The Unicorn 's a first-rate sort.
He helps the Lion to support
The royal arms of England's King
And keep the Throne from tottering.
I wonder what the King would do
If his supporters all withdrew?
Perhaps he'd try the Stage; a Throne
Should be an easy stepping-stone
To histrionic Heights, and who
Knows till he tries what he can do?
The King, with diligence and care,
Might rise to be a Manager.

Long, long ago, with vows too much forgotten,
The Cross of Christ was seal'd on every brow,
Ah! slow of heart, that shun the Christian conflict;
Rise up at last! The accepted time is now.
Soldiers of Jesus! Blest who endure;
Stand in the battle; the victory is sure.

Hark! hark! the Saviour's voice to each is calling--
"I bore the Cross of Death in pain for thee;
On thee the Cross of daily life is falling:
Children! take up the Cross and follow Me."
Soldiers of Jesus! &c.

Strive as God's saints have striven in all ages;
Press those slow steps where firmer feet have trod:
For us their lives adorn the sacred pages,
For them a crown of glory is with God.
Soldiers of Jesus! &c.

Peace! peace! sweet voices bring an ancient story,
(Such ...

This is not June, - by Autumn's stratagem
Thou hast been ambushed in the chilly air;
Upon thy fragile crest virginal fair
The rime has clustered in a diadem;
The early frost
Has nipped thy roots and tried thy tender stem,
Seared thy gold petals, all thy charm is lost.

Thyself the only sunshine: in obeying
The law that bids thee blossom in the world
Thy little flag of courage is unfurled;
Inherent pansy-memories are saying
That there is sun,
That there is dew and colour and warmth repaying
The rain, the starlight when the light is done.

These are the gaunt forms of the hollyhocks
That shower the seeds from out their withered purses;
Here were the pinks; there the nasturtium nurses
The last of colour in her gaudy smocks;
The ruins yonder

The days are long and lonely,
    The weary eve comes on,
And the nights are filled with dreaming
    Of one beloved and gone.

I reach out in the darkness
    And clasp but empty air,
For Rutha dear has vanished -
    I wonder, wonder where.

Yet must it be: her nature
    So lovely, pure, and true;
So nearly like the angels,
    Is she an angel too.

The cottage is dismantled
    Of all that made it bright;
Beyond its silent portal
    No love, nor life, nor light.

Where are the hopes I cherished,
    The joys that once I knew,
The dreams, the aspirations?
    All, all are perished too.

Yes, love's dear chain is broken;
    From shore to shore I roam -
No comfort, no companion,
    No happiness, n...

I.

I sit at evening's scented close,
In fulness of the summer-tide;
All dewy fair the lily glows,
No single petal of the row;
Has fallen to dim the rose's pride.

Sweet airs, sweet harmonies of hue,
Surround, caress me everywhere;
The spells of dusk, the spells of dew,
My senses steal, my reason woo,
And sing a lullaby to tare,

But vainly do the warm airs sing,
All vain the roses' rapturous breath;
A chill blast, as from wintry wing,
Smites on my heart, and, shuddering,
I see the beauty changed to death.

Afar I see it loom and rise,
That pitiless and icy shape.
It blots the blue, it dims the skies;
Amid the summer land it cries,
"I come, and there is no escape!"

O, bitter drop in bloom and sweet!
O, ca...

Io son sì stanco sotto 'l fascio antico.

HE CONFESSES HIS ERRORS, AND THROWS HIMSELF ON THE MERCY OF GOD.


    Evil by custom, as by nature frail,
I am so wearied with the long disgrace,
That much I dread my fainting in the race
Should let th' original enemy prevail.
Once an Eternal Friend, that heard my cries,
Came to my rescue, glorious in his might,
Arm'd with all-conquering love, then took his flight,
That I in vain pursued Him with my eyes.
But his dear words, yet sounding, sweetly say,
"O ye that faint with travel, see the way!
Hopeless of other refuge, come to me."
What grace, what kindness, or what destiny
Will give me wings, as the fair-feather'd dove,
To raise me hence and seek my rest above?

