Chapter I: KNOW not why, but ev’n to me

My songs seem sweet when read to thee.

Perhaps in this the pleasure lies—
I read my thoughts within thine eyes.

And so dare fancy that my art
May sink as deeply as thy heart.

Perhaps I love to make my words
Sing round thee like so many birds,

Or, Maybe, they are only sweet
As they seem offerings at thy feet.

Or haply, Lily, when I speak,
I think, perchance, they touch thy cheek,

Or with a yet more precious bliss,
Die on thy red lips in a kiss.

Each reason here—I cannot tell—
Or all perhaps may solve the spell.

But if she watch when I am by,
Lily may deeper see than I.
_Henry Timrod._

FLIGHT

O MEMORY! that which I gave thee
To guard in thy garner yestreen—
Little deeming thou e’er could’st behave thee
Thus basely—hath gone from thee clean!
Gone, fled, as ere autumn is ended
The yellow leaves flee from the oak—
I have lost it forever, my splendid
Original joke.

What was it? I know I was brushing
My hair when the notion occurred:
I know that I felt myself blushing
As I thought, “How supremely absurd!
How they’ll hammer on floor and on table
As its drollery dawns on them—how
They will quote it”—I wish I were able
To quote it just now.

I had thought to lead up conversation
To the subject—it’s easily done—
Then let off, as an airy creation
Of the moment, that masterly pun.
Let it off, with a flash like a rocket’s;
In the midst of a dazzled conclave,
Where I sat, with my hands in my pockets,
The only one grave.

I had fancied young Titterton’s chuckles,
And old Bottleby’s hearty guffaws
As he drove at my ribs with his knuckles,
His mode of expressing applause:
While Jean Bottleby—queenly Miss Janet—
Drew her handkerchief hastily out,
In fits at my slyness—what can it
Have all been about?

I know ’twas the happiest, quaintest
Combination of pathos and fun:
But I’ve got no idea—the faintest—
Of what was the actual pun.
I think it was somehow connected
With something I’d recently read—
Or heard—or perhaps recollected
On going to bed.

What had I been reading? The _Standard_:
“Double Bigamy”; “Speech of the Mayor.”
And later—eh? yes! I meandered
Through some chapters of “Vanity Fair.”
How it fuses the grave with the festive!
Yet e’en there, there is nothing so fine—
So playfully, subtly suggestive—
As that joke of mine.

Did it hinge upon “parting asunder?”
No, I don’t part my hair with my brush.
Was the point of it “hair”? Now I wonder!
Stop a bit—I shall think of it—hush!
There’s hare, a wild animal—stuff!
It was something a deal more recondite:
Of that I am certain enough;
And of nothing beyond it.

Hair—locks! There are probably many
Good things to be said about those.
Give me time—that’s the best guess of any—
“Lock” has several meanings, one knows.
Iron locks—iron-gray-locks—a “deadlock”—
That would set up an everyday wit:
Then of course there’s the obvious “wedlock”;
But that wasn’t it.

No! mine was a joke for the ages;
Full of intricate meaning and pith;
A feast for your scholars and sages—
How it would have rejoiced Sydney Smith!
’Tis such thoughts that ennoble a mortal;
And, singling him out from the herd,
Fling wide immortality’s portal—
But what was the word?

Ah me! ’tis a bootless endeavor.
As the flight of a bird of the air
Is the flight of a joke—you will never
See the same one again, you may swear.
’Twas my firstborn, and O how I prized it!
My darling, my treasure, my own!
This brain and none other devised it—
And now it has flown.
_Charles Stuart Calverley._

LOVE

CANST thou love me, lady?
I’ve not learn’d to woo;
Thou art on the shady
Side of sixty, too.
Still I love thee dearly!
Thou hast lands and pelf:
But I love thee merely
Merely for thyself.

Wilt thou love me, fairest?
Though thou art not fair;
And I think thou wearest
Someone-else’s hair.
Thou could’st love, though, dearly;
And, as I am told,
Thou art very nearly
Worth thy weight in gold.

Dost thou love me, sweet one?
Tell me that thou dost!
Women fairly beat one,
But I think thou must.
Thou art loved so dearly:
I am plain, but then
Thou (to speak sincerely)
Art as plain again.

Love me, bashful fairy!
I’ve an empty purse:
And I’ve “moods,” which vary;
Mostly for the worst.
Still, I love thee dearly:
Though I make (I feel)
Love a little queerly,
I’m as true as steel.

Love me, swear to love me
(As you know, they do)
By yon heaven above me
And its changeless blue.
Love me, lady, dearly,
If you’ll be so good;
Though I don’t see clearly
On what ground you should.

Love me—ah! or love me
Not, but be my bride!
Do not simply shove me
(So to speak) aside!
P’raps it would be dearly
Purchased at the price;
But a hundred yearly
Would be very nice.
_Charles Stuart Calverley._

SINCE WE PARTED

SINCE we parted yester eve,
I do love thee, love, believe,
Twelve times dearer, twelve hours longer,
One dream deeper, one night stronger,
One sun surer,—thus much more
Than I loved thee, love, before.
_Owen Meredith._

A KISS—BY MISTAKE

UPON the railway train we met—
She had the softest, bluest eyes,
A face you never could forget—
“Sixteen” with all that that implies.
I knew her once a little girl,
And meeting now a mutual friend,
Our thoughts and hearts got in a whirl;
We talked for miles without much end,

I threw my arms around the seat
Where, just in front, she sideways sat,
Her melting eyes and face to meet—
(And no one wondered much at that),
For soon the station where she left
Would on the sorrowing vision rise,
And I at least should feel bereft;
I thought a tear stood in her eyes.

She was but kith, not kin of mine;
Ten years had passed since last we met,
And when in going she did incline
Her face ’twas natural to forget,
It seemed so like a child I knew—
I met her half way by mistake;
And coming near those eyes of blue,
She gently kissed me—by mistake!

She saw her error, and straightway ran
With flaming blushes, rosy red;
I should not be one-half a man
If thoughts of wrong came in my head;
In fact, I’d take that very train
And travel daily for her sake,
If she would only come again
And gently kiss me—by mistake!
_Joel Benton._

A GAME OF FIVES

FIVE little girls, of Five, Four, Three, Two, One:
Rolling on the hearthrug, full of tricks and fun.

Five rosy girls, in years from Ten to Six:
Sitting down to lessons—no more time for tricks.

Five growing girls, from Fifteen to Eleven:
Music, Drawing, Languages, and food enough for seven!

Five winsome girls, from Twenty to Sixteen:
Each young man that calls, I say “Now tell me which you _mean_!”

Five dashing girls, the youngest Twenty-one:
But, if nobody proposes, what is there to be done?

Five showy girls—but Thirty is an age
When girls may be engaging, but they somehow don’t engage.

