I hate the fellow who sits around
    And knocks the livelong day--
Who tells of the work he might have done;
    If things had come his way.
But I love the fellow who pushes ahead
    And smiles at his work or play--
You can wager when things do come around,
    They will come his way--and stay.

Be far-fam'd [2]RHODES the theme of loftier strains,
Or [3]MITYLENE, as their Bard decrees;
Or EPHESUS, where great DIANA reigns,
Or CORINTH, towering 'twixt the rival seas;
Or THEBES, illustrious in thy birth divine,
Purpureal BACCHUS; - or of PHOEBUS' shrine
DELPHOS oracular; or warbling hail
Thessalian TEMPE's flower-embroider'd vale.

The Art-crown'd City, chaste MINERVA's pride,
There are, whose endless numbers have pourtray'd;
They, to each tree that spreads its branches wide,
Prefer the [4]tawny Olive's scanty shade.
Many, in JUNO's honor, sing thy meads,
Green ARGOS, glorying in thy agile steeds;
Or opulent MYCENE, whose proud fanes
The blood of murder'd AGAMEMNON stains.

Nor patient LACEDÆMON wakes my lyre,
Who trains her Sons to all t...

I

Breathe not, hid Heart: cease silently,
And though thy birth-hour beckons thee,
Sleep the long sleep:
The Doomsters heap
Travails and teens around us here,
And Time-wraiths turn our songsingings to fear.

II

Hark, how the peoples surge and sigh,
And laughters fail, and greetings die:
Hopes dwindle; yea,
Faiths waste away,
Affections and enthusiasms numb;
Thou canst not mend these things if thou dost come.

III

Had I the ear of wombed souls
Ere their terrestrial chart unrolls,
And thou wert free
To cease, or be,
Then would I tell thee all I know,
And put it to thee: Wilt thou take Life so?

IV

Vain vow! No hint of mine may hence
To theeward fly: to thy locked sense
Explain none can...

("Moune, écureuil.")

[xx.]


Squirrel, mount yon oak so high,
To its twig that next the sky
Bends and trembles as a flower!
Strain, O stork, thy pinion well, -
From thy nest 'neath old church-bell,
Mount to yon tall citadel,
And its tallest donjon tower!
To your mountain, eagle old,
Mount, whose brow so white and cold,
Kisses the last ray of even!
And, O thou that lov'st to mark
Morn's first sunbeam pierce the dark,
Mount, O mount, thou joyous lark -
Joyous lark, O mount to heaven!
And now say, from topmost bough,
Towering shaft, and peak of snow,
And heaven's arch - O, can you see
One white plume that like a star,
Streams along the plain afar,
And a steed that from the war
Bears my lover back to me?

A fair young girl was to the altar led
By him she loved, the chosen of her heart;
And words of solemn import there were said,
And mutual vows were pledged till death should part.

But life was young, and death a great way off,
At least it seemed so then, on that bright morn;
And they no doubt, expected years of bliss,
And in their path the rose without a thorn.

Cherished from infancy with tenderest care,
A precious only daughter was the bride;
And when that young protector's arm she took,
She for the first time left her parents' side.

With all a woman's tender, trustful heart,
She gave herself away to him she loved;
Why should she not, was he not all her own,
A choice by friends and parents too approved?

How rapidly with him the days now...

"O thou afflicted, tossed with tempest, and not comforted, behold, I will lay thy atones with fair colours, and lay thy foundations with sapphires. And I will make thy windows of agates, and thy gates of carbuncles, and all thy borders of pleasant stones. And all thy children shall be taught of the Lord; and great shall be the peace of thy children." Isaiah, liv. 11-13.


As the sand of the desert is smitten
    By hoof-beats that strike out a light,
A flash by which dumb things are litten,
    The children of night;
So Thou who of old did'st create us,
    Among the high gods the Most High,
Strike us with Thy brightness, and let us
    Behold Thee, and die.

