I 
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES 
 
 1 
 
 i 
 

 WILD -JUSTICE 
 
 A DRAMATIC 
 
 POEM j& 
 
 V 
 
 BY 
 
 MARGARET 
 L. WOODS 
 
 SHITH. 
 
 ELDER^ 
 
 J.ONDON 
 ^ 
 
WILD JUSTICE 
 
WILD JUSTICE 
 
 BY 
 
 MARGARET L. WOODS 
 
 Al'THOR OF 'A VILLAGE TRAGEDY' 'LYRICS AND BALLADS 
 'THE VAGABONDS' ETC. 
 
 LONDON 
 
 SMITH, ELDER, & CO., 15 WATERLOO PLACE 
 1896 
 
 [All rights reserved] 
 

 R 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 IN explanation of the circumstances of the following 
 dramatic poem, it may be necessary to state that light- 
 houses could formerly be erected by private individuals, 
 who were then empowered by Act of Parliament to raise 
 dues on all ships passing them. That on the Skerries 
 was in private hands so late as the year 1841. 
 
 The scene is laid on Ynys yr Unigdra off the Welsh 
 coast, in the early years of this century. The island is in 
 an estuary and is surrounded by quicksands, except on one 
 side, where the channel of a river, deep but not wide, 
 divides it from a small island of rock and firm sand. The 
 two islands are connected by a wooden footbridge. 
 Across the mouth of the river and the greater part of the 
 estuary runs a bar of sand, dry at low tide and covered 
 at high. The bar is separated from Ynys yr Unigdra by 
 a belt of quicksand, but from the smaller island, where 
 the sands are firm, it can be easily reached at low tide. 
 
 'UTS* 
 
 ;. > 
 
vi WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Ty Mawr is a grey, gaunt house, with straggling out- 
 buildings. In front is a square garden with narrow paved 
 walks, enclosed by a low stone wall ; behind, some 
 rising ground, and a wood of stunted oaks. It is separated 
 only by a bare field from the shore, and looks out to sea 
 over the quicksand and the bar. To the right the bay 
 ends in a steep headland with some isolated rocks jutting 
 out beyond it, on the largest one of which (Craig y Gwr) 
 stands a recently built lighthouse. To the left is a wider 
 extent of estuary, and in the distance a rocky coast backed 
 by mountains. There are a few cottages on the island, 
 but they are all on the other side. The action takes 
 place principally in two rooms at Ty Mawr, both on the 
 first floor ; the great parlour and an inner room leading 
 out of it. Both have windows towards the sea. 
 
NOTE 
 
 I am indebted for the first lines of the Ballad in this play 
 to the following two lines, quoted in Wuthering Heights : 
 
 It was far in the night and the bairnies grat, 
 The mither beneath the moots heard that. 
 
PERSONAGES. 
 
 GRVFFITH GWYLLIM. 
 MRS. GWYLLIM, his wife. 
 OWAIN, a cripple\ 
 
 NELTO (ELLEN) 
 
 \-their children. 
 SHONNIN (JOHN) 
 
 A BABY J 
 
 [DAVID, LUCY, and other GWYLLIM children, who do not appear.} 
 
WILD JUSTICE 
 
 SCENE I 
 
 The inner room at Ty Mawr. NELTO with a 
 baby in her arms. 
 
 Nelto [singing]. 
 
 In the dead of the night the children were weeping. 
 The mother heard that where she lay sleeping, 
 And scratched at the coffin lid. 
 
 The shrill of the lark, the scream of the owl, 
 T/ie dogs that bark, and the storms that howl 
 She never had heard them where she lay hid, 
 But she heard her poor little children weeping. 
 
 Enter SHONNIN carrying books. 
 
 Nelto. Home from school already ? 
 Shonnin [throwing down his books]. Where's mother ? 
 Nflto. The Vicar's over here to-day, and she's gone 
 to see him. 
 
 B 
 
2 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Shonnin. What for? 
 
 Nelto. For the same reason that she went last Saturday 
 to see our dear cousin at the Port. 
 
 Shonnin. But he's a lawyer. How can the parson 
 help us? 
 
 Nelto. He could at least find out if there's no law in 
 England that will help us. O Shonnin ! Fancy if mother 
 and all of us could go away and live somewhere where 
 we should never, never see father again ! 
 
 Shonnin. We will when I've earned money enough. 
 
 Nelto. But can we ? Ah ! there she is, coming in at 
 the garden gate. 
 
 Shonnin [leaning out of the window]. Mother ! 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim [from the garden]. My child ? 
 
 Nelto. Hush ! Didn't you see Owain was asleep ? 
 [Leaning out of the window.] Come in quick, mother, 
 but don't wake Owain. He's asleep in the great parlour. 
 
 [Sings] In the lone of the night the sexton lay dreaming, 
 He turned him about : ' Who is sighing and screaming ? ' 
 ' Oh. help me out, Sexton, for pity, pity's sake ! ' 
 
 'Hush! hush! hush! 
 The dead must sleep sound and never wake} 
 
 A shimmer of wings went over the sky, 
 
 A murmur of strings : ' Oh, pass me not by ! ' 
 
 The poor mother wants to get out 
 
WILD JUSTICE 3 
 
 ' Oh come, help me soon I ' 
 
 But the angels harp on 'tzuixt the earth and the moon. 
 
 [MRS. GWYLLIM comes in. 
 
 Shonnin. So you've been to the parson, mother. 
 
 Nelto. Well, what did he say ? 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. He said I must have patience. 
 
 Nelto. Patience ! The fool ! 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. I have had patience for one and 
 twenty years. 
 
 Shonnin. Did he say nothing else ? 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Yes. He said that Holy Matrimony 
 is God's ordinance, and that a good wife by her meek 
 and pious conversation should reclaim an erring husband. 
 
 Nelto. Erring ! That's good. 
 
 Shonnin. He cannot know 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. What is there all the parish does not 
 know ? But Mr. Gwyllim is a Welshman ; he speaks 
 their own language, and drinks with them at their ale- 
 houses. Besides, the Vicar says he is a public benefactor. 
 This lighthouse of his on Craig y Gwr will not only put 
 money into his pocket, which they hope will -overflow 
 into theirs, but it will bring traffic to Forth Davrarch. 
 
 Nelto. The coward ! I feared he'd never dare to 
 stir a finger against a Gwyllim. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. I was a fool to go to him. I'd not 
 
 B 2 
 
4 \VILD JUSTICE 
 
 have gone if there'd been anyone else to go to. But who 
 do I know except Mr. Gwyllim's companions? The 
 Vicar was my last hope, and now he's failed me. O look, 
 look ! Your father's in the garden. He's coming in. 
 What can be the matter ? 
 
 Nelto. Something. He's shaking his fist. 
 
 Shonnin. In a black rage. But never mind, mother ; 
 it's me he's angry with, not you. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. You ? O Shonnin, what have you 
 been doing ? Stop here ; you must. I'll go and meet 
 him. You'll only make it worse if you come. 
 
 Nelto. Wait, mother, I'll come with you. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. No ; not for worlds. He's coming up. 
 
 Gwyllim [without]. Mrs. Gwyllim ! 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. He might take the baby and fling her 
 down stairs, as he did Owain, and make a cripple of her, 
 as he did of Owain. No no 
 
 Gwyllim [appearing in t)ie doorway]. Mrs. Gwyllim ! 
 
WILD JUSTICE 
 
 SCENE II 
 
 The great parlour. MR. and MRS. GWYLLIM, OWAIN in 
 a wheeled chair by the window. The door leading 
 into the inner room is half open, and NELTO, walking 
 up and down there with the baby, continues to sing 
 from time to time in a low voice, while her father is 
 speaking. 
 
 Nelto is singing: 
 
 In the dark underground the mother lay weeping ; 
 Through the deep underground a devil was creeping. 
 
 ' Hush, hush, hush ! 
 What are you crying about ? 
 Your gravestone is carven with cherubim faces, 
 Your pall is enwoven with silver laces' 
 
 Gwyllim. Answer, you sullen slut ! I'll make you 
 
 answer. 
 
 What have you told the parson ? I'll inform you 
 What I have told him : you're an unfaithful wife. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Unfaithful ? You said that ? 
 
 Gwyllim. Ay, so I did. 
 
6 M'ILD JUSTICE 
 
 Provoke me, stare upon me with those worn 
 lacklustre eyes ; I'll tell your lover's name 
 To who cares listen, tell the amorous story 
 
 Of certain letters love-letters found cherished 
 
 Nelto [stands by the open door and sings loud]. 
 
 ' O help me, dear angel, for pity, pity's sake, 
 
 My children have wept till their hearts are like to break. 1 
 
 ' The angels are fled and the sexton is sleeping, 
 
 And I am a devil, a deril from Hell.' 
 
 Gwyllim. Damn that girl ! I'd as soon keep a 
 
 parrot, 
 
 Or a piping bullfinch. Sooner ; for their necks 
 Were easier wrung. 
 [ With assumed mildness^ Come hither, Nelto bach. 
 
 [NELTO comes in. 
 
 Gwyllim [savagely]. I wish your neck was wrung ! 
 Oivain [aside]. Our dear Papa ! 
 
 [NELTO returns to the adjoining room. 
 Gwyllim [A? MRS. GWYLLIM]. What ! Are you crazed ? 
 
 You rear yourself against me ? 
 
 You mean to strive with me ? Conspire and whisper 
 Your corner treasons ? So, you Bedlamite, 
 You thought my lawyer cousin at Forth Davrarch 
 I know you went there, I know everything 
 Would turn against me, turn against a Gwyllim 
 
\VILD JUSTICE 7 
 
 For your sake? Fool, damned fool ! We hate each 
 
 other, 
 
 We Gwyllims, in the family ; outside it 
 We fight for't, back to back. You've tried the Law, 
 And that won't touch me. Then you try the Church 
 Poor Parson Jones. Ha, ha ! 
 Nelto is singing : 
 
 ' Then help me out, devil, O help me, good devil ! ' 
 
 ' A price must be paid to a spirit of evil> 
 
 I am thinking what price] said the spirit from Hell. 
 
 Gwyllim. Now, do you listen, 
 
 You white-mouthed staring block. The country-side 
 Knows all my devil's tricks, knows 'em and likes 'em. 
 I'm salt and pepper to their market talk ; 
 Besides, I'm one of them. They know I'm master 
 Here in this house and brook no huswife mistress ; 
 And ever)' man wishes himself the same. 
 The poor man who loves drink and wenches likes me 
 For being no better than himself ; the other 
 In his hypocrite heart likes me for being worse. 
 I point the road to Heaven by contraries, 
 And certify him safely on it o' Sundays, 
 When soaped and shaven, shining from his tea 
 And bound for Chapel, plump he meets Squire Gwyllim 
 Drunk as a lord and driving straight to Hell. 
 
8 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Hell ! Let 'em scare each other white with it. 
 You, you're a stranger. Not a man among them 
 Would flick a curse across me for your sake ; 
 No, not for your sweet sake, you withered hag, 
 Mother of half a score of brats, they would not. 
 And now such gilded glorious hopes of me 
 They have conceived, because each ship that passes 
 Drops gold into my lighthouse ! 
 
 Nelto is singing : 
 
 ' The price shall be paid, the bargain is made} 
 She has sworn him an oath, the coffin is broken, 
 The poor mother runs up the stair. 
 
 Gwyllim. What d'ye mean ? 
 Damn you, attend, you are my wife my wife ; 
 My thing, my chattel. You dare move against me ? 
 By God, I am amazed ! For twenty years 
 You play at suffering Patience, weep and pray, 
 Now understand ; you might as well be quiet. 
 I choose to keep you. I have married you, 
 I choose to keep you, Mrs. Gwyllim, keep 
 You and my lawful children. 
 
 Oivain [aside]. Slave-driver ! 
 
 Else might you lack a lawful slave to torture. 
 
 Gwyllim. Eh, hunchback ? Did I hear you mutter- 
 ing there ? 
 
WILD JUSTICE 9 
 
 [To MRS. GWYLLIM]. I fathom you ! That crooked im- 
 potence, 
 
 That infirm devil, first fruit of our love, 
 You make your minister. He sits to count 
 With seeming-aimless, calculating eye 
 Sea-traffickers ; the huge East Indiaman 
 With level range of topsails, dancing peaks 
 Of snow-white schooners, giddier than girls, 
 And every drudging slave-black barge that crawls 
 Deep-laden down the coast all, all of them 
 My tributaries. 
 
 [Pushes OWAIN'S chair away from the window. 
 Nelto is singing : 
 
 ' You have sworn me an oath, but where are the pledges ? ' 
 ' My hood of white satin with Valenciennes edges , 
 The ring from my finger, the rose from my hair.' 
 
 ' No, no, no, 
 But a tress of your beautiful hair' 
 
 Gwyllim. Well, enough of counting, 
 You count and whisper her : ' A twelvemonth more 
 And he'll be rich. Now is the time to strike ; 
 Find the fool Judge, the snivelling Advocate 
 That shall unyoke you, force him to disgorge 
 Money for all, his gold for us to enjoy 
 And beard him with.' 
 
io WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Owain. What if my mother asked 
 
 Merely her money ? 
 
 Givyllim [striking hi>ii\. Misbegotten toad ! 
 \To MRS. GWYLLIM.] So you inform my children, I their 
 
 father 
 
 Owe you my fortune ? This indeed's a wife ! 
 Some women can be loyal, though not loving ; 
 But that's not you. 
 
 What, all my fortune yours ? 
 Salt harvest of those uncompanioned combs 
 Where podded sea-weeds welter ; such a rent 
 As waves that leapt them for a wager paid, 
 Or the lean tenantry of long-necked birds 
 Blackening along their crests yes, they were yours. 
 But the lighthouse yonder, sparkling on Craig y Gwr, 
 The eye, the gem of the isle who planted that ? 
 Who schemed and laboured, wore the highroads out, 
 Scraped, mortgaged half the estate 
 
 Owain [aside]. My mother brought him. 
 
 Gwyllim. Curse you, what did you say ? 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. No, do not, Owain. 
 
 You must be happier at least less wretched 
 Than I, if money interests you. 
 
 Gwyllim. So ! 
 
 There's the dumb devil out of you at last. 
 Poor devil ! Quite a stranger in a woman, 
 
WILD JUSTICE ii 
 
 And posting back to Hell. The chattering sort, 
 The scolding, whining fiends inhabit women. 
 Of those you've seven apiece. 
 
 Answer me now. 
 
 Come, find a tongue. You're growing lunatic, 
 As mad as your mad daughter. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. 'Tis like I am. 
 
 Gwyllim. Trust me, you're sane enough your brain 
 
 will serve 
 
 To set a scheming accusation forth 
 With cunning words, when 'tis against your husband. 
 White, treacherous vermin ! Ay, 'twas very well 
 You found no gullible fool, but Lawyer Gwyllim. 
 I'll punish you for this. Not now, good madam, 
 You grow too legal ; but to-night, to-night, 
 You shall repent the lawyer, shall repent 
 The parson ; most of all, repent your sons 
 You hound upon my money. 
 
 Nelto is singing : 
 
 ' My penknife of pearl for a last love-token 
 1 gave my sweet William ; then, how can I shear it 1 ' 
 ' No need] said the devil ; ' no need. I can tear it. 1 
 
 Gwyllim [to OWAIN]. As for you, 
 
 Pernicious fool, what's wealth to you ? Can money 
 Put sap into those withered legs, give life 
 To you, who just exist ? Come now, what would you 
 Buy with my money ? Clothes ? You'd set them off 
 
12 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Handsomely. Horses ? You've no knees to grip 'em. 
 Drink ? It would kill you. I can take my drink, 
 Three bottles, like a man. Would you buy Love ? 
 Tis saleable. Old, hideous men can buy it 
 Not you. Why, damn you, miserable wretch, 
 What satisfaction could you buy ? 
 
 Owain. Revenge. 
 
 [GWYLLIM laughs immoderately^ 
 
 Gwyllim, Revenge, he says. O excellent ! Revenge ! 
 A chip o' the old block yet ! There's Gwyllim blood 
 Even in that poor carcase. 
 
 You must wait, 
 
 Young Master Gwyllim, say some thirty years. 
 Your grandsire lived to ninety ; so shall I, 
 And hale and hearty too. So treasure up 
 Your petty wrongs, your venomous hunchback spites, 
 Till you have money. You'll have time to gather 
 A goodly store of festering injuries 
 Before you bury me. 
 
 Nelto sings : 
 In the dead of the night, the moon shining 
 
 Gwyllim \looking into the adjoining rooni\. Shall I 
 
 not be obeyed ? 
 
