Even so the dawn of death, whose light makes dim The starry fires that life sees rise and set, Shows higher than here he shone before us him Whom faith forgets not, nor shall fame forget.

Even so those else unfooted heights we clomb Through scudding mist and eddying whirls of cloud, Blind as a pilot beaten blind with foam, And shrouded as a corpse with storm's grey shroud,

Foot following foot along the sheer strait ledge Where space was none to bear the wild goat's feet Till blind we sat on the outer footless edge Where darkling death seemed fain to share the seat,

The abyss before us, viewless even as time's, The abyss to left of us, the abyss to right, Bid thought now dream how high the freed soul climbs That death sets free from change of day and night.

The might of raging mist and wind whose wrath Shut from our eyes the narrowing rock we trod, The wondrous world it darkened, made our path Like theirs who take the shadow of death for God.

Yet eastward, veiled in vapour white as snow, The grim black herbless heights that scorn the sun And mock the face of morning rose to show The work of earth-born fire and earthquake done.

And half the world was haggard night, wherein We strove our blind way through: but far above Was light that watched the wild mists whirl and spin, And far beneath a land worth light and love.

Deep down the Valley of the Curse, undaunted By shadow and whisper of winds with sins for wings And ghosts of crime wherethrough the heights live haunted By present sense of past and monstrous things,

The glimmering water holds its gracious way Full forth, and keeps one happier hand's-breadth green Of all that storm-scathed world whereon the sway Sits dark as death of deadlier things unseen.

But on the soundless and the viewless river That bears through night perchance again to day The dead whom death and twin-born fame deliver From life that dies, and time's inveterate sway,

No shadow save of falsehood and of fear That brands the future with the past, and bids The spirit wither and the soul grow sere, Hovers or hangs to cloud life's opening lids,

If life have eyes to lift again and see, Beyond the bounds of sensual sight or breath, What life incognisable of ours may be That turns our light to darkness deep as death.

Priests and the soulless serfs of priests may swarm With vulturous acclamation, loud in lies, About his dust while yet his dust is warm Who mocked as sunlight mocks their base blind eyes,

Their godless ghost of godhead, false and foul As fear his dam or hell his throne: but we, Scarce hearing, heed no carrion church-wolf's howl: The corpse be theirs to mock; the soul is free.

Free as ere yet its earthly day was done It lived above the coil about us curled: A soul whose eyes were keener than the sun, A soul whose wings were wider than the world.

We, sons of east and west, ringed round with dreams, Bound fast with visions, girt about with fears, Live, trust, and think by chance, while shadow seems Light, and the wind that wrecks a hand that steers.

He, whose full soul held east and west in poise, Weighed man with man, and creed of man's with creed, And age with age, their triumphs and their toys, And found what faith may read not and may read.

Scorn deep and strong as death and life, that lit With fire the smile at lies and dreams outworn Wherewith he smote them, showed sublime in it The splendour and the steadfastness of scorn.

What loftier heaven, what lordlier air, what space Illimitable, insuperable, infinite, Now to that strong-winged soul yields ampler place Than passing darkness yields to passing light,

No dream, no faith can tell us: hope and fear, Whose tongues were loud of old as children's, now From babbling fall to silence: change is here, And death; dark furrows drawn by time's dark plough.

Still sunward here on earth its flight was bent, Even since the man within the child began To yearn and kindle with superb intent And trust in time to magnify the man.

Still toward the old garden of the Sun, whose fruit The honey-heavy lips of Sophocles Desired and sang, wherein the unwithering root Sprang of all growths that thought brings forth and sees

Incarnate, bright with bloom or dense with leaf Far-shadowing, deep as depth of dawn or night: And all were parcel of the garnered sheaf His strenuous spirit bound and stored aright.

And eastward now, and ever toward the dawn, If death's deep veil by life's bright hand be rent, We see, as through the shadow of death withdrawn, The imperious soul's indomitable ascent.

But not the soul whose labour knew not end— But not the swordsman's hand, the crested head— The royal heart we mourn, the faultless friend, Burton—a name that lives till fame be dead.



A SEQUENCE OF SONNETS ON THE DEATH OF ROBERT BROWNING

I

The clearest eyes in all the world they read With sense more keen and spirit of sight more true Than burns and thrills in sunrise, when the dew Flames, and absorbs the glory round it shed, As they the light of ages quick and dead, Closed now, forsake us: yet the shaft that slew Can slay not one of all the works we knew, Nor death discrown that many-laurelled head.

The works of words whose life seems lightning wrought, And moulded of unconquerable thought, And quickened with imperishable flame, Stand fast and shine and smile, assured that nought May fade of all their myriad-moulded fame, Nor England's memory clasp not Browning's name.

December 13, 1889.

II

Death, what hast thou to do with one for whom Time is not lord, but servant? What least part Of all the fire that fed his living heart, Of all the light more keen than sundawn's bloom That lit and led his spirit, strong as doom And bright as hope, can aught thy breath may dart Quench? Nay, thou knowest he knew thee what thou art, A shadow born of terror's barren womb, That brings not forth save shadows. What art thou, To dream, albeit thou breathe upon his brow, That power on him is given thee,—that thy breath Can make him less than love acclaims him now, And hears all time sound back the word it saith? What part hast thou then in his glory, Death?

III

A graceless doom it seems that bids us grieve: Venice and winter, hand in deadly hand, Have slain the lover of her sunbright strand And singer of a stormbright Christmas Eve. A graceless guerdon we that loved receive For all our love, from that the dearest land Love worshipped ever. Blithe and soft and bland, Too fair for storm to scathe or fire to cleave, Shone on our dreams and memories evermore The domes, the towers, the mountains and the shore That gird or guard thee, Venice: cold and black Seems now the face we loved as he of yore. We have given thee love—no stint, no stay, no lack: What gift, what gift is this thou hast given us back?

IV

But he—to him, who knows what gift is thine, Death? Hardly may we think or hope, when we Pass likewise thither where to-night is he, Beyond the irremeable outer seas that shine And darken round such dreams as half divine Some sunlit harbour in that starless sea Where gleams no ship to windward or to lee, To read with him the secret of thy shrine.

There too, as here, may song, delight, and love, The nightingale, the sea-bird, and the dove, Fulfil with joy the splendour of the sky Till all beneath wax bright as all above: But none of all that search the heavens, and try The sun, may match the sovereign eagle's eye.

December 14.

