Each ounce of dross costs its ounce of gold;
For a cap and bells1 our lives we pay;
Bubbles we buy with a whole soul's tasking:
'Tis heaven alone that is given away,
'Tis only God may be had for the asking.
No price is set on the lavish summer;
June may be had by the poorest comer.

And what is so rare as a day in June?
Then, if ever, come perfect days;
Then Heaven tries the earth if it be in tune,
And over it softly her warm ear lays:2
Whether we look, or whether we listen,
We hear life murmur, or see it glisten;3
Every clod feels a stir of might,

An instinct within it that reaches and towers,
And, groping blindly above it for light,
Climbs to a soul in grass and flowers;
The flush of life may well be seen

Thrilling back over hills and valleys;
The cowslip startles in meadows green,

The buttercup catches the sun in its chalice,5 And there's never a leaf nor a blade too mean To be some happy creature's palace.

1 cap and bells, the emblems of a court jester or fool.

2 Then Heaven tries. . . lays. Express in your own words the thought in this fine metaphor.

8 life murmur... glisten. What objects do you suppose the poet had in his mind?

4 Every clod feels, etc. What is the figure of speech?

5 chalice, derived through French calice, from Latin calix, a cup or bowl. Calyx is from the same root. 6 To be... palace State in plain language what is here expressed in metaphor.

The little bird sits at his door in the sun,
Atilt like a blossom among the leaves,
And lets his illumined being 2 o'errun

3

With the deluge of summer it receives; His mate feels the eggs beneath her wings,

And the heart in her dumb breast flutters and sings;
He sings to the wide world, and she to her nest:
In the nice ear of Nature, which song is the best?

4

Now is the high tide of the year,

And whatever of life hath ebbed away
Comes flooding back with a ripply cheer,

Into every bare inlet and creek and bay;
Now the heart is so full that a drop overfills it;
We are happy now because God wills it;

No matter how barren the past may have been,
"Tis enough for us now that the leaves are green.
We sit in the warm shade, and feel right well
How the sap creeps up, and the blossoms swell;
We may shut our eyes, but we can not help knowing
That the skies are clear, and grass is growing;

The breeze comes whispering 5 in our ear

6

That dandelions are blossoming near,

That maize has sprouted, that streams are flowing,

1 Atilt. What is the application

of this word here?

2 illumined being. Explain.

3 deluge. Note, in connection with the metaphorical use of this word, that we speak of a flood of light, as well as of water.

4 high tide. What is meant? How is the metaphor subsequently carried out?

5

comes whispering, etc. What is the figure of speech?

6 dandelions. See Webster for an interesting derivation.

That the river is bluer than the sky,

That the robin is plastering his house hard by.
And if the breeze kept the good news back,
For other couriers we should not lack;

We could guess it all by yon heifer's lowing —
And hark! how clear bold chanticleer,1
Warmed with the new wine of the year,2
Tells all in his lusty 3 crowing!

Joy comes, grief goes, we know not how;
Every thing is happy now,

Every thing is upward striving;

'Tis as easy now for the heart to be true
As for grass to be green, or skies to be blue —
"Tis the natural way of living:

Who knows whither the clouds have fled?

In the unscarred heaven they leave no wake; 5
And the eyes forget the tears they have shed,
The heart forgets its sorrow and ache;

The soul partakes the season's youth,
And the sulphurous rifts of passion and woe
Lie deep 'neath a silence pure and smooth,
Like burned-out craters healed with snow.
What wonder if Sir Launfal now

Remembered the keeping of his vow?

1 chanticleer (from French chan- 5 wake, the track left by a vester, to sing): literally, the clear-sel in the water.

singing one.

2 new wine of the year.

plain the metaphor.

3 lusty, vigorous. 4 unscarred heaven. the epithet.

6 sulphurous rifts: that is, Ex- opening through which exhale

sulphur fumes. The metaphor which is carried out in the expresExplain sion "burned-out craters," is very powerful.

PART FIRST.

I.

"My golden spurs now bring to me,
And bring to me my richest mail,1
For to-morrow I go over land and sea
In search of the Holy Grail;

Shall never a bed for me be spread,
Nor shall a pillow be under my head,
Till I begin my vow to keep;
Here on the rushes will I sleep,

And perchance there may come a vision true
Ere day create the world anew.”

Slowly Sir Launfal's eyes grew dim,
Slumber fell like a cloud on him,

And into his soul the vision flew.

II.

The crows flapped over by twos and threes,
In the pool drowsed the cattle up to their knees,
The little birds sang as if it were

The one day of summer in all the year,

And the very leaves seemed to sing on the trees;
The castle alone in the landscape lay

Like an outpost 2 of winter, dull and gray;
'Twas the proudest hall in the North Countree,3

1 mail coat of mail.

castle stood in contrast with the

thing of winter in the landscape.

2 Like an outpost. An "out-singing birds and leaves - the only post" in an army is far beyond the lines of the army itself. So, when all nature proclaimed that winter was far away, the "dull and gray"

8 Countree. This form of the word is used in imitation of the style of the old English ballads.

And never its gates might opened be,
Save to lord or lady of high degree.
Summer besieged it on every side,

But the churlish stone1 her assaults defied;
She could not scale the chilly wall,

2

Though round it for leagues her pavilions tall 2

Stretched left and right,

Over the hills and out of sight;

Green and broad was every tent,
And out of each a murmur went
Till the breeze fell off at night.

III.

The drawbridge dropped with a surly clang,
And through the dark arch a charger3 sprang,
Bearing Sir Launfal the maiden knight,*
In his gilded mail, that flamed so bright
It seemed the dark castle had gathered all
Those shafts the fierce sun had shot over its wall
In his siege of three hundred summers long,
And, binding them all in one blazing sheaf,5
Had cast them forth: so, young and strong,
And lightsome as a locust-leaf,