But breathe it into earth and close it up

With secret death forever, in the pits

Which some green Christmas crams with weary, bones.

ON A MOURNER.

NATURE, so far as in her lies,

Imitates God, and turns her face

To every land beneath the skies,

Counts nothing that she meets with base,
But lives and loves in every place;

2.

Fills out the homely quick-set screens,
And makes the purple lilac ripe,
Steps from her airy hill, and greens

The swamp, where hums the dropping snipe,
With moss and braided marish-pipe;

3.

And on thy heart a finger lays,
Saying, 'beat quicker, for the time
Is pleasant, and the woods and ways
Are pleasant, and the beech and lime
Put forth and feel a gladder clime.'

4.

And murmurs of a deeper voice,
Going before to some far shrine,

VOL. II.

19

BB

Teach that sick heart the stronger choice,

Till all thy life one way incline

With one wide will that closes thine.

5.

And when the zoning eve has died

Where yon dark valleys wind forlorn,
Come Hope and Memory, spouse and bride,
From out the borders of the morn,
With that fair child betwixt them born.

6.

And when no mortal motion jars

The blackness round the tombing sod, Thro' silence and the trembling stars

Comes Faith from tracts no feet have trod, And Virtue, like a household god

7.

Promising empire; such as those

That once at dead of night did greet
Troy's wandering prince, so that he rose
With sacrifice, while all the fleet
Had rest by stony hills of Crete.

SONG.

LADY, let the rolling drums

Beat to battle where thy warrior stands :

Now thy face across his fancy comes,

And gives the battle to his hands.

Lady, let the trumpets blow,

Clasp thy little babes about thy knee:
Now their warrior father meets the foe,
And strikes him dead for thine and thee.

H

SONG.

OME they brought him slain with spears.
They brought him home at even-fall :

All alone she sits and hears

Echoes in his empty hall,

Sounding on the morrow.

The Sun peep'd in from open field,
The boy began to leap and prance,
Rode upon his father's lance,

Beat upon his father's shield

66

“O hush, my joy, my sorrow."

Burnt and broke the grove and altar of the Druid and Druidess,

Far in the East Boädicéa, standing loftily charioted, Mad and maddening all that heard her in her fierce

volubility,

Girt by half the tribes of Britain, near the colony Cámulodúne,

Yell'd and shriek'd between her daughters o'er a wild confederacy.

'They that scorn the tribes and call us Britain's

barbarous populaces,

Did they hear me, would they listen, did they pity me supplicating?

Shall I heed them in their anguish ? shall I brook to be supplicated?

Hear Icenian, Catieuchlanian, hear Coritanian, Trino

bant!

Must their ever-ravening eagle's beak and talon anni

hilate us?

Tear the noble heart of Britain, leave it gorily quiv

ering?

Bark an answer, Britain's raven! bark and blacken

innumerable,

Blacken round the Roman carrion, make the carcase a

skeleton,

Kite and kestrel, wolf and wolf kin, from the wilderness, wallow in it,

Till the face of Bel be brighten'd, Taranis be pro

pitiated.

Lo their colony half-defended! lo their colony, Cámu

lodúne !

There the horde of Roman robbers mock at a barbarous

adversary.

There the hive of Roman liars worship a gluttonous emperor-idiot.

Such is Rome, and this her deity: hear it, Spirit of Cássivelaún !

'Hear it, Gods! the Gods have heard it, O Icenian, O Coritanian !

Doubt not ye the Gods have answer'd, Catieuchlanian, Trinobant.

These have told us all their anger in miraculous utter

ances,

Thunder, a flying fire in heaven, a murmur heard

aërially,

Phantom sound of blows descending, moan of an enemy massacred,

Phantom wail of women and children, multitudinous

agonies.

Bloodily flow'd the Tamesa rolling phantom bodies of horses and men ;