Heartbreak

"The wind wears roun', the day wears doun,
The moon is grisly grey;
There's nae man rides by the mirk muirsides,
Nor down the dark Tyne's way."
In, in, out and in,
Blaws the wind and whirls the whin.
"And winna ye watch the night wi' me,
And winna ye wake the morn?
Foul shame it were that your ae mither
Should brook her ae son's scorn."
In, in, out and in,
Blaws the wind and whirls the whin.
"O mither, I may not sleep nor stay,
My weird is ill to dree;
For a fause faint lord of the south seaboard
Wad win my bride of me."
In, in, out and in,
Blaws the wind and whirls the whin.
"The winds are strang, and the nights are lang,
And the ways are sair to ride:
And I maun gang to wreak my wrang,
And ye maun bide and bide."
In, in, out and...

Maytime is to the meadows coming in,
And cowslip peeps have gotten eer so big,
And water blobs and all their golden kin
Crowd round the shallows by the striding brig.
Daisies and buttercups and ladysmocks
Are all abouten shining here and there,
Nodding about their gold and yellow locks
Like morts of folken flocking at a fair.
The sheep and cows are crowding for a share
And snatch the blossoms in such eager haste
That basket-bearing children running there
Do think within their hearts they'll get them all
And hoot and drive them from their graceless waste
As though there wa'n't a cowslip peep to spare.
--For they want some for tea and some for wine
And some to maken up a cuckaball
To throw across the garland's silken line
That reaches oer the street from wa...

1855

And what shall be the song to-night,
If song there needs must be?
If every year that brings us here
Must steal an hour from me?
Say, shall it ring a merry peal,
Or heave a mourning sigh
O'er shadows cast, by years long past,
On moments flitting by?

Nay, take the first unbidden line
The idle hour may send,
No studied grace can mend the face
That smiles as friend on friend;
The balsam oozes from the pine,
The sweetness from the rose,
And so, unsought, a kindly thought
Finds language as it flows.

The years rush by in sounding flight,
I hear their ceaseless wings;
Their songs I hear, some far, some near,
And thus the burden rings
"The morn has fled, the noon has past,
The sun will soon be set,
The twilight ...

I watch the great clear twilight
Veiling the ice-bowed trees;
Their branches tinkle faintly
With crystal melodies.
The larches bend their silver
Over the hush of snow;
One star is lighted in the west,
Two in the zenith glow.
For a moment I have forgotten
Wars and women who mourn,
I think of the mother who bore me
And thank her that I was born.

This is your month, the month of "perfect days,"
Birds in full song and blossoms all ablaze.
Nature herself your earliest welcome breathes,
Spreads every leaflet, every bower inwreathes;
Carpets her paths for your returning feet,
Puts forth her best your coming steps to greet;
And Heaven must surely find the earth in tune
When Home, sweet Home, exhales the breath of June.
These blessed days are waning all too fast,
And June's bright visions mingling with the past;

Lilacs have bloomed and faded, and the rose
Has dropped its petals, but the clover blows,
And fills its slender tubes with honeyed sweets;
The fields are pearled with milk-white margarites;
The dandelion, which you sang of old,
Has lost its pride of place, its crown of gold,
But still displays ...

At Deildar-Tongue in the autumn-tide,
So many times over comes summer again,
Stood Odd of Tongue his door beside.
What healing in summer if winter be vain?
Dim and dusk the day was grown,
As he heard his folded wethers moan.
Then through the garth a man drew near,
With painted shield and gold-wrought spear.
Good was his horse and grand his gear,
And his girths were wet with Whitewater.
"Hail, Master Odd, live blithe and long!
How fare the folk at Deildar-Tongue?"
"All hail, thou Hallbiorn the Strong!
How fare the folk by the Brothers'-Tongue?"
"Meat have we there, and drink and fire,
Nor lack all things that we desire.
But by the other Whitewater
Of Hallgerd many a tale we hear."
"Tales enow may my daughter make
If too many words b...

A CHILD’S STORY.

Written for, and inscribed to, W. M. the Younger.


I.

