ENGLISH :.I ;/;, cccxcn. oo o^ CM "d- O >- REESE LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. APR 12 1894 , 189 . Accessions 7 J . Class No. LIVING ENGLISH POETS LIVING ENGLISH POETS MDCCCXCIII LONDON KEG AN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER &> CO., LTD. MDCCCXCIll PREFACE TO THE ORIGINAL EDITION. Editors of the present selection believe them- selves justified in claiming for the principle which has directed them a certain novelty ', at least as far as regards living writers. They Jiave prepared an antJiology which aims at being no casual or desultory assemblage of beautiful poems, but one which presents in chronological order examples of tlte higliest attain- ment, and none but tJie highest, of tJte principal Poets of our own age. So great is the wealth of English poetry in this century, so varied its field, so versatile its execution, that tJie difficulty has been to know liow to repress and omit. In making such a selection it has been felt that it was of the highest importance to avoid anything like narrowness of aim, and above all to secure exemption from tJte prejudices and the vi PREFACE TO ORIGINAL EDITION partialities of any one school. TJte Editors believe that tJiey have been scrupulously catholic in their views ; they have not undertaken the work in haste, and they are anxious to record tliat, as far as they are able to learn, there is no living writer of verse, ivhose works have enjoyed any reputation eitJier in a wide or narrow circle, to wJiom they have not given their unbiassed consideration, and that, if any names are found to be omitted Jiere, tJie Editors must take upon themselves tJie responsibility of having felt obliged to omit them deliberately. There are but two exceptions to tJie names tJiey have wished to include. An eminent writer whose verse deserves to be no less widely read than is his prose, has declined "to be bound with others in a selection;" and while this is in one sense a great regret to the Editors, it is not wJwlly without its compensations, since all readers who are aware of tJie omission of any favourite Poet will of course consider that he, their own Apollo, is the fastidious One who has refused to allow his flowers to be twined in the general garland. The other has succeeded in PREFACE TO ORIGINAL EDITION vii forgetting tJie flight of time, and, being tJierefore unwilling that otJiers sJwuld take note of that swift passage of years which blanches even poetic locks, is unwilling- to comply with the chronological system which is an essential part of tJie Editors' plan. The Editors, ttien, having desired to include, to tJie best of ttieir judgment, representative pieces from all tlie verse-writers who may really be called in any high and lasting sense Poets, have been gratified to find that tfie names have for the most part arranged tJiemselves by a quantitative test in an order which approximately is that in which the public voice has classed tJie names selected. Not, Jiowever, that the test is infallible, or without its exceptions. Moreover, it lias not been thought fitting to select from Dramas, since detacJied passages suffer by division from tJieir context, and Jience SIR HENRY TAYLOR is here repre- sented by lyrics alone, of which he has written far too few. TJie present age has been particularly rich in facetious and fantastic verse, but the Editors of the present selection have only ventured to avail them- viii PREFACE TO ORIGINAL EDITION selves of it sparingly, and where an underlying seriousness of purpose and a close attention to form seemed to give it more than an epJiemeral value. Throughout it may be said that a conviction of the enduring qualities of poems and of Poets has been allowed to outweigh a mere sense of brightness or cleverness in workmanship. The Editors have been particularly struck, in reading a very large number of volumes of verse for the purpose in hand, with t}ie excellent manner in which much is now-a-days said, which in its essence is scarcely worth the saying, and they have not considered that such pieces, tJiough in tlumselves at times exquisite, are likely to be of permanent value. It would have swelled the book beyond all reasonable limits to Jiave included in it the masterpieces of con- temporary American poetry. Literature on the other side of the Atlantic has now extended so considerably in all directions that the Americans may safely be left to prepare their own anthology. It remains only to thank cordially all who have given permission to include their poems, and to PREFACE TO ORIGINAL EDITION ix apologise for tJie unavoidable prominence given to tJiese few words of preface, tJte mere string which has served to tie up our sweet posy. March, 1882. Since these words were written, English literature is the poorer by tJte loss of a Poet to whom a large space had by right been assigned in the ensuing selec- tion. DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI will write no more, and although his name and fame die not, Jie is un- happily no longer to be classed among living Poets. It is with a sad satisfaction t}iat the Editors mention tJie graceful courtesy with which he not merely acceded to tJteir request to include several of his poems, but interested Jiimself in their work. June, 1882. PREFACE TO NEW EDITION. LE VEN years have elapsed, and to tJie same hands has been entrusted tlie task of revising tJie work originally presented to tlie public in the words which have just been read. TJie labour has been a melancholy one ', for tJie first part of it was to remove those shining names which one after anotJier Jiave passed, since 1882, from the roll of tJie living. Fourteen poets, wlwse work was included then, can be quoted from here no more. TJie first to leave us, in 1884, was tJte vener- able " ORION " HORNE. LORD HOUGHTON followed in 1885. <d fatal year was 1886, in which SIR HENRY TAYLOR, WILLIAM BARNES and R. C. TRENCH passed away. One of tJie youngest of tJie group, PHILIP BOURKE MARS TON, was relieved from much suffering in 1887. Then greater lights began to be extinguisJud. TJie death of MATTHEW ARNOLD, in 1888, was but xii PREFACE TO NEW EDITION the prelude to that of ROBERT BROWNING in 1889. NEWMAN survived until 1890. In 1891 LORD LYTTON passed away. But 1892 was the year of pre-eminent loss, for the deaths of CORY and WOOLNER were scarcely noted in tJie universal mourning of an empire for tJie greatest poet of the century, for TENNYSON himself. One more name, that of JOHN ADD ING TON SYMONDS, has been erased from the list even while our work of revision has been in progress. For these fourteen deceased poets, of strangely different force and value, we have endeavoured to substitute others wJiose work has come into prominence since this book was originally planned. Seventeen poets are represented in this edition for the first time. It cannot be pretended that among these new inheritors of renown there are as yet to be found any wlto fill in our hearts the place so long occupied by TENNYSON^ and for not a few years before their deatJis by BROWNING and ARNOLD. But it is an easy thing to depreciate the achievement of youth by comparing it with the fulfilment of long life ; and it is certainly not our intention here to despair of the Republic of PREFACE TO NEW EDITION xiii Poetry. We believe tJiat among those poets who Jiave secured a hearing within the last decade there are several wJwse voices will continue to sound more clearly and more loudly as tJiey slowly ascend the hill of song. As in 1 88 2> so now in 1893, our selection is not quite so complete as we sJwuld wish to make it. One young poet of very high promise has been prevented by Jiealth from according or refusing that permission which we are certain he would have generously given. Anotlier writer, as did an elder confrere in 1882, declines to be bound with others in a collection. But though we deplore tJiese two omissions, we still Jiope tJiat the book, in its revised form, may be found to be no less characteristic of the poetry of tJie present day than its predecessor was acknowledged to be of that of eleven years ago. September, 1893. CONTENTS PAGE FREDERICK TENNYSON THE BLACKBIRD I WOMEN AND CHILDREN 6 THOMAS GORDON HAKE THE SNAKE-CHARMER 9 AUBREY DE VERE SONG 15 FROM " ODE ON THE ASCENT OF THE ALPS" 16 LYCIUS 19 THE CAMPO SANTO AT PISA / ... 22 // . . . 23 PHILIP JAMES BAILEY FROM "FESTtJS" 24 xvi CONTENTS PAGE FREDERICK LOCKER-LAMPSON THE UNREALIZED IDEAL 26 AT HER WINDOW 27 LOULOU AND HER CAT 28 CO VENTR Y PA TMORE FROM " THE ANGEL IN THE HOUSE" i LOVE'S PERVERSITY 3! ,, ,, ,, ,, // THE REVELATION . 33 THE TOYS 34 DEPARTURE 35 THE AZALEA 37 WILLIAM ALEXANDER A VISION OF OXFORD 39 CHRISTINA GEORGINA ROSSETTI AMOR MUNDI 44 UP-HILL 46 SONG 47 BIRD RAPTURES 48 NOBLE SISTERS 48 A7 HOME 51 DREAM LAND 52 CONTENTS xvii PAGE CHRISTINA GEORGINA ROSSETTI continued AFTER DEATH . 54 FROM " TIME FLIES" I 55 // 55 /// 57 ir 57 SIR EDWIN ARNOLD FROM " THE LIGHT OF ASIA " .... 59 TO A PAIR OF EGYPTIAN SLIPPERS 61 LEWIS MORRIS AT LAST 66 THE HOME ALTAR 69 FROM " GWEN" 71 THE BEGINNINGS OF FAITH .... 74 THE ODE OF DECLINE 75 ON A THRUSH SINGING IN AUTUMN 80 RICHARD WATSON DIXON SONG 83 FROM "CHRIST'S COMPANY" THE HOLY MOTHER AT THE CROSS 84 b xviii CONTENTS PAGE WILLIAM MORRIS THE CHAPEL IN LYONESS 87 THE HAYSTACK IN THE FLOODS ... 92 FROM " THE LIFE AND DEATH OF JASON" I 99 // 102 FROM " THE EARTHLY PARADISE" ... 103 FROM " LOVE IS ENOUGH" THE MUSIC . . 105 THE MESSAGE OF THE MARCH WIND . . 107 ALFRED AUSTIN IN THE HEART OF THE FOREST . . .112 A MARCH MINSTREL 118 PRIMROSES I 120 // 121 m 123 TO ENGLAND 124 SIR ALFRED LYALL A RAJPOOT CHIEF OF THE OLD SCHOOL MOR1BUNDUS LOQITUR 126 JOHN LEICESTER WARREN, LORD DE TAB LEY CIRCE 132 TWO OLD KINGS 135 CONTENTS xix PAGE WALTER THEODORE WATTS NATURA MALIGNA 136 JOHN THE PILGRIM (THE MIRAGE IN EGYPT) . 137 THE FIRST KISS 138 ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE FROM " ATALANTA IN CALYDON" CHORUS . 139 IN MEMORY OF WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR . 141 FROM "THE GARDEN OF PROSERPINE" ,-~ . 144 THE SUNDEW 146 FROM PRELUDE TO " SONGS BEFORE SUNRISE" 148 FROM "MATER TRIUMPHALIS" . . . .152 FROM "HERTHA" 155 A FORSAKEN GARDEN . . . . . .158 WILFRID SCAWEN BLUNT TO MANON COMPARING HER TO A FALCON . .162 A FOREST IN BOSNIA 163 LILAC AND GOLD AND GREEN .... 163 FROM " IN VINCULIS" 165 AUSTIN DOBSON A DEAD LETTER I 167 " 169 /// 170 A GENTLEMAN OF THE OLD SCHOOL . .173 xx CONTENTS PAGE AUSTIN DOBSON continued A SONG OF THE THE FOUR SEASONS . .178 TO AN INTRUSIVE BUTTERFLY. . . .179 THE POET AND THE CRITICS . . . .181 A FANCY FROM FONTENELLE .... 184 BEFORE SEDAN 185 THE LADIES OF ST. JAMES'S . . . .186 "GOOD NIGHT, BABETTE!" 189 THE BALLAD OF THE ARMADA . . .192 IN AFTER DAYS 194 AUGUSTA WEBSTER IF i95 HARRIET E. HAMILTON KING FROM " THE DISCIPLES" 198 FROM " AC ESI LAO MIL A NO" 200 ROBERT WILLIAMS BUCHANAN FROM " WHITE ROSE AND RED" DROWSIETOWN 203 WILLIAM JOHN COURTHOPE FROM " THE PARADISE OF BIRDS" CHORUS OF HUMAN SOULS 210 CHORUS OF BIRDS 213 CONTENTS xxi PAGE FREDERIC W. H. MYERS FROM "ST. PAUL" 216 TENERIFFE . 217 SIMMENTHAL 220 ROBERT BRIDGES ELEGY ON A LADY, WHOM GRIEF FOR THE DEATH OF HER BETROTHED KILLED 222 MY SONG 225 ANDREW LANG BALLADE OF SLEEP 227 BALLADE OF HIS CHOICE OF A SEPULCHRE 229 NATURAL THEOLOGY 230 EDMUND GOSSE LYING IN THE GRASS 231 THE RETURN OF THE SWALLOWS . . .234 THE CHARCOAL-BURNER 237 TWO POINTS OF VIEW 239 WALTER HERRIES POLLOCK A CONQUEST 241 xxii CONTENTS PAGE ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON THE HOUSE BEAUTIFUL 242 THE CELESTIAL SURGEON 243 THE WIND 244 " SAY NOT OF ME" 245 "SING CLEARLIER, MUSE" 246 THEOPHILE MARZIALS SONG 247 A PASTORAL 248 SONG 249 MARGARET L. WOODS TO THE FORGOTTEN DEAD 250 MAR Y DARMESTETER TO A DRAGON-FLY 251 LE ROI EST MORT 252 RETROSPECT 253 TWILIGHT 255 ROBERT, LORD HOUGHTON A WET SUNSET IN SOUTH AFRICA . . .257 A QUESTION 259 CONTENTS xxiii PAGB NORMAN GALE A BIRD IN THE HAND 260 KATHARINE TYNAN GOLDEN LILIES 262 A TIRED HEART 263 HERBERT P. HORNE AMICO SUO 266 ARTHUR SYMONS RAIN ON THE DOWN 267 EMMY 267 RUDYARD KIPLING MANDALA Y 269 L 'ENVOI 272 RICHARD LE GALLIENNE THE WONDER-CHILD 277 AUTUMN 27 8 ALL SUNG 279 LIVING ENGLISH POETS FREDERICK TENNYSON Born 1807 THE BLACKBIRD i How sweet the harmonies of Afternoon ! The Blackbird sings along the sunny breeze His ancient song of leaves, and Summer boon ; Rich breath of hayfields streams thro' whispering trees ; And birds of morning trim their bustling wings, And listen fondly while the Blackbird sings. 77 How soft the lovelight of the West reposes On this green valley's cheery solitude, B 2 LIVING ENGLISH POETS On the trim cottage with its screen of roses, On the gray belfry with its ivy hood, And murmuring mill-race, and the wheel that flings Its bubbling freshness while the Blackbird sings. The very dial on the village church Seems as 'twere dreaming in a dozy rest ; The scribbled benches underneath the porch Bask in the kindly welcome of the West ; But the broad casements of the old Three Kings Blaze like a furnace while the Blackbird sings. IV And there beneath the immemorial elm Three rosy revellers round a table sit, And thro' gray clouds give laws unto the realm, Curse good and great, but worship their own wit, And roar of fights, and fairs, and junketings, Corn, colts, and curs the while the Blackbird sings. v Before her home, in her accustom'd seat, The tidy Grandam spins beneath the shade Of the old honeysuckle, at her feet The dreaming pug, and purring tabby laid ; To her low chair a little maiden clings, And spells in silence while the Blackbird sings. FREDERICK TENNYSON VI Sometimes the shadow of a lazy cloud Breathes o'er the hamlet with its gardens green, While the far fields with sunlight overflow'd Like golden shores of Fairyland are seen ; Again, the sunshine on the shadow springs, And fires the thicket where the Blackbird sings. VII The woods, the lawn, the peaked Manor-house, With its peach-cover'd walls, and rookery loud, The trim, quaint garden alleys screen'd with boughs, The lion-headed gates, so grim and proud, The mossy fountain with its murmurings, Lie in warm sunshine while the Blackbird sings. VIII The ring of silver voices, and the sheen Of festal garments and my Lady streams With her gay court across the garden green ; Some laugh, and dance, some whisper their love- dreams ; And one calls for a little page ; he strings Her lute beside her while the Blackbird sings. IX A little while and lo ! the charm is heard, A youth, whose life has been all Summer, steals 4 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Forth from the noisy guests around the board, Creeps by her softly ; at her footstool kneels ; And, when she pauses, murmurs tender things Into her fond ear while the Blackbird sings. x The smoke-wreaths from the chimneys curl up higher, And dizzy things of Eve begin to float Upon the light ; the breeze begins to tire ; Half way to Sunset with a drowsy note The ancient clock from out the valley swings ; The Grandam nods and still the Blackbird sings. XI Far shouts and laughter from the farmstead peal, Where the great stack is piling in the sun ; Thro' narrow gates o'erladen waggons reel, And barking curs into the tumult run ; While the inconstant wind bears off, and brings The merry tempest and the Blackbird sings. xn On the high wold the last look of the sun Burns, like a beacon, over dale and stream ; The shouts have ceased, the laughter and the fun ; The Grandam sleeps, and peaceful be her dream ; Only a hammer on an anvil rings ; The day is dying still the Blackbird sings. FREDERICK TENNYSON XIII Now the good Vicar passes from his gate Serene, with long white hair ; and in his eye Burns the clear spirit that hath conquer'd fate, And felt the wings of immortality ; His heart is throng'd with great imaginings, And tender mercies while the Blackbird sings. XIV Down by the brook he bends his steps and thro' A lowly wicket ; and at last he stands Awful beside the bed of one who grew From boyhood with him who with lifted hands, And eyes, seems listening to far welcomings, And sweeter music than the Blackbird sings. xv Two golden stars, like tokens from the Blest, Strike on his dim orbs from the setting sun ; His sinking hands seem pointing to the West ; He smiles as though he said " Thy will be done " His eyes, they see not those illuminings ; His ears, they hear not what the Blackbird sings. WOMEN AND CHILDREN God said, " Bring little children unto me " ; And Man is likest God, when from his heart Truth flows in its divine simplicity, And love dwells in him working without art : Children are Earth's fair flowers the Crown of Life A noble Woman and he is refill'd With hope who turns with love unto his Wife, With love who turns with hope unto his Child. ii Oh ! if no faces were beheld on earth, But toiling Manhood, and repining Age, No welcome eyes of Innocence and Mirth To look upon us kindly, who would wage The gloomy battle for himself alone ? Or thro' the dark of the o'erhanging cloud Look wistfully for light ? who would not groan Beneath his daily task, and weep aloud ? /// But little children take us by the hand, And gaze with trustful cheer into our eyes FREDERICK TENNYSON Patience and Fortitude beside us stand In Woman's shape, and waft to Heav'n our sighs ; The Guiltless child holds back the arm of Guilt Upraised to strike, and woman may atone With sinless tears for sins of man, and melt The damning seal when evil deeds are done. IV When thirsty Suffering hath drunk up our tears, And left the heart sere as an Autumn leaf, From her fond eyes they fall for us ; she cheers With songs, and lights with hope the cloud of Grief ; When our sweet Youth for ever buried lies, And we well nigh forget the thing we were, Once more we meet him in the young blue eyes, And laugh to see his resurrection there. v When to the car of Vengeance and of Hate We yoke ill thoughts, and memories hot from Hell, 'Tis She that stays us, like relenting Fate, 'Tis her weak arm that locks the crazing wheel ; Above the dust of conflict, and the jar, She lifts a little child ; her voice is heard Piercing above the thunder of the War, " Spare thou, that thine hereafter may be spared ! " 8 LIVING ENGLISH POETS VI And should they go before us on that way That all must tread, and leave us faint with sorrow ; Should the great light of Love forsake our day, Memory's bright moon bespeaks a sunbright morrow ; Behold, the skies unfold ! broad beams descend ; Beneath the Gods upon the golden stair, Amid the upward glories without end, At Heavengate they stand, and bid us there. THOMAS GORDON HAKE Born 1809 THE SNAKE-CHARMER The forest rears on lifted arms A world of leaves, whence verdurous light Shakes through the shady depths and warms Proud tree and stealthy parasite, There where those cruel coils enclasp The trunks they strangle in their grasp. An old man creeps from out the woods, Breaking the vine's entangling spell ; He thrids the jungle's solitudes, O'er bamboos rotting where they fell ; Slow down the tiger's path he wends Where at the pool the jungle ends. No moss-greened alley tells the trace Of his lone step, no sound is stirred, Even when his tawny hands displace The boughs, that backward sweep unheard io LIVING ENGLISH POETS His way as noiseless as the trail Of the swift snake and pilgrim snail. The old snake-charmer, once he played Soft music for the serpent's ear, But now his cunning hand is stayed ; He knows the hour of death is near. And all that live in brake and bough, All know the brand is on his brow. Yet where his soul is he must go : He crawls along from tree to tree. The old snake-charmer, doth he know If snake or beast of prey he be ? Bewildered at the pool he lies And sees as through a serpent's eyes. Weeds wove with white-flowered lily crops Drink of the pool, and serpents hie To the thin brink as noonday drops, And in the froth-daubed rushes lie. There rests he now with fastened breath 'Neath a kind sun to bask in death. The pool is bright with glossy dyes And cast-up bubbles of decay : A green death-leaven overlies Its mottled scum, where shadows play THOMAS GORDON HAKE \\ As the snake's hollow coil, fresh shed, Rolls in the wind across its bed. No more the wily note is heard From his full flute the riving air That tames the snake, decoys the bird, Worries the she-wolf from her lair. Fain would he bid its parting breath Drown in his ears the voice of death. Still doth his soul's vague longing skim The pool beloved : he hears the hiss That siffles at the sedgy rim, Recalling days of former bliss, And the death-drops, that fall in showers, Seem honied dews from shady flowers. There is a rustle of the breeze And twitter of the singing bird ; He snatches at the melodies And his faint lips again are stirred : The olden sounds are in his ears ; But still the snake its crest uprears. His eyes are swimming in the mist That films the earth like serpent's breath : And now, as if a serpent hissed, The husky whisperings of Death 12 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Fill ear and brain he looks around Serpents seem matted o'er the ground. Soon visions of past joys bewitch His crafty soul ; his hands would set Death's snare, while now his fingers twitch The tasselled reed as 'twere his net. But his thin lips no longer fill The woods with song ; his flute is still. Those lips still quaver to the flute, But fast the life-tide ebbs away ; Those lips now quaver and are mute, But nature throbs in breathless play : Birds are in open song, the snakes Are watching in the silent brakes. In sudden fear of snares unseen The birds like crimson sunset swarm, All gold and purple, red and green, And seek each other for the charm. Lizards dart up the feathery trees Like shadows of a rainbow breeze. The wildered birds again have rushed Into the charm, it is the hour When the shrill forest-note is hushed, And they obey the serpent's power, THOMAS GORDON HAKE 13 Drawn to its gaze with troubled whirr, As by the thread of falconer. As 'twere to feed, on slanting wings They drop within the serpent's glare : Eyes flashing fire in burning rings Which spread into the dazzled air ; They flutter in the glittering coils ; The charmer dreads the serpent's toils. While Music swims away in death Man's spell is passing to his slaves : The snake feeds on the charmer's breath, The vulture screams, the parrot raves, The lone hyena laughs and howls, The tiger from the jungle growls. Then mounts the eagle flame-flecked folds Belt its proud plumes ; a feather falls : He hears the death-cry, he beholds The king-bird in the serpent's thralls, He looks with terror on the feud, And the sun shines through dripping blood. The deadly spell a moment gone Birds, from a distant Paradise, Strike the winged signal and have flown, Trailing rich hues through azure skies : LIVING ENGLISH POETS The serpent falls ; like demon wings The far-out-branching cedar swings. The wood swims round ; the pool and skies Have met ; the death-drops down that cheek Fall faster ; for the serpent's eyes Grow human, and the charmer's seek. A gaze like man's directs the dart Which now is buried at his heart The monarch of the world is cold : The charm he bore has passed away : The serpent gathers up its fold To wind about its human prey. The red mouth darts a dizzy sting, And clenches the eternal ring. AUBREY DE VERE Born 1814 SONG When I was young, I said to Sorrow, " Come, and I will play with thee " : He is near me now all day ; And at night returns to say, " I will come again to-morrow, I will come and stay with thee." Through the woods we walk together ; His soft footsteps rustle nigh me ; To shield an unregarded head, He hath built a winter shed ; And all night in rainy weather, I hear his gentle breathings by me. 16 Ul'IXG EXGLJSH POETS FSOM "ODE ON THE ASCENT OF THE ALPS All night as in my dreams I lay The shout of torrents without number Was in my ears * Away, away. No time have we for slumber ! The star-beams in our eddies play The moon is set : away, away ! " And round the hills in tumult borne Through echoing caves and gorges rocking. The voices of the night and morn Are crying louder in their scorn, My tedious languor mocking. Alas ! in vain man's wearied limbs would rise To join in elemental ecstasies ! " But thou, O Muse, our heavenly mate, Unclogged art thou by fleshly weight ! Ascend ; upbearing my desire Among the mountains higher and higher. Leap from the glen upon the forest Leap from the forest on the snow : And while from snow to cloud thou soarest Look back on me below : Where from the glacier bursts the river With iron clang, pursue it ever ; .-: : J.--T: i-. I spakeBehold her o'er the broad tike iyng Like a great Angel HUBS* r:. (Or whitened only by the ouficquail shoal) Till two duL hflls, witla darker yd behfod, Oowaid! the swan's ffi^it with tbe eagles On, winged Muse ; stfll fat aid and asrrn (Broad lights below and changeftil Chneravale Not noontide sons alone, bat sans of even, Warming die gray fields in their soft decline, The green streams flushing with the hnes of heaven. C i8 LIVING ENGLISH POETS In vain those Shepherds call ; they cannot wake The echoes on this wide and cultured plain, Where spreads the river now into a lake, Now curves through walnut meads its golden chain, In-isling here and there some spot With orchard, hive, and one fair cot : Or children dragging from their boat Into the flood some reverend goat O happy valley ! cradle soft and deep For blissful life, calm sleep, And leisure, and affections free and wide, Give me yon plough, that I with thee may bide ! Or climb those stages, cot-bestrown, Vast steps of Summer's mountain-throne, Terrace o'er terrace rising, line o'er line, Swathed in the light wreaths of the elaborate vine. On yonder loftiest steep, the last From whose green base the gray rocks rise, In random circle idly cast A happy household lies. There rests the grandsire : round his feet The children some old tale entreat, And while he speaks supply each word Forgotten, altered, or ill heard. In yonder brake reclines a maid, Her locks a lover's fingers braid AUBREY DE VERE 19 Fair, fearless maiden ! cause for fear Is none, though he alone were near : Indulge at will thy sweet security ! He doth but that bold front incline And all those wind-tossed curls on thine To catch from thy fresh lips their mountain purity ! LYCIUS Lycius ! the female race is all the same ! All variable, as the Poets tell us ; Mad through caprice half way 'twixt men and children ! Acasta, mildest late of all our maids, Colder and calmer than a sacred well, Is now more changed than Spring has changed these woods ; Hers is the fault, not mine. Yourself shall judge From "Epidaurus, where for three long days With Nicias I had stayed, honouring the God, If strength might thus mine aged sire renerve, Last evening we returned. The way was dull 20 LIVING ENGLISH POETS And vexed with mountains : tired ere long was I From warding off the oleander boughs Which, as my comrade o'er the stream's dry bed Pushed on, closed backward on my mule and me. The flies maintained a melody unblest, While Nicias, of his wreath Nemean proud, Sang of the Satyrs and the Nymphs all day Like one by Esculapius fever-smitten. Arrived at eve, we bathed ; and drank, and ate Of figs and olives till our souls exulted : Lastly we slept like Gods. While morning shone, So filled was I with weariness and sleep That as a log till noon I lay, then rose, And in the bath-room sat While there I languished Reading that old, divine and holy tale Of sad Ismen& and Antigone, Two warm, soft hands around me sudden flung Closed both my eyes ; and a clear, shrill, sweet laughter Told me that she it was, Acasta's self, That brake upon my dreams. " What would you, child?" " Child, child ! " Acasta cried, " I am no child You do me wrong in calling me a child ! Come with me to the willowy river's brim : There read, if you must read." Her eyes not less AUBREY DE VERE 21 Than hands uplifted me, and forth we strayed. O'er all the Argolic plain Apollo's shafts So fiercely fell, methought the least had slain A second Python. From that theatre Hewn in the rock the Argive tumult rolled : Before the fane of Juno seven vast oxen Lowed loud, denouncing Heaven ere yet they fell : While from the hill-girt meadows rose a scent So rich, the salt sea odours vainly strove To pierce those fumes it curled about .my brain, And sting the nimbler spirits. Nodding I watched The pale herbs from the parched bank that trailed Bathing delighted in voluptuous cold, And scarcely swayed by that slow winding stream : I heard a sigh I asked not whence it came. At last a breeze went by, to glossy waves Rippling the steely flood : I noted then The reflex of the poplar stem thereon Curled into spiral wreaths, and toward me darting Like a long, shining water-snake : I laughed To see its restlessness. Acasta cried, " Read if you will not speak or look at me ! " Unconsciously I glanced upon the page, Bent o'er it, and begun to chaunt that song, " Favoured by Love are they that love not deeply," When, leaping from my side, she snatched the