Grown old in blind anguish and travail,
    Thy world thou mad'st sinless and free
Gropes on, with no power to u...

Now first we stand and understand,
And sunder false from true,
And handle boldly with the hand,
And see and shape and do.

Dash back that ocean with a pier,
Strow yonder mountain flat,
A railway there, a tunnel here,
Mix me this Zone with that!

Bring me my horse—my horse? my wings
That I may soar the sky,
For Thought into the outward springs,
I find her with the eye.

O will she, moonlike, sway the main,
And bring or chase the storm,
Who was a shadow in the brain,
And is a living form?

Far as the Future vaults her skies,
From this my vantage ground
To those still-working energies
I spy nor term nor bound.

As we surpass our fathers’ skill,
Our sons will shame our own;
A thousand things are hidden still

The splendors of a southern sun
    Caress the glowing sky;
O'er crested waves, the colors glance
    And gleaming, softly die.
A gentle calm from heaven falls
    And weaves a mystic spell;
A glowing grace that charms the soul--
    Whose glory none can tell.

Oh, warm sweet treasures of a sun
    Of endless fire and love;
Those dying embers are the flames
    From heavenly fires above.
Unto the water's edge they creep
    And bathe the seas in red;
Then die like shadows on the deep
    With glory cold and dead.

A ship--a lone, dark wanderer
    Upon the southern seas,
Speeds like a white-faced messenger
    Before the dying breeze.
Her masts are tipped with amethyst,
    A splendor all untold;
A crimson mantle wraps h...

Hearts that are great beat never loud,
They muffle their music when they come;
They hurry away from the thronging crowd
With bended brows and lips half dumb,

And the world looks on and mutters -- "Proud."
But when great hearts have passed away
Men gather in awe and kiss their shroud,
And in love they kneel around their clay.

Hearts that are great are always lone,
They never will manifest their best;
Their greatest greatness is unknown --
Earth knows a little -- God, the rest.

Letter IX. To-Morrow.


I.

    O Love! O Love! O Gateway of Delight!
    Thou porch of peace, thou pageant of the prime
    Of all God's creatures! I am here to climb
    Thine upward steps, and daily and by night
    To gaze beyond them, and to search aright
    The far-off splendour of thy track sublime.


II.

    For, in thy precincts, on the further side,
    Beyond the turret where the bells are rung,
    Beyond the chapel where the rites are sung,
    There is a garden fit for any bride.
    O Love! by thee, by thee are sa...

We may not climb the heavenly steeps
To bring the Lord Christ down;
In vain we search the lowest deeps
For Him who fills Heaven's throne.

But to the contrite spirit yet
A present help is He;
And faith has yet its Olivet,
And love its Galilee.

The healing of His seamless dress
Is by our beds of pain;
We touch Him in life's throng and press,
And we are whole again.

Through Him the first fond prayers are said,
Our lips of childhood frame;
The last low whispers of our dead
Are burdened with His Name.

O Lord and Saviour of us all,
Whate'er our name or sign,
We own Thy sway, we hear Thy call,
And form our lives by Thine.

We faintly hear, we dimly see,
In differing phrase we pray;
But, dim or clear, we own i...

O Dearly loved!
And worthy of our love! No more
Thy aged form shall rise before
The bushed and waiting worshiper,
In meek obedience utterance giving
To words of truth, so fresh and living,
That, even to the inward sense,
They bore unquestioned evidence
Of an anointed Messenger!
Or, bowing down thy silver hair
In reverent awfulness of prayer,
The world, its time and sense, shut out
The brightness of Faith's holy trance
Gathered upon thy countenance,
As if each lingering cloud of doubt,
The cold, dark shadows resting here
In Time's unluminous atmosphere,
Were lifted by an angel's hand,
And through them on thy spiritual eye
Shone down the blessedness on high,
The glory of the Better Land!

The oak has fallen!
While, meet for no ...

