Out of the boughs he cameWhispering still her nameTumbling in twenty ringsInto the grass.Here was the strangest pairIn the world anywhere;Eve in the bells and grassKneeling, and heTelling his story low....Singing birds saw them goDown the dark path toThe Blasphemous Tree.Oh what a clatter whenTitmouse and Jenny WrenSaw him successful andTaking his leave!How the birds rated him,How they all hated him!How they all pitiedPoor motherless' Eve!Picture her cryingOutside in the lane,Eve, with no dish of sweetBerries and plums to eat,Haunting the gate of theOrchard in vain......Picture the lewd delightUnder the hill to-night—"Eva!" the toast goes round,"Eva!" again.THE BULLSee an old unhappy bull,Sick in soul and body both,Slouching in the undergrowthOf the forest beautiful,Banished from the herd he led,Bulls and cows a thousand head.Cranes and gaudy parrots goUp and down the burning sky;Tree-top cats purr drowsilyIn the dim-day green below;And troops of monkeys, nutting, some,All disputing, go and come;And things abominable sitPicking offal buck or swine,On the mess and over itBurnished flies and beetles shine,And spiders big as bladders lieUnder hemlocks ten foot high;And a dotted serpent curledRound and round and round a tree,Yellowing its greenery,Keeps a watch on all the world,All the world and this old bullIn the forest beautiful.Bravely by his fall he came:One he led, a bull of bloodNewly come to lustihood,Fought and put his prince to shame,Snuffed and pawed the prostrate headTameless even while it bled.There they left him, every one,Left him there without a lick,Left him for the birds to pick,Left him there for carrion,Vilely from their bosom castWisdom, worth and love at last.When the lion left his lairAnd roared his beauty through the hills,And the vultures pecked their quillsAnd flew into the middle air,Then this prince no more to reignCame to life and lived again,He snuffed the herd in far retreat,He saw the blood upon the ground,And snuffed the burning airs aroundStill with beevish odours sweet,While the blood ran down his headAnd his mouth ran slaver red.Pity him, this fallen chief,All his splendour, all his strength,All his body's breadth and lengthDwindled down with shame and grief,Half the bull he was before,Bones and leather, nothing more.See him standing dewlap-deepIn the rushes at the lake,Surly, stupid, half asleep,Waiting for his heart to breakAnd the birds to join the fliesFeasting at his bloodshot eyes,—Standing with his head hung downIn a stupor, dreaming things:Green savannas, jungles brown,Battlefields and bellowings,Bulls undone and lions deadAnd vultures flapping overhead.Dreaming things: of days he spentWith his mother gaunt and leanIn the valley warm and green,Full of baby wonderment,Blinking out of silly eyesAt a hundred mysteries;Dreaming over once againHow he wandered with a throngOf bulls and cows a thousand strong,Wandered on from plain to plain,Up the hill and down the dale,Always at his mother's tail;How he lagged behind the herd,Lagged and tottered, weak of limb,And she turned and ran to himBlaring at the loathly birdStationed always in the skies,Waiting for the flesh that dies.Dreaming maybe of a dayWhen her drained and drying papsTurned him to the sweets and saps,Richer fountains by the way,And she left the bull she boreAnd he looked to her no more;And his little frame grew stout,And his little legs grew strong,And the way was not so long;And his little horns came out,And he played at butting treesAnd boulder-stones and tortoises,Joined a game of knobby skullsWith the youngsters of his year,All the other little bulls,Learning both to bruise and bear,Learning how to stand a shockLike a little bull of rock.Dreaming of a day less dim,Dreaming of a time less far,When the faint but certain starOf destiny burned clear for him,And a fierce and wild unrestBroke the quiet of his breast.And the gristles of his youthHardened in his comely pow,And he came to righting growth,Beat his bull and won his cow,And flew his tail and trampled offPast the tallest, vain enough,And curved about in splendour fullAnd curved again and snuffed the airsAs who should say Come out who dares