I.
HER, that yer Honour was spakin’ to? Whin, yer Honour? last year—
Standin’ here be the bridge, when last yer Honour was here?
An’ yer Honour ye gev her the top of the mornin’, ‘Tomorra’ says she.
What did they call her, yer Honour? They call’d her Molly Magee.
An’ yer Honour’s the thrue ould blood that always manes to be kind,
But there’s rason in all things, yer Honour, for Molly was out of her mind.

II.
Shure, an’ meself remimbers wan night comin’ down be the sthrame,
An’ it seems to me now like a bit of yisther-day in a dhrame—
Here where yer Honour seen her—there was but a slip of a moon,
But I hard thim—Molly Magee wid her batchelor, Danny O’Roon—
‘You’ve been takin’ a dhrop o’ the crathur’ an’ Danny says ‘Troth, an’ I been
Dhrinkin’ yer health wid Shamus O’She...

Amor con la man destra il lato manco.

UNDER THE FIGURE OF A LAUREL, HE RELATES THE GROWTH OF HIS LOVE.


    My poor heart op'ning with his puissant hand,
Love planted there, as in its home, to dwell
A Laurel, green and bright, whose hues might well
In rivalry with proudest emeralds stand:
Plough'd by my pen and by my heart-sighs fann'd,
Cool'd by the soft rain from mine eyes that fell,
It grew in grace, upbreathing a sweet smell,
Unparallel'd in any age or land.
Fair fame, bright honour, virtue firm, rare grace,
The chastest beauty in celestial frame,--
These be the roots whence birth so noble came.
Such ever in my mind her form I trace,
A happy burden and a holy thing,
To which on rev'rent knee with loving prayer I cling.

MACGREG...

"Alive?" And I leapt in my wonder,
Was faint of my joyance,
And grasses and grove shone in garments
Of glory to me.

"She lives, in a plenteous well-being,
To-day as aforehand;
The dead bore the name though a rare one -
The name that bore she."

She lived . . . I, afar in the city
Of frenzy-led factions,
Had squandered green years and maturer
In bowing the knee

To Baals illusive and specious,
Till chance had there voiced me
That one I loved vainly in nonage
Had ceased her to be.

The passion the planets had scowled on,
And change had let dwindle,
Her death-rumour smartly relifted
To full apogee.

I mounted a steed in the dawning
With acheful remembrance,
And made for the ancient West Highway
To far E...

That day--it was the last of many days,
Nor could we know when such days might be given
Again--we read how Dante trod the ways
Of utmost Hell, and how his heart was riven
By sad Francesca, whose sin was forgiven
So far that, on her Paolo fixing gaze,
She supt on his again, and thought it Heaven,
She knew her gentler fate and felt it praise.

We read that lovers' tale; each lookt at each;
But one was fearless, innocent of guile;
So did the other learn what she could teach:
We read no more, we kiss'd not, but a smile
Of proud possession flasht, hover'd a while
'Twixt soul and soul. There was no need for speech.

    You've seen a pair of faithful lovers die:
    And much you care; for most of you will cry,
    'Twas a just judgment on their constancy.
    For, heaven be thank'd, we live in such an age,
    When no man dies for love, but on the stage:
    And even those martyrs are but rare in plays;
    A cursed sign how much true faith decays.
    Love is no more a violent desire;
    'Tis a mere metaphor, a painted fire.
    In all our sex, the name examined well,
    Tis pride to gain, and vanity to tell.
    In woman, 'tis of subtle interest made:
    Curse on the punk that made it first a trade!
    She first did wit's prerogative remove,
    And made a fool presume to prate of love.
    Let honour and preferment go for gold;
    But glorious beauty is not to be ...

Who is Lydia, pray, and who
Is Hypatia? Softly, dear,
Let me breathe it in your ear--
They are you, and only you.
And those other nameless two
Walking in Arcadian air--
She that was so very fair?
She that had the twilight hair?--
They were you, dear, only you.
If I speak of night or day,
Grace of fern or bloom of grape,
Hanging cloud or fountain spray,
Gem or star or glistening dew,
Or of mythologic shape,
Psyche, Pyrrha, Daphne, say--
I mean you, dear, you, just you.

While one sere leaf, that parting Autumn gilds,
    Trembles upon the thin, and naked spray,
    November, dragging on his sunless day,
    Lours, cold and fallen, on the watry fields;
And Nature to the waste dominion yields,
    Stript her last robes, with gold and purple gay. -
    So droops my life, of your soft beams despoil'd,
    Youth, Health, and Hope, that long exulting smil'd;
And the wild carols, and the bloomy hues
    Of merry Spring-time, spruce on every plain
    Her half-blown bushes, moist with sunny rain,
More pensive thoughts in my sunk heart infuse
    Than Winter's grey, and desolate domain,
    Faded, like my lost Youth, that no bright Spring renews.

    Oh, be not led away.
Lured by the colour of the sun-rich day.
    The gay romances of song
Unto the spirit-life doth not belong.
    Though far-between the hours
In which the Master of Angelic Powers
    Lightens the dusk within
The Holy of Holies;    be it thine to win
    Rare vistas of white light,
Half-parted lips, through which the Infinite
    Murmurs her ancient story;
Hearkening to whom the wandering planets hoary
    Waken primeval fires,
With deeper rapture in celestial choirs
    Breathe, and with fleeter motion
Wheel in their orbits through the surgeless ocean.
    So, hearken thou like these,
Intent on her, mounting by slow degrees,
    Until thy song's elation
Echoes her multitudinous meditation.

