Bonfr A 1J 
 
 _ 
 
 CopigM?_ 
 
 COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT, 
 
Of this Book there were printed 
 Fifteen Hundred Copies. This is 
 Number C(r */ 
 
r. 
 
TUSCANY 
 
 AND OTHER POEMS 
 
 BY 
 
 ROWLAND B. MAHANY 
 
 Why were they proud ? Because 
 
 red-lin'd accounts 
 Were richer than the songs of 
 
 Grecian years ? 
 
 — Keats' "Isabella." 
 
 1909 
 
 UNION AND TIMES PRESS 
 
 BUFFALO 
 
SEP 
 
 Copyright, 1909 
 By WILLIAM A. KING 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Tuscany i 
 
 Altesse 3 
 
 To the Wind Flower 4 
 
 Bashful Chloe 5 
 
 The Ferry 6 
 
 Love Conqueror 7 
 
 Memory and Hope 8 
 
 Song io 
 
 Ione io 
 
 Near Art Thou, My Beloved 1 1 
 
 All in All n 
 
 Gettysburg 12 
 
 To a Loved One 15 
 
 Nepenthe 16 
 
 Gethsemane 16 
 
 My Mother's Hand 17 
 
 In Lands of Afternoon 18 
 
 A Sigh 19 
 
 On a Photograph 20 
 
 To a Friend 20 
 
 To a Fishergirl 21 
 
 Like Art Thou to a Flower 21 
 
 A Fragment from ^Eschylus 22 
 
 Love's Palace 24 
 
 Easter Anthem 25 
 
 Love Imprisoned 27 
 
 The Charms of Rural Life 28 
 
 To Milton's Daughters 30 
 
 The Gates of Dreams 31 
 
 vii 
 
PAGE 
 
 A Salutation 31 
 
 Fifty Lines from Homer 32 
 
 To One Dreading Old Age 34 
 
 The Wish 35 
 
 In Tempers Vale 35 
 
 Palm Sunday 36 
 
 My Purchase 36 
 
 Joseph O'Connor 37 
 
 Chimborazo 37 
 
 In Arcady 38 
 
 To a Lady 39 
 
 Goddesses 40 
 
 To an Easter Violet 40 
 
 To a Flower 41 
 
 When Herrick Sang 41 
 
 Friends After-wise 42 
 
 Wellington 43 
 
 Lexington 44 
 
 Fate's Enmity 44 
 
 Deception 45 
 
 The Mirth of the Gods 45 
 
 To a Lily of the Valley 45 
 
 The Lonesome Valley 46 
 
 ozymandias 48 
 
 My Heart Will Know 49 
 
 On a Portrait of a Maid 49 
 
 The Voyagers 49 
 
 Rt. Rev. Stephen Vincent Ryan 50 
 
 Birthday Greeting to a Young Girl 51 
 
 Sweetly Laughing Lalage 52 
 
 The Sanity of Genius 52 
 
 James G. Blaine 53 
 
 General Gordon 53 
 
 Joy and Pain 54 
 
PAGE 
 
 When Love Dies 54 
 
 The Critics of Bonaparte 55 
 
 The Roseleaf and the Rock 56 
 
 To One Who Loves Italy 57 
 
 Serenity 57 
 
 La Belle Bretonne 58 
 
 On a Silhouette 58 
 
 To Her in Dreamless Slumber 58 
 
 La Fiorentina 59 
 
 The Rose of Love 59 
 
 Aux Heros Sans Gloire 60 
 
 The Choice 61 
 
 The Sovereign Love 61 
 
 Two Epitaphs 62 
 
 James N. Johnston 63 
 
 Rudolph W. Wolffsohn 63 
 
 A Vision in a Dream 64 
 
 Youth and Glory 64 
 
 Isabel 65 
 
 Roma Antiqua 66 
 
 "My Love of Olden Time*' 67 
 
 When We Shall Part 67 
 
 The Return 68 
 
 To an Empress 68 
 
 Love to Love 69 
 
 Mors Haud Molesta 69 
 
 Rose of the World 69 
 
 The Poets 70 
 
 Sin's Son and Azrael 70 
 
 To Father Cronin 71 
 
 A Dear Woman 71 
 
 Io Triumphe 72 
 
 William A. King 72 
 
 Keats 73 
 
PAGE 
 
 HARVARD MEMORIES: 
 