Five dressy girls, of Thirty-one or more:
So gracious to the shy young men they snubbed so much before!

* * * * *

Five _passé_ girls—Their age? Well, never mind!
We jog along together, like the rest of human kind:
But the quondam “careless bachelor” begins to think he knows
The answer to that ancient problem “how the money goes!”
_Lewis Carroll._

A VALENTINE

(_Sent to a friend who complained that I was glad enough to see him when he came, but didn’t seem to miss him if he stayed away._)

AND cannot pleasures, while they last,
Be actual unless, when past,
They leave us shuddering and aghast,
With anguish smarting?
And cannot friends be firm and fast,
And yet bear parting?

And must I then, at Friendship’s call,
Calmly resign the little all
(Trifling, I grant, it is and small)
I have of gladness,
And lend my being to the thrall
Of gloom and sadness?

And think you that I should be dumb,
And full _dolorum omnium_,
Excepting when you choose to come
And share my dinner?
At other times be sour and glum
And daily thinner?

Must he then only live to weep,
Who’d prove his friendship true and deep?
By day a lonely shadow creep,
At night-time languish,
Oft raising in his broken sleep
The moan of anguish.

The lover, if for certain days
His fair one be denied his gaze,
Sinks not in grief and wild amaze,
But, wiser wooer
He spends the time in writing lays,
And posts them to her.

And if the verse flow free and fast,
Till even the poet is aghast,
A touching Valentine at last
The post shall carry,
When thirteen days are gone and past
Of February.

Farewell, dear friend, and when we meet,
In desert waste or crowded street,
Perhaps before this week shall fleet,
Perhaps to-morrow,
I trust to find your heart the seat
Of wasting sorrow.
_Lewis Carroll._

THE WEDDING DAY

I

SWEETHEART, name the day for me
When we two shall wedded be.
Make it ere another moon,
While the meadows are in tune,
And the trees are blossoming,
And the robins mate and sing.
Whisper, love, and name a day
In this merry month of May.

No, no, no,
You shall not escape me so!
Love will not forever wait;
Roses fade when gathered late.

II

Fie, for shame, Sir Malcontent!
How can time be better spent
Than in wooing? I would wed
When the clover blossoms red,
When the air is full of bliss,
And the sunshine like a kiss.
If you’re good I’ll grant a boon:
You shall have me, sir, in June.

Nay, nay, nay,
Girls for once should have their way!
If you love me, wait till June:
Rosebuds wither, picked too soon.
_Edmund Clarence Stedman._

EDGED TOOLS

WELL, Helen, quite two years have flown
Since that enchanted, dreamy night,
When you and I were left alone,
And wondered whether they were right
Who said that each the other loved;
And thus debating, yes and no,
And half in earnest, as it proved,
We bargained to pretend ’twas so.

Two sceptic children of the world,
Each with a heart engraven o’er
With broken love-knots, quaintly curled,
Of hot flirtations held before;
Yet, somehow, either seemed to find,
This time, a something more akin
To that young, natural love,—the kind
Which comes but once, and breaks us in.

What sweetly stolen hours we knew,
And frolics perilous as gay!
Though lit in sport, Love’s taper grew
More bright and burning day by day.
We knew each heart was only lent,
The other’s ancient scars to heal:
The very thought a pathos blent
With all the mirth we tried to feel.

How bravely when the time to part
Came with the wanton season’s close,
Though nature with our mutual art
Had mingled more than either chose,
We smothered Love, upon the verge
Of folly, in one last embrace,
And buried him without a dirge,
And turned, and left his resting-place.

Yet often (tell me what it means!)
His spirit steals upon me here,
Far, far away from all the scenes
His little lifetime held so dear;
He comes: I hear a mystic strain
In which some tender memory lies;
I dally with your hair again;
I catch the gleam of violet eyes.

Ah, Helen! how have matters been
Since those rude obsequies, with you?
Say, is my partner in the sin
A sharer of the penance too?
Again the vision’s at my side:
I drop my head upon my breast,
And wonder if he really died,
And why his spirit will not rest.
_Edmund Clarence Stedman._

WITCHCRAFT

OUR great-great-grandpapas had schooled
Your fancies, Lita, were you born
In days when Cotton Mather ruled
And damask petticoats were worn!
Your pretty ways, your mocking air,
Had passed, mayhap, for Satan’s wiles—
As fraught with danger, then and there,
To you, as now to us your smiles.

Why not? Were inquest to begin,
The tokens are not far to seek:
_Item_—the dimple of your chin;
_Item_—that freckle on your cheek.
Grace shield his simple soul from harm
Who enters yon flirtation niche,
Or trusts in whispered counter-charm,
Alone with such a parlous witch!

Your fan a wand is, in disguise;
It conjures, and we straight are drawn
Within a witches’ Paradise
Of music, germans, roses, lawn.
So through the season, where you go,
All else than Lita men forget:
One needs no second-sight to know
That sorcery is rampant yet.

Now, since the bars no more await
Fair maids that practise sable arts,
Take heed, while I pronounce the fate
Of her who thus ensnares men’s hearts:
In time you shall a wizard meet
With spells more potent than your own,
And you shall know your master, Sweet,
And for these witcheries atone.

For you at his behest shall wear
A veil, and seek with him the church,
And at the altar rail forswear
The craft that left you in the lurch;
But oft thereafter, musing long,
With smile and sigh, and conscience-twitch,
You shall too late confess the wrong—
A captive and repentant witch.
_Edmund Clarence Stedman._

TOUJOURS AMOUR

PRITHEE tell me, Dimple-Chin,
At what age doth love begin?
Your blue eyes have scarcely seen
Summers three, my fairy queen,
But a miracle of sweets,
Soft approaches, sly retreats,
Show the little archer there,
Hidden in your pretty hair;
When didst learn a heart to win?
Prithee tell me, Dimple-Chin!

“Oh!” the rosy lips reply,
“I can’t tell you if I try.
’Tis so long I can’t remember:
Ask some younger lass than I!”

Tell, O tell me, Grizzled-Face,
Do your heart and head keep pace?
When does hoary Love expire,
When do frosts put out the fire?
Can its embers burn below
All that chill December snow?
Care you still soft hands to press,
Bonny heads to smooth and bless?
When does Love give up the chase?
Tell, O tell me, Grizzled-Face?

“Ah!” the wise old lips reply,
“Youth may pass, and strength may die;
But of Love I can’t foretoken:
Ask some older sage than I!”
_Edmund Clarence Stedman._

DICTUM SAPIENTI

THAT ’tis well to be off with the old love
Before one is on with the new
Has somehow passed into a proverb,—
But I never have found it true.

No love can be quite like the old love,
Whate’er may be said for the new—
And if you dismiss me, my darling,
You may come to this thinking, too.

