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 ^
 
 SHIFTING SCENES, 
 
 AND OTHER 
 
 POEMS. 
 
 BY 
 
 J. STANYAN BIGG, 
 
 AUTHOR OV "night AND THE SOUL," ETC. ETC. 
 
 LONDON: 
 WILLIAM FEEEMAN, 102, FLEET STREET. 
 
 1862. 
 [The Eujht of Translation is Eeserved.]
 
 33s 
 
 TO 
 
 THE EIGHT HON. JOSEPH NAPIER, 
 
 (eX-LOBB CHAirCEIiLOB OF IBSLAITD,) 
 
 IN TESTIMONY OF RESPECT AND ESTEEM, 
 
 AND IN ACKNOWLEDGMENT OP MANY ACTS OP KINDNESS, 
 AND OF THAT FRIENDSHIP WITH 
 WHICH HE HAS HONOURED THE AUTHOR FOR SEVERAL YEARS, 
 
 IS 
 
 RESPECTFULLY AND AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED. 
 
 b)3"
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 On the Importance of "Action" in Poetry (Pr 
 Hartley Pit Catastrophe .. 
 
 Little Jane 
 
 The Huguenot's Doom 
 
 An Irish Picture 
 
 Shifting Scenes 
 
 Spring and Summer 
 
 Remorse 
 
 The Two Graves 
 
 An Indian Sunset 
 
 The Hero's Widow 
 
 The Same and not the Same 
 
 Here and There 
 
 Ode on the Birth op Burns 
 
 Birth-day Stanzas 
 
 The Island Prince 
 
 Urban the Monk 
 
 O Little Child ! 
 
 Zara 
 
 Only a Little House ... 
 
 Yan or Two Lile Bits i' t' Furness Dialect 
 
 e/ace) 
 
 PAGB 
 
 1 
 
 . 13 
 
 . 16 
 
 . 18 
 
 . 25 
 
 . 27 
 
 . 89 
 
 . 93 
 
 . 95 
 
 . 106 
 
 . 109 
 
 .. 112 
 
 117 
 
 .. 121 
 
 127 
 
 129 
 
 139 
 
 157 
 
 160 
 
 .. 166 
 
 .. 169
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 ON THE IMPOETANCE OF "ACTION" 
 IN POETEY. 
 
 The author of tMs volume dislikes explanatory 
 prefaces as much as any of his readers. Poetry 
 needs no interpreter; and that which is not poetry 
 is not worthy of interpretation. This, therefore, is 
 not an explanatory preface, in the ordinary sense. 
 It has no special reference to the pieces included in 
 the volume ; hut as an author of some eminence has 
 chosen to bring forward certain propositions in re- 
 ference to the absolute importance of "action" in 
 poetry, and as the author of this book does not agree 
 with his arguments and conclusions, he ventures, in 
 a friendly spirit, to offer his own opinions on this 
 matter. 
 
 We are not about to attempt a definition of poetry. 
 Whatever it may be, or whatever other attributes it 
 may possess, it is agreed, on aU hands, that genuine 
 poetry has the quality of pleasing those to whom it 
 is addressed. This is indispensable, and a test of its 
 genuineness. How is this object to be attained? 
 The purest poetry, say some, is to be written only by 
 ignoring hmnan action. This is to be achieved, say 
 others, only in connection with human action. Action, 
 says a third, is the soul and substance of poetry. Let 
 
 ■'^ B
 
 2 PREFACE. 
 
 this be fairly developed, regarding everji;hing else as 
 an intrusion and an impertinence, and then you vnH. 
 necessarily have true and lofty poetr}'. Let tliis be 
 wanting, and poetry is an impossibility. "With this 
 last, and extreme view of the importance of " action " 
 in poetry, the present writer differs altogether. 
 
 Mr. Matthew Arnold, now Professor of Poetry at 
 Oxford, in the preface to the collected edition of his 
 poems, maintains this theory. ' ' What are the 
 eternal objects of poetry," he inqiures, " among all 
 nations and at all times ? They are actions — human 
 actions ; possessing an inherent interest in them- 
 selves, and which are to be communicated, in an 
 interesting manner, by the art of the poet." And 
 again he emphatically reiterates the doctrine, that 
 " all depends upon the subject. Choose a fitting 
 action ; penetrate yourself "w-ith the feeling of its 
 situations ; this done, everything else mil follow." 
 If, it may be asked, the pleasui'e to be di-awn from 
 the perusal of poetry is to be derived solely from the 
 exhibition of noble character thi'ough appropriate 
 action, and ever;yi;hing which is not subordinated to 
 this, however beautifid it may be in itself, is to be 
 regarded as an intrusion and an impertinence, why 
 shoidd not verse itself, which imposes unnecessary 
 restraints on the artist, in the execution of his 
 purpose of character-develoj^ment, be also treated as 
 a like impertinence? If all the pleasure is to be 
 gathered from the story, and none from the manner 
 of telling it, why not tell it in the directest possible 
 way — in simple prose ? If, as Professor Arnold 
 maintains thi'oughout his prefiice, the poet is sue-
 
 PREFACE. o 
 
 cessM or iinsuceessfiil in his efforts to please in 
 proportion as he is the exhibitor of striking situations, 
 of interesting incidents, of heroic actions, then we 
 would suggest that either the poet or the novehst is 
 a superfluous personage ; for the functions and objects 
 of both appear to be identical. 
 
 Besides, if '^all depends upon the subject," then 
 all the poets who have had great subjects, and who 
 have endeavoured to unfold them, regardless of sup- 
 posed poetical accessories, must have been gi-eat 
 poets, and must have written great poems. This 
 conclusion is inevitable. Is Professor Arnold willing 
 to submit his theory to the test of fact ? We will 
 assume for a moment that it is true — and what 
 follows ? Why, that those whom we have been in 
 the habit of regarding as our greatest bards are in 
 reahty nobodies ; while a mighty race of Titans, of 
 whom nobody has heard this centuiy, are, in truth, 
 the magnates of our poetical Hterature. Gentle 
 reader, you are courteously requested to revise your 
 poetical calendar, omitting all the names with which 
 you happen to be famiHar, and substituting in their 
 stead the names of those "gTeat unknown," who 
 have written on great subjects, and who have derived 
 their inspiration solely from the themes on which 
 they wrote. Wordsworth, Yoimg, Byron, Keats, 
 SheUey, Thomson, Coleridge, Cowper, great poets? 
 Nothing of the kind! A Jico for Shakspeare and 
 Milton! Make way for the real grandees — the 
 successors of the mighty bards of old; and keep 
 silence while the herald shouts their names ; — Cowley, 
 Wilkie, Glover, and "Poor Pye!" With these
 
 4 PREFACE. 
 
 " the subject was everji:liing : " and, this theory being 
 true, it follows that our artisans are nightly in the 
 habit of regaling themselves with the ' ' noble action ' ' 
 of the Davidies. Our political "v\"riters quote their 
 " wise saws and modern instances" fi-om the pages 
 of Pye's Alfred ; Mr. James and Mrs. Gore were in 
 the habit of embellishing their chapters with mottoes 
 chosen from Leonidas ; and Professor "Wilson must 
 have been quite mistaken, when he supposed the 
 well-thumbed volume in the cottages of the BQgh- 
 lands to be a copy of Thomson's Seasons — it was, 
 doubtless, a dog-eared copy of Wilkie's I^j/igomad/ 
 
 We agi'ee with Professor Arnold, in thinking that 
 an action that is based upon the primary affections of 
 humanity can never become antiquated. We assent 
 also to his assertion that the date of an action has 
 nothing whatever to do with its interest, and that a 
 gi'eat action of antiquity will strike the mind more 
 forcibly than a tri-vial action of oui* own times. Nay, 
 we may, without detriment to our ot\ti position con- 
 cede, that "Hermann and Dorothea," " Childe 
 Harold," " JoceljTi," and the "Excursion," leave the 
 reader cold, in comparison with the effect produced 
 upon him by the latter l)ooks of the " Iliad," by the 
 " Orestea," or by the episode of Dido, But what 
 then ? Does it follow that, because Prometheus, 
 Achilles, Clytemnestra, Orestes, Alcmseon, are more 
 interesting personages than James Jones, John 
 Smith, Thomas Johnson, or John Thompson, "action, 
 human action alone," constitutes the sole at- 
 traction of poetry? By what sjiecies of logical 
 legerdemain is this conclusion established from the
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 foregoing premises ? Because Homer, ^scliylus, 
 and Sophocles evince consummate skill in the develop- 
 ment of poetical action, it no more follows that this 
 is the prime requisite of poetry than it follows that 
 all poems must be epics or tragedies. 
 
 It is always dangerous to impose the restrictive 
 canons of one people or of one period, on another 
 people or another period, unless it can be demonstrated 
 that the two distinct nations or eras are, in all essen- 
 tial respects, duplicates of each other. Whatever is 
 universal in art and literatiu'e, is, of necessity, uni- 
 versally acceptable ; while that which is restrictive in 
 criticism, is generally local, accidental, and temporary. 
 Literature and the arts are not foreign to the soil 
 which cherishes and sustains them. They are the 
 flower and perfection of that people or that era among 
 whom they are born ; but, as nature and humanity 
 are radically the same everywhere, and at all 'times, 
 and yet are full of endless variety of detail, so that 
 no two scenes, no two nations, no two men, are 
 exactly aHke in every particular — so poetry and the 
 fine arts, though working on the same materials, and 
 aiming to produce the same general results, ^^dll vary 
 in their characteristics, in accordance with the peculiar 
 circumstances amid which they derive their origin. 
 
 Now, no two nations of equal culture, can possibly 
 be more dissimilar in almost every respect than the 
 England of to-day tmd the Greece of two thousand 
 years ago. This difference extends to almost every 
 particular of climate, scenery, religion, poHty, educa- 
 tion, morahty, and piu'suits. The Greek intellect was 
 fond of abstractions, and established its principles
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 of art as it established its philosophy — by processes 
 of deductive reasoning, more fi-equently than by 
 direct observation of the operations of nature. "We 
 should be sorry indeed to endorse what Johnson said 
 to :Mrs. Tlirale, that "the Athenians of the age of 
 Demosthenes were a people of brutes — a barbarous 
 people." But the Athenian gentleman described by 
 Macaiday, "who might jiass every morning in con- 
 versation ^^-ith Socrates, and might hear Pericles speak 
 four or five times every month ; who saw the plays of 
 Soi^hocles and Aristophanes; who walked amid the 
 friezes of Pliidias and the paintings of Zeuxis ; who 
 knew by heart the choruses of ^schylus ; who heard 
 the rhapsodist at the corner of the street reciting the 
 sliield of Achilles or the death of Argos " — was, after 
 aU, a very different personage from the Enghsh gen- 
 tleman of om- own times, who breakfasts in Belgravia, 
 and sups at his shooting-box in the Highlands ; who 
 is sipping chocolate to-day by the Falls of Niagara, 
 and a week hence is to be seen walking along Bond 
 Street ; who knows what is transpiring throughout 
 Europe, Asia, Africa, and America, and has a siim- 
 mary of the world's passing history laid upon liis 
 table every morning ; who knows more of physiology 
 than Aristotle, of geography than Strabo, of history 
 than Herodotus and Plutarch; whose library con- 
 tains more books than Plato ever saw ; who sends 
 messages to his friends in Russia and Sweden, and 
 receives replies from them in the course of a few 
 minutes ; who wanders amid rehques from Nineveh 
 and Babylon, and is siirroimded by the arts of eveiy 
 age and every nation imder the sun ; who is led by
 
 PREFACE. 7 
 
 one science down interniiuable vistas of time, past the 
 abode of the first man, out into a howling wilderness 
 of strange forms and strange vegetation, alive and 
 trembling in the tramp and roar of gigantic monsters 
 more terrible than " gorgons, and hydras, and 
 chimeras dire," — on beyond the confines of organic 
 life, where the desolating foot of death has therefore 
 never been planted, and out into that appalling 
 silence, never broken save when the primeval thun- 
 ders spake to each other, when the labouring fires 
 wrought wonders in their terrible caverns and cre- 
 vices, and the earth shook and quivered hke the 
 forests of the ancient oracles, when the spirit of pro- 
 phecy was on them ; who is transported by another 
 science across great gulfs of space, in which suns and 
 systems and constellations roll for ever, and still find 
 ample room — a palpitating wilderness of stars — world 
 on world, system on system, and galaxy on galaxy, 
 until the reason reels, and imagination flags, and the 
 eye of faith alone beholds the pavilion, " dark with 
 excess of light," of that God whom the Greek never 
 knew ! 
 
 Professor Arnold, after censuring the style of 
 Shakspeare, and citing Guizot and Hallam, in corro- 
 boration of his verdict, says, veiy truly, in reference 
 to the Greek drama : — 
 
 "A few actions eminently adapted for tragedy, maintained 
 almost exclusive possession of the Greek tragic stage ; their signi- 
 ficance appeared inexhaustible ; they were as pei-manent problems, 
 perpetually offered to the genius of every fresh poet. This, too, 
 is the reason of what appears to lis moderns a certain baldness of 
 expression in Greek tragedy ; of the triviality with which we often 
 reproach the remarks of the chorus, when it takes part in the
 
 8 PREFACE. 
 
 dialogue ; that the action itself, the situation of Orestes, or 
 Merope, or AlemEeon, was to stand the central point of interest, 
 nnforgotten, absorbing, principal ; that no accessories were for a 
 moment to distract the spectator's attention from this ; that the 
 tone of the parts was to be perpetually kept do^Ti, in orcjer not to 
 impair the grandiose effect of the whole. The terrible old mythic 
 story on which the drama was founded, stood, before he entered 
 the theatre, traced in its bare outlines upon the spectator's mind ; 
 it stood in his memory, as a group of statuary faintly seen, at the 
 end of a long and dark vista ; then came the poet embodying out- 
 lines, developing situations, not a word wasted, not a sentiment 
 capriciously thro^vn in ; stroke upon stroke, the drama proceeded ; 
 the light deepened upon the group ; more and more it revealed 
 itself to the riveted gaze of the spectator, until at last, when the 
 final words were spoken, it stood before him in broad sunlight, 
 a model of immortal beauty." 
 
 Why, we would ask, should Shakspeare be cen- 
 stu'ed for not adopting a practice whose adoption 
 depended upon circumstances over which the im- 
 mortal bard of Avon had no control ? Sophocles 
 wrote in accordance with the spu-it and requirements 
 of his age — Shakspeare with those of his. Why 
 should the example of either be cited against the 
 other ? Prominence of details was xmnecessary in 
 the case of the Greek dramatist, and would have 
 tended, in the eyes of those who beheld it, to con- 
 demn the whole piece : — prominence of details was 
 essential in the case of the Enghsh di-amatist, and, 
 without it, his "v\hole performance would have ap- 
 peared bald, vague, and unsatisfactory to his audience. 
 A few electrical words addressed to an enraged mob, 
 or an ardent army already trembhng with excite- 
 ment, might be sufficient to raise the wliole to a 
 pitch of ungovernable fury; but an elaborate speech, 
 entering into minute details, might be insufficient to
 
 PREFACE. 9 
 
 produce a similar effect on a multitude not similarly 
 prepared. The outline of the story to be portrayed 
 by the Greek poet was already in the mind of his 
 audience. To adopt Professor Arnold's image — the 
 whole was as a group of statuary dimly seen. What 
 the poet had to accomplish was to throw light upon it. 
 But a very different task was allotted to Shakspeare. 
 He had to hew out the forms, and to provide the 
 drapery. Attention to "accessories" was, therefore, 
 in his case, indispensable. 
 
 But if it could be shown that Greek poetry fur- 
 nishes the modern poet with the best examples of the 
 mode in which action is developed in poetical com- 
 positions, this would do nothing towards establish- 
 ing the theory of Professor Arnold — that action or 
 story is the prime essential, the one thing needed, 
 in all such works. His reasoning on the matter is 
 an argument of limitations, proceeding from the 
 particular to the imiversal. It should be borne 
 in mind, that the Ancients wrote poetry to be recited; 
 the Moderns write poetry to be read. With the 
 former, therefore, their worthiest poetry inevitably 
 took an epic or dramatic form, and the development 
 of the plot was a matter of prime importance. 
 Undoubtedly, " himian actions" are indispensable 
 both to plays and epic poems ; but unless Professor 
 Arnold can furnish reasons sufficient to establish 
 the proposition that all poetry is, or shovdd be, epic 
 or dramatic, he will fail to estabhsh the other pro- 
 position, that "human actions" are essential to 
 all poetry. This, however, he does not attempt to 
 
 do. His assumption is, therefore, just as ground- 
 
 B 2
 
 It) PREFACE. 
 
 less as that of Rymer, who said that " Shakspeare 
 ought not to have made Othello black ; for the 
 hero of a tragedy ought always to he white." His 
 criticism is just as narrow as that of the other critic 
 mentioned by Macaulay, who said that Milton 
 " ought not to have put so many similes into his 
 fii'st book ; for the fii*st book of an epic poem ought 
 always to be the most unadorned. There are no 
 similes in the first book of the Iliad." And his 
 logic is, we think, even worse than that of the 
 facetious actor who reasoned thus: — "All plays 
 are, or ought to be, poems ; therefore all poems 
 are, or ought to be, plays !" For, without attempt- 
 ing to prove that all poems should be plays. Pro- 
 fessor Arnold would impose upon all poems dramatic 
 restrictions, whether they are plays or not. 
 
 It is easy to see whence Professor Arnold has 
 derived his theory. Indeed, he makes no attempt 
 to conceal it. We have already said, that no two 
 nations could be more dissimilar in the mode and 
 extent of their civilization and culture ; that no 
 stronger contrast could be presented by any two 
 nations — of both of which it might be affirmed that 
 they were civilized — than that which subsists 
 between Greece and England. And yet, because 
 the Greeks — to whom the art of printing was im.- 
 known — wrote poetry to be pubHcly recited, or for 
 popidar representation, and adapted their poems to 
 the purpose which they were intended to serve ; the 
 Enghsh author, who writes poetry to be read, must 
 adopt the limitations imposed upon the Greeks by 
 the state of their society, and adapt his poetry to
 
 PREFACE. 1 1 
 
 a purpose which it was never intended to serve, 
 out of slavish imitation of the Grreek masters. The 
 absurdity of such a demand is fully apx^arent the 
 moment it is stated. Let us extend the same princi- 
 ple a little, and see what will come of it. Baron 
 Humboldt remarks, that the genuine and genial 
 love of nature, for its 0"Uti sake, first manifested 
 itself in the writings of the Semitic, Indian, and 
 Iraunian nations ; and in Europe, in those of the 
 early Christians ; such, for instance, as those of 
 Basil and Gregory of Nyssa ; while the Grreek and 
 Roman bucolic, idyllic, and didactic poems are 
 utterly destitute of it. Is the love of natiu^e, there- 
 fore, a thing to be reprehended in the moderns ? 
 Landscape painting, as we understand it, was wholly 
 unknown among the Grreeks, and even among the 
 Romans. It is true that pictures of natural ob- 
 jects were necessarily introduced into scenical re- 
 presentations, and that, in the Augustan age, 
 landscape painting passed from the theatre into 
 Roman and Grrecian halls ; but, from the excava- 
 tions made at Pompeii, Herculaneum, and Stabia, it 
 appears that they were merely a kind of bird's-eye 
 views of seajoort towns, public edifices, and villas ; 
 and were more like maps than paintings, in Ts^hich the 
 features of landscapes are carefully elaborated. Are 
 we, therefore, because the Greek painters, Kke their 
 poets, lavished all their skill on liistorical and m;ythical 
 subjects, to burn ouj Claudes and Poussins, ourRem- 
 brandts and Turners, and acknowledge poor Haydon 
 to be the greatest painter since Zeusis? Tliis, we 
 would suggest, is surely carrying admiration some-
 
 1 2 PREFACE. 
 
 what too far ! Boswell, we kno^^, in tlie lieat of his 
 enthusiasm, strove hard to acquire the Jolinsonian roll 
 and general ungainliness ; and we have heard of 
 certain slender young gentlemen of the last genera- 
 tion — ^now possibly grown into plethoric aldermen — 
 who carried broken hearts beneath gay waistcoats, 
 and not only cherished BjTonic misanthropy, but 
 also carefully cultivated the BjTonic hmp. Similar 
 enthusiasm carried into the serene region of art and 
 letters, certainly seems somewhat stai'tling, to say the 
 least of it. 
 
 The trxith seems to be, then, that action, in the all- 
 donainant sense in which it has recently been advo- 
 cated, is no more essential to the pm-poses of poetry 
 than the unities of time and place are essential to the 
 development of character in the di-ama. Those who 
 wish for a story, of the absorbing kind spoken of by 
 Professor Arnold, will not seek it in poetry. They 
 linow very well that they may find it in plays and 
 metrical romances occasionally, — almost always, and 
 without the needless encumbrance of verse, in modern 
 novels. The lover of poetry reads poems for some- 
 thing more than the mere excitement of the story. 
 The lover of exciting stories need never read poetry 
 at aU.* 
 
 * It is proper to state that the author communicated the bulk of 
 the above to the Church of England Quarterly Jtevieio, in 1855.
 
 HARTLEY PIT CATASTROPHE. 
 
 f r0lo0iu> 
 
 "Written by J. Stantan Bigg, and delivered by T. ToWN, Esq., 
 Ulverston, at the Concert held there Febrixaiy 11th, 1862, on 
 behalf of those who are bereaved by the accident. 
 
 Death in tlie Palace ; Death within the Cot, 
 
 Death in all ranks ! 'Tis but the common lot ; 
 
 He comes with stealthy steps, and in the night, 
 
 Taketh our cherished treasure from our sight ; 
 
 He tracks our steps, through hamlet, tower, and town. 
 
 And, with sure instinct, brings his victim down ; 
 
 And smites the pauper as he smites the crown. 
 
 AVith paUid face he leaps into his car. 
 
 And flames out ruddy in the sweat of war ; 
 
 He comes unto the cottage door and knocks. 
 
 And then, in spite of bars, and bolts, and locks. 
 
 Some one gets up and goes, — and is not seen — 
 
 Only another hillock on the green 
 
 Of the Sabbatic churchyard ; — all is done. 
 
 And one more mortal shall not see the sim ! 
 
 But seldom to a village doth he come, 
 Wringing all hearts, and hushing all the hum
 
 14 HARTLEY PIT CATASTKOPHE. 
 
 Of its glad voices. Seldom is he seen 
 
 Wrapping in shadow all the village green ; 
 
 Seldom he enters in at every door, 
 
 And writes the fearful legend up — "No more," 
 
 Over the mantel-piece, and on the floor. 
 
 No more a father's shadow on the wall ; 
 
 No more a husband's step, a brother's call, 
 
 No more the ruddy cliild with sunny hair, 
 
 Coming into the house — a psalm and prayer. 
 
