling at memory's shrine,


s: And hallows the thoughts which on the mind steal,


s: When up there alone with the old spinning-wheel!


s: 'Tis then that I see her in saintly guise,


s: Through the fast-welling tears that come to my eyes--


s: That beckons to me from the regions of light,


s: And illumines the way that my footsteps may tread


s: Along the straight path that she tried to reveal


s: As she taught me, and spun on the old spinning-wheel!


s: Yes, the finger of Time has furrowed the brow,


s: And silvered the hair, yet I dream of her now


s: The words of her love that my sorrows beguiled;


s: And this relic she used but brings back anew


s: The morning of life, that was fresh with the dew


s: Distilled from the heart, as she taught me to kneel


s: Right down by her side, and the old spinning-wheel!


s: Within thy hallowed precincts on this sweet autumnal day,


s: We're wandering 'neath the cedar and the pine,


s: Where rests the sacred dust of loved ones passed away,


s: And bleeding hearts a melancholy pleasure find.


s: In memory's faithful mirror here once more we trace


s: Familiar forms of those in life we knew,


s: And see again the shadowy outlines of some face


s: That, living, beamed with kindness--ever true.


s: Old age, and manhood's prime, and helpless infancy


s: Have dotted o'er with many an emerald mound,


s: And marked each stone with mournful tracery


s: Which stands within this consecrated ground.


s: And there the marble shaft its stately head


s: In polished whiteness pointing to the sky,


s: And here the modest tribute to the lowly dead--


s: The silent monitors that tell us all must die.


s: Here lavish Nature her bright smile imparts


s: And decks with lovely flowers in early Spring,


s: And here the sympathetic tear unbidden starts,


s: And loving hands their sweetest tributes bring.


s: Loved spot! A solace to the living 'tis to know


s: That when at last--life's fitful fever o'er--