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THE IDLER'S CALENDAR.

WILFRID SCAWEN BLUNT.

I.

APRIL.

TROUT-FISHING.

THIS moming, blow; and presently,

HIS morning, through my window, half awake,

With a tumultuous thrill and then a shake,
The nightingale broke forth in melody.
I rose in haste, and looked at the grey sky,
And read an omen. From its corner next

A book I drew, blest book, where fly on fly
Are all the letters of its well-thumbed text.
I chose my cast, a march-brown and a dun,
And ran down to the river, chasing hope.
At the first throw a mighty trout was on,
A very Samson, fit to burst a rope,
Yet tamed by one sad hank of yielding hair
And fate, the fisherman of king and pope.
Upon the grass he lies, and gasps the air,
Four silver pounds, sublimely fat and fair.

II.

NOVEMBER.

ACROSS COUNTRY.

NOVEMBER'S hertur, at the reverspie,

OVEMBER'S here. Once more the pink we don,

Sit changing pleasant greetings one by one
With friend and neighbour. Half the county's pride
Is here to-day. Squire, parson, peer, bestride
Their stoutest nags, impatient to be gone.

Here, schoolboys on their earliest ponies ride,
And village lads on asses, not out-done.

But hark! That sounds like music. Ay, by God! He's off across the fallow. "No, sirs, no;

Not yet a minute, just another rod !

Then let him have it. Ho, there, tallyho!"
Now that's worth seeing! Look! He's topped the wall,
Leaving his whole field pounded in a row.

A first flight place to-day was worth a fall—
So forward each, and heaven for us all!

FROM THE ARABIC.

WILFRID SCAWEN BLUNT.

I.

THE CAMEL-RIDER.

I.

HERE is no thing in all the world but love,

THER

No jubilant thing of sun or shade worth one sad tear.

Why dost thou ask my lips to fashion songs

Other than this, my song of love to thee?

II.

See where I lie and pluck the thorns of grief,

Dust on my head and fire, as one who mourns his slain.

Are they not slain, my treasures of dear peace ?

This their red burial is, sand heaped on sand.

III.

Here came I in the morning of my joys.

Before the dawn was born, through the dark downs I rode.

The low stars led me on as with a voice,

Stars of the scorpion's tail in the deep south.

IV.

Sighing I came, and scattering wide the sand.

No need had I to urge her speed with hand or heel,

The creature I bestrode. She knew my haste,

And knew the road I sought, the road to thee.

V.

Jangling her bells aloud in wantonness,

And sighing soft, she too, her sighs to my soul's sighs;
Behind us the wind followed thick with scents

Of incense blossoms and the dews of night.

VI.

The thorn trees caught at us with their crook'd hands;
The hills in blackness hemmed us in and hid the road;
The spectres of the desert howled and warned;
I heeded nothing of their words of woe.

VII.

Thus till the dawn I sped in my desire,

Breasting the ridges, slope on slope, till morning broke; And lo! the sun revealed to me no sign,

And lo! the day was widowed of my hope.

VIII.

Where are the tents of pleasure and dear love,

Set in the Vale of Thyme, where winds in Spring are fain?

The highways of the valley, where they stood

Strong in their flocks, are there. But where are they?

IX.

The plain was dumb, as emptied of all voice;
No bleat of herds, no camels roaring far below
Told of their presence in the pastures void,
Of the waste places which had been their homes.

X.

I climbed down from my watch-tower of the rocks, To where the tamarisks grow, and the dwarf palms, alarmed.

I called them with my voice, as the deer calls, Whose young the wolves have hunted from their place.

XI.

I sought them in the foldings of the hill,

In the deep hollows shut with rocks, where no winds blow:

I sought their footstep under the tall cliffs,

Shut from the storms, where the first lambs are born.

XII.

The tamarisk boughs had blossomed in the night, And the white broom which bees had found, the wild

bees' brood.

But no dear signal told me of their life,

No spray was torn in all that world of flowers.

XIII.

Where are the tents of pleasure and dear love,
For which my soul took ease for its delight in Spring,
The black tents of her people beautiful

Beyond the beauty of the sons of kings?

XIV.

The wind of war has swept them from their place, Scattering them wide as quails, whom the hawk's

hate pursues;

The terror of the sword importunate

Was at their backs, nor spared them as they flew.

XV.

The summer wind has passed upon their fields; The rain has purged their hearth-stones, and made smooth their floors;

Low in the valley lie their broken spears,

And the white bones which are their tale forlorn.

XVI.

Where are the sons of Saba in the South,

The men of mirth and pride to whom my songs were sung

The kinsmen of her soul who is my soul,

The brethren of her beauty whom I love?

XVII.

She mounted her tall camel in the waste,

Loading it high for flight with her most precious things

She went forth weeping in the wilderness,

Alone with fear on that far night of ill.

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