IAnd all beheld a bull, a Bull,And knew that here was surely oneThat backed for no bull, fearing none.And the leader of the herdLooked and saw, and beat the ground,And shook the forest with his sound,Bellowed at the loathly birdStationed always in the skies,Waiting for the flesh that dies.Dreaming, this old bull forlorn,Surely dreaming of the hourWhen he came to sultan power,And they owned him master-horn,Chiefest bull of all amongBulls and cows a thousand strong.And in all the tramping herdNot a bull that barred his way,Not a cow that said him nay,Not a bull or cow that erredIn the furnace of his lookDared a second, worse rebuke;Not in all the forest wide,Jungle, thicket, pasture, fen,Not another dared him then,Dared him and again defied;Not a sovereign buck or boarCame a second time for more.Not a serpent that survivedOnce the terrors of his hoofRisked a second time reproof,Came a second time and lived,Not a serpent in its skinCame again for discipline;Not a leopard bright as flame,Flashing fingerhooks of steel,That a wooden tree might feel,Met his fury once and cameFor a second reprimand,Not a leopard in the land.Not a lion of them allNot a lion of the hills,Hero of a thousand kills,Dared a second fight and fall,Dared that ram terrific twice,Paid a second time the price....Pity him, this dupe of dream,Leader of the herd againOnly in his daft old brain,Once again the bull supremeAnd bull enough to bear the partOnly in his tameless heart.Pity him that he must wake;Even now the swarm of fliesBlackening his bloodshot eyesBursts and blusters round the lake,Scattered from the feast half-fed,By great shadows overhead.And the dreamer turns awayFrom his visionary herdsAnd his splendid yesterday,Turns to meet the loathly birdsFlocking round him from the skies,Waiting for the flesh that dies.THE SONG OF HONOURI climbed a hill as light fell short,And rooks came home in scramble sort,And filled the trees and flapped and foughtAnd sang themselves to sleep;An owl from nowhere with no soundSwung by and soon was nowhere found,I heard him calling half-way round,Holloing loud and deep;A pair of stars, faint pins of light,Then many a star, sailed into sight,And all the stars, the flower of night,Were round me at a leap;To tell how still the valleys layI heard a watchdog miles away......And bells of distant sheep.I heard no more of bird or bell,The mastiff in a slumber fell,I stared into the sky,As wondering men have always done,Since beauty and the stars were one,Though none so hard as I.It seemed, so still the valleys were,As if the whole world knelt at prayer,Save me and me alone;So pure and wide that silence wasI feared to bend a blade of grass,And there I stood like stone.There, sharp and sudden, there I heard—Ah! some wild lovesick singing birdWoke singing in the trees?The nightingale and babble-wrenWere in the English greenwood then,And you heard one of these?The babble-wren and nightingaleSang in the Abyssinian valeThat season of the year!Yet, true enough, I heard them plain,I heard them both again, again,As sharp and sweet and clearAs if the Abyssinian treeHad thrust a bough across the sea,Had thrust a bough across to meWith music for my ear!I heard them both, and oh! I heardThe song of every singing birdThat sings beneath the sky,And with the song of lark and wrenThe song of mountains, moths and menAnd seas and rainbows vie!I heard the universal choirThe Sons of Light exalt their SireWith universal song,Earth's lowliest and loudest notes,Her million times ten million throatsExalt Him loud and long,And lips and lungs and tongues of GraceFrom every part and every placeWithin the shining of His faceThe universal throng.I heard the hymn of being soundFrom every well of honour foundIn human sense and soul:The song of poets when they writeThe testament of BeautyspriteUpon a flying scroll,The song of painters when they takeA burning brush for Beauty's sakeAnd limn her features whole—The song of men divinely wiseWho look and see in starry skiesNot stars so much as robins' eyes,And when these pale awayHear flocks of shiny pleiadesAmong the plums and apple treesSing in the summer day—The song of all both