THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 RIVERSIDE
 
 ENSLAVED
 
 •y^yip^ 
 
 THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 
 MKW YORK • BOSTON • CHICAGO • DALLAS 
 ATLANTA - SAN FRANCISCO 
 
 MACMILLAN & CO.. Limited 
 
 LONDON • BOMBAY • CALCUTTA 
 MBLBOURNB 
 
 THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd. 
 
 TORONTO
 
 ENSLAVED 
 
 BY 
 JOHN MASEFIELD 
 
 AUTHOR OF "REYNARD THE FOX" 
 
 "THE EVERLASTING MERCY" 
 
 ETC. 
 
 THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 1920 
 
 j4U rigbti rtttrvtd
 
 COPYKIGHT, 1920, 
 
 By JOHN MASEFIELD. 
 Set up and electrotyped. Published June. 1920. 
 
 Norwood Press 
 
 J. S. Gushing Co. — Berwick & Smith Co. 
 
 Norwood. Mass., U.S.A.
 
 TO 
 
 LEWIS 
 
 203785:
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Enslaved i 
 
 The Hounds of Hell 53 
 
 Cap on Head 8i 
 
 Sonnets 93 
 
 The Passing Strange 99 
 
 Animula 105 
 
 The Lemmings "5 
 
 Forget 119 
 
 On Growing Old 123 
 
 Lyric 127 
 
 vn
 
 ENSLAVED
 
 ALL early in the April when daylight comes at five 
 I went into the garden most glad to be alive 
 ^ The thrushes and the blackbirds were singing in 
 the thorn 
 The April flowers were singing for joy of being born. 
 
 I smelt the dewy morning come blowing through the woods 
 Where all the wilding cherries do toss their snowy snoods 
 I thought of the running water where sweet white violets 
 
 grow 
 I said, ''I'll pick them for her, because she loves them so." 
 
 So in the dewy morning I turned to climb the hill 
 Beside the running water whose tongue is never still, 
 O delicate green and dewy were all the budding trees 
 The blue dog-violets grew there and many primroses. 
 
 Out of the wood I wandered, but paused upon the heath 
 To watch, beyond the tree tops, the wrinkled sea beneath 
 Its blueness and its stillness were trembhng as it lay 
 In the old un-autumned beauty that never goes away. 
 
 And the beauty of the water brought my love into my mind 
 Because all sweet love is beauty and the loved thing turns 
 
 to kind 
 And I thought, " It is a beauty spread, for setting of your 
 
 grace, 
 white violet of a woman with the April in your face." 
 
 [3]
 
 So I gathered the white violets where young men pick them 
 
 still, 
 And I turned to cross the woodland to her house beneath 
 
 the hill, 
 And I thought of her delight in the flowers that I brought 
 
 her, 
 Bright Hke sunlight, sweet Uke singing, cool Uke running of 
 
 the water. 
 
 Now I noticed as I crossed the wood towards my lady's 
 
 house. 
 That wisps of smoke were blowing blue in the young green 
 
 of the boughs : 
 But I thought, "They're burning weeds," and I felt the 
 
 green and blue 
 To be lovely, so, together, while the green was in its dew. 
 
 Then I smelt the smell of burning; but I thought, "The 
 
 bonfire takes. 
 And the tongues of flame are licking up below the lifting 
 
 flakes." 
 Though, I thought, "the fire must be big, to raise a smoke 
 
 so thick." 
 And I wondered for a moment if the fire were a rick. 
 
 But the love that sang within me made me put the thought 
 
 away, 
 What do young men care for trouble if they see their love 
 
 to-day. 
 And my thought kept running forward till it knelt before 
 
 my sweet. 
 Laying thought and joy and service in a love-gift at her feet. 
 
 [4]
 
 And I thought of life beside her, and of all our days together, 
 Stormy days, perhaps, of courage, with our faces to the 
 
 weather. 
 Never any days, but happy, so I thought, if passed with her. 
 Then the smoke came blowing thickly till it made the wood 
 
 a blur. 
 
 Still, I did not think of evil, for one could not, living there. 
 But I said, "The rooks are startled," for their crying filled 
 
 the air. 
 And I wondered, in the meadow, why the cows were not at 
 
 grass, 
 Only smoke, down-blowing, bitter, that the birds were 
 
 loath to pass. 
 
 So I quickened through the meadow to the close that hid 
 
 the home 
 And the smoke drove down in volleys, lifted up, and wreathed 
 
 and clomb. 
 And I could not see, because of it, and what one cannot see 
 Holds the fear that lives in darkness, so that fear began in 
 
 me. 
 
 And the place was like a death-house save for cawings over- 
 head. 
 
 All the cocks and hens were silent and the dogs were Uke 
 the dead, 
 
 Nothing but the smoke seemed living, thick, and hiding 
 whence it came. 
 
 Bitter with the change of burning, hot upon the cheek from 
 flame. 
 
 [5]
 
 Then my fear became a terror and I knew that ill had fallen 
 From the fate that comes unthought of when the unheard 
 
 word is callen, 
 So I flung the little gate astray and burst the bushes through 
 Little red-white blossoms flecked me and my face was dashed 
 
 with dew. 
 
 Then I saw what ill had fallen, for the house had burned to 
 death, 
 
 Though it gleamed with running fire when a falHng gave a 
 breath, 
 
 All the roof was sky, the lead dripped, all the empty win- 
 dows wide 
 
 Spouted smoke, and all was silent, save the volleying rooks 
 that cried. 
 
 This I saw. I rocked with anguish at the flicking heap that 
 
 glowed. 
 She was dead among the ashes that the lead drops did 
 
 corrode. 
 She was dead, that gave a meaning to the beauty of the 
 
 spring, 
 Yet the daffodils still nodded and the blackbirds still did 
 
 sing. 
 
 When the stunning passed, I stumbled to the house's west- 
 ward side 
 
 Thinking there to find some neighbour that could tell me 
 how she died ; 
 
 Fearing, too, lest Death the devil who had dealt such mur- 
 der there 
 
 Should be liiding there behind me for to clutch me unaware. 
 
 [6]
 
 There was no one there alive, but my leaping heart was 
 
 stilled 
 By the sight of bodies lying in the grass where they were 
 
 yiled. 
 Drooped into the grass they lay there, pressing close into 
 
 the ground 
 As the dead do, in the grasses ; all my world went spinning 
 
 round. 
 
 Then I saw, that with the bodies, all the ground was heaped 
 
 and strown 
 With the litter of a house that had been gutted to the bone ; 
 SpUt and hingeless coffers yawning, Hnen drooped like people 
 
 dead, 
 Trinkets broken for their jewels, barrels staved, and crusts 
 
 of bread. 
 
 Then a mess of feathers blowing, then the cattle's heads, 
 and then 
 
 Stunned at all tliis wreck I hurried to the bodies of the men. 
 
 Five were workers of the household, lying dead in her de- 
 fence ; 
 
 Roused from sleep, perhaps, in darkness so that death might 
 dash them thence. 
 
 But the other three were strangers, swarthy, bearded, hook- 
 nosed, lean. 
 
 Wearing white (for night surprisal) over seamen's coats of 
 green ; 
 
 Moorish-coloured men, still greedy for the prize they died 
 to snatch ; 
 
 Clutching broken knives, or grass-blades, or some tatters of 
 their catch. 
 
 l7]
 
 Then I moaned aloud, for then I knew the truth, that these 
 Were the Moorish pirate raiders who had come there from 
 
 the seas, 
 Come upon my love defenceless, by surprise, and I not there. 
 Come to burn or kill her beauty or to drag her to their lair. 
 
 "Dragged away to be a slave," I thought. I saw what she 
 had seen, 
 
 All the good friends lying slaughtered in the young grass 
 dewy green ; 
 
 All the cattle killed for provant and the gutted homestead 
 burning. 
 
 And the skinny Moors to drag her to the death of no re- 
 turning. 
 
 Minutes passed, yet still I stood there, when I heard one 
 
 call my name, 
 Amys, once my darling's woman, from her hiding-corner 
 
 came, 
 "O," she cried, 'They came upon us when the Hght was 
 
 growing gray 
 And they sacked and burned and slaughtered, and they've 
 
 carried her away. 
 
 "I was sleeping in the cottage when I heard the noise of 
 
 men. 
 And the shots ; and I could see them, for the house was 
 
 blazing then. 
 They were Hke to devils, kilHng, so I hid, and then I heard 
 Rollo moaning in the bushes with a face as white as curd. 
 
 [81
 
 "He was dying from a bullet, but he said 'Saffee. Saffee 
 
 Pirates, Amys ; they were burning and they shot and mur- 
 dered me. 
 
 Amys, look where I was murdered, look, they blew away my 
 side. 
 
 And they burnt the cows in stable.' Then he moaned until 
 he died. 
 
 "It was terrible to hear them kill the beasts and pack their 
 
 prey. 
 Then they shouldered up their plunder and they sang and 
 
 marched away ; 
 And they took my lady with them as a slave-girl to be sold. 
 I saw them kill Paloma, they said that she was old. 
 
 "Then they went on board their cruiser and she sailed away 
 
 at once. 
 Look there, beyond the beaches, you see her where she runs 
 
 nms — " 
 
 I saw a peaked sail pointing and feathering oars that flasht 
 In the blueness of the water that was whitened where they 
 gasht. 
 
 * 
 
 There they carried my beloved in a pirate ship at sea 
 To be sold like meat for kilhng in the markets of Saffee. 
 Some fire-shrivelled oak-leaves blew lightly past my face, 
 A beam fell in the ruins, the fire roared a space. 
 
 [9]
 
 I walked down to the water, my heart was torn in two 
 For the anguish of her future and the nothing I could do. 
 The ship had leaned a little as she snouted to the spray ; 
 The feathering oars flashed steadily at taking her away. 
 
 I took a fisher's boat there was and dragged her down the 
 
 sand, 
 I set her sail and took an oar and thrust her from the 
 
 land, 
 I headed for the pirate, and the brown weed waved beneath 
 And the boat trod down the bubbles of the bone between 
 
 her teeth. 
 
 I brought them down the land-wind so from the first I 
 
 gained ; 
 I set a tiny topsail that bowed her till she strained. 
 My mind was with my darling aboard that ship of fear 
 In cabin close with curtains where Moormen watched my 
 
 dear. 
 
 Now when they saw me coming they wondered what it 
 
 meant, 
 This young man in a fish-boat who followed where they 
 
 went. 
 They judged that I was coming to buy the woman free ; 
 So suddenly the oars stopped, they waited on the sea. 
 
 I dropped my sail close to them and ranged to easy hail, 
 Her plunges shivered wrinklings along her spilling sail. 
 The water running by her had made her shine like gold. 
 The oar blades poised in order kissed water when she rolled. 
 
 [lo]
 
 A hundred naked rowers stared down their oars at me 
 With all the bitter hatred the slave has for the free. 
 The boatswain walked above them, he mocked me, so did 
 
 they : 
 The sun had burnt their bodies and yet their look was 
 
 gray. 
 
 So there we rocked together, while she, at every roll. 
 Moaned from her guns with creakings that shook her to 
 
 the soul ; 
 I did not see my darling ; she lay in ward below 
 Down in the green hung cabin she first joined hands with 
 
 woe. 
 
 The galley plowtered, troubling; the mockings of the 
 slaves 
 
 Passed from bench to bench, Hke bird's cries, her bow-beak 
 slapt the waves. 
 
 Then her captain came on deck, quick and hard, with snap- 
 ping force, 
 
 And a kind of cringe of terror stiffened down those banks 
 of oars. 
 
 The captain walked the deck ; he eyed me for a moment, 
 
 He called some Turkish words with a muttered added com- 
 ment, 
 
 Then he called, "Well. What d'ye want?" in the lingua 
 of the sea. 
 
 The boatswain leaned and spoke, then they sneered and 
 looked at me. 
 
 In]
 
 So I stood upon the thwart, and I called, "I want to come 
 To be comrade to the woman whom you've dragged away 
 
 from home. 
 Since I cannot set her free, I want only to be near her." 
 *'Ah," he said, "Men buy love dear, but by God you buy 
 
 it dearer. 
 
 "Well; you shall;" he spoke in Moorish and a seaman 
 
 tossed a cord, 
 So I hove myself alongside, scrambled up and climbed 
 
 aboard. 
 All were silent, but they watched me ; all those eyes above 
 
 the oars 
 Stared, and all their bitter tushes gnashed beneath them like 
 
 a boar's ! 
 
 At an order, all the oars clanked aft, and checked, and 
 
 sliced the sea. 
 The rowers' Hps twitched upward, the sheets tugged to be 
 
 free. 
 The wrinklings in the sail ran up as it rounded to a breast, 
 The ship bowed to a billow and snouted through the crest. 
 
 My boat was tossed behind us, she bowed and swung away. 
 The captain stood and mocked me, ''Well, since you would, 
 
 you may. 
 You shall be near your lady, until we fetch to port." 
 They chained me to the oar-loom upon the after-thwart. 
 
 All day, until the twilight, I swung upon the oar ; 
 Above the dropping taffrail I sometimes saw the shore, 
 Behind me swung the rowers, again and yet again 
 A gasp, a clank of rollocks and then a cry of pain. 
 
 [I2l
 
 The boatswain walked above us to lash us if we slackened •, 
 With blood of many beatings the rowers' backs were black- 
 ened, 
 Again and yet again came the lash and then the cry, 
 Then a mutter for revenge would run round the ship and die. 
 
 But twilight with her planet that brings quiet to the tired, 
 Bringing dusk upon the water brought the gift that I desired 
 For they brought my well-beloved to the deck to breathe 
 
 the air, 
 Not a half an oar's length from me, so we spoke together 
 
 there. 
 
