Chapter 2

PAGE APOLOGY v WEATHERS 1 THE MAID OF KEINTON MANDEVILLE 3 SUMMER SCHEMES 5 EPEISODIA 6 FAINTHEART IN A RAILWAY TRAIN 8 AT MOONRISE AND ONWARDS 9 THE GARDEN SEAT 11 BARTHÉLÉMON AT VAUXHALL 12 “I SOMETIMES THINK” 14 JEZREEL 15 A JOG-TROT PAIR 17 “THE CURTAINS NOW ARE DRAWN” 19 “ACCORDING TO THE MIGHTY WORKING” 21 “I WAS NOT HE” 22 THE WEST-OF-WESSEX GIRL 23 WELCOME HOME 25 GOING AND STAYING 26 READ BY MOONLIGHT 27 AT A HOUSE IN HAMPSTEAD 28 A WOMAN’S FANCY 30 HER SONG 33 A WET AUGUST 35 THE DISSEMBLERS 36 TO A LADY PLAYING AND SINGING IN THE MORNING 37 “A MAN WAS DRAWING NEAR TO ME” 38 THE STRANGE HOUSE 40 “AS ’TWERE TO-NIGHT” 42 THE CONTRETEMPS 43 A GENTLEMAN’S EPITAPH ON HIMSELF AND A LADY 46 THE OLD GOWN 48 A NIGHT IN NOVEMBER 50 A DUETTIST TO HER PIANOFORTE 51 “WHERE THREE ROADS JOINED” 53 “AND THERE WAS A GREAT CALM” 55 HAUNTING FINGERS 59 THE WOMAN I MET 63 “IF IT’S EVER SPRING AGAIN” 67 THE TWO HOUSES 68 ON STINSFORD HILL AT MIDNIGHT 72 THE FALLOW DEER AT THE LONELY HOUSE 74 THE SELFSAME SONG 75 THE WANDERER 76 A WIFE COMES BACK 78 A YOUNG MAN’S EXHORTATION 81 AT LULWORTH COVE A CENTURY BACK 83 A BYGONE OCCASION 85 TWO SERENADES 86 THE WEDDING MORNING 89 END OF THE YEAR 1912 90 THE CHIMES PLAY “LIFE’S A BUMPER!” 91 “I WORKED NO WILE TO MEET YOU” 93 AT THE RAILWAY STATION, UPWAY 95 SIDE BY SIDE 96 DREAM OF THE CITY SHOPWOMAN 98 A MAIDEN’S PLEDGE 100 THE CHILD AND THE SAGE 101 MISMET 103 AN AUTUMN RAIN-SCENE 105 MEDITATIONS ON A HOLIDAY 107 AN EXPERIENCE 111 THE BEAUTY 113 THE COLLECTOR CLEANS HIS PICTURE 114 THE WOOD FIRE 117 SAYING GOOD-BYE 119 ON THE TUNE CALLED THE OLD-HUNDRED-AND-FOURTH 121 THE OPPORTUNITY 123 EVELYN G. OF CHRISTMINSTER 124 THE RIFT 126 VOICES FROM THINGS GROWING 127 ON THE WAY 130 “SHE DID NOT TURN” 132 GROWTH IN MAY 133 THE CHILDREN AND SIR NAMELESS 134 AT THE ROYAL ACADEMY 136 HER TEMPLE 138 A TWO-YEARS’ IDYLL 139 BY HENSTRIDGE CROSS AT THE YEAR’S END 141 PENANCE 143 “I LOOK IN HER FACE” 145 AFTER THE WAR 146 “IF YOU HAD KNOWN” 148 THE CHAPEL-ORGANIST 150 FETCHING HER 157 “COULD I BUT WILL” 159 SHE REVISITS ALONE THE CHURCH OF HER MARRIAGE 161 AT THE ENTERING OF THE NEW YEAR 163 THEY WOULD NOT COME 165 AFTER A ROMANTIC DAY 167 THE TWO WIVES 168 “I KNEW A LADY” 170 A HOUSE WITH A HISTORY 171 A PROCESSION OF DEAD DAYS 173 HE FOLLOWS HIMSELF 176 THE SINGING WOMAN 178 WITHOUT, NOT WITHIN HER 179 “O I WON’T LEAD A HOMELY LIFE” 180 IN THE SMALL HOURS 181 THE LITTLE OLD TABLE 183 VAGG HOLLOW 184 THE DREAM IS—WHICH? 186 THE COUNTRY WEDDING 187 FIRST OR LAST 190 LONELY DAYS 191 “WHAT DID IT MEAN?” 194 AT THE DINNER-TABLE 196 THE MARBLE TABLET 198 THE MASTER AND THE LEAVES 199 LAST WORDS TO A DUMB FRIEND 201 A DRIZZLING EASTER MORNING 204 ON ONE WHO LIVED AND DIED WHERE HE WAS BORN 205 THE SECOND NIGHT 207 SHE WHO SAW NOT 210 THE OLD WORKMAN 212 THE SAILOR’S MOTHER 214 OUTSIDE THE CASEMENT 216 THE PASSER-BY 218 “I WAS THE MIDMOST” 220 A SOUND IN THE NIGHT 221 ON A DISCOVERED CURL OF HAIR 226 AN OLD LIKENESS 227 HER APOTHEOSIS 229 “SACRED TO THE MEMORY” 230 TO A WELL-NAMED DWELLING 231 THE WHIPPER-IN 232 A MILITARY APPOINTMENT 234 THE MILESTONE BY THE RABBIT-BURROW 236 THE LAMENT OF THE LOOKING-GLASS 237 CROSS-CURRENTS 238 THE OLD NEIGHBOUR AND THE NEW 240 THE CHOSEN 241 THE INSCRIPTION 244 THE MARBLE-STREETED TOWN 251 A WOMAN DRIVING 252 A WOMAN’S TRUST 254 BEST TIMES 256 THE CASUAL ACQUAINTANCE 258 INTRA SEPULCHRUM 260 THE WHITEWASHED WALL 262 JUST THE SAME 264 THE LAST TIME 265 THE SEVEN TIMES 266 THE SUN’S LAST LOOK ON THE COUNTRY GIRL 269 IN A LONDON FLAT 270 DRAWING DETAILS IN AN OLD CHURCH 272 RAKE-HELL MUSES 273 THE COLOUR 277 MURMURS IN THE GLOOM 279 EPITAPH 281 AN ANCIENT TO ANCIENTS 282 AFTER READING PSALMS XXXIX., XL. 285 SURVIEW 287