high and lowTo some blest vision true,The song of beggars when they throwThe crust of pity all men oweTo hungry sparrows in the snow,Old beggars hungry too—The song of kings of kingdoms whenThey rise above their fortune men,And crown themselves anew,—The song of courage, heart and willAnd gladness in a fight,Of men who face a hopeless hillWith sparking and delight,The bells and bells of song that ringRound banners of a cause or kingFrom armies bleeding white—The songs of sailors every oneWhen monstrous tide and tempest runAt ships like bulls at red,When stately ships are twirled and spunLike whipping-tops and help there's noneAnd mighty ships ten thousand tonGo down like lumps of lead—And songs of fighters stern as theyAt odds with fortune night and day,Crammed up in cities grim and greyAs thick as bees in hives,Hosannas of a lowly throngWho sing unconscious of their song,Whose lips are in their lives—And song of some at holy warWith spells and ghouls more dread by farThan deadly seas and cities are,Or hordes of quarrelling kings—The song of fighters great and small,The song of pretty fighters all,And high heroic things—The song of lovers—who knows howTwitched up from place and timeUpon a sigh, a blush, a vow,A curve or hue of cheek or brow,Borne up and off from here and nowInto the void sublime!And crying loves and passions stillIn every key from soft to shrillAnd numbers never done,Dog-loyalties to faith and friend,And loves like Ruth's of old no end,And intermission none—And burst on burst for beauty andFor numbers not behind,From men whose love of motherlandIs like a dog's for one dear hand,Sole, selfless, boundless, blind—And song of some with hearts besideFor men and sorrows far and wide,Who watch the world with pity and prideAnd warm to all mankind—And endless joyous music riseFrom children at their play,And endless soaring lullabiesFrom happy, happy mother's eyes,And answering crows and baby cries,How many who shall say!And many a song as wondrous wellWith pangs and sweets intolerableFrom lonely hearths too gray to tell,God knows how utter gray!And song from many a house of careWhen pain has forced a footing thereAnd there's a Darkness on the stairWill not be turned away—And song—that song whose singers comeWith old kind tales of pity fromThe Great Compassion's lips,That makes the bells of Heaven to pealRound pillows frosty with the feelOf Death's cold finger tips—The song of men all sorts and kinds,As many tempers, moods and mindsAs leaves are on a tree,As many faiths and castes and creeds,As many human bloods and breedsAs in the world may be;The song of each and all who gazeOn Beauty in her naked blaze,Or see her dimly in a haze,Or get her light in fitful raysAnd tiniest needles even,The song of all not wholly dark,Not wholly sunk in stupor starkToo deep for groping Heaven—And alleluias sweet and clearAnd wild with beauty men mishear,From choirs of song as near and dearTo Paradise as they,The everlasting pipe and fluteOf wind and sea and bird and brute,And lips deaf men imagine muteIn wood and stone and clay;The music of a lion strongThat shakes a hill a whole night long,A hill as loud as he,The twitter of a mouse amongMelodious greenery,The ruby's and the rainbow's song,The nightingale's—all three,The song of life that wells and flowsFrom every leopard, lark and roseAnd everything that gleams or goesLack-lustre in the sea.I heard it all, each, every noteOf every lung and tongue and throat,Ay, every rhythm and rhymeOf everything that lives and lovesAnd upward, ever upward movesFrom lowly to sublime!Earth's multitudinous Sons of Light,I heard them lift their lyric mightWith each and every chanting spriteThat lit the sky that wondrous nightAs far as eye could climb!I heard it all, I heard the wholeHarmonious hymn of being rollUp through the chapel of my soulAnd at the altar die,And in the awful quiet thenMyself I heard Amen, Amen,Amen I heard me cry!I heard it all, and then althoughI caught my flying senses, oh,A dizzy man was I!I stood and stared; the sky was lit,The sky was stars all over it,I stood, I knew not why,Without a wish, without a will,I stood upon that silent hillAnd