book, Into the river dashed it, bounded by, 22 LIVING ENGLISH POETS And, no word spoken, left me there alone. Lycius ! I see you smile ; but know you not Nothing is trifling which the Muse records, And lovers love to muse on ? Let the Gods Act as to them seems fitting. Hermes loved Phoebus loved also but the hearts of Gods Are everlasting like the sun and stars, Their loves as transient as the clouds. For me A peaceful life is all I seek, and far Removed from cares and all the female kind ! THE CAMPO SANTO AT PISA I There needs not choral song, nor organs pealing : This mighty cloister of itself inspires Thoughts breathed like hymns from spiritual choirs ; While shades and lights, in soft succession stealing, Along it creep, now veiling, now revealing Strange forms, here traced by Painting's earliest sires, Angels with palms ; and purgatorial fires ; And Saints caught up, and demons round them reeling Love, long remembering those she could not save, AUBREY DE VERE 23 Here hung the cradle of Italian Art : Faith rocked it ; hence, like hermit child, went forth That heaven-born Power which beautified the earth : She perished when the world had lured her heart From her true friends, Religion and the grave. II Lament not thou : the cold winds, as they pass Through the ribbed fret- work with low sigh or moan, Lament enough ; let them lament alone, Counting the sere leaves of the innumerous grass With thin, soft sound like one prolonged " alas ! " Spread thou thy hands on sun-touched vase, or stone That yet retains the warmth of sunshine gone, And drink warm solace from the ponderous mass. Gaze not around thee. Monumental marbles, Time-clouded frescoes, mouldering year by year, Dim cells in which all day the night-bird warbles, These things are sorrowful elsewhere, not here : A mightier Power than Art's hath here her shrine : Stranger ! thou tread'st the soil of Palestine ! PHILIP JAMES BAILEY Born 1816 FROM "FESTUS" Oh for the young heart like a fountain playing, Flinging its bright fresh feelings up to the skies It loves and strives to reach ; strives, loves in vain. It is of earth, and never meant for heaven ; Let us love both and die. The sphinx-like heart Loathes life the moment that life's riddle is read. The knot of our existence solved, all things Loose-ended lie, and useless. Life is had, And lo ! we sigh, and say, can this be all ? It is not what we thought ; it is very well, But we want something more. There is but death. And when we have said and seen, done, had, enjoyed And suffered, maybe, all we have wished, or feared, From fame to ruin, and from love to loathing, There can come but one more change try it death. Oh it is great to feel that nought of earth, Hope, love, nor dread, nor care for what's to come, Can check the royal lavishment of life ; PHILIP JAMES BAILEY 25 But, like a streamer strown upon the wind, We fling our souls to fate and to the future. For to die young is youth's divinest gift ; To pass from one world fresh into another, Ere change hath lost the charm of soft regret ; And feel the immortal impulse from within Which makes the coming, life, cry alway, on ! And follow it while strong, is heaven's last mercy. There is a fire-fly in the south, but shines W T hen on the wing. So is't with mind. When once We rest, we darken. On ! saith God to the soul, As unto the earth for ever. On it goes, A rejoicing native of the infinite, As is a bird, of air ; an orb, of heaven. FREDERICK LOCKER-LAMPSON Born 1821 THE UNREALIZED IDEAL My only Love is always near, In country or in town I see her twinkling feet, I hear The whisper of her gown. She foots it ever fair and young, Her locks are tied in haste, And one is o'er her shoulder flung And hangs below her waist. She ran before me in the meads ; And down this world-worn track She leads me on ; but while she leads She never gazes back. And yet her voice is in my dreams, To witch me more and more ; That wooing voice ! Ah me, it seems Less near me than of yore. FREDERICK LOCKER-LAMPSON 27 Lightly I sped when hope was high, And youth beguiled the chase ; > I follow follow still ; but I Shall never see her Face. AT HER WINDOW Ah, Minstrel, how strange is The carol you sing ! Let Psyche, who ranges The garden of Spring, Remember the changes December will bring. Beating Heart ! we come again Where my Love reposes : This is Mabel's window-pane ; These are Mabel's roses. Is she nested ? Does she kneel In the twilight stilly, Lily clad from throat to heel, She, my Virgin Lily ? Soon the wan, the wistful stars, Fading, will forsake her ; Elves of light, on beamy bars, Whisper then, and wake her. 28 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Let this friendly pebble plead At her flowery grating ; If she hear me will she heed ? Mabel, I am waiting, Mabel will be deck'd anon, Zoned in bride's apparel ; Happy zone ! Oh hark to yon Passion-shaken carol ! Sing thy song, thou tranced Thrush, Pipe thy best, thy clearest ; Hush, her lattice moves, O hush Dearest Mabel ! dearest . LOULOU AND HER CAT You shake your saucy curls, and vow I build no airy castles now ; You smile, and you are thinking too, He's nothing else on earth to do. Good pastry is vended In Cite Fadette ; Maison Pons can make splendid Brioche and galette. FREDERICK LOCKER-LAMPSON 29 M*sieu Pans is so fat that He's laid on the shelf; Madame had a Cat that Was fat as herself. Long hair, soft as satin, A musical purr, 'Gainst the window she'd flatten Her delicate fur. I drove Lou to see what Our neighbours were at, In rapture, cried she, " What An exquisite Cat ! " What whiskers ! She's purring All over. Regale Our eyes, Puss, by stirring Your feathery tail ! " M*sieu Pons, will you sell her ? " " Mafemme est sortie, Your offer I'll tell her; But will she ? " says he. Yet Pons was persuaded To part with the prize : 3 o LIVING ENGLISH POETS (Our bargain was aided, My Lou, by your eyes !) From his l/gitime save him, My spouse I prefer, For I warrant his gave him Un mauvais quart dJuure. I am giving a pleasant Grimalkin to Lou, Ah, Puss, what a present I'm giving to you ! COVENTRY PAT MO RE Born 1823 FROM " THE ANGEL IN THE HOUSE :) I LOVE'S PERVERSITY How strange a thing a lover seems To animals that do not love ! Lo, where he walks and talks in dreams, And flouts us with his Lady's glove ; How foreign is the garb he wears ; And how his great devotion mocks Our poor propriety, and scares The undevout with paradox ! His soul, through scorn of worldly care, And great extremes of sweet and gall, And musing much on all that's fair, Grows witty and fantastical ; He sobs his joy and sings his grief, And evermore finds such delight In simply picturing his relief, That 'plaining seems to cure his plight ; 32 LIVING ENGLISH POETS He makes his sorrow, when there's none ; His fancy blows both cold and hot ; Next to the wish that she'll be won, His first hope is that she may not ; He sues, yet deprecates consent ; Would she be captured she must fly ; She looks too happy and content, For whose least pleasure he would die ; Oh, cruelty, she cannot care For one to whom she's always kind ! He says he's nought, but, oh, despair, If he's not Jove to her fond mind ! He's jealous if she pets a dove, She must be his with all her soul ; Yet 'tis a postulate in love That part is greater than the whole ; And all his apprehension's stress, When he's with her, regards her hair, Her hand, a ribbon of her dress, As if his life were only there ; Because she's constant, he will change And kindest glances coldly meet, And, all the time he seems so strange, His soul is fawning at her feet ; Of smiles and simple heaven grown tired, He wickedly provokes her tears, And when she weeps, as he desired, CO VENTR Y PA TMORE 33 Falls slain with ecstacies of fears ; He blames her, though she has no fault, Except the folly to be his ; He worships her, the more to exalt The profanation of a kiss ; Health's his disease ; he's never well But when his paleness shames her rose ; His faith's a rock-built citadel, Its sign a flag that each way blows ; His o'erfed fancy frets and fumes ; And Love, in him, is fierce, like Hate, And ruffles his ambrosial plumes Against the bars of time and fate. 77 THE REVELATION An idle poet, here and there, Looks round him ; but, for all the rest, The world, unfathomably fair, Is duller than a witling's jest. Love wakes men, once a lifetime each ; They lift their heavy lids, and look ; And, lo, what one sweet page can teach, They read with joy, then shut the book. D 34 LIVING ENGLISH POETS And some give thanks, and some blaspheme, And most forget ; but, either way, That and the Child's unheeded dream Is all the light of all their day. THE TOYS My little Son, who look'd from thoughtful eyes, And moved and spoke in quiet grown-up wise, Having my law the seventh time disobey'd, I struck him, and dismiss'd With hard words and unkiss'd, His Mother, who was patient, being dead. Then, fearing lest his grief should hinder sleep, I visited his bed, But found him slumbering deep, With darken'd eyelids, and their lashes yet From his late sobbing wet. And I, with moan, Kissing away his tears, left others of my own ; For, on a table drawn beside his head, He had put, within his reach, A box of counters and a red-veined stone, A piece of glass abraded by the beach COVENTRY PATMORE 35 And six or seven shells, A bottle with bluebells And two French copper coins, ranged there with careful art, To comfort his sad heart. So when that night I pray'd To God, I wept, and said : Ah, when at last we lie with tranced breath, Not vexing Thee in death, And Thou rememberest of what toys We made our joys, How weakly understood, Thy great commanded good, Then, fatherly not less Than I whom Thou hast moulded from the clay, Thou'lt leave Thy wrath, and say, " 1 will be sorry for their childishness." DEPARTURE It was not like your great and gracious ways ! Do you, that have nought other to lament, Never, my Love, repent Of how, that July afternoon, 36 LIVING ENGLISH POETS You went, With sudden, unintelligible phrase, And frighten'd eye, Upon your journey of so many days, Without a single kiss, or a good-bye ? I knew, indeed, that you were parting soon ; And so we sate, within the low sun's rays, You whispering to me, for your voice was weak, Your harrowing praise. Well, it was well, To hear you such things speak, And I could tell What made your eyes a growing gloom of love, As a warm South-wind sombres a March grove. And it was like your great and gracious ways To turn your talk on daily things, my Dear, Lifting the luminous, pathetic lash To let the laughter flash, Whilst I drew near, Because you spoke so low that I could scarcely hear. But all at once to leave me at the last, More at the wonder than the loss aghast, With huddled, unintelligible phrase, And frightened eye, And go your journey of all days With not one kiss, or a good-bye, COVENTRY PATMORE 37 And the only loveless look the look with which you pass'd ; 'Twas all unlike your great and gracious ways. THE AZALEA There, where the sun shines first Against our room, She train'd the gold Azalea, whose perfume She, Spring-like, from her breathing grace dispersed. Last night the delicate crests of saffron bloom, For that their dainty likeness watch'd and nurst, Were just at point to burst. At dawn I dream'd, O God, that she was dead, And groan'd aloud upon my wretched bed, And waked, ah, God, and did not waken her, But lay, with eyes still closed, Perfectly bless'd in the delicious sphere By which I knew so well that she was near, My heart to speechless thankfulness composed. Till 'gan to stir A dizzy somewhat in my troubled head It was the azalea's breath, and she was dead ! The warm night had the lingering buds disclosed, 38 LIVING ENGLISH POETS And I had fall'n asleep with to my breast A chance-found letter press'd In which she said, " So, till to-morrow eve, my Own, adieu ! Parting's well-paid with soon again to meet, Soon in your arms to feel so small and sweet, Sweet to myself that am so sweet to you ! " WILLIAM ALEXANDER Born 1824 A VISION OF OXFORD Methought I met a Lady yestereven ; A passionless grief, that had nor tear nor wail, Sat on her pure proud face, that gleam'd to Heaven, White as a moon-lit sail. She spake : " On this pale brow are looks of youth, Yet angels listening on the argent floor Know that these lips have been proclaiming truth, Nine hundred years and more : " And I sis knows what time-grey towers rear'd up, Gardens and groves and cloister'd halls are mine, Where quaff my sons from many a myrrhine cup Draughts of ambrosial wine. " He knows how night by night my lamps are lit, How day by day my bells are ringing clear, 40 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Mother of ancient lore, and Attic wit, And discipline severe. " It may be long ago my dizzied brain Enchanted swam beneath Rome's master spell, Till like light tinctured by the painted pane Thought in her colours fell. " Yet when the great old tongue with strong effect Woke from the sepulchre across the sea, The subtler spell of Grecian intellect Work'd mightily in me. " Time pass'd my groves were full of warlike stirs ; The student's heart was with the merry spears, Or keeping measure to the clanking spurs Of Rupert's Cavaliers. 1 All those long ages, like a holy mother I rear'd my children to a lore sublime, Picking up fairer shells than any other Along the shores of Time. " And must I speak at last of sensual sleep, The dull forgetfulness of aimless years ? O ! let me turn away my head and weep Than Rachel's bitterer tears. WILLIAM ALEXANDER 41 " Tears for the passionate hearts I might have won, Tears for the age with which I might have striven, Tears for a hundred years of work undone, Crying like blood to Heaven. " I have repented, and my glorious name Stands scutcheon'd round with blazonry more bright The wither'd rod, the emblem of my shame, Bloom'd blossoms in a night. " And I have led my children on steep mountains By fine attraction of my spirit brought Up to the dark inexplicable fountains That are the springs of thought : " Led them where on the old poetic shore The flowers that change not with the changing moon Breathe round young hearts, as breathes the sycamore About the bees in June. " And I will bear them as on eagle's wings, To leave them bow'd before the sapphire Throne, High o'er the haunts where dying pleasure sings With sweet and swanlike tone. 42 LIVING ENGLISH POETS " And I will lead the age's great expansions, Progressive circles toward thought's Sabbath rest, And point beyond them to the ' many mansions ' Where Christ is with the blest. " Am I not pledged, who gave my bridal ring To that old man, heroic, strong, and true, Whose grey-hair'd virtue was a nobler thing Than even Waterloo ? " Surely that spousal morn my chosen ones Felt their hearts moving to mysterious calls, And the old pictures of my sainted sons Look'd brighter from the walls. " He sleeps at last no wind's tempestuous breath Play'd a Dead March upon the moaning billow, What time God's Angel visited with death The old Field-Marshal's pillow. " There was no omen of a great disaster Where castled Walmer stands beside the shore ; The evening clouds, like pillar'd alabaster, Hung huge and silent o'er. WILLIAM ALEXANDER 43 " The moon in brightness walk'd the * fleecy rack,' Walk'd up and down among the starry fires, Heaven's great cathedral was not hung with black Up to its topmost spires ! " But mine own Isis kept a solemn chiming, A silver Requiescat all night long, And mine old trees, with all their leaves, were timing The sorrow of the song. " And through mine angel-haunted aisles of beauty From grand old organs gush'd a music dim, Lauds for a champion who had done his duty. I knew they were for him ! " CHRISTINA GEORGINA ROSSETTI Born 1830 AMOR MUNDI " O where are you going with your love-locks flowing, On the west wind blowing along this valley track ? " " The down-hill path is easy, come with me an it please ye, We shall escape the up-hill by never turning back." So they two went together in glowing August weather, The honey-breathing heather lay to their left and right ; And dear she was to doat on, her swift feet seemed to float on The air like soft twin pigeons too sportive to alight. 4< Oh, what is that in heaven where grey cloud-flakes are seven, Where blackest clouds hang riven just at the rainy skirt ? " CHRISTINA GEORGINA ROSSETTI 45 " Oh, that's a meteor sent us, a message dumb, por- tentous, An undeciphered solemn signal of help or hurt" " Oh, what is that glides quickly where velvet flowers grow thickly, Their scent comes rich and sickly ? " "A scaled and hooded worm." " Oh, what's that in the hollow, so pale I quake to follow?" " Oh, that's a thin dead body which waits the eternal term." " Turn again, O my sweetest, turn again, false and fleetest : This beaten way thou beatest, I fear is hell's own track." " Nay, too steep for hill mounting ; nay, too late for cost counting : This down-hill path is easy, but there's no turning back." 46 LIVING ENGLISH POETS UP-HILL Does the road wind up-hill all the way ? Yes, to the very end. Will the day's journey take the whole long day ? From morn to night, my friend. But is there for the night a resting-place ? A roof for when the slow dark hours begin. May not the darkness hide it from my face ? You cannot miss that inn. Shall I meet other wayfarers at night ? Those who have gone before. Then must I knock, or call when just in sight ? They will not keep you standing at the door. Shall I find comfort, travel-sore and weak ? Of labour you shall find the sum. Will there be beds for me and all who seek ? Yea, beds for all who come. CHRISTINA GEORGINA ROSSETTI 47 SONG When I am dead, my dearest, Sing no sad songs for me ; Plant thou no roses at my head, No shady cypress tree : Be the green grass above me With showers and dewdrops wet; And if thou wilt, remember, And if thou wilt, forget. I shall not see the shadows, I shall not feel the rain ; I shall not hear the nightingale Sing on, as if in pain : And dreaming through the twilight That doth not rise nor set, Haply I may remember, And haply may forget. LIVING ENGLISH POETS BIRD RAPTURES The sunrise wakes the lark to sing, The moonrise wakes the nightingale. Come darkness, moonrise, everything That is so silent, sweet, and pale, Come, so ye wake the nightingale. Make haste to mount, thou wistful moon, Make haste to wake the nightingale : Let silence set the world in tune To hearken to that wordless tale Which warbles from the nightingale. O herald skylark, stay thy flight One moment, for a nightingale Floods us with sorrow and delight. To-morrow thou shalt hoist the sail ; Leave us to-night the nightingale. NOBLE SISTERS " Now did you mark a falcon, Sister dear, sister dear, Flying toward my window In the morning cool and clear ? CHRISTINA GEORGINA ROSSETTI 49 With jingling bells about her neck, But what beneath her wing ? It may have been a ribbon, Or it may have been a ring." " I marked a falcon swooping At the break of day : And for your love, my sister-dove, I 'frayed the thief away." " Or did you spy a ruddy hound, Sister fair and tall, Went snuffing round my garden bound, Or crouched by my bower wall ? With a silken leash about his neck ; But in his mouth may be A chain of gold and silver links, Or a letter writ to me." " I heard a hound, high-born sister, Stood baying at the moon : I rose and drove him from your wall Lest you should wake too soon." " Or did you meet a pretty page Sat swinging on the gate ; Sat whistling whistling like a bird, Or may be slept too late : With eaglets broidered on his cap, And eaglets on his glove ? E 50 LIVING ENGLISH POETS If you had turned his pockets out, You had found some pledge of love." " I met him at this daybreak, Scarce the east was red : Lest the creaking gate should anger you, I packed him home to bed." " Oh patience, sister. Did you see A young man tall and strong, Swift-footed to uphold the right And to uproot the wrong, Come home across the desolate sea To woo me for his wife ? And in his heart my heart is locked, And in his life my life." " I met a nameless man, sister, Who loitered round our door : I said : Her husband loves her much. And yet she loves him more." " Fie, sister, fie ! a wicked lie, A lie, a wicked lie, I have none other love but him, Nor will have till I die. And you have turned him from our door, And stabbed him with a lie : I will go seek him thro' the world In sorrow till I die." CHRISTINA GEORGINA ROSSETTI " Go seek in sorrow, sister, And find in sorrow too : If thus you shame our father's name My curse go forth with you" AT HOME When I was dead, my spirit turned To seek the much-frequented house : I passed the door, and saw my friends Feasting beneath green orange-boughs ; From hand to hand they pushed the wine, They sucked the pulp of plum and peach ; They sang, they jested,, and they laughed, For each was loved of each. I listened to their honest chat : Said one : " To-morrow we shall be Plod plod along the featureless sands, And coasting miles and miles of sea," Said one : " Before the turn of tide We will achieve the eyrie-seat." Said one : " To-morrow shall be like To-day, but much more sweet." 52 LIVING ENGLISH POETS " To-morrow," said they, strong with hope, And dwelt upon the pleasant way : " To-morrow," cried they one and all, While no one spoke of yesterday. Their life stood full at blessed noon ; I, only I, had passed away : " To-morrow and to-day," they cried : I was of yesterday. 1 shivered comfortless, but cast No chill across the tablecloth ; I all-forgotten shivered, sad To stay and yet to part how loth : I passed from the familiar room, I who from love had passed away, Like the remembrance of a guest That tarrieth but a day. DREAM LAND Where sunless rivers weep Their waves into the deep, She sleeps a charmed sleep : Awake her not. CHRISTINA GEORGINA ROSSETTI 53 Led by a single star, She came from very far To seek where shadows are Her pleasant lot. She left the rosy morn, She left the fields of corn, For twilight cold and lorn And water springs. Through sleep, as through a veil, She sees the sky look pale, And hears the nightingale That sadly sings. Rest, rest, a perfect rest Shed over brow and breast ; Her face is toward the west, The purple land. She cannot see the grain Ripening on hill and plain ; She cannot feel the rain Upon her hand. Rest, rest, for evermore Upon a mossy shore ; Rest, rest at the heart's core Till time shall cease : 54 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Sleep that no pain shall wake ; Night that no morn shall break Till joy shall overtake Her perfect peace. AFTER DEATH SONNET The curtains were half drawn, the floor was swept And strewn with rushes, rosemary and may Lay thick upon the bed on which I lay, Where through the lattice ivy-shadows crept. He leaned above me, thinking that I slept And could not hear him ; but I heard him say : " Poor child, poor child : " and as he turned away Came a deep silence, and I knew he wept. He did not touch the shroud, or raise the fold That hid my face, or take my hand in his, Or ruffle the smooth pillows for my head : He did not love me living ; but once dead He pitied me ; and very sweet it is To know he still is warm though I am cold. CHRISTINA GEORGINA ROSSETTI 55 FROM "TIME FLIES" I My love whose heart is tender said to me, " A moon lacks light except her sun befriend her. Let us keep tryst in heaven, dear Friend," said she, My love whose heart is tender. From such a loftiness no words could bend her ; Vet still she spoke of " us," and spoke as " we," Her hope substantial while my hope grew slender. Xow keeps she tryst beyond earth's utmost sea, \Yholly at rest tho' storms should toss and rend her, And still she keeps my heart and keeps its key, My love whose heart is tender. II \Yhere shall I find a white rose blowing ? Out in the garden where all sweets be. But out in my garden the snow was snowing And never a white rose opened for me. LIVING ENGLISH POETS Nought but snow and a wind were blowing And snowing. Where shall I find a blush rose blushing ? On the garden wall or the garden bed. But out in my garden the rain was rushing And never a blush rose raised its head. Nothing glowing, flushing or blushing ; Rain rushing. Where shall I find a red rose budding ? Out in the garden where all things grow.- But out in my garden a flood was flooding And never a red rose began to blow. Out in a flooding what should be budding ? All flooding ! Now is winter and now is sorrow, No roses but only thorns to-day : Thorns will put on roses to-morrow, Winter and sorrow scudding away. No more winter and no more sorrow To-morrow. CHRISTINA GEORGINA ROSSETTI 57 If love is not worth loving, then life is not worth living, Nor aught is worth remembering but well forgot, For store is not worth storing and gifts are not worth giving, If love is not ; And idly cold is death-cold, and life-heat idly hot, And vain is any offering and vainer our receiving, And vanity of vanities is all our lot. Better than life's heaving heart is death's heart un- heaving, Better than the opening leaves are the leaves that rot, For there is nothing left worth achieving or retrieving, If love is not. IV Of all the downfalls in the world, The flutter of an Autumn leaf Grows grievous by suggesting grief: 58 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Who thought, when Spring was first unfurled, Of this ? The wide world lay empearled ; Who thought of frost that nips the world ? Sigh on, my ditty. There lurk a hundred subtle stings To prick us in our daily walk : An apple cankered on its stalk, A robin snared for all his wings, A voice that sang but never sings ; Yea, sight or sound or silence stings. Kind Lord, show mercy. S7/e EDWIN ARNOLD Born iSj2 FROM " THE LIGHT OF ASIA " But on another day the King said, " Come, Sweet son ! and see the pleasaunce of the spring, And how the fruitful earth is wooed to yield Its riches to the reaper ; how my realm Which shall be thine when the pile flames for me Feeds all its mouths and keeps the King's chest filled. Fair is the season with new leaves, bright blooms, Green grass, and cries of plough-time." So they rode Into a land of wells and gardens, where, All up and down the rich red loam, the steers Strained their strong shoulders in the creaking yoke Dragging the ploughs ; the fat soil rose and rolled In smooth long waves back from the plough ; who drove Planted both feet upon the leaping share To make the furrow deep ; among the palms The tinkle of the rippling water rang, And where it ran the glad earth 'broidered it 60 LIVING ENGLISH POETS With balsams and the spears of lemon-grass. Elsewhere were sowers who went forth to sow ; And all the jungle laughed with nesting-songs, And all the thickets rustled with small life Of lizard, bee, beetle, and creeping things Pleased at the spring-time. In the mango-sprays The sun-birds flashed ; alone at his green forge Toiled the loud coppersmith ; bee-eaters hawked, Chasing the purple butterflies ; beneath, Striped squirrels raced, the mynas perked and picked, The seven brown sisters chattered in the thorn, The pied fish-tiger hung above the pool, The egrets stalked among the buffaloes, The kites sailed circles in the golden air ; About the painted temple peacocks flew, The blue doves cooed from every well, far off The village drums beat for some marriage-feast ; All things spoke peace and plenty, and the Prince Saw and rejoiced. But, looking deep, he saw The thorns which grew upon this rose of life : How the swart peasant sweated for his wage, Toiling for leave to live ; and how he urged The great-eyed oxen through the flaming hours, Goading their velvet flanks : then marked he, too, How lizard fed on ant, and snake on him, And kite on both ; and how the fish-hawk robbed The fish-tiger of that which it had seized ; SIX EDWIN ARNOLD 61 The shrike chasing the bulbul, which did hunt The jewelled butterflies ; till everywhere Each slew a slayer and in turn was slain, Life living upon death. So the fair show Veiled one vast, savage, grim conspiracy Of mutual murder, from the worm to man, Who himself kills his fellow ; seeing which The hungry ploughman and his labouring kine, Their dewlaps blistered with the bitter yoke, The rage to live which makes all living strife The Prince Siddartha sighed. " Is this," he said, " That happy earth they brought me forth to see ? How salt with sweat the peasant's bread ! how hard The oxen's service ! in the brake how fierce The war of weak and strong ! i' th' air what plots ! No refuge e'en in water. Go aside A space, and let me muse on what ye show." TO A PAIR OF EGYPTIAN SLIPPERS Tiny slippers of gold and green, Tied with a mouldering golden cord ! What pretty feet they must have been When Csesar Augustus was Egypt's lord ! 