Part 3

7. Tell him now: she is standing here at my head; Not beautiful now, not even kind; He may take her now; for she never speaks her mind, But is ever the one thing silent here. She is not of us, as I divine; She comes from another stiller world of the dead, Stiller, not fairer than mine.

8. But I know where a garden grows, Fairer than aught in the world beside, All made up of the lily and rose That blow by night, when the season is good, To the sound of dancing music and flutes: It is only flowers, they had no fruits, And I almost fear they are not roses, but blood; For the keeper was one, so full of pride, He linkt a dead man there to a spectral bride; For he, if he had not been a Sultan of brutes, Would he have that hole in his side?

9. But what will the old man say? He laid a cruel snare in a pit To catch a friend of mine one stormy day; Yet now I could even weep to think of it; For what will the old man say When he comes to the second corpse in the pit?

10. Friend, to be struck by the public foe, Then to strike him and lay him low, That were a public merit, far, Whatever the Quaker holds, from sin; But the red life spilt for a private blow-- I swear to you, lawful and lawless war Are scarcely even akin.

11. O me, why have they not buried me deep enough? Is it kind to have made me a grave so rough, Me, that was never a quiet sleeper? Maybe still I am but half-dead; Then I cannot be wholly dumb; I will cry to the steps above my head, And somebody, surely, some kind heart will come To bury me, bury me Deeper, ever so little deeper.

VI.

1. My life has crept so long on a broken wing Thro' cells of madness, haunts of horror and fear, That I come to be grateful at last for a little thing: My mood is changed, for it fell at a time of year When the face of night is fair on the dewy downs, And the shining daffodil dies, and the Charioteer And starry Gemini hang like glorious crowns Over Orion's grave low down in the west, That like a silent lightning under the stars She seem'd to divide in a dream from a band of the blest, And spoke of a hope for the world in the coming wars-- 'And in that hope, dear soul, let trouble have rest. Knowing I tarry for thee,' and pointed to Mars As he glow'd like a ruddy shield on the Lion's breast.

2. And it was but a dream, yet it yielded a dear delight To have look'd, tho' but in a dream, upon eyes so fair, That had been in a weary world my one thing bright; And it was but a dream, yet it lightened my despair When I thought that a war would arise in defence of the right, That an iron tyranny now should bend or cease, The, glory of manhood stand on his ancient height, Nor Britain's one sole God be the millionnaire: No more shall commerce be all in all, and Peace Pipe on her pastoral hillock a languid note, And watch her harvest ripen, her herd increase, Nor the cannon-bullet rust on a slothful shore, And the cobweb woven across the cannon's throat Shall shake its threaded tears in the wind no more.

3. And as months ran on and rumour of battle grew, 'It is time, it is time, O passionate heart,' said I (For I cleaved to a cause that I felt to be pure and true), 'It is time, O passionate heart and morbid eye, That old hysterical mock-disease should die.' And I stood on a giant deck and mix'd my breath With a loyal people shouting a battle cry, Till I saw the dreary phantom arise and fly Far into the North, and battle, and seas of death.

4. Let it go or stay, so I wake to the higher aims Of a land that has lost for a little her lust of gold, And love of a peace that was full of wrongs and shames, Horrible, hateful, monstrous, not to be told; And hail once more to the banner of battle unroll'd! Tho' many a light shall darken, and many shall weep For those that are crush'd in the clash of jarring claims, Yet God's just wrath shall be wreak'd on a giant liar; And many a darkness into the light shall leap, And shine in the sudden making of splendid names, And noble thought be freer under the sun, And the heart of a people beat with one desire; For the peace, that I deem'd no peace, is over and done, And now by the side of the Black and the Baltic deep, And deathful-grinning mouths of the fortress, flames The blood-red blossom of war with a heart of fire.

5. Let it flame or fade, and the war roll down like a wind, We have proved we have hearts in a cause, we are noble still, And myself have awaked, as it seems, to the better mind; It is better to fight for the good, than to rail at the ill; I have felt with my native land, I am one with my kind, I embrace the purpose of God, and the doom assign'd.

THE BROOK; AN IDYL.