Luck is the tuning of our inmost thought
    To chord with God's great plan.
    That done, ah! know,
Thy silent wishes to results shall grow,
And day by day shall miracles be wrought.
Once let thy being selflessly be brought
    To chime with universal good, and lo!
    What music from the spheres shall through thee flow!
What benefits shall come to thee unsought!

Shut out the noise of traffic!    Rise above
    The body's clamour!    With the soul's fine ear
    Attune thyself to harmonies divine -
All, all are written in the key of Love.
    Keep to the score, and thou hast naught to fear;
    Achievements yet undreamed of shall be thine.

"I leave my child to Heaven."    And with these words
Upon her lips, the Lady Mildred passed
Unto the rest prepared for her pure soul;
Words that meant only this: I cannot trust
Unto her earthly parent my young child,
So leave her to her heavenly Father's care;
And Heaven was gentle to the motherless,
And fair and sweet the maiden, Gladys, grew,
A pure white rose in the old castle set,
The while her father rioted abroad.

But as the day drew near when he should give,
By his dead lady's will, his child her own,
He having basely squandered all her wealth
To him intrusted, to his land returned,
And thrilled her trusting heart with terrors vague,
Of peril, of some shame to come to him,
Did she not yield unto his prayer - command,
That she would to Our La...

In Scotland’s realms, where trees are few,
Nor even shrubs abound;
But where, however bleak the view,
Some better things are found;


For husband there and wife may boast
There union undefiled,
And false ones are as rare almost
As hedgerows in the wild—


In Scotland’s realm forlorn and bare
The history chanced of late—
The history of a wedded pair,
A chaffinch and his mate.


The spring drew near, each felt a breast
With genial instinct fill’d;
They pair’d, and would have built a nest,
But found not where to build.


The heaths uncover’d and the moors
Except with snow and sleet,
Sea-beaten rocks and naked shores
Could yield them no retreat.


Long time a breeding-place they sought,
Til...

Not all the bravery that day puts on
Of gold and azure, ardent or austere,
Shall ease my soul of sorrow; grown more dear
Than all the joy that heavenly hope may don.
Far up the skies the rumor of the dawn
May run, and eve like some wild torch appear;
These shall not change the darkness, gathered here,
Of thought, that rusts like an old sword undrawn.
Oh, for a place deep-sunken from the sun!
A wildwood cave of primitive rocks and moss!
Where Sleep and Silence, breast to married breast
Lie with their child, night-eyed Oblivion;
Where, freed from all the trouble of my cross,
I might forget, I might forget, and rest!

Each year cometh with all his days,
Some are shadowed and some are bright;
He beckons us on until he stays
Kneeling with us 'neath Christmas night.

Kneeling under the stars that gem
The holy sky, o'er the humble place,
When the world's sweet Child of Bethlehem
Rested on Mary, full of grace.

Not only the Bethlehem in the East,
But altar Bethlehem everywhere,
When the ~Gloria~ of the first great feast
Rings forth its gladness on the air.

Each year seemeth loath to go,
And leave the joys of Christmas day;
In lands of sun and in lands of snow,
The year still longs awhile to stay.

A little while, 'tis hard to part
From this Christ blessed here below,
Old year! and in thy aged heart
I hear thee sing so sweet and low.

'Tis night: in silence looking down,
The Moon, from cloudless ether, sees
A Camp, and a beleaguered Town,
And Castle, like a stately crown
On the steep rocks of winding Tees;
And southward far, with moor between,
Hill-top, and flood, and forest green,
The bright Moon sees that valley small
Where Rylstone's old sequestered Hall
A venerable image yields
Of quiet to the neighbouring fields;
While from one pillared chimney breathes
The smoke, and mounts in silver wreaths.
The courts are hushed; for timely sleep
The greyhounds to their kennel creep;
The peacock in the broad ash tree
Aloft is roosted for the night,
He who in proud prosperity
Of colours manifold and bright
Walked round, affronting the daylight;
And higher still, above the bower