THE STRAYED REVELLER

For the humming street, and the child

with its toy!

[well;

For the priest and the bell, and the holy
For the wheel where I spun,

And the blessed light of the sun!"
And so she sings her fill,

Singing most joyfully,

Till the spindle drops from her hand,
And the whizzing wheel stands still.

She steals to the window, and looks at the sand,

And over the sand at the sea;
And her eyes are set in a stare;
And anon there breaks a sigh,
And anon there drops a tear,
From a sorrow-clouded eye,
And a heart sorrow-laden,
A long, long sigh;

For the cold strange eyes of a little Mermaiden

And the gleam of her golden hair.

Come away, away children;
Come children, come down!
The hoarse wind blows coldly;
Lights shine in the town.

She will start from her slumber
When gusts shake the door;
She will hear the winds howling,
Will hear the waves roar.
We shall see, while above us
The waves roar and whirl,
A ceiling of amber,

A pavement of pearl.

Singing: "Here came a mortal,
But faithless was she!
And alone dwell for ever
The kings of the sea."

But, children, at midnight,
When soft the winds blow,
When clear falls the moonlight,
When spring tides are low;
When sweet airs come seaward
From heaths starr'd with broom,
And high rocks throw mildly
On the blanch'd sands a gloom;
Up the still, glistening beaches,
Up the creeks we will hie,
Over banks of bright seaweed
The ebb-tide leaves dry.

We will gaze, from the sand hills,
At the white, sleeping town;
At the church on the hill-side-
And then come back down.

Singing: "There dwells a loved one,
But cruel is she!

She left lonely for ever

The kings of the sea."

1849.

Whence art thou, sleeper?
The Youth

When the white dawn first
Through the rough fir-planks
Of my hut, by the chestnuts,
Up at the valley-head,
Came breaking. Goddess!
I sprang up, I threw round me
My dappled fawn-skin;

Passing out, from the wet turf,
Where they lay, by the hut door,
I snatch'd up my vine-crown, my fir-staff,
All drench'd in dew--

Came swift down to join
The rout early gather'd

In the town, round the temple,
Iacchus' white fane
On yonder hill.

Quick I pass'd, following
The wood-cutters' cart-track
Down the dark valley ;-I saw
On my left, through the beeches,

Mares' milk, and bread

Baked on the embers;-all around

The boundless, waving grass-plains stretch, thick-starr'd

With saffron and the yellow hollyhock
And flag-leaved iris-flowers.
Sitting in his cart

[miles,

He makes his meal; before him, for long
Alive with bright green lizards,
And the springing bustard-fowl,
The track, a straight black line,
Furrows the rich soil; here and there
Clusters of lonely mounds
Topp'd with rough-hewn,

Gray, rain-blear'd statues, overpeer
The sunny waste.

They see the ferry

On the broad, clay-laden

Lone Chorasmian stream; thereon,
With snort and strain,

Two horses, strongly swimming, tow
The ferry-boat, with woven ropes
To either bow

Firm harness'd by the mane; a chief
With shout and shaken spear,

Stands at the prow, and guides them; but astern

The cowering merchants, in long robes,
Sit pale beside their wealth
Of silk-bales and of balsam-drops,
Of gold and ivory,

Of turquoise-earth and amethyst,
Jasper and chalcedony,

And milk-barr'd onyx-stones.
The loaded boat swings groaning
In the yellow eddies;
The Gods behold them.

They see the Heroes
Sitting in the dark ship
On the foamless, long-heaving
Violet sea.

At sunset nearing
The Happy Islands.

These things, Ulysses,
The wise bards also
Behold and sing.
But oh, what labor!
O prince, what pain!

They too can see

Tiresias ;-but the Gods,
Who give them vision,
Added this law:

That they should bear too
His groping blindness,
His dark foreboding,
His scorn'd white hairs;
Bear Hera's anger
Through a life lengthen'd
To seven ages.

