PR 5752 LS*""" ""'**""» "-ibrary ■-3 J^rymae musarum, and other poems. 3 1924 013 ■567" 874" Cornell University Library The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013567874 LACHRYM^ MUSARUM AND OTHER POEMS LACHRYM/^ MUSARUM AND OTHER POEMS BY WILLIAM WATSON !Lontroti MACMILLAN AND CO. AND NEW YORK 1893 All rights reserved First Edition printed November 1892 Reprinted December 1892 January and April 1893 TO RICHARD HOLT HUTTON AND MEREDITH TOWNSEND WITH GRATITUDE CONTENTS LACHRYMjE Musarum . Dedication of "The Dream of Man" The Dream of Man .... Shelley's Centenary . . ^ . A Golden Hour At the Grave of Charles Lamb Lines in a Flyleaf of "Christabel" Lines to our New Censor Reluctant Summer .... The Great Misgiving. "The Things that are more excellent" Beauty's Metempsychosis . . . . EAGB I ] I l6 34 42 44 46 48 SO 52 54 60 viii CONTENTS PAGE England my Mother .... 62 Night 70 The Fugitive Ideal .... 72 " The Foresters " . . . . 1i Song 75 Columbus 76 LACHRYM^ MUSARUM (6th October 1892) Low, like another's, lies the laurelled head : The life that seemed a perfect song is o'er : Carry the last great bard to his last bed. Land that he loved, thy noblest voice is mute. Land that he loved, that loved him ! nevermore Meadow of thine, smooth lawn or wild sea-shore, Gardens of odorous bloom and tremulous fruit, Or woodlands old, like Druid couches spread. The master's feet shall tread. 'B 2 LACHRYM^ MUSARUM Death's little rift hath rent the faultless lute : The singer of undying songs is dead. Lo, in this season pensive-hued and grave, While fades and falls the doomed, reluctant leaf From withered Earth's fantastic coronal, With wandering sighs of forest and of wave Mingles the murmur of a people's grief For him whose leaf shall fade not, neither fall. He hath fared forth, beyond these suns and showers. For us, the autumn glow, the autumn flame, And soon the winter silence shall be ours : Him the eternal spring of fadeless fame Crowns with no mortal flowers. LACHRYM^ MUSARUM ; Rapt though he be from us, Virgil salutes him, and Theocritus ; Catullus, mightiest-brained Lucretius, each Greets him, their brother, on the Stygian beach ; Proudly a gaunt right hand doth Dante reach ; Milton and Wordsworth bid him welcome home ; Bright Keats to touch his raiment doth beseech ; Coleridge, his locks aspersed with fairy foam. Calm Spenser, Chaucer suave, His equal friendship crave : And godlike spirits hail him guest, in speech Of Athens, Florence, Weimar, Stratford, Rome. What needs his laurel our ephemeral tears, To save from visitation of decay ? 4 LACHRYM.E MUSARUM Not in this temporal sunlight, now, that bay Blooms, nor to perishable mundane ears Sings he with lips of transitory clay ; For he hath joined the chorus of his peers In habitations of the perfect day : His earthly notes a heavenly audience hears. And more melodious are henceforth the spheres. Enriched with music stol'n from earth away. He hath returned to regions whence he came. Him doth the spirit divine Of universal loveliness reclaim. All nature is his shrine. Seek him henceforward in the wind and sea, In earth's and air's emotion or repose, In every star's august serenity. LACHRYM^ MUSARUM S And in the rapture of the flaming rose. There seek him if ye would not seek in vain, There, in the rhythm and music of the Whole ; Yea, and for ever in the human soyl Made stronger and more beauteous by his strain. For l6 ! creation's self is one great choir, And what is nature's order but the rhyme Whereto the worlds keep time. And all things move with all things from their prime ? Who shall expound the mystery of the lyre ? In far retreats of elemental mind Obscurely comes and goes The imperative breath of song, that as the wind Is trackless, and oblivious whence it blows. 6 LACHRYMyE MUSARUM Demand of lilies wherefore they are white, Extort her crimson secret from the rose, But ask not of the Muse that she disclose The meaning of the riddle of her might : Somewhat of all things sealed and recondite, Save the enigma of herself, she knows. The master could not tell, with all his lore, V Wherefore he sang, or whence the mandate sped : Ev'n as the linnet sings, so I, he said ; — Ah, rather as the imperial nightingale. That held in trance the ancient Attic shore, And charms the ages with the notes that o'er All woodland chants immortally prevail ! And now, from "our vain plaudits greatly fled, He with diviner silence dwells instead, LACHRYM^ MUSARUM And on no earthly sea with transient roar, Unto no earthly airs, he trims his sail, But far beyond our vision and our hail Is heard for ever and is seen no more. No