 Silence, you screech-owl ! Ah, Shonnin is there ! 
 Come out, boy. Tell your mother she's a fool 
 To make you worry me for money. 
 
Mrs. Guy Him. I ? 
 
 [SHONNIN comes in from adjoining room. 
 
 Shonnin. No, sir, 'twas not my mother. She knows 
 
 nothing. 
 
 I only wanted mother, I'm seventeen 
 It's time I somehow went into the world. 
 
 Gwyllim. Well, go. Your brother Richard went at 
 your age. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Ah, you forget 
 
 Gwyllim. Dick was blown overboard ? 
 
 No, I remember it. He chose to go. 
 Too weak to bear a buffet from my fist 
 Or put an old man down, he thought to outface 
 The hurricane, that plucks with giant hand 
 Men from the close-hugged mast, as I should pluck 
 A caterpillar from a stalk and toss it 
 Carelessly forth ; so does it fling them out 
 Amid the tumbling heaps of confused water 
 And the running foam. Useless to seek them there, 
 So never blame the captain. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. May Heaven have mercy 
 
 On my poor all of us ! 
 
 Skonnin. Please hear me, sir. 
 
 Old Rhys the schoolmaster says perhaps he has told 
 
 you 
 I am quick at books. 
 
i 4 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Gwyttim. Books ! 
 
 Shonnin. There was a Scotchman staying with him 
 not long ago, told me that at Edinburgh you can live for 
 nothing, and get a University education so cheap the 
 poorest people in Scotland send their sons there. 
 
 Gwyllim. The more fools they. 
 
 Shonnin. I should like to go there, sir. 
 
 Gwyllim. Well, go. 
 
 Shonnin. You don't mean ? 
 
 Gwyllim. To pay for you ? No, my lad. When I've 
 got money I shall have something better to do with it 
 than to cram your soft head with book-learning. I never 
 had more than the parson at Forth Davrarch could give 
 me, and at your age I was earning my own living. 
 
 Shonnin. That's what I want to do. 
 
 Gwyllim. And what I mean you to do. 
 
 Shonnin. If you'd advance enough to keep me there, 
 sir, till I could earn something by teaching, I'd pay you 
 back, I would, upon my honour. 
 
 Gwyllim. Would you, upon your honour ? I'm to 
 advance money on the chance that when you get a 
 wretched ushership you'll repay me. No, no, Master 
 John, that girly pink and white of yours has made me 
 half forget your age. It is high time you earned your 
 own living, and as it happens I can find employment for 
 you myself. Robert Roberts' son won't stay on the 
 
WILD JUSTICE 15 
 
 lighthouse with him, the young fool ; you shall take his 
 place there to-morrow. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. \ 
 
 \ The lighthouse ! 
 Shonmn. J 
 
 Gwyllim. Yes, sure, and a good place too. Don't I 
 spend half the night there for rny own pleasure often 
 enough ? 
 
 Mrs, Gwyllim. Shonnin is to live there with Robert 
 Roberts ? 
 
 Gwyllim. Yes, indeed, Mrs. Gwyllim, that he shall ; 
 and only wish that your fair-haired booby may turn 
 out half the man that Roberts is. He's seen some 
 life, he has. There's no man I love a drink with 
 better. He knows his business too well to be drunk 
 at his post, but he can carry liquor enough to set a 
 man-o'-war's crew reeling. An excellent fellow, Robert 
 Roberts. 
 
 Ozvain [aside]. Excellent ex-pirate ! 
 
 Shonnin. Pray, sir, don't try to send me to the light- 
 house, for I warn you I shan't go. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Hush, Shonnin. 
 
 Owain. Bravo ! 
 
 Gwyllim [divesting himself of his coat and laying 
 a gold watch with seals on the table.] There's a rule 
 in my family, John Gwyllim ; you mayn't have heard 
 of it. When a son of mine is man enough to knock me 
 
16 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 down, I'll give him some money to go out into the world 
 with, but not before. Try, now, try. It's true your 
 brother Richard couldn't do it, though he had twice 
 your chest ; but that was two years ago. I'm past sixty 
 now ; getting an old man, you think. [Laughs and 
 thrusts his fist into SHONNIN'S faceJ] Come, knock me 
 down, I say, and I'll give you fifty, a hundred pounds 
 to-morrow. If you can't, why I knock you down, and 
 to-morrow you go to the lighthouse, or to the devil, as 
 you damn please. Come on. Why don't you come on ? 
 I'm making no defence. 
 
 Shonnin. Mother? 
 
 Gwyllim. Leave her alone. Strike me, boy. I bid 
 you do it. 
 
 Shonnin. Then I will ; with all my might, and may 
 God increase it ! 
 
 Owain. There is no God. 
 
 [SHONNIN strikes his father. 
 
 Gwyllim [laughs]. Again, boy, again. I'll give you 
 three times. [SHONNIN strikes him twice again. 
 
 Gwyllim. That's the best you can do, is it? And 
 you call yourself a man and want my money. I'll show 
 you the difference between you and a man. [Strikes 
 SHONNIN, who falls, with his head against a piece of 
 oak furniture. MRS. GWYLLIM rises, as t/iough to go to 
 him.'] Go and pick up her baby boy, and kiss the place 
 
WILD JUSTICE 17 
 
 to make it well. [She sits down.'] Am I never to have 
 a man for a son ? Well, indeed, I may have, but he'll 
 be none of yours. As for this pretty thing [touching 
 SHONNIN with his foot], it's plain he's your son ; and 
 plain too he's not mine. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Shame ! 
 
 Gwyllim. Whose shame? It's just eighteen years 
 since I first planned that lighthouse, and the young 
 engineer, Ed 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Hush ! 
 
 Gwyllim. So you don't like me to tell your children 
 that Edward Liston was here eighteen years ago? 
 [Putting on his coat.~] Enough of this wrangling and 
 jangling ; I'll have no more of it. A pleasant thing 
 truly, were I to be tied down to the company of an old 
 withered shrewish wife and a pack of undutiful children. 
 You, Shonnin, take the boat round to the bar for me 
 when the tide serves. I shall go to the lighthouse this 
 evening. Mrs. Gwyllim, bring me my supper in the 
 library. Now mind, no damned treason while I'm away, 
 or it'll be the worse for somebody. 
 
 [Goes out. NELTO comes in slowly, carrying the 
 baby, and singing. While singing she puts it 
 down in an oak cradle by the fire, and goes. t& 
 the door by which GWYLLIM has. gone cyf<} 
 
 e 
 
18 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Nelto sings : 
 
 In the dead of the night, the moon shining brightly, 
 From her tomb by the church the mother rose ivhitely. 
 By the bridge o'er the stream, up the path through the 
 
 meadow, 
 Like a bird, like a gleam, through the wind, through the 
 
 shadow, 
 
 She ran, while the devil looked out from her tomb. 
 He smiles 'twixt the cherubim faces and wings, 
 And winds her long hair round his finger for rings. 
 
 Boom ! boom I boom ! 
 
 From the tower in the silence there sounds the great bell. 
 ' / am thinking what price] said the devil from Hell. 
 
 Nelto. He's gone. 
 Owain. You're sure ? 
 Nelto. I heard the stairs creak. 
 Owain. Look. 
 
 \She opens the door, looks out and shuts it 
 again, making a sign that no one is there. 
 
 *Mrs. Gwyllim. It was a lie, a foul remorseless lie, 
 And I accepted it. Children, 'tis false. 
 Will they believe him ? On my soul he's mad. 
 You cannot think me such a castaway 
 Children, you do not? 
 
 Nelto. Of course not, mother. 
 
WILD JUSTICE 19 
 
 Shonnin. My dearest mother, no. 
 
 Owain, Well, for my part 
 
 I'm sorry 'tis not true. What, always faithful 
 To Caliban ? O poor, poor, poor Miranda ! 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Owain ? What do you say ? 
 
 Nelto. 'Twas villainous 
 
 To wring a complete lie against yourself 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Not quite a lie ; in saying that I 
 
 wronged him ; 
 
 I'll tell the entire truth. There was I knew 
 He spoke a name that once was dear to me. 
 Twas a sad love and innocent of all 
 Save some few kisses and a world of tears. 
 The man I loved was married years ago ; 
 Probably has forgotten me. One letter 
 I had of his, which in my foolishness 
 I wore upon my heart ; and there he found it 
 I mean your father. Well, God knows I've suffered. 
 
 Owain. Winged Ariel, fleeting Ariel I thought 
 Ever the one right lover for Miranda. 
 She should have spread milk-white transparent wings 
 And flitted with him to that delicate lair 
 I' the cowslip's bell. 
 
 O mother, pray forgive me ! 
 If I talk lightly 'tis because I mean 
 You should not blush, for here indeed's no cause. 
 
20 ' WILD JUSTICE 
 
 If there's a crime, a folly you should blush for, 
 Tis to have married, loved then I suppose, 
 The monster we call father. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Loved him ? I ? 
 
 Alas ! I never did. It's horrible 
 To speak such naked truths to you, our children ; 
 I know, but cannot feel it, I'm degraded 
 By my much misery past proper feeling. 
 
 Owain. We never had it. Why should we pay toll 
 Of thought or speech to an injurious world 
 Which makes a slavery for us far profounder 
 Than that of slaves ? 
 
 Nelto. They say that Love is blind. 
 
 If 'twas not Love, what other eyeless madness 
 On the wide earth could drive you 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Honour Honour, 
 
 Blinder than Love and vacant as ribbed Death, 
 Honour, that heaven-white star which stoops from 
 
 heaven 
 
 To play the Jack-o'-lantern wayward Honour 
 And untoward Chance undid me. If much wrong 
 My grandsire did the Gwyllims, taking Ty Mawr. 
 It has been much avenged. I thought he loved me. 
 Oh, all might have been well, better than well, 
 Smooth as the ending of an old romance, 
 With sound of wedding-bells, and the ancient heirs 
 
WILD JUSTICE 21 
 
 Come to their own again but Gryffith Gwyllim 
 Played hero to it. Yet I thought he loved me. 
 Heaven be my witness I was not unworthy 
 Once to be loved : a young maid, innocent, 
 And fair beside. Out upon human folly, 
 Bids me remember beauty sorrow-changed ! 
 As well some murdered ghost might make lament 
 The assassin stole a jewel. 
 
 Nelto. Had I beauty 
 
 And one defaced it, I should count that up 
 Among my bitterest wrongs. 
 
 Owain. Yet are there bitterer. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Much bitterer, Owain. You and I 
 know that. 
 
 Nelto. O mother, think ! Have you not anywhere 
 Friends who would help us ? 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. No. There's no one left. 
 
 I had so few. Mostly they're dead, and all 
 He in his cunning violence quarrelled with 
 Past reconcilement. I have got no friends. 
 
 Owain. The net is closely meshed ; yet surely, surely, 
 Did I not lie here a chained prisoner, 
 I'd find the means to tear it. 
 
 You, John Gwyllim, 
 
 What are you good for ? Have you no man's blood 
 In your body, laid there at your mother's knee, 
 
22 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 To tingle at a blow, to shoot you upright 
 As I shall never be and make you swear 
 There shall be vengeance, shall be liberty 
 For her, for all of us ? 
 
 I talk foolishly. 
 
 Shonnin. I'm ready to do anything. Just tell me 
 What I can do. 
 
 Owain. Oh, nothing, nothing, nothing ! 
 
 Anne's practically dead, Richard is dead, 
 I have been dead when was my birthday ? dead 
 These twenty years. Die ; for it's your turn next. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Don't say that, Owain. 
 
 Nelto. No, you've left me out. 
 
 It's my turn next, and I don't mean to die ; 
 At least not die before I've lived. To die ! 
 Oh, 'tis a shocking thing to die, die young, 
 Be suddenly thrust on cold, remorseless Death 
 Poor Dick ! Don't think of it 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. I needs must think, 
 
 Anne, Richard, Shonnin now yes, all my children 
 As by some hungry monster, one by one 
 Are plucked from out my bosom. Owain is left, 
 My poor, poor Owain left. 
 
 \She approaches OWAIN, who motions her away. 
 
 Owain. I cannot bear it. 
 
 When others weep they've leave to hide their tears. 
 
\VILD JUSTICE 23 
 
 Grant me so much of manhood. Come, come, Nelto, 
 Take me away alone 
 
 [NELTO wheels his chair into the adjoining room. 
 
 Mrs. Guy Him. O my dear Shonnin, 
 
 What fatal freak was this ? My heart's a stone, 
 Or I'd be sorry for it. So you'll go, 
 You too. Why pull down fate upon your head ? 
 Anne's in a mad-house ; you'll be in a dungeon, 
 With Roberts for a gaoler. 
 
 Shonnin. Don't fear that. 
 
 I'm not going to the lighthouse. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. So you say. 
 
 We all say that sometimes : ' I will ' or ' will not.' 
 Tis empty arrogance. When the whip cracks 
 The slave falls into line, and does or does not 
 Just as his master chooses. 
 
 Shonnin. No, not always. 
 
 You are a woman, mother ; I'm a man. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. At seventeen, my beloved ? 
 
 Shonnin. Yes, from to-day. 
 
 My father's made me one. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. A man, a man ! 
 
 You must be more not to fear Gryffith Gwyllim. 
 
 Shonnin. And I do fear him ; know he has the strength 
 To strike me dead, the will too, could he do it 
 And keep the wind of the law. 
 
24 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Mine's a worse fear. 
 
 I fear not death why should I ? but I fear 
 Him because he's himself. 
 
 Shonnin. I've that fear, too. 
 
 Mother, a man may fear, but being a man 
 He catches Fear by the throat, and says, ' Not thou 
 But I am master.' So has this pale Fear 
 Been dragged by the hair through half the bloody mire 
 Of glorious battlefields, and died 'neath laurels. 
 Do not start, mother ; I'll not dream of glory ; 
 All that I ask is common liberty. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. You can't resist him. He could 
 
 carry you 
 Easily, like a child. 
 
 Shonnin. Yes, if he caught me, 
 
 But he shall never do it ; my plans are laid. 
 I just tried first it seemed incredible 
 To be grudged a pittance when I know he squanders 
 Money, your money Oh, it's shameful ! 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Mine ? 
 
 I think 'twas called so. Come, tell me your projects. 
 
 Shonnin. The captain of the ' Wave ' sails from Forth 
 
 Davrarch 
 
 For Liverpool to-morrow. 'Tis a promise 
 I sail aboard her. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. What, you go to sea ! 
 
ll'/LD JUSTICE 25 
 
 You be a sailor too, when even Richard 
 
 Richard For God's sake ! No, you shall not, Shonnin. 
 
 Listen ; I forbid you. 
 
 Shonnin. \\ T hy, so the Captain would. 
 
 He holds me cheap as you do. Mother mine, 
 My plans are different. I'll to Manchester ; 
 There, 'mid the flying shuttles and great wheels 
 That Fortune turns, to take my chance of Fortune. 
 
 Jfrs. Gwyllim. My little Shonnin, he that loves his 
 
 book, 
 A common mill-hand ? 
 
 SJwnnin. Yes, and a scholar, too. 
 
 I shall live hard, save half my earnings, spend 
 Nothing on pleasure-seeking. So I'll save 
 Enough to go to Edinburgh. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. No, never. 
 
 You never will. Why, it's the maddest plan. 
 You'll simply starve and die there, and your mother, 
 Your wretched mother won't even know you're dead. 
 
 SJwnnin. Tell me a better plan. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. She'll only guess it. 
 
 The're dreams enough to haunt the roaring nights 
 And bring ill tidings, when the dark's all voices ; 
 A clamour as of lamentable things 
 Climbing up from the shore and swooping seawards, 
 All clashing round Ty Mawr. Horrible voices, 
 
26 IVILD JUSTICE 
 
 Groans, sudden cries, and long, long doleful stories 
 
 The ear pursues, waiting the imminent words, 
 
 Until they whine and witter down to nothing. 
 
 Yet they're distinct enough. There's one that whispers, 
 
 Waving the ghost-white curtains. ' Hush ! I've seen it. 
 
 It's hanging now deep down amid the seaweed. 
 
 It sways in the dim water like the seaweed, 
 
 The hair and long lax limbs ; the tranquil fishes 
 
 Swim under, feed, and swim.' And that was Richard. 
 
 Shonnin. O mother, don't ! Think he's in Heaven. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. He may be. 
 He's drowned, at any rate. Another voice 
 Talks at the corner of the house. ' What ! warm ? 
 It's cold in the cell. Don't you remember her ? 
 You used to hear her pitter-patter feet 
 On the passage floor, and open half awake 
 Your arms for the soft chill thing to creep into 
 And warm herself o' nights. It's cold in the cell. 
 I've seen her there. She's whimpering in the dark 
 Because she dares not scream. Her hair's cut short, 
 Her nails are grown. She's starved, unkempt, and ragged. 
 She has no mother.' That's my daughter Anne. 
 