'Here, by this brook, we parted; I to the East And he for Italy--too late--too late: One whom the strong sons of the world despise; For lucky rhymes to him were scrip and share, And mellow metres more than cent for cent; Nor could he understand how money breeds, Thought it a dead thing; yet himself could make The thing that is not as the thing that is. O had he lived! In our schoolbooks we say, Of those that held their heads above the crowd, They flourish'd then or then; but life in him Could scarce be said to flourish, only touched On such a time as goes before the leaf, When all the wood stands in a mist of green, And nothing perfect: yet the brook he loved, For which, in branding summers of Bengal, Or ev'n the sweet half-English Neilgherry air, I panted, seems, as I re-listen to it, Prattling the primrose fancies of the boy, To me that loved him; for "O brook," he says, "O babbling brook," says Edmund in his rhyme, "Whence come you?" and the brook, why not? replies.

I come from haunts of coot and hern, I make a sudden sally And sparkle out among the fern, To bicker down a valley.

By thirty hills I hurry down, Or slip between the ridges, By twenty thorps, a little town, And half a hundred bridges.

Till last by Philip's farm I flow To join the brimming river, For men may come and men may go, But I go on for ever.

'Poor lad, he died at Florence, quite worn out, Travelling to Naples. There is Darnley bridge. It has more ivy; there the river; and there Stands Philip's farm where brook and river meet.

I chatter over stony ways, In little sharps and trebles, I bubble into eddying bays, I babble on the pebbles.

With many a curve my banks I fret By many a field and fallow. And many a fairy foreland set With willow-weed and mallow.

I chatter, chatter, as I flow To join the brimming river, For men may come and men may go, But I go on for ever.

'But Philip chatter'd more than brook or bird; Old Philip; all about the fields you caught His weary daylong chirping, like the dry High-elbow'd grigs that leap in summer grass.

I wind about, and in and out, With here a blossom sailing, And here and there a lusty trout, And here and there a grayling,

And here and there a foamy flake Upon me, as I travel With many a silvery waterbreak Above the golden gravel,

And draw them all along, and flow To join the brimming river, For men may come and men may go, But I go on for ever.

'O darling Katie Willows, his one child! A maiden of our century, yet most meek; A daughter of our meadows, yet not coarse; Straight, but as lissome as a hazel wand; Her eyes a bashful azure, and her hair In gloss and hue the chestnut, when the shell Divides threefold to show the fruit within.

'Sweet Katie, once I did her a good turn, Her and her far-off cousin and betrothed, James Willows, of one name and heart with her. For here I came, twenty years back--the week Before I parted with poor Edmund; crost By that old bridge which, half in ruins then, Still makes a hoary eyebrow for the gleam Beyond it, where the waters marry--crost, Whistling a random bar of Bonny Doon, And push'd at Philip's garden-gate. The gate, Half-parted from a weak and scolding hinge, Stuck; and he clamour'd from a casement, "run" To Katie somewhere in the walks below, "Run, Katie!" Katie never ran: she moved To meet me, winding under woodbine bowers, A little fluttered, with her eyelids down, Fresh apple-blossom, blushing for a boon.

'What was it? less of sentiment than sense Had Katie; not illiterate; nor of those Who dabbling in the fount of fictive tears, And nursed by mealy-mouth'd philanthropies, Divorce the Feeling from her mate the Deed.

'She told me. She and James had quarrell'd. Why? What cause of quarrel? None, she said, no cause; James had no cause: but when I prest the cause, I learnt that James had flickering jealousies Which anger'd her. Who anger'd James? I said. But Katie snatch'd her eyes at once from mine, And sketching with her slender pointed foot Some figure like a wizard's pentagram On garden gravel, let my query pass Unclaim'd, in flushing silence, till I ask'd If James were coming. "Coming every day," She answered, "ever longing to explain, But evermore her father came across With some long-winded tale, and broke him short; And James departed vext with him and her." How could I help her? "Would I--was it wrong?" (Claspt hands and that petitionary grace Of sweet seventeen subdued me ere she spoke) "O would I take her father for one hour, For one half-hour, and let him talk to me!" And even while she spoke, I saw where James Made toward us, like a wader in the surf, Beyond the brook, waist-deep in meadow-sweet.

