I

Victors, living, with laureled brow,
And you that sleep beneath the sward!
Your song was poured from cannon throats:
It rang in deep-tongued bugle-notes:
Your triumph came; you won your crown,
The grandeur of a world's renown.
        But, in our later lays,
        Full freighted with your praise,
Fair memory harbors those whose lives, laid down
    In gallant faith and generous heat,
        Gained only sharp defeat.
All are at peace, who once so fiercely warred:
Brother and brother, now, we chant a common chord.


II

    For, if we say God wills,
    Shall we then idly deny Him
    Care of each host in the fight?
    His thunder was here in the hills
    When the guns were loud in July;
    And the flash of the mu...

Doom’d, as I am, in solitude to waste
The present moments, and regret the past;
Deprived of every joy I valued most,
My friend torn from me, and my mistress lost;
Call not this gloom I wear, this anxious mien,
The dull effect of humour, or of spleen!
Still, still I mourn, with each returning day,
Him[1] snatch’d by fate in early youth away;
And her—thro’ tedious years of doubt and pain,
Fix’d in her choice, and faithful—but in vain!
O prone to pity, generous, and sincere,
Whose eye ne’er yet refused the wretch a tear;
Whose heart the real claim of friendship knows;
Nor thinks a lover’s are but fancied woes;
See me—ere yet my destined course half done,
Cast forth a wand’rer on a world unknown!
See me neglected on the world’s rude coast,
Each dea...

Where do ye rush, ye impious Trains,
    Why gleams afar the late-sheath'd sword?
Is it believ'd that Roman veins
    Their crimson tides have sparely pour'd?
Is not our scorn of safety, health, and ease,
Shewn by devasted climes, and blood-stain'd seas?

Those scowling brows, those lifted spears,
    Bend they against the threat'ning towers
Proud Carthage emulously rears?
    Or Britain's still unconquer'd shores?
That her fierce Sons, yet free from hostile sway,
May pass in chains along our SACRED WAY?

No! - but that warring Parthia's curse
    May quickly blast these far-famed Walls;
Accomplish'd when, with direful force,
    By her own strength the City falls;
When Foes no more her might resistless feel,
But Roman bosom...

    No more, ye warblers of the wood, no more!
        Nor pour your descant, grating, on my soul;
        Thou young-eyed Spring, gay in thy verdant stole,
    More welcome were to me grim Winter's wildest roar.

    How can ye charm, ye flow'rs, with all your dyes?
        Ye blow upon the sod that wraps my friend:
        How can I to the tuneful strain attend?
    That strain flows round th' untimely tomb where Riddel lies.

    Yes, pour, ye warblers, pour the notes of woe!
        And soothe the Virtues weeping on this bier:
        The Man of Worth, who has not left his peer,
    Is in his "narrow house" for ever darkly low.

    Thee, Spring, again with joy shall others greet,
    Me, mem'ry of my loss will only meet.

        Let the sea make a noise, let the floods clap their hands.

                                                                                                            PSALM XCVIII.


    Sweet rural scene!
    Of flocks and green!
At careless ease my limbs are spread;
    All nature still,
    But yonder rill;
And list'ning pines nod o'er my head:

    In prospect wide,
    The boundless tide!
Waves cease to foam, and winds to roar;
    Without a breeze,
    The curling seas
Dance on, in measure to the shore.

    Who sings the source
    Of wealth and force?
Vast field of commerce, and big war,
    Where wonders dwell!
    Where terrors swell!
And Neptune thunders from his car?

    Where? where are t...

Nevermore at doorways that are barken
Shall the madcap wind knock and the moonlight;
Nor the circle which thou once didst darken,
Shine with footsteps of the neighbouring moonlight,
Visitors for whom thou oft didst hearken.

Nevermore, gallooned with cloudy laces,
Shall the morning, like a fair freebooter,
Make thy leaves his richest treasure-places;
Nor the sunset, like a royal suitor,
Clothe thy limbs with his imperial graces.

And no more, between the savage wonder
Of the sunset and the moon's up-coming,
Shall the storm, with boisterous hoof-beats, under
Thy dark roof dance, Faun-like, to the humming
Of the Pan-pipes of the rain and thunder.

Oft the Satyr-spirit, beauty-drunken,
Of the Spring called; and the music measure
Of thy sap mad...

How yesterday is long ago! The past
Is a fixed infinite distance from to-day,
And bygone things, the first-lived as the last,
In irreparable sameness far away.
How the to-be is infinitely ever
Out of the place wherein it will be Now,
Like the seen wave yet far up in the river,
Which reaches not us, but the new-waved flow!
This thing Time is, whose being is having none,
The equable tyrant of our different fates,
Who could not be bought off by a shattered sun
Or tricked by new use of our careful dates.
    This thing Time is, that to the grave-will bear
    My heart, sure but of it and of my fear.

The days are long and lonely,
    The weary eve comes on,
And the nights are filled with dreaming
    Of one beloved and gone.

I reach out in the darkness
    And clasp but empty air,
For Rutha dear has vanished -
    I wonder, wonder where.

Yet must it be: her nature
    So lovely, pure, and true;
So nearly like the angels,
    Is she an angel too.

The cottage is dismantled
    Of all that made it bright;
Beyond its silent portal
    No love, nor life, nor light.

Where are the hopes I cherished,
    The joys that once I knew,
The dreams, the aspirations?
    All, all are perished too.

Yes, love's dear chain is broken;
    From shore to shore I roam -
No comfort, no companion,
    No happiness, n...

What we, when face to face we see
The Father of our souls, shall be,
John tells us, doth not yet appear;
Ah! did he tell what we are here!

