You give no portent of impermanence
    Though before sun goes you are long gone hence,
    Your bright, inherited crown
    Withered and fallen down.

    It seems that your blue immobility
    Has been for ever, and must for ever be.
    Man seems the unstable thing,
    Fevered and hurrying.

    So free of joy, so prodigal of tears,
    Yet he can hold his fevers seventy years,
    Out-wear sun, rain and frost,
    By which you are soon lost.

The Head of the Bargi Pass, in snow. Gow and Ferdinand with their Captains.

GOW (to Ferdinand). The Queen’s host would be delivered me to-day, but that these Mountain Men have sent battalia to hold the Pass. They’re shod, helmed and torqued with soft gold. For the rest, naked. By no argument can I persuade ’em their gilt carcasses against my bombards avail not. What’s to do, Fox?

FERDINAND. Fatherless folk go furthest. These loud pagans
Are doubly fatherless. Consider; they came
Over the passes, out of all man’s world,
Adullamites, unable to endure
Its ancient pinch and belly-ache, full of revenges
Or wilfully forgetful. The land they found
Was manless-her raw airs uncloven by speech,
Earth without wheel-track, hoof-mark, hearth or ploughshare
Since God created; nor even a cave...

Go—thou art all unfit to share
The pleasures of this place
With such as its old tenants are,
Creatures of gentler race.


The squirrel here his hoard provides,
Aware of wintry storms,
And woodpeckers explore the sides
Of rugged oaks for worms.


The sheep here smooths the knotted thorn
With frictions of her fleece;
And here I wander eve and morn,
Like her, a friend to peace.


Ah!—I could pity thee exiled
From this secure retreat—
I would not lose it to be styled
The happiest of the great.


But thou canst taste no calm delight;
Thy pleasure is to show
Thy magnanimity in fight,
Thy prowess—therefore, go—


I care not whether east or north,
So I no more may find thee;
The angry muse...

    Veiled in visionary haze,
    Behold, the ethereal autumn days
    Draw near again!
    In broad array,
    With a low, laborious hum
    These ministers of plenty come,
That seem to linger, while they steal away.

    O strange, sweet charm
    Of peaceful pain,
When yonder mountain's bended arm
Seems wafting o'er the harvest-plain
A message to the heart that grieves,
And round us, here, a sad-hued rain
Of leaves that loosen without number
Showering falls in yellow, umber,
Red, or russet, 'thwart the stream!
Now pale Sorrow shall encumber
All too soon these lands, I deem;
    Yet who at heart believes
    The autumn, a false friend,
    Can bring us fatal harm?
Ah, mist-hung avenues in dream
Not more uncertainly extend

Sweete secrecie, what tongue can tell thy worth?
What mortall pen sufficiently can prayse thee?
What curious Pensill serues to lim thee forth?
What Muse hath power aboue thy height to raise thee?
Strong locke of kindnesse, Closet of loues store,
Harts Methridate, the soules preseruatiue;
O vertue! which all vertues doe adore,
Cheefe good, from whom all good things wee deriue.
O rare effect! true bond of friendships measure,
Conceite of Angels, which all wisdom teachest;
O, richest Casket of all heauenly treasure,
In secret silence which such wonders preachest.
    O purest mirror! wherein men may see
    The liuely Image of Diuinitie.

What care I, so they stand the same,--
Things of the heavenly mind,--
How long the power to give them name
Tarries yet behind?

Thus far to-day your favors reach,
O fair, appeasing presences!
Ye taught my lips a single speech,
And a thousand silences.

Space grants beyond his fated road
No inch to the god of day;
And copious language still bestowed
One word, no more, to say.

    One day, when Love and Summer both were young,
        Love in a garden found my lady weeping;
    Whereat, when he to kiss her would have sprung,
        I stayed his childish leaping.

    "Forbear," said I, "she is not thine to-day;
        Subdue thyself in silence to await her;
    If thou dare call her from Death's side away
        Thou art no Love, but traitor.

    Yet did he run, and she his kiss received,
        "She is twice mine," he cried, "since she is troubled;
    I knew but half, and now I see her grieved
        My part in her is doubled."

    "Rejoice," said the Sun; "I will make thee gay
    With glory and gladness and holiday;
    I am dumb, O man, and I need thy voice!"
    But man would not rejoice.

    "Rejoice in thyself," said he, "O Sun,
    For thy daily course is a lordly one;
    In thy lofty place rejoice if thou can:
    For me, I am only a man."

    "Rejoice," said the Wind; "I am free and strong,
    And will wake in thy heart an ancient song;
    Hear the roaring woods, my organ noise!"
    But man would not rejoice.

    "Rejoice, O Wind, in thy strength," said he,
    "For thou fulfillest thy destiny;
    Shake the forest, the faint flowers fan;
    For me, I am only a man."

    "Rejoice," said the Night, "with moon and star,
    For the Sun and the...

At a bygone Western country fair
I saw a giant led by a dwarf
With a red string like a long thin scarf;
How much he was the stronger there
The giant seemed unaware.

And then I saw that the giant was blind,
And the dwarf a shrewd-eyed little thing;
The giant, mild, timid, obeyed the string
As if he had no independent mind,
Or will of any kind.

Wherever the dwarf decided to go
At his heels the other trotted meekly,
(Perhaps - I know not - reproaching weakly)
Like one Fate bade that it must be so,
Whether he wished or no.

Various sights in various climes
I have seen, and more I may see yet,
But that sight never shall I forget,
And have thought it the sorriest of pantomimes,
If once, a hundred times!

Once I knew a noble peasant
From a line of men large-hearted.
Light and strength were in his mind,
Lifted like a peak clear-lined
O'er the valley in spring sunshine,
First to feel the morning's beam,
First refreshed by cloud-born stream.

