MIRAGE 
 
MIRAGE 
 
 POEMS 
 
 BY 
 
 DOUGLAS AINSLIE 
 
 LONDON 
 
 ELKIN MATHEWS VIGO STREET 
 MGMXI 
 
All rights reserved 
 
TO MY MOTHER 
 
 FANNY AINSLIE 
 
 AND TO HER MOTHER, 
 OF FRAGRANT MEMORY, 
 
 MARY MORGAN, 
 
 THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED. 
 
 425805 
 
PREFACE 
 
 THE majority of the poems comprising this 
 volume had been written before I had a definite 
 conception of the true nature of art. This, of 
 course, can in no way affect their value, and I 
 only mention it with the intention of leading 
 up to another matter which I consider to be of 
 real importance to everyone who has attained 
 to years of discretion. These years are in many 
 ways less delightful than those spent in the 
 perpetual wonderland of youth. But in others 
 they are greatly more interesting. 
 
 When I was at Eton, and even later, in Oxford 
 days, we used to look upon poetry and the other 
 arts as things altogether divorced from one 
 another. We went further, and I remember 
 maintaining in more than one debating society 
 at the University that prose and poetry were 
 irrevocably divided by the rubicon of rhyme 
 and metre. When I published Escarlamonde 
 in 1890, we were still disdainfully talking of 
 hommes de prose et de crime, for we were great 
 students of the Romantic French poets and 
 
 vii 
 
viii MIRAGE 
 
 prone to accept as truth anything that came 
 out of the mouth of Theophile Gautier, and to 
 some extent of Victor Hugo, though we con- 
 sidered the latter to be somewhat tarnished by 
 reason of his descending from Parnassian slopes 
 to the level of politics ! 
 
 As regards aesthetic theory, we were content 
 in those days with a few phrases from Keats 
 and Poe, a happy thought or two from Shelley's 
 essay on poetry, and a few tags of studio talk 
 from D. G. Rossetti. That solemn common- 
 place about fundamental brain-work being at 
 the base of all art is, I observe, still aired by 
 some writers, when they have no very clear idea 
 as to what they ought to think of a given work. 
 
 But many people seem to me to be still 
 in the early eighties as regards the nature 
 of the poet and of his art. Quite recently 
 I was discussing a volume of verse with the 
 editor of one of the leading monthly journals, 
 having reputation for literature. He was 
 urging that the writer of the book in question 
 must be an original genius, and the reasons 
 he alleged for this belief were so original that 
 they remain engraven on my memory : " He's 
 the untidiest beggar you ever saw ; he sleeps on 
 a bench in the Park in summer, never brushes 
 his hair or his clothes, lives altogether in Public- 
 
PREFACE ix 
 
 houses, and nothing would induce him to enter 
 a drawing-room." He really seemed to believe 
 that the verse of the youth in question was 
 really the better for being soused in ale before 
 being served up for public consumption. It was 
 in vain that I strove to make clear that although 
 of interest to a possible future biographer, it 
 did not induce me to believe him to be a genius : 
 my conviction of that must depend on his work. 
 He remained rooted in his belief that the youth's 
 talent, in some mysterious way that he was 
 unable to explain, had its origin in the con- 
 sumption of alcohol in low haunts. I inquired 
 had he ever read Vico, or Schleiermacher, or 
 Schiller on the subject of ^Esthetic ? He 
 admitted with some asperity that he had not 
 done so, as though the subject were hardly 
 proper, and when I ventured to point out that 
 it had exercised the minds of the very greatest 
 thinkers from Plato and Aristotle to our own 
 day, he replied that all the same he had made 
 up his " mind " as to the nature of poetry and 
 of art, and he did not intend to alter it for 
 anyone ! 
 
 I have mentioned this instance of arrogant 
 insular ignorance in order that others may be 
 warned against holding themselves up to the 
 ridicule of the civilised world. There seems 
 
x MIRAGE 
 
 to be no doubt that the fact of Great Britain 
 being an island does encourage a certain narrow- 
 ness of view and a retention of positions long 
 since abandoned by scientific thinkers. Herbert 
 Spencer's remarks upon the nature of art are 
 another example of this, and the criticism 
 upon them when they were known on the con- 
 tinent was that they would have done credit to a 
 writer of the beginning of the eighteenth century, 
 but were about one hundred and sixty years out 
 of date. 
 
 In our own time immense progress has been 
 made in aesthetic theory, and Benedetto Croce 
 has put the final touches to the theories of 
 Vico which have for so long remained unknown 
 to the greater portion of thinkers not directly 
 in touch with Italian thought. But Croce has 
 done more than this : he has given us a complete 
 philosophical system l containing the true theory 
 and solution of the aesthetic problem. I have 
 translated the volume containing it into English. 
 There the reader will find the difficult problems 
 connected with art attacked by a trained philo- 
 sophical intellect, and he will very soon see how 
 
 1 Croce's complete system is contained in three volumes : 
 " ^Esthetic/' " Practical Activity/' and " Logic." Laterza of 
 Bari is the publisher of all three volumes, which of course 
 are in Italian. 
 
PREFACE xi 
 
 worthless are the happy thoughts of the studio 
 or of the poet's desk, when the problem of the 
 nature of art, in all its complexity, comes to be 
 dealt with. 
 
 I shall here paraphrase a few sentences from 
 Croce's criticism of Carducci taken from his 
 journal La Critica, by far the most valuable 
 publication on philosophy and literature that 
 exists in Italy. 
 
 I believe they will enable the reader to see the 
 importance of the new theories. 
 
 The human spirit is at once one and com- 
 plex ; those forces which we call poetical, in- 
 tellective, passionate and practical, are all of 
 them active at every moment of our lives, all 
 in one, although one is distinguished from the 
 other. From this distinction arises opposition 
 and strife, and from the strife come develop- 
 ment and spiritual productivity. Therefore 
 there is no such thing as a poet who is simply 
 a poet, as there is no such thing as a practical 
 man who is nothing more than that. We call 
 those men poets and practical men, in the 
 eminent sense, whose soul is so arranged and 
 disposed that poetry, or action, as the case may 
 be, constitute the principal end of the individual 
 in question, to which end all the others are 
 subordinate or conspire. But if a poet were 
 
xii MIRAGE 
 
 not also a practical man and a man with passions, 
 that is to say, if he were not a man, he would not 
 be a poet ; and if a man of action had nothing of 
 the imagination of the poet, he would not be a 
 man of action. 
 
 The material of poetry is action or the desire 
 for action ; the material of action is that 
 which is poetically desired and intellectiyely 
 thought. 
 
 Critically to understand a poet, then, is to 
 understand his soul-struggle, his practical and 
 emotional powers, not less than his contemplative 
 and poetical powers. All of these are active 
 within him, and it must be seen how from the 
 struggle between these powers, his poetry is 
 now helped, now impeded. For the non-poetical 
 powers of his soul now give themselves as nourish- 
 ment to the poetical, now devour and are in 
 turn nourished by them. This general aesthetic 
 and philosophic truth is often neglected, and 
 instead of looking at the complicated process 
 as a whole, certain particular aspects of it are 
 selected and presented without method, the 
 rough material of poetry being thus confused 
 with poetry itself, and vice versa. 
 
 We know poets, who are also something of 
 philosophers, others who never succeed in adapt- 
 ing themselves to reality, others who are per- 
 
PREFACE xiii 
 
 petually the prey of Eros and of his frenzies, 
 others with whom dwells alongside the poet, 
 a practical man, vigilant and active in practical 
 matters, in fact, a man of business. 
 
 Now these theories, these losses of equilibrium, 
 these anguishes and joys of love, this practicality, 
 act now as conditions and aids to the work of 
 art in the same individual, now as the cause of 
 ugliness or failure. For it must be remembered 
 that there are any number of ways of achieving 
 ugliness or failure to express in art, but only 
 one of achieving the beautiful. Perfect expres- 
 sion is a pleonasm ; when a thing is expressed 
 it cannot be more than expressed. Let us, 
 therefore, not attempt to gild the lily of our 
 speech. 
 
 I have said little as to the poems in this 
 volume, but if they do not speak for them- 
 selves, they will not be worth listening to, and 
 if they do, that will be unnecessary. 
 
 DOUGLAS AINSLIE. 
 
 ATHENAEUM CLUB, 1910. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PACK 
 
 CALYPSO . . . . . .1 
 
 THE CHINESE PLEASAUNCE . . .7 
 
 SAPPHICS . . . . . .15 
 
 GOOD-FRIDAY'S HOOPOE . . . .21 
 
 A FRIEND IN NEED . . . .25 
 
 THE WINDOW IN HEAVEN . . .84 
 
 THE HERBARY OF PADUA . . . .98 
 
 THE VAMPIRE AND THE DOVE . . .106 
 
 THE LILY AND THE SERPENT . . .108 
 
 THE SYREN . . . . .110 
 
 PASSION . . . . . .112 
 
 METAPHORS . . . . .113 
 
 METAMORPHOSIS . . . . .114 
 
 DAPHNE . . . . . .117 
 
 THE SECRET OF THE SUN . . .118 
 
 PHILOSOPHY . . . . .119 
 
 ITALY THE ENCHANTRESS . . . .120 
 
 OFF NAPLES . . . . .122 
 
 THE LOVER'S LAMENT . 123 
 
xvi MIRAGE 
 
 OLD LOVES OF OLD TIMES . . .125 
 
 JAPONICE . . . . . .127 
 
 TEUTONICS . . . . .128 
 
 THEN AND Now ... 129 
 
 THE OLD HOME . . . . .130 
 
 RHODANTHE'S SONG . . . .132 
 
 THE STAR ..... 133 
 
 THOUGHTS . . . . . .134. 
 
 THE MAGIC WORD . . . .135 
 
 WHICH is THE DREAM? . . . .136 
 
 INSPIRATION . . . . .137 
 
 NOCTURNE . . . . .138 
 
 SILHOUETTE . . . . .139 
 
 THE WISH . . . . .141 
 
 LITTLE LADY POEMS 
 
 FITTER PATTER . . . . .143 
 
 THE PERFECT PHYLLISTINE . . .145 
 
 To A WHITE VIOLET . . . . 147 
 
 ALICE IN WONDERLAND . . , .149 
 
 FOR MARJORIE . . . . .151 
 
 LINES . . . . . .153 
 
 (ENONE . . . . . .154 
 
 IN MEMORIAM . . . . 156 
 
MIRAGE 
 
 CALYPSO 
 
 ONCE, as the legends tell us, 
 
 Ulysses came again 
 Unto Calypso's islet 
 
 Set in the azure main. 
 But now no roses riot, 
 
 Where once the rose was king, 
 Nor aught of leaf nor blossom, 
 
 Where dwelt eternal spring. 
 Only an ancient woman 
 
 Stands by an altar bare 
 With springtime in her blue eyes, 
 
 But snowflakes in her hair. 
 " Ah ! Knew you not, Ulysses, 
 
 That the great gods above 
 Let not the nymphs immortal 
 
 Taste of a mortal love ? 
 And when you loved me lightly, 
 
 And sailed afar away, 
 To a thousand years of winter 
 
 They changed my years of May ! " 
 
CALYPSO 
 
 Thus spake the nymph Calypso 
 
 Unto the Wanderer, 
 The love within her blue eyes, 
 
 The snowflakes in her hair. 
 No answer made Ulysses, 
 
 Though shame was in his face ; 
 He kneeled him down beside her, 
 
 He held her hand a space. 
 
 Behold, a change, a marvel, 
 
 Upon the isle is wrought ! 
 The winter sudden vanished, 
 
 The springtide sudden brought. 
 Behold the hag Calypso 
 
 Is come a nymph one more ! 
 Over her slim white shoulders 
 
 The golden tresses pour ; 
 Erect as Eros' arrow 
 
 She stands that stooped but now, 
 Fled are the claws of Chronos 
 
 From off her ivory brow. 
 He clasps her to his bosom, 
 
 And now he finds his speech, 
 Like waves of ocean amorous 
 
 That woo the coral beach. 
 On her doves' wings poised above them 
 
 The Paphian goddess smiles, 
 
CALYPSO 
 
 As with incense for thanksgiving 
 
 Her altar high he piles. 
 Their worship duly rendered 
 
 To the goddess of the brave, 
 Calypso and the Wanderer 
 
 Seek out Calypso's cave. 
 Beneath the ferny curtain 
 
 At eve they disappear ; 
 What haps within I know not, 
 
 But the Paphian hovers near. 
 When now Aurora's fingers 
 
 Make blush the mountain's cone, 
 Behold the King Ulysses 
 
 Come from the cave alone. 
 His sword is in its scabbard 
 
 And on his head his crown : 
 Now what can ail Ulysses 
 
 That he paceth up and down ? 
 But hark ! he calls the goddess 
 
 Unseen of him, who stands 
 With the quiver and the arrows 
 
 Of her archer in his hands. 
 Her archer laughs beside her 
 
 As a golden shaft he speeds, 
 And when outspeaks Ulysses, 
 
 Methinks his heart it bleeds. 
 " O goddess, tell me whither 
 
 Hath fled the nymph I love ? 
 
CALYPSO 
 
 This very night I clasped her, 
 
 All joys of earth above. 
 Then to our couch came Morpheus 
 
 And at his side the Dreams, 
 Awhile they ruled my senses, 
 
 But when I woke meseems 
 I heard the voice of Echo, 
 
 Who mocked me where I lay, 
 Crying, ' O King Ulysses, 
 
 Thy nymph hath fled away.' 
 I turned me to Calypso 
 
 Where at my side she slept, 
 Craved of each nook and crevice, 
 
 If they her secret kept. 
 But she was flown : O Goddess, 
 
 I pray thee, Goddess mine, 
 Give me again Calypso, 
 
 And store of oil and wine, 
 And doves upon thine altar 
 
 I swear devout to vow, 
 If again I clasp Calypso 
 
 That fled away but now." 
 Answered the Paphian goddess : 
 
 " O King of many a wile, 
 It pleased me to see thee sailing 
 
 Again to Calypso's isle ; 
 For I knew gray-eyed Athene 
 
 (Whom overmuch men praise) 
 
CALYPSO 
 
 Willed not thy wanton voyage 
 
 And baulked thee many days ; 
 And in my heart was pity 
 
 When I saw thy head forlorn 
 Bowed o'er the hag Calypso 
 
 Who hath known Olympus' scorn. 
 Therefore I gave her springtide 
 
 Back to the nymph once more, 
 Therefore with bloom of springtide 
 
 I decked again her shore, 
 Therefore I led thy footsteps 
 
 Beneath the fringed cave, 
 And by my will Calypso 
 
 The bliss thou knewest gave. 
 But hearken now, Ulysses ; 
 
 Thou seekest her in vain, 
 Never around Calypso 
 
 Shall come thine arms again. 
 Far beyond earthly sorrow 
 
 I have fixed her in the skies, 
 Where if thou look, Ulysses, 
 
 Thou shalt see her starry eyes. 
 Thee she loved well, Ulysses, 
 
 But thou, O Wanderer, 
 (Not overmuch I blame thee,) 
 
 Slight was thy love for her. 
 Now to thy ship, Ulysses, 
 
 Smite thou the hollow sea, 
 
CALYPSO 
 
 And for those last sweet kisses, 
 Do thou give thanks to me." 
 
 Thus spake the Paphian goddess 
 Unto Ulysses, King, 
 
 Then over blue ^Egean 
 
 He saw her doves take wing. 
 
THE CHINESE PLEASAUNCE 
 
 (A Poem in Red Lacquer) 
 
 To SENATORE BENEDETTO CROCE. 
 
 The speaker is Sse-ma-Kouang, who was first minister of the Chinese 
 Empire toward the end of the eleventh century, A.D., under 
 the dynasty of Sung. He is celebrated also as the his- 
 torian of the Empire from 700 B.C., to 960 A.D., 
 date of the accession of the Sung dynasty. 
 
 LET others build wide Palaces 
 
 For their vanities, vexations ; 
 Not for me such fallacies, 
 
 Who am ruler of the nations. 
 I have built a House of Leisure, 
 
 House to lodge my friends and me ; 
 In the midst the greatest treasure : 
 
 Dome-shaped, silent library. 
 Here five thousand books delight me 
 
 With the wisdom of the ages : 
 He shall rate his wisdom lightly 
 
 Who converseth with the sages. 
 Kung-fu-tzu, 1 translucent master ! 
 
 His the teaching that doth guide me : 
 
 1 Confucius. 
 
THE CHINESE PLEASAUNCE 
 
 Though my wits should travel faster, 
 
 Lao-tze would aye outstride me ; 
 Teaching the mysterious Tao, 
 
 Which, the contraries inweaving, 
 Makes our weaknesses the way shew 
 
 To the mightiest achieving. 
 Standing on my roof of pleasure, 
 
 Ye shall see the ruby splendour, 
 Which the sun with royal measure 
 
 Hangs around the morning tender. 
 Now come sit in this pavilion, 
 
 We shall watch the waters gleam, 
 Lacquered golden and vermilion, 
 
 Where in five is split the stream, 
 Like a leopard's claw, and floating 
 
 On its waters ere they break, 
 See the white swans ever gloating 
 
 On the images they make. 
 Where the stream its tresses tosses, 
 
 As it revels in cascade, 
 Like an elephant's proboscis, 
 
 See that rocky balustrade, 
 Upward curving, and its summit 
 
 Bears an open house of summer ; 
 With the bee-loved roses' hum it 
 
 Ever welcomes the new-comer. 
 Mark the branch that westward bending 
 
 Makes an islet sand-besprinkled ; 
 
THE CHINESE PLEASAUNCE 9 
 
 Coloured shells, their beauty lending, 
 
 Deck its shores, adroitly mingled. 
 Half is planted with a forest 
 
 Ever verdant, half is graced 
 With a fisher's cottage modest : 
 
 Thatch and reed-work interlaced. 
 In that bush a feathery warbler 
 
 Waits until I touch my kin, 1 
 Then declares melodious warfare, 
 
 Which by striving much I win. 
 Painted ducks and stealthy fishes, 
 
 Hither, thither, swim and glide, 
 Startled as the coney swishes 
 
 Through the rushes at their side. 
 Here, when weary of my reading, 
 
 Artfully I sometimes angle, 
 Easily the fish misleading, 
 
 Gold and silver scales entangle. 
 Then I ponder fishes' folly, 
 
 Which resembleth much the human, 
 Thinking with less melancholy 
 
 Upon man, the son of woman. 
 From the little forest's centre 
 
 Springs the Mount of Verdure ; we shall 
 Reach its summit, peradventure, 
 
 By this path, like spiral sea-shell, 
 
 1 A kind of Chinese violin. 
 
10 THE CHINESE PLEASAUNCE 
 
 Growing less, as toward the crest we 
 
 Climb but even this is tiring 
 Here be mossy banks to rest ye, 
 
 Whence the landscape is inspiring. 
 On the west are willows weeping, 
 
 Pointing down their avenue, 
 Toward the rockery, where creeping 
 
 Once their love the ivy grew. 
 See through meadow flower-enamelled, 
 
 Other streams are seeking, hiding, 
 Flying now and now entramelled, 
 
 Through the emerald grasses gliding, 
 Forming cup-like crystal holders ; 
 
 Then they leave their level courses, 
 And against those rocky boulders 
 
 Dash they with united forces ; 
 Dash and break in silver fury ; 
 
 Thus their fortune they will squander ; 
 Then in foamy l mourning through the 
 
 Lower meadow they must wander. 
 Shall we pass into my grotto, 
 
 Which grows wider as ye enter, 
 Till it form a dome sun- shot through ? 
 
