Part 2

Staunch and valiant-hearted, to whom our toil were play, Ye man with armour’d patience the bulwarks night and day, Or on your iron coursers plough shuddering through the Bay, Or neath the deluge drive the skirmishing sharks of war: Venturous boys who leapt on the pinnace and row’d from shore, A mother’s tear in the eye, a swift farewell to say, And a great glory at heart that none can take away.

Seldom is your home-coming; for aye your pennon flies In unrecorded exploits on the tumultuous wave; Till, in the storm of battle, fast-thundering upon the foe, Ye add your kindred names to the heroes of long-ago, And mid the blasting wrack, in the glad sudden death of the brave, Ye are gone to return no more.--Idly our tears arise; Too proud for praise as ye lie in your unvisited grave, The wide-warring water, under the starry skies.

FOR “PAGES INÉDITES,” ETC.

_April, 1916._

By our dear sons’ graves, fair France, thou’rt now to us, endear’d; Since no more as of old stand th’ English against thee in fight, But rallying to defend thee they die guarding thy beauty From blind envious Hate and Perfidy leagued with Might.

GHELUVELT.

EPITAPH ON THE WORCESTERS. OCTOBER 31, 1914.

Askest thou of these graves? They’ll tell thee, O stranger, in England How we Worcesters lie where we redeem’d the battle.

THE WEST FRONT.

AN ENGLISH MOTHER, ON LOOKING INTO MASEFIELD’S “OLD FRONT LINE.”

No country know I so well as this landscape of hell. Why bring you to my pain these shadow’d effigys Of barb’d wire, riven trees, the corpse-strewn blasted plain?

And the names--Hebuterne Bethune and La Bassée-- I have nothing to learn-- Contalmaison, Boisselle, And one where night and day my heart would pray and dwell;

A desert sanctuary, where in holy vigil Year-long I have held my faith against th’ imaginings Of horror and agony in an ordeal above

The tears of suffering and took aid of angels: This was the temple of God: no mortuary of kings Ever gathered the spoils of such chivalry and love:

No pilgrim shrine soe’er hath assembled such prayer-- With rich incense-wafted ritual and requiem Not beauteous batter’d Rheims nor lorn Jerusalem.

TO THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

_April, 1917._

Brothers in blood! They who this wrong began To wreck our commonwealth, will rue the day When first they challenged freemen to the fray, And with the Briton dared the American. Now are we pledged to win the Rights of man; Labour and justice now shall have their way, And in a League of Peace--God grant we may-- Transform the earth, not patch up the old plan.

Sure is our hope since he, who led your nation, Spake for mankind; and ye arose in awe Of that high call to work the world’s salvation; Clearing your minds of all estranging blindness In the vision of Beauty, and the Spirit’s law, Freedom and Honour and sweet Loving-kindness.

TRAFALGAR SQUARE

_September, 1917._

Fool that I was: my heart was sore, Yea sick for the myriad wounded men, The maim’d in the war: I had grief for each one: And I came in the gay September sun To the open smile of Trafalgar Square; Where many a lad with a limb fordone Loll’d by the lion-guarded column That holdeth Nelson statued thereon Upright in the air.

The Parliament towers and the Abbey towers, The white Horseguards and grey Whitehall, He looketh on all, Past Somerset House and the river’s bend To the pillar’d dome of St. Paul, That slumbers confessing God’s solemn blessing On England’s glory, to keep it ours-- While children true her prowess renew And throng from the ends of the earth to defend Freedom and honour--till Earth shall end.

The gentle unjealous Shakespeare, I trow, In his country tomb of peaceful fame, Must feel exiled from life and glow If he think of this man with his warrior claim, Who looketh o’er London as if ’twere his own, As he standeth in stone, aloft and alone, Sailing the sky with one arm and one eye.

CHRISTMAS EVE, 1917

Many happy returns, sweet Babe, of the day! Didst not thou sow good seed in the world, thy field? Cam’st thou to save the poor? Thy poor yet pine. Thousands to-day suffer death-pangs like thine; Our jewels of life are spilt on the ground as dross; Ten thousand mothers stand beneath the cross. _Peace to men of goodwill_ was the angels’ song: Now there is fiercer war, worse filth and wrong. If thou didst sow good seed, is this the yield? Shall not thy folk be quell’d in dead dismay?

