POEMS 
 
 OF 
 
 RALPH WALDO EMERSON

 
 RALPH WALDO EMERSON
 
 OXFORD EDITION 
 
 RALPH WALDO EMERSON 
 
 HUMPHREY MILFORD 
 
 OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS 
 
 LONDON EDINBURGH GLASGOW 
 
 NEW YORK TORONTO MELBOURNE BOMBAY 
 
 1914
 
 OXFORD : HORACE HART 
 PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 
 PAGE 
 
 THE SPHINX .... 
 
 1 
 
 EACH AND ALL .... 
 
 6 
 
 THE PROBLEM .... 
 
 8 
 
 To RHEA 
 
 . 11 
 
 THE VISIT ..... 
 
 14 
 
 URIEL ...... 
 
 . 16 
 
 
 18 
 
 
 . 22 
 
 
 25 
 
 To J. W 
 
 . 27 
 
 FATE 
 
 . 28 
 
 GUY 
 
 . 30 
 
 TACT 
 
 . 32 
 
 HAMATREYA .... 
 
 . 33 
 
 EARTH-SONG .... 
 
 . 34 
 
 GOOD-BYE ..... 
 
 . 36 
 
 THE RHODORA .... 
 
 . 38 
 
 THE HUMBLE-BEE 
 
 . 39 
 
 BERRYING 
 
 . 42 
 
 THE SNOW-STORM 
 
 . 43 
 
 WOODNOTES, I .... 
 
 . 44 
 
 
 50 
 
 MONADNOC ..... 
 
 . 63 
 
 FABLE ..... 
 
 . 77 
 
 ODE ...... 
 
 . 78 
 
 ASTRAEA ..... 
 
 . 82 
 
 ETIENNE DE LA BOKCE 
 
 . 84 
 
 SUUM CUIQUE .... 
 
 . 85 
 
 COMPENSATION .... 
 
 . 86 
 
 FORBEARANCE .... 
 
 . 87 
 
 THE PARK 
 
 . 88 
 
 FORERUNNERS .... 
 
 . 89 
 
 SURSUM CORDA .... 
 
 . 91 
 
 ODE TO BEAUTY .... 
 
 . 92 
 
 GIVE ALL TO LOVE 
 
 . 96 
 
 To ELLEN AT THE SOUTH 
 
 . 93 
 
 To EVA 
 
 . 100
 
 vi CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 THE AMULET 101 
 
 THINE EYES STILL SHINED 102 
 
 EROS 103 
 
 HERMIONE 104 
 
 INITIAL, DAEMONIC, AND CELESTIAL LOVE . . . 107 
 
 THE APOLOGY 121 
 
 MERLIN, I 122 
 
 MERLIN, II 125 
 
 BACCHUS 127 
 
 Loss AND GAIN 130 
 
 MEROPS 131 
 
 THE HOUSE 132 
 
 SAADI 133 
 
 HOLIDAYS 139 
 
 PAINTING AND SCULPTURE . . . . . .140 
 
 FROM THE PERSIAN OF HAFIZ ..... 141 
 
 GHASELLE ......... 147 
 
 XENOPHANES 149 
 
 THE DAY S RATION ....... 150 
 
 BLIGHT 152 
 
 MUSKETAQUID . . . . . . . .155 
 
 DIRGE .......... 158 
 
 THRENODY . . . . . . . . 160 
 
 HYMN, SUNG AT THE COMPLETION OP THE CONCORD MONU 
 MENT .... .... 170 
 
 MAY-DAY 171 
 
 THE ADIRONDACS ....... 193 
 
 OCCASIONAL AND MISCELLANEOUS PIECES : 
 
 BRAHMA ........ 205 
 
 NEMESIS 206 
 
 FATE 207 
 
 FREEDOM ........ 208 
 
 ODE SUNG IN THE TOWN HALL, CONCORD, JULY 4, 1857 209 
 BOSTON HYMN . . . . . . .211 
 
 VOLUNTARIES ....... 215 
 
 LOVE AND THOUGHT ...... 220 
 
 LOVER S PETITION .221 
 
 UNA 222 
 
 LETTERS 223 
 
 RUBIES 224 
 
 MERLIN S SONG ....... 225 
 
 THE TEST 226 
 
 SOLUTION ... . 227
 
 CONTENTS vii 
 
 PAGE 
 
 NATURE AND LIFE : 
 
 NATURE, I ........ 230 
 
 NATURE, II 231 
 
 THE ROMANY GIRL ...... 232 
 
 DAYS 234 
 
 THE CHARTIST S COMPLAINT 235 
 
 MY GARDEN ........ 236 
 
 THE TITMOUSE ....... 239 
 
 SEA-SHORE ........ 243 
 
 SONG OF NATURE ....... 245 
 
 Two RIVERS ........ 249 
 
 WALDEINSAMKEIT 250 
 
 TERMINUS 252 
 
 THE PAST 254 
 
 THE LAST FAREWELL 255 
 
 IN MEMORIAM ....... 257 
 
 ELEMENTS : 
 
 EXPERIENCE 261 
 
 COMPENSATION 262 
 
 POLITICS 264 
 
 HEROISM 265 
 
 CHARACTER 266 
 
 CULTURE 267 
 
 FRIENDSHIP 268 
 
 BEAUTY ........ 269 
 
 MANNERS ........ 270 
 
 ART ......... 271 
 
 SPIRITUAL LAWS ....... 272 
 
 UNITY 273 
 
 WORSHIP 274 
 
 QUATRAINS 275 
 
 TRANSLATIONS . 283 
 
 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS : 
 
 HYMN 292 
 
 GRACE , 294 
 
 THE THREE DIMENSIONS 295 
 
 POWER ......... 295 
 
 WEALTH . . , 296 
 
 ILLUSIONS ........ 298 
 
 BOSTON ........ 300 
 
 MOTTOES TO THE ESSAYS : 
 
 HISTORY ........ 305 
 
 PRUDENCE 306
 
 viii CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 GIFTS 306 
 
 CIRCLES , 307 
 
 INTELLECT ........ 307 
 
 THE POET 308 
 
 NATURE ........ 309 
 
 NOMINALIST AND REALIST . . . . .310 
 
 INDEX OF TITLES . . . . . .311 
 
 INDEX OF FIEST LINES ...... 313
 
 (1865) 
 
 THE SPHINX 
 
 THE Sphinx is drowsy, 
 
 Her wings are furled ; 
 Her ear is heavy, 
 
 She broods on the world. 
 Who ll tell me my secret, 
 
 The ages have kept ? 
 I waited the seer, 
 
 While they slumbered and slept ; 
 
 c The fate of the man-child ; 
 
 The meaning of man ; 
 Known fruit of the unknown ; 
 
 Daedalian plan ; 
 Out of sleeping a waking, 
 
 Out of waking a sleep ; 
 Life death overtaking ; 
 
 Deep underneath deep ? 
 
 Erect as a sunbeam, 
 
 Upspringeth the palm ; 
 The elephant browses, 
 
 Undaunted and calm ; 
 In beautiful motion 
 
 The thrush plies his wings : 
 Kind leaves of his covert, 
 
 Your silence he sings.
 
 THE SPHINX 
 
 The waves, unashamed, 
 
 In difference sweet, 
 Play glad with the breezes, 
 
 Old playfellows meet ; 
 The journeying atoms, 
 
 Primordial wholes, 3 
 
 Firmly draw, firmly drive, 
 
 By their animate poles. 
 
 Sea, earth, air, sound, silence, 
 
 Plant, quadruped, bird, 
 By one music enchanted, 
 
 One deity stirred, 
 Each the other adorning, 
 
 Accompany still ; 
 Night veileth the morning, 
 
 The vapour the hill. 40 
 
 The babe by its mother 
 
 Lies bathed in joy ; 
 Glide its hours uncounted, 
 
 The sun is its toy ; 
 Shines the peace of all being, 
 
 Without cloud, in its eyes ; 
 And the sun of the world 
 
 In soft miniature lies. 
 
 But man crouches and blushes, 
 
 Absconds and conceals ; 50 
 
 He creepeth and peepeth, 
 He palters and steals ;
 
 THE SPHINX 3 
 
 Infirm, melancholy, 
 
 Jealous glancing around, 
 An oaf, an accomplice, 
 
 He poisons the ground. 
 
 Out spoke the great mother, 
 
 Beholding his fear ; 
 At the sound of her accents 
 
 Cold shuddered the sphere : 60 
 
 " Who has drugged my boy s cup ? 
 
 Who has mixed my boy s bread ? 
 Who, with sadness and madness, 
 
 Has turned the man-child s head ? " 
 
 I heard a poet answer 
 
 Aloud and cheerfully, 
 Say on, sweet Sphinx ! thy dirges 
 
 Are pleasant songs to me ; 
 Deep love lieth under 
 
 These pictures of time ; 70 
 
 They fade in the light of 
 
 Their meaning sublime. 
 
 * The fiend that man harries 
 
 Is love of the Best ; 
 Yawns the pit of the Dragon, 
 
 Lit by rays from the Blest. 
 The Lethe of nature 
 
 Can t trance him again, 
 Whose soul sees the perfect, 
 
 Which his eyes seek in vain. 80 
 
 B 2
 
 4 THE SPHINX 
 
 Prof ounder, profounder, 
 
 Man s spirit must dive ; 
 To his aye-rolling orbit 
 
 No goal will arrive ; 
 The heavens that now draw him 
 
 With sweetness untold, 
 Once found, for new heavens 
 
 He spurneth the old. 
 
 Pride ruined the angels, 
 
 Their shame them restores ; 90 
 
 And the joy that is sweetest 
 
 Lurks in stings of remorse. 
 Have I a lover 
 
 Who is noble and free ? 
 I would he were nobler 
 
 Than to love me. 
 
 Eterne alternation 
 
 Now follows, now flies ; 
 And under pain, pleasure, 
 
 Under pleasure, pain lies. 100 
 
 Love works at the centre, 
 
 Heart-heaving alway ; 
 Forth speed the strong pulses 
 
 To the borders of day. 
 
 Dull Sphinx, Jove keep thy five wits : 
 
 Thy sight is growing blear ; 
 Rue, myrrh, and cummin for the Sphinx 
 
 Her muddy eyes to clear !
 
 THE SPHINX 5 
 
 The old Sphinx bit her thick lip, 
 Said, Who taught thee mo to name ? no 
 
 I am thy spirit, yoke-fellow, 
 Of thine eye I am eyebeam. 
 
 Thou art the unanswered question ; 
 
 Couldst see thy proper eye, 
 Alway it asketh, asketh ; 
 
 And each answer is a lie. 
 So take thy quest through nature, 
 
 It through thousand natures ply ; 
 Ask on, thou clothed eternity ; 
 
 Time is the false reply. 120 
 
 Uprose the merry Sphinx, 
 
 And crouched no more in stone ; 
 She melted into purple cloud, 
 
 She silvered in the moon ; 
 She spired into a yellow flame ; 
 
 She flowered in blossoms red ; 
 She flowed into a foaming wave ; 
 
 She stood Monadnoc s head. 
 
 Thorough a thousand voices 
 
 Spoke the universal dame : 130 
 
 Who telleth one of my meanings, 
 
 Is master of all I am.
 
 EACH AND ALL 
 
 LITTLE thinks, in the field, yon red-cloaked clown, 
 
 Of thee from the hill-top looking down ; 
 
 The heifer that lows in the upland farm, 
 
 Far-heard, lows not thine ear to charm ; 
 
 The sexton, tolling his bell at noon, 
 
 Deems not that great Napoleon 
 
 Stops his horse, and lists with delight, 
 
 Whilst his files sweep round yon Alpine height ; 
 
 Nor knowest thou what argument 
 
 Thy life to thy neighbour s creed has lent. 10 
 
 All are needed by each one ; 
 
 Nothing is fair or good alone. 
 
 I thought the sparrow s note from heaven, 
 
 Singing at dawn on the alder bough ; 
 
 I brought him home, in his nest, at even ; 
 
 He sings the song, but it pleases not now, 
 
 For I did not bring home the river and sky ; 
 
 He sang to my ear, they sang to my eye. 
 
 The delicate shells lay on the shore ; 
 
 The bubbles of the latest wave 20 
 
 Fresh pearls to their enamel gave ; 
 
 And the bellowing of the savage sea 
 
 Greeted their safe escape to me. 
 
 I wiped away the weeds and foam, 
 
 I fetched my sea-born treasures home ; 
 
 But the poor, unsightly, noisome things 
 
 Had left their beauty on the shore, 
 
 With the sun and the sand and the wild uproar.
 
 EACH AND ALL 7 
 
 The lover watched his graceful maid, 
 
 As mid the virgin train she strayed, 30 
 
 Nor knew her beauty s best attire 
 
 Was woven still by the snow-white choir. 
 
 At last she came to his hermitage, 
 
 Like the bird from the woodlands to the cage ; 
 
 The gay enchantment was undone, 
 
 A gentle wife, but fairy none. 
 
 Then I said, I covet truth ; 
 
 Beauty is unripe childhood s cheat ; 
 
 I leave it behind with the games of youth. 
 
 As I spoke, beneath my feet 40 
 
 The ground-pine curled its pretty wreath, 
 
 Running over the club-moss burrs ; 
 
 I inhaled the violet s breath ; 
 
 Around me stood the oaks and firs ; 
 
 Pine-cones and acorns lay on the ground ; 
 
 Over me soared the eternal sky, 
 
 Full of light and of deity ; 
 
 Again I saw, again I heard, 
 
 The rolling river, the morning bird ; 
 
 Beauty through my senses stole ; 50 
 
 I yielded myself to the perfect whole.
 
 THE PROBLEM 
 
 I LIKE a church ; I like a cowl ; 
 
 I love a prophet of the soul ; 
 
 And on my heart monastic aisles 
 
 Fall like sweet strains, or pensive smiles ; 
 
 Yet not for all his faith can see 
 
 Would I that cowled churchman be. 
 
 Why should the vest on him allure, 
 Which I could not on me endure ? 
 
 Not from a vain or shallow thought 
 
 His awful Jove young Phidias brought ; 
 
 Never from lips of cunning fell 
 
 The thrilling Delphic oracle ; 
 
 Out from the heart of nature rolled 
 
 The burdens of the Bible old ; 
 
 The litanies of nations came, 
 
 Like the volcano s tongue of flame, 
 
 Up from the burning core below, 
 
 The canticles of love and woe ; 
 
 The hand that rounded Peter s dome, 
 
 And groined the aisles of Christian Rome, 
 
 Wrought in a sad sincerity ; 
 
 Himself from God he could not free ; 
 
 He builded better than he knew ; 
 
 The conscious stone to beauty grew. 
 
 Know st thou what wove yon woodbird s nest 
 Of leaves, and feathers from her breast ? 
 Or how the fish outbuilt her shell, 
 Painting with morn each annual cell ?
 
 THE PROBLEM 9 
 
 Or how the sacred pine-tree adds 
 
 To her old leaves new myriads ? 3 
 
 Such and so grew these holy piles, 
 
 Whilst love and terror laid the tiles. 
 
 Earth proudly wears the Parthenon, 
 
 As the best gem upon her zone ; 
 
 And Morning opes with haste her lids, 
 
 To gaze upon the Pyramids ; 
 
 O er England s abbeys bends the sky, 
 
 As on its friends, with kindred eye ; 
 
 For, out of Thought s interior sphere 
 
 These wonders rose to upper air ; 40 
 
 And Nature gladly gave them place, 
 
 Adopted them into her race, 
 
 And granted them an equal date 
 
 With Andes and with Ararat. 
 
 These temples grew as grows the grass ; 
 
 Art might obey, but not surpass. 
 
 The passive Master lent his hand 
 
 To the vast soul that o er him planned ; 
 
 And the same power that reared the shrine. 
 
 Bestrode the tribes that knelt within. 50 
 
 Ever the fiery Pentecost 
 
 Girds with one flame the countless host, 
 
 Trances the heart through chanting choirs, 
 
 And through the priest the mind inspires. 
 
 The word unto the prophet spoken 
 Was writ on tables yet unbroken ; 
 The word by seers or sibyls told, 
 In groves of oak, or fanes of gold,
 
 10 THE PROBLEM 
 
 Still floats upon the morning wind, 
 
 Still whispers to the willing mind. 60 
 
 One accent of the Holy Ghost 
 
 The heedless world hath never lost. 
 
 I know what say the fathers wise, 
 
 The Book itself before me lies, 
 
 Old Chrysostom, best Augustine, 
 
 And he who blent both in his line, 
 
 The younger Golden Lips or mines, 
 
 Taylor, the Shakespeare of divines. 
 
 His words are music in my ear, 
 
 I see his cowled portrait dear ; 70 
 
 And yet, for all his faith could see, 
 
 I would not the good bishop be.
 
 11 
 
 TO RHEA 
 
 THEE, dear friend, a brother soothes, 
 
 Not with flatteries, but truths, 
 
 Which tarnish not, but purify 
 
 To light which dims the morning s eye. 
 
 I have come from the spring-woods, 
 
 From the fragrant solitudes ; 
 
 Listen what the poplar-tree 
 
 And murmuring waters counselled me. 
 
 If with love thy heart has burned ; 
 
 If thy love is unreturned ; 10 
 
 Hide thy grief within thy breast, 
 
 Though it tear thee unexpressed ; 
 
 For when love has once departed 
 
 From the eyes of the false-hearted, 
 
 And one by one has torn off quite 
 
 The bandages of purple light ; 
 
 Though thou wert the loveliest 
 
 Form the soul had ever dressed, 
 
 Thou shalt seem, in each reply, 
 
 A vixen to his altered eye ; 20 
 
 Thy softest pleadings seem too bold, 
 
 Thy praying lute will seem to scold ; 
 
 Though thou kept the straightest road, 
 
 Yet thou errest far and broad. 
 
 But thou shalt do as do the gods 
 In their cloudless periods ;
 
 12 TO RHEA 
 
 For of this lore be thou sure, 
 
 Though thou forget, the gods, secure, 
 
 Forget never their command, 
 
 But make the statute of this land. 3 
 
 As they lead, so follow all, 
 
 Ever have done, ever shall. 
 
 Warning to the blind and deaf, 
 
 Tis written on the iron leaf, 
 
 Who drinks of Cupid s nectar cup 
 
 Lovefh downward, and not up ; 
 
 Therefore, who loves, of gods or men, 
 
 Shall not by the same be loved again ; 
 
 His sweetheart s idolatry 
 
 Falls, in turn, a new degree. 40 
 
 When a god is once beguiled 
 
 By beauty of a mortal child, 
 
 And by her radiant youth delighted, 
 
 He is not fooled, but warily knoweth 
 
 His love shall never be requited. 
 
 And thus the wise Immortal doeth. 
 
 Tis his study and delight 
 
 To bless that creature day and night ; 
 
 From all evils to defend her ; 
 
 In her lap to pour all splendour ; 5 
 
 To ransack earth for riches rare, 
 
 And fetch her stars to deck her hair : 
 
 He mixes music with her thoughts, 
 
 And saddens her with heavenly doubts : 
 
 All grace, all good his great heart knows, 
 
 Profuse in love, the king bestows : 
 
 Saying, Hearken ! Earth, Sea, Air ! 
 
 This monument of my despair
 
 TO EHEA 13 
 
 Build I to the All-Good, All-Fair. 
 
 Not for a private good, 60 
 
 But I, from my beatitude, 
 
 Albeit scorned as none was scorned, 
 
 Adorn her as was none adorned. 
 
 I make this maiden an ensample 
 
 To Nature, through her kingdoms ample, 
 
 Whereby to model newer races, 
 
 Statelier forms, and fairer faces ; 
 
 To carry man to new degrees 
 
 Of power, and of comeliness. 
 
 These presents be the hostages 70 
 
 Which I pawn for my release. 
 
 See to thyself, Universe ! 
 
 Thou art better, and not worse. 
 
 And the god, having given all, 
 
 Is freed forever from his thrall.
 
 14 
 
 THE VISIT 
 
 ASKEST, How long thou shalt stay ? 
 
 Devastator of the day ! 
 
 Know, each substance, and relation, 
 
 Thorough nature s operation, 
 
 Hath its unit, bound, and metre ; 
 
 And every new compound 
 
 Is some product and repeater, 
 
 Product of the earlier found. 
 
 But the unit of the visit, 
 
 The encounter of the wise, 10 
 
 Say, what other metre is it 
 
 Than the meeting of the eyes ? 
 
 Nature poureth into nature 
 
 Through the channels of that feature. 
 
 Riding on the ray of sight, 
 
 Fleeter far than whirlwinds go, 
 
 Or for service, or delight, 
 
 Hearts to hearts their meaning show, 
 
 Sum their long experience, 
 
 And import intelligence. 20 
 
 Single look has drained the breast ; 
 
 Single moment years confessed. 
 
 The duration of a glance 
 
 Is the term of convenance, 
 
 And, though thy rede be church or state, 
 
 Frugal multiples of that.
 
 THE VISIT 15 
 
 Speeding Saturn cannot halt ; 
 
 Linger, thou shalt rue the fault ; 
 
 If Love his moment overstay, 
 
 Hatred s swift repulsions play. 3
 
 16 
 
 URIEL 
 
 IT fell in the ancient periods 
 
 Which the brooding soul surveys, 
 
 Or ever the wild Time coined itself 
 Into calendar months and days. 
 
 This was the lapse of Uriel, 
 
 Which in Paradise befell. 
 
 Once, among the Pleiads walking, 
 
 SAID overheard the young gods talking ; 
 
 And the treason, too long pent, 
 
 To his ears was evident. 
 
 The young deities discussed 
 
 Laws of form, and metre just, 
 
 Orb, quintessence, and sunbeams, 
 
 What subsisteth, and what seems. 
 
 One, with low tones that decide, 
 
 And doubt and reverend use defied, 
 
 With a look that solved the sphere, 
 
 And stirred the devils everywhere, 
 
 Gave his sentiment divine 
 
 Against the being of a line. 
 
 Line in nature is not found ; 
 
 Unit and universe are round ; 
 
 In vain produced, all rays return ; 
 
 Evil will bless, and ice will burn. 
 
 As Uriel spoke with piercing eye, 
 
 A shudder ran around the sky ; 
 
 The stern old war-gods shook their heads ; 
 
 The seraphs frowned from myrtle-beds ;
 
 URIEL 17 
 
 Seemed to the holy festival 
 
 The rash word boded ill to all ; 3 
 
 The balance-beam of Fate was bent ; 
 
 The bounds of good and ill were rent ; 
 
 Strong Hades could not keep his own, 
 
 But all slid to confusion. 
 
 A sad self-knowledge, withering, fell 
 
 On the beauty of Uriel ; 
 
 In heaven once eminent, the god 
 
 Withdrew, that hour, into his cloud ; 
 
 Whether doomed to long gyration 
 
 In the sea of generation, 40 
 
 Or by knowledge grown too bright 
 
 To hit the nerve of feebler sight. 
 
 Straightway, a forgetting wind 
 
 Stole over the celestial kind, 
 
 And their lips the secret kept, 
 
 If in ashes the fire-seed slept. 
 
 But now and then, truth -speaking things 
 
 Shamed the angels veiling wings ; 
 
 And, shrilling from the solar course, 
 
 Or from fruit of chemic force, 50 
 
 Procession of a soul in matter, 
 
 Or the speeding change of water, 
 
 Or out of the good of evil born, 
 
 Came Uriel s voice of cherub scorn, 
 
 And a blush tinged the upper sky, 
 
 And the gods shook, they knew not why.
 
 18 
 
 THE WORLD-SOUL 
 
 THANKS to the morning light, 
 
 Thanks to the foaming sea, 
 To the uplands of New-Hampshire, 
 
 To the green-haired forest free ; 
 Thanks to each man of courage, 
 
 To the maids of holy mind ; 
 To the boy with his games undaunted, 
 
 Who never looks behind. 
 
 Cities of proud hotels, 
 
 Houses of rich and great, 
 Vice nestles in your chambers, 
 
 Beneath your roofs of slate. 
 It cannot conquer folly, 
 
 Time-and-space-conquering steam, 
 And the light-outspeeding telegraph 
 
 Bears nothing on its beam. 
 
 The politics are base ; 
 
 The letters do not cheer ; 
 And tis far in the deeps of history, 
 
 The voice that speaketh clear. 
 Trade and the streets ensnare us, 
 
 Our bodies are weak and worn ; 
 We plot and corrupt each other, 
 
 And we despoil the unborn. 
 
 Yet there in the parlour sits 
 Some figure of noble guise, 
 
 Our angel, in a stranger s form, 
 Or woman s pleading eyes ;
 
 THE WORLD-SOUL 19 
 
 Or only a flashing sunbeam 
 
 In at the window-pane ; 3 
 
 Or Music pours on mortals 
 
 Its beautiful disdain. 
 
 The inevitable morning 
 
 Finds them who in cellars be ; 
 And be sure the all-loving Nature 
 
 Will smile in a factory. 
 Yon ridge of purple landscape, 
 
 Yon sky between the walls, 
 Hold all the hidden wonders, 
 
 In scanty intervals. 4 
 
 Alas ! the Sprite that haunts us 
 
 Deceives our rash desire ; 
 It whispers of the glorious gods, 
 
 And leaves us in the mire. 
 We cannot learn the cipher 
 
 That s writ upon our cell ; 
 Stars help us by a mystery 
 
 Which we could never spell. 
 
 If but one hero knew it, 
 
 The world would blush in flame ; 50 
 
 The sage, till he hit the secret, 
 
 Would hang his head for shame. 
 But our brothers have not read it, 
 
 Not one has found the key ; 
 And henceforth we are comforted, 
 
 We are but such as they. 
 2
 
 20 THE WORLD-SOUL 
 
 Still, still the secret presses ; 
 
 The nearing clouds draw down ; 
 The crimson morning flames into 
 
 The fopperies of the town. 60 
 
 Within, without the idle earth, 
 
 Stars weave eternal rings ; 
 The sun himself shines heartily, 
 
 And shares the joy he brings. 
 
 And what if Trade sow cities 
 
 Like shells along the shore, 
 And thatch with towns the prairie broad, 
 
 With railways ironed o er ? 
 They are but sailing foam-bells 
 
 Along Thought s causing stream, 70 
 
 And take their shape and sun-colour 
 
 From him that sends the dream. 
 
 For Destiny does not like 
 
 To yield to men the helm ; 
 And shoots his thought, by hidden nerves, 
 
 Throughout the solid realm. 
 The patient Daemon sits, 
 
 With roses and a shroud ; 
 He has his way, and deals his gifts, 
 
 But ours is not allowed. 80 
 
 He is no churl nor trifler, 
 
 And his viceroy is none, 
 Love-without-weakness, 
 
 Of Genius sire and son.
 
 THE WORLD-SOUL 21 
 
 And his will is not thwarted ; 
 
 The seeds of land and sea 
 Are the atoms of his body bright, 
 
 And his behest obey. 
 
 He serveth the servant, 
 
 The brave he loves amain ; 90 
 
 He kills the cripple and the sick, 
 
 And straight begins again. 
 For gods delight in gods, 
 
 And thrust the weak aside ; 
 To him who scorns their charities, 
 
 Their arms fly open wide. 
 
 When the old world is sterile, 
 
 And the ages are effete, 
 He will from wrecks and sediment 
 
 The fairer world complete. too 
 
 He forbids to despair ; 
 
 His cheeks mantle with mirth ; 
 And the unimagined good of men 
 
 Is yeaning at the birth. 
 
 Spring still makes spring in the mind, 
 
 When sixty years are told ; 
 Love wakes anew this throbbing heart, 
 
 And we are never old. 
 Over the winter glaciers, 
 
 I see the summer glow, no 
 
 And, through the wild-piled snowdrift, 
 
 The warm rosebuds below.
 
 22 
 
 ALPHONSO OF CASTILE 
 
 I, ALPHONSO, live and learn, 
 Seeing Nature go astern. 
 Things deteriorate in kind ; 
 Lemons run to leaves and rind ; 
 Meagre crop of figs and limes ; 
 Shorter days and harder times. 
 Flowering April cools and dies 
 In the insufficient skies. 
 Imps, at high midsummer, blot 
 Half the sun s disk with a spot : 
 T will not now avail to tan 
 Orange cheek or skin of man. 
 Roses bleach, the goats are dry, 
 Lisbon quakes, the people cry. 
 Yon pale, scrawny fisher fools, 
 Gaunt as bitterns in the pools, 
 Are no brothers of my blood ; 
 They discredit Adamhood. 
 Eyes of gods ! ye must have seen, 
 O er your ramparts as ye lean, 
 The general debility ; 
 Of genius the sterility ; 
 Mighty projects countermanded ; 
 Rash ambition, brokenhanded ; 
 Puny man and scentless rose 
 Tormenting Pan to double the dose.
 
 ALPHONSO OF CASTILE 23 
 
 Rebuild or ruin : either fill 
 
 Of vital force the wasted rill, 
 
 Or tumble all again in heap 
 
 To weltering chaos and to sleep. 30 
 
 Say, Seigniors, are the old Niles dry, 
 
 Which fed the veins of earth and- sky, 
 
 That mortals miss the loyal heats, 
 
 Which drove them erst to social feats ; 
 
 Now, to a savage selfness grown, 
 
 Think nature barely serves for one ; 
 
 With science poorly mask their hurt, 
 
 And vex the gods with question pert, 
 
 Immensely curious whether you 
 
 Still are rulers, or mildew ? 4 
 
 Masters, I m in pain with you ; 
 
 Masters, I ll be plain with you ; 
 
 In my palace of Castile, 
 
 I, a king, for kings can feel. 
 
 There my thoughts the matter roll, 
 
 And solve and oft resolve the whole. 
 
 And, for I m styled Alphonse the Wise, 
 
 Ye shall not fail for sound advice. 
 
 Before ye want a drop of rain, 
 
 Hear the sentiment of Spain. 5 
 
 You have tried famine : no more try it ; 
 
 Ply us now with a full diet ; 
 
 Teach your pupils now with plenty ; 
 
 For one sun supply us twenty. 
 
 I have thought it thoroughly over, 
 
 State of hermit, state of lover ;
 
 24 ALPHONSO OF CASTILE 
 
 We must have society, 
 
 We cannot spare variety. 
 
 Hear you, then, celestial fellows ! 
 
 Fits not to be over-zealous ; 60 
 
 Steads not to work on the clean jump, 
 
 Nor wine nor brains perpetual pump. 
 
 Men and gods are too extense ; 
 
 Could you slacken and condense ? 
 
 Your rank overgrowths reduce 
 
 Till your kinds abound with juice ? 
 
 Earth, crowded, cries, Too many men ! 
 
 My counsel is, kill nine in ten, 
 
 And bestow the shares of all 
 
 On the remnant decimal. 70 
 
 Add their nine lives to this cat ; 
 
 Stuff their nine brains in his hat ; 
 
 Make his frame and forces square 
 
 With the labours he must dare ; 
 
 Thatch his flesh, and even his years 
 
 With the marble which he rears. 
 
 There, growing slowly old at ease, 
 
 No faster than his planted trees, 
 
 He may, by warrant of his age, 
 
 In schemes of broader scope engage. 80 
 
 So shall ye have a man of the sphere, 
 
 Fit to grace the solar year
 
 25 
 
 MITHRIDATES 
 
 I CANNOT spare water or wine, 
 Tobacco-leaf, or poppy, or rose ; 
 
 From the earth-poles to the line, 
 All between that works or grows, 
 
 Everything is kin of mine. 
 
 Give me agates for my meat ; 
 Give me cantharids to eat ; 
 From air and ocean bring me foods, 
 From all zones and altitudes ; 
 
 From all natures, sharp and slimy, 10 
 
 Salt and basalt, wild and tame : 
 
 Tree and lichen, ape, sea-lion, 
 Bird, and reptile, be my game. 
 
 Ivy for my fillet band ; 
 Blinding dog-wood in my hand ; 
 Hemlock for my sherbet cull me, 
 And the prussic juice to lull me ; 
 Swing me in the upas boughs, 
 Vampyre-fanned, when I carouse. 
 
 Too long shut in strait and few, 20 
 
 Thinly dieted on dew, 
 
 I will use the world, and sift it, 
 
 To a thousand humours shift it, 
 
 As you spin a cherry. 
 
 doleful ghosts, and goblins merry !
 
 26 MITHRIDATES 
 
 all you virtues, methods, mights, 
 Means, appliances, delights, 
 Reputed wrongs and braggart rights, 
 Smug routine, and things allowed, 
 Minorities, things under cloud ! 30 
 
 Hither ! take me, use me, fill me, 
 Vein and artery, though ye kill me ! 
 God ! I will not be an owl, 
 But sun me in the Capitol.
 
 27 
 
 TO J.W. 
 
 SET not thy foot on graves ; 
 
 Hear what wine and roses say ; 
 
 The mountain chase, the summer waves, 
 
 The crowded town, thy feet may well delay. 
 
 Set not thy foot on graves ; 
 
 Nor seek to unwind the shroud 
 
 Which charitable Time 
 
 And Nature have allowed 
 
 To wrap the errors of a sage sublime. 
 
 Set not thy foot on graves : 10 
 
 Care not to strip the dead 
 
 Of his sad ornament, 
 
 His myrrh, and wine, and rings, 
 
 His sheet of lead, 
 
 And trophies buried : 
 
 Go, get them where he earned them when alive; 
 
 As resolutely dig or dive. 
 
 Life is too short to waste 
 
 In critic peep or cynic bark, 
 
 Quarrel or reprimand : 20 
 
 T will soon be dark ; 
 
 Up ! mind thine own aim, and 
 
 God speed the mark !
 
 28 
 
 FATE 
 
 THAT you are fair or wise is vain, 
 
 Or strong, or rich, or generous ; 
 
 You must have also the untaught strain 
 
 That sheds beauty on the rose. 
 
 There s a melody born of melody, 
 
 Which melts the world into a sea. 
 
 Toil could never compass it ; 
 
 Art its height could never hit ; 
 
 It came never out of wit ; 
 
 But a music music-born 10 
 
 Well may Jove and Juno scorn. 
 
 Thy beauty, if it lack the fire 
 
 Which drives me mad with sweet desire, 
 
 What boots it ? what the soldier s mail, 
 
 Unless he conquer and prevail ? 
 
 What all the goods thy pride which lift, 
 
 If thou pine for another s gift ? 
 
 Alas ! that one is born in blight, 
 
 Victim of perpetual slight : 
 
 When thou lookest on his face, 20 
 
 Thy heart saith, Brother, go thy ways ! 
 
 None shall ask thee what thou doest, 
 
 Or care a rush for what thou knowest, 
 
 Or listen when thou repliest, 
 
 Or remember where thou liest, 
 
 Or how thy supper is sodden ; 
 
 And another is born 
 
 To make the sun forgotten.
 
 FATE 29 
 
 Surely he carries a talisman 
 
 Under his tongue ; 30 
 
 Broad his shoulders are and strong ; 
 
 And his eye is scornful, 
 
 Threatening, and young. 
 
 I hold it of little matter 
 
 Whether your jewel be of pure water, 
 
 A rose diamond or a white, 
 
 But whether it dazzle me with light. 
 
 I care not how you are dressed, 
 
 In coarsest weeds or in the best ; 
 
 Nor whether your name is base or brave ; 40 
 
 Nor for the fashion of your behaviour ; 
 
 But whether you charm me, 
 
 Bid my bread feed and my fire warm me, 
 
 And dress up Nature in your favour. 
 
 One thing is forever good ; 
 
 That one thing is Success 3 
 
 Dear to the Eumenides, 
 
 And to all the heavenly brood. 
 
 Who bides at home, nor looks abroad, 
 
 Carries the eagles, and masters the sword. 50
 
 30 
 
 GUY 
 
 MORTAL mixed of middle clay, 
 Attempered to the night and day, 
 Interchangeable with things, 
 Needs no amulets nor rings. 
 Guy possessed the talisman 
 That all things from him began ; 
 And as, of old, Polycrates 
 Chained the sunshine and the breeze, 
 So did Guy betimes discover 
 Fortune was his guard and lover ; 
 In strange junctures, felt, with awe, 
 His own symmetry with law ; 
 That no mixture could withstand 
 The virtue of his lucky hand. 
 He gold or jewel could not lose, 
 Nor not receive his ample dues. 
 In the street, if he turned round, 
 His eye the eye twas seeking found. 
 It seemed his Genius discreet 
 Worked on the Maker s own receipt, 
 And made each tide and element 
 Stewards of stipend and of rent ; 
 So that the common waters fell 
 As costly wine into his well. 
 He had so sped his wise affairs 
 That he taught Nature in his snares : 
 Early or late, the falling rain 
 Arrived in time to swell his grain ;
 
 GUY 31 
 
 Stream could not so perversely wind 
 
 But corn of Guy s was there to grind ; 30 
 
 The siroc found it on its way, 
 
 To speed his sails, to dry his hay ; 
 
 And the world s sun seemed to rise, 
 
 To drudge all day for Guy the wise. 
 
 In his rich nurseries, timely skill 
 
 Strong crab with nobler blood did fill ; 
 
 The zephyr in his garden rolled 
 
 From plum-trees vegetable gold ; 
 
 And all the hours of the year 
 
 With their own harvest honoured were. 40 
 
 There was no frost but welcome came, 
 
 Nor freshet, nor midsummer flame. 
 
 Belonged to wind and world the toil 
 
 And venture, and to Guy the oil.
 
 32 
 
 TACT 
 
 WHAT boots it, thy virtue, 
 
 What profit thy parts, 
 While one thing thou lackest, 
 
 The art of all arts ? 
 
 The only credentials, 
 
 Passport to success ; 
 Opens castle and parlour, 
 
 Address, man, Address. 
 
 The maiden in danger 
 Was saved by the swain ; 
 
 His stout arm restored her 
 To Broadway again. 
 
 The maid would reward him, 
 
 Gay company come, 
 They laugh, she laughs with them ; 
 
 He is moonstruck and dumb. 
 
 This clinches the bargain ; 
 
 Sails out of the bay ; 
 Gets the vote in the senate, 
 
 Spite of Webster and Clay. 
 
 Has for genius no mercy, 
 
 For speeches no heed ; 
 It lurks in the eyebeam, 
 
 It leaps to its deed. 
 
 Church, market, and tavern, 
 Bed and board, it will sway. 
 
 It has no to-morrow ; 
 It ends with to-day.
 
 33 
 
 MINOTT, Lee, Willard, Hosmer, Meriam, Flint, 
 Possessed the land which rendered to their toil 
 Hay, corn, roots, hemp, flax, apples, wool, and wood. 
 Each of these landlords walked amidst his farm, 
 Saying, T is mine, my children s, and my name s : 
 How sweet the west wind sounds in my own trees ! 
 How graceful climb those shadows on my hill ! 
 I fancy these pure waters and the flags 
 Know me, as does my dog : we sympathize ; 
 And, I affirm, my actions smack of the soil. 10 
 Where are these men ? Asleep beneath their grounds ; 
 And strangers, fond as they, their furrows plough. 
 Earth laughs in flowers, to see her boastful boys 
 Earth-proud, proud of the earth which is not theirs ; 
 Who steer the plough, but cannot steer their feet 
 Clear of the grave. 
 
 They added ridge to valley, brook to pond, 
 And sighed for all that bounded their domain. 
 This suits me for a pasture ; that s my park ; 
 We must have clay, lime, gravel, granite-ledge, 20 
 And misty lowland, where to go for peat. 
 The land is well, lies fairly to the south. 
 T is good, when you have crossed the sea and back, 
 To find the sitfast acres where you left them.
 
 31 HAMATREYA 
 
 Ah ! the hot owner sees not Death, who adds 
 Him to his land, a lump of mould the more. 
 Hear what the Earth says : 
 
 EARTH-SONG 
 
 MINE and yours ; 
 
 Mine, not yours. 
 
 Earth endures ; 3 
 
 Stars abide 
 
 Shine down in the old sea ; 
 
 Old are the shores ; 
 
 But where are old men ? 
 
 I who have seen much, 
 
 Such have I never seen. 
 
 The lawyer s deed 
 
 Ran sure, 
 
 In tail, 
 
 To them, and to their heirs 40 
 
 Who shall succeed, 
 
 Without fail, 
 
 Forevermore. 
 
 Here is the land, 
 
 Shaggy with wood, 
 
 With its old valley, 
 
 Mound, and flood. 
 
 But the heritors ? 
 
 Fled like the flood s foam, 
 
 The lawyer, and the laws, 50 
 
 And the kingdom, 
 
 Clean swept herefrom.
 
