THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 Ox^iKtr^ C<A+jP&uS^ 
 
 £ 
 
 A
 
 V. 
 
 THE SONG OF THE GOLDEN BOUGH 
 AND OTHER POEMS.
 
 V 
 
 THE SONG 
 
 OF THE 
 
 GOLDEN BOUGH 
 
 AND OTHER POEMS BY 
 CARYL BATTERSBY 
 
 WESTMINSTER 
 
 ARCHIBALD CONSTABLE & CO. 
 
 1898
 
 BIRMINGHAM: 
 PRINTED AT THE GUILD PRESS, 45, GREAT CHARLES STREET.
 
 *. 
 *• 
 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 A Page 
 
 Preface vii 
 
 i 
 
 The Song of the Golden Bough I 
 
 The Lament of Niobe 10 
 
 Pan and Syrinx 19 
 
 The Pythagorean 42 
 
 The Were- Wolf 48 
 
 The Prodigal's Farewell 55 
 
 The Flute-Player 60 
 
 Femina Victrix 65 
 
 Nature's Reply 68 
 
 On the Hill 70 
 
 Love's Suppliant 74 
 
 The Night Train 76 
 
 A Forecast 77 
 
 Before Sleeping 78 
 
 At Dawn 79 
 
 The Temptation 80 
 
 The Reply .81 
 
 An Apology 82 
 
 Old Age 84 
 
 The Gods' Gift 85 
 
 The Heir 86 

 
 VI CONTENTS 
 
 Page 
 
 To a Boy Piping 89 
 
 Flowers in Town 92 
 
 A Contrast 93 
 
 Seagulls 94 
 
 The Ordeal 97 
 
 The Land of the Green Children .... 98 
 
 A Night Fancy 101 
 
 The Husband to His Wife 102 
 
 The Last Rites 104 
 
 Counsel 106 
 
 Harvest 107
 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 The author takes this opportunity of acknowledging 
 the .courtesy by which he is permitted to reprint in this 
 volume certain poems which have already appeared in 
 Good Words, Longman's Magazine, the Parents' Review, 
 the Spectator, and Temple Bar.
 
 *• 
 
 THE SONG OF THE GOLDEN BOUGH. 
 
 I heard the sentence of the clan, 
 And turned and went, a roofless man, 
 
 Into the unforgiving night ; 
 
 Thick in the air a hovering flight 
 Of curses followed as I ran. 
 
 Undaunted, dauntless, on I fled ; 
 The moon before me weltered red, 
 
 Half-sunken in a swathe of cloud ; 
 
 The ghosts swirled past me in a crowd, 
 Or squeaked like bats around my head.
 
 THE SONG OF THE GOLDEN BOUGH 
 
 I feared them not. Far off, the fox 
 Barked from his cavern in the rocks ; 
 Beside me through the bracken slipt 
 A leering wolf, with hunger nipt, 
 Bound for the valley and the flocks. 
 
 Then darkness wrapt the moon ; the rain 
 Thrashed down from heaven upon the plain ; 
 With hands that groped before my face, 
 I rushed and reeled from place to place, 
 The storm-wind thundering through my brain. 
 
 So close the dark about me prest 
 That north and south and east and west 
 I told not, but mv heart of pride 
 Even in that hour the gods defied, 
 And bade them rave and scourge their best.
 
 *. 
 
 THE SONG OF THE GOLDEN BOUGH 
 
 T*he wind's note changed ; it seemed the din 
 Of breaking seas; the rain fell thin; 
 By these two signs I knew I stood 
 Hard on the fringes of a wood ; 
 I laughed, and softly entered in. 
 
 With wary step I trod the mold 
 
 And mosses of that forest old ; 
 
 Against my face thronged startled wings, 
 Over my feet wet woodland things 
 
 Crawled blind and sluggish, vext with cold. 
 
 The storm grew weak ; the moon soared free, 
 Disrobed of tempest ; I could see 
 
 The veined branches interlace 
 
 Across the silver of her face : 
 Then calm and sleep laid hold on me.
 
 THE SONG OF THE GOLDEN BOUGH 
 
 Amid the draggled fern I lay, 
 And took my slumber, till the day 
 From leaf to leaf dropt slowly down 
 Grey fingers feeling through the brown 
 To warn me it was death to stay. 
 
 Where was not death ? My plan was laid ; 
 
 With fox-like foot from shade to shade 
 Of that grim underwood I past, 
 And still my eyes were upward cast, 
 
 And almost in my heart I prayed. 
 
 And what I sought at length I won — 
 A bough that glistered in the sun ; 
 Its leaves were all of crinkling gold, 
 Its very touch was deathly cold, 
 Its threads of human fate were spun.
 
 THE SONG OF THE GOLDEN BOUGH $ 
 
 I Climbed and pluckt it ; then I strode 
 •From out the shadows, took the road 
 That dipt to where a temple stood, 
 Its lintel purple-splashed with blood, 
 Its hidden dark the priest's abode. 
 
 I cried within the ring of stone : 
 ' Come forth, thou priest, I stand alone, 
 1 Alone against thy gate I stand, 
 * The golden bough is in my hand, 
 * And thou must fight to keep thine own. 
 
 * The gods, men say, love best the strong ; 
 
 'And thou art old, hast served them long; 
 * They bid thee to thy trial now, 
 ' They send me with this sacred bough, 
 
 ' Lest toothless prayers should do them wrong/
 
 6 THE SONG OF THE GOLDEN BOUGH 
 
 The gate upon its hinges veered ; 
 
 With gleaming sword the priest appeared ; 
 * And thou,' he shouted, ' who art thou ? * 
 I answered not, but raised the bough, 
 
 And flung it in his whitened beard. 
 
 He whirled the gleaming sword ; I leapt 
 Beneath it as it downward swept ; 
 With breast to breast and hip to hip 
 I strained him in a deadly grip, 
 Then cast him from me, and he slept. 
 
 His garments round my limbs I threw ; 
 
 Athwart his throat the sword I drew, 
 Shearing his head oft; next I took 
 The priest's horn from its hiding-nook, 
 
 And at the wood's edge stood, and blew.
 
 THE SONG OF THE GOLDEN BOUGH 
 
 Jfs fowls come when the corn is cast, 
 'The village-folk came crowding fast; 
 
 They trembled when they saw me there 
 Clad priest-like, and amidst my hair 
 
 The golden leaves ; I spoke at last : 
 
 * But yesternight you would have trod 
 
 * My flesh and bones into the sod ; 
 
 ' To-day my star surmounts your hate, 
 1 1 bear the shining branch of fate, 
 
 * Your priest am I, your voice to God. 
 
 ' You drove me forth, but heaven, more just, 
 ' Requites me with this holy trust ; 
 * Your little lives are at my beck, 
 ' My foot is planted on your neck ; 
 * Bow down in silence to the dust.
 
 8 THE SONG OF THE GOLDEN BOUGH 
 
 ' You doubt me ? Lo, these hands are red 
 1 With slaughter of the priestly dead ; 
 ' And see ! ' My robes apart I flung, 
 And showed them from my girdle hung 
 The dripping beard, the sightless head. 
 
 * This is my warrant, this,' I cried, 
 ' The proof that heaven is on my side ; 
 ' Henceforth the lightnings at my call 
 ' On man and beast and crop shall fall, 
 1 Be reverence scanted or denied.' 
 
 I ceased and left them. From that day 
 
 I am as iron, they as clay ; 
 
 Before my will they bend and break, 
 My hatred in their blood I slake, 
 
 I name the victim, and I slay.
 
