I, to herd with narrow foreheads, vacant of our glorious gains, Like a beast with lower pleasures, like a beast with lower pains!

Mated with a squalid savage--what to me were sun or clime?
I the heir of all the ages, in the foremost files of time—

I that rather held it better men should perish one by one,
Than that earth should stand at gaze like Joshua's moon in
Ajalon!

Not in vain the distance beacons.

range,

Forward, forward, let us

Let the great world spin for ever down the ringing grooves of change.

Thro' the shadow of the globe we sweep into the younger day: Better fifty years of Europe than a cycle of Cathay.

Mother-Age (for mine I knew not) help me as when life begun : Rift the hills, and roll the waters, flash the lightnings, weigh the Sun.

O, I see the crescent promise of my spirit hath not set.
Ancient founts of inspiration well thro' all my fancy yet.

Howsoever these things be, a long farewell to Locksley Hall!
Now for me the woods may wither, now for me the roof-tree

fall.

Comes a vapour from the margin, blackening over heath and holt,

Cramming all the blast before it, in its breast a thunderbolt.

Let it fall on Locksley Hall, with rain or hail, or fire or snow; For the mighty wind arises, roaring seaward, and I go.

ST. AGNES' EVE.

DEEP on the convent roof the snows
Are sparkling to the moon:
My breath to heaven like vapour goes
May my soul follow soon!

The shadows of the convent towers
Slant down the snowy sward,
Still creeping with the creeping hours
That lead me to my Lord:

Make Thou my spirit pure and clear
As are the frosty skies,

Or this first snowdrop of the year
That in my bosom lies.

As these white robes are soil'd and dark,
To yonder shining ground;

As this pale taper's earthly spark,

To yonder argent round;

So shows my soul before the Lamb,
My spirit before Thee;

So in mine earthly house I am,

To that I hope to be.

Break up the heavens, O Lord! and far,
Thro' all yon starlight keen,

Draw me, thy bride, a glittering star,
In raiment white and clean.

He lifts me to the golden doors;
The flashes come and go;
All heaven bursts her starry floors,
And strows her lights below,

And deepens on and up! the gates
Roll back, and far within

For me the Heavenly Bridegroom waits
To make me pure of sin.
The sabbaths of Eternity,

One sabbath deep and wide—

A light upon the shining sea-

The Bridegroom with his bride!

SIR LAUNCELOT AND QUEEN GUINEVERE.

A FRAGMENT.

LIKE souls that balance joy and pain,
With tears and smiles from heaven again
The maiden Spring upon the plain

Came in a sun-lit fall of rain.

In crystal vapour everywhere,
Blue isles of heaven laugh'd between,
And far, in forest deeps unseen,
The topmost elm tree gather'd green
From draughts of balmy air.

Sometimes the linnet piped his song;
Sometimes the throstle whistled strong:
Sometimes the sparhawk, wheel'd along,
Hush'd all the groves from fear of wrong:
By grassy capes with fuller sound
In curves the yellowing river ran,
And drooping chestnut buds began
To spread into the perfect fan,

Above the teeming ground.

Then, in the boyhood of the year,
Sir Launcelot and Queen Guinevere
Rode thro' the coverts of the deer,
With blissful treble ringing clear.

She seem'd a part of joyous Spring:
A gown of grass-green silk she wore,
Buckled with golden clasps before,
A light-green tuft of plumes she bore,
Closed in a golden ring.

Now on some twisted ivy net,
Now by some tinkling rivulet,
In mosses mixt with violet

Her cream-white mule his pastern set:

And fleeter now she skimm'd the plains
Than she whose elfin prancer springs
By night to eery warblings,

When all the glimmering moorland rings
With jingling bridle-reins.

As she fled fast thro' sun and shade,
The happy winds upon her play'd,
Blowing the ringlet from the braid:
She look'd so lovely, as she sway'd

The rein with dainty finger-tips,
A man had given all other bliss.
And all his worldly worth for this,
To waste his whole heart in one kiss
Upon her perfect lips.

THE EAGLE.

FRAGMENT.

HE clasps the crag with crookèd hands;
Close to the sun in lonely lands,

Ring'd with the azure world, he stands.

The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls;
He watches from his mountain walls;
And like a thunderbolt he falls.

"COME NOT WHEN I AM DEAD.”

COME not when I am dead,

To drop thy foolish tears upon my grave, To trample round my fallen head,

And vex the unhappy dust thou wouldst not save. There let the wind sweep and the plover cry ;

But thou, go by.

Child, if it were thine error or thy crime,

I care no longer, being all unblest :

Wed whom thou wilt, but I am sick of Time,
And I desire to rest.

Pass on, weak heart, and leave me where I lie;
Go by, go by.

"MOVE EASTWARD."

MOVE eastward, happy earth, and leave
Yon orange sunset waning slow :

From fringes of the faded eve,

Oh, happy planet, eastward go;

Till over thy dark shoulder glow
Thy silver sister-world, and rise
To glass herself in dewy eyes
That watch me from the glen below.

Ah, bear me with thee, smoothly borne,
Dip forward under starry light,
And move me to my marriage-morn,
And round again to happy night.

"BREAK, BREAK, BREAK."

BREAK, break, break,

On thy cold gray stones, O Sea!
And I would that my tongue could utter
The thoughts that arise in me.

ON THY COLD GRAY STONES, O SEA!"-Page 384.