 Sun and honeysuckle blent there ! 
 For the light can filter only 
 
 Through the trellis-work of branches 
 
 1 Mourning is white in China. 
 
THE CHINESE PLEASAUNCE 11 
 
 Which defends this grotto lonely 
 
 And its mystery enhances. 
 Here one gropes among the boulders 
 
 Scattered o'er the floor in masses, 
 Ere he plunge with head and shoulders 
 
 In the bath where water passes 
 From a tiny spring that issues 
 
 Through the grotto rocky-sided, 
 Flows in green and golden tissues 
 
 Wandering here and there, well-guided. 
 Coming forth, we walk the meadow, 
 
 And behold the streamlet narrows, 
 And its waters break as they flow 
 
 O'er the rocks, like silver arrows. 
 More pavilions to the north spring 
 
 In the little hills, like mothers 
 Rising proud above their offspring, 
 
 Rise they one above the others. 
 All with bamboo groves are shaded 
 
 And with pathways intersected : 
 Thus I ordered and they made it, 
 
 That no ray should be detected. 
 To the East a plain extended 
 
 Is in flowery beds divided, 
 Square and oval and defended 
 
 From the north old cedars hide it. 
 All these flowery beds are teeming 
 
 With medicinal and scented 
 
12 THE CHINESE PLEASAUNCE 
 
 Flowers and herbs and spring is gleaming 
 
 Always in this space I lent it. 
 Every flower and every stem on 
 
 Dwells the Spring, the leaf-clad maiden, 
 Orange, pomegranate and lemon 
 
 Bow their branches, heavy laden. 
 If it please ye, we shall clamber 
 
 Upward by that rocky chain ; 
 Ye shall see Kiang, like amber, 
 
 Winding through the rice-grown plain. 
 There the sunset rays belate me, 
 
 While I watch the skimming swallows, 
 Or the hawk's manoeuvres stately, 
 
 As the nimble mouse he follows. 
 In the hills on the horizon 
 
 Evening dies the death of roses ; 
 Thick the rosy carpet lies on 
 
 Vistas where the eye reposes. 
 Oft the moon has found me sitting, 
 
 Where the sun had left me yonder ; 
 Then through rustling tea-grove flitting, 
 
 By dim waters forth I wander. 
 In a reverie I harken 
 
 To the waters' gentle lapping, 
 Watch the moon steer straight her bark in 
 
 To the haven where is flapping 
 On my boat the Five-Clawed Dragon, 
 
 Broidered with Celestial Yellow, 
 
THE CHINESE PLEASAUNCE 13 
 
 The imperial silken flag on : 
 
 Not a subject hath his fellow. 
 This the Son of Heaven gave me 
 
 As I lately left the Presence, 
 Smiled and granted leave to wave the 
 
 Yellow Dragon o'er my Pleasaunce. 
 Hardly in the gloom ye notice 
 
 How the sky he would be climbing ; 
 Lo ! the moon herself his boat is : 
 
 See him in her arms reclining ! 
 Sometimes friends will come to visit 
 
 Him they rightly count as their friend, 
 And the hours in pleasures licit 
 
 Pass we in pavilion curtained. 
 They will read me of their verses, 
 
 I shall read them verse I've written ; 
 Each one's muse in wine rehearses, 
 
 Ere with song his lips are smitten. 
 While at court men forge them fetters, 
 
 Seeking pleasure or intriguing, 
 Here we worship only letters, 
 
 Letters and a love worth seeking ; 
 Wisdom from whose radiant being 
 
 Light must pierce a thousand vapours, 
 Ere it come within my seeing, 
 
 Dim with dust of many labours. 
 Ah ! Could cloud and mist evanish, 
 
 Though it were by tempest furious ; 
 
14 THE CHINESE PLEASAUNCE 
 
 From my Pleasaunce I would banish 
 
 All but wisdom rare and curious. 
 Speak I thus that am a ruler, 
 
 Husband, citizen and father ? 
 Wisdom's self were but a fool ere 
 
 I should seek my pleasure rather 
 Than my duty ; for a season, 
 
 Pleasaunce, where I love to linger, 
 I must leave thee, and the reason : 
 
 Duty points an eastward finger. 
 Guard for some not distant morrow 
 
 All the magic of thy beauty : 
 It shall aid me vanquish sorrow, 
 
 When I shall have done my^duty. 
 
SAPPHICS 
 
 LOVE AT VERSAILLES 
 
 ONCE by the glittering borders of the fountains, 
 Where over nature the art of man triumphant 
 Reigneth, as shadow followeth a sunbeam, 
 Passed I with Phyllis. 
 
 Bright as the midday all the vanished glories 
 Of the Sun l King's court moved in parade 
 
 before me, 
 
 As from her lips, like bees from a hive of honey, 
 Flew recollections. 
 
 " See where the marble, white from the hills of 
 
 Paros, 
 
 Shews rosy veinings, as of a courtier driven 
 Forth from the Sun King, into the night of exile, 
 Bleeding his heart's blood. 
 
 " Mark the crowned casement, where the Queen 2 
 
 of Louis, 
 Mary of Austria, of the House of Eagles, 
 
 1 Louis XIV. 2 Marie Therese. 
 
 15 
 
16 SAPPHICS 
 
 Child of the children of the Roman Caesars, 
 Dwelt for a short space ; 
 
 " Till on a day the face of Athenai's, 1 
 Like to a blush-rose caught in the mane of lion, 
 Drave the Queen weeping forth from the 
 queenly chamber : 
 
 c Thunder and triumph ' : 2 
 
 " These were thy portion, proudest of Hetairai, 
 Thou that scarce deignedst move but a step in 
 
 greeting 
 
 Unto thy courtiers of the blue blood royal : 
 Served by a Conde ! 
 
 " These were thy portion till the tiny twinkling, 
 As of a faint star lost on the far horizon, 3 
 Heeded of no man, waxed on the night por- 
 tentous, 
 
 Waxed to a comet, 
 
 " Trailing a splendour through the fields of 
 
 Heaven, 
 Nor waned at midday, but to the sun thy Master 
 
 1 Fran^oise Athenai's, Marquise de Montespan, mistress 
 of Louis XIV. 
 
 2 " La Marquise de Montespan, tonnante et triomphante." 
 Madame de Sevigne. 
 
 3 Fran9oise d'Aubigne, Marquise de Maintenon, governess 
 to the children of the Marquise de Montespan by the King. 
 
SAPPHICS 17 
 
 Sped and thy glory melted as wings of mortal 
 Over jEgean." 
 
 Thus as she spake I followed her down the ages, 
 Followed by paths made straight or that curved 
 
 so gently 
 
 Under the emerald canopy of chestnuts 
 Myriad shaded ; 
 
 Passed and we came unto the fair pink Palace, 1 
 Kissed by the jasmines climbing with yellow 
 
 petals, 
 Watered with bright spray from a ring of 
 
 fountains, 
 
 Dragonfly-haunted. 
 
 Blue, white, and purple, butterflies came 
 
 crowding, 
 
 Lit on her fair curls, leaving the rose deserted ; 
 Down from the chestnuts' bosom the doves of 
 
 Lesbos 
 
 Flew to her shoulder, 
 
 Cooing with red beaks dipped in the blood of 
 
 lovers, 
 Cooing with voices broken like sighs of lovers 
 
 1 Trianon. 
 
18 SAPPHICS 
 
 Couchant in green bower of enchanted forest, 
 Hidden from all men. 
 
 " Now speak thy love, now speak or for aye be 
 
 silent : 
 
 Lo ! Cytherea prompts by her cooing minions !" 
 Yet the words came not, seeing the grip of 
 passion 
 
 Choked me to silence ; 
 
 Silence or stray speech, like to leaves of autumn 
 Down sailing earthward, useless and soon for- 
 gotten 
 
 By the slim poplar pointing the way to heaven, 
 Sure of the springtide. 
 
 " Come see the pleasaunce, 1 where the Queen of 
 
 Lilies 2 
 
 Shook as a swan shakes snowy down the ermine 
 
 Off from white shoulders and by right of beauty 
 
 Only would triumph." 
 
 Thus as she spake, we passed o'er the bridge 
 and with us 
 
 Rustled the doves' wings, while the garden- 
 haunters 
 
 1 Petit Trianon. 2 Marie Antoinette. 
 
SAPPHICS 19 
 
 Fluttered around us, blue and white and golden, 
 Forming an escort. 
 
 Here by the chestnuts, brought within my 
 
 seeing, 
 Gathered resplendent shades of illustrious 
 
 dead; 
 Wide spread the robes, bright flashed again 
 
 the rapiers, 
 
 Diamond-hilted. 
 
 Fain would I plead, but failed before the 
 
 brilliance, 
 
 Conjured by her to life and speech again : 
 Rohan and Fersen meeting in the pathway 
 Princesse de Lamballe ! 
 
 " Ah ! see the Queen, the Queen herself a- 
 
 coming," 
 
 Passed from red lip to lip of those fair ghosts, 
 As on a grassy bank by the Cottage Palace, 
 Circled with courtiers, 
 
 Stood the great lady, like to heraldic lily 
 Planted in green sward, while the waving 
 
 welcome, 
 Welcome of doffed plumes, welcome of friendly 
 
 faces, 
 
 Flew forth to greet her. 
 
20 SAPPHICS 
 
 Quick as a moon-glimpse vanished the airy 
 
 vision, 
 Vanished ! I found me standing alone with 
 
 Phyllis, 
 
 Gazing on blue eyes, while around was silence ; 
 Only the fountain 
 
 Rippled in cadence, as I voiced my pleading, 
 Which like the fountain rose from the depths 
 
 deep-hidden : 
 
 " Oh fair magician, Queen of the past and present, 
 Grant me the future ! " 
 
 Then in the golden language of Apollo 
 
 Shone forth her answer, shone from her eyes 
 
 of azure : 
 
 " Present and past and future, O beloved, ' 
 These all I give thee." 
 
 Fare thee well, fountain, fare thee well, pink 
 
 Palace, 
 
 Farewell, ye visions of the illustrious dead : 
 
 Won is the past, the present and the future, 
 
 Won is my Phyllis ! 
 
GOOD FRIDAY'S HOOPOE 
 
 ON the holiest day of the holy seven, 
 
 As the Powers of Evil strove 
 With the Son of Man come down from Heaven, 
 
 We walked in the silvery grove. 
 
 Like a dart from the north to the south it flew, 
 
 Gray bird of the red-gold crest ; 
 Ah ! then we remembered what once we knew, 
 
 How it went on a holy quest. 
 
 Three birds of the northern world took wing 
 When they knew the Lord would die, 
 
 Their best of feathery help to bring 
 In His long agony. 
 
 The Straightbill in his weed of brown, 
 
 The Robin Whitebreast too, 
 And a little gray bird of no renown 
 
 The gray and black Hoopoe. 
 
 They came to the land of sand and stone : 
 Christ Jesu nailed to tree ! 
 
 81 
 
22 GOOD FRIDAY'S HOOPOE 
 
 Fierce blazed the sun ; they heard him groan, 
 Heard Paynims' mockery. 
 
 Quoth Whit ebr east : "I will staunch the blood 
 That flows from His wounds so red " : 
 
 Quoth Straightbill : " Mine the hardihood 
 To pluck the thorns from His head." 
 
 Quoth the gray Hoopoe : "I will fly before 
 
 His kind eyes and the sun, 
 To shield His face whom I adore, 
 
 Until the Day be done." 
 
 And thus did they, and when Lord Christ 
 
 Of Whitebr east's deed was ware, 
 Quoth He unto the Robin Whitebreast : 
 
 " Of Me thou hast had care ; 
 
 " Now what can I do for thee, Robin dear ? 
 
 What wouldest thou for reward ? 
 Ask what thou will'st withouten fear, 
 
 Of Jesus Christ thy Lord." 
 
 Quoth Whitebreast : " Sir, my breast is red 
 
 With Thy dear blood this day : 
 These feathers where Thy blood was shed 
 
 I would they were red alway." 
 
GOOD FRIDAY'S HOOPOE 23 
 
 " So be it," answered the Lord Christ, 
 
 " Red shall thy breast remain, 
 Ay, red for ever the Robin's red breast 
 
 That strove to soothe My pain." 
 
 " And thou that pluckest thorn on thorn 
 
 From the crown upon My brow 
 Bent is thy beak, thy plumage torn, 
 
 What guerdon askest thou ? " 
 
 Quoth Crossbill on the thornless crown : 
 
 " I would my bill were crossed 
 Alway, and changed my robe of brown 
 
 Lest the memory be lost." 
 
 Quoth Jesu Christ the Lord : " Thy beak 
 
 For ever crossed shall be 
 And pink the Crossbill's plumes that streak 
 
 The drops that came from Me." 
 
 Then Jesus looked on the Hoopoe 
 
 That ever with brave gray wing 
 As a shield of love before Him flew, 
 
 A gray shield quivering. 
 
 " And thou, Hoopoe, that long hast flown 
 Betwixt Me and the sun, 
 
24 GOOD FRIDAY'S HOOPOE 
 
 Right dear thy small gray form hath grown, 
 A great reward hast won." 
 
 " Sir," quoth the Hoopoe, " nought for me 
 
 I crave but to remain 
 The little gray bird that shielded Thee 
 
 And strove to ease Thy pain." 
 
 Quoth Jesus : " Bird, thou hast chosen best, 
 Let the rays thou hast kept from Me 
 
 For ever in thy plumed crest 
 Shine for a memory." 
 
 Thus spake the Christ, Theresa dear, 
 
 Unto the gray Hoopoe 
 That on the holiest day of the year 
 
 Through the silvery olives flew. 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 (To the Memory of Ega de Queiroz) 
 
 ONCE in the ancient city 
 
 Segovia of Castile, 
 Dwelt the knight Don Ruy de Cardenas, 
 
 Whose faith was true as steel, 
 
 In the dwelling-house that stood beside 
 
 And in the silent shade 
 That our Lady of the Pillar's Church 
 
 In the long evenings made. 
 
 Facing this House, across the square, 
 Where the ancient fountain danced, 
 
 Frowned the Lord of Lara's Palace, 
 Like gloom by mirth enhanced. 
 
 To the knight his Virgin Godmother, 
 Since the day of his christening, 
 
 Had Our Lady of the Pillar 
 As a real mother been. 
 
 For though he loved to ride a-tilt, 
 The chase and rich regale, 
 
 25 
 
26 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 And eke a night with his friends at cards, 
 He served Her not less well. 
 
 Each morning at the hour of Prime 
 
 He sought Her Holy Place, 
 And with Ave Maria chaunted thrice 
 
 Craved Her blessing and Her grace. 
 
 Right often at the Vesper hour 
 
 Would he kneel at Her shrine once more, 
 And Salve Regina Coeli 
 
 Gently would murmur o'er. 
 
 Now likewise in Segovia 
 
 In that old time dwelt one, 
 With neck like royal heron's. 
 
 With locks like rays of sun. 
 
 Ah ! fair was she as roses 
 
 And delicate as dawn, 
 And seventeen summers scarce had kissed 
 
 Her wimple of the lawn. 
 
 Though you sought Castile and Aragon, 
 Though you travelled every Spain, 
 
 A pair so fair as he and as her 
 You would have sought in vain. 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 27 
 
 But alas no maiden was she, 
 
 Bride to old Lara's Lord, 
 Who in his gray deciduous years 
 
 Had wed this child adored. 
 
 Right jealously he guarded her 
 
 Within that palace grim, 
 All builded of black granite stone, 
 
 With windows barred and dim, 
 
 And mighty gate all iron clad, 
 
 And sombre deep arcade, 
 But garden walled and green and cool, 
 
 Where she might find the shade. 
 
 Yea, it was guarded round about 
 
 With a most lofty wall, 
 That scarce the tallest cypress tops 
 
 Looked on the square at all. 
 
 Only the Sunday of all the week 
 
 Came the Lady Leonore 
 Forth in two stalwart lacqueys' guard, 
 
 With one whose eyes were more 
 
 Wide staring than the caged owl's, 
 Who bare her book of Hours ; 
 
 The Lacqueys stalked on either side, 
 Immense as brethren towers. 
 
28 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 She left the Palace, crossed the square 
 And sought the house of God, 
 
 A prisoner revelling in the sun 
 And every stone she trod. 
 
 This only visit vouchsafed her Lord 
 
 To the Lady Leonore, 
 Lest he offend the Queen of Heaven 
 
 And the monk his confessor. 
 
 It fell upon a June morning 
 That as she kneeled before 
 
 The altar in her radiant youth, 
 Long lashes drooping o'er 
 
 Her rosary, that young Don Ruy 
 Drew near with flow'ry spray 
 
 Of jonquils, pinks and gilliflowers 
 To make Her altar gay. 
 
 He saw the flowers, he saw the sun 
 And the church ere he entered in, 
 
 But when he saw that fair lady 
 He knew not other thing : 
 
 White with a lily's whiteness 
 Blooming in yonder shade, 
 
 Yet whiter with the whiteness 
 That her black mantilla made. 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 29 
 
 When first he did behold her 
 
 He forgot to kneel and pray, 
 When again he did behold her 
 
 She stole his soul away. 
 
 His flowers they fell beside him 
 
 As useless now indeed 
 Where the flower of the world was blooming 
 
 They were but as a weed. 
 
 Slowly his stolen senses 
 
 She rendered him again, 
 And he knelt to his Virgin Godmother, 
 
 But his prayer was all in vain. 
 
 He could think but of the vision 
 
 Ineffable that was nigh, 
 For her alone his life would live, 
 
 To clasp her once would die. 
 
 When his graceless prayer was over, 
 
 He took his sombrero 
 And down the sounding nave he went 
 
 To the porch, where in a row 
 
 The lousy beggars craved an alms, 
 
 As they loitered in the sun ; 
 Don Ruy, love's beggar, stood with them, 
 
 As verily he were one. 
 
30 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 There as he stood and waited long, 
 
 Hard beat his heart for fear, 
 Then almost ceased within his breast, 
 
 When he felt her draw anear. 
 
 But she, she marks him not at all, 
 
 Or fears to raise her eyes, 
 Beneath her close-drawn veil she goes, 
 
 With her his whole soul flies ; 
 
 He marks her pass across the square 
 In the light of the splendid sun ; 
 
 But when in the dim arcade she's lost, 
 He groans as if undone : 
 
 " This then is Lara's lady, 
 
 That Donna Leonore, 
 Famous throughout the two Castiles 
 
 The weight of Love is sore." 
 
 Then six days long he sat him down 
 
 On his window-seat of stone, 
 And he gazed at the place where he saw her last, 
 
 Till his eyes were pictures grown. 
 
 At last came the lingering Sunday, 
 
 And bearing carnation bloom 
 To deck the shrine of his Godmother, 
 
 They crossed as from out the gloom 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 31 
 
 Of the iron door and the dim arcade 
 
 She sailed like the risen moon 
 Almost his flowers fell from his hands, 
 
 Almost he fell in swoon. 
 
 But she, she raised to him her eyes 
 
 Reposeful and serene, 
 Not knowing aught of passion's flames 
 
 That raged and roared between. 
 