V

Among the wondrous ways of men and time He went as one that ever found and sought And bore in hand the lamplike spirit of thought To illume with instance of its fire sublime The dusk of many a cloudlike age and clime. No spirit in shape of light and darkness wrought, No faith, no fear, no dream, no rapture, nought That blooms in wisdom, nought that burns in crime, No virtue girt and armed and helmed with light, No love more lovely than the snows are white, No serpent sleeping in some dead soul's tomb, No song-bird singing from some live soul's height, But he might hear, interpret, or illume With sense invasive as the dawn of doom.

VI

What secret thing of splendour or of shade Surmised in all those wandering ways wherein Man, led of love and life and death and sin, Strays, climbs, or cowers, allured, absorbed, afraid, Might not the strong and sunlike sense invade Of that full soul that had for aim to win Light, silent over time's dark toil and din, Life, at whose touch death fades as dead things fade? O spirit of man, what mystery moves in thee That he might know not of in spirit, and see The heart within the heart that seems to strive, The life within the life that seems to be, And hear, through all thy storms that whirl and drive, The living sound of all men's souls alive?

VII

He held no dream worth waking: so he said, He who stands now on death's triumphal steep, Awakened out of life wherein we sleep And dream of what he knows and sees, being dead. But never death for him was dark or dread: "Look forth" he bade the soul, and fear not. Weep, All ye that trust not in his truth, and keep Vain memory's vision of a vanished head As all that lives of all that once was he Save that which lightens from his word: but we, Who, seeing the sunset-coloured waters roll, Yet know the sun subdued not of the sea, Nor weep nor doubt that still the spirit is whole, And life and death but shadows of the soul.

December 15.



SUNSET AND MOONRISE

NEW YEAR'S EVE, 1889

All the west, whereon the sunset sealed the dead year's glorious grave Fast with seals of light and fire and cloud that light and fire illume, Glows at heart and kindles earth and heaven with joyous blush and bloom, Warm and wide as life, and glad of death that only slays to save. As a tide-reconquered sea-rock lies aflush with the influent wave Lies the light aflush with darkness, lapped about by lustrous gloom, Even as life with death, and fame with time, and memory with the tomb Where a dead man hath for vassals Fame the serf and Time the slave.

Far from earth as heaven, the steadfast light withdrawn, superb, suspense, Burns in dumb divine expansion of illimitable flower: Moonrise whets the shadow's edges keen as noontide: hence and thence Glows the presence from us passing, shines and passes not the power. Souls arise whose word remembered is as spirit within the sense: All the hours are theirs of all the seasons: death has but his hour.



BIRTHDAY ODE

AUGUST 6, 1891

I

Love and praise, and a length of days whose shadow cast upon time is light, Days whose sound was a spell shed round from wheeling wings as of doves in flight, Meet in one, that the mounting sun to-day may triumph, and cast out night.

Two years more than the full fourscore lay hallowing hands on a sacred head— Scarce one score of the perfect four uncrowned of fame as they smiled and fled: Still and soft and alive aloft their sunlight stays though the suns be dead.

Ere we were or were thought on, ere the love that gave us to life began, Fame grew strong with his crescent song, to greet the goal of the race they ran, Song with fame, and the lustrous name with years whose changes acclaimed the man.

II

Soon, ere time in the rounding rhyme of choral seasons had hailed us men, We too heard and acclaimed the word whose breath was life upon England then— Life more bright than the breathless light of soundless noon in a songless glen.

Ah, the joy of the heartstruck boy whose ear was opened of love to hear! Ah, the bliss of the burning kiss of song and spirit, the mounting cheer Lit with fire of divine desire and love that knew not if love were fear!

Fear and love as of heaven above and earth enkindled of heaven were one; One white flame, that around his name grew keen and strong as the worldwide sun; Awe made bright with implied delight, as weft with weft of the rainbow spun.

III

He that fears not the voice he hears and loves shall never have heart to sing: All the grace of the sun-god's face that bids the soul as a fountain spring Bids the brow that receives it bow, and hail his likeness on earth as king.

We that knew when the sun's shaft flew beheld and worshipped, adored and heard: Light rang round it of shining sound, whence all men's hearts were subdued and stirred: Joy, love, sorrow, the day, the morrow, took life upon them in one man's word.

Not for him can the years wax dim, nor downward swerve on a darkening way: Upward wind they, and leave behind such light as lightens the front of May: Fair as youth and sublime as truth we find the fame that we hail to-day.



THRENODY

OCTOBER 6, 1892

I

Life, sublime and serene when time had power upon it and ruled its breath, Changed it, bade it be glad or sad, and hear what change in the world's ear saith, Shines more fair in the starrier air whose glory lightens the dusk of death.

Suns that sink on the wan sea's brink, and moons that kindle and flame and fade, Leave more clear for the darkness here the stars that set not and see not shade Rise and rise on the lowlier skies by rule of sunlight and moonlight swayed.

So, when night for his eyes grew bright, his proud head pillowed on Shakespeare's breast, Hand in hand with him, soon to stand where shine the glories that death loves best, Passed the light of his face from sight, and sank sublimely to radiant rest.

II

Far above us and all our love, beyond all reach of its voiceless praise, Shines for ever the name that never shall feel the shade of the changeful days Fall and chill the delight that still sees winter's light on it shine like May's.

Strong as death is the dark day's breath whose blast has withered the life we see Here where light is the child of night, and less than visions or dreams are we: Strong as death; but a word, a breath, a dream is stronger than death can be.

Strong as truth and superb in youth eternal, fair as the sundawn's flame Seen when May on her first-born day bids earth exult in her radiant name, Lives, clothed round with its praise and crowned with love that dies not, his love-lit fame.

III

Fairer far than the morning star, and sweet for us as the songs that rang Loud through heaven from the choral Seven when all the stars of the morning sang, Shines the song that we loved so long—since first such love in us flamed and sprang.

England glows as a sunlit rose from mead to mountain, from sea to sea, Bright with love and with pride above all taint of sorrow that needs must be, Needs must live for an hour, and give its rainbow's glory to lawn and lea.

Not through tears shall the new-born years behold him, crowned with applause of men, Pass at last from a lustrous past to life that lightens beyond their ken, Glad and dead, and from earthward led to sunward, guided of Imogen.