 No more the eager hand upon the door. 
 
 For father, husband, brother, are no more. 
 
 Thus has it been at Hartley. Every room 
 
 Of every cottage hath its special gloom, 
 
 Some one is missing — husband, father, son. 
 
 Shall fill their place no more. Their day is done ; 
 
 And there is night, and woe, and wail, and gloom, 
 
 And saddest shadows fill up all the room 
 
 Of the dear lost ones, — each one in his place ; 
 
 Death hath washed white each bronzed and ruddy face ; 
 
 And so of all the dearest ties an end. 
 
 Of father, husband, brother, child, and fi-iend : 
 
 Husbands have said their last "Good-morn," and boys 
 
 Have set aside for ever childish toys, 
 
 And with the morning breeze upon their breath 
 
 Have gone into the mysteries of death. 
 
 Their mothers' i:)leading arms not heeding ; — So 
 
 Went the grey-headed, so the strong men go 
 
 When the dread Angel makes the sign of woe.
 
 HARTLEY PIT CATASTROPHE. 15 
 
 A village has been stricken : — On tlie door 
 Of every cottage are the words "No more ; " 
 No more the sturdy hands that won the bread, 
 Husband, and brother, child, and friend are dead. 
 And we, who come before you thus, to-night, 
 Cannot bring back the lost ones to the light ; 
 Cannot refill the lorn and empty chair, 
 Cannot bring back the earnest evening prayer ; 
 Cannot unto the mother give her son. 
 Nor to the wife her husband — all is done ! 
 But still, amid this holocaust of dead, 
 The living need what we can give them — Bread !
 
 16 
 
 LITTLE JANE. 
 
 Little Jane came dancing 
 
 Into the sunny room ; 
 
 "Ajxd what do you think, papa ? " she cried, 
 
 " I saw the father of Ellen who died, 
 
 And the men who were making her tomb ! 
 
 And the father patted me on the head 
 
 All for the sake of her who is dead 
 
 And gave me this doU, and wept, and said 
 
 That I was mi/ papa's pride." 
 
 "And so you are," with an accent wild, 
 
 Said the widower wan. " Come here, my child ! " 
 
 Ah ! but her locks were fair and bright. 
 
 Oh ! but her eyes were fidl of light, 
 
 And her little feet danced in ceaseless play ;— . 
 
 "Always be glad, always be gay, 
 
 Sing, and romp, and never be sad. 
 
 So you will make your papa glad." 
 
 Aud the little one boimded from his knee. 
 Lifted her doll, and screamed ^dth glee. 
 As the sunlight fell on the floor ; 
 But who is He at the open door, 
 AVaiting, watching, evermore — 
 "WTiose semblance none may see —
 
 LITTLE JANE. 17 
 
 "Wlio came imbidden once before, 
 And hushed the harp in the corner there, 
 And filled one heart with the wild despair 
 Of the endless never more ? 
 
 Stealthy his touch and stealthy his tread, 
 He lays his hand on her sunny head ; — 
 And who may mention the grace that has fled. 
 Or paint the bloom of life that is dead ? 
 
 The present rushes into the past, 
 Nothing on earth is doomed to last, 
 Summer has ended and winter is near, 
 Eain is steaming on moor and mere, 
 Dead leaves are on the blast. 
 
 The shutters are up in the empty room — 
 Nothing to break its hush of gloom ; 
 Nothing but gusts of plashing rain 
 Beating against the "wdndow-pane. 
 Mingled with brine swii'led up from the sea, 
 And thoughts of that which used to be 
 And cannot be, again.
 
 18 
 
 THE HUGUENOT'S DOOM. 
 
 Thk Pastor's house lies inj^e evening calm; 
 
 The cattle are all housed ; the labourer's hoe 
 
 Eests by his pickaxe ; and no sign of woe 
 
 Is on the heavens, or on the earth j 
 
 For, just as at his birth, 
 
 Man sleeps 'mid bloom and balm. 
 
 The miller to his 'prentice calls no more ; 
 
 The cliild has left his top and marbles on the floor; 
 
 The clock is safely ticking on the stair ; 
 
 And manj' a pilgrim prayer 
 
 Hath knocked, this summer night, at heaven's pearly 
 door. 
 
 But lo ! adown the sliunberous hill, 
 
 A fonn is rushing v,nth. dishevelled hair, 
 
 With straining eyes 
 
 That vainly seek the pitiless skies, 
 
 Filled with all human ill. 
 
 And heavy with despair. 
 
 Knocks wildly at the Pastor Fido's door; 
 
 And they, within, cry "Go thy way. 
 
 Our task has ended with the day ; 
 
 We do not seek for more ! " 
 
 To whom the stranger cried, witli brain distrauglit,
 
 THE huguenot's DOOM. 19 
 
 ' ' Oh ! are ye men, and have ye hearts of steel, 
 
 That for no human woe can feel. 
 
 To whom love's agony is nought ? 
 
 I tell you I'm the yoimgest son of five ; 
 
 And three He in their gore 
 
 Down by the great hall-door, 
 
 And Fred and I are all that are alive. 
 
 I tell you all the clouds are black with thunder. 
 
 And deeds are done to-day, that none may name, 
 
 Have wrenched the jaws of heaven asunder, - 
 
 And filled them full of flame. 
 
 I am the yoimgest son of five, I say. 
 
 And I have seen those sights, and heard those sounds 
 
 to-day!" 
 " We wot not what thou speakest of," cries one ; 
 " Our task was ended with the setting sim." 
 
 Thereat, the stranger gave a cry. 
 
 " Open the door," he said ; 
 
 " And let me see the old man's saintly head. 
 
 And warn him, ere I die ! " 
 
 They drew the bolt ; they brought him through the 
 
 gloom 
 Into the darkness of an inner room. 
 Where, in his cleric vestments clad. 
 The old man looked upon the lad. 
 
 '' Father ! — Pastor Fido ! — Holy man, — 
 man of saintly eld ! " — the youth began,
 
 20 THE huguenot's DOOM. 
 
 And choked in tears. '* Father! I have seen 
 
 Death-struggles all this day, — 
 
 Broad stains of blood along the common way, — 
 
 The blood of kindi*ed on the village green ; 
 
 And sounds of men in agony and pain 
 
 Are ringing mldly now within my maddened brain ! — 
 
 IMen I — my own brothers ! Murdered in their j^outh, 
 
 And in the flower, and prime, and strength, and truth, 
 
 And beauty, of that youth : 
 
 They showered theu' blood Hke rain 
 
 Upon my pathway, as I fled — 
 
 The fires of hell all gathering in my head. 
 
 Hush I Place thy hand upon my burning brow, 
 
 And I will tell thee what has happ'd, and how." 
 
 " Calm thee, my son !" the old man said ; — • 
 " The Sim's hot, crimson stain 
 Is hardly quenched yet in the distant main, — 
 Something hath touched thy head." 
 
 " Is it the sun ? Oh ! Old man, is it well 
 
 To scoff, and mock me thus ? What have I done 
 
 That thou should' st gibe and jeer me with the sun ? 
 
 Hush thee ! And I wiU tell. 
 
 Thou talkest of the sun. ' Tis well of thee ! 
 
 This morn, only this very morn, 
 
 I saw him walk upon the ripples of the sea, 
 
 And shake his gold out on the growing com ; 
 
 I saw him shine upon my father's hall, 
 
 Kipening the pears upon the garden wall ;
 
 THE huguenot's DOOM. 21 
 
 I saw him in my sisters' hair, 
 
 And on my father's brow, as the old man bent in 
 
 prayer. 
 Only this morn, a happy family 
 Gathered together round that old man's knee, — 
 My brothers fonr and I, and my fair sisters thi-ee. 
 And now — to-night — old man ! — To-night 
 The rising moon wiU show another sight, 
 Will shine on what the ruthless fires have left — 
 On desecrated rooms, 
 On horrible smoking glooms. 
 On flame-black waUs wdth many a ruin-cleft — 
 And worse ! Grod ! To-night, the moon wiU shine 
 Into my father's cold, dead eyes, — 
 And into yours, that matched the skies, 
 Ye three dead brothers mine ! " 
 
 " Ah ! This is sad." " Nay, old man ! do not speak. 
 
 My tale is short to tell. 
 
 These ears have heard a sister's shriek, 
 
 And the whoop of fiends of hell. 
 
 They came upon us unaware ; 
 
 We were still upon our knees 
 
 When a clatter of hoofs came on the breeze. 
 
 And then a hundred feet clomb up the oaken stair. 
 
 Lend me thy hand, old man ! My senses reel ; 
 
 Where was I ? Ah ! the clang of steel, 
 
 A hundred troopers in the breakfast-room, 
 
 Stabs, groans, cries, curses, then a gloom,
 
 22 THE huguenot's boom. 
 
 Where grisly shadows swam about 
 As in some cavern ; then a shout 
 Of horrible triumph pierced my brain, 
 Mingled with feebler cries of pain. 
 Old man ! Did'st ever hear the like ? 
 Did'st ever hear thy foeman strike 
 Full on thy brothers' breast, and know 
 That death was following every blow, 
 That thou wert helpless, and it must be so ? 
 Hast ever striven, with uplifted hands, 
 To ward the lightnings from thy native lands ? 
 Hast gathered up thy soul in maniac act 
 To lift the thundering wall of some great cataract ? 
 Hast heard thy sisters' wail of woe 
 Clutched by the thi'oat thyself, struggling in vain to 
 go? 
 
 I saw it all ! I heard the hellish din. 
 
 I saw the strong oppress the weak — 
 
 The weak — my nearest kin ! 
 
 I saw the deed of blood begin, 
 
 I heard its history in my sisters' slu'iek ; 
 
 I saw them droj)ping one by one, 
 
 Brother and brother, father and son, 
 
 I felt the old man's hair cool on my burning cheek, 
 
 As, A\ith a long, low cry, 
 
 He fell down stricken by my side ; 
 
 A keen blade glittered in mine eye. 
 
 And then a darkness fell, wofid, and dee}), and wide.
 
 THE huguenot's DOOM. 
 
 I cannot tell how long I lay, 
 
 I cannot say the sights I saw, 
 
 I cannot say the sounds I heard, — 
 
 Who can put heart' s-blood in a word — 
 
 The dearest blood that ever stirred 
 
 A brother's bosom ? Well-a-day ! 
 
 I hardly know, now, what I say." 
 
 ' ' And so thy father, the old man, is dead. 
 And all thy brethren, too, are slain ? " 
 
 " All ? Said I all ? Nay, all save me and Fred, 
 
 And he is coming here amain." 
 
 " And wherefore ?" "Nay, I hardly know ! 
 
 Something about a ship, he said ; 
 
 And bade me tell tliis tale of woe. 
 
 And save the grey hairs of thy head." 
 
 " What of the ship, and what of him ?" 
 
 "It's riding safely in the bay ; — 
 
 My mind is weak, my memory dim, 
 
 I hardly know what I should say ; 
 
 But, ere another sun shall shine. 
 
 Both he and I, and thou and thine. 
 
 Must be at least ten leagues away." 
 
 " Ha ! ha ! m}^ lad, thou speakest well ; 
 
 A ship is riding sure enough !" — 
 
 The laugh was cruel — the voice was rough— 
 
 The speaker flung aside disguise — 
 
 But worse than laugh, or voice, the eyes
 
 24 THE HUGtTENOT's DOOM. 
 
 Looked up, two ruddy pits of hell ! 
 And the youth saw, in wan despair. 
 It was a trooper fierce and fell — 
 A face and form he knew too well — 
 That sat in the Pastor's oaken chair ! 
 
 " Old Pastor Fido sails to-night 
 In the galley-slave ship in the bay ; 
 And thou shalt join him ere the light 
 Dawns on another day !"
 
 25 
 
 AN IRISH PICTURE. 
 
 A SMOKING swamp before a cottage door ; 
 A drowned dog bobbing to a soleless shoe ; 
 A broken wasb-tub, witb its ragged staves 
 Swimming and ducking to a battered hat, 
 Wlienever the wind stirs the reedy slime ; 
 A timibled peat-stack, dripping in the rain ; 
 A long, lank pig, with dissipated eyes. 
 Leading a vagrant life among the moors ; 
 A rotting paling, and a plot of ground, 
 With fifteen cabbage- stalks amid lush weeds ; 
 A moss-grown pathway, and a worn-out gate. 
 Its broken bars down-dangHng from the nails ; 
 A windy cottage, with a leaky thatch. 
 And two dim windows set like eyes asquint ; 
 A bulging doorway, with a drunken lean ; 
 Two half-nude children dabbling in the mire, 
 And scrambling eagerly for bottle-necks ; 
 A man akimbo at the open door. 
 His battered hat slouched o'er his sottish eyes. 
 Smoking contented in the falling rain.
 
 27 
 
 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 ^r0^m. 
 
 TO MY WIFE. 
 
 Well, dear ! our little world is hushed and still, 
 And the great world is far away, as we, 
 Sitting together, on this tranquil night, 
 Pause in our talk, and think a little while. 
 And look into the fire, and see the past 
 Unfold itself, and all its scrolls flash up 
 In sudden sparkles of swift thought. 
 
 Our boys 
 Are in their cradles, safe and well ; and dreams 
 Are filling both their baby-hearts and souls. 
 Our eldest child was with us as we walked 
 Over the hills, and through the woods to-day, 
 
 For the first time ; ^his little trotting steps 
 
 Falling on both our hearts, like music heard 
 When heads are bowed, and the cathedral chant 
 Goes up to Grod on faltering steps of prayer. 
 Here are the sticks I cut for him ; and he, 
 With the imagination of a child,
 
 28 SHIFTING scen:es. 
 
 Pronounced theni tall as trees ; and, in Lis hands, 
 
 They towered up loft}^ as the Aljiine pines 
 
 Oiu* little darhng Jacky ! — Hope and pride 
 Of both our hearts. 
 
 And little Harry, too, 
 Is Ijing in his cot — our " two-year old " — 
 AVith smiles dimpling his little happy face 
 
 Into angehc sweetness : Bless them both ! 
 
 "Grandpa" has said "Grood-night," and all is hushed ; 
 
 You, sitting at your customary work, 
 
 Ask for a story. "Well, then, take these lines — 
 
 The echo of a legend from afar, 
 
 A winter dream of southern summer-time, 
 
 A medley of the distant — and the near ; 
 
 The present — and the past ; and if you see 
 
 The moral that is hidden in the tale, 
 
 Then will the tale be dearer for its sake, 
 
 Although it is not branded on its front, 
 
 Nor made to dance attendance, everywhere 
 
 A lackey to the story through the whole : 
 
 'Tis a love-offering : Take it then as such !
 
 29 
 
 ABSENT. 
 
 Scene: A Garden near the Royal Palace. Time, 
 Evening. Hayti, the Wife of Jug Dev Purmae, 
 is walking alone. 
 
 Hee eyelids droop ; her cheek is wet ; 
 And all its budded roses hlow 
 Fainter, and fainter still, and grow 
 
 Like lilies white, and wliiter yet. 
 
 Her happy babes, that all the day 
 
 Kan lip and down the garden- walk, 
 And filled the air with their dear talk, 
 
 In a sweet slumber softly lay : 
 
 Her glorious babes — so bright and fair — 
 She almost wonders, as she sings. 
 They do not spread out gauzy wings. 
 
 And soar into the summer air. 
 
 Their laughter is so rich and deep. 
 
 She links it with the songs of birds ; 
 And all their Httle lisping words 
 
 Come trembling to her in her sleep ; 
 
 c2
 
 30 SIIIFTIXO SCENES. 
 
 And all the Kght of their sweet eyes 
 Is garnered in her heart of hearts : 
 She often thinks with shuddering starts, 
 
 They are bright aliens of the skies ; 
 
 And trembles, lest some holy night, 
 
 A glory-form should break the gloom, 
 And, shimmering through their little room, 
 
 Take them for ever out of sight ! 
 
 So wondrously their faces burn. 
 
 So pui'ely dance the sudden gushes, 
 She often tliinks the tell-tale blushes 
 
 For some more radiant planet yearn ; — 
 
 SomcAvhere beyond the gleaming bars 
 
 Of sunset, on a golden even — 
 
 Somewhere — she knows not where — in heaven, 
 "Whence comes the spii'it-peep of stars. 
 
 Her one sweet boy, so merry and wise, 
 
 And her two dainty little girls, 
 
 Shining behind a dance of curls, 
 That dazzle the mother's loving eyes, 
 
 And give her heart-beats, as she sees 
 
 The floating glory glimmer and break, 
 Like rippled moonlight on a lake, 
 
 Through tho cool dai'kness of the trees.
 
 SHIFTING SCENES. 31 
 
 Like streaming moonbeams, through the boughs, 
 Lending a lustre to each other, 
 The loved twin-sisters and their brother 
 
 Gro gleaming on with brightening brows ; 
 
 And into her heart of hearts they go, 
 
 With aU their laughters and their wiles. 
 Their innocent words, and happy smiles, 
 
 And all their life's unsullied glow. 
 
 Awaking dim imaginings 
 
 Of happy isles and regions tender, 
 Where beings of supernal splendour 
 
 Q-Hde hushing through a gleam of wings ; 
 
 And faery palfreys come and go 
 
 From castles hid in hoary woods 
 
 By faery streams, where falling floods 
 
 Fall silent as the falling snow. 
 
 And now each baby calmly sleeps ; 
 
 Her happy nest is warm and well ; 
 
 Why shoidd her bosom heave and swell ? 
 How is it the beaming mother weeps ? 
 
 Her stalwart husband's at the war. 
 
 And tongues are false, and friends are few, 
 And kings are mortal, and the true 
 
 Can meet no charges when afar.
 
 ;52 
 
 II. 
 
 ENEMIES AT COUET. 
 
 Scene : An Apartment in the Palace. Present, Sidh 
 Raj, the Ejng ; Ameer, and Sitae, Conspirators, and 
 Enemies of Jug Dev Purmar. 
 
 Sidh Raj. 
 
 He lies wlio says tliat Jug Dev is not brave ! 
 
 Thi'iee have the breezes borne liis banners liome 
 
 Scorched in the breath of battle, ragged and torn, 
 
 Crimson with carnage, but victorious. 
 
 Thrice have the eager messengers rushed up 
 
 The forest avenues, with straining eyes, 
 
 Cr}ing to all the winds the note of conquest. 
 
 Thrice has he gone down into the garden of Death, 
 
 And torn up victory by the bloody roots. 
 
 His bickering brand has beaten back the hosts 
 
 Of the on-coming fate that threatened us 
 
 Three times ; and as a storm goes thi-ough the woods 
 
 Shaking theu' ancient empire like a leaf, 
 
 And tumbling the grim giants down in heaps 
 
 Of grey dishevelled ruin, even so 
 
 Did he go do^^^l imperial to the foe, 
 
 And they lay strewn and wasted.
 
 SHIFTING SCENES. 33 
 
 Ameer. 
 
 Good, my lord 
 The King speaks true. No mau denies the might 
 And valoiu' of Purmar. They have been proven 
 In battles endless, both abroad and here ; 
 In camp and palace, by the river's marge, 
 And in the imprisoned darkness of the forest ; 
 In broils of his own seeking — at the court 
 Of him to whom his fealty is sworn. 
 His aim is sure ; his arm is mailed in might ; 
 His step is doom ; his very look is death. 
 He is a very Azrael to our foes ; 
 But, may it x>lease the King, his wings are long, 
 And Hap the blood of kinsmen in our face ! 
 
 SiDH Eaj. 
 Ha! The old story? 
 
 Ameek. 
 
 Not so old, my lord ; 
 But every child in Eajput, ten years born, 
 Remembers, shuddering, how the brave Jug Dev 
 Slew the King's brother in the open day. 
 
 SiDH Eaj. 
 He well deserved his fate : — liis doom was just. 
 
 Ameeb. 
 
 The King is very merciful. The world 
 Is less so.
 
 .'H SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 SiDH E.AJ. 
 
 Ha ! Sir Dark-face, of the thin 
 And shrivelled sneer, with its pale treachery 
 Dancing like death-lights on thy cruel hps ! 
 I do believe the breasts that gave thee suck 
 Were bitter with the bite of aspics, that 
 Thy veins run thick with poison 'stead of blood, 
 So wicked are thy words, so pinched and worn 
 Thy looks, and such a fire of hellish hate 
 Grlints deadly-bright through thy haK-closed lids, 
 Like the live levin leaping tlirough shut clouds. 
 
 SiVAR. 
 
 Let not the King be angry ! Ameer speaks 
 What thousands hold imprisoned in their breasts. 
 He is too bold, perchance ; in the face of his king 
 He should seek courteous terms, and silken speech, 
 And keep the rude and ragged garb of truth 
 For plainer presences, and lighter talk. 
 His loyalty is greater than his wit. 
 
 SiDH Eaj. 
 
 Do ye all mock me ? What is't ye would say ? 
 No fear of Ameer's prudence ! He would plant 
 One hand upon his bosom, and with speech 
 All tender sleekness — Devil's milk and honey — • 
 He would come sidhng up unto his friend. 
 And send tlie hot blood liissing to his eyes, 
 A dagger in his heart !
 
 SHIFTING SCENES. 35 
 
 Away with you, 
 Base time-servers ! that just have coiu?age to crawl 
 Behind your monarch's chair, and whisper fraud 
 And treachery against his bravest friend. 
 Who fights his battles and your own ; defends 
 The homes which you could not defend ; hurls back 
 The coming ruin ; props your roofs ; 
 And hunts the hungry wolf away that laps 
 Your very children's blood ! 
 
 Slaves that ye are ! 
 So tanned and rubicund ! So free of speech ! 
 All plimip as sun-stained berries in the woods ; 
 Wloile he seeks famine just that you may feast, 
 And, with his arms, buys freedom for your sons ; 
 And is paid back in slander. 
 
 Ameer. 
 
 It is well 
 The King should spurn his slaves. And yet — 
 
 SiDH Eaj. 
 
 And yet? 
 
 Ameer. 
 
 The King hath friends as true, though with less 
 
 thews. 
 Less brawn and muscle than Jug Dev Purmar :— 
 With less blood on their hands, of friend and foe :— 
 Friends who ne'er bullied the Monarch to his face,
 
 36 SHITTING SCENES. 
 
 Nor slew his brother in the open court, 
 
 Nor scored their bravery on theii- country's heart. 
 
 SiVAR. 
 
 The tiger-cat is brave who tears our kids ; 
 The lion is no coward, though he kills 
 And munches in the dark. 
 
 SiDH Eaj. 
 