 The young knight entered not the Church, 
 
 Withheld through pious fear, 
 Lest he of things divine should fail, 
 
 When mortal love was near, 
 
 But again amid that lousy crew 
 
 He waited, and the flowers 
 Were parched for the heat of his trembling hands, 
 
 Him-seemed a score of hours, 
 
 Ere down the long, long nave his heart 
 
 Came rustling with her gown, 
 As o'er the marble slabs she passed ; 
 
 She did not smile nor frown, 
 
 Simply that lady passed him by, 
 
 Who held his heart in thrall ; 
 The same calm, heedless, absent look 
 
 Upon him let she fall 
 
32 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 As on the beggars and the square, 
 
 Either not witting why 
 Sudden so pale the knight had grown, 
 
 Or careless wittingly. 
 
 Don Ruy sighed deeply, moved away, 
 Sought out his chamber straight, 
 
 And before the Virgin's image set 
 Those flowers he had not laid 
 
 Upon Her altar in Her Church 
 Then all his life grew dark, 
 
 Because the furnace in his soul 
 Had failed to light one spark 
 
 In her that was compact of ice ; 
 
 Then 'gan he round her walls 
 With hopeless hope to pace and pace, 
 
 Or where her shadow falls 
 
 On the bars of the lattice windows 
 Hour-long he wont to gaze 
 
 But the bars came not asunder, 
 Nor through them hopeful rays. 
 
 The whole vast gloomy mansion 
 
 Loomed like a sepulchre 
 Encircling with its massy walls 
 
 One heartless body fair. 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 33 
 
 Then o'er the parchment leaning 
 
 Don Ruy would verses make 
 Most dolorous of love despised 
 
 But failed his love to slake. 
 
 Before the Virgin's altar 
 
 Kneeled he where she had knelt, 
 
 In musings bitter-sweet sunk deep, 
 Yet no relief he felt ; 
 
 The whole wide world, to him it seemed, 
 
 Where not of stone was ice 
 Albeit on a Sunday morning 
 
 He had passed her twice or thrice, 
 
 So heedlessly she gazed on him 
 
 That he had liefer chosen 
 Rather with anger she should glow, 
 
 Than to be thus coldly frozen. 
 
 As royally remote was she 
 
 As a star in Heaven above, 
 Unconscious of the eyes on earth 
 
 That upward yearn with love. 
 
 Then thought Don Ruy, she will not love 
 
 And I, I cannot more ; 
 May Our Lady hold us both in grace 
 
 Now is the love-dream o'er. 
 c 
 
34 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 And seeing that most discreet he was, 
 And now most clearly saw 
 
 Her fixed in cold indifference, 
 He made for him a law, 
 
 That never would he seek her out, 
 
 Nor never look on high 
 To the gratings of her windows, 
 
 Nor if he should descry 
 
 From the porch of Our Lady's chapel 
 Her golden graceful head 
 
 Bent o'er her Book of Hours 
 
 Would he then the marble tread. 
 
 II 
 
 Now over all the silence 
 Of things that might not be 
 
 Could very well have fallen, 
 Save for the jealousy, 
 
 Which like a thief had entered in 
 To the Lord of Lara's breast, 
 
 And ruled there as on a throne, 
 So deep he did detest 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 35 
 
 The young knight, Guy de Cardenas, 
 
 For when, perched falconwise, 
 He had seen the Lady Leonore 
 
 Meet the darts of the gallant's eyes, 
 
 Though upon her swan-white coat of proof 
 
 Those darts no impress made, 
 They rankled all within his breast, 
 
 As he tore his beard with rage. 
 
 Henceforth the Lord of Lara's spies 
 
 Watched every step he took 
 Where'er he sojourned, hunted, played, 
 
 Was writ down in a book. 
 
 But for the Lady Leonore, 
 
 More closely yet watched he 
 Her every silence, speech, the stitch 
 
 Of her embroidery ; 
 
 He watched her as she came from Church, 
 As she mused beneath the tree, 
 
 In the garden where she wont to sit, 
 But even jealousy 
 
 Ardent as his could find no flaw 
 In stainless chastity. 
 
 Thereupon this tyrant's fury 
 Turned with a whetted edge 
 
36 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 Against the youth that dared desire 
 The bird he kept in cage. 
 
 His was her bright sun-coloured hair, 
 
 Her neck of royal herne, 
 And when he thought of young Don Ruy 
 
 For rage his heart did burn. 
 
 He paced his sombre galleries, 
 
 In furry jerkin lined, 
 His grizzled beard thrust out before, 
 
 His tangled locks behind ; 
 
 Ever the same the gall he chewed 
 
 A double death shall die 
 He who assailed her honour 
 
 And mine honour dared defy ; 
 
 Nor to his evil jaundiced mind 
 
 Availed it even one jot 
 That never now the cavalier 
 
 Sought out the self-same spot 
 
 As had the Lady Leonore 
 
 Nay, rather held aloof 
 And when he entered not the Church 
 
 Esteemed he this a proof, 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 37 
 
 That deeper lay the young knight's schemes 
 
 Than mortal eye could see ; 
 Therefore the order sent he forth 
 
 That now no longer she 
 
 Once even in the week go forth, 
 
 But on the Sabbath Day 
 Himself would hasten to the Church, 
 
 Kneel and the Rosary say ; 
 
 Then jibbering, leering, bow him down 
 
 Before the Virgin's shrine, 
 Excuse his spouse, " who cometh not, 
 
 For cause Thou dost divine." 
 
 Thus having made secure without, 
 
 He made secure within ; 
 Himself the bolts of every gate 
 
 Slid to with fingers thin ; 
 
 Along the shadowy moonlit sward 
 
 Of the walled garden prowled 
 Two bloodhounds of right savage breed 
 
 That slew but never growled ; 
 
 A naked sword lay by his bed 
 
 At the table whereupon 
 Were his lamp and reliquary, 
 
 His wine with cinnamon 
 
38 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 And cloves made ready to give force 
 
 And the torch of love to light 
 Youth sacrificed to antic lust 
 
 That breaks the heart of night ! 
 
 Oft he would wake, a grisly man, 
 
 Between the pillows deep, 
 And clawing rude fair Leonore, 
 
 Awaken her from sleep 
 
 With bruises on her snowy neck 
 
 Say that thou lov'st me only 
 And with break of dawn he would perch and spy, 
 
 Like a falcon brooding lonely. 
 
 But though thus carefully he watched 
 
 From his lofty latticed perch, 
 Never the knight now passed him by, 
 
 Nor entered in the Church, 
 
 When clear the Angelus rang out, 
 
 Nor toward the country riding 
 Which all for him was proof how clear 
 
 The twain their love were hiding. 
 
 At length one night, when he had trod 
 
 The flags of his gallery 
 By the long hour, his doubt and hate 
 
 Revolving inwardly, 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 39 
 
 He cried out that his steward should come, 
 
 And forthwith gave command 
 That pack and saddle be prepared, 
 
 Ready at dawn to stand 
 
 And bear them to his rural fief, 
 
 Cabril, two leagues of way ; 
 But though thus early all prepared, 
 
 Long hours of the day, 
 
 Her litter waiteth in the shade, 
 
 With its curtain open wide, 
 While a stable lad leads his lord's white mule, 
 
 Which Moorish trappings hide, 
 
 Backward and forward in the shade, 
 
 While beneath the sun and flies 
 He-mules their bells a- jingle 
 
 Keep the strait street in surmise, 
 
 Laden with trunks that iron rings 
 
 Hold stedfast in their places, 
 And muleteers stand at their sides, 
 
 With dark-eyed swarthy faces. 
 
 Thus learned Don Ruy and all the town 
 
 That Lara's Lord departed ; 
 But since Don Ruy now hoped no more, 
 
 So was he not down-hearted. 
 
40 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 III 
 
 Now the Lady Leonore rejoiced 
 
 Dwelling at fair Cabril 
 With its orchards and its gardens 
 
 And its lawn-meandering rill, 
 
 And its spacious marble balconies, 
 
 All sunlight and all flowers 
 Which she might tend, and birds to feed, 
 
 And she might muse for hours 
 
 By paths of laurel and of yew, 
 
 Girt with no hateful walls 
 So wide they were they seemed to her 
 
 Like Freedom's woody halls. 
 
 And timidly she dared to hope 
 That the pure, fresh, country air 
 
 Would lift from off her master's mind 
 His load of heavy care. 
 
 But this was not to be, alas, 
 
 For always up and down 
 As in Segovia he paced 
 
 In the self-same sheepskin gown, 
 Through the sounding, vaulted gallery, 
 
 Wearing the self-same frown. 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 41 
 
 His gray beard was thrust out before, 
 
 His thick hair tangled back ; 
 Oft he would snarl and show his teeth, 
 
 As brooding vengeance black. 
 
 Few were the words he spake to her, 
 
 She dared not speak to him 
 First lest he burst in furious rage, 
 
 Whose silence was so grim. 
 
 IV 
 
 One night when the Lady Leonore 
 By the light of a waxen torch 
 
 Within her chamber told her beads, 
 There passed 'neath the Moorish porch 
 
 The Lord of Lara, grim and slow, 
 
 Bearing within his hand 
 A sheet of parchment and a pen 
 
 Dipped in a bone inkstand. 
 
 With a rough sign her maidens, 
 
 Who feared him as the bear, 
 He drave forth from her chamber, 
 
 To the table drew a chair, 
 
42 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 Then to the Lady Leonore 
 
 He turned a smiling face, 
 As though the thing that he would ask 
 
 Were but a trifling grace. 
 
 " Lady, I beg you write me here 
 What 'tis needful that you write ; " 
 
 She bowed in all obedience, 
 And he began, " My Knight." 
 
 This writ she clear, with graceful, long 
 
 White fingers on the sheet, 
 Heedful that every letter formed 
 
 Should be both clear and neat. 
 
 But when in rasping voice he hissed 
 
 The next and longer line, 
 Down dashed the pen as 'twere afire, 
 
 And she cried, " O husband mine, 
 
 "Why must I write such false, false lies ? " 
 
 Her voice was all a tear 
 Then the Lord of Lara's fury 
 
 Burst forth, and in her ear 
 
 He hissed, " You write what I command, 
 Or this dagger 's in your heart ; " 
 
 More white than the torch of wax she grew, 
 And chose the craven's part. 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 43 
 
 " By the Virgin Mary, harm me not, 
 
 I live but to obey ! 
 Speak now, and what you speak I write ; " 
 
 Then the dagger he did lay 
 
 Upon the table, clenched his fists 
 On the ends and crushed his slave 
 
 With his hard wounding eyes, and thus 
 The felon missive gave. 
 
 Unwittingly she did his will 
 
 And spread the net to snare 
 The lover of whose name or face 
 
 She never yet was 'ware. 
 
 Thus spake he, thus she writ, ' ' My Knight, 
 
 Or ill you understood, 
 Or very ill repayed my love ; 
 
 But now make all things good, 
 
 " Which at Segovia you lacked 
 
 Nor dared I then discover 
 How ardently I longed for you, 
 
 Don Ruy, my own true lover ; 
 
 " But now my husband fares afield 
 
 And at Cabril all is plain ; 
 Ride then to-night the two short leagues 
 
 To the garden by the lane, 
 
44 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 " Then pass the fish-pond on your right 
 And when you reach the terrace, 
 
 You will see a ladder resting on 
 The wall by the window there is 
 
 " The chamber of your own true love ! " 
 " Now sign your name below 
 
 For that is needful above all " 
 She signed with cheeks aglow, 
 
 As if before a crowd she stripped 
 " Now write your lover's name 
 
 Don Ruy de Cardenas " she writ 
 With modest cheeks aflame. 
 
 Now was all done ; he gathered up 
 The parchment in his hand, 
 
 Placing it with the dagger 
 Thrust in his girdle's band. 
 
 He left her crouching in the gloom 
 All pierced through with fright, 
 
 Her wearied hands were in her lap, 
 Her gaze lost in the night. 
 
 Who was Don Ruy de Cardenas, 
 
 Name to her all unknown, 
 That passed the portals of her life, 
 
 With so few memories sown ? 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 45 
 
 Yet he, he knew her of a truth, 
 Had followed her with his eyes, 
 
 Since it was fitting that from her 
 Should come such promises. 
 
 He knew her nay, he knew her well, 
 
 Since 'twas her husband's will 
 He should mount up to her chamber 
 
 In the night when all was still. 
 
 Then in a flash she saw the truth 
 
 And gave an anguished cry 
 He would come to Cabril lured by her, 
 
 At Cabril he would die 
 
 By the Lord of Lara's hand whose hate 
 
 His honour thus defiled, 
 And to a murderous ambuscade 
 
 A gallant knight beguiled ! 
 
 Some glance, some movement of Don Ruy, 
 
 Some eye's flash caught aside, 
 Because Don Ruy so deep did love, 
 
 Her husband must have spied. 
 
 But how, when was it, who was he ? 
 
 Then dimly she remembered 
 The noble youth that flowers bore, 
 
 But not to her had tendered. 
 
46 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 Right noble, yet right pale he was, 
 As he stood at the Church's door ; 
 
 His eyes were large and passion-full, 
 Red and yellow flowers he bore, 
 
 For whom ? Ah, could she warn Don Ruy, 
 
 Before the break of day ! 
 Here was no help, she but a slave, 
 
 The fates must have their way. 
 
 Ah ! could she warn him ! twenty-five 
 Those were his years all told 
 
 Two tears fell from her teeming eyes 
 And on her hands they rolled ; 
 
 Then all that she, poor soul, could do, 
 
 She did, to save her lover ; 
 On bended knee she fell and raised 
 
 Her soul to heaven above her. 
 
 Just then the moon began to shine, 
 As she prayed in faith and woe ; 
 
 " O Virgin of the Pillar, watch 
 And guard him from his foe." 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 47 
 
 Don Ruy was entering his house 
 With its courtyard orange-shaded 
 
 What time the sun in heaven rode high, 
 When a peasant who had waited 
 
 An hour upon a seat of stone 
 
 Within the shade, arose, 
 Gave him a letter murmuring 
 
 " No time I have to lose, 
 
 Therefore make answer straight no need 
 
 There is to write reply, 
 Only make sign you have received 
 
 For to Cabril I must hie 
 
 To the person that hath sent me here." 
 
 As pale as death Don Ruy 
 Read the missive from his newfound love, 
 Pulled from his hand a broidered glove, 
 
 Which the peasant hastily 
 
 Stowed in his scrip and fast away 
 On his sandal points was creeping, 
 
 When the knight cried after him, " What road 
 To Cabril are you keeping ? " 
 
48 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 " By the speediest and the loneliest road 
 
 I hasten to Cabril 
 But he must have an iron heart 
 
 That goes by Gallows Hill." 
 
 " Good," quoth Don Ruy, and climbed the stairs 
 
 That led to his latticed chamber ; 
 Then read he again those blessed words, 
 Then gloated upon those golden words, 
 
 That summoned him to claim her. 
 
 Nor was he by this sudden change 
 
 In any way astonied 
 Rather he saw there love more strong, 
 That waiting warily waits long 
 
 And stakes the present on it. 
 
 Loved by the Lady Leonore, 
 
 Since that wondrous Sunday morning, 
 
 When their eyes had crossed in Our Lady's porch 
 And he fancied she was scorning ! 
 
 And while he circled round her walls 
 
 Mourning how cold was she, 
 Lo, she had given him her soul, 
 
 And full of constancy, 
 
 Choking her sighs and every sign 
 That might lead to suspicion, 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 49 
 
 Make ready the night when the body too 
 Would go where the soul was given ! 
 
 Ah ! such her firmness, such her wit, 
 
 Yet in the affairs of love, 
 Most beautiful and most desired 
 
 Was she, set far above 
 
 The weak that rush, that falter and blush 
 
 Leading the way to ruin 
 For many's the ambush set for love 
 
 And there stumble not a few in. 
 
 Impatiently he watched the sun 
 
 Sink slowly to the west, 
 And in his chamber ready made 
 
 All that he had of best 
 
 Fair laces and a jerkin black 
 
 With essences perfumed, 
 And cared that his steed in stable 
 
 Was well shod and well groomed ; 
 
 Then bent he the blade of his good sword 
 
 Upon the chamber floor, 
 Then bent again, then conned again 
 
 Her missive o'er and o'er. 
 
50 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 VI 
 
 The sun is sunken in the west, 
 
 There's evening in the air, 
 Don Ruy has leaped a-horseback, 
 
 Rides slow across the square. 
 
 He is riding with his sombrero 
 
 Clear lifted from his face, 
 As though he seeks the evening airs 
 
 Beyond the walls a space ; 
 
 He meets with none till he hath won 
 
 To the limit of the city, 
 Where a beggar at St Mauros gate 
 
 Cries out to him for pity. 
 
 Don Ruy reins in to throw him alms, 
 When he minds him suddenly 
 
 That he hath not prayed the livelong day, 
 Nor at Vesper bent the knee, 
 
 To crave of Mary Godmother 
 
 Her blessing, quick mounts down ; 
 
 On Her image by the arch a lamp 
 Flickers o'er Her golden crown, 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 51 
 
 And Her breast with the Seven Swords trans- 
 pierced 
 
 He kneels him by the way, 
 And Salve Regina Coeli, 
 
 Hear him passionately pray. 
 
 Yellow the radiance of the light 
 
 Upon Our Lady's face 
 Either She feels not the Seven Swords 
 
 Or has from them solace, 
 
 For with bright red lips she smiles on him, 
 And whiles that he's a-kneeling, 
 
 Lo, the small bell at St Dominic's 
 Sets up a muffled pealing. 
 
 Quoth the beggar from the black archway ; 
 
 " There lies a friar a-dying ; " 
 Don Ruy for him an Ave saith, 
 
 With lips and thoughts a-flying. 
 
 The Virgin of the Seven Swords 
 
 Smiles as he takes his way, 
 The languid moon is at the full, 
 
 But scarce her yellow ray 
 
 Tops yet the range of the long low hills ; 
 Dim is the aloe grove, 
 
52 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 Through which he rides 'tis early yet 
 He fears to seek his love, 
 
 Ere that her men and maidservants 
 With their daily tasks be over, 
 
 Ere yet the Rosary be said 
 But his fancy plays the rover ; 
 
 Into the garden at Cabril 
 
 It breaks and scales the ladder 
 
 And he he follows it apace, 
 And madder yet and madder 
 
 He gallops o'er the ill-laid road 
 
 Fast as his fancy flies ; 
 Then he reins in his panting steed . 
 
 "Too early yet," he cries. 
 
 And his heart beats against his ribs, 
 Like prisoned bird in cage ; 
 
 Then slowly, slow, he paces on, 
 Till at the roadside's edge 
 
 He spies the Calvary where the road 
 Splits like a fork in twain 
 
 To the Crucified he doffs his hat- 
 Then suddenly draws rein ; 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 53 
 
 For both roads pierce the pine forest 
 
 And he remembers ill 
 Which leads unto Xarama 
 
 And which to the Callow's Hill. 
 
 In the shadows of the gloomier road 
 
 Already he advances, 
 When between the stems of the silent pines 
 
 He sees a light that dances 
 
 'Tis an ancient dame in rags yclad, 
 
 With long and flowing tresses, 
 Leans on a staff and bears a lamp, 
 
 And her the knight addresses 
 
 " Canst tell me whither leads this road ? " 
 Then the lamp she swings more high 
 
 That the better she the knight may see : 
 " To Xarama " makes reply. 
 
