Chapter 5

Alas, the strong, the wise, the brave, That boast themselves the sons of men! Once they go down into the grave— Alas, the strong, the wise, the brave,— They perish and have none to save, They are sown, and are not raised again; Alas, the strong, the wise, the brave, That boast themselves the sons of men!

BALLADE OF CRICKET.

TO T. W. LANG.

THE burden of hard hitting: slog away! Here shalt thou make a “five” and there a “four,” And then upon thy bat shalt lean, and say, That thou art in for an uncommon score. Yea, the loud ring applauding thee shall roar, And thou to rival THORNTON shalt aspire, When lo, the Umpire gives thee “leg before,”— “This is the end of every man’s desire!”

The burden of much bowling, when the stay Of all thy team is “collared,” swift or slower, When “bailers” break not in their wonted way, And “yorkers” come not off as here-to-fore, When length balls shoot no more, ah never more, When all deliveries lose their former fire, When bats seem broader than the broad barn-door,— “This is the end of every man’s desire!”

The burden of long fielding, when the clay Clings to thy shoon in sudden shower’s downpour, And running still thou stumblest, or the ray Of blazing suns doth bite and burn thee sore, And blind thee till, forgetful of thy lore, Thou dost most mournfully misjudge a “skyer,” And lose a match the Fates cannot restore,— “This is the end of every man’s desire!”

ENVOY.

Alas, yet liefer on Youth’s hither shore Would I be some poor Player on scant hire, Than King among the old, who play no more,— “_This_ is the end of every man’s desire!”

THE LAST MAYING.

“It is told of the last Lovers which watched May-night in the forest, before men brought the tidings of the Gospel to this land, that they beheld no Fairies, nor Dwarfs, nor no such Thing, but the very Venus herself, who bade them ‘make such cheer as they might, for’ said she, ‘I shall live no more in these Woods, nor shall ye endure to see another May time.’”—EDMUND GORLIOT, “Of Phantasies and Omens,” p. 149. (1573.)

“WHENCE do ye come, with the dew on your hair? From what far land are the boughs ye bear, The blossoms and buds upon breasts and tresses, The light burned white in your faces fair?”

“In a falling fane have we built our house, With the dying Gods we have held carouse, And our lips are wan from their wild caresses, Our hands are filled with their holy boughs.

As we crossed the lawn in the dying day No fairy led us to meet the May, But the very Goddess loved by lovers, In mourning raiment of green and grey.

She was not decked as for glee and game, She was not veiled with the veil of flame, The saffron veil of the Bride that covers The face that is flushed with her joy and shame.

On the laden branches the scent and dew Mingled and met, and as snow to strew The woodland rides and the fragrant grasses, White flowers fell as the night wind blew.

Tears and kisses on lips and eyes Mingled and met amid laughter and sighs For grief that abides, and joy that passes, For pain that tarries and mirth that flies.

It chanced as the dawning grew to grey Pale and sad on our homeward way, With weary lips, and palled with pleasure The Goddess met us, farewell to say.

“Ye have made your choice, and the better part, Ye chose” she said, “and the wiser art; In the wild May night drank all the measure, The perfect pleasure of heart and heart.

“Ye shall walk no more with the May,” she said, “Shall your love endure though the Gods be dead? Shall the flitting flocks, mine own, my chosen, Sing as of old, and be happy and wed?

“Yea, they are glad as of old; but you, Fair and fleet as the dawn or the dew, Abide no more, for the springs are frozen, And fled the Gods that ye loved and knew.

“Ye shall never know Summer again like this; Ye shall play no more with the Fauns, I wis, No more in the nymphs’ and dryads’ playtime Shall echo and answer kiss and kiss.

“Though the flowers in your golden hair be bright, Your golden hair shall be waste and white On faded brows ere another May time Bring the spring, but no more delight.”

HOMERIC UNITY.

THE sacred keep of Ilion is rent By shaft and pit; foiled waters wander slow Through plains where Simois and Scamander went To war with Gods and heroes long ago. Not yet to tired Cassandra, lying low In rich Mycenæ, do the Fates relent: The bones of Agamemnon are a show, And ruined is his royal monument.

The dust and awful treasures of the Dead, Hath Learning scattered wide, but vainly thee, Homer, she meteth with her tool of lead, And strives to rend thy songs; too blind to see The crown that burns on thine immortal head Of indivisible supremacy!