 What ho ! Our friend 
 Is a poor warrior simply ; not much skilled 
 In the sweet speech of courtiers ; does not serve 
 Rank meat on silver platters ; nor brim up 
 A golden goblet full of poisoned wine ; 
 But gives you homel}^ fare and honest sjieech, 
 And so has done ^dth it. Your daintier selves 
 He cannot rival in luxuriousness : — 
 He knows it well ; — be satisfied. He fights 
 That you may feast ; he toils in sweat and gore 
 That you may dally through a summer day 
 With the light wenches in the laugliing woods ; 
 He wrestles in the bloody billows of war. 
 And grips the hard and bony hand of death 
 That you may mingle in the merry dance, 
 And lap the sweets of lips more ruddy than wine. 
 His deeds are rough — his speech is like his docds- 
 And this hath angered you.
 
 shifting scenes. 37 
 
 Several Coubtiers. 
 
 If we might speak, 
 Not for ourselves, but for our Monarch ? — 
 
 giDH Eaj. 
 
 Then 
 You would drop poisoned honey in his ears. 
 Say loyal things with most disloyal hearts, 
 Claim all our trust with treachery in your souls, 
 Speak honest-sounding words with lying lips, 
 And, while a falsehood festered on your tongue. 
 Pay eager deference, outwardly, to truth. 
 Bring in a robed and jewelled skeleton, 
 And let the royal diadem blaze up 
 And biu-n above his white and ghastly brows ; 
 Bow down in worship ; hail him as your King ; 
 And give him sceptre o'er your rotten hearts : — 
 But as for him ye wot of— he is true. 
 
 Ameer. 
 If the King would but listen to his slaves — 
 
 * SiDH Eaj. 
 
 He would hear slave' s-talk ;— not a doubt. What 
 more? 
 
 Ameer. 
 'Tis said, he whispers that a day wiU come 
 
 D
 
 38 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 When Eajpiit shall bow down her haughty head, 
 And take him, on his own terms, as her king. 
 
 SiDH Eaj. 
 'Tis said too, my good friend, not long ago, 
 A certain pampered courtier, menial-hke. 
 Lifted his eyes up to that Queen of Love, 
 Ha}i;i, the spotless wife of brave Purmar. 
 'Tis also said the Warrior met the Chief 
 Gay in his flaunting feathers and his silks, 
 And sadly spoiled his plimiage ! Nay, 'tis said 
 That, in that hour, the gaudy butterfly 
 Shook all the gold-dust fi'om his shining wings, 
 Slipped off his purple down, his biu'ning bronze. 
 His velvet spots, and all his ru.by rings. 
 And was a wasp thereafter. Was it so ? 
 
 A3rEER. 
 
 My lord the King is pleasant. 
 
 SiDH Eaj. 
 
 It is well 
 
 Ameer tliinks so ! 
 
 SiVAR. 
 
 My lord ! If I migh^ speak — 
 
 SiDH Eaj. 
 But to what end ? Full well I know thy speech. 
 From its first stammer to its rounded pause. 
 What ! is Sidh Eaj so weak that ho -will give 
 His mighty war-horse to the wolves, because
 
 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 39 
 
 The foolish dogs go baying at his heels ? 
 
 Or shall he cast his trusty brand away 
 
 Because a slave has dared to breathe on it ? 
 
 And have ye all forgotten who it was 
 
 That, in the hour of deadly peril, saved 
 
 Your monarch's life, while you stood white as trees 
 
 That have been barked by Hghtning ? 
 
 Ah ! that day, 
 That was a blush of fruits and fluttering wings — 
 A rich delirium of soimds and odours — 
 When every breath was balm, and the great cusp 
 Of the bright heavens gleamed with gorgeous gold. 
 And all the forest was a trembhng thrill 
 Of blended music, and of odour-rain, 
 And we, with all our train, went out and danced 
 Beneath the quivering boughs, and in our sport 
 Flung the ripe fruit, half-bursting, at the girls ; — 
 When in upon our merriment there broke 
 That grand and gleaming terror ; with his eyes 
 Burning their sockets in the lust of blood, — 
 The himgry lion, flaming on his prey, — 
 And his mane rolling biUows of stormy fire. 
 And ye shrank back, and whitened in the blaze 
 Of his fierce anger — when, as suddenly, 
 A flash shot thi-ough the hot and sidtry gloom. 
 And in the midst of us, even like a god. 
 His great brand dripping gore, and all his soul 
 Hurried in crowned crimson to his face, 
 Stood Jug Purmar !
 
 40 shifting scenes. 
 
 Ameer. 
 But, my good lord and King — 
 
 SroH Eaj. 
 
 And even now, hath he not left his bride, 
 With all her budded beauties in rich bloom, 
 To battle for our kingdom ? 
 
 Ameer. 
 
 Dearer than bride, 
 With all her jewels warming on her breast, 
 Is the rich prize he seeks. 
 
 SiDH Eaj. 
 
 (Not heeding the interrwption). 
 
 And hath exchanged 
 The eager clamour of his happy babes, 
 Who with plump fingers patted his swart cheeks. 
 For the shi-ill shriek of war, the sudden stab. 
 The cnmching blow, the terrible death-grip. 
 And the fierce wrestle on the shppery sands. 
 Sodden with gore ! 
 
 SiVAR. 
 
 He fights the best 
 Whose stake is heaviest in the bloody fray ; 
 And he who sees a sceptre in the mirk, 
 May edge his shoulders through a world of foes.
 
 shifting scenes. 41 
 
 Ameee. 
 He who walks over slaughter to a throne — 
 
 Sedh Eaj (to Siva/rJ. 
 
 Thou never didst love Purmar, hoary friend ; 
 And yet, Sivar, I have known thee lay 
 Great burdens of applause upon his back. 
 
 SrvAR, 
 
 I might cry " mighty" to the glistening force 
 
 Of the sleeked torrent, as it glided by. 
 
 With all its hurrying waters gathered up 
 
 And marshalled for the dread and terrible plunge ; 
 
 But if I saw a pale face gleaming white 
 
 Amid the snaky blackness of its folds, 
 
 And going ghastly down the ebon wall, 
 
 I shoidd look on with horror evermore. 
 
 SiDH Eaj. 
 
 Thou hast not spoken, Ali : What sayest thou ? 
 Thy heart is gentle, and thy words are wise. 
 
 Ali. 
 
 I would say simply this, my noble King, 
 That, if the pillars that support our roof 
 Be given to shaking, why the roof may fall.
 
 42 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 SiDH Raj. 
 A fool's speech truly ! Is there nothing more ? 
 
 SrvAE. 
 
 And the same shoulders that prop up the throne 
 Have power to hurl it, with its pearled state, 
 And aU its purple honours, to the dust !
 
 43 
 
 III. 
 
 THE WAEEIOE'S BABES. 
 
 Scene : The Forest near the Garden. Three Child/ren 
 
 playing. 
 
 Three little babes are laughing 
 
 In among the trees, 
 Six little eyes are dancing 
 
 Grlad as summer bees, 
 In the cool of leaves, in the gleam of springs, 
 
 In the shadow and the breeze. 
 
 Trailing golden garlands 
 
 With many a tug and bound. 
 Breaking off the blossoms, 
 
 Showering odours round ; 
 With a laugh, and a shout, and a clap of hands, 
 
 Piu'pHng all the ground. 
 
 Through the tangled forest. 
 
 By the river's brim, 
 And through the crouching mosses 
 
 Beneath the arches dim ; 
 With faces bright, and with hair like light, 
 
 They go with ruddy swim.
 
 44 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 Still laughing and still crushing 
 
 Berries in the rout, 
 Tossing up their garlands 
 
 With merry laugh and shout ; 
 Through the sun and the shade with a sudden skip 
 
 Bounding in and out. 
 
 And, where the holy silence 
 
 A sandalled pilgrim stands, 
 And communes with the forest. 
 
 In hushed uplifted hands, 
 In the wild sweet glee of their infancy 
 
 They break the solemn bands, 
 
 And carry all their gladness 
 
 With sudden turns and dips 
 Down the dusky silence. 
 
 Into the deep eclipse. 
 Till the grim woods laugh, and the gnarled boughs 
 
 Bud out in eyes and hps.
 
 45 
 
 IV. 
 IN THE FIELD. 
 
 Scene : The Camp between the Opposing Hosts. 
 
 All splashed with bloody foam, the heroes stand. 
 Three stabs have weakened Purmar, and the blood 
 And gore well freely. Two swift blinding blows 
 Have lopped the flesh from Afrah ; and still hot 
 And fierce the battle rages. 
 
 Thi'ee set times 
 Did Purmar come before the opposing hosts, 
 And challenge any hero to the fight ; 
 But they, beholding his majestic mien. 
 His towering height, and mighty strength of limb, 
 And knowing well the prowess of his arm, 
 Returned no answer. 
 
 Till grim Afrah rose. 
 The dread of Rajput. Snake-like in his scales, 
 Writhing, the warrior came, and glowed and gleamed 
 With hate and envy. Both their blades leapt out 
 At the same moment, and both bickered bright 
 Over the heads of both the eager hosts, 
 Whose faces paled with passion where they stood. 
 Both the swart heroes fought in rings of fire 
 As the sun flamed upon their biu'ning brands ; 
 
 D 2
 
 46 SHIFTIIfG SCENES. 
 
 A moment more, and both their blades ran blood. 
 
 With his keen dagger Afrah stabbed the side, 
 
 And brought the Eajput hero to his knee ; 
 
 Who, on his feet once more, hurled high his brand 
 
 And smote slim Afrah on the shoulder-blade. 
 
 Afi-ah, impatient, closed upon his foe, 
 
 Eeljdng on his pliancy of limb. 
 
 And strength compacted in the smallest space, 
 
 Hm-led high the Eajput warrior ; every nerve 
 
 Beat as a pulse of fire ; and every limb 
 
 Ean down with lightning as they tugged and swerved ; 
 
 Both their huge shoulders burst in knotted wreaths, 
 
 Like rings of serpents writhing in the fight ; 
 
 The earth shook \mder them as down they fell, 
 
 Afrah beneath, and Purmar on his foe ; 
 
 And all the thirsty wildnerness of sand 
 
 Drank mighty di-aughts of blood. Bhnded with gore, 
 
 Each seized another weapon. Afrah first 
 
 Aimed a fierce blow at Purmar's bleeding face. 
 
 Which, pan-jing, the Eajput hero swung 
 
 His terrible war-club, knotted like an oak. 
 
 And brought it down with all his giant force 
 
 On the tall front of Afi-ah. Down he dropt, 
 
 Like a huge monarch of the forest, struck 
 
 By thimder, 'mid his peers ; and all the host 
 
 Of Eajput, that had stood in silent awe. 
 
 Broke, like a loosened torrent, into shouts 
 
 Of wild acclaim. 
 
 Meanwhile, Purmar, haK blind.
 
 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 Beheld a gleam of lances as he reeled 
 On to the camp of Rajput ; and a swii'l 
 Of giddy smoke floated 'twixt him and heaven ; 
 And all the distant forests and blue hills 
 Span round and round in ruddy wheels of light ; 
 And heads and faces of the army near 
 Danced as on rippling water ; broken glints 
 Of far-off shining rivers, green of leaves 
 Sun-touched, and aching wastes of dreary sand, 
 "With ghastly faces lighting up the mirk, 
 Whirled, in a roaring chaos roxmd his head. 
 As on he staggered to his tumbhng tent. 
 
 G^iS.^.s*'^^ ^^>^£j^eo
 
 48 
 
 Y. 
 
 THE LONELY WIFE. 
 
 ScEJOE : A Room in Ptjemae's House. Hayti alone. 
 
 All daj' in purple sat the sun 
 
 Amid his sumptuous train ; 
 All night the pale moon, weird and wan, 
 
 Wandered tlu-ough clouds and rain. 
 All day the winds, like laden wings, 
 
 Dropt odours rich and dim ; 
 All night they shrieked through groaning Loughs, 
 
 And caverns dark and gi-im. 
 All day the hills were crown' d with light. 
 
 Light laved their shining sides ; 
 All night the torrents roared and dashed 
 
 Their black and sunless tides 
 Through thimderous glooms and avenues 
 
 Of ghastly ribbed rocks, 
 Wliose every paUid bone of tlint 
 
 Shuddered beneath the shocks. 
 All day the sim- crowned forest tlu'illed, 
 
 And hummed with bee and bird ; 
 The tiger and the Hon roared 
 
 All night, and were not heard ;
 
 SHIFTESTG SCENES. 49 
 
 So fiercely skrieked the murderous storm, 
 
 So wailed the shriU winds thin ; 
 With such an angry shout the heavens 
 
 Tumbled the darkness in. 
 
 My day is done, and, Like a flower, 
 
 Folds all its sweetness up. 
 The wine of life is rudely dashed 
 
 Out of the golden cup ; 
 And all the sunny hours, flower- wreathed. 
 
 That danced upon my floor. 
 Have taken all their garlands ofi". 
 
 And sing and dance no more ; 
 My day is done, my sun has gone 
 
 Down to a weary bed ; 
 The night comes shuddering down the heavens — 
 
 The night — ^with all its dead ! 
 
 I look into my children's eyes, 
 
 I stroke their shining hair, 
 I kiss their Kttle ruddy lips, 
 
 I see him budding there ; 
 I go about my household tasks 
 
 BKndly, with eyes down-bent ; 
 All night I ask my aching heart 
 
 How the long day was spent ; 
 All day I wonder when the night 
 
 Will come to cool my brow ; 
 Both night and day I thrust my arms 
 
 Through the barred dungeon — now.
 
 50 SHIFTING SCEJJES. 
 
 I cannot rest. Some greedy want 
 
 Eats all the light away, 
 And on the pearled bosom of sleep 
 
 Gnaws at my heart alway. 
 The daily heavens blaze like brass 
 
 Above my burning head ; 
 And then the shuddering night comes do"«Ti- 
 
 The night — with all its dead. 
 
 I see the first pale streak of dawn, 
 
 I see the giant limb 
 0' the sun stride o'er the bars of heaven 
 
 Out of his dungeon dim ; 
 I see the shadows gather and leap 
 
 In their evening thunder-race ; 
 I hear the night- winds howl and moan 
 
 Up in the moon's pale face. 
 No rest have I at night or morn. 
 
 For evermore I see 
 The red sm*ge creep, the red waves leap 
 
 Up in a bloody sea ; 
 And evermore a gi'eat fear comes 
 
 Swooning across my soid, 
 As I hear my husband's well-known name 
 
 In Death's dark muster-call. 
 Sometimes I hope ; a little space 
 
 The sun shines through the rain ; 
 But soon the gathering blackness comes, 
 
 And then I grope again
 
 SHIFTING SCENES. 51 
 
 Through chamel-damps, by reeking walls, 
 
 With darkness overhead — 
 Touching the cold and crawling things 
 
 That batten on the dead, 
 
 heavens ! I would I only knew 
 If I a widow be : — 
 
 Sometimes I clutch my happy babes, 
 
 And cry — " My orphans three !" 
 They only smile uj) in my face ; 
 
 They only clap their hands ; 
 They fling their blossoms at my feet 
 
 And skim along the sands. 
 Sometimes, in self-deceit, I bring 
 
 His quiet evening meal 
 And listen — not a bird can fly, 
 
 Nor drowsy beetle wheel. 
 But I can hear it : — oh! I hear 
 
 The midnight midges hum, 
 And listen till the stars burn out. 
 
 But still he does not come ! 
 
 1 know he will not ; yet no leaf 
 Nor blade of grass can stir. 
 
 But through my heart a wildering rush 
 
 Goes with a giddy whirr, 
 And dashes all the fevered blood 
 
 Up to my heated brain ; 
 I cannot bear it ; but I sit 
 
 And listen yet again. 
 Sometimes a lonely footstep comes
 
 •^2 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 Along the crisped grass ; 
 I cry with joy, and thi-ough the door 
 
 Bewildered bui'st — alas ! 
 It is to feel two shining ejes 
 
 Burn in upon my brain ; 
 And go Like serpents o'er my wounds 
 
 With poison to my pain : 
 I hoped for Purmar, but behold 
 
 The wild and wicked leer, 
 The deadly hate, the deadlier lust, 
 
 The fiend- smile of Ameer ! 
 I shut the door, I wring my hands, 
 
 And something wrings my soul ; 
 For, by the present drear I see 
 
 The golden past imroll ; 
 But something sends a deadly smoke 
 
 O'er every sunny scene. 
 And all its crowned and regal joys 
 
 Shi"ivel to phantoms lean ; 
 And all the present agony 
 
 Pales o'er its beaming brow : 
 I cannot, though I struggle, leap 
 
 Out of the seething now. 
 My day is done, my sim has gone 
 
 Down to a weary bed ; 
 The night comes shuddering down the heavens- 
 
 The night — with all its dead !
 
 63 
 
 VI. 
 
 AT COUET AGAIN. 
 
 Scene : An Inner Room in the Palace. TJie conspirators, 
 Ameer and Sivab, together. 
 
 Ameee. 
 
 The poison 'gins to work. The -\vine of victory 
 Already blackens on his parched lips. 
 He shudders at the shout of conquest. 
 
 SrvAR. 
 
 Ay! 
 His glances flame as they would shrivel up 
 The gladdened crowds, who come with eager eyes, 
 Crying, " Another battle won!" even as 
 After long droughts, and on the windy nights, 
 A fire goes roaring through the forest boughs. 
 
 Ameer. 
 
 He sees his diamonds dimmed in his own blood ; 
 He sees the hand of Purmar on hi8[^crown 
 Fingering its jewels, and his shadow flung 
 Black as a death-pall o'er his tottering throne ; 
 Ajid every wind that carries home the news 
 Rustles with doom.
 
 54 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 SiVAR. 
 
 I saw the clouds of doubt 
 Gathering when last we spoke together. He 
 Pooh-poohed oiu' foolish arguments, as one 
 Who, after a ghastly di-eam, hears the interpretation 
 And finds it dark as death. 
 
 Ameer. 
 
 He joys no more 
 In Purmar's triumphs. We were as the seers 
 Who make the same sign which the phantoms dread 
 In midnight mystery made beneath the moon, 
 And utter, in broad daylight, the weird words 
 He heard the ghostly voices whispering low. 
 
 SiVAR. 
 
 He laughed at all our warnings as one laughs 
 Who hears the steps of ruin in the dark 
 Coming to meet him. All his words of trust 
 Were wrimg from him, like drops of agony. 
 
 Ameer. 
 
 Had he not doubted first, our silly talk 
 
 Would have fallen hght as April rains 
 
 On the thick walls of serried adamant 
 
 That front the sea ; but now a whisper shakes liim. 
 
 He starts aside as though he were suddeidy stung 
 
 By some fierce serpent-thought. In festive houi's
 
 SHIFTING SCENES. 55 
 
 His looks grow dark, as though he saw a hand 
 All white and ghastly pluck the garlands green 
 Off the bright brows of all the laughing girls, 
 And painting paUid death-signs on their cheeks. 
 His old victorious banners whistle doom 
 Flapping above his throne. Down his vast halls, 
 In aU their gloomy gorgeousness, he walks 
 As though he saw a sudden dagger gleam, 
 Poisoned and pointing at his royal heart. 
 
 SiVAR. 
 
 Let's nurse these visions up to the maddening point, 
 When he will dare and do. 
 
 Ameeb. 
 
 No heavy task ! 
 Leave him alone and all his nightly dreams 
 Will swarm with lean hands beckoning but one way. 
 
 SiVAR. 
 
 The cup already winks before his eyes ; 
 Frame an excuse, and he will drain it dry ! 
 He hates the name of Purmar now ; 
 And all the noise of battle in his ears 
 Gathers in tempest for his special head. 
 What are the foes of Eajput now to him ? 
 Triumph is but an ugly mockery 
 Whichever way it falls. The victor- wreath, 
 In any case, is rank and foul with death.
 
 56 shiftinq scenes. 
 
 Ameer. 
 But what a sorry fool is this, to doubt 
 His best friend at our bidding, thus ; — to " cast 
 His trusty brand away, because a slave 
 Has dared to breathe on it : " — These were his words. 
 
 SlVAR. 
 
 He hath most royal notions of Purmar. 
 
 He talks of sceptres as of baubles, poor 
 
 In such a grasp ; kingdoms were but as shells 
 
 Laid in so wide a palm ; and diadems 
 
 Would gain great lustre on so grand a brow. 
 
 He hears his name shouted in ecstacy 
 
 On every wind of heaven. He sees his plumes 
 
 Tossing in triumph through the thick of war ; 
 
 And in his ears the chariot-wheels of fate 
 
 Go thundering through the dust of coming years, 
 
 AVith Purmar holding by the golden reins. 
 
 Ameeb. 
 
 We must strip off this gorgeous cloth of gold, 
 And place a beggar's weeds upon his back ; 
 Whisper base trifles in the warrior's name. 
 And rob the hero of his heroism ; 
 Pluck off his gear, and pin a whirligig 
 Upon the big brows of this wooden god. 
 
 SrvAR. 
 The lion singed is but a sorrj^ beast !
 
 shifting scenes. 57 
 
 Ameer. 
 
 To look at, truly ! We must trim his claws, 
 And draw his teeth. 
 
 SrvAR. 
 
 And then, when all is done ; 
 "When we have slighted all his victories. 
 Trampled his broidered banners in the mire, 
 Tarnished the lustre of his mighty arms. 
 And all befouled his white and spotless fame. 
 And cloaked the hero up in infamy, 
 Then will the hatred of Sidh Eaj break out 
 Unchecked by fear, and then — 
 
 Ameer. 
 
 Good-bye, Purmar! 
 And then for scornful Hayti. 
 
 SiVAR. 
 
 Ay, and then. 
 When this gigantic bugbear is no more — 
 We need not boast nor bully, but may say — 
 Monarchs have sat more safely than Sidh Eaj ! 
 
 »D{<3®-
 
 58 
 
 VII. 
 FAE AWAY. 
 
 Scene : The Garden ; Hayti singing. 
 
 Ah ! the heavens are too high, 
 And the stmsliine, and the Hght, 
 And the pui'ple mountains far, 
 And the moonbeam, and the star, 
 And the roimd and roUing white 
 Of the sun-cloud, sailing bright 
 Through a sea of molten light. 
 And the shows of day and night 
 Seem not what they are ! 
 
 Evermore a glory breaks 
 Over peak and over plain 
 
 In the distance, far away ; 
 
 And the gorgeous skirts of day 
 Hide the hollows fuU of pain ; 
 Hide the rents, and hide the rain ; 
 Hide the dark funereal train ; 
 Hide the clouds that come again ; 
 
 But no living tiling can say 
 
 It hatli touched tlio gorgeous day,
 
 SHIFTING SCENES. 59 
 
 Which for ever, and for ever, 
 Glideth on, a golden river, 
 Far away ! Far away ! 
 