 THE SONG OF THE GOLDEN BOUGH 
 
 -Their weakness is my robe of might ; 
 
 Their blindness leads my feet aright ; 
 Poised in the shadows of their fear, 
 My vengeance haunts them, dimly near, 
 
 A sword that hovers ere it smite.
 
 THE LAMENT OF NIOBE. 
 
 Amphion wooed and won me in the days 
 When Pan made shepherd music on the hill, 
 
 And Love walked singing in the open ways, 
 With eyes unblinded still. 
 
 I was the daughter of a king, and he 
 
 Heir to a kingdom. Ah ! those happy years, 
 
 Wherein we lived and loved beside yon sea 
 That now receives my tears !
 
 THE LAMENT OF NIOBE u 
 
 I bore him children glad and strong and fair, 
 With voices like a bird's voice in the spring, 
 
 With faces like the face of flowers, and hair 
 Bright as the golden ring 
 
 Their grandsire wore. I see them even now — 
 My children — running on the soft wet sands, 
 
 Or in the orchard leaping at some bough 
 That rises from their hands, 
 
 Then earthward flings a ruddy-fruited rain 
 About them laughing. — Visions of the past ! 
 
 Visions that for a little lull the pain 
 Wherein my soul is cast !
 
 12 THE LAMENT OF NIOBE 
 
 I was a tender mother, but unwise, 
 
 Still musing on my children all day long, 
 
 Because they were so comely to the eyes, 
 So joyous and so strong. 
 
 My soul forecast no misery. Not then 
 
 Had I been taught how out of gladness flow 
 
 As drear disasters on the lives of men 
 As ever spring from woe. 
 
 And thus, all heedless, round my life I drew 
 The curtains of my dream, and let my pride 
 
 Grow even as my children's beauty grew, 
 And yearn for things denied,
 
 THE LAMENT OF NIOBE 13 
 
 Tfll in the end I braved the gods and spake 
 ' O Zeus, who art the ruler of us all, 
 
 * If fair Latona for her children's sake 
 i Treads the celestial hall ; 
 
 * If she, because Apollo is her son, 
 
 4 And Artemis her daughter, climbs the seat 
 4 Of worship where the streams of Nilus run 
 
 ' Clear-shining in the heat ; 
 
 * Why should not I, the mother of a birth 
 
 ' In number more, in beauty equal, claim 
 
 * Room by her side in heaven, and on the earth 
 
 1 An everlasting name ? '
 
 i 4 THE LAMENT OF NIOBE 
 
 I paused ; and with my chin set in my hand 
 Looked on my children playing. — Suddenly 
 
 A darkness gathered over all the land, 
 And hid the moaning sea; 
 
 Then like the birds whom terror of the sky 
 
 Drove windward in a flickering, twittering mass, 
 
 Came all my children with a startled cry 
 Through the deep-flowered grass; 
 
 But one, the youngest-born and loved the best, 
 Reeled as he ran, and fell with arms outspread ; 
 
 And when I caught him upward to my breast, 
 I knew that he was dead.
 
 THE LAMENT OF NIOBE 15 
 
 > 
 
 A 
 
 CT in what words shall I unfold the tale, 
 
 The mournful tale which still the folk repeat, 
 
 How, one by one, my children, writhing, pale, 
 Dropt dead around my feet ? 
 
 At last I swooned, thrice-happy in my swoon, 
 Because I deemed it death. I hoped too much ; 
 
 The gods were all too wroth to grant such boon 
 To one whose sin was such. 
 
 My life returned. Soft shone the summer sky, 
 Sweet sang the bird upon the summer bough, 
 
 And with a scent of hill-side dittany 
 The wind blew on my brow.
 
 16 THE LAMENT OF NIOBE 
 
 A while, as one who in the dawning light 
 Lies betwixt sleep and waking, so I lay; 
 
 Then came the thought that was the last at night, 
 The earliest in the day, 
 
 My children ; and I looked around to see 
 If they were near, and looking I descried 
 
 Their bodies scattered pale upon the lea 
 Where they had fallen and died. 
 
 Then I remembered all, and rose, and fled, 
 Fled, never heeding whither, — on, right on, 
 
 Away from that grim meadow of the dead, 
 Those bodies stark and wan.
 
 THE LAMENT OF NIOBE 17 
 
 A 
 
 Wildly I ran beneath yon forest old, 
 
 Wildly by jutty root and clinging briar, 
 
 Now in the bracken where the snakes lay cold, 
 Now in dark pool and mire; 
 
 Then up this mount the scourges of my sin 
 Lashed me and drove me, till at length I fell, 
 
 Bleeding and faint, in this lone place, wherein 
 Age after age I dwell. 
 
 And now the rain may drift against my eyes, 
 The sleety gust swirl round about my form, — 
 
 I feel them not, though the scared eagle cries, 
 A lost thing in the storm.
 
 18 THE LAMENT OF NIOBE 
 
 For I am stone ; — yet by the heavenly will, 
 My soul endures within this rocky grain, 
 
 Still conscious of its love, its guilt, and still 
 Shot through and through with pain. 
 
 Therefore I weep, weep ever, and my tears 
 Run seaward with a lamentable flow, 
 
 So that who listens in the stillness hears 
 The story of my woe. 
 
 <Ffe3?
 
 
 PAN AND SYRINX. 
 
 > 
 
 A 
 
 There was a secret vale in Arcady, 
 
 Wherein grew many a flower sweet to smell, 
 And many a pleasant shadow of a tree 
 
 Darkened the slant sides of the cup-like dell ; 
 And day and night did birds make melody, 
 And a clear streamlet slipt through fern and brake, 
 Singing until it ceased within a lake. 
 
 And often when the drowsy summer-heat 
 
 Had wrought a longing for some little rest, 
 Here from the chase did Artemis retreat, 
 
 With bow unloosened and bare snowy breast ; 
 And maidens following with buskined feet 
 Trooped through the fern that bathed them to the knee, 
 While the red staghounds leapt beside in glee.
 
 »o PAN AND SYRINX 
 
 Now so it happened on a summer's day 
 
 When all the earth for very heat did swoon, 
 That Pan, the god of shepherds, came this way, 
 
 Fleeing the burning arrows of the noon. 
 Ah ! little thought he, as he made delay, 
 That in this shade his heart should shortly know 
 A fiercer arrow than the noon can throw. 
 
 Pan saw the place, how sweet it was and fair, 
 
 How filled with all of woodland ravishment, 
 How deeply hidden from the flaming air 
 
 That flashed upon the uplands, so he went 
 And found a hiding in the fern, and there 
 Sank softly into slumber without fears, 
 The stream growing ever fainter in his ears.
 
 PAN AND SYRINX 21 
 
 > 
 
 A 
 
 And when a little season he had lain 
 
 In the dim shadows of delicious sleep, 
 He seemed, as in a dream, to hear again 
 The babble of the water softly creep, 
 Threading his slumber ; then with louder strain 
 It shaped itself within his drowsy ear 
 To sound of girlish laughter, silvery, clear. 
 
 And Pan, scarce knowing if he were awake, 
 Lay listening till his ears could doubt no more 
 
 That the sweet noise from merry maidens brake, 
 Down in the little valley's shady core, 
 
 And round about the borders of the lake ; 
 
 Then did he rise and on his elbow lean, 
 
 Peering amid the fern-stalks brown and green.
 
 « PAN AND SYRINX 
 
 And straight he saw with his black eyes and bold 
 
 That many maidens, thinking no one by, 
 All raimentless and whiter to behold 
 
 Than any lily-flower that floated nigh, 
 Were bathing in the water clear and cold, 
 While in the throng the goddess Artemis 
 Stood laughing softly at their gentle bliss. 
 