IN TINTAGEL.

LUI.

AH lady, lady, leave the creeping mist, And leave the iron castle by the sea!

ELLE.

Nay, from the sea there came a ghost that kissed My lips, and so I cannot come to thee!

LUI.

Ah lady, leave the cruel landward wind That crusts the blighted flowers with bitter foam!

ELLE.

Nay, for his arms are cold and strong to bind, And I must dwell with him and make my home!

LUI.

Come, for the Spring is fair in Joyous Guard And down deep alleys sweet birds sing again.

ELLE.

But I must tarry with the winter hard, And with the bitter memory of pain, Although the Spring be fair in Joyous Guard, And in the gardens glad birds sing again!

PISIDICÊ.

The incident is from the Love Stories of Parthenius, who preserved fragments of a lost epic on the expedition of Achilles against Lesbos, an island allied with Troy.

THE daughter of the Lesbian king Within her bower she watched the war, Far off she heard the arrows ring, The smitten harness ring afar; And, fighting from the foremost car, Saw one that smote where all must flee; More fair than the Immortals are He seemed to fair Pisidicê!

She saw, she loved him, and her heart Before Achilles, Peleus’ son, Threw all its guarded gates apart, A maiden fortress lightly won! And, ere that day of fight was done, No more of land or faith recked she, But joyed in her new life begun,— Her life of love, Pisidicê!

She took a gift into her hand, As one that had a boon to crave; She stole across the ruined land Where lay the dead without a grave, And to Achilles’ hand she gave Her gift, the secret postern’s key. “To-morrow let me be thy slave!” Moaned to her love Pisidicê.

Ere dawn the Argives’ clarion call Rang down Methymna’s burning street; They slew the sleeping warriors all, They drove the women to the fleet, Save one, that to Achilles’ feet Clung, but, in sudden wrath, cried he: “For her no doom but death is meet,” And there men stoned Pisidicê.

In havens of that haunted coast, Amid the myrtles of the shore, The moon sees many a maiden ghost Love’s outcast now and evermore. The silence hears the shades deplore Their hour of dear-bought love; but _thee_ The waves lull, ’neath thine olives hoar, To dreamless rest, Pisidicê!

FROM THE EAST TO THE WEST.

RETURNING from what other seas Dost thou renew thy murmuring, Weak Tide, and hast thou aught of these To tell, the shores where float and cling My love, my hope, my memories?

Say does my lady wake to note The gold light into silver die? Or do thy waves make lullaby, While dreams of hers, like angels, float Through star-sown spaces of the sky?

Ah, would such angels came to me That dreams of mine might speak with hers, Nor wake the slumber of the sea With words as low as winds that be Awake among the gossamers!

LOVE THE VAMPIRE.

Ο ΕΡΩΤΑΣ ’Σ ΤΟΝ ΤΑΦΟ.

THE level sands and grey, Stretch leagues and leagues away, Down to the border line of sky and foam, A spark of sunset burns, The grey tide-water turns, Back, like a ghost from her forbidden home!

Here, without pyre or bier, Light Love was buried here, Alas, his grave was wide and deep enough, Thrice, with averted head, We cast dust on the dead, And left him to his rest. An end of Love.

“No stone to roll away, No seal of snow or clay, Only soft dust above his wearied eyes, But though the sudden sound Of Doom should shake the ground, And graves give up their ghosts, he will not rise!”

So each to each we said! Ah, but to either bed Set far apart in lands of North and South, Love as a Vampire came With haggard eyes aflame, And kissed us with the kisses of his mouth!

Thenceforth in dreams must we Each other’s shadow see Wand’ring unsatisfied in empty lands, Still the desirèd face Fleets from the vain embrace, And still the shape evades the longing hands.

BALLADE OF THE BOOK-MAN’S PARADISE

THERE _is_ a Heaven, or here, or there,— A Heaven there is, for me and you, Where bargains meet for purses spare, Like ours, are not so far and few. Thuanus’ bees go humming through The learned groves, ’neath rainless skies, O’er volumes old and volumes new, Within that Book-man’s Paradise!

There treasures bound for Longepierre Keep brilliant their morocco blue, There Hookes’ _Amanda_ is not rare, Nor early tracts upon Peru! Racine is common as Rotrou, No Shakespeare Quarto search defies, And Caxtons grow as blossoms grew, Within that Book-man’s Paradise!

