God only thro' his bounty hath thought fit,
Among the powers and princes of this world,
To make me an example to mankind,
Which few can reach to. Yet I do not say
But that a time may come yea, even now,
Now, now, his footsteps smite the threshold
stairs

Of life

-I say, that time is at the doors When you may worship me without reproach; For I will leave my relics in your land, And you may carve a shrine about my dust, And burn a fragrant lamp before my bones, When I am gather'd to the glorious saints. While I spake then, a sting of shrewdest pain Ran shrivelling thro' me, and a cloud-like change,

In passing, with a grosser film made thick These heavy, horny eyes. The end! the end! Surely the end! What's here? a shape, a shade,

A flash of light. Is that the angel there That holds a crown? Come, blessed brother,

come.

I know thy glittering face. I waited long; My brows are ready. What! deny it now? Nay, draw, draw, draw nigh. So I clutch it. 'Christ!

'Tis gone 't is, here again: the crown! the crown!

So now 't is fitted on and grows to me,
And from it melt the dews of Paradise,
Sweet! sweet! spikenard, and balm, and
frankincense.

Ah! let me not be fool'd, sweet saints: I trust
That I am whole, and clean, and meet for
Heaven.

Speak, if there be a priest, a man of God, Among you there, and let him presently Approach, and lean a ladder on the shaft, And climbing up into my airy home, Deliver me the blessed sacrament; For by the warning of the Holy Ghost, I prophesy that I shall die to-night, A quarter before twelve.

But thou, O Lord, Aid all this foolish people; let them take Example, pattern: lead them to thy light.

THE TALKING OAK.

ONCE more the gate behind me falls;
Once more before my face
I see the moulder'd Abbey-walls,
That stand within the chace.

Beyond the lodge the city lies,
Beneath its drift of smoke;
And ah! with what delighted eyes
I turn to yonder oak.

For when my passion first began,
Ere that, which in me burn'd,

The love, that makes me thrice a man,
Could hope itself return'd;

To yonder oak within the field I spoke without restraint,

j2

"I swear (and else may insects prick

Each leaf into a gall)

This girl, for whom your heart is sick, Is three times worth them all;

"For those and theirs, by Nature's law,
Have faded long ago;

But in these latter springs I saw
Your own Olivia blow,

"From when she gamboll'd on the greens, A baby-germ, to when

The maiden blossoms of her teens
Could number five from ten.

"I swear, by leaf, and wind, and rain,
(And hear me with thine ears,)
That, tho' I circle in the grain
Five hundred rings of
years

"Yet, since I first could cast a shade,
Did never creature pass
So slightly, musically made,
So light upon the grass:

"For as to fairies, that will flit
To make the greensward fresh,
I hold them exquisitely knit,
But far too spare of flesh."

O, hide thy knotted knees in fern,
And overlook the chace;

And from thy topmost branch discern
The roofs of Sumner-place.

But thou, whereon I carved her name, That oft hast heard my vows, Declare when last Olivia came

To sport beneath thy boughs.

"O yesterday, you know, the fair
Was holden at the town:
Her father left his good arm-chair,
And rode his hunter down.

"And with him Albert came on his, I look'd at him with joy:

As cowslip unto oxlip is,

So seems she to the boy.

"An hour had past—and, sitting straight,
Within the low-wheel'd chaise,
Her mother trundled to the gate
Behind the dappled grays.

"But, as for her, she stay'd at home, And on the roof she went,

And down the way you use to come She look'd with discontent.

"She left the novel half-uncut Upon the rosewood shelf; She left the new piano shut: She could not please herself.

"Then ran she, gamesome as the colt, And livelier than a lark

She sent her voice thro' all the holt
Before her, and the park.

"A light wind chased her on the wing,
And in the chase grew wild,
As close as might be would he cling
About the darling child:

"But light as any wind that blows
So fleetly did she stir,

The flower, she touch'd on, dipt and rose, And turn'd to look at her.

"And here she came, and round me play'd And sang to me the whole

Of those three stanzas that made you About my 'giant bole';

"And in a fit of frolic mirth

She strove to span my waist: Alas, I was so broad of girth, I could not be embraced.

"I wish'd myself the fair young beech
That here beside me stands,
That round me, clasping each in each,
She might have lock'd her hands.

