Races, and fairs, and royal occasions, But it's a woman, old girl, that makes me Found us coming to their call :

Think more kindly of the race ; Now they'll miss us at our stations : And it's a woman, old girl, that shakes me There's a Juggler outjuggles all !

When the Great Juggler I must face. Up goes the lark, as if all were jolly! We two were married, due and legal :

Over the duck-pond the willow shakes. Honest we've liv'd since we've been one. Easy to think that grieving's folly,

Lord ! I could then jump like an eagle : When the hand 's firm as driven stakes ! You danced bright as a bit o' the sun. Ay! when we're strong, and braced, and Birds in a May-bush we were ! right manful,

merry! Life's a sweet fiddle ; but we're a batch All night we kiss'd — we juggled all day.. Born to become the Great Juggler's han’ Joy was the heart of Juggling Jerry! ful:

Now from his old girl he's juggled away. Balls he shies up, and is safe to catch.

It 's past parsons to console us : Here's where the lads of the village cricket; No, nor no doctor fetch for me : I was a lad not wide from here ;

I can die without my bolus ; Couldn't I whip off the bale from the Two of a trade, lass, never agree ! wicket?

Parson and Doctor!- don't they love Like an old world those days appear !

rarely, Donkey, sheep, geese, and thatch'd ale Fighting the devil in other men's fields ! house I know them !

Stand up yourself and match him fairly ; They are old friends of my halts, and Then see how the rascal yields !

seem, Somehow, as if kind thanks I owe them : I, lass, have liv'd no gypsy, flaunting Juggling don't hinder the heart's esteem. Finery while his poor helpmate grubs ;

Coin I've stor'd, and you won't be wanting : Juggling 's no sin, for we must have victual ; You shan't beg from the troughs and tubs.

Nature allows us to bait for the fool. Nobly you've stuck to me, though in his Holding one's own makes us juggle no lit kitchen

Many a Marquis would hail you Cook ! But, to increase it, hard juggling 's the Palaces

you

could have rul’d and grown rich rule.

in, You that are sneering at my profession, But your old Jerry you never forsook.

Have n't you juggled a vast amount ?
There's the Prime Minister, in one Ses Hand

up the chirper ! ripe ale winks in it ; sion,

Let's have comfort and be at peace. Juggles more games than my sins 'll Once a stout draught made me light as a count.

linnet. Cheer

up

! the Lord must have his lease. I've murder'd insects with mock thunder: May be — for none see in that black holConscience, for that, in men don't quail.

low I've made bread from the bump of wonder : It's just a place where we're held in That's my business, and there's my tale.

pawn, Fashion and rank all prais’d the professor ; | And, when the Great Juggler makes us to Ay! and I've had my smile from the swallow, Queen :

It's just the sword-trick

I ain't quite Bravo, Jerry! she meant : God bless her! Ain't this a sermon on that scene ?

Yonder came smells of the gorse, so nutty, I've studied men from my topsy-turvy Gold-like and warm ; it's the prime of Close, and, I reckon, rather true.

May.
Some are fine fellows : some, right scurvy : Better than mortar, brick, and putty,
Most, a dash between the two.

Is God's house on a blowing day.

tle;

gone !

it :

Lean me more up the mound ; now I feel For all to hear and all to know

That he is joy, awake, aglow, All the old heath-smells ! Ain't it The tumult of the heart to hear strange ?

Through pureness filter'd crystal-clear, There's the world laughing, as if to conceal And know the pleasure sprinkled bright it,

By simple singing of delight, But He's by us, juggling the change. Shrill, irreflective, unrestrain'd,

Rapt, ringing, on the jet sustain'd I mind it well, by the sea-beach lying, Without a break, without a fall, Once - it's long gone

when two gulls Sweet-silvery, sheer lyrical, we beheld,

Perennial, quavering up the chord Which, as the moon got up, were flying Like myriad dews of sunny sward Down a big wave that spark'd and That trembling into fulness shine, swell’d.