Hamelin town’s in Brunswick,
By famous Hanover city;
The river Weser, deep and wide,
Washes its wall on the southern side;
A pleasanter spot you never spied;
But, when begins my ditty,
Almost five hundred years ago,
To see the townsfolk suffer so
From vermin, was a pity.

II.

Rats!
They fought the dogs and killed the cats,
And bit the babies in the cradles,
And ate the cheeses out of the vats,
And licked the soup from the cooks’ own ladles,
Split open the kegs of salted sprats,
Made nests inside men’s Sunday hats,
And even spoiled the women’s chats
By drowning their speaking
With shrieking and squeaking

Calm be thy sleep as infant's slumbers!
    Pure as angel thoughts thy dreams!
May every joy this bright world numbers
    Shed o'er thee their mingled beams!
Or if, where Pleasure's wing hath glided,
    There ever must some pang remain,
Still be thy lot with me divided,--
    Thine all the bliss and mine the pain!

Day and night my thoughts shall hover
    Round thy steps where'er they stray;
As, even when clouds his idol cover,
    Fondly the Persian tracks its ray.
If this be wrong, if Heaven offended
    By worship to its creature be,
Then let my vows to both be blended,
    Half breathed to Heaven and half to thee.

Riding down from Bangor, on an eastbound train
After weeks of hunting, in the woods of Maine
Quite extensive whiskers, beard, mustache as well
Sat a student fellow, tall and slim and swell

Empty seat behind him, no one at his side
Into quiet village, eastern train did glide
Enter aged couple, take the hindmost seat
Enter village maiden, beautiful, petite

Blushingly she faltered, “Is this seat engaged?”
Sees the aged couple, properly enraged
Student’s quite ecstatic, sees her ticket through
Thinks of the long tunnel, thinks of what he will do

Pleasantly they chatted, how the cinders fly
Til the student fellow, gets one in his eye
Maiden sympathetic, turns herself about
“May I if you please sir, try to get it out?”

Then the student fellow...

The boy on the famous gray pony,
    Just bidding good-bye at the door,
Plucking up maiden heart for the fences
    Where his brother won honour of yore.

The walk to 'the Meet' with fair children,
    And women as gentle as gay, -
Ah! how do we male hogs in armour
    Deserve such companions as they?

The afternoon's wander to windward,
    To meet the dear boy coming back;
And to catch, down the turns of the valley,
    The last weary chime of the pack.

The climb homeward by park and by moorland,
    And through the fir forests again,
While the south-west wind roars in the gloaming,
    Like an ocean of seething champagne.

And at night the septette of Beethoven,
    And the grandmother by in her chair,
And the foot of all feet...

Shadows of the twilight falling
    On the mountain’s brow,
To each other birds are calling,
    In the leafy bough.
Where the daisies are a-springing,
And the cattle bells are ringing,
Comes my Mary, gaily singing,
    Bringing home the cows.

By a bush the pathway skirted,
    Room for two allows.
All the cornfields are deserted,
    Idle are the ploughs.
Striving for wealth’s spoil and booty,
Farmer boys have finished duty,
When I meet my little beauty,
    Bringing home the cows.

Tender words and kind addresses,
    Most polite of bows,
Rosy cheeks and wavy tresses
    Do my passions rouse

Dress so natty and so cleanly,
Air so modest and so queenly.
Oh! so haughty, yet serenely,
    Bringing home the cows...

Mari Magno
or
Tales on Board
The Mate’s Story


‘I’ve often wondered how it is, at times
Good people do what are as bad as crimes.
A common person would have been ashamed
To do what once a family far-famed
For their religious ways was known to do.
Small harm befell, small thanks to them were due.
They from abroad, perhaps it cost them less,
Had brought a young French girl as governess,
A pretty, youthful thing as e’er you saw;
She taught the children how to play and draw,
Of course, the language of her native land;
English she scarcely learnt to understand.
After a time they wanted her no more;
She must go home, but how to send her o’er,
Far in the south of France she lived, and they
In Ireland there was more than they could say...