more, O never now. Lord of the lofty and the tranquil brow Whereon nor snows of time Have fall'n, nor wintry rime, Shall men behold thee, sage and mage sublime. Once, in his youth obscure. The maker of this verse, which shall endure By splendour of its theme that cannot die. Beheld thee eye to eye. And touched through thee the hand Of every hero of thy race divine, 8 LACHRVM^ MUSARUM Ev'n to the sire of all the laurelled line, The sightless wanderer on the Ionian strand, With soul as healthful as the poignant brine. Wide as his skies and radiant as his seas, Starry from haunts of his Familiars nine, Glorious Maeonides. Yea, I beheld thee, and behold thee yet : Thou hast forgotten, but can I forget ? ^ The accents of thy pure and sovereign tongue, Are they not ever goldenly impressed On memory's palimpsest? I see the wizard locks like night that hung, I tread the floor thy hallowing feet have trod ; I see the hands a nation's lyre that strung. The eyes that looked through life and gazed on God. LACHRYM^ MUSARUM 9 The seasons change, the winds they shift and veer ; The grass of yesteryear Is dead ; the birds depart, the groves decay : Empires dissolve and peoples disappear : Song passes not away. Captains and conquerors leave a little dust, And kings a dubious legend of their reign ; The swords of Caesars, they are less than rust : The poet doth remain. Dead is Augustus, Maro is alive ; And thou, the Mantuan of our age and clime. Like Virgil shalt thy race and tongue survive. Bequeathing no less honeyed words to time. Embalmed in amber of eternal rhyme. And rich with sweets from every Muse's hive ; 10 LACHRVM/E MUSARUM While to the measure of the cosmic rune For purer ears thou shalt thy lyre attune, And heed no more the hum of idle praise In that great calm our tumults cannot reach, Master who crown'st our immelodious days With flower of perfect speech. DEDICATION OF "THE DREAM OF MAN" TO LONDON, MY HOSTESS City that waitest to be sung, — For whom no hand To mighty strains the lyre hath strung In all this land, Though mightier theme the mightiest ones Sang not of old, The thrice three sisters' godlike sons With lips of gold, — Till greater voice thy greatness sing DEDICATION OF In loftier times, Suffer an alien muse to bring Her votive rhymes. Yes, alien in thy midst am I, Not of thy brood ; The nursling of a norland sky Of rougher mood : To me, thy tarrying guest, to me, 'Mid thy loud hum, Strayed visions of the moor or sea Tormenting come. Above the thunder of the wheels That hurry by. From lapping of lone waves there steals A far-sent sigh ; " THE DREAM OF MAN " 13 And many a dream-reared mountain crest My feet have trod, There where thy Minster in the West Gropes toward God. ^et, from thy presence if I go, By woodlands deep Or ocean-fringes, thou, I know, Wilt haunt my sleep ; Thy restless tides of life will foam. Still, in my sight ; Thy imperturbable dark dome Will crown my night. O sea of living waves that roll On golden sands, Or break on tragic reef and shoal 14 DEDICATION OF 'Mid fatal lands ; O forest wrought of living leaves, Some filled with Spring, Where joy life's festal raiment weaves And all birds sing, — Some trampled in the miry ways, Or whirled along By fury of tempestuous days, — Take thou my song ! For thou hast scorned not heretofore The gifts of rhyme I dropped, half faltering, at thy door. City sublime ; And though 'tis true I am but guest Within thy gate. " THE DREAM OF MAN " 15 Unto thy hands I owe the best Awards of fate. Imperial hostess ! thanks from me To thee belong : O living forest, living sea, Take thou my song! THE DREAM OF MAN To the eye and the ear of the Dreamer This Dream out of darkness flew, Through the horn or the ivory portal, But he wist not which of the two. It was the Human Spirit, Of all men's souls the Soul, Man the unWearied climber, That climbed to the unknown goal. And up the steps of the ages. The difficult steep ascent. THE DREAM OF MAN 17 Man the unwearied climber Pauseless and dauntless went, ^ons rolled behind him With thunder of far retreat, And still as he strove he conquered And laid his foes at his feet. Inimical powers of nature, Tempest and flood and fire, The spleen of fickle seasons That loved to baulk his desire. The breath of hostile climates. The ravage of blight and dearth, The old unrest that vexes The heart of the moody earth. The genii swift and radiant Sabreing heaven with flame, C 1 8 THE DREAM OF MAN He, with a keener weapon, The sword of his wit, overcame. Disease and her ravening offspring, Pain with the thousand teeth, He drave into night primeval, The nethermost worlds beneath. Till the