62 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Somebody graceful and fair you were ! Not many girls could dance in these ! When did your shoemaker make you, dear, Such a nice pair of Egyptian " threes "? Where were you measured ? In SaYs, or On, Memphis, or Thebes, or Pelusium ? Fitting them neatly your brown toes upon, Lacing them deftly with finger and thumb, I seem to see you ! so long ago, Twenty-one centuries, less or more ! And here are your sandals : yet none of us know What name, or fortune, or face you bore. Your lips would have laughed, with a rosy scorn, If the merchant, or slave-girl, had mockingly said, " The feet will pass, but the shoes they have worn Two thousand years onward Time's road shall tread, And still be footgear as good as new ! " To think that calf-skin, gilded and stitched, Should Rome and the Pharaohs outlive and you Be gone, like a dream, from the world you bewitched ! Not that we mourn you ! Twere too absurd ! You have been such a very long while away ! Your dry spiced dust would not value one word Of the soft regrets that my verse could say. EDWIN ARNOLD 63 Sorrow and Pleasure, and Love and Hate, If you ever felt them, have vaporised hence To this odour so subtle and delicate Of myrrh, and cassia, and frankincense. Of course they embalmed you ! Yet not so sweet Were aloes and nard, as the youthful glow Which Amenti stole when the small dark feet Wearied of treading our world below. Look ! it was flood-time in valley of Nile, Or a very wet day in the Delta, dear ! When your slippers tripped lightly their latest mile The mud on the soles renders that fact clear. You knew Cleopatra, no doubt ! You saw Antony's galleys from Actium come. But there ! if questions could answers draw From lips so many a long age dumb, I would not teaze you with history, Nor vex your heart for the men that were ; The one point to learn that would fascinate me Is, where and what are you to-day, my dear ! You died, believing in Horus and Pasht, I sis, Osiris, and priestly lore ; And found, of course, such theories smashed By actual fact on the heavenly shore. 64 LIVING ENGLISH POETS What next did you do ? Did you transmigrate ? Have we seen you since, all modern and fresh ? Your charming soul so I calculate Mislaid its mummy, and sought new flesh. Were you she whom I met at dinner last week, With eyes and hair of the Ptolemy black, Who still of this find in the Fayoum would speak, And to Pharaohs and scarabs still carry us back ? A scent of lotus about her hung, And she had such a far-away wistful air As of somebody born when the Earth was young ; And she wore of gilt slippers a lovely pair. Perchance you were married ? These might have been Part of your trousseau the wedding shoes ; And you laid them aside with the garments green, And painted clay Gods which a bride would use ; And, may be, to-day, by Nile's bright waters Damsels of Egypt in gowns of blue Great-great-great very-great grand-daughters Owe their shapely insteps to you ! But vainly I beat at the bars of the Past, Little green slippers with golden strings ! For all you can tell is that leather will last When loves, and delightings, and beautiful things S7K EDWIN ARNOLD 65 Have vanished, forgotten No ! not quite that ! I catch some gleam of the grace you wore When you finished with Life's daily pit-a-pat, And left your shoes at Death's bedroom door. You were born in the Egypt which did not doubt ; You were never sad with our new-fashioned sorrows : You were sure, when your play-days on Earth ran out, Of play-times to come, as we of our morrows ! Oh, wise little Maid of the Delta ! I lay Your shoes in your mummy-chest back again, And wish that one game we might merrily play At " Hunt the Slipper "to see it all plain. LEWIS MORRIS Born 1833 AT LAST Let me at last be laid On that hillside I know which scans the vale, Beneath the thick yews' shade, For shelter when the rains and winds prevail. It cannot be the eye Is blinded when we die, So that we know no more at all The dawns increase, the evenings fall ; Shut up within a mouldering chest of wood Asleep, and careless of our children's good. Shall I not feel the spring, The yearly resurrection of the earth, Stir thro' each sleeping thing With the fair throbbings and alarms of birth, Calling at its own hour On folded leaf and flower, Calling the lamb, the lark, the bee, Calling the crocus and anemone, LEWIS MORRIS 67 Calling new lustre to the maiden's eye, And to the youth love and ambition high ? Shall I no more admire The winding river kiss the daisied plain ? Nor see the dawn's cold fire Steal downward from the rosy hills again ? Nor watch the frowning cloud, Sublime with mutterings loud, Burst on the vale, nor eves of gold, Nor crescent moons, nor starlights cold, Nor the red casements glimmer on the hill At Yule-tides, when the frozen leas are still ? Or should my children's tread Through Sabbath twilights, when the hymns are done, Come softly overhead, Shall no sweet quickening through my bosom run, Till all my soul exhale Into the primrose pale, And every flower which springs above Breathes a new perfume from my love ; And I shall throb, and stir, and thrill beneath With a pure passion stronger far than death ? Sweet thought ! fair, gracious dream, Too fair and fleeting for our clearer view ! 68 LIVING ENGLISH POETS How should our reason deem That those dear souls, who sleep beneath the blue In ray less caverns dim, 'Mid ocean monsters grim, Or whitening on the trackless sand, Or with strange corpses on each hand In battle-trench or city graveyard lie, Break not their prison-bonds till time shall die ? Nay, 'tis not so indeed. With the last fluttering of the failing breath The clay-cold form doth breed A viewless essence, far too fine for death ; And ere one voice can mourn, On upward pinions borne, They are hidden, they are hidden, in some thin air, Far from corruption, far from care, Where through a veil they view their former scene, Only a little touched by what has been. Touched but a little ; and yet, Conscious of every change that doth befal, By constant change beset, The creatures of this tiny whirling ball, Filled with a higher being, Dowered with a clearer seeing, Risen to a vaster scheme of life, LEWIS MORRIS 69 To wider joys and nobler strife, Viewing our little human hopes and fears As we our children's fleeting smiles and tears. Then, whether with fire they burn This dwelling-house of mine when I am fled, And in a marble urn My ashes rest by my beloved dead, Or in the sweet cold earth I pass from death to birth, And pay kind Nature's life-long debt In heart's-ease and in violet In charnel-yard or hidden ocean wave, Where'er I lie, I shall not scorn my grave. THE HOME ALTAR Why should we seek at all to gain By vigils, and in pain, By lonely life and empty heart, To set a soul apart Within a cloistered cell, For whom the precious, homely hearth would serve as well? 70 LIVING ENGLISH POETS There, with the early breaking morn, Ere quite the day is born, The lustra 1 waters flow serene, And each again grows clean ; From sleep, as from a tomb, Born to another dawn of joy, and hope, and doom. There through the sweet and toilsome day, To labour is to pray ; There love with kindly beaming eyes Prepares the sacrifice ; And voice and innocent smile Of childhood do our cheerful liturgies beguile. There, at his chaste and frugal feast, Love sitteth as a Priest ; And with mild eyes and mien sedate, His deacons stand and wait ; And round the holy table Paten and chalice range in order serviceable. And when ere night, the vespers said, Low lies each weary head, What giveth He who gives them sleep, But a brief death less deep ? Or what the fair dreams given But ours who, daily dying, dream a happier heaven ? LEWIS MORRIS. Then not within a cloistered wall Will we expend our days ; But dawns that break and eves that fall Shall bring their dues of praise. This best befits a Ruler always near, This duteous worship mild, and reasonable fear. FROM "GWEN" EPILOGUE The silent Forces of the World, Time, Change, and Fate, deride us still ; Nor ever from the hidden summit, furled, Where sits the Eternal Will, The clouds of Pain and Error rise Before our straining eyes. It is to-day as 'twas before, From the far days when Man began to speak, Ere Moses preached or Homer sung, Ere Buddha's musing thought or Plato's silvery tongue. We pace our destined path with failing footsteps weak ; A little more we see, a little more 72 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Of that great orb which shineth day and night Through the high heaven, now hidden, now too bright, The Sun to which the earth on which we are, Life's labouring world, is as the feeblest star. Nor this firm globe we know Which lies beneath our feet ; Nor by what grades we have grown and yet shall grow, Through chains of miracle, more and more complete ; By what decrees the watery earth Compacted grew the womb of countless birth ; Nor, when the failing breath Is taken by the frozen lips of Death, Whither the Spoiler, fleeing with his prey, The fluttering, wandering Wonder bears away. The powers of Pain and Wrong, Immeasurably strong, Assail our souls, and chill with common doubt Clear brain and heart devout : War, Pestilence, and Famine, as of old, The lust of the flesh, the baser lust of gold, Vex us and harm us still ; Fire comes, and crash and wreck, and lives are shed As if the Eternal Will itself were dead ; LEWIS MORRIS 73 And sometimes Wrong and Right, the thing we fear, The thing we cherish, draw confusedly near ; We know not which to choose, we cannot separate Our longing and our hate. But Love the Conqueror, Love, Immortal Love, Through the high heaven doth move, Spurning the brute earth with his purple wings, And from the great Sun brings Some radiant beam to light the House of Life, Sweetens our grosser thought, and makes us pure ; And to a Higher Being doth mature Our lower lives, and calms the ignoble strife, And raises the dead life with his sweet breath, And from the arms of Death Soars with it to the eternal shore, Where sight or thought of evil comes no more. Love sitteth now above, Enthroned in glory, And yet hath deigned to move Through life's sad story. Fair Name, we are only thine ! Thou only art divine ! Be with us to the end, for there is none But thou to bind together God and Man in one. LIVING ENGLISH POETS THE BEGINNINGS OF FAITH All travail of high thought, All secrets vainly sought, All struggles for right, heroic, perpetually fought. Faint gleams of purer fire, Conquests of gross desire, Whereby the fettered soul ascends continually higher. Sweet cares for love or friend Which ever heavenward tend, Too deep and true and tender to have on earth their end. Vile hearts malign and fell, Lives which no tongue may tell, So dark and dread and shameful that they breathe a present hell. White mountain, deep-set lake, Sea wastes which surge and break, Fierce storms which, roaring from the north, the midnight forests shake. LEWIS MORRIS 75 Fair morns of summer days, Rich harvest eves that raise The soul and heart o'erburdened to an ecstasy of praise. Low whispers, vague and strange, Which through our being range, Breathing perpetual presage of some mighty coming change. These in the soul do breed Thoughts which, at last, shall lead To some clear, firm assurance of a satisfying creed. THE ODE OF DECLINE With forces well-nigh spent, Uneasy or in pain, Or brought to childish weakness once again, With bodies shrunk and bent, We come, if Fate so will, to cold decrepit age. The book of Life lies open at its latest page. Only four score of summers, and four score Of winters, nothing more, 76 LIVING ENGLISH POETS And then 'tis done. We have spent our fruitful days beneath the sun ; We come to a cold season and a bare, Where little is sweet or fair. We, who a few brief years ago, Would passionately go Across the fields of Life to meet the morn, We are content, content, and not forlorn, To lie upon our beds, and watch the Day Which kissed the Eastern peaks, grow gradually grey. Great Heaven, that Thou hast made our lives so brief And swiftly spent ! We toil our little day and are content, Though Time, the thief, Stands at our side, and smiles his mystic smile. We joy a little, we grieve a little while ; We gain some little glimpse of Thy great laws, Rolling in thunder through the voids of space ; We gain to look a moment on Thy face, Eternal Source and Cause ! And then, the night descending as a cloud, We walk with aspect bowed, And turn to earth and see our Life grow dark. Was it for this the fiery spark Of Thy Eternal Self, sown on the vast And infinite abysses of the Past, LEWIS MORRIS 77 Revealed itself and made Creation rise Before Thy Eternal Mind : This little span of life, with purblind eyes That grow completely blind ; This little force of brain, Holding dim thoughts sublime, Too weak to withstand the treacheries of Time ; This body bent and bowed in twain, Soon racked by growing pain, Which briefer far than is the life of the tree, Springs as a flower and fades, and then must rot And perish and be not, Passing from mystery to mystery ? It is a pain To move through the old fields, even though they lie Before our eyes, we know that never again, Where once our daily fejst were used to pass Amid the crested grass, We any more shall wander till we die ; Nor to the old grey church, with the tall spire, Whose vane the sunsets fire, Where once a little child, by kind hands led, Would spell the scant memorials of the dead, Never again, or once alone, When pain and Time are done. 78 LIVING ENGLISH POETS The soaring thoughts of youth Are dead and cold, the victories of Thought Are no more prized or sought By eyes which draw too near the face of Truth. Whatever fruit or gain Fate held in store, To tempt the growing soul or brain, Allures no more. It is as the late Autumn, when the fields Are bare of flower or fruit ; Nor charm nor profit the swept surface yields, Sullen and mute ; So that a doubting mind might come to hold The very soul and life were dead and cold. But who can peer Into another soul, or tell at all What hidden energies befall The aged lingering here ? When all the weary brain Seems dull, the immeasurable fields of life Lie open to the memory, and again They know the youthful joys, the hurry and the strife, And feel, but gentlier now, the ancient pain. In the uneasy vigils of the night, Before the tardy light ; Or, lonely days, when no young lives are by, LEWIS MORRIS 79 There come such long processions of the dead, The buried lives and hopes of far-off years, Spent joys and dried-up tears, That round them stands a blessed company, Holding high converse, though no word be said, Till only what is past and gone doth seem To live, and all the Present is a dream. So may the wintry earth, Holding her precious seeds within the ground, Pause for the coming birth, When like a clarion-note the Spring shall sound ; So may the roots which, buried deep And safe within her sleep, Whisper as 'twere, within, tales of the sun, Whisper of leaf and flower, of bee and bird, Till by a sudden glory stirred, A mystic influence bids them rise, Bursting the narrow sheath And cerement of death, And bloom as lilies again beneath the recovered skies. 8o LIVING ENGLISH POETS ON A THRUSH SINGING IN AUTUMN Sweet singer of the Spring, when the new world Was filled with song and bloom, and the fresh year Tripped, like a lamb playful and void of fear, Through daisied grass and young leaves scarce un- furled, Where is thy liquid voice That all day would rejoice ? Where now thy clear and homely call, Which from gray dawn to evening's chilling fall Would echo from thin copse and tasselled brake, For homely duty tuned and love's dear sake ? The spring-tide passed, high summer soon should come. The woods grew thick, the meads a deeper hue ; The pipy summer growths swelled, lush and tall ; The sharp scythes swept at daybreak through the dew. Thou didst not heed at all, Thy prodigal voice grew dumb ; No more with song mightst thou beguile, She sitting on her speckled eggs the while, Thy mate's long vigil as the slow days went, Solacing her with lays of measureless content LEWIS MORRIS 81 Nay, nay, thy voice was Duty's, nor would dare Sing were Love fled, though still the world were fair ; The summer waxed and waned, the nights grew cold, The sheep were thick within the wattled fold, The woods began to moan, Dumb wert thou and alone ; Yet now, when leaves are sere, thy ancient note Comes low and halting from thy doubtful throat. Oh, lonely loveless voice, what dost thou here In the deep silence of the fading year ? Thus do I read the answer of thy song : " I sang when winds blew chilly all day long ; I sang because hope came and joy was near, I sang a little while, I made good cheer ; In summer's cloudless day My music died away ; But now the hope and glory of the year Are dead and gone, a little while I sing Songs of regret for days no longer here, And touched with presage of the far-off Spring." Is this the meaning of thy note, fair bird ? Or do we read into thy simple brain Echoes of thoughts which human hearts have stirred, High-soaring joy and melancholy pain ? G 82 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Nay, nay, that lingering note Belated from thy throat " Regret," is what it sings, " regret, regret ! The dear days pass, but are not wholly gone. In praise of those I let my song go on ; Tis sweeter to remember than forget." RICHARD WATSON DIXON Bom 1833 SONG The feathers of the willow Are half of them grown yellow Above the swelling stream ; And ragged are the bushes, And rusty now the rushes, And wild the clouded gleam. The thistle now is older, His stalks begin to moulder, His head is white as snow ; The branches all are barer, The linnet's song is rarer, The robin pipeth now. 84 LIVING ENGLISH POETS FROM CHRIST S COMPANY" THE HOLY MOTHER AT THE CROSS Of Mary's pains may now learn whoso will, When she stood underneath the groaning tree Round which the true Vine clung : three hours the mill Of hours rolled round ; she saw in visions three The shadows walking underneath the sun, And these seemed all so very faint to be, That she could scarcely tell how each begun, And went its way, minuting each degree That it existed on the dial stone : For drop by drop of wine unfalteringly, Not stroke by stroke in blood, the three hours gone She seemed to see. Three hours she stood beneath the cross ; it seemed To be a wondrous dial stone, for while Upon the two long arms the sunbeams teemed, So was the head-piece like a centre stile ; Like to the dial where the judges sat Upon the grades, and the king crowned the pile, In Zion town, that most miraculous plat On which the shadow backward did defile ; And now towards the third hour the sun enorme Dressed up all shadow to a bickering smile RICHARD WATSON DIXON 85 I' the heat, and in its midst the form of form Lay like an isle. Because that time so heavily beat and slow That fancy in each beat was come and gone ; Because that light went singing to and fro, A blissful song in every beam that shone ; Because that on the flesh a little tongue Instantly played, and spake in lurid tone ; Because that saintly shapes with harp and gong Told the three hours, whose telling made them one ; Half hid, involved in alternating beams, Half mute, they held the plectrum to the zone, Therefore, as God her senses shield, it seems A dial stone. Three hours she stood beside the cross ; it seemed A splendid flower ; for red dews on the edge Stood dropping ; petals doubly four she deemed Shot out like steel knives from the central wedge, Which quadranted their perfect circle so As if four anthers should a vast flower hedge Into four parts, and in its bosom, lo, The form lay, as the seed-heart holding pledge Of future flowers ; yea, in the midst was borne The head low drooped upon the swollen ledge Of the torn breast ; there was the ring of thorn This flower was fledge. 86 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Because her woe stood all about her now, No longer like a stream as ran the hour ; Because her cleft heart parted into two, No more a mill-wheel spinning to time's power ; Because all motion seemed to be suspense ; Because one ray did other rays devour ; Because the sum of things rose o'er her sense, She standing 'neath its dome as in a bower ; Because from one thing all things seemed to spume, As from one mouth the fountain's hollow shower ; Therefore it seemed His and her own heart's bloom, A splendid flower. Now it was finished ; shrivelled were the leaves Of that pain-flower, and wasted all its bloom, She felt what she had felt then ; as receives, When heaven is capable, the cloudy stroom The edge of the white garment of the moon ; So felt she that she had received that doom ; And as an outer circle spins in tune, Born of the inner on the sky's wide room, Thinner and wider, that doom's memories, Broken and thin and wild, began to come As soon as this : St. John unwrapt his eyes, And led her home. WILLIAM MORRIS Born 1834 THE CHAPEL IN LYONESS SIR OZANA LE CURE HARDY. SIR GALAHAD. SIR BORS DE GANYS SIR OZANA All day long and every day, From Christmas-Eve to Whit-Sunday, Within that Chapel-aisle I lay, And no man came a-near. Naked to the waist was I, And deep within my breast did lie, Though no man any blood could spy, The truncheon of a spear. No meat did ever pass my lips. Those days (Alas ! the sunlight slips From off the gilded parclose, dips, And night comes on apace.) 88 LIVING ENGLISH POETS My arms lay back behind my head ; Over my raised-up knees was spread A samite cloth of white and red ; A rose lay on my face. Many a time I tried to shout ; But as in dream of battle-rout, My frozen speech would not well out ; I could not even weep. With inward sigh I see the sun Fade off the pillars one by one, My heart faints when the day is done, Because I cannot sleep. Sometimes strange thoughts pass through my head ; Not like a tomb is this my bed, Yet oft I think that I am dead ; That round my tomb is writ, " Ozana of the hardy heart, Knight of the Table Round, Pray for his soul, lords, of your part ; A true knight he was found." Ah ! me, I cannot fathom it He sleeps. WILLIAM MORRIS SIR GALAHAD All day long and every day, Till his madness pass'd away, I watch'd Ozana as he lay Within the gilded screen. All my singing moved him not ; As I sung my heart grew hot, With the thought of Launcelot Far away, I ween. So I went a little space From out the chapel, bathed my face In the stream that runs apace By the churchyard wall. There I pluck'd a faint wild rose, Hard by where the linden grows, Sighing over silver rows Of the lilies tall. I laid the flower across his mouth ; The sparkling drops seem'd good for drouth ; He smiled, turn'd round towards the south, Held up a golden tress. 90 LIVING ENGLISH POETS The light smote on it from the west : He drew the covering from his breast, Against his heart that hair he prest ; Death him soon will bless. SIR BORS I enter'd by the western door ; I saw a knight's helm lying there : I raised my eyes from off the floor, And caught the gleaming of his hair. I stept full softly up to him ; I laid my chin upon his head ; I felt him smile ; my eyes did swim, I was so glad he was not dead. I heard Ozana murmur low, " There comes no sleep nor any love." But Galahad stoop'd and kiss'd his brow : He shiver'd ; I saw his pale lips move. SIR OZANA There comes no sleep nor any love ; Ah me ! I shiver with delight. WILLIAM MORRIS 91 I am so weak I cannot move ; God move me to thee, dear, to-night ! Christ help ! I have but little wit : My life went wrong ; I see it writ, " Ozana of the hardy heart, Knight of the Table Round, Pray for his soul, lords, on your part, A good knight he was found." Now I begin to fathom it He dies. SIR BORS Galahad sits dreamily ; What strange things may his eyes see, Great blue eyes fix'd full on me ? On his soul, Lord, have mercy. SIR GALAHAD Ozana, shall I pray for thee ? Her cheek is laid to thine ; No long time hence, also I see Thy wasted ringers twine Within the tresses of her hair That shineth gloriously, Thinly outspread in the clear air Against the jasper sea. 92 LIVING ENGLISH POETS THE HAYSTACK IN THE FLOODS Had she come all the way for this, To part at last without a kiss ? Yea, had she borne the dirt and rain That her own eyes might see him slain Beside the haystack in the floods ? Along the dripping leafless woods, The stirrup touching either shoe, She rode astride as troopers do ; With kirtle kilted to her knee, To which the mud splash'd wretchedly ; And the wet dripp'd from every tree Upon her head and heavy hair, And on her eyelids broad and fair ; The tears and rain ran down her face. By fits and starts they rode apace, And very often was his place Far off from her ; he had to ride Ahead, to see what might betide When the roads cross'd ; and sometimes, when There rose a murmuring from his men, Had to turn back with promises ; Ah me ! she had but little ease ; WILLIAM MORRIS 93 And often for pure doubt and dread She sobb'd, made giddy in the head By the swift riding ; while, for cold, Her slender fingers scarce could hold The wet reins ; yea, and scarcely, too, She felt the foot within her shoe Against the stirrup ; all for this, To part at last without a kiss Beside the haystack in the floods. For when they near'd that old soak'd hay, They saw across the only way That Judas, Godmar, and the three Red running lions dismally Grinn'd from his pennon, under which, In one straight line along the ditch, They counted thirty heads. So then, While Robert turn'd round to his men, She saw at once the wretched end, And, stooping down, tried hard to rend Her coif the wrong way from her head, And hid her eyes ; while Robert said : " Nay, love, 'tis scarcely two to one, At Poictiers where we made them run So fast why, sweet my love, good cheer, 94 LIVING ENGLISH POETS The Gascon frontier is so near, Nought after this." But, " O," she said, " My God ! My God ! I have to tread The long way back without you ; then The court at Paris ; those six men ; The gratings of the Chatelet ; The swift Seine on some rainy day Like this, and people standing by, And laughing, while my weak hands try To recollect how strong men swim. All this, or else a life with him, For which I should be damned at last, Would God that this next hour were past ! " He answer'd not, but cried his cry, " St. George for Marny ! " cheerily ; And laid his hand upon her rein. Alas ! no man of all his train Gave back that cheery cry again ; And, while for rage his thumb beat fast Upon his sword-hilts, some one cast About his neck a kerchief long, And bound him. Then they went along WILLIAM MORRIS 95 To Godmar ; who said : " Now, Jehane, Your lover's life is on the wane So fast, that, if this very hour You yield not as my paramour, He will not see the rain leave off Nay, keep your tongue from gibe and scoff, Sir Robert, or I slay you now." She laid her hand upon her brow, Then gazed upon the palm, as though She thought her forehead bled, and " No." . She said, and turn'd her head away, As there were nothing else to say, And everything were settled : red Grew God mar's face from chin to head : " Jehane, on yonder hill there stands My castle, guarding well my lands : What hinders me from taking you, And doing that I list to do To your fair wilful body, while Your knight lies dead ? " A wicked smile Wrinkled her face, her lips grew thin, A long way out she thrust her chin : " You know that I should strangle you While you were sleeping ; or bite through LIVING ENGLISH POETS Your throat, by God's help ah ! " she said, " Lord Jesus, pity your poor maid ! For in such wise they hem me in, I cannot choose but sin and sin, Whatever happens : yet I think They could not make me eat or drink, And so should I just reach my rest." " Nay, if you do not my behest, O Jehane ! though I love you well," Said Godmar, "would I fail to tell All that I know." " Foul lies," she said. " Eh ? lies my Jehane ? By God's head, At Paris folks would deem them true ! Do you know, Jehane, they cry for you, ' Jehane the brown ! Jehane the brown ! Give us Jehane to burn or drown ! ' Eh gag me, Robert ! sweet my friend, This were indeed a piteous end For those long fingers, and long feet, And long neck, and smooth shoulders sweet ; An end that few men would forget That saw it So, an hour yet : Consider, Jehane, which to take Of life or death!" So, scarce awake, Dismounting, did she leave that place, WILLIAM MORRIS 97 And totter some yards : with her face Turn'd upward to the sky she lay, Her head on a wet heap of hay, And fell asleep ; and while she slept, And did not dream, the minutes crept Round to the twelve again ; but she, Being waked at last, sigh'd quietly, And strangely childlike came, and said : " I will not" Straightway God mar's head, As though it hung on strong wires, turn'd Most sharply round, and his face burn'd. For Robert both his eyes were dry, He could not weep, but gloomily He seem'd to watch the rain ; yea, too, His lips were firm ; he tried once more To touch her lips ; she reach'd out, sore And vain desire so tortured them, The poor grey lips, and now the hem Of his sleeve brush'd them. With a start Up Godmar rose, thrust them apart ; From Robert's throat he loosed the bands Of silk and mail ; with empty hands Held out, she stood and gazed, and saw, The long bright blade without a flaw H LIVING ENGLISH POETS. Glide out from Godmar's sheath, his hand In