Nay, with a larger hope we are fed and heal’d Than e’er was reveal’d to the saints who died so strong; For while men slept the seed had quicken’d unseen. England is as a field whereon the corn is green.

Of trial and dark tribulation this vision is born-- Britain as a field green with the springing corn. While we slumber’d the seed was growing unseen. Happy returns of the day, dear Babe, we say.

ENGLAND has buried her sins with her fathers’ bones. Thou shalt be throned on the ruin of kingly thrones. The wish of thine heart is rooted in carnal mind; For good seed didst thou sow in the world thy field: It shall ripen in gold and harvest an hundredfold. Peace shall come as a flood upon all mankind; Love shall comfort and succour the poor that are pined.

Wherever our gentle children are wander’d and sped, Simple apostles thine of the world to come, They carried the living seed of the living Bread. The angel-song and the gospel of Christendom, That while the nation slept was springing unseen.

So tho’ we be sorely stricken we feel no dread: Our thousand sons suffer death-pangs like thine: It shall ripen in gold and harvest an hundredfold: Peace and Love shall hallow our care and teen, Shall bind in fellowship all the folk of the earth To kneel at thy cradle, Babe, and bless thy birth.

Ring we the bells up and down in country and town, And keep the old feast unholpen of preacher or priest, Wishing thee happy returns, and thy Mother May, Ever happier and happier returns, dear CHRIST, of thy day!

TO THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

_August, 1918._

See England’s stalwart daughter, who made emprise ’Gainst her own mother, freeborn of the free, Who slew her sons for her slaves’ liberty, See for mankind her majesty arise! From her new world her unattainted eyes Espy deliverance, and her bold decree Speaks for Great Britain’s wide confederacy: The folk shall rule, if only they be wise.

Ambition, hate, revenge, the secret sway Of priest and kingcraft shall be done away By faith in beauty, chivalry and good. One God made all, and will all wrongs forgive Save their hell-heart who stab man’s hope to live In mutual freedom, peace and brotherhood.

OUR PRISONERS OF WAR IN GERMANY

_October, 1918._

Prisoners to a foe inhuman, Oh! but our hearts rebel: Defenceless victims ye are, in claws of spite a prey, Conquering your torturers, enduring night and day Malice, year-long drawn out your noble spirits to quell. Fearsomer than death this rack they ranged, and reckon’d well ’Twould harrow our homes, and plied, such devilish aim had they, That England roused to rage should wrong with wrong repay, And smirch her envied honour in deeds unspeakable.

Nor trouble we just Heaven that quick revenge be done On Satan’s chamberlains highseated in Berlin; Their reek floats round the world on all lands ’neath the sun: Tho’ in craven Germany was no man found, not one With spirit enough to cry Shame!--Nay, but on such sin Follows Perdition eternal ... and it has begun.

HARVEST-HOME

VERSES TO THE AMERICANS ON THEIR THANKSGIVING DAY, CELEBRATED IN ENGLAND NOVEMBER 28, 1918.

A toast for West and East Drink on this Thursday feast Last in November, The year when Albion’s lands Across the sea join hands-- Drink and remember!

Nineteen-eighteen fulfill’d The kindly purpose will’d By the Ever-living, When first in hope upstay’d The Pilgrim Fathers made Harvest thanksgiving.

And since the seed bore fruit, Which they went forth to root In the wildernesses, Ye now return to find The Rose that they resigned With their distresses.

’Twas when the wide world o’er, Whatever peaceful shore Britons inherit, Britons claim’d right of birth, And fought hell in the mirth Of Shakespeare’s spirit.

Then your true heart was stirr’d, Your arm raised, and your word Went forth, forecasting That the great war should cease In British bonds of peace, Peace everlasting.

_The good God bless this day, And we for ever and aye Keep our love living, Till all men ’neath heaven’s dome Sing Freedom’s Harvest-home In one Thanksgiving!_

TO AUSTRALIA

WITH THE WOUNDED AND THE SURVIVORS OF 1914 RETURNING HOME IN AUTUMN, 1918.

