The Works of Alfred Lord Tennyson, Poet Laureate

Not the Hall to-night, my grandson! Death and Silence hold their own.
Leave the Master in the first dark hour of his last sleep alone.

Worthier soul was he than I am, sound and honest, rustic Squire,
Kindly landlord, boon companion-youthful jealousy is a liar.

Cast the poison from your bosom, oust the madness from your brain.
Let the trampled serpent show you that you have not lived in vain.
Youthful! youth and age are scholars yet but in the lower school,
Nor is he the wisest man who never proved himself a fool.

Yonder lies our young sea-village-Art and Grace are less and less:
Science grows and Beauty dwindles-roofs of slated hideousness!

There is one old Hostel left us where they swing the Locksley shield,
Till the peasant cow shall butt the Lion passant' from his field.

Poor old Heraldry, poor old History, poor old Poetry, passing hence,
In the common deluge drowning old political common-sense!

Poor old voice of eighty crying after voices that have fled!
All I loved are vanish'd voices, all my steps are on the dead.
All the world is ghost to me, and as the phantom disappears,
Forward far and far from here is all the hope of eighty years.

In this Hostel-I remember-I repent it o'er his grave

Like a clown-by chance he met me—I refused the hand he gave.

From that casement where the trailer mantles all the mouldering bricksI was then in early boyhood, Edith but a child of six

While I shelter'd in this archway from a day of driving showers-
Peept the winsome face of Edith like a flower among the flowers.
Here to-night! the Hall to-morrow, when they toll the Chapel bell!
Shall I hear in one dark room a wailing, 'I have loved thee well.'
Then a peal that shakes the portal-one has come to claim his bride,
Her that shrank, and put me from her, shriek'd, and started from my side-

Silent echoes! You, my Leonard, use and not abuse your day,
Move among your people, know them, follow him who led the way,

Strove for sixty widow'd years to help his homelier brother men,
Served the poor, and built the cottage, raised the school, and drain'd the fen.

Hears he now the Voice that wrong'd him? who shall swear it cannot be ?
Earth would never touch her worst, were one in fifty such as he.

Ere she gain her Heavenly-best, a God must mingle with the game:
Nay, there may be those about us whom we neither see nor name,

568

PROLOGUE-THE CHARGE OF THE HEAVY BRIGADE.

Felt within us as ourselves, the Powers of Good, the Powers of Ill,
Strowing balm, or shedding poison in the fountains of the Will

Follow you the Star that lights a desert pathway, yours or mine.
Forward, till you see the highest Human Nature is divine.

Follow Light, and do the Right-for man can half-control his doom-
Till you find the deathless Angel seated in the vacant tomb.

Forward, let the stormy moment fly and mingle with the Past.

I that loathed, have come to love him. Love will conquer at the last.

Gone at eighty, mine own age, and I and you will bear the pall;
Then I leave thee Lord and Master, latest Lord of Locksley Hall.

PROLOGUE

TO GENERAL HAMLEY.

OUR birches yellowing and from each

The light leaf falling fast,

While squirrels from our fiery beech
Were bearing off the mast,

You came, and look'd and loved the view
Long-known and loved by me,

Green Sussex fading into blue

With one gray glimpse of sea;
And, gazing from this height alone,
We spoke of what had been
Most marvellous in the wars your own
Crimean eyes had seen;

And now-like old-world inns that take
Some warrior for a sign
That therewithin a guest may make

True cheer with honest wine-
Because you heard the lines I read

Nor utter'd word of blame,

I dare without your leave to head
These rhymings with your name,
Who know you but as one of those

I fain would meet again,

Yet know you, as your England knows
That you and all your men
Were soldiers to her heart's desire,
When, in the vanish'd year,

You saw the league-long rampart-fire

Flare from Tel-el-Kebir

Thro' darkness, and the foe was driven,

And Wolseley overthrew

Arâbi, and the stars in heaven

Paled, and the glory grew.

THE CHARGE OF THE HEAVY

BRIGADE AT BALACLAVA.

OCTOBER 25, 1854.

THE charge of the gallant three hundred, the Heavy Brigade!

Down the hill, down the hill, thousands of Russians,

Thousands of horsemen, drew to the

valley-and stay'd;

For Scarlett and Scarlett's three hundred were riding by

When the points of the Russian lances arose in the sky;

And he call'd Left wheel into line!' and they wheel'd and obey'd. Then he look'd at the host that had halted he knew not why,

And he turn'd half round, and he bad his trumpeter sound

To the charge, and he rode on ahead, as he waved his blade

To the gallant three hundred whose glory will never die—

'Follow,' and up the hill, up the hill, up the hill,

Follow'd the Heavy Brigade.