 HAMATREYA 35 
 
 They called me theirs, 
 
 Who so controlled me ; 
 
 Yet every one 
 
 Wished to stay, and is gone. 
 
 How am I theirs, 
 
 If they cannot hold me, 
 
 But I hold them ? 
 
 When I heard the Earth-song, 60 
 
 I was no longer brave ; 
 
 My avarice cooled 
 
 Like lust in the chill of the grave. 
 
 D 2
 
 36 
 
 GOOD-BYE 
 
 GOOD-BYE, proud world ! I m going home : 
 Thou art not my friend, and I m not thine. 
 Long through thy weary crowds I roam ; 
 A river-ark on the ocean brine, 
 Long I ve been tossed like the driven foam ; 
 But now, proud world ! I m going home. 
 
 Good-bye to Flattery s fawning face ; 
 
 To Grandeur with his wise grimace ; 
 
 To upstart Wealth s averted eye ; 
 
 To supple Office, low and high ; 
 
 To crowded halls, to court and street ; 
 
 To frozen hearts and hasting feet ; 
 
 To those who go, and those who come ; 
 
 Good-bye, proud world ! I m going home. 
 
 I am going to my own hearth-stone, 
 Bosomed in yon green hills alone, 
 A secret nook in a pleasant land, 
 Whose groves the frolic fairies planned ; 
 Where arches green, the livelong day, 
 Echo the blackbird s roundelay, 
 And vulgar feet have never trod 
 A spot that is sacred to thought and God. 
 
 0, when I am safe in my sylvan home, 
 I tread on the pride of Greece and Rome ;
 
 GOOD-BYE 37 
 
 A.nd when I am stretched beneath the pines, 
 Where the evening star so holy shines, 
 I laugh at the lore and the pride of man, 
 At the sophist schools, and the learned clan ; 
 For what are they all, in their high conceit, 
 When man in the bush with God may meet ? 30
 
 THE RHODORA : 
 
 ON BEING ASKED, WHENCE IS THE FLOWER ? 
 
 IN May, when sea-winds pierced our solitude;;, 
 I found the fresh Rhodora in the woods, 
 Spreading its leafless blooms in a damp nook, 
 To please the desert and the sluggish brook. 
 The purple petals, fallen in the pool, 
 Made the black water with their beauty ga} T ; 
 Here might the red-bird come his plumes to cool, 
 And court the flower that cheapens his array. 
 Rhodora ! if the sages ask thee why 
 This charm is wasted on the earth and sky, 10 
 
 Tell them, dear, that if eyes were made for seeing, 
 Then Beauty is its own excuse for being : 
 Why thou wort there, rival of the rose ! 
 I never thought to ask, I never knew ; 
 But, in my simple ignorance, suppose 
 The self -same Power that brought me there brought 
 you. 16
 
 39 
 
 THE HUMBLE-BEE 
 
 BURLY, dozing humble-bee, 
 
 Where thou art is clime for me. 
 
 Let them sail for Porto Rique, 
 
 Far-off heats through seas to seek ; 
 
 I will follow thee alone, 
 
 Thou animated torrid-zone ! 
 
 Zigzag steeref, desert cheerer, 
 
 Let me chase thy waving lines ; 
 
 Keep me nearer, me thy hearer, 
 
 Singing over shrubs and vines. 10 
 
 Insect lover of the sun, 
 Joy of thy dominion ! 
 Sailor of the atmosphere ; 
 Swimmer through the waves of air ; 
 Voyager of light and noon ; 
 Epicurean of June ; 
 Wait, I prithee, till I come 
 Within earshot of thy hum, 
 All without is martyrdom. 
 
 When the south wind, in May days, 20 
 
 With a net of shining haze 
 
 Silvers the horizon wall, 
 
 And, with softness touching all, 
 
 Tints the human countenance 
 
 With a colour of romance, 
 
 And, infusing subtle heats, 
 
 Turns the sod to violets,
 
 40 THE HUMBLE-BEE 
 
 Thou, in sunny solitudes, 
 
 Rover of the underwoods, 
 
 The green silence dost displace 3 
 
 With thy mellow, breezy bass. 
 
 Hot midsummer s petted crone, 
 Sweet to me thy drowsy tone 
 Tells of countless sunny hours, 
 Long days, and solid banks of flowers ; 
 Of gulfs of sweetness without bound 
 In Indian wildernesses found ; 
 Of Syrian peace, immortal leisure, 
 Firmest cheer, and bird-like pleasure. 
 
 Aught unsavoury or unclean 40 
 
 Hath my insect never seen ; 
 
 But violets and bilberry bells, 
 
 Maple-sap, and daffodels, 
 
 Grass with green flag half-mast high, 
 
 Succory to match the sky, 
 
 Columbine with horn of honey, 
 
 Scented fern, and agrimony, 
 
 Clover, catchfly, adder s-tongue, 
 
 And brier -roses, dwelt among ; 
 
 All beside was unknown waste, 50 
 
 All was picture as he passed. 
 
 Wiser far than human seer, 
 Yellow-breeched philosopher ! 
 Seeing only what is fair, 
 Sipping only what is sweet, 
 Thou dost mock at fate and care, 
 Leave the chaff, and take the wheat.
 
 THE HUMBLE-BEE 41 
 
 When the fierce northwestern blast 
 
 Cools sea and land so far and fast, 
 
 Thou already slumberest deep ; 60 
 
 Woe and want thou canst outsleep ; 
 
 Want and woe, which torture us, 
 
 Thy sleep makes ridiculous.
 
 BERRYING 
 
 MAY be true what I had heard, 
 
 Earth s a howling wilderness, 
 
 Truculent with fraud and force, 
 
 Said I, strolling through the pastures, 
 
 And along the river-side. 
 
 Caught among the blackberry vines, 
 
 Feeding on the Ethiops sweet, 
 
 Pleasant fancies overtook me. 
 
 I said, What influence me preferred, 
 
 Elect, to dreams thus beautiful ? 
 
 The vines replied, And didst thou deem 
 
 No wisdom from our berries went ?
 
 43 
 
 THE SNOW-STORM 
 
 ANNOUNCED l>y all the trumpets of the sky, 
 Arrives the snow, and, driving o er the fields, 
 Seems nowhere to alight : the whited air 
 Hides hills and woods, the river, and the heaven, 
 And veils the farm-house at the garden s end. 
 The sled and traveller stopped, the courier s feet 
 Delayed, all friends shut out, the housemates sit 
 Around the radiant fireplace, enclosed 
 In a tumultuous privacy of storm. 
 
 Come see the north wind s masonry. ic 
 
 Out of an unseen quarry evermore 
 Furnished with tile, the fierce artificer 
 Curves his white bastions with projected roof 
 Round every windward stake, or tree, or door. 
 Speeding, the myriad-handed, his wild work 
 So fanciful, so savage, nought cares he 
 For number or proportion. Mockingly, 
 On coop or kennel he hangs Parian wreaths ; 
 A swan-like form invests the hidden thorn ; 
 Fills up the farmer s lane from wall to wall, 2< 
 
 Maugre the farmer s sighs ; and, at the gate, 
 A tapering turret overtops the work. 
 And when his hours are numbered, and the world 
 Is all his own, retiring, as he were not, 
 Leaves, when the sun appears, astonished Art 
 To mimic in slow structures, stone by stone, 
 Built in an age, the mad wind s night-work, 
 The frolic architecture of the snow.
 
 44 
 
 WOODNOTES I 
 1 
 
 FOR this present, hard 
 Is the fortune of the bard, 
 
 Born out of time ; 
 All his accomplishment, 
 From Nature s utmost treasure spent, 
 
 Booteth not him. 
 When the pine tosses its cones 
 To the song of its waterfall tones, 
 He speeds to the woodland walks, 
 To birds and trees he talks : 
 Caesar of his leafy Rome, 
 There the poet is at home. 
 He goes to the river-side, 
 Not hook nor line hath he ; 
 He stands in the meadows wide, 
 Nor gun nor scythe to see ; 
 With none has he to do, 
 And none seek him, 
 Nor men below, 
 Nor spirits dim. 
 
 Sure some god his eye enchants : 
 What he knows nobody wants. 
 In the wood he travels glad, 
 Without better fortune had, 
 Melancholy without bad. 
 Planter of celestial plants, 
 What he knows nobody wants ; 
 What he knows he hides, not vaunts.
 
 WOODNOTES 45 
 
 Knowledge this man prizes best 
 
 Seems fantastic to the rest : 30 
 
 Pondering shadows, colours, clouds, 
 
 Grass-buds, and caterpillar-shrouds, 
 
 Boughs on which the wild bees settle, 
 
 Tints that spot the violet s petal, 
 
 Why Nature loves the number five, 
 
 And why the star-form she repeats : 
 
 Lover of all things alive, 
 
 Wonderer at all he meets, 
 
 Wonderer chiefly at himself, 
 
 Who can tell him what he is ? 40 
 
 Or how meet in human elf 
 
 Coming and past eternities ? 
 
 2 
 
 And such I knew, a forest seer, 
 A minstrel of the natural year, 
 Foreteller of the vernal ides, 
 Wise harbinger of spheres and tides, 
 A lover true, who knew by heart 
 Each joy the mountain dales impart ; 
 It seemed that Nature could not raise 
 A plant in any secret place, 50 
 
 In quaking bog, on snowy hill, 
 Beneath the grass that shades the rill, 
 Under the snow, between the rocks, 
 In damp fields known to bird and fox, 
 But he would come in the very hour 
 It opened in its virgin bower, 
 As if a sunbeam showed the place, 
 And tell its long-descended race.
 
 40 WOODNOTES 
 
 It seemed as if the breezes brought him ; 
 
 It seemed as if the sparrows taught him ; 60 
 
 As if by secret sight he knew 
 
 Where, in far fields, the orchis grew. 
 
 Many haps fall in the field 
 
 Seldom seen by wishful eyes, 
 
 But all her shows did Nature yield, 
 
 To please and win this pilgrim wise. 
 
 He saw the partridge drum in the woods ; 
 
 He heard the woodcock s evening hymn ; 
 
 He found the tawny thrush s broods ; 
 
 And the shy hawk did wait for him ; 70 
 
 What others did at distance hear, 
 
 And guessed within the thicket s gloom, 
 
 Was showed to this philosopher, 
 
 And at his bidding seemed to come. 
 
 In unploughed Maine he sought the lumberers gang, 
 Where from a hundred lakes young rivers sprang ; 
 He trode the unplanted forest floor, whereon 
 The all-seeing sun for ages hath not shone ; 
 Where feeds the moose, and walks the surly bear, 
 And up the tall mast runs the woodpecker. 80 
 
 He saw beneath dim aisles, in odorous beds, 
 The slight Linnaea hang its twin-born heads, 
 And blessed the monument of the man of flowers, 
 Which breathes his sweet fame through the northern 
 
 bowers. 
 
 He heard, when in the grove, at intervals, 
 With sudden roar the aged pine-tree falls,
 
 WOODNOTES 47 
 
 One crash, the death-hymn of the perfect tree, 
 Declares the close of its green century. 
 Low lies the plant to whose creation went 
 Sweet influence from every element ; 90 
 
 Whose living towers the years conspired to build, 
 Whose giddy top the morning loved to gild. 
 Through these green tents, by eldest Nature dressed, 
 He roamed, content alike with man and beast. 
 Where darkness found him he lay glad at night ; 
 There the red morning touched him with its light. 
 Three moons his great heart him a hermit made, 
 So long he roved at will the boundless shade. 
 The timid it concerns to ask their way ; 
 And fear what foe in caves and swamps can stray, 
 To make no step until the event is known, 101 
 And ills to come as evils past bemoan. 
 Not so the wise ; no coward watch he keeps 
 To spy what danger on his pathway creeps ; 
 Go where he will, the wise man is at home, 
 His hearth the earth, his hall the azure dome ; 
 Where his clear spirit leads him, there s his road, 
 By God s own light illumined and foreshowed. 
 
 4 
 
 Twas one of the charmed days, 
 When the genius of God doth flow, no 
 
 The wind may alter twenty ways, 
 A tempest cannot blow ; 
 It may blow north, it still is warm ; 
 Or south, it still is clear ; 
 Or east, it smells like a clover farm ; 
 Or west, no thunder fear.
 
 48 WOODNOTES 
 
 The musing peasant lowly great 
 
 Beside the forest water sate ; 
 
 The rope-like pine roots crosswise grown 
 
 Composed the network of his throne ; 120 
 
 The wide lake, edged with sand and grass, 
 
 Was burnished to a floor of glass, 
 
 Painted with shadows green and proud, 
 
 Of the tree and of the cloud. 
 
 He was the heart of all the scene ; 
 
 On him the sun looked more serene ; 
 
 To hill and cloud his face was known, 
 
 It seemed the likeness of their own ; 
 
 They knew by secret sympathy 
 
 The public child of earth and sky. 13 
 
 You ask, he said, what guide 
 
 Me through trackless thickets led, 
 
 Through thick-stemmed woodlands rough and wide ? 
 
 I found the water s bed. 
 
 The watercourses were my guide ; 
 
 I travelled grateful by their side, 
 
 Or through their channel dry ; 
 
 They led me through the thicket damp, 
 
 Through brake and fern, the beavers camp, 
 
 Through beds of granite cut my road, 14 
 
 And their resistless friendship showed ; 
 
 The falling waters led me, 
 
 The foodful waters fed me, 
 
 And brought me to the lowest land, 
 
 Unerring to the ocean sand. 
 
 The moss upon the forest bark 
 
 Was pole-star when the night was dark, 
 
 The purple berries in the wood
 
 WOODNOTES 49 
 
 Supplied me necessary food ; 
 
 For Nature ever faithful is 150 
 
 To such as trust her faithfulness. 
 
 When the forest shall mislead me, 
 
 When the night and morning lie, 
 
 When sea and land refuse to feed me, 
 
 Twill be time enough to die ; 
 
 Then will yet my mother yield 
 
 A pillow in her greenest field, 
 
 Nor the Juno flowers scorn to cover 
 
 The clay of their departed lover. 159
 
 50 
 
 WOODNOTES II 
 
 As sunbeams stream through liberal space, 
 And nothing jostle or displace, 
 So waved the pine-tree through my thought, 
 And fanned the dreams it never brought. 
 
 WHETHER is better the gift or the donor ? 
 
 Come to me, 
 
 Quoth the pine-tree, 
 
 I am the giver of honour. 
 
 My garden is the cloven rock, 
 
 And my manure the snow ; 10 
 
 And drifting sand-heaps feed my stock, 
 
 In summer s scorching glow. 
 
 Ancient or curious, 
 
 Who knoweth aught of us ? 
 
 Old as Jove, 
 
 Old as Love, 
 
 Who of me 
 
 Tells the pedigree ? 
 
 Only the mountains old. 
 
 Only the waters cold, 20 
 
 Only moon and star 
 
 My coevals are. 
 
 Ere the first fowl sung 
 
 My relenting boughs among 
 
 Ere Adam wived, 
 
 Ere Adam lived,
 
 WOODNOTES 51 
 
 Ere the duck dived, 
 
 Ere the bees hived, 
 
 Ere the lion roared, 
 
 Ere the eagle soared, 30 
 
 Light and heat, land and sea, 
 
 Spake unto the oldest tree. 
 
 Glad in the sweet and secret aid 
 
 Which matter unto matter paid, 
 
 The water flowed, the breezes fanned, 
 
 The tree confined the roving sand, 
 
 The sunbeam gave me to the sight, 
 
 The tree adorned the formless light, 
 
 And once again 
 
 O er the grave of men 40 
 
 We shall talk to each other again 
 
 Of the old age behind, 
 
 Of the time out of mind, 
 
 Which shall come again. 
 
 Whether is better the gift or the donor ? 
 Come to me, 
 Quoth the pine-tree, 
 I am the giver of honour. 
 He is great who can live by me. 
 The rough and bearded forester 50 
 
 Is better than the lord ; 
 God fills the scrip and canister, 
 Sin piles the loaded board. 
 The lord is the peasant that was, 
 The peasant the lord that shall be ; 
 The lord is hay, the peasant grass, 
 One dry, and one the living tree. 
 E 2
 
 52 WOODNOTES 
 
 Genius with my boughs shall flourish, 
 
 Want and oold our roots shall nourish. 
 
 Who liveth by the ragged pine 60 
 
 Foundeth a heroic line ; 
 
 Who liveth in the palace hall 
 
 Waneth fast and spendeth all. 
 
 He goes to my savage haunts, 
 
 With his chariot and his care ; 
 
 My twilight realm he disenchants. 
 
 And finds his prison there. 
 
 What prizes the town and the tower ? 
 
 Only what the pine-tree yields ; 
 
 Sinew that subdued the fields ; 70 
 
 The wild-eyed boy, who in the woods 
 
 Chants his hymn to hills and floods, 
 
 Whom the city s poisoning spleen 
 
 Made not pale, or fat, or lean ; 
 
 Whom the rain and the wind purgeth, 
 
 Whom the dawn and the day-star urgeth, 
 
 In whose cheek the rose-leaf blusheth, 
 
 In whose feet the lion rusheth, 
 
 Iron arms, and iron mould, 
 
 That know not fear, fatigue, or cold. 80 
 
 I give my rafters to his boat, 
 
 My billets to his boiler s throat ; 
 
 And I will swim the ancient sea, 
 
 To float my child to victory, 
 
 And grant to dwellers with the pine 
 
 Dominion o er the palm and vine. 
 
 Westward I ope the forest gates, 
 
 The train along the railroad skates ;
 
 WOODNOTES 53 
 
 It leaves the land behind like ages past, 
 
 The foreland flows to it in river fast ; 90 
 
 Missouri I have made a mart, 
 
 I teach Iowa Saxon art. 
 
 Who leaves the pine-tree, leaves his friend, 
 
 Unnerves his strength, invites his end. 
 
 Cut a bough from my parent stem, 
 
 And dip it in thy porcelain vase ; 
 
 A little while each russet gem 
 
 Will swell and rise with wonted grace ; 
 
 But when it seeks enlarged supplies, 
 
 The orphan of the forest dies. 100 
 
 Whoso \valketh in solitude, 
 
 And inhabiteth the wood, 
 
 Choosing light, wave, rock, and bird, 
 
 Before the money-loving herd, 
 
 Into that forester shall pass, 
 
 From these companions, power and grace. 
 
 Clean shall he be, without, within, 
 
 From the old adhering sin. 
 
 Love shall he, but not adulate 
 
 The all-fair, the all-embracing Fate ; no 
 
 All ill dissolving in the light 
 
 Of his triumphant piercing sight. 
 
 Not vain, sour, nor frivolous ; 
 
 Not mad, athirst, nor garrulous ; 
 
 Grave, chaste, contented, though retired, 
 
 And of all other men desired. 
 
 On him the light of star and moon 
 
 Shall fall with purer radiance down ; 
 
 All constellations of the sky 
 
 Shed their virtue through his eye. 120
 
 54 WOODNOTES 
 
 Him Nature giveth for defence 
 
 His formidable innocence ; 
 
 The mounting sap, the shells, the sea, 
 
 All spheres, all stones, his helpers be ; 
 
 He shall never be old ; 
 
 Nor his fate shall be foretold ; 
 
 He shall see the speeding year, 
 
 Without wailing, without fear ; 
 
 He shall be happy in his love, 
 
 Like to like shall joyful prove ; 130 
 
 He shall be happy whilst he woos, 
 
 Muse-born, a daughter of the Muse. 
 
 But if with gold she bind her hair, 
 
 And deck her breast with diamond, 
 
 Take off thine eyes, thy heart forbear, 
 
 Though thou lie alone on the ground. 
 
 The robe of silk in which she shines, 
 
 It was woven of many sins ; 
 
 And the shreds 
 
 Which she sheds 140 
 
 In the wearing of the same, 
 
 Shall be grief on grief, 
 
 And shame on shame. 
 
 Heed the old oracles, 
 
 Ponder my spells ; 
 
 Song wakes in my pinnacles 
 
 When the wind swells. 
 
 Soundeth the prophetic wind, 
 
 The shadows shake on the rock behind, 
 
 And the countless leaves of the pine are strings 
 
 Tuned to the lay the wood-god sings. 151
 
 WOODNOTES 55 
 
 Hearken ! Hearken ! 
 If thou wouldst know the mystic song 
 Chanted when the sphere was young. 
 Aloft, abroad, the paean swells ; 
 wise man ! hear st thou half it tells ? 
 wise man ! hear st thou the least part ? 
 Tis the chronicle of art. 
 To the open ear it sings 
 
 Sweet the genesis of things, 160 
 
 Of tendency through endless ages, 
 Of star-dust, and star-pilgrimages, 
 Of rounded worlds, of space and time, 
 Of the old flood s subsiding slime, 
 Of chemic matter, force, and form, 
 Of poles and powers, cold, wet, and warm : 
 The rushing metamorphosis, 
 Dissolving all that fixture is, 
 Melts things that be to things that seem, 
 And solid nature to a dream. 170 
 
 0, listen to the undersong 
 The ever old, the ever young ; 
 And, far within those cadent pauses, 
 The chorus of the ancient Causes ! 
 Delights the dreadful Destiny 
 To fling his voice into the tree, 
 And shock thy weak ear with a note 
 Breathed from the everlasting throat. 
 In music he repeats the pang 
 Whence the fair flock of Nature sprang. 180 
 mortal ! thy ears are stones ; 
 These echoes are laden with tones 
 Which only the pure can hear ;
 
 56 WOODNOTES 
 
 Thou canst not catch what they recite 
 Of Fate and Will, of Want and Right, 
 Of man to come, of human life, 
 Of Death, and Fortune, Growth, and Strife. 
 
 Once again the pine-tree sung : 
 Speak not thy speech my boughs among ; 
 Put off thy years, wash in the breeze ; 190 
 
 My hours are peaceful centuries. 
 Talk no more with feeble tongue ; 
 No more the fool of space and time, 
 Come weave with mine a nobler rhyme. 
 Only thy Americans 
 
 Can read thy line, can meet thy glance, 
 But the runes that I rehearse 
 Understands the universe ; 
 The least breath my boughs which tossed 
 Brings again the Pentecost ; 200 
 
 To every soul it soundeth clear 
 In a voice of solemn cheer, 
 " Am I not thine ? Are not these thine ? " 
 And they reply, " Forever mine ! " 
 My branches speak Italian, 
 English, German, Basque, Castilian, 
 Mountain speech to Highlanders, 
 Ocean tongues to islanders, 
 To Fin, and Lap, and swart Malay, 
 To each his bosom-secret say. 210 
 
 Come learn with me the fatal song 
 Which knits the world in music strong, 
 Whereto every bosom dances, 
 Kindled with courageous fancies.
 
 WOODNOTES 57 
 
 Come lift thine eyes to lofty rhymes, 
 
 Of things with things, of times with times, 
 
 Primal chimes of sun and shade, 
 
 Of sound and echo, man and maid, 
 
 The land reflected in the flood, 
 
 Body with shadow still pursued. 220 
 
 For Nature beats in perfect tune, 
 
 And rounds with rhyme her every rune, 
 
 Whether she work in land or sea, 
 
 Or hide underground her alchemy. 
 
 Thou canst not wave thy staff in air, 
 
 Or dip thy paddle in the lake, 
 
 But it carves the bow of beauty there, 
 
 And the ripples in rhymes the oar forsake. 
 
 The wood is wiser far than thou ; 
 
 The wood and wave each other know. 230 
 
 Not unrelated, unaffied, 
 
 But to each thought and thing allied, 
 
 Is perfect Nature s every part, 
 
 Rooted in the mighty Heart. 
 
 But thou, poor child ! unbound, urirhymed, 
 
 Whence earnest thou, misplaced, mistimed ? 
 
 Whence, thou orphan and defrauded ? 
 
 Is thy land peeled, thy realm marauded ? 
 
 Who thee divorced, deceived, and left ? 
 
 Thee of thy faith who hath bereft, 240 
 
 And torn the ensigns from thy brow, 
 
 And sunk the immortal eye so low ? 
 
 Thy cheek too white, thy form too slender., 
 
 Thy gait too slow, thy habits tender 
 
 For royal man ; they thee confess 
 
 An exile from the wilderness,
 
 58 WOODNOTES 
 
 The hills where health with health agrees, 
 
 And the wise soul expels disease. 
 
 Hark ! in thy ear I will tell the sign 
 
 By which thy hurt thou may st divine. 250 
 
 When thou shalt climb the mountain cliff, 
 
 Or see the wide shore from thy skiff, 
 
 To thee the horizon shall express 
 
 Only emptiness and emptiness ; 
 
 There lives no man of Nature s worth 
 
 In the circle of the earth ; 
 
 And to thine eye the vast skies fall, 
 
 Dire and satirical, 
 
 On clucking hens, and prating fools, 
 
 On thieves, on drudges, and on dolls. 260 
 
 And thou shalt say to the Most High, 
 
 " Godhead ! all this astronomy, 
 
 And fate, and practice, and invention, 
 
 Strong art, and beautiful pretension, 
 
 This radiant pomp of sun and star, 
 
 Throes that were, and worlds that are, 
 
 Behold ! were in vain and in vain ; 
 
 It cannot be, I will look again ; 
 
 Surely now will the curtain rise, 
 
 And earth s fit tenant me surprise ; 270 
 
 But the curtain doth not rise, 
 
 And Nature has miscarried wholly 
 
 Into failure, into folly." 
 
 Alas ! thine is the bankruptcy, 
 Blessed Nature so to see. 
 Come, lay thee in my soothing shade, 
 And heal the hurts which sin has made.
 
 WOODNOTES 59 
 
 I will teach the bright parable 
 
 Older than time, 
 
 Things undeclarable, 280 
 
 Visions sublime. 
 
 I see thee in the crowd alone ; 
 
 I will be thy companion. 
 
 Quit thy friends as the dead in doom, 
 
 And build to them a final tomb ; 
 
 Let the starred shade that nightly falls 
 
 Still celebrate their funerals, 
 
 And the bell of beetle and of bee 
 
 Knell their melodious memory. 
 
 Behind thee leave thy merchandise, 290 
 
 Thy churches, and thy charities ; 
 
 And leave thy peacock wit behind ; 
 
 Enough for thee the primal mind 
 
 That flows in streams, that breathes in wind. 
 
 Leave all thy pedant lore apart ; 
 
 God hid the whole world in thy heart. 
 
 Love shuns the sage, the child it crowns, 
 
 And gives them all who all renounce. 
 
 The rain comes when the wind calls ; 
 
 The river knows the way to the sea ; 300 
 
 Without a pilot it runs and falls, 
 
 Blessing all lands with its charity ; 
 
 The sea tosses and foams to find 
 
 Its way up to the cloud and wind ; 
 
 The shadow sits close to the flying ball ; 
 
 The date fails not on the palm-tree tall ; 
 
 And thou, go burn thy wormy pages, 
 
 Shalt outsee seers, and outwit sages. 
 
 Oft didst thou thread the woods in vain
 
 60 WOODNOTES 
 
 To find what bird had piped the strain ; 310 
 Seek not, and the little eremite 
 Flies gaily forth and sings in sight. 
 
 Hearken once more ! 
 
 I will tell thee the mundane lore. 
 
 Older am I than thy numbers wot ; 
 
 Change I may, but I pass not. 
 
 Hitherto all things fast abide, 
 
 And anchored in the tempest ride. 
 
 Trenchant time behooves to hurry 
 
 All to yean and all to bury : 320 
 
 All the forms are fugitive, 
 
 But the substances survive. 
 
 Ever fresh the broad creation, 
 
 A divine improvisation, 
 
 From the heart of God proceeds, 
 
 A single will, a million deeds. 
 
 Once slept the world an egg of stone, 
 
 And pulse, and sound, and light was none ; 
 
 And God said, " Throb ! " and there was motion, 
 
 And the vast mass became vast ocean. 330 
 
 Onward and on, the eternal Pan, 
 
 Who layeth the world s incessant plan, 
 
 Halteth never in one shape, 
 
 But forever doth escape, 
 
 Like wave or flame, into new forms 
 
 Of gem, and air, of plants, and worms. 
 
 I, that to-day am a pine, 
 
 Yesterday was a bundle of grass. 
 
 He is free and libertine, 
 
 Pouring of his power the wine 340
 
 WOODNOTES 61 
 
 To every age, to every race ; 
 
 Unto every race and age 
 
 He emptieth the beverage ; 
 
 Unto each, and unto all, 
 
 Maker and original. 
 
 The world is the ring of his spells, 
 
 And the play of his miracles. 
 
 As he giveth to all to drink, 
 
 Thus or thus they are and think. 
 
 He giveth little or giveth much, 350 
 
 To make them several or such. 
 
 With one drop sheds form and feature ; 
 
 With the next a special nature ; 
 
 The third adds heat s indulgent spark ; 
 
 The fourth gives light which eats the dark ; 
 
 Into the fifth himself he flings, 
 
 And conscious Law is King of kings. 
 
 Ploaseth him, the Eternal Child, 
 
 To play his sweet will, glad and wild ; 
 
 As the bee through the garden ranges, 360 
 
 From w T orld to world the godhead changes ; 
 
 As the sheep go feeding in the waste, 
 
 From form to form he makcth haste ; 
 
 This vault which glows immense with light 
 
 Is the inn where he lodges for a night. 
 
 What recks such Traveller if the bowers 
 
 Which bloom and fade like meadow flowers 
 
 A bunch of fragrant lilies be, 
 
 Or the stars of eternity ? 
 
 Alike to him the better, the worse, 370 
 
 The glowing angel, the outcast corse. 
 
 Thou metest him by centuries,
 
 62 WOODNOTES 
 
 And lo ! he passes like the breeze ; 
 
 Thou seek st in globe and galaxy, 
 
 He hides in pure transparency ; 
 
 Thou askest in fountains and in fires, 
 
 He is the essence that inquires. 
 
 He is the axis of the star ; 
 
 He is the sparkle of the spar ; 
 
 He is the heart of every creature ; 380 
 
 He is the meaning of each feature ; 
 
 And his mind is the sky, 
 
 Than all it holds more deep, more high.
 
 63 
 
 MONADNOC 
 
 THOUSAND minstrels woke within me, 
 
 Our music s in the hills ; 
 Gayest pictures rose to win me, 
 
 Leopard-coloured rills. 
 Up ! If thou knew st who calls 
 To twilight parks of beech and pine, 
 High over the river intervals, 
 Above the ploughman s highest line, 
 Over the owner s farthest walls ! 
 Up ! where the airy citadel 
 O erlooks the surging landscape s swell ! 
 Let not unto the stones the Day 
 Her lily and rose, her sea and land display. 
 Read the celestial sign ! 
 Lo ! the south answers to the north ; 
 Bookworm, break this sloth urbane ; 
 A greater spirit bids thee forth 
 Than the grey dreams which thee detain. 
 Mark how the climbing Oreads 
 Beckon thee to their arcades ! 
 Youth, for a moment free as they, 
 Teach thy feet to feel the ground, 
 Ere yet arrives the wintry day 
 When Time thy feet has bound. 
 Take the bounty of thy birth, 
 Taste the lordship of the earth.
 
 64 MONADNOC 
 
 I heard, and I obeyed, 
 Assured that he who made the claim, 
 Well known, but loving not a name, 
 
 Was not to be gainsaid. 30 
 
 Ere yet the summoning voice was still, 
 
 I turned to Cheshire s haughty hill. 
 
 From the fixed cone the cloud-rack flowed; 
 
 Like ample banner flung abroad 
 
 To all the dwellers in the plains 
 
 Round about, a hundred miles, 
 
 With salutation to the sea, and to the bordering isles. 
 
 In his own loom s garment dressed, 
 
 By his proper bounty blessed, 
 
 Fast abides this constant giver, 4 
 
 Pouring many a cheerful river ; 
 
 To far eyes, an aerial isle 
 
 Unploughed, which finer spirits pile, 
 
 Which morn and crimson evening paint 
 
 For bard, for lover, and for saint ; 
 
 The people s pride, the country s core, 
 
 Inspirer, prophet evermore ; 
 
 Pillar which God aloft had set 
 
 So that men might it not forget ; 
 
 It should be their life s ornament, 5 
 
 And mix itself with each event ; 
 
 Gauge and calendar and dial, 
 
 Weatherglass and chemic phial, 
 
 Garden of berries, perch of birds, 
 
 Pasture of pool-haunting herds,
 
 MONADNOC 65 
 
 Graced by each change of sum untold, 
 Earth-baking heat, stone-cleaving cold. 
 
 The Titan heeds his sky-affairs, 
 
 Rich rents and wide alliance shares ; 
 
 Mysteries of colour daily laid 60 
 
 By the sun in light and shade ; 
 
 And sweet varieties of chance, 
 
 And the mystic seasons dance ; 
 
 And thief-like step of liberal hours 
 
 Thawing snow-drift into flowers. 
 
 0, wondrous craft of plant and stone 
 
 By eldest science done and shown ! 
 
 Happy, I said, whose home is here ! 
 
 Fair fortunes to the mountaineer ! 
 
 Boon Nature to his poorest shed 70 
 
 Has royal pleasure-grounds outspread. 
 
 Intent, I searched the region round, 
 
 And in low hut my monarch found : 
 
 Woe is me for my hope s downfall ! 
 
 Is yonder squalid peasant all 
 
 That this proud nursery could breed 
 
 For God s vicegerency and stead ? 
 
 Time out of mind, this forge of ores ; 
 
 Quarry of spars in mountain pores ; 
 
 Old cradle, hunting-ground, and bier 80 
 
 Of wolf and otter, bear and deer ; 
 
 Well-built abode of many a race ; 
 
 Tower of observance searching space ; 
 
 Factory of river and of rain ; 
 
 Link in the alps globe-girding chain ;
 
 66 MONADNOC 
 
 By million changes skilled to tell 
 
 What in the Eternal standeth well, 
 
 And what obedient Nature can ; 
 
 Is this colossal talisman 
 
 Kindly to creature, blood, and kind, 90 
 
 Yet speechless to the master s mind ? 
 
 I thought to find the patriots 
 
 In whom the stock of freedom roots : 
 
 To myself I oft recount 
 
 Tales of many a famous mount, 
 
 Wales, Scotland, Uri, Hungary s dells ; 
 
 Bards, Roys, Scanderbegs, and Tells. 
 
 Here Nature shall condense her powers, 
 
 Her music, and her meteors, 
 
 And lifting man to the blue deep 100 
 
 Where stars their perfect courses keep, 
 
 Like wise preceptor, lure his eye 
 
 To sound the science of the sky, 
 
 And carry learning to its height 
 
 Of untried power and sane delight : 
 
 The Indian cheer, the frosty skies, 
 
 Rear purer wits, inventive eyes, 
 
 Eyes that frame cities where none be, 
 
 And hands that stablish what these see ; 
 
 And by the moral of his place no 
 
 Hint summits of heroic grace ; 
 
 Man in these crags a fastness find 
 
 To fight pollution of the mind ; 
 
 In the wide thaw and ooze of wrong, 
 
 Adhere like this foundation strong, 
 
 The insanity of towns to stem 
 
 With simpleness for stratagem.
 
 MONADNOC 67 
 
 But if the brave old mould is broke, 
 
 And end in churls the mountain folk, 
 
 In tavern cheer and tavern joke, 120 
 
 Sink, mountain, in the swamp ! 
 
 Hide in thy skies, sovereign lamp ! 
 
 Perish like leaves, the highland breed ! 
 
 No sire survive, no son succeed ! 
 
 Soft ! let not the offended muse 
 Toil s hard hap with scorn accuse. 
 Many hamlets sought I then, 
 Many farms of mountain men ; 
 Found I not a minstrel seed, 
 But men of bone, and good at need. 130 
 
 Rallying round a parish steeple 
 Nestle warm the highland people, 
 Coarse and boisterous, yet mild, 
 Strong as giant, slow as child, 
 Smoking in a squalid room 
 Where yet the westland breezes come. 
 Close hid in those rough guises lurk 
 Western magians, here they work. 
 Sweat and season are their arts, 
 Their talismans are ploughs and carts ; 140 
 And well the youngest can command 
 Honey from the frozen land ; 
 With sweet hay the wild swamp adorn, 
 Change the running sand to corn ; 
 For wolves and foxes, lowing herds, 
 And for cold mosses, cream and curds ; 
 Weave wood to canisters and mats ; 
 Drain sweet maple juice in vats 
 F 2
 
 68 MONADNOC 
 
 No bird is safe that cuts the air 
 
 From their rifle or their snare ; 150 
 
 No fish, in river or in lake, 
 
 But their long hands it thence will take ; 
 
 And the country s flinty face, 
 
 Like wax, their fashioning skill betrays, 
 
 To fill the hollows, sink the hills, 
 
 Bridge gulfs, drain swamps, build dams and mills, 
 
 And fit the bleak and howling place 
 
 For gardens of a finer race. 
 
 The World-soul knows his own affair, 
 
 Forelooking, when he would prepare 160 
 
 For the next ages, men of mould 
 
 Well embodied, well ensouled, 
 
 He cools the present s fiery glow, 
 
 Sets the life -pulse strong but slow : 
 
 Bitter winds and fasts austere 
 
 His quarantines and grottos, where 
 
 He slowly cures decrepit flesh, 
 
 And brings it infantile and fresh. 
 
 Toil and tempest are the toys 
 
 And games to breathe his stalwart boys : 170 
 
 They bide their time, and well can prove, 
 
 If need were, their line from Jove ; 
 
 Of the same stuff, and so allayed, 
 
 As that whereof the sun is made, 
 
 And of the fibre, quick and strong, 
 
 Whose throbs are love, whose thrills are song. 
 
 Now in sordid weeds they sleep, 
 In dullness now their secret keep ;
 
 MONADNOC 69 
 
 Yet, will you learn our ancient speech, 
 
 These the masters who can teach. 180 
 
 Fourscore or a hundred words 
 
 All their vocal muse affords ; 
 
 But they turn them in a fashion 
 
 Past clerks or statesmen s art or passion. 
 
 I can spare the college bell, 
 
 And the learned lecture, well ; 
 
 Spare the clergy and libraries, 
 
 Institutes and dictionaries, 
 
 For that hardy English root 
 
 Thrives here, unvalued, underfoot. 190 
 
 Rude poets of the tavern hearth, 
 
 Squandering your unquoted mirth, 
 
 Which keeps the ground, and never soars, 
 
 While Jake retorts, and Reuben roars ; 
 
 Scoff of yeoman strong and stark, 
 
 Goes like bullet to its mark ; 
 
 While the solid curse and jeer 
 
 Never balk the waiting ear. 
 
 To student ears keen relished jokes 
 
 On truck, and stock, and farming folks, ^oo 
 
 Naught the mountain yields thereof, 
 
 But savage health and sinews tough. 
 
 On the summit as I stood, 
 
 O er the floor of plain and flood 
 
 Seemed to me, the towering hill 
 
 Was not altogether still, 
 
 But a quiet sense conveyed ; 
 
 If I err not, thus it said : 
 
 Many feet in summer seek, 
 
 Betimes, my far-appearing peak ; 210
 
 70 MONADNOC 
 
 In the dreaded winter time, 
 
 None save dappling shadows climb, 
 
 Under clouds, my lonely head, 
 
 Old as the sun, old almost as the shade. 
 
 And comest thou 
 
 To see strange forests and new snow, 
 
 And tread uplifted land ? 
 
 And leavest thou thy lowland race, 
 
 Here amid clouds to stand ? 
 
 And wouldst be my companion, 220 
 
 Where I gaze, and still shall gaze, 
 
 Through tempering nights and flashing days, 
 
 When forests fall and man is gone, 
 
 Over tribes and over times, 
 
 At the burning Lyre, 
 
 Nearing me, 
 
 With its stars of northern fire, 
 
 In many a thousand years ? 
 
 Ah ! welcome, if thou bring 
 
 My secret in thy brain ; 230 
 
 To mountain -top may Muse s wing 
 
 With good allowance strain. 
 
 Gentle pilgrim, if thou know 
 
 The gamut old of Pan, 
 
 And how the hills began, 
 
 The frank blessings of the hill 
 
 Fall on thee, as fall they will. 
 
 Tis the law of bush and stone, 
 
 Each can only take his own. 
 
 Let him heed who can and will ; 240 
 
 Enchantment fixed me here
 
 MONADNOC 71 
 
 To sand the hurts of time, until 
 In mightier chant I disappear. 
 