I left the course, and by my side
There walked a ruined tout,
A hungry creature, evil-eyed,
Who poured this story out.

"You see," he said, "there came a swell
To Kensington today,
And, if I picked the winners well,
A crown at least he's pay.

"I picked three winners straight, I did;
I filled his purse with pelf,
And then he gave me half-a-quid
To back one for myself.

"A half-a-quid to me he cast,
I wanted it indeed;
So help me Bob, for two days past
I haven't had a feed.

"But still I thought my luck was in,
I couldn't go astray,
I put it all on Little Min,
And lost it straightaway.

"I haven't got a bite or bed,
I'm absolutely stuck;
So keep this lesson in your head:
Don't over-trust your luck!"

She dropped the bar, she shot the bolt, she fed the fire anew
For she heard a whimper under the sill and a great grey paw came through.
The fresh flame comforted the hut and shone on the roof-beam,
And the Only Son lay down again and dreamed that he dreamed a dream.
The last ash fell from the withered log with the click of a falling spark,
And the Only Son woke up again, and called across the dark:
"Now was I born of womankind and laid in a mother's breast?
For I have dreamed of a shaggy hide whereon I went to rest.
And was I born of womankind and laid on a father's arm?
For I have dreamed of clashing teeth that guarded me from harm.

And was I born an Only Son and did I play alone?
For I have dreamed of comrades twain that bit me to the bone.
And did I break the barley-cake...

Life, like a romping schoolboy, full of glee,
Doth bear us on his shoulder for a time.
There is no path too steep for him to climb.
With strong, lithe limbs, as agile and as free,
As some young roe, he speeds by vale and sea,
    By flowery mead, by mountain peak sublime,
    And all the world seems motion set to rhyme,
Till, tired out, he cries, "Now carry me!"
    In vain we murmur; "Come," Life says, "Fair play!"
And seizes on us.    God! he goads us so!
    He does not let us sit down all the day.
At each new step we feel the burden grow,
Till our bent backs seem breaking as we go,
    Watching for Death to meet us on the way.

A fire of fierce and laughing light
That clove the shuddering heart of night
Leapt earthward, and the thunder's might
That pants and yearns
Made fitful music round its flight:
And earth saw Burns.
The joyous lightning found its voice
And bade the heart of wrath rejoice
And scorn uplift a song to voice
The imperial hate
That smote the God of base men's choice
At God's own gate.
Before the shrine of dawn, wherethrough
The lark rang rapture as she flew,
It flashed and fired the darkling dew:
And all that heard
With love or loathing hailed anew
A new day's word.
The servants of the lord of hell,
As though their lord had blessed them, fell
Foaming at mouth for fear, so well
They knew the lie
Wherewith they sought to scan and spell

Welcome, O truant stork!
And where have you been so long?
And do you bring that grace of spring
That filleth my heart with song?

Descend upon my roof--
Bide on this ash content;
I would have you know what cruel woe
Befell me when you went.

All up in the moody sky
(A shifting threat o'er head!)
They were breaking the snow and bidding it go
Cover the beautiful dead.

Came snow on garden spot,
Came snow on mere and wold,
Came the withering breath of white robed death,
And the once warm earth was cold.

Stork, the tender rose tree,
That bloometh when you are here,
Trembled and sighed like a waiting bride--
Then drooped on a virgin bier.

But the brook that hath seen you come
Leaps forth with a hearty shout,
...

[Greek: Argureais logchaisi machou kai panta krataeseo.] [1]

(Reply of the Pythian Oracle to Philip of Macedon.)


1.

Oh! could LE SAGE'S [2] demon's gift
Be realis'd at my desire,
This night my trembling form he'd lift
To place it on St. Mary's spire.


2.

Then would, unroof'd, old Granta's halls,
Pedantic inmates full display;
Fellows who dream on lawn or stalls,
The price of venal votes to pay.


3.

Then would I view each rival wight,
PETTY and PALMERSTON survey;
Who canvass there, with all their might,
Against the next elective day. [3]


4.

Lo! candidates and voters lie
All lull'd in sleep, a goodly number!
A race renown'd for piety,<...