XVIII

But he cheer'd me, my good man, for he seldom said me

nay:

Kind, like a man, was he; like a man, too, would have his way:

Never jealous-not he: we had many a happy year;

And he died, and I could not weep-my own time seem'd

so near.

XIX

But I wish'd it had been God's will that I, too, then could
have died:

I began to be tired a little, and fain had slept at his side.
And that was ten years back, or more, if I don't forget:
But as to the children, Annie, they're all about me yet.

XX

Pattering over the boards, my Annie who left me at two,
Patter she goes, my own little Annie, an Annie like to you :
Pattering over the boards, she comes and goes at her will,
While Harry is in the five-acre and Charlie ploughing the
hill.

XXI

And Harry and Charlie, I hear them too-they sing to
their team:

Often they come to the door in a pleasant kind of a dream.
They come and sit by my chair, they hover about my bed-
I am not always certain if they be alive or dead.

XXII

And yet I know for a truth, there's none of them left alive;
For Harry went at sixty, your father at sixty-five :
And Willy, my eldest born, at nigh threescore and ten ;
I knew them all as babies, and now they're elderly men.

XXIII

For mine is a time of peace, it is not often I grieve;

I am oftener sitting at home in my father's farm at eve:
And the neighbours come and laugh and gossip, and so

do I ;

I find myself often laughing at things that have long gone

by.

XXIV

To be sure the preacher says, our sins should make us sad: But mine is a time of peace, and there is Grace to be had; And God, not man, is the Judge of us all when life shall

cease;

And in this Book, little Annie, the message is one of Peace.

XXV

And age is a time of peace, so it be free from pain,

And happy has been my life; but I would not live it again.
I seem to be tired a little, that's all, and long for rest;
Only at your age, Annie, I could have wept with the best.

XXVI

So Willy has gone, my beauty, my eldest-born, my flower; But how can I weep for Willy, he has but gone for an

hour,

Gone for a minute, my son, from this room into the next;
I, too, shall go in a minute. What time have I to be vext?

XXVII

And Willy's wife has written, she never was overwise.
Get me my glasses, Annie: thank God that I keep my

eyes.

There is but a trifle left you, when I shall have past away. But stay with the old woman now: you cannot have long to stay.

(Once a Week, July 16, 1859)

CXLVIII

THE SAILOR BOY

He rose at dawn and flushed with hope
Shot o'er the seething harbour-bar,
And reached the ship and caught the rope,
And whistled to the morning star.

And while on deck he whistled loud
He heard a fierce mermaiden cry,
"Boy, though thou art young and proud,
I see the place where thou wilt lie.

"The sands and yeasty surges mix
In caves about the dreary bay;
And on thy ribs the limpet sticks,

And in thy heart the scrawl shall play."
"Fool!" he answer'd, “Death is sure

To those that stay and those that roam :
But I will never more endure

To sit with empty hands at home.

"My mother clings about my neck,

My sisters clamour, 'Stay, for shame!'

My father raves of death and wreck,

Fa

They are all to blame, they are all to blame.

"God help me! save I take my part

Of danger on the roaring sea,

A Devil rises in my heart,

Far worse than any death to me."

UPLIFT a thousand voices full and sweet,

In this wide hall with Earth's inventions stored,
And praise th' invisible, universal Lord,
Who lets once more in peace the nations meet
Where Science, Art and Labour have outpour'd
Their myriad horns of plenty at our feet.

O silent Father of our Kings to be,
Mourn'd in this golden hour of Jubilee,

For this, for all we weep our thanks to thee!

The world-compelling plan was thine,
And lo! the long laborious miles

Of Palace, lo! the giant Aisles

Rich in model and design,

Harvest-tool and husbandry,
Loom and wheel and Enginery,
Secrets of the sullen mine,

Steel and gold, and corn and wine,

Fabric rough, or fairy-fine,

Sunny tokens of the Line,

Polar marvels, and a feast

Of wonder out of West and East,

And shapes and hues of Art divine!
All of beauty, all of use,

That one fair planet can produce;
Brought from under ev'ry star,
Blown from over ev'ry main,

And mixt, as Life is mixt with pain,
The works of peace with works of war!

And is the Goal so far away?
Far? How far no man can say,
Let us have our dream to-day.

O ye the wise who think, the wise who reign,
From growing Commerce loose her latest chain,
And let the fair white-wing'd peacemaker fly
To happy havens under all the sky,

And mix the seasons and the golden hours,
Till each man find his own in all men's good,
And all men work in noble brotherhood—
Breaking their mailed fleets and armed towers,
And ruling by obeying nature's powers,

And gathering all the fruits of peace, and crown'd with all her flowers.

CL

A WELCOME

SEA-KINGS' daughter from over the sea,

Alexandra !

Saxon and Norman and Dane are we,
But all of us Danes in our welcome of thee,

Alexandra!

Welcome her, thunders of fort and of fleet !
Welcome her, thundering cheer of the street!
Welcome her, all things youthful and sweet,
Scatter the blossom under her feet!

Break, happy land, into earlier flowers!

Make music, O bird, in the new-budded bowers!
Welcome her, welcome her, all that is ours!

Warble, O bugle, and trumpet, blare !

Flags, flutter out upon turrets and towers!
Flames, on the windy headland flare !

Utter your jubilee, steeple and spire!
Clash, ye bells, in the merry March air!
Flash, ye cities, in rivers of fire!

Welcome her, welcome the land's desire,

Sea-kings' daughter as happy as fair,
Blissful bride of a blissful heir,

Alexandra!

Bride of the heir of the kings of the sea,
O joy to the people and joy to the throne,
Come to us, love us and make us your own :
For Saxon or Dane or Norman we,
Teuton or Celt, or whatever we be,

We are each all Dane in our welcome of thee,

(1863)

Alexandra!

ATTEMPTS AT CLASSIC METRES IN QUANTITY.

CLI

TRANSLATIONS OF HOMER

Hexameters and Pentameters.

THESE lame hexameters the strong-wing'd music of Homer!
No-but a most burlesque barbarous experiment.

When was a harsher sound ever heard, ye Muses, in
England?

When did a frog coarser croak upon our Helicon ?
Hexameters no worse than daring Germany gave us,
Barbarous experiment, barbarous hexameters !

CLII
MILTON

Alcaics.

O MIGHTY-MOUTH'D inventor of harmonies,
O skill'd to sing of Time or Eternity,
God-gifted organ-voice of England,
Milton, a name to resound for ages;
Whose Titan angels, Gabriel, Abdiel,
Starr'd from Jehovah's gorgeous armouries,
Tower, as the deep-domed empyrean

Rings to the roar of an angel onset