 Evermore there bursts a bud 
 
 Wliich may never come to bloom ; 
 Evermore, in cloudy car, 
 Beameth up some royal star. 
 Which some evil thing may mar ; 
 Evennore the summer seas 
 Shake in light ; the laden trees 
 Stoop in glory to the breeze ; 
 But the beauty of the flower, 
 And the lustre on the sea, 
 And the glory on the tree, 
 And the radiance of the star, 
 Are not star, nor tree, nor flower, 
 Yet of that, which, hour by hoiu', 
 Lendeth them their golden dower, 
 Who may know it ? For the flower, 
 Star, and sea. 
 Bud, and tree, 
 Seem not what they are ! 
 
 Evermore a crimson dawn. 
 Or a glory-s"wimming noon. 
 Or a night as bright as day — 
 With a never-ending play 
 Of beaming star and moon —
 
 60 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 Gladdens all the heaven with dreams, 
 Gladdens all the earth with gleams 
 Of forgotten thiags, and streams 
 Dimpled lustre on the river 
 Far away ; 
 But for ever all the glory 
 Of the never-ending story, 
 And for ever, and for ever 
 
 All the bright and ceaseless play 
 Of the sunbeam, 
 Of the moonbeam. 
 On the tree-top, on the river, 
 Are for ever, ah ! for ever, 
 Far away ! far away !
 
 ()1 
 
 VIII. 
 FEIENDSHIP. 
 
 Scene : A Private Room in the Palace ; Sidh Haj alone. 
 
 GrEEAT acts beget great thoughts, great piirposes, 
 
 And noble aims ; and lie whose deeds transcend 
 
 The deeds of kings, has kingher aims than they. 
 
 Shall he, then, who has trodden down all ranks 
 
 In high endeavour, for the sake of rank. 
 
 Fall to the bottom of the lowest abyss, 
 
 And be a kingless king through treachery ? — 
 
 Shall he, whose life has been a constant growth 
 
 Of aU unselfish virtues, of high aims. 
 
 Suddenly shrink, until the very dwarf 
 
 Who conjures to the rustics in the woods 
 
 Might wi'ite ''black traitor" on his princely brow? 
 
 I'll not beheve it ! 
 
 There be those who say 
 The hand that grasps a sceptre need not mind 
 The blood that purples on the royal palm ; 
 But is he one of these ? And are the rags — 
 The merest emblems of regality — 
 So precious that a royal soul should fling 
 All that is kingliest eagerly away 
 For their sake merely ? Then were he discrowned 
 
 E
 
 62 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 The jewelled diadem blazing on his brow ; 
 Then were he sceptreless although the gold 
 Of royalty burned hot within his hand ; 
 And then were he, the kingliest soul alive, 
 Suddenly beggared, though an empire flung 
 Its kingdoms at his feet, and though his robes 
 Trailed on the marble floors of palaces. 
 
 He, whom foul wrong has placed upon a thi-one. 
 
 Has sorry subjects ! He who rules through crime 
 
 Rules none but criminals. All are not kings 
 
 Who wear the robes of roj'alty ; a slave 
 
 May don the pm-ple, and be still a slave. 
 
 Shall he, who is a king by right, be less. 
 
 And break his golden sceptre on his knee 
 
 For a mere beggar's bauble red with blood ? 
 
 He would not bring this stain upon his soul ! 
 
 My old familiar friend ! — my coimsellor ! — 
 
 My heart, and hand, and soul — my more than brother, 
 
 Who hast in endless conflicts shed thy blood, 
 
 Hast led my aimies, won my victories, 
 
 And been before me, like an uncrowned god 
 
 In every grand emprize — uncrowned because 
 
 Greater than crowns and empire, — shall I plant 
 
 My foot upon thy neck at last, and feel 
 
 Thee d^-iudle, till a monarch's cloak can hide 
 
 In its starred folds all thy nobility ? 
 
 Shall I grow large in death, and thou grow less 
 
 Than any honest beggar in the realm,
 
 SHIPTING SCENES. 
 
 63 
 
 Though sitting on a throne ? 
 
 Nay! ShaU I doubt 
 Thy pure high-mindedness, because I wear 
 These robes, and slaves are fawning at my feet ?
 
 64 
 
 IX. 
 
 WHERE ARE THEY? 
 
 Hayti alone in the Garden. 
 
 Dkeams! dreams! dreams! 
 Ah. ! the gush of morning 
 
 Reddening all the streams ; 
 Ah ! the smoking mountains ; 
 Ah ! the leaping fountains 
 
 Drinking in the beams ; 
 Ah ! the golden tassels 
 
 Of the forest hoar ; 
 Ah ! the gush of glory 
 
 Breaking evermore 
 On the forest, with its gums 
 
 Pouring incense at the gate 
 
 Of the dawn, where, clad in state. 
 
 All the sumptuous menials wait 
 For the King who never comes ! 
 Whither, whither 
 
 Goeth all this dance of light. 
 
 When the trembling Hds of night 
 Shut upon the heavens ? Ah ! whither
 
 SHIFTING SCEITES. 65 
 
 Goeth all tliis dance of light, 
 All tliis marriage-robe of wMte, 
 
 WMther? Whither? 
 Ah for ever ! Ah for ever ! 
 
 They are dreams. 
 
 Dreams ! dreams ! dreams ! 
 Ah ! the ripple-silvered sea, 
 Ah ! the blooms upon the tree, 
 Ah ! the whirr of bird and bee. 
 
 And the music of the streams ; 
 Ah ! the plumed and painted play 
 Of the golden-robed day 
 
 With his quiver full of beams ; 
 Ah ! the ripple and the shivei: 
 Of the sleek and shining river, 
 Ah ! the tremble and the quiver 
 
 Of the crimson flower-gauzes, — 
 
 Ah ! the music and the pauses 
 Through the day ; 
 Ah ! the shimmer and the glimmer 
 
 Of the blossom-laden boughs ; 
 Ah ! the whimple and the dimple 
 
 Of the laughter-haunted brows. 
 Where are they — 
 
 And the crimson of the rose. 
 
 And the evanescent glows 
 
 Of the bud that never blows, 
 
 e2
 
 66 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 Where are tliey — 
 Wlien, from out the black and riven 
 Tent o' the swirled and swinging heaven, 
 Leaps the Storm-King with his levin, 
 
 Where are they ?
 
 67 
 
 X. 
 
 THE CONSPIEATOES. 
 
 Scene: An Apartment in the Palace. Sivab and 
 Ameer in conversation. Ali breaks in. 
 
 All. 
 Well, have you heard the news ? 
 
 Ameer. 
 
 What news '? 
 
 Ali. 
 
 Nay, then, 
 I see ye have not ! Certain schemes have failed. 
 The mesh of cobwebs, friends, hath given way. 
 The lion is at large once more, and soon — 
 
 Ameer. 
 Wliat lion and what schemes ? 
 
 SiVAR. 
 
 Nay, friend, speak out ^ 
 Leave riddles to the idle. In a word, 
 Is't well ?
 
 68 SniFTING SCENES. 
 
 Axi. 
 All's lost! Your schemes are nought but smoke. 
 
 Ameer. 
 
 Speak, man ! What is it ? Have the ancient gods 
 Broken the silence of a thousand years 
 To warn or favour him thou wettest of ? 
 
 All 
 The war is over. Purmar's coming home ! 
 
 Ameer. 
 All's lost, indeed, then ! 
 
 SrvAR. 
 
 How is this ? AVas not 
 The messenger in time ? 
 
 Axi. 
 
 He was, to meet 
 The army wending homeward, rich with spoils. 
 And drunk with victory — ^banners and plumes, 
 Chariots and horsemen gleaming in red gold, 
 And clamorous with conquest : — Heaps of gems. 
 And skins, and slaves — captives of high degree, 
 And princely trophies of his prowess brings 
 The chieftain to the monarch.
 
 shifting scenes. 69 
 
 Ameee. 
 
 And the lad ? 
 He did not say his message ? 
 
 
 
 All 
 
 
 
 
 But he did ! 
 
 Aye, 
 
 word for word. 
 
 
 
 
 Ameee. 
 
 
 
   
 
 The fool ! 
 
 
 
 
 SrvAR. 
 
 AWs lost, indeed; 
 
 And 
 
 we, I fear, 
 
 with aU ! 
 
 Ameee, 
 
 
 
 
 What! 
 
 told Piirmar 
 
 To change his tactics, with that laughing crowd 
 Of old victorious faces looking on, 
 And heaping petty insults on the chief 
 Whilst triumph blazed about liis hated brows 
 In every conquered banner ? 
 
 All 
 
 Every word 
 The stripling breathed into the warrior's ear 
 Of his commission.
 
 70 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 No doubt ! 
 
 SrvAE. 
 
 Aye, and more, no doubt ? 
 
 Ail. 
 
 Ameee. 
 
 Then let us hope the message thrilled 
 The hot hate of Purmar through every vein : — 
 Our triumph may be yet. 
 
 All 
 
 No fear of that — 
 No hope, I mean ! For I am told the lad 
 Spake of the love of Sidh Eaj, and revealed 
 The state of things in Eajput. 
 
 Ameee. 
 
 Traitor ! Ha ? 
 
 All 
 Who ? Where ? The lad ? Aye, maybe so. 
 
 Ameee. 
 
 Aye he 
 And others nearer ! 
 
 All 
 
 Yoimgster have a care !
 
 SHIFTING SCENES. 71 
 
 SrVAK. 
 
 Nay, spare your breath friends ; you will need it all. 
 Hath the king laughed at us ? What does it mean ? 
 
 All 
 
 He was sincere. He doubted his old friend, 
 Thanks to your hints. 
 
 Ameee. 
 And yours. 
 
 SrvAB. 
 
 Already, ha ! 
 Is this black fruit, recrimination, ripe ? 
 Peace ! We are all embroiled ; and if so be 
 That Purmar will forgive the royal fool. 
 So much the worse for us. His hate will faU 
 Sharp as his blade upon our plotting heads ! 
 
 Ameee. 
 
 We'll wait and see the issue ; if adverse, 
 Then for the sunny jxmgles of the south, 
 And farewell Eajput.
 
 72 
 
 XI. 
 
 HOPE. 
 
 Hayti in the Garden, singing. 
 
 Anotiiee day ! Another day 
 
 Cometh in cool and calm, 
 With flashing rills, and music-thrills, 
 
 With bee, and bud, and balm ; 
 Adown the heavens he traileth light 
 
 And crimson as he goes ; 
 And all earth's nestlings, eager and bright, 
 Purple and pallid, blue and white, 
 
 Their daintiest hearts imclose ; 
 And a flutter of homage greeteth him, 
 And a garlanded glory meeteth him, 
 And a dance of spruags 
 And a rush of wings 
 
 Go mth him as he goes ! 
 
 Another day ! Another day 
 
 Showering from on high, 
 In bright attire, in car of fii'o, 
 
 Burneth along the slcy ;
 
 SHIFTING SCENES. 73 
 
 And every dew-cup, to the brim, 
 
 Trembles with wine of gold, 
 And, caught in silver, with a swim 
 Of purple and azure, rich and dim, 
 
 Go mists o'er wood and wold ; 
 And a song leaps up like a thing of light, 
 From the hush of the woods, half drowned in night, 
 And a flashing wing dips darkly bright 
 From out of the cloud that saileth wliite 
 
 With him o'er wood and wold. 
 And a blush of bowers, 
 And a dance of flowers, 
 
 Litter his path with gold. 
 
 Another day ! Another day 
 
 Cometh in cool and calm, 
 With flashing rills, with music-thrills, 
 
 With bee, and bud, and balm ; 
 And now no more the weary rose 
 
 Lifteth her head in vain ; 
 In his burning kiss her red lip blows. 
 In his look of love her red cheek glows — 
 
 She hath caught his fiery stain ; 
 And the purple tufts where the violets are 
 
 No longer stir and sigh — 
 " Oh ! the Day, the Day, in his golden car, 
 And his crimson robes — ^he flames afar. 
 
 But he never cometh nigh " —
 
 74 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 For they feel him on their veined tips, 
 They feel him on their dusky hps, 
 
 He flames up in their eye. 
 
 And a drowsied odour shimmer, 
 
 And a mellowed purple glimmer, 
 
 And a whirl of white 
 
 And a dance of light 
 
 Go with him gleaming by. 
 
 Another day ! Another day 
 
 Cometh with cool and calm, 
 With flashing rills, with music-thriUs, 
 
 With bee, and bud, and balm ; 
 And into my inmost heart he goes 
 
 With bird, and bud, and beam. 
 And every -svithered blossom blows, 
 And every thorn sprouts out a rose. 
 And every waste-place gleams and glows, 
 
 And brightens hke a dream ; 
 And a thousand love-caresses 
 Shake out their silken tresses. 
 
 And dance along the way, 
 Where the bhss-bud bloweth, 
 Where the day-da-^Ti goeth, 
 Where the life-stream floweth 
 
 For ever and aye ; 
 And all the dewy splendoiu- 
 Of the passion strange and tender. 
 With its silent, sweet surrender,
 
 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 75 
 
 Is with me now alway, 
 
 And faileth not, 
 
 And paletli not, 
 With the pale and fainting day.
 
 76 
 
 XII. 
 VENGEANCE. 
 
 Scene : Outside the Royal Palace, xoTierein the King 
 entertains Purmar and the Victorious Captains: — 
 Ameer and Sivar, together.' 
 
 Ameer. 
 
 Now is the time for vengeance. Every hour 
 Rolls the doom onward. 
 
 SrvAR. 
 
 Aye ! the wine will mount, 
 And then the dark tale will unfold itseK, 
 Before the gaping crowd, and then the ire — 
 The terrible ire — of PiU'mar will break out 
 Fiercer than fire. 
 
 Ameer. 
 
 Ere that, we'll see what fire 
 Will do to quench it ! 
 
 Sivar. 
 Are you ready ?
 
 suifting scenes. 77 
 
 Ameer. 
 
 Yes. 
 The faggots are besmeared, the train is set ; 
 But I shall wait vmtil the midnight hour, 
 When all the wine of revelry is red 
 And rims in riot through the festal halls, 
 And then a fiercer flame than burns the brim 
 Of sparkling goblets shall surprise them all. 
 And fold them warm in fiery winding-sheets ! 
 Just at the midnight hour, we light a spark 
 Shall make a bonfire of Purmar ; and all 
 The warriors who have " gained our victories " — 
 And Sidh Eaj with the rest — feathers and all, 
 Plimies, purple robes of state, and crown, shall be 
 Cinders to-morrow ! You will join me then ? 
 
 SiVAR. 
 
 IwiU!
 
 78 
 
 XIII. 
 
 NEMESIS. 
 
 Scene: The Palace. Ali has hechoned Sidh Eaj and 
 Jug Dev Ptjemak outside. 
 
 Jfg Dev arose, 
 The raonarcli following, out into the air 
 Where the night burned with all her cabbala, 
 With her star symbols and her mystic calm. ; 
 All unobsei'ved as yet. The revelry 
 Went on, but dragged a weary weight. The jibes 
 Fell dead and stale, and all the merriment 
 Trod on the skirts of dark forbidden things, 
 And passed like pageant past a place of tombs 
 When all the midnight flambeaux flame and flash 
 Full on the ghastly emblems. Eveiy voice 
 Had whispered undertones ; and every laugh 
 Was bitter at the core ; and though the wine 
 Ean ripe and red, it warmed, but did not cheer. 
 Some secret seemed to lurk beneath each word. 
 And all the conversation rippled on 
 Like conscious waters, in whose ooze and shme 
 The uncofiined dead lie white, with glazed eyes. 
 Portentous silence drew about the hall.
 
 SHIFTING SCENES. 79 
 
 Each soul sat brooding in a ring of niglit, 
 Wherein no step nnconsecrate might tread ; 
 Some special terror leered with fiendish eyes 
 In at the window of each separate heart, 
 And knocked with ghostly warning at the door. 
 
 When, in a moment, all the paled lamps feU, 
 Sputtering their jets of fire, whereby each saw 
 White faces leaping ghastly through the gloom, 
 As aU his neighbours rose upon their feet. 
 Then three sharp shrieks, like deadly daggers, 
 
 stabbed 
 The silence : — Out into the breezy night 
 The revellers hurried through the open door. 
 And, looking up, beheld the stedfast heavens 
 Euddy with stains of fire, and all the far 
 And dusky mountains staggering through the night. 
 To meet the fire-king in his furious raid. 
 High UJ3, the palace was aflame. And there, 
 Perched on the topmost tower, in agony 
 Clutching each other were the traitor pair, 
 Ameer and Sivar ; for some unknown hand 
 Had prematurely kindled the first spark 
 That cauffht them in their own thick mesh of fire. 
 
 '^b^ 
 
 And now the red and roaring surge updashed 
 Its flanging spume about the buttresses, 
 Shot up its tremulous tongues of forked wrath, 
 And grew and gathered round the fated tower ;-
 
 80 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 Its inpent fury bursting through the rents 
 
 And broken fissures, leaping on the night. 
 
 Hot lijDs of flame kissed the black cornices, 
 
 Blue jets of fire hissed through the crevices, 
 
 Fierce crested waves curled inward, dashed and broke 
 
 In glittering spray about the battlements. 
 
 Horrible cones shot up into the heavens, 
 
 Thin snakes of flame span out into the night, 
 
 Long sweeping billows flung their fiery froth 
 
 Full on the bhstered front of shrinking walls ; 
 
 And stiU the two fonns, black amid the glow, 
 
 Loomed high above the red and roUing sea, 
 
 That now retreated, now roared out amain 
 
 In threefold fury, with its fiery waves 
 
 Lusting for conquest ; till, at length, the beams 
 
 And rafters bent, and broke, and fell ; and then 
 
 AVith a long roll, the mighty fabric lurched 
 
 Shuddering inwards. 
 
 All the hollow glooms 
 And dark domains of night, that had been filled 
 With the fierce splendour, all the startled hills 
 That on their crests had felt the ruddy glow. 
 And all the beasts of prey, from holes and dens, 
 Sank back into the dark, and disappeared. 
 As silence once more fell upon the night.
 
 81 
 
 XIV. 
 AT HOME. 
 
 Scene: The House of Zvq Dev Purmae. 
 
 Time, Evening. 
 
 Hayti. 
 And shall I wake the children ? 
 
 PUEMAE. 
 
 Let them sleep, 
 And I will look on them. All the home-joys 
 Come fluttering their warm welcome to my soul, 
 Joys all too long estranged, which, in the heat 
 And hurry of war, draining the heart-blood dry, 
 Seemed sad and distant as the pitying moon 
 To him who sees her as the ship goes down 
 Amid the boiling surf, lashed white with rage, 
 And recollects the dewy tender time 
 Of tears and kisses underneath her beams 
 With the sole maid he loves. Ah ! I have stood, 
 Falchion in hand, and stayed the deadly stroke. 
 Thinking of wives far ofi", and helpless babes, 
 Dreading to put the hated name of death 
 Into their innocent prattle ; — turned away, 
 
 F 2
 
 82 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 Lest haply some small childish voice should say, 
 In aftertimes, with wonder in its eyes, 
 ** My father's dead, slain by the great Purmar, 
 Who made so many orphans long ago ! " 
 
 DoT\Ti the red path of slaughter, littered with death. 
 Thou and thy little ones came hand in hand 
 "With most melodious steps, and healed the wounds 
 Of ghasthest anarchy, and sounds of woe. 
 In the war-fever, when the blood was high. 
 And all the shadowy halls of sleep ran red 
 With gore and carnage — rang with fighting men. 
 And the strong horror of the tug and strife, 
 Ye came upon me like the breath of spring, 
 Murmuring along the grass and early leaves, 
 And flowers sprang up with deep ambrosial cups. 
 Full of cool nectar and delicious dew. 
 
 While I was woimded, Ipng in my tent, 
 
 The noise of battle clanging in my ears, 
 
 A feverish sleep came o'er me ; and I stood 
 
 Hard by a moimtain, black and thunderous. 
 
 Which, as I gazed upon it, cracked i' the midst. 
 
 Broke into hollow caverns, jagged and dark. 
 
 Whence came a noise as of a gathering host 
 
 Of trampling millions fi'om the nether world. 
 
 That boomed and thimdered through the black abyss, 
 
 Until at last the liideous van appeared : — 
 
 They were the dead of countless centuries
 
 SHIFTING SCENES. 83 
 
 Who had been slain in battle. On they came 
 With all their gaping wounds shedding new blood, 
 And the white woe of deadliest agony 
 Dashed on their upturned faces, on the which 
 The moon, hanging between two thunder-clouds, 
 Shed pallid lustres, weird, and sharp, and wan. 
 Eagerly upward welled the wondrous waves 
 Of this great human sea ; and all that came 
 Were as the waters in a sandy creek 
 To the on-coming ocean still behind, 
 Its mighty volume rolling thunderous. 
 And wide, and dark, with slow and sullen swell. 
 Thousands on thousands wound from out the gloom. 
 Crowding on tumbHng thousands. Heads came up 
 Livid and ghastly tlirough the welling wounds 
 Of the tormented mountain, gleaming white, 
 Followed by countless myriads, till the plain 
 Ean o'er and weltered with the thickening throng, 
 And all the little hills grew black with forms 
 That huddled and hasted from the crushing crowds 
 That choked the hidden hollows lying between. 
 Long dreary hours, all through that horrible night, 
 The endless millions rolled from out the mouths 
 Of the black caverns, waves still following waves 
 Exhaustless, dark, and dreadful, till the dawn 
 Of a drear day, that day was none, broke white 
 And sad as a last death-smile on the hills ; 
 And still the hurrying crowds came hastening on, 
 Millions on millions, hour by hour they came :
 
 84 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 And dim and far as the extremest verge 
 
 Of the horizon, where the faint blue hills 
 
 Melted into the pallor of the heavens, 
 
 Wended the fearful throng, and then went down 
 
 Into some nether world beyond my ken. 
 
 Night came again with torrents of woeful rain, 
 
 And winds that whistled through the ghastly gloom ; 
 
 And still the unending millions came up 
 
 Through the black ragged fissures, till the day 
 
 Once more came tossing-troubled on the hills. 
 
 Dashing white billows of glory in his path. 
 
 That turned to pallors of death upon their brows ; 
 
 And through that day the millions wended on 
 
 O'er plain and mountain, out into the east. 
 
 Till night di'opped down with thimder in her hand. 
 
 And forked lightnings played roimd her zone, 
 
 That shot upon the dazeless eyes of all 
 
 That ever-gathering multitude, that turned 
 
 Their scatheless sockets up to the blue blaze 
 
 With melancholy meaning : — On, and on, 
 
 For ever and for ever came the crowds. 
 
 Till the soul sickened : — On and on. 
 
 Millions on millions, crowds on crushing crowds, 
 
 For ever and for ever. 
 