--November 15, 1893

A strange life - strangely passed!
    We may not read the soul
    When God has folded up the scroll
        In death at last.
We may not - dare not say of one
Whose task of life as well was done
As he could do it, - "This is lost,
And prayers may never pay the cost."

Who listens to the song
    That sings within the breast,
    Should ever hear the good expressed
        Above the wrong.
And he who leans an eager ear
To catch the discord, he will hear
The echoes of his own weak heart
Beat out the most discordant part.

Whose tender heart could build
    Affection's bower above
    A heart where baby nests of love
        Were ever filled, -
With upward growth may reach and twine
About the children, grown divine,
That ...

I. 1.

Hence, to the realms of Night, dire Demon, hence!
    Thy chain of adamant can bind
    That little world, the human mind,
And sink its noblest powers to impotence.
    Wake the lion's loudest roar,
    Clot his shaggy mane with gore,
    With flashing fury bid his eye-balls shine;
    Meek is his savage, sullen soul, to thine!
    Thy touch, thy deadening touch has steel'd the breast, [Footnote 2]
    Whence, thro' her April-shower, soft Pity smil'd;
    Has clos'd the heart each godlike virtue bless'd,
    To all the silent pleadings of his child.
    At thy command he plants the dagger deep,
At thy command exults, tho' Nature bids him weep!

I. 2.

When, with a frown that froze the peopled earth, [Footnote 3]
    Thou dartedst thy...

When she comes home again! A thousand ways
I fashion, to myself, the tenderness
Of my glad welcome: I shall tremble - yes;
And touch her, as when first in the old days
I touched her girlish hand, nor dared upraise
Mine eyes, such was my faint heart's sweet distress.
Then silence: And the perfume of her dress:
The room will sway a little, and a haze
Cloy eyesight - soulsight, even - for a space:
And tears - yes; and the ache here in the throat,
To know that I so ill deserve the place
Her arms make for me; and the sobbing note
I stay with kisses, ere the tearful face
Again is hidden in the old embrace.

How few there are who know the pure delight,
The chaste influence, and the solace sweet,
Of walking forth to see the glorious sight,
When nature rises, with respect, to greet
The lord of day on his majestic seat,
Like some great personage of high degree,
Who cometh forth his subjects all to meet,
Like him, but yet more glorious far than he,
He comes with splendor bright, to shed o'er land and sea.

With stately, slow and solemn march he comes,
And gradually pours forth his brilliant rays,
Unheralded by sounding brass or drums,
His blazing glory on our planet plays,
And sendeth healing light thro' darken'd ways.
His undimm'd splendor maketh mortals quail,
And e'en, at times, it fiercely strikes and slays;
But then it brighteneth the cheek so pale,
Rev...

Well, Mabel, 'tis over and ended -
    The ball I wrote was to be;
And oh! it was perfectly splendid -
    If you could have been here to see.
I've a thousand things to write you
    That I know you are wanting to hear,
And one, that is sure to delight you -
    I am wearing Joe's diamond, my dear!

Yes, mamma is quite ecstatic
    That I am engaged to Joe;
She thinks I am rather erratic,
    And feared that I might say "No."
But, Mabel, I'm twenty-seven
    (Though nobody dreams it, dear),
And a fortune like Joe's isn't given
    To lay at one's feet each year.

You know my old fancy for Harry -
    Or, at least, I am certain you guessed
That it took all my sense not to marry
    And go with that fellow out west.
Bu...

TO ----.


What shall I sing thee? Shall I tell
Of that bright hour, remembered well
As tho' it shone but yesterday,

When loitering idly in the ray
Of a spring sun I heard o'er-head,
My name as by some spirit said,
And, looking up, saw two bright eyes
    Above me from a casement shine,
Dazzling my mind with such surprise
    As they, who sail beyond the Line,
Feel when new stars above them rise;--
And it was thine, the voice that spoke,
    Like Ariel's, in the mid-air then;
And thine the eye whose lustre broke--
    Never to be forgot again!

What shall I sing thee? Shall I weave
A song of that sweet summer-eve,
(Summer, of which the sunniest part
Was that we, each, had in the heart,)
When thou and I, and one like the...

A Gyges ring they bear about them still,
To be, and not seen when and where they will;
They tread on clouds, and though they sometimes fall,
They fall like dew, and make no noise at all:
So silently they one to th' other come,
As colours steal into the pear or plum,
And air-like, leave no pression to be seen
Where'er they met, or parting place has been.

I dare not spoil this spotless page
With any feeble verse of mine;
The Poet's fire has lost its rage,
Around his lyre no myrtles twine.

The voice of fame cannot recal
Those fairy days of past delight,
When pleasure seem'd to welcome all,
And morning hail'd a welcome night.

E'en love has lost its soothing power,
Its spells no more can chain my soul;
I must not venture in the bower,
Where Wit and Verse and Wine controul.

And yet, I fear, in thoughtless mirth
I once did say, Eliza, dear!
That I would tell the world thy worth,
And write the living record here.

Come Love, and Truth, and Friendship, come,
Enwreath'd in Virtue's snowy arms,
With magic rhymes the page illume,
And fancy sketch her varied charms--

Which ...

I have a fellowship with every shade
Of changing nature: with the tempest hour
My soul goes forth to claim her early dower
Of living princedom; and her wings have staid
Amidst the wildest uproar undismayed!
Yet she hath often owned a better power,
And blessed the gentle coming of the shower,
The speechless majesty of love arrayed
In lowly virtue, under which disguise
Full many a princely thing hath passed her by;
And she from homely intercourse of eyes
Hath gathered visions wider than the sky,
And seen the withered heart of man arise
Peaceful as God, and full of majesty.

Suspicion, discontent, and strife
Come in for dowry with a wife.