 Then light and ancient dame they melt 
 
 Into the night together, 
 As though they had risen up there to warn 
 
 The young knight of his error. 
 
 He turns already with a dash 
 
 And rounds the Calvary, 
 And along the other broader road 
 
 He gallops furiously, 
 
54 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 Till against the brightness of the sky 
 
 He sees the pillars black 
 And the black beams of Gallows Hill ; 
 
 Then he reins his courser back 
 
 And motionless in his stirrups stands 
 
 There on the tall bare hill, 
 Four granite pillars rise up black, 
 
 Four beams their spaces fill 
 And four hanged men depend therefrom, 
 
 Rigid and black and still. 
 
 Ay, dead they be and all around 
 
 Seems dead indeed as they, 
 The moon is full, upon the beams 
 
 There roost two birds of prey. 
 
 Then the knight the Paternoster said, 
 
 From every Christian owed 
 To guilty souls, then urged his steed 
 
 Along the moonlit road, 
 
 When in the silent solitude 
 
 A voice arose, resounded, 
 A voice that supplicated slow 
 
 He stops his steed, astounded ; 
 
 " Knight, stay, come hither," cries the voice 
 He casts astonished eyes 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 55 
 
 Over that ominous hillside 
 That deadly tranquil lies. 
 
 " Some wandering demon 'tis that calls," 
 
 Quoth he and spurs his horse, 
 Yet not at all he fears but wills 
 
 To hasten on his course. 
 
 But now behind him comes again 
 
 That voice most urgent, clear, 
 With anxious terror fraught, " Stay Knight, 
 
 Return, return, draw near ! " 
 
 Again Don Ruy reins in, again 
 
 He in his saddle turns, 
 And on the four dead men he looks, 
 
 For bright his courage burns. 
 
 Certes from one of them came forth 
 
 The voice that just now cried 
 Thus anxiously, thus urgently, 
 
 And would not be denied. 
 
 Did there in any linger yet 
 
 Perchance the breath of life ? 
 Or for a marvel greater yet 
 
 Did one of the dead men strive 
 
56 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 To warn him from beyond the grave 
 
 Of some impending evil ? 
 But whether that human voice came forth 
 
 From God or from the Devil, 
 
 'Twould be to play the craven's part, 
 
 Were he to ride away, 
 Ere he had heard of good or ill 
 
 What the voice might have to say. 
 
 Therefore he spurs his trembling horse 
 
 And up the hill doth ride ; 
 Then stops erect and calm, his hand 
 
 Resting upon his side. 
 
 Right steadfully he looks upon 
 Those four suspended bodies 
 
 " Which of you hanged men dared to call 
 Don Ruy de Cardenas ? " 
 
 Then the man whose back is to the moon 
 
 Makes answer quietly, 
 As a man that from a window talks 
 
 To the street ; " Sir, it was I." 
 
 Don Ruy spurs on his horse, but yet 
 Hidden the hanged man's face is 
 
 Sunken and hidden in his breast 
 By his long black falling tresses. 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 57 
 
 " What want you of me that hang there ? " 
 
 " I pray you, Sir, to sever 
 The cord by which I am hanging up " 
 
 His sword with slight endeavour 
 
 Severs the cord ; with bones that clash 
 To the ground the dead man falls, 
 
 And for a moment lies outstretched ; 
 But suddenly recalls 
 
 His feet from limbo, ill-secure, 
 
 All withered, pitiful, 
 And toward Don Ruy a dead face lifts 
 
 "Us little but a skull, 
 
 O'er which the skin is tightly glued 
 
 More yellow than the moon 
 Nor light nor motion shew the eyes, 
 
 But the lips are parted soon, 
 
 Making a grinning, stony smile ; 
 
 'Twixt the white teeth the tongue 
 Comes forth, a point of black, the hands 
 
 Are free, the cord unstrung, 
 
 Whereby encircled is the neck ; 
 
 Don Ruy quite calmly breathes, 
 For he fears not that hanged man ; 
 
 Calmly his sword he sheathes 
 
58 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 And asks him ; " Art thou quick or dead ? " 
 
 " I know not, none may know 
 What death and what life be." " Then say 
 
 What service do I owe 
 
 To you, that thus you call me here ? " 
 
 With fingers fleshless, long, 
 The hanged man made more loose the cord 
 
 That round his neck yet clung ; 
 
 Then calmly and right firmly spake ; 
 
 " I must fare with you to Cabril." 
 God's Wounds ! That made the knight to start 
 
 That hardly he was able 
 
 To sit his horse, reared up for fright 
 
 So sharp the reins he jerked. 
 " With me to Cabril ? " Then the hanged 
 
 On him for pity worked. 
 
 " Sir, grant me this (right earnestly 
 
 The hanged man implored), 
 For if I do you a great service, 
 
 Mine is a great reward." 
 
 Then suddenly to the knight it seemed 
 
 That this full well might be 
 Some Devil's trickery framed to slay 
 
 His soul's felicity. 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 59 
 
 Therefore no answer he vouchsafed 
 
 To the dead face upturned, 
 To the ghastly face upraised to him, 
 
 That with anxious longing yearned ; 
 
 But slowly and with large, bold sweep, 
 
 He made the sign of the Cross ; 
 Then the hanged man bent his pious knees ; 
 
 " Sir, wherefore try me thus ? 
 
 By this alone we hope for grace 
 
 And of our sins remission." 
 " If he be not by the demon sent, 
 
 Mayhap with God's permission 
 
 He moves upon the earth again " 
 Then the knight dismissed his doubt, 
 
 Trusting his future all to God 
 With a gesture all devout. 
 
 " With me to Cabril you shall fare," 
 
 Quoth he to the hanged man, 
 If it be that Heaven hath ordered so ; 
 
 Then behold the hanged one ran 
 
 By his stirrup on the stony road 
 
 With steps so airy, light, 
 That it seemed as he were borne along 
 
 By the silent wind of night. 
 
60 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 Fast, fast Don Ruy was galloping now 
 Twixt hedges of wild-flower scent ; 
 
 " 'Tis good to run," quoth the hanged one, 
 And he breathed with deep content. 
 
 Now was Don Ruy's whole soul o'erflowed 
 With amazement and with care, 
 
 For he saw quite clearly evident 
 That to do some service rare 
 
 This corpse had been revived by God ; 
 
 But such companion, 
 Plucked straight from out the nether hell 
 
 Wherefore had he been chosen ? 
 
 Efstoons ! had God no angels more 
 
 In all the courts of Heaven, 
 That He must needs upraise a man 
 
 Whose life was rightly riven 
 
 For some nefarious, felon stroke, 
 
 To guard fair Leonore 
 For piety beloved of heaven ? 
 
 Right fain he had turned once more 
 
 His steed toward Segovia, 
 
 Right fain given o'er his quest, 
 
 Save for the pride of a gallant knight 
 And the weight of God's behest. 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 61 
 
 For he felt right heavy weigh on him 
 As he galloped through the night 
 
 The hand of Almighty God in Heaven, 
 Though the dead man's hand was light. 
 
 VII 
 
 Now as the living and the dead 
 On the high road took their way, 
 
 Those dead eyes and those living eyes 
 Beheld where Cabril lay 
 
 Below, all bathed in moonlight, 
 
 And the Franciscan towers, 
 And the farmhouses sleeping too 
 
 Amid the garden flowers. 
 
 Then silently, quite silently, 
 
 With never a dog that bayed, 
 Down to the Roman bridge they passed, 
 
 And there the dead man stayed 
 
 Before the Calvary, his knees 
 On the flag stones pressing were, 
 
 And the livid bones of his hands he raised, 
 And long he dwelt in prayer. 
 
62 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 And very deep he sighed, but then 
 Great draughts of joy drank he 
 
 From a fair spring that singing ran 
 Beneath a willow tree. 
 
 And now for the path was very straight, 
 Before the knight he stalked, 
 
 Who thought with bitterness of soul 
 On the bliss the hanged man baulked. 
 
 Such was the will of God, but ah ! 
 
 How desolate the thought, 
 That to the loved one's promised door 
 
 A guest so awful brought ! 
 
 Now to the end of the lane they came, 
 And the hanged man stopped and raised 
 
 His arm, whereof the tattered sleeve 
 At his least motion played. 
 
 Before them now the long high wall 
 
 Of Lara's homestead shone, 
 With its belvedere and balconies, 
 
 All ivy overgrown. 
 
 " Sir," quoth the hanged man, as he held 
 
 The stirrup of Don Ruy, 
 " The gate of the garden lieth close, 
 
 We must go warily ; 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 63 
 
 " And best it is that you leave your steed 
 
 Fast tethered to this yew, 
 For the sound of our footsteps is too much 
 
 In the business that we do." 
 
 Silent Don Ruy obeyed and now 
 
 The hanged man tiptoe went, 
 On the least noise in that silent world 
 
 Distrustfully intent ; 
 
 And the knight followed by the wall 
 Flooded with clear moonlight ; 
 
 The hanged man careful watched its top 
 And the black hedge on the right. 
 
 And now this cautious fear in one 
 
 Beyond all human evil, 
 Filled also slowly that brave knight 
 
 With a sense of deadly peril ; 
 
 So that he drew his dagger forth, 
 Threw his cloak around his arm, 
 
 And walked on guard with flashing eyes 
 That sought some hidden harm. 
 
 Then to a little gate they came ; 
 
 A push it opened wide 
 On an avenue and a lily-pond, 
 
 With yew trees either side. 
 
64 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 Rude seats were round the pond, with flowers' 
 
 And twining creepers' charm ; 
 " This way ! " the hanged man whispered low, 
 
 Pointing a withered arm. 
 
 Now by another avenue 
 
 Beyond the pond they wended 
 
 'Twas the hanged man ever went before, 
 Close by the knight attended. 
 
 Hard by a silver rivulet 
 
 Went purling through the grass, 
 And from the roses on the yews 
 
 A wild sweet scent did pass 
 
 Stirring the heartstrings of Don Ruy 
 With hope beat high his heart 
 
 But " Hush ! Hush ! " quoth the hanged man, 
 And raised his arms apart. 
 
 Like the bars of a gate they were outstretched 
 And the knight came nigh to fall 
 
 Upon his escort sudden stayed, 
 Where the light fell full on all. 
 
 Four steps of stone before them rose, 
 
 They mounted crouching low ; 
 At the end of a treeless garden, 
 
 With flower-beds row by row, 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 65 
 
 They spied one side of Cabril House, 
 Where full fell the light of the moon ; 
 
 In the midst bet ween breast-high windows closed 
 Was a balcony of stone 
 
 Garnished with pots of basil, 
 
 Both windows open wide, 
 And black as night in the clear moonlight 
 
 Was the chamber's self inside. 
 
 Most clear against the balcony 
 
 Leaned a ladder with rungs of cord ; 
 
 Then the dead man pushed aside the knight, 
 The hanged man played the lord. 
 
 " Sir, give me now your hat and cloak, 
 
 And stay you very still 
 Here in the darkness of the trees, 
 
 Nor speak a word until 
 
 I shall mount to yonder balcony 
 
 And in the chamber peer, 
 And if all be even as you desire 
 
 I will return me here." 
 
 " Nay, nay, by God ! " the knight cried out, 
 And he stamped his foot, but the hand 
 
 Of the hanged man in the darkness 
 Tore his hat from his head, the band 
 
66 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 Of his cloak wrenched free from off his arm ; 
 
 These the hanged man did him on, 
 And as he wrapped him in the cloak, 
 
 Beseeched in fervent tone ; 
 
 " I pray you, Sir, deny me not, 
 
 I pray you by the Lord, 
 For if I do you a great service, 
 
 I shall reap a great reward." 
 
 He climbs the steps, he moves along 
 
 The terrace broad and bright ; 
 Dazed and amazed Don Ruy beholds 
 
 Indeed a marvellous sight ; 
 
 For lo, the hanged man as himself, 
 
 Don Ruy, in form and face is ; 
 Lightly and gracefully he moves 
 
 Between the flow'ry spaces ; 
 
 Now smilingly he looks above, 
 
 With hand in girdle playing, 
 And in his hat the scarlet plume 
 
 Triumphantly is swaying. 
 
 Behold, the chamber of his love 
 
 Open and dark is waiting ; 
 Don Ruy stares now with flashing eyes, 
 
 And all with wrath vibrating. 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 67 
 
 He has reached the ladder now, his foot 
 
 On the lowest rung engaging ; 
 " He goeth up, the damned villain," 
 
 Roars out Don Ruy, loud raging. 
 
 He goeth up, and now the knight 
 
 Sees his own figure tall, 
 That half way up makes a blot of black 
 
 On the whiteness of the wall. 
 
 He stops ! But nay ! he hath not stayed 
 
 He mounts ! he gains the top, 
 And now he carefully prepares 
 
 From the window ledge to drop 
 
 Into the chamber of his love 
 
 Careful he rests the knee 
 The knight's whole soul is in his eyes 
 
 That gaze despairingly. 
 
 He leaps ! He leaps ! He steals his love ! 
 
 When lo, from the pitch-black room 
 Rises a figure, shouts a voice, 
 
 " Villain ! thou hast thy doom." 
 
 The blade of a dagger rises, falls, 
 And falling once more flashes 
 
 Like a log the dead man topples down 
 And the window closing crashes ! 
 
68 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 Silence and gentle calm on all 
 
 And the moon in the summer sky 
 
 But Don Ruy has drawn his sword and stands 
 Prepared right dear to die. 
 
 When lo ! yet another marvel ! 
 
 The hanged man runs across 
 The terrace, and to the knight he cries : 
 
 " To horse, Sir, quick, to horse ! " 
 
 Thus spake he in the moonlight, 
 
 In his breast the dagger blade, 
 Nailed to the hilt its shining point 
 
 At his backbone issue made. 
 
 They hasten along the avenue 
 
 By the pond and the rose-twined yews, 
 
 And the knight must follow where he leads 
 Whom the will of Heaven did choose. 
 
 Now filled with an awful terror 
 Is the soul of the brave Don Ruy, 
 
 And he plucks the reins with frantic haste 
 And will by all means flee 
 
 Not from a mortal man but from 
 
 This awful company 
 This night of miracle, these powers 
 
 More strong than Destiny. 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 69 
 
 Now he leaps into his saddle, 
 
 And now he gallops fast, 
 When he feels a dreadful weight behind 
 
 Upon the crupper cast. 
 
 He needs not turn him round to know 
 
 What awful burden lies 
 Behind, but shivers through and through 
 
 As though it were of ice. 
 
 Despair ! Despair ! on the endless road 
 
 He gallops in wild despair ; 
 But though the good horse rocks and sways, 
 
 One sits quite rigid there, 
 
 Like a statue upon a pedestal, 
 
 Nor moves from side to side 
 The man that for his sake the death 
 
 A second time hath died. 
 
 At the Calvary the knight cries out, 
 
 " Lord aid me " ; then the fear 
 That forever in eternal night 
 
 He must gallop in wild career 
 
 With the dead man behind him 
 
 Makes him half turn aside, 
 While the wind whips him in the face : 
 
 " Whither will ye that we ride ? " 
 
70 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 Then the hanged man leans his body 
 
 So close against Don Ruy 
 That the hilt of the dagger irks the knight, 
 
 And he whispers, " Speedily, 
 We shall come to the hill where the gibbet 
 stands, 
 
 'Tis there that I would be." 
 
 Oh ! then, a surging tide of joy 
 
 Swept over the brave knight, 
 As the hill with its beams and pillars black 
 
 He glimpsed in the white moonlight. 
 
 Soon the trembling horse was standing, 
 
 All foam-flecked on the hill, 
 And noiselessly the hanged man 
 
 From the crupper slid to fill 
 
 The duties of a well-trained squire 
 
 He held the knight's stirrup, 
 With his black tongue pointing 'twixt his teeth 
 
 And his gray skull gazing up. 
 
 " Sir, do me now the great favour 
 
 To hang me there once more 
 From the beam wherefrom you cut me down 
 
 For the Lord's sake I implore." 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 71 
 
 And now the brave knight once again 
 
 With ghastly horror shook ; 
 " I hang you for the Lord's sake, I ? " 
 
 " Yea, hang me, Sir, I look 
 
 To you for this, 'tis the Lord's will 
 
 And Hers that hath His love." 
 Then the knight got from off his steed 
 
 And followed the man above. 
 
 And behold beneath the beam they stood, 
 
 Those others hanged around ; 
 The moon descended and there was 
 
 Not the least earthly sound. 
 
 Don Ruy looked now upon the beam, 
 Whence the piece of cord yet swayed, 
 
 That with his sword he cut, " and how 
 Can I hang you here ? " he said ; 
 
 " With my hand I cannot reach the cord, 
 
 Nor hoist you there alone." 
 " Sir," said the man, " there should lie near 
 
 A roll of cordage thrown ; 
 
 One end you will tie unto this knot 
 
 That is around my neck, 
 The other cast across the beam, 
 
 And the cord it will not break, 
 
72 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 When with your strength you hoist me up." 
 
 Then both sought for the roll ; 
 'Twas the hanged man that discovered it, 
 
 Unrolled, and brought the whole 
 
 To the knight, who did him off his gloves, 
 
 And by the hanged man taught, 
 One end of the cord to the hanged man's neck 
 
 In the noose he firmly wrought, 
 
 The other upward vigorous threw 
 
 Well over the beam it passed, 
 And nigh to the ground it wavering hung ; 
 
 Then the knight planted fast 
 
 His feet in the dark and brittle soil, 
 
 Hoisting with all his might : 
 Till the man once more swung as before ; 
 
 Then he cried, " Have I done right ? " 
 
 Slow, slow and sinking came the voice 
 Above from the gibbet's beam 
 
 Two vultures waked that slept thereon 
 " Sir, I am as doth beseem." 
 
 Then to make all fast Don Ruy did wind 
 The cord round the pillar of stone, 
 
 Then upward gazed upon the face 
 Of Heaven's champion. 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 73 
 
 Rigid already, as before, 
 
 That face was hanging down 
 Beneath the falling tresses black, 
 
 Quite stiff the feet were grown ; 
 
 In his breast the dagger yet was nailed 
 
 " What more remains to do ? " 
 Quoth the knight ; then a whisper from above 
 
 Came, " Sir, I beg of you 
 
 That when to Segovia you come, 
 
 To our Lady you will tell 
 The manner of our adventure, 
 
 Faithful as all befell ; 
 
 Since through Her mercy for my soul 
 
 Now is a favour due, 
 In exchange for that by Her command 
 
 My body hath wrought for you." 
 
 Then knew Don Ruy de Cardenas 
 
 He was rescued by Her care ; 
 He kneeled upon the ground of death 
 
 And offered a heartborn prayer 
 
 For the soul of the dead who had died again, 
 
 That it should enter bliss ; 
 Then he leaped upon his eager steed, 
 
 Free from all heaviness. 
 
74 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 Now was the morning growing clear, 
 As he passed St Mauros way, 
 
 And pealing were the Matin bells 
 As he kneeled in disarray 
 
 At the altar of Our Lady, 
 
 His Holy Godmother, 
 And thanked Her with warm flowing tears 
 
 For deliverance from the snare 
 
 That had lured him unto Cabril 
 
 And then to Her he swore 
 That to like evil thoughts of sin 
 
 He would open his heart no more. 
 
