Lay him low, lay him low,
In the clover or the snow!
What cares he? he cannot know:
Lay him low!
As man may, he fought his fight,
Proved his truth by his endeavor;
Let him sleep in solemn night,
Sleep, forever and forever.
Lay him low, lay him low,
In the clover or the snow!
What cares he? he cannot know:
Lay him low!
Fold him in his country's stars,
Roll the druin and fire the volley!
What to him are all our wars,
What but death, bemocking folly?
Lay him low, lay him low,
In the clover or the snow!
What cares he? he cannot know:
Lay him low!
Leave him to God's watching eye,
Trust him to the hand that made him. Mortal love weeps idly by:
God alone has power to aid him.
Lay him low, lay him low,
In the clover or the snow!
What cares he? he cannot know:
Lay him low!
THE AWAKING OF THE POETICAL FACULTY.
ALL day I heard a humming in my ears,
A buzz of many voices, and a throng
Of swarming numbers, passing with a song
Measured and stately as the rolling spheres'.
I saw the sudden light of lifted spears,
Slanted at once against some monster wrong;
And then a fluttering scarf which might belong
To some sweet maiden in her morn of years.
I felt the chilling damp of sunless glades,
Horrid with gloom; anon, the breath of May Was blown around me, and the lulling play Of dripping fountains. Yet the lights and shades, The waving scarfs, the battle's grand parades, Seemed but vague shadows of that wondrous
How canst thou call my modest love impure,
Being thyself the holy source of all?
Can ugly darkness from the fair sun fall?
Or nature's compact be so insecure,
That saucy weeds may sprout up and endure
Where gentle flowers were sown? The brooks
that crawl,
With lazy whispers, through the lilies tall,
Or rattle o'er the pebbles, will allure
With no feigned sweetness, if their fount be sweet. So thou, the sun whence all my light doth flowThou, sovereign law by which my fancies grow Thou, fount of every feeling, slow or fleet
Against thyself wouldst aim a treacherous blow, Slaying thy honor with thy own conceit.
WHY shall I chide the hand of wilful Time
When he assaults thy wondrous store of charms?
Why charge the graybeard with a wanton crime?
Or strive to daunt him with my shrill alarms?
Or seek to lull him with a silly rhyme:
So he, forgetful, pause upon his arms,
And leave thy beauties in their noble prime,
The sole survivors of his grievous harms?
Alas! my love, though I'll indeed bemoan
The fatal ruin of thy majesty,
Yet I'll remember that to Time alone
I owed thy birth, thy charms' maturity,
Thy crowning love, with which he vested me,
Nor can reclaim, though all the rest be flown.
"I HAVE BEEN MOUNTED ON LIFE'S TOPMOST WAVE."
I HAVE been mounted on life's topmost wave,
Until my forehead kissed the dazzling cloud;
I have been dashed beneath the murky shroud
That yawns between the watery crests. I rave,
Sometimes, liked cursed Orestes; sometimes lave
My limbs in dews of asphodel; or, bowed
With torrid heat, I moan to heaven aloud,
Or shrink with winter in his icy cave.
Now peace broods over me; now savage rage
Spurns me across the world. Nor am I free
From nightly visions, when the pictured page
Of sleep unfolds its varied leaves to me,
Changing as often as the mimic stage;-
And all this, lady, through my love for thee!
WILLIAM JAMES LINTON.
WILLIAM JAMES LINTON, the poet and
artist, was born in London, England, in 1812. He is an artist of no mean ability, is well known as an engraver, and is a recognized authority on history of wood engraving. He has been connected with a number of illustrated journals, among others the Illustrated London News. He was one of the founders of the London Leader (1851), and was a manager of Pen and Pencil (1855). He removed to New York in 1867; but subsequently founded a large engraving establishment in New Haven, Conn., which is his present address. He frequently visits England, and many of his works are brought out in that country.
In 1858 Mr. Linton married Eliza Lynn, who has since become a well-known and successful novelist.
His literary work includes the "History of Wood Engraving," with illustrations by himself; "Claribel, and other Poems" (London, 1865); "The Flower and the Star" (Boston, 1878), illustrated; "Some Practical Hints on Wood Engraving" (1879); "A Manual of Wood Engraving" (1887); "Poems and Translations" (1889); and a number of poetical works privately printed. He has edited "Rare Poems of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (1882); and, with R. H. Stoddard, "English Verse" (5 vols., 1883).
As a poet Mr. Linton has a vigorous command of language, and exquisite fancy. He has not received the recognition due his genius.