There’s Eve,—not our first mother fair,— But Clovis Eve, a binder true; Thither does Bauzonnet repair, Derome, Le Gascon, Padeloup! But never come the cropping crew That dock a volume’s honest size, Nor they that “letter” backs askew, Within that Book-man’s Paradise!

ENVOY.

Friend, do not Heber and De Thou, And Scott, and Southey, kind and wise, _La chasse au bouquin_ still pursue Within that Book-man’s Paradise?

BALLADE OF A FRIAR.

(Clement Marot’s _Frère Lubin_, though translated by Longfellow and others, has not hitherto been rendered into the original measure of _ballade à double refrain_.)

SOME ten or twenty times a day, To bustle to the town with speed, To dabble in what dirt he may,— Le Frère Lubin’s the man you need! But any sober life to lead Upon an exemplary plan, Requires a Christian indeed,— Le Frère Lubin is _not_ the man!

Another’s wealth on his to lay, With all the craft of guile and greed, To leave you bare of pence or pay,— Le Frère Lubin’s the man you need! But watch him with the closest heed, And dun him with what force you can,— He’ll not refund, howe’er you plead,— Le Frère Lubin is _not_ the man!

An honest girl to lead astray, With subtle saw and promised meed, Requires no cunning crone and grey,— Le Frère Lubin’s the man you need! He preaches an ascetic creed, But,—try him with the water can— A dog will drink, whate’er his breed,— Le Frère Lubin is _not_ the man!

ENVOY.

In good to fail, in ill succeed, Le Frère Lubin’s the man you need! In honest works to lead the van, Le Frère Lubin is _not_ the man!

BALLADE OF NEGLECTED MERIT. {194}

I HAVE scribbled in verse and in prose, I have painted “arrangements in greens,” And my name is familiar to those Who take in the high class magazines; I compose; I’ve invented machines; I have written an “Essay on Rhyme”; For my county I played, in my teens, But—I am not in “Men of the Time!”

I have lived, as a chief, with the Crows; I have “interviewed” Princes and Queens; I have climbed the Caucasian snows; I abstain, like the ancients, from beans,— I’ve a guess what Pythagoras means When he says that to eat them’s a crime,— I have lectured upon the Essenes, But—I am not in “Men of the Time!”

I’ve a fancy as morbid as Poe’s, I can tell what is meant by “Shebeens,” I have breasted the river that flows Through the land of the wild Gadarenes; I can gossip with Burton on _skenes_, I can imitate Irving (the Mime), And my sketches are quainter than Keene’s, But—I am not in “Men of the Time!”

ENVOY.

So the tower of mine eminence leans Like the Pisan, and mud is its lime; I’m acquainted with Dukes and with Deans, But—I am not in “Men of the Time!”

BALLADE OF RAILWAY NOVELS.

LET others praise analysis And revel in a “cultured” style, And follow the subjective Miss {196} From Boston to the banks of Nile, Rejoice in anti-British bile, And weep for fickle hero’s woe, These twain have shortened many a mile, Miss Braddon and Gaboriau.

These damsels of “Democracy’s,” How long they stop at every stile! They smile, and we are told, I wis, Ten subtle reasons _why_ they smile. Give _me_ your villains deeply vile, Give me Lecoq, Jottrat, and Co., Great artists of the ruse and wile, Miss Braddon and Gaboriau!

Oh, novel readers, tell me this, Can prose that’s polished by the file, Like great Boisgobey’s mysteries, Wet days and weary ways beguile, And man to living reconcile, Like these whose every trick we know? The agony how high they pile, Miss Braddon and Gaboriau!

ENVOY.

Ah, friend, how many and many a while They’ve made the slow time fleetly flow, And solaced pain and charmed exile, Miss Braddon and Gaboriau.

THE CLOUD CHORUS.

(FROM ARISTOPHANES.)

_Socrates speaks_.

HITHER, come hither, ye Clouds renowned, and unveil yourselves here; Come, though ye dwell on the sacred crests of Olympian snow, Or whether ye dance with the Nereid choir in the gardens clear, Or whether your golden urns are dipped in Nile’s overflow, Or whether you dwell by Mæotis mere Or the snows of Mimas, arise! appear! And hearken to us, and accept our gifts ere ye rise and go.