'O Katie, what I suffered for your sake! For in I went, and call'd old Philip out To show the farm: full willingly he rose: He led me thro' the short sweet-smelling lanes Of his wheat-suburb, babbling as he went. He praised his land, his horses, his machines; He praised his ploughs, his cows, his hogs, his dogs; He praised his hens, his geese, his guinea-hens; His pigeons, who in session on their roofs Approved him, bowing at their own deserts: Then from the plaintive mother's teat he took Her blind and shuddering puppies, naming each. And naming those, his friends, for whom they were: Then crost the common into Darnley chase To show Sir Arthur's deer. In copse and fern Twinkled the innumerable ear and tail. Then, seated on a serpent-rooted beech, He pointed out a pasturing colt, and said: 'That was the four-year-old I sold the Squire.' And there he told a long long-winded tale Of how the Squire had seen the colt at grass, And how it was the thing his daughter wish'd, And how he sent the bailiff to the farm To learn the price, and what the price he ask'd, And how the bailiff swore that he was mad, But he stood firm; and so the matter hung; He gave them line: and five days after that He met the bailiff at the Golden Fleece, Who then and there had offer'd something more, But he stood firm; and so the matter hung; He knew the man; the colt would fetch its price; He gave them line: and how by chance at last (It might be May or April, he forgot, The last of April or the first of May) He found the bailiff riding by the farm, And, talking from the point, he drew him in, And there he mellow'd all his heart with ale, Until they closed a bargain, hand in hand.

'Then, while I breathed in sight of haven, he, Poor fellow, could he help it? Recommenced, And ran thro' all the coltish chronicle, Wild Will, Black Bess, Tantivy, Tallyho, Reform, White Rose, Bellerophon, the Jilt, Arbaces, and Phenomenon, and the rest, Till, not to die a listener, I arose, And with me Philip, talking still; and so We turn'd our foreheads from the falling sun, And following our own shadows thrice as long As when they follow'd us from Philip's door, Arrived, and found the sun of sweet content Re-risen in Katie's eyes, and all things well.

I steal by lawns and grassy plots, I slide by hazel covers; I move the sweet forget-me-nots That grow for happy lovers.

I slip, I slide, I gloom, I glance. Among my skimming swallows; I make the netted sunbeam dance Against my sandy shallows.

I murmur under moon and stars In brambly wildernesses; I linger by my shingly bars; I loiter round my cresses;

And out again I curve and flow To join the brimming river, For men may come and men may go, But I go on for ever.

Yes, men may come and go; and these are gone, All gone. My dearest brother, Edmund, sleeps, Not by the well-known stream and rustic spire, But unfamiliar Arno, and the dome Of Brunelleschi; sleeps in peace: and he, Poor Philip, of all his lavish waste of words Remains the lean P. W. on his tomb: I scraped the lichen from it: Katie walks By the long wash of Australasian seas Far off, and holds her head to other stars, And breathes in converse seasons. All are gone.'

So Lawrence Aylmer, seated on a style In the long hedge, and rolling in his mind Old waifs of rhyme, and bowing o'er the brook A tonsured head in middle age forlorn, Mused, and was mute. On a sudden a low breath Of tender air made tremble in the hedge The fragile bindweed-bells and briony rings; And he look'd up. There stood a maiden near, Waiting to pass. In much amaze he stared On eyes a bashful azure, and on hair In gloss and hue the chestnut, when the shell Divides threefold to show the fruit within: Then, wondering, ask'd her 'Are you from the farm?' 'Yes' answer'd she. 'Pray stay a little: pardon me; What do they call you?' 'Katie.' 'That were strange. What surname? 'Willows.' 'No!' 'That is my name.' 'Indeed!' and here he look'd so self-perplext, That Katie laugh'd, and laughing blush'd, till he Laugh'd also, but as one before he wakes, Who feels a glimmering strangeness in his dream. Then looking at her; 'Too happy, fresh and fair, Too fresh and fair in our sad world's best bloom, To be the ghost of one who bore your name About these meadows, twenty years ago.' 'Have you not heard?' said Katie, 'we came back. We bought the farm we tenanted before. Am I so like her? so they said on board. Sir, if you knew her in her English days, My mother, as it seems you did, the days That most she loves to talk of, come with me. My brother James is in the harvest-field: But she--you will be welcome--O, come in!'

