(See Note 62)

You chosen men we welcome here
    From brothers near.
We welcome you to Olaf's town
That Norway's greatest mem'ries crown,
Where ancient prowess looking down
    With searching gaze,
The question puts to sea and strand:
Are men now in the Northern land
    Like yesterday's?

'T is well, if on the battlefield
    Our "Yes" is sealed!
'T is well, if now our strength is steeled
To grasp our fathers' sword and shield
And in life's warfare lift and wield
    For God and home!
For us they fought; 't is now our call
To raise for them a temple-hall,
    Fair freedom's dome.

List to the Northern spirit o'er
    Our sea and shore!
Here once high thoughts in word were freed,
In homely song, in homely deed;

To sing of Wars, of Captains, and of Kings,
Of Cities founded, Common-wealths begun,
For my mean pen are too superior things:
Or how they all, or each their dates have run
Let Poets and Historians set these forth,
My obscure Lines shall not so dim their worth.

But when my wondring eyes and envious heart
Great Bartas sugar'd lines, do but read o're
Fool I do grudge the Muses did not part
'Twixt him and me that overfluent store,
A Bartas can, do what a Bartas will
But simple I according to my skill.

From school-boyes tongue no rhet'rick we expect
Nor yet a sweet Consort from broken strings,
Nor perfect beauty, where's a main defect:
My foolish, broken blemish'd Muse so sings
And this to mend, alas, no Art is able,
'Cause nature, made it so irrep...

'We're going home!' I heard two lovers say,
    They kissed their friends and bade them bright good-byes;
    I hid the deadly hunger in my eyes,
And, lest I might have killed them, turned away.
Ah, love! we too once gambolled home as they,
    Home from the town with such fair merchandise, -
    Wine and great grapes - the happy lover buys:
A little cosy feast to crown the day.

Yes! we had once a heaven we called a home
    Its empty rooms still haunt me like thine eyes,
When the last sunset softly faded there;
Each day I tread each empty haunted room,
        And now and then a little baby cries,
    Or laughs a lovely laughter worse to bear.

    Like a maid on her bridal morn I rise,
With the smile on her lip and the tear in her eyes;
Whilst the breeze my crimson banner unfurls,
I wreathe my locks with the purest pearls;
Brighter diamonds never were seen
Encircling the neck of an Indian queen!
I traverse the east on my glittering wing,
And my smiles awake every living thing;
And the twilight hour like a pilgrim gray,
Follows the night on her weeping way.
I raise the veil from the saffron bed,
Where the young sun pillows his golden head;
He lifts from the ocean his burning eye,
And his glory lights up the earth and sky.

    Ah, I am like that dewy prime,
Ere youth hath shaken hands with time;
Ere the fresh tide of life has wasted low,
And discovered the hidden rocks of woe:
When lik...

The poor man went to the rich man's doors,
"I come as Lazarus came," he said.
The rich man turned with humble head,--
"I will send my dogs to lick your sores!"

S' Amor novo consiglio non n' apporta.

HE DESCRIBES HIS SAD STATE.


    If Love to give new counsel still delay,
My life must change to other scenes than these;
My troubled spirit grief and terror freeze,
Desire augments while all my hopes decay.
Thus ever grows my life, by night and day,
Despondent, and dismay'd, and ill at ease,
Harass'd and helmless on tempestuous seas,
With no sure escort on a doubtful way.
Her path a sick imagination guides,
Its true light underneath--ah, no! on high,
Whence on my heart she beams more bright than eye,
Not on mine eyes; from them a dark veil hides
Those lovely orbs, and makes me, ere life's span
Is measured half, an old and broken man.

MACGREGOR.

(For Thomas Walsh)



    I


On nights like this the huddled sheep
    Are like white clouds upon the grass,
And merry herdsmen guard their sleep
    And chat and watch the big stars pass.

It is a pleasant thing to lie
    Upon the meadow on the hill
With kindly fellowship near by
    Of sheep and men of gentle will.

I lean upon my broken crook
    And dream of sheep and grass and men --
O shameful eyes that cannot look
    On any honest thing again!

On bloody feet I clambered down
    And fled the wages of my sin,
I am the leavings of the town,
    And meanly serve its meanest inn.

I tramp the courtyard stones in grief,
    While sleep takes man and beast to her.
And every cloud is calling ...

To the City of Bombay

The Cities are full of pride, Challenging each to each, This from her mountain-side, That from her burdened beach. They count their ships full tale, Their corn and oil and wine, Derrick and loom and bale, And ramparts' gun-flecked line; City by City they hail: "Hast aught to match with mine?" And the men that breed from them They traffic up and down, But cling to their cities' hem As a child to the mother's gown; When they talk with the stranger bands, Dazed and newly alone; When they walk in the stranger lands, By roaring streets unknown; Blessing her where she stands For strength above their own. (On high to hold her fame That stands all fame beyond, By oath to back the same, Most faithful-foolish-fond; Making her mere-breathed name Their bond upon their bond.) So thank I God my birth Fell not in ...

Once in a golden hour
I cast to earth a seed.
Up there came a flower,
The people said, a weed.

To and fro they went
Thro' my garden bower,
And muttering discontent
Cursed me and my flower.

Then it grew so tall
It wore a crown of light,
But thieves from o'er the wall
Stole the seed by night.