 And some swam where the waters deepest were, 
 
 And some stood in the shallows to the knee, 
 Apparelled in their bright descending hair ; 
 
 And some, with just their faces water-free, 
 Seemed like pale flowers sprinkled here and there, 
 And some with hollowed palms in joyous play 
 Threw each on other showers of glittering spray.
 
 PAN AND SYRINX z$ 
 
 
 And tunics whiter than the mountain-snows 
 Lay on the grass, and buskins crimson-seamed, 
 
 And many purple quivers, ashen bows ; 
 
 And here and there like sleeping serpents gleamed 
 
 Gold girdles that the tender waist enclose ; 
 
 The blinking staghounds stretched themselves at ease 
 
 In places where the sunshine cleft the trees. 
 
 All these things Pan beheld, and yet his sight 
 Dwelt little on them, being surely led 
 
 To one maid only with a fixed delight, 
 
 Who seemed the perfect flower of maidenhead, 
 
 And no less lovely than her lady bright ; 
 
 Yea, Artemis was not more fair than she, 
 
 Save for a touch of loftier deity.
 
 24 PAN AND SYRINX 
 
 A freshness, like the heaven's after rain, 
 
 Moved in her shining limbs and golden hair; 
 
 The crimson of the dawn had set its stain 
 
 Upon her lips that flowered smiles. But there ! 
 
 I cheat you in my picture ; words are vain. 
 
 In brief, what seems his love to any man', 
 
 That seemed this maiden to the great god Pan. 
 
 With thoughts of her his heart lay blossoming 
 
 As thick as April bank with daffodils; 
 For who shall stand against Love's ordering, 
 
 That knows no lord and docth what he wills r 
 There is not any may achieve this thing, 
 But all must be his vassals, gods and men, 
 And lie beneath his feet as Pan lay then.
 
 PAN AND SYRINX 25 
 
 §0 Pan denied no pleasure to his eyes, 
 
 Letting them feed upon her ; and his ears 
 Did ache with listening for her sweet replies 
 
 Unto the many voices of her peers; 
 And oftentime he heard amid their cries 
 How that they called her Syrinx, at which name 
 His pulses fluttered softly like a flame. 
 
 No longer than a linnet's song, alas ! 
 
 Our joys endure. Even while Pan is stirred 
 With perfect happiness, the maidens pass 
 
 From the lake swiftly at their lady's word, 
 And gather their white raiment from the grass, 
 And being clad therewith move in a band 
 Up the vale-side on to the higher land.
 
 i6 PAx\ AND SYRINX 
 
 Then Pan with close-shut eyes in quiet lay, 
 Tricking his fancy with a fond deceit 
 
 That the bright vision had not slipt away, 
 And would again before him shine complete, 
 
 Were but his eyelids opened to the day; 
 
 The memory of the maidens' voices wrought 
 
 An echo in the stillness of his thought. 
 
 But when the blessed mood he fain would keep 
 
 Through feeding only on itself had died, 
 He rose and wandered down the gentle steep 
 
 Until he gained the grassy waterside, 
 And there he walked as one walks in a sleep, 
 And dreamily beheld the darkening lake, 
 And stept where she had stept for her sweet sake.
 
 PAN AND SYRINX z-j 
 
 And how he spent the dim and dewy night, 
 
 And where, he knew not. This alone he knew, 
 That, when the next moon glittered in the height, 
 
 He couched again amid the fern to view 
 If Artemis would bring her maidens bright 
 Unto the valley from the upland flame, 
 And, even as he watched for them, they came. 
 
 Thus on that day Pan had his joy again, 
 And many days thereafter, till he felt 
 
 The very pleasure grow to be a pain, 
 
 So great his love was. Then to Zeus he knelt 
 
 Praying to meet in forest, mount, or plain 
 
 Syrinx alone, that he might tell his care. 
 
 Zeus heard, and shortly granted him his prayer.
 
 28 PAN AND SYRINX 
 
 It chanced upon a morning when the sun 
 
 Had travelled half the way from east to south, 
 
 That Pan went slowly through a forest dun, 
 
 Rowing his head and murmuring with his mouth, 
 
 And often through his lips a sigh would run ; 
 
 Pale was his face, and well might any know 
 
 That love had housed with him and wrought him woe. 
 
 The bird upon the bough, as he passed by, 
 
 Hushed not its tune; the bird within the nest 
 
 Looked upward with a shining trustful eye ; 
 The speckled serpent stirred not from its rest ; 
 
 The timid woodmouse took no thought to fly ; 
 
 The wild fawn knew his step and never ran; 
 
 For all the creatures of the field loved Pan.
 
 PAN AND SYRINX 
 
 And as amid the darksome wood he strayed, 
 
 Vexing his heart with fruitless dreams of love, 
 He came unto a little grassy glade, 
 
 Where the bright sun a fiery shuttle drove 
 Through leafage lessened to a netted shade, 
 And lo ! a sudden vision in the wold, 
 A snowy shape beneath the flickering gold. 
 
 For scarce a man's length from his feet there lay 
 
 A maiden gathered into sleep's caress ; 
 And though, because her face was turned away, 
 
 He might not see her fullest loveliness, 
 Yet in his heart a voice made haste to say : 
 * This is the answer to thy piteous moan, 
 For thou hast found sweet Syrinx all alone.'
 
 30 PAN AND SYRINX 
 
 Then, hardly drawing breath for awe, Pan stole 
 Through the green grass towards her with soft stir, 
 
 And watched her as she slept; and all his soul 
 Leaned from his eyes to drink its fill of her ; 
 
 But she unwitting by an oak tree's bole 
 
 Lay calmly, with her golden tresses shed 
 
 Over the bow and quiver at her head. 
 
 * Alas ! ' thought Pan, * alas ! it may not be 
 That one so fair will hearken to my vows, 
 
 And yield the first-fruits of her lips to me 
 
 Who have these goat-limbs and these horned brows/ 
 
 And while he mused on this wise bitterly, 
 
 A teardrop slowly gathered in its place, 
 
 And fell— ah ! foolish Pan !— upon her face.
 
 PAN AND SYRINX 31 
 
 > 
 
 A 
 
 Then Syrinx started to her feet in haste, 
 
 And looking round with half-awakened sight, 
 And seeing a strange figure, swiftly placed 
 
 Her hands on bow and quiver in affright, 
 And drawing forth an arrow backward paced, 
 Then set it to the string and bent the bow, 
 And spake these words in trembling voice and low 
 
 * What shape art thou that darcst thus to stand 
 With horrid looks of love ? Canst thou not see 
 
 That I am one of Artemis' chaste band, 
 And seeing know that never falls on me 
 
 Touch save of maiden with her maiden hand ? 
 
 Who and what art thou, bold of heart and eyes ? 
 
 Speak, but advance not, else this arrow flies.'
 
 32 PAN AND SYRINX 
 
 * Shoot, lady,' answered Pan, ' thou canst not kill. 
 
 O ! if thou couldst, I were content to die 
 By those dear hands of thine, and at thy will ; 
 
 But on my nature everlastingly 
 The seal of godhead rests for good and i^l. 
 Alas ! men hold the best that fate can give, 
 For men are doomed to die, but gods to live. 
 
 1 O, Svrinx ! what is love that it can lead 
 
 My feet to follow ever after thine ? 
 Full many a maiden laughs by mount and mead, 
 Whose lips have bloomed the rosier for mine ; 
 But I have seen thee, and a noble need 
 Springs in me for a higher love than theirs, 
 And softens me, and fills my lips with prayers.
 
 PAN AND SYRINX 33 
 
 
 'Day after day I lurk within the dale, 
 
 Where comes at noon the Lady Artemis 
 With all her maidens ; there beneath a veil 
 
 Of grass and fern I steal a short sweet bliss 
 In watching thee ; and when the day grows pale, 
 And thou art gone, I walk bv wood and plain, 
 Longing for noon and wakeful with love's pa : n. 
 