 '^ You," she said ; "Yes, I, beloved, to be near you over sea. 
 I have come to be beside you and to help to set you free. 
 Keep your courage and be certain that the God who took 
 
 will give. 
 God will dawn and we shall prosper for the living soul will 
 
 Uve." 
 
 Then they bade me stop my talking and to use my breath 
 
 to row. 
 Darkness came upon the water and they took my love below. 
 Fire in the oar-stirred water swirled in streaks that raced 
 
 away ; 
 Topphng up and down the taffrail touched the red sky and 
 
 the gray. 
 
 Then the wind began to freshen till the shrouds were twang- 
 ing sharp. 
 Thrilling an unchanging honing Hke a madman with a harp, 
 ThrilHng on a rising water that was hissing as it rose 
 To be foamed asunder by us as we struck it down with blows. 
 
 [13]
 
 Soon we could not row, but rested with the oar blades 
 
 triced above, 
 Then my soul went from my body to give comfort to my 
 
 love, 
 Though indeed the only comfort that my mind could find 
 
 to say 
 Was, that God, who makes to-morrow makes it better than 
 
 to-day. 
 
 So I yearned towards my darling while I drooped upon my 
 
 bench. 
 All the galley's length was shaken when the mainsail gave 
 
 a wrench ; 
 Always when I roused, the taffrail toppled up to touch the 
 
 stars, 
 And the roaring seas ran hissing, and the planks whined, 
 
 and the spars. 
 
 Day by day I rowed the galley, night by night I saw the 
 
 Pole 
 Sinking lower in the northward to the sorrow of my soul, 
 Yet at night I saw my darHng when she came on deck to 
 
 walk, 
 And our thoughts passt to each other though they would 
 
 not let us talk. 
 
 Till early on a morning before the dawn had come 
 
 Some foreign birds came crying with strong wings wagging 
 
 home. 
 Then on the wind a warmness, a sweetness as of cloves, 
 Blew faintly in the darkness from spice and orange groves. 
 
 [14]
 
 Then, as they set us rowing, the sun rose over land 
 That seemed a mist of forest above a gleam of sand. 
 White houses ghttered on it, the pirates cheered to see. 
 By noon we reached the haven, we anchored in SafEee. 
 
 They cloaked my well-beloved and carried her ashore 
 She slipped a paper to me while brushing past my oar. 
 I took it, muttering "Courage"; I read it when I dared: 
 "They mean me for the Khalif. I have to be prepared." 
 
 They led her up the jetty, she passed out of my sight. 
 Then they knocked away our irons and worked us till the 
 
 night, 
 Unbending sails, unstepping masts, clean-scraping banks, 
 
 unshipping oars 
 Rousing casks and loot and cables from the orlop into stores. 
 
 When all the gear was warehoused, they marched us up 
 
 the street, 
 All sand it was, where dogs lay, that sprang and snapped 
 
 our feet. 
 Then lancers came at gallop, they knocked us to the side. 
 They struck us with their lance-staves to make them room 
 
 to ride. 
 
 Then, as we cleared the roadway, with clatter, riding 
 hard. 
 
 With foam flung from the bit-cups, there came the body- 
 guard. 
 
 Then splendid in his scarlet the Khalif's self went by 
 
 A grand young bird of rapine with a hawk-look in his eye. 
 
 [15]
 
 A slave said, "There's the Khalif. He's riding north to- 
 night, 
 To Marrakesh, the vineyard, his garden of delight. 
 That means a night of quiet to us poor dogs who row, 
 The guards will take their pleasure and we shall rest below." 
 
 Then, in the dusk, they marched us to the quarries of the 
 slaves 
 
 Which were dripping shafts in limestone giving passage 
 into caves. 
 
 There they left us with our rations to the night that pri- 
 soners know 
 
 Longing after what was happy far away and long ago. 
 
 Now often, as I rowed upon the bench. 
 In tugging back the oar-loom in the stroke, 
 A rower opposite whose face was French 
 Had signalled to me, with a cheer or joke, 
 Grinning askant, and tossing back his hair 
 To shew his white, keen features debonair. 
 
 And now that I was sitting on the stone. 
 
 He came to where I sat, and sat beside. 
 
 "So," he exclaimed, "you eat your heart alone. 
 
 I did, at first ; but prison kills the pride. 
 
 It kills the heart, and all it has to give 
 
 Is, hatred, daunted by the will to live. 
 
 [i6]
 
 " I was a courtier in the French King's court 
 
 Three years ago ; you would not think it now, 
 
 To see me rower in a pirate port 
 
 Rusting my chain with sweatings from my brow. 
 
 But I was once Duhamel, over sea, 
 
 And should be still, if they would ransom me. 
 
 " I honour you for coming as you did 
 To save your lady. It was nobly done. 
 They took her for the Khalif ; she is hid 
 There in the woman's palace ; but, my son, 
 You will not look upon her face again. 
 Best face the fact, whatever be the pain. 
 
 *' No, do not speak, for she is lost forever, 
 Hidden in that dark palace of the King. 
 Not all the loving in the world would ever 
 Bring word to her, or help, or anything. 
 She will be pasture to the King's desires, 
 Then sold, or given in barter, when he tires. 
 
 " A woman in the Khalif 's house is dead 
 To all the world forever ; that is truth : 
 And you (most gallantly) have put your head 
 Into the trap. Till you have done with youth, 
 You will be slave, in prison or at sea. 
 Sickness or death alone will set you free." 
 
 "Surely," I said, "since people have escaped 
 From worser hells than this, I, too, might try. 
 Fate, that is given to all men partly shaped. 
 Is man's, to alter daily till he die. 
 I mean to try to save her. Things which men 
 Mean with their might, succeed, as this will then." 
 
 c [17]
 
 I saw him look about him with alarm. 
 "O, not so loud," he said, ''for there are spies." 
 His look of tension passed, he caught my arm, 
 "I think none heard," he said, " but oh be wise 
 Slaves have been ganched upon the hooks for less. 
 This place has devilries men cannot guess. 
 
 " But no man, ever, has escaped from here. 
 To talk of it is death ; your friend and you 
 Are slaves for Hfe, and after many a year, 
 (At best) when you are both too old to do 
 The work of slaves, you may be flung abroad. 
 To beg for broken victuals in the road." 
 
 I saw that what he said was certainty. 
 
 I knew it, even then, but answered, "Well. 
 
 I will at least be near her till I die. 
 
 And Life is change, and no man can foretell. 
 
 Even if thirty years hence we may meet 
 
 It is worth while, and prison shall be sweet." 
 
 He looked at me with pleasure, then he sighed 
 And said, "Well, you deserve her." Then he stared 
 Across the quarry, trying to decide 
 If I were fit to see his spirit bared. 
 Quick glances of suspicion and distrust 
 Searched at my face, and then he said, "I must. 
 
 " I must not doubt you, lad, so listen now. 
 
 I have a plan, myself, for leaving this. 
 
 I meant to try to-night ; I '11 shew you how 
 
 To save your lady. And to-night there is 
 
 Hope, for the Khahf sleeps at Marrakesh. 
 
 When knots are loosened fish can burst the mesh." 
 
 [i8]
 
 So eagerly I plighted faith to try- 
 That very night to help him. "If we fail" 
 He said, "It will be Fate, who flings the die 
 Against which nothing mortal can avail. 
 But we are desperate men whose throws succeed. 
 Being one with Fate, or Change from Passionate Need." 
 
 So we agreed, that when the cave was still, 
 We would attempt, and having broken prison, 
 Would raid the women's palace on the hill. 
 And save my lady ere the sun was risen, 
 Then put to sea towards some hiding-place 
 North, in the shoals, where galleys could not chase. 
 
 Even as we made an end, another slave, 
 
 (They called him English Gerard) joined us there. 
 
 Often, upon the toppling of a wave 
 
 I'd seen him rowing and had heard him swear. 
 
 Forceful he was, with promise in his eye 
 
 Of rough capacity and Hberty. 
 
 "Still talking of escape, I'll bet a crown," 
 
 He said to me ; "But you are young, my friend, 
 
 We oldsters know we cannot leave the town, 
 
 We shall be here until the bitter end. 
 
 Give up the hope, lad, better let it be, 
 
 No slave has ever broken from Saffee. 
 
 " Inland, there's desert, westward there's the sea, 
 
 Northward the Moorish towns, and in the south 
 
 Swamps and the forest to eternity. 
 
 The young colt jibs at iron in his mouth 
 
 But has to take it, and the fact for us 
 
 Is, that we're slaves, and have to linger thus." 
 
 [19]
 
 "Just what I told him," said Duhamel, "Just, 
 My very words. It's bitter but the truth. 
 We shall be slaves until we turn to dust 
 Your lady, too, until she loses youth. 
 Put hope aside, and make what life you can 
 Being a slave, for slave you are, young man." 
 
 "Perhaps," said Gerard, "you were told what comes 
 
 Of trjdng to escape, for men have tried. 
 
 They only added to their martyrdoms. 
 
 Two got away at Christmas, but they died. 
 
 The one they skinned and stuffed, the other hangs 
 
 Still, near the gate, upon the ganches' fangs." 
 
 "How were they caught," I asked. "They were betrayed," 
 Said Gerard. "How? By whom? I cannot tell. 
 They trusted someone with the plans thay made 
 And he betrayed them, like a fiend from hell. 
 How do I know it? Well. They left no trace. 
 And yet the lancers knew their hiding place. 
 
 "They went straight to it, straight, and caught them there 
 
 As soon as daylight came, when they had gone. 
 
 (As you'll be taken if you don't beware) 
 
 They keep great hooks to hang the bodies on 
 
 Of those who run away, or try, for none 
 
 Succeeds, nor can, so you be warned, my son." 
 
 He nodded to me, gripped my arm, and went 
 Back to his place, the other side the cave. 
 "That was a spy," Duhamel whispered, "sent 
 To test your spirit as a new-come slave. 
 I know the man, and if report speaks true 
 He helped in that betrayal of the two. 
 
 [20]
 
 " Now seem to sleep and when the cave is quiet 
 We two will try ; they say God helps the mad. 
 To be a slave to Moors is bitter diet 
 That poisons men ; two bitter years I've had 
 But before dawn we two will end it, lad. 
 Now seem to sleep." 
 
 I cuddled to the stone ; 
 Yet Gerard's voice seemed calling to my bone. 
 
 And opening my eyes, I saw him there 
 Looking intently at me, and he shook 
 His head at me, as though to say " Beware", 
 And frowned a passionate warning in a look. 
 A wind-flaw, blowing through the window, took 
 The flame within the lantern, that it shed 
 Bright light on him. Again he shook his head. 
 
 The wind blowing in from the sea made the flame like a 
 plume ; 
 
 The slaves, huddled close, cursed in whispers, with chatter- 
 ing teeth, 
 
 The wolves of their spirits came stealthy to snarl in the 
 gloom 
 
 Over bones of their pleasures long-perished : the sea moaned 
 beneath. 
 
 And my heart glowed with joy that that night I might rescue 
 
 my love. 
 Glowed with joy in Duhamel whose cunning would conquer 
 
 the guards. 
 The wind blew in fresher ; a sentry went shufiling above, 
 Some gamblers crouched tense, while a lean hand flickered 
 
 the cards. 
 
 [21]
 
 Then one by one the gamblers left their game 
 The shadows shaken by the blowing flame 
 Winked on the wall until the lamp blew out. 
 Wrapping his ankle irons in a clout 
 (To save his skin) each branded slave prepared 
 To take his sleep his only comfort spared. 
 
 A kind of clearness blowing from the night 
 
 Made sleepers' faces bonelike with its Kght. 
 
 A sleeper moaning, twisted with his shoulder 
 
 Close to the Hmestone as the wind grew colder. 
 
 Trickles of water glistened down and splashed 
 
 Pools on the limestone into rings that flashed. 
 
 Often a stirring sleeper struck the bell 
 
 Of chain-Hnks upon stones. Deep breathing fell 
 
 Like sighing, out of all that misery 
 
 Of vermined men who dreamed of being free. 
 
 Heavily on the beaches fell the sea. 
 
 Then, as the tide came in, the waters seething 
 
 Under the quarries, mingled with the breathing, 
 
 Until the prison in the rock y-hewen 
 
 Seemed like a ship that trod the water's ruin 
 
 Trampling the toppHng sea, while water creeping 
 
 Splashed from the seams in darkness on men sleeping. 
 
 Far in the city all the dogs were howHng 
 
 At that white bird the moon in heaven owHng. 
 
 Out in the guardhouse soldiers made a dither 
 
 About the wiry titter of a zither 
 
 Their long-drawn songs were timed with clapping hands. 
 
 [22]
 
 The water hissed its Ufe out on the sands. 
 
 The wheel of heaven with all her glittering turned 
 
 The city window-Hghts no longer burned. 
 
 Then one by one the soldiers left their clatter 
 
 The moon arose and walked upon the water 
 
 The sleepers turned to screen her from their eyes. 
 
 A fishing boat sailed past ; the fishers' cries 
 
 Rang in the darkness of the bay without. 
 
 Her sail flapped as she creaked and stood about, 
 
 Then eased, then leaned, then strained and stood away. 
 
 Deep silence followed, save where breathers lay. 
 
 So, lying there, with all my being tense 
 Prepared to strike, to take my lady thence, 
 A prompting bade me, not to trust too far 
 This man Duhamel as a guiding star. 
 Some Httle thing in him had jarred on me 
 A touch (the flesh being raw) hurts cruelly. 
 And sometliing in his speech or in his bearing 
 Made me mistrust his steadiness in daring 
 Or his endurance, or his faith to us. 
 Some smile or word made me distrustful thus. 
 Who knows the hidden things within our being 
 That prompt our brain to safety without seeing, 
 Hear the unheard and save us without sense ? 
 What fingers touch our strings when we are tense ? 
 