"Yet seem'd the pressure thrice as sweet As woodbine's fragile hold,

Or when I feel about my feet
The berried briony fold."

O muffle round thy knees with fern,
And shadow Sumner-chace !
Long may thy topmost branch discern
The roofs of Sumner-place!

But tell me, did she read the name
I carved with many vows
When last with throbbing heart I came
To rest beneath thy boughs?

"O yes, she wander'd round and round
These knotted knees of mine,
And found, and kiss'd the name she found
And sweetly murmur'd thine.

"A teardrop trembled from its source, And down my surface crept.

My sense of touch is something coarse, But I believe she wept.

"Then flush'd her cheek with rosy light,
She glanced across the plain;
But not a creature was in sight:
She kiss'd me once again.

"Her kisses were so close and kind, That, trust me on my word,

Hard wood I am, and wrinkled rind, But yet my sap was stirr'd:

"And even into my inmost ring

A pleasure I discern'd,

Like those blind motions of the Spring, That show the year is turn'd.

My little oakling from the cup, And flung him in the dew.

"And yet it was a graceful giftI felt a pang within

As when I see the woodman lift His axe to slay my kin.

"I shook him down because he was The finest on the tree.

He lies beside thee on the grass.
O kiss him once for me.

"O kiss him twice and thrice for mc,
That have no lips to kiss,
For never yet was oak on lea
Shall grow so fair as this.'

Step deeper yet in herb and fern,
Look further thro' the chace,
Spread upward till thy boughs discern
The front of Sumner-place.

This fruit of thine by Love is blest,
That but a moment lay
Where fairer fruit of Love may rest
Some happy future day.

I kiss it twice, I kiss it thrice,
The warmth it thence shall win
To riper life may magnetize
The baby-oak within.

But thou, while kingdoms overset, Or lapse from hand to hand, Thy leaf shall never fail, nor yet Thine acorn in the land.

May never saw dismember thee,
Nor wielded axe disjoint,
That art the fairest-spoken tree
From here to Lizard-point.

O rock upon thy towery top
All throats that gurgle sweet!
All starry culmination drop

Balm-dews to bathe thy feet!

All grass of silky feather grow-
And while he sinks or swells
The full south-breeze around thee blow
The sound of minster bells.

The fat earth feed thy branchy root,
That under deeply strikes!

The northern morning o'er thee shoot,
High up, in silver spikes!

Nor ever lightning char thy grain,
But, rolling as in sleep,
Low thunders bring the mellow rain,
That makes thee broad and deep!

And hear me swear a solemn oath,
That only by thy side

Will I to Olive plight my troth,
And gain her for my bride.

Or all the same as if he had not been?
Not so.
Shall Error in the round of time
Still father Truth? O shall the braggart
shout

For some blind glimpse of freedom work itself

Thro' madness, hated by the wise, to law System and empire? Sin itself be found The cloudy porch oft opening on the Sun? And only he, this wonder, dead, become Mere highway dust! or year by year alone Sit brooding in the ruins of a life, Nightmare of youth, the spectre of himself?

If this were thus, if this, indeed, were all, Better the narrow brain, the stony heart, The staring eye glazed o'er with sapless days, The long mechanic pacings to and fro, The set gray life, and apathetic end. But am I not the nobler thro' thy love? O three times less unworthy! likewise thou Art more thro' Love, and greater than thy years.

The Sun will run his orbit, and the Moon Her circle. Wait, and Love himself will bring

The drooping flower of knowledge changed

To feel it! For how hard it seem'd to me, When eyes, love-languid thro' half-tears, would dwell

One earnest, earnest moment upon mine, Then not to dare to see! when thy low voice, Faltering, would break its syllables, to keep My own full-tuned, - hold passion in a leash, And not leap forth and fall about thy neck, And on thy bosom, (deep-desired relief!) Rain out the heavy mist of tears, that weigh'd Upon my brain, my senses, and my soul !

For Love himself took part against himself

To warn us off, and Duty loved of Love O this world's curse, beloved but hated

came

Like Death betwixt thy dear embrace and mine,

And crying, "Who is this? behold thy bride,"

She push'd me from thee.

If the sense is hard To alien ears, I did not speak to theseNo, not to thee, but to myself in thee: Hard is my doom and thine: thou knowest it all.

