Chapter 2

Gods without a name, Born or how or when, None may know!

Now from Yucatan These doth Science bear Over seas;

And methinks a man Finds youth doubly fair, Sketching these!

ON CALAIS SANDS

ON Calais Sands the grey began, Then rosy red above the grey, The morn with many a scarlet van Leap’d, and the world was glad with May! The little waves along the bay Broke white upon the shelving strands; The sea-mews flitted white as they On Calais Sands!

On Calais Sands must man with man Wash honour clean in blood to-day; On spaces wet from waters wan How white the flashing rapiers play, Parry, riposte! and lunge! The fray Shifts for a while, then mournful stands The Victor: life ebbs fast away On Calais Sands!

On Calais Sands a little space Of silence, then the plash and spray, The sound of eager waves that ran To kiss the perfumed locks astray, To touch these lips that ne’er said ‘Nay,’ To dally with the helpless hands; Till the deep sea in silence lay On Calais Sands!

Between the lilac and the may She waits her love from alien lands; Her love is colder than the clay On Calais Sands!

BALLADE OF YULE

_This life’s most jolly_, Amiens said, Heigh-ho, the Holly! So sang he. As the good Duke was comforted In forest exile, so may we! The years may darken as they flee, And Christmas bring his melancholy: But round the old mahogany tree We drink, we sing _Heigh-ho_, _the Holly_!

Though some are dead and some are fled To lands of summer over sea, The holly berry keeps his red, The merry children keep their glee; They hoard with artless secresy This gift for Maude, and that for Molly, And Santa Claus he turns the key On Christmas Eve, _Heigh-ho_, _the Holly_!

Amid the snow the birds are fed, The snow lies deep on lawn and lea, The skies are shining overhead, The robin’s tame that was so free. Far North, at home, the ‘barley bree’ They brew; they give the hour to folly, How ‘Rab and Allan cam to pree,’ They sing, we sing _Heigh-ho_, _the Holly_!

ENVOI

Friend, let us pay the wonted fee, The yearly tithe of mirth: be jolly! It is a duty so to be, Though half we sigh, _Heigh-ho_, _the Holly_!

POSCIMUR

FROM HORACE

HUSH, for they call! If in the shade, My lute, we twain have idly strayed, And song for many a season made, Once more reply; Once more we’ll play as we have played, My lute and I!

Roman the song: the strain you know, The Lesbian wrought it long ago. Now singing as he charged the foe, Now in the bay, Where safe in the shore-water’s flow His galleys lay.

So sang he Bacchus and the Nine, And Venus and her boy divine, And Lycus of the dusky eyne, The dusky hair; So shalt thou sing, ah, Lute of mine, Of all things fair;

Apollo’s glory! Sounding shell, Thou lute, to Jove desirable, When soft thine accents sigh and swell At festival— Delight more dear than words can tell, Attend my call!

ON HIS DEAD SEA-MEW

FROM THE GREEK

I

BIRD of the graces, dear sea-mew, whose note Was like the halcyon’s song, In death thy wings and thy sweet spirit float Still paths of the night along!

II THE SAILOR’S GRAVE

Tomb of a shipwrecked seafarer am I, But thou, sail on! For homeward safe did other vessels fly, Though we were gone.

FROM MELEAGER

I LOVE not the wine-cup, but if thou art fain I should drink, do thou taste it, and bring it to me; If it touch but thy lips it were hard to refrain, It were hard from the sweet maid who bears it to flee; For the cup ferries over the kisses, and plain Does it speak of the grace that was given it by thee.

ON THE GARLAND SENT TO RHODOCLEIA

RUFINUS

GOLDEN EYES

‘AH, Golden Eyes, to win you yet, I bring mine April coronet, The lovely blossoms of the spring, For you I weave, to you I bring These roses with the lilies set, The dewy dark-eyed violet, Narcissus, and the wind-flower wet: Wilt thou disdain mine offering? Ah, Golden Eyes!

Crowned with thy lover’s flowers, forget The pride wherein thy heart is set, For thou, like these or anything, Has but a moment of thy spring, Thy spring, and then—the long regret! Ah, Golden Eyes!’

A GALLOWAY GARLAND

WE know not, on these hills of ours, The fabled asphodel of Greece, That filleth with immortal flowers Fields where the heroes are at peace! Not ours are myrtle buds like these That breathe o’er isles where memories dwell Of Sappho, in enchanted seas!