 VIII 
 
 Now at that hour in Cabril, 
 
 With wide-eyed wonder fraught, 
 
 The Lord of Lara every nook 
 Of his shady garden sought ; 
 
 For when at dawn he had applied 
 His ear to the chamber door, 
 
 Where the past night with careful hand 
 He had locked his Leonore, 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 75 
 
 He hastened to the flow'ry bed 
 
 Beneath the balcony, 
 Where agasp and bleeding or a corpse 
 
 He thought to find Don Ruy. 
 
 But when he found him not, he sought 
 
 Each bush and flow'ry bed, 
 Nay, every shadow probed he close 
 
 That might conceal the dead ; 
 
 Yet found him not, though well he knew, 
 That with sure hand he drave 
 
 The dagger deep into his heart 
 No mortal power could save. 
 
 He knew him well, it was the knight, 
 
 So gay, so debonair, 
 With hand on girdle, face upraised, 
 
 And plume that danced on air. 
 
 And the mightiest marvel yet was this, 
 That the body stabbed, although 
 
 Heavy, inert it fell, yet left 
 No mark on the ground below, 
 
 Where the strip of slender lilies ran 
 
 Beneath the balcony 
 Not a flower was crushed, all stood erect, 
 
 A miracle to see. 
 
76 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 Now a sudden panic fills his soul 
 
 And wildly now he races 
 Down terrace, avenue, yew-paths, 
 
 Seeking the least small traces 
 
 A footprint or a stain of blood 
 On the fine sand nothing there ! 
 
 Order and neatness well-kept paths 
 And silence everywhere. 
 
 The evening fell and Lara's lord, 
 
 Bent low and secretly, 
 Took horse, and to Segovia rode, 
 
 Devoured with mystery. 
 
 He passed into his palace 
 
 By the secret orchard ways, 
 And straight he climbed to the lofty place, 
 
 Whence he was wont to gaze 
 
 Across the square, and looked to see 
 
 What sable hangings draped 
 Don Ruy de Cardenas' closed house, 
 
 But all the windows gaped 
 
 Wide open on him, at the door 
 
 An idle stable-boy 
 Tuned a guitar, then sang a song 
 
 That told of lovers' joy. 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 77 
 
 No house of mourning this could be, 
 
 Where thus the menials play ; 
 Then to the dining-hall he went 
 
 And clapped hands angrily 
 
 Calling for supper now he sits 
 
 In his chair of carven leather, 
 And with his steward deigns to drink 
 
 A cup of wine together ; 
 
 Then draws his fingers through his beard, 
 Calls a smile to his sombre face, 
 
 And asks, " How wags the world in town 
 Through all these summer days ? " 
 
 " Right well, my lord, yet nought of new," 
 
 The bowing steward replies. 
 " No knight found wounded by the road, 
 
 That now a-dying lies ? " 
 
 " No, my lord, no, no knight was found," 
 
 Quoth the steward, very loth 
 To undeceive and be dismissed 
 
 With the rumbling of an oath. 
 
 Nightlong the lord of Lara paced 
 
 His marble galleries, 
 Ever revolving in his mind 
 
 One mighty mystery 
 
78 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 " How could a man whose heart was pierced 
 
 Times one and two and three, 
 And in his breast the dagger nailed, 
 
 Yet breathe and live and be ? " 
 
 When morning dawned, in ample cloak 
 
 All muffled, he descended 
 Into the square, and to the house 
 
 Of the stabbed knight he wended. 
 
 There to and fro without he walked, 
 Till he heard the crier's horn, 
 
 Where he stood to read from out a scroll- 
 But barkened not for scorn 
 
 Of all pertained not to his case, 
 
 Then suddenly bethought him 
 That perchance he of the knight discoursed, 
 
 Ran forward and besought him 
 
 That he again should read the scroll ; 
 
 But he would not and departed 
 With his white staff beating on the stones ; 
 
 Then the Lord of Lara started 
 
 Again to run to the knight's house, 
 A muffled villainy, 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 79 
 
 When walking to our Lady's church 
 
 And smiling airily, 
 In jerkin bright and scarlet plume 
 
 He met the dead Don Ruy. 
 
 Fresh as the morning's self he twirls 
 
 A stick of golden tassel ; 
 Then with halting, aged steps, and eyes 
 
 That not for the sun's rays dazzle, 
 
 The Lord of Lara seeks his house, 
 
 And by the entrance gate 
 Meets his old chaplain, who forthwith 
 
 Strange happenings doth relate ; 
 
 How the past night on Gallows Hill, 
 
 When the Corregidor 
 Had thither gone on duty bent, 
 
 All to prepare before 
 
 The feast of the Twelve Apostles, 
 
 He had found in a hanged man's breast, 
 
 A dagger nailed up to the hilt 
 " Was this some vile rogue's jest ? 
 
 Or was it vengeance that to quench 
 
 Not even death availed ? " 
 And yet more marvellous, the corpse 
 
 From the gibbet had been haled 
 
80 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 Through some garden of sweet-scented blooms 
 
 And herbs of tender leaf ; 
 For these to the old rags clinging were ; 
 
 Strange strange beyond belief 
 
 And yet the truth, since he himself 
 
 With his own eyes had seen all, 
 Had seen the corpse with a new rope hanged. 
 
 These words his lord appal, 
 
 And in an anguish of suspense, 
 
 Hands trembling, hair on end, 
 To the Gallows Hill he hastens off, 
 
 Whom his chaplain must attend 
 
 Astounded, breathless, at his side, 
 
 And when the Hill they gain, 
 Lo ! a concourse of the townsfolk 
 
 Looks on the dead man slain. 
 
 For the lord of Lara all step back 
 
 He hurls him to the crest, 
 And there in the air the stabbed man swings 
 
 With his dagger in his breast ! 
 
 Then unto Cabril with bowed head 
 
 He gallops panic-stricken, 
 And yellows fast and pines away, 
 
 As one with fever stricken. 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 81 
 
 Far from his fair young wife he walked 
 
 In the gloomy garden ways, 
 Somewhat he muttered to the wind, 
 
 He groped as in a maze 
 
 Upon the ground, until one morn 
 
 A serving-maid that passed 
 From the fountain, with her pitcher filled, 
 
 Stared when she saw aghast ; 
 
 Beneath the balcony he lay 
 With his nails in the lily bed 
 
 Deep-raked the soil where he had digged 
 Dead slayer of the dead. 
 
 IX 
 
 From these sad memories to be free 
 
 Went the Donna Leonore, 
 Heiress of all her lord possessed, 
 
 To Segovia once more. 
 
 And now she knew that brave Don Ruy 
 Had 'scaped the ambush set, 
 
 But dared not trust her yearning heart, 
 While she was mourning yet. 
 
 F 
 
82 A FRIEND IN NEED 
 
 Therefore through half-drawn blinds she 
 peeped, 
 
 In hidden loveliness, 
 Watching him cross the square her eyes 
 
 Were wet and weariless ; 
 
 And when he entered in the Church 
 
 Down sank she on the knee, 
 And none there was that prayed so long, 
 
 So fervently as she. 
 
 And afterward, one Sunday morn, 
 
 In a robe of purple hue, 
 Down her palace steps she went at last, 
 
 Pale with divine and new 
 
 Emotion, trod the flags of the square, ' 
 Passed through the Church's door 
 
 Don Ruy de Cardenas was there 
 Low kneeling down before 
 
 The altar, whereupon was laid 
 
 His votive, fresh bouquet 
 Carnations yellow, saffron, white, 
 
 Such brought he every day. 
 
 At the sound of her silks he raised his eyes 
 With hope full of heavenly grace, 
 
A FRIEND IN NEED 83 
 
 As though an angel called him she 
 Kneeled with pale raptured face 
 
 And heaving breasts, that not more pale 
 
 Than the waxen torches were, 
 Yet the swallows darting through the aisles, 
 
 Methinks less happy were. 
 
 Before that altar they were wed, 
 
 On the same slabs did kneel, 
 When fourteen hundred had grown old 
 
 And the kingdom of Castile 
 
 Was by those mighty Princes ruled, 
 
 Isabella, Ferdinand, 
 
 Through whom the Lord great wonders 
 wrought 
 
 By sea and eke by land. 
 
 Yet the conquered seas of the Genoese, 
 
 Nay, his America, 
 Less wondrous are than what befell 
 
 Hard by Segovia. 
 
THE WINDOW IN HEAVEN 
 
 ON EARTH, IN ROME 
 
 Cceli fenestra facia es (Anthem of Mary, 
 Queen of Angels) 
 
 WELL worth, well worth, 
 
 Is a friend upon earth, 
 
 On him ye shall set store ; 
 
 But who hath the love 
 
 Of a Saint above 
 
 Hath a friend and somewhat more. 
 
 Yet even, yet even, 
 A Saint in Heaven, 
 Be he friend or be he foe, 
 Hath less of might 
 Than the Virgin bright, 
 To work ye weal or woe. 
 
 Now this tale I tell, 
 How it befell 
 
 84 
 
THE WINDOW IN HEAVEN 85 
 
 To Ambrose, Sacristan, 
 Who held Her sweeter 
 Than stern St Peter, 
 That every Christian man 
 
 May somewhat know 
 
 Of the powers that flow 
 
 From our Lady of Beauty and Pity, 
 
 Wherewithal She wardeth 
 
 And straitly guardeth 
 
 Those of Her Amity. 
 
 In the Burgh of Rome 
 
 Is St Peter's Dome, 
 
 Where the faithful bend the knee, 
 
 And with best of oil 
 
 Their sins assoil 
 
 For they know who holds the Key. 
 
 Now the lamps that shine 
 
 Before each shrine 
 
 Are the symbol of prayers that rise, 
 
 And all together 
 
 Should burn for ever 
 
 In clear and steadfast wise. 
 
 That antient man, 
 The Sacristan, 
 
86 THE WINDOW IN HEAVEN 
 
 Within whose charge these were, 
 
 Trimmed all and tended, 
 
 But most he bended 
 
 O'er one with love and care 
 
 This was the Lamp 
 
 That bare for stamp 
 
 The Queen of Angels' Face, 
 
 As it swung divine 
 
 On its silver line 
 
 In Her most holy Place. 
 
 But on a day 
 
 It chanced, perfay, 
 
 As the shades of evening crept 
 
 Through aisle and choir, 
 
 That the golden fire 
 
 In the Virgin's lamp uplept ; 
 
 Then sunk full low, 
 
 As if to show 
 
 How She did lack for oil ; 
 
 Which when he knew 
 
 That Antient flew, 
 
 To aid her in this coil. 
 
 By St Peter's shrine 
 To the Most Divine, 
 
THE WINDOW IN HEAVEN 87 
 
 As he hasted, the mighty blaze 
 
 From the lamp of Peter 
 
 Made stay his feet ere 
 
 They had passed without his rays. 
 
 Quoth he: " Of a troth 
 
 He will not be loth," 
 
 As he dipped with trembling hands : 
 
 " Lo the saints' elder Brother 
 
 But lends God's Mother 
 
 That whereof in need She stands " 
 
 Then his earthen bowl 
 He emptied whole 
 Into Her silvery cup 
 Right fair and steady 
 Her mild light shed She, 
 And Her carven Shrine lit up. 
 
 But a felon deed 
 
 To St Peter's greed 
 
 Seemed the oil from his lamp outpoured, 
 
 Though the loss but slight was 
 
 And sad the plight was 
 
 Of the Mother of his Lord. 
 
 For to him most great 
 Did seem his state 
 
88 THE WINDOW IN HEAVEN 
 
 Within his church at Rome 
 He raged and sorrowed 
 When Ambrose borrowed 
 What to him of right had come. 
 
 Whiles the antient slept, 
 That night, he stept 
 From the Door of Paradise, 
 And in voice of thunder 
 That pious plunder 
 Rebuked he in this wise : 
 
 " Wherefore," quoth he, 
 
 " Did ye steal from me 
 
 A measure of mine oil ? " 
 
 " I did but borrow 
 
 Until the morrow, 
 
 To aid Her in Her coil." 
 
 Made answer Peter, 
 " A million greet Her, 
 From Gaul to Muscovy ; 
 But here in Rome, 
 Beneath my Dome, 
 'Tis / am First, not She. 
 
 Lo my House is here, 
 My Tomb is near, 
 
THE WINDOW IN HEAVEN 89 
 
 Wherein my body lies, 
 
 Which is that block 
 
 Of sainted Rock 
 
 Whereon Christ's Churches rise. 
 
 Here have I lordship, 
 
 And here have worship 
 
 Before all Saints in Heaven, 
 
 Nor will I suffer 
 
 That to Another 
 
 Aught of mine oil be given. 
 
 Behold! Behold! 
 This Key I hold, 
 That openeth Heaven's Door ! 
 None passeth there, 
 Save by my care 
 Of this be very sure ; 
 
 And if peradventure 
 
 Thou wouldest venture 
 
 (With most of hardihood), 
 
 Ere thou art come nigh me 
 
 That dost defy me, 
 
 I will lock Heaven's Door of wood." 
 
 Thus spake St Peter, 
 And swift his feet were 
 
90 THE WINDOW IN HEAVEN 
 
 To the Door of Paradise, 
 (Lest the Snake of Eden, 
 That lurketh hidden 
 Should pass in Angel's guise). 
 
 Then full of dread 
 Rose from his bed 
 Ambrose, with little cheer ; 
 Right swiftly fared he 
 To Church and cared he 
 For him whom he did fear. 
 
 Small the hope he felt 
 
 That he should melt 
 
 That Rock, for all his care ; 
 
 Yet his lamp he burnished, 
 
 With oil it furnished, 
 
 And many a mumbled prayer. 
 
 Now when this was ended, 
 Her shrine he tended, 
 Whom most his heart did love ; 
 And " For thee, dear Lady," 
 Quoth he, " I've made me 
 A grievous foe above. 
 
 Wrath is the Warden 
 Of Heaven's Garden 
 
THE WINDOW IN HEAVEN 91 
 
 That from him I took for Thee ; 
 
 And alace ! alace ! 
 
 Before my face 
 
 Heaven's Door will close on me. 
 
 Tell me, sweet Lady, 
 What help there may be 
 In my most grievous case 
 For no man mortal 
 May pass Heaven's Portal, 
 Save by St Peter's grace." 
 
 No answer made She, 
 
 By day, Sweet Lady, 
 
 But behold when he lay abed 
 
 That night most bright 
 
 Was a golden light 
 
 In his poor chamber shed ; 
 
 And in robe most clear, 
 
 Like the heavenly Sphere, 
 
 She smiled on her antient Steward, 
 
 And all his trouble 
 
 Her comfortable 
 
 And dove-soft voice conjured. 
 
 Thus to Ambrose spake She, 
 " Right joyful make thee, 
 
92 THE WINDOW IN HEAVEN 
 
 Rest faithful to the end ; 
 For none may harm thee, 
 While My Love warm thee, 
 And first My Lamp thou tend. 
 
 Vainly Saint Peter 
 
 Shall stay thy feet ere 
 
 They tread the Heaven's Hall 
 
 Not his to hinder 
 
 That thou shouldst win there, 
 
 If on My Name thou call. 
 
 He telleth truth, 
 
 'Tis very sooth, 
 
 He holdeth the Key indeed ; 
 
 But when the Door he 
 
 Shall close before thee, 
 
 Be mindful of My Rede ; 
 
 Yea, mind thee well 
 
 What mine Anthems tell, 
 
 How I am the Window of Heaven 
 
 I will open to thee 
 
 That lovst Me truly, 
 
 And thou shallst enter in. 
 
 Thus aid I ever 
 
 My Friend's endeavour 
 
THE WINDOW IN HEAVEN 93 
 
 For the Door of Heaven is strait, 
 And St Peter's pride will 
 Endure no bridle 
 But My Love's Window is great." 
 
 Then Ambrose joyed, 
 
 By Her Rede upbuoyed, 
 
 And the Vision passed away, 
 
 And he fell a-praying, 
 
 Singing and saying 
 
 Her praise by night and day. 
 
 And after always 
 
 His joy, his solace, 
 
 Was first Her Lamp to fill 
 
 And every Saint there 
 
 Would willing lend Her, 
 
 Save one, who thought it ill. 
 
 But small heed payed he, 
 
 Save to his Lady, 
 
 That Her Shrine be first in Honour 
 
 (Let St Peter rage, 
 
 Now he hath Her gage, 
 
 He will lavish his love upon Her). 
 
 For right sure was he then 
 That Saints in Heaven 
 
94 THE WINDOW IN HEAVEN 
 
 Yea, the hosts of Heaven above 
 No wrong may wreak there 
 On those that seek Her 
 With faith and zeal and love. 
 
 II 
 
 NIGH HEAVEN'S DOOR 
 
 SEE Ambrose shriven 
 At door of Heaven, 
 With a mighty Company, 
 That crave an entry 
 Of Heaven's grim Sentry 
 (Right few the chosen be !) 
 
 By the Door of cedar 
 
 Frowneth St Peter, 
 
 In his hand the golden Key, 
 
 And Gabriel, 
 
 And Israfel 
 
 Bear swords of Ministry. 
 
 Lo, the great Key turneth, 
 The vast crowd yearneth, 
 Loud creak those silvery hinges, 
 And those that pray there 
 
THE WINDOW IN HEAVEN 95 
 
 Draw nigh as they dare 
 
 To the blue and golden inches. 
 
 Ambrose with these, 
 
 But the Saint's eyes freeze, 
 
 Quoth he : " Here cometh one 
 
 That did steal mine oil, 
 
 Yet would tread Heaven's soil, 
 
 Avaunt ! thou base Felon ! 
 
 Go, get thee hence 
 
 And in penitence 
 
 Thy felony atone ; 
 
 Nor again draw nigh me 
 
 That dared defy me, 
 
 Ere all Time's years are flown." 
 
 When the few are chosen 
 The door claps close then 
 (Heaven's thunder heard below) 
 And all their groaning, 
 Their prayers and moaning ; 
 Move not St Peter's woe. 
 
 Ambrose bethought him 
 Of the Rede She taught him 
 (By the Queen of Angels given), 
 And swift his feet were 
 
96 THE WINDOW IN HEAVEN 
 
 From stern St Peter, 
 
 To seek Her Window in Heaven. 
 
 But he might not find it, 
 (For eld nigh blinded 
 And dazed for the shine 
 From myriad jewel 
 That sparkled cruel 
 On the battlements divine). 
 
 Then he prayed : " O Virgin, 
 'Tis vain I search in 
 Heaven's jewelled crevices : 
 Where Thy Window lieth 
 No eye espyeth : 
 Now aid Thou my distress." 
 
 Then with strands all golden 
 
 A ladder f olden 
 
 Rolled downward from above, 
 
 And a voice full sweet 
 
 Him seemed to greet, 
 
 Like the voice of a woodland dove : 
 
 " Ambrose, behold, 
 My ladder of gold, 
 I have let fall for thee, 
 That leadeth in through 
 
THE WINDOW IN HEAVEN 97 
 
 My jewelled Window : 
 Haste thou to come to Me." 
 
 Then with trembling hands 
 
 He clasps the strands, 
 
 And his old bowed legs aquiver; 
 
 But light more light 
 
 Than the lark's his flight, 
 
 Whom Mary would deliver. 
 
