'WHITHER, O whither, love, shall we go,' For a score of sweet little summers or so? The sweet little wife of the singer said, On the day that follow'd the day she was wed, 'Whither, O whither, love, shall we go?' And the singer shaking his curly head Turn'd as he sat, and struck the keys There at his right with a sudden crash, Singing, And shall it be over the seas With a crew that is neither rude nor rash, 6 But a bevy of Eroses apple-cheek'd, To a sweet little Eden on earth that I know, A mountain islet pointed and peak'd? Mixt with myrtle and clad with vine, The facets of the glorious mountain flash Above the valleys of palm and pine.' 'Thither, O thither, love, let us go.' 'No, no, no! For in all that exquisite isle, my dear, There is but one bird with a musical throat, CHILD-SONGS. Sounds of the great sea Wander'd about. Sleep, little ladies! Wake not soon! Echo on echo Dies to the moon. Two bright stars Peep'd into the shell. 'What are they dreaming of? Who can tell?' Started a green linnet Out of the croft; Wake, little ladies, THE SPITEFUL LETTER. HERE, it is here, the close of the year, My name in song has done him much wrong, For himself has done much better. O little bard, is your lot so hard, If men neglect your pages? I think not much of yours or of mine, I hear the roll of the ages. Rhymes and rhymes in the range of the times! Are mine for the moment stronger? This faded leaf, our names are as brief; For it hangs one moment later. Greater than I is that your cry? And men will live to see it. Well if it be so-so it is, you know; And if it be so, so be it. Brief, brief is a summer leaf, But this is the time of hollies. How I hate the spites and the follies! LITERARY SQUABBLES. АH God! the petty fools of rhyme And look'd at by the silent stars: Who hate each other for a song, And strain to make an inch of room For their sweet selves, and cannot hear The sullen Lethe rolling doom On them and theirs and all things here: When one small touch of Charity Could lift them nearer God-like state Than if the crowded Orb should cry Like those who cried Diana great: And I too, talk, and lose the touch THE VICTIM. I. A PLAGUE upon the people fell, A famine after laid them low, Then thorpe and byre arose in fire, For on them brake the sudden foe; So thick they died the people cried, 'The Gods are moved against the land.' The Priest in horror about his altar To Thor and Odin lifted a hand: 'Help us from famine And plague and strife! What would you have of us? Were it our nearest, Were it our dearest, (Answer, O answer) II. But still the foeman spoil'd and burn'd, And dead men lay all over the way, Or down in a furrow scathed with flame: And ever and aye the Priesthood moan'd, Till at last it seem'd that an answer came. 'The King is happy In child and wife; Take you his dearest, Give us a life.' III. The Priest went out by heath and hill; The King was hunting in the wild; They found the mother sitting still; She cast her arms about the child. The child was only eight summers old, His beauty still with his years increased, His face was ruddy, his hair was gold, And cried with joy, IV. The King return'd from out the wild, To spill his blood and heal the land: The land is sick, the people diseased, And blight and famine on all the lea: The holy Gods, they must be appeased, So I pray you tell the truth to me. They have taken our son, Or I, the wife?' V. The King bent low, with hand on brow, He stay'd his arms upon his knee: 'O wife, what use to answer now? For now the Priest has judged for me.' The King was shaken with holy fear; 'The Gods,' he said, 'would have chosen well; Yet both are near, and both are dear, His victim won: VI. The rites prepared, the victim bared, He caught her away with a sudden cry; And shrieking 'I am his dearest, I I am his dearest!' rush'd on the knife. And the Priest was happy, We give you a life. WAGES. GLORY of warrior, glory of orator, glory of song, Paid with a voice flying by to be lost on an endless seaGlory of Virtue, to fight, to struggle, to right the wrongNay, but she aim'd not at glory, no lover of glory she: Give her the glory of going on, and still to be. The wages of sin is death: if the wages of Virtue be dust, Would she have heart to endure for the life of the worm and the fly? She desires no isles of the blest, no quiet seats of the just, To rest in a golden grove, or to bask in a summer sky: Give her the wages of going on, and not to die. |