Part 6
"I've a splendid blood horse, and--a liver That it jars into torture to trot; My row-boat's the gem of the river,-- Gout makes every knuckle a knot! I can buy boundless credits on Paris and Rome, But no palate for _ménus_,--no eyes for a dome,-- _Those_ belonged to the youth who must tarry at home, When no home but an attic he'd got,--he'd got!
"How I longed, in that lonest of garrets, Where the tiles baked my brains all July, For ground to grow two pecks of carrots, Two pigs of my own in a sty, A rosebush,--a little thatched cottage,-- Two spoons--love--a basin of pottage!-- Now in freestone I sit,--and my dotage,-- With a woman's chair empty close by,--close by!
"Ah! now, though I sit on a rock, I have shared one seat with the great; I have sat--knowing naught of the clock-- On love's high throne of state; But the lips that kissed, and the arms that caressed, To a mouth grown stern with delay were pressed, And circled a breast that their clasp had blessed Had they only not come too late,--too late!"
_Fitz-Hugh Ludlow._
* * * * *
A PETITION TO TIME.
Touch us gently, Time! Let us glide adown thy stream Gently,--as we sometimes glide Through a quiet dream! Humble voyagers are we, Husband, wife, and children three,-- (One is lost,--an angel, fled To the azure overhead!)
Touch us gently, Time! We've not proud nor soaring wings, Our ambition, our content, Lies in simple things. Humble voyagers are we, O'er Life's dim, unsounded sea, Seeking only some calm clime;-- Touch us gently, gentle Time!
_Bryan Waller Procter._
* * * * *
ICHABOD.
So fallen! so lost! the light withdrawn Which once he wore! The glory from his gray hairs gone Forevermore!
Revile him not,--the tempter hath A snare for all! And pitying tears, not scorn and wrath, Befit his fall!
Oh! dumb is passion's stormy rage, When he who might Have lighted up and led his age, Falls back in night.
Scorn! Would the angels laugh, to mark A bright soul driven, Fiend-goaded, down the endless dark, From hope and heaven?
Let not the land, once proud of him, Insult him now; Nor brand with deeper shame his dim, Dishonored brow.
But let its humbled sons, instead, From sea to lake, A long lament, as for the dead, In sadness make.
Of all we loved and honored, naught Save power remains,-- A fallen angel's pride of thought, Still strong in chains.
All else is gone; from those great eyes The soul has fled: When faith is lost, when honor dies, The man is dead!
Then, pay the reverence of old days To his dead fame; Walk backward, with averted gaze, And hide the shame!
_John Greenleaf Whittier._
* * * * *
SONG.
The heath this night must be my bed, The bracken curtain for my head, My lullaby the warder's tread, Far, far from love and thee, Mary; To-morrow eve, more stilly laid, My couch may be my bloody plaid, My vesper-song thy wail, sweet maid! It will not waken me, Mary!
I may not, dare not, fancy now The grief that clouds thy lovely brow; I dare not think upon thy vow, And all it promised me, Mary. No fond regret must Norman know; When bursts Clan-Alpine on the foe, His heart must be like bended bow, His foot like arrow free, Mary.
A time will come with feeling fraught! For, if I fall in battle fought, Thy hapless lover's dying thought Shall be a thought on thee, Mary: And if returned from conquered foes, How blithely will the evening close, How sweet the linnet sing repose To my young bride and me, Mary.
_Sir Walter Scott._
* * * * *
TO LUCASTA,
ON GOING TO THE WARS.
Tell me not, sweet, I am unkinde, That from the nunnerie Of thy chaste breast and quiet minde, To warre and armes I flee.
True, a new mistresse now I chase,-- The first foe in the field; And with a stronger faith imbrace A sword, a horse, a shield.
Yet this inconstancy is such As you, too, should adore; I could not love thee, deare, so much, Loved I not honor more.
_Richard Lovelace._
* * * * *
THE LAND OF LANDS.
You ask me, why, though ill at ease, Within this region I subsist, Whose spirits falter in the mist, And languish for the purple seas?