 4 With bootless sacrifice the shepherd-man 
 
 Offers the tender youngling on the height ; 
 With bootless prayer he lifts his voice to Pan, 
 
 And still the grey wolf robs the fold by night ; 
 For Love on all my duties sets a ban, 
 And thou art more than all. O turn thy face, 
 And give me but one little word of grace ! '
 
 34 PAN AND SYRINX 
 
 And Syrinx as she listened paler grew ; 
 
 The bow dropped from her hand, her strength all died ; 
 While him the fervour of his passion drew 
 
 With this last utterance closer to her side; 
 Hut when his voice ceased, then her strength anew 
 Flashed through her limbs, and with a wild amaze 
 She shrieked, and fled along the woodland ways. 
 
 A little while Pan stood as lost in doubt, 
 Then over-mastered by his inward pain 
 
 Followed upon her steps, with many a shout 
 Imploring her to turn to him again, 
 
 And hear the story of his love told out; 
 
 But Svrinx, quickening as his voice came near, 
 
 Sped ever onward with great sobs of fear.
 
 * 
 
 PAN AND SYRINX 35 
 
 The trees above her bowed themselves to set 
 
 Their branching ringers in her wind-blown hair, 
 
 The bracken strove to hold her in its net, 
 The very flowers laid a tender snare ; 
 
 The bramble tore her limbs with purple fret, 
 
 In memory whereof its bloom alway 
 
 Hath borne a bloodstain even from that day. 
 
 At times the shadows darkened round her flight : 
 
 At times beneath a sunny rift she flew, 
 And glittered for a moment clear and white ; 
 
 While ever following with fixed view 
 Pan ached at heart for love and cruel slight, 
 And felt through panting breast and straining limb 
 The fierceness of the chase steal over him.
 
 36 PAN AND SYRINX 
 
 And now a warmer light began to shine, 
 A fresher breath to travel with the breeze ; 
 
 And now they fled beyond the forest-line, 
 Awav from the dark shadow of the trees ; 
 
 J * 
 
 And now they crossed a field of dappled kjne, 
 That lazily looked upward from the grass 
 In sleepy wonderment to see them pass. 
 
 A river at the far end of the mead 
 
 Through many a rush went seaward hurrying, 
 And thither Syrinx hastened with all speed, 
 
 For thereof was her father Ladon kin::, 
 Who for his love's sake would befriend her need ; 
 Into the stream she leapt and never stayed, 
 And while Pan watched her from the banks, thus prayed ;
 
 PAN AND SYRINX 37 
 
 * 
 
 * O father Ladon, in whose streams I stand, 
 
 If ever the vowed tresses of my hair 
 Have duly fallen on thee from this hand, 
 
 If for thy daughter thou hast any care, 
 And any for the chaste and holy band 
 That swear to love not, hear me now and save, 
 And make me as these reeds that fringe thy wave ! ' 
 
 And when she ended, Pan crying out amain 
 
 ' O Ladon, hearken not ! ' rushed in the stream, 
 
 And cast his arms about her all in vain, 
 For she had vanished even as a dream 
 
 That mocks the clutches of the wakened brain. 
 
 So Syrinx was not; onlv in her stead 
 
 Green reeds grew upward from the river's bed.
 
 38 PAN AND SYRINX 
 
 Then Pan sank trembling by the waterside, 
 And dipt his face amid the grass to make 
 
 A darkness for his sorrow. * Love,' he cried, 
 1 1 have been thy true servant ; for thy sake 
 
 Have held as nought my godhead and my pride; 
 
 And in the end what is my great reward ? 
 
 Mv hopes all slain, and I myself the sword.' 
 
 And over him lamenting sank the sun, 
 
 And over him all night the pale moon wheeled, 
 And then the dawn broke; still he lav as one 
 
 Whom death has stricken lonely in the field, 
 Save for a murmur now and then begun 
 Of ' O to be as man and die this day, 
 For love, the life of life, is eone awav ! ' 
 
 9 9 v_ J
 
 PAN AND SYRINX 39 
 
 • 
 
 An^ while he sorrowed in this heavy case, 
 He felt the air to sudden ripples fanned 
 Bv a soft wave of pinions round the place, 
 And on his shoulder fell a gentle hand, 
 Whereat Pan looking up with joyless face 
 Beheld the wing-shod Hermes smiling near, 
 Who in the gods' tongue spake these words of cheer 
 
 'Arouse thee, Pan, and list what doom I bring ! 
 
 Thou askest death, and death shall come to the'e ; 
 And it shall chance that sailors wandering 
 
 Along the paths of the Ionian sea 
 Shall hear about the fall of evening, 
 And nigh to Paxos, a loud voice of dread 
 Shout over land and sea : " Great Pan is dead."
 
 4 o PAN AND SYRINX 
 
 1 But many seasons first shall flower and fade, 
 And thou hast yet a wondrous art to win. 
 Now hearken to me ; thou must rise and wade 
 
 Into the stream and pluck the reeds therein 
 From Syrinx sprung, then set them in due grade 
 With joints of wax, and down them softly blow, 
 So shalt thou find a solace for thy woe." 
 
 Then Hermes to the heavenly houses went, 
 
 And all according to his words did Pan ; 
 And when throughout the reeds a breath he sent, 
 
 A melody along the hollows ran, 
 Wherein the transformed Syrinx sweetly blent 
 With what Pan breathed of sadness ; so was wrought 
 A richer tune than ever throbbed in thought.
 
 PAN AND SYRINX 41 
 
 An3 thus Pan's sorrow bloomed to great delight 
 
 Which he without that sorrow had not known ; 
 And through all Arcady by vale and height 
 
 Pan piped those peerless love-songs of his own, 
 \nd oft at noon the shepherd, oft at night, 
 Would hear a sweetness with the wind go by, 
 And murmur to himself that Pan was nigh. 
 
 And some there are who in these latter days 
 
 Have thought to hear Pan piping on the hill 
 His tender ditties and his love-lorn lays, 
 
 For fancy ever worlceth at her will, 
 And leads the heart of man in many ways : 
 Yet in the end it fell as Hermes said, 
 And Pan was gathered to the silent dead.
 
 THE PYTHAGOREAN. 
 
 I do not deem thee dead, mv child, 
 
 Though as thou wast thou art no more, 
 
 Though summer soft and winter wild 
 In vain shall seek thee at mv door, 
 
 Singing because the sun is warm, 
 Singing because the thrushes sing, 
 
 Singing to see the southward storm 
 Flutter on white and windv wing.
 
 THE PYTHAGOREAN 4* 
 
 
 *Though thou art cold, and being kist 
 Dost give no tender kiss again, 
 
 And though the pulses of thy wrist, 
 Like summer brooks for want of rain, 
 
 Have ceased their music ; though thine eyes 
 Are darkened, and thy throat has lost 
 
 Its ancient gift of melodies, 
 
 Like some sweet linnet's killed by frost; 
 
 Though all the years may not restore 
 The innocent freshness of thy breath 
 
 Upon my cheek, yet none the more 
 Can I esteem thee given to death.
 
 44 THE PYTHAGOREAN 
 
 There is no death, but onlv change; 
 
 From these, her mortal bands, set free 
 The soul flies out on wider ran 
 
 God's servant still ln p land ami sea; 
 
 And at His call is clothed afresh 
 
 With many shapes that in their time- 
 Drop from her like a broken mesh, 
 And leave her pure as in her prime. 
 