 [23]
 
 Even at that point, Duhamel crept to me, 
 And whispered, "Come, by morning we'll be free. 
 Creep down the passage there towards the entry, 
 See what the guards do while I time the sentry. 
 I think that all the guards are sleeping sound 
 But, there's his foot, one sentry goes his round. 
 And I must time him till I know his beat." 
 Loitering upon the rampart came the feet 
 Of some loose-sHppered soldier. I could hear 
 Him halt, hunmiing a tune, grounding his spear. 
 
 I listened, while Duhamel urged me on. 
 "Hurry," he said, "the night will soon be gone; 
 Watch from the passage what the guards are doing ; 
 I'll time the sentry. There'll be no pursuing 
 If we can pass the guards with him away. 
 Beyond the bend he cannot see the bay," 
 
 "No," I repHed, "yet even if the guard 
 Be all asleep, it cannot but be hard 
 For us to pick the lock of that steel grille 
 Without their waking. We cannot be still 
 Crouched in the puddle, scraping at the lock. 
 The guards will wake and kill us at a knock." 
 
 "Hush," said Duhamel, "Let me whisper close. 
 I did not dare before for fear of those, 
 (The rowers and the spies) , I have a key 
 That will unlock the grating silently. 
 Making no noise at all in catch or ward. 
 Now creep along and spy upon the guard." 
 
 [24]
 
 "A key?" said I. My first suspicions died. 
 "Yes," said the man, *'I slipped it from his side, 
 While he was checking us this afternoon. 
 Courage, my son, she'll be in safety soon." 
 He shewed a key, and urged me to be gone 
 Down the gaunt gashway carven in the stone, 
 A darkness in the else half-glimmering lime, 
 Where drops, each minute splashing, told the time. 
 There, in the darkness somewhere, lay the gate 
 Where courage and the moment might make Fate. 
 
 I rose, half-doubting, upon hands and knees ; 
 The blood within my temples sang like bees ; 
 I heard my heart. I saw Duhamel's face, 
 Dark eyes in focus in a whitish space. 
 Watching me close. I doubted, even then. 
 Then with the impulse which transfigures men, 
 Doubt, hesitation, terror passed. I crawled 
 Into the dripping tunnel limestone-walled. 
 
 A cold drop spattered on my neck ; the wet 
 Struck chilly where my hands and knees were set. 
 I crawled into a darkness Hke a vault 
 Glimmering and sweating like a rock of salt. 
 
 I crept most thief-like till the passage turned. 
 There, in a barred greyness, I discerned 
 The world without, shut from me by the grille. 
 I stopped, most thief-like, listening. 
 
 [2S]
 
 All was still ; 
 The quarry I had left was still as stone. 
 The melancholy water-drip alone 
 Broke silence near me, and ahead the night 
 Was silent in the beauty of its Hght, 
 Across which fell the black of prison bars. 
 
 I crawled ten paces more and saw the stars 
 Above the guard-hut in the quarry pit : 
 The hut was still, it had no lantern Kt. 
 I crawled again with every nerve intent. 
 
 The cleanly sea-wind bringing pleasant scent 
 Blew through the grille with Httle specks of sand. 
 Each second I expected the word "Stand." 
 That, or a shot, but still, no challenge came. 
 The twilight of the moon's unearthly flame 
 Burned steadily ; the palm-leaves on the hut 
 Rustled in gusts, the crazy door was shut. 
 The guards were either sleeping or not there. 
 
 I peered out through the grille and drank the air 
 For any scent that might betray a guard 
 Hidden in ambush near me keeping ward ; 
 But no scent, save the cleanness of the sea, 
 Blew on the night wind blowing in on me. 
 There was no trace of man. 
 
 I watched and listened 
 The water dropped, the trickHng passage glistened, 
 The coldness of the iron pressed my brow. 
 
 [26]
 
 Then, as I listened, (I can hear it now), 
 
 A strangled cry such as a dreamer cries 
 
 When the dream binds him that he cannot rise, 
 
 Gurgled behind me in the sleepers' cave. 
 
 A failing hand that struggled with the grave 
 
 Beat on the floor, then fluttered, then relaxed, 
 
 Limp as an altar ox a priest has axed. 
 
 No need to say that someone had been killed 
 
 That was no dream. 
 
 Yet all the cave was stilled. 
 Nobody spoke, or called, or ran to aid. 
 The fingers of the palm leaves ticked and played 
 On the hut-roof, but yet no guard appeared. 
 I started to crawl back, because I feared. 
 I knew that someone must have heard that calUng 
 Of the killed blood upon the midnight falhng. 
 *'I shall be judged the killer," so I thought. 
 
 So crawhng swiftly back like one distraught, 
 I groped that tunnel where the blackness made 
 Me feel each inch before my hand was laid. 
 There was no gleam, save wetness on the wall. 
 No noise but heart beat or the dropping's fall. 
 Blackness and silence tense with murder done, 
 Tense with a soul that had not yet begun 
 To know the world without the help of clay. 
 I was in terror in that inky way. 
 
 Then suddenly, while stretching out my hand 
 The terror brought my heart's blood to a stand. 
 I touched a man. 
 
 [27]
 
 His face was turned to me. 
 He whispered, "To the grille. I have the key." 
 So, without speech I turned ; he followed after. 
 I trembled at the droppings from the rafter. 
 Each noise without seemed footsteps in pursuit. 
 The palm-leaves fluttered like a running foot. 
 The moonlight held her lantern to betray us. 
 A stricken stone was as a sword to slay us. 
 Then at the grille we paused that I could see 
 That it was not Duhamel there with me 
 But English Gerard. 
 
 "Do not speak," he said; 
 " Don't think about Duhamel ; he is dead. 
 This key, that should unlock, is sticking : try." 
 With shaking hands I took the clicket, I. 
 A lean cogged bolt of iron jangled bright 
 By shaking in the key-ring, day and night ; 
 It stuck in the knobbed latch and would not lift. 
 
 All kinds of terror urged me to be swift, 
 Fear of the guards and of the darkness dying, 
 And of Duhamel's body mutely cr3dng 
 The thin red cry of murdered blood and bone 
 Piping in darkness to make murder known. 
 But there the clicket jammed the iron socket 
 Nor could my hand withdraw it or unlock it. 
 "Let me," said Gerard; then with guile and skill 
 He coaxed the knobbed iron from the grille 
 "It does not fit," he muttered; "after all." 
 
 [28]
 
 Outside, within his roost, a cock did call 
 His warning to the ghosts, and slept again, 
 The stars that gHttered in the sky Hke grain 
 Seemed paler, and the ticking time sped on 
 To the guard's waking and the darkness gone 
 With nothing done. 
 
 Then Gerard turned to me 
 "Though this is wrong, Duhamel had the key, 
 And has it still about him as I guess 
 Tied to his flesh or hidden in his dress. 
 Wait here, while I go rummage through his clothes." 
 
 A sleeper, tossing, jabbered broken oaths 
 Then slept, while Gerard crawled. 
 
 I was alone 
 Afraid no more, but anxious to the bone. 
 
 And looking out I saw a sentry come 
 Slowly towards the grille. I cowered numb 
 Back into blackness pressed against the wall. 
 I heard the measure of his footsteps fall 
 Along the quarry to me. I could see 
 The tenseness of his eyes turned full on me 
 I felt that he must see me and give speech. 
 
 [29]
 
 His hand, that shook the grille, was in my reach. 
 He peered within to see if all were well. 
 Wept as though spat a drop of water fell. 
 He peered into the blackness where I stood. 
 Then, having tried the lock, he tossed his hood, 
 Crouched at the grille and struck a light, and Ht 
 Tinder, and blew the glowing end of it 
 Till all his face was fierce in the strong glow ; 
 He sucked the rank tobacco lighted so. 
 And stood a moment blowing bitter smoke. 
 I hardly dared to breathe lest I should choke. 
 I longed to move, but dared not. Had I stirred 
 Even a finger's breadth, he must have heard. 
 He must have touched me had he thrust his hand 
 Within the grille to touch the wall he scanned. 
 
 Then, slowly, muttering to himself, he took 
 Three steps away, then turned for one more look 
 Straight at the grille and me. I counted ten. 
 Something within the passage moved him then 
 Because he leaned and peered as though unsure. 
 Then, stepping to the grille-work's embrasure, 
 He thrust his face against the iron grid. 
 And stared into the blackness where I hid, 
 And softly breathed, *'Duhamel. " 
 
 As he spoke 
 A passing cloud put dimness as of smoke 
 Over the moon's face. No-one answered him, 
 A drip-drop spat its wetness in the dim. 
 He paused to call again, then turned away. 
 He wandered slowly up the quarry way 
 But at the bend he stopped to rest his bones. 
 
 [30]
 
 He sat upon the bank and juggled stones 
 
 For long long minutes. Gerard joined me there 
 
 We watched the sentry tossing stones in air 
 
 To catch them on his hand's back as they fell. 
 
 We wished him in the bottom pit of hell. 
 
 At last he rose and sauntered round the bend. 
 
 The falling of his footsteps had an end 
 
 At last, and Gerard spoke, *'I have the key." 
 
 The cogs caught in the locket cHcldly, 
 
 The catch fell back, the heavy iron gave. 
 
 We pushed the grille and stept out of the grave 
 
 Into the moonlight where the wind was blowing. 
 
 "Hurry," I whispered, for the cocks were crowing 
 
 In unseen roosts, the morning being near. 
 
 We climbed the bank. 
 
 "This way," said Gerard, "here. 
 
 Now, down the slope. We dodge the sentry so. 
 Now through the water where the withies grow. 
 Now we are out of sight ; now we can talk." 
 We changed our crouching running to a walk. 
 
 He led me up a slope where rats carousing 
 
 Squealed or showed teeth among the tumbled housing. 
 
 Half ruined wooden huts, or hme-washed clay. 
 
 We turned from this into a trodden way 
 
 Pale in the moonhght, where the dogs that prowled 
 
 Snarled as we passed, then eyed the moon and howled. 
 
 [31]
 
 Below us, to our right, the harbour gleamed, 
 In front, pale with the moon, the city dreamed, 
 Roof upon roof, with pointing fingers white, 
 The minarets, frost-fretted with the Ught, 
 With many a bubbled dome-top Hke a shell 
 Covering the hillside to the citadel. 
 
 "There, to the left," said Gerard, "where the trees are. 
 That whiteness is the palace of the Caesar, 
 His gardens and his fishpools. That long building 
 Flanked by the domes that glitter so with gilding 
 Is where the women are. She will be there. 
 But courage, comrade, never yield to care, 
 We'll set her free, before the morning breaks. 
 But oh, my son, no more of your mistakes. 
 What made you trust Duhamel as you did? 
 Well, he is dead. The world is better rid 
 Of men Uke him. He tempted and betrayed 
 Those two poor souls last year. 
 
 Ah, when he bade 
 You go to watch the guard I studied him. 
 He was a bitter viper, supple — slim. 
 When he had judged that you had reached the entry. 
 He stole towards the grate and called the sentry, 
 'Hussein, Hussein — ' but Hussein never heard. 
 He called him twice, but never called the third 
 I stopped his calHng, luckily for you." 
 
 [32]
 
 "Yes, but" (I said), "what did he mean to do, 
 Calling the sentry? What could that have done?" 
 ''Caught you in trying to escape, my son. 
 The thing they love to do from time to time. 
 They reckon that examples stop the crime. 
 One caught and skinned makes many fear to try. 
 They would have flayed your skin off cruelly 
 In face of all these slaves, to daunt them down. 
 Then you'd have hung a dying in the town 
 Nailed to some post, two days, perhaps, or three, 
 With thirst and flies. 
 
 But let Duhamel be, 
 Bad though he was, misfortune tempts a soul 
 Worse than we think, and few men can control 
 Their virtue, being slave ; and he had been 
 A Knight of France, a courtier of the Queen. 
 He must have suffered to have fallen so, 
 A slave, a spy on slaves ; we cannot know 
 Thank God, what power of sinking lies in us. 
 God keep us all.' 
 
 j> 
 
 So talking to me thus, 
 He turned me leftward from the citadel 
 Uphill. He said, "I know this city well, 
 There is the Khalif's palace straight ahead. 
 How many days I've staggered nearly dead 
 From thirst, and from the sun, and from the load, 
 Up to the palace-gates along this road, 
 Bearing the plunder of the cruise to store. 
 After a month of tugging at the oar, 
 But now, please God, I shall not come again." 
 
 » [33I
 
 Our talking stopped ; we turned into a lane. 
 High, white-washed walls rose up on either side, 
 The narrow gash between was four feet wide, 
 And there at sprawl within the narrow way 
 With head in hood a sleeping beggar lay. 
 We stepped across his body heedfully 
 Deep in his dream he muttered drowsily. 
 
 We tip-toed on. The wall- tops, high above, 
 White in the quiet moonlight, hid my love. 
 We crept like worms in darkness yard by yard, 
 Still as the dead, but that our hearts beat hard. 
 And, spite of self, my teeth clickt from the flood 
 Of quick excitement running in my blood. 
 We were so near her, and the peril came 
 Close, with the moment that would prove the same. 
 
 The lane turned sharply twice. In shadow dark, 
 
 With shiverings of singing like a lark, 
 
 A fountain sprang, relented, sprinkled, bubbled. 
 
 In some cool garden that the moonlight troubled. 
 
 Unseen by us, although a smell of roses 
 
 Warm on the wind, stole to us from its closes. 
 
 Then came a wood-smoke smell, and mixed therewith 
 
 Gums from the heart's blood of the sinnam's pith. 
 
 And Gerard touched me. We had reached the place. 
 