HARRY MARTEN'S DUNGEON THOUGHTS.
THOU flowest, Stream! beside old Chepstow's walls,
Hence to the Severn, and the Severn falls
To the wide ocean. I have ceased to flow.
And yet thou listenest to the stagnant Woe
That overhangs thy banks, like some vain weed
Rooted in Chepstow's hoariness. Indeed,-
Save that the veriest weed its hope may fling
Upon the winds, there, as on certain wing,
Borne to the mainland,-I but weed-like seem.
And yet my memory loves to watch the dream Of Harry Marten's triumphs,-those brave days When Vane outshone me with his steady rays, When gravest Milton scorn'd not Harry's wit, And fierce-will'd Cromwell had some heed of it; When we stood in the breach against the world, And from his folly's wall the Stuart hurl'd
Into the tide of ruin. By this tower,
If all those glorious days were in my power,
I would not reconsider them again,
But shout my battle-song to the same high strain,
Take the same odds, the same gay, daring strife,
And the same forfeit of a prison'd life,
Past even the natural riddance of the grave.
Not for himself, O Freedom! would thy knave
Ask some poor wages. Let my life be shent,
And this worn tomb be all my monument.
Dear Freedom! have we vainly toil'd for thee?
Our Rachel lost-and our apprentice fee
This Leah, the evil-favor'd. Shall I laugh,
Write on her lips my jesting epitaph,
And hug Misfortune for another term?
Alas! if hope might set the slowest germ
In these old chinks. But England's soil is dead
As Chepstow stones. The blue sky overhead
Is all the prisoner's hope in these wall'd years.
I need not wet this dungeon-mould with tears:
I will not tame my spirit to its cage;
As little would I stoop me to assuage
Captivity with foolish querulousness.
And yet my courage mourneth none the less
Our ruin'd cause, and that nor sword nor voice
Of mine may lead the time to worthier choice:
While I rest here like a forgotten blade,
And Scot and Vane in bloody tombs are laid.
And yet, not so, friend Scot!-thy better doom,
To wait by God until new chance may bloom
Out of the barren land men call thy grave,—
That England which thy virtues could not save,
Nor pious Vane lift heavenward from the slough.
For me, hard penance but atoneth now
My many a youthful folly: though the worst
Left me a patriot. Wassails quench'd no thirst
For the full cup of England's liberty.
I never squandered my great love for thee;
And though men call'd me loose of life and speech,
There was no public act they could impeach;
And my loose tongue was first which dared to say,
What hinderance 't was stood in the nation's way.
Or loose or not, it wagg'd to no ill tune
Nor out of time. Troth, I'll forswear no boon
Of this frank life; and now, in living grave,
Am thankful that I had. And that I have:
While memory traces back the flow of mirth,
From here where it is driven under earth-
As if the Wye had dived 'neath Chepstow's base.
God give the stream some outlet, of his grace!—
There is some reach of joy in looking back
On the lost river's current. I can track
Its merry, laughing gush among the reeds,
And how its ripplings lipp'd the blossomy weeds
In shallow passages; its songful strife
Swift bounding o'er the rocks of active life;
And see again the glorious forms whose worth
Its sometime deeper water imaged forth.
No idle image was reflected there:
Not in the stream, but on the rock, I bear
The impress of the gods who stood by me.
Nor was I all unmeriting to be
Their chosen companion. Arrows may hang loose: The bowman yet be staunch and mind their use.
My England! never one of all thy brave
Whose love o'erpass'd my love. I could be grave,
Whene'er thy need required a solem brow.
What was my task? To give thee room to grow:
To give thee sober freedom, godly growth,-
Freedom and sanctifying worship, both.
Milton and Vane and Scot and I, at one,
Were in this work. And I am here, alone.
And Milton in his darkness-if he lives.
O English hearts! are ye but Danaid sieves,
Where-through, like water, noblest blood is pour'd?
O English sense! what is this word Restored?
Restore Heroic Virtue, Holy Strength,
Now, Agonistes-like, through all the length
Of this great England prostrate! Gyved you lie,
Mock'd at by Dalila, your Royalty.
I set this dungeon-gloom against the May
Of all your Restoration. I will say,
Against it. I, a pleasure-loving man,
Place every pleasure under honor's ban,
And bid you give your country life, and death,
Rather than foul the land with slavish breath.
Am I a prisoner? Difference between
Chepstow and England is not much, I ween.
'T is but a cell a few more paces wide.