 Shonnin. Mother, you are not yourself. These 
 
 shocking fancies 
 Are themselves madness. 
 
 Mrs. Givyllim. My lovely, delicate Anne ! 
 
WILD JUSTICE 27 
 
 Shonnin. Twas terror turned her brain the daily 
 
 terror 
 
 Of him. She's better far away, and doubtless 
 They're kind to her ; they surely must be kind 
 To your pretty Anne. 
 
 Mrs. Guy Hi i. They may be ; but who knows ? 
 Shonnin, for my sake see, I beg and pray you, 
 Don't leave me now. Indeed, I cannot bear it ; 
 I've borne so much. Shonnin, indeed, you know not 
 Just what you are to me. Dear, twice beloved ; 
 Dear child, and then you'll never apprehend ! 
 My angel of consolation. Just one look, 
 One sinful look at that pure paradise 
 Some women walk in ; then the gate was closed. 
 The darkness and the anguish ! Then came you 
 Flower of my soul ! You son of very love ; 
 Because my heart was love, and all its blood, 
 Feeding your heart, fled through its thrilling pulses 
 In jubilant ministry ; for love is triumph 
 Even in the extreme of fate, and love is light 
 In death's gate and the darkness afterwards. 
 Well that is past, long past. But you remain, 
 Flower of my heart. Shonnin my son, my best, 
 See how in my exceeding selfishness 
 I hang on you, implore, and supplicate 
 You will not, will not leave me. 
 
28 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Shonnin. My sweet mother, 
 
 What can I do ? Consider ; there's no choice. 
 I must escape, else be endungeoned yonder 
 At the lighthouse. Either way we're separated, 
 As well by one strait channel of stormy sea 
 As by a hundred miles. 
 
 Jfrs. Gwyllim. Nay, not so far. 
 
 Sometimes you'd surely come. Oh, not so far, 
 For I should see your nightly vigilant flame 
 Through the dead hours when nothing seems alive 
 Except myself ; see it through all the nights 
 I must keep watch to please his devilish humour. 
 Indeed, I want you there. 
 
 Shonnin. Mother, you are strange, 
 
 And different from yourself. You'd have me waste 
 My youth, my hopeful, all-containing youth 
 A vacant prisoner ? Better to die. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. A very little while ; just a reprieve, 
 Then I'll have courage. 
 
 , Shonnin. Courage, courage now ! 
 
 You've had so much. Now comes the push of fate ; 
 No other moment's good. Were I once captured 
 Escape were mere conjecture. Now at most 
 Tis hazard, and that favourable. Mother, 
 I will return, I never will forget. 
 Do I not love you ? Ay, but you want help, 
 
WILD JUSTICE 29 
 
 What help is here for any of us ? Away, 
 I'll surely find it. Dearest soul, take heart. 
 I'll write 
 
 Mrs. GwyHim. What use ? I never get my letters. 
 
 Shonnin. At least you'll guess I'm working for you. 
 
 "WTio knows ? 
 
 I may discover sudden stairs to fortune 
 In Manchester. Men once as poor as I 
 Walk the streets now, their pockets stuffed with gold. 
 Think of that, mother. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Oh, I'll think of it ! 
 
 Mad boy, upon my word you make me smile 
 Who cannot weep ! You any fish-wife cheats, 
 If the market-women give you gillyflowers, 
 Just for your beaux yeux ! 
 
 Ay, some men grow rich, 
 
 But you're not one of them. The man, my Shonnin, 
 Born to be rich, makes of such bones as yours 
 Grist for his mill. 
 
 [NELTO comes in from the adjoining room, leaving 
 the door open. 
 
 Shonnin. Well, mother, laugh at me, 
 
 But let me go. 
 
 Nelto. Mother, indeed he must ; 
 Go anyhow, go anywhere. You cannot 
 Wish otherwise, I think. 
 
30 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. No, I suppose not. 
 
 What can I find to wish ? [Stands at the window. 
 
 How the tide eddies 
 
 Over the engulfed quicksand ! I remember 
 Hearing of one who blundered on it by chance, 
 Taking it for firm land. He stood quite still 
 Shrieking for help ; began to sink and struggled 
 Sank all the faster, so was quiet again, 
 Yet sank and shrieked and sank, then one wild horror 
 Of choking cries and battling arms, then nothing 
 To see but bubbles. The island's all one quicksand. 
 I sink, and sink and live. 
 
 Nelto. And while there's life 
 
 There's hope, too. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Hope? 
 
 Shonnin. I swear you shall have succour 
 
 If I'm alive. If not, I'm but your raven ; 
 Out of your flock some bird of happier wing 
 Shall fly to fetch you comfort. Dearest mother, 
 Patience till then ; wait you in patience, sister, 
 Your brothers won't forget. 
 
 Nelto. How wait in patience ? 
 
 I doubt I've not a genius for it. Wait ? 
 Had you said ' Fly ! ' 
 
 Shonnin. You'd be the very bird 
 
 Were you a boy. 
 
WILD JUSTICE 31 
 
 Nelto. Sometimes a girl has wings. 
 
 Shonnin. A husband finds them for her. Find the 
 husband. 
 
 Nelto. On Ynys yr Unigdra ? 
 
 Mrs. Givyllim. Tis impossible. 
 
 My daughters cannot marry. No honest men 
 Come to Ty Mawr. 
 
 Nelto. Is there no way but marriage ? 
 
 Mrs. Givyllim. Would that there were, my love ! 
 
 Alas, what other ? 
 
 I fear you are too ignorant, too untaught 
 In the world's ways to teach. You've hands to 
 
 scrub, 
 
 Yet none, I think, would use you for a servant, 
 Except your father. 
 
 Nelto. Mother, do you mean 
 
 That I'm to wither out my whole sweet youth 
 Here at Ty Mawr, waiting while indolent Fortune 
 Shuffles my brother's cards ? Oh, never, never ! 
 There's Lucy growing tall, there's little Gwen ; 
 They can supply my place. They're young, they've 
 
 time ; 
 
 But I'm eighteen, next year nineteen, and next 
 Out of my teens. O mother, one grows old 
 So terribly soon, and youth youth's all we've got, 
 We women ! Don't you see I must go ? 
 
3 a WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Shonnin. Where ? 
 
 How can you go ? 
 
 Mrs. Givyllim. I would to God you could. 
 Have I not beat my brains a million times 
 Seeking some way for you ? 
 
 Nelto. But I have found it. 
 I might have gone last May. If he returns 
 He swore he should return 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Who is this he ? 
 No gentleman, for never such comes hither. 
 Surely my Nelto has not given her heart 
 
 Nelto. To a drunken quarryman, a scheming clerk, 
 Or any other Williams, Parry, or Jones 
 Foots this delectable island. No, my heart, 
 My heart's my own. Yet, 'tis a luxury 
 I can't afford. 
 
 Shonnin. Mother, don't waste your terrors. 
 Nelto fools seriously, yet never could be 
 Too serious to fool. 
 
 Nelto. Do you know this song ? 
 
 \Sings~\ Winged Lovers a rover, 
 Where'er he may fly, 
 Young hearts must follow ; 
 Then kiss me good-bye. 
 
WILD JUSTICE 33 
 
 fleet Love, O sweet Love, 
 He came but for this 
 Greeting and parting, 
 A smile and a kiss. 
 
 Shonnin. Why, the sailors sang it to death aboard 
 the Italian ship that anchored in the bay last Spring. 
 What of it ? 
 
 Nelto. Do you remember meeting the sailors as we 
 were coming from church one Sunday ? 
 
 Shonnin. Yes, very well. They were bursting with 
 admiration of our Nelto's beauty. 
 
 Nelto. And you were all bursting with laughter at 
 their admiration. It was no laughing matter for me, 
 though. Why, before that I had always believed you 
 when you said I was ugly, for there's no true mirror but 
 other people's eyes. However, the Captain was not 
 there that day. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. The Captain? What of him? Where 
 did you meet him ? 
 
 Nelto. On the shore. Not very often, but often 
 enough. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. What sort of man is he? Did he 
 make you an offer ? 
 
 Nelto. He is handsome, I suppose. He offered 
 to take me away with him. You see, mother, he'd never 
 seen Anne, and foreigners' notions' of beauty must be 
 
 D 
 
.,4 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 different from ours. He said I was too fine a girl and 
 sang too sweetly to be buried alive in this horrible country. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Did he offer you marriage ? 
 
 Nelto. He did not mention it. He told me he adored 
 me, and that Italy was beautiful as Paradise. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. But you did not go. Thank God for 
 that ! 
 
 Nelto. I liked him at first. I should have gone if he 
 had not made love to me ; that was intolerable. But, 
 mother, other things become still more intolerable. If 
 he comes again I shall go. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. My child, for God's sake, hush ! 
 You don't know what you're talking about. 
 
 Nelto. I know. It means dishonour. Books tell one 
 that. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. My innocent child, my poor unhappy 
 Nelto ! You do not, do not know. Books cannot tell 
 you but enough of this. Your ignorance, your wretched 
 home excuse you. My sweet child, you must promise 
 me to put quite away from your mind this shocking 
 memory, this Promise me. 
 
 Nelto. And if I promise you that, what can you pro- 
 mise me ? Life, mother, life ; or a kind of deadly exist- 
 ence, without the blessing of a grave ? Could I choose 
 any lot for myself more miserable than the lot you chose 
 for yourself? 
 
WILD JUSTICE 35 
 
 Shonnin. Shame, Nelto ! My mother gave up all for 
 honour, and you would give up honour. 
 Nelto. A slave can have no honour. 
 Shonnin. If ever your damnable foreigner comes this 
 
 way again, I'll 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Hush, Shonnin ; let us hear no more 
 on the subject. And Nelto will promise me [putting her 
 hands on Nelto 's shoulders], Nelto, you will promise me 
 
 by all that's holy to forget 
 
 Nelto. Never to forget you, my own, own mother. I'll 
 promise nothing more. 
 
 \The mother and daughter look at each other silently. 
 Then MRS. GWYLLIM looses NELTO slowly, and. 
 falling on }ier knees by the table, buries her face in 
 her hands ^\ 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. O merciful God ! 
 How often have I prayed ; ' Look on our sufferings ; 
 See, Lord, our mortal griefs.' Thou wouldst not hear me. 
 Now must I pray ; ' Look Thou upon our sins.' 
 We are left too long in hell, our hearts grow hellish, 
 Immortal wrongs are heaped upon our souls. 
 
 we grow wicked one by one ; I first, 
 Owain, this girl we shudder at ourselves. 
 Save us, good Lord ! Have mercy on their souls, 
 
 Mercy [Her voice fails in sobs. SHONNIN and NELTO 
 
 throw their arms round her.~\ 
 
36 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 SCENE III 
 
 The inner room. Two windows look out to sea, one across 
 the bay to distant mountains. OWAIN in his chair, 
 NELTO mending clothes by the window. 
 
 Nelto \singing\ 
 
 Sleep we must, but when to slumber ? 
 Every hour's too fair to choose it, 
 Morn of gold and eve of umber, 
 Silver night Ah, who would lose it ? 
 Honey's hid in every flow V, 
 Joy in every sweet, sweet hour. 
 
 Sleep we shall, but first be weary, 
 Dance with hours of morning gladness, 
 Pillage noon nor chide the dreary 
 Hours that weave delightful madness, 
 Round the earth that's with us racing, 
 Sun and moon and meteors chasing ; 
 Worn with journeys, white with dust, 
 Then we'll sleep for sleep we must. 
 
WILD JUSTICE 37 
 
 Owain. The boisterous Winter's long outstayed his 
 
 term. 
 
 See how the powdered snow pricks out the lean 
 Anatomy of the hills, their toothed spines 
 And skeleton ribs ; colourless, lifeless, old, 
 Old as the hills. 
 
 Nelto. April and then comes May. 
 
 Owain. I warrant the inheriting Spring blows a brave 
 
 horn 
 Somewhere through flush green fields and sprinkled 
 
 woods. 
 
 Stark Winter holds him out. Fierce cecity 
 Of the grey tyrant ! There's his grip on us 
 So long endured he thinks it must endure. 
 Madman ! Tis certain he must loose at last, 
 Then why not now ? 'Tis certain he must die ; 
 Let him die now or live for ever. 
 
 Nelto. To-day 
 
 I took my summer clothes out of the closet ; 
 They're all blue mould. 
 
 Owain. What else do you expect ? 
 
 Everything moulders at Ty Mawr, ourselves 
 Included. 
 
 Shonnin [coming iri\. Nelto, will you make my bundle ? 
 The ' Wave ' goes out on the ebb to-morrow morning, 
 And I with her. 
 
\VILD JUSTICE 
 
 Nelto. But, O unlucky day ! 
 
 The fishermen's boats from the other side the island 
 Are sailing out see, one, two, three black sails. 
 Old Williams knocked a hole yesterday night 
 I n our smaller boat ; so now on all Unigdra 
 There's just one craft, and that the one my father 
 \Vill take to Craig y Gwr. 
 
 Chvain. What ? What do you say ? 
 
 The fishermen gone ? No other boats ? 
 
 Shonnin. That's bad. 
 
 I dare not meet my father. Will you go 
 To the bar to-night, then bring the boat to harbour ? 
 I will be there. Pray Heaven he may return 
 From the lighthouse early ! I must speed to gain 
 The port in time. 
 
 Nelto. O you are fleet enough ! 
 
 Yes, you must go. But is it farewell for ever, 
 Old Shonnin ? 
 
 Shonnin. No, believe me I'll return. 
 
 Owain. When ? 
 
 SJionnin. When I have gained the power to help you. 
 
 Owain. Ah , 
 
 Shonnin. Come, Owain, man, wish me good luck 
 
 for all. 
 
 I mayn't succeed, but if I fail, by Heaven 
 It shall not be because this Hell behind me, 
 
I VILD JUSTICE 39 
 
 Wherein you sit and suffer, 's unremembered. 
 Would it were you might make the attempt, not I ! 
 But you being hindered, why the adventure's mine, 
 And God will surely 
 
 Owain. Help. Ay, cry aloud ! 
 
 Perchance the Almighty sleeps or He pursues 
 Some maned star, leaping prodigiously 
 Forth from a lair of suns. I'm sick of God. 
 
 Shonnin. Ill-omened words. Find better, as you 
 
 love me 
 
 I think you do to speed me on this road. 
 Owain, your hand. I would you saw my heart ; 
 It cannot find the words. I know I know not 
 Half what you suffer. To mitigate your pain, 
 To save my mother, Nelto, all from bondage 
 In grey Ty Mawr, I'd give what would I not ? 
 I'd give my heart, my life 
 
 Owain. Would you give your soul ? 
 
 Shonnin. What do you mean ? 
 
 Owain. I mean that if my soul 
 
 Had legs to carry it, it should this night 
 Have rushed upon damnation. That for her sake, 
 Yours, mine, everyone's sake. 
 
 Shonnin [to NELTO]. What does he mean ? 
 
 Nelto. I cannot guess. Owain, how pale you look ! 
 Shall we not leave you ? Will you sleep ? 
 
40 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Owain. For ever > 
 
 If so I could. Why did I say damnation ? 
 The thing's a fraud ; yet were it otherwise 
 I would encounter it I say if I could walk, 
 Stand but six hours, reach anyhow the means, 
 Knife, bullet, poison I would kill my father 
 Like a mad dog. 
 
 Shonnin. Hush, Owain, you would not. 
 
 Owain. I say I would. A dangerous lunatic ! 
 His wickedness amounts to madness. She, 
 Our mother, holds him mad. Well, shut him up. 
 
 Nelto. No one would do it. Sober, yes or drunk, 
 He's sane enough in business. 
 
 Owain. Sane enough 
 
 In the head but mad at heart. No, yet not so ; 
 Such madness mounts. He cannot estimate 
 Debit and credit here. He overdraws ; 
 That's some mea's mania. Were it but his money 
 He fancied inexhaustible, why then 
 They'd clap him in a cell with no more scruple 
 Than his poor victim Anne. But on human souls 
 He draws, on flesh and blood. The coward world 
 Protects such madmen, the obsequious Priest 
 Sets bogies up to fright into submission 
 Their recalcitrant slaves ; God His mysterious Will. 
 I have a God, a God to whom I appeal 
 
WILD JUSTICE 41 
 
 Unawed, an essence above all modes, an element 
 Not to be dissolved in the limbec I mean Justice. 
 