 If thou trowest 
 How the chemic eddies play, 
 Pole to pole, and what they say ; 
 And that these grey crags 
 Not on crags are hung, 
 But beads are of a rosary 
 
 On prayer and music strung ; 250 
 
 And, credulous, through the granite seeming, 
 Seest the smile of Reason beaming ; 
 Can thy style -discerning eye 
 The hidden-working Builder spy, 
 Who builds, yet makes no chips, no din, 
 With hammer soft as snow-flake s flight ; 
 Knowest thou this ? 
 pilgrim, wandering not amiss ! 
 Already my rocks lie light, 
 And soon my cone will spin. 260 
 
 For the world was built in order, 
 
 And the atoms march in tune ; 
 
 Rhyme the pipe, and Time the warder, 
 
 Cannot forget the sun, the moon. 
 
 Orb and atom forth they prance, 
 
 When they hear from far the rune ; 
 
 None so backward in the troop, 
 
 When the music and the dance 
 
 Reach his place and circumstance, 
 
 But knows the sun-creating sound, 270 
 
 And, though a pyramid, will bound.
 
 72 MONADNOC 
 
 Monadnoc is a mountain strong, 
 
 Tall and good my kind among ; 
 
 But well I know, no mountain can 
 
 Measure with a perfect man. 
 
 For it is on zodiacs writ, 
 
 Adamant is soft to wit : 
 
 And when the greater comes again 
 
 With my secret in his brain, 
 
 I shall pass, as glides my shadow 280 
 
 Daily over hill and meadow. 
 
 Through all time, in light, in gloom, 
 
 Well I hear the approaching feet 
 
 On the flinty pathway beat 
 
 Of him that cometh, and shall come ; 
 
 Of him who shall as lightly bear 
 
 My daily load of woods and streams, 
 
 As doth this round sky-cleaving boat 
 
 Which never strains its rocky beams ; 
 
 Whose timbers, as they silent float, 290 
 
 Alps and Caucasus uprear, 
 
 And the long Alleghanies here, 
 
 And all town-sprinkled lands that be, 
 
 Sailing through stars with all their history. 
 
 Every morn I lift my head, 
 
 Gaze o er New England underspread, 
 
 South from Saint Lawrence to the Sound, 
 
 From Katskill east to the sea-bound. 
 
 Anchored fast for many an age, 
 
 I await the bard and sage, 300 
 
 Who, in large thoughts, like fair pearl-seed, 
 
 Shall string Monadnoc like a bead.
 
 MONADNOC 73 
 
 Comes that cheerful troubadour, 
 
 This mound shall throb his face before, 
 
 As when, with inward fires and pain, 
 
 It rose a bubble from the plain. 
 
 When he cometh, I shall shed, 
 
 From this wellspring in my head, 
 
 Fountain-drop of spicier worth 
 
 Than all vintage of the earth. 310 
 
 There s fruit upon my barren soil 
 
 Costlier far than wine or oil. 
 
 There s a berry blue and gold, 
 
 Autumn-ripe, its juices hold 
 
 Sparta s stoutness, Bethlehem s heart, 
 
 Asia s rancour, Athens art, 
 
 Slowsure Britain s secular might, 
 
 And the German s inward sight. 
 
 I will give my son to eat 
 
 Best of Pan s immortal meat, 320 
 
 Bread to eat, and juice to drink ; 
 
 So the thoughts that he shall think 
 
 Shall not be forms of stars, but stars, 
 
 Nor pictures pale, but Jove and Mars. 
 
 He comes, but not of that race bred 
 
 Who daily climb my specular head. 
 
 Oft as morning wreathes my scarf, 
 
 Fled the last plumule of the Dark, 
 
 Pants up hither the spruce clerk 
 
 From South Cove and City Wharf. 330 
 
 I take him up my rugged sides, 
 
 Half-repentant, scant of breath, 
 
 Bead-eyes my granite chaos show, 
 
 And my midsummer snow ;
 
 74 MONADNOC 
 
 Open the daunting map beneath, 
 
 All his county, sea and land, 
 
 Dwarfed to measure of his hand ; 
 
 His day s ride is a furlong space, 
 
 His city-tops a glimmering haze. 
 
 I plant his eyes on the sky -hoop bounding : 340 
 
 " See there the grim grey bounding 
 
 Of the bullet of the earth 
 
 Whereon ye sail, 
 
 Tumbling steep 
 
 In the uncontinented deep." 
 
 He looks on that, and he turns pale. 
 
 T is even so ; this treacherous kite, 
 
 Farm-furrowed, town-incrusted sphere, 
 
 Thoughtless of its anxious freight, 
 
 Plunges eyeless on forever ; 350 
 
 And he, poor parasite, 
 
 Cooped in a ship he cannot steer, 
 
 Who is the captain he knows not, 
 
 Port or pilot trows not, 
 
 Risk or ruin he must share. 
 
 I scowl on him with my cloud, 
 
 With my north wind chill his blood ; 
 
 I lame him, clattering down the rocks ; 
 
 And to live he is in fear. 
 
 Then, at last, I let him down 360 
 
 Once more into his dapper town, 
 
 To chatter, frightened, to his clan, 
 
 And forget me if he can. 
 
 As in the old poetic fame 
 The gods are blind and lame,
 
 MONADNOC 75 
 
 And the simular despite 
 
 Betrays the more abounding might, 
 
 So call not waste that barren cone 
 
 Above the floral zone, 
 
 Where forests starve : 37 
 
 It is pure use ; 
 
 What sheaves like those which here we glean and 
 
 bind 
 Of a celestial Ceres and the Muse ? 
 
 Ages are thy days, 
 
 Thou grand expresser of the present tense, 
 
 And type of permanence ! 
 
 Firm ensign of the fatal Being, 
 
 Amid these coward shapes of joy and grief, 
 
 That will not bide the seeing ! 
 
 Hither we bring 380 
 
 Our insect miseries to the rocks ; 
 
 And the whole flight, with pestering wing, 
 
 Vanish, and end their murmuring, 
 
 Vanish beside these dedicated blocks, 
 
 Which who can tell what mason laid ? 
 
 Spoils of a front none need restore, 
 
 Replacing frieze and architrave ; 
 
 Yet flowers each stone rosette and metope brave; 
 
 Still is the haughty pile erect 
 
 Of the old building Intellect. 39 
 
 Complement of human kind, 
 Having us at vantage still, 
 Our sumptuous indigence, 
 barren mound, thy plenties fill !
 
 76 MONADNOC 
 
 We fool and prate ; 
 
 Thou art silent and sedate. 
 
 To myriad kinds and times one sense 
 
 The constant mountain doth dispense ; 
 
 Shedding on all its snows and leaves, 
 
 One joy it joys, one grief it grieves. 400 
 
 Thou seest, watchman tall, 
 
 Our towns and races grow and fall, 
 
 And imagest the stable good 
 
 For which we all our lifetime grope, 
 
 In shifting form the formless mind, 
 
 And though the substance us elude, 
 
 We in thee the shadow find. 
 
 Thou, in our astronomy 
 
 An opaquer star, 
 
 Seen haply from afar, 410 
 
 Above the horizon s hoop, 
 
 A moment, by the railway troop, 
 
 As o er some bolder height they speed, 
 
 By circumspect ambition, 
 
 By errant gain, 
 
 By feasters and the frivolous, 
 
 Recallest us, 
 
 And makest sane. 
 
 Mute orator ! well skilled to plead, 
 
 And send conviction without phrase, 420 
 
 Thou dost supply 
 
 The shortness of our days, 
 
 And promise, on thy Founder s truth. 
 
 Long morrow to this mortal youth.
 
 77 
 
 FABLE 
 
 THE mountain and the squirrel 
 
 Had a quarrel ; 
 
 And the former called the latter Little Prig . 
 
 Bun replied, 
 
 You are doubtless very big ; 
 
 But all sorts of things and weather 
 
 Must be taken in together, 
 
 To make up a year 
 
 And a sphere. 
 
 And I think it no disgrace 10 
 
 To occupy my place. 
 
 If I m not so large as you, 
 
 You are not so small as I, 
 
 And not half so spry. 
 
 I ll not deny you make 
 
 A very pretty squirrel track ; 
 
 Talents differ ; all is well and wisely put ; 
 
 If I cannot carry forests on my back, 
 
 Neither can you crack a nut.
 
 78 
 ODE 
 
 INSCRIBED TO W. H. CHANNING 
 
 THOUGH loath to grieve 
 The evil time s sole patriot, 
 I cannot leave 
 My honeyed thought 
 For the priest s cant, 
 Or statesman s rant. 
 
 If I refuse 
 
 My study for their politique, 
 
 Which at the best is trick, 
 
 The angry Muse 
 
 Puts confusion in my brain. 
 
 But who is he that prates 
 Of the culture of mankind, 
 Of better arts and life ? 
 Go, blindworm, go, 
 Behold the famous States 
 Harrying Mexico 
 With rifle and with knife ! 
 
 Or who, with accent bolder, 
 
 Dare praise the freedom-loving mountaineer ? 
 
 I found by thee, rushing Contoocook ! 
 
 And in thy valleys, Agiochook ! 
 
 The jackals of the negro -holder. 
 
 The God who made New Hampshire 
 Taunted the lofty land
 
 ODE 79 
 
 With little men ; 
 
 Small bat and wren 
 
 House in the oak : 
 
 If earth-fire cleave 
 
 The upheaved land, and bury the folk, 30 
 
 The Southern crocodile would grieve. 
 
 Virtue palters ; Right is hence ; 
 Freedom praised, but hid ; 
 Funeral eloquence 
 Rattles the coffin-lid. 
 
 What boots thy zeal, 
 
 glowing friend, 
 
 That would indignant rend 
 
 The Northland from the South ? 
 
 Wherefore ? to what good end ? 40 
 
 Boston Bay and Bunker Hill 
 
 Would serve things still ; 
 
 Things are of the snake. 
 
 The horseman serves the horse, 
 
 The neatherd serves the neat, 
 
 The merchant serves the purse, 
 
 The eater serves his meat ; 
 
 Tis the day of the chattel, 
 
 Web to weave, and corn to grind ; 
 
 Things are in the saddle, 50 
 
 And ride mankind. 
 
 There are two laws discrete, 
 
 Not reconciled, 
 
 Law for man, and law for thing :
 
 80 ODE 
 
 The last builds town and fleet, 
 
 But it runs wild, 
 
 And doth the man unking. 
 
 Tis fit the forest fall, 
 
 The steep be graded, 
 
 The mountain tunnelled, 60 
 
 The sand shaded, 
 
 The orchard planted, 
 
 The glebe tilled, 
 
 The prairie granted, 
 
 The steamer built. 
 
 Let man serve law for man ; 
 
 Live for friendship, live for love, 
 
 For truth s and harmony s behoof ; 
 
 The state may follow how it can, 
 
 As Olympus follows Jove. 70 
 
 Yet do not I implore 
 
 The wrinkled shopman to my sounding woods, 
 Nor bid the unwilling senator 
 Ask votes of thrushes in the solitudes. 
 Every one to his chosen work ; 
 Foolish hands may mix and mar ; 
 Wise and sure the issues are. 
 Round they roll till dark is light, 
 Sex to sex, and even to odd ; 
 The over-god 80 
 
 Who marries Right to Might, 
 Who peoples, unpeoples, 
 He who exterminates 
 Races by stronger races, 
 Black by white faces,
 
 ODE 81 
 
 Knows to bring honey 
 Out of the lion ; 
 Grafts gentlest scion 
 On pirate and Turk. 
 
 The Cossack eats Poland, 90 
 
 Like stolen fruit ; 
 
 Her last noble is ruined, 
 
 Her last poet mute : 
 
 Straight, into double band 
 
 The victors divide ; 
 
 Half for freedom strike and stand ; 
 
 The astonished Muse finds thousands at her side. 
 
 G
 
 82 
 
 ASTRAEA 
 
 EACH the herald is who wrote 
 
 His rank, and quartered his own coat. 
 
 There is no king nor sovereign state 
 
 That can fix a hero s rate ; 
 
 Each to all is venerable, 
 
 Cap-a-pie invulnerable, 
 
 Until he write, where all eyes rest, 
 
 Slave or master on his breast. 
 
 I saw men go up and down, 
 In the country and the town, 
 With this tablet on their neck, 
 Judgement and a judge we seek. 
 Not to monarchs they repair, 
 Nor to learned jurist s chair ; 
 But they hurry to their peers, 
 To their kinsfolk and their dears ; 
 Louder than with speech they pray, 
 What am I ? companion, say. 
 And the friend not hesitates 
 To assign just place and mates ; 
 Answers not in word or letter, 
 Yet is understood the better ; 
 Each to each a looking-glass, 
 Reflects his figure that doth pass. 
 Every wayfarer he meets 
 What himself declared repeats,
 
 ASTRAEA 83 
 
 What himself confessed records, 
 
 Sentences him in his words ; 
 
 The form is his own corporal form, 
 
 And his thought the penal worm. 30 
 
 Yet shine forever virgin minds, 
 
 Loved by stars and purest winds, 
 
 Which, o er passion throned sedate, 
 
 Have not hazarded their state ; 
 
 Disconcert the searching spy, 
 
 Rendering to a curious eye 
 
 The durance of a granite ledge 
 
 To those who gaze from the sea s edge. 
 
 It is there for benefit ; 
 
 It is there for purging light ; 40 
 
 There for purifying storms ; 
 
 And its depths reflect all forms ; 
 
 It cannot parley with the mean, 
 
 Pure by impure is not seen. 
 
 For there s no sequestered grot, 
 
 Lone mountain tarn, or isle forgot, 
 
 But Justice, journeying in the sphere, 
 
 Daily stoops to harbour there. 48 
 
 G 2
 
 84 
 
 ETIENNE DE LA BOECE 
 
 I SERVE you not, if you I follow, 
 
 Shadowlike, o er hill and hollow ; 
 
 And bend my fancy to your leading, 
 
 All too nimble for my treading. 
 
 When the pilgrimage is done, 
 
 And we ve the landscape overrun, 
 
 I am bitter, vacant, thwarted, 
 
 And your heart is unsupported. 
 
 Vainly valiant, you have missed 
 
 The manhood that should yours resist, 
 
 Its complement ; but if I could, 
 
 In severe or cordial mood, 
 
 Lead you rightly to my altar, 
 
 Where the wisest Muses falter, 
 
 And worship that world-warming spark 
 
 Which dazzles me in midnight dark, 
 
 Equalizing small and large, 
 
 While the soul it doth surcharge, 
 
 That the poor is wealthy grown, 
 
 And the hermit never alone, 
 
 The traveller and the road seem one 
 
 With the errand to be done, 
 
 That were a man s and lover s part, 
 
 That were Freedom s whitest chart.
 
 85 
 
 SUUM CUIQUE 
 
 THE rain has spoiled the farmer s day ; 
 Shall sorrow put my books away ? 
 
 Thereby are two days lost : 
 Nature shall mind her own affairs ; 
 I will attend my proper cares, 
 
 In rain, or sun, or frost.
 
 86 
 
 COMPENSATION 
 
 WHY should I keep holiday 
 
 When other men have none ? 
 Why but because, when these are gay, 
 
 I sit and mourn alone ? 
 
 And why, when mirth unseals all tongues, 
 
 Should mine alone be dumb ? 
 Ah ! late I spoke to silent throngs, 
 
 And now their hour is come.
 
 87 
 
 FORBEARANCE 
 
 HAST thou named all the birds without a gun ? 
 
 Loved the wood-rose, and left it on its stalk ? 
 
 At rich men s tables eaten bread and pulse ? 
 
 Unarmed, faced danger with a heart of trust ? 
 
 And loved so well a high behaviour, 
 
 In man or maid, that thou from speech refrained, 
 
 Nobility more nobly to repay ? 
 
 0, be my friend, and teach me to be thine !
 
 88 
 
 THE PARK 
 
 THE prosperous and beautiful 
 
 To me seem not to wear 
 The yoke of conscience masterful, 
 
 Which galls me everywhere. 
 
 I cannot shake off the god ; 
 
 On my neck he makes his seat ; 
 I look at my face in the glass, 
 
 My eyes his eyeballs meet. 
 
 Enchanters ! enchantresses ! 
 
 Your gold makes you seem wise ; 
 The morning mist within your grounds 
 
 More proudly rolls, more softly lies. 
 
 Yet spake yon purple mountain, 
 
 Yet said yon ancient wood, 
 That Night or Day, that Love or Crime, 
 
 Leads all souls to the Good.
 
 89 
 
 FORERUNNERS 
 
 LONG I followed happy guides, 
 
 I could never reach their sides ; 
 
 Their step is forth, and, ere the day 
 
 Breaks up their leaguer, and away. 
 
 Keen my sense, my heart was young, 
 
 Right good-will my sinews strung, 
 
 But no speed of mine avails 
 
 To hunt upon their shining trails. 
 
 On and away, their hasting feet 
 
 Make the morning proud and sweet ; 
 
 Flowers they strew, I catch the scent ; 
 
 Or tone of silver instrument 
 
 Leaves on the wind melodious trace ; 
 
 Yet I could never see their face. 
 
 On eastern hills I see their smokes, 
 
 Mixed with mist by distant lochs. 
 
 I met many travellers 
 
 Who the road had surely kept ; 
 
 They saw not my fine revellers, 
 
 These had crossed them while they slept, 
 
 Some had heard their fair report, 
 
 In the country or the court. 
 
 Fleetest couriers alive 
 
 Never yet could once arrive, 
 
 As they went or they returned, 
 
 At the house where these sojourned. 
 
 Sometimes their strong speed they slacken, 
 
 Though they are not overtaken ;
 
 90 FORERUNNERS 
 
 In sleep their jubilant troop is near, 
 
 I tuneful voices overhear ; 30 
 
 It may be in wood or waste, 
 
 At unawares tis corne and past. 
 
 Their near camp my spirit knows 
 
 By signs gracious as rainbows. 
 
 I thenceforward, and long after, 
 
 Listen for their harp-like laughter, 
 
 And carry in my heart, for days, 
 
 Peace that hallows rudest ways. 38
 
 91 
 
 SURSUM CORDA 
 
 SEEK not the spirit, if it hide 
 
 Inexorable to thy zeal : 
 
 Baby, do not whine and chide : 
 
 Art thou not also real ? 
 
 Why shouldst thou stoop to poor excuse ? 
 
 Turn on the accuser roundly ; say, 
 
 Here am I, here will I remain 
 
 For ever to myself soothfast ; 
 
 Go thou, sweet Heaven, or at thy pleasure stay ! 
 
 Already Heaven with thee its lot has cast, 10 
 
 For only it can absolutely deal.
 
 92 
 
 ODE TO BEAUTY 
 
 WHO gave thee, Beauty, 
 The keys of this breast, 
 Too credulous lover 
 Of blest and unblest ? 
 Say, when in lapsed ages 
 Thee knew I of old ? 
 Or what was the service 
 For which I was sold ? 
 When first my eyes saw thee, 
 I found me thy thrall, 
 By magical drawings, 
 Sweet tyrant of all ! 
 I drank at thy fountain 
 False waters of thirst ; 
 Thou intimate stranger, 
 Thou latest and first ! 
 Thy dangerous glances 
 Make women of men ; 
 New-born, we are melting 
 Into nature again. 
 
 Lavish, lavish promiser, 
 Nigh persuading gods to err ! 
 Guest of million painted forms, 
 Which in turn thy glory warms ! 
 The frailest leaf, the mossy bark, 
 The acorn s cup, the raindrop s arc, 
 The swinging spider s silver line, 
 The ruby of the drop of wine,
 
 ODE TO BEAUTY 93 
 
 The shining pebble of the pond, 
 
 Thou inscribest with a bond, 30 
 
 In thy momentary play, 
 
 Would bankrupt nature to repay. 
 
 Ah, what avails it 
 
 To hide or to shun 
 
 Whom the Infinite One 
 
 Hath granted his throne ? 
 
 The heaven high over 
 
 Is the deep s lover ; 
 
 The sun and sea, 
 
 Informed by thee, 40 
 
 Before me run, 
 
 And draw me on, 
 
 Yet fly me still, 
 
 As Fate refuses 
 
 To me the heart Fate for me chooses. 
 
 Is it that my opulent soul 
 
 Was mingled from the generous whole ; 
 
 Sea-valleys and the deep of skies 
 
 Furnished several supplies ; 
 
 And the sands whereof I m made 50 
 
 Draw me to them, self-betrayed ? 
 
 I turn the proud portfolios 
 
 Which hold the grand designs 
 
 Of Salvator, of Guercino, 
 
 And Piranesi s lines. 
 
 I hear the lofty paeans 
 
 Of the masters of the shell, 
 
 Who heard the starry music 
 
 And recount the numbers well ;
 
 94 ODE TO BEAUTY 
 
 Olympian bards who sung 60 
 
 Divine Ideas below, 
 
 Which always find us young, 
 
 And always keep us so. 
 
 Oft, in streets or humblest places, 
 
 I detect far-wandered graces, 
 
 Which, from Eden wide astray, 
 
 In lowly homes have lost their way. 
 
 Thee gliding through the sea of form. 
 
 Like the lightning through the storm, 
 
 Somewhat not to be possessed, 70 
 
 Somewhat not to be caressed, 
 
 No feet so fleet could ever find, 
 
 No perfect form could ever bind. 
 
 Thou eternal fugitive, 
 
 Hovering over all that live, 
 
 Quick and skilful to inspire 
 
 Sweet, extravagant desire, 
 
 Starry space and lily-bell 
 
 Filling with thy roseate smell, 
 
 Wilt not give the lips to taste So 
 
 Of the nectar which thou hast. 
 
 All that s good and great with thee 
 Works in close conspiracy ; 
 Thou hast bribed the dark and lonely 
 To report thy features only, 
 And the cold and purple morning 
 Itself with thoughts of thee adorning ; 
 The leafy dell, the city mart, 
 Equal trophies of thine art ;
 
 ODE TO BEAUTY 95 
 
 E en the flowing azure air 90 
 
 Thou hast touched for my despair ; 
 
 And, if I languish into dreams, 
 
 Again I meet the ardent beams. 
 
 Queen of things ! I dare not die 
 
 In Being s deeps past ear and eye ; 
 
 Lest there I find the same deceiver, 
 
 And be the sport of Fate forever 97 
 
 Dread Power, but dear ! if God thou be, 
 
 Unmake me quite, or give thyself to me !
 
 96 
 
 GIVE ALL TO LOVE 
 
 GIVE all to love ; 
 
 Obey thy heart ; 
 
 Friends, kindred, days, 
 
 Estate, good-fame, 
 
 Plans, credit, and the Muse, 
 
 Nothing refuse. 
 
 T is a brave master ; 
 
 Let it have scope : 
 
 Follow it utterly, 
 
 Hope beyond hope : 
 
 High and more high 
 
 It dives into noon, 
 
 With wing unspent, 
 
 Untold intent ; 
 
 But it is a god, 
 
 Knows its own path, 
 
 And the outlets of the sky. 
 
 It was not for the mean ; 
 It requireth courage stout, 
 Souls above doubt, 
 Valour unbending ; 
 Such twill reward, 
 They shall return 
 More than they were, 
 And ever ascending
 
 GIVE ALL TO LOVE 97 
 
 Leave all for love ; 
 
 Yet, hear me, yet, 
 
 One word more thy heart behoved, 
 
 One pulse more of firm endeavour, 
 
 Keep thee to-day, 30 
 
 To-morrow, forever, 
 
 Free as an Arab 
 
 Of thy beloved. 
 
 Cling with life to. the maid ; 
 
 But when the surprise, 
 
 First vague shadow of surmise 
 
 Flits across her bosom young 
 
 Of a joy apart from thee, 
 
 Free be she, fancy-free ; 
 
 Nor thou detain her vesture s hem, 40 
 
 Nor the palest rose she flung 
 
 From her summer diadem. 
 
 Though thou loved her as thyself, 
 
 As a self of purer clay, 
 
 Though her parting dims the day, 
 
 Stealing grace from all alive ; 
 
 Heartily know, 
 
 When half-gods go, 
 
 The gods arrive. 49
 
 98 
 TO ELLEN 
 
 AT THE SOUTH 
 
 THE green grass is bowing, 
 
 The morning wind is in it ; 
 T is a tune worth thy knowing, 
 
 Though it change every minute. 
 
 T is a tune of the spring ; 
 Every year plays it over 
 To the robin on the wing, 
 And to the pausing lover. 
 
 O er ten thousand, thousand acres, 
 
 Goes light the nimble zephyr ; 10 
 
 The Flowers tiny sect of Shakers 
 
 Worship him ever. 
 
 Hark to the winning sound ! 
 
 They summon thee, dearest, 
 Saying, We have dressed for thee the ground, 
 
 Nor yet thou appearest. 
 
 hasten ; t is our time, 
 
 Ere yet the red Summer 
 Scorch our delicate prime, 
 
 Loved of bee, the tawny hummer. 20 
 
 pride of thy race ! 
 
 Sad, in sooth, it were to ours, 
 If our brief tribe miss thy face, 
 
 We poor New England flowers.
 
 TO ELLEN 99 
 
 Fairest, choose the fairest members 
 
 Of our lithe society ; 
 June s glories and September s 
 
 Show our love and piety. 
 
 Thou shalt command us all, 
 
 April s cowslip, summer s clover, 30 
 
 To the gentian in the fall, 
 
 Blue-eyed pet of blue-eyed lover. 
 
 come, then, quickly come ! 
 
 We are budding, we are blowing ; 
 And the wind that we perfume 
 
 Sings a tune that s worth the knowing. 
 
 H 2
 
 100 
 
 TO EVA 
 
 O FATE and stately maid, whose eyes 
 Were kindled in the upper skies 
 
 At the same torch that lighted mine ; 
 For so I must interpret still 
 Thy sweet dominion o er my will, 
 
 A sympathy divine. 
 
 Ah ! let me blameless gaze upon 
 Features that seem at heart my own ; 
 
 Nor fear those watchful sentinels, 
 Who charm the more their glance forbids, 
 Chaste-glowing, underneath their lids, 
 
 With fire that draws while it repels.
 
 101 
 
 THE AMULET 
 
 YOCR picture smiles as first it smiled ; 
 
 The ring you gave is still the same ; 
 Your letter tells, changing child ! 
 
 No tidings since it came. 
 
 Give me an amulet 
 
 That keeps intelligence with you, 
 Red when you love, and rosier red, 
 
 And when you love not, pale and blue. 
 
 Alas ! that neither bonds nor vows 
 
 Can certify possession ; 
 Torments me still the fear that love 
 
 Died in its last expression.
 
 102 
 
 THINE EYES STILL SHINED 
 
 THINE eyes still shined for me, though far 
 I lonely roved the land or sea : 
 
 As I behold yon evening star, 
 Which yet beholds not me. 
 
 This morn I climbed the misty hill, 
 And roamed the pastures through ; 
 
 How danced thy form before my path 
 Amidst the deep-eyed dew ! 
 
 When the redbird spread his sable wing, 
 And showed his side of flame ; 
 
 When the rosebud ripened to the rose, 
 In both I read thy name.
 
 103 
 
 EROS 
 
 THE sense of the world is short, 
 Long and various the report, 
 
 To love and be beloved ; 
 Men and gods have not outlearned it ; 
 And, how oft soe er they ve turned it, 
 
 Tis not to be improved.
 
 104 
 
 HERMIONE 
 
 ON a mound an Arab lay, 
 
 And sung his sweet regrets, 
 
 And told his amulets : 
 
 The summer bird 
 
 His sorrow heard, 
 
 And, when he heaved a sigh profound, 
 
 The sympathetic swallow swept the ground. 
 
 If it be, as they said, she was not fair, 
 
 Beauty s not beautiful to me, 
 
 But sceptred genius, aye inorbed, 
 
 Culminating in her sphere. 
 
 This Hermione absorbed 
 
 The lustre of the land and ocean, 
 
 Hills and islands, cloud and tree, 
 
 In her form and motion. 
 
 I ask no bauble miniature, 
 Nor ringlets dead 
 Shorn from her comely head, 
 Now that morning not disdains 
 Mountains and the misty plains 
 Her colossal portraiture ; 
 They her heralds be, 
 Steeped in her quality, 
 And singers of her fame 
 Who is their Muse and dame.
 
 HERMIONE 105 
 
 Higher, dear swallows ! mind not what I say. 
 
 Ah ! heedless how the weak are strong, 
 
 Say, was it just, 
 
 In thee to frame, in me to trust, 
 
 Thou to the Syrian couldst belong ? 30 
 
 I am of a lineage 
 That each for each doth fast engage ; 
 In old Bassora s schools, I seemed 
 Hermit vowed to books and gloom,- 1 
 Ill-bested for gay bridegroom. 
 I was by thy touch redeemed ; 
 When thy meteor glances came, 
 We talked at large of worldly fate, 
 And drew truly every trait. 
 
 Once I dwelt apart, 4 
 
 Now I live with all ; 
 
 As shepherd s lamp on far hill-side 
 
 Seems, by the traveller espied, 
 
 A door into the mountain heart, 
 
 So didst thou quarry and unlock 
 
 Highways for me through the rock. 
 
 Now, deceived, thou wanderest 
 
 In strange lands unblest ; 
 
 And my kindred come to soothe me. 
 
 Southwind is my next of blood ; 50 
 
 He is come through fragrant wood, 
 
 Drugged with spice from climates warm, 
 
 And in every twinkling glade, 
 
 And twilight nook, 
 
 Unveils thy form.
 
 106 HERMIONE 
 
 Out of the forest way 
 
 Forth paced it yesterday ; 
 
 And when I sat by the watercourse, 
 
 Watching tiae daylight fade, 
 
 It throbbed up from the brook. 60 
 
 River, and rose, and crag, and bird, 
 
 Frost, and sun, and eldest night, 
 
 To me their aid preferred, 
 
 To me their comfort plight ; 
 
 " Courage ! we are thine allies, 
 
 And with this hint be wise, 
 
 The chains of kind 
 
 The distant bind ; 
 
 Deed thou doest she must do, 
 
 Above her will, be true ; 70 
 
 And, in her strict resort 
 
 To winds and waterfalls, 
 
 And autumn s sunlit festivals, 
 
 To music, and to music s thought, 
 
 Inextricably bound, 
 
 She shall find thee, and be found. 
 
 Follow not her flying feet ; 
 
 Come to us herself to meet." 78
 
 107 
 
 INITIAL, DAEMONIC, AND CELESTIAL LOVE 
 
 I 
 THE INITIAL LOVE 
 
 VENUS, when her son was lost, 
 
 Cried him up and down the coast, 
 
 In hamlets, palaces, and parks, 
 
 And told the truant by his marks, 
 
 Golden curls, and quiver, and bow. 
 
 This befell long ago. 
 
 Time and tide are strangely changed, 
 
 Men and manners much deranged : 
 
 None will now find Cupid latent 
 
 By this foolish antique patent. 10 
 
 He came late along the waste, 
 
 Shod like a traveller for haste ; 
 
 With malice dared me to proclaim him, 
 
 That the maids and boys might name him. 
 
 Boy no more, he wears all coats, 
 
 Frocks, and blouses, capes, capotes ; 
 
 He bears no bow, or quiver, or wand, 
 
 Nor chaplet on his head or hand. 
 
 Leave his weeds and heed his eyes, 
 
 All the rest he can disguise. 20 
 
 In the pit of his eye s a spark 
 
 Would bring back day if it were dark ; 
 
 And, if I tell you all my thought, 
 
 Though I comprehend it not,
 
 108 THE INITIAL LOVE 
 
 In those unfathomable orbs 
 
 Every function he absorbs. 
 
 He doth eat, and drink, and fish, and shoot, 
 
 And write, and reason, and compute, 
 
 And ride, and run, and have, and hold, 
 
 And whine, and flatter, and regret, 30 
 
 And kiss, and couple, and beget, 
 
 By those roving eyeballs bold. 
 
 Undaunted are their courages, 
 
 Right Cossacks in their forages ; 
 
 Fleeter they than any creature, 
 
 They are his steeds, and not his feature ; 
 
 Inquisitive, and fierce, and fasting, 
 
 Restless, predatory, hasting ; 
 
 And they pounce on other eyes 
 
 As lions on their prey ; 4 
 
 And round their circles is writ, 
 
 Plainer than the day, 
 
 Underneath, within, above, 
 
 Love love love love. 
 
 He lives in his eyes ; 
 
 There doth digest, and work, and spin, 
 
 And buy, and sell, and lose, and win ; 
 
 He rolls them with delighted motion, 
 
 Joy-tides swell their mimic ocean. 
 
 Yet holds he them with tautest rein, 50 
 
 That they may seize and entertain 
 
 The glance that to their glance opposes, 
 
 Like fiery honey sucked from roses. 
 
 He palmistry can understand, 
 
 Imbibing virtue by his hand 
 
 As if it were a living root ;
 
 THE INITIAL LOVE 109 
 
 The pulse of hands will make him mute ; 
 With all his force he gathers balms 
 Into those wise, thrilling palms. 
 
 Cupid is a casuist, 60 
 
 A mystic, and a cabalist, 
 
 Can your lurking thought surprise, 
 
 And interpret your device 
 
 He is versed in occult science, 
 
 In magic, and in clairvoyance ; 
 
 Oft he keeps his fine ear strained, 
 
 And Reason on her tiptoe pained 
 
 For aery intelligence, 
 
 And for strange coincidence. 
 
 But it touches his quick heart 70 
 
 When Fate by omens takes his part, 
 
 And chance-dropped hints from Nature s sphere 
 
 Deeply soothe his anxious ear. 
 
 Heralds high before him run ; 
 
 He has ushers many a one ; 
 
 He spreads his welcome where he goes, 
 
 And touches all things with his rose. 
 
 All things wait for and divine him, 
 
 How shall I dare to malign him, 
 
 Or accuse the god of sport ? 80 
 
 I must end my true report, 
 
 Painting him from head to foot, 
 
 In as far as I took note, 
 
 Trusting well the matchless power 
 
 Of this young-eyed emperor 
 
 Will clear his fame from every cloud, 
 
 With the bards and with the crowd.
 
 110 THE INITIAL LOVE 
 
 He is wilful, mutable, 
 
 Shy, untamed, inscrutable, 
 
 Swifter -fashioned than the fairies, 90 
 
 Substance mixed of pure contraries ; 
 
 His vice some elder virtue s token, 
 
 And his good is evil-spoken. 
 
 Failing sometimes of his own, 
 
 He is headstrong and alone ; 
 
 He affects the wood and wild, 
 
 Like a flower-hunting child ; 
 
 Buries himself in summer waves, 
 
 In trees, with beasts, in mines, and caves ; 
 
 Loves nature like a horned cow, too 
 
 Bird, or deer, or caribou. 
 
 Shun him, nymphs, on the fleet horses ! 
 
 He has a total world of wit ; 
 
 how wise are his discourses ! 
 
 But he is the arch-hypocrite, 
 
 And, through all science and all art, 
 
 Seeks alone his counterpart. 
 
 He is a Pundit of the East, 
 
 He is an augur and a priest, 
 
 And his soul will melt in prayer, no 
 
 But word and wisdom is a snare ; 
 
 Corrupted by the present toy 
 
 He follows joy, and only joy. 
 
 There is no mask but he will wear ; 
 
 He invented oaths to swear ; 
 
 He paints, he carves, he chants, he prays, 
 
 And holds all stars in his embrace, 
 
 Godlike, but t is for his fine pelf,
 
 THE INITIAL LOVE 111 
 
 The social quintessence of self. 
 
 Well said I he is hypocrite, 120 
 
 And folly the end of his subtle wit ! 
 
 He takes a sovran privilege 
 
 Not allowed to any liege ; 
 
 For he does go behind all law, 
 
 And right into himself does draw ; 
 
 For he is sovereignly allied, 
 
 Heaven s oldest blood flows in his side, 
 
 And interchangeably at one 
 
 With every king on every throne, 
 
 That no god dare say him nay, 130 
 
 Or see the fault, or seen betray : 
 
 He has the Muses by the heart, 
 
 And the Parcae all are of his part. 
 
 His many signs cannot be told ; 
 
 He has not one mode, but manifold, 
 
 Many fashions and addresses, 
 
 Piques, reproaches, hurts, caresses, 
 
 Arguments, lore, poetry, 
 
 Action, service, badinage ; 
 
 He will preach like a friar, 140 
 
 And jump like Harlequin ; 
 
 He will read like a crier, 
 
 And fight like a Paladin. 
 
 Boundless is his memory ; 
 
 Plans immense his term prolong ; 
 
 He is not of counted age, 
 
 Meaning always to be young. 
 
 And his wish is intimacy, 
 
 Intimater intimacy, 
 
 And a stricter privacy ; 150
 
 112 THE INITIAL LOVE 
 
 The impossible shall yet be done, 
 
 And, being two, shall still be one. 
 
 As the wave breaks to foam on shelves, 
 
 Then runs into a wave again, 
 
 So lovers melt their sundered selves, 
 
 Yet melted would be twain. 156 
 
 II 
 THE DAEMONIC AND THE CELESTIAL LOVE 
 
 MAN was made of social earth, 
 
 Child and brother from his birth, 
 
 Tethered by a liquid cord 
 
 Of blood through veins of kindred poured. 
 
 Next his heart the fireside band 
 
 Of mother, father, sister, stand : 
 
 Names from awful childhood heard 
 
 Throbs of a wild religion stirred ;- 
 
 Virtue, to love, to hate them, vice ; 
 
 Till dangerous Beauty came, at last, 10 
 
 Till Beauty came to snap all ties ; 
 
 The maid, abolishing the past, 
 
 With lotus wine obliterates 
 
 Dear memory s stone-incarved traits, 
 
 And, by herself, supplants alone 
 
 Friends year by year more inly known. 
 
 When her calm eyes opened bright, 
 
 All were foreign in their light. 
 
 It was ever the self-same tale, 
 
 The first experience will not fail ; 20 
 
 Only two in the garden walked, 
 
 And with snake and seraph talked.
 
 DAEMONIC AND CELESTIAL LOVE 113 
 
 But God said, 
 I will have a purer gift ; 
 There is smoke in the flame ; 
 New flowerets bring, new prayers uplift, 
 And love without a name. 
 Fond children, ye desire 
 To please each other well ; 
 Another round, a higher, 30 
 
 Ye shall climb on the heavenly stair, 
 And selfish preference forbear ; 
 And in right deserving, 
 And without a swerving 
 Each from your proper state, 
 Weave roses for your mate. 
 
 Deep, deep are loving eyes, 
 
 Flowed with naphtha fiery sweet ; 
 
 And the point is paradise, 
 
 Where their glances meet : 40 
 
 Their reach shall yet be more profound, 
 
 And a vision without bound : 
 
 The axis of those eyes sun-clear 
 
 Be the axis of the sphere : 
 
 So shall the lights ye pour amain 
 
 Go, without check or intervals, 
 
 Through from the empyrean walls 
 
 Unto the same again. 
 
 Close, close to men, 
 
 Like undulating layer of air, 50 
 
 Right above their heads, 
 
 The potent plain of Daemons spreads.
 
 114 THE DAEMONIC AND 
 
 Stands to each human soul its own, 
 
 For watch, and ward, and furtherance, 
 
 In the snares of Nature s dance ; 
 
 And the lustre and the grace 
 
 To fascinate each youthful heart, 
 
 Beaming from its counterpart, 
 
 Translucent through the mortal covers, 
 
 Is the Daemon s form and face. 60 
 
 To and fro the Genius hies, 
 
 A gleam which plays and hovers 
 
 Over the maiden s head, 
 
 And dips sometimes as low as to her eyes. 
 
 Unknown, albeit lying near, 
 
 To men, the path to the Daemon sphere ; 
 
 And they that swiftly come and go 
 
 Leave no track on the heavenly snow. 
 
 Sometimes the airy synod bends, 
 
 And the mighty choir descends, 7 
 
 And the brains of men thenceforth, 
 
 In crowded and in still resorts, 
 
 Teem with unwonted thoughts : 
 
 As, when a shor/er of meteors 
 
 Cross the orbit of the earth, 
 
 And, lit by fringent air, 
 
 Blaze near and far, 
 
 Mortals deem the planets bright 
 
 Have slipped their sacred bars, 
 
 And the lone seaman all the night 80 
 
 Sails, astonished, amid stars. 
 
 Beauty of a richer vein, 
 Graces of a subtler strain,
 
 THE CELESTIAL LOVE 115 
 
 Unto men these moonmen lend, 
 And our shrinking sky extend. 
 So is man s narrow path 
 By strength and terror skirted ; 
 Also (from the song the wrath 
 Of the Genii be averted ! 
 