Robert's hair ; she saw him bend Uick Robert's head ; she saw him send The thin steel down ; the blow told well, Right backward the knight Robert foil, And moan'd as dogs do, being half dead, Unwitting, as I deem : so then Godmar turn'd grinning to his men, \Yho ran, some five or six, and boat His head to pieces at their feet. Then Godmar turn'd again and said : " So, Jehane, the first fitte is read ! Take note, my lady, that your way Lies backward to the Chatelet ! " She shook her head and gazed awhile At her cold hands with a rueful smile, As though this thing had made her mad. This was the parting that they had Beside the haystack in the floods. WILLIAM MORRIS /*OMTffJS LffB AND DEATH OF JASON' Now Neptune, joyful of the sacrifice Beside the sea, and all tV f price That Jason gave him, sent them wind at \\ And swiftly Argo climbed each changing hill, ran through rippling valleys of the sea ; Nor toiled the heroes unmelodior. For by the mast sat great CEager's son, ,1 through the harp-strings let his fingers run Nigh soundless, and with closed lips for a while ; But soon across his face there came a smile, And his glad voice brake into such a song That swift Her sped the eager ship away. * O bitter sea, tumultuous sea, 1 many an ill is wrought by thee 1 to the wasters of the land Thou holdest out thy wrinkled hand ; And when they leave the conquered town, Whose black smoke makes thy surges brown, Driven betwixt thee and the sun, As the lon<r day of blood is done, ioo LIVING ENGLISH POETS From many a league of glittering waves Thou smilest on them and their slaves. " The thin bright-eyed Phoenician Thou drawest to thy waters wan, With ruddy eve and golden morn Thou temptest him, until, forlorn, Unburied, under alien skies Cast up ashore his body lies. " Yea, whoso sees thee from his door, Must ever long for more and more ; Nor will the beechen bowl suffice, Or homespun robe of little price, Or hood well-woven from the fleece Undyed, or unspiced wine of Greece ; So sore his heart is set upon Purple, and gold, and cinnamon ; For as thou cravest, so he craves, Until he rolls beneath thy waves. Nor in some landlocked, unknown bay, Can satiate thee for one day. " Now, therefore, O thou bitter sea, With no long words we pray to thee, But ask thee, hast thou felt before Such strokes of the long ashen oar ? And hast thou yet seen such a prow Thy rich and niggard waters plough ? WILLIAM MORRIS 101 " Nor yet, O sea, shalt thou be cursed, If at thy hands we gain the worst, And, wrapt in water, roll about Blind-eyed, unheeding song or shout, Within thine eddies far from shore. Warmed by no sunlight any more. " Therefore, indeed, we joy in thee. And praise thy greatness, and will we Take at thy hands both good and ill, Yea, what thou wilt, and praise thee still, Enduring not to sit at home, And wait until the last days come, When we no more may care to hold White bosoms under crowns of gold, And our dulled hearts no longer are Stirred by the clangorous noise of war, And hope within our souls is dead, And no joy is remembered. " So, if thou hast a mind to slay, Fair prize thou hast of us to-day ; And if thou hast a mind to save, Great praise and honour shalt thou have ; But whatso thou wilt do with us, Our end shall not be piteous, Because our memories shall live When folk forget the way to drive 102 LIVING ENGLISH POETS The black keel through the heaped-up sea, And half dried up by waters be." H SONG " I know a little garden close Set thick with lily and red rose, Where I would wander if I might From dewy dawn to dewy night, And have one with me wandering. " And though within it no birds sing, And though no pillared house is there, And though the apple boughs are bare Of fruit and blossom, would to God, Her feet upon the green grass trod, And I beheld them as before. " There comes a murmur from the shore, And in the place two fair streams are, Drawn from the purple hills afar, Drawn down unto the restless sea ; The hills whose flowers ne'er fed the bee, The shore no ship hath ever seen, Still beaten by the billows green, Whose murmur comes unceasingly Unto the place for which I cry. WILLIAM MORRIS 103 " For which I cry both day and night, For which I let slip all delight, That maketh me both deaf and blind, Careless to win, unskilled to find, And quick to lose what all men seek. " Yet tottering as I am, and weak, Still have I left a little breath To seek within the jaws of death An entrance to that happy place, To seek the unforgotten face Once seen, once kissed, once reft from me Anigh the murmuring of the sea." FROM " THE EARTHL Y PARADISE " INTRODUCTION Of Heaven or Hell I have no power to sing, I cannot ease the burden of your fears, Or make quick-coming death a little thing, Or bring again the pleasure of past years, Nor for my words shall ye forget your tears, Or hope again for aught that I can say, The idle singer of an empty day. i<H LIVING ENGLISH POETS But rather, when aweary of your mirth, From full hearts still unsatisfied ye sigh, And, feeling kindly unto all the earth, Grudge every minute as it passes by, Made the more mindful that the sweet days die Remember me a little then I pray, The idle singer of an empty day. The heavy trouble, the bewildering care That weighs us down who live and earn our bread, These idle verses have no power to bear ; So let me sing of names remembered, Because they, living not, can ne'er be dead, Or long time take their memory quite away From us poor singers of an empty day. Dreamer of dreams, born out of my due time, Why should I strive to set the crooked straight ? Let it suffice me that my murmuring rhyme Beats with light wing against the ivory gate, Telling a tale not too importunate To those who in the sleepy region stay, Lulled by the singer of an empty day. Folk say, a wizard to a northern king At Christmas-tide such wondrous things did show, That through one window men beheld the spring, WILLIAM MORRIS 105 And through another saw the summer glow, And through a third the fruited vines a-row, While still, unheard, but in its wonted way, Piped the drear wind of that December day. So with this Earthly Paradise it is, If ye will read aright, and pardon me, Who strive to build a shadowy isle of bliss Midmost the beating of the steely sea, Where tossed about all hearts of men must be ; Whose ravening monsters mighty men shall slay, Not the poor singer of an empty day. FROM "LOVE IS ENOUGH" THE MUSIC Love is enough : ho ye who seek saving, Go no further ; come hither ; there have been who have found it, And these know the House of Fulfilment of Craving ; These know the Cup with the roses around it ; These know the World's Wound and the balm that hath bound it : Cry out, the World heedeth not, 'Love, lead us home ! ' io6 LIVING ENGLISH POETS He leadeth, He hearkeneth, He cometh to you-ward ; Set your faces as steel to the fears that assemble Round his goad for the faint, and his scourge for the froward : Lo his lips, how with tales of last kisses they tremble ! Lo his eyes of all sorrow that may not dissemble ! Cry out, for he heedeth, ' O Love, lead us home ! ' O hearken the words of his voice of compassion : ' Come cling round about me, ye faithful who sicken Of the weary unrest and the world's passing fashion ! As the rain in mid-morning your troubles shall thicken, But surely within you some Godhead doth quicken, As ye cry to me heeding, and leading you home. 'Come pain ye shall have, and be blind to the ending ! Come fear ye shall have, mid the sky's overcasting ! Come change ye shall have, for far are ye wending ! Come no crown ye shall have for your thirst and your fasting, But the kissed lips of Love and fair life everlasting ! Cry out, for one heedeth, who leadeth you home ! ' Is he gone ? was he with us ? ho ye who seek saving, Go no further ; come hither ; for have we not found it ? WILLIAM MORRIS 107 Here is the House of Fulfilment of Craving ; Here is the Cup with the roses around it ; The World's Wound well healed, and the balm that hath bound it : Cry out ! for he heedeth, fair Love that led home. THE MESSAGE OF THE MARCH WIND Fair now is the spring-tide, now earth lies beholding With the eyes of a lover, the face of the sun ; Long lasteth the daylight, and hope is enfolding The green-growing acres with increase begun. Now sweet, sweet it is through the land to be straying, 'Mid the birds and the blossoms and the beasts of the field; Love mingles with love, and no evil is weighing On thy heart or mine, where all sorrow is healed. From township to township, o'er down and by tillage, Far, far have we wandered and long was the day ; But now cometh eve at the end of the village, Where over the grey wall the church riseth grey. io8 LIVING ENGLISH POETS There is wind in the twilight ; in the white road before us The straw from the ox-yard is blowing about ; The moon's rim is rising, a star glitters o'er us, And the vane on the spire-top is swinging in doubt. Down there dips the highway, toward the bridge crossing over The brook that runs on to the Thames and the sea. Draw closer, my sweet, we are lover and lover ; This eve art thou given to gladness and me. Shall we be glad always ? Come closer and hearken : Three fields further on, as they told me down there, When the young moon has set, if the March sky should darken, We might see from the hill-top the great city's glare. Hark, the wind in the elm-boughs ! from London it bloweth, And telleth of gold, and of hope and unrest ; Of power that helps not ; of wisdom that knoweth, But teacheth not aught of the worst and the best. Of the rich men it telleth, and strange is the story How they have and they hanker, and grip far and wide ; WILLIAM MORRIS 109 And they live and they die, and the earth and its glory Has been but a burden they scarce might abide. Hark ! the March wind again of a people is telling ; Of the life that they live there, so haggard and grim, That if we and our love amidst them had been dwelling, My fondness had faltered, thy beauty grown dim. This land we have loved in our love and our leisure, For them hangs in heaven, high out of their reach ; The wide hills o'er the sea-plain for them have no pleasure, The grey homes of their fathers no story to teach. The singers have sung and the builders have builded, The painters have fashioned their tales of delight ; For what and for whom hath the world's book been gilded, When all is for these but the blackness of night ? How long, and for what is their patience abiding? How long and how oft shall their story be told, While the hope that none seeketh in darkness is hiding, And in grief and in sorrow the world groweth old ? i io LIVING ENGLISH POETS Come back to the inn, love, and the lights and the fire, And the fiddler's old tune and the shuffling of feet ; For there in a while shall be rest and desire, And there shall the morrow's uprising be sweet. Yet, love, as we wend, the wind bloweth behind us, And beareth the last tale it telleth to-night, How here in the spring-tide the message shall find us ; For the hope that none seeketh is coming to light. Like the seed of midwinter, unheeded, unperished, Like the autumn-sown wheat 'neath the snow lying green, Like the love that o'ertook us, unawares and un- cherished, Like the babe 'neath thy girdle that groweth unseen ; So the hope of the people now buddeth and groweth, Rest fadeth before it, and blindness and fear ; It biddeth us learn all the wisdom it knoweth ; It hath found us and held us, and biddeth us hear : For it beareth the message : " Rise up on the morrow, And go on thy ways toward the doubt and the strife ; Join hope to our hope and blend sorrow with sorrow, And seek for men's love in the short days of life." WILLIAM MORRIS. in But lo, the old inn, and the lights, and the fire, And the fiddler's old tune and the shuffling of feet ; Soon for us shall be quiet and rest and desire, And to-morrow's uprising to deeds shall be sweet ALFRED AUSTIN Born 1835 IN THE HEART OF THE FOREST I heard the voice of my own true love Ripple the sunny weather; Then away, as a dove that follows a dove, We flitted through woods together. There was not a bush nor branch nor spray, But with song was swaying and ringing. " Let us ask of the birds what means their lay, And what is it prompts their singing." We paused where the stichwort and speedwell grew 'Mid a forest of grasses fairy : From out of the covert the cushat flew, And the squirrel perched shy and wary. On an elm-tree top shrilled a missel-thrush proud, Disdaining shelter or screening. ALFRED AUSTIN 113 " Xow what is it makes you pipe so loud, And what is your music's meaning ? " Your matins begin ere the dewdrop sinks To the heart of the moist musk-roses, And your vespers last till the first star winks, And the vigilant woodreeve dozes." Then louder, still louder he shrilled : " I sing For the pleasure and pride of shrilling, For the sheen and the sap and the showers of Spring That fill me to overfilling. " Yet a something deeper than Spring-time, though It is Spring-like, my throat keeps flooding : Peep soft at my mate, she is there below, Where the bramble-trails are budding. " She sits on the nest and she never stirs ; She is true to the trust I gave her ; And what were my love if I cheered not hers As long as my throat can quaver ? " So he quavered on, till asudden we heard A voice that called " Cuckoo ! " and fleeted. " Why all day is your name by yourself, vain bird, Repeated and still repeated ? " I ii4 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Then Cuckoo ! Cuck ! Cuck ! Cuck-oo ! " he called, And he laughed and he chuckled cheerly ; " Your hearts they run dry and your heads grow bald, But I come back with April yearly. " I come in the month that is sweet, so sweet, Though its sweetness be frail and fickle, In the season when shower and sunshine meet, And you reck not of Autumn's sickle. " I flout at the April loves of men And the kisses of trustful maidens ; And then I call ' Cuckoo ! ' again, again, With a jeering and jocund cadence. " When the hawthorn blows and the yaffel mates, I sing and am silent never ; Just as love of itself in the May-time prates, As though it will last for ever ! " And in June, ere I go, I double the note, As I flit from cover to cover : Are not vows, at the last, repeated by rote By fading and fleeting lover ? " A tear trickled down my true love's cheek At the words of the mocking rover ; ALFRED AUSTIN 115 She clung to my side, but she did not speak, And I kissed her over and over. And while she leaned on my heart as though Her love in its depths was rooting, There rose from the thicket behind us, slow, O such a silvery fluting ! When the long smooth note, as it seemed, must break, It fell in a swift sweet treble, Like the sound that is made when a stream from a lake Gurgles o'er stone and pebble. And I cried, " O nightingale ! tell me true, Is your music rapture or weeping ? And why do you sing the whole night through, When the rest of the world is sleeping ? " Then it fluted : " My notes are of love's pure strain, And could there be descant fitter ? For why do you sever joy and pain, Since love is both sweet and bitter ? My song now wails of the sighs, the tears, The long absence that makes love languish ; Then thrills with its fluttering hopes and fears, Its rapture, again its anguish. ii6 LIVING ENGLISH POETS " And why should my notes be hushed at night ? Why sing in the sunlight only ? Love loves when 'tis' dark, as when 'tis bright, Nor ceaseth because 'tis lonely." My love looked up with a happy smile, (For a moment the woods were soundless) : The smile of a heart that knows no guile, And whose trust is deep and boundless. And as I smiled that her smile betrayed The fulness of love's surrender, Came a note from the heart of the forest shade, O so soft, and smooth, and tender ! 'Twas but one note, and it seemed to brood On its own sufficing sweetness ; That cooed, and cooed, and again but cooed In a round, selfsame completeness. Then I said, " There is, ringdove, endless bliss In the sound that you keep renewing : But have you no other note than this, And why are you always cooing ? " The ringdove answered : " I too descant Of love as the woods keep closing ; ALFRED AUSTIN 117 Not of springtime loves that exalt and pant, But of harvest love reposing. " If I coo all day on the selfsame bough, While the noisy popinjay ranges, Tis that love which is mellow keeps its vow, And callow love shifts and changes. " When summer shall silence the merle's loud throat And the nightingale's sweet sad singing, You still will hear my contented note, On the branch where I now am clinging. " For the rapture of fancy surely wanes, And anguish is lulled by reason ; But the tender note of the heart remains Through all changes of leaf and season." Then we plunged in the forest, my love and I, In the forest plunged deeper and deeper, Till none could behold us save only the sky, Through a trellis of branch and creeper. And we paired and nested away from sight In a bower of woodbine pearly ; And she broods on our love from morn to night, And I sing to her late and early. u8 LIVING ENGLISH POETS. Nor till Death shall have stripped our lives as bare As the forest in wintry weather, Will the world find the nest in the covert where We dwelt, loved, and sang together. A MARCH MINSTREL Hail ! once again, that sweet strong note ! Loud on my loftiest larch, Thou quaverest with thy mottled throat, Brave minstrel of bleak March ! Hearing thee flute, who pines or grieves For vernal smiles and showers ? Thy voice is greener than the leaves, And fresher than the flowers. Scorning to wait for tuneful May When every throat can sing, Thou floutest Winter with thy lay, And art thyself the Spring. While daffodils, half mournful still, Muffle their golden bells, Thy silvery peal o'er landscape chill Surges, and sinks, and swells. ALFRED AUSTIN 119 Across the unsheltered pasture floats The young lamb's shivering bleat : There is no trembling in thy notes, For all the snow and sleet Let the bullace bide till frosts have ceased, The blackthorn loiter long ; Undaunted by the blustering east, Thou burgeonest into song. Yet who can wonder thou dost dare Confront what others flee ? Thy carol cuts the keen March air Keener than it cuts Thee. The selfish cuckoo tarrieth till April repays his boast Thou, thou art lavish of thy trill, Now when we need it most The nightingale, while buds are coy, Delays to chant its grief. Brave throstle ! thou dost pipe for joy, With never a bough in leaf. Even fond turtle-doves forbear To coo till woods are warm : 120 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Thou hast the heart to love and pair Ere the cherry blossoms swarm. The skylark, fluttering to be heard In realms beyond his birth, Soars vainly heavenward. Thou, wise bird ! Art satisfied with earth. Thy home is not upon the ground, Thy hope not in the sky : Near to thy nest thy notes resound, Neither too low nor high. Blow what wind will, thou dost rejoice To carol, and build, and woo. Throstle ! to me impart thy voice ; Impart thy wisdom too ! PRIMROSES I Latest, earliest of the year, Primroses that still were here, Snugly nestling round the boles Of the cut down chestnut poles, ALFRED AUSTIN 121 When December's tottering tread Rustled 'mong the deep leaves dead, And with confident young faces Peeped from out the sheltered places When pale January lay In its cradle day by day, Dead or living, hard to say ; Now that mid-March blows and blusters, Out you steal in tufts and clusters, Making leafless lane and wood Vernal with your hardihood. Other lovely things are rare, You are prodigal as fair. First you come by ones and ones, Lastly in battalions, Skirmish along hedge and bank, Turn old Winter's wavering flank, Round his flying footsteps hover, Seize on hollow, ridge and cover, Leave nor slope nor hill unharried, Till, his snowy trenches carried, O'er his sepulchre you laugh, Winter's joyous epitaph. II This, too, be your glory great, Primroses, you do not wait, 122 LIVING ENGLISH POETS As the other flowers do, For the Spring to smile on you, But with coming are content, Asking no encouragement. Ere the hardy crocus cleaves Sunny borders 'neath the eaves, Ere the thrush his song rehearse Sweeter than all poet's verse, Ere the early bleating lambs Cling like shadows to their dams, Ere the blackthorn breaks to white, Snowy-hooded anchorite ; Out from every hedge you look, You are bright by every brook, Wearing for your sole defence Fearlessness of innocence. While the daffodils still waver, Ere the jonquil gets its savour, While the linnets yet but pair, You are fledged, and everywhere. Nought can daunt you, nought distress, Neither cold nor sunlessness. You, when Lent sleet flies apace, Look the tempest in the face ; As descend the flakes more slow, From your eyelids shake the snow, And when all the clouds have flown, ALFRED AUSTIN 123 Meet the sun's smile with your own. Nothing ever makes you less Gracious to ungraciousness. March may bluster up and down, Pettish April sulk and frown ; Closer to their skirts you cling, Coaxing Winter to be Spring. Ill Then when your sweet task is done, And the wild flowers, one by one, Here, there, everywhere do blow, Primroses, you haste to go, Satisfied with what you bring, Fading morning-stars of Spring. You have brightened doubtful days, You have sweetened long delays, Fooling our enchanted reason To miscalculate the season. But when doubt and fear are fled, When the kine leave wintry shed, And 'mid grasses green and tall Find their fodder, make their stall ; When the wintering swallow flies Homeward back from southern skies, To the dear old cottage thatch Where it loves to build and hatch, i2 4 LIVING ENGLISH POETS That its young may understand, Nor forget, this English land ; When the cuckoo, mocking rover, Laughs that April loves are over ; When the hawthorn, all ablow, Mimics the defeated snow ; Then you give one last look round ; Stir the sleepers under ground, Call the campion to awake, Tell the speedwell courage take, Bid the eyebright have no fear, Whisper in the bluebell's ear Time has come for it to flood With its blue waves all the wood, Mind the stichwort of its pledge To replace you in the hedge, Bid the ladysmocks good-bye, Close your bonnie lids and die ; And, without one look of blame, Go as gently as you came. ALFRED AUSTIN 125 TO ENGLAND Men deemed thee fallen, did they ? fallen like Rome Coiled into self to foil a Vandal throng : Not wholly shorn of strength, but vainly strong ; Weaned from thy fame by a too happy home, Scanning the ridges of thy teeming loam, Counting thy flocks, humming thy harvest song, Callous, because thyself secure, 'gainst wrong, Behind the impassable fences of the foam ! The dupes ! Thou dost but stand erect, and lo ! The nations cluster round ; and while the horde Of wolfish backs slouch homeward to their snow, Thou, 'mid thy sheaves in peaceful seasons stored, Towerest supreme, victor without a blow, Smilingly leaning on thy undrawn sword ! S/X ALFRED LYALL Born 1835 A RAJPOOT CHIEF OF THE OLD SCHOOL MORIBUNDUS LOQUITUR And why say ye that I must leave This pleasure-garden, where the sun Is baffled by the boughs that weave Their shade o'er my pavilion ? The trees I planted with my hands, This house I built among the sands, Within a lofty wall which rounds This green oasis, kept with care ; With room for my horses, hawks and hounds, And the cool arcade for my ladies fair. How often, while the landscape flames With heat, within the marble court I lie, and laugh to see my dames About the shimmering fountain sport : Or after the long scorching days, When the hot wind hushes, and falling, stays The clouds of dust, and stars are bright, I've spread my carpets in the grove, SIR ALFKED LYALL 127 And talked and loitered the live-long night With some foreign leman light o'love. My wives I married, as was fit, Some thirteen of the purest blood And two or three have germs of wit, And almost all are chaste and good ; But all their womanhood has been Hencooped behind a marble screen ; They count their pearls and doze while she, The courtezan, had travelled far, Her songs were fresh, her talk was free Of the Delhi Court, or the Kabul War. Those days are gone, I am old and ill, Why should I move ? I love the place ; The dawn is fresh, the nights are still ; Ah yes ! I see it in your face, My latest dawn and night are nigh, And of my clan a chief must die Within the ancestral rampart's fold Paced by the listening sentinel, Where ancient cannon, and beldames old As the guns, peer down from the citadel. Once more, once only, they shall bear My litter up the steep ascent LIVING ENGLISH POETS That pierces, mounting stair on stair, The inmost ring of battlement. Oft-times that frowning gate I've past (This time, but one, shall be the last) Where the tribal demon's image stands Crowning the arch, and on the side Are scarlet prints of woman's hands Farewell ! and forth must the lady ride, Her face unveiled, in rich attire, She strikes the stone with ringers red, " Farewell the palace, to the pyre We follow, widows of the dead ! " And I, whose life has reached its verge, Bethink me of the wailing dirge That day my father forth was borne High seated, swathed in many a shawl, By priests who scatter flowers, and mourn ; And the eddying smoke of the funeral. Thus did he vanish ; with him went Seven women, by the flames set free ; I built a stately monument To shrine their graven effigy : In front my father, godlike, stands, The widows kneel with folded hands ; SSR ALFRED LYALL 129 All yearly rites are duly paid, All round are planted sacred trees, And the ghosts are soothed by the spreading shade, And lulled by the strain of their obsequies. His days were troubled ; his curse I earned Full often, ere he passed that arch, My father, by his farms we burned, By raiding on the English march ; And then that summer I rebelled, One fort we seized, and there we held Until my father's guns grew hot ; But the floods and darkness veiled our flight, We rode their lines with never a shot, For the matches were moist in the rainy night. That's forty years ago ; and since, With all these wild unruly clans, In this salt wilderness, a prince Of camel-riding caterans, I've sought religiously, Heaven knows, A life of worship and repose, Vext by the stiff ungrateful league Of all my folk in fretful stir, By priests and gods in dark intrigue, And the wasting curse of the sorcerer. K 1 30 LIVING ENGLISH POETS They say I seized their broad estates, Upbraid me with a kinsman's blood ; He led his bands before my gates, And then it was an ancient feud ; But I must offer gifts, and pray The Brahmin's stain be washed away. Saint and poisoner, fed with bribes, Deep versed in every traitorous plan I told them only to kill the scribes, But my Afghans hated the holy man. Yes, peace is blessed, and prayer is good ; My eldest son defied my power ; I lost his mother in the wood That hides my lonely hunting-tower : She was a proud unbroken dame : Like son, like mother, hard to tame Or tire And so he took the bent, His mother's kinsfolk at his heel, With many a restless malcontent ; There were some had ease, ere I sheathed my steel. The English say I govern ill, That laws must silence spear and gun, So may my peaceful subjects till ; But peaceful subjects have I none. SIX ALFXEZ} LYALL 131 I can but follow my father's rule, I cannot learn in an English school ; Yet the hard world softens, and change is best, My sons must leave the ancient ways, The folk are weary, the land shall rest, And the gods are kind, for I end my days. Then carry me to my castle steep, Whose time is ending with its lord's : Eight months my grandsire held the keep Against the fierce Maratha hordes ; It would not stand three winter suns Before the shattering English guns ; And so these rude old faithful stones, My father's haven in high war-tide, Must rive and moulder, as soon my bones Shall bleach on the holy river-side. Years hence, when all the earth is calm, And forts are level, and foes agree, Since feuds must end, to trade and farm, And toil, like oxen, patiently ; When this my garden-palace stands A desert ruin, choked with sands, A broken well 'mid trees that fade, Some traveller still my name may bless, The chief long syne that left him shade And a water spring in the wilderness. JOHN LEICESTER WARREN, LORD DE TAB LEY Born 1835 CIRCE This the house of Circe, queen of charms A kind of beacon-cauldron poised on high, Hooped round with ember-clasping iron bars, Sways in her palace porch, and smoulderingly Drips out in blots of fire and ruddy stars ; But out behind that trembling furnace air, The lands are ripe and fair, Hush are the hills and quiet to the eye. The river's reach goes by With lamb and holy tower and squares of corn, And shelving interspace Of holly bush and thorn And hamlets happy in an Alpine morn, And deep-bowered lanes with grace Of woodbine newly born. But inward o'er the hearth a torch-head stands Inverted, slow green flames of fulvous hue, LORD DE TABLEY 133 Echoed in wave-like shadows over her. A censer's swing-chain set in her fair hands Dances up wreaths of