 Shonnin. Justice is my God too, for God is 
 
 Justice, 
 
 And therefore O, have done with argument ! 
 Let devils argue on Free-will and Fate ; 
 Fools on the ten commandments. You mean nothing, 
 I know, by talk like this, Nelto means nothing 
 By talk about the foreign fellow. 
 
 Nelto. I mean 
 
 Just what I said. 
 
 Owain. What now ? What have you said ? 
 
 Again the Italian ? And you'll go ? No, sister, 
 Not to dishonour. Think, you have a mother 
 To die of your disgrace. 
 
 Nelto. She cannot die. 
 
 She's cursed to live, and who may comfort her ? 
 Owain, there's a mad hurry in my veins 
 My father's blood to-day 'tis mirth and music, 
 To-morrow 'tis what time and misery make it. 
 Oh, there's no comfort in me ! Let me go ; 
 I were better gone. 
 
 Owain. Shonnin, do you hear that ? 
 
 How many years, supposing you successful, 
 Must this beleaguered city of souls hold out 
 Before there's hope of succour ? Say, ten years, 
 
42 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Ten at the soonest. Why, that's far too late. 
 Mother'll be dead, Nelto be lost, dishonoured. 
 
 Shonnin. No ; I will not believe it. 
 
 Ou'ain. Your beliefs 
 
 Are comfortable. David in ten years 
 Where will he be ? Lucy's a patient creature ; 
 She'll wait and wait and wait, till she's transformed 
 From flesh to dull grey marble. For myself, 
 You may say to-morrow were too late, to-day 
 Alike too late. Yet even I have claims 
 Can righteously demand scope, satisfaction 
 For the intellectual being, sole surviving 
 Of all that should be life, that might have been 
 Abundant life, in this foul half-animate 
 Mis-shapen body. Look on me, John Gwyllim, 
 And ask yourself, what has this monster done 
 Steeped in a woman's tears, red from the winepress 
 Of warm out-trampled hearts, what has he done 
 That he should live, and live to be the ruin, 
 The horror and despair of unhelped creatures 
 ( 'rude Law and shameless Nature yield him ? 
 
 Shonnin. Nothing : 
 
 But then I have done nothing to deserve 
 To be made a parricide. 
 
 Owain. What do you fear ? 
 
 Night after night, or morning after morning 
 
WILD JUSTICE 43 
 
 That varying hour's just his malignant way 
 To keep my mother watching, some one waiting 
 Sleepless upon the shore night after night 
 I hear him stumbling up the stair half drunk, 
 Three-quarters drunk, and then I ask myself, 
 Does God work miracles, that this drunken man, 
 Walking yon dangerous shore, never mistakes ? 
 Never sets foot upon that bottomless quicksand, 
 Which should he tread it well, there were an end. 
 And the clear morn, lifting long lids of cloud 
 Over the sea, would laugh on a clean world. 
 
 Shonnin. Consider no such accident. The lamp 
 My mother trims in the casement is most visible 
 Even from the wet edge of the lowest tide. 
 The stretched sands the further side the river 
 Are solid enough, for all they look as slopped, 
 As slimy with the salt and slippery weed 
 As the hither perilous shore. The lantern waits him 
 Always on the bar, that side the river's mouth. 
 The bar ! What boisterous shivering nights I've paced it ! 
 Lain, too, in summer, under a yellow moon, 
 Soft on the fine sand, gathering small pink shells 
 Like sea-nymphs' finger nails. No more of that. 
 David must 
 
 Owain. Do you think the lantern guides him 
 
 When he steers homewards ? 
 
^ WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Shonnin. That doubtless, and the lamp 
 
 High in Ty Mawr. 
 
 Owain. It were an easy thing 
 
 And easier yet to close that single eye 
 Of light in dark Ty Mawr an easy thing 
 To let your flitting lantern leap the river 
 And stop this side. If he should land this side, 
 Were it not dangerous, mortal dangerous ? 
 The quicksand would say nothing. 
 
 Shonnin. Horrible ! 
 
 How dare you, Owain, even in imagination 
 Caress these murderous but I'm very simple 
 To take you seriously ! When I turn murderer 
 I'll devise something rare. Your plan's absurd, 
 Impracticable. 
 
 Owain. Why impracticable ? 
 
 Nothing of note was ever practicable 
 Till it was done. He who vouchsafes not Fortune 
 Her part in his game, has Fortune for his foe. 
 Pshaw ! 'Tis beside the mark, since you are purposed 
 In your most sanctified selfishness to depart 
 Leaving us in our quicksand. 
 
 Shonnin. What I purpose 
 
 You are informed. This shall not be farewell, 
 Yet I were best begone. Did the master see me, 
 Who knows, this very night I were impounded 
 In the lighthouse ? David must bring round the boat. 
 
45 
 
 Nelto. I'll meet it on its return. 
 
 Shonnin. Thanks. That were best. 
 
 You have often been before ; he'll notice nothing. 
 
 [Goes out. 
 
 Owain. Shonnin, one moment, stay. He'll not, he's 
 
 gone 
 
 And still so much to urge ! I wanted judgement, 
 I was too violent. Yet an angel's tongue 
 Had not persuaded him. I might have touched 
 At least upon the difference, all the difference, 
 T would make to him. Oh, he would never heed ! 
 Yet Nelto, you, I, anyone that knows 
 The metal of his mind, cannot expect 
 Success for him in a machine-made world, 
 Where men perforce work like machinery 
 Grinding against each other. He wants learning ; 
 The temperate atmosphere, the cloistered calm 
 Where learning flowers, were native to him. 
 
 Nelto. You know 
 
 Schoolmaster says were he but given the chance 
 He would achieve distinction. 
 
 Owain. Go, impress that 
 
 Nelto. I cannot and 'twere useless. 
 
 Owain. Right. At least 
 
 He will have freedom, he has hope. My Nelto, 
 This stiff-necked righteousness ' doth something smack, 
 
46 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Doth something grow to ' common selfishness. 
 
 Sooner than wear a stain, an importune 
 
 Discomfortable stain upon his soul, 
 
 He'll heave us to perdition. But consider, 
 
 Prejudice apart, how stands the real account ? 
 
 This modern minotaur, half brute, half tyrant, 
 
 Who stands convicted out of his own mouth 
 
 Of devilish cruelties to man, beast, ay 
 
 To wife and children, whom he maims and tortures 
 
 For pleasure ; this mean plunderer of a woman, 
 
 This what in every answering nerve you know 
 
 him 
 
 Society protects. Society 
 That strings up starved wretches by the score 
 For paltry thefts, sends by the waggon-load 
 Poor whimpering boys and girls to load the gallows 
 With puny bones. Does the judge dream o' nights ? 
 Does the worm Conscience wither in his bloom 
 The purple juryman ? No ; yet if one should rid 
 The earth of this notorious old mad villain, 
 He were deemed blood-guilty. Did I do the deed 
 Twould leave a snaky something in my soul 
 Not to be reasoned with, a venomous head 
 To stir and threat i' the dark ; yet yet I'd do it, 
 And do it again. Once for the immediate good, 
 Twice for bare Justice, thrice for my revenge. 
 
WILD JUSTICE 47 
 
 Revenge, revenge ! He, he 'twas huddled up 
 
 All appetites, all aims into that span, 
 
 Pressed in and welded them. What ! flesh and blood 
 
 Turn to hard steel ? Ay, that's your chemistry. 
 
 Wake Nelto ! Have I reasoned you to sleep, 
 
 Or are you praying for deliverance ? Wake, 
 
 Either way. Let us read. Find me the book 
 
 Of the wise Verulam, where he speaks well 
 
 About Revenge. 
 
 Xelto. Owain, of all our lives 
 
 Whose is the worst ? Whose the least valuable ? 
 
 Owain. Mine. 
 
 Nelto. But mine next. 
 
 Owain. Why yours ? 
 
 Nelto. Look at it, brother. 
 
 I do sometimes, and all's far too distinct, 
 Like the long coast before the rain bare, cheerless, 
 Monotonous year, following monotonous year, 
 Myself at end of them, a body and soul 
 Too withered even for pity. 
 
 Owain. Yes yes yes. 
 
 Nelto. Well, I can't bear it. I choose exile, shame, 
 I know not what I choose, but 'tis life, life, 
 Not living burial. Yet I fear 'tis ugly 
 And miserable. O why mayn't one be happy ? 
 Owain, are you sure I never shall be happy ? 
 
48 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Owain. Sure. 
 
 Nelto. I want to be so much. 
 
 Owain. You cannot be. 
 
 A sailor's strumpet, flung at the first port 
 Into Good God ! 
 
 Nelto. So little makes me glad. 
 
 Fresh flowers, ripe strawberries, the first fine day 
 Set my blood capering. There in the brown dusk, 
 Under the orange moon, out of dim warmth 
 Music will flutter and fall, a crowded thrumming 
 Of mellow strings, laughter o'ertakes ; the curve 
 Of the marbled quays and palaces hangs hushed 
 In a translucency, half sky, half sea. 
 The stars drown under them. Shall I not sing 
 To such music, laugh in such a 
 
 Owain. You may laugh. 
 
 You'll not be happy. 
 
 Nelto. Shall I not? Why not? 
 
 Owain. Shame, horror of yourself, the strong re- 
 membrance 
 Of your mother, all your heart clings to 
 
 Nelto. I know it. 
 
 To what will you drive me ? 
 
 {She goes to the bookshelf and passes her hand along 
 the books, as though looking for one. Presently 
 begins singing to herself: 
 
WILD JUSTICE 49 
 
 O wind that fares t 
 Afar and barest 
 Beyond the streaming 
 Of storms the gleaming 
 Of one red star. 
 
 \Takes down a book and opens it. 
 
 Whichever way accursed ? 
 [ Turns the leaves slowly, singing : 
 
 Beyond the streaming 
 Of storms the gleaming 
 The strong wind caught it, 
 The wild wind brought it 
 Out through the thunder 
 Of surf and under 
 
 \Flings the book on to the table. 
 
 Owain, I will do it. 
 
 Owain. You will do what ? 
 
 Nelto. The thing you would have done. 
 
 Owain. Who asked you ? Who ? 
 
 Who set that in your book ? Not I not I ! 
 There are many things I would have done. Be 
 
 plain. 
 What do you mean ? 
 
 Nelto. I mean the thing you mean. 
 
 Owain. Him ? To to ? 
 
 E 
 
50 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Nelto. Ay. 
 
 Owain. You'll swear that ? 
 
 Nelto. I will do it. 
 
 Owain. By God, you'll not. You're jesting. 
 
 Nelto. Jesting ? I ? 
 
 Look at me, Owain. 
 
 Owain. Brave, splendid sister ! 
 
 You'll do it. But no, by Heaven, you shall not 
 
 dare ! 
 
 You are a girl. No ! Never drag this horror 
 Down to the eternal mansion of your soul. 
 'Twould take a man to bed with that o' nights 
 And say, ' We'll sleep : ' to taste that in his meat 
 And still be hungry. If this deed be done 
 Let a man do it. 
 
 Nelto. Who ? Where is the man ? 
 
 Owain. David or Lewis 
 
 Nelto. Children ! Shall we all wait ? 
 
 David a fool too. 
 
 Owain. O that I were a man ! 
 
 Nelto. You are and are not. Accept necessity, 
 And with few words. 
 
 Owain. It is not in the act. 
 
 'Twere easily accomplished 
 
 Nelto. Show me how. 
 
 Owain. Tis the ugly horror climbing out of it. 
 
WILD JUSTICE 51 
 
 Nelto. Let's to the core of the matter. 
 
 Here's my life, 
 
 Yourself have shown how ineluctably set 
 To misery and despair. Shall I for nothing 
 Endure much evil, or for sufficient cause, 
 And benefits arising ? 
 
 Owain. Consider, Nelto 
 
 Nelto. Enough considered. Here's your instrument : 
 Use it or lose it. What ! Do you think that I 
 I do not hate him too ? 
 
 Owain. O rarely, rarely ! 
 
 Nelto. How is the moon to-night ? 
 
 Owain. At one o'clock 
 
 She's down. At three the tide sweeps round the bar. 
 Whoop over ! Then you know in a trice it's up 
 Across the level. 
 
 Nelto. Well ? 
 
 Owain. The shrimp-fishers 
 
 From the long sands the further side the stream 
 Sometimes, at slack tide, wade across the bar 
 At the river's mouth. 
 
 Nelto. It can be done. 
 
 Owain. 'Tis venturesome : 
 
 For should they linger till half tide they're caught. 
 They cannot cross again ? 
 
 Nelto. If they're strong swimmers. 
 
5 z WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Owain. He cannot swim. A quicksand cuts them off 
 From shore, and the sea mounts upon the bar. 
 [The door leading into the adjoining room moves slightly. 
 
 Nelto. Ah! What's that? 
 
 Owain. Nothing. The door creaked. 
 
 Nelto. Is it open ? 
 
 Owain. It was left ajar. 
 
 [NELTO, who is kneeling by his chair, half rises. 
 
 No, no 
 
 The room is empty. Listen, Nelto. The bar 
 Runs level either side the river mouth, 
 The same straight sand, the same tide-trampled rocks 
 Bank from the sea. Might not a sober man, 
 Steering for an accustomed light eh, sister ? 
 On a so cloud-enmeshed and wolf-dark planet 
 As ours will be ere morn a sober man 
 Land on the dangerous side, and not discover 
 His error till too late ? That is supposing 
 The light misplaced. To-night you carry it ? 
 
 Nelto. Yes. He will not be sober. 
 
 Owain. Can you wade 
 
 Across the river? 
 
 Nelto. I have done it for sport. 
 
 Owain. What is to fear, should he discover in time, 
 But blows and curses ? We get those every day 
 For nothing. 
 
\VILD JUSTICE 53 
 
 Nelto. What should I say ? 
 
 Owain. Make an excuse. 
 
 Nelto. A lie ? 
 
 Owain. Of course. 
 
 Nelto, I cannot. 
 
 Owain. Ah ! you stick at lying ? 
 
 Nelto. 'Twould be ridiculous. But what to say ? 
 I have no invention for excuses. 
 
 Owain. Say 
 
 You wearied waiting for him. Don't we all know 
 Patience is not your gift ? Say that you waded 
 Across the river for sport, and, the tide rising, 
 Return became impossible. It will be. 
 Think of that, Nelto. 
 
 Nelto. I am not afraid. 
 
 He'll come about half tide. But if all goes well, 
 If he should land observing nothing ? 
 
 Owain. Let him. 
 
 When he's ashore, then quick into the boat, 
 Push out, push out for your life ; don't look or listen 
 Land where you will, and let the boat drift. Then 
 Come home. The quicksand covers all. 
 
 Nelto. If he 
 
 Owain. In twenty paces he's in it, and, if not 
 The vigilant tide will see to it. 
 
 Nelto. Horrible ! 
 
WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Owain. Ay, this may wear the loathed mask of murder: 
 Remember, it is Justice. Tis despair 
 For one man, brief despair, for the rest long hope. 
 
 Nelto. Yes ; but I Oh, I'll go and perish with him ! 
 I could not live to dream of it. 
 
 Owain. You die ? 
 
 Nelto. Yes, I had rather. 
 
 Owain. But you shall not, Nelto ; 
 
 Not without me. Mine be the expiation, 
 If death be so. No, life be arbitrator, 
 Condemn or justify. Sister, unurged 
 Of me beat round the compass of this question. 
 When you decide, why, let it be decision, 
 Not inclination. Meanwhile our grand accomplice 
 Steals greyly down the shore. 
 
 Bring me his watch ; 
 It lies on the parlour-table. I'll reset it 
 Slow by a quarter, so there'll be less hazard 
 Of his return while the river's fordable. 
 Thus I, the first, move in our enterprise, 
 And thus will seal with devout hands a compact 
 That must attend your hand. The sin be mine 
 And the repentless sea's. 
 
 Bring me the watch. 
 
 [NELTO opens the door into the next room, and sees 
 MRS. GWYLLIM there. 
 
IVILD JUSTICE 55 
 
 Nelto. Ah ! Mother ! 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. The watch give me the watch. 
 
 Nelto. The the watch ? 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Your father's. He sent me for it. 
 
 Nelto. [Pointing to the table J\ It is there. [Touching 
 MRS. GWYLLIM'S hand.~\ What's that. You've blood on 
 your hand. 
 
 Owain. [Calling.] Bring me the watch. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Does it still bleed? His food was 
 
 not to his liking. 
 He broke his glass on my hand. 
 
 Nelto. Yes, Owain. [Taking up the ivatch. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. [Catching her handJ] No let me 
 have it. [GWYLLIM is heard shouting below stairs. 
 
 Owain. Quick ! 
 