BASIL KENNET.

When Love is kind,
    Cheerful and free,
Love's sure to find
    Welcome from me.

But when Love brings
    Heartache or pang,
Tears, and such things--
    Love may go hang!

If Love can sigh
    For one alone,
Well pleased am I
    To be that one,

But should I see
    Love given to rove
To two or three,
    Then--good by Love!

Love must, in short,
    Keep fond and true,
Thro' good report,
    And evil too.

Else, here I swear,
    Young Love may go.
For aught I care--
    To Jericho.

Woman's faith, and woman's trust
Write the characters in the dust;
Stamp them on the running stream,
Print them on the moon's pale beam,
And each evanescent letter
Shall be clearer, firmer, better,
And more permanent, I ween,
Than the thing those letters mean.

I have strain'd the spider's thread
'Gainst the promise of a maid;
I have weigh'd a grain of sand
'Gainst her plight of heart and hand;
I told my true love of the token,
How her faith proved light, and her word was broken:
Again her word and truth she plight,
And I believed them again ere night.

I saw thee once--once only--years ago:
I must not say how many--but not many.
It was a July midnight; and from out
A full-orbed moon, that, like thine own soul, soaring,
Sought a precipitate pathway up through heaven,
There fell a silvery-silken veil of light,
With quietude, and sultriness and slumber,
Upon the upturn'd faces of a thousand
Roses that grew in an enchanted garden,
Where no wind dared to stir, unless on tiptoe--
Fell on the upturn'd faces of these roses
That gave out, in return for the love-light,
Their odorous souls in an ecstatic death--
Fell on the upturn'd faces of these roses
That smiled and died in this parterre, enchanted
By thee, and by the poetry of thy presence.

Clad all in white, upon a violet bank
I saw thee h...

The ways of Providence are odd.
If THEODORE means "The Gift of God,"
Let us give thanks, at any rate,
The Gift was not a duplicate.


Aside (To T. R)

Dear Theodore, should it give you pain
To read this Rhyme, let me explain.
If we 'exchanged' you, where on Earth
Could we find one of Equal worth?

O. H.

Virtue! thou hast spells divine,
    Spells, that savage force controul!
What's the strongest charm of thine?
    Courage in a mother's soul.

Haste my song, the scene proclaim,
    That may prove the maxim true!
Fair ones of maternal fame,
    Hark! for honour speaks to you.

Noblest of your noble band,
    Brave Marcella chanc'd to rove,
Leading childhood in her hand,
    Thro' a deep and lonely grove:

See her child! how gay! how light!
    Twice two years her life has run,
Like a young Aurora bright,
    Sporting near the rising sun.

Thro' a pass of sandy stone,
    Where autumnal foliage glow'd,
While the quivering sun-beams shone,
    Lay their deep, and narrow road:

Now, as thro' the dale they pac'd,
 ...

A poor owd man wi' tott'ring gait,
Wi' body bent, an snowy pate,
Aw met one day; -
An daan o'th' rooad side grassy banks
He sat to rest his weary shanks;
An aw, to while away mi time,
O'th' neighbourin hillock did recline,
An bade "gooid day."

Said aw, "Owd friend, pray tell me true,
If in your heart yo nivver rue
Th' time 'at's past?
Does envy nivver fill yor breast
When passin fowk wi' riches blest?
An do yo nivver think it wrang
At yo should have to trudge along,
Soa poor to th' last?"

"Young man," he sed, "aw envy nooan;
But ther are times aw pity some,
Wi' all mi heart;
To see what trubbl'd lives they spend,
What cares upon their hands depend;
Then aw in thowtfulness declare
'At 'little cattle little care'
Is...

Observe these Pirates bold and gay,
That sail a gory sea:
Notice their bright expression:--
The handsome one is me.



We plundered ships and harbours,
We spoiled the Spanish main;
But Nemesis watched over us,
For it began to rain.