WEATHERS

I

THIS is the weather the cuckoo likes, And so do I; When showers betumble the chestnut spikes, And nestlings fly: And the little brown nightingale bills his best, And they sit outside at “The Travellers’ Rest,” And maids come forth sprig-muslin drest, And citizens dream of the south and west, And so do I.

II

This is the weather the shepherd shuns, And so do I; When beeches drip in browns and duns, And thresh, and ply; And hill-hid tides throb, throe on throe, And meadow rivulets overflow, And drops on gate-bars hang in a row, And rooks in families homeward go, And so do I.

THE MAID OF KEINTON MANDEVILLE (A TRIBUTE TO SIR H. BISHOP)

I HEAR that maiden still Of Keinton Mandeville Singing, in flights that played As wind-wafts through us all, Till they made our mood a thrall To their aery rise and fall, “Should he upbraid.”

Rose-necked, in sky-gray gown, From a stage in Stower Town Did she sing, and singing smile As she blent that dexterous voice With the ditty of her choice, And banished our annoys Thereawhile.

One with such song had power To wing the heaviest hour Of him who housed with her. Who did I never knew When her spoused estate ondrew, And her warble flung its woo In his ear.

Ah, she’s a beldame now, Time-trenched on cheek and brow, Whom I once heard as a maid From Keinton Mandeville Of matchless scope and skill Sing, with smile and swell and trill, “Should he upbraid!”

1915 or 1916.

SUMMER SCHEMES

WHEN friendly summer calls again, Calls again Her little fifers to these hills, We’ll go—we two—to that arched fane Of leafage where they prime their bills Before they start to flood the plain With quavers, minims, shakes, and trills. “—We’ll go,” I sing; but who shall say What may not chance before that day!

And we shall see the waters spring, Waters spring From chinks the scrubby copses crown; And we shall trace their oncreeping To where the cascade tumbles down And sends the bobbing growths aswing, And ferns not quite but almost drown. “—We shall,” I say; but who may sing Of what another moon will bring!

EPEISODIA

I

PAST the hills that peep Where the leaze is smiling, On and on beguiling Crisply-cropping sheep; Under boughs of brushwood Linking tree and tree In a shade of lushwood, There caressed we!

II

Hemmed by city walls That outshut the sunlight, In a foggy dun light, Where the footstep falls With a pit-pat wearisome In its cadency On the flagstones drearisome There pressed we!

III

Where in wild-winged crowds Blown birds show their whiteness Up against the lightness Of the clammy clouds; By the random river Pushing to the sea, Under bents that quiver There rest we.

FAINTHEART IN A RAILWAY TRAIN

AT nine in the morning there passed a church, At ten there passed me by the sea, At twelve a town of smoke and smirch, At two a forest of oak and birch, And then, on a platform, she:

A radiant stranger, who saw not me. I queried, “Get out to her do I dare?” But I kept my seat in my search for a plea, And the wheels moved on. O could it but be That I had alighted there!

AT MOONRISE AND ONWARDS

I THOUGHT you a fire On Heron-Plantation Hill, Dealing out mischief the most dire To the chattels of men of hire There in their vill.

But by and by You turned a yellow-green, Like a large glow-worm in the sky; And then I could descry Your mood and mien.

How well I know Your furtive feminine shape! As if reluctantly you show You nude of cloud, and but by favour throw Aside its drape . . .

—How many a year Have you kept pace with me, Wan Woman of the waste up there, Behind a hedge, or the bare Bough of a tree!

No novelty are you, O Lady of all my time, Veering unbid into my view Whether I near Death’s mew, Or Life’s top cyme!

THE GARDEN SEAT

ITS former green is blue and thin, And its once firm legs sink in and in; Soon it will break down unaware, Soon it will break down unaware.

At night when reddest flowers are black Those who once sat thereon come back; Quite a row of them sitting there, Quite a row of them sitting there.

With them the seat does not break down, Nor winter freeze them, nor floods drown, For they are as light as upper air, They are as light as upper air!

BARTHÉLÉMON AT VAUXHALL

François Hippolite Barthélémon, first-fiddler at Vauxhall Gardens, composed what was probably the most popular morning hymn-tune ever written. It was formerly sung, full-voiced, every Sunday in most churches, to Bishop Ken’s words, but is now seldom heard.

HE said: “Awake my soul, and with the sun,” . . . And paused upon the bridge, his eyes due east, Where was emerging like a full-robed priest The irradiate globe that vouched the dark as done.

It lit his face—the weary face of one Who in the adjacent gardens charged his string, Nightly, with many a tuneful tender thing, Till stars were weak, and dancing hours outrun.

And then were threads of matin music spun In trial tones as he pursued his way: “This is a morn,” he murmured, “well begun: This strain to Ken will count when I am clay!”

And count it did; till, caught by echoing lyres, It spread to galleried naves and mighty quires.

“I SOMETIMES THINK” (FOR F. E. H.)

I SOMETIMES think as here I sit Of things I have done, Which seemed in doing not unfit To face the sun: Yet never a soul has paused a whit On such—not one.

There was that eager strenuous press To sow good seed; There was that saving from distress In the nick of need; There were those words in the wilderness: Who cared to heed?