 The Muse the truth uncoloured speaking) 90 
 The Daemons are self-seeking : 
 Their fierce and limitary will 
 Draws men to their likeness still. 
 The erring painter made Love blind, 
 Highest Love who shines on all ; 
 Him, radiant, sharpest-sighted god, 
 None can bewilder ; 
 Whose eyes pierce 
 The universe, 
 
 Path-finder, road-builder, 100 
 
 Mediator, royal giver ; 
 Rightly seeing, rightly seen, 
 Of joyful and transparent mien. 
 Tis a sparkle passing 
 From each to each, from thee to me, 
 To and fro perpetually ; 
 Sharing all, daring all, 
 Levelling, displacing 
 Each obstruction, it unites 
 
 Equals remote, and seeming opposites. no 
 
 And ever and for ever Love 
 Delights to build a road : 
 Unheeded Danger near him strides, 
 Love laughs, and on a lion rides. 
 But Cupid wears another face, 
 i 2
 
 116 THE DAEMONIC AND 
 
 Born into Daemons less divine : 
 
 His roses bleach apace, 
 
 His nectar smacks of wine. 
 
 The Daemon ever builds a wall, 
 
 Himself encloses and includes, 120 
 
 Solitude in solitudes : 
 
 In like sort his love doth fall. 
 
 He is an oligarch ; 
 
 He prizes wonder, fame, and mark ; 
 
 He loveth crowns ; 
 
 He scorneth drones ; 
 
 He doth elect 
 
 The beautiful and fortunate, 
 
 And the sons of intellect, 
 
 And the souls of ample fate, 13 
 
 Who the Future s gates unbar, 
 
 Minions of the Morning Star. 
 
 In his prowess he exults, 
 
 And the multitude insults. 
 
 His impatient looks devour 
 
 Oft the humble and the poor ; 
 
 And, seeing his eye glare, 
 
 They drop their few pale flowers, 
 
 Gathered with hope to please, 
 
 Along the mountain towers, 140 
 
 Lose courage, and despair. 
 
 He will never be gainsaid, 
 
 Pitiless, will not be stayed ; 
 
 His hot tyranny 
 
 Burns up every other tie. 
 
 Therefore comes an hour from Jove 
 
 Which his ruthless will defies,
 
 THE CELESTIAL LOVE 117 
 
 And the dogs of Fate unties. 
 
 Shiver the palaces of glass ; 
 
 Shrivel the rainbow-coloured walls, 150 
 
 Where in bright Art each god and sibyl dwelt, 
 
 Secure as in the zodiac s belt ; 
 
 And the galleries and halls, 
 
 Wherein every siren sung, 
 
 Like a meteor pass. 
 
 For this fortune wanted root 
 
 In the core of God s abysm, 
 
 Was a weed of self and schism ; 
 
 And ever the Daemonic Love 
 
 Is the ancestor of wars, 160 
 
 And the parent of remorse. 
 
 HIGHER far, 
 
 Upward into the pure realm, 
 
 Over sun and star, 
 
 Over the flickering Daemon film, 
 
 Thou must mount for love ; 
 
 Into vision where all form 
 
 In one only form dissolves ; 
 
 In a region where the wheel, 
 
 On which all beings ride, 
 
 Visibly revolves ; 10 
 
 Where the starred, eternal worm 
 
 Girds the world with bound and term : 
 
 Where unlike things are like ; 
 
 Where good and ill.
 
 118 THE CELESTIAL LOVE 
 
 And joy and moan, 
 
 Melt into one. 
 
 There Past, Present, Future, shoot 
 
 Triple blossoms from one root ; 
 
 Substances at base divided 
 
 In their summits are united ; 20 
 
 There the holy essence rolls, 
 
 One through separated souls ; 
 
 And the sunny Aeon sleeps 
 
 Folding Nature in its deeps ; 
 
 And every fair and every good, 
 
 Known in part, or known impure, 
 
 To men below, 
 
 In their archetypes endure. 
 
 The race of gods, 
 
 Or those we erring own, 30 
 
 Are shadows flitting up and down 
 
 In the still abodes. 
 
 The circles of that sea are laws 
 
 Which publish and which hide the cause. 
 
 Pray for a beam 
 
 Out of that sphere, 
 
 Thee to guide and to redeem. 
 
 O, what a load 
 
 Of care and toil, 
 
 By lying use bestowed, 40 
 
 From his shoulders falls who sees 
 
 The true astronomy, 
 
 The period of peace. 
 
 Counsel which the ages kept 
 
 Shall the well-born soul accept.
 
 THE CELESTIAL LOVE 119 
 
 As the overhanging trees 
 
 Fill the lake with images, 
 
 As garment draws the garment s hem, 
 
 Men their fortunes bring with them. 
 
 By right or wrong, 5 
 
 Lands and goods go to the strong. 
 
 Property will brutely draw 
 
 Still to the proprietor ; 
 
 Silver to silver creep and wind, 
 
 And kind to kind. 
 
 Nor less the eternal poles 
 
 Of tendency distribute souls. 
 
 There need no vows to bind 
 
 Whom not each other seek, but find. 
 
 They give and take no pledge or oath, 60 
 
 Nature is the bond of both : 
 
 No prayer persuades, no flattery fawns, 
 
 Their noble meanings are their pawns. 
 
 Plain and cold is their address, 
 
 Power have they for tenderness ; 
 
 And, so thoroughly is known 
 
 Each other s counsel by his own, 
 
 They can parley without meeting ; 
 
 Need is none of forms of greeting ; 
 
 They can well communicate 70 
 
 In their innermost estate ; 
 
 When each the other shall avoid, 
 
 Shall each by each be most enjoyed. 
 
 Not with scarfs or perfumed gloves 
 Do these celebrate their loves ; 
 Not by jewels, feasts, and savours,
 
 120 THE CELESTIAL LOVE 
 
 Not by ribbons or by favours, 
 
 But by the sun-spark on the sea, 
 
 And the cloud-shadow on the lea, 
 
 The soothing lapse of morn to mirk, 80 
 
 And the cheerful round of work. 
 
 Their cords of love so public are, 
 
 They intertwine the farthest star : 
 
 The throbbing sea, the quaking earth, 
 
 Yield sympathy and signs of mirth ; 
 
 Is none so high, so mean is none, 
 
 But feels and seals this union ; 
 
 Even the fell Furies are appeased, 
 
 The good applaud, the lost are eased. 
 
 Love s hearts are faithful, but not fond, 90 
 
 Bound for the just, but not beyond ; 
 
 Not glad, as the low-loving herd, 
 
 Of self in other still preferred, 
 
 But they have heartily designed 
 
 The benefit of broad mankind. 
 
 And they serve men austerely, 
 
 After their own genius, clearly, 
 
 Without a false humility ; 
 
 For this is Love s nobility, 
 
 Not to scatter bread and gold, 100 
 
 Goods and raiment bought and sold ; 
 
 But to hold fast his simple sense, 
 
 And speak the speech of innocence, 
 
 And with hand and body and blood, 
 
 To make his bosom -counsel good. 
 
 For he that feeds men serveth few ; 
 
 He serves all who dares be true.
 
 121 
 
 THINK me not unkind and rude 
 
 That I walk alone in grove and glen ; 
 
 I go to the god of the wood 
 To fetch his word to men. 
 
 Tax not my sloth that I 
 
 Fold my arms beside the brook ; 
 Each cloud that floated in the sky 
 
 Writes a letter in my book. 
 
 Chide me not, laborious band, 
 For the idle flowers I brought ; 
 
 Every aster in my hand 
 
 Goes home loaded with a thought. 
 
 There was never mystery 
 
 But t is figured in the flowers ; 
 
 Was never secret history 
 
 But birds tell it in the bowers. 
 
 One harvest from thy field 
 
 Homeward brought the oxen strong ; 
 A second crop thine acres yield, 
 
 Which I gather in a song.
 
 122 
 
 MERLIN 
 
 THY trivial harp will never please 
 
 Or fill my craving ear ; 
 
 Its chords should ring as blows the breeze, 
 
 Free, peremptory, clear. 
 
 No jingling serenader s art, 
 
 Nor tinkle of piano strings, 
 
 Can make the wild blood start 
 
 In its mystic springs. 
 
 The kingly bard 
 
 Must smite the chords rudely and hard, 
 
 As with hammer or with mace ; 
 
 That they may render back 
 
 Artful thunder, which conveys 
 
 Secrets of the solar track, 
 
 Sparks of the supersolar blaze. 
 
 Merlin s blows are strokes of fate, 
 
 Chiming with the forest tone, 
 
 When boughs buffet boughs in the wood ; 
 
 Chiming with the gasp and moan 
 
 Of the ice -imprisoned flood ; 
 
 With the pulse of manly hearts ; 
 
 With the voice of orators ; 
 
 With the din of city arts ; 
 
 With the cannonade of wars ; 
 
 With the marches of the brave ; 
 
 And prayers of might from martyrs cave.
 
 MERLIN 123 
 
 Great is the art, 
 
 Great be the manners, of the bard. 
 
 He shall not his brain encumber 
 
 With the coil of rhythm and number ; 30 
 
 But, leaving rule and pale forethought, 
 
 He shall aye climb 
 
 For his rhyme. 
 
 Pass in, pass in, the angels say, 
 
 In to the upper doors, 
 
 Nor count compartments of the floors, 
 
 But mount to paradise 
 
 By the stairway of surprise. 
 
 Blameless master of the games, 
 
 King of sport that never shames, 40 
 
 He shall daily joy dispense 
 
 Hid in song s sweet influence. 
 
 Things more cheerly live and go, 
 
 What time the subtle mind 
 
 Sings aloud the tune whereto 
 
 Their pulses beat, 
 
 And march their feet, 
 
 And their members are combined. 
 
 By Sybarites beguiled, 
 
 He shall no task decline ; 50 
 
 Merlin s mighty line 
 
 Extremes of nature reconciled, 
 
 Bereaved a tyrant of his will, 
 
 And made the lion mild. 
 
 Songs can the tempest still, 
 
 Scattered on the stormy air,
 
 124 MERLIN 
 
 Mould the year to fair increase, 
 And bring in poetic peace. 
 
 He shall not seek to weave, 
 
 In weak, unhappy times, 60 
 
 Efficacious rhymes ; 
 
 Wait his returning strength. 
 
 Bird, that from the nadir s floor 
 
 To the zenith s top can soar, 
 
 The soaring orbit of the muse exceeds that journey s 
 
 length. 
 
 Nor profane affect to hit 
 Or compass that, by meddling wit, 
 Which only the propitious mind 
 Publishes when tis inclined. 
 
 There are open hours 7 
 
 When the God s will sallies free, 
 And the dull idiot might see 
 The flowing fortunes of a thousand years ; 
 Sudden, at unawares, 
 Self -moved, fly-to the doors, 
 Nor sword of angels could reveal 
 What they conceal.
 
 125 
 
 MERLIN 
 II 
 
 THE rhyme of the poet 
 
 Modulates the king s affairs ; 
 
 Balance-loving Nature 
 
 Made all things in pairs. 
 
 To every foot its antipode ; 
 
 Each colour with its counter glowed ; 
 
 To every tone beat answering tones, 
 
 Higher or graver ; 
 
 Flavour gladly blends with flavour ; 
 
 Leaf answers leaf upon the bough ; 10 
 
 And match the paired cotyledons. 
 
 Hands to hands, and feet to feet, 
 
 In one body grooms and brides ; 
 
 Eldest rite, two married sides 
 
 In every mortal meet. 
 
 Light s far furnace shines, 
 
 Smelting balls and bars, 
 
 Forging double stars, 
 
 Glittering twins and trines. 
 
 The animals are sick with love, 20 
 
 Lovesick with rhyme ; 
 
 Each with all propitious time 
 
 Into chorus wove. 
 
 Like the dancers ordered band, 
 Thoughts come also hand in hand ;
 
 126 MERLIN 
 
 In equal couples mated, 
 
 Or else alternated ; 
 
 Adding by their mutual gage, 
 
 One to other, health and age. 
 
 Solitary fancies go 30 
 
 Short-lived wandering to and fro, 
 
 Most like to bachelors, 
 
 Or an ungiven maid, 
 
 Not ancestors, 
 
 With no posterity to make the lie afraid, 
 
 Or keep truth undecayed. 
 
 Perfect-paired as eagle s wings, 
 
 Justice is the rhyme of things ; 
 
 Trade and counting use 
 
 The self -same tuneful muse ; 40 
 
 And Nemesis, 
 
 Who with even matches odd, 
 
 Who athwart space redresses 
 
 The partial wrong, 
 
 Fills the just period, 
 
 And finishes the song. 
 
 Subtle rhymes, with ruin rife, 
 
 Murmur in the house of life, 
 
 Sung by the Sisters as they spin ; 
 
 In perfect time and measure they 50 
 
 Build and unbuild our echoing clay, 
 
 As the two twilights of the day 
 
 Fold us music-drunken in,
 
 127 
 
 BACCHUS 
 
 BRING me wine, but wine which never grew 
 
 In the belly of the grape, 
 
 Or grew on vine whose tap-roots, reaching 
 
 thiough 
 
 Under the Andes to the Cape, 
 Suffered no savour of the earth to scape. 
 
 Let its grapes the morn salute 
 
 From a nocturnal root, 
 
 Which feels the acrid juice 
 
 Of Styx and Erebus ; 
 
 And turns the woe of Night, 10 
 
 By its own craft, to a more rich delight. 
 
 We buy ashes for bread ; 
 
 We buy diluted wine ; 
 
 Give me of the true, 
 
 Whose ample leaves and tendrils curled 
 
 Among the silver hills of heaven, 
 
 Draw everlasting dew ; 
 
 Wine of wine, 
 
 Blood of the world, 
 
 Form of forms, and mould of statures, 20 
 
 That I intoxicated, 
 
 And by the draught assimilated, 
 
 May float at pleasure through all natures ; 
 
 The bird-language rightly spell, 
 
 And that which roses say so well.
 
 128 BACCHUS 
 
 Wine that is shed 
 
 Like the torrents of the sun 
 
 Up the horizon walls, 
 
 Or like the Atlantic streams, which run 
 
 When the South Sea calls. 30 
 
 Water and bread, 
 Food which needs no transmuting, 
 Rainbow-flowering, wisdom -fruiting 
 Wine which is already man, 
 Food which teach and reason can. 
 
 Wine which Music is, 
 
 Music and wine are one, 
 
 That I, drinking this, 
 
 Shall hear far Chaos talk with me ; 
 
 Kings unborn shall walk with me ; 40 
 
 And the poor grass shall plot and plan 
 
 What it will do when it is man. 
 
 Quickened so, will I unlock 
 
 Every crypt of every rock. 
 
 I thank the joyful juice 
 
 For all I know ; 
 
 Winds of remembering 
 
 Of the ancient being blow, 
 
 And seeming-solid walls of use 
 
 Open and flow. 50 
 
 Pour, Bacchus ! the remembering wine ; 
 Retrieve the loss of me and mine ! 
 Vine for vine be antidote, 
 And the grape requite the lote !
 
 BACCHUS 129 
 
 Haste to cure the old despair, 
 
 Reason in Nature s lotus drenched, 
 
 The memory of ages quenched ; 
 
 Give them again to shine ; 
 
 Let wine repair what this undid ; 
 
 And where the infection slid, 60 
 
 A dazzling memory revive ; 
 
 Refresh the faded tints, 
 
 Recut the aged prints, 
 
 And write my old adventures with the pen 
 
 Which on the first day drew, 
 
 Upon the tablets blue, 
 
 The dancing Pleiads and eternal men.
 
 130 
 
 LOSS AND GAIN 
 
 VIRTUE runs before the Muse, 
 
 And defies her skill ; 
 She is rapt, and doth refuse 
 
 To wait a painter s will. 
 
 Star-adoring, occupied, 
 
 Virtue cannot bend her 
 Just to please a poet s pride, 
 
 To parade her splendour. 
 
 The bard must be with good intent 
 
 No more his, but hers ; 
 Must throw away his pen and paint, 
 
 Kneel with worshippers. 
 
 Then, perchance, a sunny ray 
 
 From the heaven of fire 
 His lost tools may overpay, 
 
 And better his desire.
 
 131 
 
 MEROPS 
 
 WHAT care I, so they stand the same, 
 Things of the heavenly mind, 
 
 How long the power to give them name 
 Tarries yet behind ? 
 
 Thus far to-day your favours reach, 
 fair, appeasing presences ! 
 
 Ye taught my lips a single speech, 
 And a thousand silences. 
 
 Space grants beyond his fated road 
 
 No inch to the god of day ; 
 And copious language still bestowed 
 
 One word, no more, to say. 
 
 K 2
 
 132 
 
 THE HOUSE 
 
 THERE is no architect 
 
 Can build as the Muse can ; 
 
 She is skilful to select 
 Materials for her plan ; 
 
 Slow and warily to choose 
 
 Rafters of immortal pine, 
 Or cedar incorruptible, 
 
 Worthy her design. 
 
 She threads dark Alpine forests, 
 
 Or valleys by the sea, 
 In many lands, with painful steps, 
 
 Ere she can find a tree. 
 
 She ransacks mines and ledges, 
 
 And quarries every rock, 
 To hew the famous adamant 
 
 For each eternal block. 
 
 She lays her beams in music, 
 
 In music every one, 
 To the cadence of the whirling world 
 
 Which dances round the sun ; 
 
 That so they shall not be displaced 
 
 By lapses or by wars, 
 But, for the love of happy souls, 
 
 Outlive the newest stars.
 
 133 
 
 SAADI 
 
 TREES in groves, 
 
 Kine in droves, 
 
 In ocean sport the scaly herds, 
 
 Wedge-like cleave the air the birds, 
 
 To northern lakes fly wind-borne ducks, 
 
 Browse the mountain sheep in flocks, 
 
 Men consort in camp and town, 
 
 But the poet dwells alone. 
 
 God, who gave to him the lyre, 
 
 Of all mortals the desire, 10 
 
 For all breathing men s behoof, 
 
 Straitly charged him, Sit aloof ; 
 
 Annexed a warning, poets say, 
 
 To the bright premium, 
 
 Ever, when twain together play, 
 
 Shall the harp be dumb. 
 
 Many may come, 
 
 But one shall sing ; 
 
 To touch the string, 
 
 The harp is dumb. 20 
 
 Though there come a million, 
 
 Wise Saadi dwells alone. 
 
 Yet Saadi loved the race of men, 
 No churl, immured in cave or den ;
 
 134 SAADI 
 
 In bower and hall 
 
 He wants them all, 
 
 Nor can dispense 
 
 With Persia for his audience ; 
 
 They must give ear, 
 
 Grow red with joy and white with fear ; 30 
 
 But he has no companion ; 
 
 Come ten, or come a million, 
 
 Good Saadi dwells alone. 
 
 Be thou ware where Saadi dwells ; 
 
 Wisdom of the gods is he, 
 
 Entertain it reverently 
 
 Gladly round that golden lamp 
 
 Sylvan deities encamp, 
 
 And simple maids and noble youth 
 
 Are welcome to the man of truth. 4 
 
 Most welcome they who need him most, 
 
 They feed the spring which they exhaust ; 
 
 For greater need 
 
 Draws better deed : 
 
 But, critic, spare thy vanity, 
 
 Nor show thy pompous parts, 
 
 To vex with odious subtlety 
 
 The cheerer of men s hearts. 
 
 Sad-eyed Fakirs swiftly say 
 
 Endless dirges to decay, 50 
 
 Never in the blaze of light 
 
 Lose the shudder of midnight ; 
 
 Pale at overflowing noon 
 
 Hear wolves barking at the moon ;
 
 SAADI 135 
 
 In the bower of dalliance sweet 
 
 Hear the far Avenger s feet ; 
 
 And shake before those awful Powers, 
 
 Who in their pride forgive not ours. 
 
 Thus the sad-eyed Fakirs preach : 
 
 Bard, when thee would Allah teach, 60 
 
 And lift thee to his holy mount, 
 
 He sends thee from his bitter fount 
 
 Wormwood, saying, " Go thy ways, 
 
 Drink not the Malaga of praise, 
 
 But do the deed thy fellows hate, 
 
 And compromise thy peaceful state ; 
 
 Smite the white breasts which thee fed ; 
 
 Stuff sharp thorns beneath the head 
 
 Of them thou shouldst have comforted ; 
 
 For out of woe and out of crime 70 
 
 Draws the heart a lore sublime." 
 
 And yet it seemeth not to me 
 
 That the high gods love tragedy ; 
 
 For Saadi sat in the sun, 
 
 And thanks was his contrition ; 
 
 For haircloth and for bloody whips, 
 
 Had active hands and smiling lips ; 
 
 And yet his runes he rightly read, 
 
 And to his folk his message sped. 
 
 Sunshine in his heart transferred 80 
 
 Lighted each transparent word, 
 
 And well could honouring Persia learn 
 
 What Saadi wished to say ; 
 
 For Saadi s nightly stars did burn 
 
 Brighter than Dschami s day.
 
 136 SAADI 
 
 Whispered the Muse in Saadi s cot : 
 
 gentle Saadi, listen not, 
 
 Tempted by thy praise of wit, 
 
 Or by thirst and appetite 
 
 For the talents not thine own, 90 
 
 To sons of contradiction. 
 
 Never, son of eastern morning, 
 
 Follow falsehood, follow scorning. 
 
 Denounce who will, who will deny, 
 
 And pile the hills to scale the sky ; 
 
 Let theist, atheist, pantheist, 
 
 Define and wrangle how they list, 
 
 Fierce conserver, fierce destroyer, 
 
 But thou, joy-giver and enjoyer, 
 
 Unknowing war, unknowing crime, 100 
 
 Gentle Saadi, mind thy rhyme ; 
 
 Heed not what the brawlers say, 
 
 Heed thou only Saadi s lay. 
 
 Let the great world bustle on 
 
 With war and trade, with camp and town ; 
 
 A thousand men shall dig and eat ; 
 
 At forge and furnace thousands sweat ; 
 
 And thousands sail the purple sea, 
 
 And give or take the stroke of war, 
 
 Or crowd the market and bazaar ; no 
 
 Oft shall war end, and peace return, 
 
 And cities rise where cities burn, 
 
 Ere one man my hill shall climb, 
 
 Who can turn the golden rhyme. 
 
 Let them manage how they may, 
 
 Heed thou only Saadi s lay.
 
 SAADI 137 
 
 Seek the living among the dead, 
 
 Man in man is imprisoned ; 
 
 Barefooted Dervish is not poor, 
 
 If fate unlock his bosom s door, 120 
 
 So that Avhat his eye hath seen 
 
 His tongue can paint as bright, as keen ; 
 
 And what his tender heart hath felt 
 
 With equal fire thy heart shall melt. 
 
 For, whom the Muses smile upon, 
 
 And touch with soft persuasion, 
 
 His words like a storm-wind can bring 
 
 Terror and beauty on their wing ; 
 
 In his every syllable 
 
 Lurketh nature veritable ; 130 
 
 And though he speak in midnight dark, 
 
 In heaven no star, on earth no spark, 
 
 Ye before the listener s eye 
 
 Swims the world in ecstasy, 
 
 The forest waves, the morning breaks, 
 
 The pastures sleep, ripple the lakes, 
 
 Leaves twinkle, flowers like persons be, 
 
 And life pulsates in rock or tree. 
 
 Saadi, so far thy words shall reach : 
 
 Suns rise and set in Saadi s speech ! 140 
 
 And thus to Saadi said the Muse : 
 
 * Eat thou the bread which men refuse ; 
 
 Flee from the goods which from thee flee ; 
 
 Seek nothing, Fortune seeketh thee. 
 
 Nor mount, nor dive ; all good things keep 
 
 The midway of the eternal deep.
 
 138 SAADI 
 
 Wish not to fill the isles with eyes 
 
 To fetch thee birds of paradise : 
 
 On thine orchard s edge belong 
 
 All the brags of plume and song ; 150 
 
 Wise Ali s sunbright sayings pass 
 
 For proverbs in the market-place ; 
 
 Through mountains bored by regal art, 
 
 Toil whistles as he drives his cart. 
 
 Nor scour the seas, nor sift mankind, 
 
 A poet or a friend to find : 
 
 Behold, he watches at the door ! 
 
 Behold his shadow on the floor ! 
 
 Open innumerable doors 
 
 The heaven where unveiled Allah pours 160 
 
 The flood of truth, the flood of good, 
 
 The Seraph s and the Cherub s food : 
 
 Those doors are men : the Pariah hind 
 
 Admits thee to the perfect Mind. 
 
 Seek not beyond thy cottage wall 
 
 Redeemers that can yield thee all : 
 
 While thou sittest at thy door 
 
 On the desert s yellow floor, 
 
 Listening to the grey-haired crones, 
 
 Foolish gossips, ancient drones, 170 
 
 Saadi, see ! they rise in stature 
 
 To the height of mighty Nature, 
 
 And the secret stands revealed 
 
 Fraudulent Time in vain concealed, 
 
 That blessed gods in servile masks 
 
 Plied for thee thy household tasks.
 
 139 
 
 HOLIDAYS 
 
 FROM fall to spring the russet acorn, 
 Fruit beloved of maid and boy, 
 
 Lent itself beneath the forest 
 To be the children s toy. 
 
 Pluck it now ! In vain, thou canst not ; 
 
 Its root has pierced yon shady mound ; 
 Toy no longer it has duties ; 
 
 It is anchored in the ground. 
 
 Year by year the rose-lipped maiden, 
 
 Playfellow of young and old, 
 Was frolic sunshine, dear to all men, 
 
 More dear to one than mines of gold. 
 
 Whither went the lovely hoyden ? 
 
 Disappeared in blessed wife ; 
 Servant to a wooden cradle, 
 
 Living in a baby s life. 
 
 Still thou playest ; short vacation 
 Fate grants each to stand aside ; 
 
 Now must thou be man and artist, 
 Tis the turning of the tide.
 
 140 
 
 PAINTING AND SCULPTURE 
 
 THE sinful painter drapes his goddess warm, 
 Because she still is naked, being dressed : 
 
 The godlike sculptor will not so deform 
 
 Beauty, which limbs and flesh enough invest.
 
 141 
 
 The poems of Hafiz are held by the Persians to be allegoric and 
 mystical. His German editor, Von Hammer, remarks on the 
 following poem, that, though in appearance anacreontic, it 
 may be regarded as one of the best of those compositions 
 which earned for Hafiz the honourable title of " Tongue of 
 the Secret ". 
 
 BUTLER, fetch the ruby wine 
 
 Which with sudden greatness fills us ; 
 
 Pour for me, who in my spirit 
 
 Fail in courage and performance. 
 
 Bring this philosophic stone, 
 
 Karun s treasure, Noah s age , 
 
 Haste, that by thy means I open 
 
 All the doors of luck and life. 
 
 Bring to me the liquid fire 
 
 Zoroaster sought in dust : 10 
 
 To Hafiz, revelling, t is allowed 
 
 To pray to Matter and to Fire. 
 
 Bring the wine of Jamschid s glass, 
 
 Which glowed, ere time was, in the Neant ; 
 
 Bring it me, that through its force 
 
 I, as Jamschid, see through worlds. 
 
 Wisely said the Kaisar Jamschid, 
 
 The world s not worth a barleycorn : 
 
 Let flute and lyre lordly speak ; 
 
 Lees of wine outvalue crowns. 20 
 
 Bring me, boy, the veiled beauty, 
 
 Who in ill -famed houses sits : 
 
 Bring her forth ; my honest name
 
 142 FROM THE PERSIAN OF HAFIZ 
 
 Freely barter I for wine. 
 
 Bring me, boy, the fire-water ; 
 
 Drinks the lion, the woods burn ; 
 
 Give it me, that I storm heaven, 
 
 And tear the net from the arch wolf. 
 
 Wine wherewith the Houris teach 
 
 Souls the ways of paradise ! 30 
 
 On the living coals I ll set it, 
 
 And therewith my brain perfume. 
 
 Bring me wine, through whose effulgence 
 
 Jam and Chosroes yielded light ; 
 
 Wine, that to the flute I sing 
 
 Where is Jam, and where is Kauss. 
 
 Bring the blessing of old times, 
 
 Bless the old, departed shahs ! 
 
 Bring me wine which spendeth lordship, 
 
 Wine whose pureness searcheth hearts ; 40 
 
 Bring it me, the shah of hearts ! 
 
 Give me wine to wash me clean 
 
 Of the weather-stains of cares, 
 
 See the countenance of luck. 
 
 Whilst I dwell in spirit -gardens, 
 
 Wherefore stand I shackled here ? 
 
 Lo, this mirror shows me all ! 
 
 Drunk, I speak of purity, 
 
 Beggar, I of lordship speak ; 
 
 When Hafiz in his revel sings, 5 
 
 Shouteth Sohra in her sphere. 
 
 Fear the changes of a day : 
 Bring wine which increases life. 
 Since the world is all untrue,
 
 FROM THE PERSIAN OF HAFIZ 143 
 
 Let the trumpets thee remind 
 
 How the crown of Kobad vanished. 
 
 Be not certain of the world, 
 
 Twill not spare to shed thy blood. 
 
 Desperate of the world s affair, 
 
 Came I running to the wine-house. 60 
 
 Bring me wine which maketh glad, 
 
 That I may my steed bestride, 
 
 Through the course career with Rustem, 
 
 Gallop to my heart s content ; 
 
 That I reason quite expunge, 
 
 And plant banners on the worlds. 
 
 Let us make our glasses kiss ; 
 
 Let us quench the sorrow-cinders. 
 
 To-day let us drink together ; 
 
 Now and then will never agree. 70 
 
 Whoso has arranged a banquet 
 
 Is with glad mind satisfied, 
 
 Scaping from the snares of Dews. 
 
 Woe for youth ! t is gone in the wind : 
 
 Happy he who spent it well ! 
 
 Bring wine, that I overspring 
 
 Both worlds at a single leap. 
 
 Stole, at dawn, from glowing spheres 
 
 Call of Houris to my sense : 
 
 lovely bird, delicious soul, 80 
 
 Spread thy pinions, break thy cage ; 
 
 Sit on the roof of seven domes, 
 
 Where the spirits take their rest. 
 
 In the time of Bisurdschimihr, 
 Menutscheher s beauty shined.
 
 144 FROM THE PERSIAN OF HAFIZ 
 
 On the beaker of Nushirvan, 
 
 Wrote they once in elder times, 
 
 1 Hear the counsel ; learn from us 
 
 Sample of the course of things : 
 
 The earth it is a place of sorrow, 90 
 
 Scanty joys are here below ; 
 
 Who has nothing has no sorrow. 
 
 Where is Jam, and where his cup ? 
 
 Solomon and his mirror, where ? 
 
 Which of the wise masters knows 
 
 What time Kauss and Jam existed ? 
 
 When those heroes left this world, 
 
 They left nothing but their names. 
 
 Bind thy heart not to the earth ; 
 
 When thou goest, come not back ; 100 
 
 Fools spend on the world their hearts, 
 
 League with it is feud with heaven : 
 
 Never gives it what thou wishest. 
 
 A cup of wine imparts the sight 
 
 Of the five heaven-domes with nine steps : 
 
 Whoso can himself renounce 
 
 Without support shall walk thereon ; 
 
 Who discreet is is not wise. 
 
 Give me, boy, the Kaisar cup, 
 
 Which rejoices heart and soul. no 
 
 Under wine and under cup 
 
 Signify we purest love. 
 
 Youth like lightning disappears ; 
 
 Life goes by us as the wind. 
 
 Leave the dwelling with six doors, 
 
 And the serpent with nine heads ;
 
 FROM THE PERSIAN OF HAFIZ 145 
 
 Life and silver spend thou freely 
 
 If thou honourest the soul. 
 
 Haste into the other life ; 
 
 All is vain save God alone. 120 
 
 Give me, boy, this toy of Daemons : 
 
 When the cup of Jam was lost, 
 
 Him availed the world no more. 
 
 Fetch the wineglass made of ice ; 
 
 Wake the torpid heart with wine. 
 
 Every clod of loam beneath us 
 
 Is a skull of Alexander ; 
 
 Oceans are the blood of princes ; 
 
 Desert sands the dust of beauties. 
 
 More than one Darius was there 130 
 
 Who the whole world overcame ; 
 
 But, since these gave up the ghost, 
 
 Thinkest thou they never were ? 
 
 Boy, go from me to the Shah ; 
 
 Say to him, Shah, crowned as Jam, 
 
 Win thou first the poor man s heart, 
 
 Then the glass ; so know the world. 
 
 Empty sorrows from the earth 
 
 Canst thou drive away with wine. 
 
 Now in thy throne s recent beauty, 140 
 
 In the flowing tide of power, 
 
 Moon of fortune, mighty king, 
 
 Whose tiara sheddeth lustre, 
 
 Peace secure to fish and fowl, 
 
 Heart and eye-sparkle to saints ; 
 
 Shoreless is the sea of praise ; 
 
 I content me with a prayer : 
 
 BSON L
 
 146 FROM THE PERSIAN OF HAFIZ 
 
 From Nisami s lyric page, 
 
 Fairest ornament of speech, 
 
 Here a verse will I recite, 150 
 
 Verse more beautiful than pearls : 
 
 " More kingdoms wait thy diadem 
 
 Than are known to thee by name ; 
 
 Thee may sovran Destiny 
 
 Lead to victory day by day ! "
 
 147 
 GHASELLE 
 
 FROM THE PERSIAN OF IIAFIZ 
 
 OF Paradise, hermit wise, 
 
 Let us renounce the thought ; 
 Of old therein our names of sin 
 
 Allah recorded not. 
 
 Who dear to God on earthly sod 
 
 No rice or barley plants, 
 The same is glad that life is had, 
 
 Though corn he wants. 
 
 just fakir, with brow austere, 
 
 Forbid me not the vine ; 10 
 
 On the first day, poor Hafiz clay 
 
 Was kneaded up with wine. 
 
 Thy mind the mosque and cool kiosk, 
 
 Spare fast and orisons ; 
 Mine me allows the drinking-house, 
 
 And sweet chase of the nuns. 
 
 He is no dervise, Heaven slights his service, 
 
 Who shall refuse 
 There in the banquet to pawn his blanket 
 
 For Schiraz juice. 20 
 
 Who his friend s skirt or hem of his shirt 
 
 Shall spare to pledge, 
 To him Eden s bliss and angel s kiss 
 
 Shall want their edge. 
 
 L 2
 
 148 GHASELLE 
 
 Up ! Hafiz, grace from high God s face 
 
 Beams on thee pure ; 
 Shy thou not hell, and trust thou well, 
 
 Heaven is secure. 28
 
 149 
 
 XENOPHANES 
 
 BY fate, not option, frugal Nature gave 
 
 One scent to hyson and to wall-flower, 
 
 One sound to pine-groves and to waterfalls, 
 
 One aspect to the desert and the lake. 
 
 It was her stern necessity : all things 
 
 Are of one pattern made ; bird, beast, and flower, 
 
 Song, picture, form, space, thought, and character, 
 
 Deceive us, seeming to be many things, 
 
 And are but one. Beheld far off, they part 
 
 As God and devil ; bring them to the mind, 10 
 
 They dull its edge with their monotony. 
 
 To know one element, explore another, 
 
 And in the second reappears the first. 
 
 The specious panorama of a year 
 
 But multiplies the image of a day, 
 
 A belt of mirrors round a taper s flame ; 
 
 And universal Nature, through her vast 
 
 And crowded whole, an infinite paroquet, 
 
 Repeats one note. 19
 
 150 
 
 THE DAY S RATION 
 
 WHEN I was born, 
 
 From all the seas of strength Fate filled a chalice, 
 Saying, This be thy portion, child ; this chalice, 
 Less than a lily s, thou shalt daily draw 
 From my great arteries, nor less, nor more. 
 All substances the cunning chemist Time 
 Melts down into that liquor of my life, 
 Friends, foes, joys, fortunes, beauty, and disgust. 
 And whether I am angry or content, 
 Indebted or insulted, loved or hurt, i< 
 
 All he distils into sidereal wine 
 And brims my little cup ; heedless, alas ! 
 Of all he sheds how little it will hold, 
 How much runs over on the desert sands. 
 If a new Muse draw me with splendid ray, 
 And I uplift myself into its heaven, 
 The needs of the first sight absorb my blood, 
 And all the following hours of the day 
 Drag a ridiculous age. 
 
 To-day, when friends approach, and every hour 
 Brings book, or star-bright scroll of genius, 2 
 
 The little cup will hold not a bead more. 
 And all the costly liquor runs to waste ; 
 Nor gives the jealous lord one diamond drop 
 So to be husbanded for poorer days. 
 Why need I volumes, if one word suffice ? 
 Why need I galleries, when a pupil s draught
 
 THE DAY S RATION 151 
 
 After the master s sketch fills and o erfills 
 
 My apprehension ? why seek Italy, 
 
 Who cannot circumnavigate the sea 30 
 
 Of thoughts and things at home, but still adjourn 
 
 The nearest matters for a thousand days ?
 
 152 
 
 BLIGHT 
 
 GIVE me truths ; 
 
 For I am weary of the surfaces, 
 
 And die of inanition. If I knew 
 
 Only the herbs and simples of the wood, 
 
 Rue, cinquefoil, gill, vervain, and agrimony, 
 
 Blue-vetch, and trillium, hawkweed, sassafras, 
 
 Milkweeds, and murky brakes, quaint pipes, and 
 
 sundew, 
 
 And rare and virtuous roots, which in these woods 
 Draw untold juices from the common earth, 
 Untold, unknown, and I could surely spell ic 
 
 Their fragrance, and their chemistry apply 
 By sweet affinities to human flesh, 
 Driving the foe and stablishing the friend, 
 0, that were much, and I could be a part 
 Of the round day, related to the sun 
 And planted world, and full executor 
 Of their imperfect functions. 
 But these young scholars, who invade our hills, 
 Bold as the engineer who fells the wood, 
 And travelling often in the cut he makes, 20 
 
 Love not the flower they pluck, and know it not, 
 And all their botany is Latin names. 
 The old men studied magic in the flowers, 
 And human fortunes in astronomy, 
 And an omnipotence in chemistry, 
 Preferring things to names, for these were men,
 
 BLIGHT 153 
 
 Were Unitarians of the united world, 
 
 And, wheresoever their clear eye-beams fell, 
 
 They caught the footsteps of the SAME. Our eyes 
 
 Are armed, but we are strangers to the stars, 30 
 
 And strangers to the mystic beast and bird, 
 
 And strangers to the plant and to the mine. 
 
 The injured elements say, Not in us ; 
 
 And night and day, ocean and continent, 
 
 Fire, plant, and mineral say, Not in us, 
 
 And haughtily return us stare for stare. 
 
 For we invade them impiously for gain ; 
 
 We devastate them unreligiously, 
 
 And coldly ask their pottage, not their love. 
 
 Therefore they shove us from them, yield to us 
 
 Only what to our griping toil is due ; 41 
 
 But the sweet affluence of love and song, 
 
 The rich results of the divine consents 
 
 Of man and earth, of world beloved and lover, 
 
 The nectar and ambrosia, are withheld ; 
 
 And in the midst of spoils and slaves, we thieves 
 
 And pirates of the universe, shut out 
 
 Daily to a more thin and outward rind, 
 
 Turn pale and starve. Therefore, to our sick eyes, 
 
 The stunted trees look sick, the summer short, 50 
 
 Clouds shade the sun, which will not tan our hay, 
 
 And nothing thrives to reach its natural term ; 
 
 And life, shorn of its venerable length, 
 
 Even at its greatest space is a defeat, 
 
 And dies in anger that it was a dupe ; 
 
 And, in its highest noon and wantonness, 
 
 Is early frugal, like a beggar s child ; 
 
 Even in the hot pursuit of the best aims
 
 154 BLIGHT 
 
 And prizes of ambition, checks its hand, 
 
 Like Alpine cataracts frozen as they leaped, 60 
 
 Chilled with a miserly comparison 
 
 Of the toy s purchase with the length of life.
 
 155 
 
 MUSKETAQUID 
 
 BECAUSE I was content with these poor fields, 
 
 Low, open meads, slender and sluggish streams, 
 
 And found a home in haunts which others scorned, 
 
 The partial wood-gods overpaid my love, 
 
 And granted me the freedom of their state, 
 
 And in their secret senate have prevailed 
 
 With the dear, dangerous lords that rule our life, 
 
 Made moon and planets parties to their bond, 
 
 And through my rock-like, solitary wont 
 
 Shot million rays of thought and tenderness. 10 
 
 For me, in showers, in sweeping showers, the spring 
 
 Visits the valley ; break away the clouds, 
 
 I bathe in the morn s soft and silvered air, 
 
 And loiter willing by yon loitering stream. 
 
 Sparrows far off, and nearer, April s bird, 
 
 Blue-coated, flying before from tree to tree, 
 
 Courageous, sing a delicate overture 
 
 To lead the tardy concert of the year. 
 