We meet not, on our upland moor, The singing Maid of Helicon, You may not hear her music pure Float on the mountain meres withdrawn; The Muse of Greece, the Muse is gone! But we have songs that please us well And flowers we love to look upon.

More sweet than Southern myrtles far The bruised Marsh-myrtle breatheth keen; Parnassus names the flower, the star, That shines among the well-heads green The bright Marsh-asphodels between— Marsh-myrtle and Marsh-asphodel May crown the Northern Muse a queen

CELIA’S EYES

PASTICHE

TELL me not that babies dwell In the deeps of Celia’s eyes; Cupid in each hazel well Scans his beauties with surprise, And would, like Narcissus, drown In my Celia’s eyes of brown.

Tell me not that any goes Safe by that enchanted place; Eros dwells with Anteros In the garden of her Face, Where like friends who late were foes Meet the white and crimson Rose.

BRITANNIA

FROM JULES LEMAÎTRE

THY mouth is fresh as cherries on the bough, Red cherries in the dawning, and more white Than milk or white camellias is thy brow; And as the golden corn thy hair is bright, The corn that drinks the Sun’s less fair than thou; While through thine eyes the child-soul gazeth now— Eyes like the flower that was Rousseau’s delight.

Sister of sad Ophelia, say, shall these Thy pearly teeth grow like piano keys Yellow and long; while thou, all skin and bone, Angles and morals, in a sky-blue veil, Shalt hosts of children to the sermon hale, Blare hymns, read chapters, backbite, and intone?

GALLIA

LADY, lady neat Of the roguish eye, Wherefore dost thou hie, Stealthy, down the street, On well-booted feet? From French novels I Gather that you fly, Guy or Jules to meet.

Furtive dost thou range, Oft thy cab dost change; So, at least, ’tis said: Oh, the sad old tale Passionately stale, We’ve so often read!

THE FAIRY MINISTER

The Rev. Mr. Kirk of Aberfoyle was carried away by the Fairies in 1692.

PEOPLE of Peace! a peaceful man, Well worthy of your love was he, Who, while the roaring Garry ran Red with the life-blood of Dundee, While coats were turning, crowns were falling, Wandered along his valley still, And heard your mystic voices calling From fairy knowe and haunted hill. He heard, he saw, he knew too well The secrets of your fairy clan; You stole him from the haunted dell, Who never more was seen of man. Now far from heaven, and safe from hell, Unknown of earth, he wanders free. Would that he might return and tell Of his mysterious Company! For we have tired the Folk of Peace; No more they tax our corn and oil; Their dances on the moorland cease, The Brownie stints his wonted toil. No more shall any shepherd meet The ladies of the fairy clan, Nor are their deathly kisses sweet On lips of any earthly man. And half I envy him who now, Clothed in her Court’s enchanted green, By moonlit loch or mountain’s brow Is Chaplain to the Fairy Queen.

TO ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON

WITH KIRK’S ‘SECRET COMMONWEALTH’

O LOUIS! you that like them maist, Ye’re far frae kelpie, wraith, and ghaist, And fairy dames, no unco chaste, And haunted cell. Among a heathen clan ye’re placed, That kensna hell!

Ye hae nae heather, peat, nor birks, Nae trout in a’ yer burnies lurks, There are nae bonny U.P. kirks, An awfu’ place! Nane kens the Covenant o’ Works Frae that o’ Grace!

But whiles, maybe, to them ye’ll read Blads o’ the Covenanting creed, And whiles their pagan wames ye’ll feed On halesome parritch; And syne ye’ll gar them learn a screed O’ the Shorter Carritch.

Yet thae uncovenanted shavers Hae rowth, ye say, o’ clash and clavers O’ gods and etins—auld wives’ havers, But their delight; The voice o’ him that tells them quavers Just wi’ fair fright.

And ye might tell, ayont the faem, Thae Hieland clashes o’ our hame To speak the truth, I takna shame To half believe them; And, stamped wi’ _Tusitala’s_ name, They’ll a’ receive them.

And folk to come ayont the sea May hear the yowl o’ the Banshie, And frae the water-kelpie flee, Ere a’ things cease, And island bairns may stolen be By the Folk o’ Peace.

FOR MARK TWAIN’S JUBILEE

TO brave Mark Twain, across the sea, The years have brought his jubilee; One hears it half with pain, That fifty years have passed and gone Since danced the merry star that shone Above the babe, Mark Twain!