 TiU at last, 
 Just as the day broke with an angry blazo 
 Over the edges of the mountain peaks. 
 Out of that black and weltering abyss.
 
 SUIFXING SCENES. 85 
 
 Out of that ghastly death-throng glode, you foxu- — 
 
 Thou and thy children — meekly, silently, 
 
 With balm and heaKng, and with calm love-looks ; 
 
 And straightway all the scene was changed. I lay 
 
 Beneath the quiet boom of summer boughs. 
 
 Dallying softly with the teasing winds. 
 
 That rippled up among the shadowy leaves — 
 
 Still cool with night dews in the early dawn — 
 
 And shook down honey and odour. By my side 
 
 Sparkled a tiny river, where I slaked 
 
 The feverous thirst that burned within my blood ; 
 
 And, looking on you all, ye seemed so near, 
 
 And yet so strangely far, so true and real. 
 
 And yet so evanescent, sweet, and dim — 
 
 Wrapped in dream-azures and in mists of sleep — 
 
 That, as I stretched my arms to clasp you all, 
 
 To fold you to my soothed and softened heart. 
 
 Four cloudy shapes passed by me, and I woke, 
 
 And heard the sword-blades ringing sharp and near. 
 
 And shouts and clamours of victory and defeat, 
 
 And all the fury of battle by my tent. 
 
 And now I see you all, so like my dreams, 
 But with no glances in your deep dark eyes 
 Looking afar ; I touch you, and behold ! 
 No cloudy phantom passes through my arms ; 
 I press you to my heart, and do not wake 
 To woimds and agony, and sounds of war 
 Jangling dread arms for ever !
 
 86 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 There they lie, 
 My innocent babes ! all folded up in sleep 
 Silent and sweet as flowers ; all their day-smiles 
 Hanging in rosy hues upon their cheeks, 
 All their day-laughter lying deep and warm 
 In silken dimples ; aU their daily tasks, 
 Their garland-gatherings in the empui-pled woods, 
 Forgotten, or enacted o'er in dreams. 
 How sweet they look ! — the two meek infant girls, 
 Each in her little nest, and the bright boy. 
 With merry thoughts shut up within the lids 
 Of his dark dreaming eyes, and laughing out 
 Of the rich reel of his ambrosial curls. 
 
 Oh ! if we could but draw aside the veil 
 Which hangs between them and futurity, — 
 Could see the bright and dew-sprent path of youth 
 All through its many windings, and behold 
 The poisonous reptiles coiled amid its flowers, 
 And the grim company of beasts of prey 
 Liu'king amid the thickets by the way, — 
 Could we behold the far-off ghostly shapes 
 Poising their poisoned barbs even as we speak, 
 And waiting in the mists of distant years 
 For the set time to flame before the eyes 
 Of their now slumbering victims, — could we see 
 The man and woman in the sleeping child. 
 Catch the wan woe-look on the budding cheek. 
 Hear the thick sighs of sorrow in the dark.
 
 SHIFTING SCENES. 87 
 
 And read the history from this dawning time 
 
 When the young steps stumble through clumps of 
 
 flowers, 
 And the young heart dances its fill of glee, 
 And the young soul wears all its gala-robes, 
 On through the distance, till the lone-path winds 
 Over the craggy heights that cut the feet. 
 And where, weary and wan, with garments soiled. 
 And hair dishevelled, through the wind and rain. 
 With red eyes blinded by the storms o' the world, 
 •They go grief-laden past the hollow caves 
 Strewn o'er with bones, and stretch their woe- worn 
 
 hands 
 Out towards the distant arches, lying low 
 And dim and dark, beyond the mountain-slopes, 
 Thi'ough which the weary walk to endless rest — 
 With what an agony of love we'd press 
 The Httle brows now lying milky white ! 
 We should hear sorrow surging in each tone. 
 And hollow wails sounding through every laugh, 
 And every look would catch the haggard hue 
 Of passing suffering, every word would be 
 Symbolic of some agony to come. 
 And every childish antic seem to wave 
 Some grim old woe out of its cavern-hold ; 
 And every innocent wile would be the dress 
 Wlierein gaimt wretchedness was quaintly dight. 
 And every look a window where the face 
 Of some pale spectre came to sun itseK.
 
 88 SHIFTING SCENES. 
 
 But now they live, sweet in the present hour 
 As untouched roses cool with evening dew, 
 Eeposing on the present, with no fear 
 Shooting athwart the heaven of their dreams. 
 And lying beautiful and hushed in sleep 
 As though each morrow were a festal morn, 
 And they its chosen actors.
 
 89 
 
 SPRING AND SUMMER. 
 
 I. 
 
 SPRING. 
 
 With joy tlie heart of Earth o'erfills ; 
 
 Sun-linked and golden go the hours ; 
 "With fainter murmur from the hills 
 Voluptuously the sleek-tongued rills 
 
 Are Hpping honeyed mouths of flowers. 
 
 In garden-plots the tulip blows, 
 
 The Bacchanalian peonies burn, 
 And pansies, in delicious rows. 
 Make purple glooms, in whose repose 
 Their golden hearts hke stars outyearn. 
 
 Blowing cherry-blooms fall and fall 
 Silently, through the silent noon ; 
 Peach-blossoms stain the garden-wall, — 
 The very air, with tlie odour of all. 
 
 In a poppied trance doth swim and swoon.
 
 90 SUMMER. 
 
 Elch hazes over the orient creep ; 
 
 With a softer glory swells the beam ; 
 Trembles of splendour surge and sweep ; 
 In a flood of light the orchards sleep 
 
 Thick bloomed, and gorgeous as a dream. 
 
 Like a gold-tipped spear, the high church spire 
 
 Doth gleam and lighten on the view, 
 With its glowing vane that would aspire 
 In bickering hght, with a tongue of fire. 
 To hold high converse with the blue. 
 
 Spring in Earth's pulses bums and glows ; 
 
 In bursts of music pass her hours ; 
 Her brimming being overflows, 
 Her life is fragrant as a rose. 
 
 And her deep heart goes out in flowers. 
 
 n. 
 
 SUMMER. 
 
 Lo ! lazy Simimer, swarthy in the sun. 
 
 Lies panting, with bare breasts, upon the hills. 
 Swathing her limbs in hazes warm and dun. 
 Where splendours into dusky splendoiu-s rim. 
 And sultry glory all the heaven o'erfills.
 
 , SUMMER. 91 
 
 Not a white dimple stirs amid the com, 
 
 Not a low ripple shivers through the leaves ; — 
 Since, wrapped in gold and crimson gleams unshorn, 
 Came, flashing through the east, the regal morn, 
 No throated twitterings gurgle round the eaves. 
 
 Flooded in simny silence sleep the kine ; 
 
 In languid murmurs brooklets float and flow ; 
 The quaint farm-gables in the rich light shine, 
 And round them jasmined honeysuckles twine. 
 
 And close beside them sim-flowers burn and blow. 
 
 Amid the growing heat I lie me down. 
 
 And into visions swarms the moted air ; 
 Gleams up before me many a famous town, 
 Pillared and crested with a regal crown 
 Outshimmering in an orient purple glare ; 
 
 Lo ! lowly Tadmor, burning in its sands — 
 
 Baelbeck and Babylon : — I see slow streams 
 Q-liding by mosque and minaret, — see the gleams 
 Of seas in simset — slips of shining strands. 
 
 And drowsy Bagdad buried deep in dreams ; — 
 
 See swarthy monarchs flushed in purple rings 
 Of silken courtiers ; — through haK-open doors 
 
 Catch the spice-odours, and the cool of springs 
 
 Leaping for ever in a maze of wings, — 
 
 See light forms dancing over pearly floors ; —
 
 92 SUMMER. . 
 
 Sleeping seraglios, spire, and tremulous dome 
 Winking in drowsy splendour all the day, — 
 See forest haunts where thick the lions roam, — 
 See thirsty panthers splashed in bloody foam 
 Leaj) terrible as lightnings on their prey ; 
 
 Or stand with Cortez on a mountain-peak 
 
 Above the Aztec city, — see um-olled 
 Gem-tlireaded shores of Montezuma weak, — 
 See the white temples swanning thick and sleek, 
 And sunny streets stretch up by towers of gold ; 
 
 See silken sails float by, ambrosial, 
 Laden with spices, up a Persian glen ; 
 
 Or stand on Lebanon, 'mid the cedars tall, 
 
 Or hear the soft and silver fall 
 Of water down a jut of Darien. 
 
 But lo ! a waking shiver in the trees, 
 
 And voices 'mid the hay-cocks in the glen ; 
 The sun is setting ; and the crimson seas 
 Are skaken into splendour by the breeze, 
 And all the busy world is up again ! 
 
 -oOjO^Oo-
 
 93 
 
 REMORSE. 
 
 The stony garlands wreath about the roof, 
 And up the fluted pillars ; snakes of stone 
 Wind round stone fruits ; and clumps of flowers and 
 
 stems, 
 And pallid leaflets, wrought in marble, start 
 Out of the chiselled cornices ; the stairs 
 That wind into the distant glooms, where lamps 
 Golden the far-off gorgeousness, are rich 
 And jocund with the swarms of slaves 
 Who wait upon the royal festival ; 
 The halls are all aflame ; the tables groan 
 Under their load of meats, and fruits, and wines ; 
 The guests are all assembled, and the host — 
 The royal entertainer — sits in state. 
 His best friend at his side. 
 
 Let the wine wink, 
 Let mellow laughter gladden o'er the wine. 
 Let the lamps blaze, let all the lights laugh down 
 Over the ruddy cheeks of all the fruits, 
 Let all the costly tables clink with gold. 
 And let the merriest chant his merriest tale, 
 Let the stone globes burst out with purple juice, 
 And the stone serpent trail through crimson flowers,
 
 94 BEMOKSE. 
 
 And the stone stems sprout out their living buds, 
 And all the ceiling tumble o'er with blooms 
 In the high-mounting jubilance — and yet 
 There is a white and glimmering ghasthness 
 Somewhere behind the arras — ah ! and yet 
 There is a shadow on the royal feast, 
 And yet — and yet — the wine is hot so red 
 But it hath caught the pallor that is hid 
 Somewhere behind the arras !
 
 95 
 
 THE TWO GKAVES. 
 
 In the lonely twilight, 
 In the dewy twilight, 
 
 Lie they softly by each other. 
 Hearing not. 
 Fearing not — 
 My sister and my mother ! 
 And amid the lonely twihght, 
 
 Twilight hushed and dim, 
 Stand I dreaming of a summer 
 
 And a brooklet's dimpled brim ; 
 And I hear a silver laughter 
 EippHng up the sultry air. 
 And I see a blithe form dancing 
 
 In a dusk of darkling hair. 
 And I feel the cool leaves flout me, 
 And a storm of flowers about me, 
 
 Flimg forth by that tiny hand ; — 
 Well I know that little dancer 
 
 On the narrow marge of sand, 
 And those dimples, and that laughter. 
 And that tiny faery hand,
 
 96 THE TWO GRAVES. 
 
 And I murmur out " My sister — 
 
 my sister !" where I stand ; — 
 But no answer from the twilight, 
 From the dusk and dewy twiHght, 
 
 Save the moan of far-off waves, — 
 Nothing but a mom-ner listening 
 
 By two green and grassy graves, 
 Nothing but a single mourner 
 
 And two green and grassy gi'aves ! 
 
 n. 
 
 In the lonely twilight, 
 In the de-^y twilight, 
 
 Lie they softly by each other, 
 Hearing not, 
 Fearing not — 
 
 My sister and my mother ! 
 And amid the sobbing t-nilight, 
 
 Twilight wet and blear. 
 Stand I dreaming of a winter — 
 
 Winter icy-stark and drear ; 
 And I lie amid the shadows 
 
 Of a pallid, noiseless room. 
 And I see my yoimger brothers 
 
 Streaming stormy through the gloom. 
 And wild eyes are gleaming on me 
 
 In a lurid thunder-race. 
 And the wind amid the cm'tains 
 
 Dashes horrors in my face, —
 
 THE TWO GRAVES. 97 
 
 Goblin-featiires dimly seen, 
 
 Faces seamed, and gaimt, and lean, 
 
 Flickering in a ghastly sheen 
 
 In fever, round my head ; 
 When, behold ! a gliding footstep 
 
 Rustles softly towards my bed, 
 And I feel the milky coolness 
 
 Of a white and loving hand ; — 
 Well I know that gliding footstep, 
 
 And that influence dewy-bland, 
 And that shower of balmy kisses. 
 
 And the pressure of that hand ! 
 And I stammer out " My mother — 
 
 my mother ! " where I stand ; — 
 But no answer from the twilight. 
 From the wet and sobbing twilight, 
 
 Save the plash of distant waves, — 
 Nothing but a mourner weeping 
 
 By two green and silent graves. 
 Nothing but a single mourner 
 
 And two green and silent gi-aves ! 
 
 III. 
 
 In the lonely tx^ihght. 
 In the dewy twihght. 
 
 Lie they softly by each other. 
 
 Hearing not, 
 Fearing not — 
 My sister and my mother ! 
 
 G
 
 98 THE TWO GRAVES. 
 
 And amid the hovering twilight, 
 
 Twilight of the summer prime, 
 Stand I dreaming of an evening 
 
 Of the holy olden time ; 
 And I see two figures kneeling 
 
 In the moonlight of a room, 
 With their faces leaning upward 
 
 Through the rich and mellow gloom ; 
 One is listening, — one is praying 
 
 With a heaven-appealing hand ; — 
 Well I know the low voice speaking 
 
 Of the bright and better land, 
 And the meek and silent listener, 
 
 And the heaven appealing hand ! 
 And I murmur out " My mother 
 
 And my sister ! " where I stand ; — 
 But no answer from the twilight, 
 From the hovering summer twilight. 
 
 Save the sob of wakeful waves, — 
 Nothing but a mourner standing 
 
 By two dim and dusky graves, 
 Nothing but a single mourner 
 
 And two dim and dusky graves ! 
 
 rv. 
 
 In the lonely twilight. 
 In the dewy twilight. 
 
 Lie they softly by each other, 
 
 n caring not,
 
 THE TWO GEAVEvS. 99 
 
 Fearing not — 
 
 My sister and my mother ! 
 And amid the bleaching twilight, 
 
 Twilight of the crisping rime, 
 Stand I dreaming of a golden, 
 
 Warbling, flower-flushed summer-time ; 
 And I see a young form gliding 
 
 Down among the shadowy trees, 
 Faint and languid, in the languor 
 
 Of the odorous summer-breeze. 
 Faint amid the breathing blossoms, 
 
 And the sultry hum of bees ; 
 And I see her in the evening 
 
 Sinking spent upon her chair, 
 And I mark the patient tremble 
 
 Of the hand within her hair : — 
 Comes an angel down unto her 
 
 In the silence of the night, 
 And he whispers low, " My daughter. 
 
 Forth with me into the light ! 
 Come unto the better country, 
 
 Where they pant no more for breath, — 
 Past the stark but sleepy terrors 
 
 In the windy halls of Death, — 
 Down the dark and leaden pathway 
 
 Dug of old by ancient sin. 
 Lo ! the Master's wedding- garment ; 
 
 Thou shalt surely enter in !" 
 And she takes the wedding-garment
 
 100 THE TWO GRAVES. 
 
 Underneath the solemn stars, 
 And the angel at the portal 
 
 Draws aside the gleaming bars, 
 For behold ! her feet have wandered 
 
 Through the windy halls of Death, — 
 Past the stark and sleepy terrors 
 
 That aye pant and heave for breath,— 
 Down the dark and leaden pathway 
 
 Dug of old by ancient sin. 
 And the angel draws the gold bars, 
 
 And she meekly enters in ! 
 But I cannot, cannot see her , 
 
 In that glory-streaming land. 
 Nor the flushing of her featm-es 
 
 As she wanders on the strand, 
 Nor the flutter of her garments. 
 
 Nor the waving of her hand, 
 Though I cry aloud — " My sister, 
 
 my sister !" where I stand ; — 
 Still no answer from the twilight. 
 From the bleak and rimy twilight, 
 
 Save the rush of roaring waves, — 
 Nothing but a mourner shivering 
 
 By two white and frozen graves. 
 Nothing but a shivering mourner 
 
 And two white and frozen graves !
 
 THE TWO GEAVES. 101 
 
 In the lonely twiHght, 
 
 In the dewy twiKght, 
 
 Lie they softly by each other, 
 
 Hearing not, 
 Fearing not — 
 My sister and my mother ! 
 And amid the tender twilight, — 
 
 Swimming twilight rich and dim, — 
 Stand I dreaming of a white face, 
 
 And a whispered midnight hymn ; 
 And I feel an arm about me, 
 
 Pressing with a trembling cling. 
 And I whisper words of cheering, 
 
 Murmuring of the coming Spring. 
 And I guide the fainting footsteps 
 
 Gently through the darkened rooms. 
 And I hear the laboured breathing 
 
 Through the hush of gathering glooms ; 
 Comes the angel down unto her 
 
 With another at his side ; 
 Well I know that milk-white angel, 
 
 With his silent, moonlike slide. 
 And the garments of the other 
 
 Meek-browed spirit at his side ; 
 Come they shimmering down unto her 
 
 In the silence of the night, 
 And he whispers low, "My sister, 
 
 G 2
 
 102 THE TWO GRAVES. 
 
 Forth with us into the light ! 
 Come unto the better country, 
 
 Where they pant no more for breath, - 
 Past the blind and trembling terrors 
 
 In the gusty halls of Death, — 
 Down the drear and wind}' pathway 
 
 Dug of old by ancient sin. 
 Lo ! the Master's wedding-garment ; 
 
 Thou shalt surely enter in !" 
 And she also takes the garment 
 
 Underneath the solemn stars, 
 And the angel at the portal 
 
 Draws aside the gleaming bars ; 
 For, behold ! she too has wandered 
 
 Through the gusty halls of Death, 
 Past the blind and trembhng terrors 
 
 That for ever gasp for breath, 
 DoT\Ti the steep and windy pathway 
 
 Dug of old by ancient sin. 
 And the angel draws the gold-bars, 
 
 And she also enters in ! 
 But I cannot hear their greetings 
 
 As they touch the shining strand, 
 For they render back no token 
 
 From the bright and better land — 
 Not the wliimple of a garment, 
 
 Not the waving of a hand. 
 Though I moan aloud, — "My sister 
 
 And my mother ! " where I stand —
 
 THE TWO GllAVES. 103 
 
 Comes no answer from the twilight, 
 From the trembling, dewy twilight, 
 
 Save the gentle fall of waves, 
 Nothing but a mourner dreaming 
 
 By two soft and silent graves. 
 Nothing but a di'eaming mourner 
 
 And two soft and silent graves ! 
 
 VI. 
 
 In the deeper twilight, 
 In the later twilight, 
 
 Lie they softly by each other. 
 Hearing not, 
 Fearing not — 
 
 My sister and my mother ! 
 And amid the deeper twilight. 
 
 Twilight hushed and steeped in dew. 
 Stand I dreaming of this old world, 
 
 And the ever-budding new, — 
 Of the many base and selfish, 
 
 And the bright and blessed few ; 
 With strange visions, broken, starry, 
 
 Of the regions hid from view, 
 G-limpses of the golden splendours 
 
 Peopled with angelic wings, 
 GKstening glades, and sliding rivers, 
 
 Forest-haimts of milk-cool springs. 
 Faces moonlike with the gladness 
 
 Caught from looking unto Him,
 
 104 THE TWO QKAVES. 
 
 Golden waves of music rushing 
 
 From rapt Ijtos of seraphim, 
 Billows of ecstatic worship, 
 
 Garments in their purple splendour 
 
 Many-folded, roUing dim, 
 Sparry glistenings from the gateways. 
 
 Glinting glories from the street, 
 And the ever-dimpling music 
 
 Of the white and dewy feet ; 
 Then, of all the dreary future 
 
 Looming through the misty years. 
 Cheerless toil and thankless labour. 
 
 And the bitter cup of tears ; 
 And I murmur, " Would, ye bright ones ! 
 
 That this stormy race was o'er. 
 That my barque might drift up lightly 
 
 To your silver-rippled shore. 
 That this weary, weary struggle. 
 
 And this sordid strife were o'er. 
 That my life might float out softly 
 
 To your boundless evermore, 
 That the Master's wedding-garment 
 
 I might also safely win. 
 For alas ! the world is weary. 
 
 And I too would enter in ! " 
 Wlien, behold ! the tender moonlight 
 
 Swimming o'er the slumbering land, 
 And amid the floating splendour 
 
 Breathes a blessing holy, bland ;
 
 THE TWO GRAVES. 105 
 
 Sliding down the silken star-stairs 
 
 From the bright and better land, 
 And a peace is in the murmured 
 
 "Mother, sister," where I stand; 
 Though no voice is in the moonlight, 
 In the sleek and sleepy moonlight, 
 
 Save the silver fall of waves, 
 Nothing but a silent mourner 
 
 By two deep and tender graves. 
 Yet a holier-hearted mourner 
 
 By two deep and tender graves. 
 Yes ! a holier-hearted mourner, 
 
 And two deep and tender graves ! 
 
 ^-^^^^-^
 
 106 
 
 AN INDIAN SUNSET. 
 
 Through the verandah came the laden winds 
 With spices and the breath of odorous gums. 
 The west was all aflusli with the rich hues — 
 Azure and crimson, swart and sanguine gold, 
 And bickering saffron, as the day went down. 
 All the trees swam in sunset ; all the boughs 
 Shook in swift spasms of fire, as every breath 
 Swept the balms ofi" them ; every copse and brake 
 Lay laden with the sweets of summer time ; 
 And out from all the heats the evening came 
 Dispensing the cool blessing of the dews, 
 And gathering up into her dripping skirts 
 The fiery seeds of morrows yet to come. 
 
 Like lightning in his cloud, the panther slept, 
 With aU his spots reposing on their gold. 
 Save when some footstep of the coming night 
 Sent dusky shiverings down his tawny sides. 
 And sudden gleams of expectation to his eyes. 
 The lion slumbered in liis leafy lair ; 
 The tiger licked liis paws ; and the red eyes 
 Of the yet drowsy woLf just gleamed and broke 
 In lurid flashes on the deepening dusk.
 
 XS INDIAN SUNSET. 
 
 107 
 
 Swooning with joy the siiltry day down sank, 
 
 In gleaming hues of crimson — glory robes, 
 
 Shot through with streaks of purple and fine gold ; 
 
 The heavens surged with saffron, with still depths 
 
 Of slowly-darkening amethyst, o'er which 
 
 Fell subtle flakes of fire, and floating pomps 
 
 Of ruddy clouds went by, and, dim with light, 
 
 Were banks with nebulous shores, within whose 
 
 boimds 
 Bright skifi's of wondrous splendour swept the heavens, 
 And spirits of mist leapt out in hght, like gods. 
 