 Before Her Throne 
 
 Now he falleth prone 
 
 She smiles, the Angels' Queen 
 
 (Her robe he knew 
 
 Of Heaven's blue, 
 
 And the twinkling stars between). 
 
 " Ambrose, fear not, 
 
 For thou are got, 
 
 Where none can harm thee more ; 
 
 Lo ! all wide Heaven 
 
 To thee is given 
 
 Thou art past St Peter's Door." 
 
THE HERBARY OF PADUA 
 
 TO THE HONBLE. 
 
 WILLIAM PEEL. 
 
 ELDEST of the world's old gardens, 
 
 Ocean-lapped Hesperides ! 
 Dragons are thy faithful wardens ; 
 
 I will throw no sop to these. 
 
 Sown with magic seedlings shaken 
 
 From Europa's blossomy dress, 
 By the godlike bull uptaken, 
 
 Exquisite in her distress, 
 Somewhere blooms an old-world garden, 
 
 Out of seeing of mine eyes, 
 When the snows of winter harden, 
 
 But in summer clear it lies. 
 (Rose leaves of the days departed, 
 
 Day of days of summer's pride, 
 Single-heart to single-hearted 
 
 Closer by the rose-roots tied !) 
 
 Gardens of the world, how often 
 Have ye wrought in me the mood 
 
 Woven of rays that roses soften 
 When To Be is very good ! 
 
THE HERBARY OF PADUA 99 
 
 O the cool, green English summer 
 
 Lawn and garden, manor-house, 
 Beauty welcomes the newcomer 
 
 Beauty that hath youth to spouse ! 
 This in England most to praise is 
 
 Beauty budding more and more- 
 Beauty, buttercups and daisies, 
 
 Blossoming at every door ! 
 
 But the garden that I tell of 
 
 Lies at Padua, far away, 
 Weaves her charm, compounds her spell of 
 
 Art and Science, grave and gay. 
 Venice shone in vernal glory, 
 
 Fifteen hundred yet was young, 
 When began this garden's story ; 
 
 Simples first, then flowers, sprung. 
 For Venetians truly laid the 
 
 First of seed-beds Barbaro, 
 Foscarini, Bonafede 
 
 These be Venice names, I trow. 
 Ducats gave the Doge and blessing 
 
 Aquileia's Patriarch 
 Screamed as eagles will, caressing 
 
 Roared the Lion of St Mark. 
 Thus the garden first was founded, 
 
 Chiefly for the body's weal 
 
100 THE HERBARY OF PADUA 
 
 Doge Donato's gold abounded, 
 
 When Fallopio taught to heal, 
 Notomy and leechcraft teaching 
 
 But the Doge bade him take heed, 
 Lest that overmuch of leeching 
 
 Slay the flower to save the weed. 
 When Fallopio had departed 
 
 On the road that all men take, 
 Anguillara, single-hearted, 
 
 Laboured all for beauty's sake ; 
 Statuas of saints and sages 
 
 Did he artfully dispose : 
 Chrysostom made friends with Thales, 
 
 Reconciled beneath the rose ! 
 Goddess Flora met Priapus, 
 
 Lover's errand bent upon : 
 Quick she runs to ^Esculapius ! 
 
 Soon the garden god is flown ; 
 For St Antony of Padua 
 
 Rising from the loamy sod 
 Drives him forth a shrieking statua 
 
 Set a saint to catch a god ! 
 But enough of antique fable, 
 
 I would sing of what I know, 
 And to urge the Muse is able 
 
 Melchior Guilandino. 
 For to wander did he cherish, 
 
 Ere he filled the Paduan chair ; 
 
THE HERfiARY OF. PADUA 101 
 
 Twice beheld the Phoenix perish, 
 
 Flaming in the Afric air. 
 Seeking for the herb Nepenthe, 
 
 That he might forget the cry 
 Which the mandrake utters when he 
 
 Is uprooted suddenly, 
 He was seized upon this mission 
 
 In the cause of medicine 
 Such the grim fates' grim derision 
 
 By the pirates Algerine ; 
 Forced to labour at the galleys, 
 
 All his eloquence was vain 
 They received his witty sallies 
 
 In a way that gave him pain. 
 So he toiled and brave withstood the 
 
 Blows of fate, until a friend 
 Payed two hundred golden scudi, 
 
 Brought his bondage to an end, 
 Brought his bondage, not his sorrow : 
 
 All but touched Italia' s shore, 
 Fell a tempest, on the morrow, 
 
 Nude in Barbary once more, 
 Must he crave a gracious crossing, 
 
 Proffering in his despair 
 For the privilege of tossing 
 
 Once again in Ocean's care, 
 All he had, which was but zero, 
 
 All he hoped, a mine of gold, 
 
102 TEE EERRARY OF PADUA 
 
 For his motto it was " spero," 
 
 And his heart was firm and bold. 
 When to Genoa wafted safely 
 
 By the wind and by the wave, 
 From his patrons he did crave the 
 
 Keeping of the pledge he gave. 
 Corpo Baeco ! bella Storia ! 
 
 As he made his buffets known, 
 Quoth Grimaldi, echoed Doria, 
 
 And they made his pledge their own 
 Gilded the brown sail that bore him, 
 
 Filled his purse, his body clad, 
 Blew fame's brazen trumpet o'er him 
 
 Melchior was passing glad. 
 Buffets yesterday a-plenty 
 
 Fortune dealt him, but to-day 
 Favours ten nor favours twenty, 
 
 Fickle jade, her hand can stay ! 
 By Girolamo Priuli, 
 
 Doge of Venice, Melchior bid, 
 Took the road to Venice truly 
 
 Marvelling at what favours hid 
 Underneath such mighty sending : 
 
 " Vagrant lover of the flowers, 
 Padua's garden asks thy tending, 
 
 Thou shallst know but sunny hours 
 Nor henceforth have need to wander, 
 For beneath the tropic trees 
 
THE HERBARY OF PADUA 103 
 
 Of the garden thou shallst ponder 
 
 Upon nature's mysteries." 
 Thus was Melchior's fate befitting, 
 
 And we say farewell to him 
 By the agnus castus l sitting 
 
 In the Cinque Cento dim. 
 Shall I chronicle the wardens, 
 
 Careful noting one by one 
 Just what each did for the garden's 
 
 Welfare ? 'twere a task well done ; 
 But Roberto Visiani 
 
 Writing sixty years ago 
 Hath made record of the herbary, 
 
 Told me all I want to know, 
 And a great deal more beside it ; 
 
 Well I wot that this is verse, 
 And that ye may yet abide it, 
 
 I shall not again rehearse 
 All that happened in the circle, 
 
 Planted round with ancient trees 
 Every year a greener girdle, 
 
 As the years grew centuries. 
 Glide we o'er much time together, 
 
 Come to seventeen-seventy-four, 
 Fell an August hail that never 
 
 Fell in Padua, and tore 
 
 1 The oldest tree still alive in the garden at Padua. 
 
104 THE HERBARY OF PADUA 
 
 Herbs and blossoms from their station, 
 
 Broke a thousand panes of glass, 
 Everywhere wrought desolation, 
 
 Caused the good Benato pass 
 All the miseries of Hades, 
 
 As he gazed upon a sight, 
 Which the God of Dreams had made his 
 
 Blackest nightmare of the night. 
 But all gardens are immortal, 
 
 Bud again with newcome spring, 
 And ere long an open portal 
 
 Welcomed great ones entering in : 
 Margarita of Savoia 
 
 Dined with learned Paduans here ; 
 To the German poet Goethe 
 
 Was this gnarled bignonia dear, 
 Trailing o'er the wall and greeting 
 
 As a brother Goethe's palm, 
 Which points upward to the fleeting 
 
 Clouds in oriental calm. 
 
 Paduan herbary, trickling fountains, 
 Quiet walks where few men come, 
 
 Mighty cedars from the mountains, 
 Marble statues, mossy, dumb ! 
 
 Ye be all dear friends to dreamers 
 What need we of mortal speech 
 
THE HERBARY OF PADUA 105 
 
 That for nothing now are schemers ? 
 
 Each but asks for space from each, 
 Let each man but do his duty, 
 
 Growing as the cedars may, 
 Death shall garner age and beauty, 
 
 Even agnus castus slay. 
 Quiet Paduan garden yonder, 
 
 Thanks ! ye gave me joy and peace : 
 Finding these I will not wander 
 
 Further for the Golden Fleece. 
 
THE VAMPIRE AND THE DOVE 
 
 I DREAMED I saw a Vampire seize a Dove, 
 Chief Chariot-bearer of the Car of Love. 
 Her feathers ivory white did strew the ground, 
 Her neck that with her glossy head was crowned 
 Shewed a red wound where Vampire's lips were 
 
 pressed, 
 
 Languid it drooped upon her panting breast. 
 I dreamed I woke, I dreamed the dream was 
 
 true, 
 
 I dreamed, beloved, that the Dove was you. 
 I dreamed I dreamed again, and, lo ! the brand 
 Of Perseus sudden came into my hand ; 
 I dreamed I plunged it in the Vampire's side 
 Up to the hilt ; I dreamed the Vampire died, 
 With horrid quivering of its leathery wings, 
 With claws all blooded and with mouth that 
 
 stings, 
 Fallen from my Dove ; I dreamed a woman's 
 
 face 
 
 Glared upward on me from the Vampire's place. 
 But for the Dove her gentle head upraised 
 Resumed perfection, cooingly she praised 
 
 106 
 
THE VAMPIRE AND THE DOVE 107 
 
 This deed of mine, with wounded neck come 
 
 whole, 
 While from her eyes shone forth on mine your 
 
 soul. 
 
 No more I dreamed, but woke and waking knew, 
 O my beloved, that the dream was true. 
 
THE LILY AND THE SERPENT 
 
 QUATRAINS 
 
 SEE where she passes, laughter-loving eyes, 
 Brown diamonds set in flesh like flushing skies, 
 When dawn is white, her little perfect head 
 Poised on its stem aslant in lily wise. 
 
 Beware, beware the rosebud of her mouth, 
 Wherefrom the jocund voicing of the south 
 Comes tinkling as a peal of silver bells 
 Who tastes of this shall know the desert's 
 drouth ! 
 
 What of her body ? Slim, nor over tall : 
 Where all is perfect, I have told ye all : 
 Wherefore dethrone the gods that dwell in 
 
 heaven, 
 Or hurl the Paphian from her pedestal ? 
 
 Ah ! when her draperies on the breezes float, 
 Is she most ravishing, and every note 
 She speaks is music. Ay, her common speech 
 Soars upward as the song from skylark's throat. 
 
 108 
 
THE LILY AND THE SERPENT 109 
 
 Turn we the medal, cease a while our praise ; 
 Now mark the serpent take the lily's place : 
 Yea, serpents write their cunning arabesque, 
 Wreathing in circles round her radiant face. 
 
 Mark well the serpents glittering in her eyes, 
 Her voice, Medusa's, uttering only lies ; 
 Her body is of little serpents made, 
 Only in lore of evil is she wise. 
 
 Here be two shadows thrown upon the screen 
 The Lily and the Serpent, white or green : 
 Choose ye the one, or choosing both, choose right, 
 Since both she is, being but an Undine. 
 
 Child of the woods and waters, vain to find 
 Soul in her eyes or pity in her mind ; 
 Never she looks upon the starry sky, 
 Alas ! to things celestial she is blind. 
 
 Content ye then to watch her comb her curls, 
 Where round her rock the foam-flecked torrent 
 
 swirls ; 
 
 Venture not nigh, for she would draw ye down 
 And hang your souls about her neck for pearls. 
 
THE SYREN 
 
 You have an eye whose glance is love's, 
 
 A neck like a lily's stem ; 
 You have a voice more rare than dove's 
 
 And a body like a gem. 
 All these you have and add to these 
 
 Your mind of many hues 
 That kindles genius when you please, 
 
 But kills it when you choose. 
 For in your mind a serpent lies, 
 
 Now drowsing, now alert : 
 Bit by its fangs your lover dies, 
 
 And you laugh at his mortal hurt. 
 Thou must have been a Syren once 
 
 That sang beside the sea, 
 Then tore the soul from the charmed dunce 
 
 Who looked for love from thee. 
 Perchance it is because to thee 
 
 No soul the gods have given 
 That thou tearest the lover's soul from me, 
 
 Who to win thy love have striven. 
 There is a legend of the East 
 
 That tells of the soul's award, 
 no 
 
THE SYREN 111 
 
 How its every deed from best to least 
 
 For future lives is stored. 
 Now when I die my deeds will shew 
 
 How we wasted my golden gifts ; 
 Strown on the seashore, high and low, 
 
 They shift as the sea-sand shifts. 
 Wasted and ruined utterly, 
 
 I shall pay for my ruined soul, 
 That I gave to a Syren of the sea, 
 
 Gave to her claws' control. 
 Now what can it serve that here I tell 
 
 This tale of ruined treasure ? 
 Thou hast torn my soul 'tis very well, 
 
 We will tear our bodies together. 
 
PASSION 
 
 You are more melting sweet 
 
 Than sun in mid-December ; 
 I burn from head to feet, 
 
 Grow pale as ashen ember ; 
 I carry in my soul 
 
 The thought of you for ever ; 
 Oil upon ruby coal 
 
 The hour we are together. 
 I hate you for a while, 
 
 I love you, love, for ever ; 
 Heaven opens when you smile, 
 
 Hell when we have to sever. 
 
 112 
 
METAPHORS 
 
 I GAZE upon the rolling sea, 
 
 I wander through the town, 
 I search the heavens for glimpse of thee, 
 
 I wander on the down. 
 And do I find thee ? Yea, my love, 
 
 For thou art everywhere ; 
 Thy lightsome veils float far above, 
 
 White cloudlets in the air ; 
 Thy form and features flower the land, 
 
 Thy garb of blue and green 
 Flows rippling o'er the golden sand, 
 
 To robe thee Mermaid Queen. 
 All these, what are they ? Shades that fill 
 
 The hollows of thy throne ; 
 They are but Nature striving still, 
 
 Thou art thyself, alone. 
 
 113 
 
METAMORPHOSIS 
 
 How I wish that I could be 
 
 Like to you, green willow tree ! 
 Ah ! your graceful willow bough, 
 
 It is bending o'er me now. 
 Babe at springtide, youth in May, 
 
 Manhood every summer's day ! 
 Ladies I should love ye well, 
 
 Ere the chills of autumn fell ; 
 Then a gray-beard, grim, precise, 
 
 I should be October wise, 
 Pass November at the club, 
 
 Feet uplifted to the hub ; 
 In December take to bed ; 
 
 New- Year's Day, I should be dead ! 
 Wreathe me, ladies, in my shroud, 
 
 Sing a dirge, not over loud ; 
 Lay me not in coffin close, 
 
 Strow upon me leaves of rose ; 
 Leave me lying where ye find me, 
 
 Fairy folk will come and mind me. 
 Just when snow-drops through the snow, 
 
 Modest maids, pale faces show, 
 
 114 
 
METAMORPHOSIS 115 
 
 Ye shall hear an infant cry ; 
 
 Ladies, fear not, it is I ! 
 When the crocus through the mould 
 
 Thrusts his spear of yellow gold, 
 In February's glinting sun, 
 
 I shall toddle, I shall run. 
 Ladies in the schoolroom search, 
 
 Noisy March will need the birch. 
 Sprouting green, an April fool, 
 
 Lo, once more I'm leaving school ; 
 Lithe of limb and bright of eye, 
 
 I shall at your bidding fly. 
 Come the merry month of May, 
 
 I shall be a lover gay, 
 London town and Paris streets, 
 
 I shall sip their sweet of sweets ; 
 With the end of lusty June, 
 
 Love will ride in heaven at noon ; 
 I shall carry everywhere 
 
 Twined tresses of the fair ; 
 On the river we shall float, 
 
 Gliding in our trim-built boat 
 Muslin Vanity and I, 
 
 Happy human butterfly, 
 Caring nought for books or art 
 
 Lovely life, like wine, will dart 
 Through my veins with ruddy cheer ; 
 
 All a life-time every year ! 
 
116 METAMORPHOSIS 
 
 Fill, July, the brimming cup ! 
 
 Fill with nectar, fill it up ! 
 Let me revel that must die 
 
 Darling, in thy bosom lie ! 
 August comes, with sheaves of gold, 
 
 Ripest fruit and perfume rolled 
 Into one most perfect whole 
 
 I do sup the summer's soul ! 
 With the first days of September, 
 
 Most I joy me to remember 
 Distant days of childhood's blisses 
 
 Youthful follies, rosebud kisses 
 In the merry month of May, 
 
 Many a fleeting hour away. 
 Rise, November, winter, rise, 
 
 Warning in your weary eyes ! 
 I will lie me down to die. 
 
 Ladies fair, good-night, good-bye. 
 Fare thee well, green willow tree, 
 
 I shall bud in spring like thee ! 
 
DAPHNE 
 
 DAPHNE, I place a diamond on thy brow, 
 
 Sole worthy thee : I have stolen the Evening 
 
 Star ! 
 O wiser, thou, than all the wise men are ! 
 
 When I do laud thy name as I would now, 
 O then doth gall with pulsing heart's blood war 
 
 And victory only to my love allow ; 
 Yet as a wayworn pilgrim from afar 
 
 Kneels at the shrine, so I fulfil my vow. 
 
 For I will laud thee, Daphne, though these lips 
 Be parched with too much longing for thy 
 
 mouth, 
 And through them but a husky murmur slips, 
 
 As of a roseless bee in summer drouth. 
 Daphne, thy name shall never know eclipse, 
 While roses bloom and winds blow from the 
 south. 
 
 117 
 
RADIUM, THE SECRET OF THE SUN 
 
 AGES agone, when first his splendour rose 
 Upon the Gardener, father of mankind, 
 And Eva clasped him trembling, as the blind 
 Whose closed portals suddenly unclose, 
 Gazed they and joyance in their hearts arose. 
 While the first morning dawned upon the mind, 
 Ages agone men knew his path assigned ; 
 Yet when he veiled his face their courage froze, 
 But yesterday men spake of how the fire, 
 Which ever rageth round his golden heart, 
 Must some day cease, like to an earthly pyre ; 
 To-day we guess the secret of his art, 
 As radiant on their way his steeds depart, 
 Winged and immortal as the soul's desire. 
 
 118 
 
PHILOSOPHY 
 
 FAIN would I climb, ere I go down to death, 
 Where Plato came and Kant and Hegel were, 
 And now the wise hold converse, but the air 
 Is tenuous for one of mortal breath ; 
 None may endure for any shibboleth, 
 The chemist's lamp grows dim upon the stair, 
 Apollo's lyre would make but discord there ; 
 No virtuous deed avails, nor any faith. 
 
 It is a lofty, ever sunlit hall, 
 Above the clouds, above the mortal fray, 
 Voyaging with the sun and free to all, 
 But very few they be that win their way. 
 Ah ! Icarus, how often doomed to fall 
 Yet those sail on serene from day to day ! 
 
 119 
 
ITALY THE ENCHANTRESS 
 
 ITALY ! Italy ! England how clear she cries, 
 
 " Come o'er the Alps again, come o'er the snow, 
 Dance through the vintage of France with the 
 
 dear free eyes, 
 
 Dance with the Nymphs of the Seine as you 
 go!" 
 