THE LETTERS.

1. Still on the tower stood the vane, A black yew gloom'd the stagnant air, I peer'd athwart the chancel pane And saw the altar cold and bare. A clog of lead was round my feet, A band of pain across my brow; 'Cold altar, Heaven and earth shall meet Before you hear my marriage vow.'

2. I turn'd and humm'd a bitter song That mock'd the wholesome human heart, And then we met in wrath and wrong, We met, but only meant to part. Full cold my greeting was and dry; She faintly smiled, she hardly moved; I saw with half-unconscious eye She wore the colours I approved.

3. She took the little ivory chest, With half a sigh she turn'd the key, Then raised her head with lips comprest, And gave my letters back to me. And gave the trinkets and the rings, My gifts, when gifts of mine could please; As looks a father on the things Of his dead son, I look'd on these.

4. She told me all her friends had said; I raged against the public liar; She talk'd as if her love were dead, But in my words were seeds of fire. 'No more of love; your sex is known: I never will be twice deceived. Henceforth I trust the man alone, The woman cannot be believed.

5. 'Thro' slander, meanest spawn of Hell (And women's slander is the worst), And you, whom once I loved so well, Thro' you, my life will be accurst.' I spoke with heart, and heat and force, I shook her breast with vague alarms-- Like torrents from a mountain source We rush'd into each other's arms.

6. We parted: sweetly gleam'd the stars, And sweet the vapour-braided blue, Low breezes fann'd the belfry bars, As homeward by the church I drew. The very graves appear'd to smile, So fresh they rose in shadow'd swells; 'Dark porch,' I said, 'and silent aisle There comes a sound of marriage bells.'

ODE ON THE DEATH OF THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON.

1. Bury the Great Duke With an empire's lamentation, Let us bury the Great Duke To the noise of the mourning of a mighty nation, Mourning when their leaders fall, Warriors carry the warrior's pall, And sorrow darkens hamlet and hall.

2. Where shall we lay the man whom we deplore? Here, in streaming London's central roar. Let the sound of those he wrought for, And the feet of those he fought for, Echo round his bones for evermore.

3. Lead out the pageant: sad and slow, As fits an universal woe, Let the long long procession go, And let the sorrowing crowd about it grow, And let the mournful martial music blow; The last great Englishman is low.

4. Mourn, for to us he seems the last. Remembering all his greatness in the Past. No more in soldier fashion will he greet With lifted hand the gazer in the street. O friends, our chief state-oracle is mute: Mourn for the man of long-enduring blood, The statesman-warrior, moderate, resolute, Whole in himself, a common good. Mourn for the man of amplest influence, Yet clearest of ambitious crime, Our greatest yet with least pretence, Great in council and great in war, Foremost captain of his time, Rich in saving common-sense, And, as the greatest only are, In his simplicity sublime. O good gray head which all men knew, O voice from which their omens all men drew, O iron nerve to true occasion true, O fall'n at length that tower of strength Which stood four-square to all the winds that blew! Such was he whom we deplore. The long self-sacrifice of life is o'er. The great World-victor's victor will be seen no more.

5. All is over and done: Render thanks to the Giver, England, for thy son. Let the bell be toll'd. Render thanks to the Giver, And render him to the mould. Under the cross of gold That shines over city and river, There he shall rest for ever Among the wise and the bold. Let the bell be toll'd: And a reverent people behold The towering car, the sable steeds: Bright let it be with its blazon'd deeds, Dark in its funeral fold. Let the bell be toll'd: And a deeper knell in the heart be knoll'd; And the sound of the sorrowing anthem roll'd Thro' the dome of the golden cross; And the volleying cannon thunder his loss; He knew their voices of old. For many a time in many a clime His captain's-ear has heard them boom Bellowing victory, bellowing doom; When he with those deep voices wrought, Guarding realms and kings from shame; With those deep voices our dead captain taught The tyrant, and asserts his claim In that dread sound to the great name, Which he has won so pure of blame, In praise and in dispraise the same, A man of well-attemper'd frame, O civic muse, to such a name, To such a name for ages long, To such a name, Preserve a broad approach of fame, And ever-ringing avenues of song.