 And so the daily miracle went on : 
 
 The Sun built himself cities in the heavens. 
 
 And heaped them o'er with riches, pHe on pile, 
 
 polar on piUar, street on flaming street, 
 
 Huge rolling domes, and pinnacles of gold, 
 
 Long corridors of far-retreating deeps ; 
 
 Then, weary ynth. his work, he seized his wand, 
 
 And at the magic touch the tottering towers, 
 
 Fretworks of silver, gleaming gates of gold, 
 
 Pillars, and rounded roofs, and shafts of Hght, 
 
 Tumbled ia gorgeous ruin ; till the prone 
 
 And squandered splendours, at his will supreme. 
 
 Turned into life fantastic, changed their shape. 
 
 And all the loosened glories burned and glowed. 
 
 Polled into hills of gems, and craggy heights 
 
 Of j)urest amber ; floated ships ablaze 
 
 Sailing down seas of purple ; ^^^ithed hke snakes
 
 1U8 AJV INDIAN SUNSET. 
 
 Suddenly caught witliiii a forest of fii-e ; 
 
 Bulged into argosies of gleaming wealth ; — 
 
 Down the day sank ; and all the glories went 
 
 In sullen lapsings of splendour, ebb by ebb, 
 
 Piu'ple by purple, pomp by crowding pomp, 
 
 TiU leaden windings of Lethe-streams, and swamps 
 
 Of gloom grew greening on the dusky verge 
 
 Of the on-coming darkness — on, and on, 
 
 Till Night came, like a stern dark Fate, 
 
 And brushed the busy pageantry away. 
 
 3E>!<3e
 
 109 
 
 THE HERO'S WIDOW. 
 
 He clomb the heights of danger 
 
 To deathless fame, they said, — 
 The bullets hurthng round him, 
 
 The banner o'er his head, 
 Defiance in his wild shout, 
 
 Jove's thunder in his hand, 
 And in his eye the lightning 
 
 That bickered o'er his brand ! 
 With his plume i' the bellowing tempest 
 
 High tossing o'er the rest ; 
 And where War's lance was keenest 
 
 His breast the foremost breast, 
 And where the cannon shouted 
 
 Fire-tongued in their own might, — 
 Where'er the fight was deadliest 
 
 He deadliest in the fight ! 
 For he fought for holy freedom 
 
 And England's old renown, 
 And where he stood a victor 
 
 He found a martyr's crown ! 
 
 I only know, she answered, 
 He is not at my side ; 
 
 n
 
 THE hero's widow. 
 
 My breast is not his pillow, 
 
 I am no more his bride. 
 Eed War's loud roar still thunders, 
 
 But it does not pale my brow ; — 
 I have ceased my prayer — He is not there, 
 
 I do not tremble now ! 
 
 Amid the clash and clangour 
 
 Where reddest ran the flood, 
 AMiere swords were wildly leaping 
 
 To the hilt in foemen's blood. 
 Where the storm of plumes was thickest, 
 
 And the bayonets hid the sun, 
 Where the ratthng shots leapt out in fire 
 
 From many a smoking gun. 
 Where the legions swung like billows 
 
 On a mad and tossing sea. 
 And the tug and strife for right and life 
 
 Swelled high war's anarchy ; 
 Amid the murky darkness 
 
 He burst like a shock of flame, — 
 His name shall aye be deathless 
 
 Who went through death to fame ! ' 
 For he fought for holy freedom 
 
 And England's old renown, 
 And where he stood a victor 
 
 He found a martjT's crown ! 
 
 I only know, she answered, 
 He is not at my side ;
 
 THE HEKO S WIDOW. 
 
 HI 
 
 My breast is not his pillow, 
 
 I am no more his bride. 
 Eed War's loud roar still thunders, 
 
 But it does not pale my brow ; — 
 I have ceased my prayer — He is not there, 
 
 I do not tremble now !
 
 112 
 
 THE SAME AND NOT THE SAME. 
 
 The summer sunsliine played upon our path, 
 The summer sunshine, and the warm south -wind ; 
 And fi'om the billowy hill-top, where we stood, 
 AVe watched the lazy ships ghde out to sea, 
 Past the green island and its ruined church. 
 That slept in peace amid the pleasant trees 
 Down-bending in low, whispering liillabies. 
 The green sweet island, with its hoary fane 
 And drowsy, humming trees, that o'er the sea, 
 Just dimpled into silver by the breeze, 
 Cast a long, cooling shadow : — Ah ! that noon, 
 rnied with the buzz and boom of happy wings 
 "Wheehng amid the simshine on our path. 
 The summer sunshine, and the warm south uind ! 
 
 Far down below us, on the white, hot road 
 Some boys were pulling apples from the boughs, 
 Merry as wreathed and dancing Bacchanals, 
 Their shouts of laughter running up the hill 
 In honeyed ripples, 'mong the heather-bells ; 
 And, midway up the moimtain, an old man 
 Crawled like a beetle in the shining day ;
 
 THE SAME AND NOT THE SAME. 113 
 
 Wliile on the left a low-browed cottage stood 
 Full in the sunshine of that golden noon, 
 With its old yew-tree by the ivied porch 
 Holding a dusky coolness in its boughs, 
 And making pleasant murmurs to the bees ; 
 And a yoimg girl upon the breezy slope 
 Was playing on the greensward with a lamb, 
 Now fi'isking with it in the crisping grass, 
 And now down lying imderneath a tree 
 Twining a wreath of mosses round its neck 
 In laughter-dimpled gladness ! — Ah ! that noon, 
 Filled with the buzz and boom of happy wings 
 Wheehng amid the sunshine on our path. 
 The summer sunshine, and the warm south wind ! 
 
 Down on our right, the sunny town lay still. 
 
 Just folded in a thin, white haze of smoke, 
 
 Its sleepy clock low-toUing out the hour ; 
 
 The sluggish, heated town, thick with sun-motes, 
 
 Low lying mid the dim and shadowy fields 
 
 With all their tawny wealth of ripening corn ; 
 
 And round about us hummed the golden bees 
 
 Heavy with honey from the tulip-plots, 
 
 And peaches warm i' the sim, and mellowing pear s ; 
 
 And butterflies came fluttering their warm wings. 
 
 Purple and crimson, dusk and sultry gold ; 
 
 And dragon-flies went gleaming tlu-ough the air, 
 
 Gorgeous as Jimo and her peacock steeds ; 
 
 And all the glory of that carnival time
 
 114 THE SAME Am) NOT THE SAME. 
 
 Lay like a slum'ber on tlie happy earth 
 In her glad, teeming plenty ; — when, behold ! 
 Mighty as Mars — Bellona at his side 
 In all the terror of her sounding thongs. 
 Smiting the silence backward to the hills, 
 Hushed the long thundering train ; — a glory plume 
 Melting in sunshine followed at its wake — 
 Past the still grange, and slumbering rookery, 
 Startling the milk-kine sleeping on the slope, 
 On through the valley with its silent farms, 
 And the warm languor of the whitening corn ; 
 On through the sunny distance, till the noon, 
 Drowsy though humming, sank again in sleep, 
 And we could hear the waggons, down below, 
 Rolling, hay-laden, through the deep, white lanes, 
 And heard the creaking barn-door swinging wide, 
 And mui'miu"ed hum of voices : — Ah ! that noon, 
 rnied with the buzz and boom of happy wings 
 AVheeling amid the sunshine on our path. 
 The summer sunshine, and the warm south wind ! 
 
 Now, as I stand upon the howling hill, 
 
 A scene of desolation Hes below. 
 
 Wild as a lone moor, with its single tarn 
 
 And drowned girl floatiag through the slobbering 
 
 waste, 
 Her dead eyes open to the windy rain ! 
 No boys are pulling apples from the trees 
 That make an iron music to the blast,
 
 THE SAME AND NOT THE SAME. 115 
 
 Tossing their bare boughs in the wintry wind, 
 Graunt as worn maniacs shrivelled to the bone. 
 The little girl has vanished from the slope, 
 Her voice is hushed, and the pet lamb is dead. 
 The sunshine has abandoned the stark world, 
 The birds are shivering in the dripping boughs. 
 The imploring winds seek rest and find it not, 
 Sending shrill wails above the cold, drowned 
 earth. 
 
 Now, as I stand upon the howHng hiU, 
 The sea flings its salt spray about the church : 
 I see the white waves through the slanting rain, 
 Leaping in fury round the dreary isle. 
 But cannot hear their roaring for the wind. 
 The tumbled sea-gulls, blown about the sky. 
 Strive to win inland from the frenzied shore ; 
 The desolate farms loom dimly through the rain, 
 Each standing stagnant in its sejjarate swamp ; 
 The starveling hedges drip into the pools ; 
 The town is hidden in a swirl of sleet : 
 I hear the engine shi-ieking up the wind. 
 But cannot see it for the bHnding rain. 
 Below me, on the lush and plasliing path, 
 An old bent woman is abroad to-day — 
 The cold drops drizzling from her flouting rags- 
 Fighting with wind and tempest for her bread. 
 She seeks the low-browed cottage on the hill ; 
 She will find winter on its cheerless hearth —
 
 116 THE SAME AND NOT THE SAME. 
 
 Winter sole inmate of its reeking walls, 
 And thin winds wailing in its desolate rooms ! 
 
 My way lies tkrough theclmreliyard where she sleeps- 
 She who was with me on that sunny noon — 
 Sleeps ? Aye ! though the lean and hungry winds 
 Are howling, like starved wolves, along the grass, 
 And though the tempest, in the dripping yews, 
 Loosens a deluge down upon the graves ! 
 
 <:l©2£LSi»*^F°^'''^*^xiJS«^:)
 
 117 
 
 HERE AND THERE. 
 
 Oh ! the Jiily winds were blowing', 
 
 And the Avon, full and flowing. 
 
 Washed the oak-roots, warm, and growing 
 
 Thick and bent ; 
 Oh ! the July winds were blowing 
 Warmly blowing, 
 
 When he went ! 
 And I flung my arms around him, 
 
 And he blest me ; 
 And I flung my trembling arms around him. 
 
 And he blest me ; 
 And I begged him in the strife 
 To beware of his rich life. 
 And he murmured out, " Sweet wife ! " 
 
 And blest me ! 
 (But oh ! for the cold, cold rain — 
 
 The rain, and the winds that blow ; 
 The cold, cold rain, and the colder wind — 
 The wind, and the rain, and the snow ! ) 
 
 Oh ! the blithesome larks were singing. 
 Full throats were richly flinging 
 
 h2
 
 118 HERE AND THERE. 
 
 Their hearts down dim woods ringing 
 
 All unspent ; 
 Oh, the blithesome larks were singing, 
 Sweetly singing. 
 
 When he went ! 
 And I shook my hair about him, 
 
 And he kissed me ; 
 And I wildly shook my hair about him, 
 
 And he kissed me; 
 And I told him if he died 
 I should creep unto his side. 
 And he murmured out, " Sweet bride ! " 
 
 And kissed me ! 
 (But oh ! for the cold, cold rain, — 
 
 The rain, and the winds that blow ; 
 The cold, cold rain, and the colder wind — 
 The wind, and the rain, and the snow ! ) 
 
 Oh ! the humble bees were booming 
 Where the wild-briar's pearls were looming 
 In a dusk of branches blooming 
 
 Dew besprent ; 
 Oh ! the humble-bees were booming. 
 Sweetly booming 
 
 When he went ! 
 And I pressed him to my bosom, 
 
 And he blest me ; 
 And I madly pressed him to my bosom, 
 
 And he blest me ;
 
 HERE AND THEEE. 119 
 
 And I said, if from that shore 
 He should come to me no more, 
 When the cruel war was o'er ? 
 
 And he blest me I 
 (But oh ! for the cold, cold rain — 
 
 The rain, and the winds that blow ; 
 The cold, cold rain, and the colder wind — 
 
 The wind, and the rain, and the snow ! ) 
 
 Oh ! the setting sun was beaming, 
 And a gorgeous glow was streaming 
 Over copse and meadow, gleaming 
 
 Glory blent ; 
 Oh ! the setting sun was beaming, 
 Brightly beaming 
 
 "When he went ! 
 And I fondly hovered o'er him, 
 
 And he kissed me ; 
 And I fondly, fondly hovered o'er him, 
 
 And he kissed me ; 
 And I said, if in that fight 
 He should vanish from my sight, 
 Like a meteor in the night ? 
 
 And he kissed me ! 
 (But oh ! for the cold, cold rain — 
 
 The rain, and the winds that blow ; 
 The cold, cold rain, and the colder wind — 
 The wind, and the rain, and the snow ! )
 
 120 HERE AND THERE. 
 
 Oh ! the eve to night -vras turning, 
 And the early stars were yearning 
 Through a mist of odours, burniag, 
 
 Grlory blent ; 
 Oh ! the eve to night was turning, 
 Gently turning. 
 
 When he went ! 
 And with shut eyes clung I to him. 
 
 And he left me ! 
 And ^vith tearful shut eyes climg I to him, 
 
 And he left me ! 
 And with passionate arms I prest him, 
 And with shuddering spasms I blest liim. 
 And in frenzied haste caressed him, 
 
 And he left me ! 
 (But oh ! for the cold, cold rain — 
 
 The rain, and the winds that blow ; 
 The cold, cold rain, and the colder wind — 
 The wind, and the rain, and the snow ! )
 
 121 
 
 ODE ON THE BIRTH OF BURNS * 
 
 A HUNDRED times, with clangorous shout and din, 
 Have tower and steeple hailed the New Year in ; 
 A myriad brazen throats, a hundred times. 
 Have wildly chanted forth their Christmas chimes ; 
 A hundred times the ancient world hath rolled 
 Out of the lap of summer, warm with gold, 
 Into the bleaching wind and drenching rain, 
 Since first the wondrous peasant felt the air, 
 Since first above his head a mother's prayer 
 Went fluttering up to God, amid the angelic train. 
 
 II. 
 
 No royal palace was prepared for him ; 
 No silent courtiers shd from room to room, 
 Gathering together in the gorgeous gloom 
 Of purple hangings, drooping rich and dim ; 
 For him no silver cressets shed their hght, 
 No eager joy-bells sounded through the night 
 From city minster, or from village tower, 
 No loud hurrahs, sent from deep-chested men 
 
 * One of the six recommended to be published by the judges of 
 the Crystal Palace ^Competition, on the centenary of the birth of 
 Robert Burns.
 
 122 ODE ON THE BIRTH OF BURNS. 
 
 Lifted the midniglit mist from off tlie glen 
 
 In celebration of h.is natal hour ; 
 
 No hush of deep expectance filled the earth ; 
 
 No cry rose rich with gladness at his birth ; 
 
 The noble revelled at his sumptuous hall ; 
 
 The beauty bloomed and languished at the ball ; 
 
 The drowsy miller scolded at the mill ; 
 
 The peasant slept beneath the misty hill ; 
 
 The heavens were still ; no shaggy lightnings came 
 
 To burn the midnight in their eager ire ; 
 
 No mighty portent, with a pen of fire, 
 
 Scribbled upon the dark the poet's name ; 
 
 He came and no man knew it ; no man knew 
 
 The wondrous boon to Scotland given ; 
 
 That there — beneath that grim and wintry blue — 
 
 A glorious poet, strong and true, 
 
 Had newly dropped from heaven ! 
 
 III. 
 
 Nature herself lay still, and dumb, and cold ; 
 Gone were her summer garments fringed with gold, 
 Her gorgeous sunsets, streaked with crimson bars — 
 DarMing in violet depths, shot through with light — 
 Deepening m splendour as the enchantress, Night, 
 Gathered and creamed the dim light into stars ; 
 Gone were her balms and blooms, her hum of bees, 
 Her sweet-mouthed zephyrs toying with the trees. 
 Her honeyed murmurings under hedge-rows dim,
 
 ODE ON THE BIRTH OF BUBNS. 123 
 
 Where happy lovers spent their evening hours, 
 
 Her festival array of cups and flowers, 
 
 Full of rich nectar to the fiery brim ; 
 
 Gone was the banquet and the golden sheen, 
 
 The Hghts were out, the revelry was o'er. 
 
 And she who, erstwhile, was a crowned queen, 
 
 Shivered a beggar at her palace-door. 
 
 Giving scant welcome to the new-born child, 
 
 She seized him in her stiff arms, lank and cold, 
 
 And held him out upon the wintry wold. 
 
 To look upon the desolation, strange and wild. 
 
 Which weirdly shuddered down on farm and fold, 
 
 In rain, and sleet, and silent- falKng snow — 
 
 Wrapping the heavens in a pall above, 
 
 And the dead earth in a white shroud below. 
 
 IV. 
 
 A wintry path, a futui'e thick with gloom, 
 Solid as adamant, before him lay. 
 Through which the poet cleft his lonely way, 
 'Mid menace and reproach and muttering doom, 
 Into the dawning of that better day 
 Which now has settled down upon his tomb. 
 For nature hath a Spartan mother's heart, 
 And, to prepare her noblest for their part 
 In the stern strife and struggle, she ordains 
 Eude tasks, hard fare, and bitter cups of pains — 
 Kjiowing the heroic stature is built higher
 
 124 ODE ON THE BIRTH OF BURNS. 
 
 By toil and suffering, and the hero shows 
 Kingliest and grandest when his forehead glows 
 Beneath that burning zone — the martyr's crown of 
 fire. 
 
 And so he grew and wrestled for the right ; 
 
 True man ! true bard ! who battled with the strong ; 
 
 And, having crowned his poverty with song, 
 
 He brought it boldly forth into the hght, 
 
 Heedless of jibe or jeer ; and all men sought 
 
 To see the wonder which the bard had wrought ; 
 
 Great, as though under some enchanter's rod, 
 
 A shapeless block of stone had shimmered out a god ! 
 
 VI. 
 
 He took his coimtry to his inmost soul. 
 And sang her joys and sorrows as his own ; 
 And in his verse we hear her wild winds moan, 
 The rapid rustle of her brooks, and roll 
 Of her rude rivers, as they dash and foam 
 In tawny fury round the shepherd's home. 
 Her Doric speech, her heart of simple truth, 
 Her piety and strength, her tales of ruth, 
 Her fireside legends, and her wild romance 
 Ghtter and gather in a rustic dance. 
 Laughing in garlands of perpetual youth,
 
 ODE ON THE BIRTH OF BURNS. 125 
 
 "Within the magic circle of his rhymes ; 
 And Scottish faeries ring their silver chimes, 
 GobHn and ghost, warlock and witch uncouth, 
 And all the marvels of the olden times 
 Troop forth at his behest ; 
 And every terror of his native land 
 Shakes out its eK-locks, bares its bony hand, 
 And every sportive whim, at his command, 
 Sits down the poet's guest. 
 
 VII. 
 
 Laughter and tears alike were at his nod, 
 Humour and wit ran sparkling rich as wine ; 
 And at the rare carousal, half divine, 
 He sat amid his subjects, like a god 
 Waited upon by satyrs. 
 
 Like a bee. 
 He sipped sweet honey from the bitterest flower ; 
 And at his touch the starkest wintry tree 
 Eained down its apples in a golden shower. 
 Young men and maidens whisp'ring, stiU rehearse 
 Their joys and sorrows in his manly verse ; 
 His witching words stiU weU o'er budding Hps, 
 MantUng soft cheeks in ruddy dimple-dips 
 And innocent laughters of the ancient prime ; 
 And still, at hearthstone, and at rural fair, 
 Old men and matrons, heeding not that Time
 
 126 ODE ON THE BIBTH OF BUENS. 
 
 Hatli fiirrow'd cheek and brow, and Llancii'd the 
 
 glossy hair, 
 Chuckle and murmur o'er the magic rhj-me, 
 Brimful of life and light, and all youth's dainty fare ; 
 Nature, fidl-Hpped, was singing in his heart ; 
 And, though the wounded poet felt the smart 
 Of poverty, yet, like a bird in spring, 
 Soul-full of music, he did nought but sing, 
 And in the choral whole, he grandly bore his part.
 
 127 
 
 BIRTH-DAY STANZAS. 
 
 TO 
 
 ON HIS ATTAINING HIS TWENTY-FIEST BIETH-DAY. 
 
 OvEE all the greening valleys 
 
 Breathes the dewy balm of spring, 
 Over all the shadowy woodlands 
 
 Burst the notes of welcoming; 
 And a brighter light is streaming 
 
 Over all the world to-day, 
 For it is the gleesome spring-tide, 
 
 'Tis the merry month of May ! 
 
 With a gladder note the skylark 
 
 Flutters up to meet the morn, 
 "With a richer note the black-bird 
 
 Warbles from the tufted thorn, 
 With a softer voice the streamlet 
 
 Lisps its whispered love-song gay. 
 For it is the happy spring-tide, 
 
 'Tis the merry month of May ! 
 
 And a dawn of gorgeous promise 
 
 Trembles over wood and wold, •
 
 128 BIRTH-DAY STANZAS. 
 
 Waiting for the regal Summer 
 And her pomp of green and gold ; 
 
 "Waiting for the full fruition 
 Of the blossoms of to-day, 
 
 Oh ! it is the happy spring-time, 
 'Tis the merry month of May ! 
 
 So, my friend, may your spring morning 
 
 Scatter fragrant promise roimd ; 
 So, with trophy- wreaths and garlands, 
 
 May your after years he crown' d ; 
 May a rich and sumptuous summer 
 
 Of good deeds begin to-day, 
 May the God of heaven be with you 
 
 In your merry, merry May !
 
 129 
 
 THE ISLAND PRINCE. 
 
 DEEAM FEAGMENTS. 
 
 Up jErom his crimson cushions and his couch 
 
 Broidered with gold the King rose wearily. 
 
 He flung aside his purples, and went out 
 
 Into the humming woods. Nor heeded he 
 
 The lotus in the water, nor the shine 
 
 And startled splendour of the birds that glanced 
 
 Through cinnamon groves, and boughs of orange 
 
 trees, 
 Nor all the fruits that dangled in his way, 
 Sun-ripe to the very core ; nor the dim cloud 
 Of blended incense, that, at every step, 
 Eose up from all the rich empurpled banks. 
 He passed a festal party, who, with cheeks 
 Glowing with health, and eyes that gleamed with 
 
 glee. 
 Danced to the clash of cymbals, heedlessly. 
 And plunged into the thicker forest glooms. 
 His heart sang of the past ; and as that lake 
 Whose outer verge reflects Potosi's towers 
 And blazing domes, all dimpled into gold, 
 But whose secreted waters, subterrene,
 
 130 THE ISLAND PRmCE. 
 
 Preserve imrotting whatso'er they hold, 
 
 And sometimes, breaking through the golden bars 
 
 Wherein Peruvian miners hold them bound, 
 
 Disgorge their treasures from their caverned deeps, — 
 
 Their hoarded dead of many centiu-ies. 
 