Yet can this be full true, or no? For one did care, And, spiriting into my house, to, fro, Like wind on the stair, Cares still, heeds all, and will, even though I may despair.

JEZREEL ON ITS SEIZURE BY THE ENGLISH UNDER ALLENBY, SEPTEMBER 1918

DID they catch as it were in a Vision at shut of the day— When their cavalry smote through the ancient Esdraelon Plain, And they crossed where the Tishbite stood forth in his enemy’s way— His gaunt mournful Shade as he bade the King haste off amain?

On war-men at this end of time—even on Englishmen’s eyes— Who slay with their arms of new might in that long-ago place, Flashed he who drove furiously? . . . Ah, did the phantom arise Of that queen, of that proud Tyrian woman who painted her face?

Faintly marked they the words “Throw her down!” rise from Night eerily, Spectre-spots of the blood of her body on some rotten wall? And the thin note of pity that came: “A King’s daughter is she,” As they passed where she trodden was once by the chargers’ footfall?

Could such be the hauntings of men of to-day, at the cease Of pursuit, at the dusk-hour, ere slumber their senses could seal? Enghosted seers, kings—one on horseback who asked “Is it peace?” . . . Yea, strange things and spectral may men have beheld in Jezreel!

_September_ 24, 1918.

A JOG-TROT PAIR

WHO were the twain that trod this track So many times together Hither and back, In spells of certain and uncertain weather?

Commonplace in conduct they Who wandered to and fro here Day by day: Two that few dwellers troubled themselves to know here.

The very gravel-path was prim That daily they would follow: Borders trim: Never a wayward sprout, or hump, or hollow.

Trite usages in tamest style Had tended to their plighting. “It’s just worth while, Perhaps,” they had said. “And saves much sad good-nighting.”

And petty seemed the happenings That ministered to their joyance: Simple things, Onerous to satiate souls, increased their buoyance.

Who could those common people be, Of days the plainest, barest? They were we; Yes; happier than the cleverest, smartest, rarest.

“THE CURTAINS NOW ARE DRAWN” (SONG)

I

THE curtains now are drawn, And the spindrift strikes the glass, Blown up the jagged pass By the surly salt sou’-west, And the sneering glare is gone Behind the yonder crest, While she sings to me: “O the dream that thou art my Love, be it thine, And the dream that I am thy Love, be it mine, And death may come, but loving is divine.”

II

I stand here in the rain, With its smite upon her stone, And the grasses that have grown Over women, children, men, And their texts that “Life is vain”; But I hear the notes as when Once she sang to me: “O the dream that thou art my Love, be it thine, And the dream that I am thy Love, be it mine, And death may come, but loving is divine.”

1913.

“ACCORDING TO THE MIGHTY WORKING”

I

WHEN moiling seems at cease In the vague void of night-time, And heaven’s wide roomage stormless Between the dusk and light-time, And fear at last is formless, We call the allurement Peace.

II

Peace, this hid riot, Change, This revel of quick-cued mumming, This never truly being, This evermore becoming, This spinner’s wheel onfleeing Outside perception’s range.

1917.

“I WAS NOT HE” (SONG)

I WAS not he—the man Who used to pilgrim to your gate, At whose smart step you grew elate, And rosed, as maidens can, For a brief span.

It was not I who sang Beside the keys you touched so true With note-bent eyes, as if with you It counted not whence sprang The voice that rang . . .

Yet though my destiny It was to miss your early sweet, You still, when turned to you my feet, Had sweet enough to be A prize for me!

THE WEST-OF-WESSEX GIRL

A VERY West-of-Wessex girl, As blithe as blithe could be, Was once well-known to me, And she would laud her native town, And hope and hope that we Might sometime study up and down Its charms in company.

But never I squired my Wessex girl In jaunts to Hoe or street When hearts were high in beat, Nor saw her in the marbled ways Where market-people meet That in her bounding early days Were friendly with her feet.