It is the land that freemen till, That sober-suited Freedom chose, The land where, girt with friends or foes, A man may speak the thing he will;
A land of settled government, A land of just and old renown, Where Freedom broadens slowly down From precedent to precedent;
Where faction seldom gathers head, But by degrees to fulness wrought, The strength of some diffusive thought Hath time and space to work and spread.
Should banded unions persecute Opinion, and induce a time When single thought is civil crime, And individual freedom mute;
Though Power should make from land to land The name of Britain trebly great,-- Though every channel of the state Should almost choke with golden sand,--
Yet waft me from the harbor-mouth, Wild wind! I seek a warmer sky, And I will see before I die The palms and temples of the South.
_Alfred Tennyson._
* * * * *
THE SOLDIER'S DREAM.
Our bugles sang truce; for the night-cloud had lowered, And the sentinel stars set their watch in the sky; And thousands had sunk on the ground overpowered,-- The weary to sleep, and the wounded to die.
When reposing that night on my pallet of straw, By the wolf-scaring fagot that guarded the slain, At the dead of the night a sweet vision I saw, And thrice ere the morning I dreamt it again.
Methought from the battle-field's dreadful array Far, far I had roamed on a desolate track: 'Twas autumn,--and sunshine arose on the way To the home of my fathers, that welcomed me back.
I flew to the pleasant fields traversed so oft In life's morning march, when my bosom was young; I heard my own mountain-goats bleating aloft, And knew the sweet strain that the corn-reapers sung.
Then pledged we the wine-cup, and fondly I swore From my home and my weeping friends never to part; My little ones kissed me a thousand times o'er, And my wife sobbed aloud in her fulness of heart.
Stay, stay with us!--rest; thou art weary and worn!-- And fain was their war-broken soldier to stay; But sorrow returned with the dawning of morn, And the voice in my dreaming ear melted away.
_Thomas Campbell._
* * * * *
MONTEREY.
We were not many,--we who stood Before the iron sleet that day; Yet many a gallant spirit would Give half his years if but he could Have been with us at Monterey.
Now here, now there, the shot it hailed In deadly drifts of fiery spray, Yet not a single soldier quailed When wounded comrades round them wailed Their dying shout at Monterey.
And on, still on our column kept, Through walls of flame, its withering way; Where fell the dead, the living stept, Still charging on the guns which swept The slippery streets of Monterey.
The foe himself recoiled aghast, When, striking where he strongest lay, We swooped his flanking batteries past, And, braving full their murderous blast, Stormed home the towers of Monterey.
Our banners on those turrets wave, And there our evening bugles play; Where orange-boughs above their grave Keep green the memory of the brave Who fought and fell at Monterey.
We are not many,--we who pressed Beside the brave who fell that day; But who of us has not confessed He'd rather share their warrior rest Than not have been at Monterey?
_Charles Fenno Hoffman._
* * * * *
A SONG OF THE CAMP.
"Give us a song!" the soldiers cried, The outer trenches guarding, When the heated guns of the camp allied Grew weary of bombarding.
The dark Redan, in silent scoff, Lay grim and threatening under; And the tawny mound of the Malakoff No longer belched its thunder.
There was a pause. A guardsman said: "We storm the forts to-morrow; Sing while we may, another day Will bring enough of sorrow."
They lay along the battery's side, Below the smoking cannon,-- Brave hearts from Severn and from Clyde, And from the banks of Shannon.
They sang of love, and not of fame; Forgot was Britain's glory; Each heart recalled a different name, But all sang "Annie Laurie."
Voice after voice caught up the song, Until its tender passion Rose like an anthem rich and strong, Their battle-eve confession.
Dear girl! her name he dared not speak; But as the song grew louder, Something upon the soldier's cheek Washed off the stains of powder.
Beyond the darkening ocean burned The bloody sunset's embers, While the Crimean valleys learned How English love remembers.
And once again a fire of hell Rained on the Russian quarters, With scream of shot and burst of shell, And bellowing of the mortars!
And Irish Nora's eyes are dim For a singer dumb and gory; And English Mary mourns for him Who sang of "Annie Laurie."