 To Harvard College yy 
 
 Charles F. Dunbar yy 
 
 On a Banquet Card 78 
 
 John J. Hayes 78 
 
 George Martin Lane 79 
 
 Ephraim Emerton 79 
 
 Freeman Snow 80 
 
 Silas Marcus Macvane 80 
 
 Charles Pomeroy Parker 81 
 
 Nathaniel Southgate Shaler 81 
 
 Le Baron Russell Briggs 82 
 
o 
 
 Tuscany 
 
 smiling land of Tuscany, 
 I would but do thee wrong, 
 To breathe thy matchless witchery 
 With my imperfect song. 
 
 But, Italy, thy memories, 
 
 They lure the heart of me; 
 Land fairest of all lands that are, — 
 
 Thou of the Tyrrhene Sea ! 
 
 Yea, Rome is old, Bologna wise, 
 
 And Venice is divine, 
 While Naples and her Capri are 
 
 Beyond the speech of mine. 
 
 And many a longing dream of yore, 
 
 My heart with rapture thrills, 
 For that dear day when last I saw 
 
 The Euganean hills. 
 
 But loveliest of thy lovely realms, 
 
 Etruria the Serene, 
 Is of thy mountains and thy vales 
 
 The glory and the queen. 
 
 Where Dante thought and Browning dreamed, 
 
 On the Old Bridge I stand, 
 And see again where Cosmo rode, 
 
 And great Lorenzo planned. 
 
And she who in the olden days 
 Taught these fair tales to me, — 
 
 Would that my mother might be here 
 To keep me company. 
 
 Or she, the soul of gentleness, 
 
 The idol of my youth, — 
 Not wholly gone ! For I have still 
 
 The memory of their truth. 
 
 Yon gleams the pride of Tuscany, 
 
 The loved, historic tower, 
 That from her Florence soars as from 
 
 The calyx of a flower. 
 
 And all her hills are golden 
 With the rays of old romance, 
 
 Her moonlight silvers Arno's vales 
 Through all their wide expanse. 
 
 O land of beauty, land of love, 
 
 Of laughter and of wine, 
 Where every dream is all of art, 
 
 And all of art divine ! 
 
 For, Tuscany, thy cities each 
 
 Hath glory of her own ; 
 It is the glory of them all 
 
 That each can charm alone. 
 
 Arezzo the alluring, 
 
 And Lucca rightly proud, 
 Volterra of the Lordly Gate 
 
 Through which the centuries crowd. 
 
Livorno dear! Siena sweet! 
 
 Carrara, loved of Art! 
 These and thy peoples help to make 
 
 Of thee a land apart. 
 
 I love them all ! I love them each, — 
 
 Pistoja's golden plain ; 
 And Pisa's Leaning Wonder, 
 
 Where her river seeks the main. 
 
 O Tuscany, O Tuscany, 
 A thousand healths to thee, 
 
 The fairest of the Fairylands 
 That gem the Azure Sea ! 
 
 Altesse 
 
 Thou of magnolia blooms, 
 
 I love thee still; 
 And though the years stretch on, 
 
 Of good or ill, 
 Thou and thy loveliness 
 
 My vision fill. 
 
 Princess, what more of life 
 
 Is there than this? 
 Where find a higher heaven 
 
 Than thy love's bliss, 
 Or just to have the memory 
 
 Of thy kiss ? 
 
To the Wind Flower 
 
 Sweet, winsome flower, that decks the wold 
 Despite the snowdrift's chilling cold, 
 Dost thou to March's kiss unfold 
 
 Thy petals pure? 
 Or hast thou wakened at the song 
 The red-breast trills, as, bold and strong, 
 Through early groves he wings along, 
 
 Of summer sure? 
 
 Nay, soft as is thy perfume thrown, 
 
 So is thy mystic coming known ; 
 
 Thou bloomest when the winds have blown, 
 
 A beauteous thing! 
 That we may know when storms are rife, 
 And tawdry joys fade in their strife, 
 The sweetest flowers of human life 
 
 From trouble spring. 
 