stared into the sky untilMy eyes were blind with stars and stillI stared into the sky.REASON HAS MOONSReason has moons, but moons not hersLie mirror'd on her sea,Confounding her astronomers,But, O! delighting me.JAMES JOYCESTRINGS IN THE EARTHStrings in the earth and airMake music sweet;Strings by the river whereThe willows meet.There's music along the riverFor Love wanders there,Pale flowers on his mantle,Dark leaves on his hair.All softly playing,With head to the music bent,And fingers strayingUpon an instrument.I HEAR AN ARMYI hear an army charging upon the land,And the thunder of horses plunging, foam about their knees:Arrogant, in black armour, behind them stand,Disdaining the reins, with fluttering whips, the charioteers.They cry unto the night their battle-name:I moan in sleep when I hear afar their whirling laughter.They cleave the gloom of dreams, a blinding flame,Clanging, clanging upon the heart as upon an anvil.They come shaking in triumph their long green hair:They come out of the sea and run shouting by the shore.My heart, have you no wisdom thus to despair?My love, my love, my love, why have you left me alone?D. H. LAWRENCESERVICE OF ALL THE DEADBetween the avenues of cypresses,All in their scarlet cloaks, and surplicesOf linen, go the chaunting choristers,The priests in gold and black, the villagers.And all along the path to the cemeteryThe round, dark heads of men crowd silently,And black-scarved faces of women-folk, wistfullyWatch at the banner of death, and the mystery.And at the foot of a grave a father standsWith sunken head, and forgotten, folded hands;And at the foot of a grave a woman kneelsWith pale shut face, and neither hears nor feelsThe coming of the chaunting choristersBetween the avenues of cypresses,The silence of the many villagers,The candle-flames beside the surplices.FRANCIS LEDWIDGEKilled in Action, 1917,IN FRANCEThe silence of maternal hillsIs round me in my evening dreams;And round me music-making rillsAnd mingling waves of pastoral streams.Whatever way I turn I findThe path is old unto me still.The hills of home are in my mind,And there I wander as I will.February 3rd,1917.THOMAS MACDONAGHHe shall not hear the bittern cryIn the wild sky, where he is lain,Nor voices of the sweeter birdsAbove the wailing of the rain.Nor shall he know when loud March blowsThro' slanting snows her fanfare shrill,Blowing to flame the golden cupOf many an upset daffodil.But when the Dark Cow leaves the moor,And pastures poor with greedy weeds,Perhaps he'll hear her low at mornLifting her horn in pleasant meads.IN SEPTEMBERStill are the meadowlands, and stillRipens the upland com,And over the brown gradual hillThe moon has dipped a horn.The voices of the dear unknownWith silent hearts now call,My rose of youth is overblownAnd trembles to the fall.My song forsakes me like the birdsThat leave the rain and grey,I hear the music of the wordsMy lute can never say.ROSE MACAULAYTRINITY SUNDAYAs I walked in Petty Cury on Trinity Day,While the cuckoos in the fields did shout,Right through the city stole the breath of the may,And the scarlet doctors all aboutLifted up their heads to snuff at the breeze,And forgot they were bound for great St. Mary'sTo listen to a sermon from the Master of Caius,And "How balmy," they said, "the air is!"And balmy it was; and the sweet bells rockingShook it till it rent in twoAnd fell, a torn veil; and like maniacs mockingThe wild things from without passed through.Wild wet things that swam in King's ParadeThe days it was a marshy fen,Through the rent veil they did sprawl and wadeBlind bog-beasts and Ugrian men.And the city was not. (For cities are wroughtOf the stuff of the world's live brain.Cities are thin veils, woven of thought,And thought, breaking, rends them in twain.)And the fens were not. (For fens are dreamsDreamt by a race long dead;And the earth is naught, and the sun but seems:And so those who know have said.)So veil beyond veil inimitably lifted:And I saw the world's naked face,Before, reeling and baffled and blind, I driftedBack within the bounds of space.