THE BALLAD OF MELICERTES

IN MEMORY OF THEODORE DE BANVILLE

Death, a light outshining life, bids heaven resume Star by star the souls whose light made earth divine. Death, a night outshining day, sees burn and bloom Flower by flower, and sun by sun, the fames that shine Deathless, higher than life beheld their sovereign sign. Dead Simonides of Ceos, late restored, Given again of God, again by man deplored, Shone but yestereve, a glory frail as breath. Frail? But fame's breath quickens, kindles, keeps in ward, Life so sweet as this that dies and casts off death.

Mother's love, and rapture of the sea, whose womb Breeds eternal life of joy that stings like brine, Pride of song, and joy to dare the singer's doom, Sorrow soft as sleep and laughter bright as wine, Flushed and filled with fragrant fire his lyric line. As the sea-shell utters, like a stricken chord, Music uttering all the sea's within it stored, Poet well-beloved, whose praise our sorrow saith, So thy songs retain thy soul, and so record Life so sweet as this that dies and casts off death.

Side by side we mourned at Gautier's golden tomb: Here in spirit now I stand and mourn at thine. Yet no breath of death strikes thence, no shadow of gloom, Only light more bright than gold of the inmost mine, Only steam of incense warm from love's own shrine. Not the darkling stream, the sundering Stygian ford, Not the hour that smites and severs as a sword, Not the night subduing light that perisheth, Smite, subdue, divide from us by doom abhorred, Life so sweet as this that dies and casts off death.

Prince of song more sweet than honey, lyric lord, Not thy France here only mourns a light adored, One whose love-lit fame the world inheriteth. Strangers too, now brethren, hail with heart's accord Life so sweet as this that dies and casts off death.



AU TOMBEAU DE BANVILLE

La plus douce des voix qui vibraient sous le ciel Se tait: les rossignols ailes pleurent le frere Qui s'envole au-dessus de l'apre et sombre terre, Ne lui laissant plus voir que l'etre essentiel,

Esprit qui chante et rit, fleur d'une ame sans fiel. L'ombre elyseenne, ou la nuit n'est que lumiere, Revoit, tout revetu de splendeur douce et fiere, Melicerte, poete a la bouche de miel.

Dieux exiles, passants celestes de ce monde, Dont on entend parfois dans notre nuit profonde Vibrer la voix, fremir les ailes, vous savez S'il vous aima, s'il vous pleura, lui dont la vie Et le chant rappelaient les votres. Recevez L'ame de Melicerte affranchie et ravie.



LIGHT: AN EPICEDE

TO PHILIP BOURKE MARSTON

Love will not weep because the seal is broken That sealed upon a life beloved and brief Darkness, and let but song break through for token How deep, too far for even thy song's relief, Slept in thy soul the secret springs of grief.

Thy song may soothe full many a soul hereafter, As tears, if tears will come, dissolve despair; As here but late, with smile more bright than laughter, Thy sweet strange yearning eyes would seem to bear Witness that joy might cleave the clouds of care.

Two days agone, and love was one with pity When love gave thought wings toward the glimmering goal Where, as a shrine lit in some darkling city, Shone soft the shrouded image of thy soul: And now thou art healed of life; thou art healed, and whole.

Yea, two days since, all we that loved thee pitied: And now with wondering love, with shame of face, We think how foolish now, how far unfitted, Should be from us, toward thee who hast run thy race, Pity—toward thee, who hast won the painless place;

The painless world of death, yet unbeholden Of eyes that dream what light now lightens thine And will not weep. Thought, yearning toward those olden Dear hours that sorrow sees and sees not shine, Bows tearless down before a flameless shrine:

A flameless altar here of life and sorrow Quenched and consumed together. These were one, One thing for thee, as night was one with morrow And utter darkness with the sovereign sun: And now thou seest life, sorrow, and darkness done.

And yet love yearns again to win thee hither; Blind love, and loveless, and unworthy thee: Here where I watch the hours of darkness wither, Here where mine eyes were glad and sad to see Thine that could see not mine, though turned on me.

But now, if aught beyond sweet sleep lie hidden, And sleep be sealed not fast on dead men's sight For ever, thine hath grace for ours forbidden, And sees us compassed round with change and night: Yet light like thine is ours, if love be light.



THRENODY

Watching here alone by the fire whereat last year Sat with me the friend that a week since yet was near, That a week has borne so far and hid so deep, Woe am I that I may not weep, May not yearn to behold him here.

Shame were mine, and little the love I bore him were, Now to mourn that better he fares than love may fare Which desires, and would not have indeed, its will, Would not love him so worse than ill, Would not clothe him again with care.

Yet can love not choose but remember, hearts but ache, Eyes but darken, only for one vain thought's poor sake, For the thought that by this hearth's now lonely side Two fast friends, on the day he died, Looked once more for his hand to take.

Let thy soul forgive them, and pardon heal the sin, Though their hearts be heavy to think what then had been, The delight that never while they live may be— Love's communion of speech with thee, Soul and speech with the soul therein.

O my friend, O brother, a glory veiled and marred! Never love made moan for a life more evil-starred. Was it envy, chance, or chance-compelling fate, Whence thy spirit was bruised so late, Bowed so heavily, bound so hard?

Now released, it may be,—if only love might know— Filled and fired with sight, it beholds us blind and low With a pity keener yet, if that may be, Even than ever was this that we Felt, when love of thee wrought us woe.

None may tell the depths and the heights of life and death. What we may we give thee: a word that sorrow saith, And that none will heed save sorrow: scarce a song. All we may, who have loved thee long, Take: the best we can give is breath.



A DIRGE

A bell tolls on in my heart As though in my ears a knell Had ceased for awhile to swell, But the sense of it would not part From the spirit that bears its part In the chime of the soundless bell.

Ah dear dead singer of sorrow, The burden is now not thine That grief bade sound for a sign Through the songs of the night whose morrow Has risen, and I may not borrow A beam from its radiant shrine.

The burden has dropped from thee That grief on thy life bound fast; The winter is over and past Whose end thou wast fain to see. Shall sorrow not comfort me That is thine no longer—at last?

Good day, good night, and good morrow, Men living and mourning say. For thee we could only pray That night of the day might borrow Such comfort as dreams lend sorrow: Death gives thee at last good day.



A REMINISCENCE

The rose to the wind has yielded: all its leaves Lie strewn on the graveyard grass, and all their light And colour and fragrance leave our sense and sight Bereft as a man whom bitter time bereaves Of blossom at once and hope of garnered sheaves, Of April at once and August. Day to night Calls wailing, and life to death, and depth to height, And soul upon soul of man that hears and grieves.