 The woman's palace-wall was there in face 
 
 The garden-wall merged with it, moonlight-topped, 
 
 Just where the two together merged we stopped. 
 
 [34]
 
 Then, as we stood there, breathing, we could hear, 
 Beyond the wall, some footsteps loitering near, 
 Some garden sentry slowly paced his watch 
 Crooning a love song ; I could smell the match 
 That smouldered in the linstock at his hand. 
 
 His footsteps passed away upon the sand 
 Slowly, with pauses, for he stopped to eat 
 The green buds of the staric on his beat. 
 When he had gone, a cock crowed in the lane. 
 "It will be morning when he crows again," 
 Was in our thoughts : we had full Uttle time. 
 
 Some joist-holes gave us foothold, we could climb 
 Without much trouble to the wall's flat top. 
 There we lay still, to let the plaster drop. 
 And see what dangers lay below us there. 
 
 The garden of the palace breathed sweet air 
 Under our perch, the fountain's leaping gHtter 
 Shone ; a bird started with a frightened twitter. 
 Alleys of blossomed fruit trees girt a cool 
 White marble screen about a bathing pool. 
 The palace rose beyond among its trees, 
 Splay-fronded figs and dates and cypresses. 
 
 Close to our left hands was the Woman's House. 
 
 We crept along our wall-top perilous 
 
 Till we could touch the roof that hid my love 
 
 A teaken joist-end jutted out above. 
 
 We swung ourselves upon the roof thereby. 
 
 [35]
 
 The dewy wet flat house-top faced the sky. 
 We crouched together there. 
 
 Sweet smoke was wreathing 
 Out of a trap-door near us ; heavy breathing 
 Came from a woman sleeping near the trap. 
 I crept to her, not knowing what might hap. 
 She was an old Moor woman with primmed lips, 
 And foul white hair, and hennaed finger tips 
 That clutched a dark hair blanket to her chin. 
 
 I crept to the trap-door and peered within. 
 A ladder led within. A lantern burning 
 Shewed us a passage leading to a turning j 
 But open to the garden at one end. 
 
 Even as we peered, a man came round the bend, 
 Walked slowly down that lamp-Ut corridor, 
 And stood to watch the garden at the door. 
 We saw his back within that moonUt square. 
 He had a curving sword which glittered bare. 
 He stood three minutes still, watching the night, 
 Each beating second made the east more Hght. 
 He cracked and relished nuts or melon seeds. 
 
 [36I
 
 The hoof-sparks of the morning's running steeds 
 Made a pale dust now in the distant east 
 But still the man stood cracking at his feast 
 Nut after nut ; Then flinging broken shell 
 Into the rose-walk, clicking as it fell, 
 He turned towards us up the passage dim. 
 There at the trap we crouched right over him, 
 And as he passed beneath, his fingers tried 
 A door below us in the passage-side. 
 Then, slowly loitering on, he reached and passed 
 The passage turning ; he was gone at last 
 His footsteps died away ; they struck on stone 
 In some far cloister ; we were left alone. 
 
 Then, while our leaping hearts beat like to drums 
 We took the gambler's way, that takes what comes. 
 We sUd into the trap and down the stair, 
 Steep, like a loft's ; eleven rungs there were. 
 We stood within the passage at the door 
 Tried by the guard that little while before. 
 
 Within, there was a rustling and a chinking, 
 (Like the glass dangles that the wind sets cUnking) 
 And something tense there was within ; the throbbing 
 Of hearts in a despair too deep for sobbing 
 We felt it there before we pressed the latch. 
 
 The teaken bar rose stiffly from its catch. 
 We slipt within and closed the door again. 
 We were within the dwelling place of pain. 
 Among the women whom the Moors had taken, 
 The broken-hearts, despairing and forsaken. 
 The desolate that cried where no man heard. 
 
 [37]
 
 Nobody challenged, but some women stirred. 
 
 It was so dark at first, after the moon. 
 
 A smoking censer, swinging, creaked a croon, 
 
 There was a hanging lamp of beaten brass 
 
 That gave dim light through scraps of coloured glass 
 
 I saw a long low room with many a heap 
 
 Dark, on the floor, where women lay asleep 
 
 On silken cushions. Round the wall there ran 
 
 (Dark, too, with cushioned women) a divan. 
 
 And women stirred and little chains were shaken. 
 
 What horror 'tis, to prisoners, to waken 
 
 Out of the dreams of home back to the chain, 
 
 Back to the iron and the mill again, 
 
 In some far land among one's enemies. 
 
 I knew that then ; those women made me wise. 
 
 We stared into the twilight till our eyes 
 Could see more clearly : no one challenged us. 
 But standing back against the doorway thus, 
 I saw the warden of the room, asleep, 
 Close to me, on the cushions, breathing deep, 
 Her hard face made like iron by the gloom. 
 An old grim Moor that warden of the room, 
 A human iron fettered on the poor. 
 Far down the room a fetter touched the floor. 
 
 [38]
 
 Even in the gloom I knew that she was there, 
 My April of a woman with bright hair ; 
 She sat upright against the wall alone 
 By burning meditation turned to stone, 
 Staring ahead and when I touched her shoulder 
 Her body (stiffened like a corpse and colder) 
 Seemed not herself, her mind seemed far away. 
 
 There was no need to talk, but to essay 
 
 The light steel chain that linked her to the wall. 
 
 We gripped it, heaving, till its hnks were gall 
 
 Biting across our hands, but still we drave 
 
 She, I and Gerard heaving till it gave 
 
 The leaded staple snapped across the shank. 
 
 The loosed chain struck the flooring with a clank. 
 
 We all lay still, my arm about my own. 
 
 ''Who's moving there? Be silent," snapped the crone. 
 
 Cross with the slave who had awakened her 
 
 She stared towards us. We could hear her stir, 
 
 Craning towards us, but she could not see 
 
 More than the cushions tumbled there with me. 
 
 She thought, perhaps, "That fair one shook her chain." 
 
 She growled, "I'll beat you, if you stir again. 
 
 A Moorish whip upon your Christian skin." 
 
 [39]
 
 I saw her clutch her blanket to her chin 
 
 Turn to her side and settle to her rest. 
 
 The dawn, that brings the skylark from her nest 
 
 Was flying with bright feet that ever hasted. 
 
 Each moment there meant happy chances wasted, 
 
 Yet still we had to stay until she slept. 
 
 When she had fallen to a doze we crept 
 Stealthily to the door on hands and knees. 
 All of those women came from over seas. 
 We could not waken them to share our chance. 
 Not Peru's silver nor the fields of France 
 Could buy a place in our society. 
 One tender feeling might have made us die 
 All three, and been no kindness to the fourth : 
 Compassions perish when the wind is north. 
 
 Close to the door, a woman leaned and caught 
 My darhng's hand and kissed it swift as thought 
 And whispered, *'0, good luck," and then was still. 
 She had no luck, but she had good will. 
 We blest her in our hearts. 
 
 The warder stirred 
 Growling but dozing lightly, then we heard 
 Outside the door, within three feet of us, 
 The footsteps of the sentry perilous, 
 The cHnking of his scabbard lightly touching 
 Some metal button, then his fingers clutching 
 The teaken catch to try if it were home. 
 
 We stood stone-still expecting him to come. 
 He did not come, he pushed the door and passed, 
 Treading this beat exactly like the last, 
 To loiter at the door to crack and spit. 
 
 l4o]
 
 The time dragged by till he had done with it. 
 Then back he came, and once again he shook 
 The catch upon its socket, then he took 
 His way along the passage out of hearing. 
 
 The room 'gan glimmer from the dawning nearing 
 The warder struggled with a dream and cried 
 The lamp-flame purred from want of oil and died. 
 And she, the woman who had kissed her hand, 
 Whispered, "O go, for God's sake, do not stand 
 One moment more, but go. God help you free." 
 
 We crept out of the prison silently, 
 
 Gerard the last, who closed the door behind us, 
 
 The crowing of a cock came to remind us 
 
 That it was morning now with daylight breaking 
 
 The leaves all shivering and birds awaking. 
 
 We climbed the ladder. 
 
 Its eleven rungs 
 Called to the Moors of us with all their tongues. 
 "Wake," "Wake; " "They fly." "The three of them are 
 flying." 
 O broken house," "0 sleepers, thieves are trying 
 To take the KhaUf's treasure." " Guards," "Awake. " 
 " They rob the women." " For the prophet's sake." 
 "Slaughter these Christians." Thus the ladder spoke 
 Three times aloud yet nobody awoke 
 Even the hag upon the roof was still. 
 
 {( 
 
 [41]
 
 Now the red cock of dawning triumphed shrill 
 
 And little ends of landwind shook the leaves. 
 
 White through the cypress gleamed the palace eaves. 
 
 The dim and dewy beauty of the blossom, 
 
 Shy with the daybreak, trembled in its bosom, 
 
 Some snowy petals loitered to the ground. 
 
 The city houses had a wakening sound 
 
 Some smoke was rising, and we heard the stirs 
 
 Made at the gates by country marketers ; 
 
 Only a moment's twilight yet remained. 
 
 The supple links that held my darling chained 
 Served as a rope to help her down the wall. 
 Our hearts stood still to hear the plaster fall 
 But down we scrambled safely to the lane. 
 We heard the hag upon the roof complain 
 She called strange names and Hstened for reply. 
 We heard her tread the ladder heavily 
 It was her rising time, perhaps^ we thought. 
 
 And now the dangers that the dayHght brought 
 Came thick upon us ; for our foreign dress 
 Betrayed us at each step beyond a guess, 
 Even to be seen was certain death to us. 
 We hid my darhng's face, and hasting thus 
 Kept up the narrow lane as Gerard bade. 
 He said, " Beyond, the city wall is laid 
 Heaped in the ditch and we can cross it there. 
 It fell from rottenness and dis-repair. 
 They set no guard there — or they did not set. 
 They will not notice us, and we can get 
 Out to the tombs and hide inside a vault." 
 
 [42]
 
 In overbrimming beauty without fault 
 The sun brought colour to that dingy hive. 
 It made the black tree green, the sea alive, 
 The huts Hke palaces, but us who fled 
 Like ghosts at cockcrow hasting to the dead. 
 
 The lane had ceased. We reached an open space, 
 The greenish slope, the horses' baiting place, 
 Between the city and the palace wall. 
 The hill dipped sharply in a steepish fall 
 Down to the houses, and the grass was worn 
 With hoofs, and Httered with the husks of corn. 
 ''Now, slowly," Gerard said, " for Moors go slowly." 
 
 There trembling in its blueness dim and holy 
 Lay the great water bursting on the Mole 
 Her tremblings came as thoughts come in a soul. 
 There was our peace, there was the road to home, 
 That never trodden trembling bright with foam. 
 "There lies the road," said Gerard, "now, come on." 
 
 The high leaves in the trees above us shone, 
 For now the sun had cHmbed the eastern hill. 
 The coldness of the dawn was with us still. 
 We walked along the grass towards an alley 
 Between high walls beyond a tiny valley. 
 
 Fronting this alley's mouth our sloping grass 
 
 Dipped down and up, a Httle gut there was 
 
 Down which we slithered and from which we cHmbed. 
 
 [43]
 
 And just as we emerged, exactly timed, 
 Just as we drew my darling to the top, 
 There came a noise that made our pulses stop. 
 
 For down towards us, blocking all the road, 
 Their horses striking sparks out as they strode, 
 Came lancers clattering with their hands held high, 
 Their knees bent up, and many a sharp quick cry ; 
 The pennons in their lance heads flapped like flame. 
 
 Three ranks in twos and then a swordsman came, 
 Then one who held a scarlet banner ; then 
 One in a scarlet cloak, a King of men. 
 
 It was the Khahf s self, returning home. 
 His rein had smeared his stalHon's crest with foam, 
 I noticed that. He was not twenty yards 
 From us. He saw us. 
 
 At a sign his guards 
 Rode round us ; bade us stand ; there was no hope. 
 
 "Our luck," said Gerard. Then they took a rope 
 And hitched our wrists together. Then they led 
 The three of us down-hearted like the dead 
 Before the KhaHf's self. The swordsman bared 
 His right arm to the shoulder and prepared. 
 
 [44]
 
 The Khalif stared at us, and we at him 
 
 We were defiant at him, he was grim. 
 
 A hawk-like fellow, like a bird of prey, 
 
 A hawk to strike, a swift to get away. 
 
 His clean brown face (with blood beneath the brown), 
 
 Puckered, his thin lips tightened in a frown. 
 
 He knew without our telhng, what we were. 
 
 The swordsman looked for word to kill us there. 
 
 I saw the lancers' glances at their chief. 
 Death on the instant would have seemed relief 
 To that not knowing what her fate would be 
 After the sword had made an end of me. 
 
 The Khalif 's face grew grimmer ; then he said 
 
 *' Bring them with us." The swordsman sheathed his blade. 
 
 They took us to the palace, to a chamber 
 SmelHng of bruised spice and burning amber, 
 There slaves were sent to fetch the newly risen 
 Servants and warders of the woman's prison. 
 The white of death was on them when they came. 
 
 The Khahf lightened on them with quick flame. 
 Harsh though she was, I sorrowed for the crone, 
 For she was old, a woman, and alone, 
 And came, in age, upon disgrace through me ; 
 I know not what disgrace, I did not see 
 Those crones again, I doubt not they were whipt 
 For letting us escape them while they slept. 
 Perhaps they killed the sentry. Who can tell ? 
 The devil ever keeps the laws in hell. 
 
 [4S]
 
 They dragged them out to justice one by one. 
 However bitter was the justice done 
 I doubt not they were thankful to be quit 
 (At cost of some few pangs) the fear of it. 
 Then our turn came. 
 