6. Who is he that cometh, like an honour'd guest, With banner and with music, with soldier and with priest, With a nation weeping, and breaking on my rest? Mighty seaman, this is he Was great by land as thou by sea. Thine island loves thee well, thou famous man, The greatest sailor since our world began. Now, to the roll of muffled drums, To thee the greatest soldier comes; For this is he Was great by land as thou by sea; His foes were thine; he kept us free; O give him welcome, this is he, Worthy of our gorgeous rites, And worthy to be laid by thee; For this is England's greatest son, He that gain'd a hundred fights, Nor ever lost an English gun; This is he that far away Against the myriads of Assaye Clash'd with his fiery few and won; And underneath another sun, Warring on a later day, Round affrighted Lisbon drew The treble works, the vast designs Of his labour'd rampart-lines, Where he greatly stood at bay, Whence he issued forth anew, And ever great and greater grew, Beating from the wasted vines Back to France her banded swarms, Back to France with countless blows, Till o'er the hills her eagles flew Past the Pyrenean pines, Follow'd up in valley and glen With blare of bugle, clamour of men, Roll of cannon and dash of arms, And England pouring on her foes. Such a war had such a close. Again their ravening eagle rose In anger, wheel'd on Europe-shadowing wings, And barking for the thrones of kings; Till one that sought but Duty's iron crown On that loud sabbath shook the spoiler down; A day of onsets of despair! Dash'd on every rocky square Their surging charges foam'd themselves away; Last, the Prussian trumpet blew; Thro' the long-tormented air Heaven flash'd a sudden jubilant ray, And down we swept and charged and overthrew. So great a soldier taught us there, What long-enduring hearts could do In that world's-earthquake, Waterloo! Mighty seaman, tender and true, And pure as he from taint of craven guile, O saviour of the silver-coasted isle, O shaker of the Baltic and the Nile, If aught of things that here befall Touch a spirit among things divine, If love of country move thee there at all, Be glad, because his bones are laid by thine! And thro' the centuries let a people's voice In full acclaim, A people's voice, The proof and echo of all human fame, A people's voice, when they rejoice At civic revel and pomp and game, Attest their great commander's claim With honour, honour, honour, honour to him, Eternal honour to his name.

7. A people's voice! we are a people yet. Tho' all men else their nobler dreams forget Confused by brainless mobs and lawless Powers; Thank Him who isled us here, and roughly set His Saxon in blown seas and storming showers, We have a voice, with which to pay the debt Of boundless love and reverence and regret To those great men who fought, and kept it ours. And keep it ours, O God, from brute control; O Statesmen, guard us, guard the eye, the soul Of Europe, keep our noble England whole, And save the one true seed of freedom sown Betwixt a people and their ancient throne, That sober freedom out of which there springs Our loyal passion for our temperate kings; For, saving that, ye help to save mankind Till public wrong be crumbled into dust, And drill the raw world for the march of mind, Till crowds at length be sane and crowns be just. But wink no more in slothful overtrust. Remember him who led your hosts; He bad you guard the sacred coasts. Your cannons moulder on the seaward wall; His voice is silent in your council-hall For ever; and whatever tempests lour For ever silent; even if they broke In thunder, silent; yet remember all He spoke among you, and the Man who spoke; Who never sold the truth to serve the hour, Nor palter'd with Eternal God for power; Who let the turbid streams of rumour flow Thro' either babbling world of high and low; Whose life was work, whose language rife With rugged maxims hewn from life; Who never spoke against a foe; Whose eighty winters freeze with one rebuke All great self-seekers trampling on the right: Truth-teller was our England's Alfred named; Truth-lover was our English Duke; Whatever record leap to light He never shall be shamed.