Two old fogies, - Dick an me, -
Old, an grey as grey can be.
A'a,-but monny a jolly spree
We have had; -
An tha ne'er went back o' me; -
Bonny lad!

All thi life, sin puppy days
We've been chums: - tha knows mi ways; -
An noa matter what fowk says,
On we jog.
'Spite what tricks dame Fortun plays, -
Tha'rt my dog.

Th' world wod seem a dreary spot, -
All mi joys wod goa to pot; -
Looansum be mi little cot,
Withaat thee;
A'a, tha knows awst freeat a lot
If tha'd to dee.

Once on a time we rammeld far
O'er hills an dales, an rugged scar;
Whear fowk, less ventersum, ne'er dar
To set ther feet;
An nowt wor thear awr peace to mar; -
Oh, it wor sweet!

But nah, old chap, thi limbs are stiff; -
Tha conno...

1.

Why should my anxious breast repine,
Because my youth is fled?
Days of delight may still be mine;
Affection is not dead.
In tracing back the years of youth,
One firm record, one lasting truth
Celestial consolation brings;
Bear it, ye breezes, to the seat,
Where first my heart responsive beat, -
"Friendship is Love without his wings!"


2

Through few, but deeply chequer'd years,
What moments have been mine!
Now half obscured by clouds of tears,
Now bright in rays divine;
Howe'er my future doom be cast,
My soul, enraptured with the past,
To one idea fondly clings;
Friendship! that thought is all thine own,
Worth worlds of bliss, that thought alone -
"Friendship is Love without his wings!"


3
...

Fresco ambroso fiorito e verde colle.

HE CONGRATULATES HIS HEART ON ITS REMAINING WITH HER.


    O hill with green o'erspread, with groves o'erhung!
Where musing now, now trilling her sweet lay,
Most like what bards of heavenly spirits say,
Sits she by fame through every region sung:
My heart, which wisely unto her has clung--
More wise, if there, in absence blest, it stay!
Notes now the turf o'er which her soft steps stray,
Now where her angel-eyes' mild beam is flung;
Then throbs and murmurs, as they onward rove,
"Ah! were he here, that man of wretched lot,
Doom'd but to taste the bitterness of love!"
She, conscious, smiles: our feelings tally not:
Heartless am I, mere stone; heaven is thy grove--
O dear delightful shade, O consecrated spo...

[1]

Scene, the Royal Exchange

CORYDON

Now the keen rigour of the winter's o'er,
No hail descends, and frost can pinch no more,
While other girls confess the genial spring,
And laugh aloud, or amorous ditties sing,
Secure from cold, their lovely necks display,
And throw each useless chafing-dish away;
Why sits my Phillis discontented here,
Nor feels the turn of the revolving year?
Why on that brow dwell sorrow and dismay,
Where Loves were wont to sport, and Smiles to play?

PHILLIS

Ah, Corydon! survey the 'Change around,
Through all the 'Change no wretch like me is found:
Alas! the day, when I, poor heedless maid,
Was to your rooms in Lincoln's Inn betray'd;
Then how you swore, how many vows you made!
Ye listen...

In God's commands ne'er ask the reason why;
Let thy obedience be the best reply.

(DEDICATED TO CHATEAUBRIAND.)

[Bk. IV. vi., July, 1822.]


Woe unto him! the child of this sad earth,
    Who, in a troubled world, unjust and blind,
Bears Genius - treasure of celestial birth,
    Within his solitary soul enshrined.
Woe unto him! for Envy's pangs impure,
    Like the undying vultures', will be driven
Into his noble heart, that must endure
Pangs for each triumph; and, still unforgiven,
Suffer Prometheus' doom, who ravished fire from Heaven.

Still though his destiny on earth may be
    Grief and injustice; who would not endure
With joyful calm, each proffered agony;
    Could he the prize of Genius thus ensure?
What mortal feeling kindled in his soul
    That clear celestial flame, so pure and high,
O'er which nor tim...