 The KhaUf's fury raged 
 Because our eyes had seen those women caged, 
 Because our Christian presence had defiled 
 The Wom.an's House and somehow had beguiled 
 A woman-slave, his victim, out of it, 
 Against all Moorish law and Holy Writ 
 If we had killed his son it had been less. 
 
 He rose up in his place and rent his dress 
 "Let them be ganched upon the hooks," he cried, 
 "Throughout to-day, but not till they have died. 
 Then gather all the slaves, and flay these three 
 Alive, before them, that the slaves may see 
 What comes to dogs who try to get away. 
 So, ganch the three." 
 
 Then Gerard answered, "Stay. 
 Before you fling us to the hooks, hear this. 
 There are two laws, and men may go amiss 
 Either by breaking or by keeping one. 
 There is man's law by which man's work is done. 
 Your galleys rowed, your palace kept in state 
 Your victims ganched or headed on the gate 
 And accident has bent us to its yoke. 
 
 [46]
 
 We break it : death : but it is better broke. 
 
 " You know, you Khalif, by what death you reign, 
 What force of fraud, what cruelty of pain, 
 What spies and prostitutes support your power, 
 And help your law to run its little hour, 
 We, who are but ourselves, defy it all. 
 
 " We were free people till you made us thrall 
 I was a sailor whom you took at sea 
 While saiUng home. This woman that you see 
 You broke upon with murder in the night 
 To drag her here to die for your delight, 
 This young man is her lover. 
 
 When he knew 
 That she was taken by your pirate crew 
 He followed her to save her, or at least 
 Be near her in her grief. Man is a beast 
 And women are his pasture by your law. 
 This young man was in safety, but he saw 
 His darling taken to the slave-girls' pen 
 Of weeping in the night and beasts of men. 
 He gave up everything, risked everytliing. 
 Came to your galley, took the iron ring, 
 Rowed at the bitter oar-loom as a slave, 
 Only for love of her, for hope to save 
 Her from one bruise of all the many bruises 
 That fall upon a woman when she loses 
 Those whom your gang of bloodhounds made her lose. 
 
 [47]
 
 " Knowing another law we could not choose 
 
 But stamp your law beneath our feet as dust, 
 
 Its bloodshed and its rapine and its lust, 
 
 For one clean hour of struggle to be free ; 
 
 She for her passionate pride of chastity, 
 
 He for his love of her, and I because 
 
 I'm not too old to glory in the cause 
 
 Of generous souls who have harsh measure meted. 
 
 " We did the generous thing and are defeated. 
 Boast, then, to-night, when you have drunken deep, 
 Between the singing woman's song and sleep, 
 That you have tortured to the death three slaves 
 Who spat upon your law and found their graves 
 Helping each other in the generous thing. 
 No mighty triumph for a boast, O King." 
 
 Then he was silent while the KhaUf stared. 
 Never before had any being dared 
 To speak thus to him. All the courtiers paled. 
 We, who had died, expected to be haled 
 To torture there and then before the crowd. 
 It was so silent that the wind seemed loud 
 Clicking a loose slat in the open shutter. 
 I heard the distant breakers at their mutter 
 Upon the Mole, I saw my darHng's face 
 Steady and proud ; a breathing filled the place, 
 Men drawing breath until the KhaHf spoke. 
 
 [48]
 
 His torn dress hung upon him like a cloak 
 
 He spoke at last. "You speak of law," he said. 
 
 "By climates and by soils the laws are made. 
 
 Ours is a hawk-law suited to the land, 
 
 This rock of hawks or eyrie among sand, 
 
 I am a hawk, the hawk law pleases me. 
 
 " But I am man, and, being man, can be 
 Moved, sometimes, Christian, by the law which makes 
 Men who are suffering from man's mistakes. 
 Brothers sometimes. 
 
 I had not heard this tale 
 Of you, the lover, following to jail 
 The woman whom you loved. You bowed your neck 
 Into the iron fettered to the deck. 
 And followed her to prison, all for love ? 
 
 " Allah, who gives men courage from above, 
 Has surely blessed you, boy. 
 
 " And you, his queen; 
 Without your love his courage had not been. 
 Your beauty and your truth prevailed on him. 
 Allah has blessed you, too. 
 
 " And you, the grim 
 Killer of men at midnight, you who speak 
 To Kings as peers with colour in your cheek, 
 Allah made you a man who helps his friends. 
 
 « [49]
 
 " God made you all. I will not thwart his ends 
 You shall be free. 
 
 Hear all. These folk are free. 
 You Emir, fit a xebec for the sea 
 To let them sail at noon. 
 
 Go where you will. 
 And lest my rovers should molest you still, 
 Here is my seal that they shall let you pass." 
 
 Throughout the room a sudden murmur was 
 A gasp of indrawn breath and shifting feet. 
 So Hfe was given back, the thing so sweet 
 The undrunk cup that we were longing for. 
 
 My darling spoke, "O Khahf, one gift more. 
 
 After this bounty that our hearts shall praise 
 
 At all our praying-times by nights and days 
 
 I ask yet more, O raiser from the dead. 
 
 There in your woman's prison as we fled 
 
 A hopeless woman blessed us. It is said 
 
 That blessings from the broken truly bless. 
 
 Khalif, we would not leave in hopelessness 
 
 One whose great heart could bless us even then 
 
 Even as we left her in the prison pen. 
 
 She wished us fortune from a broken heart. 
 
 Let her come with us, Khalif, when we start." 
 
 *'Go, you," the Khalif said, "and choose her forth." 
 
 [50]
 
 At noon the wind was blowing to the north, 
 
 A swift felucca with a scarlet sail 
 
 Was ready for us, deep with many a bale, 
 
 Of gold and spice and silk, the great King's gifts. 
 
 The banners of the King were on her Hfts. 
 
 The King and all his court rode down to see 
 
 Us four glad souls put seawards from Saffee. 
 
 In the last glowing of the sunset's gold 
 We looked our last upon that pirate hold ; 
 The palace gilding shone awhile like fire. 
 We were at sea with all our heart's desire 
 Beauty and friendship and the dream fulfilled. 
 The golden answer to the deeply willed. 
 The purely longed for, hardly tried for thing. 
 Into the dark our sea boat dipped her wing 
 Polaris climbed out of the dark and shone. 
 Then came the moon, and now Saffee was gone 
 With all hell's darkness hidden by the sea. 
 
 O beautiful is love and to be free 
 
 Is beautiful, and beautiful are friends. 
 
 Love, freedom, comrades, surely make amends 
 
 For all these thorns through which we walk to death. 
 
 God let us breathe your beauty with our breath. 
 
 All early in the Maytime when daylight comes at four, 
 We blessed the hawthorn blossom that welcomed us ashore, 
 O beautiful in this Hving that passes Hke the foam 
 It is to go with sorrow yet come with beauty home. 
 
 [51
 
 THE HOUNDS OF HELL
 
 A 
 
 BOUT the crowing of the cock, 
 
 When the shepherds feel the cold, 
 A horse's hoofs went clip-a-clock 
 Along the Hangman's wold. 
 
 The horse-hoofs trotted on the stone, 
 The hoof-sparks glittered by, 
 
 And then a hunting horn was blown 
 And hounds broke into cry. 
 
 There was a strangeness in the horn, 
 
 A wildness in the cry, 
 A power of devilry forlorn 
 
 Exulting bloodily. 
 
 A power of night that ran a prey 
 
 Along the hangman's hill. 
 The shepherds heard the spent buck bray 
 
 And the horn blow for the kill. 
 
 They heard the worrying of the hounds 
 
 About the dead beast's bones ; 
 Then came the horn, and then the sounds 
 
 Of horse-hoofs treading stones. 
 
 "What hounds are these, that hunt the night?" 
 
 The shepherds asked in fear : 
 "Look, there are calkins clinking bright; 
 
 They must be coming here." 
 
 [55J
 
 The calkins clinkered to a spark, 
 
 The hunter called the pack ; 
 The sheep-dogs' fells all bristled stark 
 
 And all their lips went back. 
 
 "Lord God," the shepherds said, "They come; 
 
 And see what hounds he has ; 
 All dripping bluish fire, and dumb, 
 
 And nosing to the grass. 
 
 " And trotting scatheless through the gorse, 
 
 And bristling in the fell : 
 Lord, it is death upon the horse. 
 
 And they're the hounds of hell !" 
 
 They shook to watch them as they sped, 
 
 All black against the sky ; 
 A horseman with a hooded head 
 
 And great hounds padding by. 
 
 When daylight drove away the dark 
 And larks went up and thrilled. 
 
 The shepherds cHmbed the wold to mark 
 What beast the hounds had killed. 
 
 They came to where the hounds had fed, 
 
 And in that trampled place 
 They found a pedlar lying dead 
 
 With horror in his face. 
 
 [56]
 
 There was a farmer on the wold 
 Where all the brooks begin, 
 
 He had a thousand sheep from fold 
 Out grazing on the whin. 
 
 The next night, as he lay in bed 
 He heard a canterer come 
 
 TrampKng the wold-top with a tread 
 That sounded like a drum. 
 
 He thought it was a post that rode, 
 So turned him to his sleep, 
 
 But the canterer in his dreams abode 
 Like horse-hoofs running sheep. 
 
 And in his dreams a horn was blown 
 And feathering hounds replied, 
 
 And all his wethers stood like stone 
 In rank on the hillside. 
 
 Then, while he struggled still with dreams, 
 
 He saw his wethers run 
 Before a pack cheered on with screams. 
 
 The thousand sheep as one. 
 
 So, leaping from his bed in fear, 
 
 He flung the window back, 
 And he heard a death-horn blowing clear 
 
 And the crying of a pack. 
 
 [57]
 
 And the thundering of a thousand sheep, 
 
 All mad and running wild 
 To the stone-pit seven fathoms deep, 
 
 Whence all the town is tiled. 
 
 After them came the hounds of hell 
 With hell's own fury filled ; 
 
 Into the pit the wethers fell 
 And all but three were killed. 
 
 The hunter blew his horn a note 
 And laughed against the moon ; 
 
 The farmer's breath caught in his throat. 
 He fell into a swoon. 
 
 The next night when the watch was set 
 
 A heavy rain came down, 
 The leaden gutters dripped with wet 
 
 Into the shuttered town. 
 
 So close the shutters were, the chink 
 Of lamplight scarcely showed ; 
 
 The men at fireside heard no clink 
 Of horse-hoofs on the road. 
 
 They heard the creaking hinge complain 
 And the mouse that gnawed the floor, 
 
 And the limping footsteps of the rain 
 On the stone outside the door. 
 
 [58J
 
 And on the wold the rain came down 
 Till trickles streakt the grass : 
 
 A traveller riding to the town 
 Drew rein to let it pass. 
 
 The wind sighed in the fir-tree tops, 
 The trickles sobb'd in the grass, 
 
 The branches ran with showers of drops ; 
 No other noise there was. 
 
 Till up the wold the traveller heard 
 A horn blow faint and thin ; 
 
 He thought it was the curlew bird 
 Lamenting to the whin ; 
 
 And when the far horn blew again. 
 He thought an owl hallooed, 
 
 Or a rabbit gave a shriek of pain 
 As the stoat leapt in the wood. 
 
 But when the horn blew next, it blew 
 A trump that spHt the air. 
 
 And hounds gave cry to an Halloo — 
 The hunt of hell was there. 
 
 "Black," (said the traveller), "black and swift, 
 
 Those running devils came ; 
 Scoring to cry with hackles stifft, 
 
 And grin- jowls dripping flame." 
 
 [59]
 
 They settled to the sightless scent, 
 
 And up the hill a cry 
 Told where the frightened quarry went, 
 
 Well knowing it would die. 
 
 Then presently a cry rang out, 
 And a mort blew for the kill ; 
 
 A shepherd with his throat torn out 
 Lay dead upon the hill. 
 
 When this was known, the shepherds drove 
 
 Their flocks into the town ; 
 No man, for money or for love, 
 
 Would watch them on the down. 
 
 But night by night the terror ran. 
 The townsmen heard them still ; 
 
 Nightly the hell-hounds hunted man 
 And the hunter whooped the kill. 
 
 The men who lived upon the moor 
 Would waken to the scratch 
 
 Of hounds' claws digging at the door. 
 Or scraping at the latch. 
 
 And presently no man would go 
 
 Without doors after dark, 
 Lest hell's black hunting horn should blow. 
 
 And hell's black bloodhounds mark. 
 
 [60]
 
 They shivered round the fire at home, 
 
 While out upon the bent 
 The hounds with black jowls dropping foam 
 
 Went nosing to the scent. 
 
 Men let the hay crop run to seed, 
 And the corn crop sprout in ear, 
 
 And the root crop choke itself in weed 
 That hell-hound hunting year. 
 
 Empty to heaven lay the wold, 
 
 Village and church grew green. 
 The courtyard flagstones spread with mould, 
 
 And weeds sprang up between. 
 
 And sometimes when the cock had crowed, 
 And the hillside stood out grey, 
 
 Men saw them slinking up the road, 
 All sullen from their prey. 
 
 A hooded horseman on a black. 
 With nine black hounds at heel, 
 
 After the hell-hunt going back 
 All bloody from their meal. 
 
 And in men's minds a fear began 
 That hell had over-hurled 
 
 The guardians of the soul of man 
 And come to rule the world. 
 
 [6i]
 
 With bitterness of heart by day, 
 And terror in the night, 
 
 And the bhndness of a barren way 
 And withering of delight. 
 
 St. Withiel lived upon the moor, 
 Where the peat-men live in holes ; 
 
 He worked among the peat-men poor, 
 Who only have their souls. 
 
 He brought them nothing but his love 
 And the will to do them good. 
 
 But power filled him from above. 
 His very touch was food. 
 