_The Clouds sing_.

Immortal Clouds from the echoing shore Of the father of streams, from the sounding sea, Dewy and fleet, let us rise and soar. Dewy and gleaming, and fleet are we! Let us look on the tree-clad mountain crest, On the sacred earth where the fruits rejoice, On the waters that murmur east and west On the tumbling sea with his moaning voice, For unwearied glitters the Eye of the Air, And the bright rays gleam; Then cast we our shadows of mist, and fare In our deathless shapes to glance everywhere From the height of the heaven, on the land and air, And the Ocean stream.

Let us on, ye Maidens that bring the Rain, Let us gaze on Pallas’ citadel, In the country of Cecrops, fair and dear The mystic land of the holy cell, Where the Rites unspoken securely dwell, And the gifts of the Gods that know not stain And a people of mortals that know not fear. For the temples tall, and the statues fair, And the feasts of the Gods are holiest there, The feasts of Immortals, the chaplets of flowers And the Bromian mirth at the coming of spring, And the musical voices that fill the hours, And the dancing feet of the Maids that sing!

BALLADE OF LITERARY FAME.

“All these for Fourpence.”

OH, where are the endless Romances Our grandmothers used to adore? The Knights with their helms and their lances, Their shields and the favours they wore? And the Monks with their magical lore? They have passed to Oblivion and _Nox_, They have fled to the shadowy shore,— They are all in the Fourpenny Box!

And where the poetical fancies Our fathers rejoiced in, of yore? The lyric’s melodious expanses, The Epics in cantos a score? They have been and are not: no more Shall the shepherds drive silvery flocks, Nor the ladies their languors deplore,— They are all in the Fourpenny Box!

And the Music! The songs and the dances? The tunes that Time may not restore? And the tomes where Divinity prances? And the pamphlets where Heretics roar? They have ceased to be even a bore,— The Divine, and the Sceptic who mocks,— They are “cropped,” they are “foxed” to the core,— They are all in the Fourpenny Box!

ENVOY.

Suns beat on them; tempests downpour, On the chest without cover or locks, Where they lie by the Bookseller’s door,— They are _all_ in the Fourpenny Box!

Νήνεμος Αἰών.

I WOULD my days had been in other times, A moment in the long unnumbered years That knew the sway of Horus and of hawk, In peaceful lands that border on the Nile.

I would my days had been in other times, Lulled by the sacrifice and mumbled hymn Between the Five great Rivers, or in shade And shelter of the cool Himâlayan hills.

I would my days had been in other times, That I in some old abbey of Touraine Had watched the rounding grapes, and lived my life, Ere ever Luther came or Rabelais!

I would my days had been in other times, When quiet life to death not terrible Drifted, as ashes of the Santhal dead Drift down the sacred Rivers to the Sea!

SCIENCE.

THE BARBAROUS BIRD-GODS: A SAVAGE PARABASIS.

In the _Aves_ of Aristophanes, the Bird Chorus declare that they are older than the Gods, and greater benefactors of men. This idea recurs in almost all savage mythologies, and I have made the savage Bird-gods state their own case.

_The Birds sing_:

WE would have you to wit, that on eggs though we sit, and are spiked on the spit, and are baked in the pan, Birds are older by far than your ancestors are, and made love and made war ere the making of Man! For when all things were dark, not a glimmer nor spark, and the world like a barque without rudder or sail Floated on through the night, ’twas a Bird struck a light, ’twas a flash from the bright feather’d Tonatiu’s {207} tail! Then the Hawk {208a} with some dry wood flew up in the sky, and afar, safe and high, the Hawk lit Sun and Moon, And the Birds of the air they rejoiced everywhere, and they recked not of care that should come on them soon. For the Hawk, so they tell, was then known as Pundjel, {208b} and a-musing he fell at the close of the day; Then he went on the quest, as we thought, of a nest, with some bark of the best, and a clawful of clay. {208c} And with these did he frame two birds lacking a name, without feathers (his game was a puzzle to all); Next around them he fluttered a-dancing, and muttered; and, lastly, he uttered a magical call: Then the figures of clay, as they featherless lay, they leaped up, who but they, and embracing they fell, And _this_ was the baking of Man, and his making; but now he’s forsaking his Father, Pundjel! Now these creatures of mire, they kept whining for fire, and to crown their desire who was found but the Wren? To the high heaven he came, from the Sun stole he flame, and for this has a name in the memory of men! {209a} And in India who for the Soma juice flew, and to men brought it through without falter or fail? Why the Hawk ’twas again, and great Indra to men would appear, now and then, in the shape of a Quail, While the Thlinkeet’s delight is the Bird of the Night, the beak and the bright ebon plumage of Yehl. {209b} And who for man’s need brought the famed Suttung’s mead? why ’tis told in the creed of the Sagamen strong, ’Twas the Eagle god who brought the drink from the blue, and gave mortals the brew that’s the fountain of song. {210a} Next, who gave men their laws? and what reason or cause the young brave overawes when in need of a squaw, Till he thinks it a shame to wed one of his name, and his conduct you blame if he thus breaks the law? For you still hold it wrong if a _lubra_ {210b} belong to the self-same _kobong_ {210c} that is Father of you, To take _her_ as a bride to your ebony side; nay, you give her a wide berth; quite right of you, too. For _her_ father, you know, is _your_ father, the Crow, and no blessing but woe from the wedding would spring. Well, these rules they were made in the wattle-gum shade, and were strictly obeyed, when the Crow was the King. {210d} Thus on Earth’s little ball to the Birds you owe all, yet your gratitude’s small for the favours they’ve done, And their feathers you pill, and you eat them at will, yes, you plunder and kill the bright birds one by one; There’s a price on their head, and the Dodo is dead, and the Moa has fled from the sight of the sun!

MAN AND THE ASCIDIAN.

A MORALITY.

“THE Ancestor remote of Man,” Says Darwin, “is th’ Ascidian,” A scanty sort of water-beast That, ninety million years at least Before Gorillas came to be, Went swimming up and down the sea.

Their ancestors the pious praise, And like to imitate their ways; How, then, does our first parent live, What lesson has his life to give?

Th’ Ascidian tadpole, young and gay, Doth Life with one bright eye survey, His consciousness has easy play. He’s sensitive to grief and pain, Has tail, and spine, and bears a brain, And everything that fits the state Of creatures we call vertebrate. But age comes on; with sudden shock He sticks his head against a rock! His tail drops off, his eye drops in, His brain’s absorbed into his skin; He does not move, nor feel, nor know The tidal water’s ebb and flow, But still abides, unstirred, alone, A sucker sticking to a stone.

And we, his children, truly we In youth are, like the Tadpole, free. And where we would we blithely go, Have brains and hearts, and feel and know. Then Age comes on! To Habit we Affix ourselves and are not free; Th’ Ascidian’s rooted to a rock, And we are bond-slaves of the clock; Our rocks are Medicine—Letters—Law, From these our heads we cannot draw: Our loves drop off, our hearts drop in, And daily thicker grows our skin.

Ah, scarce we live, we scarcely know The wide world’s moving ebb and flow, The clanging currents ring and shock, But we are rooted to the rock. And thus at ending of his span, Blind, deaf, and indolent, does Man Revert to the Ascidian.

BALLADE OF THE PRIMITIVE JEST.

“What did the dark-haired Iberian laugh at before the tall blonde Aryan drove him into the corners of Europe?”—_Brander Matthews_.

I AM an ancient Jest! Palæolithic man In his arboreal nest The sparks of fun would fan; My outline did he plan, And laughed like one possessed, ’Twas thus my course began, I am a Merry Jest!

I am an early Jest! Man delved, and built, and span; Then wandered South and West The peoples Aryan, _I_ journeyed in their van; The Semites, too, confessed,— From Beersheba to Dan,— I am a Merry Jest!

I am an ancient Jest, Through all the human clan, Red, black, white, free, oppressed, Hilarious I ran! I’m found in Lucian, In Poggio, and the rest, I’m dear to Moll and Nan! I am a Merry Jest!

ENVOY.

Prince, you may storm and ban— Joe Millers _are_ a pest, Suppress me if you can! I am a Merry Jest!

CAMEOS. _SONNETS FROM THE ANTIQUE_.

These versions from classical passages are pretty close to the original, except where compression was needed, as in the sonnets from Pausanias and Apuleius, or where, as in the case of fragments of Æschylus and Sophocles, a little expansion was required.

CAMEOS.