Lord of Death, the undying, Ev'n Asrael the King, No more with Furies for heralds Came armed with scourge and sting, But gentle of voice and of visage. By calm Age ushered and led, A guest, serenely featured. Entering, woke no dread. And, as the rolling aeons Retreated with pomp of sound, THE DREAM OF MAN 19 Man's spirit, grown too lordly For this mean orb to bound, By arts in his youth undreamed of His terrene fetters broke, With enterprise ethereal Spuming the natal yoke, And, stung with diyine ambition. And fired with a glorious greed. He annexed the stars and the planets And peopled them with his seed. Then said he, " The infinite Scripture I have read and interpreted clear. And searching all worlds I have found not My sovereign or my peer. In what room of the palace of nature 20 THE DREAM OF MAN Resides the invisible God ? For all her doors I have opened, And all her floors I have trod. If greater than I be her tenant, Let him answer my challenging call : Till then I admit no rival, But crown myself master of all." And forth as that word went bruited. By Man unto Man were raised Fanes of devout self-homage. Where he who praised was the praised ; And from vast unto vast of creation The new evangel ran. And an odour of world-wide incense Went up from Man unto Man ; Until, on a solemn feast-day. THE DREAM OF MAN When the world's usurping lord At a million impious altars His own proud image adored, God spake as He stept from His ambush : " O great in thine own conceit, I will show thee thy source, how humble, Thy goal, for a god how unmeet." Thereat, by the word of the Maker The Spirit of Man was led To a mighty peak of vision. Where God to His creature said : " Look eastward toward time's sunrise." And, age upon age untold, The Spirit of Man saw clearly The Past as a chart out-rolled, — THE DREAM OF MAN Beheld his base beginnings In the depths of time, and his strife, With beasts and crawling horrors For leave to live, when life Meant but to slay and to procreate, To feed and to sleep, among Mere mouths, voracities boundless, Blind lusts, desires without tongue, And ferocities vast, fulfilling Their being's malignant law, While nature was one hunger. And one hate, all fangs and maw. With that, for a single moment, Abashed at his own descent. In humbleness Man's Spirit THE DREAM OF MAN 23 At the feet of the Maker bent ; But, swifter than light, he recovered The stature and pose of his pride. And, " Think not thus to shame me With my mean birth," he cried. " This is my loftiest greatness, To have been born so low ; Greater than Thou the ungrowing Am I that for ever grow." And God forbore to rebuke him, But answered brief and stern, Bidding him toward time's sunset His vision westward turn ; And the Spirit of Man obeying Beheld as a chart out-rolled The likeness and fornri of the Future, 24 THE DREAM OF MAN Age upon age untold ; Beheld his own meridian, And beheld his dark decline, His secular fall to nadir From summits of light divine. Till at last, amid worlds exhausted, And bankrupt of force and fire, 'Twas his, in a torrent of darkness, Like a sputtering lamp to expire. Then a war of shame and anger Did the realm of his soul divide ; " 'Tis false, 'tis a lying vision," In the face of his God he cried. " Thou thinkest to daunt me with shadows ; Not such as Thou feign'st is my doom : THE DREAM OF MAN 25 From glory to rise unto glory Is mine, who have risen from gloom. I doubt if Thou knew'st at my making How near to Thy throne I should climb, O'er the mountainous slopes of the ages And the conquered peaks of time. Nor shall I look backward nor rest me Till the uttermost heights I have trod, And am equalled with Thee or above Thee, The mate or the master of God." Ev'n thus Man turned from the Maker, With thundered defiance wild, And God with a terrible silence Reproved the speech of His child. And Man returned to his labours, 26 THE DREAM OF MAN And stiffened the neck of his will ; And the aeons still went rolling, And his power was crescent still. But yet there remained to conquer One foe, and the greatest — although Despoiled of his ancient terrors. At heart, as of old, a foe — Unmaker of all, and renewer, Who winnows the world with his wing, The Lord of Death, the undying, Ev'n Asrael the King. And lo, Man mustered his forces The war of wars to wage, And with storm and thunder of onset Did the foe of foes engage. THE DREAM OF MAN 27 And the Lord of Death, the undying, Was beset and harried sore, In his immemorial fastness At night's aboriginal core. And during years a thousand Man leaguered his enemy's hold, While nature was one deep tremor, And the heart of