Sleep, soldiers! still in honored rest Your truth and valor wearing; The bravest are the tenderest,-- The loving are the daring.
_Bayard Taylor._
* * * * *
THE CAVALIER'S SONG.
A steed! a steed of matchlesse speed, A sword of metal keene! All else to noble hearts is drosse, All else on earth is meane. The neighyinge of the war-horse prowde, The rowlinge of the drum, The clangor of the trumpet lowde, Be soundes from heaven that come; And oh! the thundering presse of knightes, Whenas their war-cryes swell, May tole from heaven an angel bright, And rouse a fiend from hell.
Then mounte! then mounte, brave gallants all, And don your helmes amaine: Deathe's couriers, Fame and Honor, call Us to the field againe. No shrewish teares shall fill our eye When the sword-hilt's in our hand,-- Heart-whole we'll part, and no whit sighe For the fayrest of the land. Let piping swaine and craven wight Thus weepe and puling crye; Our business is like men to fight, And hero-like to die!
_William Motherwell._
* * * * *
THE KNIGHT'S TOMB.
Where is the grave of Sir Arthur O'Kellyn? Where may the grave of that good man be?-- By the side of a spring, on the breast of Helvellyn, Under the twigs of a young birch tree! The oak that in summer was sweet to hear, And rustled its leaves in the fall of the year, And whistled and roared in the winter alone, Is gone,--and the birch in its stead is grown. The knight's bones are dust, And his good sword rust;-- His soul is with the saints, I trust.
_Samuel Taylor Coleridge._
* * * * *
CORONACH.
He is gone on the mountain, He is lost to the forest, Like a summer-dried fountain, When our need was the sorest. The fount reappearing From the rain-drops shall borrow; But to us comes no cheering, To Duncan no morrow!
The hand of the reaper Takes the ears that are hoary, But the voice of the weeper Wails manhood in glory. The autumn winds, rushing, Waft the leaves that are searest, But our flower was in flushing When blighting was nearest.
Fleet foot on the correi, Sage counsel in cumber, Red hand in the foray, How sound is thy slumber! Like the dew on the mountain, Like the foam on the river, Like the bubble on the fountain, Thou art gone, and forever.
_Sir Walter Scott._
* * * * *
DIRGE FOR A SOLDIER.
Close his eyes; his work is done! What to him is friend or foeman, Rise of moon or set of sun, Hand of man or kiss of woman? Lay him low, lay him low, In the clover or the snow! What cares he? he cannot know; Lay him low!
As man may, he fought his fight, Proved his truth by his endeavor; Let him sleep in solemn night, Sleep forever and forever. Lay him low, lay him low, In the clover or the snow! What cares he? he cannot know; Lay him low!
Fold him in his country's stars, Roll the drum and fire the volley! What to him are all our wars?-- What but death bemocking folly? Lay him low, lay him low, In the clover or the snow! What cares he? he cannot know; Lay him low!
Leave him to God's watching eye; Trust him to the hand that made him. Mortal love weeps idly by; God alone has power to aid him. Lay him low, lay him low, In the clover or the snow! What cares he? he cannot know; Lay him low!
_George Henry Boker._
* * * * *
ODE.
Sung on the occasion of decorating the graves of the Confederate dead at Magnolia Cemetery, Charleston, S. C., 1867.
Sleep sweetly in your humble graves,-- Sleep, martyrs of a fallen cause! Though yet no marble column craves The pilgrim here to pause,
In seeds of laurel in the earth The blossom of your fame is blown, And somewhere, waiting for its birth, The shaft is in the stone!
Meanwhile, behalf the tardy years Which keep in trust your storied tombs, Behold! your sisters bring their tears, And these memorial blooms.
Small tributes! but your shades will smile More proudly on these wreaths to-day, Than when some cannon-moulded pile Shall overlook this bay.
Stoop, angels, hither from the skies! There is no holier spot of ground Than where defeated valor lies, By mourning beauty crowned!
_Henry Timrod._
* * * * *
ODE.
Read at Utica, N. Y., on the occasion of decorating the graves of the Federal dead, May 30, 1872.