 Italy ! Italy ! why should I cling to thee, 
 Thou that hast worshippers better a score, 
 
 Poets and painters and lovers to bring to thee 
 Passionate kisses and memories of yore ? 
 
 Italy ! Italy ! I too, I love thee well, 
 
 I that have scarce touched thy cheek with my 
 lips, 
 
 Scarce seen the sun kiss thy turreted citadel, 
 Scarce seen thy smile set the world in eclipse. 
 
 Italy ! Italy ! I too was made for thee, 
 
 Changed at my birth for some child of the mist ; 
 
 I walked afar while he laughed and he played to 
 
 thee 
 Music on lutes that my fathers had kissed. 
 
 120 
 
ITALY THE ENCHANTRESS 121 
 
 Now at this last I have found and I cleave to 
 thee, 
 
 Land that my footsteps have trodden so late, 
 Well will it be if my passing may leave to thee 
 
 One northern pearl for the crown of thy state. 
 
OFF NAPLES 
 
 WE are sailing in a classic sea, 
 
 Where once Ulysses sailed ; 
 Behold above us Mercury 
 
 And Aphrodite veiled. 
 " Strange isles be these ! " dost thou not 
 know 
 
 These be the isles where sang 
 The Syrens in the long ago ? 
 
 How faint their singing rang 
 Upon the ears of the King ! 
 
 For he was very wise 
 He did not hear the Syrens sing, 
 
 Or heard them with his eyes. 
 He was tied fast unto the mast, 
 
 And wool was in his ears : 
 He saw them as his ship sailed past 
 
 And blessed the pretty dears ! 
 
 122 
 
THE LOVER'S LAMENT 
 
 (FROM THE ARABIC) 
 
 O FRIEND, draw nigh and hearken to my sorrow, 
 To the sorrow of the brother of thy tribe ! 
 And listening, ask thyself how 'tis I carry 
 Such a sorrow as would lay ten strong men low. 
 Young was I, the youngest of his children, 
 Fair as whelps of desert lion were they all. 
 When my cheek with down of manhood first was 
 
 dusky, 
 
 My father gave me manhood's treasures three : 
 A carbine and a fiery steed to bear me, 
 And the third of manhood's treasures gave he me : 
 A bride of forehead pure and eyes of night. 
 Her name alone was called as to bring blessing 
 On our tent our country's ancient name was 
 
 hers 
 
 Saida, pearl of all the Kazan's daughters. 
 But upon the page of destiny was written : 
 He shall never know but sorrow here below. 
 There came an hour whereon I had not counted, 
 The passing of the Angel of the Night, 
 
 123 
 
124 THE LOVER'S LAMENT 
 
 When his wing-tip touched Saida's forehead. 
 As a woman's was my weeping for Saida, 
 Three days long and three long nights I wept 
 
 her. 
 Then my blood boiled as the vintage of the palm 
 
 tree, 
 
 And I felt its fire that burned into my heart. 
 I wandered forth alone into the desert, 
 Seeking but for him would slay me and my pain. 
 Now at last, behold, now I have sold me, 
 Weary, weary of my misery and life, 
 I have sold me to the service of the Christian, 
 And my sorrow I have swathed in cloak of red. 
 Now I know not who is born or who shall perish, 
 Far away beneath the spreading of my tent. 
 Of a certainty the women-folk have wept me 
 As a man that hath gone down among the dead ; 
 Upon me is now my father's malediction, 
 And my brethren have denied our brotherhood. 
 But I will not turn again my footsteps homeward : 
 We are faring to the country of the South, 
 To the country of the vulture and the jackal : 
 These will know when I have fallen in the sand. 
 Tell me, tell me, who there is will lave my body ? 
 Who will weep upon the orphan-soldier's tomb ? 
 Who will know that as a dove in hands of maidens 
 All a-tremble were the pulses of my heart ? 
 Tell me this, for I am faring to the desert. 
 
"OLD LOVES OF OLD TIMES " 
 (FROM THE JAPANESE) 
 
 IN the land of Katsushika 
 
 Dwelt a maiden willow-graceful ; 
 
 As the seaweed sways in ocean 
 Was her grace in every motion. 
 
 Magic was the maiden's beauty 
 From afar men came to woo her ; 
 
 One there was that filled her fancy, 
 One alone of all that knew her. 
 
 Ofttimes bent the maid to gather 
 (White her hand as water-lily) 
 
 Drifting sea-spoil in clear waters 
 Fairest of all sun-kissed daughters. 
 
 Still the sea-wrack sways and passes 
 In Katsushika's clear waters ; 
 
 O'er her tomb hath twined the maki, 
 O'er the fairest of Earth's daughters. 
 
 125 
 
126 OLD LOVERS OF OLD TIMES 
 
 Long as pine tree knows the breezes 
 Will the tale of all her sorrow, 
 
 Piteous tale of brave heart broken, 
 Dwell within my heart unspoken. 
 
JAPONICE 
 
 i 
 THE snow falleth ever 
 
 On tall Mikane 
 At every bend 
 
 Of the winding pathway, 
 A snow-white feather. 
 
 ii 
 The sun shineth ever 
 
 On fair Yoshine 
 On every leaf 
 
 Of the glittering forest, 
 'Tis sunny weather. 
 
 in 
 
 My thoughts dwell ever 
 With thee, my dearest. 
 
 127 
 
TEUTONIC^ 
 
 WHEN you seek my grave 
 
 At the vesper's hour, 
 
 You will find it brave 
 
 With many a flower. 
 Do thou thy dark locks adorn 
 With the blossoms that are born 
 
 From my heart 
 
 Those songs I thought, but ne'er writ down, 
 Those words of love that did in passion 
 
 drown, 
 
 Ere my lips could part. 
 
 128 
 
THEN AND NOW 
 
 I SAW thee then as now, 
 
 Imperial neck and brow, 
 
 Eyes lakes of loveliness, 
 
 Gaze upward on my face. 
 
 Without, the fog lay heavy ; 
 
 Within, the room grew dim ; 
 
 Yet where thou wast was really 
 
 Eternal spring for him. 
 
 No change has thy face known, 
 
 Though we be elder grown ; 
 
 No change thine eyes and brow 
 
 As clear I see them now 
 
 Gaze up on me as when, 
 
 With love in every vein, 
 
 I worshipped and wondered 
 
 It thundered 
 The lightning strook me 
 
 Life took thee. 
 
THE OLD HOME 
 
 I CANNOT dwell at ease here 
 The ghosts flit to and fro 
 
 They creep into my fancy, 
 The ghosts of long ago. 
 
 It is not that I fear them 
 
 Sweet, weary, wistful faces- 
 Why should I fear that love them 
 Who haunt the ancient places ? 
 
 Sweet mother, rustling, rustling, 
 With silver chatelaine, 
 
 I hear your keys a- jangle, 
 I hear your voice quite plain. 
 
 My father standing yonder 
 Yet broodeth o'er his tome 
 
 I hardly like to whisper 
 He thinks I am from home. 
 
 There blows a gentle breeze now, 
 It bears my gentle sister 
 
 130 
 
THE OLD HOME 131 
 
 She was my fair confessor 
 Ah ! bitterly I missed her ! 
 
 To-day she comes not lonely, 
 For Goldilocks is with her 
 
 I remember when we lost her 
 
 All the world was like a nightmare. 
 
 And sister, loving sister, 
 
 Thinks yet on these old things ; 
 
 She has searched the land of spirits, 
 And Goldilocks she brings. 
 
 I love them all too well here, 
 
 That flitter to and fro 
 Too tenderly, too tenderly, 
 
 The ghosts of long ago. 
 
RHODANTHE'S SONG 
 
 To thee, my dear, to thee my only love, 
 
 My heart flies forth on wings, 
 Then with the lark soars up to heaven above, 
 
 Soars up to heaven and sings. 
 On me, my love, on me no brown soft feathers 
 
 Spring Hermes-like on me, 
 Yet have I wings to cleave all worldly weathers, 
 
 The wings of poesy. 
 For thee, my love, for thee I have no golden 
 
 Shower covering Danae's bed ; 
 As Phoebus, not as Zeus, I am beholden 
 
 For gift of thy bright head. 
 Thou that hast more in oval face upturning 
 
 Carven for my kiss alone, 
 In eyes and lips with lovely longings yearning, 
 
 Than Cypris on her throne, 
 Remember, O remember, my Rhodanthe, 
 
 When I am oversea, 
 
 Those be my songs that in the zephyrs fan 
 thee, 
 
 My heart I leave with thee. 
 
 132 
 
THE STAR 
 
 You move upon the earth as one 
 
 New lit from off the car 
 That God Apollo guides, the Sun 
 
 And in your hand, a Star ; 
 For in your perfect form unite 
 
 Divided hemispheres, 
 The joy of day, the bliss of night 
 
 Sun raptures, moonlit tears. 
 These words of love, I tell them o'er, 
 
 As monk his rosary 
 We know the visions we adore 
 
 Are bright Reality. 
 
 133 
 
THOUGHTS 
 
 From the French of Amiel. 
 
 EVERY thought is a bloom 
 That buds in our gloom, 
 That buds and is bright 
 In the mirk of our night, 
 That appears and is gone 
 Like a dream at the dawn. 
 Whence comes she ? None knows 
 Who can tell where she goes ? 
 
 Ah ! quick, let us treasure 
 This giver of pleasure, 
 Let us kiss and caress 
 This fair enchantress, 
 Fix her colour and shape, 
 Ere yet she escape ! 
 Every thought is a bloom 
 That shines in our gloom. 
 
 134 
 
THE MAGIC WORD 
 
 WOULD you win your young love's heart ? 
 
 Whisper just a little word 
 At the moment you must part ; 
 
 But the right word it must be, 
 Not from others overheard, 
 
 Made for her alone by thee, 
 Minted in love's treasury ; 
 
 Whisper low that little word ! 
 
 She will listen, she will know 
 
 Copper coin from ruddy gold, 
 Though the August moon sinks low, 
 
 And the mist creeps o'er the wold. 
 Therefore find the magic word, 
 
 Love will help you, sir, to find it, 
 Fresh from every lover heard, 
 
 Spring before and spring behind it ! 
 
 135 
 
WHICH IS THE DREAM ? 
 
 (FOR B. v.) 
 
 AM I a butterfly 
 
 Vermeil and golden ? 
 In rose's heart I lie 
 
 Petal enfolden. 
 Blow, summer breezes, blow ! 
 
 Wide, meadow, wide ! 
 Lo, I seek to and fro 
 
 Butterfly bride. 
 
 Am I a man once more 
 
 This chill December ? 
 Butterfly's dream before 
 
 Seem to remember ? 
 Or are life's joys and woes 
 
 Dreams as I sway, 
 Deep in the mystic rose 
 
 Waiting for day ? 
 
 136 
 
INSPIRATION 
 
 WHEREFORE seek out the soil whence flamed the 
 rose, 
 
 Which on love's bosom glows, 
 Or strive to know what streamlets fed the tides 
 
 Whereon a navy rides ? 
 
 To-day the sun is veiled in clouds of sorrow ; 
 
 But if he shine to-morrow, 
 With him ye will forget and put away 
 
 The clouds of yesterday. 
 
 So with the poet if his song ring true, 
 
 Ye shall give him his due, 
 Nor probe the hidden caverns of his heart, 
 
 Wherefrom the sweet songs start. 
 
 137 
 
NOCTURNE 
 
 I WALK upon the waves to-night, 
 
 The pathway of the moon 
 Leads straight unto the halls of light, 
 
 I shall be with thee soon : 
 And thou, my darling, open wide 
 
 Thy window on the sea ; 
 Behold the stars a-thousand-eyed 
 
 I gaze with them on thee. 
 
 Hark to the rustling wind among 
 
 The shadows of the grove ; 
 It is my voice in ancient song 
 
 Of immemorial love. 
 And now its murmurs die away, 
 
 And calm the sleeping world ; 
 Do thou sleep too, yet keep till day 
 
 This on thy bosom furled. 
 
 138 
 
SILHOUETTE 
 
 ONE night we were silent together, 
 
 I and my slim Silhouette, 
 Out of reach of the wild world weather, 
 
 In the kingdom of Forget. 
 She whispered, Come paint me her beauty 
 
 That shall conquer your innermost soul, 
 For I know that the leashes of duty 
 
 Make me less than a part of the whole. 
 I made answer, Her eyes must be changing, 
 
 Blue and green, like the deeps of the sea, 
 Whereunder mermaidens are ranging 
 
 Off the shores of Normandy ; 
 Let the tresses that follow her fleeting 
 
 Gleam gold as the shafts of the light 
 That Apollo triumphant is speeding, 
 
 As he drives off the shades of the night. 
 Let her limbs be as white alabaster, 
 
 Let the body that I would embrace 
 Shimmer through the thin draperies that clasp 
 her 
 
 In the delicate foam of her lace. 
 I would feel as she quietly passes, 
 
 139 
 
140 SILHOUETTE 
 
 That she is not a queen by choice 
 Can look as she will in all glasses, 
 
 Could speak with the angel's voice ; 
 And Ah ! above all to be certain 
 
 That so she will not be long- 
 Quite soon she will lower the curtain, 
 
 Quite suddenly cease her song. 
 Thus my fantasy ended its flighting 
 
 And I gazed through your eyes on your soul, 
 Where I found I had merely been citing, 
 
 Silhouette, the least charm of the whole ! 
 
THE WISH 
 
 OH ! let me not be buried deep 
 
 Beneath the mould ; 
 Oh ! let me sleep out my last sleep, 
 
 Tinged with the gold. 
 Of sun and moon and galaxy, 
 
 The heaven's flambeaux ; 
 With all that lives escorting me, 
 
 Thus would I go. 
 
 141 
 
LITTLE LADY POEMS 
 
FITTER PATTER 
 
 FITTER PATTER, Rainy Rose ! 
 Dewdrops glitter on your clothes, 
 Stars of dew upon your hair, 
 Stars and dewdrops everywhere 
 
 Round the little Rainy Rose, 
 Sweetest flower or child that grows. 
 Laughing eyes and lips of glee : 
 Sweet white Rosebud, dance with me ? 
 
 " Dance with you, of course I will, 
 
 I will dance with you until 
 
 All the other little girls 
 
 Toss their jealous golden curls, 
 
 For you are grown up and tall, 
 Nice to dance with at a ball 
 Let us fly around once more 
 On the smooth and slippery floor. 
 
 143 
 
144 FITTER PATTER 
 
 Fitter Patter, Rainy Rose ! 
 Here's a secret no one knows : 
 Childhood's joy from you I borrow, 
 I will be grown-up to-morrow. 
 
 Sad good-night, sweet Rainy Rose ! 
 Sunset on your dewdrops glows, 
 But I see life's morning rise, 
 Dancing in your dancing eyes ! 
 
THE PERFECT PHYLLISTINE 
 
 " You care no more for games or sport, 
 
 For art, or books, or wine ; 
 Dear friend you have become in short 
 
 A perfect Philistine." 
 
 " True, I seek not the tennis-court, 
 No more ply rod and line ; 
 
 I never touch a gun nor port 
 I am, as you define, 
 
 Indifferent to art and books 
 And ' pleasures that refine ' 
 
 No critic's eye more coldly looks 
 On all these things than mine. 
 
 One thought within my heart I hold, 
 
 And rose and lily twine 
 And bind them with a thread of gold 
 
 For her that is divine. 
 
 K 145 
 
146 THE PERFECT PHYLLISTINE 
 
 Dear friend, behold ! The truth I tell, 
 Your joys no more are mine ; 
 
 I'm as you say, but as I spell 
 A perfect Phyllistine." 
 
TO A WHITE VIOLET 
 
 (FOR v. o.) 
 
 White Violet of violets, 
 
 Purple and blue, 
 That Naples on her forehead sets, 
 
 I think of you, 
 So blond amid the many dark, 
 
 So slim, so trim 
 Demureness often drops the spark 
 
 That burns up him ! 
 And do you sing the lays you sung, 
 
 Those songs of France, 
 That while my eyes to your lips clung, 
 
 Called for a dance, 
 And lit the ball-room in my brain, 
 
 And bade the guest 
 Whom in the throng of memory's train 
 
 I love the best ? 
 And have you laughed and have you hit 
 
 The tennis ball, 
 And volleyed hearts, nor cared a bit 
 
 Whose side they fall ? 
 
 147 
 
148 TO A WHITE VIOLET 
 
 Ah ! well I know that if I played 
 
 Toss who'll begin ! 
 'Twere thus our score would be displayed : 
 
 " Love one you win ! " 
 White Violet of violets 
 
 Purple and blue 
 That Naples on her forehead sets : 
 
 Adieu ! Adieu ! 
 
ALICE IN WONDERLAND 
 
 (Miss Maidie Andrews as Alice at the New Theatre) 
 
 ALICE in Wonderland, 
 
 Dear little lady ! 
 Look and you'll understand 
 
 Why we love Maidie. 
 Blue eyes and brown hair, 
 
 Caroll's true Alice, 
 Who would not crown her 
 
 To bear the chalice, 
 Wherein the dreamer 
 
 Poured his quaint fancy ? 
 Haste ye to see her 
 
 Maidie'll entrance ye. 
 Tea with the March hare, 
 
 Mad as the Hatter 
 I would far rather 
 
 Pop in the latter, 
 Than the dear Dormouse 
 
 Dosing unheeding, 
 Through the enormous 
 
 Lengthy proceeding. 
 
 149 
 
150 ALICE IN WONDERLAND 
 
 Down with the Duchess 
 
 Careless and cruel ! 
 Wrench from her clutches 
 
 Maidie, our jewel ! 
 Nay, let her linger 
 
 Long as she will 
 No fairy finger 
 
 Will work her ill. 
 Shadowland, dreamland, 
 
 Better than true, 
 Ask but of Maidie, 
 
 She'll show it you. 
 Alice in Wonderland, 
 
 Sweet little lady ! 
 Look and you'll understand 
 
 Why we love Maidie ! 
 
FOR MARJORIE STEWART 
 
 WRITE in thy book for thee ? 
 How shall I worthily 
 Write in thy book for thee, 
 
 Brown-eyed, bright Marjorie ? 
 
 Shall I dip pen in sea, 
 
 Steal from the clouds for thee, 
 
 Blazon thy pedigree, 
 
 Sweet cousin Marjorie ? 
 
 See how the ancient tree 
 Spreads its new greenery ; 
 Fairest, last leaf, I see 
 
 True Stewart Marjorie. 
 
 Come, drink a toast with me, 
 Drink " Love and Loyalty." 
 Drink, as ye bend the knee, 
 " Jacobite Marjorie " ! 
 
 May all thy years to be 
 Chime as a harmony, 
 
 151 
 
152 FOR MARJORIE 
 
 Whereof the melody 
 
 Comes from fair Marjorie. 
 
 Thus on one rhyme for thee 
 Rhyme I unvaryingly, 
 Since in the world can be 
 Only one Marjorie. 
 