 With the rude bloom of health fixed on their cheeks, 
 
 No dimple -worn away, no hair disj^laced, 
 
 Arrayed in all the quaint dress of the past, 
 
 And dancing suddenly sunned upon the waves, 
 
 Known from the living only by their garb, — 
 
 Even so his soxil swarmed thick with other years. 
 
 That came up to the surface, long entombed. 
 
 Yet all undimmed and lustrous as this hour ; — 
 
 Came with their parted hair, and smiling lips. 
 
 And meek-clasped hands, and moveless feet, and felt 
 
 The sun upon their white and pulseless brows. 
 
 Onward he plunged, until he reached a spot 
 
 Where the o'er-hanging branches wreathed above 
 
 A dim grot lying low, and cool, and green, 
 
 Wherein a rivulet darted darkly-bright 
 
 O'er tawny pebbles, and embrowned sand. 
 
 And shells -ndth lips that curled from pearl to pink. 
 
 Here, couched on yielding mosses, down he sank, 
 
 Till all his fancy into \asions broke : 
 
 Chiefly of England, and the golden prime 
 
 Of Chivahy in the bright-plumed past, 
 
 Tales told him in the sumptuous autumn nights, 
 
 Dropping with honey, by famed travellers. 
 
 He saw the stormy Viking ride the wavea ;
 
 THE ISLAND PRINCE. 131 
 
 He heard the burly baron clang his steel ; 
 He saw the beard of Merlin waving white ; 
 And all the pageantry of Arthur's court 
 At joust and tournament. The mighty brand 
 Durandal, flashes all its magic light 
 Full in his face ; he sees Astolpho's lance 
 Divide the darkness of the meeting boughs ; 
 I Sir Gruy of Warwick, Lancelot of the Lake, 
 Sir Roland, and the Cid go by all plumed, 
 Jingling their golden trappings. He beholds 
 The towers of fabled Camelot, and sees 
 The silken ladies glancing up the streets ; 
 Enchanted palaces, with blazing fronts, 
 Yearning towards the south, within whose rooms, 
 Guarded by griffins, lo ! the Princess lies ; 
 And hoary castles swarm above the woods, 
 Their wondrous towers all tumbling into mist, 
 Eeehng in flame and sunset o'er his eyes. 
 A sleep seals all his senses ; down he goes 
 A laden pilgrim through the world of dreams. 
 
 'Tis broad mid-day. The hunt is done. The horns, 
 
 Far ofi", sound the recall. He is alone. 
 
 The forest shimmers o'er him ; and a sense 
 
 Of being here by some foredoomed appointment 
 
 Weighs heavy on his soul ; some great event 
 
 Seems summoning its thunders in the heavens 
 
 To herald its approach. Faint on the air 
 
 The echo of the horns dies far away,
 
 132 THE ISLAND PRINCE. 
 
 And all the world of men, and busy deeds 
 Falls from him in his trance ; he is alone. 
 When lo ! a wonder wrought before his eyes ; 
 Some unseen power catches the forest up, 
 And all the mighty trunks and twisted boughs 
 Writhe groaning as in fire, and disappear 
 Utterly, leaving not a cloud or sjieck 
 On the gold disc of day. On he is urged 
 By some invisible hand, until he sees 
 Broadening before his steps, a valley wide, 
 Fragrant with spices of the sunny south, 
 And musical Tvdth voices of the spring. 
 Stretch up into the crimson- clouded east, 
 Where in a purple mist, a city glowed. 
 With gorgeous domes, and winkiug cupolas. 
 And golden spires, that in the mellow Hght 
 Shot out bewildering lances of keen fire. 
 
 In sooth a pleasant valley ! full of brooks. 
 
 And the low murmurs of the well-j)leased winds, 
 
 And voices rich with gladness, and sweet bm'sts 
 
 Of tremulous music sent from carolling hearts ; — 
 
 A valley dark with dim voluptuous fi-uits. 
 
 And flowers that shook upon their fragrant stems. 
 
 And groves of sj)ices bleeding odorous gums ; — 
 
 But on the one side, hung a forest hoar 
 
 With tossing boughs, and branches bleak and bare. 
 
 Through whose dark solitudes went wailing winds. 
 
 And soimds of dolour, and dim shapes of woe ; —
 
 THE ISLAND PRINCE. 133 
 
 And on the other rose, with ragged peaks, 
 
 A tumbled world of grey and cruel rocks ; 
 
 And mid the flowers of the valley gleamed 
 
 The deadly beauty of the gliding snake. 
 
 And, mingled with the fruits, were poisonous shrubs 
 
 That himg their crimson globes amid the vines. 
 
 On towards the shining city in the east, 
 Two forms were wending on the valley-path. 
 The one was human ; but the other shone 
 With a meek lustre, as the harvest moon 
 After still rain, upon a breathless night 
 Hangs low and large above the dripping boughs ; 
 And where she passed, a richer fragrance breathed 
 From out the cool hearts of the dewy flowers, 
 And to the clustering fruits, a mellower hue 
 Ran o'er the tan of their suffused cheeks ; 
 "While all the poisonous berries shrivelled up 
 Their shining purples to the blackened core. 
 And all the slimy reptiles sought their holes. 
 
 At length they reached the city ; and the gate 
 Eolled back in mufiled music on its hinge ; 
 And a dehcious clamour of loud harps 
 Stirred all the air to raptiu'e, and a shout, 
 *' Blessed for ever ! " ran along the streets, 
 Through the long length of shining colonnades, 
 And stately squares and jasj^er cornices. 
 And by the golden domes and twinkling spires, —
 
 134 THE ISLAND PRINCE. 
 
 All through the pillared splendour of the place 
 
 *' Blessed for ever ! " rang in jubilant tones ; 
 
 And then the great gate rolled back on its hinge, 
 
 And music welled out o'er the city walls. 
 
 Again the vision changes ; and behold ! 
 
 Deep in the centre of the hoary woods, 
 
 Where never to the sound of timbrel danced 
 
 The swarthy maidens of his native land : 
 
 Where never human foot had pressed the grass ; 
 
 Nor wild beast wandered in the quest of prey : 
 
 Where preternatural sUence kept a hush 
 
 Of centuries, the trees drew back, and left 
 
 A space ringed roim.d by broken, moss-grown 
 
 walls: 
 Where basked no lizard, and no creeping thing 
 Went in and out the fissures ; o'er the gate, 
 That stood wide open in the mooned calm 
 And shadowy glamour of this silent place, 
 Carved in white marble, white as Polar snows, 
 Each tender finger trembling in the light, 
 All soft as water-lilies, was a hand — 
 A dehcate lady's hand — that pointed still 
 Towards the old house, which, with its high-peaked 
 
 roof. 
 And many gables, in the garden stood 
 White La the moonlight. Through the arch he passed, 
 And stepped upon the lawn, where, high in air, 
 A foxmtain played, whose feathery waters feU. 
 Silent as shadows on the pleached grafw,
 
 THE ISLAND PEINCE 135 
 
 And then wound out, through roots of flowering 
 
 shrubs, 
 And down dim alleys where the starlight shone 
 Still and transparent, on its breast, as still, 
 Into some unseen basin far away. 
 Close by the fountain, on a pillar of brass, 
 Thrown back, up to the pitiless heavens, a face 
 Flecked o'er with shadows smote upon his eyes, 
 And thrilled his soul with horror. On a neck 
 No thicker than the poisonous cobra gleamed 
 This ghastly copper phantom : — Oh ! a face 
 Where eld unsearchable, and hate, and scorn, 
 And agony, were scorched in lava-lines. 
 The salted fixes of preternatural woe 
 Had washed those thin cheeks ere the Pharaohs went 
 Clad in asbestos to the mummied ranks 
 Of their forefathers. On that woman's brow. 
 Thick-seamed with wrinkles, blazing centuries 
 Had burned like bars ; those dim and simken eyes 
 Sought out the blue depths far beyond the moon. 
 Beyond the stars ! beyond the universe, 
 "With savage hate ; and from those cruel Hps, 
 Drawn up in untold agony, a cry 
 Of scorn, and curses, and of coimtless woes 
 Seemed ever bursting forth in bhstering fire. 
 But came not, fixed for ever ! 
 
 On he passed. 
 Sickened with dread, urged forward by his dream, 
 Through an old Gothic doorway, ribbed and rich
 
 136 THE ISLAND PRmCE. 
 
 With tracery, into a dim-liglited hall, 
 Where, fi-om the rusted armour on the wall, 
 Cobwebs hung stirless in the breathless hush, 
 And moveless shadows clung along the roof, 
 Save at the upper end, where, like two wings 
 In some infernal air, two banners black. 
 With motion slow and regular, flapped all 
 The horror of that ghastly face, picked out 
 In sweltering gold, upon the inner gloom. 
 
 Onward, from room to room, from door to door. 
 He passed with tottering knees ; and in each room. 
 Out from some corner, o'er the painted door, 
 Or grinning down from the deep-groined-roof. 
 Chiselled in stone, or worked in glinting bronze, 
 Flamed the same hideous face before his eyes. 
 He ran ; he strove to cry ; but not a soimd 
 Broke on the peopled stillness of the place. 
 Onward he darted ; and his footsteps fell 
 Silent as feather-down from molting birds, — 
 From room to haunted room, striving in vain 
 To escape the ghastly whirl that, close behind, 
 Filled all the gloom with faces. On, and on, 
 Flying in agony, he dashed the doors 
 Behind him, to shut oiit the shapes he knew 
 Were coming in pursuit — up through the silence — 
 Up through the dark that drew close on liis heels — 
 And, evermore, he found the pictured walls 
 Grow still more ghastly ; evermore the face
 
 THE ISLAND PRINCE. 137 
 
 Shuddered out more distinctly from the gloom ; 
 The lank, thin hair almost began to move 
 On the long serpent neck ; the dreadful eyes 
 Almost began to gleam ; and through the lips 
 The long-pent cry seemed just about to break 
 In cataracts of cixrses : 
 
 When, behold ! 
 As he smote in a cedar door, and burst 
 Into the last room of the ghostly range, 
 A silken couch, beside a window wide 
 Lay saintly sweet in moonlight ; and no more, 
 Either from doorway, or from painted roof, 
 Or ghastly-gleaming wall, looked out the face ; 
 But on the couch a veiled form lay in sleep, 
 Lifting with gentle rise and fall, the silks 
 That warm and white lay on her breathing breast. 
 Behold a hand most exquisitely fair — 
 Twin lily of the one that met his eyes 
 Brightening the outer arch — and, nestling deep 
 In gauze, an arm lay on the coverlet. 
 Daintily rounded as the milky stem 
 Of flowering balsams. Up he deftly stole, 
 And, with expectant hand, drew gently back 
 The veil of samite from the sleeping face : — 
 Horror of horrors ! There, oh ! there, at last. 
 The Kving hair winds round the serpent-neck ; 
 The living eyes wink up their witcheries 
 Dead into his ! The seamed and ghastly brow. 
 Like heated brass, is pressed against his own !
 
 138 TUE ISLAND PKINCE. 
 
 There is the ante-type, the living face — 
 
 The face of dateless eld — of agony — 
 
 Of hate and scorn — is there ; and there, hark ! hark ! 
 
 Oh there, at last, the cry ! 
 
 Up from the grass, 
 The big drops starting on his clammy brow. 
 The King leapt, startled from his ghastly dream. 
 The day was done ; the stars wore high in heaven ; 
 And close beside the bank whereon he slept, 
 A stealthy step glode through the hush of night. 
 And not a sound disturbed the dreaming boughs.
 
 139 
 
 URBAN THE MONK. 
 
 §1. (^ttmmx '^t^tixh. 
 
 PAET I. 
 
 THE LIBRARY. 
 
 I. 
 
 Young Urban keeps the burnished keys 
 Of the Scriptorium ; and he sits 
 Through sunny noons in dreamful ease, 
 Reading or copying, by tits ; 
 Or adding quaint and golden tints, 
 Or plushy purples to the page <* 
 Of mass-book, or of breviary. 
 Of holy father, bard, or sage ; 
 Till all the full-lored veUums swim 
 In crimsons and in purples dim. 
 And coromon words, in soft array. 
 Prance down the page, like palfry gay, 
 Trapped all in gold, to bear away 
 The faery form of princess prim. 
 And whether round the abbey blow 
 The soft south winds, with overflow
 
 140 URBAli THE MONK. 
 
 Of balm and honey, or the snow 
 Lies -white upon the ground below, 
 And tempests round the belfry go, 
 'Tis all the same to him ! 
 
 n. 
 
 All through the sunny summer noon, 
 When lilies over wall-flowers swoon. 
 And, in the honeyed heart of June, 
 
 The bee on roses feeds — 
 He pores, amid the shadiest nooks. 
 Over the gold-illumined books, 
 With earnest face, and eager looks, 
 
 Believing all he reads. 
 
 III. 
 
 Legends of saints fill up the gloom 
 Of winter nights, and drizzling days ;— 
 He sees them swim along his room, 
 And then wind upward, in a bloom 
 Of roseate colours, dipt in gloom. 
 
 Wrapped in a trembling haze 
 Of cloudy splendour, bidging low ; 
 Billows of fire, as white as snow, 
 Eoll with pale crimsons down below 
 Their sandal' d feet, with motion slow ; 
 And round about their bare heads go 
 
 Halos, like sunset rays !
 
 TJEBAN THE MONK. 141 
 
 rv. 
 Of holy martyrs, too, he reads — 
 Of blessed Blandina — Appian — 
 Qiiinta the pure — and Ulpian — 
 Metra — and blameless Adrian ; 
 Until his young heart pants and bleeds 
 For those who, for the true faith died ; 
 How some were torn by wild-beasts ; some 
 Flung into boihng pitch ; and some 
 Tormented in the murderous hum 
 Of Rome, were crucified ; 
 How mangled Porphyry dauntless stood, 
 With flayed ribs slowly dripping blood, 
 Daring the tyrant's ire ; 
 How Polycarp, with garments riven, 
 "Went with a holy shout to heaven 
 On flickering wings of fire ! 
 
 Mingled with these were legends old 
 
 Of wondrous knights and ladies gay ; 
 
 The Cid, Sir Eoland, Tristram bold, 
 
 Streamed in rich trappings, jingling gold. 
 
 Over the crimson sunset wold, 
 
 Adown the sinking day ; 
 
 And ladies, with a silken swim. 
 
 Fluttered along the mossy brim 
 
 Of meres, by deep woods hushed and dim, 
 
 On to the bright tournay,
 
 142 TJEBAN THE MONK. 
 
 VI. 
 
 But cliief he loved the mystic story 
 
 Of saintly knights, with faces pale, 
 
 Who spurned the earth, and earthly glory, 
 
 And went in quest of Holy Grail. 
 
 He followed them on by land and flood — 
 
 Sir Parzival — brave and holy knight — 
 
 And bold Sir Galahad — the good ; 
 
 He heard them clanging through the night. 
 
 Over the pavements, still and white, 
 
 Their studded bridles jinghng light, 
 
 Flashing amid the soft moonhght. 
 
 And saw them skim along the wood — 
 
 Up alleys of moonbeams, trembhng pale — 
 
 Past church, and city, and lordly tower, 
 
 And valley, and swamp, and lady's bower, 
 
 All in the hush of the midnight hour. 
 
 In quest of Holy Grail ! 
 
 VII. 
 
 Titurel's temple o'er him rose, 
 Blushing with gems, and gorgeous glows 
 Of golden domes, and twinkling spires ; 
 Roses of rubies, and pale fires 
 Of clustered diamonds shook about 
 The wondrous fabric in and out ; 
 And in the central sanctuary, 
 On a thick slab of porphjTy,
 
 URBAN THE MONK. 143 
 
 "Wrapped in white samite, stood the Grail, 
 Outshimmering like a cloudy moon ; 
 And o'er it swelled a mimic noon 
 Of topaz, and of jasper bright, 
 Hung in the sapphire ceiKng light ; 
 Outside, the dome bulged up red gold, 
 With blue enamel fretted o'er ; 
 And banners, with unruffled fold. 
 Hung silken out at every door ; 
 And roimd about the Holy Grail 
 Eose two-and-seventy chapels, pale 
 With gold and diamonds ; every two 
 Shot up a tower into the blue 
 Like sudden flame ; and over those 
 Shook crystal crosses in the light. 
 Clutched from above within the claws 
 Of gold spread-eagles, day and night ; 
 And o'er the central dome there rose 
 A huge carbuncle, with red glows 
 And sullen splendour, like a sun 
 Lighting the cypress-forest dun. 
 That roimd about the temple stood. 
 Filling its shadowy heart with blood : — 
 And none might tread that mystic hight 
 Of hushed Montsalvage, save the knight 
 Chosen of Him of holy-rood !
 
 144 URBAN THE MONK. 
 
 vm. 
 
 And still he turns the gilded leaves ; 
 And, rich in faith, the monk beheves 
 Fui-ther than logic ere hath got : — 
 His creed soars higher' than his sight — 
 Reason is not his only Hght ; — 
 Still through the hot hewildered night, 
 Angels go heavenward, clad in white, 
 And so he reads, and doubteth not ! 
 
 PAET 11. 
 
 DOUBTING CASTLE. 
 
 I. 
 
 Alas the day ! Alas the hour ! 
 The sullen clouds, with downward roll, 
 And heart of hidden thunders lower 
 Over the brightness of his soul. 
 He sits in sadness, in his room, 
 AVrapped in the old Tartarean gloom, 
 Murmuring, in dire perplexity, 
 " This is a fearfid mystery ; — 
 I cannot think how this can be ! " 
 
 n. 
 
 It is the holy Sabbath day ; 
 The Bible rests upon his knee ;
 
 URBAK THE MONK. 145 
 
 He cannot ^-ead, lie cannot pray, 
 Although his lips the words may say 
 With shuddering effort, yet the "Nay" 
 Is in his heart ; and piteously 
 He murmurs low — " A mystery — 
 I cannot think how this may be ! " 
 
 III. 
 
 Ye pitting heavens help him now ! 
 And take the cloud from off his brow, 
 And draw the fang from out his smart : — 
 Into the garden of his heart 
 The storm hath gone, with cruel cry, 
 And all is dead from sward to sky ! 
 
 IV. 
 
 For he has read how, unto Him 
 Who ruleth all things with a nod. 
 Time is as nought ; how unto God 
 A thousand years are as a day, 
 Or as a night-watch ; and he feels 
 His heart rock in the stormy "Nay 1 " 
 That 'Will be heard, both night and day, 
 Although he struggles hard to pray 
 And cannot, though he kneels ! 
 
 At church, he seems a guilty thing ; 
 He hears the fiiU-choired anthems ring 
 
 K
 
 146 UEBAN THE MONK. 
 
 With roll, and surge, and golden spring, 
 The bannered aisles about ; 
 But they have lost the air divine : — 
 Seems all a blank, and idiot sign. 
 The bright soul shaken out ! 
 
 VI. 
 
 Through the east ^vindow shines the sun, 
 With niello-\\' splendour, warm and dun ; 
 Through violet tints, and gorgeous streams 
 Of falling robes, and softest creams 
 Of rapt saints' halos — flashing gleams 
 Of roses dankhng — mingled beams 
 Eich as the silks of Trebizond : — 
 He marks the sunlight as it paints 
 That glorious cloud of holy saints, 
 Until his shuddering spirit faints ; 
 For, though he sees that heaven of saints, 
 There is no other heaven beyond ! 
 
 VII. 
 
 He hears the golden gust and rush 
 Of rich and mellow organ thunder. 
 Now winding heaven-nard in a gush 
 Of swelling praise and holy wonder. 
 Now falling, with a soft rebound. 
 Boiling deep basses roimd and round ; 
 Till fluted notes again aspire 
 In Lark-liko dartings ; — from the choir,
 
 UBBAN THE MONK. 147 
 
 With upward flutterings, higher and higher, 
 
 One note rich-throbbing in desire 
 
 Goes giddy in a whirl of fire 
 
 Up shuddering solitudes of sound ; 
 
 And then returning, 
 
 Earthward yearning, 
 Lo ! the luted music falls 
 Soft as water down the walls 
 Of sparry grottos, underground ; 
 Then, Hke sword-blades glancing brightly, 
 Plunge the sudden notes out hghtly, 
 Till the treble swerves and skips, 
 And the muffled thunder, low 
 EoUing inward, heaves and dips, 
 Like a midnight sea-swell ; — ^lo ! 
 Clarion-bugles seem to blow, 
 And all the loosened gi-andeurs go 
 Eocking sweetly to and fro. 
 In a sumptuous overflow. 
 And throbbing harmonies kiss Hke Hps : • 
 StiU, amid the golden blare, 
 Eolling thunderous through the air 
 The bannered aisles about. 
 Like a curse flung into prayer. 
 Hears he hissing his wild doubt ; 
 And he feels the holy chapel 
 Holier were, were he without.
 
 148 URBAN THE MONK. 
 
 PAET III. 
 
 THE LITTLE BIRD. 
 
 I. 
 
 Out from the books and stifling room, 
 Out of the shadows and the gloom, 
 Into the cloister-garden bright, 
 Into the summer air and light ! 
 
 II. 
 
 He wanders in the humming breeze. 
 Amid the shadows of the trees, 
 Himself a shadow, iU at ease. 
 
 III. 
 
 When lo ! from out a neighbouring copse. 
 With richest plumage simny bright, 
 Making a wheel of coloured light, 
 A little bird, aflutter, drops 
 Down upon the pear-tree tops, 
 
 Hopping lightly, 
 
 Glancing brightly 
 'Mid the twisted, shadowy boughs, 
 Raining lightnings round his brows.
 
 URBAN THE MONK. 149 
 
 IV. 
 
 A glory and a wonder are 
 Its crested colours to the sight ; 
 It shakes with music, as a star 
 Trembles with excess of light : 
 Round about its throat assemble 
 Blushes of the damask rose ; 
 And a deepening violet goes 
 Sleeking down its back, atremble ; 
 Eich and hazy flutterings 
 Glow about its yellow wings 
 Dancing golden in the light ; 
 Like a crowd of singing sxmbeams 
 Gleams the little vision bright. 
 
 Tame it seems, too, as a bird 
 Bom amid the tropics hushed, 
 Where no flower is ever crushed, 
 And no voice of man is heard ; — 
 Nothing but a gorgeous noon. 
 And a silent silken river. 
 And an endless, endless Jime 
 Sinking down into a swoon. 
 Or a low and bulging moon 
 For ever and for ever.
 
 150 URBAN THE MONK. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Up among the twigs it ran, 
 Hopping, wheeling, full of graces ; 
 'Mid the apples with the tan 
 Summering all their jocund faces ; 
 "Wlien the monk, advancing near it, 
 Strove to touch it with his iinger, 
 Scarcely seemed the bird to fear it, 
 Only, with a sidelong linger, 
 Hopped it on — a twig or two — 
 All its purples in a shiver, 
 Shaking like a ruffled river 
 In the storm of notes it blew. 
 
 vn. 
 