They sleep so calm and stately, Each in his graveyard bed, It scarcely seems that lately They trod the fields blood-red, With fearless tread.
They marched and never halted, They scaled the parapet, The triple lines assaulted, And paid without regret The final debt.
The debt of slow accruing A guilty nation made, The debt of evil doing, Of justice long delayed, 'Twas this they paid.
On fields where Strife held riot, And Slaughter fed his hounds, Where came no sense of quiet, Nor any gentle sounds, They made their rounds.
They wrought without repining, Till, weary watches o'er, They passed the bounds confining Our green, familiar shore, Forevermore.
And now they sleep so stately, Each in his graveyard bed, So calmly and sedately They rest, that once I said: "These men are dead.
"They know not what sweet duty We come each year to pay, Nor heed the blooms of beauty, The garland gifts of May, Strewn here to-day.
"The night-time and the day-time, The rise and set of sun, The winter and the May-time, To them whose work is done, Are all as one."
Then o'er mine eyes there floated A vision of the Land Where their brave souls, promoted To Heaven's own armies, stand At God's right hand.
From out the mighty distance I seemed to see them gaze Back on their old existence, Back on the battle-blaze Of war's dread days.
"The flowers shall fade and perish (In larger faith spake I), But these dear names we cherish Are written in the sky, And cannot die."
_Theodore P. Cook._
* * * * *
ODE.
How sleep the brave who sink to rest By all their country's wishes blessed! When Spring, with dewy fingers cold, Returns to deck their hallowed mould, She there shall dress a sweeter sod Than Fancy's feet have ever trod.
By fairy hands their knell is rung; By forms unseen their dirge is sung; There Honor comes, a pilgrim gray, To bless the turf that wraps their clay; And Freedom shall awhile repair, To dwell a weeping hermit there!
_William Collins._
* * * * *
DRIVING HOME THE COWS.
Out of the clover and blue-eyed grass He turned them into the river-lane; One after another he let them pass, Then fastened the meadow bars again.
Under the willows, and over the hill, He patiently followed their sober pace; The merry whistle for once was still, And something shadowed the sunny face.
Only a boy! and his father had said He never could let his youngest go; Two already were lying dead Under the feet of the trampling foe.
But after the evening work was done, And the frogs were loud in the meadow-swamp, Over his shoulder he slung his gun And stealthily followed the foot-path damp.
Across the clover and through the wheat With resolute heart and purpose grim, Though cold was the dew on his hurrying feet, And the blind bat's flitting startled him.
Thrice since then had the lanes been white, And the orchards sweet with apple-bloom; And now, when the cows came back at night, The feeble father drove them home.
For news had come to the lonely farm That three were lying where two had lain; And the old man's tremulous, palsied arm Could never lean on a son's again.
The summer day grew cool and late, He went for the cows when the work was done; But down the lane, as he opened the gate, He saw them coming one by one,--
Brindle, Ebony, Speckle, and Bess, Shaking their horns in the evening wind; Cropping the buttercups out of the grass,-- But who was it following close behind?
Loosely swung in the idle air The empty sleeve of army blue; And worn and pale, from the crisping hair Looked out a face that the father knew.
For Southern prisons will sometimes yawn, And yield their dead unto life again; And the day that comes with a cloudy dawn In golden glory at last may wane.
The great tears sprang to their meeting eyes; For the heart must speak when the lips are dumb; And under the silent evening skies Together they followed the cattle home.
_Kate Putnam Osgood._
* * * * *
THE BRAVE AT HOME.
The maid who binds her warrior's sash With smile that well her pain dissembles, The while beneath her drooping lash One starry tear-drop hangs and trembles, Though Heaven alone records the tear, And Fame shall never know her story, Her heart has shed a drop as dear As e'er bedewed the field of glory!
The wife who girds her husband's sword, 'Mid little ones who weep or wonder, And bravely speaks the cheering word, What though her heart be rent asunder, Doomed nightly in her dreams to hear The bolts of death around him rattle, Hath shed as sacred blood as e'er Was poured upon the field of battle!