the world waxed cold. Till the phantom battlements wavered. And the ghostly fortress fell. And Man with shadowy fetters Bound fast great Asrael. So, to each star in the heavens, The exultant word was blown, The annunciation tremendous, 28 THE DREAM OF MAN Death is overthrown! And Space in her ultimate borders Prolonging the jubilant tone, With hollow ingeminations, Sighed, Death is overthrown ! And God in His house of silence. Where He dwelleth aloof, alone, Paused in His tasks to hearken : Death is overthrown ! Then a solemn and high thanksgiving By Man unto Man was sung, In his temples of self-adoration. With his own multitudinous tongue ; And he said to his Soul : " Rejoice thou For thy last great foe lies bound. THE DREAM OF MAN 29 Ev'n Asrael the Unmaker, Unmade, disarmed, discrowned." And behold, his Soul rejoiced not, The breath of whose being was strife, For life with nothing to vanquish Seemed but the shadow of life. No goal invited and promised And divinely provocative shone ; And Fear having fled, her sister, Blest Hope, in her train was gone ; And the coping and crown of achievement Was hell than defeat more dire — The torment of all-things-compassed. The plague of nought-to-desire ; And Man the invincible queller, . 30 THE DREAM OF MAN Man with his foot on his foes, In boundless satiety hungred, Restless from utter repose, Victor of nature, victor Of the prince of the powers of the air, By mighty weariness vanquished, And crowned with august despair. Then, at his dreadful zenith, He cried unto God : " O Thou Whom of old in my days of striving Methought I needed not, — now, In this my abject glory. My hopeless and helpless might. Hearken and cheer and succour ! " And God from His lonely height, THE DREAM OF MAN 31 From eternity's passionless summits, On suppliant Man looked down, And His brow waxed human with pity, Belying its awful crown. " Thy richest possession," He answered, " Blest Hope, will I restore, And the infinite wealth of weakness Which was thy strength of yore ; And I will arouse from slumber, In his hold where bound he lies, Thine enemy most benefic ; — O Asrael, hear and rise ! " And a sound like the heart of nature Riven and cloven and torn, Announced, to the ear universal. 32 THE DREAM OF MAN Undying Death new-born. Sublime he rose in his fetters, And shook the chains aside Ev'n as some mortal sleeper 'Mid forests in autumntide Rises and shakes off lightly The leaves that lightly fell On his limbs and his hair unheeded While as yet he slumbered well. And Deity paused and hearkened, Then turned to the undivine. Saying, " O Man, My creature. Thy lot was more blest than Mine. I taste not delight of seeking. Nor the boon of longing know. THE DREAM OF MAN 33 There is but one joy transcendent, And I hoard it not but bestow. I hoard it not nor have tasted, But freely I gave it to thee — The joy of most glorious striving, Which dieth in victory." Thus, to the Soul of the Dreamer, This Dream out of darkness flew. Through the .horn or the ivory portal, But he wist not which of the two. SHELLEY'S CENTENARY (4TH August 1892) Within a narrow span of time, Three princes of the realm of rhyme, At height of youth or manhood's prime From earth took wing. To join the fellowship sublime Who, dead, yet sing. He, first,' his earliest wreath who wove Of laurel grown in Latmian grove. Conquered by pain and hapless love Found calmer home, SHELLEY'S CENTENARY 35 Roofed by the heaven that glows above Eternal Rome. A fierier soul, its own fierce prey, And cumbered with more mortal clay At Missolonghi flamed away. And left the air Reverberating to this day Its loud despair. Alike remote from Byron's scorn And Keats's magic as of morn Bursting for ever newly-born On forests old, Waking a hoary world forlorn With touch of gold, 36 SHELLEY'S CENTENARY Shelley, the cloud-begot, who grew Nourished on air and sun and dew, Into that Essence whence he drew His life and lyre Was fittingly resolved anew Through wave and fire. 'Twas like his rapid soul ! 