 Nelto. Mother, for Shonnin's sake 
 
 Owain. We must delay him. 
 
 [MRS. GWYLLIM lets NELTO pass through to OWAIX. 
 
 Owain. All explanations after. Damn the key ! 
 
 [Setting back the hands and reclosing it. 
 So, Nelto ! There's my seal set to the bond. 
 
 [GWYLLIM comes in. 
 
 Gwyllim. You devil's drab, bring me my watch, 
 
 I say ! 
 
 My watch ! Look at the tide, you bat-eyed fool. 
 It's down from the bar. When it's below the rocks 
 
5 6 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 No getting aboard dry-shod. 
 
 [To OWAIN who holds up the ivatch.] You've my watch ? 
 
 Curse you, how dare you touch it ? 
 
 Owain. I've used it, sir. 
 Only to seal a something, like a Gwyllim. 
 
 Gwyllim. Letters? Who dares have letters in my 
 
 house, 
 
 Except myself? I will not pay hard money 
 For senseless trash. I loathe your modern nonsense, 
 Newspapers and letters. I had none of them 
 When I was a boy. 
 
 Owain. To whom, sir, should I write ? 
 
 Or who to me ? This matter which I sealed 
 Was but a trifling jest, a bond for sport 
 'Twixt Nelto and myself. 
 
 Gwyllim. [Putting on his watch^\ I must be off. 
 But look you, Owain, you devil, I mislike you. 
 You stuff your brain with books. The doddering fool 
 That owned Ty Mawr before, left you too many. 
 Bess shall make fuel of them. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim, 
 
 Your girl's dismissed. I'll have no maid who talks 
 Against her master. I've engaged Bess Owen 
 The hawker's daughter : she's the buxom fresh 
 Free-smiling lass for me. Sit up till I come, 
 Keep the lamp trimmed and have a foot-bath ready, 
 
WILD JUSTICE 57 
 
 And the water warm. If you were fresh and buxom, 
 Not sallow, thin, hagged past the years you bear, 
 I would not spoil your bloom with nights of vigil. 
 Such service now befits you. 
 
 Let Shonnin come 
 
 By moonset to the bar, and take the boat 
 As usual to her moorings. Why do you stare 
 All of you on me ? What's there strange in me ? 
 One would suppose you well, 'tis no great matter 
 If you do hate. A nest of unfanged serpents ! 
 [Turns to go out. To MRS. GWYLLIM.] Follow me, you. 
 Nelto. [To OWAIN.] I too have sealed the bond. 
 
;3 \VILD JUSTICE 
 
 SCENE IV 
 
 Night. A high wooden footbridge over the river. A long 
 stretch of wet sand goes down to the sea. Beyond the 
 distant fire of the lighthouse shows red. NELTO comes 
 towards the bridge from Ty Mawr, carrying an un- 
 lighted lantern. 
 
 Nelto. Not to be thought of think of anything else. 
 Think Gabriello's waiting on the bridge. 
 
 \_Sings\ Young hearts must follow 
 
 Where'er he may fly ; 
 Ladylove, light-o'-love, 
 JKiss me good-bye. 
 
 What a smile he'll flash upon me ! Radiant. Bah ! 
 I hate hot lips on my neck. 
 
 \Sings\_ Love comes and goes, 
 
 Hither and thither he flies, 
 Sleeps here in a rose, 
 
 Wakes there in your eyes. 
 
 Could I love no one ? 
 Somewhere to-night on this wide unknown earth, 
 
\VILD JUSTICE 59 
 
 That seems to heave with the innumerous breathing 
 
 Of her stilled inhabitant swarm, somewhere No, never ! 
 
 Farewell, lost love, for, oh, this night ends all, 
 
 Ere ever 'tis begun ! 
 
 {Climbing the steps of the bridge^ Down slips the moon. 
 
 Broken and tarnished too ? Now she hangs motionless 
 
 As 'twere amazed, in a silver strait of sky 
 
 Between the long black cloud and the long black sea ; 
 
 The sea crawls like a snake. 
 
 {Sings'} 
 
 In the dead of the night the children were weeping, 
 The mother heard that 
 [Catches sight of a seated figure on the top of the steps. 
 
 A woman on the bridge ? 
 
 My God! Who? Who? What does she here at this hour? 
 To turn were No, by Heaven, I will not turn ! 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. \On the top of the steps. Rising .] 
 Ellen ? 
 
 Nelto. \Coming to the top of the steps :] Mother ! 
 What are you doing here ? 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. What are you doing ? 
 
 Nelto. Hurrying to meet the boat, 
 
 Pray let me pass. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Why does not Shonnin go ? 
 Is this girl's work? 
 
60 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Nelto. You know I often do it. 
 
 I am full as strong as he is. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Yet I say 
 
 You shall not. 
 
 Nelto. Mother, you speak very strangely. 
 
 This trouble about Shonnin 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Where's your lantern ? 
 
 Perfectly dark ? Why, girl, you ought to know 
 This is a dangerous shore. 
 
 Nelto. There's light enough. 
 
 Mother, go home. You've nothing on your head. 
 The uncivil wind scatters your silver hair 
 Like a lone cloud fleecing above the moon. 
 You should return. Think, Shonnin goes to night, 
 May even be gone. Bid him farewell. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. No farewells. 
 
 I've had too many of them. He is not going. 
 \Holding up a key^\ His bedroom door is fast. 
 
 Nelto. Ah ! That's well thought of, 
 
 Very jvell done. But, mother, now you've told me, 
 Pray hasten home. The moon stoops to the sea, 
 I hear the mounting surge. Haste let me go. 
 Why do you hold me ? 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Is your lamp well trimmed 
 
 In the lantern ? 
 
 Nelto. Why delay me ? 
 
WILD JUSTICE 61 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. I do not. 
 
 I stop you. 
 
 Nelto. For God's sake ! This is madness. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Give me that lantern. What ! am I 
 
 not your mother ? 
 
 Shall I not be obeyed ? Give me the lantern, 
 And go you home. I mean myself to meet 
 The boat to-night. 
 
 Yes, Nelto, I do know. 
 I am an eavesdropper that's how I know it. 
 
 Nelto. You do ? You mean to thwart us ? Fatal, fond, 
 Unhappy woman ! Ay, you will do nothing 
 Yourself to save yourself, to save your children ! 
 We must all die to please you, go to Bedlam, 
 Be trodden in the mire 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Child, you are wrong. 
 
 Nelto. Pardon me, mother Oh, forgive me, mother 
 But in this purposed business of mine, 
 Which is wise, equitable, the only Justice 
 We are like to obtain, why will you thwart me ? Go, 
 Go home, forget, be innocent 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. To you 
 
 I say those words : my Ellen must be innocent. 
 The crime, if the imagination be a crime, 
 Is Owain's ; I cannot clear him. The execution 
 Shall be mine only. 
 
62 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Nelto. Yours, mother ? You ? 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Yes. I surprise you, like an unknown 
 
 creature 
 
 Splitting from out a dry familiar shape. 
 I do surprise myself, for I am free ; 
 The husk has split, out darts a winged life 
 And leaps on the wind. When I went forth to-night 
 I was yet undetermined. Girl, behold me ! 
 Am I not changed ? All's fallen from me now 
 But naked motherhood. What ! Shall a hare 
 Turn on the red-jawed dogs, being a mother, 
 The unpitying lioness suckle her whelps 
 Smeared with her heart's blood, this one law be stamped 
 For ever on the imperishable stuff 
 Of our mortality, and I, I only 
 Forbidden to obey it ? A bitter curse 
 Light on me if I do not. Give me the lantern. 
 I must save my children. 
 
 Nelto [embracing her\ Well said, oh, most well, 
 Dear mother ! I must not weep. Pray you forgive me. 
 Yet do not. intervene ; make me your instrument. 
 Consider, all hangs on his not observing 
 The least unusual circumstance. Your presence 
 Sobers him, even by the unnatural hate 
 He bears towards you, and thrust thus strangely on him, 
 'T would prick his observation. 
 
WILD JUSTICE 63 
 
 Mrs. Givyllim. Alas ! that's true. 
 
 Nelto. O me, your small soft arms ! In mine the 
 
 muscles 
 
 Leap like a man's. When have you handled boats ? 
 Ours is a heavy one, and the gusty wind 
 Drives dead on shore. But 'twill be necessary 
 To push out immediately, lest he discover 
 The trap ere he's well in. You cannot do it. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. What matter if I fail ? I shall but 
 
 perish, 
 Tis simple. 
 
 Nelto. No, your failure means our failure. 
 Never again could we attempt this business, 
 Once having failed. And mother, my dear mother, 
 Your children cannot lose you. Think of Owain, 
 Your little ones left to the hawker's girl 
 And her base kind. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. You torture me 
 
 Nelto. I speak truth. 
 
 Mine is the undertaking, or 'twere best 
 To abandon it. Resolve, ere the moon's rim 
 Grazes the sea. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Ellen, you are too young ; 
 You should be innocent 
 
 Nelto. Never again 
 
 After this night. Come, mother, I am yours ; 
 Make me a wanton or an avenger. 
 
64 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Powers 
 
 That set my spirit to swing on such a thread 
 Over mere blackness, teach me now to guide it ! 
 
 Nelto. Mother, the moon dips. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Go, my daughter, go ! 
 
 And let these hands, these miserable hands, 
 Too weak to avenge my children, let them be 
 Yet strong enough to pull upon my head 
 God's everlasting judgement. All that weight 
 Fall on me only ! 
 
 Nelto. Amen, so let it be, 
 
 If so it may be. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Farewell. 
 
 Nelto. I'd forgotten 
 
 Something of urgency. Haste to extinguish 
 The lamp in the parlour window, lest it guide him 
 Too well in the dark. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Better, I think, rekindle it 
 In the granary dormer. 
 
 Nelto. Good. To shift the light 
 
 About that distance, should serve very well 
 Our purpose. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Hence, and may the black Heaven 
 shield you ! 
 
 [Goes away in the direction of Ty Mawr, while 
 NELTO descends the steps on the further side. 
 
WILD JUSTICE 65 
 
 Nelto [sings]. 
 
 In the dead of the night, the moon shining brightly, 
 From her tomb by the church 
 
 What's all that red 
 
 Awash on the oozed sand ? Fool ! Tis reflection 
 From the lighthouse fire. What ! Is it different 
 To-night ? 
 
 [Sings] 
 
 By the bridge o'er the stream, by the path up the meadow, 
 Like a bird, like a gleam, thrd the wind, thro 1 the 
 shadmv 
 
 If he should scream out horribly ? 
 I must hear and never help. O God ! I could not, 
 I must return. I must 
 
 [Sings] Boom, boom, boom ! 
 
 From the tower in the silence there sounds the great bell. 
 
 Plumb drops the moon ! 
 Drown not so fast ! Wait for me wait awhile. 
 
 [Runs down the sands towards the sea. 
 
WILD JUSTICE 
 
 SCENE V 
 
 \ight. The inner room. OWAIN in his chair at the 
 window looking towards the sea. His mother beside 
 him. The curtains are drawn back and there is no 
 light in the room except a candle on the ground. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. She'll be drowned. 
 
 Owain. Not so. She cannot be. 
 
 Mrs Gwyllim. Cannot ? 
 
 Me does not come. She's waiting all this while, 
 And the tide storming up. Oh, but this darkness ! 
 I s that foam at the river's mouth ? I'm sure by now 
 (Ireat rushing surges rise like sheeted phantoms 
 Momently from the headland. But one sees nothing. 
 -Owain. Enough ; the lighthouse 
 
 .\frs. Gwyllim. Ay, that glares at us. 
 
 Owain. And yon small stationary light 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. So small ! 
 
 What if he overlooked it ? Landed there, 
 At the usual place ? She's lost so. 
 
 (hvain. No, no, mother ! 
 
WILD JUSTICE 67 
 
 Shall we not mark him ? Shonnin must run down 
 And fetch her off with the boat. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. But tell me, Owain, 
 
 What if he does not come ? 
 
 Owain. Impossible. 
 
 He never yet delayed the night there. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Never ! 
 
 These will-o'-the wisps, ' never,' ' impossible,' 
 Misguide men to their ruin. What if he did ? 
 There's not another boat on the island. 
 
 Owain. None. 
 
 But mother, do not with distracted horrors 
 Flaw the firm texture of resolved minds. 
 Rather we should drug deep imagination, 
 Leaving a mere mechanic sense to observe 
 An unmeaning light, nor search the invisible 
 Behind it, even for facts ; to see her yonder, 
 Alone on the bar, and Vengeance on all sight 
 But eyesight ! What do we see here that's fearful ? 
 A night much less tempestuous than most 
 Of this mad season, darkness and two lights. 
 Ah, but another, as I live ! Yes surely ; 
 Tis gone now, but I'd swear quick, mother, quick ! 
 Bring me the telescope. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. His telescope ? 
 
 It is forbidden, I dare not. 
 
 r 2 
 
68 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Owain. You forget 
 
 How much you dare to-night. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. {Laughing wildly.'] Oh, I'm a fool, 
 A very idiot ! I will fetch it. [Goes out.'] 
 
 Owain. Now, 
 
 Gwyllim, my devil has yours by the throat ; 
 They tussle up and down. Shall's wager on them ? 
 Hike a good devil ! Yours is a tough grey fellow, 
 Yet will I back my pup he bears a name, 
 A dreadful name, whose echoes roar of blood 
 Down the black galleries of bottomless Hell 
 To the unplumbed primal void. 
 
 [To MRS. GWYI.LIM, who re-enters with a telescope.'] 
 
 You have it ? Good ! 
 You have been speedy. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. I have brought the night-glass. 
 
 [Placing the telescope on a table between OWAIX 
 
 and the window, and fumbling with it.'] 
 I cannot fix it. 
 
 O:jain. Come, give it to me. 
 
 Your hand shakes like a leaf. Do you see the light ? 
 
 Afrs. Gwyllim. No, I I cannot see anything. 
 
 Owain. There ! 
 
 I have it. Look ! That's the boat right enough, 
 She ducks to the hurrying seas. Again 'tis lost, 
 Twinkles again. 
 
WILD JUSTICE 69 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Hush ! Do you hear that noise ? 
 There there what can it be? 
 
 Owain. [Listening.] Tis Shonnin. 
 
 He's hammering on his bedroom door, poor fool, 
 Discreetly, thinking you'll go free him. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. [Sinking on the floor, and hiding her 
 face in the couch.] Shonnin ! 
 
 Owain. You know his purpose. Well, if ours suc- 
 ceed 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Ah- 
 
 Owain. He's better where he is. 
 
 [Looking out of the window.] The wind 
 
 Sits on her quarter. She flies straight, too straight, 
 Can a drunkard hold her tiller ? Asleep or drunk, 
 If but his hand be there, some instinct in it 
 Answers to wind and tide. Hell take his instinct ! 
 We're in the balance now ; this may prove weightier 
 Than all our conjurations. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Hark ! Again ! 
 
 And louder louder. Heavens ! He'll raise the 
 house. 
 
 Owain. David's his only neighbour ; he's as fixed 
 As a rock when once abed. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Promise me, Owain, 
 
 Whatever happens, Shonnin shall know nothing 
 Of this this 
 
TO WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Owain. Shonnin, I fear, has heard so much 
 
 He needs must guess the whole. 
 
 J//-J-. Gwyllim. Not my part in it. 
 
 I'll hang for you, Owain, but not that 
 
 Owain. Be sure 
 
 He shall know nothing of it. Look ! Look, mother ! 
 By heaven, he's keeping off ! He'll hold right on 
 To the other side the river. Does he not mark 
 The light ? What does it mean ? 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Nothing, I think. 
 
 He backs against the wind, lest it should push him 
 Too suddenly ashore. 
 
 Owain. Plague on this caution ! 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. She swings her light aloft ; see, it 
 
 burns strongly, 
 
 He cannot overlook it. Hark ! What's that ? 
 Owain. The knocking's over. I hear nothing. 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Hush ! 
 
 Owain. Steps overhead ! Now may a thousand 
 
 devils 
 
 \The steps come downstairs and about the house. 
 
 Shonnin is heard without, calling ' Mother ! '] 
 Mrs. Gwyllim [blowing out the light and crouching 
 
 down behind OWAIN'S chair]. Ah I knew it. 
 Shonnin [coming into the outer rooni]. Mother ! 
 [He pushes the door of the inner room and enters.'] 
 
 Is anyone here ? 
 
WILD JUSTICE 71 
 
 Why is it all so dark? I'm sure there's someone, 
 Though I cannot see. Who's there ? 
 
 [Gropes round, and takes hold 0/" OWAIN.] 
 