Could Love part thus? was it not well to speak,

To have spoken once? It could not but be well.

The slow sweet hours that bring us all things good,

The slow sad hours that bring us all things ill, And all good things from evil, brought the night

In which we sat together and alone,
And to the want, that hollow'd all the heart,
Gave utterance by the yearning of an eye,
That burn'd upon its object thro' such tears
As flow but once a life.

The trance gave way
To those caresses, when a hundred times
In that last kiss, which never was the last,
Farewell, like endless welcome, lived and
died.

Then follow'd counsel, comfort, and the words That make a man feel strong in speaking truth;

Till now the dark was worn, and overhead
The lights of sunset and of sunrise mix'd
In that brief night; the summer night, that
paused

Among her stars to hear us; stars that hung
Love-charm'd to listen: all the wheels a
Time

Spun round in station, but the end had come. O then like those, who clench their nerves to rush

Upon their dissolution, we two rose,
There closing like an individual life-
In one blind cry of passion and of pain,
Like bitter accusation ev'n to death,
Caught up the whole of love and utter'd it,
And bade adieu forever.

Live- yet live —
Shall sharpest pathos blight us, knowing all
Life needs for life is possible to will
Live happy; tend thy flowers; be tended by

My blessing! Should my Shadow cross thy thoughts

Too sadly for their peace, remand it thou
For calmer hours to Memory's darkest hold,
If not to be forgotten-not at once-
Not all forgotten. Should it cross thy
dreams,

O might it come like one that looks content,
With quiet eyes unfaithful to the truth,
And point thee forward to a distant light,
Or seem to lift a burthen from thy heart
And leave thee freër, till thou wake refresh'd,
Then when the low matin-chirp hath grown
Full choir, and morning driv'n her plough of
pearl

Far furrowing into light the mounded rack,
Beyond the fair green field and eastern sea.

THE GOLDEN YEAR.

WELL, you shall have that song which Leonard wrote:

It was last summer on a tour in Wales:
Old James was with me: we that day had

been

Up Snowdon; and I wish'd for Leonard there,

And found him in Llamberis: then we crost
Between the lakes, and clamber'd half way up
The counter side; and that same song of his
He told me; for I banter'd him, and swore
They said he lived shut up within himself,
A tongue-tied Poet in the feverous days,
That, setting the how much before the how,
Cry, like the daughters of the horse-leech,
"Give,

Cram us with all," but count not me the herd! To which "They call me what they will," he said:

"But I was born too late the fair new forms, That float about the threshold of an age, Like truths of Science waiting to be caughtCatch me who can, and make the catcher crown'd

Are taken by the forelock. Let it be.
But if you care indeed to listen, hear
These measured words, my work of yester-

'Shall eagles not be eagles? wrens be

wrens?

If all the world were falcons, what of that?
The wonder of the eagle were the less,
But he not less the eagle. Happy days
Roll onward, leading up the golden year.
"Fly happy happy sails and bear the
Press;

Fly happy with the mission of the Cross;
Knit land to land, and blowing havenward
With silks, and fruits, and spices, clear of
toll,

Enrich the markets of the golden year.

"But we grow old. Ah! when shall all men's good

Be each man's rule, and universal Peace
Lie like a shaft of light across the land,
And like a lane of beams athwart the sea,
Thro' all the circle of the golden year?"

Thus far he flowed, and ended; whereupon "Ah, folly!" in mimic cadence answer'd James

Ah, folly! for it lies so far away,

Not in our time, nor in our children's time, "T is like the second world to us that live; 'T were all as one to fix our hopes on Heaven As on this vision of the golden year." With that he struck his staff against the rocks

And broke it, - James, old, but full

-you know him,

Of force and choler, and firm upon his feet, And like an oaken stock in winter woods, O'erflourish'd with the hoary clematis : Then added, all in heat:

"What stuff is this! Old writers push'd the happy season back,The more fools they, -we forward: dreamers both :

You most, that in an age, when every hour Must sweat her sixty minutes to the death, Live on, God love us, as if the seedsman, rapt

Upon the teeming harvest, should not dip His hand into the bag: but well I know That unto him who works, and feels he

I cannot rest from travel: I will drink
Life to the lees: all times I have enjoy'd
Greatly, have suffer'd greatly, both with
those