66

Not less, tho' dogs of Faction bay,

Would serve his kind in deed and word, Certain, if knowledge bring the sword, That knowledge takes the sword away—

Would love the gleams of good that broke From either side, nor veil his eyes: And if some dreadful need should rise Would strike, and firmly, and one stroke :

To-morrow yet would reap to-day,

As we bear blossom of the dead; Earn well the thrifty months, nor wed Raw Haste, half-sister to Delay.

ENGLAND AND AMERICA

IN 1782.

O THOU, that sendest out the man
To rule by land and sea,
Strong mother of a Lion-line,
Be proud of those strong sons of thine
Who wrench'd their rights from thee!

What wonder, if in noble heat

Those men thine arms withstood, Retaught the lesson thou hadst taught, And in thy spirit with thee fought

Who sprang from English blood!

But Thou rejoice with liberal joy,
Lift up thy rocky face,

And shatter, when the storms are black,
In many a streaming torrent back,

The seas that shock thy base!

Whatever harmonies of law

The growing world assume,

Thy work is thine-The single note From that deep chord which Hampden

smote

Will vibrate to the doom.

THE GOOSE.

I KNEW an old wife lean and poor, Her rags scarce held together; There strode a stranger to the door, And it was windy weather.

And round the attics rumbled,

Till all the tables danced again, And half the chimneys tumbled.

The glass blew in, the fire blew out, The blast was hard and harder.

And a whirlwind clear'd the larder:

And while on all sides breaking loose Her household fled the danger, Quoth she, 'The Devil take the goose, And God forget the stranger!'

THE EPIC.

AT Francis Allen's on the Christmaseve,

The game of forfeits done-the girls all

kiss'd

Beneath the sacred bush and past awayThe parson Holmes, the poet Everard Hall,

The host, and I sat round the wassail

bowl,

Then half-way ebb'd: and there we held a talk,

How all the old honour had from Christmas

gone,

Or gone, or dwindled down to some odd games

In some odd nooks like this; till I, tired

out

With cutting eights that day upon the pond,

Where, three times slipping from the

outer edge,

I bump'd the ice into three several stars, Fell in a doze; and half-awake I heard The parson taking wide and wider

sweeps,

And none abroad: there was no anchor, none,

To hold by.' Francis, laughing, clapt his hand

On Everard's shoulder, with 'I hold by him.'

'And I,' quoth Everard, by the wassailbowl.'

'Why yes,' I said, 'we knew your gift that way

At college but another which you had, I mean of verse (for so we held it then), What came of that?' 'You know,' said Frank, he burnt

His epic, his King Arthur, some twelve books'

And then to me demanding why? Oh, sir,

He thought that nothing new was said, or else

Something so said 'twas nothing-that a truth

Looks freshest in the fashion of the day : God knows he has a mint of reasons: ask. It pleased me well enough.' 'Nay, nay,'

:

said Hall,

'Why take the style of those heroic times?

And sparkled keen with frost against the hilt:

For all the haft twinkled with diamond

sparks,

Myriads of topaz-lights, and jacinth-work Of subtlest jewellery. He gazed so long That both his eyes were dazzled, as he stood,

This way and that dividing the swift mind,

In act to throw but at the last it seem'd Better to leave Excalibur conceal'd There in the many-knotted waterflags, That whistled stiff and dry about the marge.

So strode he back slow to the wounded King.

Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedi

vere:

Should thus be lost for ever from the earth, Which might have pleased the eyes of

many men.

What good should follow this, if this were done?

What harm, undone? deep harm to disobey,

Seeing obedience is the bond of rule. Were it well to obey then, if a king demand An act unprofitable, against himself? The King is sick, and knows not what he does.

What record, or what relic of my lord Should be to aftertime, but empty breath And rumours of a doubt? but were this kept,

Stored in some treasure-house of mighty kings,

Some one might show it at a joust of arms,

I gave?

What is it thou hast seen? or what hast

heard?'

And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere: 'I heard the ripple washing in the reeds, And the wild water lapping on the crag.' To whom replied King Arthur, faint and pale :

'Thou hast betray'd thy nature and thy

name,

Not rendering true answer, as beseem'd
Thy fealty, nor like a noble knight :
For surer sign had follow'd, either hand,
Or voice, or else a motion of the mere.
This is a shameful thing for men to lie.
Yet now, I charge thee, quickly go again
As thou art lief and dear, and do the thing
I bad thee, watch, and lightly bring me
word.'

Then went Sir Bedivere the second time Across the ridge, and paced beside the| mere,

Counting the dewy pebbles, fix'd in thought;

But when he saw the wonder of the hilt, How curiously and strangely chased, he

smote

His palms together, and he cried aloud,

'And if indeed I cast the brand away, Surely a precious thing, one worthy note,

Wrought by the lonely maiden of the Lake. Nine years she wrought it, sitting in the deeps

Upon the hidden bases of the hills." So might some old man speak in the aftertime

To all the people, winning reverence. But now much honour and much fame were lost.'

So spake he, clouded with his own
conceit,

And hid Excalibur the second time,
And so strode back slow to the wounded
King.

Then spoke King Arthur, breathing
heavily:

What is it thou hast seen? or what hast heard?'

And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere: I heard the water lapping on the crag, And the long ripple washing in the reeds.' To whom replied King Arthur, much in wrath :

'Ah, miserable and unkind, untrue, Unknightly, traitor-hearted! Woe is me! Authority forgets a dying king,

Laid widow'd of the power in his eye That bow'd the will. I see thee what

thou art,

For thou, the latest-left of all my knights,

In whom should meet the offices of all, Thou wouldst betray me for the precious hilt;

Either from lust of gold, or like a girl Valuing the giddy pleasure of the eyes. Yet, for a man may fail in duty twice, And the third time may prosper, get thee hence:

But, if thou spare to fling Excalibur,

But when I look'd again, behold an arm, Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful,

That caught him by the hilt, and brandish'd him

Three times, and drew him under in the mere.'

And answer made King Arthur, breathing hard:

ran,

And, leaping down the ridges lightly,

plunged

were gone.

Make broad thy shoulders to receive my

weight,

And bear me to the margin; yet I fear

sword,

And strongly wheel'd and threw it. The

great brand

die.'

So saying, from the pavement he half rose,

moon,

And flashing round and round, and whirl'd

in an arch,

Shot like a streamer of the northern morn, Seen where the moving isles of winter shock

By night, with noises of the northern sea. So flash'd and fell the brand Excalibur : But ere he dipt the surface, rose an arm Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful,

And caught him by the hilt, and brandish'd him

Three times, and drew him under in the

mere.

And lightly went the other to the King.

And looking wistfully with wide blue eyes As in a picture. Him Sir Bedivere Remorsefully regarded thro' his tears, And would have spoken, but he found not words,

Then took with care, and kneeling on one knee,

O'er both his shoulders drew the languid hands,

And rising bore him thro' the place of tombs.

But, as he walk'd, King Arthur panted

hard,