[To F., who complained of his vagueness and lack of dogmatic statement]

    Not, I suppose, since I deny
    Appearance is reality,
    And doubt the substance of the earth
    Does your remonstrance come to birth;
    Not that at once I both affirm
    'Tis not the skin that makes the worm
    And every tactile thing with mass
    Must find its symbol in the grass
    And with a cool conviction say
    Even a critic's more than clay
    And every dog outlives his day.
    This kind of vagueness suits your view,
    You would not carp at it; for you
    Did never stand with those who take
    Their pleasures in a world opaque.
    For you a tree would never be
    Lovely were it but a tree,
    And earthly splendours never splendid

The ancient Highlanders believed the spirits of their departed friends continually present, and that their imagined appearances and voices communicated warnings of approaching death.


Oh! set the bridal feast aside,
And bear the harp away;
The coronach must sound instead,
From solemn kirk-yard gray.

I heard last eve, at set of sun,
The death-bell on the gale.
It was no earthly melody:--
The eglantine grew pale;

And leaf and blossom seemed to thrill
With an unuttered prayer,
As, fraught with desolateness wild,
The strange notes stirred the air.

And on the rugged mountain height,
Where snow and sunbeam meet,
That never yet in storm or shine
Was trod by human feet,

A weird and spectral presence came
Between me and the ...

If I have seemed more prompt to censure wrong
Than praise the right; if seldom to thine ear
My voice hath mingled with the exultant cheer
Borne upon all our Northern winds along;
If I have failed to join the fickle throng
In wide-eyed wonder, that thou standest strong
In victory, surprised in thee to find
Brougham's scathing power with Canning's grace combined;
That he, for whom the ninefold Muses sang,
From their twined arms a giant athlete sprang,
Barbing the arrows of his native tongue
With the spent shafts Latona's archer flung,
To smite the Python of our land and time,
Fell as the monster born of Crissa's slime,
Like the blind bard who in Castalian springs
Tempered the steel that clove the crest of kings,
And on the shrine of England's freedom laid
T...

(Southampton Docks: October, 1899)



Here, where Vespasian's legions struck the sands,
And Cerdic with his Saxons entered in,
And Henry's army leapt afloat to win
Convincing triumphs over neighbour lands,

Vaster battalions press for further strands,
To argue in the self-same bloody mode
Which this late age of thought, and pact, and code,
Still fails to mend. - Now deckward tramp the bands,
Yellow as autumn leaves, alive as spring;
And as each host draws out upon the sea
Beyond which lies the tragical To-be,
None dubious of the cause, none murmuring,

Wives, sisters, parents, wave white hands and smile,
As if they knew not that they weep the while.

        Instrumenta regni.--TACITUS.


Here's a choice set of Tools for you, Ge'mmen and Ladies,
They'll fit you quite handy, whatever your trade is;
(Except it be Cabinet-making;--no doubt,
In that delicate service they're rather worn out;
Tho' their owner, bright youth! if he'd had his own will,
Would have bungled away with them joyously still.)
You see they've been pretty well hackt--and alack!
What tool is there job after job will not hack?
Their edge is but dullish it must be confest,
And their temper, like Ellenborough's, none of the best;
But you'll find them good hardworking Tools, upon trying,
Were't but for their brass they are well worth the buying;
They're famous for making blinds, sliders, and screens,

When success exalts thy lot,
God for thy virtue lays a plot:
And all thy life is for thy own,
Then for mankind's instruction shown;
And though thy knees were never bent,
To Heaven thy hourly prayers are sent,
And whether formed for good or ill,
Are registered and answered still.

With kindly thoughts full oft we've met,
And bow'd at Friendship's sacred shrine;
Oh, may we ne'er those thoughts forget,
But may they still our hearts entwine.

May both retain those feelings long,
Which prompt the words of friendly tongue,
May I not fail to think of thee,
Nor you to think of T. F. Young.

Songs that could span the earth,
When leaping thought had stirred them,
In many an hour since birth,
We heard or dreamed we heard them.

Sometimes to all their sway
We yield ourselves half fearing,
Sometimes with hearts grown grey
We curse ourselves for hearing.

We toil and but begin;
In vain our spirits fret them,
We strive, and cannot win,
Nor evermore forget them.

A light that will not stand,
That comes and goes in flashes,
Fair fruits that in the hand
Are turned to dust and ashes.

Yet still the deep thoughts ring
Around and through and through us,
Sweet mights that make us sing,
But bring no resting to us.

I.

An empty sky, a world of heather,
Purple of foxglove, yellow of broom;
We two among them wading together,
Shaking out honey, treading perfume.

Crowds of bees are giddy with clover,
Crowds of grasshoppers skip at our feet,
Crowds of larks at their matins hang over,
Thanking the Lord for a life so sweet.

Flusheth the rise with her purple favor,
Gloweth the cleft with her golden ring,
'Twixt the two brown butterflies waver,
Lightly settle, and sleepily swing.

We two walk till the purple dieth
And short dry grass under foot is brown.
But one little streak at a distance lieth
Green like a ribbon to prank the down.


II.

Over the grass we stepped unto it,
And God He knoweth how blithe we were!
Never a vo...

(See Note 65)

"Here your Hamar-made matches!" -
Of them these verses I sang;
A thought to which humor attaches,
But yet to my heart sparks sprang.

