Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss,

Though winning near the goal-yet, do not grieve;

She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss,
For ever wilt thou love, and she be fair!

Ah, happy, happy boughs! that cannot shed
Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring adieu;
And, happy melodist, unwearièd,

For ever piping songs for ever new;
More happy love! more happy, happy love!
For ever warm and still to be enjoyed,
For ever panting and for ever young;

All breathing human passion far above,

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That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloyed,
A burning forehead, and a parching tongue.

30

Who are these coming to the sacrifice?

To what green altar, O mysterious priest, Lead'st thou that heifer lowing at the skies,

And all her silken flanks with garlands drest?

What little town by river or sea-shore,

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Or mountain-built with peaceful citadel,

Is emptied of its folk, this pious morn? And, little town, thy streets for evermore Will silent be; and not a soul to tell

Why thou art desolate, can e'er return.

O Attic shape! Fair attitude! with brede

Of marble men and maidens overwrought, With forest branches and the trodden weed;

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Thou, silent form! dost tease us out of thought

As doth eternity: Cold Pastoral!

45

When old age shall this generation waste,

Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say'st, 'Beauty is truth, truth beauty,'-that is all

Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.

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John Keats.

CCXXVIII

STANZAS WRITTEN IN DEJECTION NEAR
NAPLES.

The sun is warm, the sky is clear,
The waves are dancing fast and bright,
Blue isles and snowy mountains wear
The purple noon's transparent light:
The breath of the moist air is light
Around its unexpanded buds;

Like many a voice of one delight,

The winds, the birds, the ocean-floods,

The City's voice itself is soft like solitude's.

I see the Deep's untrampled floor

With green and purple sea-weeds strown;
I see the waves upon the shore,

Like light dissolved in star-showers, thrown:
I sit upon the sands alone;

The lightning of the noon-tide ocean

Is flashing round me, and a tone

Arises from its measured motion

How sweet, did any heart now share in my emotion!

Alas! I have nor hope nor health,

Nor peace within nor calm around,

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ΙΟ

15

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Nor that content surpassing wealth

The sage in meditation found,

And walked with inward glory crowned

Nor fame, nor power, nor love, nor leisure;
Others I see whom these surround;

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Smiling they live, and call life pleasure;

To me that cup has been dealt in another measure.

Yet now despair itself is mild,

Even as the winds and waters are;

I could lie down like a tired child,

And weep away the life of care

Which I have borne, and yet must bear,

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Till death like sleep might steal on me,
And I might feel in the warm air

My cheek grow cold, and hear the sea
Breathe o'er my dying brain its last monotony.
Some might lament that I were cold,
As I, when this sweet day is gone,

Which my lost heart, too soon grown old,
Insults with this untimely moan;

They might lament-for I am one

Whom men love not, and yet regret ;

Unlike this day, which, when the sun

Shall on its stainless glory set,

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Will linger, though enjoyed, like joy in memory yet. 45

Percy Bysshe Shelley.

CCXXIX

DESPONDENCY REBUKED.

Say not, the struggle nought availeth,
The labour and the wounds are vain,
The enemy faints not, nor faileth,
And as things have been they remain.

If hopes were dupes, fears may be liars;
It may be, in yon smoke concealed,
Your comrades chase e'en now the fliers,
And, but for you, possess the field.

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For while the tired waves, vainly breaking,
Seem here no painful inch to gain,

ΙΟ

Far back, through creeks and inlets making,
Comes silent, flooding in, the main.

And not by eastern windows only,
When daylight comes, comes in the light;
In front, the sun climbs slow, how slowly,
But westward, look, the land is bright.

Arthur Hugh Clough.

15

CCXXX

THE LIGHT OF OTHER DAYS.

Oft in the stilly night

Ere slumber's chain has bound me, Fond Memory brings the light

Of other days around me :

The smiles, the tears

Of boyhood's years,

The words of love then spoken;

The eyes that shone,

Now dimmed and gone,

The cheerful hearts now broken!

Thus in the stilly light

Ere slumber's chain has bound me,

Sad Memory brings the light

Of other days around me.

When I remember all

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The friends so linked together

I've seen around me fall

Like leaves in wintry weather,

I feel like one

Who treads alone

Some banquet-hall deserted,

Whose lights are fled, Whose garlands dead, And all but he departed!

Thus in the stilly night

Ere slumber's chain has bound me,

Sad Memory brings the light

Of other days around me.

Thomas Moore.

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CCXXXI

DIRGE.

If thou wilt ease thine heart

Of love, and all its smart-
Then sleep, dear, sleep!
And not a sorrow

Hang any tear on your eyelashes;
Lie still and deep,

Sad soul, until the sea-wave washes

The rim o' the sun to-morrow

In Eastern sky.

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But wilt thou cure thine heart

IO

Of love, and all its smart

Then die, dear, die!

'Tis deeper, sweeter,

Than on a rose-bank to lie dreaming

With folded eye;

And then alone, amid the beaming

Of love's stars, thou'lt meet her

In Eastern sky.

CCXXXII

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Thomas Lovell Beddoes.

LINES WRITTEN IN MY OWN ALBUM.

Fresh clad from heaven in robes of white,
A young probationer of light,

Thou wert, my soul, an album bright,

A spotless leaf; but thought, and care,
And friend and foe, in foul and fair,
Have 'written strange defeatures' there;
And Time with heaviest hand of all,
Like that fierce writing on the wall,
Hath stamped sad dates-he can't recall.

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