intertwisted blue In clouds of fragrant frankincense and myrrh. A giant tulip head and two pale leaves Grew in the midmost of her chamber there, A flaunting bloom, naked and undivine, Rigid and bare, Gaunt as a tawny bond-girl born to shame, With freckled cheeks and splotched side serpentine, A gipsy among flowers, Unmeet for bed or bowers, Virginal where pure-handed damsels sleep : Let it not breathe a common air with them, Lest when the night is deep, And all things have their quiet in the moon, Some birth of poison from its leaning stem Waft in between their slumber-parted lips, And they cry out or swoon, Deeming some vampire sips, Where riper Love may come for nectar boon ! And near this tulip, reared across a loom, Hung a fair web of tapestry half done, Crowding with folds and fancies half the room : Men eyed as gods and damsels still as stone, Pressing their brows alone, 134 LIVING ENGLISH POETS In amethystine robes, Or reaching at the polished orchard globes, Or rubbing parted love-lips on their rind, While the wind Sows with sere apple leaves their breast and hair. And all the margin there Was arabesqued and bordered intricate With hairy spider things That catch and clamber, And salamander in his dripping cave Satanic ebon-amber ; Blind worm, and asp, and eft of cumbrous gait, And toads who love rank grasses near a grave, And the great goblin moth, who bears Between his wings the ruined eyes of death ; And the enamelled sails Of butterflies, who watch the morning's breath. And many an emerald lizard with quick ears Asleep in rocky dales. And for an outer fringe embroidered small, A ring of many locusts, horny-coated, A round of chirping tree-frogs merry-throated, And sly, fat fishes sailing, watching all. LORD DE TABLE Y 135 THE TWO OLD KINGS In ruling well what guerdon ? Life runs low, As yonder lamp upon the hour-glass lies, Waning and wasted. We are great and wise, But Love is gone ; and Silence seems to grow Along the misty road where we must go. From summits near the morning star's uprise, Death comes, a shadow from the northern skies, As, when all leaves are down, thence comes the snow Brother and king, we hold our last carouse. One loving cup we drain and then farewell. The night is spent The crystal morning ray Calls us, as soldiers laurelled on our brows, To march undaunted, while the clarions swell, Heroic hearts, upon our lonely way. WALTER THEODORE WATTS Born 1836 NATURA MALIGN A The Lady of the Hills with crimes untold Followed my feet, with azure eyes of prey ; By glacier-brink she stood, by cataract-spray, When mists were dire, or avalanche-echoes rolled. At night she glimmered in the death-wind cold, And if a foot-print shone at break of day, My flesh would quail but straight my soul would say : " Tis hers whose hand God's mightier hand doth hold." I trod her snow-bridge, for the moon was bright, Her icicle-arch across the sheer crevasse, When lo, she stood ! . . . God made her let me pass Then felled the bridge ! ... Oh, in the sallow light Adown the chasm, I saw her cruel, white, And all my wondrous days as in a glass. WALTER THEODORE WATTS 137 JOHN THE PILGRIM (THE MIRAGE IN EGYPT) Beneath the sand-storm John the Pilgrim prays ; But when he rises, lo ! an Eden smiles, Green leafy slopes, meadows of camomiles, Claspt in a silvery river's winding maze : " Water, water ! Blessed be God ! " he says, And totters gasping toward those happy isles. Then all is fled ! Over the sandy piles The bald-eyed vultures come and stand at gaze. " God heard me not," says he, " blessed be God," And dies. But as he nears the pearly strand, Heav'n's outer coast where waiting angels stand, He looks below : " Farewell, thou hooded clod, Brown corpse the vultures tear on bloody sand, God heard my prayer for life blessed be God ! " 133 LIVING ENGLISH POETS THE FIRST KISS If only in dreams may Man be fully blest, Is heav'n a dream ? Is she I claspt a dream ? Or stood she here even now where dew-drops gleam, And miles of furze shine golden down the West ? I seem to clasp her still still on my breast Her bosom beats, I see the blue eyes beam : I think she kissed these lips, for now they seem Scarce mine : so hallow'd of the lips they press'd ! Yon thicket's breath can that be eglantine ? Those birds can they be morning's choristers ? Can this be earth ? Can these be banks of furze ? Like burning bushes fired of God they shine ! I seem to know them, though this body of mine Pass'd into spirit at the touch of hers ! ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE Born 1837 FROM "ATALANTA IN CALYDON" CHORUS When the hounds of spring are on winter's traces, The mother of months in meadow or plain Fills the shadows and windy places With lisp of leaves and ripple of rain ; And the brown bright nightingale amorous Is half assuaged for Itylus, For the Thracian ships and the foreign faces, The tongueless vigil, and all the pain. Come with bows bent and with emptying of quivers, Maiden most perfect, lady of light, With a noise of winds and many rivers, With a clamour of waters, and with might ; Bind on thy sandals, O thou most fleet, Over the splendour and speed of thy feet ; For the faint east quickens, the wan west shivers, Round the feet of the day and the feet of the night. HO LIVING ENGLISH POETS Where shall we find her, how shall we sing to her, Fold our hands round her knees, and cling? O that man's heart were as fire and could spring to her Fire, or the strength of the streams that spring ! For the stars and the winds are unto her As raiment, as songs of the harp-player ; For the risen stars and the fallen cling to her, And the south west-wind and the west-wind sing. For winter's rains and ruins are over, And all the season of snows and sins ; The days dividing lover and lover, The light that loses, the night that wins ; And time remembered is grief forgotten, And frosts are slain and flowers begotten, And in green underwood and cover Blossom by blossom the spring begins. The full streams feed on flower of rushes, Ripe grasses trammel a travelling foot, The faint fresh flame of the young year flushes From leaf to flower and flower to fruit ; And fruit and leaf are as gold and fire, And the oat is heard above the lyre, And the hoofed heel of a satyr crushes The chestnut-husk at the chestnut-root. ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE 141 And Pan by noon and Bacchus by night, Fleeter of foot than the fleet-foot kid, Follows with dancing and fills with delight The Maenad and the Bassarid ; And soft as lips that laugh and hide The laughing leaves of the trees divide, And screen from seeing and leave in sight The god pursuing, the maiden hid. The ivy falls with the Bacchanal's hair Over her eyebrows hiding her eyes ; The wild vine slipping down leaves bare Her bright breast shortening into sighs ; The wild vine slips with the weight of its leaves, But the berried ivy catches and cleaves To the limbs that glitter, the feet that scare The wolf that follows, the fawn that flies. IN MEMORY OF WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR Back to the flower-town, side by side, The bright months bring, New-born, the bridegroom and the bride, Freedom and spring. 142 LIVING ENGLISH POETS The sweet land laughs from sea to sea, Filled full of sun ; All things come back to her, being free ; All things but one. In many a tender wheaten plot Flowers that were dead Live, and old suns revive ; but not That holier head. By this white wandering waste of sea, Far north, I hear One face shall never turn to me As once this year : Shall never smile and turn and rest On mine as there, Nor one most sacred hand be prest Upon my hair. I came as one whose thoughts half linger, Half run before ; The youngest to the oldest singer That England bore. I found him whom I shall not find Till all grief end, ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE 143 In holiest age our mightest mind, Father and friend. But thou, if anything endure, If hope there be, O spirit that man's life left pure, Man's death set free, Not with disdain of days that were Look earthward now ; Let dreams revive the reverend hair, The imperial brow ; Come back in sleep, for in the life Where thou art not We find none like thee. Time and strife And the world's lot Move thee no more ; but love at least And reverent heart May move thee, royal and released, Soul, as thou art. And thou, his Florence, to thy trust Receive and keep, Keep safe his dedicated dust, His sacred sleep. 144 LIVING ENGLISH POETS So shall thy lovers, come from far, Mix with thy name As morning-star with evening-star His faultless fame. FROM "THE GARDEN OF PROSERPINE" Pale, beyond porch and portal, Crowned with calm leaves, she stands Who gathers all things mortal With cold immortal hands ; Her languid lips are sweeter Than love's who fears to greet her To men that mix and meet her From many times and lands. She waits for each and other, She waits for all men born ; Forgets the earth her mother, The life of fruits and corn ; And spring and seed and swallow Take wing for her and follow Where summer song rings hollow And flowers are put to scorn. There go the loves that wither, The old loves with wearier wings ; ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE 145 And all dead years draw thither, And all disastrous things ; Dead dreams of days forsaken, Blind buds that snows have shaken, Wild leaves that winds have taken, Red strays of ruined springs. We are not sure of sorrow, And joy was never sure ; To-day will die to-morrow ; Time stoops to no man's lure ; And love, grown faint and fretful, With lips but half regretful Sighs, and with eyes forgetful Weeps that no loves endure. From too much love of living, From hope and fear set free, We thank with brief thanksgiving Whatever gods may be That no life lives for ever ; That dead men rise up never ; That even the weariest river Winds somewhere safe to sea. Then star nor sun shall waken, Nor any change of light : L 146 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Nor sound of waters shaken, Nor any sound or sight : Nor wintry leaves nor vernal, Nor days nor things diurnal ; Only the sleep eternal In an eternal night. THE SUNDEW A little marsh-plant, yellow green, And pricked at lip with tender red. Tread close, and either way you tread Some faint black water jets between Lest you should bruise the curious head. A live thing may be ; who shall know ? The summer knows and suffers it ; For the cool moss is thick and sweet Each side, and saves the blossom so That it lives out the long June heat. The deep scent of the heather burns About it ; breathless though it be, Bow down and worship ; more than we ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE 147 Is the least flower whose life returns, Least weed renascent in the sea. We are vexed and cumbered in earth's sight With wants, with many memories ; These see their mother what she is, Glad-growing, till August leave more bright The apple-coloured cranberries. Wind blows and bleaches the strong grass, Blown all one way to shelter it From trample of strayed kine, with feet Felt heavier than the moorhen was, Strayed up past patches of wild wheat You call it sundew : how it grows, If with its colour it have breath, If life taste sweet to it, if death Pain its soft petal, no man knows : Man has no sight or sense that saith. My sundew, grown of gentle days, In these green miles the spring begun Thy growth ere April had half done With the soft secret of her ways Or June made ready for the sun. 148 LIVING ENGLISH POETS red-lipped mouth of marsh-flower, 1 have a secret halved with thee. The name that is love's name to me Thou knowest, and the face of her Who is my festival to see. The hard sun, as thy petals knew, Coloured the heavy moss-water : Thou wert not worth green midsummer Nor fit to live to August blue, O sundew, not remembering her. FROM PRELUDE TO "SONGS BEFORE SUNRISE" Play then and sing ; we too have played, We likewise, in that subtle shade. We too have twisted through our hair Such tendrils as the wild Loves wear, And heard what mirth the Maenads made, Till the wind blew our garlands bare And left their roses disarrayed, And smote the summer with strange air, And disengirdled and discrowned The limbs and locks that vine-wreaths bound. ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE 149 We too have tracked by star-proof trees The tempest of the Thyiades Scare the loud night on hills that hid The blood-feasts of the Bassarid, Heard their song's iron cadences Fright the wolf hungering from the kid, Outroar the lion-throated seas, Outchide the north-wind if it chid, And hush the torrent-tongued ravines With thunders of their tambourines. But the fierce flute whose notes acclaim Dim goddesses of fiery fame, Cymbal and clamorous kettledrum, Timbrels and tabrets, all are dumb That turned the high chill air to flame ; The singing tongues of fire are numb That called on Cotys by her name Edonian, till they felt her come And maddened, and her mystic face Lightened along the streams of Thrace. For Pleasure slumberless and pale, And Passion with rejected veil, Pass, and the tempest-footed throng Of hours that follow them with song Till their feet flag and voices fail, LIVING ENGLISH POETS And lips that were so loud so long Learn silence, or a wearier wail ; So keen is change, and time so strong, To weave the robes of life and rend And weave again till life have end But weak is change, but strengthless time, To take the light from heaven, or climb The hills of heaven with wasting feet. Songs they can stop that earth found meet, But the stars keep their ageless rhyme ; Flowers they can slay that spring thought sweet, But the stars keep their spring sublime ; Passions and pleasures can defeat, Actions and agonies control, And life, and death, but not the soul. Because man's soul is man's God still, What wind soever waft his will Across the waves of day and night To port or shipwreck, left or right, By shores and shoals of good and ill ; And still its flame at mainmast height Through the rent air that foam-flakes fill Sustains the indomitable light Whence only man hath strength to steer Or helm to handle without fear. ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE 151 Save his own soul's light overhead, None leads him, and none ever led, Across birth's hidden harbour-bar, Past youth where shoreward shallows are, Through age that drives on toward the red Vast void of sunset hailed from far, To the equal waters of the dead ; Save his own soul he hath no star, And sinks, except his own soul guide, Helmless in middle turn of tide. No blast of air or fire of sun Puts out the light whereby we run With girdled loins our lamplit race, And each from each takes heart of grace And spirit till his turn be done, And light of face from each man's face In whom the light of trust is one ; Since only souls that keep their place By their own light, and watch things roll, And stand, have light for any soul. A little time we gain from time To set our seasons in some chime, For harsh or sweet or loud or low, With seasons played out long ago And souls that in their time and prime 152 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Took part with summer or with snow, Lived abject lives out or sublime, And had their chance of seed to sow For service or disservice done To those days dead and this their son. A little time that we may fill Or with such good works or such ill As loose the bonds or make them strong Wherein all manhood suffers wrong. By rose-hung river and light-foot rill There are who rest not ; who think long Till they discern as from a hill, At the sun's hour of morning song, Known of souls only, and those souls free, The sacred spaces of the sea. FROM "MATER TRIUMPHALIS" I do not bid thee spare me, O dreadful mother ! I pray thee that thou spare not, of thy grace. How were it with me then, if ever another Should come to stand before thee in this my place ? I am the trumpet at thy lips, thy clarion Full of thy cry, sonorous with thy breath ; ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE 153 The graves of souls born worms and creeds grown carrion Thy blast of judgment fills with fires of death. Thou art the player whose organ-keys are thunders, And I beneath thy foot the pedal prest, Thou art the ray whereat the rent night sunders, And I the cloudlet borne upon thy breast. I shall burn up before thee, pass and perish, As haze in sunrise on the red sea-line ; But thou from dawn to sunsetting shalt cherish The thoughts that led and souls that lighted mine. Reared between night and noon and truth and error, Each twilight-travelling bird that trills and screams Sickens at midday, nor can face for terror The imperious heaven's inevitable extremes. I have no spirit of skill with equal fingers At sign to sharpen or to slacken strings ; I keep no time of song with gold-perched singers And chirp of linnets on the wrists of kings. I am thy storm-thrush of the days that darken, Thy petrel in the foam that bears thy bark To port through night and tempest ; if thou hearken, My voice is in thy heaven before the lark. 154 LIVING ENGLISH POETS My song is in the mist that hides thy morning, My cry is up before the day for thee ; I have heard thee and beheld thee and give warning, Before thy wheels divide the sky and sea. Birds shall wake with thee voiced and feathered fairer, To see in summer what I see in spring ; I have eyes and heart to endure thee, O thunder-bearer, And they shall be who shall have tongues to sing. I have love at least, and have not fear, and part not From thine unnavigable and wingless way ; Thou tarriest, and I have not said thou art not, Nor all thy night long have denied thy day. Darkness to daylight shall lift up thy paean, Hill to hill thunder, vale cry back to vale, With wind-notes as of eagles ^Eschylean, And Sappho singing in the nightingale. Sung to by mighty sons of dawn and daughters, Of this night's songs thine ear shall keep but one, That supreme song which shook the channelled waters, And called thee skyward as God calls the sun. Come, though all heaven again be fire above thee ; Though death before thee come to clear thy sky ; Let us but see in his thy face who love thee ; Yea, though thou slay us, arise and let us die. ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE 155 FROM HERTHA" The tree many-rooted That swells to the sky With frondage red-fruited, The life-tree am I ; In the buds of your lives is the sap of my leaves : ye shall live and not die. But the Gods of your fashion That take and that give, In their pity and passion That scourge and forgive, They are worms that are bred in the bark that falls off; they shall die and not live. My own blood is what stanches The wounds in my bark ; Stars caught in my branches Make day of the dark, And are worshipped as suns till the sunrise shall tread out their fires as a spark. Where dead ages hide under The live roots of the tree, 156 LIVING ENGLISH POETS In my darkness the thunder Makes utterance of me ; In the clash of my boughs with each other ye hear the waves sound of the sea. That noise is of Time, As his feathers are spread And his feet set to climb Through the boughs overhead, And my foliage rings round him and rustles, and branches are bent with his tread. The storm-winds of ages Blow through me and cease, The war-wind that rages, The spring-wind of peace, Ere the breath of them roughen my tresses, ere one of my blossoms increase. All sounds of all changes, All shadows and lights On the world's mountain-ranges And stream-riven heights, Whose tongue is the wind's tongue and language of storm-clouds on earth-shaking nights ; All forms of all faces, All works of all hands ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE 157 In unsearchable places Of time-stricken lands, All death and all life, and all reigns and all ruins, drop through me as sands. Though sore be my burden And more than ye know, And my growth have no guerdon But only to grow, Yet I fail not of growing for lightnings above me or deathworms below. These too have their part in me, As I too in these ; Such fire is at heart in me, Such sap is this tree's, Which hath in it all sounds and all secrets of infinite lands and of seas. In the spring-coloured hours When my mind was as May's, There brake forth of me flowers By centuries of days, Strong blossoms with perfume of manhood, shot out from my spirit as rays. And the sound of them springing And smell of their shoots 158 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Were as warmth and sweet singing And strength to my roots ; And the lives of my children made perfect with free- dom of soul were my fruits. A FORSAKEN GARDEN In a coign of the cliff between lowland and highland, At the sea-down's edge between windward and lee, Walled round with rocks as an inland island, The ghost of a garden fronts the sea. A girdle of brushwood and thorn encloses The steep square slope of the blossomless bed Where the weeds that grew green from the graves of its roses Now lie dead. The fields fall southward, abrupt and broken, To the low last edge of the long lone land. If a step should sound or a word be spoken, Would a ghost not rise at the strange guest's hand ? So long have the grey bare walks lain guestless, Through branches and briers if a man make way, He shall find no life but the sea-wind's, restless Night and day. ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE 159 The dense hard passage is blind and stifled That crawls by a track none turn to climb To the strait waste place that the years have rifled Of all but the thorns that are touched not of time. The thorns he spares when the rose is taken ; The rocks are left when he wastes the plain. The wind that wanders, the weeds wind-shaken, These remain. Xot a flower to be prest of the foot that falls not ; As the heart of a dead man the seed-plots are dry ; From the thicket of thorns whence the nightingale calls not, Could she call, there were never a rose to reply. Over the meadows that blossom and wither Rings but the note of a sea-bird's song ; Only the sun and the rain come hither All year long. The sun burns sere and the rain dishevels One gaunt bleak blossom of scentless breath. Only the wind here hovers and revels In a round where life seems barren as death. Here there was laughing of old, there was weeping, Haply, of lovers none ever will know, Whose eyes went seaward a hundred sleeping Years ago. 160 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Heart handfast in heart as they stood, " Look thither," Did he whisper ? " Look forth from the flowers to the sea ; For the foam-flowers endure when the rose-blossoms wither, And men that love lightly may die but we ? " And the same wind sang and the same waves whitened, And or ever the garden's last petals were shed, In the lips that had whispered, the eyes that had lightened, Love was dead. Or they loved their life through, and then went whither ? And were one to the end but what end who knows ? Love deep as the sea as a rose must wither, As the rose-red seaweed that mocks the rose. Shall the dead take thought for the dead to love them ? What love was ever as deep as a grave ? They are loveless now as the grass above them Or the wave. All are at one now, roses and lovers, Not known of the cliffs and the fields and the sea. Not a breath of the time that has been hovers In the air now soft with a summer to be. ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE 161 Xot a breath shall there sweeten the seasons hereafter Of the flowers or the lovers that laugh now or weep, When as they that are free now of weeping and laughter We shall sleep. Here death may deal not again for ever ; Here change may come not till all change end. From the graves they have made they shall rise up never, Who have left nought living to ravage and rend. Earth, stones, and thorns of the wild ground growing j When the sun and the rain live, these shall be ; Till a last wind's breath upon all these blowing Roll the sea. Till the slow sea rise and the sheer cliff crumble, Till terrace and meadow the deep gulfs drink, Till the strength of the waves of the high tides humble The fields that lessen, the rocks that shrink, Here now in his triumph where all things falter, Stretched out on the spoils that his own hand spread, As a god self-slain on his own strange altar, Death lies dead. M WILFRID SCAWEN BLUNT Born 1840 TO MANON COMPARING HER TO A FALCON Brave as a falcon and as merciless, With bright eyes watching still the world, thy prey, I saw thee pass in thy lone majesty, Untamed, unmated, high above the press. The dull crowd gazed at thee. It could not guess The secret of thy proud aerial way, Or read in thy mute face the soul which lay A prisoner there in chains of tenderness. Lo, thou art captured. In my hand to-day I hold thee, and awhile thou deignest to be Pleased with my jesses. I would fain beguile My foolish heart to think thou lovest me : See, I dare not love thee quite. A little while And thou shalt sail back heavenwards. Woe is me ! WILFRID SCAWEN BLUNT 163 A FOREST IN BOSNIA Spirit of Trajan ! What a world is here. What remnant of old Europe in this wood Of life primaeval rude as in the year When thy first legions by the Danube stood. These are the very Dacians they subdued, Swineherds and shepherds clad in skins of deer And fox and marten still, a bestial brood, Than their own swine begotten swinelier. The fair oak-forest, their first heritage, Pastures them still, and still the hollow oak Receives them in its bosom. Still o'erhead Upon the stag-head tops, grown hoar with age, Calm buzzards sit and ancient ravens croak, And all with solemn life is tenanted. LILAC AND GOLD AND GREEN Lilac and gold and green ! Those are the colours I love the best, Spring's own raiment untouched and clean, When the world is awake and yet hardly dressed, 164 LIVING ENGLISH POETS And the stranger sun, her bridegroom shy, Looks at her bosom and wonders why She is so beautiful, he so blest. Lilac and green and gold ! Those were the colours you wore to-day. Robed you were in them fold on fold, Clothed in the light of your love's delay. And I held you thus in my arms, once only, And wondered still, as you left me lonely, How the world's beauty was changed to grey. Lilac and gold and green ! I would die for the truth of those colours true : Lilac for loyalty, gold for my queen, And green the faith of my love for you. Here is a posy of all the three. My heart is with it. So think of me, And our weeping skies shall once more be blue. WILFRID SCAWEN BLUNT 165 FROM "IN VINCULIS" Behold the Court of Penance. Four gaunt walls Shutting out all things but the upper heaven. Stone flags for floor, where daily from their stalls The human cattle in a circle driven Tread down their pathway to a mire uneven, Pale-faced, sad-eyed, and mute as funerals. Woe to the wretch whose weakness unforgiven Falters a moment in the track or falls. Yet is there consolation. Overhead The pigeons build and the loud jackdaws talk, And once in the wind's eye, like a ship moored, A sea-gull flew and I was comforted. Even here the heavens declare thy glory, Lord, And the free firmament thy handiwork. My prison has its pleasures. Every day At breakfast-time, spare meal of milk and bread, Sparrows come trooping in familiar way With head aside beseeching to be fed. A spider too for me has spun her thread 166 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Across the prison rules, and a brave mouse Watches in sympathy the warder's tread, These two my fellow prisoners in the house. But about dusk in the rooms opposite I see lamps lighted, and upon the blind A shadow passes all the evening through. It is the gaoler's daughter fair and kind And full of pity so I image it Till the stars rise, and night begins anew. AUSTIN DOBSON Born 184 A DEAD LETTER " A cceur bksslV ombre et k silence " H. DB BALZAC I I drew it from its china tomb ; It came out feebly scented With some thin ghost of past perfume That dust and days had lent it An old, old letter, folded still ! To read with due composure, I sought the sun-lit window-sill Above the grey enclosure, That glimmering in the sultry haze, Faint-flowered, dimly shaded, Slumbered like Goldsmith's Madam Blaize, Bedizened and brocaded. i68 LIVING ENGLISH POETS A queer old place ! You'd surely say Some tea-board garden-maker Had planned it in Dutch William's day To please some florist Quaker, So trim it was. The yew-trees still, With pious care perverted, Grew in the same grim shapes ; and still The lipless dolphin spurted ; Still in his wonted state abode The broken-nosed Apollo ; And still the cypress-arbour showed The same umbrageous hollow. Only, as fresh young Beauty gleams From coffee-coloured laces, So peeped from its old-fashioned dreams The fresher modern traces ; For idle mallet, hoop, and ball Upon the lawn were lying ; A magazine, a tumbled shawl, Round which the swifts were flying ; And, tossed beside the Guelder rose, A heap of rainbow knitting, AUSTIN DOBSON 169 Where, blinking in her pleased repose, A Persian cat was sitting. " A place to love in, live, for aye, If we two, like