A loving message at Christmastide, Sent round the world to the underside A-sail in the ship that across the foam Carries the wounded Aussies home, Who rallied at War’s far-thundering call, When England stood with her back to the wall, To fight for Freedom, that ne’er shall die So long as on earth the old flag fly.

O hearts so loving, eager and bold-- Whose praise hath claim to be writ on the sky In letters of gold, of fire and gold-- Never shall prouder tale be told, Than how ye fought as the knights of old “Against the heathen in Turkye In Flanders Artois and Picardie:” But above all triumph that else ye have won This is the goodliest deed ye have done, To have seal’d with blood in a desperate day The love-bond that binds us for ever and aye.

_September, 1918._

THE EXCELLENT WAY

Man’s mind that hath this earth for home Hath too its far-spread starry dome Where thought is lost in going free, Prison’d but by infinity. He first in slumbrous babyhood Took conscience of his heavenly good; Then with his sins grown up to youth Wept at the vision of God’s truth.

Soon in his heart new hopes awoke As poet sang or prophet spoke: Temples arose and stone he taught To stand agaze in trancèd thought: He won the trembling air to tell Of far passions ineffable, Feeding the hungry things of sense With instincts of omniscience, Immortal modes that should abide Cherish’d by love and pious pride, That unborn children might inherit The triumph of his holy spirit, Outbidding Nature, to entice Her soul from her own Paradise, Till her wild face had fallen to shame Had he not praised her in God’s name.

Alas! poor man, what blockish curse Would violate thy universe, To enchain thy freedom and entomb Thy pleasance in devouring gloom? Behold thy savage foes of yore With woes of pestilence and war, Siva and Moloch, Odin and Thor, Rise from their graves to greet amain The deeds that give them life again.

Poor man, sunk deeper than thy slime In blood and hate, in terror and crime, Thou who wert lifted on the wings Of thy desire, the king of kings, In promise beyond ken sublime: O thou man-soul, who mightest climb To heavenly happiness, whereof Thine easy path were Mirth and Love!

_October, 1918._

ENGLAND TO INDIA

_Christmas, 1918._

Beautiful is man’s home: how fair, Wrapt in her robe of azurous air, The Earth thro’ stress of ice and fire Came on the path of God’s desire, Redeeming Chaos, to compose Exquisite forms of lily and rose, With every creature a design Of loveliness or craft divine Searchable and unsearchable, And each insect a miracle!

Truth is as Beauty unconfined: Various as Nature is man’s Mind: Each race and tribe is as a flower Set in God’s garden with its dower Of special instinct; and man’s grace Compact of all must all embrace. China and Ind, Hellas or France, Each hath its own inheritance; And each to Truth’s rich market brings Its bright divine imaginings, In rival tribute to surprise The world with native merchandise. Nor least in worth nor last in years Of artists, poets, saints and seers, England, in her far northern sea, Fashion’d the jewel of Liberty, Fetch’d from the shore of Palestine (Land of the Lily and mystic Vine). Where once in the everlasting dawn Christ’s Love-star flamed, that heavenly sign Whereto all nations shall be drawn, Unfabled Magi, and uplift Each to Love’s cradle his own gift.

Thou who canst dream and understand, Dost thou not dream for thine own land This dream of Truth, and contemplate That happier world, Love’s free Estate? Say, didst thou dream, O Sister fair, How hand in hand we entered there?

BRITANNIA VICTRIX

Careless wast thou in thy pride, Queen of seas and countries wide, Glorying on thy peaceful throne:-- Can thy love thy sins atone? What shall dreams of glory serve, If thy sloth thy doom deserve, When the strong relentless foe Storm thy gates to lay thee low?

Careless, ah! he saw thee leap Mighty from thy startled sleep, Heard afar thy challenge ring: ’Twas the world’s awakening.

Welcome to thy children all Rallying to thee without call Oversea, the sportive sons From thy vast dominions! Stern in onset or defence, Terrible in their confidence.

Dauntless wast thou, fair goddess, ’Neath the cloud of thy distress; Fierce and mirthful wast thou seen In thy toil and in thy teen; While the nations looked to thee, Spent in worldwide agony.