How many and many a weary day, When sad enough were we, ‘Mark’s way’ (Unlike the Laureate’s Mark’s) Has made us laugh until we cried, And, sinking back exhausted, sighed, Like Gargery, _Wot larx_!

We turn his pages, and we see The Mississippi flowing free; We turn again, and grin O’er all _Tom Sawyer_ did and planned, With him of the Ensanguined Hand, With _Huckleberry Finn_!

Spirit of mirth, whose chime of bells Shakes on his cap, and sweetly swells Across the Atlantic main, Grant that Mark’s laughter never die, That men, through many a century, May chuckle o’er Mark Twain!

III POEMS WRITTEN UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF WORDSWORTH

MIST

MIST, though I love thee not, who puttest down Trout in the Lochs, (they feed not, as a rule, At least on fly, in mere or river-pool When fogs have fallen, and the air is lown, And on each Ben, a pillow not a crown, The fat folds rest,) thou, Mist, hast power to cool The blatant declamations of the fool Who raves reciting through the heather brown.

Much do I bar the matron, man, or lass Who cries ‘How lovely!’ and who does not spare When light and shadow on the mountain pass,— Shadow and light, and gleams exceeding fair, O’er rock, and glade, and glen,—to shout, the Ass, To me, to me the Poet, ‘Oh, look there!’

LINES

Written under the influence of Wordsworth, with a slate-pencil on a window of the dining-room at the Lowood Hotel, Windermere, while waiting for tea, after being present at the Grasmere Sports on a very wet day, and in consequence of a recent perusal of _Belinda_, a Novel, by Miss Broughton, whose absence is regretted.

HOW solemn is the front of this Hotel, When now the hills are swathed in modest mist, And none can speak of scenery, nor tell Of ‘tints of amber,’ or of ‘amethyst.’ Here once thy daughters, young Romance, did dwell, Here _Sara_ flirted with whoever list, _Belinda_ loved not wisely but too well, And _Mr. Ford_ played the Philologist! Haunted the house is, and the balcony Where that fond Matron knew her Lover near, And here we sit, and wait for tea, and sigh, While the sad rain sobs in the sullen mere, And all our hearts go forth into the cry, Would that the teller of the tale were here!

LINES

Written on the window pane of a railway carriage after reading an advertisement of sunlight soap, and _Poems_, by William Wordsworth.

I PASSED upon the wings of Steam Along Tay’s valley fair, The book I read had such a theme As bids the Soul despair.

A tale of miserable men Of hearts with doubt distraught, Wherein a melancholy pen With helpless problems fought.

Where many a life was brought to dust, And many a heart laid low, And many a love was smirched with lust— I raised mine eyes, and, oh!—

I marked upon a common wall, These simple words of hope, That mute appeal to one and all, _Cheer up_! _Use Sunlight Soap_!

Our moral energies have range Beyond their seeming scope, How tonic were the words, how strange, _Cheer up_! _Use Sunlight Soap_!

‘Behold,’ I cried, ‘the inner touch That lifts the Soul through cares!’ I loved that Soap-boiler so much I blessed him unawares!

Perchance he is some vulgar man, Engrossed in £ s. d. But, ah! through Nature’s holy plan He whispered hope to me!

ODE TO GOLF

‘DELUSIVE Nymph, farewell!’ How oft we’ve said or sung, When balls evasive fell, Or in the jaws of ‘Hell,’ Or salt sea-weeds among, ’Mid shingle and sea-shell!

How oft beside the Burn, We play the sad ‘two more’; How often at the turn, The heather must we spurn; How oft we’ve ‘topped and swore,’ In bent and whin and fern!

Yes, when the broken head Bounds further than the ball, The heart has inly bled. Ah! and the lips have said Words we would fain recall— Wild words, of passion bred!

In bunkers all unknown, Far beyond ‘Walkinshaw, Where never ball had flown— Reached by ourselves alone— Caddies have heard with awe The music of our moan!

Yet, Nymph, if once alone, The ball hath featly fled— Not smitten from the bone— That drive doth still atone; And one long shot laid dead Our grief to the winds hath blown!

So, still beside the tee, We meet in storm or calm, Lady, and worship thee; While the loud lark sings free, Piping his matin psalm Above the grey sad sea!