Wide the springtime spread its banner,
Waving in his will illumined,
Bright with promise, color-sound;
Heritage of toil its ground.
Round that mountain music floated,
Songsters sweet of faith and hope
Nestled on its tree-clad slope.

Sometime, sometime all the valley
Like him shall with light be flooded;
Sometime all his faith and truth
Sunward grow in dewy youth,
And the dreams he dreamt too early
Live and make him leader be
For a race as true as he.

How can I be to blame?
Is it my fault I am fair?
I did not fashion my features,
Or brush the gold in my hair;
Because my eyes are so blue and bright,
Must I never look up from the ground,
But put out with my eyelids' snow their light,
Lest some foolish heart they should wound?

How can I be in fault?
I am sure where hearts are so few,
It is difficult to discern
The diamonds of paste from the true;
I thought him like all the rest,
Skilful in playing his part;
As careful at cards or at chess,
As winning a woman's heart.

I am sure it is nothing wrong,
Nothing to think of - and yet
I know I lured him with glance and song,
Into my shining net;
Provokingly cold at first he seemed,
Like crystal to smiles and sighs,
But at last...

In the far forest, overhead,
A bell is often heard obscurely;
How long since first, no one can tell--
Nor can report explain it surely:
From the lost church, the rumour hath,
Out on the winds the ringing goeth;
Once full of pilgrims was the path--
Now where to find it, no one knoweth.

Deep in the wood I lately went
Where no foot-trodden way is lying;
From times corrupt, on evil bent,
My heart to God went out in sighing:
There, in the wild wood's deep repose,
I heard the ringing somewhat nearer;
The higher that my longing rose
Its peal grew fuller and came clearer.

My thoughts upon themselves did brood;
My sense was with the sound so busy
That I have never understood
How I did climb that steep so dizzy.
It seemed more than a hund...

1.

Well! thou art happy, and I feel
That I should thus be happy too;
For still my heart regards thy weal
Warmly, as it was wont to do.


2.

Thy husband's blest - and 'twill impart
Some pangs to view his happier lot:
But let them pass - Oh! how my heart
Would hate him if he loved thee not!


3.

When late I saw thy favourite child,
I thought my jealous heart would break;
But when the unconscious infant smil'd,
I kiss'd it for its mother's sake.


4.

I kiss'd it, - and repress'd my sighs
Its father in its face to see;
But then it had its mother's eyes,
And they were all to love and me.


5.

Mary, adieu! I must away:
While thou art blest I'll not repine;
But ne...

What's riches to him
That has made a great peacock
With the pride of his eye?
The wind-beaten, stone-grey,
And desolate Three Rock
Would nourish his whim.
Live he or die
Amid wet rocks and heather,
His ghost will be gay
Adding feather to feather
For the pride of his eye.

Amidst thy sacred effigies
Of old renown give place,
O city, Freedom-loved! to his
Whose hand unchained a race.
Take the worn frame, that rested not
Save in a martyr's grave;
The care-lined face, that none forgot,
Bent to the kneeling slave.
Let man be free! The mighty word
He spake was not his own;
An impulse from the Highest stirred
These chiselled lips alone.
The cloudy sign, the fiery guide,
Along his pathway ran,
And Nature, through his voice, denied
The ownership of man.
We rest in peace where these sad eyes
Saw peril, strife, and pain;
His was the nation's sacrifice,
And ours the priceless gain.
O symbol of God's will on earth
As it is done above!
Bear witness to the cost and worth
Of justice and of love.
Stand in...

When Israel, of the Lord beloved,
Out from the land of bondage came,
Her father's God before her moved,
An awful Guide, in smoke and flame.
By day, along the astonished lands
The cloudy pillar glided slow;
By night, Arabia's crimsoned sands
Returned the fiery column's glow.

There rose the choral hymn of praise,
And trump and timbrel answer'd keen,
And Zion's daughters pour'd their lays,
With priest's and warrior's voice between.
No portents now our foes amaze,
Forsaken Israel wanders lone:
Our fathers would not know Thy ways,
And Thou hast left them to their own.

But present still, though now unseen,
When brightly shines the prosperous day,
Be thoughts of Thee a cloudy screen,
To temper the deceitful ray.
And O, when gathers on ...

The noon was shady, and soft airs
Swept Ouse’s silent tide,
When, ‘scaped from literary cares,
I wander’d on his side.


My spaniel, prettiest of his race,
And high in pedigree
(Two nymphs[1] adorn’d with every grace
That spaniel found for me),


Now wanton’d lost in flags and reeds,
Now starting into sight,
Pursued the swallow o’er the meads
With scarce a slower flight.


It was the time when Ouse display’d
His lilies newly blown;
Their beauties I intent survey’d,
And one I wish’d my own.


With cane extended far I sought
To steer it close to land;
But still the prize, though nearly caught,
Escaped my eager hand.


Beau mark’d my unsuccessful pains
With fix’d considerate fac...

New England, we love thee; no time can erase
From the hearts of thy children the smile on thy face.
'T is the mother's fond look of affection and pride,
As she gives her fair son to the arms of his bride.

His bride may be fresher in beauty's young flower;
She may blaze in the jewels she brings with her dower.
But passion must chill in Time's pitiless blast;
The one that first loved us will love to the last.

You have left the dear land of the lake and the hill,
But its winds and its waters will talk with you still.
"Forget not," they whisper, "your love is our debt,"
And echo breathes softly, "We never forget."

The banquet's gay splendors are gleaming around,
But your hearts have flown back o'er the waves of the Sound;
They have found the brown home whe...