Who knows, though he see the snow-cold blossom shed, If haply the heart that burned within the rose, The spirit in sense, the life of life be dead? If haply the wind that slays with storming snows Be one with the wind that quickens? Bow thine head, O Sorrow, and commune with thine heart: who knows?



VIA DOLOROSA

The days of a man are threescore years and ten. The days of his life were half a man's, whom we Lament, and would yet not bid him back, to be Partaker of all the woes and ways of men. Life sent him enough of sorrow: not again Would anguish of love, beholding him set free, Bring back the beloved to suffer life and see No light but the fire of grief that scathed him then.

We know not at all: we hope, and do not fear. We shall not again behold him, late so near, Who now from afar above, with eyes alight And spirit enkindled, haply toward us here Looks down unforgetful yet of days like night And love that has yet his sightless face in sight.

February 15, 1887.

I

TRANSFIGURATION

But half a man's days—and his days were nights. What hearts were ours who loved him, should we pray That night would yield him back to darkling day, Sweet death that soothes, to life that spoils and smites? For now, perchance, life lovelier than the light's That shed no comfort on his weary way Shows him what none may dream to see or say Ere yet the soul may scale those topless heights Where death lies dead, and triumph. Haply there Already may his kindling eyesight find Faces of friends—no face than his more fair— And first among them found of all his kind Milton, with crowns from Eden on his hair, And eyes that meet a brother's now not blind.

II

DELIVERANCE

O Death, fair Death, sole comforter and sweet, Nor Love nor Hope can give such gifts as thine. Sleep hardly shows us round thy shadowy shrine What roses hang, what music floats, what feet Pass and what wings of angels. We repeat Wild words or mild, disastrous or divine, Blind prayer, blind imprecation, seeing no sign Nor hearing aught of thee not faint and fleet As words of men or snowflakes on the wind. But if we chide thee, saying "Thou hast sinned, thou hast sinned, Dark Death, to take so sweet a light away As shone but late, though shadowed, in our skies," We hear thine answer—"Night has given what day Denied him: darkness hath unsealed his eyes."

III

THANKSGIVING

Could love give strength to thank thee! Love can give Strong sorrow heart to suffer: what we bear We would not put away, albeit this were A burden love might cast aside and live. Love chooses rather pain than palliative, Sharp thought than soft oblivion. May we dare So trample down our passion and our prayer That fain would cling round feet now fugitive And stay them—so remember, so forget, What joy we had who had his presence yet, What griefs were his while joy in him was ours And grief made weary music of his breath, As even to hail his best and last of hours With love grown strong enough to thank thee, Death?

IV

LIBITINA VERTICORDIA

Sister of sleep, healer of life, divine As rest and strong as very love may be, To set the soul that love could set not free, To bid the skies that day could bid not shine, To give the gift that life withheld was thine. With all my heart I loved one borne from me: And all my heart bows down and praises thee, Death, that hast now made grief not his but mine.

O Changer of men's hearts, we would not bid thee Turn back our hearts from sorrow: this alone We bid, we pray thee, from thy sovereign throne And sanctuary sublime where heaven has hid thee, Give: grace to know of those for whom we weep That if they wake their life is sweet as sleep.

V

THE ORDER OF RELEASE

Thou canst not give it. Grace enough is ours To know that pain for him has fallen on rest. The worst we know was his on earth: the best, We fain would think,—a thought no fear deflowers— Is his, released from bonds of rayless hours. Ah, turn our hearts from longing; bid our quest Cease, as content with failure. This thy guest Sleeps, vexed no more of time's imperious powers, The spirit of hope, the spirit of change and loss, The spirit of love bowed down beneath his cross, Nor now needs comfort from the strength of song. Love, should he wake, bears now no cross for him: Dead hope, whose living eyes like his were dim, Has brought forth better comfort, strength more strong.

VI

PSYCHAGOGOS

As Greece of old acclaimed thee God and man, So, Death, our tongue acclaims thee: yet wast thou Hailed of old Rome as Romans hail thee now, Goddess and woman. Since the sands first ran That told when first man's life and death began, The shadows round thy blind ambiguous brow Have mocked the votive plea, the pleading vow That sought thee sorrowing, fain to bless or ban.

But stronger than a father's love is thine, And gentler than a mother's. Lord and God, Thy staff is surer than the wizard rod That Hermes bare as priest before thy shrine And herald of thy mercies. We could give Nought, when we would have given: thou bidst him live.

VII

THE LAST WORD

So many a dream and hope that went and came, So many and sweet, that love thought like to be, Of hours as bright and soft as those for me That made our hearts for song's sweet love the same, Lie now struck dead, that hope seems one with shame. O Death, thy name is Love: we know it, and see The witness: yet for very love's sake we Can hardly bear to mix with thine his name.

Philip, how hard it is to bid thee part Thou knowest, if aught thou knowest where now thou art Of us that loved and love thee. None may tell What none but knows—how hard it is to say The word that seals up sorrow, darkens day, And bids fare forth the soul it bids farewell.



IN MEMORY OF AURELIO SAFFI

The wider world of men that is not ours Receives a soul whose life on earth was light. Though darkness close the date of human hours, Love holds the spirit and sense of life in sight, That may not, even though death bid fly, take flight. Faith, love, and hope fulfilled with memory, see As clear and dear as life could bid it be The present soul that is and is not he.

He, who held up the shield and sword of Rome Against the ravening brood of recreant France, Beside the man of men whom heaven took home When earth beheld the spring's first eyebeams glance And life and winter seemed alike a trance Eighteen years since, in sight of heaven and spring That saw the soul above all souls take wing, He too now hears the heaven we hear not sing.

He too now dwells where death is dead, and stands Where souls like stars exult in life to be: Whence all who linked heroic hearts and hands Shine on our sight, and give it strength to see What hope makes fair for all whom faith makes free: Free with such freedom as we find in sleep, The light sweet shadow of death, when dreams are deep And high as heaven whence light and lightning leap.

And scarce a month yet gone, his living hand Writ loving words that sealed me friend of his. Are heaven and earth as near as sea to strand? May life and death as bride and bridegroom kiss? His last month's written word abides, and is; Clear as the sun that lit through storm and strife And darkling days when hope took fear to wife The faith whose fire was light of all his life.