And sparkle dropping argentine ; Crack ! went a gun: one fell : the second Such wooing as the ear receives Wheel'd round him twice, and was off From zephyr caught in choric leaves for new luck :

Of aspens when their chattering net There in the dark her white wing Is flush'd to white with shivers wet; beckon'd :

And such the water-spirit's chime Drop me a kiss — I'm the bird dead On mountain heights in morning's prime, struck !

Too freshly sweet to seem excess,
Too animate to need a stress ;

But wider over many heads
THE LARK ASCENDING The starry voice ascending spreads,

Awakening, as it waxes thin,
He rises and begins to round,

The best in us to him akin ; He drops the silver chain of sound

And every face to watch him rais'd, Of many links without a break,

Puts on the light of children prais'd, In chirrup, whistle, slur and shake,

So rich our human pleasure ripes All intervolv'd and spreading wide,

When sweetness on sincereness pipes, Like water-dimples down a tide

Though nought be promis'd from the seas, Where ripple ripple overcurls

But only a soft-ruffling breeze And eddy into eddy whirls ;

Sweep glittering on a still content,
A press of hurried notes that run

Serenity in ravishment.
So fleet they scarce are more than one,
Yet changingly the trills repeat

For singing till his heaven fills,
And linger ringing while they fleet,

'T is love of earth that he instils, Sweet to the quick o' the ear, and dear And ever winging up and up, To her beyond the handmaid ear,

Our valley is his golden cup, Who sits beside our inner springs,

And be the wine which overflows Too often dry for this he brings,

To lift us with him as he goes : Which seems the very jet'of earth

The woods and brooks, the sheep and kine At sight of sun, her music's mirth,

He is, the hills, the human line, As up he wings the spiral stair,

The meadows green, the fallows brown, A song of light, and pierces air

The dreams of labor in the town ; With fountain ardor, fountain play,

He sings the sap, the quicken'd veins ; To reach the shining tops of day,

The wedding song of sun and rains And drink in everything discern'd

He is, the dance of children, thanks An ecstasy to music turn’d,

Of sowers, shout of primrose-banks, Impell’d by what his happy bill

And eye of violets while they breathe ; Disperses ; drinking, showering still, All these the circling song will wreathe, Unthinking save that he may give

And you shall hear the herb and tree, His voice the outlet, there to live

The better heart of men shall see, Renewid in endless notes of glee,

Shall feel celestially, as long So thirsty of his voice is he,

As you crave nothing save the song.

I

That little twist of brain would ring a chime

Was never voice of ours could say

Soaring through wider zones that prick'd Our inmost in the sweetest way,

his scars Like yonder voice aloft, and link

With memory of the old revolt from Awe, All hearers in the song they drink :

He reach'd a middle height, and at the Our wisdom speaks from failing blood,

stars, Our passion is too full in flood,

Which are the brain of heaven, he look'd, We want the key of his wild note

and sank. Of truthful in a tuneful throat,

Around the ancient track march'd, rank on The song seraphically free

rank, Of taint of personality,

The army of unalterable law.
So pure that it salutes the suns
The voice of one for millions,
In whom the millions rejoice

THE SPIRIT OF SHAKESPEARE
For giving their one spirit voice.
Yet men bave we, whom we revere,
Now names, and men still housing here, The greatest knew thee, Mother Earth ;
Whose lives, by many a battle-dint

unsour'd Defaced, and grinding wheels on Aint, He knew thy sons.

He prob'd from hell to Yield substance, though they sing not,

hell sweet

Of human passions, but of love deflower'd For song our highest heaven to greet: His wisdom was not, for he knew thee well