 God hath some need of thee elsewhere; 
 
 Poor men, perchance, in some dark land 
 Shut from the knowledge of things fair 
 
 Lie down beneath a tyrant's hand ;
 
 THE PYTHAGOREAN 45 
 
 And God from His eternal keep 
 Hath looked upon their loveless lot, 
 
 Hath seen the eyes that dare not weep, 
 Hath heard the mouth that crieth not ; 
 
 And thou shalt he His nightingale 
 
 To sow their barren hearts with song, 
 And teach them in thy passionate wail 
 Their voiceless fever and their wrong. 
 
 Or haply shrouding truth in night 
 
 Some priest usurps the strength of heaven, 
 
 And God will have him out of sight, 
 And unto thee the task hath given,
 
 46 THE PYTHAGOREAN 
 
 And thou a lion maned with wrath, 
 
 With fierceness clad, with swiftness shod, 
 
 Shalt meet him in a secret path, 
 
 And slay him with the power of Go I. 
 
 Perhaps with bud and blossom crowned 
 In every springtime, year by year, 
 
 Thy soul shall greet me from the ground, 
 And on thy leaves a shining tear 
 
 Will hang, because I know thee not, 
 
 And thou wilt sway through all thy stem 
 
 To win my glances to thy spot, 
 Or kiss at least my vesture's hem ;
 
 THE PYTHAGOREAN 47 
 
 A 
 
 £)r thou mayst come in human guise 
 A ruler whom the world reveres; 
 
 Or woman holding in her eyes 
 
 The perfect knowledge of all tears. 
 
 I know not, and I would not know ; 
 
 For God, the lord of good and ill, 
 Thinks fit a cloudy veil to throw 
 
 Across the secrets of His will. 
 
 And so, my best-beloved, farewell, 
 A long farewell. Enough for me, 
 
 Unshaken in this faith to dwell,— 
 
 God somewhere else hath need of thee.
 
 THE WERE-WOLF. 
 
 The snow lies deep on wood and wold; 
 The moon is up, a shield of gold ; 
 And all is bare and bright and cold. 
 
 O Jesu, keep us ! Hark, a crv ! 
 It is the were-wolf passing hv, 
 And howling to the bitter sky. 

 
 THE WERE-WOLF 49 
 
 From set of sun to break of day 
 He runs abroad, a ghost in gray, 
 Or lies in wait to seize and slay. 
 
 The sheep from out the fold he takes, 
 The ice with padded foot he breaks, 
 His thirst within the stream he slakes. 
 
 On wind-swept moor, in wooded glen, 
 And down beside the reedy fen, 
 He hunts the track of lonely men ;
 
 5° 
 
 THE WERE- WOLF 
 
 And some have seen through brake and briar 
 His eyes, two orbs of mingled fire, 
 The man's regret, the brute's desire. 
 
 His human storv none can tell, 
 Nor by what deed of guilt he fell 
 Beneath the burden of this spell. 
 
 Two in the wood, two on the plain,- 
 This is the number of his slain, 
 And still he lusts to strike again.
 
 
 THE WERE-WOLF 51 
 
 > 
 1 
 
 One night against the gate I spied 
 The monster sitting, evil-eyed, 
 His gleaming jaws dropt open wide. 
 
 I saw him in the pale moonshine; 
 
 He stretched his haggard throat to whine, 
 
 The bristles rose on neck and spine. 
 
 My heart within me sank, afraid, 
 And thrice the blessed sign I made, 
 And loud to Mary Mother prayed.
 
 52 THE WERE-WOLF 
 
 For well I guessed my little child, 
 Crying for sickness, had beguiled 
 The starveling from his barren wild; 
 
 And Marv Mother brought me cheer; 
 She smote the beast with flving fear, 
 And drove him back to moor and mere. 
 
 Since then, with terrors overcast, 
 Through what dark midnights have I past, 
 Each darker, drearier than the last !
 
 THE WERE-WOLF 53 
 
 A muffled foot comes up the stair, 
 Two eyes beside me start and glare, 
 A hot breath flickers in my hair. 
 
 Each day I beg the men to go 
 With axe and spear and bended bow, 
 And slay the creature in the snow. 
 
 O God, that I might see him dead, 
 Two arrows piercing eyes and head, 
 The white beneath him dabbled red !
 
 54 THE WERE-WOLF 
 
 Then might I lie and take my rest, 
 My limbs with holy slumber blest, 
 My little babe against my breast.
 
 THE PRODIGAL'S FAREWELL. 
 
 ' A crafty woman,' 
 
 Says babbling spite ; 
 1 Sweeter than human,' 
 
 Were nearer right ; 
 I knew her wholly, 
 
 As the wild bee knows 
 Heart of moly 
 
 And core of rose.
 
 56 THE PRODIGAL'S FAREWELL 
 
 'Twas magical daytime, 
 
 Matchless night, 
 March was Maytime, 
 
 And darkness light, 
 When we together 
 
 Our laughter hurled 
 At that bell-wether, 
 
 The world, the world. 
 
 At last came ending ; 
 
 We drew apart 
 With wrench and rending 
 
 Of heart from heart ; 
 And the old bell-wether 
 
 Bleated its pack 
 Of fools together 
 
 To hail me back.
 
 V 
 
 THE PRODIGAL'S FAREWELL 57 
 
 Now we rub noses, 
 
 The world and I, 
 In the fat closes 
 
 Of decency : 
 But she, all blameless 
 
 And undefiled, 
 Is driven a nameless 
 
 Wretch to the wild. 
 
 Banish the woman, 
 
 Receive the man ; 
 That's the inhuman 
 
 Human plan ; 
 But O exempt her, 
 
 This one from taint; 
 I was the tempter, 
 
 And she the saint.
 
 58 THE PRODIGAL'S FAREWELL 
 
 Never a claimant 
 
 Of vou were meet 
 To touch her raiment, 
 
 Or kiss her feet, 
 For all about her 
 
 Is heavenly worth ; 
 You cannot flout her, 
 
 You earth of earth. 
 
 Come all together 
 
 From east and west ; 
 Come, old bell-wether, 
 
 And bring the rest ; 
 Let sighs be mingled, 
 
 And tear-drops rain ; 
 The prodigal springald 
 
 Is off again.
 
 THE PRODIGAL'S FAREWELL 59 
 
 He stands your debtor 
 
 For much, 'tis true, 
 But husks were better 
 
 Than life with vou ; 
 You count him dullard, 
 
 Dissolute, crass; 
 Your views are coloured 
 
 With too much grass. 
 
 And so he'll travel, 
 
 And if God should 
 Prove kind, unravel 
 
 Some way to good : 
 And mav love speed him ! 
 
 He means to try 
 If she can lead him, 
 
 That she ! Good-bye.
 
 THE FLUTE-PLAYER. 
 
 He paused a while upon the mountain side, 
 
 And looking downward through the dark descried 
 
 The village windows, evening stars of home, 
 Gleams from a Paradise to him denied. 
 
 A snowy flake, the firstling of its flight, 
 Flew to his lips. " It is the kiss of night, 
 
 The welcome to her gusty revelries," 
 He said, then turned toward the homeless height.
 
 THE FLUTE-PLAYER 61 
 
 And, as he turned, the storm leapt suddenly 
 Upon him, smote him white from neck to knee, 
 
 And round his tingling ears and in his eyes 
 Lashed like the spindrift of a reeling sea. 
 
 Onward he struggled, clutching to his breast, 
 In the scant shelter of a tattered vest, 
 
 His flute, the silver consort of his grief, 
 The sweet interpreter of life's unrest. 
 
 Onward he struggled till at last he fell, 
 Breathless and blind, too weary to rebel 
 
 Against the stern insistence of his doom, 
 And ready to meet death with " It is well."
 