*    *    *I have forgot the unforgettable.All of honey and milk the air is.God send I do forget.... The merry winds swellIn the scarlet gowns bound for St. Mary's.THOMAS MACDONAGHBorn 1878.Executed after Easter Week Rising, 1916.INSCRIPTION ON A RUINI stood beside the postern here,High up above the trampling sea,In shadow, shrinking from the spearOf light, not daring hence to flee.The moon beyond the western cliffHad passed, and let the shadow fall,Across the water to the skiffThat came on to the castle wall.I heard below murmur of wordsNot loud, the splash upon the strand,And the long cry of darkling birds.The ivory horn fell from my hand.THE NIGHT HUNTIn the morning, in the dark,When the stars begin to blunt,By the wall of Barn a ParkDogs I heard and saw them hunt;All the parish dogs were there,All the dogs for miles around,Teeming up behind a hare,In the dark, without a sound.How I heard I scarce can tell—'Twas a patter in the grass—And I did not see them wellCome across the dark and pass;Yet I saw them and I knewSpearman's dog and Spellman's dogAnd, beside my own dog too,Leamy's from the Island Bog.In the morning when the sunBurnished all the green to gorse,I went out to take a runRound the bog upon my horse;And my dog that had been sleepingIn the heat beside the doorLeft his yawning and went leapingOn a hundred yards before.Through the village street we passed—Not a dog there raised a snout—Through the street and out at lastOn the white bog road and outOver Barna Park full pace,Over to the silver stream,Horse and dog in happy race,Rider between thought and dream.By the stream, at Leamy's house,Lay a dog—my pace I curbed—But our coming did not rouseHim from drowsing undisturbed;And my dog, as unawareOf the other, dropped besideAnd went running by me thereWith my horse's slackened stride.Yet by something, by a twitchOf the sleeper's eye, a lookFrom the runner, something whichLittle chords of feeling shook,I was conscious that a thoughtShuddered through the silent deepOf a secret—I had caughtSomething I had known in sleep.JOHN MASEFIELDC. L. M.In the dark womb where I beganMy mother's life made me a man.Through all the months of human birthHer beauty fed my common earth.I cannot see, nor breathe, nor stir,But through the death of some of her.Down in the darkness of the graveShe cannot see the life she gave.For all her love, she cannot tellWhether I use it ill or well,Nor knock at dusty doors to findHer beauty dusty in the mind.If the grave's gates could be undone,She would not know her little son,I am so grown. If we should meetShe would pass by me in the street,Unless my soul's face let her seeMy sense of what she did for me.What have I done to keep in mindMy debt to her and womankind?What woman's happier life repaysHer for those months of wretched days?For all my monthless body leechedEre Birth's releasing hell was reached?What have I done, or tried, or saidIn thanks to that dear woman dead?Men triumph over women still,Men trample women's rights at will,And man's lust roves the world untamed.*    *    *O grave, keep shut lest I be shamed.WHAT AM I, LIFE?What am I, Life? A thing of watery saltHeld in cohesion by unresting cellsWhich work they know not why, which never halt,Myself unwitting where their master dwells.I do not bid them, yet they toil, they spin;A world which uses me as I use them,Nor do I know which end or which begin,Nor which to praise, which pamper, which condemn.So, like a marvel in a marvel set,I answer to the vast, as wave by waveThe sea of air goes over, dry or wet,Or the full moon comes swimming from her cave,Or the great sun comes north, this myriad ITingles, not knowing how, yet wondering why.HAROLD MONROJOURNEYIHow many times I nearly miss the trainBy running up the staircase once againFor some dear trifle almost left behind.At that last moment the unwary mindForgets the solemn tick of station-time;That muddy lane the feet must climb—The bridge—the ticket—signal down—Train just emerging beyond the town:The great blue engine panting as it takesThe final curve, and grinding on its brakesUp to the platform-edge... The little doorsSwing open, while the burly porter roars.The tight compartment fills: our careful eyesGo to explore each other's destinies.A