 You, Owain ? 
 
 Owain. Shonnin ? Is that you ? You startled me. 
 I was asleep. 
 
 Shonnin. But why the devil here ? 
 
 Oivain. I was disinclined for bed. At times this 
 
 chair 
 Appears the easier. 
 
 Shonnin. Where can mother be ? 
 
 She's nowhere in the house. Yon lamp's extinguished, 
 Yet he is not returned. Owain, she's gone. 
 
 Owain. Well ? May she not walk abroad ? 
 
 Shonnin. What, mother ? 
 
 Alone on this dark night ? No, surely, unless 
 Owain, my mind misgives me. That countenance 
 She wore this evening strange to all discourse, 
 Fixed, desperately brooding. Oh, I should have guessed 
 The meaning ! 
 
 Owain. W'hy, what meaning ? 
 
 Shonnin. Self-destruction. 
 
 CHvain. Nonsense. You are a dreamer. Search 
 again. 
 
 She's asleep somewhere. 
 
 Shonnin. Yes, I have had dreams, 
 
72 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Horrible dreams. I almost could believe 
 111 things afoot to-night. 
 
 Owain. Go you disturb me. 
 
 Shonnin. Tis superstition. Where are flint and steel ? 
 Ay, here they are. That lamp must be re-kindled, 
 Else there'll be cruel doings on his return. 
 
 \He goes into the outer room, and is heard walking 
 about and striking a light. Presently he re-enters ; 
 with a lighted candle in his hand^\ 
 What does this mean ? There is no lamp. 
 
 Owain. Go, fool ! 
 
 Shonnin. Why is the light on the shore so strangely 
 
 placed ? 
 
 'Tis almost opposite. Speak, Owain, man ! 
 Say I am mad, tell me you are a dream, 
 A murderous dream. If not, you are a murderer. 
 
 Owain. I am, and I am justified. Content you ; 
 You will be innocent. 
 
 Sho; I intend to be. 
 
 Who else is here ? Is it Nelto ? O my God ! [Mrs. 
 
 " GWYLLIM rises to her feel '.] 
 
 What are you doing here, mother ? Why were you silent 
 When I came to seek you ? Mother, answer me, 
 Don't look upon me thus ; have pity on me 
 Not pity, rather curse me, for on my soul 
 I do suspect you. Hate me for it, mother, 
 
WILD JUSTICE 73 
 
 Only resolve my question. I am dull, 
 
 Dull, and a villain. Despise me, only swear, 
 
 My perfect gentle mother, make me an oath 
 
 By things religious, by the Almighty God 
 
 And the most merciful Christ, by Heaven's salvation 
 
 And all that angels wonder at assure me 
 
 That you are innocent of the least knowledge 
 
 Of this unnatural crime. 
 
 Mrs. GivyUhn. Unnatural, Shonnin ? 
 
 I was unnatural when I let this monster 
 Destroy my children. Yes, I watched him tamely. 
 A beast defends her young. Now that themselves 
 Defend themselves, though with an enforced violence, 
 I dare not thwart them. His blood be on his head, 
 And upon mine. 
 
 Shonnin. My mother ! Merciful Heaven ! 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Would 'twere my brain conceived 
 
 this retribution, 
 
 And Owain at his book ! Would 'twere my hand 
 Held yonder beckoning light, my little Nelto 
 Asleep with her sisters. Would that I alone 
 Were guilty, and they innocent. That's my regret. 
 
 Shonnin. Mother ! My God, all's whirling in my head 
 And my heart too. Oh, this is sleep-walking ! 
 Either you sleep or I. Wake understand. 
 Tis murder that's about, and worse than murder, 
 
74 \V1LD JUSTICE 
 
 Because, however we may reason, this man, 
 This miserable man, is yet our father, 
 Your husband. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Ay, these vacant syllables 
 Had once power over me. Their spell is broken. 
 
 Shonnin. I dreamed I saw you dead, dead and cor- 
 rupting. 
 I wish it had been true. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Why would you leave me ? 
 
 It was not for myself I have endured 
 An Indian's torture. Ropes of steel will break 
 At length with the ounce too much. Why would you 
 
 leave me ? 
 You should not have 
 
 Shonnin. A truce to all reproaches. 
 
 I have no leisure for them ; I must be doing. 
 Had he not locked me in or David heard me 
 Ten minutes earlier 
 
 Owain. It was David, was it ? 
 
 Trust not in fools, not even in their folly. 
 
 Shonnin. Yet there is time to save him. 
 [ffe reaches the door as MRS. GWYLLIM rushes to close if.] 
 
 Owain. Stop, stop, Shonnin. 
 
 There is not time. There's surf in the river mouth. 
 You cannot cross it. 
 
 Shonnin. I will, if necessary. 
 
WILD JUSTICE 75 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. A stronger swimmer could not. You 
 
 are cramped 
 If the water's cold. 
 
 Shonnin. A light's the thing most needed. 
 
 Owain. They have both the lanterns. 
 
 Shonnin [opening the door]. I'll go find a lamp 
 Instantly. [To his mother who clings to him.] Let me go. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. You shall not go. 
 Or I'll go with you. 
 
 Shonnin. Mother, I'll not have you. 
 
 I cannot. No. 
 \After a minute MRS. GWYLLIM looses him. He goes out.} 
 
 Owain. Go then ! You are too late 
 
 To traverse our design so it do prosper ; 
 If not, why then his presence on the bar, 
 On the customary side were best for Nelto, 
 Safer for all of us. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. I have lost my son. 
 His heart is changed. Whatever the event, 
 My penalty falls due. It was for his sake, 
 For all your sakes ; yet he'll not pardon me, 
 Not understand. 
 
 Owain. Shame ! Shame upon him then. 
 
 You always loved him best. O mother, mother, 
 I had most need of love, a thing so maimed 
 And disinherited ! 
 
7 5 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. My unhappy Owain, 
 Have I not loved you ? 
 
 Owain. Yes, but not enough. 
 
 This night shuts up the passage of his heart 
 Against you ? Well, some slight indifferent girl 
 Had done it to-morrow. I am yours unchangeably, 
 Yours only. This so-scorned detested deed 
 Knits up us two in an eternal friendship 
 Death can alone disjoin. You'll love me best, 
 Mother, me best ? 
 
 Mrs. Givyllim. My child, indeed I love you, 
 Always have loved and shall but what I shall do 
 After to-night's not thinkable. Oh, this night 
 Opened like an abyss ! We toppled down it, 
 And still we fall, whirling upon ourselves, 
 Unguiding and unguided, spinning down 
 An infinite blackness to an uncharted bottom. 
 Talk not of what we shall be when we've touched it. 
 
 Owain. I am too much, it seems, my father's son, 
 To be> well loved ; yet were I not so much, 
 Your wrongs had never been avenged upon him, 
 As soon as they may be Ah ! they shall be. See 
 He's round he's round ! There there ! his light 
 Flying this way. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. He's not yet in, not landed. 
 Look ! At the garden-gate 
 
WILD JUSTICE 77 
 
 Owain. Shonnin with a lamp. 
 
 What is it ? Where did he find it ? 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. A small lamp 
 
 In a wooden frame hangs on the cellar stairs. 
 He's thought of it. 
 
 Oivain. A feeble flame enough, 
 
 Invisible at a distance, thank our fortune. 
 Stars of the starless night, in your blind courses 
 At length ye fight for us ! Running like a hare. 
 Run, lad ! We are before you. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Now Heaven grant 
 
 He may not attempt the river ! 
 
 Owain. Oh, he'll not. 
 
 Shonnin's no dare-devil ; don't consider it. 
 See, see, he's caught ! I know as though 'twere noonday, 
 His sail's down ; now he's pushing quietly in. 
 The light moves slow, damnation slow. Come, hurry ! 
 Don't keep us all night on the gridiron. Look, 
 Mother you are not looking. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. I cannot look. 
 
 O O me ! 
 
 Owain. He'll land in another moment. 
 Nelto has met him : which is her lantern now ? 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Poor girl poor wretch ! I know not 
 
 what to wish, 
 And pray we dare not. 
 
7 8 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Owain. They oscillate together. 
 
 One's moving now. Right ! Coming across the bar. 
 Why does it stop ? Push off, Nelto, push off ! 
 Ay, now he moves again. The telescope ! 
 [Looking through it.} The light's in his hand doubtless, 
 
 and lurches with him. 
 
 I know his gait o' nights. Plague seize you, girl, 
 Why do you loiter ? Haste ! You should be away. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. The tide sets up the bar, the wind's 
 
 against her, 
 And she she's but a girl. 
 
 Owain. Ay, but a brave one, 
 
 And pulls a good oar. What ! Do you suppose, 
 Were I other than I am, I'd leave her to it ? 
 Would we were face to face, my knife in his heart, 
 Come after it what might come ! 
 
 Bravely, Nelto ! 
 
 She's under weigh at last. Pull for your life ! 
 [Throws himself back in his chair.~\ 
 Our part is now accomplished. What remains 
 Let the inconscient sea, the accustomed tide 
 Hold to its issue. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim [hiding her face\ Oh ! Oh ! horri- 
 ble- 
 Merciful God ! 
 
 Owain. What is it ? 
 
WILD JUSTICE 79 
 
 Airs. GwyUtM. Did you hear nothing ? 
 
 Owain. No, not a sound. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Then 'twas my haunted fancy. 
 
 Owain. The light on the sand Mother, do you 
 see it ? 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. No. 
 
 Owain. It has disappeared. That means 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. He's sinking 
 
 Down, down, down to the bottomless pit, 
 And our souls with him. 
 
 Owain. Do you understand 
 
 What the boat's doing ? 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. It returns. 
 
 Owain. Returns ? 
 
 Now divination fails and rife conjecture 
 Falls barren. Yet 'tis true. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Owain, that sound 
 
 I seemed to hear what if it were a sound, 
 A hideous outcry, audible a moment 
 Even here ? 
 
 Owain. Well if it were ? Infernal powers ! 
 She is ashore. Yonder her light comes flitting 
 Over the bar. Oh, this is unbound madness ! 
 It can't be Nelto, ' tis a Will-o'-the-wisp, 
 Or God knows who. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. 'Tis she. An hour or more 
 
3o \VILD JUSTICE 
 
 Have we not watched her ? She has a heart of flesh, 
 Ears has she not ? How if, with scream on scream, 
 His agony pursued her ? She's no monster. 
 She's gone to his assistance. 
 
 Owain. His assistance ? 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. See, the light stops. 
 
 Owain. Ay, where his disappeared. 
 
 She can't assist him, oh, that's manifest. 
 Nelto is reasonable. The thing's not possible 
 For her unaided would she were at sea, 
 Miles out in a gale 'twere better 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. \Yhat can we do ? 
 
 Owain. Nothing we cannot reach her. Nay, she's 
 safe. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Where's Shonnin ? 
 
 Owain. [Looking through the telescope.'] His lamp 
 
 must be extinguished ; 
 I cannot find yes, on the opposite shore 
 I see it. It moves and now is stationary. 
 The 'river mouth's impassable. He sees that. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Heaven send he may ! Yet would he 
 
 were across it ! 
 
 [A silence.'] Her light it reddens, fades, and now 'tis 
 gone. [OWAIN searches with the telescope. 
 
 You cannot find it ? 
 
 Owain. Shonnin still seems yonder. 
 
WILD JUSTICE 8 1 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Seems Ay, but is he ? And Ellen ? 
 Where is she ? 
 
 Owain. Wait, mother stay. The merest accident 
 May quench a light they'll soon be coming home. 
 However, 'tis we are helpless. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. O my God ! 
 
 Why do I call on God ? Let me call rather 
 On potencies of Hell, for they do owe us 
 Protection on their errands. 
 
 \There is again a silence] Listen ! The tide. 
 It has swirled about the bar ; now half the quicksand 
 Is covered with long shallow crawling waves, 
 And swift as fire the thin pools run and deepen 
 On the other side, ankle-deep, knee-deep, waist-deep 
 Do I need mine eyes ? Have not my ears been filled 
 These twenty years with the sea's sound ? I know 
 To a hairs-breadth where it is. Find me his light. 
 
 Owain. [Looking.] I have found it. Ah ! This 
 moment it is gone. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. The tide o'er-runsit. Shonninis not 
 
 there. 
 I'll to the cottages and rouse 
 
 Owain. Rouse no one, 
 
 'Twould but endanger us. Tis very like 
 They are in the boat, both of them safe enough, 
 Waiting for the flood tide. 
 
 G 
 
t- WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. I have no time 
 
 For smooth conjecture or slow-footed reason. 
 I must away, discover, know, do something, 
 Do something instantly. \Goingout. 
 
 Owain. Do something ? What ? 
 
 We can do nothing. 
 
WILD JUSTICE 
 
 SCENE VI 
 
 The same. The grey light of dawn coming in through 
 the windows. 
 
 Owain. The day. Wherefore the day ? 
 Rather perpetual suspensive night 
 Cover Ty Mawr. But still the rolling earth 
 Pushes her giant shoulder towards the sun, 
 And myriad eyes of myriad living things 
 Begin to shine expecting it. 
 
 I'll not look. 
 
 The dark sea drinks the greyness of the sky, 
 Then all's one wan immensity. What else ? - 
 What shall day show or not show ? Let me cease 
 To think, for if I think my whole cramped mind, 
 Which yesterday harboured the universe, 
 Is packed to bursting with one thought, is nothing 
 Except that monstrous thought. 
 
 Had someone told me 
 Yesterday : By to-morrow he'll be dead, 
 And you will wish it yesterday once more, 
 
8 4 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 I had merely laughed. But now, but now, if prayer 
 Could anything, my soul how I would pray 
 To have him back again, that loathed tyrant, 
 Bolting out venomous insults, swollen with fury 
 And unappeased malice ! To have him back ! 
 So he would heave this nightmare from my heart. 
 Shonnin, Nelto, are dead? Impossible ! 
 Would I could waken ! Oh, this hideous anguish 
 Must somehow end ! My heart, my brain will burst. 
 No, it must be endured. Come, be a man ; 
 For there's my mother's step on the garden-walk. 
 It hastens, yet methinks 'tis deeply loaded 
 With an assured calamity. 
 
 [Enter MRS. GWYLLIM, her skirts draggled with 
 sand and ivater. 
 
 Well, mother ? 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. \Showinga small shawl, dripping wet. 
 Nothing but this. 
 
 Owain. Nelto's. Where did you find it ? 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Just opposite, on the shore. I called 
 
 old Williams 
 To bring his lantern. 
 
 Owain. Ay, 'tis Nelto's shawl. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. What does that prove ? Why, one 
 
 lets drop a shawl 
 Easily. 
 
 Not a word ? You who've so many 
 
WILD JUSTICE 85 
 
 Smooth and ingenious words will spare not one 
 To hold me from despair ? You'd pity me 
 Did you but guess what an eternity 
 I have been searching for them. 
 
 Owain. I've been waiting 
 
 The same eternity. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. See, see ! I ve waded 
 Waist-deep and shrieked, holloaing against the wind 
 Till my throat cracked its strings ; yet nothing answered 
 Save the hoarse sea-bird. 
 
 What of that ? The wind 
 
 Blew back my voice. Shall one despair so soon ? 
 The comfortable light brings hope. Look yonder, 
 A patch of solid darkness gathers in 
 From the universal grey. I've watched it shaping 
 Clearly the boat now. Twere an easy thing, 
 Old Williams says, the boat being water-logged, 
 Just there, in such a tide to get aground. 
 They are waiting for the day. 
 
 Owain. Old Williams thinks so ? 
 
 His eyesight fails. I would mine own confirmed him. 
 No, I'm not cruel. Mother, let's brace our hearts, 
 For now's the pivot moment that must swing us 
 From an unfixed suspense to a fixed knowledge 
 Less miserable however based with horror. 
 Mother, I think that boat is empty. 
 
86 WILD JUSTICE 
 
 Mrs. GwyUim. Look ! 
 
 To me it seems there's somewhat lying there. 
 They sleep perhaps. 
 
 [OwAiN looks at the boat through the telescope. 
 
 Mrs. GwyUim. Well? 
 
 [He turns it about, still looking^ What did you see ? 
 
 Owain. There's something floating. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. What? Who? 
 
 Owain. No one. 
 
 Tis something small a lamp, I think. 
 
 Mrs. Givyllim. But the boat, 
 
 Look in the boat. 
 
 Owain. I have. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. What did you see. 
 
 Owain. I saw the sail. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Nothing besides ? 
 
 Owain. No, nothing. 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. There's someone lying under it ? 
 
 Owain. No, no one. 
 
