Till the fire-light laughs and passes
"Twixt the tankards and the glasses,
Touching with responsive graces
All those grave Batavian faces,-
Making bland and beatific
All that session soporific.

Then I come and write beneath,
BOUGHTON, he deserves the wreath;
He can give us form and hue-
This the Muse can never do!

TO A PASTORAL POET

TO A PASTORAL POET

(H. E. B.)

AMONG my best I put your Book

O Poet of the breeze and brook! (That breeze and brook which blows and falls More soft to those in city walls)

Among my best: and keep it still

Till down the fair grass-girdled hill,
Where slopes my garden-slip, there goes
The wandering wind that wakes the rose,
And scares the cohort that explore
The broad-faced sun-flower o'er and o'er,
Or starts the restless bees that fret
The bindweed and the mignonette.

Then I shall take your Book, and dream
I lie beside some haunted stream;
And watch the crisping waves that pass,
And watch the flicker in the grass;
And wait-and wait-and wait to see
The Nymph . . . that never comes to me!

TO ONE WHO BIDS ME SING

"The straw is too old to make pipes of."

-DON QUIXOTE

You ask a "many-winter'd" Bard

Where hides his old vocation?
I'll give the answer is not hard—
A classic explanation.

"Immortal" though he be, he still,
Tithonus-like, grows older,
While she, his Muse of Pindus Hill,
Still bares a youthful shoulder.

Could that too-sprightly Nymph but leave Her ageless grace and beauty,

They might, betwixt them both, achieve A hymn de Senectute;

But She She can't grow gray; and so, Her slave, whose hairs are falling, Must e'en his Doric flute forego,

And seek some graver calling,

Not ill-content to stand aside,
To yield to minstrels fitter
His singing-robes, his singing-pride,
His fancies sweet-and bitter!

"SAT EST SCRIPSISSE"

"SAT EST SCRIPSISSE"

(TO E. G., WITH A COLLECTION OF ESSAYS)

WHEN

WHEN You and I have wandered beyond the reach of call,

And all our Works immortal lie scattered on the

Stall,

It may be some new Reader, in that remoter

age,

Will find the present Volume and listless turn the page.

For him I speak these verses. And, Sir (I say to him),

This Book you see before you,-this masterpiece of Whim,

Of Wisdom, Learning, Fancy (if you will, please, attend),

Was written by its Author, who gave it to his Friend.

For they had worked together,-been Comrades of the Pen;

They had their points at issue, they differed now

and then;

But both loved Song and Letters, and each had close at heart

The hopes, the aspirations, the "dear delays" of Art.

And much they talked of Measures, and more they talked of Style,

Of Form and "lucid Order," of "labour of the File:"

And he who wrote the writing, as sheet by sheet was penned

(This all was long ago, Sir !), would read it to his Friend.

They knew not, nor cared greatly, if they were spark or star;

They knew to move is somewhat, although the goal be far;

And larger light or lesser, this thing at least is

clear,

They served the Muses truly,-their service was sincere.

This tattered page you see, Sir, this page alone remains

(Yes,-fourpence is the lowest !) of all those pleasant pains;

And as for him that read it, and as for him that

wrote,

No Golden Book enrolls them among its "Names

of Note."