Yet now my West-of-Wessex girl, When midnight hammers slow From Andrew’s, blow by blow, As phantom draws me by the hand To the place—Plymouth Hoe— Where side by side in life, as planned, We never were to go!

Begun in Plymouth, _March_ 1913.

WELCOME HOME

TO my native place Bent upon returning, Bosom all day burning To be where my race Well were known, ’twas much with me There to dwell in amity.

Folk had sought their beds, But I hailed: to view me Under the moon, out to me Several pushed their heads, And to each I told my name, Plans, and that therefrom I came.

“Did you? . . . Ah, ’tis true I once heard, back a long time, Here had spent his young time, Some such man as you . . . Good-night.” The casement closed again, And I was left in the frosty lane.

GOING AND STAYING

I

THE moving sun-shapes on the spray, The sparkles where the brook was flowing, Pink faces, plightings, moonlit May, These were the things we wished would stay; But they were going.

II

Seasons of blankness as of snow, The silent bleed of a world decaying, The moan of multitudes in woe, These were the things we wished would go; But they were staying.

III

Then we looked closelier at Time, And saw his ghostly arms revolving To sweep off woeful things with prime, Things sinister with things sublime Alike dissolving.

READ BY MOONLIGHT

I PAUSED to read a letter of hers By the moon’s cold shine, Eyeing it in the tenderest way, And edging it up to catch each ray Upon her light-penned line. I did not know what years would flow Of her life’s span and mine Ere I read another letter of hers By the moon’s cold shine!

I chance now on the last of hers, By the moon’s cold shine; It is the one remaining page Out of the many shallow and sage Whereto she set her sign. Who could foresee there were to be Such letters of pain and pine Ere I should read this last of hers By the moon’s cold shine!

AT A HOUSE IN HAMPSTEAD SOMETIME THE DWELLING OF JOHN KEATS

O POET, come you haunting here Where streets have stolen up all around, And never a nightingale pours one Full-throated sound?

Drawn from your drowse by the Seven famed Hills, Thought you to find all just the same Here shining, as in hours of old, If you but came?

What will you do in your surprise At seeing that changes wrought in Rome Are wrought yet more on the misty slope One time your home?

Will you wake wind-wafts on these stairs? Swing the doors open noisily? Show as an umbraged ghost beside Your ancient tree?

Or will you, softening, the while You further and yet further look, Learn that a laggard few would fain Preserve your nook? . . .

—Where the Piazza steps incline, And catch late light at eventide, I once stood, in that Rome, and thought, “’Twas here he died.”

I drew to a violet-sprinkled spot, Where day and night a pyramid keeps Uplifted its white hand, and said, “’Tis there he sleeps.”

Pleasanter now it is to hold That here, where sang he, more of him Remains than where he, tuneless, cold, Passed to the dim.

_July_ 1920.

A WOMAN’S FANCY

“AH Madam; you’ve indeed come back here? ’Twas sad—your husband’s so swift death, And you away! You shouldn’t have left him: It hastened his last breath.”

“Dame, I am not the lady you think me; I know not her, nor know her name; I’ve come to lodge here—a friendless woman; My health my only aim.”

She came; she lodged. Wherever she rambled They held her as no other than The lady named; and told how her husband Had died a forsaken man.

So often did they call her thuswise Mistakenly, by that man’s name, So much did they declare about him, That his past form and fame

Grew on her, till she pitied his sorrow As if she truly had been the cause— Yea, his deserter; and came to wonder What mould of man he was.

“Tell me my history!” would exclaim she; “_Our_ history,” she said mournfully. “But _you_ know, surely, Ma’am?” they would answer, Much in perplexity.

Curious, she crept to his grave one evening, And a second time in the dusk of the morrow; Then a third time, with crescent emotion Like a bereaved wife’s sorrow.

No gravestone rose by the rounded hillock; —“I marvel why this is?” she said. —“He had no kindred, Ma’am, but you near.” —She set a stone at his head.