Were the proverb not wiser if mended,
And the fickle and wavering told
To be sure they’re on with the new love
Before they are off with the old?
_Charles Henry Webb._

UNDOWERED

THOU hast not gold? Why, this is gold
All clustering round thy forehead white;
And were it weighed, and were it told,
I could not say its worth to-night!

Thou hast not wit? Why, what is this
Wherewith thou capturest many a wight,
Who doth forget a tongue is his,
As I well-nigh forgot to-night?

Nor station? Well, ah, well! I own
Thou hast no place assured thee quite;
So now I raise thee to a throne;
Begin thy reign, my Queen, to-night.
_Harriet McEwen Kimball._

THE LOVE-KNOT

TYING her bonnet under her chin,
She tied her raven ringlets in;
But not alone in the silken snare
Did she catch her lovely floating hair,
For tying her bonnet under her chin,
She tied a young man’s heart within.

They were strolling together up the hill,
Where the wind comes blowing merry and chill;
And it blew the curls, a frolicsome race,
All over the happy peach-colored face,
Till, scolding and laughing, she tied them in,
Under her beautiful dimpled chin.

And it blew a color, bright as the bloom
Of the pinkest fuchsia’s tossing plume,
All over the cheeks of the prettiest girl
That ever imprisoned a romping curl,
Or, tying her bonnet under her chin,
Tied a young man’s heart within.

Steeper and steeper grew the hill;
Madder, merrier, chillier still
The western wind blew down and played
The wildest tricks with the little maid,
As, tying her bonnet under her chin,
She tied a young man’s heart within.

O western wind, do you think it was fair
To play such tricks with her floating hair?
To gladly, gleefully do your best
To blow her against the young man’s breast,
Where he as gladly folded her in,
And kissed her mouth and her dimpled chin?

Ah! Ellery Vane, you little thought,
An hour ago, when you besought
This country lass to walk with you,
After the sun had dried the dew,
What perilous danger you’d be in,
As she tied her bonnet under her chin
_Nora Perry._

VERS DE SOCIÉTÉ

THERE, pay it, James! ’tis cheaply earned;
My conscience! how one’s cabman charges!
But never mind, so I’m returned
Safe to my native street of Clarges.
I’ve just an hour for one cigar
(What style these Reinas have, and what ash!)
One hour to watch the evening star
With just one Curaçoa-and-potash.

Ah me! that face beneath the leaves
And blossoms of its piquant bonnet!
Who would have thought that forty thieves
Of years had laid their fingers on it!
Could you have managed to enchant
At Lord’s to-day old lovers simple,
Had Robber Time not played gallant,
And spared you every youthful dimple!

That Robber bold, like courtier Claude,
Who danced the gay coranto jesting,
By your bright beauty charmed and awed,
Has bowed and passed you unmolesting.
No feet of many-wintered crows
Have traced about your eyes a wrinkle;
Your sunny hair has thawed the snows
That other heads with silver sprinkle.

I wonder if that pair of gloves
I won of you you’ll ever pay me!
I wonder if our early loves
Were wise or foolish, Cousin Amy?
I wonder if our childish tiff
Now seems to you, like me, a blunder!
I wonder if you wonder if
I ever wonder if you wonder.

I wonder if you’d think it bliss
Once more to be the fashion’s leader!
I wonder if the trick of this
Escapes the unsuspecting reader!
And as for him who does or can
Delight in it, I wonder whether
He knows that almost any man
Could reel it off by yards together!

I wonder if—What’s that? A knock?
Is that you, James? Eh? What? God bless me!
How time has flown! It’s eight o’clock,
And here’s my fellow come to dress me.
Be quick, or I shall be the guest
Whom Lady Mary never pardons;
I trust you, James, to do your best
To save the soup at Grosvenor Gardens.
_H. D. Traill._

A LETTER OF ADVICE

WHEN you love—as all men will—
Sing the theme of your devotion,
Sue—and vow—and worship still—
Overflow with deep emotion,
Bow to Cupid’s sweet decrees,
Lightly wear the happy fetter,
Bend the knee and plead! But please,
Do not write your love a letter!

Ah! most tempting it may be:
Ink flows free—and pens will write,
And your passion fain you’d see
Plainly mapped in black and white.
Yet refrain from shedding ink,
If you can:—’tis wiser—better.
Ere you pen a sentence, think!
Do not write your love a letter.

Hearts may cool, and views may change—
Other scenes may seem inviting,
But a heart can’t safely range
If committed ’tis to writing.
What you’ve written is a writ,
Holds you closely as a debtor.
Will she spare you? Not a bit!
Do not write your love a letter!

Think of Breach of Promise cause,
Think of barristers provoking,
Leading you to slips and flaws,
Turning all your love to joking.
If you’ve written aught, they’ll be
Safe to find it as a setter—
Then you’ll wish you’d hearkened me—
Do not write your love a letter!

Oh, those letters read in Court!
How the tender things seem stupid!
How deep feeling seems but sport!
How young Momus trips up Cupid!
Take my warning then—or soon,
O’er your folly you’ll be fretter,
Saying, “Why, poor, foolish spoon,
Did I write my love a letter?”
_Thomas Hood, Jr._

AT THE LATTICE

BEHIND the curtain,
With glance uncertain,
Peeps pet Florence as I gaily ride;
Half demurely,
But, though purely
Most, most surely
Wishing she were riding, riding by my side.

In leafy alleys,
Where sunlight dallies,
Pleasant were it, bonnie, to be riding rein by rein;
And where summer tosses,
All about in bosses,
Velvet verdant mosses,
Still more pleasant, surely, to dismount again.

O thou Beauty!
Hanging ripe and fruity
At the muslined lattice in the drooping eve,
Whisper from the casement
If that blushing face meant,
“At the cottage basement,
Gallant, halt, I come to thee; I come to never leave.”

But if those coy lashes
Stir for whoso dashes
Past the scented window in the fading light,
Close the lattice, sweetest;
Darkness were discreetest;
And, with bridle fleetest,
I will gallop onwards, unattended through the night.
_Alfred Austin._

FRENCH WITH A MASTER

TEACH you French? I will, my dear!
Sit and con your lesson here.
What did Adam say to Eve?
_Aimer, aimer; c’est à vivre._

Don’t pronounce the last word long;
Make it short to suit the song;
Rhyme it to your flowing sleeve,
_Aimer, aimer; c’est à vivre_.

Sleeve, I said, but what’s the harm
If I really meant your arm?
Mine shall twine it (by your leave),
_Aimer, aimer; c’est à vivre_.

Learning French is full of slips;
Do as I do with the lips;
Here’s the right way, you perceive,
_Aimer, aimer; c’est à vivre_.

French is always spoken best
Breathing deeply from the chest;
Darling, does your bosom heave?
_Aimer, aimer; c’est à vivre._

Now, my dainty little sprite,
Have I taught your lesson right?
Then what pay shall I receive?
_Aimer, aimer; c’est à vivre._

Will you think me overbold
If I linger to be told
Whether you yourself believe
_Aimer, aimer; c’est à vivre_.

Pretty pupil, when you say
All this French to me to-day,
Do you mean it, or deceive?
_Aimer, aimer; c’est à vivre._

Tell me, may I understand,
When I press your little hand,
That our hearts together cleave?
_Aimer, aimer; c’est à vivre._

Have you in your tresses room
For some orange-buds to bloom?
May I such a garland weave?
_Aimer, aimer; c’est à vivre._

Or, if I presume too much
Teaching French by sense of touch,
Grant me pardon and reprieve!
_Aimer, aimer; c’est à vivre._

Sweetheart, no! you cannot go!
Let me sit and hold you so;
Adam did the same to Eve,—
_Aimer, aimer; c’est à vivre_.
_Theodore Tilton._

ON AN INTAGLIO HEAD OF MINERVA

THE cunning hand that carved this face,
A little helmeted Minerva—
The hand, I say, ere Phidias wrought,
Had lost its subtle skill and fervour.

Who was he? Was he glad or sad?
Who knew to carve in such a fashion?
Perchance he shaped this dainty head
For some brown girl that Scorned his passion.

But he is dust: we may not know
His happy or unhappy story:
Nameless and dead these thousand years,
His work outlives him—there’s his glory!

Both man and jewel lay in earth
Beneath a lava-buried city;
The thousand summers came and went,
With neither haste, nor hate, nor pity.

The years wiped out the man, but left
The jewel fresh as any blossom.
Till some Visconti dug it up,
To rise and fall on Mabel’s bosom.

O Roman brother! see how Time
Your gracious handiwork has guarded;
See how your loving, patient art
Has come, at last, to be rewarded.

Who would not suffer slights of men
And pangs of hopeless passion also,
To have his carven agate-stone
On such a bosom rise and fall so!
_Thomas Bailey Aldrich._

THE LUNCH

A GOTHIC window, where a damask curtain
Made the blank daylight shadowy and uncertain:
A slab of agate ore four Eagle-talons
Held trimly up and neatly taught to balance:
A porcelain dish, o’er which in many a cluster
Black grapes hung down, dead ripe and without lustre:
A melon cut in thin, delicious slices:
A cake that seemed mosaic-work in spices:
Two China cups with golden tulips sunny,
And rich inside with chocolate like honey:
And she and I the banquet-scene completing
With dreamy words—and very pleasant eating.
_Thomas Bailey Aldrich._

THE WITCH IN THE GLASS

“MY mother says I must not pass
Too near that glass;
She is afraid that I will see
A little witch that looks like me,
With a red, red mouth to whisper low
The very thing I should not know!”

“Alack for all your mother’s care!
A bird of the air,
A wistful wind, or (I suppose)
Sent by some hapless boy—a rose,
With breath too sweet, will whisper low
The very thing you should not know!”
_Sarah Morgan Bryan Piatt._

TO PHŒBE

“GENTLE, modest, little flower,
Sweet epitome of May,
Love me but for half-an-hour,
Love me, love me, little Fay.”
Sentences so fiercely flaming
In your tiny shell-like ear,
I should always be exclaiming,
If I loved you, Phœbe, dear!

“Smiles that thrill from any distance
Shed upon me while I sing!
Please ecstaticise existence;
Love me, oh, thou fairy thing!”
Words like these, outpouring sadly,
You’d perpetually hear,
If I loved you, fondly, madly;—
But I do not, Phœbe, dear!
_William Schwenck Gilbert._

MY LOVE AND MY HEART

OH, the days were ever shiny
When I ran to meet my love;
When I press’d her hand so tiny
Through her tiny tiny glove.
Was I very deeply smitten?
Oh, I loved like anything!
But my love she is a kitten,
And my heart’s a ball of string.

She was pleasingly poetic,
And she loved my little rhymes;
For our tastes were sympathetic,
In the old and happy times.
Oh, the ballads I have written,
And have taught my love to sing!
But my love she is a kitten,
And my heart’s a ball of string.

Would she listen to my offer,
On my knees I would impart
A sincere and ready proffer
Of my hand and of my heart.
And below her dainty mitten
I would fix a wedding ring—
But my love she is a kitten,
And my heart’s a ball of string.

Take a warning, happy lover,
From the moral that I show;
Or too late you may discover
What I learn’d a month ago.
We are scratch’d or we are bitten
By the pets to whom we cling.
Oh, my love she is a kitten,
And my heart’s a ball of string.
_Henry S. Leigh._

TO A COUNTRY COUSIN

CRUEL Cousin Kate, you ask me
For a lyric or a lay.
How tyrannical to task me,
Cousin Kate, in such a way.
Pardon me, I pray, and pity—
(Oh, do anything but frown!)
For I can’t be wise or witty
In an album out of town

No, my Pegasus will canter
Only here on civic stones;
In the country I instanter
Come to grief and broken bones.
Be it mine to sing the city,
Where I seek my mild renown;—
But I can’t be wise or witty
In an album out of town.

Small my power and small my will is
Rural sympathies to win;
Ludgate my sublimest hill is,
And my fields are Lincoln’s Inn
All the Muses in committee,
Pouring inspiration down,
Cannot make me wise or witty
In an album out of town.

London life in many phases
I describe for Cockney friends;
Lead me out among the daisies
And my versifying ends.
I can favor with a ditty
Jones, and Robinson, and Brown;
But I can’t be wise or witty
In an album out of town.

Cousin, hear my supplication;
Give me something else to do.
Is there aught in all creation
I would not attempt for you?
Ask my life, my cruel Kitty:
Bid me hang, or bid me drown;
But I can’t be wise or witty
In an album out of town.
_Henry S. Leigh._

THE FAMILY FOOL

OH! a private buffoon is a light-hearted loon,
If you listen to popular rumour;
From morning to night he’s so joyous and bright,
And he bubbles with wit and good humour!
He’s so quaint and so terse, both in prose and in verse;
Yet though people forgive his transgression,
There are one or two rules that all Family Fools
Must observe if they love their profession.
There are one or two rules,
Half-a-dozen, maybe,
That all family fools,
Of whatever degree,
Must observe, if they love their profession.

If you wish to succeed as a jester, you’ll need
To consider each person’s auricular:
What is all right for B. would quite scandalize C.
(For C. is so very particular);
And D. may be dull, and E.’s very thick skull
Is as empty of brains as a ladle;
While F. is F sharp, and will cry with a carp,
That he’s known your best joke from his cradle!
When your humour they flout,
You can’t let yourself go;
And it _does_ put you out
When a person says, “Oh!
I have known that old joke from my cradle!”

If your master is surly, from getting up early
(And tempers are short in the morning),
An inopportune joke is enough to provoke
Him to give you, at once, a month’s warning.
Then if you refrain, he is at you again,
For he likes to get value for money,
He’ll ask then and there, with an insolent stare,
“If you know that you’re paid to be funny?”
It adds to the tasks
Of a merryman’s place,
When your principal asks,
With a scowl on his face,
If you know that you’re paid to be funny?

Comes a Bishop, maybe, or a solemn D.D.—
Oh! beware of his anger provoking
Better not pull his hair—don’t stick pins in his chair;
He won’t understand practical joking.
If the jests that you crack have an orthodox smack,
You may get a bland smile from these sages;
But should it, by chance, be imported from France,
Half-a-crown is stopped out of your wages!
It’s a general rule,
Though your zeal it may quench
If the Family Fool
Makes a joke that’s too French,
Half-a-crown is stopped out of his wages!

Though your head it may rack with a bilious attack,
And your senses with toothache you’re losing,
Don’t be mopy and flat—they don’t fine you for that
If you’re properly quaint and amusing!
Though your wife ran away with a soldier that day
And took with her your trifle of money;
Bless your heart, they don’t mind—they’re exceedingly kind—
They don’t blame you—as long as you’re funny!
It’s a comfort to feel
If your partner should flit,
Though you suffer a deal,
_They_ don’t mind it a bit—
They don’t blame you—so long as you’re funny!
_W. S. Gilbert._

AN INTERLUDE

IN the greenest growth of the May-time,
I rode where the woods were wet,
Between the dawn and the day-time;
The spring was glad that we met.

There was something the season wanted,
Though the ways and the woods smelt sweet;
The breath at your lips that panted,
The pulse of the grass at your feet.

You came, and the sun came after,
And the green grew golden above;
And the May-flowers lightened with laughter,
And the meadow-sweet shook with love.

Your feet in the full-grown grasses
Moved soft as a weak wind blows;
You passed me as April passes,
With face made out of a rose.

By the stream where the stems were slender,
Your light foot paused at the sedge;
It might be to watch the tender
Light leaves in the spring-time hedge.

On boughs that the sweet month blanches
With flowery frost of May;
It might be a bird in the branches,
It might be a thorn in the way.

I waited to watch you linger,
With foot drawn back from the dew,
Till a sunbeam straight like a finger
Struck sharp through the leaves at you.

And a bird overhead sang “Follow,”
And a bird to the right sang “Here”;
And the arch of the leaves was hollow,
And the meaning of May was clear.

I saw where the sun’s hand pointed,
I knew what the bird’s note said;
By the dawn and the dew fall anointed,
You were queen by the gold on your head.

As the glimpse of a burnt-out ember
Recalls a regret of the sun,
I remember, forget, and remember
What love saw done and undone.

I remember the way we parted,
The day and the way we met;
You hoped we were both broken-hearted,
And knew we should both forget.

And May with her world in flower
Seemed still to murmur and smile
As you murmured and smiled for an hour;
I saw you twice at the stile.

A hand like a white-wood blossom
You lifted and waved, and passed,
With head hung down to the bosom,
And pale, as it seemed, to the last.

And the best and the worst of this is,
That neither is most to blame,
If you’ve forgotten my kisses,
And I’ve forgotten your name.
_Algernon Charles Swinburne._

A MATCH

IF love were what the rose is,
And I were like the leaf,
Our lives would grow together
In sad or singing weather,
Blown fields or flowerful closes,
Green pleasure or grey grief;
If love were what the rose is,
And I were like the leaf.

If I were what the words are,
And love were like the tune,
With double sound and single
Delight our lips would mingle,
With kisses glad as birds are
That get sweet rain at noon;
If I were what the words are,
And love were like the tune.

If you were Life, my darling,
And I, your love, were Death,
We’d shine and snow together
Ere March made sweet the wreath
With daffodil and starling
And hours of fruitful breath;
If you were Life, my darling,
And I, your love, were Death.

If you were thrall to Sorrow,
And I were page to Joy,
We’d play for lives and seasons
With loving looks and treasons,
And tears of night and morrow,
And laughs of maid and boy;
If you were thrall to Sorrow,
And I were page to Joy.

If you were April’s lady,
And I were lord in May,
We’d throw with leaves for hours,
And draw for days with flowers,
Till day like night were shady,
And night were bright like day;
If you were April’s lady,
And I were lord in May.

If you were queen of pleasure
And I were king of pain,
We’d hunt down Love together,
Pluck out his flying feather,
And teach his feet a measure,
And find his mouth a rein;
If you were queen of pleasure,
And I were king of pain.
_Algernon Charles Swinburne._

CAPRICE

I

SHE hung the cage at the window:
“If he goes by,” she said,
“He will hear my robin singing,
And when he lifts his head,
I shall be sitting here to sew,
And he will bow to me, I know.”

The robin sang a love-sweet song,
The young man raised his head;
The maiden turned away and blushed:
“I am a fool!” she said,
And went on ’broidering in silk
A pink-eyed rabbit, white as milk.

II

The young man loitered slowly
By the house three times that day;
She took her bird from the window:
“He need not look this way.”
She sat at her piano long,
And sighed, and played a death-sad song.

But when the day was done, she said,
“I wish that he would come!
Remember, Mary, if he calls
To-night—I’m not at home.”
So when he rang, she went—the elf!—
She went and let him in herself.

III

They sang full long together
Their songs love-sweet, death-sad;
The robin woke from his slumber,
And rang out, clear and glad.
“Now go!” she coldly said; “’tis late”;
And followed him—to latch the gate.

He took the rosebud from her hair,
While, “You shall not!” she said;
He closed her hand within his own,
And, while her tongue forbade,
Her will was darkened in the eclipse
Of blinding love upon his lips.
_William Dean Howells._

THE MINUET

GRANDMA told me all about it,
Told me so I couldn’t doubt it,
How she danced—my Grandma danced!—
Long ago.
How she held her pretty head,
How her dainty skirt she spread,
Turning out her little toes;
How she slowly leaned and rose—
Long ago.

Grandma’s hair was bright and sunny;
Dimpled cheeks, too—ah, how funny!
Really quite a pretty girl,
Long ago.
Bless her! why she wears a cap,
Grandma does, and takes a nap
Every single day; and yet
Grandma danced the minuet
Long ago.

Now she sits there rocking, rocking,
Always knitting Grandpa’s stocking—
(Every girl was taught to knit
Long ago),
Yet her figure is so neat,
And her ways so staid and sweet,
I can almost see her now
Bending to her partner’s bow,
Long ago.

Grandma says our modern jumping,
Hopping, rushing, whirling, bumping,
Would have shocked the gentle folk
Long ago.
No—they moved with stately grace,
Everything in proper place,
Gliding slowly forward, then
Slowly curtseying back again.
Long ago.

Modern ways are quite alarming,
Grandma says; but boys were charming—
Girls and boys I mean, of course—
Long ago.
Bravely modest, grandly shy,—
She would like to have us try
Just to feel like those who met
In the graceful minuet
Long ago.

With the minuet in fashion,
Who could fly into a passion?
All would wear the calm they wore
Long ago.
In time to come, if I, perchance,
Should tell my grandchild of our dance,
I should really like to say,
“We did it, dear, in some such way,
Long ago.”
_Mary Mapes Dodge._

A STREET SKETCH

UPON the Kerb, a maiden neat—
Her hazel eyes are passing sweet—
There stands and waits in dire distress:
The muddy road is pitiless,
And ’busses thunder down the street!

A snowy skirt, all frills and pleat;
Two tiny, well-shod, dainty feet
Peep out, beneath her kilted dress,
Upon the Kerb.

She’ll first advance, and then retreat,
Half-frightened by a hansom fleet.
She looks around, I must confess,
With marvellous coquettishness!—
Then droops her eyes and looks discreet,
Upon the Kerb!
_J. Ashby-Sterry._

SAINT MAY

A CITY LYRIC

ST. ALOYS THE GREAT is both mouldy and grim,
Not knowing the road there, you’ll long have to search
To find your way into this old city church;
Yet on fine Sunday mornings I frequently stray
There to see a new saint, whom I’ve christened St. May.

Of saints I’ve seen plenty in churches before—
In Florence or Venice they’re there by the score;
Agnese, Maria—the rest I forget—
By Titian, Bassano, and brave Tintoret:
They none can compare, though they’re well in their way,
In maidenly grace with my dainty St. May.

She’s young for a saint, for she’s scarcely eighteen,
And ne’er could wear peas in those dainty _bottines_;
Her locks are not shaven, and ’twould be a sin
To wear a hair-shirt next that delicate skin;
Save diagonal stripes on a dress of light gray,
Stripes ne’er have been borne by bewitching St. May.

Then she’s almost too plump and too round for a saint,
With sweet little dimples that Millais might paint;
She has no mediæval nor mortified mien,
No wimple of yellow, nor background of green,
A nimbus of hair throws its sunshiny ray
Of glory around the fair face of St. May.

What surquayne or partlet could look better than
My saint’s curly jacket of black Astracan?
What coif than her bonnet—a triumph of skill—
Or alb than her petticoat edged with a frill?
So sober, yet smiling—so grave, yet so gay,
Oh, where is a saint like my charming St. May?
_J. Ashby-Sterry._

PET’S PUNISHMENT

OH, if my love offended me,
And we had words together,
To show her I would master be,
I’d whip her with a feather!

If then she, like a naughty girl,
Would tyranny declare it,
I’d give my pet a cross of pearl,
And make her always bear it.

If still she tried to sulk and sigh,
And threw away my posies,
I’d catch my darling on the sly,
And smother her with roses!

But should she clench her dimpled fists,
Or contradict her betters,
I’d manacle her tiny wrists
With dainty golden fetters.

And if she dared her lips to pout—
Like many pert young misses—
I’d wind my arm her waist about,
And punish her—with kisses!
_J. Ashby-Sterry._

HER LETTER

I’M sitting alone by the fire,
Dressed just as I came from the dance,
In a robe even _you_ would admire—
It cost a cool thousand in France;
I’m be-diamonded out of all reason,
My hair is done up in a queue:
In short, sir, “the belle of the season”
Is wasting an hour on you.

A dozen engagements I’ve broken;
I left in the midst of a set;
Likewise a proposal, half spoken,
That waits—on the stairs—for me yet.
They say he’ll be rich—when he grows up—
And then he adores me indeed.
And you, sir, are turning your nose up,
Three thousand miles off, as you read.

“And how do I like my position?”
“And what do I think of New York?”
“And now, in my higher ambition,
With whom do I waltz, flirt, or talk?”
“And isn’t it nice to have riches,
And diamonds and silks, and all that?”
“And isn’t it a change to the ditches
And tunnels of Poverty Flat?”

Well, yes—if you saw us out driving
Each day in the Park, four-in-hand—
If you saw poor dear mania contriving
To look supernaturally grand—
If you saw papa’s picture, as taken
By Brady, and tinted at that—
You’d never suspect he sold bacon
And flour at Poverty Flat.

And yet, just this moment when sitting
In the glare of the grand chandelier—
In the bustle and glitter befitting
The “finest _soirée_ of the year”—
In the mists of a _gaze de Chambéry_,
And the hum of the smallest of talk—
Somehow, Joe, I thought of the “Ferry,”
And the dance that we had on “The Fork”;

Of Harrison’s barn, with its muster
Of flags festooned over the wall;
Of the candles that shed their soft lustre
And tallow on head-dress and shawl;
Of the steps that we took to one fiddle;
Of the dress of my queer _vis-a-vis_,
And how I once went down the middle
With the man that shot Sandy McGee;

Of the moon that was quietly sleeping
On the hill, when the time came to go;
Of the few baby peaks that were peeping
From under their bedclothes of snow;
Of that ride—that to me was the rarest;
Of—the something you said at the gate.
Ah, Joe, then I wasn’t an heiress
To “the best-paying lead in the State!”

Well, well, it’s all past; yet it’s funny
To think, as I stood in the glare
Of fashion and beauty and money,
That I should be thinking, right there,
Of some one who breasted high water,
And swam the North Fork, and all that,
Just to dance with old Folinsbee’s daughter,
The Lily of Poverty Flat.

But goodness! what nonsense I’m writing!
(Mama says my taste still is low),
Instead of my triumphs reciting,
I’m spooning on Joseph—heigh-ho!
And I’m to be “finished” by travel—
Whatever’s the meaning of that—
Oh! why did papa strike pay gravel
In drifting on Poverty Flat?

Good-night—here’s the end of my paper;
Good-night—if the longitude please—
For maybe, while wasting my taper,
Your sun’s climbing over the trees.
But know, if you haven’t got riches,
And are poor, dearest Joe, and all that,
That my heart’s somewhere there in the ditches,
And you’ve struck it—on Poverty Flat.
_Francis Bret Harte._

AVICE

THOUGH the voice of modern schools
Has demurred,
By the dreamy Asian creed
’Tis averred,
That the souls of men, released
From their bodies when deceased,
Sometimes enter in a beast,—
Or a bird.

I have watched you long, Avice,—
Watched you so,
I have found your secret out;
And I know
That the restless ribboned things,
Where your slope of shoulder springs,
Are but undeveloped wings,
That will grow.

When you enter in a room,
It is stirred
With the wayward, flashing flight
Of a bird;
And you speak—and bring with your
Leaf and sun-ray, bud and blue,
And the wind-breath and the dew,
At a word.

When you called to me my name,
Then again
When I heard your single cry
In the lane,
All the sound was as the “sweet”
Which the birds to birds repeat
In their thank-song to the heat
After rain.