 6i THE FLUTE-PLAYER 
 
 Then came the irony that haunts us still; 
 
 The storm passed southward, weakening in its will, 
 
 And from their heaven the pale, unruffled stars 
 Looked on the white-robed silence of the hill. 
 
 Hi- rose, a tottering shade above the snow, 
 And for a little moment saw below 
 
 The valley twinkling with those lights of home 
 That he had known not, and could never know. 
 
 He sank and slept; the heartache and the cold, 
 He felt them not upon that frozen wold, 
 For he had entered on a land of dream 
 Whose dusk horizon winked with stars of gold.
 
 THE FLUTE-PLAYER 63 
 
 One star was his, the brightest shining there, 
 A star that shaped itself a roseate square, 
 
 A cottage window, filled with light to lead 
 His homeward footsteps through the darkening air. 
 
 He reached the door, he raised the latch, and stood 
 A moment on the threshold. It was good 
 
 To see his happiness and yet refrain, 
 Knowing that he might take it when he would. 
 
 The blazing hearth he saw, the waiting chair, 
 The simple meal set out with cleanly care, 
 
 And in their midst, the heart of all the home, 
 The woman that he loved, still young, still fair.
 
 64. THE FLUTE-PLAYER 
 
 She heard his step, and hastening from her place 
 Ran laughing: like a child to his embrace, 
 
 Then softly drew his head down with her hands, 
 And kissed him tenderly upon the face. 
 
 That kiss was death. A shepherd boy at morn 
 Pound him amid the snow, a thing forlorn, 
 But smiling still, and on his ragged breast 
 Clutching the flute that he so lonu' had borne.
 
 
 FEMINA VICTRIX. 
 
 Here we separate ; you must go ; 
 
 I would not keep vou a moment longer;) 
 I.(i\ e is strong in vour heart, I know, 
 
 Hut the masterful law of growth is stronger; 
 I have taught you all that I have to teach, 
 
 Nothing wondrous or superhuman, 
 The tender trick of a lover's speech, 
 
 The simple heart of a simple woman.
 
 66 FEMINA V1CTRIX 
 
 
 This, you think, is the life for vou, — 
 
 Here in these fields, with scarce a neighbour, 
 To sing me songs in the morning dew, 
 
 And take a kiss for your lvric labour: 
 Perhaps vou see in a pastoral dream 
 
 Yourself a Corydon, me a Phvllis, 
 Simpering over our curds and cream, 
 
 Shepherding lambs as white as in 
 
 A passable life for me, I own, 
 
 Hut not with a man like vou to share it, 
 For fate appoints vou a path alone, 
 
 And time will bring vou the strength to dare it ; 
 H :h is the Alp that vou must scale, 
 
 Where the lights of heaven shine closer, clearer, 
 But madrigals piped in the love-lorn vale 
 
 Will never get vou a whit the nearer.
 
 FEMINA VICTRIX 67 
 
 O trust me, love, for a woman's sight 
 
 Can read the face of the unborn morrow, 
 Though sometimes, led hv the heart's delight, 
 
 Or haplv fearing another's sorrow, 
 She blinks the truth, and across her eyes 
 
 Wilfully drops a veil of blindness, 
 Banishing thought of the grief that lies 
 
 Beyond the hour of her foolish kindness. 
 
 Ah, well I know that the life with me 
 
 Could not for a single day content you, 
 When God shall open your eves to see 
 
 The hero's work to which he has sent you; 
 You would pine for the mountain-tracks afar, 
 
 And scorn the calm of the sheltered hollow ; 
 But now vou are free ! And, behold, a star ! 
 
 It is yours, it moves, vou must rise and follow.
 
 NATURE'S REPLY 
 
 The voice of God hath sounded in the ears 
 Of many men ; theirs is the happier fate. 
 But thou, !e-s favoured, who amidst tin- tears 
 
 Hast scanned the riddles of thy present state, 
 And brought them, child-like, unto Nature's knee, 
 
 Turn not in wrath away, 
 Because I ha\e no answer: it may he 
 
 That on some chosen day 
 God will at length reveal himself through me.
 
 NATURE'S REPLY 69 
 
 Wouldst thou have voices quiring down the wind 
 
 Soft svllables and clear. 
 To e^ase the noble torments of thy mind ? 
 
 Dost thou desire to hear 
 Oracular hymnings from the salty deep, 
 And, lest thv hopes should sleep, 
 See graven on the air 
 Bold parables against despair, 
 And lines of gracious promise drawn 
 On every little leaf that shades thy lawn r 
 
 I cannot say if thou shalt win such things: 
 
 But God is merciful, and knows 
 That not all mind- ascend on spiritual wings 
 
 To the eternal snows. 
 God may ennoble mortal sense, 
 
 Step after step mav guide its wav 
 Through mv dark caves and thickets dense 
 
 To His unclouded day ; 
 Then, looking backward, men shall see 
 God's will, a flaming legend, traced on me, 
 And life's solution in my outstretched hand, 
 Had they but known to read and understand.
 
 ON THE HILL. 
 
 This is God's wilderness, unploughed, unsown, 
 Deep in green turf, and here and there beset 
 With knots of gleaming rush, all one way blown 
 By the unrelieved fret 
 
 Of tyrannous sea-winds. Overhead, the sky 
 
 Leaps wide from hill to hill, 
 
 Blue, infinite, and still, 
 
 Deathless above this world of things that die.
 
 * 
 
 ON THE HILL 71 
 
 Ah me, how far away 
 
 Are All the sights and sounds of yesterdav,- 
 
 Tiie furnace capped with bickering flame, 
 
 The fixed smoke, whose red-lit underglow 
 
 Seems like a blush of shame 
 
 For heavens deflowered of crystal noon, 
 
 White stars and daffodil moon, 
 
 'And clouds of piled snow. 
 
 Gone are the long gray leagues of stone, 
 
 The blind misfeatured street, 
 
 Still clattering with the enslaved feet 
 
 Of those who speed on errands net their own. 
 
 Gone is the tireless drone 
 
 Of wheels that whirr by pallid faces 
 
 In dim ghost-ridden places, 
 
 Where strength of man and beauty of maid 
 
 Into the crucible are cast, 
 
 To come forth gold at last 
 
 For the glutted hands or trade.
 
 7i ON THE HILL 
 
 Were it not well, 
 
 Divorced from all the uncleaiuiess of the town, 
 
 Here on this sinless slope to dwell, 
 
 Weaving as in a crown 
 
 Flowers from the heart of solitary days, 
 
 And stars pluclct on the height 
 
 Where the soul walks hv night, 
 
 God holding, lest she founder in amaze ?> 
 
 Untouched bv mortal gladness, mortal grief, 
 
 Here might one rest, sunk in the murmurous grass, 
 
 And let the soul sway lightly as a 
 
 Amid the rhythms that wake and stir and pass; 
 
 Here, dimly brooding, find 
 
 The lark's thought, when the mother and the nest 
 
 Are all forgot, and he bevond the wind 
 
 Unlocks the silver fountain of his breast; 
 
 Here learn the burden of the moorland bee, 
 
 Here from the brown throat of the peaty rill 
 
 Draw forth its babbled mystery ;
 
 ON THE HILL 73 
 
 Yea, and with these each lamb's bleat on the hill, 
 
 Each piping insect's cry, 
 
 And*every voice that falters to the sky 
 
 Should blend their meanings, till at last 
 
 Deep-surging, secular, vast, 
 
 Hurst on the ear in one full orb of sound 
 
 The music of God's heart, the strain 
 
 To which this earth moves, and the listening train 
 
 Of all the stars with bright allegiance crowned. 
 
 *fc5r
 
 LOVE'S SUPPLIANT. 
 