A life so fair, so pure of earthlier leaven, That none hath won through higher and harder ways The deathless life of death which earth calls heaven; Heaven, and the light of love on earth, and praise Of silent memory through subsiding days Wherein the light subsides not whence the past Feeds full with life the future. Time holds fast Their names whom faith forgets not, first and last.

Forget? The dark forgets not dawn, nor we The suns that sink to rise again, and shine Lords of live years and ages. Earth and sea Forget not heaven that makes them seem divine, Though night put out their fires and bid their shrine Be dark and pale as storm and twilight. Day, Not night, is everlasting: life's full sway Bids death bow down as dead, and pass away.

What part has death in souls that past all fear Win heavenward their supernal way, and smite With scorn sublime as heaven such dreams as here Plague and perplex with cloud and fire the light That leads men's waking souls from glimmering night To the awless heights of day, whereon man's awe, Transfigured, dies in rapture, seeing the law Sealed of the sun that earth arising saw?

Faith, justice, mercy, love, and heaven-born hate That sets them all on fire and bids them be More than soft words and dreams that wake too late, Shone living through the lordly life that we Beheld, revered, and loved on earth, while he Dwelt here, and bade our eyes take light thereof; Light as from heaven that flamed or smiled above In light or fire whose very hate was love.

No hate of man, but hate of hate whose foam Sheds poison forth from tongues of snakes and priests, And stains the sickening air with steams whence Rome Now feeds not full the God that slays and feasts; For now the fangs of all the ravenous beasts That ramped about him, fain of prayer and prey, Fulfil their lust no more: the tide of day Swells, and compels him down the deathward way.

Night sucks the Church its creature down, and hell Yawns, heaves, and yearns to clasp its loathliest child Close to the breasts that bore it. All the spell Whence darkness saw the dawn in heaven defiled Is dumb as death: the lips that lied and smiled Wax white for fear as ashes. She that bore The banner up of darkness now no more Sheds night and fear and shame from shore to shore.

When they that cast her kingdom down were born, North cried on south and east made moan to west For hopes that love had hardly heart to mourn, For Italy that was not. Kings on quest, By priests whose blessings burn as curses blest, Made spoil of souls and bodies bowed and bound, Hunted and harried, leashed as horse or hound, And hopeless of the hope that died unfound.

And now that faith has brought forth fruit to time, How should not memory praise their names, and hold Their record even as Dante's life sublime, Who bade his dream, found fair and false of old, Live? Not till earth and heaven be dead and cold May man forget whose work and will made one Italy, fair as heaven or freedom won, And left their fame to shine beside her sun.

April 1890.



THE FESTIVAL OF BEATRICE

Dante, sole standing on the heavenward height, Beheld and heard one saying, "Behold me well: I am, I am Beatrice." Heaven and hell Kept silence, and the illimitable light Of all the stars was darkness in his sight Whose eyes beheld her eyes again, and fell Shame-stricken. Since her soul took flight to dwell In heaven, six hundred years have taken flight.

And now that heavenliest part of earth whereon Shines yet their shadow as once their presence shone To her bears witness for his sake, as he For hers bare witness when her face was gone: No slave, no hospice now for grief—but free From shore to mountain and from Alp to sea.



THE MONUMENT OF GIORDANO BRUNO

I

Not from without us, only from within, Comes or can ever come upon us light Whereby the soul keeps ever truth in sight. No truth, no strength, no comfort man may win, No grace for guidance, no release from sin, Save of his own soul's giving. Deep and bright As fire enkindled in the core of night Burns in the soul where once its fire has been The light that leads and quickens thought, inspired To doubt and trust and conquer. So he said Whom Sidney, flower of England, lordliest head Of all we love, loved: but the fates required A sacrifice to hate and hell, ere fame Should set with his in heaven Giordano's name.

II

Cover thine eyes and weep, O child of hell, Grey spouse of Satan, Church of name abhorred. Weep, withered harlot, with thy weeping lord, Now none will buy the heaven thou hast to sell At price of prostituted souls, and swell Thy loveless list of lovers. Fire and sword No more are thine: the steel, the wheel, the cord, The flames that rose round living limbs, and fell In lifeless ash and ember, now no more Approve thee godlike. Rome, redeemed at last From all the red pollution of thy past, Acclaims the grave bright face that smiled of yore Even on the fire that caught it round and clomb To cast its ashes on the face of Rome.

June 9, 1889.



LIFE IN DEATH

He should have followed who goes forth before us, Last born of us in life, in death first-born: The last to lift up eyes against the morn, The first to see the sunset. Life, that bore us Perchance for death to comfort and restore us, Of him hath left us here awhile forlorn, For him is as a garment overworn, And time and change, with suns and stars in chorus, Silent. But if, beyond all change or time, A law more just, more equal, more sublime Than sways the surge of life's loud sterile sea Sways that still world whose peace environs him, Where death lies dead as night when stars wax dim, Above all thought or hope of ours is he.

August 2, 1891.



EPICEDE

As a vesture shalt thou change them, said the prophet, And the raiment that was flesh is turned to dust; Dust and flesh and dust again the likeness of it, And the fine gold woven and worn of youth is rust. Hours that wax and wane salute the shade and scoff it, That it knows not aught it doth nor aught it must: Day by day the speeding soul makes haste to doff it, Night by night the pride of life resigns its trust.

Sleep, whose silent notes of song loud life's derange not, Takes the trust in hand awhile as angels may: Joy with wings that rest not, grief with wings that range not, Guard the gates of sleep and waking, gold or grey. Joys that joys estrange, and griefs that griefs estrange not, Day that yearns for night, and night that yearns for day, As a vesture shalt thou change them, and they change not, Seeing that change may never change or pass away.

Life of death makes question, "What art thou that changest? What am I, that fear should trust or faith should doubt? I that lighten, thou that darkenest and estrangest, Is it night or day that girds us round about? Light and darkness on the ways wherein thou rangest Seem as one, and beams as clouds they put to rout. Strange is hope, but fear of all things born were strangest, Seeing that none may strive with change to cast it out.

"Change alone stands fast, thou sayest, O death: I know not: What art thou, my brother death, that thou shouldst know? Men may reap no fruits of fields wherein they sow not; Hope or fear is all the seed we have to sow. Winter seals the sacred springs up that they flow not: Wind and sun and change unbind them, and they flow. Am I thou or art thou I? The years that show not Pass, and leave no sign when time shall be to show."