I

O goat-foot God of Arcady!
This modern world is grey and old,
And what remains to us of thee?

No more the shepherd lads in glee
Throw apples at thy wattled fold,
O goat-foot God of Arcady!

Nor through the laurels can one see
Thy soft brown limbs, thy beard of gold,
And what remains to us of thee?

And dull and dead our Thames would be,
For here the winds are chill and cold,
O goat-foot God of Arcady!

Then keep the tomb of Helice,
Thine olive-woods, thy vine-clad wold,
And what remains to us of thee?

Though many an unsung elegy
Sleeps in the reeds our rivers hold,
O goat-foot God of Arcady!
Ah, what remains to us of thee?

II

Ah, leave the hills of Arcady,
Thy satyrs and their wanton ...

        Cometh the night.    The wind falls low,
        The trees swing slowly to and fro:
        Around the church the headstones grey
        Cluster, like children strayed away
        But found again, and folded so.

        No chiding look doth she bestow:
        If she is glad, they cannot know;
        If ill or well they spend their day,
            Cometh the night.

        Singing or sad, intent they go;
        They do not see the shadows grow;
        "There yet is time," they lightly say,
        "Before our work aside we lay";
        Their task is but half-done, and lo!
            Cometh the night.

Here in turn succeed and rule
Carter, smith, and village fool,
Then again the place is known
As tavern, shop, and Sunday-school;
Now somehow it's come to me
To light the fire and hold the key,
Here in Heaven to reign alone.

All the walls are white with lime,
Big blue periwinkles climb
And kiss the crumbling window-sill;
Snug inside I sit and rhyme,
Planning, poem, book, or fable,
At my darling beech-wood table
Fresh with bluebells from the hill.

Through the window I can see
Rooks above the cherry-tree,
Sparrows in the violet bed,
Bramble-bush and bumble-bee,
And old red bracken smoulders still
Among boulders on the hill,
Far too bright to seem quite dead.

But old Death, who can't forget,
Waits his time and watche...

We, O Nature, depart:
Thou survivest us: this,
This, I know, is the law.
Yes, but more than this,
Thou who seest us die
Seest us change while we live;
Seest our dreams one by one,
Seest our errors depart:
Watchest us, Nature, throughout,
Mild and inscrutably calm.

Well for us that we change!
Well for us that the Power
Which in our morning prime
Saw the mistakes of our youth,
Sweet, and forgiving, and good,
Sees the contrition of age!

Behold, O Nature, this pair!
See them to-night where they stand,
Not with the halo of youth
Crowning their brows with its light,
Not with the sunshine of hope,
Not with the rapture of spring,
Which they had of old, when they stood
Years ago at my side
In this self same garden, an...

"For old sake's sake!" 'Twere hard to choose
Words fitter for an old-world Muse
Than these, that in their cadence bring
Faint fragrance of the posy-ring,
And charms that rustic lovers use.

The long day lengthens, and we lose
The first pale flush, the morning hues,--
Ah! but the back-look, lingering,
For old sake's sake!

That we retain. Though Time refuse
To lift the veil on forward views,
Despot in most, he is not King
Of those kind memories that cling
Around his travelled avenues
For old sake's sake!



"Qui n'a pas l'esprit de son âge
De son âge a tout le malheur."
Voltaire.

My latest tribute here I send,
With this let your collection end.
Thus I consign you down to fame
A character to praise or blame:
And if the whole may pass for true,
Contented rest, you have your due.
Give future time the satisfaction,
To leave one handle for detraction.