Oft, throughout that long ordeal Dark with horror-stricken duty, Nature on thy heart would steal Beckoning thee with heavenly beauty, Heightening ever on thine isle All her seasons’ tranquil smile; Till thy soul anew converted, Roaming o’er the fields deserted, By thy sorrow sanctified, Found a place wherein to hide.

Soon fresh beauty lit thy face, Then thou stood’st in Heaven’s high grace: Sudden in air on land and sea Swell’d the voice of victory.

Now when jubilant bells resound And thy sons come laurel-crown’d, After all thy years of woe Thou no longer canst forgo, Now thy tears are loos’d to flow.

Land, dear land, whose sea-built shore Nurseth warriors evermore, Land, whence Freedom far and lone Round the earth her speech has thrown Like a planet’s luminous zone,-- In thy strength and calm defiance Hold mankind in love’s alliance!

Beauteous art thou, but the foes Of thy beauty are not those Who lie tangled and dismay’d; Fearless one, be yet afraid Lest thyself thyself condemn In the wrong that ruin’d them.

God, who chose thee and upraised ’Mong the folk (His name be praised!), Proved thee then by chastisement Worthy of His high intent, Who, because thou could’st endure, Saved thee free and purged thee pure, Won thee thus His grace to win, For thy love forgave thy sin, For thy truth forgave thy pride, Queen of seas and countries wide,-- He who led thee still will guide.

Hark! thy sons, those spirits fresh Dearly housed in dazzling flesh, Thy full brightening buds of strength, Ere their day had any length Crush’d, and fallen in torment sorest, Hark! the sons whom thou deplorest Call--I hear one call; he saith: “Mother, weep not for my death: ’Twas to guard our home from hell, ’Twas to make thy joy I fell Praising God, and all is well. What if now thy heart should quail And in peace our victory fail! If low greed in guise of right Should consume thy gather’d might, And thy power mankind to save Fall and perish on our grave! On my grave, whose legend be _Fought with the brave and joyfully Died in faith of victory_. Follow on the way we won! Thou hast found, not lost thy son.”

_November 23, 1918._

DER TAG: NELSON AND BEATTY

A BROADSHEET.

1.

No doubt ’twas a truly Christian sight When the German ships came out of the Bight, But it can’t be said it was much of a fight That grey November morning; The wonderful day, the great Der Tag, Which Prussians had vow’d with unmannerly brag Should see Old England lower her flag Some grey November morning.

2.

The spirit of Nelson, that haunts the Fleet, Had come whereabouts the ships must meet, But he fear’d there was some decoy or cheat That grey November morning, When the enemy led by a British scout Stole ’twixt our lines ... and never a shout Or a signal; and never a gun spoke out That grey November morning.

3.

So he shaped his course to the Admiral’s ship, Where Beatty stood with hand on hip Impassive, nor ever moved his lip That grey November morning; And touching his shoulder he said: “My mate, Am I come too soon or am I too late? Is it friendly manœuvres or pageant of State This grey November morning?”

4.

Then Beatty said: “As Admiral here In the name of the King I bid you good cheer: It’s not my fault that it looks so queer This grey November morning; But there come the enemy all in queues; They can fight well enough if only they choose; Small blame to me if the fools refuse, This grey November morning.

5.

“That’s Admiral Reuter, surrendering nine Great Dreadnoughts, all first-rates of the line; Beyond, in the haze that veils the brine This grey November morning, Loom five heavy Cruisers, and light ones four, With a tail of Destroyers, fifty or more, Each squadron under its Commodore, This grey November morning.

6.

“The least of all those captive queens Could have knock’d your whole navy to smithereens, And nothing said of the other machines, On a grey November morning, The aeroplanes and the submarines, Bombs, torpedoes, and Zeppelins, Their floating mines and their smoky screens, Of a grey November morning.

7.

“They’ll rage like bulls sans reason or rhyme, And next day, as if ’twere a pantomime, They walk in like cows at milking-time, On a grey November morning. We’re four years sick of the pestilent mob; --You’ve heard of our biblical _Battle in Gob_?-- At times it was hardly a gentleman’s job Of a grey November morning.”

8.