Hope makes suit to faith lest fear give ear to sorrow: Doubt strews dust upon his head, and goes his way. All the golden hope that life of death would borrow, How, if death require again, may life repay? Earth endures no darkness whence no light yearns thorough; God in man as light in darkness lives, they say: Yet, would midnight take assurance of the morrow, Who shall pledge the faith or seal the bond of day?

Darkness, mute or loud with music or with mourning, Starry darkness, winged with wind or clothed with calm, Dreams no dream of grief or fear or wrath or warning, Bears no sign of race or goal or strife or palm. Word of blessing, word of mocking or of scorning, Knows it none, nor whence its breath sheds blight or balm. Yet a little while, and hark, the psalm of morning: Yet a little while, and silence takes the psalm.

All the comfort, all the worship, all the wonder, All the light of love that darkness holds in fee, All the song that silence keeps or keeps not under, Night, the soul that knows gives thanks for all to thee. Far beyond the gates that morning strikes in sunder, Hopes that grief makes holy, dreams that fear sets free, Far above the throne of thought, the lair of thunder, Silent shines the word whose utterance fills the sea.



MEMORIAL VERSES ON THE DEATH OF WILLIAM BELL SCOTT

A life more bright than the sun's face, bowed Through stress of season and coil of cloud, Sets: and the sorrow that casts out fear Scarce deems him dead in his chill still shroud,

Dead on the breast of the dying year, Poet and painter and friend, thrice dear For love of the suns long set, for love Of song that sets not with sunset here,

For love of the fervent heart, above Their sense who saw not the swift light move That filled with sense of the loud sun's lyre The thoughts that passion was fain to prove

In fervent labour of high desire And faith that leapt from its own quenched pyre Alive and strong as the sun, and caught From darkness light, and from twilight fire.

Passion, deep as the depths unsought Whence faith's own hope may redeem us nought, Filled full with ardour of pain sublime His mourning song and his mounting thought.

Elate with sense of a sterner time, His hand's flight clomb as a bird's might climb Calvary: dark in the darkling air That shrank for fear of the crowning crime,

Three crosses rose on the hillside bare, Shown scarce by grace of the lightning's glare That clove the veil of the temple through And smote the priests on the threshold there.

The soul that saw it, the hand that drew, Whence light as thought's or as faith's glance flew, And stung to life the sepulchral past, And bade the stars of it burn anew,

Held no less than the dead world fast The light live shadows about them cast, The likeness living of dawn and night, The days that pass and the dreams that last.

Thought, clothed round with sorrow as light, Dark as a cloud that the moon turns bright, Moved, as a wind on the striving sea, That yearns and quickens and flags in flight,

Through forms of colour and song that he Who fain would have set its wide wings free Cast round it, clothing or chaining hope With lights that last not and shades that flee.

Scarce in song could his soul find scope, Scarce the strength of his hand might ope Art's inmost gate of her sovereign shrine, To cope with heaven as a man may cope.

But high as the hope of a man may shine The faith, the fervour, the life divine That thrills our life and transfigures, rose And shone resurgent, a sunbright sign,

Through shapes whereunder the strong soul glows And fills them full as a sunlit rose With sense and fervour of life, whose light The fool's eye knows not, the man's eye knows.

None that can read or divine aright The scriptures writ of the soul may slight The strife of a strenuous soul to show More than the craft of the hand may write.

None may slight it, and none may know How high the flames that aspire and glow From heart and spirit and soul may climb And triumph; higher than the souls lie low

Whose hearing hears not the livelong rhyme, Whose eyesight sees not the light sublime, That shines, that sounds, that ascends and lives Unquenched of change, unobscured of time.

A long life's length, as a man's life gives Space for the spirit that soars and strives To strive and soar, has the soul shone through That heeds not whither the world's wind drives

Now that the days and the ways it knew Are strange, are dead as the dawn's grey dew At high midnoon of the mounting day That mocks the might of the dawn it slew.

Yet haply may not—and haply may— No sense abide of the dead sun's ray Wherein the soul that outsoars us now Rejoiced with ours in its radiant sway.

Hope may hover, and doubt may bow, Dreaming. Haply—they dream not how— Not life but death may indeed be dead When silence darkens the dead man's brow.

Hope, whose name is remembrance, fed With love that lightens from seasons fled, Dreams, and craves not indeed to know, That death and life are as souls that wed.

But change that falls on the heart like snow Can chill not memory nor hope, that show The soul, the spirit, the heart and head, Alive above us who strive below.



AN OLD SAYING

Many waters cannot quench love, Neither can the floods drown it. Who shall snare or slay the white dove Faith, whose very dreams crown it, Gird it round with grace and peace, deep, Warm, and pure, and soft as sweet sleep? Many waters cannot quench love, Neither can the floods drown it.

Set me as a seal upon thine heart, As a seal upon thine arm. How should we behold the days depart And the nights resign their charm? Love is as the soul: though hate and fear Waste and overthrow, they strike not here. Set me as a seal upon thine heart, As a seal upon thine arm.



A MOSS-ROSE

If the rose of all flowers be the rarest That heaven may adore from above, And the fervent moss-rose be the fairest That sweetens the summer with love,

Can it be that a fairer than any Should blossom afar from the tree? Yet one, and a symbol of many, Shone sudden for eyes that could see.

In the grime and the gloom of November The bliss and the bloom of July Bade autumn rejoice and remember The balm of the blossoms gone by.

Would you know what moss-rose now it may be That puts all the rest to the blush, The flower was the face of a baby, The moss was a bonnet of plush.



TO A CAT

I

Stately, kindly, lordly friend, Condescend Here to sit by me, and turn Glorious eyes that smile and burn, Golden eyes, love's lustrous meed, On the golden page I read.

All your wondrous wealth of hair, Dark and fair, Silken-shaggy, soft and bright As the clouds and beams of night, Pays my reverent hand's caress Back with friendlier gentleness.

Dogs may fawn on all and some As they come; You, a friend of loftier mind, Answer friends alone in kind. Just your foot upon my hand Softly bids it understand.

Morning round this silent sweet Garden-seat Sheds its wealth of gathering light, Thrills the gradual clouds with might, Changes woodland, orchard, heath, Lawn, and garden there beneath.

Fair and dim they gleamed below: Now they glow Deep as even your sunbright eyes, Fair as even the wakening skies. Can it not or can it be Now that you give thanks to see?

May not you rejoice as I, Seeing the sky Change to heaven revealed, and bid Earth reveal the heaven it hid All night long from stars and moon, Now the sun sets all in tune?

