And here's to thane and yeoman,

Drink, lads, drink!

To horseman and to bowman,

Clink, jugs, clink !

To lofty and to low man,
Who bears a grudge to no man,
But flinches from no foeman,
Drink, lads, drink!

MARIAN

PASSING feet pause, as they pass,
By this little slab of slate.
People, if they go this way,

By the linchen'd wicket gate,
At each other look and say,
"Pity, pity! sad it was!

Here have fallen as many tears
As the months in her short years.

Seven and ten brief sunny springs;
Scarce so many winter snows:
Here the little speedwell keeps

Watch beside the pale dog-rose; On this hillock, while she sleeps Underneath, the red-breast sings. Wedded on an April day! In the Autumn laid away!

And dusk and golden hair,

And lips that broke in kisses long ago,
Like sun-kiss'd flowers, are there;
And warm fire-side, and sunny orchard wall,
And river-brink and bower,

And wood and hill, and morning and dayfall,

And every place and hour!

And each on each a white unclouded brow Still as a sister bends,

As they would say, "love makes us kindred now,

Who sometime were his friends."

BY THE SALPÉTRIÈRE

I SAW a poor old woman on the bench
That you may find by the Salpétrière.
The yellow leaves were falling, and the
wind

Gave hint of bitter days to come ere long.
And yet the sun was bright: and as I knew
A little sun, with the Parisiennes,

Means light of heart, I could not but demand

"Why, now, so near to weeping, citizen?" She look'd up at me with vague surprise, And said, "You see I'm old; I'm very

old:

And from their lips a stream

Of tender words flows, smooth as any brook, And softer than a dream:

And, one by one, holding my hands, they say
Things of the years agone;

And each head will a little turn away,
And each one still sigh on ;

This winter will be hard. And we have

here,

We poor old women in this hospital,

A mortal dread of one strange bitter thing.
We would be buried in a coffin, we;
For each her own. It is not much you

crave,

Who 've striven ninety years, and come to this,

And we would have the priest to say a prayer To the good God for us, within the church, Before we go the way that go we must. And sou by sou we save a coffin costs, You hear, Sir? - sixteen francs; and if

we go

To church en route, 't is six francs for the priest.

There's some of us have sav'd it all, and smile,

With the receipt sew'd up, lest they should lose

This passport to the grave of honest folk.
But one may die before; and then there is
One coffin for us all, and we are borne
To our last place, and slipp'd within the
grave,

And back they take the coffin for the next.
And if you 've sixteen francs, and not the six,
No church, but just a sprinkle with the brush,
And half a prayer, and you must take your

chance.

Good God! and I shall die: I know I shall : I feel it here! and I have ten francs just : No more!" My tears fell like a shower of rain.

I said, "Old woman, here's the other twelve;"

And fled, with great strides, like a man possess'd.

A VISION OF CHILDREN

I DREAM'D I saw a little brook Run rippling down the Strand; With cherry-trees and apple-trees Abloom on either hand :

The sparrows gather'd from the Squares, Upon the branches green;

The pigeons flock'd from Palace-Yard, Afresh their wings to preen;

And children down St. Martin's Lane, And out of Westminster,

Came trooping, many a thousand strong, With a bewilder'd air.

They hugg'd each other round the neck And titter'd for delight,

To see the yellow daffodils,

And see the daisies white;
They roll'd upon the grassy slopes,
And drank the water clear,
While 'busses the Embankment took,
Asham'd to pass anear;

And sandwich-men stood still aghast,
And costermongers smil'd;
And the policeman on his beat
Pass'd, weeping like a child.

POETA NASCITUR

THE flame-wing'd seraph spake a word To one of Galilee :

"Be not afraid: know, of the Lord Is that is born of thee."

And by the poet's bliss and woe Learn we the will of Heaven: He is God's instrument; and so

Swords in his heart are seven.

He is God's oracle and slave,
As once the priestesses;
His griefs in keeping we should have,
To heal, or make them less.

ODE TO MOTHER CAREY'S CHICKEN

(ON SEEING A STORM-PETREL IN A CAGE ON A COTTAGE WALL AND RELEASING IT)

GAZE not at me, my poor unhappy bird; That sorrow is more than human in thine eye;

Too deep already is my spirit stirr'd

To see thee here, child of the sea and sky,

Coop'd in a cage with food thou canst not eat, Thy "snow-flake" soil'd, and soil'd those conquering feet

That walk'd the billows, while thy "sweetsweet-sweet"

Proclaim'd the tempest nigh.

Bird whom I welcom'd while the sailors curs'd,

Friend whom I bless'd wherever keels may roam,

Prince of my childish dreams, whom mermaids nurs'd

In purple of billows silver of oceanfoam,

Abash'd I stand before the mighty grief That quells all other: Sorrow's king and chief:

'To ride the wind and hold the sea in fief, Then find a cage for home!

From out thy jail thou seest yon heath and woods,

But canst thou hear the birds or smell the flowers?

Ah, no! those rain-drops twinkling on the buds

Bring only visions of the salt sea-showers. "The sea!" the linnets pipe from hedge and heath;

"The sea!" the honeysuckles whisper and breathe;

And tumbling waves, where those wild-roses wreathe,

Murmur from inland bowers.

To thee yon swallow seems a wheeling tern. And when the rain recalls the briny lash Old Ocean's kiss thou lovest, - when thy sight

Is mock'd with Ocean's horses- manes of white,

The long and shadowy flanks, the shoulders bright

Bright as the lightning's flash,—

When all these scents of heather and brier and whin,

All kindly breaths of land-shrub, flower, and vine,

Recall the sea-scents, till thy feather'd skin
Tingles in answer to a dream of brine,
When thou, remembering there thy royal
birth,

Dost see between the bars a world of dearth,
Is there a grief-a grief on all the earth
So heavy and dark as thine?

But I can buy thy freedom-I (thank
God !),

Who lov'd thee more than albatross or gull,

A restless lore like that the billows teach; For on these sonnet-waves my soul would reach

From its own depths, and rest within you, dear,

As, through the billowy voices yearning here, Great nature strives to find a human speech. A sonnet is a wave of melody:

From heaving waters of the impassion'd soul

A billow of tidal music one and whole
Flows in the "octave ;" then returning free,
Its ebbing surges in the "sestet" roll
Back to the deeps of Life's tumultuous sea.