Year after year; and under Chepstow's side
The muddied Wye still flows. My hair is grey;
My old bones cramp'd; my heart, this many a day,
O'er-moss'd with sorrow, like an ancient tomb.
Now the old man is harmless, he may roam
So far as falls the shadow of his jail.
Jail'd for his life. I have not learn'd to quail.
Thou askest me-"Were it to do again?"
I tell thee-Yes! the tyrant should be slain.
Scot's word is mine: "Not only was my hand
But my heart in it." Here I take my stand;
Nor twenty years of solitude can move
My conscience from its keep. And so this love,
Your pity proffer'd me, must be withdrawn?
Well, Harry Marten never cared to fawn.
I am alone again, on my grave's edge.
And my long-suffering shall be as a wedge
To rive this tyranny. I climb thy height,
Old feudal fastness! with my feeble might;
And see from thee, for all my age is dim,
The beautiful rich woods beyond the rim
Of Wye and Severn, and the meadows fair
Stretching into the distance; and the air
Is charged with fragrance; and the uncaged birds
Say blithely in the sun their liberal words,
Which yet shall wake the tillers of the ground.
And, lo! the harvestmen are gathering round
The banner of God. They put their sickles in;
The day of a new trial doth begin.
Thou saidst aright, my Vane! it had to be.
Nor jail nor scaffold stays futurity.
The twenty years have pass'd even as a mist;
And now the dying prisoner's brow is kiss'd
By his old comrades: Hampden, Pym, and Vane,
Fairfax, and Scot, and Ludlow, Cromwell fain
To hide old scars and holding Milton's hand,
Bradshaw and Ireton. At my side they stand,
And the old cheerful smile illumes my cell.
"There is no death nor bondage: we, who dwell
In higher realms of faith, assure thee this."-
Friends! ye say sooth; this cell no longer is
A prison; England only is my bound,
This coward England all unworthy found.
Still you can smile.-"The resurrection morn
Riseth o'er England's grave; and we, forlorn,
Shall be triumphant. Look thou forth and see
Our merry England, kingless, bold and free.
We have not lived, we have not died, for nought.
The victory we have lost shall yet be wrought:
We have not sown high deeds and hopes in vain."
Bright lightning-flash of death! speed through my brain,
And sink into the grave my sacrifice:
A grave unhonor'd until England rise
To avenge the Regicide-
O Martyr Tomb!
Thou bear'st the seed of Triumph in thy womb.
WHY hath God led thy noble beauty hither?
To lay upon my heart a gather'd flower,
Through the brief time of passion; then to wither,
And drop away upon my coffin'd hour?
Is human life nought but a lusty living,
A day of pleasure nighted by the grave,
With no hereafter dawning, no forgiving
Of all the eternal hopes our spirits crave?
Is love the mere lamp of a wanton chamber,
Whose walls are grave-stones, ne'er so finely hid?
Is all the height where Love and Hope can clamber,
Alas! no higher than our coffin-lid?
Is Love a fool for all its future-yearning?
Wise only in the drunkenness of bliss?
Is there no flame divine within us burning?
Is hope betray'd so cheaply with a kiss?
Why hath God led thy noble beauty hither?
Why doth celestial light inform thine eyes?
Is it to guide the lone wayfarer? Whither?
The Star of the East hangs not o'er Paradise.
Some girl with delicate skin and golden tresses, And eyes that float in their voluptuous light, Holding her boy-adorer in the jesses
Of her caprice, staying his spirit's flight,
Smoothing his folded pinions with light fingers,
Kissing his vigor to a pleasant swoon,
Until the God sunk in the Dreamer lingers
Fondly beside her for the frailest boon.
Is this the highest end of all thy beauty?
O noble woman? art thou but a girl?
Hast thou no thought of all the scope of duty?
No aim beyond the fingering of a curl?
Why hath God made thee beautiful and loving?
Only to bear the bacchanal cup of life?
Cup-bearing Hebe! seek thou Jove's approving:
O Beauty! be thou Strength's diviner wife.
I AM Achilles. Thou wast hither brought
To be my wife; not for a sacrifice.
Greece and her kings may stand aside as nought
To what thou art in my expectant eyes.
Or kings or gods: I, too, am heaven-born.
I trample on their auguries and needs.
Where the foreboding dares to front my scorn,
Or break the promise from my heart proceeds?
But thou, Belovéd! smilest down my wrath So able to protect thee. Who should harm Achilles' Bride?-Thou pointest to the path Of sacrifice, yet leaning on my arm.
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