 Put on thy flying sandals, Love, draw near, 
 
 Illumine earth and >>ca 
 With rich interpretations, showing thee; 
 For I grow sordid with thy want ; my ear 
 Confounds the flowing ditties of the wind, 
 Makes mutiny of music, and doth find, 
 
 Because thou art not here, 
 A disenchantment to annul the tune 
 
 Of the million-throated nightingale, 
 That is the sorrow in the voice of June.
 
 
 LOVE'S SUPPLIANT 75 
 
 Without thy kisses, Love, the world grows pale, 
 
 And for this cause the green-apparelled hills 
 Do lack their robe of glory, and the deep 
 
 Crawls up his sandy sills 
 In misty desolation, bound with sleep; 
 And wood and field are desert ; and the flowers, 
 
 Missing the invocation of their prime, 
 Thy soft voice calling through the early showers, 
 
 Fret death upon their beauty ere the time; 
 And I mourn daily, graver than with years, 
 
 Because the shreds of this world's loveliness 
 Fall swifter than mv tears ; 
 
 And only thou, O Love, canst bring redress, 
 And yet thou dost not ; O relent and hear, 
 
 And hasten, Love, 
 O hasten, hasten, Love, draw near.
 
 THE NIGHT TRAIN. 
 
 I stand upon the platform, and behold % 
 The faces in the many-windowed train, 
 Weird faces all, the happiest touched with pain, 
 
 The youngest with some hint of growing old; 
 
 Each by inexorable fate controlled, 
 
 They linger here a moment, then again 
 Drift out bevond the darkness and the rain 
 
 To unimagined issues, dooms untold. 
 
 The engine shrieks, the faces pass and go, 
 They die, — for I shall see them nevermore, 
 
 Or if perchance I see them, fail to know ; 
 
 And now they are gone, as, when the great winds roar, 
 
 A swarm of gnats floats out confusedly 
 
 To helpless drowning in the unknown sea.
 
 A FORECAST. 
 
 When I am old, dishevelled, lean and bent, 
 And move, a thin poor shadow of to-day, 
 With staff-propt steps along the garden way, 
 
 And in the sunshine rest a while, content 
 
 To blink against the bright, blue firmament, 
 And nod myself to slumber; when decay 
 Has left me nought to think on, nought to say, 
 
 And life sits waiting for its last event 
 
 With infinite pathos ; even in that sad time 
 Some woman, reading in this little book, 
 
 Writ in the honeymoon of love and rhyme, 
 May bend above me with compassionate look, 
 
 And on my silver hair one kiss bestow, 
 
 Because I sang of women long ago.
 
 BEFORE SLEEPING, 
 
 Now is the dead of night, and I must sleep; 
 
 Hut first, my soul, if thou dost aught recall 
 Wherein thou hast done ill, I bid thee weep, 
 
 And pray God's tender mercy on thee fall ; 
 Purge thyself clean of whatso bitter hate 
 
 Thou hast for them that wrong thee; sink thy pride, 
 Nor deem thou Standest in a higher state 
 
 Than those whom God thy happier chance denied. 
 Be all for heaven ; think life draws near the close; 
 
 Give to repentance thy last conscious breath ; 
 For more and more this mortal weakness grows 
 
 That pledges thee to take the form of death, 
 And sleep a while. What if in dreams the door 
 Of life should shut, and thou return no more ?
 
 AT DAWN. 
 
 Bold, jubilant blackbird, whistling in the boughs, 
 When the desired beginnings of the day 
 With glimmering rifts divide the eastern gray, 
 And heaven puts off the starlight from her brows, 
 Sing on, and cease not, for thy nested spouse 
 Hears and beholds thee on the flickering spray, 
 And I, the wreck of thought, sleep's castaway, 
 Drift on the swell of thy rich-flooded vows 
 To rest and peace. O draw me with thy song, 
 
 Draw me from out the unfathomable deep, 
 Wherein mv soul has travailed all night long 
 Betwixt the worlds of waking and of sleep, 
 And bring me to some drowsy, dawn-lit isle, 
 Where the night-weary close their eyes awhile.
 
 THE TEMPTATION. 
 
 Lift up thy voice, embittered man, and rail, 
 Rail on the fortune that hath used thee so: 
 Behold how men, not half thine equals, go 
 
 Chin-deep in luxuries that never fail, 
 
 While thou, an outcast, set bevond the pale 
 
 Of common comforts, dost thy strength bestow 
 On daily fight with that lean-visaged foe 
 
 Whose narrowing siege still threatens to prevail. 
 
 Alas, this struggle ! It hath cost thee dear, 
 
 For love, that should have Irist thy storm-beat face, 
 
 And fame, whereof the brightness came so near, 
 Have played the traitor, flying off apace. 
 
 Were it not well to throw thy weapons by, 
 
 To heap the world with curses, and to die?
 
 t 
 
 THE REPLY. 
 
 Riches and fame and love, — if these were all, 
 These the sole mitigations of our fate, 
 Then might I rue this conflict, lasting late, 
 
 And shirk unblamed the summoning bugle-call. 
 
 Blind world of men ! The hero's crown and pall 
 Above his deeds, above himself, we rate ; 
 We dream too much of greatness to be great, 
 
 We scale our mean ambitions, and we fall. 
 
 To have deserved the laurels of the fight 
 
 Outshines the laurels; to have still fought on, 
 
 When all rewardless stood forsaken Right, 
 Her squadrons scattered and her leaders gone, 
 
 That is the noblest. Hark ! the bugles blow ; 
 
 Mv comrades rally ; to the front I go.
 
 AN APOLOGY. 
 
 The songs that I make and mend 
 Are only of self, you sav ; 
 
 Blame me or praise me, friend ; 
 I can sing no other way.
 
 AN APOLOGY 83 
 
 The blackbird on the tree, 
 
 As he sings and shakes the dew, 
 
 Does he make his songs of me ? 
 Does he make his songs of you ? 
 
 Self, self, self, 
 
 Self from morn till night ; 
 And his songs are only sweet, 
 
 Because they are self outright.
 
 OLD AGE. 
 
 When I no longer love to make 
 Mv little songs tor singing's sake, 
 When I no Longer mount and fly 
 Up with the lark into the sky, 
 When April with her dropping rain 
 Scatters no gladness in my brain, 
 And summer can no more unbind 
 The leaf and blossom of my mind, 
 When a maid's sweetness cannot light 
 With golden musings a whole night, 
 When in the starrv heavens I see 
 No visions of eternity, 
 Then call me old, but not till then, 
 Though I outlast three lives of men.
 
 * 
 
 THE GODS' GIFT. 
 
 To grip the sword tight when all hope is gone, 
 Unshaken breast the battle day by day, 
 
 And even in death fall forward, fighting on, — 
 That is the part that many a man can play. 
 
 But still to keep the heart fresh, still to see 
 A dew on all things, read in every face 
 
 The brightening legend of a world to be, — 
 That is the gods' gift, that the perfect grace.
 
 THE HEIR. 
 
 A father rose from out the grave, 
 And stood beside his son : 
 
 'Alas, I wronged thee grievously 
 1 When life and I were one.'
 
 THE HEIR 87 
 
 * Nay, father, I remember well 
 
 ' Thy tenderness of old ; 
 
 * And all I have thou gavest me, 
 
 * My life, my lands, my gold.' 
 
 * God save thee, lad, but in the years 
 
 * Before thy breath began, 
 
 * I yielded to the shameful lures 
 
 ' That tempt the growing man ;
 
 88 THE HEIR 
 
 * And fleshly riot, flaws of will, 
 * And moods of godless scorn. 
 
 'Tainted thy blood when it was mine, 
 'And thou wert still unborn.' 
 
