Friendship

O! well I mind the olden time,
    The sweet, sweet olden time;
When I did long for eve all day,
    And watch'd upon the new-mown grass
    The shadows slowly eastward pass,
And o'er the meadows glide away,
    Till I could steal, with heart elate,
    Unto the little cottage-gate,
In the sweet, sweet olden time.

O! well I mind the olden time,
    The sweet, sweet olden time;
How all the night I long'd for morn,
    And bless'd the thrush whose early note
    The silver chords of silence smote
With greetings to the day new-born;
    For then again, with heart elate,
    I hoped to meet her at the gate,
In the sweet, sweet olden time.

But now hath pass'd the olden time,
    That sweet, sweet olden time;
And there is neither morn...

I gaue my faith to Loue, Loue his to mee,
That hee and I, sworne brothers should remaine,
Thus fayth receiu'd, fayth giuen back againe,
Who would imagine bond more sure could be?
Loue flies to her, yet holds he my fayth taken,
Thus from my vertue raiseth my offence,
Making me guilty by mine innocence;
And surer bond by beeing so forsaken,
He makes her aske what I before had vow'd,
Giuing her that, which he had giuen me,
I bound by him, and he by her made free,
Who euer so hard breach of fayth alow'd?
    Speake you that should of right and wrong discusse,
    Was right ere wrong'd, or wrong ere righted thus?

I

TEMPEST


Wrapped round of the night, as a monster is wrapped of the ocean,
Down, down through vast storeys of darkness, behold, in the tower
Of the heaven, the thunder! on stairways of cloudy commotion,
Colossal of tread, like a giant, from echoing hour to hour
Goes striding in rattling armor ...
The Nymph, at her billow-roofed dormer
Of foam; and the Sylvan--green-housed--at her window of leaves appears;
--As a listening woman, who hears
The approach of her lover, who comes to her arms in the night;
And, loosening the loops of her locks,
With eyes full of love and delight,
From the couch of her rest in ardor and haste arises.--
The Nymph, as if breathed of the tempest, like fire surprises
The riotous bands of the rocks,
That face with a roa...

Within the sitting-room, the company
Had been increased in number. Two or three
Young couples had been added: Emma King,
Ella and Mary Mathers - all could sing
Like veritable angels - Lydia Martin, too,
And Nelly Millikan. - What songs they knew! -

        "'Ever of Thee - wherever I may be,
        Fondly I'm drea-m-ing ever of thee!'"

And with their gracious voices blend the grace
Of Warsaw Barnett's tenor; and the bass
Unfathomed of Wick Chapman - Fancy still
Can feel, as well as hear it, thrill on thrill,
Vibrating plainly down the backs of chairs
And through the wall and up the old hall-stairs. -
Indeed young Chapman's voice especially
Attracted Mr. Hammond - For, said he,
Waiving the most Elysian sweetness of
...

Yes, you do well to mock us, you
    Who knew our bitter woe -
To jeer the false, deny the true
    In us blind struggling low,

While, on your pleasant place aloft
    With flowers and clouds and streams,
At our black sweat and toil you scoffed
    That marred your idle dreams.

"Oh, freedom, what was that to us,"
(You'd shout down to us there),
"Except the freedom foul, vicious,
    From all of good and fair?

"Obedience, faith, humility,
    To us were empty names." -
The like to you (might we reply)
    Whose noisy life proclaims

Presumption, want of human love,
    Impatience, filthy breath, {32}
The snob in soul who looks above,
    Trampling on what...

Come to me in my dreams, and then
By day I shall be well again!
For so the night will more than pay
The hopeless longing of the day.

Come, as thou cam'st a thousand times,
A messenger from radiant climes,
And smile on thy new world, and be
As kind to others as to me!

Or, as thou never cam'st in sooth,
Come now, and let me dream it truth,
And part my hair, and kiss my brow,
And say, My love why sufferest thou?