 Onward and nearer rides the sun of May ; 
 
 And wide around, the marriage of the plants 20 
 
 Is sweetly solemnized. Then flows amain 
 
 The surge of summer s beauty ; dell and crag, 
 
 Hollow and lake, hill-side, and pine arcade, 
 
 Are touched with genius. Yonder ragged cliff 
 
 Has thousand faces in a thousand hours. 
 
 Beneath low hills, in the broad interval 
 Through which at will our Indian rivulet
 
 156 MUSKETAQUID 
 
 Winds mindful still of sannup and of squaw, 
 Whose pipe and arrow oft the plough unburies, 
 Here in pine houses built of new fallen trees, 30 
 Supplanters of the tribe, the farmers dwell. 
 Traveller, to thee, perchance, a tedious road, 
 Or, it may be, a picture ; to these men, 
 The landscape is an armoury of powers, 
 Which, one by one, they know to draw and use. 
 They harness beast, bird, insect, to their work ; 
 They prove the virtues of each bed of rock, 
 And, like the chemist mid his loaded jars, 
 Draw from each stratum its adapted use 
 To drug their crops or weapon their arts withal. 
 They turn the frost upon their chemic heap, 41 
 They set the wind to winnow pulse and grain, 
 They thank the spring-flood for its fertile slime, 
 And, on cheap summit-levels of the snow, 
 Slide with the sledge to inaccessible woods 
 O er meadows bottomless. So, year by year, 
 They fight the elements with elements, 
 (That one would say, meadow and forest walked, 
 Transmuted in these men to rule their like,) 
 And by the order in the field disclose 50 
 
 The order regnant in the yeoman s brain. 
 
 What these strong masters wrote at large in miles, 
 
 I followed in small copy in my acre ; 
 
 For there s no rood has not a star above it ; 
 
 The cordial quality of pear or plum 
 
 Ascends as gladly in a single tree 
 
 As in broad orchards resonant with bees ; 
 
 And every atom poises for itself,
 
 MUSKETAQUID 157 
 
 And for the whole. The gentle deities 
 
 Showed me the lore of colours and of sounds, 60 
 
 The innumerable tenements of beauty, 
 
 The miracle of generative force, 
 
 Far-reaching concords of astronomy 
 
 Felt in the plants, and in the punctual birds ; 
 
 Better, the linked purpose of the whole, 
 
 And, chiefest prize, found I true liberty 
 
 In the glad home plain-dealing nature gave. 
 
 The polite found me impolite ; the great 
 
 Would mortify me, but in vain ; for still 
 
 I am a willow of the wilderness, 70 
 
 Loving the wind that bent me. All my hurts 
 
 My garden spade can heal. A woodland walk, 
 
 A quest of river-grapes, a mocking thrush, 
 
 A wild-rose, or rock-loving columbine, 
 
 Salve my worst wounds. 
 
 For thus the wood -gods murmured in my ear : 
 
 Dost love our manners ? Canst thou silent lie ? 
 
 Canst thou, thy pride forgot, like nature pass 
 
 Into the winter night s extinguished mood ? 
 
 Canst thou shine now, then darkle, 80 
 
 And being latent feel thyself no less ? 
 
 As, when the all-worshipped moon attracts the eye, 
 
 The river, hill, stems, foliage, are obscure, 
 
 Yet envies none, none are unenviable.
 
 158 
 
 DIRGE 
 
 KNOWS he who tills this lonely field, 
 
 To reap its scanty corn, 
 What mystic fruit his acres yield 
 
 At midnight and at morn ? 
 
 In the long sunny afternoon, 
 The plain was full of ghosts ; 
 
 I wandered up, I wandered down, 
 Beset by pensive hosts. 
 
 The winding Concord gleamed below, 
 
 Pouring as wide a flood 
 As when my brothers, long ago, 
 
 Came with me to the wood. 
 
 But they are gone, the holy ones 
 Who trod with me this lovely vale ; 
 
 The strong, star-bright companions 
 Are silent, low, and pale. 
 
 My good, my noble, in their prime, 
 Who made this world the feast it was, 
 
 Who learned with me the lore of time, 
 Who loved this dwelling-place ! 
 
 They took this valley for their toy, 
 They played with it in every mood ; 
 
 A cell for prayer, a hall for joy, 
 They treated nature as they would.
 
 DIRGE 159 
 
 They coloured the horizon round ; 
 
 Stars flamed and faded as they bade ; 
 All echoes hearkened for their sound, 
 
 They made the woodlands glad or mad. 
 
 I touch this flower of silken leaf, 
 
 Which once our childhood knew ; 30 
 
 Its soft leaves wound me with a grief 
 
 Whose balsam never grew. 
 
 Hearken to yon pine-warbler 
 
 Singing aloft in the tree ! 
 Hearest thou, traveller, 
 
 What he singeth to me ? 
 
 Not unless God made sharp thine ear 
 
 With sorrow such as mine, 
 Out of that delicate lay couldst thou 
 
 Its heavy tale divine. 40 
 
 Go, lonely man, it saith ; 
 
 They loved thee from their birth ; 
 Their hands were pure, and pure their faith, 
 
 There are no such hearts on earth. 
 
 Ye drew one mother s milk, 
 
 One chamber held ye all ; 
 A very tender history 
 
 Did in your childhood fall. 
 
 Ye cannot unlock your heart, 
 
 The key is gone with them ; 5 
 
 The silent organ loudest chants 
 
 The master s requiem.
 
 160 
 
 THRENODY 
 
 THE South-wind brings 
 
 Life, sunshine, and desire, 
 
 And on every mount and meadow 
 
 Breathes aromatic fire ; 
 
 But over the dead he has no power, 
 
 The lost, the lost, he cannot restore ; 
 
 And, looking over the hills, I mourn 
 
 The darling who shall not return. 
 
 I see my empty house, 
 
 I see my trees repair their boughs ; 
 
 And he, the wondrous child, 
 
 Whose silver warble wild 
 
 Outvalued every pulsing sound 
 
 Within the air s cerulean round, 
 
 The hyacinthine boy, for whom 
 
 Morn well might break and April bloom, 
 
 The gracious boy, who did adorn 
 
 The world whereinto he was born, 
 
 And by his countenance repay 
 
 The favour of the loving Day, 
 
 Has disappeared from the Day s eye ; 
 
 Far and wide she cannot find him ; 
 
 My hopes pursue, they cannot bind him. 
 
 Returned this day, the south-wind searches, 
 
 And finds young pines and budding birches ; 
 
 But finds not the budding man ; 
 
 Nature, who lost, cannot remake him ;
 
 THRENODY 161 
 
 Fate let him fall, Fate can t retake him ; 
 Nature, Fate, men, him seek in vain. 
 
 And whither now, my truant wise and sweet, 
 
 0, whither tend thy feet ? 31 
 
 I had the right, few days ago, 
 
 Thy steps to watch, thy place to know ; 
 
 How have I forfeited the right ? 
 
 Hast thou forgot me in a new delight ? 
 
 I hearken for thy household cheer, 
 
 eloquent child ! 
 
 Whose voice, an equal messenger, 
 
 Conveyed thy meaning mild. 
 
 What though the pains and joys 40 
 
 Whereof it spoke were toys 
 
 Fitting his age and ken, 
 
 Yet fairest dames and bearded men, 
 
 Who heard the sweet request, 
 
 So gentle, wise, and grave, 
 
 Bended with joy to his behest, 
 
 And let the world s affairs go by, 
 
 Awhile to share his cordial game, 
 
 Or mend his wicker wagon-frame, 
 
 Still plotting how their hungry ear 50 
 
 That winsome voice again might hear ; 
 
 For his lips could well pronounce 
 
 Words that were persuasions. 
 
 Gentlest guardians marked serene 
 His early hope, his liberal mien ; 
 Took counsel from his guiding eyes 
 To make this wisdom earthly wise. 
 
 IERSON M
 
 162 THRENODY 
 
 Ah, vainly do these eyes recall 
 
 The school-march, each day s festival, 
 
 When every morn my bosom glowed 60 
 
 To watch the convoy on the road ; 
 
 The babe in willow wagon closed, 
 
 With rolling eyes and face composed ; 
 
 With children forward and behind, 
 
 Like Cupids studiously inclined ; 
 
 And he the chieftain paced beside, 
 
 The centre of the troop allied, 
 
 With sunny face of sweet repose, 
 
 To guard the babe from fancied foes. 
 
 The little captain innocent 70 
 
 Took the eye with him as he went ; 
 
 Each village senior paused to scan 
 
 And speak the lovely caravan. 
 
 From the window I look out 
 
 To mark thy beautiful parade, 
 
 Stately marching in cap and coat 
 
 To some tune by fairies played ; 
 
 A music heard by thee alone 
 
 To works as noble led thee on. 
 
 Now Love and Pride, alas ! in vain, 80 
 
 Up and down their glances strain. 
 
 The painted sled stands where it stood ; 
 
 The kennel by the corded wood ; 
 
 The gathered sticks to stanch the wall 
 
 Of the snow-tower, when snow should fall ; 
 
 The ominous hole he dug in the sand, 
 
 And childhood s castles built or planned ;
 
 THRENODY 163 
 
 His daily haunts I well discern, 
 
 The poultry-yard, the shed, the barn, 
 
 And every inch of garden ground 90 
 
 Paced by the blessed feet around, 
 
 From the roadside to the brook 
 
 Whereinto he loved to look. 
 
 Step the meek birds where erst they ranged ; 
 
 The wintry garden lies unchanged ; 
 
 The brook into the stream runs on ; 
 
 But the deep-eyed boy is gone. 
 
 On that shaded day, 
 
 Dark with more clouds than tempests are, 
 
 When thou didst yield thy innocent breath 100 
 
 In birdlike heavings unto death, 
 
 Night came, and Nature had not thee ; 
 
 I said, We are mates in misery. 
 
 The morrow dawned with needless glow ; 
 
 Each snowbird chirped, each fowl must crow ; 
 
 Each tramper started ; but the feet 
 
 Of the most beautiful and sweet 
 
 Of human youth had left the hill 
 
 And garden, they were bound and still. 
 
 There s not a sparrow or a wren, no 
 
 There s not a blade of autumn grain, 
 
 Which the four seasons do not tend, 
 
 And tides of life and increase lend ; 
 
 And every chick of every bird, 
 
 And weed and rock-moss is preferred. 
 
 ostrich -like forgetfulness ! 
 loss of larger in the less ! 
 M 2
 
 164 THRENODY 
 
 Was there no star that could be sent, 
 
 No watcher in the firmament, 
 
 No angel from the countless host 120 
 
 That loiters round the crystal coast, 
 
 Could stoop to heal that only child, 
 
 Nature s sweet marvel undefiled, 
 
 And keep the blossom of the earth, 
 
 Which all her harvests were not worth ? 
 
 Not mine, I never called thee mine, 
 
 But Nature s heir, if I repine, 
 
 And seeing rashly torn and moved 
 
 Not what I made, but what I loved, 
 
 Grow early old Avith grief that thou 130 
 
 Must to the wastes of Nature go, 
 
 Tis because a general hope 
 
 Was quenched, and all must doubt and grope. 
 
 For flattering planets seemed to say 
 
 This child should ills of ages stay, 
 
 By wondrous tongue, and guided pen, 
 
 Bring the flown Muses back to men. 
 
 Perchance not he but Nature ailed, 
 
 The world and not the infant failed. 
 
 It was not ripe yet to sustain 140 
 
 A genius of so fine a strain, 
 
 Who gazed upon the sun and moon 
 
 As if he came unto his own, 
 
 And, pregnant with his grander thought, 
 
 Brought the old order into doubt. 
 
 His beauty once their beauty tried ; 
 
 They could not feed him, and he died, 
 
 And wandered backward as in scorn, 
 
 To wait an aeon to be born.
 
 THRENODY 165 
 
 111 day which made this beauty waste, 150 
 
 Plight broken, this high face defaced 1 
 
 Some went and came about the dead ; 
 
 And some in books of solace read ; 
 
 Some to their friends the tidings say ; 
 
 Some went to write, some went to pray ; 
 
 One tarried here, there hurried one ; 
 
 But their heart abode with none. 
 
 Covetous death bereaved us all, 
 
 To aggrandize one funeral. 
 
 The eager fate which carried thee 160 
 
 Took the largest part of me : 
 
 For this losing is true dying ; 
 
 This is lordly man s down-lying, 
 
 This his slow but sure reclining, 
 
 Star by star his world resigning. 
 
 child of paradise, 
 
 Boy who made dear his father s home, 
 
 In whose deep eyes 
 
 Men read the welfare of the times to come, 
 
 1 am too much bereft. 170 
 The world dishonoured thou hast left. 
 
 truth s and nature s costly lie ! 
 trusted broken prophecy ! 
 richest fortune sourly crossed ! 
 Born for the future, to the future lost ! 
 
 THE deep Heart answered, Weepest thou ? 
 Worthier cause for passion wild 
 If I had not taken the child.
 
 166 THRENODY 
 
 And deemest thou as those who pore, 
 
 With aged eyes, short way before, 180 
 
 Think st Beauty vanished from the coast 
 
 Of matter, and thy darling lost ? 
 
 Taught he not thee the man of eld, 
 
 Whose eyes within his eyes beheld 
 
 Heaven s numerous hierarchy span 
 
 The mystic gulf from God to man ? 
 
 To be alone wilt thou begin 
 
 When worlds of lovers hem thee in ? 
 
 To-morrow, when the masks shall fall 
 
 That dizen Nature s carnival, 190 
 
 The pure shall see by their own will, 
 
 Which overflowing Love shall fill, 
 
 Tis not within the force of fate 
 
 The fate-conjoined to separate. 
 
 But thou, my votary, weepest thou ? 
 
 I gave thee sight where is it now ? 
 
 I taught thy heart beyond the reach 
 
 Of ritual, bible, or of speech ; 
 
 Wrote in thy mind s transparent table, 
 
 As far as the incommunicable ; 200 
 
 Taught thee each private sign to raise, 
 
 Lit by the supersolar blaze. 
 
 Past utterance, and past belief, 
 
 And past the blasphemy of grief, 
 
 The mysteries of Nature s heart ; 
 
 And though no Muse can these impart, 
 
 Throb thine with Nature s throbbing breast, 
 
 And all is clear from east to west. 
 
 I came to thee as to a friend ; 
 
 Dearest, to thee I did not send 210
 
 THRENODY 167 
 
 Tutors, but a joyful eye, 
 
 Innocence that matched the sky, 
 
 Lovely locks, a form of wonder, 
 
 Laughter rich as woodland thunder, 
 
 That thou might st entertain apart 
 
 The richest flowering of all art : 
 
 And, as the great all-loving Day 
 
 Through smallest chambers takes its way, 
 
 That thou might st break thy daily bread 
 
 With prophet, saviour, and head ; 220 
 
 That thou might st cherish for thine own 
 
 The riches of sweet Mary s Son, 
 
 Boy-Rabbi, Israel s paragon. 
 
 And thoughtest thou such guest 
 
 Would in thy hall take up his rest ? 
 
 Would rushing life forget her laws, 
 
 Fate s glowing revolution pause ? 
 
 High omens ask diviner guess ; 
 
 Not to be conned to tediousness. 
 
 And know my higher gifts unbind 230 
 
 The zone that girds the incarnate mind. 
 
 When the scanty shores are full 
 
 With Thought s perilous, whirling pool ; 
 
 When frail Nature can no more, 
 
 Then the Spirit strikes the hour : 
 
 My servant Death, with solving rite, 
 
 Pours finite into infinite. 
 
 Wilt thou freeze love s tidal flow, 
 Whose streams through nature circling go ? 
 Nail the wild star to its track 240 
 
 On the half -climbed zodiac ?
 
 168 THRENODY 
 
 Light is light which radiates, 
 
 Blood is blood which circulates, 
 
 Life is life which generates, 
 
 And many-seeming life is one, 
 
 Wilt thou transfix and make it none ? 
 
 Its onward force too starkly pent 
 
 In figure, bone, and lineament ? 
 
 Wilt thou, uncalled, interrogate, 
 
 Talker ! the unreplying Fate ? 250 
 
 Nor see the genius of the whole 
 
 Ascendant in the private soul, 
 
 Beckon it when to go and come, 
 
 Self-announced its hour of doom ? 
 
 Fair the soul s recess and shrine, 
 
 Magic-built to last a season ; 
 
 Masterpiece of love benign, 
 
 Fairer that expansive reason 
 
 Whose omen t is, and sign. 
 
 Wilt thou not ope thy heart to know 260 
 
 What rainbows teach, and sunsets show ? 
 
 Verdict which accumulates 
 
 From lengthening scroll of human fates, 
 
 Voice of earth to earth returned, 
 
 Prayers of saints that inly burned, 
 
 Saying, What is excellent, 
 
 As God lives, is permanent ; 
 
 Hearts are dust, hearts loves remain ; 
 
 Heart s love will meet thee again. 
 
 Revere the Maker ; fetch thine eye 270 
 
 Up to his style, and manners of the sky. 
 
 Not of adamant and gold 
 
 Built he heaven stark and cold ;
 
 THRENODY 169 
 
 No, but a nest of bending reeds, 
 
 Flowering grass, and scented weeds ; 
 
 Or like a traveller s fleeing tent, 
 
 Or bow above the tempest bent ; 
 
 Built of tears and sacred flames, 
 
 And virtue reaching to its aims ; 
 
 Built of furtherance and pursuing, 280 
 
 Not of spent deeds, but of doing. 
 
 Silent rushes the swift Lord 
 
 Through ruined systems still restored, 
 
 Broadsowing, bleak and void to bless, 
 
 Plants with worlds the wilderness ; 
 
 Waters with tears of ancient sorrow 
 
 Apples of Eden ripe to-morrow. 
 
 House and tenant go to ground, 
 
 Lost in God, in Godhead found. 289
 
 170 
 
 HYMN 
 
 SUNG AT THE COMPLETION OF THE 
 CONCORD MONUMENT 
 
 April 19, 1836 
 
 BY the rude bridge that arched the flood, 
 Their flag to April s breeze unfurled, 
 
 Here once the embattled farmers stood, 
 And fired the shot heard round the world. 
 
 The foe long since in silence slept ; 
 
 Alike the conqueror silent sleeps ; 
 And Time the ruined bridge has swept 
 
 Down the dark stream which seaward creeps. 
 
 On this green bank, by this soft stream, 
 
 We set to-day a votive stone ; 
 That memory may their deed redeem, 
 
 When, like our sires, our sons are gone. 
 
 Spirit, that made those heroes dare 
 To die, or leave their children free, 
 
 Bid Time and Nature gently spare 
 The shaft we raise to them and thee.
 
 MAY-DAY AND OTHER PIECES 
 
 (1867) 
 
 MAY-DAY 
 
 DAUGHTER of Heaven and Earth, coy Spring, 
 
 With sudden passion languishing, 
 
 Maketh all things softly smile, 
 
 Painteth pictures mile on mile, 
 
 Holds a cup with cowslip-wreaths, 
 
 Whence a smokeless incense breathes. 
 
 Girls are peeling the sweet willow, 
 
 Poplar white, and Gilead-tree, 
 
 And troops of boys 
 
 Shouting with whoop and hilloa, 
 
 And hip, hip, three times three. 
 
 The air is full of whistlings bland ; 
 
 What was that I heard 
 
 Out of the hazy land ? 
 
 Harp of the wind, or song of bird, 
 
 Or clapping of shepherd s hands, 
 
 Or vagrant booming of the air, 
 
 Voice of a meteor lost in day ? 
 
 Such tidings of the starry sphere 
 
 Can this elastic air convey. 
 
 Or haply twas the cannonade 
 
 Of the pent and darkened lake, 
 
 Cooled by the pendent mountain s shade, 
 
 Whose deeps, till beams of noonday break,
 
 172 MAY-DAY 
 
 Afflicted moan, and latest hold 
 
 Even unto May the iceberg cold. 
 
 Was it a squirrel s pettish bark, 
 
 Or clarionet of jay ? or hark, 
 
 Where yon wedged line the Nestor leads, 
 
 Steering north with raucous cry 30 
 
 Through tracts and provinces of sky, 
 
 Every night alighting down 
 
 In new landscapes of romance, 
 
 Where darkling feed the clamorous clans 
 
 By lonely lakes to men unknown. 
 
 Come the tumult whence it will, 
 
 Voice of sport, or rush of wings, 
 
 It is a sound, it is a token 
 
 That the marble sleep is broken, 
 
 And a change has passed on things. 40 
 
 Beneath the calm, within the light, 
 A hid unruly appetite 
 Of swifter life, a surer hope, 
 Strains every sense to larger scope, 
 Impatient to anticipate 
 The halting steps of aged Fate. 
 Slow grows the palm, too slow the pearl : 
 When Nature falters, fain would zeal 
 Grasp the felloes of her wheel, 
 And grasping give the orbs another whirl. 50 
 Turn swiftlier round, tardy ball ! 
 And sun this frozen side, 
 Bring hither back the robin s call, 
 Bring back the tulip s pride.
 
 MAY-DAY 173 
 
 Why chidest thou the tardy Spring ? 
 The hardy bunting does not chide ; 
 The blackbirds make the maples ring 
 With social cheer and jubilee ; 
 The redwing flutes his o-ka-lee, 
 The robins know the melting snow ; 60 
 
 The sparrow meek, prophetic -eyed, 
 Her nest beside the snow-drift weaves, 
 Secure the osier yet will hide 
 Her callow brood in mantling leaves ; 
 And thou, by science all undone, 
 Why only must thy reason fail 
 To see the southing of the sun ? 
 
 As w r e thaw frozen flesh with snow, 
 So Spring will not, foolish fond, 
 Mix polar night with tropic glow, 70 
 
 Nor cloy us with unshaded sun, 
 Nor wanton skip with bacchic dance, 
 But she has the temperance 
 Of the gods, whereof she is one, 
 Masks her treasury of heat 
 Under east-winds crossed with sleet. 
 Plants and birds and humble creatures 
 Well accept her rule austere ; 
 Titan-born, to hardy natures 
 Cold is genial and dear. 80 
 
 As Southern wrath to Northern right 
 Is but straw to anthracite ; 
 As in the day of sacrifice, 
 When heroes piled the pyre,
 
 174 MAY-DAY 
 
 The dismal Massachusetts ice 
 
 Burned more than others fire, 
 
 So Spring guards with surface cold 
 
 The garnered heat of ages old : 
 
 Hers to sow the seed of bread, 
 
 That man and all the kinds be fed ; 90 
 
 And, when the sunlight fills the hours, 
 
 Dissolves the crust, displays the flowers. 
 
 The world rolls round, mistrust it not, 
 Befalls again what once befell ; 
 All things return, both sphere and mote, 
 And I shall hear my bluebird s note, 
 And dream the dream of Auburn dell. 
 
 When late I walked, in earlier days, 
 All was stiff and stark ; 
 
 Knee-deep snows choked all the ways, 100 
 
 In the sky no spark ; 
 Firm-braced I sought my ancient woods, 
 Struggling through the drifted roads ; 
 The whited desert knew me not, 
 Snow-ridges masked each darling spot ; 
 The summer dells, by genius haunted, 
 One arctic moon had disenchanted. 
 All the sweet secrets therein hid 
 By Fancy, ghastly spells undid. 
 Eldest mason, Frost, had piled, no 
 
 With wicked ingenuity, 
 Swift cathedrals in the wild ; 
 The piny hosts were sheeted ghosts 
 In the star-lit minster aisled.
 
 MAY-DAY 175 
 
 I found no joy : the icy wind 
 
 Might rule the forest to his mind. 
 
 Who would freeze in frozen brakes ? 
 
 Back to books and sheltered home, 
 
 And wood-fire nickering on the walls, 
 
 To hear, when, mid our talk and games, 120 
 
 Without the baffled north-wind calls. 
 
 But soft ! a sultry morning breaks ; 
 
 The cowslips make the brown brook gay ; 
 
 A happier hour, a longer day. 
 
 Now the sun leads in the May, 
 
 Now desire of action wakes, 
 
 And the wish to roam. 
 
 The caged linnet in the spring 
 Hearkens for the choral glee, 
 When his fellows on the wing 130 
 
 Migrate from the Southern Sea ; 
 When trellised grapes their flowers unmask, 
 And the new-born tendrils twine, 
 The old wine darkling in the cask 
 Feels the bloom on the living vine, 
 And bursts the hoops at hint of spring : 
 And so, perchance, in Adam s race, 
 Of Eden s bower some dream-like trace 
 Survived the Flight, and swam the Flood, 
 And wakes the wish in youngest blood 140 
 To tread the forfeit Paradise, 
 And feed once more the exile s eyes ; 
 And ever when the happy child 
 In May beholds the blooming wild,
 
 176 MAY-DAY 
 
 And hears in heaven the bluebird sing, 
 
 Onward, he cries, your baskets bring, 
 
 In the next field is air more mild, 
 
 And o er yon hazy crest is Eden s balmier spring. 
 
 Not for a regiment s parade, 
 
 Nor evil laws or rulers made, 150 
 
 Blue Walden rolls its cannonade, 
 But for a lofty sign 
 Which the Zodiac threw, 
 That the bondage-days are told, 
 And waters free as winds shall flow. 
 Lo ! how all the tribes combine 
 To rout the flying foe. 
 See, every patriot oak-leaf throws 
 His elfin length upon the snows, 
 Not idle, since the leaf all day 160 
 
 Draws to the spot the solar ray, 
 Ere sunset quarrying inches down, 
 And half-way to the mosses brown ; 
 While the grass beneath the rime 
 Has hints of the propitious time, 
 And upward pries and perforates 
 Through the cold slab a thousand gates, 
 Till green lances peering through 
 Bend happy in the welkin blue. 
 
 April cold with dropping rain 170 
 
 Willows and lilacs brings again, 
 The whistle of returning birds, 
 And trumpet-lowing of the herds. 
 The scarlet maple-keys betray 
 What potent blood hath modest May ;
 
 MAY-DAY 177 
 
 What fiery force the earth renews, 
 The wealth of forms, the flush of hues ; 
 Joy shed in rosy waves abroad 
 Flows from the heart of Love, the Lord. 
 
 Hither rolls the storm of heat ; 180 
 
 I feel its finer billows beat 
 Like a sea which me infolds ; 
 Heat with viewless fingers moulds, 
 Swells, and mellows, and matures, 
 Paints, and flavours, and allures, 
 Bird and brier inly warms, 
 Still enriches and transforms, 
 Gives the reed and lily length, 
 Adds to oak and oxen strength, 
 Boils the world in tepid lakes, 190 
 
 Burns the world, yet burnt remakes ; 
 Enveloping heat, enchanted robe, 
 Wraps the daisy and the globe, 
 Transforming what it doth infold, 
 Life out of death, new out of old, 
 Painting fawns and leopards fells, 
 Seethes the gulf-encrimsoning shells, 
 Fires gardens with a joyful blaze 
 Of tulips, in the morning s rays. 
 The dead log touched bursts into leaf, 200 
 
 The wheat-blade whispers of the sheaf. 
 What god is this imperial Heat, 
 Earth s prime secret, sculpture s seat ? 
 Doth it bear hidden in its heart 
 Water-line patterns of all art, 
 All figures, organs, hues, and graces ?
 
 178 MAY-DAY 
 
 Is it Daedalus ? is it Love ? 
 
 Or walks in mask almighty Jove, 
 
 And drops from Power s redundant horn 
 
 All seeds of beauty to be born ? 210 
 
 Where shall we keep the holiday, 
 And duly greet the entering May ? 
 Too strait and low our cottage doors, 
 And all unmeet our carpet floors ; 
 Nor spacious court, nor monarch s hall, 
 Suffice to hold the festival. 
 Up and away ! where haughty woods 
 Front the liberated floods : 
 We will climb the broad-backed hills, 
 Hear the uproar of their joy ; 220 
 
 We will mark the leaps and gleams 
 Of the new-delivered streams, 
 And the murmuring rivers of sap 
 Mount in the pipes of the trees, 
 Giddy with day, to the topmost spire, 
 Which for a spike of tender green 
 Bartered its powdery cap ; 
 And the colours of joy in the bird, 
 And the love in its carol heard, 
 Frog and lizard in holiday coats, 230 
 
 And turtle brave in his golden spots ; 
 We will hear the tiny roar 
 Of the insects evermore, 
 While cheerful cries of crag and plain 
 Reply to the thunder of river and main. 
 
 As poured the flood of the ancient sea 
 Spilling over mountain chains,
 
 MAY-DAY 179 
 
 Bending forests as bends the sedge, 
 
 Faster flowing o er the plains, 239 
 
 A world-wide wave with a foaming edge 
 
 That rims the running silver sheet, 
 
 So pours the deluge of the heat 
 
 Broad northward o er the land, 
 
 Painting artless paradises, 
 
 Drugging herbs with Syrian spices, 
 
 Fanning secret fires which glow 
 
 In columbine and clover-blow, 
 
 Climbing the northern zones, 
 
 Where a thousand pallid towns 
 
 Lie like cockles by the main, 250 
 
 Or tented armies on a plain. 
 
 The million-handed sculptor moulds 
 
 Quaintest bud and blossom folds, 
 
 The million-handed painter pours 
 
 Opal hues and purple dye ; 
 
 Azaleas flush the island floors, 
 
 And the tints of heaven reply. 
 
 Wreaths for the May ! for happy Spring 
 To-day shall all her dowry bring, 
 The love of kind, the joy, the grace, 260 
 
 Hymen of element and race, 
 Knowing well to celebrate 
 With song and hue and star and state, 
 With tender light and youthful cheer, 
 The spousals of the new-born year. 
 Lo Love s inundation poured 
 Over space and race abroad ! 
 
 N 2
 
 180 MAY-DAY 
 
 Spring is strong and virtuous, 
 Broad-sowing, cheerful, plenteous, 
 Quickening underneath the mould 270 
 
 Grains beyond the price of gold. 
 So deep and large her bounties are, 
 That one broad, long midsummer day 
 Shall to the planet overpay 
 The ravage of a year of war. 
 
 Drug the cup, thou butler sweet, 
 And send the nectar round ; 
 The feet that slid so long on sleet 
 Are glad to feel the ground. 
 Fill and saturate each kind 280 
 
 With good according to its mind, 
 Fill each kind and saturate 
 With good agreeing with its fate, 
 Willow and violet, maiden and man. 
 
 The bitter-sweet, the haunting air, 
 Creepeth, bloweth everywhere ; 
 It preys on all, all prey on it, 
 Blooms in beauty, thinks in wit, 
 Stings the strong with enterprise, 
 Makes travellers long for Indian skies, 290 
 And where it comes this courier fleet 
 Fans in all hearts expectance sweet, 
 As if to-morrow should redeem 
 The vanished rose of evening s dream. 
 By houses lies a fresher green, 
 On men and maids a ruddier mien, 
 As if time brought a new relay 
 Of shining virgins every May,
 
 MAY-DAY 181 
 
 And Summer came to ripen maids 
 
 To a beauty that not fades. 300 
 
 The ground-pines wash their rusty green, 
 The maple-tops their crimson tint, 
 On the soft path each track is seen, 
 The girl s foot leaves its neater print. 
 The pebble loosened from the frost 
 Asks of the urchin to be tost. 
 In flint and marble beats a heart, 
 The kind Earth takes her children s part, 
 The green lane is the school-boy s friend, 
 Low leaves his quarrel apprehend, 310 
 
 The fresh ground loves his top and ball, 
 The air rings jocund to his call, 
 The brimming brook invites a leap, 
 He dives the hollow, climbs the steep. 
 The youth reads omens where he goes, 
 And speaks all languages the rose. 
 The wood-fly mocks with tiny noise 
 The far halloo of human voice ; 
 The perfumed berry on the spray 
 Smacks of faint memories far away. 320 
 
 A subtle chain of countless rings 
 The next unto the farthest brings, 
 And, striving to be man, the worm 
 Mounts through all the spires of form. 
 
 I saw the bud-crowned Spring go forth, 
 Stepping daily onward north 
 To greet staid ancient cavaliers 
 Filing single in stately train.
 
 182 MAY-DAY 
 
 And who, and who are the travellers ? 
 
 They were Night and Day, and Day and Night, 
 
 Pilgrims wight with step forthright. 331 
 
 I saw the Days deformed and low, 
 
 Short and bent by cold and snow ; 
 
 The merry Spring threw wreaths on them, 
 
 Flower-wreaths gay with bud and bell ; 
 
 Many a flower and many a gem, 
 
 They were refreshed by the smell, 
 
 They shook the snow from hate and shoon, 
 
 They put their April raiment on ; 
 
 And those eternal forms, 340 
 
 Unhurt by a thousand storms, 
 
 Shot up to the height of the sky again, 
 
 And danced as merrily as young men. 
 
 I saw them mask their awful glance 
 
 Sidewise meek in gossamer lids ; 
 
 And to speak my thought if none forbids 
 
 It was as if the eternal gods, 
 
 Tired of their starry periods, 
 
 Hid their majesty in cloth 
 
 Woven of tulips and painted moth. 350 
 
 On carpets green the maskers march 
 
 Below May s well-appointed arch, 
 
 Each star, each god, each grace amain, 
 
 Every joy and virtue speed, 
 
 Marching duly in her train, 
 
 And fainting Nature at her need 
 
 Is made whole again. 
 
 Twas the vintage-day of field and wood, 
 When magic wine for bards is brewed ;
 
 MAY-DAY 183 
 
 Every tree and stem and chink 360 
 
 Gushed with syrup to the brink. 
 
 The air stole into the streets of towns, 
 
 And betrayed the fund of joy 
 
 To the high-school and medalled boy : 
 
 On from hall to chamber ran, 
 
 From youth to maid, from boy to man, 
 
 To babes, and to old eyes as well. 
 
 Once more, the old man cried, ye clouds, 
 
 Airy turrets purple-piled, 
 
 Which once my infancy beguiled, 370 
 
 Beguile me with the wonted spell. 
 
 I know ye skilful to convoy 
 
 The total freight of hope and joy 
 
 Into rude and homely nooks, 
 
 Shed mocking lustres on shelf of books, 
 
 On farmer s byre, on meadow-pipes, 
 
 Or on a pool of dancing chips. 
 
 I care not if the pomps you show 
 
 Be what they soothfast appear, 
 
 Or if yon realms in sunset glow 380 
 
 Be bubbles of the atmosphere. 
 
 And if it be to you allowed 
 
 To fool me with a shining cloud, 
 
 So only new griefs are consoled 
 
 By new delights, as old by old, 
 
 Frankly I will be your guest, 
 
 Count your change and cheer the best. 
 
 The world hath overmuch of pain, 
 
 If Nature give me joy again, 
 
 Of such deceit I ll not complain. 39
 
 184 MAY-DAY 
 
 Ah ! well I mind the calendar, 
 Faithful through a thousand years, 
 Of the painted race of flowers, 
 Exact to days, exact to hours, 
 Counted on the spacious dial 
 Yon broidered zodiac girds. 
 I know the pretty almanac 
 Of the punctual coming-back, 
 On their due days, of the birds. 
 I marked them yestermorn, 400 
 
 A flock of finches darting 
 Beneath the crystal arch, 
 Piping, as they flew, a march, 
 Belike the one they used in parting 
 Last year from yon oak or larch ; 
 Dusky sparrows in a crowd, 
 Diving, darting northward free, 
 Suddenly betook them all, 
 Every one to his hole in the wall, 
 Or to his niche in the apple-tree. 410 
 
 I greet with joy the choral trains 
 Fresh from palms and Cuba s canes. 
 Best gems of Nature s cabinet, 
 With dews of tropic morning wet, 
 Beloved of children, bards, and Spring, 
 birds, your perfect virtues bring, 
 Your song, your forms, your rhythmic flight, 
 Your manners for the heart s delight, 
 Nestle in hedge, or barn, or roof, 
 Here weave your chamber weather-proof, 
 Forgive our harms, and condescend 421 
 
 To man, as to a lubber friend,
 
 MAY-DAY 185 
 
 And, generous, teach his awkward raco 
 Courage, and probity, and grace 1 
 
 Poets praise that hidden wine 
 Hid in milk we drew 
 At the barrier of Time, 
 When our life was new. 
 We had eaten fairy fruit, 
 
 We were quick from head to foot, 430 
 
 All the forms we look on shone 
 As with diamond dews thereon. 
 What cared we for costly joys, 
 The Museum s far-fetched toys ? 
 Gleam of sunshine on the wall 
 Poured a deeper cheer than all 
 The revels of the Carnival. 
 We a pine-grove did prefer 
 To a marble theatre, 
 
 Could with gods on mallows dine, 440 
 
 Nor cared for spices or for wine. 
 Wreaths of mist and rainbow spanned, 
 Arch on arch, the grimmest land ; 
 Whistle of a woodland bird 
 Made the pulses dance, 
 Note of horn in valleys heard 
 Filled the region with romance. 
 
 None can tell how sweet, 
 How virtuous, the morning air ; 
 Every accent vibrates well ; 45 
 
 Not alone the wood-bird s call, 
 Or shouting boys that chase their ball, 
 Pass the height of minstrel skill,
 
 186 MAY-DAY 
 
 But the ploughman s thoughtless cry, 
 
 Lowing oxen, sheep that bleat, 
 
 And the joiner s hammer-beat, 
 
 Softened are above their will. 
 
 All grating discords melt, 
 
 No dissonant note is dealt, 
 
 And though thy voice be shrill 460 
 
 Like rasping file on steel, 
 
 Such is the temper of the air, 
 
 Echo waits with art and care, 
 
 And will the faults of song repair. 
 
 So by remote Superior Lake, 
 And by resounding Mackinac, 
 When northern storms the forest shake, 
 And billows on the long beach break, 
 The artful Air doth separate 
 Note by note all sounds that grate, 470 
 
 Smothering in her ample breast 
 All but godlike words, 
 Reporting to the happy ear 
 Only purified accords. 
 Strangely wrought from barking waves, 
 Soft music daunts the Indian braves, 
 Convent-chanting which the child 
 Hears pealing from the panther s cave 
 And the impenetrable wild. 
 
 One musician is sure, 480 
 
 His wisdom will not fail, 
 He has not tasted wine impure, 
 Nor bent to passion frail. 
 Age cannot cloud his memory,
 
 MAY-DAY 187 
 
 Nor grief untune his voice, 
 
 Ranging down the ruled scale 
 
 From tone of joy to inward v/ail, 
 
 Tempering the pitch of all 
 
 In his windy cave. 
 
 He all the fables knows, 49 
 
 And in their causes tells, 
 
 Knows Nature s rarest moods, 
 
 Ever on her secret broods. 
 
 The Muse of men is coy, 
 
 Oft courted will not come ; 
 
 In palaces and market squares 
 
 Entreated, she is dumb ; 
 
 But my minstrel knows and tells 
 
 The counsel of the gods, 
 
 Knows of Holy Book the spells, 500 
 
 Knows the law of Night and Day, 
 
 And the heart of girl and boy, 
 
 The tragic and the gay, 
 
 And what is writ on Table Round 
 
 Of Arthur and his peers, 
 
 What sea and land discoursing say 
 
 In sidereal years. 
 
 He renders all his lore 
 
 In numbers wild as dreams, 
 
 Modulating all extremes, 5:0 
 
 What the spangled meadow saith 
 
 To the children who have faith ; 
 
 Only to children children sing, 
 
 Only to youth will spring be spring. 
 
 Who is the Bard thus magnified ? 
 When did he sing ? and where abide ?
 
 188 MAY-DAY 
 
 Chief of song where poets feast 
 Is the wind-harp which thou seesfc 
 In the casement at my side. 
 
 Aeolian harp, 520 
 
 How strangely wise thy strain ! 
 Gay for youth, gay for youth, 
 (Sweet is art, but sweeter truth,) 
 In the hall at summer eve 
 Fate and Beauty skilled to weave. 
 From the eager opening strings 
 Rung loud and bold the song. 
 Who but loved the wind-harp s note ? 
 How should not the poet doat 
 On its mystic tongue, 530 
 
 With its primeval memory, 
 Reporting what old minstrels said 
 Of Merlin locked the harp within, 
 Merlin paying the pain of sin, 
 Pent in a dungeon made of air, 
 And some attain his voice to hear, 
 Words of pain and cries of fear, 
 But pillowed all on melody, 
 As fits the griefs of bards to be. 
 And what if that all-echoing shell, 540 
 
 Which thus the buried Past can tell, 
 Should rive the Future, and reveal 
 What his dread folds would fain conceal ? 
 It shares the secret of the earth, 
 And of the kinds that owe her birth. 
 Speaks not of self that mystic tone, 
 But of the Overgods alone :
 
 MAY-DAY 189 
 
 It trembles to the cosmic breath, 
 
 As it heareth, so it saith ; 
 
 Obeying meek the primal Cause, 550 
 
 It is the tongue of mundane laws. 
 