Where we sat at dawn together, while the star-rich heavens shifted,
We were weaving dreams in silence, suddenly the veil was lifted.
By a hand of fire awakened, in a moment caught and led
Upward to the wondrous vision: through the star-mists overhead
Flare and flaunt the monstrous highlands; on the sapphire coast of night
Fall the ghostly froth and fringes of the ocean of the light.
Many coloured shine the vapours: to the moon-eye far away
'Tis the fairy ring of twilight mid the spheres of night and day,
Girdling with a rainbow cincture round the planet where we go,
We and it together fleeting, poised upon the pearl    glow;
We and it and all together flashing through the starry spaces
In a tempest dream of beauty lighting up the place of places.
Half our eyes behold the glory: h...

When first that smile, like sunshine, blest my sight,
    Oh what a vision then came o'er me!
Long years of love, of calm and pure delight,
    Seemed in that smile to pass before me.
Ne'er did the peasant dream of summer skies,
    Of golden fruit and harvests springing,
With fonder hope than I of those sweet eyes,
    And of the joy their light was bringing.

Where now are all those fondly-promised hours?
    Ah! woman's faith is like her brightness--
Fading as fast as rainbows or day-flowers,
    Or aught that's known for grace and lightness.
Short as the Persian's prayer, at close of day,
    Should be each vow of Love's repeating;
Quick let him worship Beauty's precious ray--
    Even while he kneels, that ray is fleeting!

    I would enshrine in silvern song
    The charm that bore our souls along,
        As in the sun-flushed days of summer
    We felt the pulsings of nature's throng;

    When flecks of foam of flying spray
    Smote white the red sun's torrid ray,
        Or wimpling fogs toyed with the mountain,
    Aërial spirits of dew at play;

    When hovering stars, poised in the blue,
    Came down and ever closer drew;
        Or, in the autumn air astringent,
    Glimmered the pearls of the moonlit dew.


    We talked of bird and flower and tree,
    Of God and man and destiny.
        The years are wise though days be foolish,
    We said, as swung to its goal the sea.

    Our spirits knew keen fellowship
    Of light and shadow, h...

I many a time haue greatly marueil'd, why
Men say, their friends depart when as they die,
How well that word, a dying, doth expresse,
I did not know (I freely must confesse,)
Till her departure: for whose missed sight,
I am enforc'd this Elegy to write:
But since resistlesse fate will haue it so,
That she from hence must to Iberia goe,
And my weak wishes can her not detaine,
I will of heauen in policy complaine,
That it so long her trauell should adiourne,
Hoping thereby to hasten her returne.
Can those of Norway for their wage procure,[1]
By their blacke spells a winde that shall endure
Till from aboard the wished land men see,
And fetch the harbour, where they long to be,
Can they by charmes doe this and cannot I
Who am the Priest of Phoebus,...

When the mist drives past and the wind blows high,
And the harbour lights are dim -
See where they circle, and dip and fly,
The grey free-lances of wind and sky,
To the water's distant rim!

Like spirits possessed of a fierce delight,
A courage that cannot fail,
They face the breakers - they face the night -
The mad storm-horses are silvery white,
They ride through the bitter gale!

They seem like the souls of the long, long lost,
Who breasted the ocean-main -
Vikings whose vessels were tempest-tossed,
Voyagers who sailed, whatever the cost,
And never came home again.

Or stranger and wilder fancy - it seems
As I hear their wind-torn cry,
No birds fly there through the sun's last gleams,
But the wraiths of hopes - the ghosts of dreams<...

Obscurest night involved the sky,
The Atlantic billows roar’d,
When such a destined wretch as I,
Wash’d headlong from on board,
Of friends, of hope, of all bereft,
His floating home for ever left.


No braver chief could Albion boast
Than he with whom he went,
Nor ever ship left Albion’s coast
With warmer wishes sent.
He loved them both, but both in vain,
Nor him beheld, nor her again.


Not long beneath the whelming brine,
Expert to swim, he lay;
Nor soon he felt his strength decline,
Or courage die away:
But waged with death a lasting strife,
Supported by despair of life.


He shouted; nor his friends had fail’d
To check the vessel’s course,
But so the furious blast prevail’d,
That, pitiless perforce,