Come to me in my dreams, and then
By day I shall be well again!
For so the night will more than pay
The hopeless longing of the day.

The jester walked in the garden:
The garden had fallen still;
He bade his soul rise upward
And stand on her window-sill.

It rose in a straight blue garment,
When owls began to call:
It had grown wise-tongued by thinking
Of a quiet and light footfall;

But the young queen would not listen;
She rose in her pale night gown;
She drew in the heavy casement
And pushed the latches down.

He bade his heart go to her,
When the owls called out no more;
In a red and quivering garment
It sang to her through the door.

It had grown sweet-tongued by dreaming,
Of a flutter of flower-like hair;
But she took up her fan from the table
And waved it off on the air.

‘I have cap and bells’ he pondered,
‘I will send them to her and...

Be not proud, but now incline
Your soft ear to discipline;
You have changes in your life,
Sometimes peace, and sometimes strife;
You have ebbs of face and flows,
As your health or comes or goes;
You have hopes, and doubts, and fears,
Numberless as are your hairs;
You have pulses that do beat
High, and passions less of heat;
You are young, but must be old:
And, to these, ye must be told,
Time, ere long, will come and plow
Loathed furrows in your brow:
And the dimness of your eye
Will no other thing imply,
But you must die
As well as I.

    The Cry of the Little Peoples went up to God in vain;
    The Czech and the Pole, and the Finn, and the Schleswig Dane:

    We ask but a little portion of the green, ambitious earth;
    Only to sow and sing and reap in the land of our birth.

    We ask not coaling stations, nor ports in the China seas,
    We leave to the big child-nations such rivalries as these.

    We have learned the lesson of Time, and we know three things of worth;
    Only to sow and sing and reap in the land of our birth.

    O leave us little margins, waste ends of land and sea,
    A little grass, and a hill or two, and a shadowing tree;

    O leave us our little rivers that sweetly catch the sky,
    To drive our mills, and to carry our wood, and to ripple by.

 ...

When I looked up at my love-birds
That Sunday afternoon,
There was in their tiny tune
A dying fetch like broken words,
When I looked up at my love-birds
That Sunday afternoon.

When he, too, scanned the love-birds
On entering there that day,
'Twas as if he had nought to say
Of his long journey citywards,
When he, too, scanned the love-birds,
On entering there that day.

And billed and billed the love-birds,
As 'twere in fond despair
At the stress of silence where
Had once been tones in tenor thirds,
And billed and billed the love-birds
As 'twere in fond despair.

O, his speech that chilled the love-birds,
And smote like death on me,
As I learnt what was to be,
And knew my life was broke in sherds!
O, his speech that...

This thing, that thing is the rage,
Helter-skelter runs the age;
Minds on this round earth of ours
Vary like the leaves and flowers,
Fashion’d after certain laws;
Sing thou low or loud or sweet,
All at all points thou canst not meet,
Some will pass and some will pause.

What is true at last will tell:
Few at first will place thee well;
Some too low would have thee shine,
Some too high—no fault of thine—
Hold thine own, and work thy will!
Year will graze the heel of year,
But seldom comes the poet here,
And the Critic’s rarer still.

Singing, as if enamour'd, she resum'd
And clos'd the song, with "Blessed they whose sins
Are cover'd." Like the wood-nymphs then, that tripp'd
Singly across the sylvan shadows, one
Eager to view and one to 'scape the sun,
So mov'd she on, against the current, up
The verdant rivage. I, her mincing step
Observing, with as tardy step pursued.

Between us not an hundred paces trod,
The bank, on each side bending equally,
Gave me to face the orient. Nor our way
Far onward brought us, when to me at once
She turn'd, and cried: "My brother! look and hearken."
And lo! a sudden lustre ran across
Through the great forest on all parts, so bright
I doubted whether lightning were abroad;
But that expiring ever in the spleen,
That doth unfold it, and this during st...