'Twas meet That he, who brooked not Time's slow feet, With passage thus abrupt and fleet Should hurry hence. Eager the Great Perhaps to greet With Why ? and Whence ? Impatient of the world's fixed way. He ne'er could suffer God's delay. SHELLEY'S CENTENARY 37 But all the future in a day Would build divine, And the whole past in ruins lay, An emptied shrine. Vain vision ! but the glow, the fire, The passion of benign desire. The glorious yearning, lift him higher Than many a soul That mounts a million paces nigher Its meaner goal. And power is his, if naught besides, In that thin ether where he rides, Above the roar of human tides To ascend afar, 38 SHELLEY'S CENTENARY Lost in a storm of light that hides His dizzy car. Below, the unhasting world toils on, And here and there are victories won Some dragon slain, some justice done. While, through the skies, A meteor rushing on the sun. He flares and dies. But, as he cleaves yon ether clear. Notes from the unattempted Sphere He scatters to the enchanted ear Of earth's dim throng. Whose dissonance doth more endear The showering song. SHELLEY'S CENTENARY 39 In other shapes than he forecast The wofld is moulded : his fierce blast, — His wild assault upon the Past, — These things are vain ; Revolt is transient : what must last Is that pure strain, Which seems the wandering voices blent Of every virgin element,- — A sound from ocean caverns sent, — An airy call From the pavilioned firmament O'erdoming all. And in this world of worldlings, where Souls rust in apathy, and ne'er 40 SHELLEY'S CENTENARY A great emotion shakes the air, And life flags tame, And rare is noble impulse, rare The impassioned aim, 'Tis no mean fortune to have heard A singer who, if errors blurred Hissight, had yet a spirit stirred By vast desire. And ardour fledging the swift word With plumes of fire. A creature of impetuous breath. Our torpor deadlier than death He knew not ; whatsoe'er he saith Flashes with life : SHELLEY'S CENTENARY 41 He spurreth men, he quickeneth To splendid strife. And in his gusts of song he brings Wild odours shaken from strange wings, And unfamiliar whisperings From far lips blown. While all the rapturous heart of things Throbs through his own, — His own that from the burning pyre One who had loved his wind-swept lyre Out of the sharp teeth of the fire Unmolten drew, Beside the sea that in her ire Smote him and slew. A GOLDEN HOUR A BECKONING spirit of gladness seemed afloat, That lightly danced in laughing air before us : The earth was all in tune, and you a note Of Nature's happy chorus. 'Twas like a vernal morn, yet overhead The leafless boughs across the lane were knitting: The ghost of some forgotten Spring, we said. O'er Winter's world comes flitting. Or was it Spring herself, that, gone astray, i Beyond the alien frontier chose to tarry ? A GOLDEN HOUR 43 Or but some bold outrider of the May, Some April-emissary? The apparition faded on the air, Capricious and incalculable comer. — Wilt thou too pass, and leave my chill days bare, And fall'n my phantom Summer ? AT THE GRAVE OF CHARLES LAMB, IN EDMONTON Not here, O teeming City, was it meet Thy lover, thy most faithful, should repose. But where the multitudinous life-tide flows Whose ocean-murmur was to him more sweet Than melody of birds at morn, or bleat Of flocks in Spring-time, there should Earth enclose His earth, amid thy thronging joys and woes, There, 'neath the music of thy million feet. AT THE GRAVE OF CHARLES LAMB 4S In love of thee this lover knew no peer. , Thine eastern or thy western fane had made Fit habitation for his noble shade. Mother of mightier, nurse of none more dear, Not here, in rustic exile, O not here, Thy Elia like an alien should be laid ! LINES IN A FLYLEAF OF « CHRISTABEL " Inhospitably hast thou entertained, O Poet, us the bidden to thy board. Whom in mid -feast, and while our thousand mouths Are one laudation of the festal cheer. Thou from thy table dost dismiss, unfilled. Yet loudlier thee than many a lavish host We praise, and oftener thy repast half-served Than many a stintless banquet, prodigally LINES IN A FLYLEAF OF " CHRISTABEL " 47 Through satiate hours prolonged; nor praise less well Because with tongues thou hast not cloyed, and lips That mourn the parsimony of afifluent souls, And mix the lamentation with the laCid. LINES TO OUR NEW CENSOR [Mr. Oscar Wilde, having discovered that England is unworthy of him, has announced his resolve to become a naturalised Frenchman, ] And wilt thou, Oscar, from us flee, And must we, henceforth, wholly sever ? Shall thy Xahorlous j'eux-d' esprit Sadden our lives no more for ever ? And all thy future wilt thoja link With that brave land to which thou goest ? Unhappy France ! we used to think She touched, at Sedan, fortune's lowest. LINES TO OUR NEW CENSOR 49 And you're made French as easily As you might change the clothes you're wearing ? Fancy ! — and 'tis so hard to be A man of sense and modest bearing. May fortitude beneath this blow Fail not the gallant Gallic nation ! By past experience, well we know Her genius for recuperation. And as for us — to our disgrace, Your stricture's truth must be conceded : Would any but a stupid race Have made the fuss about you we did ? RELUCTANT SUMMER Reluctant Summer ! once, a maid Full easy of access, In many a bee-frequented shade Thou didst thy lover bless. Divinely unreproved I played, Then, with each liberal tress — And art thou grown at last afraid Of some too close caress ? Or deem'st that if thou shouldst abide My passion might decay? RELUCTANT SUMMER 51 Thou leav'st me pining and denied, Coyly thou say'st me nay. Ev'n as I woo thee to my side, Thou, importuned to stay. Like Orpheus' half-recovered bride Ebb'st from my arms away.. THE GREAT MISGIVING " Not ours," say some, " the thought of death to dread ; Asking no heaven, we fear no fabled hell : Life is a feast, and we have banqueted — Shall not the worms as well ? " The after-silence, when the feast is o'er, And void the places where the minstrels stood, Differs in nought from what hath been before, And is nor ill nor good." THE GREAT MISGIVING S3 Ah, but the Apparition — the dumb sign — The beckoning finger bidding me forego The fellowship, the converse, and the wine, The songs, the festal glow ! And ah, to know not, while with friends I sit, And while the purple joy is passed about, Whether 'tis ampler day divinelier lit Or homeless night without ; And whether, stepping forth, my soul shall see New prospects, or fall sheer — a blinded thing ! There is,_0 grave, thy hourly victory. And there, O death, thy sting. "THE THINGS THAT ARE MORE EXCELLENT " As we wax older on this earth, Till many a toy that charmed us seems Emptied of beauty, stripped of worth. And mean as dust and dead as dreams,— For gauds that perished, shows -that passed, Some recompense the Fates have sent : Thrice lovelier shine the things 'that last. The things that are more excellent. " THE THINGS THAT ARE MORE EXCELLENT " 55 Tired of the Senate's barren brawl, An hovir with silence we prefer, Where statelier rise the woods than all Yon towers of talk at Westminster. Let this man prate and that man plot, On fame or place or title bent : The votes of veering crowds are not The things that are more excellent. Shall we perturb and vex our soul For " wrongs " which no true freedom mar, Which no man's upright walk control, And from no guiltless deed debar ? What odds though tonguesters heal, or leave Unhealed, the grievance they invent ? 56 "THE THINGS THAT ARE MORE EXCELLENT » To things, not phantoms, let us cleave — The things that are more excellent. Nought nobler is, than to be free : The stars of heaven are free because In amplitude of liberty Their joy is to obey the laws. From servitude to freedom's name Free thou thy mind in bondage pent ; Depose the fetich, and proclaim The things that are more excellent. And in appropriate dust, be hurled That dull, punctilious god, whom they That call their tiny clan the world, Serve and obsequiously obey : " THE THINGS THAT ARE MORE EXCELLENT " 57 Who con their ritual of Routine, With minds to one dead likeness blent, And never ev'n in dreams have seen The things that are more excellent. To dress, to call, to dine, to break No canon of the social code, The little laws that lacqueys make, The futile decalogue of Mode, — How many a soul for these things lives. With pious passion, grave intent ! While Nature careless-handed gives The things that are more excellent. To hug the wealth ye cannot use, And lack the riches all may gain,-^ O blind and wanting wit to choose, S8 "THE THINGS THAT ARE MORE EXCELLENT " Who house the chaff and burn the grain ! And still doth life with starry towers Lure to the bright, divine ascent ! — Be yours the things ye would : be ours The things that are more excellent. The grace of friendship — mind and heart Linked with their fellow heart and mind ; The gains of science, gifts of art ; The sense of oneness with our kind ; The thirst to know and understand — A large and liberal discontent : These are the goods in lif(?'s rich hand, The things that are more excellent. In faultless rhythm the ocean rolls, A rapturous silence thrills the skies ; " THE THINGS THAT ARE MORE EXCELLENT " S9 And on this earth are lovely souls, • That softly look with aidful eyes. Though dark, O God, Thy course and track, I think Thou must at least have meant That nought which lives should wholly lack The things that are more excellent. BEAUTY'S METEMPSYCHOSIS That beauty such as thine * Can die indeed, Were ordinance too wantonly malign : No wit may reconcile so cold a creed With beauty such as thine. From wave and star and flower Some effluence rare Was lent thee, a divine but transient dower : Thou yield'st it back from eyes and lips and . hair To wave and star and flower. BEAUTY'S METEMPSYCHOSIS 6i Shouldst thou to-morrow die, Thou still shalt be Found