II.

The trumpet, the gallop, the charge, and the might of the fight!

IV.

'Lost one and all' were the words Mutter'd in our dismay;

But they rode like Victors and Lords
Thro' the forest of lances and swords
In the heart of the Russian hordes,
They rode, or they stood at bay-
Struck with the sword-hand and slew,
Down with the bridle-hand drew
The foe from the saddle and threw
Underfoot there in the fray-
Ranged like a storm or stood like a rock
In the wave of a stormy day;
Till suddenly shock upon shock
Stagger'd the mass from without,
Drove it in wild disarray,

For our men gallopt up with a cheer and a shout,

And the foeman surged, and waver'd, and reel'd

Up the hill, up the hill, up the hill, out of the field,

And over the brow and away.

III.

Fell like a cannonshot,
Burst like a thunderbolt,
Crash'd like a hurricane,

Broke thro' the mass from below,
Drove thro' the midst of the foe,
Plunged up and down, to and fro,
Rode flashing blow upon blow,
Brave Inniskillens and Greys
Whirling their sabres in circles of light!
And some of us, all in amaze,

Who were held for a while from the fight,

And were only standing at gaze,
When the dark-muffled Russian crowd
Folded its wings from the left and the

right,

And roll'd them around like a cloud,— O mad for the charge and the battle were we,

When our own good redcoats sank from sight,

Like drops of blood in a dark-gray

sea,

And we turn'd to each other, whispering, all dismay'd,

'Lost are the gallant three hundred of Scarlett's Brigade !'

Glory to each and to all, and the charge that they made!

Glory to all the three hundred, and all the Brigade!

NOTE.-The 'three hundred' of the 'Heavy Brigade' who made this famous charge were the Scots Greys and the 2nd squadron of Inniskillings; the remainder of the 'Heavy Brigade' subsequently dashing up to their support.

The 'three' were Scarlett's aide-de-camp, Elliot, and the trumpeter and Shegog the orderly, who had been close behind him.

IRENE.

You praise when you should blame The barbarism of wars.

A juster epoch has begun.

POET.

Yet tho' this cheek be gray,
And that bright hair the modern sun,

Those eyes the blue to-day,
You wrong me, passionate little friend.
I would that wars should cease,
I would the globe from end to end

Might sow and reap in peace,
And some new Spirit o'erbear the old,
Or Trade re-frain the Powers
From war with kindly links of gold,

Or Love with wreaths of flowers.
Slav, Teuton, Kelt, I count them all
My friends and brother souls,
With all the peoples, great and small,
That wheel between the poles.
But since, our mortal shadow, Ill
To waste this earth began-
Perchance from some abuse of Will
In worlds before the man
Involving ours-he needs must fight
To make true peace his own,
He needs must combat might with might,
Or Might would rule alone;

And who loves War for War's own sake

Is fool, or crazed, or worse;
But let the patriot-soldier take
His meed of fame in verse;
Nay tho' that realm were in the wrong
For which her warriors bleed,

It still were right to crown with song
The warrior's noble deed-
A crown the Singer hopes may last,
For so the deed endures;
But Song will vanish in the Vast;

And that large phrase of yours
'A Star among the stars,' my dear,
Is girlish talk at best;

For dare we dally with the sphere
As he did half in jest,

Old Horace? I will strike' said he The stars with head sublime,'

But scarce could see, as now we see, The man in Space and Time,

Let it live then-ay, till when? Earth passes, all is lost

In what they prophesy, our wise men, Sun-flame or sunless frost,

And deed and song alike are swept

Away, and all in vain

As far as man can see, except

The man himself remain ;
And tho', in this lean age forlorn,

Too many a voice may cry
That man can have no after-morn,
Not yet of these am I.
The man remains, and whatsoe'er

He wrought of good or brave Will mould him thro' the cycle-year That dawns behind the grave.

And here the Singer for his Art
Not all in vain may plead
'The song that nerves a nation's heart,
Is in itself a deed.'

TO VIRGIL.

WRITTEN AT THE REQUEST OF THE MANTUANS FOR THE NINETEENTH CENTENARY OF VIRGIL'S DEATH.

ROMAN VIRGIL, thou that singest

Ilion's lofty temples robed in fire,

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