The mother who conceals her grief While to her breast her son she presses, Then breathes a few brave words and brief, Kissing the patriot brow she blesses, With no one but her secret God To know the pain that weighs upon her, Sheds holy blood as e'er the sod Received on Freedom's field of honor!
_Thomas Buchanan Read._
* * * * *
ON HIS BLINDNESS.
When I consider how my light is spent Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide, And that one talent which is death to hide, Lodged with me useless, though my soul more bent To serve therewith my Maker, and present My true account, lest he returning chide; "Doth God exact day-labor, light denied?" I fondly ask. But Patience, to prevent That murmur, soon replies, "God doth not need Either man's work or his own gifts; who best Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best: his state Is kingly; thousands at his bidding speed, And post o'er land and ocean without rest; They also serve who only stand and wait."
_John Milton._
* * * * *
THE THREE FISHERS.
Three fishers went sailing out into the west, Out into the west, as the sun went down, Each thought on the woman who loved him the best, And the children stood watching them out of the town; For men must work, and women must weep, And there's little to earn, and many to keep, Though the harbor-bar be moaning.
Three wives sat up in the lighthouse tower, And they trimmed the lamps as the sun went down; They looked at the squall, and they looked at the shower, And the night-rack came rolling up ragged and brown; But men must work, and women must weep, Though storms be sudden, and waters deep, And the harbor-bar be moaning.
Three corpses lie out on the shining sands, In the morning gleam, as the tide goes down, And the women are weeping and wringing their hands, For those who will never come home to the town. For men must work, and women must weep, And the sooner it's over, the sooner to sleep, And good by to the bar and its moaning.
_Charles Kingsley._
* * * * *
HEROES.
The winds that once the Argo bore Have died by Neptune's ruined shrines: And her hull is the drift of the deep-sea floor, Though shaped of Pelion's tallest pines. You may seek her crew on every isle Fair in the foam of Ægean seas; But out of their rest no charm can wile Jason and Orpheus and Hercules.
And Priam's wail is heard no more By windy Ilion's sea-built walls; Nor great Achilles, stained with gore, Cries, "O ye gods, 'tis Hector falls!" On Ida's mount is the shining snow; But Jove has gone from its brow away; And red on the plain the poppies grow Where the Greek and the Trojan fought that day.
Mother Earth, are the heroes dead? Do they thrill the soul of the years no more? Are the gleaming snows and the poppies red All that is left of the brave of yore? Are there none to fight as Theseus fought, Far in the young world's misty dawn? Or to teach as the gray-haired Nestor taught? Mother Earth, are the heroes gone?
Gone? In a grander form they rise! Dead? We may clasp their hands in ours, And catch the light of their clearer eyes, And wreathe their brows with immortal flowers! Wherever a noble deed is done, 'Tis the pulse of a hero's heart is stirred; Wherever the Right has a triumph won, There are the heroes' voices heard.
Their armor rings on a fairer field Than the Greek or the Trojan ever trod: For Freedom's sword is the blade they wield, And the light above is the smile of God. So in his isle of calm delight Jason may sleep the years away; For the heroes live, and the skies are bright, And the world is a braver world to-day.
_Edna Dean Proctor._
* * * * *
THE ARSENAL AT SPRINGFIELD.
This is the arsenal. From floor to ceiling, Like a huge organ, rise the burnished arms; But from their silent pipes no anthem pealing Startles the villages with strange alarms.
Ah! what a sound will rise, how wild and dreary, When the death-angel touches those swift keys! What loud lament and dismal Miserere Will mingle with their awful symphonies!
I hear even now the infinite fierce chorus,-- The cries of agony, the endless groan, Which, through the ages that have gone before us, In long reverberations reach our own.
On helm and harness rings the Saxon hammer; Through Cimbric forest roars the Norseman's song; And loud, amid the universal clamor, O'er distant deserts sounds the Tartar gong.
I hear the Florentine, who from his palace Wheels out his battle-bell with dreadful din; And Aztec priests upon their teocallis Beat the wild war-drums made of serpent's skin;