in the rose and met in all the sky : And from the ocean's heart shalt sing to me, Shouldst thou to-morrow die. ENGLAND MY MOTHER England my mother, Wardress of waters, Builder of peoples. Maker of men, — Hast thou yet leisure Left for the muses ? Heed'st thou the songsmith Forging the rhyme? ENGLAND MY MOTHER 63 Deafened with tumults, How canst thou hearken ? Strident is faction, Demos is loud. Lazarus, hungry, Menaces Dives ; Labour the giant Chafes in his hold. Yet do the songsmiths Quit not their forges ; Still on life's anvil Forge they the rhyme. Still the rapt faces Glow from the furnace : 64 ENGLAND MY MOTHER Breath of the smithy Scorches their brows. Yea, and thou hear'st them ? So shall the hammers Fashion not vainly Verses of gold. II Lo, with the ancient Roots of man's nature Twines the eternal Passion of song. Ever Love fans it, Ever Life feeds it, ENGLAND MY >IOTHER 6$ Time cannot age it ; Death cannot slay. Deep in the world-heart Stand its foundations, Tangled with all things, Twin-made with all. Nay, what is Nature's Self, but an endless Strife toward music, Euphony, rhyme ? Trees in their blooming, Tides in their flowing. Stars in their circling. Tremble with song. F 66. ENGLAND MY MOTHER God on His throne is Eldest of poets : Unto His measures Moveth the Whole. Ill Therefore deride not Speech of the muses, England my mother, Maker of men. Nations are mortal, Fragile is greatness ; Fortune may fly thee. Song shall not fly. ENGLAND MY MOTHER 67 Song the all-girdling, Song cannot perish : Men shall make music, Man shall give ear. Not while the choric Chant of creation Floweth from all things, Poured without pause. Cease we to echo Faintly the descant Whereto for ever Dances the world. IV So let the songsmith Proffer his rhyme-gift, 68 ENGLAND MY MOTHER England my mother, Maker of men. Gray grows thy count'nance, Full of the ages ; Time on thy forehead Sits like a dream : Song is the potion All things renewing, Youth's one elixir, ' Fountain of morn. Thou, at the world-loom Weaving thy future. Fitly may'st temper Toil with delight. ENGLAND MY MOTHER 69 Deemest thou, labour Only is earnest ? Grave is all beauty, Solemn is joy. Song is no bauble — Slight not the songsmith, England my mother. Maker of men. NIGHT In the night, in the night, When thou liest alone, Ah, the sounds that are blown In the freaks of the breeze^ By the spirit that sends The voice of far friends With the sigh of the seas In the night ! In the night, in the night. When thou liest alone. NIGHT 71 Ah, the ghosts that make moan From the days that are sped : The old dreams, the old deeds, The old wound that still bleeds, And the face of the dead In the night ! In the night, in the night, When thou liest alone, With the grass and the stone O'er thy chamber so-deep. Ah, the silence at last, Life's dissonance past, - And only pure sleep In the night ! THE FUGITIVE IDEAL As some most pure and noble face, Seen in the thronged and hurrying street, Sheds o'er the world a sudden grace, A flying odour sweet. Then, passing, leaves the cheated sense Baulked with a phantom excellence ; So, on our soul the visions rise " Of that fair life we never led : They flash a splendour past our eyes, We start, and they are fled : They pass, and leave us with blank gaze, Resigned to our ignoble days. "THE FORESTERS" (Lines written on the appearance of Lord Tennyson's drama.) Clear as of old the great voice rings to-day, While Sherwood's oak -leaves twine with Al worth's bay : The voice of him the master and the sire Of one whole age and legion of the lyre, Who sang his morning-song when Coleridge stil Uttered dark oracles from Highgate Hill, And with new-launched argosies of rhyme Gilds and makes brave this sombreing tide time. 74 " THE FORESTERS " Far be the hour when lesser brows shall wear The laurel glorious from that wintry hair — When he, the sovereign of our lyric day, In Charon's shallop must be rowed away. And hear, scarce heeding, 'mid the plash of oar. The ave atque vale from the shore ! To him nor tender nor heroic muse Did her divine confederacy refuse : To all its moods the lyre of life he strung, And notes of death fell deathless from his tongue. Himself the Merlin of his magic strain, He bade old glories break in bloom again ; And so exempted from oblivious doom. Through him these days shall fadeless break in bloom. SONG Lightly we met in the morn, Lightly we parted at eve. There was never a thought of the thorn The rose of a day might leave. Fate's finger we did not perceive, So lightly we met in the morn ! So lightly we parted at eve We knew not" that Love was born. I rose on the morrow