 And this, at least, I dare affirm, 
 
 Since genius too has bound and term, 
 
 There is no bard in all the choir, 
 
 Not Homer s self, the poet sire, 
 
 Wise Milton s odes of pensive pleasure, 
 
 Or Shakespeare, whom no mind can measure, 
 
 Nor Collins verse of tender pain, 
 
 Nor Byron s clarion of disdain, 
 
 Scott, the delight of generous boys, 560 
 
 Or Wordsworth, Pan s recording voice, 
 
 Not one of all can put in verse, 
 
 Or to this presence could rehearse, 
 
 The sights and voices ravishing 
 
 The boy knew on the hills in spring, 
 
 When pacing through the oaks he heard 
 
 Sharp queries of the sentry-bird, 
 
 The heavy grouse s sudden whirr, 
 
 The rattle of the kingfisher ; 
 
 Saw bonfires of the harlot flies 570 
 
 In the lowland, when day dies ; 
 
 Or marked, benighted and forlorn, 
 
 The first far signal -fire of morn. 
 
 These syllables that Nature spoke, 
 
 And the thoughts that in him woke, 
 
 Can adequately utter none 
 
 Save to his ear the wind-harp lone. 
 
 And best can teach its Delphian chord 
 
 How Nature to the soul is moored,
 
 190 MAY-DAY 
 
 If once again that silent string, 580 
 
 As erst it wont, would thrill and ring. 
 
 Not long ago, at eventide, 
 It seemed, so listening, at my side 
 A window rose, and, to say sooth, 
 I looked forth on the fields of youth : 
 I saw fair boys bestriding steeds, 
 I knew their forms in fancy weeds, 
 Long, long concealed by sundering fates, 
 Mates of my youth, yet not my mates, 
 Stronger and bolder far than I, 590 
 
 With grace, with genius, well attired, 
 And then as now from far admired, 
 Followed with love 
 They knew not of, 
 With passion cold and shy. 
 joy, for what recoveries rare ! 
 Renewed, I breathe Elysian air, 
 See youth s glad mates in earliest bloom, 
 Break not my dream, obtrusive tomb ! 
 Or teach thou, Spring ! the grand recoil 
 Of life resurgent from the soil 601 
 
 Wherein was dropped the mortal spoil. 
 
 Soft on the south-wind sleeps the haze ! 
 So on thy broad mystic van 
 Lie the opal-coloured days, 
 And waft the miracle to man. 
 Soothsayer of the eldest gods, 
 Repairer of what harms betide, 
 Revealer of the inmost powers 
 Prometheus proffered, Jove denied ; 610
 
 MAY-DAY 191 
 
 Disclosing treasures more than true, 
 
 Or in what far to-morrow due ; 
 
 Speaking by the tongues of flowers, 
 
 By the ten-tongued laurel speaking, 
 
 Singing by the oriole songs, 
 
 Heart of bird the man s heart seeking ; 
 
 Whispering hints of treasure hid 
 
 Under Morn s unlifted lid, 
 
 Islands looming just beyond 
 
 The dim horizon s utmost bound ; 620 
 
 Who can, like thee, our rags upbraid, 
 
 Or taunt us with our hope decayed ? 
 
 Or who like thee persuade, 
 
 Making the splendour of the air, 
 
 The morn and sparkling dew, a snare ? 
 
 Or who resent 
 
 Thy genius, wiles, and blandishment ? 
 
 There is no orator prevails 
 To beckon or persuade 
 
 Like thee the youth or maid : 630 
 
 Thy birds, thy songs, thy brooks, thy gales, 
 Thy blooms, thy kinds, 
 Thy echoes in the wilderness, 
 Soothe pain, and age, and love s distress, 
 Fire fainting will, and build heroic minds. 
 
 For thou, Spring ! canst renovate 
 All that high God did first create. 
 Be still his arm and architect, 
 Rebuild the ruin, mend defect ;
 
 192 MAY-DAY 
 
 Chemist to vamp old worlds with new, 640 
 
 Coat sea and sky with heavenlier blue, 
 
 New-tint the plumage of the birds, 
 
 And slough decay from grazing herds, 
 
 Sweep ruins from the scarped mountain, 
 
 Cleanse the torrent at the fountain, 
 
 Purge alpine air by towns defiled, 
 
 Bring to fair mother fairer child, 
 
 Not less renew the heart and brain, 
 
 Scatter the sloth, wash out the stain, 
 
 Make the aged eye sun-clear, 650 
 
 To parting soul bring grandeur near. 
 
 Under gentle types, my Spring 
 
 Masks the might of Nature s king, 
 
 An energy that searches thorough 
 
 From Chaos to the dawning morrow ; 
 
 Into all our human plight, 
 
 The soul s pilgrimage and flight ; 
 
 In city or in solitude, 
 
 Step by step, lifts bad to good, 
 
 Without halting, without rest, 660 
 
 Lifting Better up to Best ; 
 
 Planting seeds of knowledge pure, 
 
 Through earth to ripen, through heaven endure.
 
 193 
 
 THE ADIRONDACS 
 
 A JOURNAL 
 
 DEDICATED TO MY FELLOW-TRAVELLERS IN AUGUST, 1858 
 
 Wise and polite, and if I drew 
 Their several portraits, you would own 
 Chaucer had no such worthy crew, 
 Nor Boccace in Decameron. 
 
 WE crossed Champlain to Keeseville with our friends, 
 
 Thence, in strong country carts, rode up the forks 
 
 Of the Ausable stream, intent to reach 
 
 The Adirondac lakes. At Martin s Beach 
 
 We chose our boats ; each man a boat and guide, 
 
 Ten men, ten guides, our company all told. 
 
 Next morn, we swept with oars the Saranac, 
 With skies of benediction, to Round Lake, 
 Where all the sacred mountains drew around us, 
 Tahawus, Seaward, Maclntyre, Baldhead, 10 
 
 And other Titans without muse or name. 
 Pleased with these grand companions, we glide on, 
 Instead of flowers, crowned with a wreath of hills, 
 And made our distance wider, boat from boat, 
 As each would hear the oracle alone. 
 By the bright morn the gay flotilla slid 
 Through files of flags that gleamed like bayonets, 
 Through gold-moth-haunted beds of pickerel-flower, 
 Through scented banks of lilies white and gold, 
 Where the deer feeds at night, the teal by day, 
 On through the Upper Saranac, and up 21
 
 194 THE ADIRONDACS 
 
 Pere Raquette stream, to a small tortuous pass 
 Winding through grassy shallows in and out, 
 Two creeping miles of rushes, pads, and sponge, 
 To Follansbee Water, and the Lake of Loons. 
 
 Northward the length of Follansbee we rowed, 
 Under low mountains, whose unbroken ridge 
 Ponderous with beechen forest sloped the shore. 
 A pause and council : then, where near the head 
 On the east a bay makes inward to the land 30 
 Between two rocky arms, we climb the bank, 
 And in the twilight of the forest noon 
 Wield the first axe these echoes ever heard. 
 We cut young trees to make our poles and thwarts, 
 Barked the white spruce to weatherfend the roof, 
 Then struck a light, and kindled the camp-fire. 
 
 The wood was sovran with centennial trees, 
 Oak, cedar, maple, poplar, beech and fir, 
 Linden and spruce. In strict society 
 Three conifers, white, pitch, and Norway pine, 
 Five-leaved, three-leaved, and two-leaved, grew 
 thereby. 41 
 
 Our patron pine was fifteen feet in girth, 
 The maple eight, beneath its shapely tower. 
 
 Welcome ! the wood god murmured through the 
 leaves, 
 
 Welcome, though late, unknowing, yet known to 
 me. 
 
 Evening drew on ; stars peeped through maple- 
 boughs,
 
 THE ADIRONDACS 195 
 
 Which o erhung, like a cloud, our camping fire. 
 Decayed millennial trunks, like moonlight flecks, 
 Lit with phosphoric crumbs the forest floor. 
 
 Ten scholars, wonted to lie warm and soft 50 
 In well-hung chambers daintily bestowed, 
 Lie here on hemlock-boughs, like Sacs and Sioux, 
 And greet unanimous the joyful change. 
 So fast will Nature acclimate her sons, 
 Though late returning to her pristine ways. 
 Off soundings, seamen do not suffer cold ; 
 And, in the forest, delicate clerks, unbrowned, 
 Sleep on the fragrant brush, as on down-beds. 
 Up with the dawn, they fancied the light air 
 That circled freshly in their forest dress 60 
 
 Made them to boys again. Happier that they 
 Slipped off their pack of duties, leagues behind, 
 At the first mounting of the giant stairs. 
 No placard on these rocks warned to the polls, 
 No door-bell heralded a visitor, 
 No courier waits, no letter came or went, 
 Nothing was ploughed, or reaped, or bought, or 
 
 sold ; 
 
 The frost might glitter, it would blight no crop, 
 The falling rain will spoil no holiday. 
 We were made freemen of the forest laws, 70 
 
 All dressed, like Nature, fit for her own ends, 
 Essaying nothing she cannot perform. 
 
 In Adirondac lakes, 
 
 At morn or noon, the guide rows bareheaded : 
 Shoes, flannel shirt, and kersey trousers make 
 o 2
 
 196 THE ADIRONDACS 
 
 His brief toilette : at night, or in the rain, 
 
 He dons a surcoat which he doffs at morn : 
 
 A paddle in the right hand, or an oar, 
 
 And in the left, a gun, his needful arms. 79 
 
 By turns we praised the stature of our guides, 
 
 Their rival strength and suppleness, their skill 
 
 To row, to swim, to shoot, to build a camp, 
 
 To climb a lofty stem, clean without boughs 
 
 Full fifty feet, and bring the eaglet down : 
 
 Temper to face wolf, bear, or catamount, 
 
 And wit to trap or take him in his lair. 
 
 Sound, ruddy men, frolic and innocent, 
 
 In winter, lumberers ; in summer, guides ; 
 
 Their sinewy arms pull at the oar untired 
 
 Three times ten thousand strokes, from morn to eve. 
 
 Look to yourselves, ye polished gentlemen ! 
 No city airs or arts pass current here. 92 
 
 Your rank is all reversed : let men of cloth 
 Bow to the stalwart churls in overalls : 
 They are the doctors of the wilderness, 
 And we the low-prized laymen. 
 In sooth, red flannel is a saucy test 
 Which few can put on with impunity. 
 What make you, master, fumbling at the oar ? 
 Will you catch crabs ? Truth tries pretension here. 
 The sallow knows the basket-maker s thumb ; 
 The oar, the guide s. Dare you accept the tasks 
 He shall impose, to find a spring, trap foxes, 103 
 Tell the sun s time, determine the true north, 
 Or stumbling on through vast self-similar woods 
 To thread by night the nearest way to camp ?
 
 THE ADIRONDACS 197 
 
 Ask you, how went the hours ? 
 All day we swept the lake, searched every cove, 
 North from Camp Maple, south to Osprey Bay, 
 Watching when the loud dogs should drive in deer, 
 Or whipping its rough surface for a trout ; m 
 Or bathers, diving from the rock at noon ; 
 Challenging Echo by our guns and cries ; 
 Or listening to the laughter of the loon ; 
 Or, in the evening twilight s latest red, 
 Beholding the procession of the pines ; 
 Or, later yet, beneath a lighted jack, 
 In the boat s bows, a silent night-hunter 
 Stealing with paddle to the feeding-grounds 
 Of the red deer, to aim at a square mist. 120 
 
 Hark to that muffled roar ! a tree in the woods 
 Is fallen : but hush ! it has not scared the buck 
 Who stands astonished at the meteor light, 
 Then turns to bound away, is it too late ? 
 
 Sometimes we tried our rifles at a mark, 
 Six rods, sixteen, twenty, or forty-five ; 
 Sometimes our wits at sally and retort, 
 With laughter sudden as the crack of rifle ; 
 Or parties scaled the near acclivities 
 Competing seekers of a rumoured lake, 130 
 
 Whose unauthenticated waves we named 
 Lake Probability, our carbuncle, 
 Long sought, not found. 
 
 Two Doctors in the camp 
 
 Dissected the slain deer, weighed the trout s brain, 
 Captured the lizard, salamander, shrew,
 
 198 THE ADIRONDACS 
 
 Crab, mice, snail, dragon-fly, minnow, and moth ; 
 
 Insatiate skill in water or in air 
 
 Waved the scoop-net, and nothing came amiss ; 
 
 The while, one leaden pot of alcohol 
 
 Gave an impartial tomb to all the kinds. 140 
 
 Not less the ambitious botanist sought plants, 
 
 Orchis and gentian, fern, and long whip-scirpus, 
 
 Rosy polygonum, lake-margin s pride, 
 
 Hypnum and hydnum, mushroom, sponge, and moss, 
 
 Or harebell nodding in the gorge of falls. 
 
 Above, the eagle flew, the osprey screamed, 
 
 The raven croaked, owls hooted, the woodpecker 
 
 Loud hammered, and the heron rose in the swamp. 
 
 As water poured through the hollows of the hills 
 
 To feed this wealth of lakes and rivulets, 150 
 
 So Nature shed all beauty lavishly 
 
 From her redundant horn. 
 
 Lords of this realm, 
 
 Bounded by dawn and sunset, and the day 
 Rounded by hours where each outdid the last 
 In miracles of pomp, we must be proud, 
 As if associates of the sylvan gods. 
 We seemed the dwellers of the zodiac, 
 So pure the Alpine element we breathed, 
 So light, so lofty pictures came and went. 
 We trode on air, contemned the distant town, 160 
 Its timorous ways, big trifles, and we planned 
 That we should build, hard-by, a spacious lodge, 
 And how we should come hither with our sons, 
 Hereafter, willing they, and more adroit.
 
 THE ADIRONDACS 199 
 
 Hard fare, hard bed, and comic misery, 
 The midge, the blue-fly, and the mosquito 
 Painted our necks, hands, ankles, with red bands : 
 But, on the second day, we heed them not, 
 Nay, we saluted them Auxiliaries, 
 Whom earlier we had chid with spiteful names. 
 For who defends our leafy tabernacle 171 
 
 From bold intrusion of the travelling crowd, 
 Who but the midge, mosquito, and the fly, 
 Which past endurance sting the tender cit, 
 But which we learn to scatter with a smudge, 
 Or baffle by a veil, or slight by scorn ? 
 
 Our foaming ale we drunk from hunters pans, 
 Ale, and a sup of wine. Our steward gave 
 Venison and trout, potatoes, beans, wheat-bread ; 
 All ate like abbots, and, if any missed 180 
 
 Their wonted convenance, cheerly hid the loss 
 With hunters appetite and peals of mirth. 
 And Stillman, our guides guide, and Commodore, 
 Crusoe, Crusader, Pius Aeneas, said aloud, 
 Chronic dyspepsia never came from eating 
 Food indigestible : then murmured some, 
 Others applauded him who spoke the truth. 
 
 Nor doubt but visitings of graver thought 
 Checked in these souls the turbulent heyday 
 Mid all the hints and glories of the home. 190 
 
 For who can tell what sudden privacies 
 Were sought and found, amid the hue and cry 
 Of scholars furloughed from their tasks, and let 
 Into this Oreads fended Paradise,
 
 200 THE ADIRONDACS 
 
 As chapels in the city s thoroughfares, 
 Whither gaunt Labour slips to wipe his brow, 
 And meditate a moment on Heaven s rest. 
 Judge with what sweet surprises Nature spoke 
 To each apart, lifting her lovely shows 
 To spiritual lessons pointed home. 200 
 
 And as through dreams in watches of the night, 
 So through all creatures in their form and ways 
 Some mystic hint accosts the vigilant, 
 Not clearly voiced, but waking a new sense 
 Inviting to new knowledge, one with old. 
 Hark to that petulant chirp ! what ails the warbler ? 
 Mark his capricious ways to draw the eye. 
 Now soar again. What wilt thou, restless bird, 
 Seeking in that chaste blue a bluer light, 
 Thirsting in that pure for a purer sky ? 210 
 
 And presently the sky is changed ; world 1 
 What pictures and what harmonies are thine I 
 The clouds are rich and dark, the air serene, 
 So like the soul of me, what if t were me ? 
 A melancholy better than all mirth. 
 Comes the sweet sadness at the retrospect, 
 Or at the foresight of obscurer years ? 
 Like yon slow-sailing cloudy promontory, 
 Whereon the purple iris dwells in beauty 
 Superior to all its gaudy skirts. 220 
 
 And, that no day of life may lack romance, 
 The spiritual stars rise nightly, shedding down 
 A private beam into each several heart. 
 Daily the bending skies solicit man, 
 The seasons chariot him from this exile,
 
 THE ADIRONDACS 201 
 
 The rainbow hours bedeck his glowing chair, 
 The storm-winds urge the heavy weeks along, 
 Suns haste to set, that so remoter lights 
 Beckon the wanderer to his vaster home. 
 
 With a vermilion pencil mark the day 230 
 
 When of our little fleet three cruising skiffs 
 Entering Big Tupper, bound for the foaming Falls 
 Of Loud Bog River, suddenly confront 
 Two of our mates returning with swift oars. 
 One held a printed journal waving high 
 Caught from a late-arriving traveller, 
 Big with great news, and shouted the report 
 For which the world had waited, now firm fact, 
 Of the wire-cable laid beneath the sea, 
 And landed on our coast, and pulsating 240 
 
 With ductile fire. Loud, exulting cries 
 From boat to boat, and to the echoes round, 
 Greet the glad miracle. Thought s new-found path 
 Shall supplement henceforth all trodden ways, 
 Match God s equator with a zone of art, 
 And lift man s public action to a height 
 Worthy the enormous clouds of witnesses, 
 When linked hemispheres attest his deed. 
 We have few moments in the longest life 
 Of such delight and wonder as there grew, 250 
 Nor yet unsuited to that solitude : 
 A burst of joy, as if we told the fact 
 To ears intelligent ; as if grey rock 
 And cedar grove and cliff and lake should know 
 This feat of wit, this triumph of mankind ; 
 As if we men were talking in a vein
 
 202 THE ADIRONDACS 
 
 Of sympathy so large, that ours was theirs, 
 And a prime end of the most subtle element 
 Were fairly reached at last. Wake, echoing caves ! 
 Bend nearer, faint day-moon ! Yon thundertops, 
 Let them hear well ! t is theirs as much as ours. 
 
 A spasm throbbing through the pedestals 262 
 Of Alp and Andes, isle and continent, 
 Urging astonished Chaos with a thrill 
 To be a brain, or serve the brain of man. 
 The lightning has run masterless too long ; 
 He must to school, and learn his verb and noun, 
 And teach his nimbleness to earn his wage, 
 Spelling with guided tongue man s messages 
 Shot through the weltering pit of the salt sea. 
 And yet I marked, even in the manly joy 271 
 
 Of our great-hearted Doctor in his boat, 
 (Perchance I erred,) a shade of discontent ; 
 Or was it for mankind a generous shame, 
 As of a luck not quite legitimate, 
 Since fortune snatched from wit the lion s part ? 
 Was it a college pique of town and gown, 
 As one within whose memory it burned 
 That not academicians, but some lout, 
 Found ten years since the Calif ornian gold ? 280 
 And now, again, a hungry company 
 Of traders, led by corporate sons of trade, 
 Perversely borrowing from the shop the toola 
 Of science, not from the philosophers, 
 Had won the brightest laurel of all time. 
 T was always thus, and will be ; hand and head 
 Are ever rivals : but, though this be swift,
 
 THE ADIRONDACS 203 
 
 The other slow, this the Prometheus, 
 
 And that the Jove, yet, howsoever hid, 
 
 It was from Jove the other stole his fire, 290 
 
 And, .without Jove, the good had never been. 
 
 It is not Iroquois or cannibals, 
 
 But ever the free race with front sublime, 
 
 And these instructed by their wisest too, 
 
 Who do the feat, and lift humanity. 
 
 Let not him mourn who best entitled was, 
 
 Nay, mourn not one : let him exult, 
 
 Yea, plant the tree that bears best apples, plant, 
 
 And water it with wine, nor watch askance 
 
 Whether thy sons or strangers eat the fruit : 300 
 
 Enough that mankind eat, and are refreshed. 
 
 We flee away from cities, but we bring 
 The best of cities with us, these learned classifiers, 
 Men knowing what they seek, armed eyes of experts, 
 We praise the guide, we praise the forest life ; 
 But will we sacrifice our dear-bought lore 
 Of books and arts and trained experiment, 
 Or count the Sioux a match for Agassiz ? 
 no, not we ! Witness the shout that shook 
 Wild Tupper Lake ; witness the mute all-hail 
 The joyful traveller gives, when on the verge 
 Of craggy Indian wilderness he hears 312 
 
 From a log-cabin stream Beethoven s notes 
 On the piano, played with master s hand. 
 Well done ! he cries ; the bear is kept at bay, 
 The lynx, the rattlesnake, the flood, the fire ; 
 All the fierce enemies, ague, hunger, cold, 
 This thin spruce roof, this clayed log-wall,
 
 204 THE ADIRONDACS 
 
 This wild plantation will suffice to chase. 
 
 Now speed the gay celerities of art, 320 
 
 What in the desert was impossible 
 
 Within four walls is possible again, 
 
 Culture and libraries, mysteries of skill, 
 
 Traditioned fame of masters, eager strife 
 
 Of keen competing youths, joined or alone 
 
 To outdo each other, and extort applause. 
 
 Mind wakes a new-born giant from her sleep. 
 
 Twirl the old wheels ! Time takes fresh start again, 
 
 On for a thousand years of genius more. 
 
 The holidays were fruitful, but must end ; 330 
 One August evening had a cooler breath ; 
 Into each mind intruding duties crept ; 
 Under the cinders burned the fires of home ; 
 Nay, letters found us in our paradise ; 
 So in the gladness of the new event 
 We struck our camp, and left the happy hills. 
 The fortunate star that rose on us sank not ; 
 The prodigal sunshine rested on the land, 
 The rivers gambolled onward to the sea, 
 And Nature, the inscrutable and mute, 340 
 
 Permitted on her infinite repose 
 Almost a smile to steal to cheer her sons, 
 As if one riddle of the Sphinx were guessed.
 
 OCCASIONAL AND MISCELLANEOUS 
 PIECES 
 
 BRAHMA 
 
 IF the red slayer think he slays, 
 Or if the slain think he is slain, 
 
 They know well the subtle ways 
 I keep, and pass, and turn again. 
 
 Far or forgot to me is near ; 
 
 Shadow and sunlight are the same ; 
 The vanquished gods to me appear ; 
 
 And one to me are shame and fame. 
 
 They reckon ill who leave me out ; 
 
 When me they fly, I am the wings ; 10 
 
 I am the doubter and the doubt, 
 
 And I the hymn the Brahmin sings. 
 
 The strong gods pine for my abode, 
 And pine in vain the sacred Seven ; 
 
 But thou, meek lover of the good ! 
 
 Find me, and turn thy back on heaven.
 
 206 
 
 NEMESIS 
 
 ALREADY blushes in thy cheek 
 
 The bosom-thought which thou must speak ; 
 
 The bird, how far it haply roam 
 
 By cloud or isle, is flying home ; 
 
 The maiden fears, and fearing runs 
 
 Into the charmed snare she shuns ; 
 
 And every man, in love or pride, 
 
 Of his fate is never wide. 
 
 Will a woman s fan the ocean smooth ? 
 Or prayers the stony Parcae soothe, i 
 
 Or coax the thunder from its mark ? 
 Or tapers light the chaos dark ? 
 In spite of Virtue and the Muse, 
 Nemesis will have her dues, 
 And all our struggles and our toils 
 Tighter wind the giant coils.
 
 207 
 
 FATE 
 
 DEEP in the man sits fast his fate 
 
 To mould his fortunes mean or great : 
 
 Unknown to Cromwell as to me 
 
 Was Cromwell s measure or degree ; 
 
 Unknown to him, as to his horse, 
 
 If he than his groom be better or worse. 
 
 He works, plots, fights, in rude affairs, 
 
 With squires, lords, kings, his craft compares, 
 
 Till late he learned, through doubt and fear, 
 
 Broad England harboured not his peer : 
 
 Obeying Time, the last to own 
 
 The Genius from its cloudy throne. 
 
 For the prevision is allied 
 
 Unto the thing so signified ; 
 
 Or say, the foresight that awaits 
 
 Is the same Genius that creates.
 
 208 
 
 FREEDOM 
 
 ONCE I wished I might rehearse 
 
 Freedom s paean in my verse, 
 
 That the slave who caught the strain 
 
 Should throb until he snapped his chain. 
 
 But the Spirit said, Not so ; 
 
 Speak it not, or speak it low ; 
 
 Name not lightly to be said, 
 
 Gift too precious to be prayed, 
 
 Passion not to be expressed 
 
 But by heaving of the breast : 
 
 Yet, wouldst thou the mountain find 
 
 Where this deity is shrined, 
 
 Who gives to seas and sunset skies 
 
 Their unspent beauty of surprise, 
 
 And, when it lists him, waken can 
 
 Brute or savage into man ; 
 
 Or, if in thy heart he shine, 
 
 Blends the starry fates with thine, 
 
 Draws angels nigh to dwell with thee, 
 
 And makes thy thoughts archangels be ; 
 
 Freedom s secret wilt thou know ? 
 
 Counsel not with flesh and blood ; 
 
 Loiter not for cloak or food ; 
 
 Right thou feelest, rush to do.
 
 209 
 ODE SUNG IN THE TOWN HALL 
 
 CONCORD, JULY 4, 1857 
 
 TENDERLY the haughty day 
 
 Fills his blue urn with fire ; 
 One morn is in the mighty heaven, 
 
 And one in our desire. 
 
 The cannon booms from town to town, 
 
 Our pulses are not less, 
 The joy-bells chime their tidings down, 
 
 Which children s voices bless. 
 
 For He that flung the broad blue fold 
 
 O er-mantling land and sea, 
 One third part of the sky unrolled 
 
 For the banner of the free. 
 
 The men are ripe of Saxon kind 
 
 To build an equal state, 
 To take the statute from the mind, 
 
 And make of duty fate. 
 
 United States ! the ages plead, 
 Present and Past in under-song, 
 
 Go put your creed into your deed, 
 Nor speak with double tongue. 
 
 For sea and land don t understand, 
 
 Nor skies without a frown 
 See rights for which the one hand fights 
 
 By the other cloven down.
 
 210 ODE SUNG IN THE TOWN HALL 
 
 Be just at home ; then write your scroll 
 
 Of honour o er the sea, 
 And bid the broad Atlantic roll, 
 
 A ferry of the free. 
 
 And, henceforth, there shall be no chain, 
 Save underneath the sea 30 
 
 The wires shall murmur through the main 
 Sweet songs of LIBERTY. 
 
 The conscious stars accord above, 
 
 The waters wild below, 
 And under, through the cable wove, 
 
 Her fiery errands go. 
 
 For He that worketh high and wise, 
 
 Nor pauses in his plan, 
 Will take the sun out of the skies 
 
 Ere freedom out of man. 40
 
 211 
 
 BOSTON HYMN 
 
 READ IN Music HALL, JANUARY 1, 1863 
 
 THE word of the Lord by night 
 To the watching Pilgrims came 
 As they sat by the seaside, 
 And filled their hearts with flame. 
 
 God said, I am tired of kings, 
 I suffer them no more ; 
 Up to my ear the morning brings 
 The outrage of the poor. 
 
 Think ye I made this ball 
 A field of havoc and war, 10 
 
 Where tyrants great and tyrants small 
 Might harry the weak and poor ? 
 
 My angel, his name is Freedom, 
 Choose him to be your king ; 
 He shall cut pathways east and west, 
 And fend you with his wing. 
 
 Lo ! I uncover the land 
 
 Which I hid of old time in the West, 
 
 As the sculptor uncovers the statue 
 
 When he has wrought his best ; 20 
 
 I show Columbia, of the rocks 
 Which dip their foot in the seas, 
 And soar to the air-borne flocks 
 Of clouds, and the boreal fleece. 
 p 2
 
 212 BOSTON HYMN 
 
 I will divide my goods ; 
 Call in the wretch and slave : 
 None shall rule but the humble, 
 And none but Toil shall have. 
 
 I will have never a noble, 
 
 No lineage counted great ; 30 
 
 Fishers and choppers and ploughmen 
 
 Shall constitute a state. 
 
 Go, cut down trees in the forest, 
 And trim the straightest boughs ; 
 Cut down trees in the forest, 
 And build me a wooden house. 
 
 Call the people together, 
 
 The young men and the sires, 
 
 The digger in the harvest field, 
 
 Hireling, and him that hires ; 40 
 
 And here in a pine state-house 
 They shall choose men to rule 
 In every needful faculty, 
 In church, and state, and school. 
 
 Lo, now ! if these poor men 
 Can govern the land and sea, 
 And make just laws below the sun, 
 As planets faithful be. 
 
 And ye shall succour men ; 
 T is nobleness to serve ; 53 
 
 Help them who cannot help again : 
 Beware from right to swerve.
 
 BOSTON HYMN 213 
 
 I break your bonds and masterships, 
 And I unchain the slave : 
 Free be his heart and hand henceforth 
 As wind and wandering wave. 
 
 I cause from every creature 
 
 His proper good to flow : 
 
 As much as he is and doeth, 
 
 So much he shall bestow. 60 
 
 But laying hands on another 
 To coin his labour and sweat, 
 He goes in pawn to his victim 
 For eternal years in debt. 
 
 To-day unbind the captive, 
 So only are ye unbound ; 
 Lift up a people from the dust, 
 Trump of their rescue, sound ! 
 
 Pay ransom to the owner, 
 
 And fill the bag to the brim. 70 
 
 Who is the owner ? The slave is owner, 
 And ever was. Pay him. 
 
 O North ! give him beauty for rags, 
 And honour, South ! for his shame ; 
 Nevada ! coin thy golden crags 
 With Freedom s image and name 
 
 Up ! and the dusky race 
 
 That sat in darkness long, 
 
 Be swift their feet as antelopes, 
 
 And as behemoth strong. 80
 
 214 BOSTON HYMN 
 
 Come, East and West and North, 
 By races, as snow-flakes, 
 And carry my purpose forth, 
 Which neither halts nor shakes. 
 
 My will fulfilled shall be, 
 
 For, in daylight or in dark, 
 
 My thunderbolt has eyes to SBS 
 
 His way home to the mark. 88
 
 215 
 
 VOLUNTARIES 
 
 I 
 
 Low and mournful be the strain, 
 Haughty thought be far from me ; 
 Tones of penitence and pain, 
 Meanings of the tropic sea ; 
 Low and tender in the cell 
 Where a captive sits in chains, 
 Crooning ditties treasured well 
 From his Afric s torrid plains. 
 Sole estate his sire bequeathed 
 Hapless sire to hapless son 
 Was the wailing song he breathed, 
 And his chain when life was done. 
 
 What his fault, or what his crime ? 
 Or what ill planet crossed his prime ? 
 Heart too soft and will too weak 
 To front the fate that crouches near, 
 Dove beneath the vulture s beak ; 
 Will song dissuade the thirsty spear ? 
 Dragged from his mother s arms and breast, 
 Displaced, disfurnished here, 
 His wistful toil to do his best 
 Chilled by a ribald jeer. 
 Great men in the Senate sate, 
 Sage and hero, side by side, 
 Building for their sons the State,
 
 216 VOLUNTARIES 
 
 Which they shall rule with pride. 
 
 They forbore to break the chain 
 
 Which bound the dusky tribe, 
 
 Checked by the owners fierce disdain, 
 
 Lured by Union as the bribe. 30 
 
 Destiny sat by, and said, 
 
 Pang for pang your seed shall pay, 
 
 Hide in false peace your coward head, 
 
 I bring round the harvest-day. 
 
 II 
 
 FREEDOM all winged expands, 
 Nor perches in a narrow place ; 
 Her broad van seeks unplanted lands ; 
 She loves a poor and virtuous race. 
 Clinging to a colder zone 
 
 Whose dark sky sheds the snow-flake down, 40 
 The snow-flake is her banner s star, 
 Her stripes the boreal streamers are. 
 Long she loved the Northman well : 
 Now the iron age is done, 
 She will not refuse to dwell 
 With the offspring of the Sun ; 
 Foundling of the desert far, 
 Where palms plume, siroccos blaze, 
 He roves unhurt the burning ways 
 In climates of the summer star. 50 
 
 He has avenues to God 
 Hid from men of Northern brain, 
 Far beholding, without cloud, 
 What these with slowest steps attain.
 
 VOLUNTARIES 217 
 
 If once the generous chief arrive 
 To lead him willing to be led, 
 For freedom he will strike and strive, 
 And drain his heart till he be dead. 
 
 Ill 
 
 IN an age of fops and toys, 
 
 Wanting wisdom, void of right, 60 
 
 Who shall nerve heroic boys 
 To hazard all in Freedom s fight, 
 Break sharply off their jolly games 
 Forsake their comrades gay, 
 And quit proud homes and youthful dames, 
 For famine, toil, and fray ? 
 Yet on the nimble air benign 
 Speed nimbler messages, 
 That waft the breath of grace divine 
 To hearts in sloth and ease. 70 
 
 So nigh is grandeur to our dust, 
 So near is God to man, 
 When Duty whispers low, Thou must, 
 The youth replies, / can. 
 
 IV 
 
 O, WELL for the fortunate soul 
 Which Music s wings infold, 
 Stealing away the memory 
 Of sorrows new and old ! 
 Yet happier he whose inward sight, 
 Stayed on his subtile thought, 80 
 
 Shuts his sense on toys of time, 
 To vacant bosoms brought.
 
 218 VOLUNTARIES 
 
 But best befriended of the God 
 
 He who, in evil times, 
 
 Warned by an inward voice, 
 
 Heeds not the darkness and the dread, 
 
 Biding by his rule and choice, 
 
 Feeling only the fiery thread 
 
 Leading over heroic ground, 
 
 Walled with mortal terror round, 90 
 
 To the aim which him allures, 
 
 And the sweet heaven his deed secures. 
 
 Stainless soldier on the walls, 
 
 Knowing this, and knows no more, 
 
 Whoever fights, whoever falls, 
 
 Justice conquers evermore, 
 
 Justice after as before, 
 
 And he who battles on her side, 
 
 God, though he were ten times slain, 
 
 Crowns him victor glorified, 100 
 
 Victor over death and pain ; 
 
 Forever : but his erring foe, 
 
 Self-assured that he prevails, 
 
 Looks from his victim lying low, 
 
 And sees aloft the red right arm 
 
 Redress the eternal scales. 
 
 He, the poor foe, whom angels foil, 
 
 Blind with pride, and fooled by hate, 
 
 Writhes within the dragon coil, 
 
 Reserved to a speechless fate. no
 
 VOLUNTAKIES 219 
 
 V 
 
 BLOOMS the laurel which belongs 
 
 To the valiant chief who fights ; 
 
 I see the wreath, I hear the songs 
 
 Lauding the Eternal Rights, 
 
 Victors over daily wrongs : 
 
 Awful victors, they misguide 
 
 Whom they will destroy, 
 
 And their coming triumph hide 
 
 In our downfall, or our joy : 
 
 They reach no term, they never sleep, 120 
 
 In equal strength through space abide ; 
 
 Though, feigning dwarfs, they crouch and creep, 
 
 The strong they slay, the swift outstride : 
 
 Fate s grass grows rank in valley clods, 
 
 And rankly on the castled steep, 
 
 Speak it firmly, these are gods, 
 
 All are ghosts beside.
 
 220 
 
 LOVE AND THOUGHT 
 
 Two well-assorted travellers use 
 The highway, Eros and the Muse. 
 From the twins is nothing hidden, 
 To the pair is naught forbidden ; 
 Hand in hand the comrades go 
 Every nook of nature through : 
 Each for other they were born, 
 Each can other best adorn ; 
 They know one only mortal grief 
 Past all balsam or relief, 
 When, by false companions crossed, 
 The pilgrims have each other lost.
 
 221 
 
 LOVER S PETITION 
 
 GOOD Heart, that ownest all ! 
 
 I ask a modest boon and small : 
 
 Not of lands and towns the gift, 
 
 Too large a load for me to lift, 
 
 But for one proper creature, 
 
 Which geographic eye, 
 
 Sweeping the map of Western earth, 
 
 Or the Atlantic coast, from Maine 
 
 To Powhatan s domain, 
 
 Could not descry. 10 
 
 Is t much to ask in all thy huge creation, 
 
 So trivial a part, 
 
 A solitary heart ? 
 
 Yet count me not of spirit mean, 
 
 Or mine a mean demand, 
 
 For t is the concentration 
 
 And worth of all the land, 
 
 The sister of the sea, 
 
 The daughter of the strand, 
 
 Composed of air and light, 20 
 
 And of the swart earth-might. 
 
 So little to thy poet s prayer 
 
 Thy large bounty well can spare. 
 
 And yet I think, if she were gone, 
 
 The world were better left alone.
 
 222 
 
 UNA 
 
 ROVING, roving, as it seems, 
 Una lights my clouded dreams ; 
 Still for journeys she is dressed ; 
 We wander far by east and west. 
 
 In the homestead, homely thought ; 
 At my work I ramble not ; 
 If from home chance draw me wide, 
 Half -seen Una sits beside. 
 
 In my house and garden-plot, 
 
 Though beloved, I miss her not ; 10 
 
 But one I seek in foreign places, 
 
 One face explore in foreign faces. 
 
 At home a deeper thought may light 
 The inward sky with chrysolite, 
 And I greet from far the ray, 
 Aurora of a dearer day. 
 
 But if upon the seas I sail, 
 
 Or trundle on the glowing rail, 
 
 I am but a thought of hers, 
 
 Loveliest of travellers. 20 
 
 So the gentle poet s name 
 To foreign parts is blown by fame ; 
 Seek him in his native town, 
 He is hidden and unknown.
 
 223 
 
 LETTERS 
 
 EVERY day brings a ship, 
 Every ship brings a word ; 
 Well for those who have no fear, 
 Looking seaward well assured 
 That the word the vessel brings 
 Is the word they wish to hear.
 
 224 
 
 RUBIES 
 
 THEY brought me rubies from the mine, 
 
 And held them to the sun ; 
 I said, they are drops of frozen wine 
 
 From Eden s vats that run. 
 
 I looked again, I thought them hearts 
 
 Of friends to friends unknown ; 
 Tides that should warm each neighbouring life 
 
 Are locked in sparkling stone. 
 
 But fire to thaw that ruddy snow, 
 
 To break enchanted ice, i 
 
 And give love s scarlet tides to flow, 
 
 When shall that sun arise ?
 
 225 
 
 MERLIN S SONG 
 
 OF Merlin wise I learned a song, 
 
 Sing it low, or sing it loud, 
 
 It is mightier than the strong, 
 
 And punishes the proud. 
 
 I sing it to the surging crowd, 
 
 Good men it will calm and cheer, 
 
 Bad men it will chain and cage. 
 
 In the heart of the music peals a strain 
 
 Which only angels hear ; 
 
 Whether it waken joy or rage, 
 
 Hushed myriads hark in vain, 
 
 Yet they who hear it shed their age, 
 
 And take their youth again.
 
 226 
 
 THE TEST 
 
 (Musa loquitur.) 
 
 I HUNG my verses in the wind, 
 
 Time and tide their faults may find. 
 
 All were winnowed through and through, 
 
 Five lines lasted sound and true ; 
 
 Five were smelted in a pot 
 
 Than the South more fierce and hot ; 
 
 These the siroc could not melt, 
 
 Fire their fiercer flaming felt, 
 
 And the meaning was more white 
 
 Than July s meridian light. 
 
 Sunshine cannot bleach the snow, 
 
 Nor time unmake what poets know. 
 
 Have you eyes to find the five 
 
 Which five hundred did survive ?
 
 227 
 
 SOLUTION 
 
 I AM the Muse who sung alway 
 By Jove, at dawn of the first day. 
 Star-crowned, sole-sitting, long I wrought 
 To fire the stagnant earth with thought : 
 On spawning slime my song prevails, 
 Wolves shed their fangs, and dragons scales ; 
 Flushed in the sky the sweet May-morn, 
 Earth smiled with flowers, and man was born. 
 Then Asia yeaned her shepherd race, 
 And Nile substructs her granite base, 
 Tented Tartary, columned Nile, 
 And, under vines, on rocky isle, 
 Or on wind-blown sea-marge bleak, 
 Forward stepped the perfect Greek : 
 That wit and joy might find a tongue, 
 And earth grow civil, HOMER sung. 
 
