SONG. THE OWL.

WHEN cats run home and light is come,
And dew is cold upon the ground,

And the far-off stream is dumb,

And the whirring sail goes round,

And the whirring sail goes round ;

Alone and warming his five wits,

The white owl in the belfry sits.

When merry milkmaids click the latch,
And rarely smells the new-mown hay,
And the cock hath sung beneath the thatch
Twice or thrice his roundelay,

Twice or thrice his roundelay :
Alone and warming his five wits,
The white owl in the belfry sits.

SECOND SONG.

TO THE SAME.

THY tuwhits are lull'd I wot,
Thy tuwhoos of yesternight,
Which upon the dark afloat,

So took echo with delight,

So took echo with delight,

That her voice untuneful grown,

Wears all day a fainter tone.

I would mock thy chaunt anew;
But I cannot mimick it ;

Not a whit of thy tuwhoo,

Thee to woo to thy tuwhit,

Thee to woo to thy tuwhit,

With a lengthen'd loud halloo,

Tuwhoo, tuwhit, tuwhit, tuwhoo-o-o.

RECOLLECTIONS

OF

THE ARABIAN NIGHTS.

I.

WHEN the breeze of a joyful dawn blew free

In the silken sail of infancy,

The tide of time flow'd back with me,

The forward-flowing tide of time;

And many a sheeny summer-morn,
Adown the Tigris I was borne,
By Bagdat's shrines of fretted gold,
High-walled gardens green and old;
True Mussulman was I and sworn,
For it was in the golden prime

Of good Haroun Alraschid.

RECOLLECTIONS OF THE ARABIAN NIGHTS.

II.

Anight my shallop, rustling thro'

The low and bloomed foliage, drove

The fragrant, glistening deeps, and clove
The citron-shadows in the blue :

By garden porches on the brim,

The costly doors flung open wide,
Gold glittering thro' lamplight dim,
And broider'd sofas on each side :

In sooth it was a goodly time,
For it was in the golden prime
Of good Haroun Alraschid.

III.

Often, where clear-stemm'd platans guard

The outlet, did I turn away

The boat-head down a broad canal

From the main river sluiced, where all

The sloping of the moon-lit sward

Was damask-work, and deep inlay

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Nor martyr-flames, nor trenchant swords Can do away that ancient lie;

A gentler death shall Falsehood die,

Shot thro' and thro' with cunning words.

Weak Truth a leaning on her crutch,

Wan, wasted Truth in her utmost need,

Thy kingly intellect shall feed,

And

Until she be an athlete bold,

weary with a finger's touch

Those writhed limbs of lightning speed;

Like that strange angel which of old, Until the breaking of the light, Wrestled with wandering Israel,

Past Yabbok brook the livelong night, And heaven's mazed signs stood still In the dim tract of Penuel.