Heigh-ho! Babyhood! Tell me where you linger:
    Let's toddle home again, for we have gone astray;
Take this eager hand of mine and lead me by the finger
    Back to the Lotus lands of the far-away.

Turn back the leaves of life; don't read the story, -
    Let's find the pictures, and fancy all the rest: -
We can fill the written pages with a brighter glory
    Than Old Time, the story-teller, at his very best!

Turn to the brook, where the honeysuckle, tipping
    O'er its vase of perfume spills it on the breeze,
And the bee and humming-bird in ecstacy are sipping
    From the fairy flagons of the blooming locust trees.

Turn to the lane, where we used to "teeter-totter,"
    Printing little foot-palms in the mellow mold,
Laughing at the lazy ca...

    Thou, who thy honour as thy God rever'st,
    Who, save thy mind's reproach, nought earthly fear'st,
    To thee this votive offering I impart,
    The tearful tribute of a broken heart.
    The friend thou valuedst, I, the patron, lov'd;
    His worth, his honour, all the world approv'd,
    We'll mourn till we too go as he has gone,
    And tread the dreary path to that dark world unknown.

Sing for the sun your lyric, lark,
Of twice ten thousand notes;
Sing for the moon, you nightingales,
Whose light shall kiss your throats;
Sing, sparrows, for the soft warm rain,
To wet your feathers through;
And when a rainbow's in the sky,
Sing you, cuckoo - Cuckoo!

Sing for your five blue eggs, fond thrush,
By many a leaf concealed;
You starlings, wrens, and blackbirds, sing
In every wood and field:
While I, who fail to give my love
Long raptures twice as fine,
Will for her beauty breathe this one -
A sigh, that's more divine.

You must not call me Maggie, you must not call me Dear,
    For I'm Lady of the Manor now stately to see;
And if there comes a babe, as there may some happy year,
    'Twill be little lord or lady at my knee.

Oh, but what ails you, my sailor cousin Phil,
    That you shake and turn white like a cockcrow ghost?
You're as white as I turned once down by the mill,
    When one told me you and ship and crew were lost:

Philip my playfellow, when we were boy and girl
    (It was the Miller's Nancy told it to me),
Philip with the merry life in lip and curl,
    Philip my playfellow drowned in the sea!

I thought I should have fainted, but I did not faint;
    I stood stunned at the moment, scarcely sad,
Till I raised my wail of desolate complaint
    For y...

I.

    My Love is a lady fair and free,
    A lady fair from over the sea,
    And she hath eyes that pierce my breast
    And rob my spirit of peace and rest.


II.

    A youthful warrior, warm and young,
    She takes me prisoner with her tongue,
    Aye! and she keeps me, - on parole, -
    Till paid the ransom of my soul.


III.

    I swear the foeman, arm'd for war
    From cap-à-pie, with many a scar,
    More mercy finds for prostrate foe
    Than she who deals me never a blow.


IV.

    And so 'twill be, this many a day;
    She comes to wound, if not to slay.
    But in my dreams, - in honied sleep, -
    'Tis I to smile, and she to weep!

Women ben full of Ragerie,
Yet swinken not sans secresie.
Thilke Moral shall ye understand,
From Schoole-boy's Tale of fayre Ireland:
Which to the Fennes hath him betake,
To filch the gray Ducke fro the Lake.
Right then, there passen by the Way
His Aunt, and eke her Daughters tway.
Ducke in his Trowses hath he hent,
Not to be spied of Ladies gent.
"But ho! our Nephew," (crieth one)
"Ho!" quoth another, "Cozen John;"
And stoppen, and lough, and callen out,
This sely Clerk full low doth lout:
They asken that, and talken this,
"Lo here is Coz, and here is Miss."
But, as he glozeth with Speeches soote,
The Ducke sore tickleth his Erse-roote:
Fore-piece and buttons all-to-brest,
Forth thrust a white neck, and red crest.
"Te-he," cry'd Ladies; Cl...