forlorn, To pine and remember and grieve. Too lightly we met in the morn ! Too lightly we parted at eve ! COLUMBUS (i2TH October 1492) From his adventurous prime He dreamed the dream sublime : Over his wandering youth It hung, a beckoning star. At last the vision fled, And left him in its stead The scarce sublimer truth, The world he found afar. COLUMBUS 11 The scattered isles that stand Warding the mightier land Yielded their maidenhood To his imperious prow. The mainland within call Lay vast and virginal : In its blue porch he stood : No more did fate allow. No more ! but ah, how much, To be the first to touch The veriest azure hem Of that majestic robe ! Lord of the lordly sea, Earth's mightiest sailor he ; Great Captain among them, The captors of the globe. 78 COLUMBUS When shall the world forget Thy glory and our debt, Indomitable soul, Immortal Genoese? Not while the shrewd salt gale Whines amid shroud and sail. Above the rhythmic roll And thunder of the seas. THE END Printed h R. & R. Clakk, Edinburgh MESSRS. MACMILLAN & CO.'S PUBLICATIONS. BY THE SAME AUTHOR. Fcap. 8vo. 5s. POEMS BY WILLIAM WATSON. Mainly a reprint of the second edition of ' Wordsworth^ s Grave and Other Poems, ^ with the addition of twenty -six short pieces, most of which have already been contributed to periodicals. TIMES, — " It is trae poetry ; its inspiration is genuine and individual, and its execution is full of various melody." SCOTSMAN. — " There is always something true, manful, robust, and musical in his work." SATURDAY REVIEW.— '^ 'V^QrAswortYHs Grave' and some of the sonnets might alone suffice for a high reputation. Their excellence is of a kind that admits of no dispute." PALL MALL GAZETTE.— "Tht verse has a calm sweep, ^ grave and equahle power, a solid and chastened melody." SPECTA TOR. — " He is always classical in the better sense of the word." ACADEMY QAr. Cosmo Monkhouse). — "It is of * Collins' lonely vesper- chime ' and ' the frugal note of Gray ' that we think as we read the choicely worded, well-turned quatrains that succeed each other, like the strong, unbroken waves of a full tide." Mr. W. D. HowELLS in HARPER'S MAGAZINE.-^'' The very rare and beautiful quality of Mr. William Watson's poetry." Mr. Walter Besant in the A UTHOR. — "The contents of this book have in them such a ring of poetry as we have not heard for a long time, — the true ring of noble thought embedded in noble rhyme." Mr. Grant Allen in the FORTNIGHTLY REVIEW.^" In Its own kind, I venture to say, since In MemorzarK burst upon us, we have not heard from any new tongue quite so authentic a voiCe, so large and whole an utterance ; we have not met anywhere with such close marks of kinship to the sanest work of the great English singers." Mr. Andrew Lang in LONGMAN'S MAGAZINE.— ** The verse is so ex- cellent that we may call it finished and almost perfect." EDITED BY THE SAME. i8mo. Cloth. 2s. 6d. net. LYRIC LOVE: An Anthology. Edited by William Watson. With a Steel Vignette after Stothard, engraved by W. RiDGWAY. [Golden Treasury Series. TIMES. — "A charming anthology. . . . Atask well worthy of theauthor of Wflwilr- worth's Grtwe,, who has accomplished it with great skill and a very catholic taste." SCOTSMAN. — " It is a charming collec^on of verse, nearly all of which is fine, and the volume is a prize for any one who desires a neat little pocketful of lyrics." GLASGOW HERALD.—" The book is quite a delightful body of verse." DAILY CHRONICLE. — "An admirable and an exemplary anthology." SPECTA TOR. — " Mr. Watson's preface is a beautiful piece of writing, and his own dedicatory sonnet seems to us one of his finest pieces of work." BOOKMAN. — "Mr. Watson*s_ collection has a distinct individuality ;_ it is fastidious and unconventional. It is gathered from many ages, and, considering its size, very full recognition is given in it to the poetry of the present day." MACMILLAN & CO., LONDON. MESSRS. MACMILLAN & CO.'S STANDARD POETS. Crown 8vo. 7s, 6d. each. THE WORKS OF LORD TENNYSON. A New and Enlarged Edition. With a Portrait. *«,* Also Pocket JEdttion of Poetical Works only. Limp MoroccOf js. 6d. This Volume contains all Lord Tennyson's Poems published in hook form, up to this time. THE COMPLETE POETICAL WORKS OF JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. With Portrait, and Introduction by Thomas Hughes. THE COMPLETE POETICAL WORKS OF WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. With an Introduction by John Morley, and Portrait. SPECTATOR — "Mr. Morley has seldom written anything fresher or more vigorous than the essay on Wordsworth." PALL MALL GAZETTE.— "TheVj&aaaoiViQr&sviax