What within you wakes with day Who can say? All too little may we tell, Friends who like each other well, What might haply, if we might, Bid us read our lives aright.

II

Wild on woodland ways your sires Flashed like fires; Fair as flame and fierce and fleet As with wings on wingless feet Shone and sprang your mother, free, Bright and brave as wind or sea.

Free and proud and glad as they, Here to-day Rests or roams their radiant child, Vanquished not, but reconciled, Free from curb of aught above Save the lovely curb of love.

Love through dreams of souls divine Fain would shine Round a dawn whose light and song Then should right our mutual wrong— Speak, and seal the love-lit law Sweet Assisi's seer foresaw.

Dreams were theirs; yet haply may Dawn a day When such friends and fellows born, Seeing our earth as fair at morn, May for wiser love's sake see More of heaven's deep heart than we.



HAWTHORN DYKE

All the golden air is full of balm and bloom Where the hawthorns line the shelving dyke with flowers. Joyous children born of April's happiest hours, High and low they laugh and lighten, knowing their doom Bright as brief—to bless and cheer they know not whom, Heed not how, but washed and warmed with suns and showers Smile, and bid the sweet soft gradual banks and bowers Thrill with love of sunlit fire or starry gloom. All our moors and lawns all round rejoice; but here All the rapturous resurrection of the year Finds the radiant utterance perfect, sees the word Spoken, hears the light that speaks it. Far and near, All the world is heaven: and man and flower and bird Here are one at heart with all things seen and heard.



THE BROTHERS

There were twa brethren fell on strife; Sweet fruits are sair to gather: The tane has reft his brother of life; And the wind wears owre the heather.

There were twa brethren fell to fray; Sweet fruits are sair to gather: The tane is clad in a cloak of clay; And the wind wears owre the heather.

O loud and loud was the live man's cry, (Sweet fruits are sair to gather) "Would God the dead and the slain were I!" And the wind wears owre the heather.

"O sair was the wrang and sair the fray," (Sweet fruits are sair to gather) "But liefer had love be slain than slay." And the wind wears owre the heather.

"O sweet is the life that sleeps at hame," (Sweet fruits are sair to gather) "But I maun wake on a far sea's faem." And the wind wears owre the heather.

"And women are fairest of a' things fair," (Sweet fruits are sair to gather) "But never shall I kiss woman mair." And the wind wears owre the heather.

Between the birk and the aik and the thorn (Sweet fruits are sair to gather) He's laid his brother to lie forlorn: And the wind wears owre the heather.

Between the bent and the burn and the broom (Sweet fruits are sair to gather) He's laid him to sleep till dawn of doom: And the wind wears owre the heather.

He's tane him owre the waters wide, (Sweet fruits are sair to gather) Afar to fleet and afar to bide: And the wind wears owre the heather.

His hair was yellow, his cheek was red, (Sweet fruits are sair to gather) When he set his face to the wind and fled: And the wind wears owre the heather.

His banes were stark and his een were bright (Sweet fruits are sair to gather) When he set his face to the sea by night: And the wind wears owre the heather.

His cheek was wan and his hair was grey (Sweet fruits are sair to gather) When he came back hame frae the wide world's way: And the wind wears owre the heather.

His banes were weary, his een were dim, (Sweet fruits are sair to gather) And nae man lived and had mind of him: And the wind wears owre the heather.

"O whatten a wreck wad they seek on land" (Sweet fruits are sair to gather) "That they houk the turf to the seaward hand?" And the wind wears owre the heather.

"O whatten a prey wad they think to take" (Sweet fruits are sair to gather) "That they delve the dykes for a dead man's sake?" And the wind wears owre the heather.

A bane of the dead in his hand he's tane; Sweet fruits are sair to gather: And the red blood brak frae the dead white bane. And the wind wears owre the heather.

He's cast it forth of his auld faint hand; Sweet fruits are sair to gather: And the red blood ran on the wan wet sand. And the wind wears owre the heather.

"O whatten a slayer is this," they said, (Sweet fruits are sair to gather) "That the straik of his hand should raise his dead?" And the wind wears owre the heather.

"O weel is me for the sign I take" (Sweet fruits are sair to gather) "That now I may die for my auld sin's sake." And the wind wears owre the heather.

"For the dead was in wait now fifty year," (Sweet fruits are sair to gather) "And now shall I die for his blood's sake here." And the wind wears owre the heather.



JACOBITE SONG

Now who will speak, and lie not, And pledge not life, but give? Slaves herd with herded cattle: The dawn grows bright for battle, And if we die, we die not; And if we live, we live.

The faith our fathers fought for, The kings our fathers knew, We fight but as they fought for: We seek the goal they sought for, The chance they hailed and knew, The praise they strove and wrought for, To leave their blood as dew On fields that flower anew.

Men live that serve the stranger; Hounds live that huntsmen tame: These life-days of our living Are days of God's good giving Where death smiles soft on danger And life scowls dark on shame.

And what would you do other, Sweet wife, if you were I? And how should you be other, My sister, than your brother, If you were man as I, Born of our sire and mother, With choice to cower and fly, And chance to strike and die?

No churl's our oldworld name is, The lands we leave are fair: But fairer far than these are, But wide as all the seas are, But high as heaven the fame is That if we die we share.

Our name the night may swallow, Our lands the churl may take: But night nor death may swallow, Nor hell's nor heaven's dim hollow, The star whose height we take, The star whose light we follow For faith's unfaltering sake Till hope that sleeps awake.

Soft hope's light lure we serve not, Nor follow, fain to find: Dark time's last word may smite her Dead, ere man's falsehood blight her, But though she die, we swerve not, Who cast not eye behind.

Faith speaks when hope dissembles: Faith lives when hope lies dead: If death as life dissembles, And all that night assembles Of stars at dawn lie dead, Faint hope that smiles and trembles May tell not well for dread: But faith has heard it said.

Now who will fight, and fly not, And grudge not life to give? And who will strike beside us, If life's or death's light guide us? For if we live, we die not, And if we die, we live.



THE BALLAD OF DEAD MEN'S BAY

The sea swings owre the slants of sand, All white with winds that drive; The sea swirls up to the still dim strand, Where nae man comes alive.

At the grey soft edge of the fruitless surf A light flame sinks and springs; At the grey soft rim of the flowerless turf A low flame leaps and clings.

What light is this on a sunless shore, What gleam on a starless sea? Was it earth's or hell's waste womb that bore Such births as should not be?