They see the Centaurs

On Pelion;-then they feel,
They too, the maddening wine
Swell their large veins to bursting; in
wild pain

They feel the biting spears

Of the grim Lapitha, and Theseus, drive, Drive crashing through their bones: they feel

High on a jutting rock in the red stream
Alemena's dreadful son

Ply his bow; such a price
The Gods exact for song:
To become what we sing.

The old Silenus

Came, lolling in the sunshine,
From the dewy forest-coverts,
This way at noon.

Sitting by me, while his Fauns
Down at the water-side
Sprinkled and smoothed
His drooping garland,
He told me these things.

But I, Ulysses,
Sitting on the warm steps,
Looking over the valley,
All day long, have seen.
Without pain, without labor,
Sometimes a wild-hair'd Mænad-
Sometimes a Faun with torches--
And sometimes, for a moment,
Passing through the dark stems
Flowing-robed, the beloved,
The desire, the divine,
Beloved Iacchus.

Ah, cool night-wind, tremulous stars!
Ah, glimmering water,
Fitful earth-murmur,

Dreaming woods!

Ah, golden-haired, strangely smiling
Goddess,

And thou, proved, much enduring,
Wave-toss'd Wanderer!

Who can stand still?

Ye fade, ye swim, ye waver before me-The cup again!

Wordsworth has gone from us-and ye,
Ah, may ye feel his voice as we!
He too upon a wintry clime
Had fallen--on this iron time

Of doubts, disputes, distractions, fears.
He found us when the age had bound
Our souls in its benumbing round;
He spoke, and loosed our heart in tears.
He laid us as we lay at birth
On the cool flowery lap of earth,
Smiles broke from us and we had ease:
The hills were round us, and the breeze
Went o'er the sun-lit fields again;
Our foreheads felt the wind and rain.
Our youth returned; for there was shed
On spirits that had long been dead,
Spirits dried up and closely furl'd,
The freshness of the early world.

Ah! since dark days still bring to light
Man's prudence and man's fiery might,
Time may restore us in his course
Goethe's sage mind and Byron's force ;
But where will Europe's latter hour
Again find Wordsworth's healing
power?

Others will teach us how to dare,
And against fear our breast to steel;
Others will strengthen us to bear-
But who, ah! who, will make us feel?
The cloud of mortal destiny,
Others will front it fearlessly-
But who, like him, will put it by?

Keep fresh the grass upon his grave
O Rotha, with thy living wave!
Sing him thy best! for few or none
Hears thy voice right, now he is gone.
1850.

SELF-DECEPTION

Then, as now, a Power beyond our seeing,

Staved us back, and gave our choice the law.

Ah, whose hand that day through Heaven guided

Man's new spirit, since it was not we? Ah, who swayed our choice and who decided

What our gifts, and what our wants should be?

For, alas! he left us each retaining Shreds of gifts which he refused in full. Still these waste us with their hopeless straining,

Still the attempt to use them proves them null.

And on earth we wander, groping, reeling;

Powers stir in us, stir and disappear. Ah! and he, who placed our masterfeeling,

Fail'd to place that master-feeling clear.

We but dream we have our wish'd-for powers,

Ends we seek we never shall attain. Ah! some power exists there, which is ours?

Some end is there, we indeed may gain? 1852.

THE SECOND BEST

MODERATE tasks and moderate leisure,
Quiet living, strict-kept measure
Both in suffering and in pleasure-

'Tis for this thy nature yearns.

But so many books thou readest,
But so many schemes thou breedest,
But so many wishes feedest.

That thy poor head almost turns.
And (the world 's so madly jangled,
Human things so fast-entangled)
Nature's wish must now be strangled
For that best which she discerns.
So it must be! yet, while leading
A strain'd life, while overfeeding,
Like the rest, his wit with reading,
No small profit that man earns,
Who through all he meets can steer him
Can reject what cannot clear him,
Cling to what can truly cheer him;

Who each day more surely learns