 Thus thou within this tangled dell, 
 Where wildling, woodsy spirits dwell, 
 Hast cast the magic of thy spell 
 
 O'er all the scene; 
 Like some fair maid with face demure, 
 Yet witching glance from eye-depths pure, 
 Whose every aspect doth allure 
 
 With grace serene. 
 
 Sure blest, sweet flower, is lot of thine, • 
 And doubly blest compared with mine ; 
 Thou seest content each sun decline, 
 Nor askest why ; 
 
I dumbly watch youth's rosy years, 
 As each, 'twixt meteor hopes and fears, 
 Trembles and fades and disappears 
 In leaden sky. 
 
 But e'en upon thy tender leaf, 
 I spy a dew-drop tear of grief ; — 
 Would human sorrows were as brief, 
 
 And, ah, as few! 
 Yet oft what seemeth gruesome ill, 
 Is but the dew our souls distill , 
 To keep us sweet, against our will, 
 
 And fair to view. 
 
 Bashful Chloe 
 
 (Horace, Od. I, 23.) 
 
 You shun me, Chloe, like a fawn 
 That seeks its gentle mother's side, 
 
 Timid on pathless mountain lawn, 
 Lest breeze or brake may ill betide. 
 
 For if the coming of the spring 
 With rustling life awake the trees, 
 
 If lizard move, — a startled thing 
 She trembles in her heart and knees. 
 
 I seek you not, — like tiger wild 
 Or Afric lion, — to destroy! 
 
 Cease, then, to be a timorous child, 
 And be your lover's blushing joy! 
 
The Ferry 
 
 (Uhland's "Auf der UberfahrL") 
 
 O'er this stream in days of yore, 
 I was ferried once before ; 
 Here the castle sunlit glows, 
 Yon the weir, still rushing, flows. 
 
 And within this wherry's bound, 
 Comrades twain were with me found; 
 One a friend, more like a sire, 
 And a youth with hopes like fire. 
 
 One in peace wrought here below, 
 And in peace departed so ; 
 But that eager, restless form 
 Fell in battle and in storm. 
 
 Ah, if to the days long fled' — 
 Happier hours — my thoughts be led, 
 Then I ever yearn to see 
 Those dear friends death reft from me. 
 
 Yet what keeps all friendship whole, 
 Is when soul communes with soul; 
 Soulful were the hours we passed, 
 Soulful ties still bind me fast. 
 
 Take, oh boatman, thrice thy fee, 
 And with joy I give it thee ; 
 For two friends aforetime lost 
 Have with me in spirit crossed. 
 
Love Conqueror 
 
 Twain souls came to the loveless mead of Hell, 
 Wherein no flower of beauty e'er had bloomed, 
 And whose reed shores by Acheron were laved ; 
 Nor ever sun shone in that midnight land, 
 But sable darkness dwelt, and a wind blew 
 Like snow-drowned bay of Alpine Bernard's 
 
 hounds, 
 Or wail of the primeval forest drear 
 Swept by mysterious and voiceful storms 
 Whose birth men ken not of ; and all was woe, 
 A woe walled in by black infinitude. 
 And they who loved aforetime here were met, — 
 Who loved, yet of their mighty love were dumb, 
 Who let love's torch lie smoking in the dust, 
 Nor lit life's light from that ambrosial flame. 
 So joy's soft splendor faded from their days, 
 As dies away Aurora's rosy glance 
 In the dim depths of ancient Tithon's orbs. 
 But on this shore of sorrow now they stood 
 With face a-cold that knew each other not, 
 Till their eyes met that ever yearned for love; 
 And, lo ! the frozen winter of their looks, 
 Broke into orient dawns of joy supreme, 
 And that sweet song, unsung in days of yore, 
 Leaped to the music of a hope fulfilled, 
 And in that hour Love changed their Hell to 
 
 Heaven ! 
 
Memory and Hope 
 
 i. 
 