As lithe snakes turning, as bright stars burning, They bicker and beckon and call; As wild waves churning, as wild winds yearning, They flicker and climb and fall.

A soft strange cry from the landward rings— "What ails the sea to shine?" A keen sweet note from the spray's rim springs— "What fires are these of thine?"

A soul am I that was born on earth For ae day's waesome span: Death bound me fast on the bourn of birth Ere I were christened man.

"A light by night, I fleet and fare Till the day of wrath and woe; On the hems of earth and the skirts of air Winds hurl me to and fro."

"O well is thee, though the weird be strange That bids thee flit and flee; For hope is child of the womb of change, And hope keeps watch with thee.

"When the years are gone, and the time is come, God's grace may give thee grace; And thy soul may sing, though thy soul were dumb, And shine before God's face.

"But I, that lighten and revel and roll With the foam of the plunging sea, No sign is mine of a breathing soul That God should pity me.

"Nor death, nor heaven, nor hell, nor birth Hath part in me nor mine: Strong lords are these of the living earth And loveless lords of thine.

"But I that know nor lord nor life More sure than storm or spray, Whose breath is made of sport and strife, Whereon shall I find stay?"

"And wouldst thou change thy doom with me, Full fain with thee would I: For the life that lightens and lifts the sea Is more than earth or sky.

"And what if the day of doubt and doom Shall save nor smite not me? I would not rise from the slain world's tomb If there be no more sea.

"Take he my soul that gave my soul, And give it thee to keep; And me, while seas and stars shall roll Thy life that falls on sleep."

That word went up through the mirk mid sky, And even to God's own ear: And the Lord was ware of the keen twin cry, And wroth was he to hear.

He's tane the soul of the unsained child That fled to death from birth; He's tane the light of the wan sea wild, And bid it burn on earth.

He's given the ghaist of the babe new-born The gift of the water-sprite, To ride on revel from morn to morn And roll from night to night.

He's given the sprite of the wild wan sea The gift of the new-born man, A soul for ever to bide and be When the years have filled their span.

When a year was gone and a year was come, O loud and loud cried they— "For the lee-lang year thou hast held us dumb Take now thy gifts away!"

O loud and lang they cried on him, And sair and sair they prayed: "Is the face of thy grace as the night's face grim For those thy wrath has made?"

A cry more bitter than tears of men From the rim of the dim grey sea;— "Give me my living soul again, The soul thou gavest me, The doom and the dole of kindly men, To bide my weird and be!"

A cry more keen from the wild low land Than the wail of waves that roll;— "Take back the gift of a loveless hand, Thy gift of doom and dole, The weird of men that bide on land; Take from me, take my soul!"

The hands that smite are the hands that spare; They build and break the tomb; They turn to darkness and dust and air The fruits of the waste earth's womb; But never the gift of a granted prayer, The dole of a spoken doom.

Winds may change at a word unheard, But none may change the tides: The prayer once heard is as God's own word; The doom once dealt abides.

And ever a cry goes up by day, And ever a wail by night; And nae ship comes by the weary bay But her shipmen hear them wail and pray, And see with earthly sight The twofold flames of the twin lights play Where the sea-banks green and the sea-floods grey Are proud of peril and fain of prey, And the sand quakes ever; and ill fare they That look upon that light.



DEDICATION

1893

The sea of the years that endure not Whose tide shall endure till we die And know what the seasons assure not, If death be or life be a lie, Sways hither the spirit and thither, A waif in the swing of the sea Whose wrecks are of memories that wither As leaves of a tree.

We hear not and hail not with greeting The sound of the wings of the years, The storm of the sound of them beating, That none till it pass from him hears: But tempest nor calm can imperil The treasures that fade not or fly; Change bids them not change and be sterile, Death bids them not die.

Hearts plighted in youth to the royal High service of hope and of song, Sealed fast for endurance as loyal, And proved of the years as they throng, Conceive not, believe not, and fear not That age may be other than youth; That faith and that friendship may hear not And utter not truth.

Not yesterday's light nor to-morrow's Gleams nearer or clearer than gleams, Though joys be forgotten and sorrows Forgotten as changes of dreams, The dawn of the days unforgotten That noon could eclipse not or slay, Whose fruits were as children begotten Of dawn upon day.

The years that were flowerful and fruitless, The years that were fruitful and dark, The hopes that were radiant and rootless, The hopes that were winged for their mark, Lie soft in the sepulchres fashioned Of hours that arise and subside, Absorbed and subdued and impassioned, In pain or in pride.

But far in the night that entombs them The starshine as sunshine is strong, And clear through the cloud that resumes them Remembrance, a light and a song, Rings lustrous as music and hovers As birds that impend on the sea, And thoughts that their prison-house covers Arise and are free.

Forgetfulness deep as a prison Holds days that are dead for us fast Till the sepulchre sees rearisen The spirit whose reign is the past, Disentrammelled of darkness, and kindled With life that is mightier than death, When the life that obscured it has dwindled And passed as a breath.

But time nor oblivion may darken Remembrance whose name will be joy While memory forgets not to hearken, While manhood forgets not the boy Who heard and exulted in hearing The songs of the sunrise of youth Ring radiant above him, unfearing And joyous as truth.

Truth, winged and enkindled with rapture And sense of the radiance of yore, Fulfilled you with power to recapture What never might singer before— The life, the delight, and the sorrow Of troublous and chivalrous years That knew not of night or of morrow, Of hopes or of fears.

But wider the wing and the vision That quicken the spirit have spread Since memory beheld with derision Man's hope to be more than his dead. From the mists and the snows and the thunders Your spirit has brought for us forth Light, music, and joy in the wonders And charms of the north.

The wars and the woes and the glories That quicken and lighten and rain From the clouds of its chronicled stories, The passion, the pride, and the pain, Whose echoes were mute and the token Was lost of the spells that they spake, Rise bright at your bidding, unbroken Of ages that break.

For you, and for none of us other, Time is not: the dead that must live Hold commune with you as a brother By grace of the life that you give. The heart that was in them is in you, Their soul in your spirit endures: The strength of their song is the sinew Of this that is yours.

Hence is it that life, everlasting As light and as music, abides In the sound of the surge of it, casting Sound back to the surge of the tides, Till sons of the sons of the Norsemen Watch, hurtling to windward and lee, Round England, unbacked of her horsemen, The steeds of the sea.

THE END