lull. The station-master waves. The trainGathers, and grips, and takes the rails again,Moves to the shining open land, and soonBegins to tittle-tattle a tame tattoon.IIThey ramble through the country-side,Dear gentle monsters, and we ridePleasantly seated—so we sinkInto a torpor on the brinkOf thought, or read our books, and understandHalf them and half the backward-gliding land:(Trees in a dance all twirling round;Large rivers flowing with no sound;The scattered images of town and field,Shining flowers half concealed.)And, having settled to an equal rate,They swing the curve and straighten to the straight,Curtail their stride and gather up their joints,Snort, dwindle their steam for the noisy points,Leap them in safety, and, the other side,Loop again to an even stride.The long train moves: we move in it along.Like an old ballad, or an endless song,It drones and wimbles its unwearied croon—Croons, drones, and mumbles all the afternoon.Towns with their fifty chimneys close and high,Wreathed in great smoke between the earth and sky,It hurtles through them, and you think it mustHalt—but it shrieks and sputters them with dust,Cracks like a bullet through their big affairs,Rushes the station-bridge, and disappearsOut to the suburb, laying bareEach garden trimmed with pitiful care;Children are caught at idle play,Held a moment, and thrown away.Nearly everyone looks round.Some dignified inhabitant is foundRight in the middle of the commonplace—Buttoning his trousers, or washing his face.IIIOh the wild engine! Every time I sitIn any train I must remember it.The way it smashes through the air; its greatPetulant majesty and terrible rate:Driving the ground before it, with those roundFeet pounding, eating, covering the ground;The piston using up the white steam soYou cannot watch it when it come or go;The cutting, the embankment; how it takesThe tunnels, and the clatter that it makes;So careful of the train and of the track,Guiding us out, or helping us go back;Breasting its destination: at the closeYawning, and slowly dropping to a doze.IVWe who have looked each other in the eyesThis journey long, and trundled with the train,Now to our separate purposes must rise,Becoming decent strangers once again.The little chamber we have made our homeIn which we so conveniently abode,The complicated journey we have come,Must be an unremembered episode.Our common purpose made us all like friends.How suddenly it ends!A nod, a murmur, or a little smile,Or often nothing, and away we file.I hate to leave you, comrades. I will stayTo watch you drift apart and pass away.It seems impossible to go and meetAll those strange eyes of people in the street.But, like some proud unconscious god, the trainGathers us up and scatters us again.SOLITUDEWhen you have tidied all things for the night,And while your thoughts are fading to their sleep,You'll pause a moment in the late firelight,Too sorrowful to weep.The large and gentle furniture has stoodIn sympathetic silence all the dayWith that old kindness of domestic wood;Nevertheless the haunted room will say:"Some one must be away."The little dog rolls over half awake,Stretches his paws, yawns, looking up at you,Wags his tail very slightly for your sake,That you may feel he is unhappy too.A distant engine whistles, or the floorCreaks, or the wandering night-wind bangs a door.Silence is scattered like a broken glass.The minutes prick their ears and run about,Then one by one subside again and passSedately in, monotonously out.You bend your head and wipe away a tear.Solitude walks one heavy step more near.MILK FOR THE CATWhen the tea is brought at five o'clock,And all the neat curtains are drawn with care,The little black cat with bright green eyesIs suddenly purring there.At first she pretends, having nothing to do,She has come in merely to blink by the grate,But, though tea may be late or the milk may be sourShe is never late.And presently her agate eyesTake a soft large milky haze,And her independent casual glanceBecomes a stiff, hard gaze.Then she stamps her claws or lifts her ears,Or twists her tail and begins to stir,Till suddenly all her lithe body becomesOne breathing, trembling