 O Memory set for himself a course ! 
 Fond Memory of a golden past, 
 When youth in joyous lines was cast, 
 When life was young 
 And woodlands rung 
 With that sweet song which Nature sung, 
 
 In those fair days of yore. 
 And Memory entered into the race 
 To win, at a bound, high honor's place, 
 Yet ever he backward turned his face 
 
 To the past's Elysian shore ; 
 So he saw but the toil-worn, uncrowned throng 
 In the eager race that swept along, 
 
 Nor ever his eyes beheld 
 The host of the crowned whose goal was won, 
 Whose feet were swift till the race was done, 
 
 By Victory's voice impelled. 
 Then dark on his soul a shadow fell, 
 And under the potence of that spell, 
 To his wearied mind 
 Life seemed unkind, 
 And he fain would think of the long ago, 
 But the race pressed on in its fiery glow, 
 And waited not for the fleet or slow, 
 And he was left behind' — 
 His course was o'er 
 Forevermore ! 
 
II. 
 
 O eager Hope went into the world! 
 Bright Hope, of form and feature fair, 
 With orient eyes and sun-swept hair, 
 And heart of fire 
 Wherein desire 
 Of his high aim could ne'er expire, 
 
 Though girt with darkling fears. 
 But rough before his pathway spread, 
 Peopled with many a form of dread, 
 Yet winged-sandall'd on he sped 
 To greet the smiling years; 
 And, far from the present's tangled maze, 
 On the light of the future fixed his gaze, 
 And the gleam of the laurel crown; 
 Nor heeded he envy's serpent hiss, 
 Nor faithless friend, nor siren kiss, 
 Nor dread detraction's frown. 
 For his soul was blythe with a purpose strong, 
 And he heard an echoing triumph song, 
 With a presage of cheer 
 Swell sweet and clear; 
 And the path fled under his flying feet 
 As he passed the fleetest among the fleet, 
 And Honor welcomed him unto her seat 
 While Glory crowned him peer. 
 And life was fair 
 And debonair! 
 
 i/envoi. 
 
 We aye and aye can be what we would seem : 
 Hope is success, and Memory — but a dream ! 
 
Song 
 
 Though o'er wind-swept barren leas 
 Float the Yule-tide memories ; 
 Though the snow-drift hide the heather, 
 Love cares naught for wintry weather! 
 
 Tempests o'er the path may lour, 
 Roses fade from Youth's sweet bower; 
 But if we twain be together, 
 Love will smile at wintry weather! 
 
 For* within the heart is Spring 
 With life's fairest blossoming, — 
 And time's fondest joys we tether 
 When Love laughs at wintry weather! 
 
 lone 
 
 Sweetness, Purity and Truth 
 Are the handmaids of thy youth ; 
 And thy friendship that doth last, 
 Makes the future as the past, 
 And about the present throws 
 All the perfume of the rose. 
 
 O thy smile is like the smiling 
 Of some dream at morn beguiling 
 All the senses with the tender 
 Glamour hopes to memories render, 
 Noble, fair and true thou art, 
 And all-golden is thy heart. 
 
 10 
 
Near Art Thou, My Belove4 
 
 (Goethe's "N'dhe des Geliebten") 
 
 I think of thee, when from, the sea's expanses 
 
 The sunshine beams ; 
 I think of thee, when rippling moonlight dances 
 
 In picturing streams. 
 
 I vision thee, when on the distant ridgeway 
 
 The dust appears — 
 In darksome night, when on the slender bridge- 
 way 
 
 The wanderer fears. 
 
 'Tis thee I hear when yon with echoing voices 
 
 The billow calls ; 
 Thy whisper in still wood my heart rejoices, 
 When silence falls. 
 
 With thee I dwell ; though I be far that love thee, 
 
 Yet art thou near. 
 The sunlight fails ; soon shine the stars above me ; 
 
 Oh, wert thou here ! 
 
 All in All 
 
 Who strangles fear and puts hope from his 
 throne, 
 Yet seats thereon a silent, tireless will 
 To be not conquered but to conquer still, — 
 
 That man can call the golden world his own. 
 
 11 
 
Gettysburg* 
 
 What shall we say to crown the honored dead, 
 What voice of ours shall magnify their fame 
 
 Who on this field for truth and country bled, 
 In storm of shot, in hell of battle's flame? 
 