 Men told St. Withiel of the hounds 
 And how they killed their prey. 
 
 He thought them far beyond his bounds, 
 So many miles away. 
 
 Then one whose son the hounds had killed 
 
 Told him the tale at length ; 
 St. Withiel pondered why God willed 
 
 That hell should have such strength. 
 
 Then one, a passing traveller, told 
 How, since the hounds had come, 
 
 The church was empty on the wold, 
 And all the priests were dumb. 
 
 [62]
 
 St. Withiel rose at this, and said, 
 "This priest will not be dumb ; 
 
 My spirit will not be afraid 
 Though all hell's devils come." 
 
 He took his stick and out he went, 
 
 The long way to the wold, 
 Where the sheep-bells clink upon the bent 
 
 And every wind is cold. 
 
 He past the rivers running red 
 And the mountains standing bare ; 
 
 At last the wold-land lay ahead, 
 Un-yellowed by the share. 
 
 All in the brown October time 
 He clambered to the weald ; 
 
 The plum lay purpled into slime, 
 The harvest lay in field. 
 
 Trampled by many-footed rain. 
 The sun-burnt corn lay dead ; 
 
 The myriad finches in the grain 
 Rose bothering at his tread. 
 
 The myriad finches took a sheer 
 And settled back to food : 
 
 A man was not a thing to fear 
 In such a soHtude. 
 
 [63]
 
 The hurrying of their wings died out, 
 
 A silence took the hill ; 
 There was no dog, no bell, no shout, 
 
 The windmill's sails were still. 
 
 The gate swung creaking on its hasp, 
 The pear splashed from the tree. 
 
 In the rotting apple's heart the wasp 
 Was drunken drowsily. 
 
 The grass upon the cart-wheel ruts 
 Had made the trackways dim, 
 
 The rabbits ate and hopped their scuts, 
 They had no fear of him. 
 
 The sunset reddened in the west ; 
 
 The distant depth of blue 
 Stretched out and dimmed ; to twiggy nest 
 
 The rooks in clamour drew. 
 
 The oakwood in his mail of brass 
 Bowed his great crest and stood ; 
 
 The pine-tree saw St. Withiel pass, 
 His great bole blushed like blood. 
 
 Then tree and wood alike were dim, 
 Yet still St. Withiel strode ; 
 
 The only noise to comfort him 
 Were his footsteps on the road. 
 
 164]
 
 The crimson in the west was smoked, 
 The west-wind heaped the wrack, 
 
 Each tree seemed Hke a murderer cloaked 
 To stab him in the back. 
 
 Darkness and desolation came 
 
 To dog his footsteps there ; 
 The dead leaves rustling called his name, 
 
 The death-moth brushed his hair. 
 
 The murmurings of the wind fell still ; 
 
 He stood and stared around : 
 He was alone upon the hill, 
 
 On devil-haunted ground. 
 
 What was the whitish thing which stood 
 In front, with one arm raised, 
 
 Like death a-grinning in a hood ? 
 The saint stood still and gazed. 
 
 "What are you?" said St. Withiel, "Speak!" 
 
 Not any answer came 
 But the night-wind making darkness bleak, 
 
 And the leaves that called his name. 
 
 A glow shone on the whitish thing. 
 It neither stirred nor spoke : 
 
 In spite of faith, a shuddering 
 Made the good saint to choke. 
 
 p 
 
 [65]
 
 He struck the whiteness with his staff 
 
 It was a withered tree : 
 An owl flew from it with a laugh, 
 
 The darkness shook with glee. 
 
 The darkness came all round him close 
 
 And cackled in his ear : 
 The midnight, full of life none knows, 
 
 Was very full of fear. 
 
 The darkness cackled in his heart, 
 That things of hell were there, 
 
 That the startled rabbit played a part 
 And the stoat's leap did prepare — 
 
 Prepare the stage of night for blood 
 And the mind of night for death, 
 
 For a spirit trembling in the mud, 
 In an agony for breath. 
 
 A terror came upon the saint. 
 It stripped his spirit bare ; 
 
 He was sick body standing faint. 
 Cold sweat and stiffened hair. 
 
 He took his terror by the throat 
 And stamped it underfoot ; 
 
 Then, far away, the death-horn's note 
 Quailed like a screech-owl's hoot. 
 
 66]
 
 Still far away that devil's horn 
 
 Its quavering death-note blew, 
 But the saint could hear the crackHng thorn 
 
 That the hounds trod as they drew. 
 
 "Lord, it is true," St. Withiel moaned, 
 "And the hunt is drawing near ; 
 
 Devils that Paradise disowned ; 
 They know that I am here. 
 
 " And there, O God, a hound gives tongue. 
 And great hounds quarter dim." — 
 
 The saint's hands to his body clung. 
 He knew they came for him. 
 
 Then close at hand the horn was loud, 
 
 Like Peter's cock of old, 
 For joy that Peter's soul was cowed, 
 
 And Jesus' body sold. 
 
 Then terribly the hounds in cry 
 Gave answer to the horn ; 
 
 The saint in terror turned to fly 
 Before his flesh was torn. 
 
 After his body came the hounds, 
 
 After the hounds the horse ; 
 Their running crackled with the sounds 
 
 Of fire that runs in gorse. 
 
 [67]
 
 The saint's breath failed, but still they came 
 
 The hunter cheered them on ; 
 Even as a wind that blows a flame 
 
 In the vigil of St. John. 
 
 And as St. Withiel's terror grew 
 
 The crying of the pack 
 Bayed nearer, as though terror drew 
 
 Those grip teeth to his back. 
 
 No hope was in his soul, no stay, 
 Nothing but screaming will 
 
 To save his terror-stricken clay 
 Before the hounds could kill. 
 
 The laid corn tripped, the bramble caught, 
 
 He stumbled on the stones. 
 The thorn that scratched him, to his thought, 
 
 Was hell's teeth at his bones. 
 
 His legs seemed bound as in a dream, 
 The wet earth held his feet, 
 
 He screamed aloud as rabbits scream 
 Before the stoat's teeth meet. 
 
 A black thing struck him on the brow, 
 A blackness loomed and waved ; 
 
 It was a tree. He caught a bough 
 And scrambled up it, saved. 
 
 [68]
 
 Saved for the moment, as he thought, 
 
 He pressed against the bark : 
 The hell-hounds missed the thing they sought, 
 
 They quartered in the dark. 
 
 They panted underneath the tree, 
 They quartered to the call, 
 
 The hunter cried, "Yoi doit, go see!" 
 His death-horn blew a fall. 
 
 Now up, now down, the hell-hounds went 
 
 With soft feet padding wide ; 
 They tried, but could not hit the scent, 
 
 However hard they tried. 
 
 Then presently the horn was blown, 
 The hounds were called away. 
 
 The hoof-beats glittered on the stone 
 And trotted on the brae. 
 
 The saint gat strength, but with it came 
 
 A horror of his fear. 
 Anguish at having failed, and shame. 
 
 And sense of judgment near. 
 
 Anguish at having left his charge 
 
 And having failed his trust, 
 At having flung his sword and targe 
 
 To save his body's dust. 
 
 [69]
 
 He clambered down the saving tree ; 
 
 "I am unclean," he cried. 
 "Christ died upon a tree for me, 
 
 I used a tree to hide. 
 
 (C 
 
 The hell hounds bayed about the cross, 
 And tore his clothes apart, 
 But Christ was gold and I am dross, 
 And mud is in my heart." 
 
 He stood in anguish in the field ; 
 
 A little wind blew by, 
 The dead leaves dropped, the great stars wheeled 
 
 Their squadrons in the sky. 
 
 "Lord, I will try again," he said, 
 "Though all hell's devils tear. 
 
 This time I will not be afraid 
 And what is sent I'll dare." 
 
 He set his face against the slope 
 
 Until he topped the brae ; 
 Courage had healed his fear, and hope 
 
 Had put his shame away. 
 
 And then, far off, a quest-note ran, 
 
 A feathering hound repHed : 
 The hounds still drew the night for man 
 
 Along that countryside. 
 
 [70]
 
 Then one by one the hell-hounds spoke 
 And still the horn made cheer ; 
 
 Then the full devil-chorus woke 
 To fill the saint with fear. 
 
 He knew that they were after him 
 To hunt him till he fell ; 
 
 He turned and fled into the dim, 
 And after him came hell. 
 
 Over the stony wold he went, 
 Through thorns and over quags ; 
 
 The bloodhounds cried upon the scent, 
 They ran like rutting stags. 
 
 And when the saint looked round, he saw 
 
 Red eyes intently strained, 
 The bright teeth in the grinning jaw, 
 
 And running shapes that gained. 
 
 Uphill, downhill, with faihng breath, 
 
 He ran to save his skin, 
 Like one who knocked the door of death, 
 
 Yet dared not enter in. 
 
 Then water gurgled in the night, 
 
 Dark water lay in front, 
 The saint saw bubbles running bright ; 
 
 The huntsman cheered his hunt. 
 
 [71]
 
 The saint leaped far into the stream 
 And struggled to the shore. 
 
 The hunt died like an evil dream, 
 A strange land lay before. 
 
 He waded to a gHttering land, 
 With brighter light than ours, 
 
 The water ran on silver sand 
 By yellow water-flowers. 
 
 The fishes nosed the stream to rings 
 
 As petals floated by, 
 The apples were like orbs of kings 
 
 Against a glow of sky. 
 
 On cool and steady stalks of green 
 
 The outland flowers grew, 
 The ghost-flower, silver like a queen, 
 
 The queen-flower streakt with blue. 
 
 The king-flower, crimson on his stalk, 
 
 With frettings in his crown, 
 The peace-flower purple, from the chalk, 
 
 The flower that loves the down. 
 
 Lilies like thoughts, roses like words 
 
 In the sweet brain of June ; 
 The bees there, like the stock-dove birds, 
 
 Breathed all the air with croon. 
 
 [72I
 
 Purple and golden hung the plums. 
 
 Like slaves bowed down with gems 
 The peach-trees were ; sweet-scented gums 
 
 Oozed clammy from their stems. 
 
 And birds of every land were there, 
 Like flowers that sang and flew ; 
 
 All beauty that makes singing fair 
 That sunny garden knew. 
 
 For all together sang with throats 
 So tuned, that the intense 
 
 Colour and odour pearled the notes 
 And passed into the sense. 
 
 And as the saint drew near, he heard 
 The birds talk, each to each. 
 
 The fire-bird to the glory-bird ; 
 He understood their speech. 
 
 One said, "The saint was terrified 
 Because the hunters came." 
 
 Another said, "The bloodhounds cried 
 And all their eyes were flame." 
 
 Another said, **No shame to him, 
 For mortal men are blind, 
 
 They cannot see beyond the grim 
 Into the peace behind." 
 
 [73I
 
 Another sang, "They cannot know, 
 
 Unless we give the clue, 
 The power that waits in them below 
 
 The thing they are to do." 
 
 Another sang : " they never guess 
 That deep within them stand 
 
 Courage and peace and loveliness, 
 Wisdom and skill of hand." 
 
 Another sang, *'Sing, brothers; come, 
 
 Make beauty in the air ; 
 The saint is shamed with martyrdom 
 
 Beyond his strength to bear. 
 
 " Sing, brothers, every bird that flies !" 
 
 They stretcht their throats to sing, 
 With the sweetness known in Paradise 
 \ When the bells of heaven ring. 
 
 "Open the doors, good saint," they cried, 
 
 " Pass deeper to your soul ; 
 There is a spirit in your side 
 ■\ That hell cannot control. 
 
 " Open the doors to let him in, 
 That beauty with the sword ; 
 
 The hounds are silly shapes of sin. 
 They shrivel at a word. 
 
 [74]
 
 " Come, saint !" and as they sang, the air 
 Shone with the shapes of flame. 
 
 Bird after bright bird glittered there, 
 Crying aloud they came. 
 
 A rush of brightness and deUght, 
 White as the snow in drift. 
 
 The fire-bird and the glory-bright, 
 Most beautiful, most swift. 
 
 Sweeping aloft to show the way 
 And singing as they flew. 
 
 Many and ghttering as the spray 
 When windy seas are blue. 
 
 So cheerily they rushed, so strong 
 Their sweep was through the flowers, 
 
 The saint was swept into their song 
 And gloried in their powers. 
 
 He sang, and leaped into the stream 
 And struggled to the shore ; 
 
 The garden faded Hke a dream, 
 A darkness lay before. 
 
 Darkness with glimmery light forlorn 
 And quavering hounds in quest, 
 
 A huntsman blowing on a horn. 
 And lost things not at rest. 
 
 [75]
 
 He saw the huntsman's hood show black 
 
 Against the graying east, 
 He heard him hollo to the pack 
 
 And horn them to the feast. 
 
 He heard the bloodhounds come to cry 
 
 And settle to the scent, 
 The black horse made the hoof-casts fly, 
 
 The sparks flashed up the bent. 
 
 The saint stood still until they came 
 
 Baying to ring him round ; 
 A horse whose flecking foam was flame, 
 
 And hound on yelHng hound. 
 
 And jaws that dripped with bitter fire 
 Snarled at the saint to tear. 
 
 Pilled hell-hounds, balder than the geier, 
 Leaped round him everywhere. 
 
 St. Withiel let the hell-hounds rave. 
 
 He cried, ''Now, in this place, 
 Climb down, you huntsman of the grave, 
 
 And let me see your face. 
 
 IC 
 
 Climb down, you huntsman out of hell, 
 And show me what you are. 
 The judge has stricken on the bell, 
 Now answer at the bar." 
 
 [76]
 
 The baying of the hounds fell still, 
 
 Their jaws' salt fire died. 
 The wind of morning struck in chill 
 
 Along that countryside. 
 