Tithonus, Could find some God to stretch the grey, Scant life the Fates have thrown us ; " But now by steam we run our race, With buttoned heart and pocket ; Our Love's a gilded, surplus grace, Just like an empty locket ! " ' The time is out of joint/ Who will, May strive to make it better ; For me, this warm old window-sill, And this old dusty letter." II " Dear John (the letter ran), it can't, can't be, For Father's gone to Chorley Fair with Sam, And Mother's storing Apples, Prue and Me Up to our Elbows making Damson Jam : But we shall meet before a Week is gone, ' Tis a long Lane that has no Turning/ John ! " Only till Sunday next, and then you'll wait Behind the White-Thorn, by the broken Stile i;o LIVING ENGLISH POETS We can go round and catch them at the Gate, All to Ourselves, for nearly one long Mile ; Dear Prue won't look, and Father he'll go on, And Sam's two Eyes are all for Cissy > John ! "Jo/in, she's so smart, with every Ribbon new, Flame-coloured Sack, and Crimson Padesoy ; As proud as proud ; and has the Vapours too, Just like My Lady ; calls poor Sam a Boy, And vows no Sweet-heart's worth the Thinking-on Till he's past Thirty ... I know better, Jo/in ! " My Dear, I don't think that I thought of much Before we knew each other, I and you ; And now, why, John, your least, least Finger-touch, Gives me enough to think a Summer through. See, for I send you Something ! There, 'tis gone ! Look in this corner, mind you find it, John ! " III This was the matter of the note, A long-forgot deposit, Dropped in an Indian dragon's throat, Deep in a fragrant closet, Piled with a dapper Dresden world, Beaux, beauties, prayers, and posies, AUSTIN DOB SON 171 Bonzes with squat legs undercurled, And great jars filled with roses. Ah, heart that wrote ! Ah, lips that kissed ! You had no thought or presage Into what keeping you dismissed Your simple old-world message ! A reverent one. Though we to-day Distrust beliefs and powers, The artless, ageless things you say Are fresh as May's own flowers, Starring some pure primeval spring, Ere Gold had grown despotic, Ere Life was yet a selfish thing, Or Love a mere exotic ! I need not search too much to find Whose lot it was to send it, That feel upon me yet the kind, Soft hand of her who penned it ; And see, through two score years of smoke, In by-gone, quaint apparel, Shine from yon time-black Norway oak The face of Patience Caryl, 172 LIVING ENGLISH POETS The pale, smooth forehead, silver-tressed ; The grey gown, primly flowered ; The spotless, stately coif whose crest Like Hector's horse-plume towered ; And still the sweet half-solemn look Where some past thought was clinging, As when one shuts a serious book To hear the thrushes singing. I kneel to you ! Of those you were, Whose kind old hearts grow mellow, Whose fair old faces grow more fair As Point and Flanders yellow ; Whom some old store of garnered grief, Their placid temples shading, Crowns like a wreath of autumn leaf With tender tints of fading. Peace to your soul ! You died unwed Despite this loving letter. And what of John ? The less that's said Of John, I think, the better. A US TIN DOSSON 1 73 A GENTLEMAN OF THE OLD SCHOOL He lived in that past Georgian day, When men were less inclined to say That " Time is Gold," and overlay With toil their pleasure ; He held some land, and dwelt thereon, Where, I forget, the house is gone ; His Christian name, I think, was John, His surname, Leisure. Reynolds has painted him, a face Filled with a fine, old-fashioned grace, Fresh-coloured, frank, with ne'er a trace Of trouble shaded ; The eyes are blue, the hair is drest In plainest way, one hand is prest Deep in a flapped canary vest, With buds brocaded. He wears a brown old Brunswick coat, With silver buttons, round his throat, A soft cravat ; in all you note An elder fashion, 174 LIVING ENGLISH POETS A strangeness, which, to us who shine In shapely hats, whose coats combine All harmonies of hue and line, Inspires compassion. He lived so long ago, you see ! Men were untravelled then, but we, Like Ariel, post o'er land and sea With careless parting ; He found it quite enough for him To smoke his pipe in " garden trim," And watch, about the fish-tank's brim, The swallows darting. He liked the well-wheel's creaking tongue, He liked the thrush that stopped and sung, He liked the drone of flies among His netted peaches ; He liked to watch the sunlight fall Athwart his ivied orchard-wall ; Or pause to catch the cuckoo's call Beyond the beeches. His were the times of Paint and Patch, And yet no Ranelagh could match The sober doves that round his thatch Spread tails and sidled ; AUSTIN DOBSON 175 He liked their ruffling, puffed content, For him their drowsy wheelings meant More than a Mall of Beaux that bent, Or Belles that bridled. Not that, in truth, when life began He shunned the flutter of the fan ; He too had maybe " pinked his man " In Beauty's quarrel ; But now his " fervent youth " had flown Where lost things go, and he was grown As staid and slow-paced as his own Old hunter, Sorrel. Yet still he loved the chase, and held That no composer's score excelled The merry horn, when Sweetlip swelled Its jovial riot ; But most his measured words of praise Caressed the angler's easy ways, His idly meditative days, His rustic diet. Not that his " meditating " rose Beyond a sunny summer doze ; He never troubled his repose With fruitless prying ; 1 76 LIVING ENGLISH POETS But held, as law for high and low, What God withholds no man can know, And smiled away inquiry so, Without replying. We read alas, how much we read ! The jumbled strifes of creed and creed With endless controversies feed Our groaning tables ; His books and they sufficed him were Cotton's " Montaigne," " The Grave " of Blair, A " Walton " much the worse for wear, And "^sop's Fables." One more," The Bible." Not that he Had searched its page as deep as we ; No sophistries could make him see Its slender credit ; It may be that he could not count The sires and sons to Jesse's fount, He liked the " Sermon on the Mount," And more, he read it. Once he had loved, but failed to wed, A red-cheeked lass who long was dead ; His ways were far too slow, he said, To quite forget her ; AUSTIN DOBSON 177 And still when time had turned him gray, The earliest hawthorn buds in May Would find his lingering feet astray, Where first he met her. " In Ccelo Quies " heads the stone On Leisure's grave, now little known, A tangle of wild-rose has grown So thick across it ; The " Benefactions " still declare He left the clerk an elbow-chair, And " 12 Pence Yearly to Prepare A Christmas Posset" Lie softly, Leisure ! Doubtless you, With too serene a conscience drew Your easy breath, and slumbered through The gravest issue ; But we, to whom our age allows Scarce space to wipe our weary brows, Look down upon your narrow house, Old friend, and miss you ! 1 78 LIVING ENGLISH POETS A SONG OF THE FOUR SEASONS When Spring comes laughing By vale and hill, By wind-flower walking And daffodil, Sing stars of morning, Sing morning skies, Sing blue of speedwell, And my Love's eyes. When comes the Summer, Full-leaved and strong, And gay birds gossip The orchard long, Sing hid, sweet honey That no bee sips ; Sing red, red roses, And my Love's lips. When Autumn scatters The leaves again, And piled sheaves bury The broad-wheeled wain, AUSTIN DOBSON 179 Sing flutes of harvest Where men rejoice ; Sing rounds of reapers, And my Love's voice. But when comes Winter With hail and storm, And red fire roaring And ingle warm, Sing first sad going Of friends that part ; Then sing glad meeting, And my Love's heart. TO AN INTRUSIVE BUTTERFLY " Kill not for Pity's sake and lest ye slay The meanest thing upon its upward way. " Five Rules of Buddha. I watch you through the garden walks, I watch you float between The avenues of dahlia stalks, And flicker on the green ; You hover round the garden seat, You mount, you waver. Why, i So LIVING ENGLISH POETS Why storm us in our still retreat, saffron Butterfly ! Across the room in loops of flight 1 watch you wayward go ; Dance down a shaft of glancing light, Review my books a-row ; Before the bust you flaunt and flit Of " blind Maeonides " Ah, trifler, on his lips there lit Not butterflies, but bees ! You pause, you poise, you circle up Among my old Japan ; You find a comrade on a cup, A friend upon a fan ; You wind anon, a breathing-while, Around Amanda's brow ; Dost dream her then, O Volatile ! E'en such an one as thou ? Away ! Her thoughts are not as thine. A sterner purpose fills Her steadfast soul with deep design Of baby bows and frills ; What care hath she for worlds without,- What heed for yellow sun, AUSTIN DOBSON 181 Whose endless hopes revolve about A planet, cetat One ! Away ! Tempt not the best of wives : Let not thy garish wing Come fluttering our Autumn lives With truant dreams of Spring ! Away ! Re-seek thy " Flowery Land ; " Be Buddha's law obeyed ; Lest Betty's undiscerning hand Should slay ... a future PRAED ! THE POET AND THE CRITICS If those who wield the Rod forget, 'Tis truly Quis custodiet? A certain Bard (as Bards will do) Dressed up his Poems for Review. His Type was plain, his Title clear ; His Frontispiece by Fourdrinier. Moreover he had on the Back A sort of sheepskin Zodiac ; A Mask, a Harp, an Owl, in fine A neat and " classical " Design. 1 82 LIVING ENGLISH POETS But the zVz-Side ? Well, good or bad, The Inside was the best he had : Much Memory, more Imitation ; Some Accidents of Inspiration ; Some Essays in that finer Fashion Where Fancy takes the place of Passion ; And some (of course) more roughly wrought To catch the Advocates of Thought. In the less-crowded Age of Anne, Our Bard had been a favoured Man ; Fortune, more chary with the Sickle Had ranked him next to Garth or Tickell ; He might have even dared to hope A Line's Malignity from Pope ! But now, when Folks are hard to please, And Poets are as thick as Peas, The Fates are not so prone to flatter, Unless, indeed, a Friend . . . No Matter. The Book, then, had a minor Credit : The Critics took, and doubtless read it. Said A. These little Songs display No lyric Gift ; but still a Ray, A Promise. They will do no harm. 'Twas kindly, if not very warm. Said B. The Author may, in time AUSTIN DOBS ON 183 Acquire the Rudiments of Rhyme : His Efforts now are scarcely Verse. This, certainly, could not be worse. Sorely discomfited, our Bard Worked for another ten years hard. Meanwhile the World, unmoved, went on ; New stars shot up, shone out, were gone ; Before his second Volume came His Critics had forgot his Name : And who, forsooth, is bound to know Each Laureate in embryo ! They tried and tested him, no less, The pure Assayers of the Press. Said A. The AutJior, may in Time . . . Or much what B. had said of Rhyme. Then B.T/iese little Songs display . . . And so forth, in the sense of A. Over the Bard I throw a Veil. There is no Moral to this Tale. 1 84 LIVING ENGLISH POETS A FANCY FROM FONTENELLE " De memoires de Rose on n'a point vti mourir lejardinier." The Rose in the garden slipped her bud, And she laughed in the pride of her youthful blood, As she thought of the Gardener standing by " He is old, so old ! And he soon must die ! " The full Rose waxed in the warm June air, And she spread and spread till her heart lay bare ; And she laughed once more as she heard his tread " He is older now ! He will soon be dead ! " But the breeze of the morning blew, and found That the leaves of the blown Rose strewed the ground ; And he came at noon, that Gardener old, And he raked them softly under the mould. And I wove tJte thing to a random rhyme^ For the Rose is Beauty ', the Gardener Time. AUSTIN DOBSON 185 BEFORE SEDAN 1 The dead hand clasped a Utter. " Special Correspondence. Here, in this leafy place, Quiet he lies, Cold, with his sightless face Turned to the skies ; 'Tis but another dead ; All you can say is said. Carry his body hence, Kings must have slaves ; Kings climb to eminence Over men's graves : So this man's eye is dim ; Throw the earth over him. What was the white you touched, There, at his side ? Paper his hand had clutched Tight ere he died ; Message or wish, may be ; Smooth the folds out and see. fii 1 86 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Hardly the worst of us Here could have smiled !- Only the tremulous Words of a child ; Prattle, that has for stops Just a few ruddy drops. Look. She is sad to miss, Morning and night, His her dead father's kiss ; Tries to be bright, Good to mamma, and sweet. That is all. " Marguerite." Ah, if beside the dead Slumbered the pain ! Ah, if the hearts that bled Slept with the slain ! If the grief died ; But no ; Death will not have it so. THE LADIES OF ST. JAMES'S The ladies of St. James's Go swinging to the play ; A VST IN DOB SON \ 87 Their footmen go before them, With a " Stand by ! Clear the way ! " But Phyllida, my Phyllida ! She takes her buckled shoon, When we go out a-courting Beneath the harvest moon. The ladies of St. James's Wear satin on their backs ; They sit all night at Ombre, With candles all of wax : But Phyllida, my Phyllida ! She dons her russet gown, And runs to gather May dew Before the world is down. The ladies of St. James's ! They are so fine and fair, You'd think a box of essences Was broken in the air : But Phyllida, my Phyllida ! The breath of heath and furze, When breezes blow at morning, Is not so fresh as hers. The ladies of St. James's ! They're painted to the eyes ; 188 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Their white it stays for ever, Their red it never dies : But Phyllida, my Phyllida ! Her colour comes and goes ; It trembles to a lily, It wavers to a rose. The ladies of St. James's ! You scarce can understand The half of all their speeches, Their phrases are so grand : But Phyllida, my Phyllida ! Her shy and simple words Are clear as after rain-drops The music of the birds. The ladies of St. James's They have their fits and freaks ; They smile on you for seconds, They frown on you for weeks ; But Phyllida, my Phyllida ! Come either storm or shine, From Shrove-tide unto Shrove-tide, Is always true and mine. My Phyllida ! my Phyllida ! I care not though they heap AUSTIN DOBS ON 189 The hearts of all St. James's, And give me all to keep ; I care not whose the beauties Of all the world may be, For Phyllida for Phyllida Is all the world to me ! "GOOD NIGHT, BABETTE!" " Si vieillesse pouvait / " SCENE. A small neat Room. In a high Voltaire Chair sits a white-haired old Gentleman. MONSIEUR VIEUXBOIS. BABETTE. M. VIEUXBOIS (turning querulously} Day of my life ! Where can she get ? BABETTE ! I say ! BABETTE ! BABETTE ! ! BABETTE (entering hurriedly) Coming, M'sieu ! If M'sieu' speaks So loud he won't be well for weeks ! M. VIEUXBOIS Where have you been ? 190 LIVING ENGLISH POETS BABETTE Why, M'sieu' knows April ! . . . Ville-d'Avray ! . . . Ma'am'selle ROSE M. VIEUXBOIS Ah ! I am old, and I forget. Was the place growing green, BABETTE ? BABETTE But of a greenness ! yes, M'sieu ! And then the sky so blue ! so blue ! And when I dropped my immortelle^ How the birds sang ! (Lifting her apron to her eyes) This poor Ma'am'selle ! M. VIEUXBOIS You're a good girl, BABETTE, but she, She was an Angel, verily. Sometimes I think I see her yet Stand smiling by the cabinet ; And once, I know, she peeped and laughed Betwixt the curtains . . . Where's the draught ? (She gives him a cup] Now I shall sleep, I think, BABETTE ; Sing me your Norman chansonnette. AUSTIN DOBSON 191 BABETTE (sings) " Once at tJte Angelus (Ere I was dead), Angels all glerious Came to my Bed ; Angels in blue and white Crowned on the Head" M. VIEUXBOIS (drowsily) " She was an Angel " . . . " Once she laughed "... What, was I dreaming ? Where's the draught ? BABETTE (showing the empty cup) The draught, M'sieu ? M. VIEUXBOIS How I forget! I am so old ! But sing, BABETTE ! BABETTE (sings) " One was tJie Friend I left Stark in tlie Snow ; One was t/ie Wife that died Long, long ago ; One was tJte Love I lost . . . How could s/ie know ? " 192 LIVING ENGLISH POETS M. VIEUXBOIS (murmuring") Ah, PAUL ! ... old PAUL ! . . . EULALIE too ! And ROSE ! . . . And O ! " the sky so blue ! " BABETTE (sings) " One had my Mother's eyes, Wistful and mild ; One had my Father 's face ; One was a Child : All of them bent to me> Bent down and smiled ! " (He is asleep !) M. VIEUXBOIS (almost inaudibly) How I forget ! " " I am so old ! ... " Good night, BABETTE ! " THE BALLAD OF THE ARMADA King Philip had vaunted his claims ; He had sworn for a year he would sack us ; With an army of heathenish names He was coming to fagot and stack us ; Like the thieves of the sea he would track us, AUSTIN DOBSON 193 And shatter our ships on the main ; But we had bold Neptune to back us, And where are the galleons of Spain ? His carackes were christened of dames To the kirtles whereof he would tack us ; With his saints and his gilded stern-frames, He had thought like an egg-shell to crack us ; Now Howard may get to his Flaccus, And Drake to his Devon again, And Hawkins bowl rubbers to Bacchus, For where are the galleons of Spain ? Let his Majesty hang to St. James The axe that he whetted to hack us ; He must play at some lustier games Or at sea he can hope to out-thwack us ; To his mines of Peru he would pack us To tug at his bullet and chain ; Alas ! that his Greatness should lack us ! But where are the galleons of Spain ? EXVOY Gloriana ! the Don may attack us Whenever his stomach be fain ; He must reach us before he can rack us, ... And where are the galleons of Spain ? O 194 LIVING ENGLISH POETS IN AFTER DA YS In after days when grasses high O'er-top the stone where I shall lie, Though ill or well the world adjust My slender claim to honoured dust, I shall not question nor reply. I shall not see the morning sky ; I shall not hear the night-wind sigh ; I shall be mute, as all men must In after days ! But yet, now living, fain would I That some one then should testify, Saying " He held his pen in trust To Art, not serving shame or lust." Will none ? Then let my memory die In after days ! AUGUSTA WEBSTER Born i3j& IF If I should die this night, (as well might be, So pain has on my weakness worked its will), And they should come at morn and look on me Lying more white than I am wont, and still In the strong silence of unchanging sleep, And feel upon my brow the deepening chill, And know we gathered to His time-long keep, The quiet watcher over all men's rest, And weep as those around a death-bed weep There would no anguish throb my vacant breast, No tear-drop trickle down my stony cheek, No smile of long farewell say " Calm is best." I should not answer aught that they should speak, Nor look my meaning out of earnest eyes, Nor press the reverent hands that mine should seek ; 196 LIVING ENGLISH POETS But, lying there in such an awful guise, Like some strange presence from a world unknown Unmoved by any human sympathies, Seem strange to them, and dreadfully alone, Vacant to love of theirs or agony, Having no pulse in union with their own. Gazing henceforth upon infinity With a calm consciousness devoid of change, Watching the current of the years pass by, And watching the long cycles onward range, With stronger vision of their perfect whole, As one whom time and space from them estrange. And they might mourn and say " The parted soul " Is gone out of our love ; we spend in vain " A tenderness that cannot reach its goal." Yet I might still perchance with them remain In spirit, being free from laws of mould, Still comprehending human joy and pain. Ah me ! but if I knew them as of old, Clasping them in vain arms, they unaware, And mourned to find my kisses leave them cold, And sought still some part of their life to share Still standing by them, hoping they might see, And seemed to them but as the viewless air ! AUGUSTA WEBSTER 197 For so once came it in a dream to me, And in my heart it seemed a pang too deep, A shadow having human life to be. For it at least would be long perfect sleep Unknowing Being and all Past to lie, Void of the growing Future, in God's keep : But such a knowledge would be misery Too great to be believed. Yet if the dead In a diviner mood might still be nigh, Their former life unto their death so wed That they could watch their loved with heavenly eye, That were a thing to joy in, not to dread. HARRIET . HAMILTON KING Born 1840 FROM " THE DISCIPLES" And now I speak, not with the bird's free voice, Who wakens the first mornings of the year With low sweet pipings, dropped among the dew ; Then stops and ceases, saying, " All the spring And summer lies before me ; I will sleep ; And sing a little louder, while the green Builds up the scattered spaces of the boughs ; And faster, while the grasses grow to flower Beneath my music ; let the full song grow With the full year, till the heart too is filled." But as the Swan (who has pass'd through the spring, And found it snow still in the white North land, And over perilous wilds of Northern seas, White wings above the white and wintry waves, Has won, through night and battle of the blasts, Breathless, alone, without one note or cry) HARRIET E. HAMILTON KING 199 Sinks into summer by a land at last ; And knows his wings are broken, and the floods Will bear him with them whither God shall will ; And knows he has one hour between the tides ; And sees the salt and silent marshes spread Before him outward to the shining sea, Whereon was never any music heard. I am not proud for anything of mine, Done, dreamed, or suffered, but for this alone : That the great orb of that great human soul Did once deflect and draw this orb of mine, (In the shadow of it, not the sunward side), Until it touched and trembled on the line By which my orbit crossed the plane of his ; And heard the music of that glorious sphere Resound a moment ; and so passed again, Vibrating with it, out on its own way ; Where, intertwined with others, it may yet Spin through its manifold mazes of ellipse, Amid the clangour of a myriad more, Revolving, and the dimness of the depths Remotest, through the shadows without shape, Arcs of aphelion, silences of snow : But henceforth doth no more go spiritless, But knows its own pole through the whirling ways, And hath beheld the Angel of the Sun, 200 LIVING ENGLISH POETS And yearns to it, and follows thereunto ; And feels the conscious thrill that doth transmute Inertia to obedience, underneath The ordered sway of balanced counter-force, That speedeth all life onward through all space ; And hears the key-note of all various worlds, Caught and combined in one vast harmony, And floated down the perfect Heavens of God. FROM "AGESILAO MILANO" Sunrise ! and it is summer, and the morning Waits glorified An hour hence, when the cool clear rose-cloud gathers About heaven's eastern side, And down the azure grottoes where the bathers Loose the tired limbs, a lovely light will glide. Fold after fold the winding waves of opal The sands will drown ; And when the morning-star amid the pearly Light of the east goes down, Then my star shall arise, and late and early Shine for a jewel in the Master's crown. HARRIET E. HAMILTON KING 201 Mazzini, Master, singer of the sunrise ! Knowest thou me ? I held thy hand once, and the summer lightning Still of thy smile I see ; Me thou rememberest not amidst the heightening Vision of God, and of God's Will to be. But thou wilt hear of me, by noon to-morrow, And henceforth I Shall be to thee a memory and a token Out of the starry sky ; And when my soul unto thy soul hath spoken, Enough, I shall not wholly pass nor die. Italia, when thou comest to thy kingdom, Remember me ! Me, who on this thy night of shame and sorrow Was scourged and slain with thee ; Me, who upon thy resurrection morrow Shall stand among thy sons beside thy knee. Shalt thou not be one day, indeed, O Mother, Enthroned of all, To the world's vision as to ours now only, At Rome for festival ; Around thee gathered all thy lost and lonely And loyal ones, that failed not at thy call. 202 LIVING ENGLISH POETS With golden lyre, or violet robe of mourning, Or battle-scar ; And one shall stand more glorious than the others, He of the Morning-Star, Whose face lights all the faces of his brothers, Out of the silvery northern land afar. But grant to me there, unto all beholders, Bare to the skies, To stand with bleeding hands, and feet, and shoulders, And rapt, unflinching eyes, And locked lips, yielding to the question-holders Nor moanings, nor beseechings, nor replies. Is the hour hard ? Too soon it will be over, Too sweet, too sore ; The arms of Death fold over me with rapture, Life knew not heretofore ; Heaven will be peace, but I shall not recapture, The passion of this hour, for evermore. ROBERT WILLIAMS BUCHANAN Born 1841 FROM " WHITE ROSE AND RED" DROWSIETOWN O so drowsy ! In a daze Sweating 'mid the golden haze, With its smithy like an eye Glaring bloodshot at the sky, And its one white row of street Carpetted so green and sweet, And the loungers smoking still Over gate and window-sill ; Nothing coming, nothing going, Locusts grating, one cock crowing, Few things moving up or down, All things drowsy Drowsietown ! Thro' the fields with sleepy gleam, Drowsy, drowsy steals the stream, 204 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Touching with its azure arms Upland fields and peaceful farms, Gliding with a twilight tide Where the dark elms shade its side ; Twining, pausing sweet and bright Where the lilies sail so white ; Winding in its sedgy hair Meadow-sweet and iris fair ; Humming as it hies along Monotones of sleepy song ; Deep and dimpled, bright nut-brown, Flowing into Drowsietown. Far as eye can see, around, Upland fields and farms are found, Floating prosperous and fair In the mellow misty air : Apple-orchards, blossoms blowing Up above, and clover growing Red and scented round the knees Of the old moss-silvered trees. Hark ! with drowsy deep refrain, In the distance rolls a wain ; As its dull sound strikes the ear, Other kindred sounds grow clear Drowsy all the soft breeze blowing, Locusts grating, one cock crowing, ROBERT WILLIAMS BUCHANAN 205 Cries like voices in a dream Far away amid the gleam, Then the waggons rumbling down Thro' the lanes to Drowsietown, Drowsy? Yea ! but idle ? Nay! Slowly, surely, night and day, Humming low, well greased with oil, Turns the wheel of human toil. Here no grating gruesome cry Of spasmodic industry ; No rude clamour, mad and mean, Of a horrible machine ! Strong yet peaceful, surely roll'd, Winds the wheel that whirls the gold. Year by year the rich rare land Yields its store to human hand Year by year the stream makes fat Every field and meadow-flat Year by year the orchards fair Gather glory from the air, Redden, ripen, freshly fed, Their bright balls of golden red. Thus, most prosperous and strong, Flows the stream of life along Six slow days ! wains come and go, Wheat-fields ripen, squashes grow, 2 6 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Cattle browse on hill and dale, Milk foams sweetly in the pail, Six days : on the seventh day, Toil's low murmur dies away All is husht save drowsy din Of the waggons rolling in, Drawn amid the plenteous meads By small fat and sleepy steeds. Folks with faces fresh as fruit Sit therein or trudge afoot, Brightly drest for all to see, In their seventh-day finery : Farmers in their breeches tight, Snowy cuffs, and buckles bright ; Ancient dames and matrons staid In their silk and flower'd brocade, Prim and tall, with soft brows knitted, Silken aprons, and hands mitted ; Haggard women, dark of face, Of the old lost Indian race ; Maidens happy-eyed and fair, With bright ribbons in their hair, Trip along, with eyes cast down, Thro' the streets of Drowsietown. Drowsy in the summer day In the meeting-house sit they : ROBERT WILLIAMS BUCHANAN 207 'Mid the high-back'd pews they doze, Like bright garden-flowers in rows ; And old Parson Pendon, big In his gown and silver'd wig, Drones above in periods fine Sermons like old flavour'd wine Crusted well with keeping long In the darkness, and not strong. O ! so drowsily he drones In his rich and sleepy tones, While the great door, swinging wide, Shows the bright green street outside, And the shadows as they pass On the golden sunlit grass. Then the mellow organ blows, And the sleepy music flows, And the folks their voices raise In old unctuous hymns of praise, Fit to reach some ancient god Half asleep with drowsy nod. Deep and lazy, clear and low, Doth the oily organ grow ! Then with sudden golden cease Comes a silence and a peace Then a murmur, all alive, As of bees within a hive ; And they swarm with quiet feet 2o8 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Out into the sunny street : There, at hitching-post and gate Do the steeds and waggons wait. Drawn in groups, the gossips talk, Shaking hands before they walk ; Maids and lovers steal away, Smiling hand in hand, to stray By the river, and to say Drowsy love in the old way Till the sleepy sun shines down On the roofs of Drowsietown. In the great marsh, far beyond Street and building, lies the Pond, Gleaming like a silver shield In the midst of wood and