WITH A SPOON OF TRANSLUCENT 
 ENAMEL 
 
 HOLD thou me up against the light, 
 
 If thou wouldst judge my beauty, 
 For then the sun and I unite 
 
 He helps me do my duty. 
 I treasure all the rainbow's lights, 
 
 Yet have I none that vies 
 With those divine black diamond nights 
 
 That are Rhodanthe's eyes. 
 Your necks, ye proudest swans that float, 
 
 Curve not nor shine as hers 
 A neck it is whereon to dote 
 
 I do so in this verse. 
 I cannot see her breast of snow, 
 
 Soft as the eider's down, 
 Nor watch her limbs' harmonious flow 
 
 Beneath her vaporous gown. 
 Though you close me in my case once more, 
 
 Yet open very soon, 
 O mistress mine that I adore, 
 
 For I am but a spoon. 
 
GENONE 
 
 (ENONE of the elfin locks ! 
 
 You ask me for a little song 
 
 That shall be yours and yours alone. 
 
 Tis done ! Though mortals claim to own 
 
 Your name and claiming it do wrong 
 
 Their frocks and faces both are long, 
 
 (Enone of the briefer frocks ! 
 
 OEnone of the elfin locks ! 
 Fear not at all lest anyone 
 Should so misread me as to dream 
 Of Paris since you dwell in London 
 Eyes blue as yours could never seem 
 (Enone's of Mount Ida's rocks ! 
 
 (Enone of the elfin locks ! 
 Right sure am I that never pen 
 Hath writ a name, nor gods nor men 
 Beheld a face so fair as yours, 
 All rose and music, that allures, 
 (Enone, hearts to sudden shocks. 
 
 164 
 
GENONE 155 
 
 (Enone of the elfin locks ! 
 QEnone, name that I adore, 
 If I do speak your name once more, 
 Ever as a spell 'twill rule my heart. 
 Lo ! now I swear I will depart 
 (Enone ! Elfin prison locks ! 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 
IN MEMORIAM 
 
 AT Oxford on a leafy day in June, 
 
 Beneath the elms I trod the college walk 
 
 Past Keble, as the College clock struck noon. 
 
 With me was one who turned our common talk 
 
 To fairy waterfall of changing hue, 
 
 Lit with the radiance of his dazzling mind, 
 
 Wherefrom the old came ever forth the new ; 
 
 Ah ! kind to others, to thyself unkind, 
 
 Most true to friendship, to thyself untrue : 
 
 The sun gives light to all, the sun himself is blind. 
 
 He was above the common stature large, 
 His head, a Roman emperor's, heavy crowned 
 With hyacinthine curls, the forehead's marge 
 Set above eyes, like agates that are found 
 Full of the secrets of the sea, strange lights 
 Would shine in them, when from the teeming brain 
 Came the retort, like lightning-flash that smites 
 The ignorant, the foolish, and the vain. 
 Yea, from his lips flew wit in arrowy flights, 
 And laughing wisdom dwelt, whose like I never 
 met again. 
 
 157 
 
158 IN MEMORIAM 
 
 Novalis somewhere tells of how the bard 
 Turns all he touches into fairy story ; 
 If this be true, my friend should be enstarred 
 As sharer with old Homer of his glory ; 
 For unto him was all adventure dear, 
 Furnishing forth good matter for his theme, 
 Whether he told of how to bear him here 
 He had procured a hansom-cab of dream, 
 Winged like a falcon, or for youth did rear 
 The crystal bridge of art athwart life's turbid 
 stream. 
 
 Well I remember as we fared came one 
 Slowly beneath the elms, with weary look ; 
 His face was like old ivory where shone 
 Small sapphire eyes, he bore a parchment book 
 Beneath his arm, he walked deliberately, 
 Seeking the shade, not letting rove his gaze, 
 And doubtless would have passed us most 
 
 sedately, 
 
 But my companion cried aloud : ' We praise 
 Even now the work that you have given us 
 
 lately " ; 
 And Marius smiled on us, recovering from amaze. 
 
 That day they told of one to whom the right 
 Pertained to make a strange new world take 
 
 shape, 
 Limned cunningly in black upon the white ; 
 
IN MEMORIAM 159 
 
 Yet did the fates his cot in sable drape, 
 And with a mortal sickness strike him down, 
 Ere he had yet fulfilled a tithe his course ; 
 Smooth auburn hair, most vivid eyes of brown, 
 Mercutio's brilliant sword-play and the force 
 To make a world, to captivate the town, 
 Yet him the fates spared not, but slew with 
 no remorse. 
 
 They talked, I harkened, as the legends tell 
 Of that young shepherd, who, to find a sheep, 
 Strayed on Olympus, upward clomb, until 
 He came, with many wanderings hard and steep, 
 Where in a circle of the antique mount, 
 Nigh to the summit, overarched with rocks, 
 He chanced upon a company renowned ; 
 A bearded King, with curled ambrosial locks, 
 Upon a throne of basalt, and around 
 Those others sat, or stood, or leaned upon great 
 blocks 
 
 Rough-hewn of basalt : one a trident bore, 
 His flowing robes part azure, party green, 
 Upon his neck a crown of pearls he wore, 
 Blue were his eyes and cruel and serene. 
 Nigh him was one, her eyes alive with laughter, 
 Nude save that round her whiteness was a zone, 
 A dove upon her shoulder, and to waft her 
 
160 IN MEMORIAM 
 
 Their fragrance, where she stood had roses 
 
 blown ; 
 
 A King stood nigh, whose looks did follow after 
 Her wayward gaze, just then before her thrown 
 
 Upon a youth, fair, slim, his shoulders bearing 
 Long wings that folded well nigh touched the 
 
 ground, 
 He of some journey spake ; the shepherd 
 
 staring, 
 
 Drank deep and long of that delicious sound. 
 For now he knew those were the gods conversing 
 Upon their ancient mountain-top divine, 
 The secrets of the time to be rehearsing, 
 Making the ancient mysteries to shine ; 
 Life, as they spake the bonds of death was 
 
 bursting ; 
 He felt that he too came of their immortal line. 
 
 But of a sudden one arose, a Queen, 
 Broad-browed and eyes of gray, a mighty owl 
 Was on the rock above her ; " Well I ween," 
 Quoth she, " that here some mortal man doth 
 
 prowl," 
 
 And where the shepherd lay she glanced austere. 
 Thereat arose a rumour and the spy 
 Had fain fled speedily, but " Bring him near," 
 Came from the throne, and ere he even could cry 
 
IN MEMORIAM 161 
 
 A wind became his furious charioteer 
 
 And urged him forward, certain now to die. 
 
 And verily had Jove his right arm raised 
 
 To strike him to the earth, a hapless wight ; 
 
 When Venus, whom his guileless lips had praised 
 
 Erewhile on rustic flute, right quickly cried : 
 
 " Spare him, O Thunderer, to pleasure me ; 
 
 His life, a nothing, that is all I ask, 
 
 And lest he blab, do thou send Mercury 
 
 To Lethe for a draught, an easy task." 
 
 Jove nodded, smiled the Irresistible, 
 
 The shepherd drained the oblivion-giving flask. 
 
 He waked and found himself a-lying where 
 At noon-tide he had lain beneath the oak, 
 But when again he would repeat the rare 
 And wondrous vision, gone was all like smoke. 
 So as a youth I harkened to the speech 
 Of godlike men and thought to grasp the whole, 
 And give where I had taken unto each ; 
 But the veil falls, and on this parchment scroll 
 These rhymes in pious memory I pleach, 
 That on Olympus stood and heard Olympian 
 thunder roll. 
 
NOTE 
 
 FOR many years I had in mind Mirage as a 
 good title, but Mr Temple Thurston was first 
 in the field, and I have now to thank him for 
 kindly permitting me to use it on the present 
 occasion. The disyllabic danger signal following 
 the title will doubtless warn readers of fiction to 
 seek their verdant pastures elsewhere. 
 
 Most of the preceding poems have not pre- 
 viously been published, but Calypso was first 
 seen in Mr Murray's Monthly Review, Sapphics 
 in the Fortnightly ; Good Friday's Hoopoe was 
 first published in the Dublin Review, and a 
 few of the lyrics have already appeared in the 
 Westminster Gazette, the Pall Mall Gazette, the 
 Glasgow Herald, and the Evening Standard. 
 
 A Friend in Need has been suggested by Mr 
 Edgar Prestage's admirable prose version of 
 E$a de Queiros's Defunto, and I am much 
 indebted to him for permission to make full 
 use of his translation. 
 
 TUHNBULL AND Sl'JiAKS, fKINXUHS, EDINBUKQH. 
 
BY THE SAME AUTHOR 
 
 JOHN OF DAMASCUS 
 
 Third Edition. Price 6s. 
 
 SOME PRESS OPINIONS 
 
 " Mr Ainslie, in this third edition of his suggestive poem, has given 
 to the world in swift spontaneous verse the mature expression of the 
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 arguments in the woof of the old material as to produce the effect 
 of a work almost wholly new. Not only do these additions help to 
 knit the thread of the narrative more harmoniously together, they 
 redound as well as to the reader's ease in keeping in touch with it. 
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 in the stirring pages which deal with the story of Muhammad's life 
 and the conquests of the doughty warriors who fought after him. 
 . . . Everybody whom the advice may concern would be wise to allow 
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 along by constant variety and happy turns of -expression. . . . The 
 fascination of the East, which is casting its spell more and more over 
 our literature, has taken hold of the author's mind and communicates 
 itself to his verse." Outlook. 
 
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 Morning Post. 
 
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 Daily Telegraph. 
 
 " The verse runs on like a brook, so that its rippling 
 almost makes one shut the ears to its subtlety of depth of 
 suggestion. Delicate in texture, it is often packed with 
 significance ... a writer with a true lyric gift and genuine 
 poetic insight." Glasgow Herald. 
 
 " Nearly every poem has a thought that was worth ex- 
 pressing, and the expression is musical and distinguished." 
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 " Made up of gracefully-turned and musical lyrical pieces. 
 . . . It is a pleasant little book for a reader of culture." 
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 "Mr Ainslie is another real poet. . . . His verse is 
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 " A charming little booklet of verse." Truth. 
 
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 AESTHETIC 
 
 BY BENEDETTO CROCE 
 
 Being a close translation of his complete Theory of 
 ^Esthetic and General Linguistic 
 
 BY DOUGLAS AINSLIE, B.A. Oxon. 
 
 From the Italian of the enlarged third edition of 1909 
 
 Price IOS. net 
 SOME PRESS OPINIONS 
 
 "Mr Balfour in his recent Romanes Lecture spoke with enthusiasm of Signor 
 Croce, but the English reader is, perhaps, more likely to have heard of him as 
 the director of that admirable literary review La Critica than as the erudite 
 creator of a complete philosophical system. Meanwhile in Italy, where, unlike 
 ourselves, they are more deeply interested in philosophy than in fiction, there 
 has been no influence since the death of the poet Carducci to compare with that 
 of Signer Croce, the speculative thinker. In support of this statement we hare 
 the enthusiastic testimony of Mr Ainslie ; or, if the translator's vocation in the 
 world of letters cause him to be suspected of a capacity for poetic licence, we 
 have the brutally objective facts that the ^Esthetic has within seven years reached 
 its third Italian edition, and the Logic its second, whilst the Philosophy of the 
 Practical shows no sign of lagging behind its forerunners in the race for popular 
 favour. . . . His work will appeal to many. It is in the grand manner, simple, 
 severe, spaceless, and timeless as any classic. Italy may well be proud of him." 
 Athenaeum, 
 
 " The two books which seem to have been most prominently before Mr Balfour 
 when he composed his (Romanes) lecture exhibit more thoroughly than he the 
 grounds and the extent of the aesthetic theory. One is a translation of Signor 
 Benedetto Croce's Esthetic, which is quoted by Mr Balfour in his lecture. . . . 
 It is Signor Croce's merit among metaphysicians that be recognises the real and 
 inherent difference between aesthetic activity or experience and all other forms 
 of activity cr experience. His book is little more than a statement that art is 
 unique and real and not a form of some other activity or experience, just as the 
 works of other modern philosophers are vindications of the reality and unique- 
 ness of matter or thought or space or time. The greater part of the remainder 
 of the book is a refutation of other theories and an effort to dispel illusions." 
 Edinburgh Review. 
 
 " Benedetto Croce's Msthetics as Science of Expression and General Linguistic 
 forms part of a complete system of philosophy, ' the Philosophy of the Spirit,' 
 with the main outlines of which we are made acquainted by the very sympathetic 
 preface of the translator, Mr D. Ainslie. It is one of three volumes dealing re- 
 spectively with Logic, Ethics, or ' the Philosophy of the Practical' and /Esthetics 
 Of this series the present volume is charactei istically the first. . . . Our grati- 
 tude to Mr Ainslie for having made Croce's ^Esthetics accessible to English readers 
 can only be enhanced if we realise the courage required to undertake the trans- 
 lation of a work full of such original and unwonted theories, more especially 
 when we read in the chapter on ' Expression and Rhetoric ' Croce's discouraging 
 views on the ' Impossibility of Translations. 1 " Morning Post. 
 
SOME PRESS OPlNlQNS-continued 
 
 'Signer Croce Is an ardent metaphysician. He believes that there is an 
 essential truth in things which can be discovered and expressed in words ; and 
 In this book he tries to discover the essential truth about aesthetics. . . . No one 
 after reading his book has any excuse for believing any kind of nonsense about 
 art, either the nonsense that pretends to be mystical, or the nonsense that pre- 
 tends to be scientific; and when he comes to construction, his main ideas are 
 usually supported by reasoning at once close and candid. Those ideas, we believe, 
 are of great importance, though the conclusions to be drawn from them could 
 only be set out in a book as long as his own. The translation is usually very 
 clear, and Mr Ainslie has done a valuable service in making it." Times. 
 
 " Mr Balfour in his recent Romanes Lecture mentioned with respect the work 
 on aesthetic of the Italian philosopher, Signer Croce, as giving more practical 
 guidance to the inquirer than the ordinary absolutist aesthetics. The translation 
 which Mr Douglas Ainslie has given us of Croce's chief work comes opportunely 
 when our doubts have been stirred by Mr Balfour's scepticism. Mr Ainslie 
 translates the whole of the Theory of ^Esthetic, and in a very useful ' Historical 
 Summary ' gives a synopsis of the historical portion of the original. The trans- 
 lator is an enthusiast for his subject, as is evident from the introduction, but on 
 the whole we do not think he makes extravagant claims for Croce. This ^Esthetic 
 is really a most remarkable performance, and an English translation is a real 
 boon." Spectator. 
 
 "The translator in his introduction claims to have discovered Croce, a claim 
 which probably will not be disputed. For this the British philosophic public owe 
 Mr Ainslie a debt of gratitude. Even those who differ from Signer Croce cannot 
 fail to recognise in him a vigorous original thinker with whom it is stimulating 
 to come into contact." Glasgow Herald. 
 
 ". . . The book suggests nothing so much, perhaps, as a gigantic spring cleaning 
 of the penetralia of aesthetic. Signer Croce has cleared out all the old furniture 
 he will have nothing to do with the names idealism, naturalism, symmetry, 
 harmony, genius, classical, romantic, epic, lyric, idyll, symphony, sonata, meta- 
 phor, symbol, proportion, value, tone he clears them all out." Pall Mall 
 Gazette. 
 
 " Nevertheless, this fresh and gallant attempt to capture for philosophy the 
 shy secret of Beauty is one which can heartily be recommended to all who are 
 interested in aesthetic. Croce has a definite and clearly thought theory on the 
 subject which he presents with such power, knowledge, and resource of expres- 
 sion as to reveal him to us not only as a learned man with a mind of unusual 
 temper and strength, but also as one with claims to be considered as himself an 
 artist. His work is a piece of literature as well as a serious contribution to the 
 solution of a tangled problem." M achester Guardian. 
 
 "... From these illustrated examples it may be gathered that there is a great 
 deal of wisdom scattered throughout Mr Croce's stimulating and profound essay. 
 Its value is greatly enhanced by a wide survey of writers on the theory of aesthetic, 
 among whom I notice many of the wiseacres that Shelley, in a moment of extreme 
 youth and misguided inquiry, called in to complete his poetical education. Back 
 to intuition is the theme of this book." New Age. 
 
 "... Mr Ainslie shares this gratitude which will be ungrudgingly extended to 
 him by every thoughtful student of life. One can pay him no higher compliment 
 on his work than by saying that not a sentence in the book bears the mark of 
 translation. The value of the book is greatly enhanced by an extremely able 
 Historical Summary of the development of ^Esthetics from Plato down to the 
 new Columbus. The external appearance of the volume is in perfect keeping 
 with its subject-matter." Banffshire Journal. 
 
 "Every recognition is due to Mr Ainslie for having made the volume, full, 
 when all is said, of the most suggestive and original views, accessible to English 
 readers. "Hibbert Journal. 
 
 MACMILLAN & CO. 
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BY THE SAME AUTHOR 
 
 THE 
 SONG OF THE STEWARTS 
 
 Prelude 
 Price 7S. 6d. net 
 
 SOME PRESS OPINIONS 
 
 " Every lover of this kind of poetry should read it with both interest and 
 admiration." Scottman. 
 
 "The author has a distinct sense of rhythm, and writes with a cultured fervour 
 and distinction." Observer. 
 
 " His poetry has tremendous vigour, and its force alone is a noble quality . . . 
 it never lacks point and deflniteness." Morning Leader. 
 
 ''Mr Ainslie has the gift of fluent versification, and readers of culture will 
 appreciate the original ideas and happy imagery which occur in the ' Prelude, 
 a sustained effort on a worthy theme." Bo ksfller. 
 
 "Mr Ainslie Is A Scot of Scots, and his verse often has an inspiring lilt." 
 Daily Exprett. 
 
 "Mr Ainslie has an adequate conception of his task, and he is well equipped 
 for its performance." Aberdeen Evening Express. 
 
 " Mr Ainslie's fluent verse has a swing that admirably suits the heroic incidents 
 which he sings." Dundee Advertiser . 
 
 "Mr Ainslie is obviously in love with his subject, and the verse is worthy of 
 the theme." Bystander. 
 
 " We are convinced that Mr Ainslie has got a splendid theme, and possesses 
 the artistic power to make of it a splendid poem." Aberdeen Daily Journal. 
 
 " Few who take up the book will lay it down without reading to the end, and 
 none but will be stirred and stimulated by the streng human strokes that on 
 every page strike fire from the bedrock of our common sympathies." Catholic- 
 Field. 
 
 "There is a sincerity and simplicity, mixed with a freshness and vigour of 
 style, which ought to endear his works to a Scottish audience. ... It is for its 
 vividness of description and dexterity of handling that we chiefly commend this 
 volume to our readers." Irish Times. 
 
 " He has brought to bear upon his subject all the enthusiasm that a man having 
 the power of poetic expression must feel under the influence of such an appeal. 
 ... In the stirring themes of Wallace and Bruce, Falkirk and Bannockburn, the 
 muse of Mr Ainslie shows herself at her best, and inspires him to emulate the 
 songs of the ancient bards." Daily Graphic. 
 
 "The verse is easy and graceful, monotony being avoided by frequent change 
 of metre. The battle pieces are marked with great spirit." Aberdeen Free Press 
 
 "Mr Ainslie's volume will without doubt afford a good deal of pleasure to 
 Stewart devotees." Daily Telegraph, London. 
 
 "It is a fascinating theme, and the author has treated it worthily. . . . 
 Mr Ainslie's work is one that may cordially be recommended to all lovers of 
 romantic poetry, and we hope the author will carry out his design and give us 
 the rest of the story." Reynolds' s Newspaper. 
 
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UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY