Chapter V: Part II (2)

She left the web, she left the loom,
She made three paces thro’ the room,
She saw the water-lily bloom,
She saw the helmet and the plume,
She look’d down to Camelot.
Out flew the web and floated wide;
The mirror crack’d from side to side;
“The curse is come upon me,” cried
The Lady of Shalott.

IV.

In the stormy east-wind straining,
The pale yellow woods were waning,
The broad stream in his banks complaining,
Heavily the low sky raining
Over tower’d Camelot;
Down she came and found a boat
Beneath a willow left afloat,
And round about the prow she wrote
_The Lady of Shalott_.

And down the river’s dim expanse--
Like some bold seer in a trance,
Seeing all his own mischance--
With a glassy countenance
Did she look to Camelot.
And at the closing of the day
She loosed the chain and down she lay;
The broad stream bore her far away,
The Lady of Shalott.

Lying, robed in snowy white
That loosely flew to left and right--
The leaves upon her falling light--
Thro’ the noises of the night
She floated down to Camelot:
And as the boat-head wound along
The willowy hills and fields among,
They heard her singing her last song,
The Lady of Shalott.

Heard a carol, mournful, holy,
Chanted loudly, chanted lowly,
Till her blood was frozen slowly,
And her eyes were darken’d wholly,
Turn’d to tower’d Camelot.
For ere she reached upon the tide
The first house by the water-side,
Singing in her song she died,
The Lady of Shalott.

Under tower and balcony,
By garden-wall and gallery,
A gleaming shape she floated by,
Dead-pale between the houses high,
Silent into Camelot.
Out upon the wharfs they came,
Knight and burgher[47], lord and dame,
And round the prow they read her name,
_The Lady of Shalott_.

Who is this? and what is here?
And in the lighted palace near
Died the sound of royal cheer;
And they cross’d themselves for fear
All the knights at Camelot:
But Lancelot mused a little space;
He said, “She has a lovely face;
God in his mercy lend her grace,
The Lady of Shalott.”

ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON.

[44] _greaves_: leg-armour below the knee.

[45] _galaxy_: the “Milky Way.”

[46] _blazon’d baldric_: a broad shoulder-belt painted heraldically.

[47] _burgher_: citizen.

THE FORSAKEN MERMAN

Come, dear children, let us away;
Down and away below.
Now my brothers call from the bay;
Now the great winds shoreward blow;
Now the salt tides seaward flow;
Now the wild white horses play,
Champ and chafe and toss in the spray.
Children dear, let us away.
This way, this way!

Call her once before you go--
Call once yet!
In a voice that she will know:
“Margaret! Margaret!”
Children’s voices should be dear
(Call once more) to a mother’s ear;
Children’s voices, wild with pain--
Surely she will come again!
Call her once and come away.
This way, this way!
“Mother dear, we cannot stay!”
The wild white horses foam and fret.
Margaret! Margaret!

Come, dear children, come away down.
Call no more.
One last look at the white-wall’d town,
And the little grey church on the windy shore.
Then come down.
She will not come though you call all day.
Come away, come away!

Children dear, was it yesterday
We heard the sweet bells over the bay?
In the caverns where we lay,
Through the surf and through the swell,
The far-off sound of a silver bell?
Sand-strewn caverns, cool and deep,
Where the winds are all asleep;
Where the spent lights quiver and gleam;
Where the salt weed sways in the stream;
Where the sea-beasts, ranged all round,
Feed in the ooze of their pasture-ground;
Where the sea-snakes coil and twine,
Dry their mail and bask in the brine;
Where great whales come sailing by,
Sail and sail, with unshut eye,
Round the world for ever and aye?
When did music come this way?
Children dear, was it yesterday?

Children dear, was it yesterday
(Call yet once) that she went away?
Once she sate with you and me,
On a red gold throne in the heart of the sea,
And the youngest sate on her knee.
She combed its bright hair, and she tended it well,
When down swung the sound of a far-off bell.
She sigh’d, she look’d up through the clear green sea;
She said: “I must go, for my kinsfolk pray
In the little grey church on the shore to-day,
’Twill be Easter-time in the world--ah me!
And I lose my poor soul, Merman, here with thee.”
I said, “Go up, dear heart, through the waves;
Say thy prayer, and come back to the kind sea-caves.”
She smiled, she went up through the surf in the bay.
Children dear, was it yesterday?

Children dear, were we long alone?
“The sea grows stormy, the little ones moan.
Long prayers,” I said, “in the world they say.
Come!” I said, and we rose through the surf in the bay.
We went up the beach, by the sandy down
Where the sea-stocks bloom, to the white-walled town.
Through the narrow paved streets, where all was still,
To the little grey church on the windy hill.
From the church came a murmur of folk at their prayers,
But we stood without in the cold blowing airs.
We climb’d on the graves, on the stones worn with rains,
And we gazed up the aisle through the small leaded panes.
She sate by the pillar; we saw her clear:
“Margaret, hist! come quick, we are here!
Dear heart,” I said, “we are long alone.
The sea grows stormy, the little ones moan.”
But, ah! she gave me never a look,
For her eyes were sealed to the holy book.
Loud prays the priest; shut stands the door.
Come away, children, call no more.
Come away, come down, call no more.

Down, down, down,
Down to the depths of the sea!
She sits at her wheel in the humming town,
Singing most joyfully.
Hark what she sings: “O joy, O joy,
For the humming street, and the child with its toy!
For the priest, and the bell, and the holy well;
For the wheel where I spun,
And the blessèd light of the sun!”
And so she sings her fill.
Singing most joyfully,
Till the spindle drops from her hand,
And the whizzing wheel stands still.
She steals to the window and looks at the sand,
And over the sand at the sea;
And her eyes are set in a stare;
And anon there breaks a sigh,
And anon there drops a tear,
From a sorrow-clouded eye,
And a heart sorrow-laden,
A long, long sigh
For the cold strange eyes of a little Mermaiden
And the gleam of her golden hair.

Come away, away, children!
Come children, come down!
The hoarse wind blows coldly;
Lights shine in the town.
She will start from her slumber
When gusts shake the door;
She will hear the winds howling,
Will hear the waves roar.
We shall see, while above us
The waves roar and whirl,
A ceiling of amber,
A pavement of pearl.
Singing: “Here came a mortal,
But faithless was she:
And alone dwell for ever
The kings of the sea.”

But, children, at midnight,
When soft the winds blow,
When clear falls the moonlight,
When spring-tides are low:
When sweet airs come seaward
From heaths starr’d with broom;
And high rocks throw mildly
On the blanch’d sands a gloom:
Up the still, glistening beaches,
Up the creeks we will hie,
Over banks of bright seaweed
The ebb-tide leaves dry.
We will gaze, from the sand-hills,
At the white, sleeping town;
At the church on the hill-side--
And then come back down.
Singing: “There dwells a loved one,
But cruel is she.
She left lonely for ever
The kings of the sea.”

MATTHEW ARNOLD.

THE LEGEND BEAUTIFUL

“Hadst thou stayed, I must have fled!”
That is what the Vision said.

In his chamber all alone,
Kneeling on the floor of stone,
Prayed the Monk in deep contrition
For his sins of indecision,
Prayed for greater self-denial
In temptation and in trial;
It was noonday by the dial,
And the Monk was all alone.

Suddenly, as if it lighten’d,
An unwonted splendour brighten’d
All within him and without him
In that narrow cell of stone;
And he saw the Blessed Vision
Of our Lord, with light Elysian[48]
Like a vesture wrapped about him,
Like a garment round him thrown.

Not as crucified and slain,
Not in agonies of pain,
Not with bleeding hands and feet,
Did the Monk his Master see;
But as in the village street,
In the house or harvest-field,
Halt and lame and blind he healed,
When he walked in Galilee.

In an attitude imploring,
Hands upon his bosom crossed,
Wondering, worshipping, adoring,
Knelt the Monk in rapture lost.
Lord, he thought, in heaven that reignest,
Who am I, that thus thou deignest
To reveal thyself to me?
Who am I, that from the centre
Of thy glory thou shouldst enter
This poor cell, my guest to be?

Then amid his exaltation,
Loud the convent bell appalling,
From its belfry calling, calling,
Rang through court and corridor
With persistent iteration
He had never heard before.
It was now the appointed hour
When alike in sun or shower,
Winter’s cold or summer’s heat,
To the convent portals came
All the blind and halt and lame,
All the beggars of the street,
For their daily dole of food
Dealt them by the brotherhood;
And their almoner[49] was he
Who upon his bended knee,
Rapt in silent ecstasy
Of divinest self-surrender,
Saw the Vision and the Splendour.

Deep distress and hesitation
Mingled with his adoration;
Should he go or should he stay?
Should he leave the poor to wait
Hungry at the convent gate,
Till the Vision passed away?
Should he slight his radiant guest,
Slight his visitant celestial,
For a crowd of ragged, bestial
Beggars at the convent gate?
Would the Vision there remain?
Would the Vision come again?

Then a voice within his breast
Whispered, audible and clear,
As if to the outward ear:
“Do thy duty; that is best;
Leave unto thy Lord the rest!”
Straightway to his feet he started,
And with longing look intent
On the Blessed Vision bent,
Slowly from his cell departed,
Slowly on his errand went.

At the gate the poor were waiting,
Looking through the iron grating,
With that terror in the eye
That is only seen in those
Who amid their wants and woes
Hear the sound of doors that close,
And of feet that pass them by;
Grown familiar with disfavour,
Grown familiar with the savour
Of the bread by which men die!
But to-day, they knew not why,
Like the gate of Paradise
Seemed the convent gate to rise,
Like a sacrament divine
Seemed to them the bread and wine.
In his heart the Monk was praying,
Thinking of the homeless poor,
What they suffer and endure;
What we see not, what we see;
And the inward voice was saying:
“Whatsoever thing thou doest
To the least of mine and lowest,
That thou doest unto me!”

Unto me! but had the Vision
Come to him in beggar’s clothing,
Come a mendicant imploring,
Would he then have knelt adoring,
Or have listened with derision,
And have turned away with loathing?

Thus his conscience put the question,
Full of troublesome suggestion,
As at length, with hurried pace,
Towards his cell he turned his face,
And beheld the convent bright
With a supernatural light,
Like a luminous cloud expanding
Over floor and wall and ceiling.

But he paused with awe-struck feeling
At the threshold of his door,
For the Vision still was standing
As he left it there before,
When the convent bell appalling,
From its belfry calling, calling,
Summoned him to feed the poor.

Through the long hour intervening
It had waited his return,
And he felt his bosom burn,
Comprehending all the meaning,
When the Blessed Vision said,
“Hadst thou stayed, I must have fled!”

H. W. LONGFELLOW.

[48] _Elysian_: heavenly.

[49] _almoner_: giver of alms or charity.

ABOU BEN ADHEM

Abou Ben Adhem (may his tribe increase!)
Awoke one night from a deep dream of peace,
And saw, within the moonlight in his room,
Making it rich, and like a lily in bloom,
An angel writing in a book of gold:--
Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold,
And to the presence in the room he said,
“What writest thou?”--The vision rais’d its head,
And with a look made all of sweet accord,
Answer’d, “The names of those that love the Lord.”
“And is mine one?” said Abou. “Nay, not so,”
Replied the angel. Abou spoke more low,
But cheerly still; and said, “I pray thee, then,
Write me as one that loves his fellow men.”

The angel wrote, and vanished. The next night
It came again with a great wakening light,
And show’d the names whom love of God had blest,
And lo! Ben Adhem’s name led all the rest.

LEIGH HUNT.

THE SANDS OF DEE

“O Mary, go and call the cattle home,
And call the cattle home,
And call the cattle home,
Across the sands of Dee”;
The western wind was wild and dank with foam,
And all alone went she.

The western tide crept up along the sand,
And o’er and o’er the sand,
And round and round the sand,
As far as eye could see.
The rolling mist came down and hid the land:
And never home came she.

“O is it weed, or fish, or floating hair--
A tress of golden hair,
A drownèd maiden’s hair,
Above the nets at sea?”
Was never salmon yet that shone so fair
Among the stakes of Dee.

They rowed her in across the rolling foam,
The cruel crawling foam,
The cruel hungry foam,
To her grave beside the sea.
But still the boatmen hear her call the cattle home,
Across the sands of Dee.

CHARLES KINGSLEY.

LOCHINVAR

O young Lochinvar is come out of the west,
Through all the wide Border his steed was the best,
And save his good broad-sword he weapons had none;
He rode all unarmed, and he rode all alone.
So faithful in love, and so dauntless in war,
There never was knight like the young Lochinvar.

He stay’d not for brake, and he stopp’d not for stone,
He swam the Esk river where ford there was none;
But, ere he alighted at Netherby gate,
The bride had consented, the gallant came late:
For a laggard in love, and a dastard in war,
Was to wed the fair Ellen of brave Lochinvar.

So boldly he entered the Netherby Hall,
Among bride’s-men and kinsmen, and brothers and all:
Then spoke the bride’s father, his hand on his sword
(For the poor craven bridegroom said never a word),
“O come ye in peace here, or come ye in war,
Or to dance at our bridal, young Lord Lochinvar?”

“I long wooed your daughter, my suit you denied:--
Love swells like the Solway, but ebbs like its tide--
And now I am come, with this lost love of mine
To lead but one measure, drink one cup of wine.
There are maidens in Scotland more lovely by far,
That would gladly be bride to the young Lochinvar.”

The bride kiss’d the goblet; the knight took it up,
He quaff’d off the wine, and he threw down the cup;
She look’d down to blush, and she look’d up to sigh,
With a smile on her lips and a tear in her eye.
He took her soft hand, ere her mother could bar,--
“Now tread we a measure!” said young Lochinvar.

So stately his form, and so lovely her face,
That never a hall such a galliard[50] did grace;
While her mother did fret, and her father did fume,
And the bridegroom stood dangling his bonnet and plume;
And the bride-maidens whisper’d, “’Twere better by far
To have match’d our fair cousin with young Lochinvar.”

One touch to her hand and one word in her ear,
When they reach’d the hall door and the charger stood near;
So light to the croupe the fair lady he swung,
So light to the saddle before her he sprung!
“She is won! we are gone, over bank, bush, and scaur[51];
They’ll have fleet steeds that follow,” quoth young Lochinvar.

There was mounting ’mong Graemes of the Netherby clan;
Forsters, Fenwicks, and Musgraves, they rode and they ran:
There was racing and chasing on Cannobie Lee,
But the lost bride of Netherby ne’er did they see.
So daring in love, and so dauntless in war,
Have ye e’er heard of gallant like young Lochinvar?

SIR WALTER SCOTT.

[50] _galliard_: a gay dance.

[51] _scaur_: a steep bank.

DAY-DREAMS

_This section will appeal to girls rather than to boys. And yet day-dreams are no bad things for either sex--just now and again, as a getting away from realities._

DREAMS TO SELL

If there were dreams to sell,
What would you buy?
Some cost a passing bell;
Some a light sigh,
That shakes from Life’s fresh crown
Only a rose-leaf down.
If there were dreams to sell,
Merry and sad to tell,
And the crier rang the bell,
What would you buy?

A cottage lone and still,
With bowers nigh,
Shadowy, my woes to still,
Until I die.
Such pearl from Life’s fresh crown
Fain would I shake me down.
Were dreams to have at will,
This would best heal my ill,
This would I buy.

T. L. BEDDOES.

THE LOST BOWER

In the pleasant orchard closes,
“God bless all our gains,” say we;
But “May God bless all our losses,”
Better suits with our degree.--
Listen gentle--ay, and simple! Listen children on the knee!

Green the land is where my daily
Steps in jocund childhood played--
Dimpled close with hill and valley,
Dappled very close with shade;
Summer-snow of apple blossoms, running up from glade to glade.

There is one hill I see nearer,
In my vision of the rest;
And a little wood seems clearer,
As it climbeth from the west,
Sideway from the tree-locked valley, to the airy upland crest.

Small the wood is, green with hazels,
And, completing the ascent,
Where the wind blows and sun dazzles,
Thrills in leafy tremblement:
Like a heart that, after climbing, beateth quickly through content.

Not a step the wood advances
O’er the open hill-top’s bound:
There, in green arrest, the branches
See their image on the ground:
You may walk between them smiling, glad with sight and glad with
sound.

For you hearken on your right hand,
How the birds do leap and call
In the greenwood, out of sight and
Out of reach and fear of all;
And the squirrels crack the filberts, through their cheerful madrigal.

On your left, the sheep are cropping
The slant grass and daisies pale;
And five apple-trees stand, dropping
Separate shadows toward the vale,
Over which, in choral silence, the hills look you their “All hail!”

Yet in childhood little prized I
That fair walk and far survey:
’Twas a straight walk, unadvised by
The least mischief worth a nay--
Up and down--as dull as grammar on an eve of holiday!

But the wood, all close and clenching
Bough in bough and root in root,--
No more sky (for over-branching)
At your head than at your foot,--
Oh, the wood drew me within it, by a glamour past dispute.

Few and broken paths showed through it,
Where the sheep had tried to run,--
Forced with snowy wool to strew it
Round the thickets, when anon
They with silly thorn-pricked noses bleated back into the sun.

But my childish heart beat stronger
Than those thickets dared to grow:
_I_ could pierce them! _I_ could longer
Travel on, methought, than so!
Sheep for sheep-paths! braver children climb and creep where they
would go.

On a day, such pastime keeping,
With a fawn’s heart debonair,
Under-crawling, overleaping
Thorns that prick and boughs that bear,
I stood suddenly astonished--I was gladdened unaware!

From the place I stood in, floated
Back the covert dim and close;
And the open ground was suited
Carpet-smooth with grass and moss,
And the blue-bell’s purple presence signed it worthily across.

’Twas a bower for garden fitter,
Than for any woodland wide!
Though a fresh and dewy glitter
Struck it through, from side to side,
Shaped and shaven was the freshness, as by garden-cunning plied.

Rose-trees, either side the door, were
Growing lithe and growing tall;
Each one set a summer warder
For the keeping of the hall,--
With a red rose, and a white rose, leaning, nodding at the wall.

As I entered--mosses hushing
Stole all noises from my foot:
And a round elastic cushion,
Clasped within the linden’s root,
Took me in a chair of silence, very rare and absolute.

So, young muser, I sat listening
To my Fancy’s wildest word--
On a sudden, through the glistening
Leaves around, a little stirred,
Came a sound, a sense of music, which was rather felt than heard.

Softly, finely, it inwound me--
From the world it shut me in,--
Like a fountain falling round me,
Which with silver waters thin
Clips a little marble Naiad, sitting smilingly within.

Whence the music came, who knoweth?
_I_ know nothing. But indeed
Pan or Faunus never bloweth
So much sweetness from a reed
Which has sucked the milk of waters, at the oldest river-head.

Never lark the sun can waken
With such sweetness! when the lark,
The high planets overtaking
In the half-evanished Dark,
Casts his singing to their singing, like an arrow to the mark.

Never nightingale so singeth--
Oh! she leans on thorny tree,
And her poet-soul she flingeth
Over pain to victory!
Yet she never sings such music,--or she sings it not to me!

Never blackbirds, never thrushes,
Nor small finches sing as sweet,
When the sun strikes through the bushes
To their crimson clinging feet,
And their pretty eyes look sideways to the summer heavens complete.

In a child-abstraction lifted,
Straightway from the bower I passed;
Foot and soul being dimly drifted
Through the greenwood, till, at last,
In the hill-top’s open sunshine, I all consciously was cast.

And I said within me, laughing,
I have found a bower to-day,
A green lusus[52]--fashioned half in
Chance, and half in Nature’s play--
And a little bird sings nigh it, I will never more missay.

Henceforth, _I_ will be the fairy
Of this bower, not built by one;
I will go there, sad or merry,
With each morning’s benison;
And the bird shall be my harper in the dream-hall I have won.

So I said. But the next morning,
(--Child, look up into my face--
’Ware, O sceptic, of your scorning!
This is truth in its pure grace;)
The next morning, all had vanished, or my wandering missed the place.

Day by day, with new desire,
Toward my wood I ran in faith--
Under leaf and over brier--
Through the thickets, out of breath--
Like the prince who rescued Beauty from the sleep as long as death.

But his sword of mettle clashèd,
And his arm smote strong, I ween;
And her dreaming spirit flashèd
Through her body’s fair white screen,
And the light thereof might guide him up the cedarn alleys green.

But for me, I saw no splendour--
All my sword was my child-heart;
And the wood refused surrender
Of that bower it held apart,
Safe as Œdipus’s grave-place, ’mid Colone’s olives swart.

I have lost--oh many a pleasure--
Many a hope, and many a power--
Studious health and merry leisure--
The first dew on the first flower!
But the first of all my losses was the losing of the bower.

All my losses did I tell you,
Ye, perchance, would look away;--
Ye would answer me, “Farewell! you
Make sad company to-day;
And your tears are falling faster than the bitter words you say.”

For God placed me like a dial
In the open ground, with power;
And my heart had for its trial,
All the sun and all the shower!
And I suffered many losses; and my first was of the bower.

ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING.

[52] _lusus_: a sport, a freak.

ECHO AND THE FERRY

Ay, Oliver! I was but seven, and he was eleven;
He looked at me pouting and rosy. I blushed where I stood.
They had told us to play in the orchard (and I only seven!
A small guest at the farm); but he said, “Oh, a girl was no good,”
So he whistled and went, he went over the stile to the wood.
It was sad, it was sorrowful! Only a girl--only seven!
At home in the dark London smoke I had not found it out.
The pear trees looked on in their white, and blue birds flashed
about;
And they too were angry as Oliver. Were they eleven?
I thought so. Yes, every one else was eleven--eleven!

So Oliver went, but the cowslips were tall at my feet,
And all the white orchard with fast-falling blossom was littered,
And under and over the branches those little birds twittered,
While hanging head downwards they scolded because I was seven.
A pity. A very great pity. One should be eleven.
But soon I was happy, the smell of the world was so sweet.
And I saw a round hole in an apple-tree rosy and old.
Then I knew! for I peeped, and I felt it was right they should
scold!
Eggs small and eggs many. For gladness I broke into laughter;
And then some one else--oh, how softly! came after, came after
With laughter--with laughter came after.

So this was the country; clear dazzle of azure and shiver
And whisper of leaves, and a humming all over the tall
White branches, a humming of bees. And I came to the wall--
A little low wall--and looked over, and there was the river,
The lane that led on to the village, and then the sweet river.
Clear-shining and slow, she had far far to go from her snow;
But each rush gleamed a sword in the sunlight to guard her long
flow,
And she murmured methought, with a speech very soft, very low--
“The ways will be long, but the days will be long,” quoth the
river,
“To me a long liver, long, long!” quoth the river--the river.

I dreamed of the country that night, of the orchard, the sky,
The voice that had mocked coming after and over and under.
But at last--in a day or two namely--Eleven and I
Were very fast friends, and to him I confided the wonder.
He said that was Echo. “Was Echo a wise kind of bee
That had learned how to laugh: could it laugh in one’s ear and then
fly,
And laugh again yonder?” “No; Echo”--he whispered it low--
“Was a woman, they said, but a woman whom no one could see
And no one could find; and he did not believe it, not he,
But he could not get near for the river that held us asunder.
Yet I that had money--a shilling, a whole silver shilling--
We might cross if I thought I would spend it.” “Oh yes, I was
willing”--
And we ran hand in hand, we ran down to the ferry, the ferry,
And we heard how she mocked at the folk with a voice clear and merry
When they called for the ferry; but oh! she was very--was very
Swift-footed. She spoke and was gone; and when Oliver cried,
“Hie over! hie over! you man of the ferry--the ferry!”
By the still water’s side she was heard far and wide--she replied,
And she mocked in her voice sweet and merry “You man of the ferry,
You man of--you man of the ferry!”

“Hie over!” he shouted. The ferryman came at his calling,
Across the clear reed-bordered river he ferried us fast;--
Such a chase! Hand in hand, foot to foot, we ran on; it surpassed
All measure her doubling--so close, then so far away falling,
Then gone, and no more. Oh! to see her but once unaware,
And the mouth that had mocked, but we might not (yet sure she was
there!)
Nor behold her wild eyes and her mystical countenance fair.

We sought in the wood, and we found the wood-wren in her stead;
In the field, and we found but the cuckoo that talked overhead;
By the brook, and we found the reed-sparrow deep-nested, in brown--
Not Echo, fair Echo! for Echo, sweet Echo! was flown.

So we came to the place where the dead people wait till God call.
The church was among them, grey moss over roof, over wall.
Very silent, so low. And we stood on a green grassy mound
And looked in at a window, for Echo, perhaps, in her round
Might have come in to hide there. But no; every oak carven seat
Was empty. We saw the great Bible--old, old, very old,
And the parson’s great Prayer-book beside it; we heard the slow beat
Of the pendulum swing in the tower; we saw the clear gold
Of a sunbeam float down to the aisle and then waver and play
On the low chancel step and the railing, and Oliver said,
“Look, Katie! Look, Katie! when Lettice came here to be wed
She stood where that sunbeam drops down, and all white was her gown;
And she stepped upon flowers they strewed for her.” Then quoth small
Seven,
“Shall I wear a white gown and have flowers to walk upon ever?”

All doubtful: “It takes a long time to grow up,” quoth Eleven;
“You’re so little, you know, and the church is so old, it can never
Last on till you’re tall.” And in whispers--because it was old,
And holy, and fraught with strange meaning, half felt, but not told,
Full of old parsons’ prayers, who were dead, of old days, of old folk
Neither heard nor beheld, but about us, in whispers we spoke.
Then we went from it softly, and ran hand in hand to the strand,
While bleating of flocks and birds piping made sweeter the land,
And Echo came back e’en as Oliver drew to the ferry,
“O Katie!” “O Katie!” “Come on, then!” “Come on, then!” “For, see,
The round sun, all red, lying low by the tree”--“by the tree.”
“By the tree.” Ay, she mocked him again, with her voice sweet and
merry:
“Hie over!” “Hie over!” “You man of the ferry”--“the ferry.”
“You man of the ferry--you man of--you man of--the ferry.”

Ay, here--it was here that we woke her, the Echo of old;
All life of that day seems an echo, and many times told.
Shall I cross by the ferry to-morrow, and come in my white
To that little old church? and will Oliver meet me anon?
Will it all seem an echo from childhood passed over--passed on?
Will the grave parson bless us? Hark, hark! in the dim failing light
I hear her! As then the child’s voice clear and high, sweet and merry
Now she mocks the man’s tone with “Hie over! Hie over the ferry!”
“And Katie.” “And Katie.” “Art out with the glowworms to-night,
My Katie?” “My Katie.” For gladness I break into laughter
And tears. Then it all comes again as from far-away years;
Again, some one else--Oh, how softly!--with laughter comes after,
Comes after--with laughter comes after.

JEAN INGELOW.

POOR SUSAN’S DREAM

At the corner of Wood Street, when daylight appears,
Hangs a thrush that sings loud, it has sung for three years:
Poor Susan has passed by the spot, and has heard
In the silence of morning the song of the bird.

’Tis a note of enchantment; what ails her? She sees
A mountain ascending, a vision of trees;
Bright volumes of vapour through Lothbury glide,
And a river flows on through the vale of Cheapside.

Green pastures she views in the midst of the dale
Down which she so often has tripp’d with her pail;
And a single small cottage, a nest like a dove’s,
The one only dwelling on earth that she loves.

She looks, and her heart is in heaven: but they fade,
The mist and the river, the hill and the shade;
The stream will not flow, and the hill will not rise,
And the colours have all passed away from her eyes!

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.

FANCY

Tell me where is Fancy bred,
Or in the heart or in the head?
How begot, how nourishèd?
Reply, reply.
It is engender’d in the eyes,
With gazing fed; and Fancy dies
In the cradle where it lies.
Let us all ring Fancy’s knell:
I’ll begin it,--Ding, dong, bell.
Ding, dong, bell.

SHAKESPEARE.

TWO HOME-COMINGS

1. THE GOOD WOMAN MADE WELCOME IN HEAVEN

Angels, thy old friends, there shall greet thee,
Glad at their own home now to meet thee.
All thy good works which went before,
And waited for thee at the door,
Shall own thee there; and all in one
Weave a constellation
Of crowns, with which the King, thy spouse,
Shall build up thy triumphant brows.
All thy old woes shall now smile on thee,
And thy pains sit bright upon thee:
All thy sorrows here shall shine,
And thy sufferings be divine.
Tears shall take comfort, and turn gems,
And wrongs repent to diadems.
Even thy deaths shall live, and new
Dress the soul which late they slew.
Thy wounds shall blush to such bright scars
As keep account of the Lamb’s wars.

RICHARD CRASHAW.

2. THE SOLDIER RELIEVED

I’d like now, yet had haply been afraid,
To have just looked, when this man came to die,
And seen who lined the clean gay garret sides,
And stood about the neat low truckle-bed,
With the heavenly manner of relieving guard.
Here had been, mark, the general-in-chief,
Thro’ a whole campaign of the world’s life and death,
Doing the King’s work all the dim day long,
In his old coat and up to knees in mud,
Smoked like a herring, dining on a crust,--
And, now the day was won, relieved at once!
No further show or need of that old coat,
You are sure, for one thing! Bless us, all the while
How sprucely we are dressed out, you and I!
A second, and the angels alter that.

ROBERT BROWNING.

WHEN KNIGHTS WERE BOLD

HUNTING SONG

Waken, lords and ladies gay,
On the mountain dawns the day,
All the jolly chase is here,
With horse, and hawk, and hunting spear!
Hounds are in their couples yelling,
Hawks are whistling, horns are knelling[53].
Merrily, merrily, mingle they,
“Waken, lords and ladies gay.”

Waken, lords and ladies gay,
The mist has left the mountain grey,
Springlets in the dawn are steaming,
Diamonds on the brake[54] are gleaming,
And foresters have busy been
To track the buck in thicket green;
Now we come to chant our lay,
“Waken, lords and ladies gay.”

Waken, lords and ladies gay,
To the greenwood haste away;
We can show you where he lies,
Fleet of foot, and tall of size;
We can show the marks he made
When ’gainst the oak his antlers[55] frayed;
You shall see him brought to bay;
“Waken, lords and ladies gay.”

Louder, louder chant the lay,
Waken, lords and ladies gay!
Tell them youth, and mirth, and glee,
Run a course as well as we;
Time, stern huntsman! who can baulk,
Stanch as hound, and fleet as hawk?
Think of this, and rise with day,
Gentle lords and ladies gay!

SIR WALTER SCOTT.

[53] _knelling_: sounding like a bell.

[54] _brake_: fern, bracken.

[55] _antlers_: horns.

THE RIDING TO THE TOURNAMENT

Over meadows purple-flowered,
Through the dark lanes oak-embowered,
Over commons dry and brown,
Through the silent red-roofed town,
Past the reapers and the sheaves,
Over white roads strewn with leaves,
By the gipsy’s ragged tent,
Rode we to the Tournament.

Over clover wet with dew,
Whence the sky-lark, startled, flew,
Through brown fallows, where the hare
Leapt up from its subtle lair,
Past the mill-stream and the reeds
Where the stately heron feeds,
By the warren’s sunny wall,
Where the dry leaves shake and fall,
By the hall’s ancestral trees,
Bent and writhing in the breeze,
Rode we all with one intent,
Gaily to the Tournament.

Golden sparkles, flashing gem,
Lit the robes of each of them,
Cloak of velvet, robe of silk,
Mantle snowy-white as milk,
Rings upon our bridle-hand,
Jewels on our belt and band,
Bells upon our golden reins,
Tinkling spurs and shining chains--
In such merry mob we went
Riding to the Tournament.

Laughing voices, scraps of song,
Lusty music loud and strong,
Rustling of the banners blowing,
Whispers as of rivers flowing.
Whistle of the hawks we bore
As they rise and as they soar,
Now and then a clash of drums
As the rabble louder hums,
Now and then a burst of horns
Sounding over brooks and bourns,
As in merry guise we went
Riding to the Tournament.

There were abbots fat and sleek,
Nuns in couples, pale and meek,
Jugglers tossing cups and knives,
Yeomen with their buxom wives,
Pages playing with the curls
Of the rosy village girls,
Grizzly knights with faces scarred,
Staring through their vizors barred,
Huntsmen cheering with a shout
At the wild stag breaking out,
Harper, stately as a king,
Touching now and then a string,
As our revel laughing went
To the solemn Tournament.

Charger with the massy chest,
Foam-spots flecking mane and breast,
Pacing stately, pawing ground,
Fretting for the trumpet’s sound,
White and sorrel, roan and bay,
Dappled, spotted, black, and grey,
Palfreys snowy as the dawn,
Ponies sallow as the fawn,
All together neighing went
Trampling to the Tournament.

Long hair scattered in the wind,
Curls that flew a yard behind,
Flags that struggled like a bird
Chained and restive--not a word
But half buried in a laugh;
And the lance’s gilded staff
Shaking when the bearer shook
At the jester’s merry look,
As he grins upon his mule,
Like an urchin leaving school,
Shaking bauble, tossing bells,
At the merry jest he tells,--
So in happy mood we went,
Laughing to the Tournament.

What a bustle at the inn,
What a stir, without--within;
Filling flagons, brimming bowls
For a hundred thirsty souls;
Froth in snow-flakes flowing down,
From the pitcher big and brown,
While the tankards brim and bubble
With the balm for human trouble;
How the maiden coyly sips,
How the yeoman wipes his lips,
How the old knight drains the cup
Slowly and with calmness up,
And the abbot, with a prayer,
Fills the silver goblet rare,
Praying to the saints for strength
As he holds it at arm’s length;
How the jester spins the bowl
On his thumb, then quaffs the whole;
How the pompous steward bends
And bows to half-a-dozen friends,
As in a thirsty mood we went
Duly to the Tournament.

Then again the country over
Through the stubble and the clover,
By the crystal-dropping springs,
Where the road dust clogs and clings
To the pearl-leaf of the rose,
Where the tawdry nightshade blows,
And the bramble twines its chains
Through the sunny village lanes,
Where the thistle sheds its seed,
And the goldfinch loves to feed,
By the milestone green with moss,
By the broken wayside cross,
In a merry band we went
Shouting to the Tournament.

Pilgrims with their hood and cowl,
Pursy burghers cheek by jowl,
Archers with their peacock’s wing
Fitting to the waxen string,
Pedlars with their pack and bags,
Beggars with their coloured rags,
Silent monks, whose stony eyes
Rest in trance upon the skies,
Children sleeping at the breast,
Merchants from the distant West,
All in gay confusion went
To the royal Tournament.

Players with the painted face
And a drunken man’s grimace,
Grooms who praise their raw-boned steeds,
Old wives telling maple beads,--
Blackbirds from the hedges broke,
Black crows from the beeches croak,
Glossy swallows in dismay
From the mill-stream fled away,
The angry swan, with ruffled breast,
Frowned upon her osier nest,
The wren hopped restless on the brake,
The otter made the sedges shake,
The butterfly before our rout
Flew like a blossom blown about,
The coloured leaves, a globe of life,
Spun round and scattered as in strife,
Sweeping down the narrow lane
Like the slant shower of the rain,
The lark in terror, from the sod,
Flew up and straight appealed to God,
As a noisy band we went
Trotting to the Tournament.

But when we saw the holy town,
With its river and its down,
Then the drums began to beat
And the flutes piped mellow sweet;
Then the deep and full bassoon
Murmured like a wood in June,
And the fifes, so sharp and bleak,
All at once began to speak.
Hear the trumpets clear and loud,
Full-tongued, eloquent and proud,
And the dulcimer that ranges
Through such wild and plaintive changes;
Merry sounds the jester’s shawm[56],
To our gladness giving form;
And the shepherd’s chalumeau[57],
Rich and soft and sad and low;
Hark! the bagpipes squeak and groan--
Every herdsman has his own;
So in measured step we went
Pacing to the Tournament.

All at once the chimes break out,
Then we hear the townsmen shout,
And the morris-dancers’ bells
Tinkling in the grassy dells;
The bell thunder from the tower
Adds its sound of doom and power,
As the cannon’s loud salute
For a moment made us mute;
Then again the laugh and joke
On the startled silence broke;--
Thus in merry mood we went
Laughing to the Tournament.

G. W. THORNBURY.

[56] _shawm_: reed pipe.

[57] _chalumeau_: reed pipe.

VARIOUS

A RED, RED ROSE

O, my love is like a red, red rose,
That’s newly sprung in June:
O, my love is like the melody
That’s sweetly play’d in tune.

As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,
So deep in love am I,
And I will love thee still, my dear,
Till all the seas gang[58] dry.

Till all the seas gang dry, my dear,
And the rocks melt wi’ the sun!
And I will love thee still, my dear,
While the sands o’ life shall run.

And fare thee well, my only love,
And fare thee well a while!
And I will come again, my love,
Tho’ it were ten thousand mile!

ROBERT BURNS.

[58] _gang_: go.

BLOW, BUGLE, BLOW

The splendour falls on castle walls
And snowy summits old in story:
The long light shakes across the lakes,
And the wild cataract leaps in glory.
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying,
Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

O hark, O hear! how thin and clear,
And thinner, clearer, farther going!
O sweet and far from cliff and scar[59]
The horns of Elfland faintly blowing!
Blow, let us hear the purple glens replying:
Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

O love, they die in yon rich sky,
They faint on hill or field or river:
Our echoes roll from soul to soul,
And grow for ever and for ever.
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying,
And answer, echoes, answer, dying, dying, dying.

ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON.

[59] _scar_: a crag, a precipice.

WEST AND EAST

_Rome is chiefly known to young readers through the medium of Macaulay’s spirited “Lays,” which, however, are only a re-telling, in English ballad form, of some of the legends which survived into historical times concerning the infant city, about which nothing certain is known. They give no idea of the Rome of history, the world-power, or of the brooding immensity of her influence through centuries. This and the following poem illustrate, to some slight extent, the later Rome._

In his cool hall, with haggard eyes,
The Roman noble lay;
He drove abroad, in furious guise,
Along the Appian way.

He made a feast, drank fierce and fast,
And crown’d his hair with flowers--
No easier nor no quicker pass’d
The impracticable hours.

The brooding East with awe beheld
Her impious younger world.
The Roman tempest swell’d and swell’d,
And on her head was hurled.

The East bow’d low before the blast
In patient, deep disdain;
She let the legions thunder past,
And plunged in thought again.

MATTHEW ARNOLD.

GENSERIC

Genseric, King of the Vandals, who, having laid waste seven lands,
From Tripolis far as Tangier, from the sea to the great desert sands,
Was lord of the Moor and the African,--thirsting anon for new
slaughter,
Sail’d out of Carthage, and sail’d o’er the Mediterranean water;
Plunder’d Palermo, seiz’d Sicily, sack’d the Lucanian coast,
And paused, and said, laughing, “Where next?”
Then there came to the Vandal a Ghost
From the Shadowy Land that lies hid and unknown in the Darkness Below.
And answered, “To Rome!”
Said the King to the Ghost, “And whose envoy art thou?
Whence com’st thou? and name me his name that hath sent thee: and say
what is thine.”
“From far: and His name that hath sent me is God,” the Ghost answered,
“and mine
Was Hannibal once, ere thou wast: and the name that I now have is
Fate.
But arise, and be swift, and return. For God waits, and the moment is
late.”
And, “I go,” said the Vandal. And went. When at last to the gates he
was come,
Loud he knock’d with his fierce iron fist. And full drowsily answer’d
him Rome.
“Who is it that knocketh so loud? Get thee hence. Let me be. For ’tis
late.”
“Thou art wanted,” cried Genseric. “Open! His name that hath sent me
is Fate,
And mine, who knock late, Retribution.”
Rome gave him her glorious things;
The keys she had conquer’d from kingdoms: the crowns she had wrested
from kings:
And Genseric bore them away into Carthage, avenged thus on Rome,
And paused, and said, laughing, “Where next?”
And again the Ghost answer’d him, “Home!
For now God doth need thee no longer.”
“Where leadest thou me by the hand?”
Cried the King to the Ghost. And the Ghost answer’d, “Into the Shadowy
Land.”

OWEN MEREDITH.

KUBLA KHAN

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.
So twice five miles of fertile ground
With walls and towers were girdled round:
And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills
Where blossom’d many an incense-bearing tree;
And here were forests ancient as the hills,
Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.
But O, that deep romantic chasm which slanted
Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!
A savage place! as holy and enchanted
As e’er beneath a waning moon was haunted
By woman wailing for her demon-lover!
And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething,
As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,
A mighty fountain momently was forced;
Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst
Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,
Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher’s flail:
And ’mid these dancing rocks at once and ever
It flung up momently the sacred river.
Five miles meandering with a mazy motion
Through wood and dale the sacred river ran,
Then reached the caverns measureless to man,
And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean:
And ’mid this tumult Kubla heard from far
Ancestral voices prophesying war!
The shadow of the dome of pleasure
Floated midway on the waves;
Where was heard the mingled measure
From the fountain and the caves.
It was a miracle of rare device,
A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!

A damsel with a dulcimer
In a vision once I saw:
It was an Abyssinian maid,
And on her dulcimer she play’d,
Singing of Mount Abora.
Could I revive within me
Her symphony and song,
To such a deep delight ’twould win me
That with music loud and long,
I would build that dome in air,
That sunny dome! those caves of ice!
And all who heard should see them there,
And all should cry, Beware! Beware!
His flashing eyes, his floating hair!
Weave a circle round him thrice,
And close your eyes with holy dread,
For he on honey-dew hath fed,
And drunk the milk of Paradise.

SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE.

SOMETHING TO REMEMBER

Ah, did you once see Shelley plain,
And did he stop and speak to you,
And did you speak to him again?
How strange it seems, and new!

But you were living before that.
And also you are living after,
And the memory I started at--
My starting moves your laughter!

I crossed a moor, with a name of its own
And a certain use in the world, no doubt,
Yet a hand’s-breadth of it shines alone
’Mid the blank miles round about:

For there I picked up on the heather
And there I put inside my breast
A moulted feather, an eagle-feather!
Well, I forget the rest.

ROBERT BROWNING.

RING OUT, WILD BELLS

Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the frosty light:
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out wild bells, and let him die.

Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.

Ring out the grief that saps the mind,
For those that here we see no more;
Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.

Ring out a slowly dying cause,
And ancient forms of party strife;
Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.

Ring out the want, the care, the sin,
The faithless coldness of the times;
Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes,
But ring the fuller minstrel in.

Ring out false pride in place and blood,
The civic slander and the spite;
Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.

Ring out old shapes of foul disease;
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.

Ring in the valiant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.

ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON.

INDEX OF AUTHORS

PAGE

Anonymous 28, 30, 34, 36

Arnold, Matthew 65, 115

Beddoes, Thomas Lovell 83

Browning, Elizabeth Barrett 84

Browning, Robert 19, 20, 54, 103, 120

Burns, Robert 113

Byron, Lord 39, 43

Campbell, Thomas 21

Clough, Arthur Hugh 57

Coleridge, Samuel Taylor 118

Collins, William 52

Crashaw, Richard 102

Herrick, Robert 1

Hovey, Richard 27

Howe, Julia Ward 47

Hunt, Leigh 77

Ingelow, Jean 92

Jonson, Ben 18

Keats, John 7

Kingsley, Charles 31, 78

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth 22, 24, 26, 72

Lovelace, Richard 48

Meredith, Owen 116

Miller, Joaquin 56

Roberts, Theodore 37

Scott, Sir Walter 49, 53, 79, 104

Shakespeare, William 30, 101

Shelley, Percy Bysshe 9, 13

Tennyson, Alfred, Lord 2, 58, 114, 121

Thornbury, G. W. 105

Wolfe, Charles 50

Wordsworth, William 4, 100

INDEX OF FIRST LINES

PAGE

A lofty ship from Salcombe came 34

Abou Ben Adhem (may his tribe increase!) 77

Ah, did you once see Shelley plain 120

Ah! what pleasant visions haunt me 22

“All honour to him who shall win the prize” 56

Angels, thy old friends, there shall greet thee 102

At the corner of Wood Street, when daylight appears 100

Ay, Oliver! I was but seven, and he was eleven 92

Come, dear children, let us away 65

Full fathom five thy father lies 30

Genseric, King of the Vandals, who, having laid waste
seven lands 116

“Hadst thou stayed, I must have fled” 72

Hail to thee, blithe spirit 13

Here’s the tender coming 30

How sleep the brave, who sink to rest 52

I am fever’d with the sunset 27

I come from haunts of coot and hern 2

I’d like now, yet had haply been afraid 103

If there were dreams to sell 83

In his cool hall, with haggard eyes 115

In the pleasant orchard closes 84

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan 118

It was roses, roses, all the way 54

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord 47

Nobly, nobly Cape St Vincent to the North-west died away 20

Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note 50

Oh England is a pleasant place for them that’s rich and
high 31

O for the voice of that wild horn 49

O Mary, go and call the cattle home 78

O, my love is like a red, red rose 113

O my true love’s a smuggler and sails upon the sea 36

O, to be in England 19

O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn’s being 9

O young Lochinvar is come out of the West 79

Often I think of the beautiful town 26

On either side the river lie 58

Over meadows purple-flowered 105

Queen and huntress, chaste and fair 18

Ring out wild bells to the wild sky 121

Say not the struggle nought availeth 57

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness 7

Simon Danz has come home again 24

Soldier, rest! thy warfare o’er 53

Tell me not, Sweet, I am unkind 48

Tell me where is Fancy bred 101

The isles of Greece! the isles of Greece! 43

The splendour falls on castle walls 114

There was a sound of revelry by night 39

There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream 4

Thunder of riotous hoofs over the quaking sod 37

’Twas in the good ship _Rover_ 28

Waken, lords and ladies gay 104

Ye have been fresh and green 1

Ye Mariners of England 21

CAMBRIDGE: PRINTED BY JOHN CLAY, M.A. AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.

Books on English Language and Literature published by the Cambridge University Press

ENGLISH LANGUAGE