 All along the garden alleys, 
 Past the dial on the lawn, 
 Followed he the happy sallies 
 Of this creature of the dawn, 
 Out, into the solitude 
 Of the summer-haunted wood. 
 
 vni. 
 
 Out, amid the stirless hush 
 Of the twilight shadows dun, 
 Glancing on, from bush to bush, 
 Glowing like a burning blush.
 
 URBAN THE MONK. lol 
 
 Followed he, with cheek aflush, 
 This gleaming creature of the sun : — 
 On about three hundred paces 
 From the cloister-garden door, 
 Joined he in the wheeKng races, 
 Tlirough the copse and open spaces — 
 Sudden summer on their faces 
 As the branches backward bore — 
 Just about three hundred paces 
 From the little G-othic door, 
 Just three hundred, and no more ! 
 
 IX. 
 
 When, behold ! a slope of sunbeams 
 Smote athwart the inner gloom. 
 Steeping all the fluttering plumage 
 In a ruddier golden bloom ; 
 And the little bird went winging 
 Showering music down, like rain. 
 Up the slope of sunbeams, singing. 
 And he saw it not again !
 
 152 UEBAN THE MONK. 
 
 PAET IV. 
 
 THE RETURN. 
 
 I. 
 
 YoiiNG Urban, musing still, returned ; 
 
 His pious soul "within him yearned, 
 
 As in the days of old, to pray ; 
 
 But still he clutched his misery. 
 
 " A thousand long-dra"svn years !" quoth he, 
 
 " I cannot — though I wish it — see 
 
 How centuries can roll away, 
 
 Muffled in silent mystery, 
 
 Just as a night-watch hushed, or be, 
 
 Even to God, but as a day ! " 
 
 II. 
 
 Wonder of wonders ! as he spoke 
 A vision on his senses broke : 
 A mighty abbey met his eyes. 
 Just like his own, but thrice its size ; 
 And where, not half an hour before. 
 The Httle cloister-garden stood — 
 The garden \n.th. the Gothic door 
 That opened out upon the wood-;- 
 A huge cathedi'al rose on high, 
 Three-steepled ; — every vaned spire
 
 URBAN THE MONK. 
 
 153 
 
 Flung up into the summer sky 
 G-reat sHning spokes of steadfast fire ! 
 
 III. 
 
 About the Abbey all was hushed, 
 
 Just as it was an hour before ; 
 
 The corbels in the sunlight flushed, 
 
 The great east window glowed and blushed 
 
 He could not find the Gothic door : — 
 
 And where the sun-dial erst was seen 
 
 Eose a new wing above the wood, 
 
 And where the Abbot's house had been 
 
 A great refectory bulging stood, 
 
 And where the apples were, a flood 
 
 Of painted windows glimmered keen : — 
 
 And all the strange and mystic scene 
 
 Filled him with wonder where he stood. 
 
 IV. 
 
 AH in amaze, he sought the door ; 
 And as he stretched his hand to knock, 
 Behold! a pursy Sacristan — 
 Whom he had never seen before — 
 Descending from the steeple-clock, 
 No sooner saw him, than he ran 
 Pale with a£Eright ; — his starting eyes 
 Both wide agoggle, twice their size !
 
 154 URBAN THE MONK. 
 
 He heard the noise of banging doors, 
 Sounding up long corridors, 
 **Deo gratias," quoth the Porter, 
 As he drew the bolt aside — 
 "Bene" — ^but ere it was uttered 
 On white lips the blessing died ! 
 
 TI. 
 
 He sought the stately Chapter-hall, 
 Where the Brethren were assembled, 
 And he whispered — ** Strangers all — 
 What a change an hour may make ! " 
 As he bent his figure tall 
 Every limb among them trembled, 
 Every eye was seen to quake. 
 Every hand was seen to shake, 
 And he unfolded his brief tale 
 Unto listeners hushed and pale. 
 
 VII. 
 
 But, ere the nan-ative was told. 
 
 Through both his ears strange noises rung ; 
 
 He felt his Hmbs were growing cold ; 
 
 He shook with palsy, like the old ; 
 
 He saw a silver beard had rolled 
 
 Down to his girdle, fold on fold — 
 
 The girdle where the keys were hung —
 
 URBAN THE MONK. 155 
 
 And all the keys, though almost new, 
 Looked red with rust, and worn out too. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 When lo ! from out a grated case. 
 With tottering step, and blanched face, 
 A monk a written parchment bore. 
 Illumined all, and bright with gold 
 And costly crimson ; and it told 
 How, just three himdred years before, 
 The young monk Urban first was missed, 
 And never had been heard of more ! 
 
 IX. 
 
 Deep silence was there as he read — 
 
 Silence — and wonder — and great dread. 
 
 Quoth the monk Urban, young no more, 
 
 Sighing deeply, " Ah I see ! 
 
 Forest bird that sang to me 
 
 In the wondrous days of yore. 
 
 Mystic ages rolled away 
 
 As I watched thy happy play, 
 
 And the little Gothic door 
 
 Opened on eternity ! 
 
 AU my faith I owe to thee ; 
 
 And, adoring God, I see 
 
 How a thousand years may be 
 
 Even as a single day ! "
 
 156 URBAN THE MOKK. 
 
 Then he bowed his reverend head : — 
 All the Fathers, gathering near, 
 Hushed their very breath to hear 
 Every word that might be said : — 
 Quoth the Abbot shortly — " Brethren, 
 Back to prayers — he is dead ! "
 
 157 
 
 O LITTLE child: 
 
 LITTLE cliild ! tliat earnest, and art gone, 
 
 Whose tiny footprints are upon our hearts ; 
 
 little wonder of the dreaming eyes, 
 
 Whovse dreams we saw not, and could never see ; 
 
 Who wert with us, and yet we knew thee not, 
 
 Nor thought that, underneath om* quiet roof. 
 
 An angel harboured with us for a time, 
 
 And was oui- child, and is our child no more. 
 
 Being familiar with the floor of heaven, 
 
 And dwelling nigh imto the throne of God ! 
 
 Dost ever think of us, as we of thee ? 
 
 Dost ever bend thy beaming brow, cliild ! 
 
 Only a little space — a little space — 
 
 And turn from all the glories of thy home 
 
 To look into the lorn hearts thou hast left ? 
 
 And we, child ! who tend our daily tasks. 
 
 Go in and out, and weep with those who weep. 
 
 And laugh with those who laugh, and buy and sell. 
 
 And travel o'er the dusty highways still 
 
 As though thou wert not, and hadst never been. 
 
 As when wo knew thy little sunny face
 
 158 O LITTLE child! 
 
 "Would surely greet us at the garden-gate ; — 
 Dost tliink that \ve forget thee, our child ? 
 
 Not always are we in the weary mart ; 
 
 Not always are we plodding in the streets. 
 
 We, in our rural home, when the grey dusk 
 
 Falls upon copse and meadow, saunter out. 
 
 And do not talk, but think of thee, child ! 
 
 And, in the night, when heavy hearts are hushed. 
 
 In the deep night we hear the beating rain, 
 
 And in the beating rain the wailing wind, 
 
 And in the wailing wind a cry, a low. 
 
 Soft cry, not as of agony, but bliss — 
 
 A silvery cry, as though we heard a thrill 
 
 Of siiirit-music, far beyond the rain. 
 
 Beyond the wailings of the wind, beyond 
 
 The storms and gloomy reaches of the night, — 
 
 Out of the golden spaces far beyond. 
 
 And then we dream. We do but dream, child ! 
 
 little child ! that camest, and art gone, 
 
 That wert our child, and art our child no more. 
 
 We dream thou hast not yet forgotten us, 
 
 But yearnest from thy starry home, as we 
 
 Yearn towards the heavens for thee. We do but 
 
 di'eam. 
 And in our dreamings are not quite forlorn. 
 
 Thy room is here, sweet babe ! We enter it — 
 The room, bxit oh ! the child. Thy httle bed
 
 O LITTLE child! 159 
 
 Is white in moonliglit ; — Oh ! for the beauteous form. 
 Thy toys are trembling in our palms — ^but oh ! 
 The tiny, dimpled hands that fingered them. 
 The stairs are here ; — but oh ! the Httle feet. 
 Gone ! Gone for ever ! Yet we hope to reach 
 The heaven that holds thee ; and, with humble hearts, 
 Thank God for thee, child ! "We know that thou 
 Art seeing now, and not as in a dream. 
 The things we long for, and shall never see 
 Until we join thee in the after- world ; — 
 Thee, little child ! who camest, and art gone, 
 Who wert our child, and art our child no more. 
 Being familiar with the floor of heaven, 
 And dwelling nigh imto the throne of God ! 
 
 -©D«3®-
 
 160 
 
 Z ARA. 
 
 Six years have passed, since from her mountain-home 
 
 Zara came down to Delhi ; — six bright years 
 
 Since first her great eyes flashed on tower and dome 
 
 Through gushes of hot tears. 
 
 Oh ! how she gazed from that high mountain-peak, 
 
 When on the far horizon's utmost rim 
 
 The royal city shimmered far and dim 
 
 Between the earth and heaven, — a purple streak 
 
 Betwixt the green and gold ; a dusky band 
 
 Of elephants went wavering o'er the land, 
 
 Gaudy with trappings, but so faint and far 
 
 Their silver buckles, flashing like a star, 
 
 Glowed larger than themselves : she drank the scene 
 
 As one who bids farewell to what has been 
 
 Once and for ever, and so passes on 
 
 Into the futiu-e, with far-straining eyes. 
 
 Wondering what next, and saying amid sighs 
 
 O'er all the old familiars, " Dead and gone ! " 
 
 But now she has been taught no more to look 
 
 With stag-eyed wonder on the stranger's face, 
 
 And, with the rapid instincts of her race, 
 
 Has learnt her maiden lessons by the book ;
 
 ZAEA. 161 
 
 Is coy as any in the drawing-room, 
 Is stiU and stately, or is maiden-meek ; 
 Can sigh and simper o'er a lover's doom, 
 Or in hot blushes thrill with gorgeous bloom 
 The tawny marble of her Indian cheek ; 
 She sings and dances, plays on the guitar. 
 Knits and embroiders, makes her morning calls, 
 Hustles her silks, and asks you how you are. 
 And, ere you answer, rattles on of balls ; 
 Is in all things, save what you cannot tell, 
 A sweet brunette, a fashionable helle. 
 But in the silence of her lonely room, 
 When none are by to listen or to mark, 
 She flings aside her dresses in the dark. 
 And with them her reserve. She beats the gloom 
 In frenzied passion, all her tropic hate 
 Gathered in lurid lustres in her eyes, 
 Her savage natiire glowing sans disguise, 
 A stoi-my Nemesis, — a dusky Fate. 
 All the affronts and trifles, which by day 
 She carols over, merry as a lark, 
 By night the woimded tigress makes her prey. 
 And paws and crunshes them within the dark, 
 ; Her terrible beauty pallid with her ire, 
 I And her large eyeballs flaming o'er with fire. 
 
 I 
 
 The dance is almost done. 
 
 And laguidly the dancers move ;
 
 162 - ZABA. 
 
 Already coos the early dove, 
 
 Already all the east begins to glow 
 
 With mellow morning-tints ; and, lo ! 
 
 Yonder the morning sun ! 
 
 The lamps are paling in the rooms, 
 
 And now o'er minaret a^nd spire 
 
 And hushed pagoda, runs a thrill of fire. 
 
 And rosy flush of blooms. 
 
 Long threads of morning light 
 
 Are woven on the ruddy mountain-peaks ; 
 
 The davra is here with all his gleesome freaks. 
 
 Painting with gold and amber streaks 
 
 The dark face of the gloom. 
 
 And flinging unbought favoui's down 
 
 On nooks and corners of the town. 
 
 On palace, tower, and tomb. 
 
 And all night long, through all the mazes of the dance, 
 
 Have Walter Verner and sweet Alice Grey 
 
 Been biu^ning in the fierce and furtive glance 
 
 Of Zara far away. 
 
 Sullenly has she answered every call 
 
 To join the revelry, 
 
 And kept her seat behind the thickest fall 
 
 Of Persian tapestry ; 
 
 Darting her arrowy looks along the room, 
 
 Across the giddy swim 
 
 Of silks and musHns, and of tresses dim. 
 
 Amid their topaz and their ruby bloom, 
 
 Searching alone for him.
 
 ZARA. 
 
 163 
 
 Alone, amid that music, mirth, and sheen, 
 
 He has the power to thrill her inmost heart, 
 
 To bid the dusky goddess play her part, 
 
 And be once more a Queen ; 
 
 To flame her passionate beauty on the sight, 
 
 And be the Cleopatra of the night ; 
 
 But not a look amid the endless dance 
 
 Has answered Zara's dark and passionate glance ; 
 
 And hence her anger, hence her frequent sigh, 
 
 And hence the leaping lightning in her eye. 
 
 Ah ! let the glad and golden music roll. 
 
 It Tvill not soothe the trouble of her soul. 
 
 It will not tame the fierceness of her frown. 
 
 Though in sweet gushes it go up in prayer. 
 
 With passionate pleading hands into the air, 
 
 With musical sighs and moanings of despair, 
 
 To bring the infinite down. 
 
 She has no sighs to throw away 
 
 On aught, save Walter and sweet Alice Grey. 
 
 All through that weary, weary night. 
 Heavy with musky odours, filled with light. 
 Glad with a hundred voices, gay with wit, 
 Thi-illing with music, droll with sparkling fun, 
 Flashing with riches rare, — 
 Alone in her great beauty will she sit. 
 Catching the wavy glory in her hair, 
 Flinging the brightness back with many an angry 
 glare,
 
 164 ZAKA. 
 
 And ^nshiIlg all were done. 
 
 For what to her are music, mirth, and wine ? 
 
 What all this blaze of beauty but an empty sign ? 
 
 What all this glorious talk, though haK divine, 
 
 But idle air ? 
 
 A worship offered at a godless shrine, — 
 
 A garlanded despair. 
 
 He is no longer hers, — ^but was he ever ? 
 
 A low, wild, silver laugh rang thi-ough the room, 
 
 And then a thrilling whisper, — "Never, never! " 
 
 Startled the dancers like the breath of doom ; 
 
 But soon the fearless English bloom 
 
 Into the ladies' cheeks came back, crimson and glad 
 
 as ever. 
 Aye, let her ponder ! She will never find 
 Aught more than this to soothe her angry mind — 
 " Walter was always generous, always kind, 
 But nothing more. 
 
 And nothing more, — ah ! nothing more 
 Will he now be to her, for ever and for ever ! " 
 
 Henceforth her heart and life are lorn. 
 
 Henceforth the world is dim, — 
 
 Its sxmny tresses soiled or shorn, 
 
 Its banners of beauty draggled and torn. 
 
 Its bridal blushes wan and worn, 
 
 For she is nought to him.
 
 ZARA. 165 
 
 His heart is in his eyes agleam, — 
 His honest heart, as open as day !- 
 Its love is all for Alice Grey, 
 For her, oh ! not a beam.
 
 166 
 
 ONLY A LITTLE HOUSE. 
 
 Only a little house — 
 
 A house by the side of a hill — 
 
 With dances of sunshine gleaming about 
 
 Through tossing branches in and out, 
 
 And the sound of a little riU, 
 
 That, through the tiny garden-plot. 
 
 All day long, and all night through, 
 
 Mm-murs music ever new, — 
 
 " I am happy — and you ? 
 
 Why not?" 
 
 Only a little house, 
 
 But a house brimfid of life, — 
 
 Busy husband, and happy \vife, 
 
 Prattle of babies three : 
 
 Singing of bii'ds, and humming of bees ; 
 
 Shadow and simshine on the trees ; 
 
 Glancing needles, eager talk ; 
 
 Books, and pens, and the evening walk 
 
 Thi'ough the meadows do'mi below ; — 
 
 Thus the simimer days go by. 
 
 And we look on, and only sigh — 
 
 We sigh, but do not know.
 
 ONLY A LITTLE HOUSE. ^ 167 
 
 Only a little house, 
 
 But a house heart-full of bliss, — 
 
 Plenty of work, and plenty of play ; 
 
 Busy heart and brain aU day ; 
 
 And then, ere the good-night kiss 
 
 The lingering shadow of worldly care. 
 
 Wafted off by the evening prayer ; 
 
 And silence falls on the little house, 
 
 Save for the whir of the midnight mouse, 
 
 Here, and there, and everywhere ; 
 
 And through the tiny garden-plot, 
 
 The voice of the rill, which, all night through, 
 
 Mm-murs its music ever new, — 
 
 ** I am happy — and you ? 
 
 Why not?" 
 
 Happy ! little house ! 
 House by the side of the hill, 
 Who can say what an hour may bring ? 
 Who would think that the song we sing 
 Is the music of coming ill ? 
 Little it boots to live and learn 
 Lessons harsh and lessons stern ; 
 Eather turn to the merry notes 
 Of the voice that ever jioats 
 Through the flowery garden-plot. 
 All day long and all night through, 
 With its burden ever new, —
 
 168 ONLY A LITTLE HOUSE. 
 
 " I am happy — and you ? 
 Why not?" 
 
 Only a little house — 
 
 But a house all still and cold, — 
 
 Gone the voice of the happy child ; 
 
 Gone the smile of the matron mild ; 
 
 Gone the svmimer-gold 
 
 That fell on the gables one by one ; 
 
 Gone the himian toil and care ; 
 
 The daily task, the evening prayer ; 
 
 Father, and mother, and babes — all gone ! 
 
 And, through the roof, I hear the rain 
 
 Dripping on the desolate floor. 
 
 And hear the creaking of a door 
 
 No human hand shall shut again, 
 
 And hear a murmur harsh go by 
 
 Through the tangled garden-plot, 
 
 Where the ragged palings rot, — 
 
 " I am wretched, I know not why ; 
 
 Would you Hve, or would you die ?" 
 
 s^XB®-
 
 1^9 
 
 YAN OR TWO LILE BITS I' T' FURNESS 
 
 DIALECT. 
 
 AULD GEANFADDER JONES. 
 
 AuLD Q-ranfadder Jones is stordy and Strang ; 
 
 Aiild Granfadder Jones is six feet lang ; 
 
 He lies spindle shanks, lie lies lantern jaws, 
 
 But there's neabody's laugh like his hee-haws ! 
 
 He's first at a weddin' an' last at a fair, 
 
 He's t' j oiliest of aw, whaiver is there ; 
 
 For he keeps a lad's heart in his wizened auld skin, 
 
 An' warks out his woes as fast as they're in ; 
 
 Ye'd niver beheve he'd iver seen trouble, 
 
 Though there's times when t'auld fellow's amaist 
 
 walking double ; 
 He hes corns on his taes, an' t' gout i' his hands, 
 An' he shivers an' shacks wheniver he stands. 
 He hes t' rheumatiz tu ; but whaiver heeard groans 
 Frae t' withered auld lips o' Granfadder Jones ? 
 
 n. 
 
 T' AULD MAN. 
 
 T' AULD man ! T' auld man ! 
 He's eighty year an' mair ;
 
 170 t' auld man. 
 
 He wrought seean, Trrouglit leate, 
 
 "Wrought hard an' sair ; 
 
 An' now he sits i' t' sunshine, 
 
 Duing aw he can ; 
 
 Whsi wod grudge him house-room ? 
 
 Poor aiJd man ! 
 
 Lang afoore we saaw t' leet, 
 
 He was fashing hard ; 
 
 Indure, out o' dure, 
 
 I' shuppen, field, an' yard ; 
 
 Lang afoore we saaw t' leet, 
 
 He was hoddin t' plough — 
 
 He wrought hard for us, lads, 
 
 We'se du t' saame now 
 
 For t' auld man i' t' simshine, 
 
 Duing aw he can ; 
 
 Wha wod grudge him house-room ? 
 
 Poor auld man ! 
 
 Aw thro' t' summer sunshine 
 
 He watches t' clouds gang by ; 
 
 Nin can tell what wonders 
 
 Glour up in his eye ; 
 
 For far-ofi", an' far-off 
 
 Aw his leeaks gang. 
 
 Thro' many summer simshines 
 
 To t' times when he was Strang, 
 
 An' laboured leate an' early 
 
 Wi' hoe, an' speado, an' plough,
 
 LILE POLLY. 171 
 
 An' dud his best for us, lads, 
 
 As we are duing now 
 
 For t' auld man i' t' sunshine, 
 
 Duing aw he can ; — 
 
 Wha wod grudge him house-room ? 
 
 Poor auld man ! 
 
 III. 
 LILE POLLY. 
 
 It's nobbut this time last year, come tomorn. 
 
 Sen me an' PoUy walkt to U'ston fair. 
 
 Across t' green fields an' down t' lang sunny looans, 
 
 A good three mile an' mair. 
 
 "We stopp't a' parKsh bit tu, now an' then. 
 
 An' yet it mod a' been three yirds. 
 
 For t' time flang by at sic a reate, 
 
 Titter nor wings o' birds. 
 
 For sweet lile PoUy was wi' me ; 
 
 But now my heart is sair. 
 
 For I'se see PoUy, bonny Polly, 
 
 Niver, niver mair ! 
 
 I'd often hid behint a dike, 
 
 Or Hgged in an empty cart 
 
 To leeak at her, an' hear her sing, — 
 
 An' t' sound o' her bonny voice wod ring 
 
 An' finger about my heart. 
 
 I darn't tell her what I felt,
 
 172 
 
 LILE POLLY. 
 
 But leeakt an' leeakt an' niver stirr'd, 
 
 Though I'd a' geen my silver watch 
 
 Just for ya single word. 
 
 Oh ! sweet lile Polly ! Bonny Polly ! 
 
 Oh ! my heart is sair ; 
 
 For I'se see Polly, gentle Polly, 
 
 Niver, niver mair ! 
 
 Afaoore we gat to U'ston town, 
 
 I pluckt up heart an' spak reet out ; 
 
 She leeakt at me — the sweet lile lass 
 
 But what she answered matters nout. 
 
 I'se niver forgit the words she spak 
 
 Under that goolden sky ; 
 
 A limmer, bonny fairy she, 
 
 An' a gurt clodhopper I ! 
 
 But niver heed ; she loved me weeU ; 
 
 That's a' I care to knaw ; 
 
 An' it's gang wi' me, baith neet an' day. 
 
 Through sun, an' winter snaw. 
 
 Oh ! sweet lile PoUy, bonny Polly, 
 
 Oh ! my heart is sair ; 
 
 Por I'se see PoUy, gentle Polly, 
 
 Niver, niver mail' ! 

 
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