Sparks from the box-side flying
Sank deep in my memory,
Till in a light undying
Two eyes cast their spell on me, -

Light on the fire that's present,
When faith blazes forth in deed.
Know, that to every peasant
Those eyes sent a light in need.

Sent to souls without measure
The flame of love's message broad,
Gathering in one treasure
Fatherland, home, and God.

For it was Herman Anker
Took of his fathers' gold,
Loaned it as wisdom's banker,
Spread riches of thought untold,

Scattered it wide as living
Seed for the soil to enwrap;
Flowers spring from ...

"Thy gentleness hath made me great."

Now winter past, the white-thorn bower
    Breaks forth and buds down all the glen;
Now spreads the leaf and grows the flower:
    So grows the life of God, in men.

Oh, my child-God, most gentle King,
    To me Thy waxing glory show;
Wake in my heart as wakes the spring,
    Grow as the leaf and lily grow.

I was a child, when Thou a child
    Didst make Thyself again to me;
And holy, harmless, undefiled,
    Play'd at Thy mother Mary's knee.

Thou gav'st Thy pure example so,
    The copy in my childish breast
Was a child's copy. I did know
    God, made in childhood manifest.

Now I am grown, and Thou art grown
    The God-man, strong to love, to will,
Who was alone, yet not...

Orchards in the Spring-time! Oh, I think and think of them,--
Filmy mists of pink and white above the fresh, young green,
Lifting and drifting,--how my eyes could drink of them,
I'm staring at a dirty wall beyond a big machine.

Orchards in the Spring-time! Deep in soft, cool shadows,--
Moving all together when the west wind blows
Fragrance upon fragrance over road and meadows--
I'm smelling heat and oil and sweat, and thick, black clothes.

Orchards in the Spring-time! The clean white and pink of them
Lifting and drifting with all the winds that blow.
Orchards in the Spring-time! Thank God I still can think of them!
You're not docked for thinking,--if the foreman doesn't know.

By night when others soundly slept
And hath at once both ease and Rest,
My waking eyes were open kept
And so to lie I found it best.

I sought him whom my Soul did Love,
With tears I sought him earnestly.
He bow'd his ear down from Above.
In vain I did not seek or cry.

My hungry Soul he fill'd with Good;
He in his Bottle put my tears,
My smarting wounds washt in his blood,
And banisht thence my Doubts and fears.

What to my Saviour shall I give
Who freely hath done this for me?
I'll serve him here whilst I shall live
And Loue him to Eternity

Immortal is an ample word
When what we need is by,
But when it leaves us for a time,
'T is a necessity.

Of heaven above the firmest proof
We fundamental know,
Except for its marauding hand,
It had been heaven below.

Dante.


    He liv'd and lov'd; he suffer'd; he was poor;
    But he was gifted with the gifts of Heaven,
    And those of all the week-days that are seven,
    And those of all the centuries that endure.
    He bow'd to none; he kept his honour sure.
    He follow'd in the wake of those Eleven
    Who walk'd with Christ, and lifted up his steven[A]
    To keep the bulwarks of his faith secure.
    He knew the secrets of the singing-time;
    He track'd the sun; he ate the luscious fruit
    Of grief and joy; and with his wonder-lute
    He made himself a name in every clime.
    The minds of men were madly stricken mute
    And all the world lay subject to his rhyme!

[A] Steven, a voice; old word revived.

Ye mountains, on whose torrent-furrowed slopes,
And bare and silent brows uplift to heaven,
I envied oft the soul which fills your wastes
Of pure and stern sublime, and still expanse
Unbroken by the petty incidents
Of noisy life:    Oh hear me once again!

Winds, upon whose racked eddies, far aloft,
Above the murmur of the uneasy world,
My thoughts in exultation held their way:
Whose tremulous whispers through the rustling glade
Were once to me unearthly tones of love,
Joy without object, wordless music, stealing
Through all my soul, until my pulse beat fast
With aimless hope, and unexpressed desire--
Thou sea, who wast to me a prophet deep
Through all thy restless waves, and wasting shores,
Of silent labour, and eternal change;
First teacher of the ...

I saw her for a moment,
    Her presence haunts me yet,
In oft-recurring visions
    Of grace and gladness met
That marked the sweet demeanor
    Of dainty Margaret.

Like gossamer her robe was
    Around her lightly drawn,
A filmy summer-garment
    That fairy maidens don
To make them look like angels
    Croqueting on the lawn.

The mallet-sport became her
    In hue of exercise
That tinged her cheek with roses;
    And, dancing in her eyes,
Were pantomime suggestions
    Of having won - a prize.

No more to me a stranger
    Is she who occupies
A place in all my musings;
    And brings in tender guise
A thought of one so like her -
    Long years in Paradise.

Dear Margaret! that "pearl-name"
...

My lady walks her morning round,
My lady’s page her fleet greyhound,
My lady’s hair the fond winds stir,
And all the birds make songs for her.

Her thrushes sing in Rathburn bowers,
And Rathburn side is gay with flowers;
But ne’er like hers, in flower or bird,
Was beauty seen or music heard.

The distance of the stars is hers;
The least of all her worshippers,
The dust beneath her dainty heel,
She knows not that I see or feel.

Oh, proud and calm! she cannot know
Where’er she goes with her I go;
Oh, cold and fair! she cannot guess
I kneel to share her hound’s caress!

Gay knights beside her hunt and hawk,
I rob their ears of her sweet talk;
Her suitors come from east and west,
I steal her smiles from every guest.

U...