Is he gone? was he with us ?-ho ye

I heard men saying, Leave tears and

praying, The sharp knife heedeth not the sheep; Are we not stronger than the rich and

the wronger, When day breaks over dreams and sleep? Come, shoulder to shoulder, ere the

world grows older ! Help lies in nought but thee and me : Hope is before us, the long years that

bore us Bore leaders more than men may be.

And the tale shall be told of a country,

a land in the midst of the sea, And folk shall call it England in the

days that are going to be.

Let dead hearts tarry and trade and

marry, And trembling nurse their dreams of

mirth. While we the living our lives are giving To bring the bright new world to birth.

Come, shoulder to shoulder, ere earth

grows older ! The cause spreads over land and sea ; Now the world shaketlı, and fear

awaketh, And joy at last for thee and me.

1884,

There more than one in a thousand in

the days that are yet to come, Shall have some hope of the morrow,

some joy of the ancient home. For then, laugh not, but listen to this

strange tale of mine, All folk that are in England shall be

better lodged than swine. Then a man shall work and bethink him,

and rejoice in the deeds of his

hand, Nor yet come home in the even too faint

and weary to stand. Men in that time a-coming shall work

and have no fear For to-morrow's lack of earning and the

hunger-wolf anear. I tell you this for a wonder, that no

man then shall be glad Of his fellow's fall and mishap to snatch

at the work he had.

NO MASTER

Saith man to man, We've heard and

known
That we no master need
To live upon this earth our own,

In fair and manly deed.
The grief of slaves long passed away

For us hath forgeil the chain,
Till now each worker's patient day

Builds up the House of Pain.

For that which the worker winneth shall

then be bis indeed, Nor shall half be reaped for nothing by

him that sowed no seed.

And we, shall we too, crouch and quail,

Ashamed, afraid of strife, And lest our lives untimely fail

Embrace the Death in Life? Nay, cry aloud, and have no fear,

We few agaiust the worll; Awake, arise! the hope we bear

Against the curse is hurled.

It grows and grows--are we the same,

The feeble band, the few ?
Or what are these with eyes aflame,

And hands to deal and do?
This is the host that bears the word,

"NO MASTER HIGH OR LOW A lightning flame, a shearing sword, A storm to overthrow.

1884.

O strange new wonderful justice! But

for whom shall we gather the gain? For ourselves and for each of our fellows,

and no hand shall labor in vain. Then all Mine and all Thine shall be Ours,

and no more shall any man crave For riches that serve for nothing but to

fetter a friend for a slave. And what wealth then shall be left us

when none shall gather gold To buy his friend in the market, and

pinch and pine the sold ? Nay, what save the lovely city, and the

little house on the hill, And the wastes and the woodland beauty,

and the happy fields we till ; And the homes of ancient stories, the

tombs of the mighty dead : And the wise men seeking out marvels,

and the poet's teeming head;

THE DAY IS COMING

Come hither, lads, and larken, for a tale

there is to tell, Of the wonderful days a-coming, when

all shall be better than well.

And the painter's hand of wonder; and

the marvelous fiddle-bow, And the banded choirs of music: all

those that do and know.

For all these shall be ours and all men's;

nor shall any lack a share Of the toil and the gain of living in the

days when the world grows fair.

Come, then, let us cast off fooling, and

put by ease and rest, For the Cause alone is worthy till the

good days bring the best. Come, join in the only battle wherein no

man can fail, Where whoso fadeth and dieth, yet his

deed shall still prevail. Ah! come, cast off all fooling, for this,

at least, we know : That the Dawn and the Day is coming,

and forth the Banners go, 1885.

Ah! such are the days that shall be! But

what are the deeds of to-day, In the days of the years we dwell in,

that wear our lives away?

THE DAYS THAT WERE

Why, then, and for wbat are we wait

ing? There are three words to

speak; WE WILL IT, and what is the foeman

but the dream-strong wakened and weak?

O why and for what are we waiting ?

while our brothers droop and die, And on every wind of the heavens a

wasted life goes by.

(MOTTO OF THE HOUSE OF THE WOLFINGS)
Whiles in the early winter eve
We pass amid the gathering night
Some homestead that we had to leave
Years past; and see its candles bright
Shine in the room beside the door
Where we were merry years agone,
But now must never enter more,
As still the dark road drives us on.
E'en so the world of men may turn
At even of some hurried day
And see the ancient glimmer burn
Across the waste that hath no way ;
Then, with that faint light in its eyes,
Awhile I bid it linger near
And nurse in waving memories
The bitter sweet of days that were.

1889.

How long shall they reproach us where

crowd on crowd they dwell, Poor ghosts of the wicked city, the gold

crushed, hungry hell ? Through squalid life they labored, in

sordid grief they died, Those sons of a mighty mother, those

props of England's pride. They are gone ; there is none can undo

it, nor save our souls from the

curse: But many a million cometh, and shall

they be better or worse ?

THE DAY OF DAYS

It is we must answer and hasten, and

open wide the door For the rich man's hurrying terror, and

the slow-foot hope of the poor. Yea, the voiceless wrath of the

wretched, and their unlearned dis

content, We must give it voice and wisdom till

the waiting-tide be spent.

EACH eve earth falleth down the dark,
As though its hope were o'er ;
Yet lurks the sun when day is done
Behind to-morrow's door.
Gray grows the dawn while men-folk

sleep, Unseen spreads on the light, Till the thrush sings to the colored

things,
And earth forgets the night.
No otherwise wends on our Hope :
E'en as a tale that's told
Are fair lives lost, and all the cost
Of wise and true and bold.