Sow'd it far and wide
By every town and tower,
Till all the people cried,
"Splendid is the flower!"

Read my little fable:
He that runs may read.
Most can raise the flowers now,
For all have got the seed.

And some are pretty enough,
And some are poor indeed;
And now again the people
Call it but a weed.

The tiny crocus is so bold
        It peeps its head above the mould,
        Before the flowers awaken,
To say that spring is coming, dear,
With sunshine and that winter drear
        Will soon be overtaken.

Oh, call it by some better name,
    For Friendship sounds too cold,
While Love is now a worldly flame,
    Whose shrine must be of gold:
And Passion, like the sun at noon,
    That burns o'er all he sees,
Awhile as warm will set as soon--
    Then call it none of these.

Imagine something purer far,
    More free from stain of clay
Than Friendship, Love, or Passion are,
    Yet human, still as they:
And if thy lip, for love like this,
    No mortal word can frame,
Go, ask of angels what it is,
    And call it by that name!

To The Right Honourable Lady Marianne Carnegie, passing her winters at Ethic House on the Coast of Scotland, with her Father, Lord Northesk, who retired thither after the death of his excellent Countess.

WRITTEN FEBRUARY 1787.


Lady, each soft effusion of thy mind,
    Flowing thro' thy free pen, shows thee endu'd
    With taste so just for all of wise, and good,
    As bids me hope thy spirit does not find,
Young as thou art, with solitude combin'd
    That wish of change, that irksome lassitude,
    Which often, thro' unvaried days, obtrude
    On Youth's rash bosom, dangerously inclin'd
To pant for more than peace. - Rich volumes yield
    Their soul-endowing wealth. - Beyond e'en these
    Shall consciousness of filial duty gild
The gloomy hours, when Wi...

In the old, vain, and fickle city of Athens, an orator,[2] seeing how the light-hearted citizens were blind to certain dangers which threatened the state, presented himself before the tribune, and there sought, by the very tyranny of his forceful eloquence, to move the heart of the republic towards a sense of the common welfare.

But the people neither heard nor heeded. Then the orator had recourse to more urgent arguments and stronger metaphors, potent enough to touch hearts of stone. He spoke in thunders that might have raised the dead; but his words were carried away on the wind. The beast of many heads[3] did not deign to hear the launching of these thunderbolts. It was engrossed in something quite different. A fight between two urchins was what the crowd found so engaging; not the orator's warnings.

    Dreary and dismal and dark
        Is the night of life to me,
    With nothing but clouds in the heaven above,
    Cruelly hiding the star that I love,
        Whose radiance was rapture to see.

    While the blasts from the cold frozen North
        Are biting right in to my soul -
    While the pitiless blasts from the bleak, barren shore
    Of the crystalline ocean incessantly roar,
        And the tempests that sweep from the pole.

    Oh! the gloom of the dark, dreary night,
        Concealing the star that I love!
    Oh! how bitter the anguish, bereft of its beam!
    While the beings around me are such that I seem
        In a dungeon of demons to move.

    Oh! when will the clouds clear away?
        And brighten the heaven abo...

There's a murmur in the air,
And noise in every street -
The murmur of many tongues,
The noise of numerous feet -
While round the Workhouse door
The Laboring Classes flock,
For why? the Overseer of the Poor
Is setting the Workhouse Clock.

Who does not hear the tramp
Of thousands speeding along
Of either sex and various stamp,
Sickly, cripple, or strong,
Walking, limping, creeping
From court and alley, and lane,
But all in one direction sweeping
Like rivers that seek the main?

Who does not see them sally
From mill, and garret, and room,
In lane, and court and alley,
From homes in poverty's lowest valley,
Furnished with shuttle and loom -
Poor slaves of Civilization's galley -
And in the road and footways rally,
As ...

There is a flower that bees prefer,
And butterflies desire;
To gain the purple democrat
The humming-birds aspire.

And whatsoever insect pass,
A honey bears away
Proportioned to his several dearth
And her capacity.

Her face is rounder than the moon,
And ruddier than the gown
Of orchis in the pasture,
Or rhododendron worn.

She doth not wait for June;
Before the world is green
Her sturdy little countenance
Against the wind is seen,

Contending with the grass,
Near kinsman to herself,
For privilege of sod and sun,
Sweet litigants for life.

And when the hills are full,
And newer fashions blow,
Doth not retract a single spice
For pang of jealousy.

Her public is the noon,
Her providence t...

Daily walked the fair and lovely
Sultan's daughter in the twilight, -
In the twilight by the fountain,
Where the sparkling waters plash.

Daily stood the young slave silent
In the twilight by the fountain,
Where the plashing waters sparkle,
Pale and paler every day.

Once by twilight came the princess
Up to him with rapid questions:
"I would know thy name, thy nation,
Whence thou comest, who thou art."

And the young slave said, "My name is
Mahomet, I come from Yemmen.
I am of the sons of Azra,
Men who perish if they love."

The sturdy man, if he in love obtains,
In open pomp and triumph reigns:
The subtle woman, if she should succeed,
Disowns the honour of the deed.
Though he for all his boast is forced to yield,
Though she can always keep the field,
He vaunts his conquests, she conceals her shame:
How partial is the voice of Fame!