FRESHMAN’S TERM

RETURN again, thou Freshman’s year, When bloom was on the rye, When breakfast came with bottled beer, When Pleasure walked the High; When Torpid Bumps were more by far To every opening mind Than Trade, or Shares, or Peace, or War, To senior humankind; When ribbons of outrageous hues Were worn with honest pride, When much was talked of boats and crews, When Proctors were defied: When Tick was in its early bloom, When Schools were far away, As vaguely distant as the tomb, Nor more regarded—they! When arm was freely linked with arm Beneath the College limes, When Sunday grinds possessed a charm Denied to _College Rhymes_: When ices were in much request Beside the April fire, When men were very strangely dressed By Standen or by Prior. Return, ye Freshman’s Terms! They _do_ Return, and much the same, To boys, who, just like me and you, Play the absurd old game!

A TOAST

Kate Kennedy is the Patron Saint of St. Leonard’s and St. Salvator. Her history is quite unknown.

THE learned are all ‘in a swither,’ (They don’t very often agree,) They know not her ‘whence’ nor her ‘whither,’ The Maiden we drink to together, The College’s Kate Kennedie!

Did she shine in days early or later? Did she ever achieve a degree? Was she pretty or plain? Did she mate, or Live lonely? And who was the _pater_ Of mystical Kate Kennedie?

The learned may scorn her and scout her, But true to her colours are _we_, The learned may mock her and flout her, But surely we’ll rally about her, In the College that stands by the Sea!

So here’s to her memory! here to The mystical Maiden drink we, We pledge her, and we’ll persevere too, Though the reason is not very clear to The critical mind, nor to _me_. Here’s to Kate! she’s our own, and she’s dear to The College that stands by the Sea.

DEATH IN JUNE

FOR CRICKETERS ONLY

_June is the month of Suicides_

WHY do we slay ourselves in June, When life, if ever, seems so sweet? When “Moon,” and “tune,” and “afternoon,” And other happy rhymes we meet, When strawberries are coming soon? Why do we do it?’ you repeat!

Ah, careless butterfly, to thee The strawberry seems passing good; And sweet, on Music’s wings, to flee Amid the waltzing multitude, And revel late—perchance till three— For Love is monarch of thy mood!

Alas! to _us_ no solace shows For sorrows we endure—at Lord’s, When Oxford’s bowling _always_ goes For ‘fours,’ for ever to the cords— Or more, perhaps, with ‘overthrows’;— These things can pierce the heart like swords!

And thus it is though woods are green, Though mayflies down the Test are rolling, Though sweet, the silver showers between, The finches sing in strains consoling, We cut our throats for very spleen, And very shame of Oxford’s bowling!

TO CORRESPONDENTS

MY Postman, though I fear thy tread, And tremble as thy foot draws nearer, ’Tis not the Christmas Dun I dread, _My_ mortal foe is much severer,— The Unknown Correspondent, who, With undefatigable pen, And nothing in the world to do, Perplexes literary men.

From Pentecost and Ponder’s End They write: from Deal, and from Dacotah, The people of the Shetlands send No inconsiderable quota; They write for _autographs_; in vain, In vain does Phyllis write, and Flora, They write that Allan Quatermain Is not at all the book for Brora.

They write to say that they have met This writer ‘at a garden party, And though’ this writer ‘_may_ forget,’ _Their_ recollection’s keen and hearty. ‘And will you praise in your reviews A novel by our distant cousin?’ These letters from Provincial Blues Assail us daily by the dozen!

O friends with time upon your hands, O friends with postage-stamps in plenty, O poets out of many lands, O youths and maidens under twenty, Seek out some other wretch to bore, Or wreak yourselves upon your neighbours, And leave me to my dusty lore And my unprofitable labours!

BALLADE OF DIFFICULT RHYMES

WITH certain rhymes ’tis hard to deal; For ‘silver’ we have ne’er a rhyme. On ‘orange’ (as on orange peel) The bard has slipped full many a time. With ‘babe’ there’s scarce a sound will chime, Though ‘astrolabe’ fits like a glove; But, ye that on Parnassus climb, Why, why are rhymes so rare to _Love_?

A rhyme to ‘cusp,’ to beg or steal, I’ve sought, from evensong to prime, But vain is my poetic zeal, There’s not one sound is worth a ‘dime’: ‘Bilge,’ ‘coif,’ ‘scarf,’ ‘window’—deeds of crime I’d do to gain the rhymes thereof; Nor shrink from acts of moral grime— Why, why are rhymes so rare to _Love_?