 The blackness of the horse was shrunk, 
 His sides seemed ribbed and old. 
 
 The rider, hooded like a monk, 
 Was trembling with the cold. 
 
 The rider bowed as though with pain ; 
 
 Then clambered down and stood, 
 The thin thing that the frightened brain 
 
 Had fed with living blood. 
 
 "Show me. What are you?" said the saint. 
 
 A hollow murmur spoke. 
 "This, Lord," it said ; a hand moved faint 
 
 And drew aside the cloak. 
 
 A Woman Death that palsy shook 
 Stood sick and dwindling there ; 
 
 Her fingers were a bony crook 
 And blood was on her hair. 
 
 "Stretch out your hands and sign the Cross," 
 
 Was all St. Withiel said. 
 The bloodhounds moaned upon the moss, 
 
 The Woman Death obeyed. 
 
 [77]
 
 Whimpering with pain, she made the sign. 
 
 "Go, devil-hag," said he, 
 "Beyond all help of bread and wine, 
 
 Beyond all land and sea. 
 
 " Into the ice, into the snow. 
 Where Death himself is stark. 
 
 Out, with your hounds about you, go, 
 And perish in the dark." 
 
 They dwindled as the mist that fades 
 
 At coming of the sun. 
 Like rags of stuff that fire abrades, 
 
 They withered and were done. 
 
 The cock, that scares the ghost from earth. 
 Crowed as they dwindled down ; 
 
 The red sun, happy in his girth, 
 Strode up above the town. 
 
 Sweetly above the sunny wold 
 The bells of churches rang ; 
 
 The sheep-bells clinked within the fold, 
 And the larks went up and sang. 
 
 Sang for the setting free of men 
 From devils that destroyed. 
 
 The lark, the robin and the wren. 
 They joyed and over-joyed. 
 
 [78]
 
 The chats, that harbour in the whin, 
 Their Httle sweet throats swelled. 
 
 The blackbird and the thrush joined in, 
 The missel-thrush excelled. 
 
 Till round the saint the singing made 
 
 A beauty in the air, 
 An ecstasy that cannot fade 
 
 But is forever there. 
 
 [79]
 
 CAP ON HEAD 
 A TALE OF THE O'NEILL
 
 O'NEILL took ship, O'Neill set sail, 
 And left his wife ashore 
 In the foursquare castle like a jail 
 Between the Mull and the Gore. 
 
 Many a month he stayed away, 
 
 His lady sorrowed long ; 
 She heard the tide come twice a day 
 
 And the sea-lark at his song ; 
 
 She watched the sun go down in the west, 
 
 And another day begin, 
 At nights she made her mate a nest 
 
 But no mate came therein. 
 
 One night, a red light burned at sea, 
 
 A ship came in to port, 
 A foot stirred and the horn was blown 
 
 Within the outer court. 
 
 It was all dark, save up the brae, 
 
 The dead moon wore her heel. 
 The watchman called, "Who's there the day?" 
 
 A voice said, "The O'Neill." 
 
 The watchman flung the great gate back, 
 
 "Come in, Lord, to your own." 
 O'Neill stood huddled up in black. 
 
 Upon the threshold stone. 
 
 [83]
 
 White as a riser from the dead 
 
 He passed the lintel post. 
 *' God spare us, Lord," the watchman said, 
 
 "I thought you were a ghost. 
 
 "I never heard you come ashore, 
 And, look your ship is gone. 
 
 Are all our fellows dead, my lord, 
 That you should come alone?" 
 
 O'Neill stood grinning in the porch 
 
 A Httle breathing space ; 
 The redness blowing from the torch 
 
 Put colour in his face. 
 
 **IVe left my ship behind," he said, 
 "To join the Scotch king's fleet. 
 
 I've left my men behind," he said, 
 "To haul on her fore-sheet. 
 
 " I have come home all alone," he said, 
 " In a country ship from sea. 
 
 Let my lady know the news," he said, 
 "Then open here to me." 
 
 Then lights were lit and men gave hail 
 And welcomed him ashore ; 
 
 The wife was glad within that jail 
 Between the Mull and the Gore. 
 
 [84]
 
 O'Neill went swimming in the sea 
 And hunting up the glen ; 
 
 No one could swim or ride as he 
 Of all the sons of men. 
 
 His wife went happy in the lane, 
 And singing in the tower ; 
 
 The sweet of having him again 
 Had ended all the sour. 
 
 But Kate, an old crone muttering dark 
 
 About that windy place, 
 Did not rejoice : she said, "I mark 
 
 O'Neill has fal'n from grace. 
 
 " He has been under the dark star 
 
 Since when he went away. 
 Men think that when they wander far 
 
 The black thing becomes grey. 
 
 " He has been dipped in the strange vat 
 And dyed with the strange dye. 
 
 And then the black thing, what is that 
 That dogs him, going by ? 
 
 " A dog thing, black, goes padding past 
 
 Forever at his heel : 
 God help us all to peace at last, 
 
 I fear for the O'Neill. 
 
 [85]
 
 " His teeth show when the Host does come 
 
 To comfort dying men, 
 And in the chapel he is dumb, 
 
 He never says Amen." 
 
 She would not speak with the O'Neill, 
 
 But when he crossed her path 
 She prayed, as tremblers do that feel 
 
 The devil in his wrath. 
 
 And so the Time went by, whose hand 
 Upheaves the lives of men. 
 
 The cuckoo left his burning land 
 To toll along the glen. 
 
 So loud the thrushes sang that spring, 
 
 So rich the hawthorn was, 
 The air was like a living thing 
 
 Between the sky and the grass. 
 
 O'Neill's wife bore a little son 
 
 And set him on her knee ; 
 He grew apace to romp and run 
 
 And dabble in the sea. 
 
 But one thing strange about the child 
 The neighbours noted there : 
 
 That, even if the winds were mild. 
 His head was never bare. 
 
 [86]
 
 His father made him wear a cap 
 At all times, night and day, 
 
 Bound round his forehead with a strap 
 To keep the cold away. 
 
 And up and down the Httle lad 
 Went singing at his game : 
 
 Men marvelled at the grace he had 
 To make the wild birds tame. 
 
 Men marvelled at the joy he took 
 And at the things he said. 
 
 And at the beauty of his look, 
 This Httle Cap on Head. 
 
 And when the nights were dark between 
 
 The new moon and the old, 
 And fires were Ht, and ^vinds blew keen, 
 
 And old wives' tales were told, 
 
 This httle son would scramble near 
 Beside his mother's place, 
 
 To Usten to the tale and peer 
 With firehght on his face. 
 
 O'Neill would gather to the glow 
 With great eyes ghttering fierce ; 
 
 Old Kate would shake to see him so 
 And cross herself from curse. 
 
 [87]
 
 It fell about hay-harvest time, 
 
 When the Lammas floods were out, 
 
 A ship all green with water-slime 
 Stood in and went about, 
 
 And anchored off the bight of sand, 
 And swam there like a seal, 
 
 With a banner of the bloody hand, 
 The flag of the O'Neill. 
 
 Then there was cheering in the court 
 And hurrying to the beach : 
 
 "A ship !" they cried, *' A ship in port, 
 Brought up in Castle Reach. 
 
 " It is our ship. They are our men 
 There, coiling up the sheet ; 
 
 It is our ship come home agen 
 From out the Scotch King's fleet. 
 
 " And who's the noble in the boat 
 Comes rowing through the sea ? 
 
 His colours are the O'Neill coat, 
 But what O'Neill is he?" 
 
 O'Neill was in his turret tower, 
 With writings red and black ; 
 
 Kate crossed herself to see him glower 
 That tide the ship came back. 
 
 [88]
 
 He looked long at the anchored ship, 
 
 And at the coming boat ; 
 The devil writhelled up his lip, 
 
 And snickered in his throat. 
 
 He strode the room and bit his nails, 
 He bit his flesh with rage, 
 
 As maddened felons do in jails, 
 And rats do in a cage. 
 
 He looked at Kate, who crossed her breast. 
 
 He heard them cheer below : 
 He said, "The wicked cannot rest, 
 
 And now I have to go." 
 
 They saw him hurry up the green 
 
 And on into the rain ; 
 Beyond the brae he was not seen : 
 
 He was not seen again. 
 
 O'Neill's wife went to watch the boat 
 
 Come driving to the sand : 
 The noble in the O'Neill coat 
 
 Stood up and waved his hand. 
 
 "That is O'NeiU !" the clansmen cried, 
 
 "Or else his very twin. 
 How came he to the ship?" they cried. 
 
 "Just now he was within." 
 
 [89]
 
 "It is O'Neill," the lady said, 
 "And that's his ship returned. 
 
 A woman's life's a school," she said, 
 "Where bitter things are learned." 
 
 O'Neill called to her through his tears, 
 
 "The bitter days are past. 
 I've prayed for this for seven years, 
 
 Now here I am at last." 
 
 Then, as the boat's bows cut the strand, 
 
 Among the slipping foam, 
 He sprang to take his lady's hand. 
 
 He said, " I have come home. 
 
 }} 
 
 His lady fainted like the dead. 
 
 Beside the slipping sea. 
 "This is O'Neill," the servants said, 
 
 "What is that other he?" 
 
 "Master," they said, "where have you been 
 
 These seven years and more?" 
 "I've served the Scottish King and Queen, 
 
 Along the Scottish shore." 
 
 "Master," they said, "Another came 
 
 So Hke in voice and face 
 To you, we thought it was the same. 
 
 And so he took your place. 
 
 " These seven years he's ruled us here, 
 
 While you were still at sea, 
 And that's his son that's coming here : 
 
 Look, Master, that is he." 
 
 [90]
 
 O'Neill took off the wee boy's cap 
 And ruffled through his hair ; 
 
 He said, "A young tree full of sap, 
 A good shoot growing fair." 
 
 He turned the hair for men to see 
 And swallowed down his tears ; 
 
 He said, ''The gods be good to me, 
 The boy has devil's ears." 
 
 He took the young child by the heels 
 And broke him, head and breast : 
 
 The red hand ridded the O'Neills 
 That cuckoo in the nest. 
 
 O'Neill flung out the little limbs 
 
 To drift about the bay : 
 "Watch, fellows, if he sinks or swims,' 
 
 Was all they heard him say. 
 
 He said, "The wicked cannot rest 
 
 And now I have to go." 
 He set his ship's head north and west 
 
 And stood into the flow. 
 
 The ship went shining like a seal 
 
 And dimmed into the rain — 
 And no man saw the great O'Neill, 
 
 Nor heard of him again. 
 
 [91
 
 SONNETS
 
 LIKE bones the ruins of the cities stand, 
 Like skeletons and skulls with ribs and eyes 
 4 Strewn in the saltness of the desert sand 
 Carved with the unread record of Kings' Ues. 
 
 Once they were strong with soldiers, loud with voices, 
 The markets clattered as the carts drove through, 
 Where now the jackal in the moon rejoices 
 And the still asp draws death along the dew. 
 
 There at the gates the market men paid toll 
 In bronze and silver pennies long worn thin 
 Wine was a silver penny for a bowl 
 Women they had there, and the moon and sin. 
 
 And looking from his tower the watchman saw 
 Green fields for miles, the roads, the great king's law. 
 
 [9SJ
 
 Now they are gone with all their songs and sins, 
 Women and men, to dust ; their copper penny, 
 Of living, spent, among these dusty inns ; 
 The ghttering One made level with the many. 
 
 Their speech is gone, none speaks it, none can read 
 The pictured writing of their conqueror's march 
 The dropping plaster of a fading screed 
 Ceils with its mildews the decaying arch. 
 
 The fields are sand, the streets are fallen stones 
 Nothing is bought or sold there, nothing spoken, 
 The sand hides all, the wind that blows it moans, 
 Blowing more sand until the pUnth is broken. 
 
 Day in, day out, no other utterance falls ; 
 Only the sand, pit-pitting on the walls. 
 
 [96]
 
 None knows what overthrew that city's pride. 
 Some say, the spotted pestilence arose 
 And smote them to the marrow, that they died 
 Till every pulse was dusty ; no man knows. 
 
 Some say, that foreign Kings with all their hosts, 
 Sieged it with mine and tower till it fell 
 So that the sword shred shrieking flesh from ghosts 
 Till every street was empty ; who can tell ? 
 
 Some think, that in the fields, or in the pit, 
 Out of the light, in filth, among the rotten, 
 Insects like sands in number, swift as wit, 
 Famined the city dead ; it is forgotten. 
 
 Only the city's bones stand, gaunt in air, 
 Pocked by the pitting sandspecks everywhere. 
 
 [97]
 
 So shall we be ; so will our cities lie, 
 Unknown beneath the grasses of the summer, 
 Walls without roofs, naves open to the sky, 
 Doors open to the wind, the only comer. 
 
 And men will grub the ruins, eyes will peer, 
 Fingers will grope for pennies, brains will tire 
 To chronicle the skills we practised here, 
 While still we breathed the wind and trod the mire. 
 
 O, like the ghost at dawn, scared by the cock, 
 Let us make haste, to let the spirit dive 
 Deep in self's sea, until the deeps unlock 
 The depths and sunken gold of being ahve 
 
 Till, though our Many pass, a Something stands 
 Aloft through Time that covers all with sands. 
 
 [98]
 
 THE PASSING STRANGE
 
 o 
 
 UT of the earth to rest or range 
 Perpetual in perpetual change 
 The unknown passing through the strange. 
 
 Water and saltness held together 
 
 To tread the dust and stand the weather 
 
 And plough the field and stretch the tether. 
 