purr.The children eat and wriggle and laugh;The two old ladies stroke their silk:But the cat is grown small and thin with desire,Transformed to a creeping lust for milk:The white saucer like some full moon descendsAt last from the clouds of the table above;She sighs and dreams and thrills and glows,Transfigured with love.She nestles over the shining rim,Buries her chin in the creamy sea;Her tail hangs loose; each drowsy pawIs doubled under each bending knee.A long dim ecstasy holds her life;Her world is an infinite shapeless white,Till her tongue has curled the last half drop,Then she sinks back into the night,Draws and dips her body to heapHer sleepy nerves in the great arm-chair,Lies defeated and buried deepThree or four hours unconscious there.T. STURGE MOORESENT FROM EGYPT WITH A FAIR ROBEOF TISSUE TO A SICILIAN VINE-DRESSER.276 B.C.Put out to sea, if wine thou wouldest makeSuch as is made in Cos: when open boatMay safely launch, advice of pilots take;And find the deepest bottom, most remoteFrom all encroachment of the crumbling shore,Where no fresh stream tempers the rich salt wave,Forcing rash sweetness on sage ocean's brine;As youthful shepherds pourTheir first love forth to Battos gnarled and grave,Fooling shrewd age to bless some fond design.Not after storm! but when, for a long spell,No white-maned horse has raced across the blue,Put from the beach! lest troubled be the well—Less pure thy draught than from such depth were due.Fast close thy largest jars, prepared and clean!Next weigh each buoyant womb down through the flood,Far down! when, with a cord the lid remove,And it will fill unseen,Swift as a heart Love smites sucks back the blood:—This bubbles, deeper born than sighs, shall prove.If thy bowed shoulders ache, as thou dost haul—Those groan who climb with rich ore from the mine;Labour untold round Ilion girt a wall;A god toiled that Achilles' arms might shine;Think of these things and double knit thy will!Then, should the sun be hot on thy return,Cover thy jars with piles of bladder weed,Dripping, and fragrant stillFrom sea-wolds where it grows like bracken-fern:A grapnel dragged will soon supply thy need.Home to a tun-convey thy precious freight!Wherein, for thirty days, it should abide,Closed, yet not quite closed from the air, and waitWhile, through dim stillness, slowly doth subsideThick sediment. The humour of a day,Which has defeated youth and health and joy,Down, through a dreamless sleep, will settle thus,Till riseth maiden gaySet free from all glooms past—or else a boyOnce more a school-friend worthy Troilus.Yet to such cool wood tank some dream might dip:Vision of Aphrodite sunk to sleep,Or of some sailor let down from a ship,Young, dead, and lovely, while across the deep,Through the calm night, his hoarse-voiced comrades chaunt—So far at sea, they cannot reach the landTo lay him perfect in the warm brown earth.Pray that such dreams there haunt!While, through damp darkness, where thy tun doth stand,Cold salamanders sidle round its girth.Gently draw off the clear and tomb it yetFor other twenty days in cedarn casks!Where through trance, surely, prophecy will set;As, dedicated to light temple-tasks,The young priest dreams the unknown mystery.Through Ariadne, knelt disconsolateIn the sea's marge, so welled back warmth which throbbedWith nuptial promise: sheTurned; and, half-choked through dewy glens, some great,Some magic drone of revel coming sobbed.Of glorious fruit, indeed, must be thy choice,Such as has fully ripened on the branch,Such as due rain, then sunshine, made rejoice,Which, pulped and coloured, now deep bloom doth blanch;Clusters like odes for victors in the games,Strophe on strophe globed, pure nectar all!Spread such to dry,—if Helios grant thee grace,Exposed unto his flamesTwo days, or, if not, three; or, should rain fall;Stretch them on hurdles in the house four days.Grapes are not sharded chestnuts, which the treeLets fall to burst them on the ground, where redRolls forth the fruit, from white-lined wards set free,And all undamaged glows 'mid husks it shed;Nay, they are soft and should be singly strippedFrom off the bunch, by maiden's dainty hand,Then dropped through the cool silent depth to sink(Coy, as herself hath slipped,Bathing, from shelves in caves along the strand)Till round each dark grape water barely wink;Since some nine measures of sea-water fillA butt of fifty, ere the plump fruit peep,—Like sombre dolphin shoals when nights are still,Which penned in Proteus' wizard circle sleep,And 'twixt them glinting curves of silver glanceIf Zephyr, dimpling dark calm, counts them o'er.