Oh all well-meaning folk take heed!
Our Captain's fate was sore;
A more well-meaning Pirate,
Had never dripped with gore.

The rain was pouring long and loud,
The sea was drear and dim;
A little fish was floating there:
Our Captain pitied him.



"How sad," he said, and dropped a tear
Splash on the cabin roof,
"That we are dry, while he is there
Without a waterproof.

"We'll get him up on board at once;
For Science teaches me,
He will be wet if he remains

How wildly blows the wintry wind, deep lies the drifting snow
On the hillside, and the roadside, and the valleys down below;
And up the gorge all through last night the rushing storm flew fast,
And there old walls and casements were rattling in the blast.
Lady, I had a dream last night, born of the storm and pain,
I dreamed it was the time of spring; but the clouds were black with rain.
I thought that I was on the bay, a good way out from shore
Alone, and feeling much afraid at the wild tempest's roar,
I tried to reach the distant land, but could not find the way,
And suddenly my boat capsized far out upon the bay.
I shrieked in wildest agony amid the thunder shock,
When I heard you saying unto me, "Beneath us is a Rock,
Trust not to me, these waves are strong, but lift your tear...

Across a world where all men grieve
And grieving strive the more,
The great days range like tides and leave
Our dead on every shore.
Heavy the load we undergo,
And our own hands prepare,
If we have parley with the foe,
The load our sons must bear.
Before we loose the word
That bids new worlds to birth,
Needs must we loosen first the sword
Of Justice upon earth;
Or else all else is vain
Since life on earth began,
And the spent world sinks back again
Hopeless of God and Man.
A People and their King
Through ancient sin grown strong,
Because they feared no reckoning
Would set no bound to wrong;
But now their hour is past,
And we who bore it find Evil
Incarnate hell at last
To answer to mankind.
For agony and spoil
Of na...

The first was like a dream through summer heat,
    The second like a tedious numbing swoon,
While the half-frozen pulses lagged to beat
    Beneath a winter moon.

'But,' says my friend, 'what was this thing and where?'
    It was a pleasure-place within my soul;
An earthly paradise supremely fair
    That lured me from the goal.

The first part was a tissue of hugged lies;
    The second was its ruin fraught with pain:
Why raise the fair delusion to the skies
    But to be dashed again?

My castle stood of white transparent glass
    Glittering and frail with many a fretted spire,
But when the summer sunset came to pass
    It kindled into fire.

My pleasaunce was an undulating green,
    Stately with trees whose shadows slept below,...

"For he is our peace."


O Bethlehem, where Christ was born
And angels watched him where he lay,
When cradled on that holy morn
That ushered in earth's promised day!

O Bethlehem, it was thy star
Which guided o'er the deserts wild
Those who had journeyed from afar
To gaze upon the sinless child!

O Bethlehem, 'twas thine to see
God's choir announce the Saviour's birth,
And hear those waves of melody
Chant peace and good will to the earth!

O Bethlehem, 'twas thine to weep
With Rachel o'er the crimson woe
When cruel hands did vainly seek
To quench heaven's radiance below!

O Bethlehem, we hear thy call
To joy and bliss, and would not cease
To praise him who has died for all
Who will accept his blood-bought peace...

At evening when the aspens rustled soft
And the last blackbird by the hedge-nest laughed,
And through the leaves the moon's unmeaning face
Looked, and then rose in dark-blue leafless space;
Watching the trees and moon she could not bear
The silence and the presence everywhere.
The blackbird called the silence and it came
Closing and closing round like smoke round flame.
Into her heart it crept and the heart was numb,
Even wishes died, and all but fear was dumb--
Fear and its phantoms. Then the trees were enlarged,
And from their roundness unguessed shapes emerged,
Or no shape but the image of her fear
Creeping forth from her mind and hovering near.
If a bat flitted it was an evil thing;
Sadder the trees grew with every shadowy wing--
Their shape enlarged, thei...