SIR WALTER VIVIAN all a summer's day Gave his broad lawns until the set of sun Up to the people: thither flocked at noon His tenants, wife and child, and thither half The neighboring borough with their Institute, Of which he was the patron. I was there From college, visiting the son, the son A Walter, too, with others of our set, Five others we were seven at Vivian-place.
And me that morning Walter showed the house, Greek, set with busts: from vases in the hall
Flowers of all heavens, and lovelier than their names, Grew side by side; and on the pavement lay
Carved stones of the Abbey-ruin in the park, Huge Ammonites, and the first bones of Time; And on the tables every clime and age Jumbled together; celts and calumets, Claymore and snowshoe, toys in lava, fans Of sandal, amber, ancient rosaries, Laborious orient ivory sphere in sphere,
The cursed Malayan crease, and battle-clubs From the isles of palm: and higher on the walls, Betwixt the monstrous horns of elk and deer, His own forefathers' arms and armor hung.
And "this," he said, "was Hugh's at Agincourt; And that was old Sir Ralph's at Ascalon : A good knight he! we keep a chronicle
With all about him," — which he brought, and I
Dived in a hoard of tales that dealt with knights Half-legend, half-historic, counts and kings Who laid about them at their wills and died; And mixt with these, a lady, one that armed Her own fair head, and sallying through the gate, Had beat her foes with slaughter from her walls.
And, I all rapt in this, "Come out," he said, "To the Abbey: there is Aunt Elizabeth
And sister Lilia with the rest." We went
(I kept the book and had my finger in it)
Down through the park: strange was the sight to me; For all the sloping pasture murmured, sown
With happy faces and with holiday.
There moved the multitude, a thousand heads : The patient leaders of their Institute
Taught them with facts. One reared a font of stone, And drew, from butts of water on the slope, The fountain of the moment, playing now A twisted snake, and now a rain of pearls, Or steep-up spout whereon the gilded ball Danced like a wisp and somewhat lower down A man with knobs and wires and vials fired A cannon Echo answered in her sleep From hollow fields: and here were telescopes For azure views; and there a group of girls In circle waited, whom the electric shock Dislinked with shrieks and laughter: round the lake A little clock-work steamer paddling plied
And shook the lilies: perched about the knolls
A dozen angry models jetted steam :
A petty railway ran: a fire-balloon Rose gem-like up before the dusky groves
And dropt a fairy parachute and past:
And there through twenty posts of telegraph They flashed a saucy message to and fro Between the mimic stations; so that sport With Science hand in hand went; otherwhere Pure sport a herd of boys with clamor bowled And stumped the wicket; babies rolled about Like tumbled fruit in grass; and men and maids Arranged a country dance, and flew through light And shadow, while the twangling violin Struck up with Soldier-laddie, and overhead The broad ambrosial aisles of lofty lime
Made noise with bees and breeze from end to end.
Strange was the sight and smacking of the time; And long we gazed, but satiated at length Came to the ruins. High-arched and ivy-claspt, Of finest Gothic, lighter than a fire,
Through one wide chasm of time and frost they gave The park, the crowd, the house; but all within
The sward was trim as any garden lawn :
And here we lit on Aunt Elizabeth,
And Lilia with the rest, and lady friends
From neighbor seats: and there was Ralph himself, A broken statue propt against the wall, As gay as any. Lilia, wild with sport,
Half child, half woman as she was, had wound
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