 Flown to Italy from Greece, 
 I brooded long, and held my peace, 
 For I am wont to sing uncalled, 
 And in days of evil plight 
 Unlock doors of new delight ; 
 And sometimes mankind I appalled 
 With a bitter horoscope, 
 With spasms of terror for balm of hope. 
 Then by better thought I lead 
 Bards to speak what nations need ; 
 So I folded me in fears, 
 And DANTE searched the triple spheres, 
 Q2
 
 228 SOLUTION 
 
 Moulding nature at his will, 
 
 So shaped, so coloured, swift or still, 30 
 
 And, sculptor-like, his large design 
 
 Etched on Alp and Apennine. 
 
 Seethed in mists of Penmanmaur, 
 Taught by Plinlimmon s Druid power, 
 England s genius filled all measure 
 Of heart and soul, of strength and pleasure, 
 Gave to the mind its emperor, 
 And life was larger than before : 
 Nor sequent centuries could hit 
 Orbit and sum of SHAKESPEARE S wit. 40 
 
 The men who lived with him became 
 Poets, for the air was fame. 
 
 Far in the North, where polar night 
 Holds in check the frolic light, 
 In trance upborne past mortal goal 
 The Swede EMANUEL leads the soul. 
 Through snows above, mines underground, 
 The inks of Erebus he found ; 
 Rehearsed to men the damned wails 
 On which the seraph music sails. 50 
 
 In spirit-worlds he trod alone, 
 But walked the earth unmarked, unknown. 
 The near by-stander caught no sound, 
 Yet they who listened far aloof 
 Heard rendings of the skyey roof, 
 And felt, beneath, the quaking ground ; 
 And his air-sown, unheeded words, 
 In the next age, are flaming swords.
 
 SOLUTION 229 
 
 In newer days of war and trade, 
 Romance forgot, and faith decayed, 60 
 
 When Science armed and guided war, 
 And clerks the Janus-gates unbar, 
 When France, where poet never grew, 
 Halved and dealt the globe anew, 
 GOETHE, raised o er joy and strife, 
 Drew the firm lines of Fate and Life, 
 And brought Olympian wisdom down 
 To court and mart, to gown and town ; 
 Stooping, his finger wrote in clay 
 The open secret of to-day. 70 
 
 So bloom the unfading petals five, 
 And verses that all verse outlive.
 
 NATURE AND LIFE 
 
 i 
 
 WINTERS know 
 
 Easily to shed the snow, 
 
 And the untaught Spring is wise 
 
 In cowslips and anemones. 
 
 Nature, hating art and pains, 
 
 Baulks and baffles plotting brains ; 
 
 Casualty and Surprise 
 
 Are the apples of her eyes ; 
 
 But she dearly loves the poor, 
 
 And, by marvel of her own, 10 
 
 Strikes the loud pretender down. 
 
 For Nature listens in the rose, 
 
 And hearkens in the berry s bell, 
 
 To help her friends, to plague her foes, 
 
 And like wise God she judges well. 
 
 Yet doth much her love excel 
 
 To the souls that never fell, 
 
 To swains that live in happiness, 
 
 And do well because they please, 
 
 Who walk in ways that are unfamed, 20 
 
 And feats achieve before they re named.
 
 231 
 
 NATURE 
 
 II 
 
 SHE is gamesome and good, 
 But of mutable mood, 
 No dreary repeater now and again, 
 She will be all things to all men. 
 She who is old, but nowise feeble, 
 Pours her power into the people, 
 Merry and manifold without bar, 
 Makes and moulds them what they are, 
 And what they call their city way 
 Is not their way, but hers, 
 And what they say they made to-day, 
 They learned of the oaks and firs, 
 She spawneth men as mallows fresh, 
 Hero and maiden, flesh of her flesh ; 
 She drugs her water and her wheat 
 With the flavours she finds meet, 
 And gives them what to drink and eat ; 
 And having thus their bread and growth, 
 They do her bidding, nothing loath. 
 What s most theirs is not their own, 
 But borrowed in atoms from iron and stone, 
 And in their vaunted works of Art 
 The master-stroke is still her part.
 
 232 
 
 THE ROMANY GIRL 
 
 THE sun goes down, and with him takes 
 The coarseness of my poor attire ; 
 The fair moon mounts, and aye the flame 
 Of Gypsy beauty blazes higher. 
 
 Pale Northern girls ! you scorn our race ; 
 You captives of your air-tight halls, 
 Wear out in-doors your sickly days, 
 But leave us the horizon walls. 
 
 And if I take you, dames, to task, 
 And say it frankly without guile, 
 Then you are Gypsies in a mask, 
 And I the lady all the while. 
 
 If, on the heath, below the moon, 
 I court and play with paler blood, 
 Me false to mine dare whisper none, 
 One sallow horseman knows me good. 
 
 Go, keep your cheek s rose from the rain, 
 For teeth and hair with shopmen deal ; 
 My swarthy tint is in the grain, 
 The rocks and forest know it real. 
 
 The wild air bloweth in our lungs, 
 The keen stars twinkle in our eyes, 
 The birds gave us our wily tongues, 
 The panther in our dances flies.
 
 THE ROMANY GIRL 233 
 
 You doubt we read the stars on high, 
 Nathless we read your fortunes true ; 
 The stars may hide in the upper sky, 
 But without glass we fathom you.
 
 234 
 
 DAYS 
 
 DAMSELS of Time, the hypocritic Days, 
 
 Muffled and dumb like barefoot dervishes, 
 
 And marching single in an endless file, 
 
 Bring diadems and faggots in their hands. 
 
 To each they offer gifts after his will, 
 
 Bread, kingdoms, stars, and sky that holds them all. 
 
 I, in my pleached garden, watched the pomp, 
 
 Forgot my morning wishes, hastily 
 
 Took a few herbs and apples, and the Day 
 
 Turned and departed silent. I, too late, 10 
 
 Under her solemn fillet saw the scorn.
 
 235 
 
 THE CHARTIST S COMPLAINT 
 
 DAY ! hast thou two faces, 
 
 Making one place two places ? 
 
 One, by humble farmer seen, 
 
 Chill and wet, unlighted, mean, 
 
 Useful only, triste and damp, 
 
 Serving for a labourer s lamp ? 
 
 Have the same mists another side, 
 
 To be the appanage of pride, 
 
 Gracing the rich man s wood and lake, 
 
 His park where amber mornings break 10 
 
 And treacherously bright to show 
 
 His planted isle where roses glow ? 
 
 O Day ! and is your mightiness 
 
 A sycophant to smug success ? 
 
 Will the sweet sky and ocean broad 
 
 Be fine accomplices to fraud ? 
 
 Sun ! I curse thy cruel ray : 
 
 Back, back to chaos, harlot Day ! 18
 
 236 
 
 MY GARDEN 
 
 IF I could put my woods in song, 
 And tell what s there enjoyed, 
 All men would to my gardens throng, 
 And leave the cities void. 
 
 In my plot no tulips blow, 
 Snow-loving pines and oaks instead ; 
 And rank the savage maples grow 
 From spring s faint flush to autumn red. 
 
 My garden is a forest ledge 
 
 Which older forests bound ; 
 
 The banks slope down to the blue lake-edge, 
 
 Then plunge to depths profound. 
 
 Here once the Deluge ploughed, 
 Laid the terraces, one by one ; 
 Ebbing later whence it flowed, 
 They bleach and dry in the sun. 
 
 The sowers made haste to depart, 
 The wind and the birds which sowed it ; 
 Not for fame, nor by rules of art, 
 Planted these, and tempests flowed it. 
 
 Waters that wash my garden side 
 Play not in Nature s lawful web, 
 They heed not moon or solar tide, 
 Five years elapse from flood to ebb.
 
 MY GARDEN 237 
 
 Hither hasted, in old time, Jove, 
 And every god, none did refuse ; 
 And be sure at last came Love, 
 And after Love, the Muse. 
 
 Keen ears can catch a syllable, 
 
 As if one spake to another, 30 
 
 In the hemlocks tall, untamable, 
 
 And what the whispering grasses smother. 
 
 Aeolian harps in the pine 
 Ring with the song of the Fates ; 
 Infant Bacchus in the vine, 
 Far distant yet his chorus waits. 
 
 Canst thou copy in verse one chime 
 
 Of the wood-bell s peal and cry, 
 
 Write in a book the morning s prime, 
 
 Or match with words that tender sky ? 40 
 
 Wonderful verse of the gods, 
 Of one import, of varied tone ; 
 They chant the bliss of their abodes 
 To man imprisoned in his own. 
 
 Ever the words of the gods resound ; 
 But the porches of man s ear 
 Seldom in this low life s round 
 Are unsealed, that he may hear. 
 
 Wandering voices in the air, 
 
 And murmurs in the wold, 50 
 
 Speak what I cannot declare, 
 
 Yet cannot all withhold.
 
 238 MY GARDEN 
 
 When the shadow fell on the lake, 
 The whirlwind in ripples wrote 
 Air-bells of fortune that shine and break, 
 And omens above thought. 
 
 But the meanings cleave to the lake, 
 
 Cannot be carried in book or urn ; 
 
 Go thy ways now, come later back, 
 
 On waves and hedges still they burn. 60 
 
 These the fates of men forecast, 
 Of better men than live to-day ; 
 If who can read them comes at last, 
 He will spell in the sculpture, e Stay !
 
 239 
 
 THE TITMOUSE 
 
 You shall not be overbold 
 
 When you deal with arctic cold, 
 
 As late I found my lukewarm blood 
 
 Chilled wading in the snow-choked wood. 
 
 How should I fight ? my foeman fine 
 
 Has million arms to one of mine : 
 
 East, west, for aid I looked in vain, 
 
 East, west, north, south, are his domain. 
 
 Miles off, three dangerous miles, is home ; 
 
 Must borrow his winds who there would come. 
 
 Up and away for life ! be fleet ! 
 
 The frost-king ties my fumbling feet, 
 
 Sings in my ears, my hands are stones, 
 
 Curdles the blood to the marble bones, 
 
 Tugs at the heart-strings, numbs the sense, 
 
 And hems in life with narrowing fence. 
 
 Well, in this broad bed lie and sleep, 
 
 The punctual stars will vigil keep, 
 
 Embalmed by purifying cold, 
 
 The winds shall sing their dead-march old, 
 
 The snow is no ignoble shroud, 
 
 The moon thy mourner, and the cloud. 
 
 Softly, but this way fate was pointing, 
 T was coming fast to such anointing, 
 When piped a tiny voice hard by, 
 Gay and polite, a cheerful cry,
 
 240 THE TITMOUSE 
 
 Chic-chicadeedee ! saucy note 
 
 Out of sound heart and merry throat, 
 
 As if it said, Good day, good sir ! 
 
 Fine afternoon, old passenger ! 30 
 
 Happy to meet you in these places 
 
 Where January brings few faces. 
 
 This poet, though he live apart, 
 Moved by his hospitable heart, 
 Sped, when I passed his sylvan fort, 
 To do the honours of his court, 
 As fits a feathered lord of land ; 
 Flew near, with soft wing grazed my hand, 
 Hopped on the bough, then, darting low, 
 Prints his small impress on the snow, 40 
 
 Shows feats of his gymnastic play, 
 Head downward, clinging to the spray. 
 
 Here was th s atom in full breath, 
 Hurling defiance at vast death ; 
 This scrap of valour just for play 
 Fronts the north-wind in waistcoat grey, 
 As if to shame my weak behaviour ; 
 I greeted loud my little saviour, 
 You pet ! what dost here ? and what for ? 
 In these woods, thy small Labrador, 50 
 
 At this pinch, wee San Salvador ! 
 What fire burns in that little chest 
 So frolic, stout, and self-possest ? 
 Henceforth I wear no stripe but thine ; 
 Ashes and jet all hues outshine. 
 Why are not diamonds black and grey, 
 To ape thy dare-devil array ?
 
 THE TITMOUSE 241 
 
 And I affirm, the spacious North 
 
 Exists to draw thy virtue forth. 
 
 I think no virtue goes with size ; 60 
 
 The reason of all cowardice 
 
 Is, that men are overgrown, 
 
 And, to be valiant, must come down 
 
 To the titmouse dimension. 
 
 Tis good-will makes intelligence, 
 And I began to catch the sense 
 Of my bird s song : Live out of doors, 
 In the great woods, on prairie floors. 
 I dine in the sun ; when he sinks in the sea, 
 I too have a hole in a hollow tree ; 70 
 
 And I like less when Summer beats 
 With stifling beams on these retreats, 
 Than noontide twilights which snow makes 
 With tempest of the blinding flakes. 
 For well the soul, if stout within, 
 Can arm impregnably the skin ; 
 And polar frost my frame defied, 
 Made of the air that blows outside. 
 
 With glad remembrance of my debt, 
 I homeward turn ; farewell, my pet ! 80 
 
 When here again thy pilgrim comes, 
 He shall bring store of seeds and crumbs. 
 Doubt not, so long as earth has bread, 
 Thou first and foremost shalt be fed ; 
 The Providence that is most large 
 Takes hearts like thine in special charge, 
 Helps who for their own need are strong, 
 And the sky dotes on cheerful song. 
 
 EMERSON R
 
 242 THE TITMOUSE 
 
 Henceforth I prize thy wiry chant 
 
 O er all that mass and minster vaunt ; 90 
 
 For men mis-hear thy call in spring, 
 
 As t would accost some frivolous wing, 
 
 Crying out of the hazel copse, Phe-be! 
 
 And, in winter, Chic-a-dee-dee f 
 
 I think old Caesar must have heard 
 
 In northern Gaul my dauntless bird, 
 
 And, echoed in some frosty wold, 
 
 Borrowed thy battle-numbers bold. 
 
 And I will write our annals new, 
 
 And thank thee for a better clew, 100 
 
 I, who dreamed not when I came here 
 
 To find the antidote of fear, 
 
 Now hear thee say in Roman key, 
 
 Paean I Veni, vidi, vici*
 
 SEA-SHORE 
 
 I HEARD or seemed to hear the chiding Sea 
 Say, Pilgrim, why so late and slow to come ? 
 Am I not always here, thy summer home ? 
 Is not my voice thy music, morn and eve ? 
 My breath thy healthful climate in the heats, 
 My touch thy antidote, my bay thy bath ? 
 Was ever building like my terraces ? 
 Was ever couch magnificent as mine ? 
 Lie on the warm rock-ledges, and there learn 
 A little hut suffices like a town. 
 I make your sculptured architecture vain, 
 Vain beside mine. I drive my wedges home, 
 And carve the coastwise mountain into caves. 
 Lo ! here is Rome, and Nineveh, and Thebes, 
 Karnak, and Pyramid, and Giant s Stairs, 
 Half piled or prostrate ; and my newest slab 
 Older than all thy race. 
 
 Behold the Sea, 
 
 The opaline, the plentiful and strong, 
 Yet beautiful as is the rose in June, 
 Fresh as the trickling rainbow of July ; 
 Sea full of food, the nourisher of kinds, 
 Purger of earth, and medicine of men ; 
 Creating a sweet climate by my breath, 
 Washing out harms and griefs from memory, 
 And, in my mathematic ebb and flow, 
 Giving a hint of that which changes not. 
 
 II 2
 
 244 SEA-SHORE 
 
 Rich are the sea-gods : who gives gifts but they ? 
 They grope the sea for pearls, but more than pearls : 
 They pluck Force thence, and give it to the wise. 
 For every wave is wealth to Daedalus, 30 
 
 Wealth to the cunning artist who can work 
 This matchless strength. Where shall he find, 
 
 waves ! 
 A load your Atlas shoulders cannot lift ? 
 
 I with my hammer pounding evermore 
 The rocky coast, smite Andes into dust, 
 Strewing my bed, and, in another age, 
 Rebuild a continent of better men. 
 Then I unbar the doors : my paths lead out 
 The exodus of nations : I disperse 
 Men to all shores that front the hoary main. 40 
 
 I too have arts and sorceries ; 
 Illusion dwells forever with the wave. 
 I know what spells are laid. Leave me to deal 
 With credulous and imaginative man ; 
 For, though he scoop my water in his palm, 
 A few rods off he deems it gems and clouds. 
 Planting strange fruits and sunshine on the shore, 
 I make some coast alluring, some lone isle, 
 To distant men, who must go there, or die. 49
 
 245 
 
 SONG OF NATURE 
 
 MINE are the night and morning, 
 The pits of air, the gulf of space, 
 The sportive sun, the gibbous moon, 
 The innumerable days. 
 
 I hide in the solar glory, 
 I am dumb in the pealing song, 
 I rest on the pitch of the torrent, 
 In slumber I am strong. 
 
 No numbers have counted my tallies, 
 No tribes my house can fill, 
 I sit by the shining Fount of Life, 
 And pour the deluge still ; 
 
 And ever by delicate powers 
 Gathering along the centuries 
 From race on race the rarest flowers, 
 My wreath shall nothing miss. 
 
 And many a thousand summers 
 My apples ripened well, 
 And light from meliorating stars 
 With firmer glory fell.
 
 246 SONG OF NATURE 
 
 I v.*rote the past in characters 
 Of rock and fire the scroll, 
 The building in the coral sea, 
 The planting of the coal. 
 
 And thefts from satellites and rings 
 And broken stars I drew, 
 And out of spent and aged things 
 I formed the world anew ; 
 
 What time the gods kept carnival, 
 
 Tricked out in star and flower, 30 
 
 And in cramp elf and saurian forms 
 
 They swathed their too much power. 
 
 Time and Thought were my surveyors, 
 They laid their courses well, 
 They boiled the sea, and baked the layers 
 Of granite, marl, and shell. 
 
 But he, the man-child glorious, 
 
 Where tarries he the while ? 
 
 The rainbow shines his harbinger, 
 
 The sunset gleams his smile. 4 
 
 My boreal lights leap upward, 
 Forthright my planets roll, 
 And still the man-child is not born, 
 The summit of the whole. 
 
 Must time and tide for ever run ? 
 Will never my winds go sleep in the west ? 
 Will never my wheels which whirl the sun 
 And satellites have rest ?
 
 SONG OF NATURE 247 
 
 Too much of donning and doffing, 
 
 Too slow the rainbow fades, 50 
 
 I weary of my robe of snow, 
 
 My leaves and my cascades ; 
 
 I tire of globes and races, 
 Too long the game is played ; 
 What without him is summer s pomp, 
 Or winter s frozen shade ? 
 
 I travail in pain for him, 
 
 My creatures travail and wait ; 
 
 His couriers come by squadrons, 
 
 He comes not to the gate. 60 
 
 Twice I have moulded an image, 
 And thrice outstretched my hand, 
 Made one of day, and one of night, 
 And one of the salt sea-sand. 
 
 One in a Judaean manger, 
 
 And one by Avon stream, 
 
 One over against the mouths of Nile, 
 
 And one in the Academe. 
 
 I moulded kings and saviours, 
 
 And bards o er kings to rule ; 70 
 
 But fell the starry influence short, 
 
 The cup was never full. 
 
 Yet whirl the glowing wheels once more, 
 And mix the bowl again ; 
 Seethe, Fate ! the ancient elements, 
 Heat, cold, wet, dry, and peace, and pain.
 
 248 SONG OF NATURE 
 
 Let war and trade and creeds and song 
 
 Blend, ripen race on race, 
 
 The sunburnt world a man shall breed 
 
 Of all the zones, and countless days. 80 
 
 No ray is dimmed, no atom worn, 
 My oldest force is good as new, 
 And the fresh rose on yonder thorn 
 Gives back the bending heavens in dew.
 
 249 
 
 TWO RIVERS 
 
 THY summer voice, Musketaquit, 
 
 Repeats the music of the rain ; 
 
 But sweeter rivers pulsing flit 
 
 Through thee, as thou through Concord Plain. 
 
 Thou in thy narrow banks are pent : 
 The stream I love unbounded goes 
 Through flood and sea and firmament ; 
 Through light, through life, it forward flows. 
 
 I see the inundation sweet, 
 
 I hear the spending of the stream 10 
 
 Through years, through men, through nature fleet, 
 Through passion, thought, through power and dream. 
 
 Musketaquit, a goblin strong, 
 Of shard and flint makes jewels gay ; 
 They lose their grief who hear his song, 
 And where he winds is the day of day. 
 
 So forth and brighter fares my stream, 
 
 Who drink it shall not thirst again ; 
 
 No darkness stains its equal gleam, 
 
 And ages drop in it like rain. 20
 
 250 
 
 WALDEINSAMKEIT 
 
 I DO not count the hours I spend 
 In wandering by the sea ; 
 The forest is my loyal friend, 
 Like God it useth me. 
 
 In plains that room for shadows make 
 Of skirting hills to lie, 
 Bound in by streams which give and take 
 Their colours from the sky ; 
 
 Or on the mountain-crest sublime, 
 Or down the oaken glade, 
 what have I to do with time ? 
 For this the day was made. 
 
 Cities of mortals woe-begone 
 Fantastic care derides, 
 But in the serious landscape lone 
 Stern benefit abides. 
 
 Sheen will tarnish, honey cloy, 
 And merry is only a mask of sad, 
 But, sober on a fund of joy, 
 The woods at heart are glad. 
 
 There the great Planter plants 
 Of fruitful worlds the grain, 
 And with a million spells enchants 
 The souls that walk in pain.
 
 WALDEINSAMKEIT 251 
 
 Still on the seeds of all he made 
 
 The rose of beauty burns ; 
 
 Through times that wear, and forms that fade, 
 
 Immortal j^outh returns. 
 
 The black ducks mounting from the lake, 
 The pigeon in the pines, 30 
 
 The bittern s boom, a desert make 
 Which no false art refines. 
 
 Down in yon watery nook, 
 
 Where bearded mists divide, 
 
 The grey old gods whom Chaos knew, 
 
 The sires of Nature, hide. 
 
 Aloft, in secret veins of air, 
 
 Blows the sweet breath of song, 
 
 0, few to scale those uplands dare, 
 
 Though they to all belong ! 40 
 
 See thou bring not to field or stone 
 The fancies found in books ; 
 Leave authors eyes, and fetch your own, 
 To brave the landscape s looks. 
 
 And if, amid this dear delight, 
 My thoughts did home rebound, 
 I well might reckon it a slight 
 To the high cheer I found. 
 
 Oblivion here thy wisdom is, 
 
 Thy thrift, the sleep of cares ; 50 
 
 For a proud idleness like this 
 
 Crowns all thy mean affairs.
 
 252 
 
 TERMINUS 
 
 IT is time to be old, 
 
 To take in sail : 
 
 The god of bounds, 
 
 Who sets to seas a shore, 
 
 Came to me in his fatal rounds, 
 
 And said : No more ! 
 
 No farther spread 
 
 Thy broad ambitious branches, and thy root. 
 
 Fancy departs : no more invent, 
 
 Contract thy firmament 
 
 To compass of a tent. 
 
 There s not enough for this and that, 
 
 Make thy option which of two ; 
 
 Economize the failing river, 
 
 Not the less revere the Giver, 
 
 Leave the many and hold the few. 
 
 Timely wise accept the terms, 
 
 Soften the fall with wary foot ; 
 
 A little while 
 
 Still plan and smile, 
 
 And, fault of novel germs, 
 
 Mature the unfallen fruit. 
 
 Curse, if thou wilt, thy sires, 
 
 Bad husbands of their fires, 
 
 Who, when they gave thee breath, 
 
 Failed to bequeath 
 
 The needful sinew stark as once, 
 
 The Baresark marrow to thy bones,
 
 TERMINUS 253 
 
 But left a legacy of ebbing veins, 
 
 Inconstant heat and nerveless reins, 30 
 
 Amid the Muses, left thee deaf and dumb, 
 
 Amid the gladiators, halt and numb. 
 
 As the bird trims her to the gale, 
 
 I trim myself to the storm of time, 
 
 I man the rudder, reef the sail, 
 
 Obey the voice at eve obeyed at prime : 
 
 Lowly faithful, banish fear, 
 
 Right onward drive unarmed ; 
 
 The port, well worth the cruise, is near, 
 
 And every wave is charmed. 40
 
 254 
 
 THE PAST 
 
 THE debt is paid, 
 
 The verdict said, 
 
 The Furies laid, 
 
 The plague is stayed, 
 
 All fortunes made ; 
 
 Turn the key and bolt the door, 
 
 Sweet is death forevermore. 
 
 Nor haughty hope, nor swart chagrin, 
 
 Nor murdering hate, can enter in. 
 
 All is now secure and fast ; 
 
 Not the gods can shake the Past ; 
 
 Flies-to the adamantine door 
 
 Bolted down forevermore. 
 
 None can re-enter there, 
 
 No thief so politic, 
 
 No Satan with a royal trick 
 
 Steal in by window, chink, or hole, 
 
 To bind or unbind, add what lacked, 
 
 Insert a leaf, or forge a name, 
 
 New-face or finish what is packed, 
 
 Alter or mend eternal Fact.
 
 255 
 
 THE LAST FAREWELL 
 
 LINES WRITTEN BY THE AUTHOR S BROTHER, EDWARD BLISS 
 EMERSON, WHILST SAILING OUT OF BOSTON HARBOUR, BOUND 
 FOB THE ISLAND OF PORTO Rico, IN 1832. 
 
 FAREWELL, ye lofty spires 
 That cheered the holy light ! 
 Farewell, domestic fires 
 That broke the gloom of night ! 
 Too soon those spires are lost, 
 Too fast we leave the bay, 
 Too soon by ocean tost 
 From hearth and home away, 
 
 Far away, far away. 
 
 Farewell the busy town, 10 
 
 The wealthy and the wise, 
 
 Kind smile and honest frown 
 
 From bright, familiar eyes. 
 
 All these are fading now ; 
 
 Our brig hastes on her way, 
 
 Her unremembering prow 
 
 Is leaping o er the sea, 
 
 Far away, far away. 
 
 Farewell, my mother fond, 
 
 Too kind, too good to me ; 20 
 
 Nor pearl nor diamond 
 
 Would pay my debt to thee.
 
 256 THE LAST FAREWELL 
 
 But even thy kiss denies 
 Upon my cheek to stay ; 
 The winged vessel flies, 
 And billows round her play, 
 
 Far away, far away. 
 
 Farewell, my brothers true, 
 
 My betters, yet my peers ; 
 
 How desert without you 30 
 
 My few and evil years ! 
 
 But though aye one in heart, 
 
 Together sad or gay, 
 
 Rude ocean doth us part ; 
 
 We separate to-day, 
 
 Far away, far away. 
 
 Farewell I breathe again 
 
 To dim New England s shore ; 
 
 My heart shall beat not when 
 
 I pant for thee no more. 40 
 
 In yon green palmy isle, 
 
 Beneath the tropic ray, 
 
 I murmur never while 
 
 For thee and thine I pray ; 
 
 Far away, far away.
 
 257 
 
 IN MEMORIAM 
 
 E. B. E. 
 
 I MOURN upon this battle-field, 
 
 But not for those who perished here. 
 
 Behold the river-bank 
 
 Whither the angry farmers came, 
 
 In sloven dress and broken rank, 
 
 Nor thought of fame. 
 
 Their deed of blood 
 
 All mankind praise ; 
 
 Even the serene Reason says, 
 
 It was well done. 10 
 
 The wise and simple have one glance 
 
 To greet yon stern head-stone, 
 
 Which more of pride than pity gave 
 
 To mark the Briton s friendless grave. 
 
 Yet it is a stately tomb ; 
 
 The grand return 
 
 Of eve and morn, 
 
 The year s fresh bloom, 
 
 The silver cloud, 
 
 Might grace the dust that is most proud. 
 
 Yet not of these I muse 21 
 
 In this ancestral place, 
 But of a kindred face 
 That never joy or hope shall here diffuse. 
 
 [EESON S
 
 258 IN MEMORIAM 
 
 Ah, brother of the brief but blazing star ! 
 What hast thou to do with these 
 Haunting this bank s historic trees ? 
 Thou born for noblest life, 
 For action s field, for victor s car, 
 Thou living champion of the right ? 30 
 
 To these their penalty belonged : 
 I grudge not these their bed of death, 
 But thine to thee, who never wronged 
 The poorest that drew breath. 
 
 All inborn power that could 
 Consist with homage to the good 
 Flamed from his martial eye ; 
 He who seemed a soldier born, 
 He should have the helmet worn, 
 All friends to fend, all foes defy, 40 
 
 Fronting foes of God and man, 
 Frowning down the evil-doer, 
 Battling for ttie weak and poor. 
 His from youth the leader s look 
 Gave the law which others took, 
 And never poor beseeching glance 
 Shamed that sculptured countenance. 
 
 There is no record left on earth, 
 Save in tablets of the heart, 
 Of the rich inherent worth, 50 
 
 Of the grace that on him shone, 
 Of eloquent lips, of joyful wit ; 
 He could not frame a word unfit, 
 An act unworthy to be done ;
 
 IN MEMORIAM 259 
 
 Honour prompted every glance, 
 
 Honour came and sat beside him, 
 
 In lowly cot or painful road, 
 
 And evermore the cruel god 
 
 Cried, Onward ! and the palm-crown showed. 
 
 Born for success he seemed, Co 
 
 With grace to win, with heart to hold, 
 
 With shining gifts that took all eyes, 
 
 With budding power in college-halls, 
 
 As pledged in coming days to forge 
 
 Weapons to guard the State, or scourge 
 
 Tyrants despite their guards or walls. 
 
 On his young promise Beauty smiled, 
 
 Drew his free homage unbeguiled, 
 
 And prosperous Age held out his hand, 
 
 And richly his large future planned, 70 
 
 And troops of friends enjoyed the tide, 
 
 All, all was given, and only health denied. 
 
 I see him with superior smile 
 Hunted by Sorrow s grisly train 
 In lands remote, in toil and pain, 
 With angel patience labour on, 
 With the high port he wore erewhile, 
 When, foremost of the youthful band, 
 The prizes in all lists he won ; 
 Nor bate one jot of heart or hope, So 
 
 And, least of all, the loyal tie 
 Which holds to home neath every sky, 
 The joy and pride the pilgrim feels 
 In hearts which round the hearth at home 
 Keep pulse for pulse with those who roam. 
 
 S 2
 
 260 IN MEMORIAM 
 
 What generous beliefs console 
 The brave whom Fate denies the goal ! 
 If others reach it, is content ; 
 To Heaven s high will his will is bent. 
 Firm on his heart relied, 90 
 
 What lot soe er betide, 
 Work of his hand 
 He nor repents nor grieves, 
 Pleads for itself the fact, 
 As unrepenting Nature leaves 
 Her every act. 
 
 Fell the bolt on the branching oak ; 
 The rainbow of his hope was broke ; 
 No craven cry, no secret tear, 
 He told no pang, he knew no fear ; 100 
 
 Its peace sublime his aspect kept, 
 His purpose woke, his features slept ; 
 And yet between the spasms of pain 
 His genius beamed with joy again. 
 
 O er thy rich dust the endless smile 
 Of Nature in thy Spanish isle 
 Hints never loss or cruel break 
 And sacrifice for love s dear sake, 
 Nor mourn the unalterable Days 
 That Genius goes and Folly stays. no 
 
 What matters how, or from what ground, 
 The freed soul its Creator found ? 
 Alike thy memory embalms 
 That orange-grove, that isle of palms, 
 And these loved banks, whose oak-boughs bold 
 Boot in the blood of heroes old.
 
 ELEMENTS 
 
 EXPERIENCE 
 
 THE lords of life, the lords of life, 
 
 I saw them pass, 
 
 In their own guise, 
 
 Like and unlike, 
 
 Portly and grim, 
 
 Use and Surprise, 
 
 Surface and Dream, 
 
 Succession swift and spectral Wrong, 
 
 Temperament without a tongue, 
 
 And the inventor of the game 10 
 
 Omnipresent without name ; 
 
 Some to see, some to be guessed, 
 
 They march from east to west : 
 
 Little man, least of all, 
 
 Among the legs of his guardians tall, 
 
 Walked about with puzzled look. 
 
 Him by the hand dear Nature took, 
 
 Dearest Nature, strong and kind, 
 
 Whispered, Darling, never mind ! 
 
 To-morrow they will wear another face, 20 
 
 The founder thou ; these are thy race !
 
 262 
 
 COMPENSATION 
 
 THE wings of Time are black and white, 
 Pied with morning and with night. 
 Mountain tall and ocean deep 
 Trembling balance duly keep. 
 In changing moon and tidal wave 
 Glows the feud of Want and Have. 
 Gauge of more and less through space, 
 Electric star or pencil plays, 
 The lonely Earth amid the balls 
 That hurry through the eternal halls, 
 A makeweight flying to the void, 
 Supplemental asteroid, 
 Or compensatory spark, 
 Shoots across the neutral Dark, 
 
 II 
 
 Man s the elm, and Wealth the vine ; 
 Staunch and strong the tendrils twine : 
 Though the frail ringlets thee deceive, 
 None from its stock that vine can reave. 
 Fear not, then, thou child infirm, 
 There s no god dare wrong a worm ; 
 Laurel crowns cleave to deserts, 
 And power to him who power exerts.
 
 COMPENSATION 263 
 
 Hast not thy share ? On winged feet, 
 
 Lo ! it rushes thee to meet ; 
 
 And all that Nature made thy own, 
 
 Floating in air or pent in stone, 
 
 Will rive the hills and swim the sea, 
 
 And, like thy shadow, follow thee. 28
 
 264 
 
 POLITICS 
 
 GOLD and iron are good 
 
 To buy iron and gold ; 
 
 All earth s fleece and food 
 
 For their like are sold. 
 
 Hinted Merlin wise, 
 
 Proved Napoleon great, 
 
 Nor kind nor coinage buys 
 
 Aught above its rate. 
 
 Fear, Craft, and Avarice 
 
 Cannot rear a State. 
 
 Out of dust to build 
 
 What is more than dust, 
 
 Walls Amphion piled 
 
 Phoebus stablish must. 
 
 When the Muses nine 
 
 With the Virtues meet, 
 
 Find to their design 
 
 An Atlantic seat, 
 
 By green orchard boughs 
 
 Fended from the heat, 
 
 Where the statesman ploughs 
 
 Furrow for the wheat, 
 
 When the Church is social worth, 
 
 When the state-house is the hearth, 
 
 Then the perfect State is come, 
 
 The republican at home.
 
 265 
 
 HEROISM 
 
 RUBY wine is drunk by knaves, 
 Sugar spends to fatten slaves, 
 Rose and vine-leaf deck buffoons ; 
 Thunder-clouds are Jove s festoons, 
 Drooping oft in wreaths of dread, 
 Lightning-knotted round his head ; 
 The hero is not fed on sweets, 
 Daily his own heart he eats ; 
 Chambers of the great are jails, 
 And head-wings right for royal sails.
 
 266 
 
 CHARACTER 
 
 THE sun set, but set not his hope : 
 Stars rose ; his faith was earlier up : 
 Fixed on the enormous galaxy, 
 Deeper and older seemed his eye ; 
 And matched his sufferance sublime 
 The taciturnity of time. 
 He spoke, and words more soft than rain 
 Brought the Age of Gold again : 
 His action won such reverence sweet 
 As hid all measure of the feat.
 
 267 
 
 CULTURE 
 
 CAN rules or tutors educate 
 The semigod whom we await ? 
 He must be musical, 
 Tremulous, impressional, 
 Alive to gentle influence 
 Of landscape and of sky, 
 And tender to the spirit-touch 
 Of man s or maiden s eye : 
 But, to his native centre fast, 
 
 Shall into Future fuse the Past, 10 
 
 And the world s flowing fates in his own mould 
 recast.
 
 268 
 
 FRIENDSHIP 
 
 A RUDDY drop of manly blood 
 
 The surging sea outweighs, 
 
 The world uncertain comes and goes, 
 
 The lover rooted stays. 
 
 I fancied he was fled, 
 
 And, after many a year, 
 
 Glowed unexhausted kindliness, 
 
 Like daily sunrise there. 
 
 My careful heart was free again, 
 
 O friend, my bosom said, 
 
 Through thee alone the sky is arched, 
 
 Through thee the rose is red ; 
 
 All things through thee take nobler form, 
 
 And look beyond the earth, 
 
 The mill -round of our fate appears 
 
 A sun-path in thy worth. 
 
 Me too thy nobleness has taught 
 
 To master my despair ; 
 
 The fountains of my hidden life 
 
 Are through thy friendship fair.
 
 269 
 
 WAS never form and never face 
 So sweet to SEYD as only grace 
 Which did not slumber like a stone, 
 But hovered gleaming and was gone. 
 Beauty chased he everywhere, 
 In flame, in storm, in clouds of air. 
 He smote the lake to feed his eye 
 With the beryl beam of the broken wave ; 
 He flung in pebbles well to hear 
 The moment s music which they gave. 
 Oft pealed for him a lofty tone 
 From nodding pole and belting zone. 
 He heard a voice none else could hear 
 From centred and from errant sphere. 
 The quaking earth did quake in rhyme, 
 Seas ebbed and flowed in epic chime. 
 In dens of passion, and pits of woe, 
 He saw strong Eros struggling through, 
 To sun the dark and solve the curse, 
 And beam to the bounds of the universe. 
 While thus to love he gave his days 
 In loyal worship, scorning praise, 
 How spread their lures for him in vain 
 Thieving Ambition and paltering Gain ! 
 He thought it happier to be dead, 
 To die for Beauty, than live for bread.
 
 270 
 
 GRACE, Beauty, and Caprice 
 
 Build this golden portal ; 
 
 Graceful women, chosen men, 
 
 Dazzle every mortal. 
 
 Their sweet and lofty countenance 
 
 His enchanted food ; 
 
 He need not go to them, their forms 
 
 Beset his solitude. 
 
 He looketh seldom in their face, 
 
 His eyes explore the ground, 
 
 The green grass is a looking-glass 
 
 Whereon their traits are found. 
 
 Little and less he says to them, 
 
 So dances his heart in his breast ; 
 
 Their tranquil mien bereaveth him 
 
 Of wit, of words, of rest. 
 
 Too weak to win, too fond to shun 
 
 The tyrants of his doom, 
 
 The much deceived Endymion 
 
 Slips behind a tomb.
 
 271 
 
 ART 
 
 GIVE to barrows, trays, and pans 
 
 Grace and glimmer of romance ; 
 
 Bring the moonlight into noon 
 
 Hid in gleaming piles of stone ; 
 
 On the city s paved street 
 
 Plant gardens lined with lilacs sweet ; 
 
 Let spouting fountains cool the air, 
 
 Singing in the sun-baked square ; 
 
 Let statue, picture, park, and hall, 
 
 Ballad, flag, and festival, 10 
 
 The past restore, the day adorn, 
 
 And make to-morrow a new morn. 
 
 So shall the drudge in dusty frock 
 
 Spy behind the city clock 
 
 Retinues of airy kings, 
 
 Skirts of angels, starry wings, 
 
 His fathers shining in bright fables, 
 
 His children fed at heavenly tables. 
 
 T is the privilege of Art 
 
 Thus to play its cheerful part, 20 
 
 Man on earth to acclimate, 
 
 And bend the exile to his fate, 
 
 And, moulded of one element 
 
 With the days and firmament, 
 
 Teach him on these as stairs to climb, 
 
 And live on even terms with Time ; 
 
 Whilst upper life the slender rill 
 
 Of human sense doth overfill. 28
 
 272 
 
 SPIRITUAL LAWS 
 
 THE living Heaven thy prayers respect. 
 House at once and architect, 
 Quarrying man s rejected hours, 
 Builds therewith eternal towers ; 
 Sole and self-commanded works, 
 Fears not undermining days, 
 Grows by decays, 
 
 And, by the famous might that lurks 
 In reaction and recoil, 
 Makes flame to freeze, and ice to boil ; 
 Forging, through swart arms of Offence, 
 The silver seat of Innocence.
 
 273 
 
 UNITY 
 
 SPACE is ample, east and west, 
 But two cannot go abreast, 
 Cannot travel in it two : 
 Yonder masterful cuckoo 
 Crowds every egg out of the nest, 
 Quick or dead, except its own ; 
 A spell is laid on sod and stone, 
 Night and day were tampered with, 
 Every quality and pith 
 Surcharged and sultry with a power 
 That works its will on age and hour.
 