When you sang the Schwalbenlied,—
’Twas absurd,—
But it seemed no human note
That I heard;
For your strain had all the trills,
All the little shakes and stills,
Of the over-song that rills
From a bird.

You have just their eager, quick
Airs _de tête_,
All their flush and fever-heat
When elate;
Every bird-like nod and beck,
And a bird’s own curve of neck
When she gives a little peck
To her mate.

When you left me, only now,
In that furred,
Puffed, and feathered Polish dress,
I was spurred
Just to catch you, O my sweet,
By the bodice trim and neat,—
Just to feel your heart-a-beat,
Like a bird.

Yet alas! Love’s light you deign
But to wear
As the dew upon your plumes,
And you care
Not a whit for rest or hush;
But the leaves, the lyric gush,
And the wing-power, and the rush
Of the air.

So I dare not woo you, sweet,
For a day,
Lest I lose you in a flash,
As I may;
Did I tell you tender things,
You would shake your sudden wings;—
You would start from him who sings,
And away.
_Austin Dobson._

A SONG OF THE FOUR SEASONS

WHEN Spring comes laughing
By vale and hill,
By wind-flower walking
And daffodil,—
Sing stars of morning,
Sing morning skies,
Sing blue of Speedwell,—
And my Love’s eyes.

When comes the Summer,
Full-leaved and strong,
And gay birds gossip
The orchard long,—
Sing hid, sweet honey
That no bee sips;
Sing red, red roses,—
And my love’s lips.

When Autumn scatters
The leaves again,
And piled sheaves bury
The broad-wheeled wain,—
Sing flutes of harvest
Where men rejoice;
Sing rounds of reapers,—
And my Love’s voice.

But when comes winter
With hail and storm,
And red fire roaring
And ingle warm,—
Sing first sad going
Of friends that part;
Then sing glad meeting,—
And my Love’s heart.
_Austin Dobson._

IN TOWN

“_The blue fly sung in the pane._”—TENNYSON.

TOILING in Town now is “horrid”
(There is that woman again!)—
June in the zenith is torrid,
Thought gets dry in the brain.

There is that woman again:
“Strawberries! fourpence a pottle!”
Thought gets dry in the brain;
Ink gets dry in the bottle.

“Strawberries! fourpence a pottle!”
Oh for the green of a lane!—
Ink gets dry in the bottle;
“Buzz” goes a fly in the pane!

Oh for the green of a lane,
Where one might lie and be lazy!
“Buzz” goes a fly in the pane;
Bluebottles drive me crazy!

Where one might lie and be lazy,
Careless of Town and all in it!—
Bluebottles drive me crazy:
I shall go mad in a minute!

Careless of Town and all in it,
With some one to soothe and to still you,
I shall go mad in a minute,
Bluebottle, then I shall kill you!

With some one to soothe and to still you,
As only one’s feminine kin do,—
Bluebottle, then I shall kill you:
There now! I’ve broken the window!

As only one’s feminine kin do,—
Some muslin-clad Mabel or May!—
There now! I’ve broken the window!
Bluebottle’s off and away!

Some muslin-clad Mabel or May,
To dash one with _eau de Cologne_;—
Bluebottle’s off and away,
And why should I stay here alone?

To dash one with _eau de Cologne_,
All over one’s eminent forehead;
And why should I stay here alone?
Toiling in Town now is “horrid.”
_Austin Dobson._

WHEN I SAW YOU LAST, ROSE

WHEN I saw you last, Rose,
You were only so high;—
How fast the time goes!

Like a bud ere it blows,
You just peeped at the sky,
When I saw you last, Rose!

Now your petals unclose,
Now your May-time is nigh;—
How fast the time goes!

And a life—how it grows!
You were scarcely so shy,
When I saw you last, Rose!

In your bosom it shows
There’s a guest on the sly;
How fast the time goes!

Is it Cupid? Who knows!
Yet you used not to sigh,
When I saw you last, Rose;—
How fast the time goes!
_Austin Dobson._

TO “LYDIA LANGUISH”

“_Il me faut des emotions._”—BLANCHE AMORY

YOU ask me, Lydia, “whether I,
If you refuse my suit, shall die,”
(Now pray don’t let this hurt you!)
Although the time be out of joint,
I should not think a bodkin’s point
The sole resource of virtue;
Nor shall I, though your mood endure,
Attempt a final Water-cure
Except against my wishes;
For I respectfully decline
To dignify the Serpentine,
And make _hors-d’œuvres_ for fishes;
But if you ask me whether I
Composedly can go,
Without a look, without a sigh,
Why, then I answer—No.

“You are assured,” you sadly say
(If in this most considerate way
To treat my suit your will is),
That I shall “quickly find as fair
Some new Neæra’s tangled hair—
Some easier Amaryllis.”
I cannot promise to be cold
If smiles are kind as yours of old
On lips of later beauties;
Nor can I, if I would, forget
The homage that is Nature’s debt,
While man has social duties;
But if you ask shall I prefer
To you I honour so,
A somewhat visionary Her,
I answer truly—No.

You fear, you frankly add, “to find
In me too late the altered mind
That altering Time estranges.”
To this I make response that we
(As physiologists agree)
Must have septennial changes;
This is a thing beyond control,
And it were best upon the whole
To try and find out whether
We could not, by some means, arrange
This not-to-be-avoided change
So as to change together:
But, had you asked me to allow
That you could ever grow
Less amiable than you are now,—
Emphatically—No.

But—to be serious—if you care
To know how I shall really bear
This much-discussed rejection,
I answer you. As feeling men
Behave, in best romances, when
You outrage their affection;—
With that gesticulatory woe,
By which, as melodramas show,
Despair is indicated;
Enforced by all the liquid grief
Which hugest pocket-handkerchief
Has ever simulated;
And when, arrived so far, you say
In tragic accents “Go,”
Then, Lydia, then ... I still shall stay,
And firmly answer—No.
_Austin Dobson._

THE OLD SEDAN CHAIR

IT stands in the stable-yard, under the eaves,
Propped up by a broom-stick and covered with leaves:
It once was the pride of the gay and the fair,
But now ’tis a ruin,—that old Sedan chair!

It is battered and tattered,—it little avails
That once it was lacquered, and glistened with nails;
For its leather is cracked into lozenge and square,
Like a canvas by Wilkie,—that old Sedan chair!

See,—here came the bearing-straps; here were the holes
For the poles of the bearers—when once there were poles;
It was cushioned with silk, it was wadded with hair,
As the birds have discovered,—that old Sedan chair!

“Where’s Troy?” says the poet! Look,—under the seat,
Is a nest with four eggs,—’tis the favored retreat
Of the Muscovy hen, who has hatched, I dare swear,
Quite an army of chicks in that old Sedan chair!