 To pass the wine cup and be witty, 
 Water the sands and build the city- 
 Slaughter Hke devils and have pity, 
 
 Be red with rage and pale with lust, 
 
 Make beauty come, make peace, make trust, 
 
 Water and saltness mixed with dust ; 
 
 Drive over earth, swim under sea, 
 
 Fly in the eagle's secrecy, 
 
 Guess where the hidden comets be ; 
 
 Know all the deathy seeds that still 
 Queen Helen's beauty, Caesar's will. 
 And slay them even as they kill, 
 
 Fashion an altar for a rood. 
 
 Defile a continent with blood, 
 
 And watch a brother starve for food ; 
 
 Love like a madman, shaking, blind 
 Till self is burnt into a kind 
 Possession of another mind ; 
 
 [lOl]
 
 Brood upon beauty till the grace 
 Of beauty with the holy face 
 Brings peace into the bitter place ; 
 
 Probe in the lifeless granites, scan 
 The stars for hope, for guide, for plan ; 
 Live as a woman or a man ; 
 
 Fasten to lover or to friend 
 Until the heart break at the end 
 The break of death that cannot mend 
 
 Then to lie useless, helpless, still 
 Down in the earth, in dark, to fill 
 The roots of grass or daffodil. 
 
 Down in the earth, in dark, alone, 
 
 A mockery of the ghost in bone, 
 
 The strangeness, passing the unknown. 
 
 Time will go by, that outlasts clocks, 
 Dawn in the thorps will rouse the cocks 
 Sunset be glory on the rocks 
 
 But it, the thing, will never heed 
 Even the rootling from the seed 
 Thrusting to suck it for its need. 
 
 Since moons decay and suns decline 
 How else should end this life of mine ? 
 Water and saltness are not wine. 
 
 [102]
 
 But in the darkest hour of night 
 When even the foxes peer for sight 
 The byre-cock crows ; he feels the light. 
 
 So, in this water mixed with dust, 
 The byre-cock spirit crows from trust 
 That death will change because it must. 
 
 For all things change, the darkness changes, 
 The wandering spirits change their ranges, 
 The corn is gathered to the granges. 
 
 The corn is sown again, it grows ; 
 The stars burn out, the darkness goes. 
 The rhythms change, they do not close. 
 
 They change, and we, who pass Uke foam, 
 Like dust blown through the streets of Rome, 
 Change ever, too ; we have no home, 
 
 Only a beauty, only a power. 
 
 Sad in the fruit, bright in the flower, 
 
 Endlessly erring for its hour 
 
 But gathering, as we stray, a sense 
 Of Life, so lovely and intense, 
 It lingers when we wander hence. 
 
 That those who follow feel behind 
 Their backs, when all before is bHnd, 
 Our joy, a rampart to the mind. 
 
 [103]
 
 ANIMULA
 
 THIS is the place, this house beside the sea, 
 This was the setting where they played their parts 
 Two men, who knew them all, have talked to me. 
 Beauty she had, and all had passionate hearts. 
 
 I write this in the window where she sat 
 Two fields, all green with summer, lie below 
 Then the grey sea, at thought, cloud-coloured, flat, 
 Wind-dappled from the glen, the tide at flow. 
 
 Her portrait and her husband's hang together 
 One on each side the fire ; it is close : 
 The tree-tops toss ; it is a change of weather ; 
 They were most lovely and unhappy, those 
 
 That married pair and he who loved too well ; 
 This was the door by which they entered hell. 
 
 This, is a drawing of her as a child, 
 This, is she wed ; the faces are the same, 
 Only, the beauty of the babe is wild ; 
 The woman's beauty has been broken tame. 
 
 Witty, bright, gentle, earnest, with great eyes, 
 Dark hair in heaps, pure colour, lips that smile ; 
 Beauty that is more wisdom than the wise 
 Lived in this woman for a little while. 
 
 Dressed in that beauty that our mothers wore, 
 (So touching now), she looks out of the frame 
 With stag-like eyes, that wept till they were sore 
 Many's the time, till she was broken tame. 
 
 [ 107 ]
 
 Witty, bright, gentle, earnest, even so : 
 Destiny calls and spirits come and go. 
 
 This, is her husband in his youth ; and this 
 Is he in manhood ; this, is he in age : 
 There is a devil in those eyes of his, 
 A glittering devil, restless in his cage. 
 
 A grand man, with a beauty and a pride 
 A manner and a power and a fire 
 With beaks of vultures eating at his side 
 The great brain mad with unfulfilled desire. 
 
 ''With grand ideas," they say; tall, wicked, proud, 
 
 Cold, cruel, bitter, clever, dainty, skilled ; 
 
 Splendid to see, a head above the crowd, 
 
 Splendid with every strength, yet unfulfilled. 
 
 Cutting himself (and all those near) with hate 
 
 From that sharp mind which should have shaped a state. 
 
 And many years ago I saw the third 
 Bowed in old age and mad with misery 
 Mad with the bright eyes of the eagle bird ; 
 Burning his heart at fires of memory. 
 
 He stood behind a chair and bent and muttered 
 Grand still, grey, sunburnt, bright with mad eyes brown, 
 Burning, though dying, like a torch that guttered 
 That once had Ht Queen Helen through the town. 
 
 [io8]
 
 I only saw him once : I saw him go 
 
 Leaning uphill his body to the rain 
 
 Too good a man for life to punish so 
 
 Theirs were the pride and passion, his the pain. 
 
 His old coat flapped : the Httle children turned 
 To see him pass, that passionate age that burned. 
 
 "I knew them well, all three," the old man said; 
 "He was an unused force and she a child. 
 She caught him with her beauty, being a maid. 
 The thought that she had trapped him drove him wild. 
 
 He would not work with others, could not rest, 
 And nothing here could use him or engage him 
 Yet here he stayed with devils in his breast 
 To blast the woman who had dared to cage him. 
 
 Then, when the scholar came, it made the three, 
 She turned to him and he, he turned to her. 
 They both were saints : elopement could not be : 
 So here they stayed, and passion pHed the spur. 
 
 Then the men fought, and later she was found 
 In that green pool beyond the headland, drowned. 
 
 They carried her drowned body up the grass 
 Here to the house, they laid it on the bed 
 (This very bed, where I have slept, it was) 
 The scholar begged to see her, being dead. 
 
 [109]
 
 The husband walked downstairs to see him there 
 Begging to see her as one asks an alms 
 He spat at him and cut his cheek-bone bare 
 "There's pay," he said, "my poet, for your psalms." 
 
 And then they fought together at the door 
 Biting each other, like two dogs, while she 
 Lay dead, poor woman, dripping on the floor 
 Out of her hair the death-drops of the sea. 
 Later, they fought whenever they might meet 
 In church, or in the fields, or in the street." 
 
 Up, on the hill, another aged man 
 Remembered them. He said, " they were afraid. 
 They feared to end the passions they began. 
 They held the cards and yet they never played. 
 
 He should have broken from her at all cost. 
 She should have loved her lover and gone free. 
 They all held winning cards and yet they lost 
 So two were wrecked and one drowned in the sea. 
 
 Some harshness or some law, or else some fear 
 Stifled their souls : God help us, when we know 
 Certainly, certain things, the way is clear. 
 And yet, they paid, and one respects them, so. 
 
 Perhaps they were too fine. I know not, I. 
 Men must have mercy, being ripe to die." 
 
 [iiol
 
 So this old house of mourning was the stage 
 (This house and those green fields) for all that woe. 
 There are her books, her writing on the page, 
 In those choked beds she made the flowers grow. 
 
 Most desolate it is, the rain is pouring 
 The trees all toss and drip and scatter evil, 
 The floods are out, the waterfall is roaring, 
 The bar is mad with many a leaping devil. 
 
 And in this house the wind goes whining wild 
 The door blows open, till I think to see 
 That deUcate sweet woman like a child 
 Standing with great dark stag's eyes watching me. 
 
 Watching as though her sorrow might make plain 
 (Had 1 but wit) the meaning of such pain. 
 
 I wonder if she sang in this old room. 
 Ah, never ; no ; they tell me that she stood 
 For hours together staring into gloom 
 Out of the prison bars of flesh and blood. 
 
 So, when the ninth wave drowned her, haply she 
 Wakened, with merging senses, till she blent 
 Into the joy and colour of the sea 
 One with the purpose of the element. 
 
 And there, perhaps, she cannot feel the woe 
 Passed in this rotting house, but runs like light 
 Over the billows where the clippers go. 
 One with the blue sea's pureness of delight. 
 
 [Ill]
 
 Laughing, perhaps, at that old woe of hers 
 Chained in the cage with fellow prisoners. 
 
 He died in that lone cottage near the sea. 
 
 In the grey morning when the tide was turning, 
 
 The wards of life slipt back and set him free 
 
 From cares of meat and dress, from joys and yearning. 
 
 Then, like an old man gathering strength, he strayed 
 Over the beach, and strength came into him 
 Beauty that never threatened nor betrayed 
 Made bright the eyes that sorrow had made dim 
 
 So that upon that stretch of barren sand 
 He knew his dreams ; he saw her beauty run 
 With Sorrowful Beauty, laughing, hand in hand, 
 He heard the trumpets blow in Avalon. 
 
 He saw the golden statue stretching down 
 The wreath, for him, of roses, in a crown. 
 
 They say that as her husband lay a-dying 
 He clamoured for a chain to beat the hound. 
 They say that all the garden rang with crying 
 That came out of the air, out of the ground, 
 
 Out of the waste that was his soul, may be. 
 Out of the running wolf-hound of his soul. 
 That had been kennelled in and now broke free 
 Out to the moors where stags go, past control. . 
 
 [II2]
 
 All through his life his will had kennelled him 
 Now he was free, and with a hackling fell 
 He snarled out of the body to the dim 
 To run the spirits with the hounds of hell. 
 
 To run forever at the quarry gone, 
 The uncaught thing a little further on. 
 
 So, one by one, Time took them to his keeping 
 Those broken lanterns that had held his fire, 
 Dust went to dust and flesh had time for sleeping, 
 And soul, the stag, escaped the hound desire. 
 
 And now, perhaps, the memory of their hate 
 Has passed from them and they are friends again 
 Laughing at all the troubles of this state 
 Where men and women work each other pain. 
 
 And in that wind that runs along the glen 
 Beating at cottage doors, they may go by, 
 Exulting now, and helping sorrowing men 
 To do some little good before they die. 
 
 For from these ploughed-up souls the spirit brings 
 Harvest at last, and sweet from bitter things. 
 
 [113]
 
 THE LEMMINGS
 
 ONCE in a hundred years the Lemmings come 
 Westward, in search of food, over the snow, 
 Westward, until the salt sea drowns them dumb, 
 Westward, till all are drowned, those Lemmings go. 
 
 Once, it is thought, there was a westward land, 
 
 (Now drowned) where there was food for those starved 
 
 things, 
 And memory of the place has burnt its brand 
 In the Uttle brains of all the Lemming Kings. 
 
 Perhaps, long since, there was a land beyond 
 Westward from death, some city, some calm place, 
 Where one could taste God's quiet and be fond 
 With the little beauty of a human face ; 
 
 But now the land is drowned, yet still we press 
 Westward, in search, to death, to nothingness. 
 
 [117]
 
 FORGET
 
 F 
 
 ORGET all these, the barren fool in power, 
 The madman in command, the jealous O, 
 The bitter world biting its bitter hour, 
 The cruel now, the happy long ago. 
 
 Forget all these, for, though they truly hurt. 
 Even to the soul, they are not lasting things. 
 Men are no gods ; we tread the city dirt. 
 But in our souls we can be queens and kings. 
 
 And I, O Beauty, O divine white wonder. 
 On whom my dull eyes, bhnd to all else, peer, 
 Have you for peace, that not the whole war's thunder 
 Nor the world's wreck, can threat or take from here. 
 
 So you remain, though all man's passionate seas 
 Roar their blind tides, I can forget all these. 
 
 [I2l]
 
 ON GROWING OLD
 
 B 
 
 E with me Beauty for the fife is dying. 
 My dog and I are old, too old for roving, 
 Man, whose young passion sets the spindrift flying 
 Is soon too lame to march, too cold for loving. 
 
 I take the book and gather to the fire, 
 Turning old yellow leaves ; minute by minute, 
 The clock ticks to my heart ; a withered wire 
 Moves a thin ghost of music in the spinet. 
 
 I cannot sail your seas, I cannot wander. 
 
 Your cornland, nor your hill-land nor your valleys, 
 
 Ever again, nor share the battle yonder 
 
 Where the young knight the broken squadron rallies. 
 
 Only stay quiet while my mind remembers 
 The beauty of fire from the beauty of embers. 
 
 Beauty, have pity, for the strong have power 
 The rich their wealth, the beautiful their grace 
 Summer of man its sunlight and its flower 
 Spring time of man all April in a face. 
 
 Only, as in the jostling in the Strand, 
 Where the mob thrusts or loiters or is loud 
 The beggar with the saucer in his hand 
 Asks only a penny from the passing crowd, 
 
 So, from this glittering world with all its fashion 
 Its fire and play of men, its stir, its march. 
 Let me have wisdom, Beauty, wisdom and passion, 
 Bread to the soul, rain where the summers parch. 
 
 Give me but these, and though the darkness close 
 Even the night will blossom as the rose. 
 
 [125]
 
 LYRIC
 
 GIVE me a light that I may see her, 
 Give me a grace that I may be her, 
 Give me a clue that I may find her, 
 Whose beauty shews the brain behind her. 
 Stars and women and running rivers 
 And sunny water where a shadow shivers, 
 And the Kttle brooks that Hft the grasses 
 And April flowers are where she passes. 
 And all things good and all things kind 
 Are ghmmerings coming from her mind 
 And in the may a blackbird sings 
 Against her very hearte springs. 
 
 Printed in the United States of America. 
 
 [129]
 
 'JC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY 
 
 AA 000 596 774