 M^rs. Gwyllim. [Taking the telescope^ You are mis- 
 taken, you must be mistaken, 
 For if they are not in the boat, where can they be ? 
 I have looked and looked, there's not a possible place 
 But I have searched. 
 
 \Looks through the telescope, then turns away. 
 
WILD JUSTICE 87 
 
 There's something in my eyes, 
 My hand trembles. Do you look again. 
 
 Owain. O mother ! 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. Where are my children, if they are 
 
 not there ? 
 They cannot both be Owain, where are they ? 
 
 Owain. \Makes a gesture towards the sea.] Mother, 
 May God have mercy on us ! 
 
 Mrs. Gwyllim. No, not both, 
 
 Not both ! She's somewhere in the house. Come, Ellen ! 
 She is afraid to come. Come, Nelto, Nelto ! 
 Shonnin, my heart's adored, Shonnin, my love, 
 Do not be angry with me, answer, Shonnin, 
 Shonnin ! Not dead not dead ! 
 
 Owain. O hush hush hush. 
 
 PRINTED BY 
 
 SPOTTISWOODK AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUAP.B 
 LONDON 
 
DYBmRCARET-L-tUDQSI SS 
 /A mathews'^shillinc carland 
 
AEROMANCY 
 
AEROMANCY 
 
 AND OTHER POEMS 
 
 BY 
 
 MARGARET L. WOODS 
 
 LONDON 
 
 ELKIN MATHEWS, VIGO STREET 
 1896 
 
TO 
 
 HARRY & MABEL 
 
Three of the following poems have 
 already appeared: "An April Song" in 
 the Pelican, and in a small volume of 
 songs printed by Mr, Daniel, of Worcester 
 House, Oxford; " The Mariner's Sleep 
 by the Sea" in the Pageant; "March 
 Thoughts from England" in the English 
 Illustrated Magazine. 
 
AEROMANCY 
 
 I 
 
 THE watchers in the everlasting towers, 
 lind watchers of bright heaven, the bells who own 
 changing years, but the unchanging hours 
 
 Listen ! They strike : a sinister monotone 
 Deep as all time. The same sound and who hears 
 Could be the same, did she not hear alone. 
 
 Those iron tongues have portioned out our years 
 Indifferently, with fateful rumours blown 
 About the solemn spires and aery tiers 
 
 Of clustered pinnacles, and far unknown 
 Utterance that communes with the void. It fills 
 The valley broadening round their ancient throne, 
 Out to the edges of the violet hills. 
 
8 AEROMANCY 
 
 II 
 
 Again that hour has struck, has dropped again 
 Into the gulf whence nothing may resurge, 
 Yet lo ! with hollow iteration vain, 
 
 Itself the phantom and the thaumaturge, 
 The old long-dead inevitable hour 
 'Neath the emerging stars shall re-emerge. 
 
 Once heedlessly, as, ignorant of their power, 
 A wizard's child might hear such dooming spells 
 As make the dead to groan and brave men cower 
 
 Muttering hoarse prayers, so have I heard the bells. 
 Heard in the green hush of some long-drawn 
 
 bower, 
 Walks where a legendary shade compels 
 
 Day to its hue, where slow, with mirrored tower, 
 Garden and bridge that waver as it goes, 
 Cherwell to Isis bears its meadowy dower, 
 
 Strewn hawthorn petals, shatterings of the rose : 
 Serene as it could know their garland bright 
 Year after year renews, and even as those, 
 
 Brings to the winding wave its joyous freight 
 Of eager youth, to push adventurous prows 
 Far up its ancient ways with new delight, 
 Or dream old dreams under its haunted boughs. 
 
AEROMANCY 9 
 
 III 
 
 How in yon high-walled garden has mine ear 
 Hung on their imminent voices, where the yew 
 Darkens above each grey majestic pier 
 
 Of the antique gate. 
 
 'Tis closed : none passes thro', 
 But in the unfooted mimic theatre 
 A fountain springs, scattering a lonely dew. 
 
 This was a child of music, some aver, 
 
 In olden time, and here men pressed around 
 
 Her throne of song. But one that loved her, 
 
 fV student, who in pagan books had found 
 Strange lore, came once ghost-white with wrath 
 
 and love, 
 And sat a little while upon the ground, 
 
 Hearing men whisper, seeing high above 
 The slim girl sing ; till suddenly upright 
 He leapt, and shrieked out stammering words. 
 The grove 
 
 Stood on the instant void, silence and night 
 Shrouded it up ; nor was one left to show 
 How from its marble urn the fountain slight 
 Arose to plain the loves of long ago. 
 
io AEROMANCY 
 
 Time was this formal garden seemed our own, 
 So world-forgot and beautiful ; the glow 
 Of its great flowers, the birds that as alone 
 
 Made sparkling sport upon the fountain's rim, 
 Its diamond drip into the pool, o'ergrown 
 With iris and pale reed, the skyey, slim 
 
 Poplar that still October turns to flame, 
 
 All was our own the couchant monsters grim 
 
 Remember it : and the bells sound the same. 
 
 IV 
 
 From tower to tower eternally they call, 
 O'er the grey windings of the storied town, 
 Its large lawns, set in many a time-rich wall 
 
 And cool with broad tree-shadows. Floating 
 
 down, 
 
 Everywhere have I listened to that chime. 
 Heard it high-laden with the summer crown 
 
 Of the lone reaches, heard it when the rime 
 Broidered the fretted stone and flung light lace 
 Of silver on the boughs, when winter's prime 
 
 Over the frozen flood in whirling race 
 Swept out and scattered wide our joyous crew, 
 Like birds that beat some viewless bound of space 
 
AEROMANCY 11 
 
 On wheeling wings ; till deep and deeper blue 
 Gathered on Oxford towers, and far away, 
 Ere up the stream in swinging line we flew, 
 Through the black trees burned out the crimson 
 day. 
 
 V 
 
 Hour after hour most ignorantly I heard. 
 A certain night, a warm and obscure night, 
 On a dim lawn I found the master-word. 
 
 Dawn and high day, wan visitings of light 
 Out of the haunting moon, come to the bells, 
 ^Heaven's horologe turns in their darkling sight. 
 
 Blind aeromancers, from their hollow cells 
 Float forth the eyeless ghosts of all hours dead, 
 With voices hidden as the sigh in shells. 
 
 The living hour leaps clangorous overhead 
 
 To living ears. A thin ethereal 
 
 Long sound pursues, the sweep of pinions spread, 
 
 Rushing they knew not whither, and the call 
 Of the oblivious ghosts, wild-whispering 
 To dust of unremembered burial. 
 
 But I have heard them, since with folded wing 
 One wandered ghost her former pathway found, 
 One blind, blind ghost, that knew not anything 
 
12 AEROMANCY 
 
 Of change, but with her filmy hair enwound 
 Mine eyes, and closely murmuring, filled my 
 
 sense 
 With the enchantment of that fading sound. 
 
 Ah, faded, gone! Yet had its effluence 
 Brooded about my soul and learned me more, 
 Had not ill-friending Chance scattered it hence, 
 
 Dispersing much that companied of yore 
 A spirit the world's business doth subdue 
 * To that it works in.' So that Hour forbore 
 
 To come again and whisper all she knew. 
 Young was she yet, and taught me first her own 
 Young secret. Hark ! The ancient hours renew 
 
 Their solemn solitary undertone; 
 
 And I do hear them, yet as one who hears 
 
 A talk confused in a tongue half-known, 
 
 With hints of roaring battle, hopes and fears, 
 And festival and music and shrill play, 
 Of loves forgotten and forgotten tears; 
 
 And one grey murmur under arches grey 
 The sigh of cloistral hours that fain would tell 
 Of how they stole and stole long lives away, 
 Issueless, void, alike, innumerable. 
 
AEROMANCY 13 
 
 VI 
 
 I hear the incantation of the bells, 
 And since that Hour made me her neophyte, 
 I know what occult power within them dwells 
 To mock at Time's inviolable might. 
 
 A power to make invisible things seen, 
 And tumult calm and morning in dull night, 
 To set the day with stars, and like a screen 
 
 Rolled back, the curtain of a peopled stage, 
 Uplift the tenuous moment's painted scene 
 From Life's loud pageant and mute pilgrimage. 
 
 VII 
 
 Wherefore in ways familiar, I behold 
 
 Shapes that are not and voiceless greetings greet ; 
 
 And often when the sullen midnight tolled 
 
 Makes sound of hurrying footsteps in the street, 
 I hear not these but other footsteps fall, 
 In the hush night a sound of many feet. 
 
 Away ! Away ! Ah, whither haste they all, 
 Echoing into the dark so crowdedly, 
 And scattering there, until the gradual 
 
 Silence resumes them ? Yet her voices cry 
 1 Away ! ' From shrine and sculptured pinnacle 
 The crownless images make chill reply. 
 
I 4 AEROMANCY 
 
 VIII 
 
 The bells their loud unchanging task fulfil, 
 Beating upon the ear and on the brain 
 With a remindful resonance, until 
 
 Half could I wish their oracles again 
 Silent for me, as once they were ; and yet 
 More than remembrance is it mortal pain 
 
 To watch that still, pursuing sea, whose fret 
 Washes our footsteps out, and one by one, 
 O'er everything we were and would regret, 
 Sweeps the smooth water of oblivion. 
 
 IX 
 
 (To R. B., 1894.) 
 
 Rather their incantation still sound on ! 
 
 As on a certain morn, let them repeat 
 
 Fair hours and bring you back who both are gone. 
 
 There was a summer silence in the street, 
 Where half the shouldering gables caught the sun, 
 Your bloomy window fragrant in the heat. 
 
 Methought 'twas but a little way to run 
 
 To cross your threshold, then a shadowy space, 
 
 Reach the gay garden and yourself and one 
 
AEROMANCY 15 
 
 Standing amid her flowers. In many a place 
 Does this white moon of May find multitude 
 Of flowers more beautiful than her own face : 
 
 What long glades pale with hawthorn, what 
 
 bedewed 
 
 Soft slopes o'erspangled with the cowslip's sheen, 
 And nested primroses, a late lone brood ! 
 
 Through nets of delicate shadow she hath seen 
 The sea-blue splendour of wild-hyacinths spread 
 Up Wytham woods, under the first fresh green ; 
 
 O'er foamy orchards her young light is shed, 
 And flash of wilding blossom and the pride 
 country gardens, richly tapestried 
 
 With royal tulips sumptuously dyed, 
 
 Purple and gold and sanguine, striped and smeared, 
 
 Or pure in their keen colour as a bride 
 
 Is in her whiteness. Yet as oft she peered 
 Over the black tower, smiling silverly, 
 In yonder strip of city earth appeared 
 
 As crowded wealth of flowers as she might see 
 By ample lawns o'erflowed with ministrant air, 
 Or hollow coverts none explore save she. 
 
 For once it had your blithe and debonnair 
 And c lucky-fingered ' lady, eve and morn 
 To visit every bloom with happy care. 
 
i6 AEROMANCY 
 
 She was a votary of that later born 
 
 Young Muse, whom not less holy than the nine, 
 
 Some brown-haired Dryad bore to the unshorn 
 
 Bright god ; who now a hierophant divine, 
 Comes treading with fair feet invisible, 
 Choosing herself the priestess and the shrine. 
 
 Such was that clear-eyed lady, who knew well 
 Out of the earth's dark homes to call up store 
 Of heaven-bright beauty, and a wafting smell 
 
 Sweeter than incense. All the bells restore, 
 Even to the noontide shadow where we read 
 Those ardent leaves, plucked from a heart's live 
 core: 
 
 Flower-heart, whose burning petals wide dispread, 
 With scarlet ruin did enrich the mould, 
 Where still they glow, though long the flower is 
 dead. 
 
 Tranquil and far, with murmur manifold, 
 
 On Autumn eves the bells their power resume, 
 
 Lone in the quiet sunset's waning gold. 
 
 They conjure up a green embowered room, 
 Where through the open casement there would 
 
 swing 
 A sound of bells into the fire-lit gloom. 
 
 Oft have they chid me there, late lingering, 
 Warm in its lady's gracious atmosphere, 
 While easily as flames or fountains spring, 
 
AEROMANCY 17 
 
 That sparkling spirit of yours threw out its clear 
 Lightnings of mirth, and the swift talk would flit 
 Flashing its wings through laughter everywhere. 
 
 How small a boon I brought you for your wit ! 
 Only perchance some woodbine wreath of song, 
 Or hedgerow tale, dark though you smiled on it. 
 
 And even as I musing passed along 
 That street, you laid her to her near repose. 
 Hush ! There are griefs that grief itself may 
 wrong. 
 
 \^| since I brought no garland such as blows 
 Inflewy May, for her that loved the May, 
 From other fields, where Herb Remembrance 
 grows, 
 
 I bring the unsheaved harvest of the way ; 
 Its purple leaves some dimmer dews immerse, 
 I pluck, and on your living breast I lay 
 The coronal of this Autumnal verse. 
 
i8 AN APRIL SONG 
 
 AN APRIL SONG 
 
 O COME across the hillside, the April month is 
 
 here, 
 The lamb-time, the lark-time, the child-time of 
 
 the year. 
 
 The wren sings on the sallow, 
 The lark above the fallow, 
 The birds sing everywhere, 
 With whistle and with holloa 
 The labourers follow 
 The shining share, 
 And sing upon the hillside in the seed-time of 
 
 the year. 
 
 O come into the hollow, for Eastertide is here, 
 And pale below the hillside the budding palms 
 
 appear. 
 
 The silver buds a-blowing 
 Their yellow bloom are showing 
 To woo the bee ; 
 The bee awhile yet drowses, 
 But the drunken moth carouses 
 
AN APRIL SONG 19 
 
 All night upon the tree, 
 
 And dreams there in the dawning of the Spring- 
 time of the year. 
 
 O come into the woodland, the primroses are 
 
 here, 
 And down in the woodland beneath the grasses 
 
 sere, 
 
 As in a wide dominion, 
 How many a pretty minion 
 Of Spring to-day, 
 WkWe warm the sunshine passes 
 Thro' the forest of the grasses 
 Awakes to play, 
 To sport there in the sun-time, the play-time of 
 
 the year. 
 
 O come across the hillside, for now the Spring 
 is here, 
 
 Come child with your laughter, your pretty 
 April cheer. 
 
 Your fantasy possesses 
 
 The airy wildernesses, 
 
 The shrill lark's dower, 
 
 The forest and the blossom, 
 
 The earth and in her bosom 
 
 The mouse's bower ; 
 
 The sunlight and the starlight of the spring- 
 time of the year. 
 
 B 2 
 
20 AN APRIL SONG 
 
 O come into the wide world, for you the Spring 
 
 is here, 
 The blue heaven is smiling, the young earth 
 
 carols clear. 
 
 Come happy heart to wonder, 
 Come eager hands to plunder 
 The wide world's store, 
 The meadow's golden glory, 
 The shining towers of story 
 On Dreamland's shore, 
 To reign there all the song-time, the child-time 
 
 of the year. 
 
THE MARINERS SLEEP BY THE SEA 21 
 
 1 THE MARINERS SLEEP BY THE SEA* 
 
 THE mariners sleep by the sea. 
 
 The wild wind comes up from the sea, 
 
 It wails round the tower, and it blows through 
 
 the grasses, 
 It scatters the sand o'er the graves where it 
 
 passes, 
 And the sound and the scent of the sea. 
 
 The white waves beat up from the shore, 
 
 They beat on the church by the shore, 
 
 They rush round the grave-stones aslant to the 
 
 leeward, 
 And the wall and the mariners' graves lying 
 
 seaward, 
 That are banked with the stones from the shore. 
 
 For the huge sea comes up in the storm, 
 Like a beast from the lair of the storm, 
 To claim with its ravenous leap and to mingle 
 The mariners' bones with the surf and the 
 
 shingle 
 That it rolls round the shore in the storm. 
 
22 THE MARINERS SLEEP BY THE SEA 
 
 There is nothing beyond but the sky, 
 But the sea and the slow-moving sky, 
 Where a cloud from the grey lifts the gleam of 
 
 its edges, 
 
 Where the foam flashes white from the shoul- 
 dering ridges, 
 As they crowd on the uttermost sky. 
 
 The mariners sleep by the sea. 
 
 Far away there's a shrine by the sea ; 
 
 The pale women climb up the path to it slowly, 
 
 To pray to Our Lady of Storms ere they wholly 
 
 Despair of their men from the sea. 
 
 The children at play on the sand, 
 Where once from the shell-broidered sand 
 They would watch for the sails coming in from 
 
 far places, 
 
 Are forgetting the ships and forgetting the faces 
 Lying here, lying hid in the sand. 
 