Come, then, since all things call us, the

living and the dead, And o'er the weltering tangle a glim

mering light is shed.

We've toiled and failed; we spake the

word ;
None barkened ; dumb we lie;
Our Hope is dead, the seed we spread
Fell o'er the earth to die.

What's this? For joy our hearts stand

still, And life is loved and dear, The lost and found the Cause hath

crowned, The Day of Days is here.

1890.

We spoke the word of war,
And sowed this harvest of the plain,
and we return no more.
Lay spears about the Ruddy Fox!
The days of old are o'er ;
Heave sword about the Running Ox!
For we return no more,

1891.

AGNES AND THE HILL-MAN

TRANSLATED FROM THE DANISH

AGNES went through the meadows a.

weeping, Fowl are a-singing. There stood the hill-man heed thereof

keeping. Agnes, fair Agnes !

Come to the hill, fair Agnes, with me, The reddest of gold will I give unto

thee!”

Twice went Agnes the hill round about, Then wended within, left the fair world

without.

THE BURGHERS' BATTLE
Thick rise the spear-shafts o'er the land
That erst the harvest bore ;
The sword is heavy in the hand,
And we return no more.
The light wind waves the Ruddy Fox,
Our banner of the war,
And ripples in the Running Ox,
And we return no more.
Across our stubble acres now
The teams go four and four ;
But out-worn elders guide the plough,
And we return no more.
And now the women heavy-eyed
Turn through the open door
From gazing down the highway wide,
Where we return no more.
The shadows of the fruited close
Dapple the feast-hall floor;
There lie our dogs and dream and doze,
And we return no more.
Down from the minster tower to-day
Fall the soft chimes of yore
Amidst the chattering jackdaws' play:
And we return no more.
But underneath the streets are still ;
Noon, and the market's o'er !
Back go the goodwives o'er the hill ;
For we return no more.
What merchant to our gates shall come ?
What wise man bring us lore?
What abbot ride away to Rome,
Now we return no more?
What mayor shall rule the hall we built?
Whose scarlet sweep the floor ?
What judge shall doom the robber's

guilt,
Now we return no more?
New houses in the streets shall rise
Where builded we before,
Of other stone wrought otherwise ;
For we return no more.
And crops shall cover field and hill
Unlike what once they bore,
And all be done without our will,
Now we return no more.
Look up! the arrows streak the sky,
The horns of battle roar ;
The long spears lower and draw nigh,
And we return no more.
Remember how beside the wain,

And when the church she stood within To her mother on bench straight did she

win,

But that there 'mid the gray grassy dales

sore scarred by the ruining streams Lives the tale of the Northland of old

and the undying glory of dreams?

And when she heard the high God's

name, Knee unto earth she bowed to the same.

When all the mass was sung to its end Home with her mother dear did she

weud.

" Come, Agnes, into the hillside to me, For thy seven small sons greet sorely for

thee!”

“Let them greet, let them greet, as

they will have to do ; For never again will I hearken thereto !"

Weird laid he on her, sore sickness he

wrought, Fowl are a-singing. That self-same hour to death was she

brought. Agnes, fair Agnes.

1891.

O land, as some cave by the sea where

the treasures of old have been laid, The sword it may be of a king whose

name was the turning of fight; Or the staff of some wise of the world

that many things made and unmade. Or the ring of a woman may be whose

woe is grown wealth and delight. No wheat and no wine grow's above it,

no orchard for blossom and shade ; The few ships that sail by its blackness

but deem it the mouth of a grave; Yet sure when the world shall awaken,

this too shall be mighty to save. Or rather, O land, if a marvel it seemeth

that men ever sought Thy wastes for a field and a garden ful

filled of all wonder and doubt, And feasted amidst of the winter when

the fight of the year had been fought, Whose plunder all gathered together

was little to babble about: Cry aloud from thy wastes, 0 thou

land, “ Not for this nor for that was I

wrought Amid waning of realms and of riches

and death of things worshipped and

stue, I abide here the spouse of a God, and I

made and I make and endure."

ICELAND. FIRST SEEN

Lo from our loitering ship a new land at

last to be seen ; Toothed rocks down the siile of the firth

on the east guard a weary wide lea, And black slope the bill-sides above,

striped adown with their desolate

green: And a peak rises up on the west from

the meeting of cloud and of sea, Foursquare from base unto point like

the building of Gods that have been, The last of that waste of the mountains

all cloud-wreathed and snow-flecked And bright with the dawn that began

just now at the ending of day.

and gray,

Ah! what came we forth for to see that

our hearts are so hot with desire ? Is it enough for our rest the sight of this

desolate strand, And the mountain-waste voiceless as death but for winds that may sleep not nor tire?

O Queen of the grief without know

ledge, of the courage that may not

avail, Of the longing that may not attain, of

the love that shall never forget, More joy than the gladness of laughter

thy voice hath amidst of its wail : More hope than of pleasure fulfilled

amidst of thy blindness is set ; More glorious than gaining of all, thine

unfaltering hand that shall fail : For what is the mark on thy brow but

the brand that thy Brynhild doth

bear? Lone once, and loved and undone by a

love that no ages outwear. Ah! when thy Balder comes back, and

bears from the heart of the Sun, Peace and the healing of pain, and the

wisdom that waiteth no more ; And the lilies are laid on thy brow

Why do we long to wend forth through

the length and breadth of a land, Dreadful with grinding of ice, and record of scarce hidden fire,