To ‘dove’ my fancies flit, and wheel Like butterflies on banks of thyme. ‘Above’?—or ‘shove’—alas! I feel, They’re too much used to be sublime. I scorn with angry pantomime, The thought of ‘move’ (pronounced as _muv_). Ah, in Apollo’s golden clime Why, why are rhymes so rare to _Love_?

ENVOI

Prince of the lute and lyre, reveal New rhymes, fresh minted, from above, Nor still be deaf to our appeal. Why, _why_ are rhymes so rare to _Love_?

BALLANT O’ BALLANTRAE

TO ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON

Written in wet weather, this conveyed to the Master of Ballantrae a wrong idea of a very beautiful and charming place, with links, a river celebrated by Burns, good sea-fishing, and, on the river, a ruined castle at every turn of the stream. ‘Try Ballantrae’ is a word of wisdom.

WHAN suthern wunds gar spindrift flee Abune the clachan, faddums hie, Whan for the cluds I canna see The bonny lift, I’d fain indite an Ode to _thee_ Had I the gift!

Ken ye the coast o’ wastland Ayr? Oh mon, it’s unco bleak and bare! Ye daunder here, ye daunder there, And mak’ your moan, They’ve rain and wund eneuch to tear The suthern cone!

Ye’re seekin’ sport! There’s nane ava’, Ye’ll sit and glower ahint the wa’ At bleesin’ breakers till ye staw, If that’s yer wush; ‘There’s aye the Stinchar.’ Hoot awa’, She wunna fush!

She wunna fush at ony gait, She’s roarin’ reid in wrathfu’ spate; Maist like yer kimmer when ye’re late Frae Girvan Fair! Forbye to speer for leave I’m blate For fushin’ there!

O Louis, you that writes in Scots, Ye’re far awa’ frae stirks and stots, Wi’ drookit hurdies, tails in knots, An unco way! _My_ mirth’s like thorns aneth the pots In Ballantrae!

SONG BY THE SUB-CONSCIOUS SELF

RHYMES MADE IN A DREAM

I KNOW not what my secret is, I know but it is mine; I know to dwell with it were bliss, To die for it divine. I cannot yield it in a kiss, Nor breathe it in a sigh. I know that I have lived for this; For this, my love, I die.

THE HAUNTED HOMES OF ENGLAND

THE Haunted Homes of England, How eerily they stand, While through them flit their ghosts—to wit, The Monk with the Red Hand, The Eyeless Girl—an awful spook— To stop the boldest breath, The boy that inked his copybook, And so got ‘wopped’ to death!

Call them not shams—from haunted Glamis To haunted Woodhouselea, I mark in hosts the grisly ghosts I hear the fell Banshie! I know the spectral dog that howls Before the death of Squires; In my ‘Ghosts’-guide’ addresses hide For Podmore and for Myers!

I see the Vampire climb the stairs From vaults below the church; And hark! the Pirate’s spectre swears! O Psychical Research, Canst _thou_ not hear what meets my ear, The viewless wheels that come? The wild Banshie that wails to thee? The Drummer with his drum?

O Haunted Homes of England, Though tenantless ye stand, With none content to pay the rent, Through all the shadowy land, Now, Science true will find in you A sympathetic perch, And take you all, both Grange and Hall, For Psychical Research!

THE DISAPPOINTMENT

A HOUSE I took, and many a spook Was deemed to haunt that House, I bade the glum Researchers come With Bogles to carouse. That House I’d sought with anxious thought, ’Twas old, ’twas dark as sin, And _deeds of bale_, so ran the tale, Had oft been done therein.

Full many a child its mother wild, Men said, had strangled there, Full many a sire, in heedless ire, Had slain his daughter fair! ’Twas rarely let: I can’t forget A recent tenant’s dread, This widow lone had heard a moan Proceeding from her bed.

The tenants next were chiefly vexed By spectres grim and grey. A Headless Ghost annoyed them most, And so they did not stay. The next in turn saw corpse lights burn, And also a Banshie, A spectral Hand they could not stand, And left the House to me.

Then came my friends for divers ends, Some curious, some afraid; No direr pest disturbed their rest Than a neat chambermaid. The grisly halls were gay with balls, One melancholy nook Where ghosts _galore_ were seen before Now yielded ne’er a spook.