. Whom heavenly singing gives us new, Thence came the honey'd corner at his lips, Enspheres them brilliant in our blue, The conquering smile wherein his spirit From firmest base to farthest leap,

sails Because their love of Earth is deep,

Calm as the God who the white sea-wave And they are warriors in accord

whips, With life to serve and pass reward,

Yet full of speech and intershifting tales, So touching purest and so heard

Close mirrors of us : thence had he the In the brain's reflex of yon bird ;

laugh Wherefore their soul in me, or mine,

We feel is thine ; broad as ten thousand Through self-forgetfulness divine,

beeves In them, that song aloft maintains,

At pasture ! thence thy songs, that winnow To fill the sky and thrill the plains

chaff With showerings drawn from human stores,

From grain, bid sick Philosophy's last As he to silence nearer soars,

leaves Extends the world at wings and dome, Whirl, if they have no response — they enMore spacious making more our home,

forced Till lost on his aërial rings

To fatten Earth when from her soul diIn light, and then the fancy sings.

vorced. LUCIFER IN STARLIGHT How smiles he at a generation rank'd On a starr'd night Prince Lucifer uprose,

In gloomy noddings over life! They pass. Tir'd of his dark dominion swung the

Not he to feed upon a breast unthank'd, fiend

Or eye a beauteous face in a crack'd glass. Above the rolling ball in cloud part screen’d,

But he can spy that little twist of brain Where sinners hugg’d their spectre of re

Which mov'd some weighty leader of the

blind, pose. Poor prey to his hot fit of pride were those.

Unwitting 't was the goad of personal pain, And now upon his Western wing he lean’d,

To view in curs’d eclipse our Mother's mind, Now his huge bulk o'er Africa careen'd,

And show us of some rigid harridan
Now the black planet shadow'd Arctic

The wretched bondmen till the end of time.
O liv'd the Master now to paint us Man,

1

!

II

snows.

AT HOME

Christina Georgina tossetti
THE UNSEEN WORLD

Yet if you should forget me for a while
And afterwards remember, do not grieve :
For if the darkness and corruption leave

A vestige of the thoughts that once I When I was dead, my spirit turn’d

had, To seek the much-frequented house : Better by far you should forget and smile I pass'd the door, and saw my friends Than that you should remember and be Feasting beneath green orange-boughs ;

sad.
From hand to hand they push'd the wine,
They suck'd the pulp of plum and peach ;

AFTER DEATH
They sang, they jested, and they laugh’d,
For each was lov'd of each.

The curtains were half drawn, the floor

was swept I listen'd to their honest chat :

And strewn with rushes, rosemary

and

may Said one : “ To-morrow we shall be Lay thick upon the bed on which I lay, Plod plod along the featureless sands, Where through the lattice ivy-shadows And coasting miles and miles of sea."

crept. Said one : “ Before the turn of tide

He lean’d above me, thinking that I slept We will achieve the eyrie-seat.”

And could not hear him ; but I heard him Said one : “To-morrow shall be like

say : To-day, but much more sweet.”

* Poor child, poor child :” and as he turn'd

away “ To-morrow,” said they, strong with hope, Came a deep silence, and I knew he wept.

And dwelt upon the pleasant way : He did not touch the shroud, or raise the “ To-morrow,” cried they, one and all,

fold While no one spoke of yesterday. That hid my face, or take my hand in Their life stood full at blessed noon ;

his, I, only I, had pass'd away :

Or ruffle the smooth pillows for my head: “ To-morrow and to-day,” they cried ; He did not love me living ; but once dead I was of yesterday.

He pitied me ; and very sweet it is

To know he still is warm though I am cold. I shiver'd comfortless, but cast

No chill across the table-cloth ;
I, all forgotten, shiver'd, sad

WIFE TO HUSBAND
To stay, and yet to part how loth :
I pass'd from the familiar
room,

PARDON the faults in me,
I who from love had pass'd away,

For the love of years ago : Like the remembrance of a guest

Good-by.
That tarrieth but a day.

I must drift across the sea,
I must sink into the snow,

I must die.

REMEMBER

REMEMBER me when I am gone away,
Gone far away into the silent land ;
When you can no more hold me by the

hand,
Nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more, day by day,
You tell me of our future that you plann'd :
Only remember me ; you understand
It will be late to counsel then or pray.

You can bask in this sun,
You can drink wine, and eat :

Good-by.
I must gird myself and run,
Though with unready feet :

I must die.

Blank sea to sail upon,
Cold bed to sleep in :

Good-by.