A mind for thoughts to pass into,
A heart for loves to travel through,
Five senses to detect things near,
Is this the whole that we are here?

Rules baffle instincts--instinct rules,
Wise men are bad--and good are fools,
Facts evil--wishes vain appear,
We cannot go, why are we here?

O may we for assurance's sake,
Some arbitrary judgement take,
And wilfully pronounce it clear,
For this or that 'tis we are here?

Or is it right, and will it do,
To pace the sad confusion through,
And say:--It doth not yet appear,
What we shall be, what we are here?

Ah yet, when all is thought and...

    Two children in a garden
    Shouting for joy
    Were playing dolls and houses,
    A girl and boy.
    I smiled at a neighbor window,
    And watched them play
    Under a budding oak tree
    On a wintry day.

    And then a board half broken
    In the high fence
    Fell over and there entered,
    I know not whence,
    A jailbird face of yellow
    With a vacant sulk,
    His body was a sickly
    Thing of bulk.

    His open mouth was slavering,
    And a green light
    Turned disc-like in his eyeballs,
    Like a dog's at night.
    His teeth were like a giant's,
    And far apart;
    I saw him reel on the children
    With a stopping heart.
    He trampled their dolls and ruined
    The hou...

Children (as such forgive them) have I known,
Ever in their own eager pastime bent
To make the incurious bystander, intent
On his own swarming thoughts, an interest own;
Too fearful or too fond to play alone.
Do thou, whom light in thine own inmost soul
(Not less thy boast) illuminates, control
Wishes unworthy of a man full-grown.
What though the holy secret which moulds thee
Moulds not the solid Earth? though never Winds
Have whisper’d it to the complaining Sea,
Nature’s great law, and law of all men’s minds
To its own impulse every creature stirs:
Live by thy light, and Earth will live by hers

It's such a little thing to weep,
So short a thing to sigh;
And yet by trades the size of these
We men and women die!

That which is marred at birth Time shall not mend,
Nor water out of bitter well make clean;
All evil thing returneth at the end,
Or elseway walketh in our blood unseen.
Whereby the more is sorrow in certaine,
Dayspring mishandled cometh not agen.

To-bruized be that slender, sterting spray
Out of the oake's rind that should betide
A branch of girt and goodliness, straightway
Her spring is turned on herself, and wried
And knotted like some gall or veiney wen.
Dayspring mishandled cometh not againe.

Noontide repayeth never morning-bliss
Sith noon to morn is incomparable;
And, so it be our dawning goth amiss,
None other after-hour serveth well.
Ah! Jesu-Moder, pitie my oe paine
Dayspring mishandled cometh not againe!

Villain shows his indiscretion,
Villain's partner makes confession.
Juvenile, with golden tresses,
Finds her pa and dons long dresses.
Scapegrace comes home money-laden,
Hero comforts tearful maiden,
Soubrette marries loyal chappie,
Villain skips, and all are happy.

There is sorrow enough in the natural way
From men and women to fill our day;
And when we are certain of sorrow in store,
Why do we always arrange for more?
Brothers and Sisters, I bid you beware
Of giving your heart to a dog to tear.

Buy a pup and your money will buy
Love unflinching that cannot lie,
Perfect passion and worship fed
By a kick in the ribs or a pat on the head.
Nevertheless it is hardly fair
To risk your heart for a dog to tear.

When the fourteen years which Nature permits
Are closing in asthma, or tumour, or fits,
And the vet's unspoken prescription runs
To lethal chambers or loaded guns,
Then you will find, it's your own affair,
But . . . you've given your heart to a dog to tear.

When the body that lived at your sin...

Ye nymphs! if e'er your eyes were red
With tears o'er hapless favourites shed,
O share Maria's grief!
Her favourite, even in his cage,
(What will not hunger's cruel rage?)
Assassin'd by a thief.


Where Rhenus strays his vines among,
The egg was laid from which he sprung;
And, though by nature mute,
Or only with a whistle blest,
Well taught he all the sounds express'd
Of flageolet or flute.


The honours of his ebon poll
Were brighter than the sleekest mole,
His bosom of the hue
With which Aurora decks the skies,
When piping winds shall soon arise,
To sweep away the dew.


Above, below, in all the house,
Dire foe alike of bird and mouse,
No cat had leave to dwell;
And Bully's cage supported stood
On p...

Take the harp, but very softly for our brother touch the strings:
Wind and wood shall help to wail him, waves and mournful mountain-springs.
Take the harp, but very softly, for the friend who grew so old
Through the hours we would not hear of nights we would not fain behold!
Other voices, sweeter voices, shall lament him year by year,
Though the morning finds us lonely, though we sit and marvel here:
Marvel much while Summer cometh, trammelled with November wheat,
Gold about her forehead gleaming, green and gold about her feet;
Yea, and while the land is dark with plover, gull, and gloomy glede,
Where the cold, swift songs of Winter fill the interlucent reed.

Yet, my harp and oh, my fathers! never look for Sorrow’s lay,
Making life a mighty darkness in the patient noon of day;

In the unquiet night,
With all her beauty bright,
She walketh my silent chamber to and fro;
Not twice of the same mind,
Sometimes unkind - unkind,
And again no cooing dove hath a voice so sweet and low.

Such madness of mirth lies
In the haunting hazel eyes,
When the melody of her laugh charms the listening night;
Its glamour as of old
My charmed senses hold,
Forget I earth and heaven in the pleasures of sense and sight.

With sudden gay caprice
Quaint sonnets doth she seize,
Wedding them unto sweetness, falling from crimson lips;
Holding the broidered flowers
Of those enchanted hours,
When she wound my will with her silk round her white finger-tips.

Then doth she silent stand,
Lifting her slender hand,
On which gleams the r...