field ; There on sombre days you see Anglers old in reverie, Fishing feebly morn to night For the pickerel so bright. From the woods of beech and fir, Dull blows of the woodcutter Faintly sound ; and haply, too, Comes the cat-owl's wild " tuhoo " ! Drown'd by distance, dull and deep, a dark sound heard in sleep ; ROBERT WILLIAMS BUCHANAN 209 And a cock may answer, down In the depths of Drowsietown. Such is Drowsietown but nay ! Was, not is, my song should say Such was summer long ago In this town so sleepy and slow. Change has come : thro' wood and dale Runs the demon of the rail, And the Drowsietown of yore Is not drowsy any more ! WILLIAM JOHN COURTHOPE Born 1842 FROM "THE PARADISE OF J3IKDS" CHORUS OF HUMAN SOULS Mortals who attempt the seas Where man's breath and blood must freeze You whom Fortune, by despite, Destiny, or daring, carry Farther in the four months' night Than M'Clintock, Sabine, Parry, Hayes, or Kane Say, we charge ye, why ye come Where humanity is dumb ; Is it but to reive and harry, Or for gain, That you break the arctic barriers where feathered spirits reign ? Are you whalers, blown astray In the chase through Baffin's Bay ? WILLIAM JOHN COURTHOPE 211 Or men tired of the sun, Human thought and speech and feature, That you seek, what all things shun, Night, that hides each kind and creature ? Have hard times Driven you up, in hopes of food, To this landless latitude ? Know ye not, indeed, that Nature In these climes For our race produces nothing but requital for our crimes ? Back, we do beseech ye, back To the ice-floe and the pack ! If your hand has driven a quill, Clipped a wing, or plucked a feather, Were your purpose good or ill, Ye are ruined altogether, Body and soul ! We were men who speak these words, But for harm we did the birds Now are beaten in this weather, Past control, Round the Paradise that holds the Aviary of the Pole. For our crimes are here decreed Pains proportioned to each deed : 212 LIVING ENGLISH POETS As on earth we played our parts, Such in Purgatory our measure : But behold our human hearts Are transfigured, and old pleasure Here is pain : Some become the birds they slew ; Some fruitlessly pursue Feathered phantoms ; all at leisure, In one strain, Swear the birds should live for ever could tJiey live their lives again. Therefore, back ! and if one bird By your dwelling still be heard (Since for all this winter none Pass our barriers), we implore ye Leave this singer in the sun, Telling the live world our story ; For 'tis meet That the infidel should so By report believe the woe, Waiting all in Purgatory, Who entreat Cruelly with death or dungeon things so simple and so sweet. WILLIAM JOHN COURTHOPE 213 CHORUS OF BIRDS We wish to declare how the Birds of the air all high Institutions designed, And holding in awe, art, science, and law, delivered the same to mankind. To begin with : of old Man went naked and cold whenever it pelted or froze, Till we showed him how feathers were proof against weathers ; with that he bethought him of hose. And next it was plain that he in the rain was forced to sit dripping and blind, While the reed-warbler swung in a nest with her young, deep-sheltered and warm from the wind. So our homes in the boughs made him think of the house ; and the swallow, to help him invent, Revealed the best way to economise clay, and bricks to combine with cement. The knowledge withal of the carpenter's awl is drawn from the nuthatch's bill, And the sand-marten's pains in the hazel-clad lanes instructed the mason to drill. Is there one of the arts more dear to men's hearts, to the birds' inspiration they owe it, For the nightingale first sweet music rehearsed, prima donna, composer, and poet. 214 LIVING ENGLISH POETS The owl's dark retreats showed sages the sweets of brooding to spin or unravel Fine webs in one's brain, philosophical, vain, the swallows the pleasures of travel, Who chirped in such strain of Greece, Italy, Spain, and Egypt, that men, when they heard, Were mad to fly forth from their nests in the north, and follow the tail of the bird. Besides, it is true to our wisdom is due the knowledge of sciences all, And chiefly those rare Metaphysics of air men Me- teorology call. For, indeed, it is said a kingfisher when dead has his science alive in him still ; And, hung up, he will show how the wind means to blow, and turn to the point with his bill. And men in their words acknowledge the birds' erudi- tion in weather and star ; For they say, "'Twill be dry the swallow is high ;" or, " Rain for the chough is afar." 'Twas the rooks who taught men vast pamphlets to pen upon Social Compact and Law, And Parliaments hold, as themselves did of old, ex- claiming " Hear, hear," for " Caw, caw ! " When they build, if one steal, so great is their zeal for justice, that all, at a pinch, Without legal test will demolish his nest, and hence is the trial by Lynch. WILLIAM JOHN CO URTHOPE 2 1 5 And whence arose love? Go ask of the dove, or behold how the titmouse, unresting, Still early and late ever sings by his mate, to lighten her labours of nesting. Their bonds never gall, though the leaves shoot and fall, and the seasons roll round in their course, For their Marriage each year grows more lovely and dear, and they know not decrees of Divorce. That these things are Truth we have learned from our youth, for our hearts to our customs incline, As the rivers that roll from the fount of our soul, immortal, unchanging, divine. Man, simple and old, in his ages of gold, derived from our teaching true light, And deemed it his praise in his ancestors' ways to govern his footsteps aright. But the fountain of woes, Philosophy, rose, and what betwixt Reason and Whim, He has splintered our rules into sections and schools, so the world is made bitter for him. But the birds, since on earth they discovered the worth of their souls, and resolved, with a vow, No custom to change for a new or a strange have attained unto Paradise now. FREDERIC W. H. MYERS Born 1843 FROM "ST. PAUL" See, where a fireship in mid ocean blazes Lone on the battlements a swimmer stands, Looks for a help, and findeth not, and raises High for a moment melancholy hands ; Then the sad ship, to her own funeral flaring, Holds him no longer in her arms, for he Simple and strong, and desolate, and daring, Leaps to the great embraces of the sea. So when around me for my soul's affrighting, Madly red-litten of the woe within, Faces of men and deeds of their delighting Stare in a lurid cruelty of sin, Thus, as I weary me, and long, and languish, Nowise availing from that pain to part, Desperate tides of the whole great world's anguish Forced thro' the channels of a single heart, FREDERIC W. H. MYERS 217 Then let me feel how infinite around me Floats the eternal peace that is to be, Rush from the demons, for my King has found me, Leap from the universe and plunge in Thee ! TENERIFFE Atlantid islands, phantom-fair, Throned on the solitary seas, Immersed in amethystine air, Haunt of Hesperides ! Farewell ! I leave Madeira thus Drowned in a sunset glorious, The Holy Harbour fading far Beneath a blaze of cinnabar. What sights had burning eve to show From Tacoronte's orange bowers, From palmy headlands of Ycod, From Orotava's flowers ! When Palma or Canary lay Cloud-cinctured in the crimson day Sea, and sea-wrack, and rising higher Those purple peaks 'twixt cloud and fire. 2i8 LIVING ENGLISH POETS But oh the cone aloft and clear Where Atlas in the heavens withdrawn To hemisphere and hemisphere Disparts the dark and dawn ! O vaporous waves that roll and press ! Fire-opalescent wilderness ! O pathway by the sunbeams ploughed Betwixt those pouring walls of cloud ! We watched adown that glade of fire Celestrial Iris floating free, We saw the cloudlets keep in choir Their dances on the sea ; The scarlet, huge, and quivering sun Feared his due hour was overrun, On us the last he blazed, and hurled His glory on Columbus' world. Then ere our eyes the change could tell, Or feet bewildered turn again, From Teneriffe the darkness fell Head-foremost on the main : A hundred leagues was seaward flown The gloom of Teyde's towering cone, Full half the height of heaven's blue That monstrous shadow overflew. FREDERIC W. H. MYERS 219 Then all is twilight ; pile on pile The scattered flocks of cloudland close, An alabaster wall, erewhile Much redder than the rose ! Falls like a sleep on souls forspent Majestic Night's abandonment ; Wakes like a waking life afar Hung o'er the sea one eastern star. O Nature's glory, Nature's youth ! Perfected sempiternal whole ! And is the World's in very truth An impercipient soul ? Or doth that Spirit, past our ken, Live a profounder life than men, Awaits our passing days, and thus In secret places calls to us ? O fear not thou, whate'er befall Thy transient individual breath, Behold, thou knowest not at all What kind of thing is Death ; And here indeed might Death be fair, If Death be dying into air, If souls evanished mix with thee, Illumined heaven, eternal sea. 220 LIVING ENGLISH POETS SIMMENTHAL Far off the old snows ever new With silver edges cleft the blue Aloft, alone, divine ; The sunny meadows silent slept, Silence the sombre armies kept, The vanguard of the pine. In that thin air the birds are still, No ringdove murmurs on the hill Nor mating cushat calls ; But gay cicalas singing sprang, And waters from the forest sang The song of waterfalls. O Fate ! a few enchanted hours Beneath the firs, among the flowers, High on the lawn we lay, Then turned again, contented well, While bright about us flamed and fell The rapture of the day. And softly with a guileless awe Beyond the purple lake she saw The embattled summits glow ; FREDERIC W. H. MYERS 221 She saw the glories melt in one, The round moon rise, while yet the sun Was rosy on the snow. Then like a newly-singing bird The child's soul in her bosom stirred ; I know not what she sung : Because the soft wind caught her hair, Because the golden moon was fair, Because her heart was young. I would her sweet soul ever may Look thus from those glad eyes and grey, Unfearing, undefiled : I love her ; when her face I see, Her simple presence wakes in me The imperishable child. ROBERT BRIDGES Born 1844 ELEGY ON A LADY, WHOM GRIEF FOR THE DEA TH OF HER BETROTHED KILLED. Assemble, all ye maidens, at the door, And all ye loves assemble ; far and wide Proclaim the bridal, that proclaimed before Has been deferred to this late eventide : For on this night the bride, The days of her betrothal over, Leaves the parental hearth for evermore j To-night the bride goes forth to meet her lover. Reach down the wedding vesture, that has lain Yet all unvisited, the silken gown : Bring out the bracelets, and the golden chain Her dearer friends provided : sere and brown Bring out the festal crown, And set it on her forehead lightly : ROBERT BRIDGES 223 Though it be withered, twine no wreath again ; This only is the crown she can wear rightly. Cloke her in ermine, for the night is cold, And wrap her warmly, for the night is long, In pious hands the flaming torches hold, While her attendants, chosen from among Her faithful virgin throng, May lay her in her cedar litter, Decking her coverlet with sprigs of gold, Roses, and lilies white that best befit her. Sound flutes and tabors, that the bridal be Not without music, nor with these alone ; But let the viol lead the melody, With lesser intervals, and plaintive moan Of sinking semitone ; And, all in choir, the virgin voices Rest not from singing in skilled harmony The song that aye the bridegroom's ear rejoices, Let the priests go before, arrayed in white, And let the dark stoled minstrels follow slow, Next they that bear her, honoured on this night, And then the maidens, in a double row, Each singing soft and low, And each on high a torch upstaying : 224 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Unto her lover lead her forth with light, With music, and with singing, and with praying. Twas at this sheltering hour he nightly came, And found her trusty window open wide, And knew the signal of the timorous flame, That long the restless curtain would not hide Her form that stood beside ; As scarce she dared to be delighted, Listening to that sweet tale, that is no shame To faithful lovers, that their hearts have plighted. But now for many days the dewy grass Has shown no markings of his feet at morn : And watching she has seen no shadow pass The moonlit walk, and heard no music borne Upon her ear forlorn. In vain has she looked out to greet him ; He has not come, he will not come, alas ! So let us bear her out where she must meet him. Now to the river bank the priests are come : The bark is ready to receive its freight : Let some prepare her place therein, and some Embark the litter with its slender weight : The rest stand by in state, And sing her a safe passage over ; ROBERT BRIDGES 225 While she is oared across to her new home, Into the arms of her expectant lover. And thou, O lover, that art on the watch, Where, on the banks of the forgetful streams, The pale indifferent ghosts wander, and snatch The sweeter moments of their broken dreams, Thou, when the torchlight gleams, When thou shalt see the slow procession, And when thine ears the fitful music catch, Rejoice ! for thou art near to thy possession. MY SONG I have loved flowers that fade, Within whose magic tents Rich hues have marriage made With sweet unmemoried scents A joy of love at sight, A honeymoon delight, That ages in an hour : My song be like a flower ! I have loved airs, that die Before their charm is writ Q 226 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Upon the liquid sky Trembling to welcome it. Notes, that with pulse of fire Proclaim the spirit's desire, Then die, and are nowhere : My song be like an air ! Die, song, die like a breath, And wither as a bloom : Fear not a flowery death, Dread not an airy tomb ! Fly with delight, fly hence ! 'Twas thine love's tender sense To feast, and on thy bier Beauty shall shed a tear. ANDREW LANG Born 1844 BALLADE OF SLEEP The hours are passing slow, I hear their weary tread Clang from the tower, and go Back to their kinsfolk dead. Sleep ! death's twin brother dread ! Why dost thou scorn me so ? The wind's voice overhead Long wakeful here I know, And music from the steep Where waters fall and flow. Wilt thou not hear me, Sleep ? All sounds that might bestow Rest on the fever'd bed, All slumb'rous sounds and low Are mingled here and wed, And bring no drowsihead. 228 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Shy dreams flit to and fro With shadowy hair dispread ; With wistful eyes that glow, And silent robes that sweep. Thou wilt not hear me ; no ? Wilt thou not hear me, Sleep ? What cause hast thou to show Of sacrifice unsped ? Of all thy slaves below I most have laboured With service sung and said ; Have cull'd such buds as blow, Soft poppies white and red, Where thy still gardens grow, And Lethe's waters weep. Why, then, art thou my foe ? Wilt thou not hear me, Sleep ? ENVOY Prince, ere the dark be shred By golden shafts, ere low And long the shadows creep : Lord of the wand of lead, Soft-footed as the snow, W T ilt thou not hear me, Sleep ! ANDREW LANG 229 BALLADE OF HIS CHOICE OF A SEPULCHRE Here I'd come when weariest ! Here the breast Of the Windburg's tufted over Deep with bracken ; here his crest Takes the west, Where the wide-winged hawk doth hover. Silent here are lark and plover ; In the cover Deep below the cushat best Loves his mate, and croons above her O'er their nest, Where the wide-winged hawk doth hover. Bring me here, Life's tired-out guest, To the blest Bed that waits the weary rover, Here should failure be confessed ; Ends my quest, Where the wide-winged hawk doth hover ! 2 3 o LIVING ENGLISH POETS ENVOY Friend, or stranger kind, or lover, Ah, fulfil a last behest, Let me rest Where the wide-winged hawk doth hover ! NATURAL THEOLOGY t TOVTOV ctofini dGavdroiaiv ii>Xta9ai' TLdvTiQ dt 6euv \ariova 1 dvOpwTroi. Od. iii. 47. " Once CAGN was like a father, kind and good, But He was spoiled by fighting many things ; He wars upon the lions in the wood, And breaks the Thunder-bird's tremendous wings ; But still we cry to Him, We are thy brood O Cagn, be merciful ! and us He brings To herds of elands, and great store of food, And in the desert opens water-springs." So Qing, King Nqsha's Bushman hunter, spoke Beside the camp-fire, by the fountain fair, When all were weary, and soft clouds of smoke Were fading, fragrant, in the twilit air : And suddenly in each man's heart there woke A pang, a sacred memory of prayer. EDMUND GOSSE Born 1849 LYING IN THE GRASS Between two golden tufts of summer grass, I see the world through hot air as through glass, And by my face sweet lights and colours pass. Before me, dark against the fading sky, I watch three mowers mowing, as I lie : With brawny arms they sweep in harmony. Brown English faces by the sun burnt red, Rich glowing colour on bare throat and head, My heart would leap to watch them, were I dead ! And in my strong young living as I lie, I seem to move with them in harmony, A fourth is mowing, and that fourth am I. The music of the scythes that glide and leap, The young men whistling as their great arms sweep, And all the perfume and sweet sense of sleep, 232 LIVING ENGLISH POETS The weary butterflies that droop their wings, The dreamy nightingale that hardly sings, And all the lassitude of happy things, Is mingling with the warm and pulsing blood That gushes through my veins a languid flood. And feeds my spirit as the sap a bud. Behind the mowers, on the amber air, A dark-green beech wood rises, still and fair, A white path winding up it like a stair. And see that girl, with pitcher on her head, And clean white apron on her gown of red, Her even-song of love is but half-said : She waits the youngest mower. Now he goes ; Her cheeks are redder than the wild blush-rose : They climb up where the deepest shadows close. But though they pass, and vanish, I am there. I watch his rough hands meet beneath her hair, Their broken speech sounds sweet to me like prayer. Ah ! now the rosy children come to play, And romp and struggle with the new-mown hay ; Their clear high voices sound from far away. EDMUND GOSSE 233 They know so little why the world is sad, They dig themselves warm graves and yet are glad ; Their muffled screams and laughter make me mad ! I long to go and play among them there ; Unseen, like wind, to take them by the hair, And gently make their rosy cheeks more fair. The happy children ! full of frank surprise, And sudden whims and innocent ecstasies ; What godhead sparkles from their liquid eyes ! Xo wonder round those urns of mingled clays That Tuscan potters fashioned in old days, And coloured like the torrid earth ablaze, We find the little gods and loves portrayed, Through ancient forests wandering undismayed, And fluting hymns of pleasure unafraid. They knew, as I do now, what keen delight, A strong man feels to watch the tender flight Of little children playing in his sight ; What pure sweet pleasure, and what sacred love, Comes drifting down upon us from above, In watching how their limbs and features move. 234 LIVING ENGLISH POETS I do not hunger for a well-stored mind, I only wish to live my life, and find My heart in unison with all mankind. My life is like the single dewy star That trembles on the horizon's primrose-bar, A microcosm where all things living are. And if, among the noiseless grasses, Death Should come behind and take away my breath, I should not rise as one who sorroweth ; For I should pass, but all the world would be Full of desire and young delight and glee, And why should men be sad through loss of me ? The light is flying ; in the silver-blue The young moon shines from her bright window through : The mowers are all gone, and I go too. THE RETURN OF THE SWALLOWS " Out in the meadows the young grass springs, Shivering with sap," said the larks, " and we Shoot into air with our strong young wings, Spirally up over level and lea ; EDMUND GOSSE 235 Come, O Swallows, and fly with us Now that horizons are luminous ! Evening and morning the world of light, Spreading and kindling, is infinite ! " Far away, by the sea in the south, The hills of olive and slopes of fern Whiten and glow in the sun's long drouth, Under the heavens that beam and burn ; And all the swallows were gathered there Flitting about in the fragrant air, And heard no sound from the larks, but flew Flashing under the blinding blue. Out of the depths of their soft rich throats Languidly fluted the thrushes, and said : " Musical thought in the mild air floats, Spring is coming and winter is dead ! Come, O Swallows, and stir the air, For the buds are all bursting unaware, And the drooping eaves and the elm-trees long To hear the sound of your low sweet song." Over the roofs of the white Algiers, Flashingly shadowing the bright bazaar, Flitted the swallows, and not one hears The call of the thrushes from far, from far ; 236 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Sighed the thrushes ; then, all at once, Broke out singing the old sweet tones, Singing the bridal of sap and shoot, The tree's slow life between root and fruit. But just when the dingles of April flowers Shine with the earliest daffodils, When, before sunrise, the cold clear hours Gleam with a promise that noon fulfils, Deep in the leafage the cuckoo cried, Perched on a spray by a rivulet-side, Swallows, O Swallows, come back again To swoop and herald the April rain. And something awoke in the slumbering heart Of the alien birds in their African air, And they paused, and alighted, and twittered apart, And met in the broad white dreamy square, And the sad slave woman, who lifted up From the fountain her broad-lipped earthen cup, Said to herself, with a weary sigh, " To-morrow the swallows will northward fly ! " EDMUND GOSSE 237 THE CHARCOAL-BURNER He lives within the hollow wood, From one clear dell he seldom ranges ; His daily toil in solitude Revolves, but never changes. A still old man, with grizzled beard, Grey eye, bent shape, and smoke-tanned features, His quiet footstep is not feared By shyest woodland creatures. I love to watch the pale blue spire His scented labour builds above it ; I track the woodland by his fire, And, seen afar, I love it. It seems among the serious trees The emblem of a living pleasure, It animates the silences As with a tuneful measure. And dream not that such humdrum ways Fold naught of nature's charm around him ; 238 LIVING ENGLISH POETS The mystery of soundless days Hath sought for him and found him. He hides within his simple brain An instinct innocent and holy, The music of a wood-bird's strain, Not blithe, nor melancholy, But hung upon the calm content Of wholesome leaf and bough and blossom- An unecstatic ravishment Born in a rustic bosom. He knows the moods of forest things, He feels, in his own speechless fashion, For helpless forms of fur and wings A mild paternal passion. Within his horny hand he holds The warm brood of the ruddy squirrel ; Their bushy mother storms and scolds, But knows no sense of peril. The dormouse shares his crumb of cheese, His homeward trudge the rabbits follow ; He finds, in angles of the trees, The cup-nest of the swallow. EDMUND GOSSE 239 And through this sympathy, perchance, The beating heart of life he reaches Far more than we who idly dance An hour beneath the beeches. Our science and our empty pride, Our busy dream of introspection, To God seem vain and poor beside This dumb, sincere reflection. Yet he will die unsought, unknown, A nameless head-stone stand above him, And the vast woodland, vague and lone, Be all that's left to love him. TWO POINTS OF VIEW If I forget, May joy pledge this weak heart to sorrow ! If I forget, May my soul's coloured summer borrow The hueless tones of storm and rain, Of ruth and terror, shame and pain, If I forget! 240 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Though you forget, There is no binding code for beauty ; Though you forget, Love was your charm, but not your duty ; And life's worst breeze must never bring A ruffle to your silken wing, Though you forget. If I forget, The salt creek may forget the ocean ; If I forget, The heart whence flows my heart's bright motion, May I sink meanlier than the worst, Abandoned, outcast, crushed, accurst, If I forget! Though you forget, No word of mine shall mar your pleasure ; Though you forget, You filled my barren life with treasure, You may withdraw the gift you gave, You still are lord, I still am slave, Though you forget. WALTER HERRIES POLLOCK Born 1830 A CONQUEST I found him openly wearing her token ; I knew that her troth could never be broken ; I laid my hand on the hilt of my sword, He did the same and spoke not a word ; I bad him confess his villany, He smiled, and said, * She gave it me/ We searched for seconds, they soon were found, They measured our swords and measured the ground, To save us they would not have uttered a breath, They were ready enough to help us to death. We fought in the midst of a wintry wood, Till the fair white snow was red with his blood : But his was the victory, for, as he died, He swore by the rood that he had not lied. ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON Born THE HOUSE BEAUTIFUL A naked house, a naked moor, A shivering pool before tJie door, A garden bare of flowers and fruit And poplars at the garden-foot ; Such is tJie place that I live in, Bleak witJiout and bare within. Yet shall your ragged moor receive The incomparable pomp of eve, And the cold glories of the dawn Behind your shivering trees be drawn ; And when the wind from place to place Doth the unmoored cloud-galleons chase, Your garden gloom and gleam again, With leaping sun, with glancing rain. Here shall the wizard moon ascend The heavens, in the crimson end Of day's declining splendour ; here ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 243 The army of the stars appear. The neighbour hollows dry and wet, Spring shall with tender flowers beset ; And oft the morning muser see Larks rising from the broomy lea, And every fairy wheel and thread Of cobweb dew-bediamonded. When daises go, shall winter time Silver the simple grass with rime ; Autumnal frosts enchant the pool And make the cart-ruts beautiful ; And when snow-bright the moor expands, How shall your children clap their hands ! To make this earth, our hermitage, A cheerful and a changeful page, God's bright and intricate device Of days and seasons doth suffice. THE CELESTIAL SURGEON If I have faltered more or less In my great task of happiness ; If I have moved among my race And shown no glorious morning face ; 244 LIVING ENGLISH POETS If beams from happy human eyes Have moved me not ; if morning skies, Books, and my food, and summer rain Knocked on my sullen heart in vain ; Lord, thy most pointed pleasure take And stab my spirit broad awake ; Or, Lord, if too obdurate I, Choose Thou, before that spirit die, A piercing pain, a killing sin, And to my dead heart run them in. THE WIND I saw you toss the kites on high And blow the birds about the sky ; And all around I heard you pass, Like ladies' skirts across the grass O wind, a-blowing all day long, O wind, that sings so loud a song ! I saw the different things you did, But always you yourself you hid. I felt you push, I heard you call, I could not see yourself at all O wind, a-blowing all day long, O wind, that sings so loud a song ! ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 245 O you that are so strong and cold, O blower, are you young or old ? Are you a beast of field and tree, Or just a stronger child than me ? O wind, a-blowing all day long, O wind, that sings so loud a song ! "SAY NOT OF ME" Say not of me that weakly I declined The labours of my sires, and fled the sea, The towers we founded and the lamps we lit, To play at home with paper like a child. But rather say : In the afternoon of time A strenuous family dusted from its ftands TJte sand of granite, and beJwlding far Along tJie sounding coast its pyramids And tall memorials catch the dying sun, Smiled well content, and to this childish task Around the fire addressed its evening /tours. 