—Let soak thy fruit for two days thus, then tread!While bare-legged bumpkins dance,Bright from thy bursting press arched spouts shall pour,And gurgling torrents towards thy vats run red.Meanwhile the maidens, each with wooden rake,Drag back the skins and laugh at aprons splashed;Or youths rest, boasting how their brown arms ache,So fast their shovels for so long have flashed,Baffling their comrades' legs with mounting heaps.Treble their labour! still the happier they,Who at this genial task wear out long hours,Till vast night round them creeps,When soon the torch-light dance whirls them away;For gods who love wine double all their powers.Iacchus is the always grateful god!His vineyards are more fair than gardens far;Hanging, like those of Babylon, they nodO'er each Ionian cliff and hill-side scar!While Cypris lends him saltness, depth, and peace;The brown earth yields him sap for richest green;And he has borrowed laughter from the sky;Wildness from winds; and beesBring honey.—Then choose casks which thou hast seenAre leakless, very wholesome, and quite dry!That Coan wine the very finest is,I do assure thee, who have travelled muchAnd learned to judge of diverse vintages.Faint not before the toil! this wine is suchAs tempteth princes launch long pirate barks;—Fromwhich may Zeus protect Sicilian bays,And, ere long, me safe home from Egypt bring,Letting no black-sailed sharksScent this king's gifts, for whom I sweeten praiseWith those same songs thou didst to Chloe sing!I wrote them 'neath the vine-cloaked elm, for thee.Recall those nights! our couches were a loadOf scented lentisk; upward, tree by tree,Thy father's orchard sloped, and past us flowedA stream sluiced for his vineyards; when, above,The apples fell, they on to us were rolled,But kept us not awake.—O Laco, ownHow thou didst rave of love!Now art thou staid, thy son is three years old;But I, who made thee love-songs, live alone.Muse thou at dawn o'er thy yet slumbering wife!—Not chary of her best was nature there,Who, though a third of her full gift of lifeWas spent, still added beauties still more rare;What calm slow days, what holy sleep at night,Evolved her for long twilight trystings fraughtWith panic blushes and tip-toe surmise:And then, what mystic might—All, with a crowning boon, through travail brought!Consider this and give thy best likewise!Ungrateful be not! Laco, ne'er be that!Well worth thy while to make such wine 'twould be;I see thy red face 'neath thy broad straw hat,I see thy house, thy vineyards, Sicily!—Thou dost demur, good but too easy friend!Come, put those doubts away! thou hast strong lads,Brave wenches; on the steep beach lolls thy shipWhere vine-clad slopes descend,Sheltering our bay, that headlong rillet glads,Like a stripped child fain in the sea to dip.A SPANISH PICTUREThy life is over now, Don Juan:Thy fingers are so shrunkThat all their rings from off their cold tips crowd,Where limp thy hand hath sunk;On a trestle-table laid, Don Juan,A half-mask near thine ear,A visor black in which void gape two gapsWhere through thou oft didst leer.Thou waitest for the priests, Don Juan,To bear thee to thy grave;Thou'rt theirs at length beyond all doubt, but ha!Hast now no soul to save.Thou wast brought home last night, Don Juan,Upon a stable door;Beneath a young nun's casement, found dropped dead,Where thou hadst wooed of yore:To pay their trouble then, Don Juan,Those base grooms took thy sword;A rapier to fetch gold, with shagreened sheath,Wrought hand-grip, and silk cord;Which, with thy fame enhanced, Don Juan,Were worth hidalgo's rent;Yet on which now, at most, some few moidoreMay by some fop be spent.Dull brown a cloak enwraps, Don Juan,Both thy lean shanks, one arm,