 'Father, I love thee' ... At the words 
 The spirit moaned, and fled 
 
 Back to the memory-haunted dark 
 That folds the sinful dead.
 
 TO A BOY PIPING. 
 
 Pipe, while thou mayst, O happy boy, 
 Thy songs so true, so rare, 
 
 That cost as little pain to be 
 As this soft, natural air, 
 
 That from thy lips take easier birth 
 
 Than violets from the showered earth.
 
 90 TO A BOY PIPING 
 
 Pipe, while thou mayst; the world is deaf; 
 
 This time is all thine own ; 
 Pipe in thy mirth, nor waste a sigh, 
 
 Because thou art unknown ; 
 The songs that win a nation's ears 
 Are red with blood, are wet with tears. 
 
 Pipe, while thou mayst; and O beware, 
 When thou to love shalt bow, 
 
 That she with whom thy pipe then pleads 
 Be pure as thou art now, 
 
 Nor let thy songs untuned be 
 
 By aught that shames the Muse and thee.
 
 
 TO A BOY PIPING 91 
 
 Pipe, while thou mayst ; for life is short, 
 And, ere these leaves are brown, 
 
 Death in his hands thy pipe may grasp, 
 And toss it rudely down, 
 
 And bring thee to the sunless shore 
 
 Where voice and pipe are heard no more.
 
 FLOWERS IN TOWN. 
 
 You ask me why within this town, 
 
 Where all is black that is not brown, 
 
 I take the trouble still to set 
 
 My window-box with mignonette. 
 
 Well, even here the seeds unfold 
 
 A little hint of all they hold ; 
 
 The blades break out, a patch of mirth, 
 
 Upon the sombre-coloured earth, 
 
 And, as they grow, I seem to see 
 
 A new descent of Deitv. 
 
 The hand that fashioned vale and hill 
 
 Makes beautiful my window-sill ; 
 
 The source from which all being runs, 
 
 The light that fills a thousand suns, 
 
 Transfigured here to mean disguise, 
 
 Within a smoky flower lies; 
 
 And O how closer still to me 
 
 The heart of heaven appears to be, 
 
 When on some trembling leaf I view 
 
 The tears of God in drops of dew.
 
 A 
 
 • 
 
 A CONTRAST. 
 
 I saw a beggar palsied, bent, and gray, 
 
 One who had lingered past his working day, 
 
 And, as we met, I turned my face away. 
 
 I read the last new story-book that told 
 
 Of idle love, self-tortured, as of old, 
 
 And, while I read, the tears fell uncontrolled.
 
 SEAGULLS. 
 
 We are the souls of shipwreckt men who sleep, 
 
 Laid in the oozy chambers of the deep, 
 
 Far off from those who think of them and weep.
 
 SEAGULLS 95 
 
 Creatures that haunt those wildernesses lone 
 Have battened on them, leaving every bone 
 As white as chalk is and as bare as stone. 
 
 But we, released and given to the sky, 
 Pass and repass with melancholy cry 
 Above the places where our bodies lie. 
 
 Sometimes along the channels of the breeze 
 We drift to landward, but our fate decrees 
 A swift returning to the ghostly seas.
 
 96 SEAGULLS 
 
 Wailing we go, balked of our hope to win 
 A glance at those dear inland homes, wherein 
 Our bodies dwelt before the years of sin. 
 
 Wailing we go, doomed for our guilt to be 
 Exiled from land and wcarv of the sea, 
 Until a second death shall set us free.
 
 THE ORDEAL. 
 
 Though thou hast a world of wit 
 
 And a heaven of graces, 
 Thou canst never poet be, 
 Till thy fate entangles thee 
 Fast in love's embraces. 
 
 Though of love thou singest well, 
 
 Love in sunshine lying, 
 Thou canst never sing aright, 
 Till thou learnest in the night 
 What love means by sighing.
 
 THE LAND OF THE GREEN CHILDREN. 
 
 Would you see the land we come from, 
 You must take your staff and go 
 
 Through the shadows of the cavern, 
 On and on, and deep below, 
 
 Till a new wind steals about you 
 With a song you do not know.
 
 THE LAND OF THE GREEN CHILDREN 99 
 
 You will find a dark-eyed people 
 Moving softly here and there ; 
 
 You will see the pallid flowers 
 Shining through a dusky air; 
 
 You will hear the bells of churches 
 Ringing faintly unto prayer. 
 
 And the daylight is as twilight 
 In the land where we abide ; 
 
 There is neither sun at noonday, 
 Nor star at eventide ; 
 
 But a glamour broods for ever 
 On all that country-side.
 
 ioo THE LAND OF THE GREEN CHILDREN 
 
 And a mighty river rushes 
 By the margin of the land ; 
 
 Whence it cometh, whither goeth, 
 Doth no man understand ; 
 
 But we see a gleaming city 
 Set on the further strand. 
 
 We are dying of your sunshine ; 
 
 Let us go, that we may dream, 
 In our quiet darkened meadows, 
 
 Of a land of light and gleam, 
 Of the city lying golden 
 
 On the far side of the stream.
 
 A NIGHT FANCY. 
 
 O nightingale, sweet nightingale, 
 
 Singing in the tree, 
 If thou couldst add my heart 
 
 To thine own melody, 
 What a poet, little nightingale, 
 
 The world would hear in thee !
 
 THE HUSBAND TO HIS WIFE. 
 
 If I should die before you, love, 
 
 I pray you do not keep 
 Your woe beyond the first few tears 
 
 The world will have you weep, 
 But say, 'I make his heaven less 
 c By moaning thus in dreariness.'
 
 THE HUSBAND TO HIS WIFE 103 
 
 And on my grave for memory 
 
 Set pansies, eyed with gold, 
 And tend them with those dear kind hands 
 
 That now I love to hold, 
 And say, ' These flowers were his last will, 
 'And for his sake I watch them still.' 
 
 And when the Spring that I so loved 
 Shall flush the land with life, 
 
 I pray you seek my quiet grave, 
 But not with tears, sweet wife, 
 
 And if the flowers in bloom shall be, 
 
 Say, ' Lo, he sends his love to me.'
 
 THE LAST RITES. 
 
 O women of his house and love 
 Draw near, for he hath died, 
 
 And wash the body white and fair, 
 And bathe it in a tide 
 
 Of unguents whose perfumed breath 
 
 Sheds April on the frost of death.
 
 THE LAST RITES 105 
 
 And round his hair a coronal 
 
 Set of the sweetest flowers, 
 And fold him in the robe you wrought 
 
 In distant, happy hours, 
 When he lay singing at your feet, 
 And watched you weave this winding-sheet. 
 
 Next, place within the fingers cold 
 
 Of him who lies asleep 
 No obol, but this written line, — 
 
 ' For him two women weep ; ' 
 These tender words shall Charon move, 
 Love's passage shall be paid by love.
 
 COUNSEL. 
 
 Sit not down with a pen in your hand, 
 If there's no new thought in your brain, 
 
 For the old has been said too oft and well 
 For us to say it again. 
 
 But if vou have got a strong, new thought, 
 Use the first plain words; they are best; 
 
 For thought had better go forth all bare 
 Than die of being overdrest.
 
 HARVEST. 
 
 Low in the dust are the leaves, 
 Ragged and umber and sere ; 
 
 Autumn has gathered her sheaves, 
 Hope is gone out of the year.
 
 io8 HARVEST 
 
 Though in the wood and the wold 
 Shrewd is the wind as it grieves, 
 
 Comfort is stored for the cold, 
 
 Autumn has gathered her sheaves. 
 
 God, for my autumn prepare 
 Grain that shall never grow old, 
 
 Fruits that shall sweeten the air 
 Down in the valley of cold.
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
 
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