246 LIVING ENGLISH POETS " SING CLEARLIER, MUSE" Sing clearlier, Muse, or evermore be still, Sing truer or no longer sing ! No more the voice of melancholy Jacques To make a weeping echo in the hill ; But as the boy, the pirate of the spring, From the green elm a living linnet takes, One natural verse recapture then be still. THEOPHILE MARZIALS Born 1830 SONG There's one great bunch of stars in heaven That shines so sturdily, Where good Saint Peter's sinewy hand Holds up the dull gold-wroughten key. There's eke a little twinkling gem As green as beryl-blue can be, The lowest bead the Blessed Virgin Shakes a-telling her rosary. There's one that flashes flames and fire, No doubt the mighty rubicel, That sparkles from the centre point P the buckler of stout Raphael. And also there's a little star So white a virgin's it must be ; Perhaps the lamp my love in heaven Hangs out to light the way for me. / 248 LIVING ENGLISH POETS A PASTORAL Flower of the medlar, Crimson of the Quince, I saw her at the blossom-time, And loved her ever since ! She swept the draughty pleasance, The blooms had left the trees, The whilst the birds sang canticles, In cheery symphonies. Whiteness of the white rose, Redness of the red, She went to cut the blush-rose-buds To tie at the altar-head ; And some she laid in her bosom, And some around her brows, And as she past, the lily-heads All beck'd and made their bows. Scarlet of the poppy, Yellow of the corn, The men were at the garnering, A-shouting in the morn ; I chased her to a pippin-tree, The waking birds all whist, THEOPHILE MARZIALS 249 And oh ! it was the sweetest kiss That I have ever kiss'd. Marjorie, mint, and violets A-drying round us set, Twas all done in the faYence-room A-spicing marmalet ; On one tile was a satyr, On one a nymph at bay, Methinks the birds will scarce be home To wake our wedding-day ! SONG I dream'd I was in Sicily, All sky and hills and flowers ; We sat us under a citron-tree And courted, hours and hours. I woke by the dunes of a bleak north-land, Along a lonely grave in the snow ; The salt wind rattled the ivy-band I'd tied at the headstone long ago. MARGARET L. WOODS Born 1853 TO THE FORGOTTEN DEAD To the forgotten dead, Come, let us drink in silence ere we part. To every fervent yet resolved heart That brought its tameless passion and its tears, Renunciation and laborious years, To lay the deep foundations of our race, To rear its stately fabric overhead And light its pinnacles with golden grace To the unhonoured dead. To the forgotten dead, Whose dauntless hands were stretched to grasp the rein Of Fate and hurl into the void again Her thunder-hoofed horses, rushing blind Eastward along the courses of the wind. Among the stars, along the wind in vain Their souls were scattered and their blood was shed, And nothing, nothing of them doth remain To the thrice-perished dead. MARY DARMESTETER Born 1857 TO A DRAGON-FLY You hail from Dream-land, Dragon-fly ? A stranger hither ? So am I, And (sooth to say) I wonder why We either of us came, Are you (that shine so bright i' the air) King Oberon's state-messenger? Come tell me how my old friends fare, Is Dream-land still the same ? Who won the latest tourney fight, King Arthur, or the Red-Cross Knight, Or he who bore away the bright Renown'd Mambrino's Casque? Is Caliban King's councillor yet? Cross Mentor jester still and pet ? Is Suckling out of love and debt ? Has Spenser done his task ? 252 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Say, have they settled over there, Which is the loveliest Guinevere, Or Gloriana, or the fair Young Queen of Oberon's Court ? And does Titania torment still Mike Drayton and sweet-throated Will ? In sooth of her amours 'twas ill To make such merry sport. Ah, I have been too long away ! No doubt I shall return some day, But now I'm lost in love and may Not leave my lady's sight. Mine is, (of course), the happier lot Yet tell them I forget them not, My pretty gay compatriot, When you go home to-night. LE ROI EST MORT And shall I weep that Love's no more, And magnify his reign ? Sure never mortal man before Would have his grief again. MARY DARMESTETER 253 Farewell the long-continued ache, The days a-dream, the nights awake, I will rejoice and merry make, And never more complain. King Love is dead and gone for aye, Who ruled with might and main, For with a bitter word one day, I found my tyrant slain, And he in Heathenesse was bred, Nor ever was baptized, 'tis said, Nor is of any creed, and dead Can never rise again. RETROSPECT Here beside my Paris fire, I sit alone and ponder All my life of long ago that lies so far asunder ; " Here, how came I thence ? " I say, and greater grows the wonder As I recall the farms and fields and placid hamlets yonder. 254 LIVING ENGLISH POETS . . . See, the meadow-sweet is white against the water- courses, Marshy lands are kingcup-gay and bright with streams and sources, Dew-bespangled shines the hill where half-abloom the gorse is ; And all the northern fallows steam beneath the plough- ing horses. There's the red-brick-chimneyed house, the ivied haunt of swallows, All its garden up and down and full of hills and hollows ; Past the lawn, the sunken fence whose brink the laurel follows ; And then the knee-deep pasture where the herd for ever wallows ! So they've clipped the lilac bush : a thousand thousand pities ! 'Twas the blue old-fashioned sort that never grows in cities. There we little children played and chaunted aimless ditties, While oft the old grandsire looked at us and smiled his Nunc Dimittis ! MARY DARMESTETER 255 Green, O green with ancient peace, and full of sap and sunny, Lusty fields of Warwickshire, O land of milk and honey, Might I live to pluck again a spike of agrimony, A silver tormentilla leaf or ladysmock upon ye ! Patience, for I keep at heart your pure and perfect seeming, I can see you wide awake as clearly as in dreaming, Softer, with an inner light, and dearer, to my deeming, Than when beside your brooks at noon I watched the sallows gleaming ! TWILIGHT When I was young the twilight seemed too long. How often on the western window-seat I leaned my book against the misty pane And spelled the last enchanting lines again, The while my mother hummed an ancient song, Or sighed a little and said : " The hour is sweet ! " When I, rebellious, clamoured for the light. 256 LIVING ENGLISH POETS But now I love the soft approach of night, And now with folded hands I sit and dream While all too fleet the hours of twilight seem ; And thus I know that I am growing old. O granaries of Age ! O manifold And royal harvest of the common years ! There are in all thy treasure-house no ways But lead by soft descent and gradual slope To memories more exquisite than Hope. Thine is the Iris born of olden tears, And thrice more happy are the happy days That live divinely in thy lingering rays. So autumn roses bear a lovelier flower ; So in the emerald after-sunset hour The orchard wall and trembling aspen-trees Appear an infinite Hesperides. Ay, as at dusk we sit with folded hands, Who knows, who cares in what enchanted lands We wander while the undying memories throng ? When I was young the twilight seemed too long. ROBERT, LORD HOUGHTON Bom iSj8 A WET SUNSET IN SOUTH AFRICA Across the waste of dreary veldt, Unmarked by hut, or knoll, or hollow, The lifeless mountain's arid belt Trends southward, far as eye can follow. A fitful rain is dripping still, Close to the plain the swifts are skimming ; The thirsty soil has drunk its fill, And left a thousand pools a-brimming. The west is rapt from sight and sense, Lost in a haze of fairy yellow ; A sadness, born we know not whence, Falls with that light divinely mellow : Where hangs unseen the guiding Cross, The lightning's magic veil is lifting, Clouds like Atlantic billows toss, From summit on to summit drifting ; S 258 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Eastward, a cold unearthly sheen Of mists fantastically riven, All steel and silver damascene, Bright armour for the hosts of heaven. Unbidden memories of home The stranger landscape seem to hallow, The tender touch of English Crome On Norfolk broad, and stream, and shallow,- A dream of looming towers that crown A northern city's smoke and shadow, Where Lincoln Church looks stately down On flooded fen and steaming meadow. One moment} off the vanished sun A redder fire of glory flushes, The pools grow rosy one by one, The pallid east in answer blushes ; Another, half the glow is gone, The near and far in shade are blended, Black-plumaged night flies swiftly on, The curtain falls, the dream is ended. ROBERT LORD HOUGHTON 259 A QUESTION "Me thinks too little cost For a moment so found, so lost! " Ought the Man to be cut, Just as much as the Lady ? When they've met Justice Butt Ought the Man to be cut ? When they've stuck in a rut Down a lane that is shady ; Ought the Man to be cut, Just as much as the Lady ? NORMAN GALE Born iS(>2 A BIRD IN THE HAND Look at this ball of intractable fluff, Panting and staring with piteous eyes ! What a rebellion of heart ! what a ruff Tickles my hand as the missel-thrush tries, Pecking my hand with her termagant bill, How to escape (and I love her, the sweet !) Back where the clustering oaks on the hill Climb to the blue with their branches, and meet ! Nay, polished beak, you are pecking a friend ! Bird of the grassland, you bleed at the wing ! Stay with me, love ; in captivity mend Wrong that was wrought by the boy and his sling. Oh for a Priest of the Birds to arise, Wonderful words on his lips that persuade Reasoning creatures to leave to the skies Song at its purest a-throb in the glade ! NORMAN GALE 261 Bow, woodland heart, to the yoke for a while ! Soon shall the lyrics of wind in the trees Stir you to pipe in the green forest-aisle, God send me there with the grass to my knees ! See, I am stroking my cheek with thy breast, Ah, how the bountiful velvet is fair ! Stay with me here for your healing and rest, Stay, for I love you, delight of the air ! KATHARINE TYNAN Born 1862 GOLDEN LILIES Daffodils all aflame 1 know from whence ye came To warm March with your blaze ! As Gabriel went a-winging Through flowering country ways He heard your trumpets ringing. God's Paradise this was, With a city of rainbow glass, The River of Life there flows, The Tree of Life there blooming Hath many a name that glows Like flower and fruit illuming. But Gabriel going down, With a gold gown and crown, Was grave as him bestead ; Great tidings he was bringing, KATHERINE TYNAN 263 To raise the earth from dead, And set the heaven to singing. " Oh, young," he said, " is she, God's Maid and Queen, Marie ;" He said, " I will bring down These golden trumpets blowing, And lay them on her gown, To glad her with their showing." Queen Marie in her bower Had a white lily in flower, And Gabriel brought the gold, The gold lily that ever Blowing his trumpet bold, Declares her praise for ever. A TIRED HEART Dear Lord ! if one should some day come to Thee, Weary exceedingly, and poor, and worn, With bleeding feet sore-pierced of many a thorn And lips athirst, and eyes too tired to see, And, falling down before Thy face, should say : " Lord, my day counts but as an idle day, 264 LIVING ENGLISH POETS My hands have garnered fruit of no fair tree, Empty am I of stores of oil and corn, Broken am I and utterly forlorn, Yet in Thy vineyard hast Thou room for me?" Wouldst turn Thy face away ? Nay, Thou wouldst lift Thy lost sheep tenderly. " Lord ! Thou art pale, as one that travaileth, And Thy wounds bleed where feet and hands were riven ; Thou hast lain all these years, in balms of Heaven, Since Thou wert broken in the arms of Death, And these have healed not!" "Child! be comforted. I trod the winepress where thy feet have bled ; Yea, on the Cross, I cried with mighty breath, Thirsting for thee, whose love was elsewhere given, I, God, have followed thee from dawn to even, With yearning heart, by many a moor and heath, My sheep that wandered ! Now on My breast, Mine arm its head beneath." Then, if this stricken one cried out to Thee, " Now mine eyes see that Thou art passing fair, And Thy face marred of men beyond compare," And so should fall to weeping bitterly, With, " Lord, I longed for other love than Thine, And my feet followed earthly lovers fine, CATHERINE TYNAN 265 Turning from where Thy gaze entreated me ; Now these grow cold, and wander otherwhere, And I, heart-empty, poor, and sick, and bare, Loved of no lover, turn at last to Thee ; " Wouldst stretch Thine hands divine, And stroke the bowed head very pityingly ? " Will not My love suffice, though great thy pain ?" " Ah, Lord ! all night without a lighted house, While some within held revel and carouse, My lost heart wandered in the wind and rain, And moaned unheard amid the tempest's din." " Peace, peace ! if one had oped to let thee in, Perchance this hour were lost for that hour's gain ; Wouldst thou have sought Me then, with thy new vows ? Ah, child ! I too, with bleeding feet and brows, Knocked all the night at a heart's door in vain, And saw the dawn begin, On My gold head the dews have left a stain." HERBERT P. HORNE Born 1864 AMICO SUO When on my country walks I go, I never am alone : Though, whom 'twere pleasure then to know, Are gone, and you are gone ; From every side discourses flow. There are rich counsels in the trees, And converse in the air ; All magic thoughts in those and these And what is sweet and rare ; And everything that living is. But most I love the meaner sort, For they have voices too ; Yet speak with tongues that never hurt, As ours are apt to do : The weeds, the grass, the common wort. ARTHUR SYMONS Born RAIN ON THE DOWN Night, and the down by the sea, And the veil of rain on the down ; And she came through the mist and the rain to me From the safe warm lights of the town. The rain shone in her hair, And her face gleamed in the rain ; And only the night and the rain were there As she came to me out of the rain. EMMY Emmy's exquisite youth and her virginal air, Eyes and teeth in the flash of a musical smile, Come to me out of the past, and I see her there As I saw her once for a while. 268 LIVING ENGLISH POETS Emmy's laughter rings in my ears, as bright, Fresh and sweet as the voice of a mountain brook, And still I hear her telling us tales that night, Out of Boccaccio's book. There, in the midst of the villainous dancing-hall, Leaning across the table, over the beer, While the music maddened the whirling skirts of the ball, As the midnight hour drew near, There with the women, haggard, painted and old, One fresh bud in a garland withered and stale, She, with her innocent voice and her clear eyes, told Tale after shameless tale ; And ever the witching smile, to her face beguiled, Paused and broadened, and broke in a ripple of fun. And the soul of a child looked out of the eyes of a child, Or ever the tale was done. O my child, who wronged you first, and began First the dance of death that you dance so well ? Soul for soul : and I think the soul of a man Shall answer for yours in hell. RUDYARD KIPLING Born 1865 M AND ALA Y By the old Moulmein Pagoda, looking eastward to the sea, There's a Burma girl a-settin 1 , an' I know she thinks o' me; For the wind is in the palm-trees, an' the temple-bells they say : " Come you back, you British soldier ; come you back to Mandalay ! " Come you back to Mandalay, Where the old Flotilla lay : Can't you 'ear their paddles chunkin' from Rangoon to Mandalay ? O the road to Mandalay, Where the flyin' fishes play, An' the dawn comes up like thunder outer China 'crost the Bay ! 270 LIVING ENGLISH POETS 'Er petticut was yaller an' 'er little cap was green, An' 'er name was Supi-yaw-lat jes the same as Thee- baw's Queen, An' I seed her fust a-smoking of a whackin' white cheroot, An' a-wastin' Christian kisses on an' 'eathen idol's foot : Bloomin' idol made o' mud Wot they called the Great Gawd Budd Plucky lot she cared for idols when I kissed 'er where she stud ! On the road to Mandalay, When the mist was on the rice-fields an' the sun was droppin' slow, She'd git 'er little banjo an' she'd sing " Kulla-lo-lo /" With 'er arm upon my shoulder an' her cheek agin my cheek We useter watch the steamers an' the hathis pilin' teak. Elephints a-pilin' teak In the sludgy, squdgy creek, Where the silence 'ung that 'eavy you was 'arf afraid to speak ! On the road to Mandalay, But that's all shove be'ind me long ago an' fur away, An' there ain't no 'buses runnin' from the Bank to Mandalay ; RUDYARD KIPLING 271 An' I'm learnin' 'ere in London what the ten-year sodger tells : " If you've 'eard the East a'callin', why, you won't 'eed nothin' else." No ! you won't 'eed nothin' else But them spicy garlic smells An' the sunshine an' the palm-trees an' the tinkly temple-bells ! On the road to Mandalay, I am sick o' wastin' leather on these gutty pavin'-stones, An' the blasted Henglish drizzle wakes the fever in my bones ; Tho' I walks with fifty 'ousemaids outer Chelsea to the Strand, An' they talks a lot o' lovin', but wot do they under- stand ? Beefy face an' grubby 'and Law ! wot do they understand ? I've a neater, sweeter maiden in a cleaner, greener land ! On the road to Mandalay, Ship me somewheres east of Suez where the best is like the worst, Where there aren't no Ten Commandments, an' a man can raise a thirst ; 272 LIVING ENGLISH POETS For the Temple-bells are callin', an' it's there that I would be By the old Moulmein Pagoda, lookin' lazy at the sea On the road to Mandalay, Where the old Flotilla lay, With our sick beneath the awnings when we went to Mandalay ! Oh, the road to Mandalay, Where the flyin' fishes play, An' the dawn comes up like thunder outer China 'crost the Bay ! LENVOI There's a whisper down the field where the year has shot her yield, And the ricks stand grey to the sun, Singing : " Over then, come over, for the bee has quit the clover, And your English summer's done." You have heard the beat of the off-shore wind, And the thresh of the deep-sea rain ; You have heard the song how long ! how long ? Pull out on the trail again ! RUDYARD KIPLING 273 Ha' done with the Tents of Shem, dear lass, We've seen the seasons through, And it's time to turn on the old trail, our own trail, the out trail, Pull out, pull out, on the Long Trail the trail that is always new. It's North you may run to the rime-ringed sun Or South to the blind Horn's hate ; Or East all the way into Mississippi Bay, Or West to the Golden Gate ; Where the blindest bluffs hold good, dear lass, And the wildest tales are true, And the men bulk big on the old trail, our own trail, the out trail, And life runs large on the Long Trail the trail that is always new. The days are sick and cold, and the skies are grey and old, And the twice-breathed airs blow damp ; And I'd sell my tired soul for the bucking beam-sea roll Of a black Bilbao tramp ; With her load-line over her hatch, dear lass, And a drunken Dago crew, T 274 LIVING ENGLISH POETS And her nose held down on the old trail, our own trail, the out trail, From Cadiz Bar on the Long Trail the trail that is always new. There be triple ways to take, of the eagle or the snake, Or the way of a man with a maid ; But the sweetest way to me is a ship's upon the sea In the heel of the North-East Trade ; Can you hear the crash on her bows, dear lass, And the drum of the racing screw, As she slips it green on the old trail, our own trail, the out trail, As she lifts and 'scends on the Long Trail the trail that is always new ? See the shaking funnels roar, with the Peter at the fore, And the fenders grind and heave, And the derricks clack and grate, as the tackle hooks the crate, And the fall-rope whines through the sheave ; It's " Gang-plank up and in," dear lass, It's " Hawsers warp her through ! " And it's " All clear aft " on the old trail, our own trail, the out trail, We're backing down on the Long Trail the trail that is always new. RUDYARD KIPLING 275 O the mutter overside, when the port-fog holds us tied, And the sirens hoot their dread ! When foot by foot we creep o'er the hueless viewless deep To the sob of the questing lead ! It's down by the Lower Hope, dear lass, With the Gunfleet Sands in view, Till the Mouse swings green on the old trail, our own trail, the out trail, And the Gull Light lifts on the Long Trail the trail that is always new. O the blazing tropic night, when the wake's a welt of light That holds the hot sky tame, And the steady fore-foot snores through the planet- powdered floors Where the scared whale flukes in flame ! Her plates are scarred by the sun, dear lass, And her ropes are taunt with the dew, For we're booming down on the old trail, our own trail, the out trail, We're sagging south on the Long Trail the trail that is always new. Then home, get her home, where the drunken rollers comb, And the shouting seas drive by, 2/6 LIVING ENGLISH POETS And the engines stamp and ring, and the wet bows reel and swing, And the Southern Cross rides high ! Yes, the old lost stars wheel back, dear lass, That blaze in the velvet blue. They're all old friends on the old trail, our own trail, the out trail, They're God's own guides on the Long Trail the trail that is always new. Fly forward, O my heart, from the Foreland to the Start We're steaming ail-too slow, And it's twenty thousand mile to our little lazy isle Where the trumpet-orchids blow ! You have heard the call of the off-shore wind And the voice of the deep-sea rain ; You have heard the song how long, how long ? Pull out on the trail again ! The Lord knows what we may find, dear lass, And the Deuce knows what we may do But we're back once more on the old trail, our own trail, the out trail, We're down, hull down on the Long Trail the trail that is always new. RICHARD LE GALLIENNE Boni 1866 THE WONDER-CHILD " Our little babe," each said, " shall be Like unto thee " " Like unto tJiee .'" " Her mother's " " Nay, his father's " " eyes," " Dear curls like thine "but each replies, " As thine, all thine, and naught of me." What sweet solemnity to see The little life upon thy knee, And whisper as so soft it lies, "Our little babe!" For, whether it be he or she, A David or a Dorothy, " As mother fair," or " father wise," Both when it's " good," and when it cries, One thing is certain, it will be Our little babe. 278 LIVING ENGLISH POETS A UTUMN The year grows still again, the surging wake Of full-sailed summer folds its furrows up As after passing of an argosy Old silence settles back upon the sea, And ocean grows as placid as a cup. Spring, the young morn, and Summer, the strong noon, Have dreamed and done and died for Autumn's sake : Autumn that finds not for a loss so dear Solace in stack and garner hers too soon Autumn, the faithful widow of the year. Autumn, a poet once so full of song, Wise in all rhymes of blossom and of bud, Hath lost the early magic of his tongue, And hath no passion in his failing blood. Hear ye no sound of sobbing in the air ? 'Tis his. Low bending in a secret lane, Late blooms of second childhood in his hair, He tries old magic, like a dotard mage ; Tries spell and spell, to weep and try again : Yet not a daisy bears, and everywhere The hedgerow rattles like an empty cage. RICHARD LE GALLIENNE 279 He hath no pleasure in his silken skies, Nor delicate ardours of the yellow land ; Yea, dead, for all its gold, the woodland lies, And all the throats of music filled with sand. Neither to him across the stubble field May stack nor garner any comfort bring, Who loveth more this jasmine he hath made, The little tender rhyme he yet can sing, Than yesterday, with all its pompous yield, Or all its shaken laurels on his head. ALL SUNG What shall I sing when all is sung, And every tale is told, And in the world is nothing young That was not long since old ? Why should I fret unwilling ears With old things sung anew, While voices from the old dead years Still go on singing too ? A dead man singing of his maid Makes all my rhymes in vain, U 28o LIVING ENGLISH POETS Yet his poor lips must fade and fade, And mine shall kiss again. Why should I strive through weary moons To make my music true ? Only the dead men know the tunes The live world dances to. INDEX OF FIRST LINES. Across the waste of dreary veldt . . . . .257 A little marsh-plant, yellow green . . . . .146 All day long and every day ...... 87 All night as in my dreams I lay . . . . .16 All travail of high thought ...... 74 A naked house, a naked moor ...... 242 And now I speak, not with the bird's free voice . .198 And shall I weep that Love's no more . . . .252 And why say ye that I must leave . . . . .126 An idle poet, here and there . . . . . 33 Assemble, all ye maidens, at the door ..... 222 A tlantid islands, phantom-fair 217 Back to the flower-town, side by side 141 Beating Heart / we come again 27 Behold the Court of Penance. Four gaunt walls .165 Beneath the sand-storm John the Pilgrim prays . .137 Between two golden tufts of summer grass . . .231 Brave as a falcon and as merciless . . . . .162 But on another day the King said, Come .... 59 By the old Moulmein Pagoda, looking eastward to the sea 269 Day of my life .' Where can she get 189 Dear Lord ! if one should some day come to Thee . . 263 Does the road wind up-hill all the way .... 46 Emmy's exquisite youth and her virginal air . . . 267 282 INDEX OF FIRST LINES PAGE Fair now is the spring-tide ', now earth lies beholding . 107 Far off the old snows ever new 220 Flower of the medlar 248 God said, " Bring little children unto me " ... 6 Good pastry is vended ....... 28 Had she come all the way for this 92 Hail I once again, that sweet strong note . . . .118 He lived in that past Georgian day 173 He lives within the hollow wood ..... 237 Here beside my Paris fire, I sit alone and ponder . .253 Here Pd come when weariest ...... 229 Here, in this leafy place 185 How strange a thing a lover seems 31 How sweet the harmonies of Afternoon i I do not bidthee spare vie, O dreadful mother . . .152 I dream' d I was in Sicily . . . . . . . 249 I drew it from its china tomb 167 If I forget 239 If I have faltered more or less 243 If I shoidd die this night, (as well might be . . . 195 If love is not worth loving, then life is not worth living . 57 If only in dreams may Man be fully blest . . . .138 I found him openly wearing her token . . . .241 If those who wield the Rod forget 181 I have loved flowers that fade 225 I heard the voice of my own true love . . . .112 I know a little garden close 102 In a coign of the cliff between lowland and highland . 158 In after days when grasses high 194 In ruling well what guerdon? Life rtms low . . . 135 INDEX OF FIRST LINES 283 CAGE I saw you toss the kites on high 244 It was not like your great and gracious ways . . -35 / watch you through the garden walks . . . .179 King Philip had vaunted his claims 192 Latest^ earliest of the year 120 Let me at last be laid 66 Lilac and gold and green . . . . . . .163 Look at this ball of intractable fluff 260 Love is enough : ho ye who seek saving . . . .105 Lycius / the female race is all the same . . . .19 Men deemed thee fallen, did they ? fallen like Rome . .125 Methought I met a Lady yestereven ..... 39 Mortals who attempt the seas 210 My little Son, who loo&dfrom thoughtful eyes ... 34 My love whose heart is tender said to me . . . -55 My only Love is always near ...... 26 Nighty and the down by the sea 267 Now did you mark a falcon ...... 48 Now Neptune, joyful of the sacrifice 99 O Daffodils all aflame 262 Of all the downfalls in the world ..... 57 Of Heaven or Hell I have no power to sing . , . 103 Of Mary's pains may now learn whoso will ... 84 Oh for the young heart like a fountain playing ... 24 Once Cagn was like a father, kind and good . . . 230 O so drowsy ! In a daze 203 Ought the Man to be cut 259 Our little babe, each said, shall be 277 284 INDEX OF FIRST LINES PAGE Out in the meadows the young grass springs . . .234 O where are you going with your love-locks flowing . . 44 Pale, beyond porch and portal 144 Play then and sing; we too have played ' . . .148 Say not of me that weakly I declined 245 See, where ajireship in mid ocean blazes . . . .216 Sing clearlier, Muse, or evermore be still .... 246 Spirit of Trajan! What a world is here . . . .163 Sunrise / and it is summer, and the morning . . . 200 Sweet singer of the Spring, when the new world . . 80 The curtains were half drawn, the floor was swept . . 54 The feathers of the willow 83 The forest rears on lifted arms 9 The hours are passing slow 227 The ladies of St. James's 186 The Lady of 'the Hills with crimes untold . . . .136 There needs not choral song, nor organs pealing . . 22 There's a whisper down the field where the year has shot her yield ......... 272 Therms one great bunch of stars in heaven . . . 247 There, where the sun shines first 37 The Rose in the garden slipped her bud . . . 1 84 The silent Forces of the World 71 The sunrise wakes the lark to sing ..... 48 The tree many -rooted . . . . . . . 1 5 5 The year grows still again, the surging wake . . . 278 This the house of Circe, queen of charms . . . .132 This was the matter of the note . . . . . .170 Tiny slippers of gold and green 61 To the forgotten dead 250 INDEX OF FIRST LINES 285 PAGB What shall I sing when all is sung 279 We wish to declare how the Birds of the air all high Institutions designed 213 When I am dead> my dearest 47 When I was dead, my spirit turned . . . . .51 When I was young, I said to Sorrow . . . .15 When I was young the twilight seemed too long . . 255 When on my country walks I go ..... 266 When Spring comes laughing 178 When the hounds of spring are on winter's traces . .139 Where shall I find a white rose blowing . . . 55 Where sunless rivers weep 52 Why should we seek at all to gain 69 With forces well-nigh spent 75 You hail from Dream-land, Dragon-fly? 251 CHISWICK PRESS : C. WHITTINGHAM AND CO., TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE. UNIVERSITY OF CALI FOKX I A LIBRARY THIS BOOK IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE STAMPED BELOW FEB 4 1920 30m-6,'14 re 14298 1 f\,,n - s IS* 7 JO AIISH3AINn AHVHSn 3S33H