 274 
 
 WORSHIP 
 
 THIS is he, who, felled by foes, 
 
 Sprung harmless up, refreshed by blows : 
 
 He to captivity was sold, 
 
 But him no prison-bars would hold : 
 
 Though they sealed him in a rock, 
 
 Mountain chains he can unlock : 
 
 Thrown to lions for their meat, 
 
 The crouching lion kissed his feet : 
 
 Bound to the stake, no flames appalled, 
 
 But arched o er him an honouring vault. 
 
 This is he men miscall Fate, 
 
 Threading dark ways, arriving late, 
 
 But ever coming in time to crown 
 
 The truth, and hurl wrong-doers down. 
 
 He is the oldest, and best known, 
 
 More near than aught thou call st thy own, 
 
 Yet, greeted in another s eyes, 
 
 Disconcerts with glad surprise. 
 
 This is Jove, who, deaf to prayers, 
 
 Floods with blessings unawares. 
 
 Draw, if thou canst, the mystic line 
 
 Severing rightly his from thine, 
 
 Which is human, which divine.
 
 QUATRAINS 
 
 S. H. 
 
 WITH beams December planets dart 
 His cold eye truth and conduct scanned, 
 July was in his sunny heart, 
 October in his liberal hand. 
 
 A. H. 
 
 HIGH was her heart, and yet was well inclined, 
 
 Her manners made of bounty well refined ; 
 
 Far capitals, and marble courts, her eye still seemed to 
 
 see, 
 Minstrels, and kings, and high-born dames, and of the 
 
 best that be. 
 
 SUTIM CUIQTTE 
 
 WILT thou seal up the avenues of ill ? 
 Pay every debt, as if God wrote the bill. 
 
 HUSH ! 
 
 EVERY thought is public, 
 Every nook is wide ; 
 Thy gossips spread each whisper, 
 And the gods from side to side. 
 T 2
 
 276 QUATRAINS 
 
 ORATOR 
 
 HE who has no hands 
 Perforce must use his tongue ; 
 Foxes are so cunning 
 Because they are not strong. 
 
 ARTIST 
 
 QUIT the hut, frequent the palace, 
 Reck not what the people say ; 
 For still, where er the trees grow biggest, 
 Huntsmen find the easiest way. 
 
 POET 
 
 EVER the Poet from the land 
 Steers his bark, and trims his sail ; 
 Right out to sea his courses stand, 
 New worlds to find in pinnace frail. 
 
 POET 
 
 To clothe the fiery thought 
 In simple words succeeds, 
 For still the craft of genius is 
 To mask a king in weeds.
 
 QUATRAINS 277 
 
 BOTANIST 
 
 Go thou to thy learned task, 
 I stay with the flowers of spring : 
 Do thou of the ages ask 
 What me the hours will bring. 
 
 GARDENER 
 
 TRUE Bramin, in the morning meadows wet, 
 Expound the Vedas of the violet, 
 Or, hid in vines, peeping through many a loop, 
 See the plum redden, and the beurre stoop. 
 
 FORESTER 
 
 HE took the colour of his vest 
 From rabbit s coat or grouse s breast ; 
 For, as the wood-kinds lurk and hide, 
 So walks the woodman, unespied. 
 
 NORTHMAN 
 
 THE. gale that wrecked you on the sand, 
 It helped my rowers to row ; 
 The storm is my best galley hand, 
 And drives me where I go.
 
 278 QUATRAINS 
 
 FROM ALCUIN 
 
 THE sea is the road of the bold, 
 Frontier of the wheat-sown plains, 
 The pit wherein the streams are rolled, 
 And fountain of the rains. 
 
 EXCELSIOR 
 
 OVER his head were the maple buds, 
 And over the tree was the moon, 
 And over the moon were the starry studs, 
 That drop from the angels shoon. 
 
 BORROWING 
 
 FROM THE FRENCH 
 
 SOME of your hurts you have cured, 
 And the sharpest you still have survived, 
 But what torments of grief you endured 
 From evils which never arrived ! 
 
 NATURE 
 
 BOON Nature yields each day a brag which we now 
 
 first behold, 
 And trains us on to slight the new, as if it were the 
 
 old: 
 But blest is he, who, playing deep, yet haply asks 
 
 not why, 
 Too busied with the crowded hour to fear to live 
 
 or die.
 
 QUATRAINS 279 
 
 FATE 
 
 HER planted eye to-day controls, 
 Is in the morrow most at home, 
 And sternly calls to being souls 
 That curse her when they come. 
 
 HOROSCOPE 
 
 ERE he was born, the stars of fate 
 Plotted to make him rich and great : 
 When from the womb the babe was loosed, 
 The gate of gifts behind him closed. 
 
 POWER 
 
 CAST the bantling on the rocks, 
 Suckle him with the she-wolf s teat, 
 Wintered with the hawk and fox, 
 Power and speed be hands and feet. 
 
 CLIMACTERIC 
 
 I AM not wiser for my age, 
 
 Nor skilful by my grief ; 
 
 Life loiters at the book s first page, 
 
 Ah ! could we turn the leaf.
 
 280 QUATRAINS 
 
 HERI, CBAS, HODIE 
 
 SHINES the last age, the next with hope is seen, 
 To-day slinks poorly off unmarked between : 
 Future or Past no richer secret folds, 
 friendless Present ! than thy bosom holds. 
 
 MEMORY 
 
 NIGHT-DREAMS trace on Memory s wall 
 Shadows of the thoughts of day, 
 And thy fortunes, as they fall, 
 The bias of the will betray. 
 
 LOVE 
 
 LOVE on his errand bound to go 
 Can swim the flood, and wade through snow, 
 Where way is none, t will creep and wind 
 And eat through Alps its home to find. 
 
 SACRIFICE 
 
 THOUGH love repine, and reason chafe, 
 There came a voice without reply, 
 T is man s perdition to be safe, 
 When for the truth he ought to die.
 
 QUATRAINS 281 
 
 PERICLES 
 
 WELL and wisely said the Greek, 
 Be them faithful, but not fond ; 
 To the altar s foot thy fellow seek, 
 The Furies wait beyond. 
 
 CAS ELL A 
 
 TEST of the poet is knowledge of love, 
 For Eros is older than Saturn or Jove ; 
 Never was poet, of late or of yore, 
 Who was not tremulous with love-lore. 
 
 SHAKESPEARE 
 
 I SEE all human wits 
 Are measured but a few, 
 Unmeasured still my Shakespeare sits, 
 Lone as the blessed Jew. 
 
 HAFIZ 
 
 HER passions the shy violet 
 From Hafiz never hides ; 
 Love-longings of the raptured bird 
 The bird to him confides.
 
 282 QUATRAINS 
 
 NATURE IN LEASTS 
 
 As sings the pine-tree in the wind, 
 So sings in the wind a sprig of the pine ; 
 Her strength and soul has laughing France 
 Shed in each drop of wine. 
 
 AAAKPYN NEMONTAI AIQNA 
 
 A NEW commandment, said the smiling Muse, 
 I give my darling son, Thou shalt not preach ; 
 Luther, Fox, Behmen, Swedenborg, grew pale, 
 And, on the instant, rosier clouds upbore 
 Hafiz and Shakespeare with their shining choirs.
 
 TRANSLATIONS 
 
 SONNET OF MICHEL ANGELO BUONAROTI 
 
 NEVER did sculptor s dream unfold 
 
 A form which marble doth not hold 
 
 In its white block ; yet it therein shall find 
 
 Only the hand secure and bold 
 
 Which still obeys the mind. 
 
 So hide in thee, thou heavenly dame, 
 
 The ill I shun, the good I claim ; 
 
 I, alas ! not well alive, 
 
 Miss the aim whereto I strive. 
 
 Not love, nor beauty s pride, Ic 
 
 Not fortune, nor thy coldness, can I chide, 
 If, whilst within thy heart abide 
 Both death and pity, my unequal skill 
 Fails of the life, but draws the death and ill.
 
 284 TRANSLATIONS 
 
 THE EXILE 
 
 FROM THE PERSIAN OF KEEMANI 
 
 IN Farsistan the violet spreads 
 Its leaves to the rival sky ; 
 I ask how far is the Tigris flood, 
 And the vine that grows thereby ? 
 
 Except the amber morning wind, 
 Not one salutes me here ; 
 There is no lover in all Bagdat 
 To offer the exile cheer. 
 
 I know that thou, morning wind ! 
 
 O er Kernan s meadow blowest, 10 
 
 And thou, heart-warming nightingale ! 
 
 My father s orchard knowest. 
 
 The merchant hath stuffs of price, 
 And gems from the sea- washed strand, 
 And princes offer me grace 
 To stay in the Syrian land ; 
 
 But what is gold for, but for gifts ? 
 
 And dark, without love, is the day ; 
 
 And all that I see in Bagdat 
 
 Is the Tigris to float me away. 22
 
 TRANSLATIONS 285 
 
 FROM HAFIZ 
 
 I SAID to heaven that glowed above, 
 hide yon sun-filled zone, 
 Hide all the stars you boast ; 
 For, in the world of love 
 And estimation true, 
 The heaped-up harvest of the moon 
 Is worth one barley-corn at most, 
 The Pleiads sheaf but two. 
 
 IF my darling should depart, 
 
 And search the skies for prouder friends, 
 
 God forbid my angry heart 
 
 In other love should seek amends. 
 
 When the blue horizon s hoop 
 Me a little pinches here, 
 Instant to my grave I stoop, 
 And go to find thee in the sphere. 
 
 EPITAPH 
 
 BETHINK, poor heart, what bitter kind of jest 
 Mad Destiny this tender stripling played ; 
 For a warm breast of maiden to his breast, 
 She laid a slab of marble on his head. 
 
 THEY say, through patience, chalk 
 Becomes a ruby stone ; 
 Ah, yes ! but by the true heart s blood 
 The chalk is crimson grown.
 
 286 TRANSLATIONS 
 
 FRIENDSHIP 
 
 THOU foolish Hafiz ! Say, do churls 
 Know the worth of Oman s pearls ? 
 Give the gem which dims the moon 
 To the noblest, or to none. 
 
 DEAREST, where thy shadow falls, 
 Beauty sits, and Music calls ; 
 Where thy form and favour come, 
 All good creatures have their home. 
 
 ON prince or bride no diamond stone 
 Half so gracious ever shone, 
 As the light of enterprise 
 Beaming from a young man s eyes.
 
 TRANSLATIONS 287 
 
 FROM OMAR CHIAM 
 
 EACH spot where tulips prank their state 
 Has drunk the life-blood of the great ; 
 The violets yon field which stain 
 Are moles of beauties time hath slain. 
 
 HE who has a thousand friends has not a friend to 
 spare, 
 
 And he who has one enemy will meet him every 
 where. 
 
 ON two days it steads not to run from thy grave, 
 The appointed, and the unappointed day ; 
 On the first, neither balm nor physician can save, 
 Nor thee, on the second, the Universe slay.
 
 288 TRANSLATIONS 
 
 FROM IBN JEMIN 
 
 Two things thou shalt not long for, if thou love a mind 
 serene ; 
 
 A woman to thy wife, though she were a crowned 
 queen ; 
 
 And the second, borrowed money, though the smiling 
 lender say, 
 
 That he will not demand the debt until the Judge 
 ment Day. 
 
 FROM HILALI 
 
 HARK what, now loud, now low, the pining flute 
 
 complains, 
 Without tongue, yellow-cheeked, full of winds that 
 
 wail and sigh ; 
 
 Saying, Sweetheart ! the old mystery remains, 
 If I am I ; thou, thou ; or thou art I ?
 
 TRANSLATIONS 289 
 
 TO THE SHAH 
 
 FROM HAFIZ 
 
 THY foes to hunt, thy enviers to strike down, 
 Poises Arcturus aloft morning and evening his 
 spear. 
 
 TO THE SHAH 
 
 FROM ENWERI 
 
 NOT in their houses stand the stars, 
 But o er the pinnacles of thine ! 
 
 TO THE SHAH 
 
 FROM ENWERI 
 
 FROM thy worth and weight the stars gravitate, 
 And the equipoise of heaven is thy house s equipoise. 
 
 TJ
 
 290 TRANSLATIONS 
 
 SONG OF SEID NTMETOLLAH OF KUHISTAN 
 
 [Among the religious customs of the dervishes is an astrono 
 mical dance, in which the dervish imitates the movements of the 
 heavenly bodies, by spinning on his own axis, whilst at the same 
 time he revolves round the Sheikh in the centre, representing the 
 sun ; and, as he spins, he sings the Song of Seid Nimetollah of 
 Kuhistan.] 
 
 SPIN the ball ! I reel, I burn, 
 Nor head from foot can I discern, 
 Nor my heart from love of mine, 
 Nor the wine-cup from the wine. 
 All my doing, all my leaving, 
 Reaches not to my perceiving ; 
 Lost in whirling spheres I rove, 
 And know only that I love. 
 
 I am seeker of the stone, 
 Living gem of Solomon ; 10 
 
 From the shore of souls arrived, 
 In the sea of sense I dived ; 
 But what is land, or what is wave, 
 To me who only jewels crave ? 
 Love is the air-fed fire intense, 
 And my heart the frankincense ; 
 As the rich aloes flames, I glow, 
 Yet the censer cannot know. 
 I m all-knowing, yet unknowing ; 
 Stand not, pause not, in my going. 20 
 
 Ask not me, as Muftis can, 
 To recite the Alcoran ;
 
 TRANSLATIONS 291 
 
 Well I love the meaning sweet, 
 I tread the book beneath my feet. 
 
 Lo ! the God s love blazes higher, 
 Till all difference expire. 
 What are Moslems ? what are Giaours ? 
 All are Love s, and all are ours. 
 I embrace the true believers, 
 But I reck not of deceivers. 30 
 
 Firm to Heaven my bosom clings, 
 Heedless of inferior things ; 
 Down on earth there, underfoot, 
 What men chatter know I not. 
 
 T7 2
 
 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS 
 HYMN 
 
 SUNG AT THE SECOND CHURCH, BOSTON, AT THE ORDINATION OF 
 
 REV. CHANDLER BOBBINS 
 
 (1833) 
 
 In Hymns of the Spirit, 1864 
 
 WE love the venerable house 
 
 Our fathers built to God : 
 In heaven are kept their grateful vows ; 
 
 Their dust endears the sod. 
 
 Here holy thoughts a light have shed 
 
 From many a radiant face, 
 And prayers of tender hope have spread 
 
 A perfume through the place : 
 
 And anxious hearts have pondered here 
 
 The mystery of life, 10 
 
 And prayed the eternal God to clear 
 Their doubts, and aid their strife. 
 
 From humble tenements around 
 
 Came up the pensive train, 
 And in the church a blessing found 
 
 Which filled their homes again. 
 
 For faith, and peace, and mighty love, 
 
 That from the Godhead flow, 
 Showed them the life of Heaven above 
 
 Springs from the life below. 20
 
 HYMN 293 
 
 They live with God, their homes are dust ; 
 
 But here their children pray, 
 And in this fleeting lifetime trust 
 
 To find the narrow way. 
 
 On him who by the altar stands, 
 
 On him Thy blessing fall ! 
 Speak through his lips Thy pure commands, 
 
 Thou Heart, that lovest all ! 28
 
 294 
 
 GRACE 
 
 (Dial, January 1842) 
 
 How much, Preventing God ! how much I owe 
 To the defences thou hast round me set : 
 Example, custom, fear, occasion slow, 
 These scorned bondmen were my parapet. 
 I dare not peep over this parapet 
 To gauge with glance the roaring gulf below, 
 The depths of sin to which I had descended, 
 Had not these me against myself defended.
 
 295 
 
 THE THREE DIMENSIONS 
 
 (Dial, October 1843) 
 
 ROOM for the spheres ! then first they shined, 
 
 And dived into the ample sky ; 
 
 Room ! room ! cried the new mankind, 
 
 And took the oath of liberty. 
 
 Room ! room ! willed the opening mind, 
 
 And found it in Variety. 
 
 POWER 
 
 (I860) 
 
 His tongue was framed to music, 
 And his hand was armed with skill, 
 
 His face was the mould of beauty, 
 And his heart the throne of will.
 
 296 
 
 WEALTH 
 
 (I860) 
 
 WHO shall tell what did befall, 
 Far away in time, when once, 
 Over the lifeless ball, 
 Hung idle stars and suns ? 
 When god the element obeyed ? 
 Wings of what wind the lichen bore, 
 Wafting the puny seeds of power, 
 Which, lodged in rock, the rock abrade ? 
 And well the primal pioneer 
 Knew the strong task to it assigned 
 Patient through Heaven s enormous year 
 To build in matter home for mind. 
 From air the creeping centuries drew 
 The matted thicket low and wide, 
 This must the leaves of ages strew 
 The granite slap to clothe and hide, 
 Ere wheat can wave its golden pride. 
 What smiths, and in what furnace, rolled 
 (In dizzy aeons dim and mute 
 The reeling brain can ill compute) 
 Copper and iron, lead and gold ? 
 What oldest star the fame can save 
 Of races perishing to pave 
 The planet with a floor of lime ? 
 Dust is their pyramid and mole :
 
 WEALTH 297 
 
 Who saw what ferns and palms were pressed 
 
 Under the tumbling mountain s breast, 
 
 In the safe herbal of the coal ? 
 
 But when the quarried means were piled, 
 
 All is waste and worthless, till 30 
 
 Arrives the wise selecting will, 
 
 And, out of slime and chaos, Wit 
 
 Draws the threads of fair and fit. 
 
 Then temples rose, and towns, and marts, 
 
 The shop of toil, the hall of arts ; 
 
 Then flew the sail across the seas 
 
 To feed the North from tropic trees ; 
 
 The storm-wind wove, the torrent span, 
 
 Where they were bid the rivers ran ; 
 
 New slaves fulfilled the poet s dream, 40 
 
 Galvanic wire, strong-shouldered steam. 
 
 Then docks were built, and crops were stored, 
 
 And ingots added to the hoard. 
 
 But, though light-headed man forget, 
 
 Remembering Matter pays her debt : 
 
 Still, though her motes and masses, draw 
 
 Electric thrills and ties of Law, 
 
 Which bind the strength of Nature wild 
 
 To the conscience of a child. 49
 
 298 
 
 ILLUSIONS 
 
 (I860) 
 
 FLOW, flow the waves hated, 
 
 Accursed, adored, 
 
 The waves of mutation : 
 
 No anchorage is. 
 
 Sleep is not, death is not ; 
 
 Who seem to die live. 
 
 House you were born in, 
 
 Friends of your spring-time, 
 
 Old man and young maid, 
 
 Day s toil and its guerdon, 
 
 They are all vanishing, 
 
 Fleeing to fables, 
 
 Cannot be moored. 
 
 See the stars through them, 
 
 Through treacherous marbles. 
 
 Know, the stars yonder, 
 
 The stars everlasting, 
 
 Are fugitive also, 
 
 And emulate, vaulted, 
 
 The lambent heat-lightning, 
 
 And fire-fly s flight. 
 
 When thou dost return 
 On the wave s circulation, 
 Beholding the shimmer, 
 The wild dissipation,
 
 ILLUSIONS 299 
 
 And, out of endeavour 
 
 To change and to flow, 
 
 The gas becomes solid, 
 
 And phantoms and nothings 
 
 Return to be things, 30 
 
 And endless imbroglio 
 
 Is law and the world, 
 
 Then first shalt thou know, 
 
 That in the wild turmoil, 
 
 Horsed on the Proteus, 
 
 Thou ridest to power, 
 
 And to endurance. 37
 
 300 
 
 BOSTON 
 
 SICDT PATBIBUS, SIT DEtTS NOBIS 
 
 (Atlantic Monthly, 1876) 
 
 THE rocky nook with hill-tops three 
 Looked eastward from the farms, 
 And twice each day the flowing sea 
 Took Boston in its arms ; 
 
 The men of yore were stout and poor, 
 And sailed for bread to every shore. 
 
 And where they went on trade intent 
 
 They did what freemen can, 
 Their dauntless ways did all men praise, 
 The merchant was a man. 
 
 The world was made for honest trade, 
 To plant and eat be none afraid. 
 
 The waves that rocked them on the deep 
 
 To them their secret told ; 
 Said the winds that sung the lads to sleep, 
 Like rs, be free and bold ! 
 The honest waves refuse to slaves 
 The empire of the ocean caves. 
 
 Old Europe groans with palaces, 
 
 Has lords enough, and more ; 
 We plant and build by foaming seas 
 A city of the poor ; 
 For day by day could Boston Bay 
 Their honest labour overpay.
 
 BOSTON 301 
 
 The noble craftsman we promote, 
 
 Disown the knave and fool ; 
 Each honest man shall have his vote, 
 Each child shall have his school. 
 For what avail the plough or sail, 
 Or land, or life, if freedom fail ? 30 
 
 We grant no dukedoms to the few, 
 
 We hold like rights, and shall, 
 Equal on Sunday in the pew, 
 
 On Monday in the mall. 
 
 The wild rose and the barberry thorn 
 
 Hung out their summer pride 
 Where now on heated pavements worn 
 
 The feet of millions stride. 
 
 Fair rose the planted hills behind 
 
 The good town on the bay ; 4 
 
 And where the western hills declined 
 
 The prairie stretched away. 
 
 Yv hat rival towers majestic soar 
 
 Along the stormy coast, 
 Penn s town, New York, and Baltimore, 
 
 If Boston knew the most ! 
 
 They laughed to know the world so wide ; 
 
 The mountains said, Good-day ! 
 We greet you well, you Saxon men, 
 
 Up with your towns, and stay ! 5 
 
 The world was made for honest trade, 
 To plant and eat be none afraid.
 
 302 BOSTON 
 
 For you, they said, no barriers be, 
 
 For you no sluggard rest ; 
 Each street leads downward to the sea, 
 
 Or landward to the West. 
 
 happy town beside the sea, 
 Whose roads lead everywhere to all ; 
 
 Than thine no deeper moat can be, 
 
 No stouter fence, no steeper wall ! 60 
 
 Bad news from George on the English throne : 
 
 You are thriving well, said he, 
 * Now by these presents be it known 
 You shall pay us a tax on tea ; 
 Tis very small, no load at all, 
 Honour enough that we send the call. 
 
 Not so, said Boston, good my lord, 
 
 We pay your governors here 
 Abundant for their bed and board, 
 
 Six thousand pounds a year. 70 
 
 (Your Highness knows our homely word,) 
 Millions for self-government, 
 But for tribute never a cent? 
 
 The cargo came ! and who could blame 
 
 If Indians seized the tea, 
 And, chest by chest, let down the same, 
 Into the laughing sea ? 
 For what avail the plough or sail, 
 Or land, or life, if freedom fail ?
 
 BOSTON 303 
 
 The townsmen braved the English king, 80 
 
 Found friendship in the French, 
 And Honour joined the patriot ring 
 
 Low on their wooden bench. 
 
 bounteous seas that never fail ! 
 
 day remembered yet ! 
 O happy port that spied the sail 
 Which wafted Lafayette ! 
 
 Pole-star of light in Europe s night, 
 That never faltered from the right. 
 
 Kings shook with fear, old empires crave 90 
 
 The secret force to find 
 Which fired the little state to save 
 
 The rights of all mankind. 
 
 But right is might through all the world ; 
 
 Province to province faithful clung, 
 Through good and ill the war-bolt hurled, 
 
 Till Freedom cheered and the joy-bells rung. 
 
 The sea returning day by day 
 
 Restores the world-wide mart ; 
 So let each dweller on the Bay 100 
 
 Fold Boston in his heart, 
 
 Till these echoes be choked with snows, 
 Or over the town blue ocean flows. 
 
 Let the blood of her hundred thousands 
 
 Throb in each manly vein ; 
 And the wits of all her wisest 
 Make sunshine in her brain. 
 
 For you can teach the lightning speech, 
 And round the globe your voices reach.
 
 304 BOSTON 
 
 And each shall care for other, 
 And each to each shall bend, 
 
 To the poor a noble brother, 
 To the good an equal friend. 
 
 A blessing through the ages thus 
 Shield all thy roofs and towers ! 
 
 God with the fathers, so with us, 
 Thou darling town of ours !
 
 MOTTOES TO THE ESSAYS 
 
 HISTORY 
 
 THERE is no great and no small 
 To the Soul that maketh all : 
 And where it cometh, all things are ; 
 And it cometh every where. 
 
 I am owner of the sphere, 
 
 Of the seven stars and the solar year, 
 
 Of Caesar s hand, and Plato s brain, 
 
 Of Lord Christ s heart, and Shakespeare s strain.
 
 306 
 
 PRUDENCE 
 
 THEME no poet gladly sung, 
 Fair to old and foul to young, 
 Scorn not thou the love of parts 
 And the articles of arts. 
 Grandeur of the perfect sphere 
 Thanks the atoms that cohere. 
 
 GIFTS 
 
 GIFTS of one who loved me, 
 Twas high time they came ; 
 When he ceased to love me, 
 Time they stopped for shame.
 
 307 
 
 CIRCLES 
 
 NATURE centres into balls, 
 And her proud ephemerals, 
 Fast to surface and outside, 
 Scan the profile of the sphere ; 
 Knew they what that signified, 
 A new genesis were here. 
 
 INTELLECT 
 
 Go, speed the stars of Thought 
 On to their shining goals ; 
 The sower scatters broad his seed, 
 The wheat thou strew st be souls. 
 
 X2
 
 308 
 
 THE POET 
 
 A MOODY child and wildly wise 
 
 Pursued the game with joyful eyes, 
 
 Which chose, like meteors, their way, 
 
 And rived the dark with private ray : 
 
 They overleapt the horizon s edge, 
 
 Searched with Apollo s privilege ; 
 
 Through man, and woman, and sea, and star, 
 
 Saw the dance of nature forward far ; 
 
 Through worlds, and races, and terms, and times, 
 
 Saw musical order, and pairing rhymes. 10 
 
 Olympian bards who sung 
 
 Divine ideas below, 
 Which always find us young, 
 
 And always keep us so.
 
 309 
 
 NATURE 
 
 THE rounded world is fair to see, 
 
 Nine times folded in mystery : 
 
 Though baffled seers cannot impart 
 
 The secret of its labouring heart, 
 
 Throb thine with Nature s throbbing breast, 
 
 And all is clear from east to west. 
 
 Spirit that lurks each form within 
 
 Beckons to spirit of its kin ; 
 
 Self-kindled every atom glows, 
 
 And hints the future which it owes.
 
 310 
 
 NOMINALIST AND REALIST 
 
 IN countless upward-striving waves 
 
 The moon-drawn tide-wave strives ; 
 
 In thousand far-transplanted grafts 
 
 The parent fruit survives ; 
 
 So, in the new-born millions, 
 
 The perfect Adam lives. 
 
 Not less are summer-mornings dear 
 
 To every child they wake, 
 
 And each with novel life his sphere 
 
 Fills for his proper sake.
 
 INDEX OF TITLES 
 
 AAAKPTN NEMONTAI AIHNA, 
 
 282. 
 
 Adirondacs, The, 193. 
 A. H., 275. 
 Alcuin, From, 278. 
 Alphonso of Castile, 22. 
 Amulet, The, 101. 
 Apology, The, 121. 
 Art, 271. 
 Artist, 276. 
 Astraea, 82. 
 
 Bacchus, 127. 
 Beauty, 269. 
 Beauty, Ode to, 92. 
 Berrying, 42. 
 Blight, 152. 
 Borrowing, 278. 
 Boston, 300. 
 Boston Hymn, 211. 
 Botanist, 277. 
 Brahma, 205. 
 
 Casella, 281. 
 
 Character, 266. 
 
 Chartist s Complaint, The, 235. 
 
 Circles, 307. 
 
 Climacteric, 279. 
 
 Compensation, 86, 262. 
 
 Culture, 267. 
 
 Days, 234. 
 
 Day s Ration, The, 150. 
 
 Dirge, 158. 
 
 Each and All, 6. 
 
 Earth-song, 34. 
 
 Ellen at the South, To, 98. 
 
 Enweri, Translations from, 289. 
 
 Epitaph, 285. 
 
 Eros, 103. 
 
 Etienne de la Boece, 84. 
 
 Eva, To, 100. 
 
 Excelsior, 278. 
 Exile, 284. 
 Experience, 261. 
 
 Fable, 77. 
 Fate, 28, 207, 279. 
 Flute, 288. 
 Forbearance, 87. 
 Forerunners, 89. 
 Forester, 277. 
 Freedom, 208. 
 Friendship, 268, 286. 
 
 Gardener, 277. 
 Ghaselle, 147. 
 Gifts, 306. 
 Give all to love, 96. 
 Good-bye, 36. 
 Grace, 294. 
 Guy, 30. 
 
 Hafiz, 281. 
 
 Hafiz, Translations from, 141, 
 
 147, 285, 289. 
 Hamatreya, 33. 
 Heri, Cras, Hodie, 280. 
 Hermione, 104. 
 Heroism, 265. 
 Hilali, From, 288. 
 History, 305. 
 Holidays, 139. 
 Horoscope, 279. 
 House, The, 132. 
 Humble-Bee, The, 39. 
 Hush, 275. 
 Hymn, 170, 292. 
 
 Ibn Jemin, From, 288. 
 Illusions, 298. 
 
 Initial, Daemonic, and Celes 
 tial Love, 107. 
 
 In Memoriam, E. B. E. ; 257. 
 Intellect, 307.
 
 312 
 
 INDEX OF TITLES 
 
 J. W., To, 27. 
 
 Last Farewell, The, 255. 
 
 Letters, 223. 
 
 Loss and Gain, 130. 
 
 Love, 280. 
 
 Love and Thought, 220. 
 
 Lover s Petition, 221. 
 
 Manners, 270. 
 May-Day, 171. 
 Memory, 280. 
 Merlin, 122, 125. 
 Merlin s Song, 225. 
 Merops, 131. 
 
 Michel Angelo Buonaroti, Son 
 net of, 283. 
 Mithridates, 25. 
 Monadnoc, 63. 
 Musketaquid, 155. 
 My Garden, 236. 
 
 Nature, 230, 278, 309. 
 Nature in Leasts, 282. 
 Nemesis, 206. 
 
 Nominalist and Realist, 310. 
 Northman, 277. 
 
 Ode, 30, 78. 
 
 Ode Sung in the Town Hall, 
 
 209. 
 
 Ode to Beauty, 92. 
 Omar Chiam, From, 287. 
 Orator, 276. 
 
 Painting and Sculpture, 
 Park, The, 88. 
 Past, The, 254. 
 Pericles, 281. 
 Poet, The, 276, 308. 
 Politics, 264. 
 Power, 229, 279, 295. 
 Problem, The, 8. 
 Prudence, 306. 
 
 Quatrains, 275. 
 
 140. 
 
 Rhea, To, 11. 
 Rhodora, The, 38. 
 Romany Girl, The, 232. 
 Rubies, 224. 
 
 Saadi, 133. 
 
 Sacrifice, 280. 
 
 Sea-Shore, 243. 
 
 S. H., 275. 
 
 Shah, To the, 289. 
 
 Shakespeare, 281. 
 
 Snow-Storm, The, 43. 
 
 Solution, 227. 
 
 Song of Nature, 245. 
 
 Song of Scid Nimetollah, 290. 
 
 Sphinx, The, 1. 
 
 Spiritual Laws, 272. 
 
 Sursum Corda, 91. 
 
 Suum Cuique, 85, 275. 
 
 Tact, 32. 
 
 Terminus, 252. 
 
 Test, The, 226. 
 
 Thine eyes still shinCd, 102. 
 
 Three Dimensions, The, 295. 
 
 Threnody, 160. 
 
 Titmouse, The, 239. 
 
 To Ellen, at the South, 98. 
 
 To Eva, 100. 
 
 ToJ. W., 27. 
 
 To Rhea, 11. 
 
 Two Rivers, 249. 
 
 Una, 222. 
 Unity, 273. 
 Uriel, 16. 
 
 Visit, The, 14. 
 Voluntaries, 215. 
 
 Waldeinsamkeit, 250. 
 Wealth, 296. 
 Woodnotes, 44, 50. 
 World-Soul, The, 18. 
 Worship, 274. 
 
 Xenophanes, 149.
 
 INDEX OF FIRST LINES 
 
 PAGE 
 
 A moody child and wildly wise ..... 308 
 
 A new commandment, said the smiling Muse . 282 
 
 A ruddy drop of manly blood ..... 268 
 
 Already blushes in thy cheek ..... 206 
 Announced by all the trumpets of the sky . . .43 
 
 As sings the pine-tree in the wind .... 282 
 
 As sunbeams stream through liberal space ... 50 
 Askest, How long thou shalt stay ? . . . .14 
 
 Because I was content with these poor fields . . . 155 
 
 Bethink, poor heart, what bitter kind of jest . . . 285 
 
 Boon Nature yields each day ..... 278 
 
 Bring me wine, but wine which never grew . . . 127 
 
 Burly, dozing humble-bee ...... 39 
 
 Butler, fetch the ruby wine ...... 141 
 
 By fate, not option, frugal Nature gave . . . 149 
 
 By the rude bridge that arched the flood . . . 170 
 
 Can rules or tutors educate ...... 267 
 
 Cast the bantling on the rocks ..... 279 
 
 Damsels of Time, the hypocritic Days .... 234 
 
 Daughter of Heaven and Earth, coy Spring . . .171 
 
 Day ! hast thou two faces ...... 235 
 
 Dearest, where thy shadow falls ..... 286 
 
 Deep in the man sits fast his fate .... 207 
 
 Each spot where tulips prank their state . . . 287 
 
 Each the herald is who wrote ..... 82 
 
 Ere he was born, the stars of fate .... 279 
 
 Ever the Poet from the land 276 
 
 Every day brings a ship ...... 223 
 
 Every thought is public ...... 275 
 
 Farewell, ye lofty spires ...... 255 
 
 Flow, flow the waves hated ...... 298 
 
 For this present, hard ....... 44 
 
 From fall to spring the russet acurn . . . .139 
 
 From thy worth and weight the stars gravitate . . 289 
 
 Gifts of one who loved me ...... 306 
 
 Give all to love 96 
 
 Give me truths ........ 152
 
 314 INDEX OF FIRST LINES 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Give to barrows, trays, and pans ..... 271 
 
 Go, speed the stars of Thought ..... 307 
 
 Go thou to thy learned task ..... 277 
 
 Gold and iron are good ...... 264 
 
 Good-bye, proud world ! I m going home ... 36 
 Good Heart, that ownest all . . . . .221 
 
 Grace, Beauty, and Caprice ...... 270 
 
 Hark what, now loud, now low ..... 288 
 
 Hast thou named all the birds without a gun . . 87 
 
 He took the colour of his vest ..... 277 
 
 He who has a thousand friends ..... 287 
 
 He who has no hands ....... 276 
 
 Her passions the shy violet . . . . . .281 
 
 Her planted eye to-day controls ..... 279 
 
 High was her heart ....... 275 
 
 His tongue was framed to music ..... 295 
 
 How much, Preventing God ! how much I owe . . 294 
 
 I, Alphonso, live and learn ...... 22 
 
 I am not wiser for my age ...... 279 
 
 I am the Muse who sung alway ..... 227 
 
 I cannot spare water or wine ..... 25 
 
 I do not count the hours I spend .... 250 
 
 I heard or seemed to hear the chiding Sea . . . 243 
 
 I hung my verses in the wind ..... 226 
 
 I like a church ; I like a cowl ..... 8 
 
 I mourn upon this battle-field ..... 257 
 
 I said to heaven that glowed above .... 285 
 
 I see all human wits ....... 281 
 
 I serve you not, if you I follow ..... 84 
 
 If I could put my woods in song .... 236 
 
 If my darling should depart ..... 285 
 
 If the red slayer think he slays ..... 205 
 
 In countless upward-striving waves .... 310 
 
 In Farsistan the violet spreads ..... 284 
 
 In May, when sea-winds pierced our solitudes . . 38 
 It fell in the ancient periods ... .16 
 
 It is time to be old ....... 252 
 
 Knows he who tills this lonely field . . . .158 
 
 Little thinks, in the field, yon red-cloaked clown . . 6 
 
 Long I followed happy guides ..... 89 
 
 Love on his errand bound to go . . . . . 280 
 
 Low and mournful be the strain ..... 215 
 
 Man was made of social earth . . . . .112 
 
 May be true what I had heard . . . . .42 
 
 Mine and yours ........ 34 
 
 Mine are the night and morning ..... 245
 
 INDEX OF FIRST LINES 315 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Minott, Lee, Willard, Hosmer, Meriam, Flint ... 33 
 Mortal mixed of middle clay ..... 30 
 
 Nature centres into balls ...... 307 
 
 Never did sculptor s dream unfold . . . . 283 
 
 Night-dreams trace on memory s wall .... 280 
 
 Not in their houses stand the stars .... 289 
 
 O fair and stately maid, whose eyes . . . .100 
 
 O tenderly the haughty day ..... 209 
 
 Of Merlin wise I learned a song ..... 225 
 
 Of Paradise, hermit wise ...... 147 
 
 Olympian bards who sung ...... 308 
 
 On a mound an Arab lay ...... 104 
 
 On prince or bride no diamond stone .... 286 
 
 On two days it steads not ...... 287 
 
 Once I wished I might rehearse ..... 208 
 
 Over his head were the maple buds . . . 278 
 
 Quit the hut, frequent the palace .... 276 
 
 Room for the spheres ! . . . . . . 295 
 
 Roving, roving, as it seems ..... 
 
 Ruby wine is drunk by knaves . . . 265 
 
 Seek not the spirit, if it hide 91 
 
 Set not thy foot on graves . 
 
 She is gamesome and good .... 
 
 Shines the last age, the next with hope is seen 
 
 Some of your hurts you have cured 
 
 Space is ample, east and west 
 
 Spin the ball ! I reel, I burn 
 
 Test of the poet is knowledge of love . 
 
 Thanks to the morning light 
 
 That you are fair or wise is vain 
 
 The debt is paid ... ... 254 
 
 The gale that wrecked you on the sand . . . 277 
 The green grass is bowing ..... 
 
 The living Heaven thy prayers respect . 
 
 The lords of life, the lords of life .... 261 
 
 The mountain and the squirrel 
 
 The prosperous and beautiful 
 
 The rain has spoiled the farmer s day . 
 
 The rhyme of the poet 
 
 The rocky nook with hill-tops three . . JJX; 
 
 The rounded world is fair to see . j>9 
 
 The sea is the road of the bold . * ino 
 
 The sense of the world is short . 
 
 The sinful painter drapes his goddess warm . 
 
 The South- wind brings lb y 
 
 The Sphinx is drowsy
 
 316 INDEX OF FIRST LINES 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The sun goes down, and with him takes . . 232 
 
 The sun set, but set not his hope .... 266 
 
 The wings of Time are black and white , . . 262 
 TLe word of the Lord by night . . . .211 
 
 Thee, dear friend, a brother soothes . . . .11 
 
 Theme no poet gladly sung . ... 306 
 
 There is no architect . . . . . . .132 
 
 There is no great and no small ..... 30,") 
 
 They brought me rubies from the mine . . . 224 
 
 They say, through patience, chalk .... 285 
 
 Thine eyes still shined for me, though far . . .102 
 Think me not unkind and rude . . . . .121 
 
 This is he, who, felled by foes ..... 274 
 
 Thou foolish Hafiz ! Say, do churls .... 286 
 
 Though loath to grieve ...... 78 
 
 Though love repine, and reason chafe .... 280 
 
 Thousand minstrels woke within me .... 63 
 
 Thy foes to hunt 289 
 
 Thy summer voice, MusketaquSt ..... 249 
 Thy trivial harp will never please . . . .122 
 
 To clothe the fiery thought 276 
 
 Trees in groves . . . . . . . .133 
 
 True Bramin, in the morning meadows wet . . . 277 
 Two things thou shalt not long for .... 288 
 
 Two well-assorted travellers use . 220 
 
 Venus, when her son was lost ..... 107 
 Virtue runs before the Muse . . . . .130 
 
 Was never form and never face ..... 269 
 
 We crossed Champlain to Keeseville with our friends . 193 
 We love the venerable house ..... 292 
 
 Well and wisely said the Greek . . . . .281 
 
 What boots it, thy virtue ...... 32 
 
 What care I, so they stand the same . . . .131 
 
 When I was born ....... 150 
 
 Whether is better the gift or the donor . . .50 
 Who gave thee, Beauty ...... 92 
 
 Who shall tell what did befall 296 
 
 Why should I keep holiday ...... 86 
 
 Wilt thou seal up the avenues of ill . . . 275 
 
 Winters know 230 
 
 Wise and polite, and if I drew ..... 193 
 With beams December planets dart .... 275 
 
 You shall not be overbold ...... 239 
 
 Your picture smiles as first it smiled . . . .101
 
 ABB II II II III | 
 
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