"The moon in brightness walk'd the 'fleecy rack,' Walk'd up and down among the starry fires, Heaven's great cathedral was not hung with black Up to its topmost spires!

"But mine own Isis kept a solemn chiming,

A silver Requiescat all night long,

And mine old trees, with all their leaves, were timing The sorrow of the song.

"And through mine angel-haunted aisles of beauty
From grand old organs gush'd a music dim,
Lauds for a champion who had done his duty.
I knew they were for him!”

CHRISTINA GEORGINA ROSSETTI

Born 1830

AMOR MUNDI

"O where are you going with your love-locks flowing, On the west wind blowing along this valley track?" "The down-hill path is easy, come with me an it please ye,

We shall escape the up-hill by never turning back."

So they two went together in glowing August weather, The honey-breathing heather lay to their left and

right;

And dear she was to doat on, her swift feet seemed to float on

The air like soft twin pigeons too sportive to alight.

"Oh, what is that in heaven where grey cloud-flakes

are seven,

Where blackest clouds hang riven just at the rainy skirt?"

"Oh, that's a meteor sent us, a message dumb, por

tentous,

An undeciphered solemn signal of help or hurt."

"Oh, what is that glides quickly where velvet flowers grow thickly,

Their scent comes rich and sickly?" "A scaled and hooded worm."

"Oh, what's that in the hollow, so pale I quake to follow ?"

"Oh, that's a thin dead body which waits the eternal

term."

"Turn again, O my sweetest,-turn again, false and fleetest :

This beaten way thou beatest, I fear is hell's own

track."

"Nay, too steep for hill mounting; nay, too late for cost counting:

This down-hill path is easy, but there's no turning back."

UP-HILL

Does the road wind up-hill all the way?

Yes, to the very end.

Will the day's journey take the whole long day? From morn to night, my friend.

But is there for the night a resting-place?
A roof for when the slow dark hours begin.
May not the darkness hide it from my face?
You cannot miss that inn.

Shall I meet other wayfarers at night?
Those who have gone before.

Then must I knock, or call when just in sight?
They will not keep you standing at the door.

Shall I find comfort, travel-sore and weak?
Of labour you shall find the sum.

Will there be beds for me and all who seek?
Yea, beds for all who come.

SONG

When I am dead, my dearest,

Sing no sad songs for me; Plant thou no roses at my head, No shady cypress tree: Be the green grass above me With showers and dewdrops wet; And if thou wilt, remember,

And if thou wilt, forget.

I shall not see the shadows,
I shall not feel the rain;
I shall not hear the nightingale
Sing on, as if in pain:

And dreaming through the twilight

That doth not rise nor set,

Haply I may remember,

And haply may forget.