Then Nelson said: “God bless my soul! How things are changed in this age of coal; For the spittle it isn’t with you I’d condole This grey November morning. By George! you’ve netted a monstrous catch: You’ll be able to pen the best dispatch That ever an Admiral wrote under hatch On a grey November morning.

9.

“I like your looks and I like your name: My heart goes out to the old fleet’s fame, And I’m pleased to find you so spry at the game This grey November morning. Your ships, tho’ I don’t half understand Their build, are stouter and better mann’d Than anything I ever had in command Of a grey November morning.”

10.

Then Beatty spoke: “Sir! none of my crew, All bravest of brave and truest of true, Is thinking of me so much as of you This grey November morning.” And Nelson replied: “Well, thanks f’ your chat. Forgive my intrusion! I take off my hat And make you my bow ... we’ll leave it at that, This grey November morning.”

“TO BURNS”

TOAST FOR THE GREENOCK CLUB DINNER, JANUARY, 1914.

To Burns! brave Scotia’s laurel’d son Who drove his plough on Helicon-- Who with his Doric rhyme erewhile Taught English bards to mend their style-- And by the humour of his pen Fairly befool’d auld Nickie-ben ... Blithe Robbie Burns! we love thee well Because thou wert so like thysel’, And in full cups with festive cheer We toast thy fame from year to year.

POOR CHILD

On a mournful day When my heart was lonely, O’er and o’er my thought Conned but one thing only,

Thinking how I lost Wand’ring in the wild-wood The companion self Of my careless childhood.

How, poor child, it was I shall ne’er discover, But ’twas just when he Grew to be thy lover,

With thine eyes of trust And thy mirth, whereunder All the world’s hope lay In thy heart of wonder.

Now, beyond regrets And faint memories of thee. Saddest is, poor child, That I cannot love thee.

TO PERCY BUCK

Folk alien to the Muse have hemm’d us round And fiends have suck’d our blood: our best delight Is poison’d, and the year’s infective blight Hath made almost a silence of sweet sound. But you, what fortune, Percy, have you found At Harrow? doth fair hope your toil requite? Doth beauty win her praise and truth her right, Or hath the good seed fal’n on stony ground?

Ply the art ever nobly, single-soul’d Like Brahms, or as you ruled in Wells erewhile, --Nor yet the memory of that zeal is cold-- Where lately I, who love the purer style, Enter’d, and felt your spirit as of old Beside me, listening in the chancel-aisle.

_1904._

TO HARRY ELLIS WOOLDRIDGE

Love and the Muse have left their home, now bare Of memorable beauty, all is gone, The dedicated charm of Yattendon, Which thou wert apt, dear Hal, to build and share. What noble shades are flitting, who while-ere Haunted the ivy’d walls, where time ran on In sanctities of joy by reverence won, Music and choral grace and studies fair!

These on some kindlier field may Fate restore, And may the old house prosper, dispossest Of her whose equal it can nevermore Hold till it crumble: O nay! and the door Will moulder ere it open on a guest To match thee in thy wisdom and thy jest.

_October, 1905._

FORTUNATUS NIMIUM

I have lain in the sun I have toil’d as I might I have thought as I would And now it is night.

My bed full of sleep My heart of content For friends that I met The way that I went.

I welcome fatigue While frenzy and care Like thin summer clouds Go melting in air.

To dream as I may And awake when I will With the song of the birds And the sun on the hill.

Or death--were it death-- To what should I wake Who loved in my home All life for its sake?

What good have I wrought? I laugh to have learned That joy cannot come Unless it be earned;

For a happier lot Than God giveth me It never hath been Nor ever shall be.

DEMOCRITUS

Joy of your opulent atoms! wouldst thou dare Say that Thought also of atoms self-became, Waving to soul as light had the eye in aim; And so with things of bodily sense compare Those native notions that the heavens declare, Space and Time, Beauty and God--Praise we his name!-- Real ideas, that on tongues of flame From out mind’s cooling paste leapt unaware?

Thy spirit, Democritus, orb’d in the eterne Illimitable galaxy of night Shineth undimm’d where greater splendours burn Of sage and poet: by their influence bright We are held; and pouring from his quenchless urn Christ with immortal love-beams laves the height.

_1919._

NOTES