And yet—can’t you fancy a face in the frame
Of the window,—some high-headed damsel or dame,
Be-patched and be-powdered, just set by the stair,
While they raise up the lid of that old Sedan chair?

Can’t you fancy Sir Plume, as beside her he stands,
With his ruffles a-droop on his delicate hands,
With his cinnamon coat, with his laced solitaire,
As he lifts her out light from that old Sedan chair?

Then it swings away slowly. Ah, many a league
It has trotted ’twixt sturdy-legged Terence and Teague;
Stout fellows!—but prone, on a question of fare,
To brandish the poles of that old Sedan chair!

It has waited by portals where Garrick has played;
It has waited by Heidegger’s “Grand Masquerade”;
For my Lady Codille, for my Lady Bellair,
It has waited—and waited, that old Sedan chair!

Oh, the scandals it knows! Oh, the tales it could tell
Of Drum and Ridotto, of Rake and of Belle,—
Of Cock-fight and Levee, and (scarcely more rare!)
Of Fête-days at Tyburn, that old Sedan chair!

“Heu! _quantum mutata_,” I say as I go.
It deserves better fate than a stable-yard, though!
We must furbish it up, and dispatch it—“With care,”—
To a Fine-Art Museum—that old Sedan chair!
_Austin Dobson._

“LE ROMAN DE LA ROSE”

POOR Rose! I lift you from the street,—
Far better I should own you
Than you should lie for random feet
Where careless hands have thrown you.

Poor pinky petals, crushed and torn!
Did heartless Mayfair use you,
Then cast you forth to lie forlorn,
For chariot-wheels to bruise you?

I saw you last in Edith’s hair,
Rose, you would scarce discover
That I she passed upon the stair
Was Edith’s favoured lover.

A month—“a little month”—ago—
O theme for moral writer!—
’Twixt you and me, my Rose, you know,
She might have been politer;

But let that pass. She gave you then—
Behind the oleander—
To one, perhaps, of all the men—
Who best could understand her,—

Cyril, that, duly flattered, took,
As only Cyril’s able,
With just the same Arcadian look
He used, last night, for Mabel;

Then, having waltzed till every star
Had paled away in morning,
Lit up his cynical cigar,
And tossed you downward, scorning.

Kismet, my Rose! Revenge is sweet,—
She made my heart strings quiver;
And yet—You sha’n’t lie in the street;
I’ll drop you in the river.
_Austin Dobson._

NINETY-NINE IN THE SHADE

O FOR a lodge in a garden of cucumbers!
O for an iceberg or two at control!
O for a vale which at mid-day the dew cumbers!
O for a pleasure-trip up to the pole!

O for a little one-story thermometer,
With nothing but zeroes all ranged in a row!
O for a big double-barreled hygrometer,
To measure this moisture that rolls from my brow!

O that this cold world were twenty times colder!
(That’s irony red-hot, it seemeth to me);
O for a turn of its dreaded cold shoulder!
O what a comfort an ague would be!

O for a grotto frost-lined and rill-riven,
Scooped in the rock under cataract vast!
O for a winter of discontent even!
O for wet blankets judiciously cast!

O for a soda-fount spouting up boldly
From every hot lamp-post against the hot sky!
O for proud maiden to look on me coldly,
Freezing my soul with a glance of her eye!

Then O for a draught from a cup of cold pizen,
And O for a resting-place in the cold grave!
With a bath in the Styx where the thick shadow lies on
And deepens the chill of its dark-running wave.
_Rossiter Johnson._

BRIGHTON PIER

WHICH is the merriest place to love,
Whether it be for a day or year;
Where can we slip, like a cast-off glove,
The care that hovers our world above?
Come and be taught upon Brighton Pier!

Wandering waves on the shingle dash,
The sky’s too blue for a thoughtless tear;
Danger is nothing but pessimist trash,
And the morning’s made for a healthy splash:
Come for a header from Brighton Pier!

Filled with life, see the children race,
Motherly hearts they quake with fear,
Meeting the breezes face to face!
Whether we’re steady or “go the pace,”
Let us be young upon Brighton Pier!

Here she comes with her love-lit eyes,
Hearts will throb when a darling’s near;
Would it be well to avoid her—wise?
Every fool in the wide world tries,
But love must win upon Brighton Pier!

Lazily lost in a dream we sit—
Maidens’ eyes are a waveless mere—
There’s many a vow when seagulls flit,
And many a sigh when lamps are lit,
And many a kiss upon Brighton Pier.

Dear old friends of the days long fled,
Why did you vanish and leave me here?
Girls are marrying, boys are wed,
Youth is living, but I seem dead,
Kicking my heels upon Brighton Pier!
_Clement Scott._

A CONTRADICTION

“_Varium et mutabile semper Fœmina!_”—VIRGIL

THEY say she’s like an April day,
All sun and shower, grave and gay,
Just half in love, and half in play,
Like other misses.
Go to! They tell a pack of lies;
For I have heard her heart-drawn sighs,
And I have seen her inmost eyes,
And felt her kisses!

They think her laugh is over-bold,
And hint her smiles are bought for gold;
Dull heretics have thought her cold,
As is the fashion.
Ah me! when we together stole
Across the weald to leafy Knole,
’Twas there she showed to me her soul
And all her passion!

They vow her life is tossed about
From ball to picnic, play to rout;
A careless butterfly, no doubt,
That scandal crushes.
What could we answer, if ’twere said
That Time and Fate two lovers led
To lily-streams at Maidenhead,
Among the rushes?

Her reputation shivered most
Last night at supper, when our host
Made her of careless lips the toast
And reigning goddess.
But I, who know my love, dare say
She thought of home, and tried to pray
Before her handmaid slipped away
Her satin bodice.

Your silly worldings all forget
Her depth of hidden life, and bet
They’ve never met her equal yet
In fact or fiction.
But I, who love in secret, sit
Unweaving webs that Fate has knit
To bind me to so exquisite
A contradiction.
_Clement Scott._

RONDEL

KISS me, sweetheart; the Spring is here
And Love is Lord of you and me.
The blue-bells beckon each passing bee;
The wild wood laughs to the flowered year:
There is no bird in brake or brere,
But to his little mate sings he,
“Kiss me, sweetheart; the Spring is here,
And Love is Lord of you and me!”

The blue sky laughs out sweet and clear,
The missel-thrush upon the tree
Pipes for sheer gladness loud and free;
And I go singing to my dear,
“Kiss me, sweetheart; the Spring is here,
And Love is Lord of you and me.”
_John Payne._

WHITE, PILLARED NECK

I

WHITE, pillared neck; a brow to make men quake;
A woman’s perfect form;
Like some cool marble, should that wake,
Breathe, and be warm.

II

A shape, a mind, a heart
Of womanhood the whole;
Her breath, her smile, her touch, her art,
All—save her soul.
_Richard Watson Gilder._

JANET

I