 When at night there's a seething of surf, 
 
 The grandames look out o'er the surf, 
 
 They reckon their dead and their long years of 
 
 sadness, 
 And they shake their lean fists at the sea and its 
 
 madness, 
 And curse the white fangs of the surf. 
 
THE MARINERS SLEEP BY THE SEA 23 
 
 But the mariners sleep by the sea. 
 
 They hear not the sound of the sea, 
 
 Nor the hum from the church where the psalm 
 
 is uplifted, 
 Nor the crying of birds that above them are 
 
 drifted. 
 The mariners sleep by the sea. 
 
24 MARCH THOUGHTS 
 
 MARCH THOUGHTS FROM ENGLAND 
 
 O THAT I were lying under the olives, 
 Lying alone among the anemones ! 
 Shell-coloured blossoms they bloom there and 
 
 scarlet, 
 
 Far under stretches of silver woodland, 
 Flame in the delicate shade of the olives. 
 
 O that I were lying under the olives ! 
 
 Grey grows the thyme on the shadowless head- 
 land, 
 
 The long low headland, where white in the 
 sunshine 
 
 The rocks run seaward. It seems suspended 
 
 Lone in an infinite gulf of azure. 
 
 There, were I lying under the olives, 
 Might I behold come following seaward, 
 Clear brown shapes in a world of sunshine, 
 A russet shepherd, his sheep too, russet. 
 Watch them wander the long grey headland 
 Out to the edge of the burning azure. 
 
MARCH THOUGHTS 25 
 
 O that I were lying under the olives ! 
 
 So should I see the far-off cities 
 
 Glittering low by the purple water, 
 
 Gleaming high on the purple mountain ; 
 
 Sec where the road goes winding southward. 
 
 It passes the valleys of almond blossom, 
 
 Curves round the crag o'er the steep-hanging 
 
 orchards, 
 Where almond and peach are aflush 'mid the 
 
 olives- 
 
 Hardly the amethyst sea shines through them 
 Over it cypress on solemn cypress 
 Lead to the lonely pilgrimage places. 
 
 O that I were dreaming under the olives ! 
 Hearing alone on the sun-steeped headland 
 A crystalline wave, almost inaudible, 
 Steal round the shore ; and thin, far off, 
 The shepherd's music. So did it sound 
 In fields Sicilian, Theocritus heard it, 
 Moschus and Bion piped it at noontide. 
 
 O that I were listening under the olives ! 
 
 So should I hear behind in the woodland 
 
 The peasants talking. Either a woman, 
 
 A wrinkled grandame, stands in the sunshine, 
 
 Stirs the brown soil in an acre of violets 
 
 Large odorous violets and answers slowly 
 
 A child's swift babble ; or else at noon 
 
 The labourers come. They rest in the shadow, 
 
 Eating their dinner of herbs, and are merry. 
 
26 MARCH THOUGHTS 
 
 Soft speech Provencal under the olives ! 
 Like a queen's raiment from days long perished, 
 Breathing aromas of old unremembered 
 Perfumes and shining in dust-covered places 
 With sudden hints of forgotten splendour 
 So on the lips of the peasant his language, 
 His only now, the tongue of the peasant. 
 
 Would I were listening under the olives ! 
 
 So- should I see in an airy pageant 
 
 A proud chivalrous pomp sweep by me, 
 
 Hear in high courts the joyous ladies 
 
 Devising of Love in a world of lovers : 
 
 Hear the song of the Lion-hearted, 
 
 A deep-voiced song and oh ! perchance, 
 
 Ghostly and strange and sweet to madness, 
 
 Rudel sing the Lady of Tripoli. 
 
2 7 
 
 ON THE DEATH OF AN INFANT 
 
 ALAS ! the little child is dead. 
 O sorrow for the downy head 
 That used to keep his mother's arm 
 
 And bosom warm, 
 And now the chilling earth instead 
 
 Must hide, for he is dead ! 
 
 Mourn mothers, ye who know how sweet 
 They were, the blossom-coloured feet 
 That in our dusty pathways yet 
 
 No print had set, 
 
 So that the world will scarcely mark 
 Their little track into the dark. 
 Only for one the baby feet 
 
 Have left earth incomplete. 
 
 They coldly lie, but she before 
 
 The hearth will chafe them now no more, 
 
 Nor swing the boy to let him leap, 
 
 Who scarce could creep, 
 In dainty dance upon the floor : 
 
 For all his play-time's o'er. 
 
2 8 ON THE DEATH OF AN INFANT 
 
 Nor from that slumber where he lies 
 Shall he with blue half-wakened eyes, 
 Stir at her shadow o'er him thrown 
 
 Or rustling gown, 
 And dream a smile because her face 
 Flits through some visionary place. 
 She need no longer still her cries 
 
 Lest he unclose his eyes. 
 
 When last she wept how many years 
 Ago it seems ! he dried her tears 
 With wandering touches velvet-sleek 
 
 Upon her cheek. 
 
 Now on his fragile breast she bows 
 Her shaken mouth and heavy brows, 
 And holds him fast, while he nor fears 
 
 Nor wonders at her tears. 
 
 Ye mothers, let her not alone 
 Make on this little dust her moan, 
 Be near with looks of love and touch 
 
 Not over-much 
 
 Her quivering grief with words, but wend 
 With her to-day made more than friend 
 By ancient mysteries of Earth, 
 By solemn pangs of death and birth, 
 Made consecrate, apart, unknown 
 
 Save unto you alone. 
 
ON THE DEATH OF AN INFANT 29 
 
 How lightly borne the little bier, 
 
 With all its flowers ! And what is here, 
 
 That ye in long procession go, 
 
 Sombre and slow, 
 As who at famous obsequies 
 Mourn for a world bereaved ? The wise 
 Will ask in wonder and recall 
 Some larger grief, or prodigal 
 Rich waste of Nature ; year by year 
 
 Things born to disappear. 
 
 But here, within this narrow hearse 
 The mystery of the Universe 
 Doth house as kingly and secure 
 
 As vast and sure 
 As in the marble or the lead 
 That hold the world-subduing dead. 
 Its bare inscription doth contain 
 More than philosophers explain, 
 Or mightier poets can rehearse, 
 
 Making immortal verse. 
 
 And who is she with veiled head ? 
 She had a name, but now instead 
 Another. What she was before 
 
 She is no more, 
 
 Nor what she shall be. In her mind 
 By ways unknown she seems to wind, 
 Some endless lapse of time to tread 
 
 Slowly behind the dead. 
 
3 o ON THE DEATH OF AN INFANT 
 
 Ay, this beyond her thought is true. 
 The seas have shaped their shores anew, 
 And stars in other courses roll 
 
 About the pole, 
 
 Since first this mourning way she went. 
 In Babylon she made lament, 
 And hath her ancient sorrow hid 
 Neath an Egyptian pyramid ; 
 Yet shall through countries waste and new 
 
 The unchanging road pursue. 
 
 She mightier names and powers hath known, 
 For lilies on her pathway strown, 
 Out of the unsounded gulf of Heaven 
 
 The stars were given. 
 The deep of Earth's divine desire 
 Surged round her feet in argent fire, 
 Its passionate rumour, soft, immense, 
 Rose up to her through frankincense; 
 She took the moon and Hera's throne, 
 
 And Aphrodite's zone. 
 
 Through warring chaos, primal gloom, 
 Promethean shape she seems to loom, 
 Kindling her hearth with holier flame. 
 
 Around it came 
 
 Man that was beast, and where it burned 
 For strife he human order learned, 
 She first his shelter, she the nurse 
 
ON THE DEATH OF AN INFANT 31 
 
 Of all he is, for her the curse 
 Sprung where he made her blessings room 
 The chain, the Titan's doom. 
 
 Adorn with flowers the darkling gate 
 Where things majestic pass, with state 
 Religious and with mourning eyes 
 
 Your ministries 
 
 Perform, ye mothers. Tell aloud 
 How that the glorious and the proud 
 The world's deep wave a moment ride 
 Like foam, and fade upon its tide. 
 Tell them that Life alone is great, 
 
 And Love and mortal Fate. 
 
EVISA 
 
 EVISA 
 
 THROUGH the rose-red chasms and the gorges 
 
 Of granite and porphyry, 
 
 The mountain river surges 
 
 And battles down to the sea, 
 
 Deep, deep out of sight, 
 
 Save where a flash of white 
 
 Sometimes leaps in the sun 
 
 And then is gone. 
 
 And a giant might shoot with an arrow, 
 
 Mile upon mile though it be, 
 
 Through the cloven mountain, the narrow 
 
 Sheer portal out to the sea. 
 
 The sea shines purple and blue, 
 
 Save where a sanguine hue 
 
 Melts in it under the shapes 
 
 Of the bare fantastic capes, 
 
 Coloured like Autumn eves, 
 
 Or a rose's inner leaves. 
 
 On the sea is a single skiff, 
 
 Above, 'twixt clifF and cliff, 
 
 A grey sea-eagle swings 
 
 Lone upon wide-spread wings. 
 
SONG 33 
 
 SONG 
 
 WEEP no more, for why should sorrow 
 Spend a time too short for kisses ? 
 
 Wilt thou weep because to-morrow 
 Brings no hour so sweet as this is ? 
 O fond heart ! 
 
 Soon 'tis fled and then we part. 
 
 Comes no hour so sweet as this is 
 Haste to harvest then such flow'rs 
 
 All thine hours 
 Keep the fragrance of its kisses. 
 
 Time but treads the slow sun's measure, 
 Lightning souls outstrip his fleetness, 
 
 Packing half a life-time's pleasure 
 In a moment of completeness. 
 Haste, O haste, 
 
 Ere such moments run to waste ! 
 
 Soon shall come an hour for weeping, 
 Days enough and long to spare 
 
 For thy care, 
 And thy tears shall haunt thee sleeping. 
 
34 
 
 SONG 
 
 Tears are longer than sweet laughter, 
 Yet they pass, and being ended, 
 
 Like a radiance following after 
 Stormy eves from suns descended, 
 So their rain 
 
 Fades into this light again. 
 
THE CHILD ALONE 35 
 
 THE CHILD ALONE 
 
 'Tis a pleasant thing to be free. 
 Nobody knows, nobody guesses 
 What I am doing, where I am straying. 
 " Where is Marjorie?" mother is saying. 
 Julie, who loves to sit making her dresses, 
 
 Says, " She is playing 
 
 Under the tree." 
 
 No through the jungle Marjorie passes. 
 Sometimes I run, sometimes I stand 
 Still in a covert of high-waving grasses, 
 
 Over my head. 
 Wilderness ways, uninhabited land, 
 
 Lone I explore. 
 Hares in the grass, mice where I tread, 
 
 Look up and wonder ; 
 
 Or the squirrel flashes 
 
 Red as he dashes 
 Over the leafy forest floor, 
 
 Then in the tree 
 
 High sits he 
 
 And mocks me under ; 
 While all of them, all of them wonder, wonder 
 
 What I can be. 
 
36 THE CHILD ALONE 
 
 I was a child, a little child, 
 I am a happy creature wild. 
 I used to have to run or walk 
 As I was bid, be still or talk ; 
 To shun the wind or sun or show'r, 
 And then come in at such an hour. 
 I was a child, a little child, 
 I am a happy creature wild. 
 
 For see I wander like a deer 
 
 That sniffs about the furrowed bole 
 
 Of some great tree, or starts in fear 
 
 From every leaf that trembles near ; 
 
 Or neighing like a frolic foal 
 
 That prances in a field at play, 
 
 I gallop further on my way. 
 
 Sometimes a beech-mast tumbles thro' ; 
 
 I strip it daintily to find 
 
 The nut within its wooden rind, 
 
 And nibbling sit as squirrels do. 
 
 I was a child, a little child, 
 
 I am a happy creature wild. 
 
 Now, now again, 
 
 Reversing the spell, 
 
 Turning this plain 
 
 Little ring on my finger, 
 
 See I regain 
 
 Form of a child, spirit as well. 
 
 Yet I am free, no one can tell 
 
THE CHILD ALONE 37 
 
 Margie to haste, come and not linger. 
 Turn it again, thrice must it turn, 
 Thrice the sunlight flicker and burn 
 Deep in the heart of its single gem 
 And see I ride from Jerusalem. 
 
 I am a knight ; the paynim horde 
 Have felt the weight of this good sword 
 About the Sepulchre of Our Lord. 
 
 'Tis a sinister woodland deep and wide; 
 
 Alone I ride. 
 Saint Hubert scatter the demon breed ! 
 
 Mary Mother be my guide ! 
 Up the glade at rushing speed, 
 What comes shining, what comes sweeping ? 
 
 'Tis a band of mailed men 
 
 And a lady passing fair, 
 
 Whom they carry to their den 
 
 Gleaming in her golden hair. 
 
 Ha ! I come, like lightning leaping, 
 
 Thrust and hew mid caitiff clamour. 
 
 Beat the stubborn thorn-bush down ! 
 
 Cleave and rend the bracken's crown ! 
 
 Not a stalk be left upright ! 
 
 Now they know the paynim's hammer, 
 
 Now they know King kichard's knight. 
 
 Turn, turn again, 
 Magical ring. 
 
3 8 THE CHILD ALONE 
 
 I am a Dane, 
 Cunning and brave, 
 A pirate king. 
 Swiftly I come over the wave. 
 
 The shore, the Saxon town I see. 
 
 The smoke hangs blue on roof and tree 
 
 At evening over the little town. 
 
 I hear the bells in the gray church tower. 
 
 With fire and sword at midnight hour 
 
 I mean to harry and burn it down. 
 
 But fierce as a wolf, as a raven wise, 
 
 I come at first in a deep disguise 
 
 To the little town. 
 
 And when I climb to the nursery yonder 
 
 They'll call me Marjorie, and wonder 
 
 Why I should want to run away 
 
 And be as any rabbit wild, 
 
 For I shall seem to be a child 
 
 Named Marjorie. What would they say 
 
 If they could know it was instead 
 
 A pirate that they put to bed ? 
 
BESIDE THE DOOR 39 
 
 4 BESIDE THE DOOR 
 
 BESIDE the door there stands a fountain, 
 And he who looks therein 
 
 Sees his own face that wont to smile so freshly 
 Look forth all changed and wan. 
 
 The lilac bushes and the gay laburnum 
 Were once a spreading forest high o'erhead, 
 And when in the white dew I marked my foot- 
 steps, 
 
 I said: 'They are alone. 
 No other wanderer ever came this way.' 
 
 Beside the door there stands a fountain, 
 
 And he who leans above 
 
 And speaks to it, hears his own voice make 
 
 answer 
 Hollow and strange and sad. 
 
 In yonder field was wont to bloom a thorn-tree, 
 A tree with scarlet flowers ; 
 And there a cuckoo cried as now he cries not, 
 Greeting the sun, greeting the moon, 
 When she rose red behind the frail abeles. 
 
40 BESIDE THE DOOR 
 
 Beside the door there stands a fountain ; 
 
 But thou shalt see it not, 
 
 And though thou speak the fountain will not 
 answer, 
 
 With hollow tongue and sad. 
 
 And vainly have I sought to find the forest, 
 
 And find the scarlet tree; 
 
 But thou shalt find them. Go, and then return, 
 Return and tell how all the unrooted pathways 
 Are white with dew, and deeper in the forest 
 
 Dwells the enchanted bird. 
 
 Beside the door there stands a fountain, 
 
 And he who looks therein 
 Sees his own face, that wont to smile so freshly, 
 
 Look forth all changed and wan. 
 
 FINIS 
 
Price One S net, each part. 
 
 No. i . L O N 1) O X V I S I O X S : Book I. By 
 LAURENCE BINYON. [Second Edition. 
 
 "Mr. Binyon U. " . Elkin Mathews' new 
 
 poetical series . . . with a book of new verses, ' London 
 
 n>,' and there seems to me to be no question about the 
 
 uncommon worth of these They are t\\ 
 
 genuine things cut out-of the heart of London life, 
 
 of them are poems of a big order. . . . Th-.- -;uff of 
 
 poetry is in him, as it is in few oj liters 
 
 to-day; and I doubt if one of th \u not 
 
 forgetting Mr. ! I 
 
 into ir 
 
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 ihat of many stormier, more urilliant 
 
 [ORATION ODE, 
 and other Poems. By ROBERT BRII< 
 
 No. 3. CHRIST IX HADES, &c. By STEPHEN 
 UPS. 
 
 4. AEROMAXCV, and other Poems, By 
 HARET L. \\'c>- 
 
 No. 5. SO-NGS AND ODES. By RICHARD 
 
 WATSON Dixox. Selected by R. BRIDGES. 
 
 [/ preparation. 
 
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