 Weak were our words to sound the note of woe, 
 And vain the woven laurel of our praise, 
 
 If that high faith by which their memories grow, 
 Exalteth not the spirit of our days. 
 
 We sit at ease ! Across our prosperous years 
 No bugle peal of war's alarum sounds ; 
 
 No host of armed battalions now appears, 
 To desolate what smiling Commerce founds. 
 
 Blest is our land ! It teems with all increase, 
 
 Its glory is the glory of mankind ; 
 And all that Nationhood can give in peace, 
 
 The slaves of older systems here may find. 
 
 We greet today the great majestic past, 
 
 Wherein these heroes wrought their work sub- 
 lime, 
 Whose glory never can be overcast, 
 While progress treads the broad highway of 
 time. 
 
 Here on this storied ground whose holy sod 
 Is fertile with the blood they nobly shed, 
 
 ♦Dedication Poem, delivered July i, 1888, at the unveiling of the 
 monument erected by the Ninth Veteran Regiment of New York 
 Volunteers, in honor of their comrades who fell on this battlefield a 
 quarter of a century before. 
 
 12 
 
We gather now to consecrate to God 
 
 The fame of His, and our, immortal dead. 
 
 On Gettysburg the fate of ages hung, 
 
 The unborn millions in the future's womb 
 
 Rejoiced, when our exultant anthem rung, 
 And Freedom's light broke over Slavery's 
 tomb. 
 
 Oh, never struggle was akin to this ! 
 
 The olden battles meant dynastic gains : 
 This ranks both Marathon and Salamis, 
 
 For humankind was freed upon these plains. 
 
 Here on this spot where countless heroes fell, 
 We rear this fair memorial to their worth, 
 
 That to all generations it may tell 
 
 That freedom everlasting here had birth. 
 
 O hallowed shaft! It speaks the garnered grief 
 Of those whose tears forever silent fall 
 
 For their lost loved ones, whose existence brief 
 A dream of glory seemed, and that was all ! 
 
 They went in strength, to nevermore return; 
 
 Their dust was mingled with the myriad years ; 
 But while high deeds make bosoms beat and bum, 
 
 Their names will grace the temple Fame up- 
 rears. 
 
 Through all the changing future's vast unknown, 
 Their valor points the length of freedom's day ; 
 
 We, for the love we bear them, raise this stone, 
 To mark the mightiest triumph on the way. 
 
 13 
 
Yet why recount the ceaseless roll of fame? 
 
 Their glory is as deathless as the stars! 
 Of those that fought, we see each shining name, 
 
 Where neither praise nor censure makes or 
 mars. 
 
 Here where their hearts were wrung, we conse- 
 crate 
 Ourselves to that great truth for which they 
 died, — , 
 
 Their legatees of freedom in a State 
 Where evermore the Union shall abide. 
 
 And as our love of love the Nation claims, 
 Let us forget the fury of past strife ; 
 
 And North and South with reunited aims, 
 Move forward in the future's grander life. 
 
 Yea, that the South fought well, let us rejoice: 
 They were our brothers chivalrous and brave; 
 
 And with time's softened feelings, let our voice 
 Place valor's wreath above each hero's grave. 
 
 We are too great to cherish olden wrongs ; 
 
 The din of conflict dies within our ears, 
 As swelling on the breeze the festal songs 
 
 Of Peace and Friendship greet the coming 
 years. 
 
 O North and South, O Nation one and free! 
 
 We lay our whole existence at thy feet, — 
 For here the hallowed dead that died for thee, 
 
 Have rounded out and made thy fate complete. 
 
 14 
 
To a Loved One 
 
 Time on jocund wing speeds fast 
 With the treasures of the past; 
 Love alone defies his will, — 
 Mother, thou art with me still. 
 
 Sweet the dreams that round thee clung, 
 When the bloom of hope was young; 
 Fair the castles that we built, 
 Ere the wine of life was spilt. 
 
 Now ambition's earthly fire 
 Purer glows in faith's desire, 
 That our parting may but mean 
 A few rushing years between. 
 
 And these years of joy and pain 
 Shall to me be not in vain; 
 For the pain will cleanse the dross, 
 And the joy support the cross. 
 
 Never year shall come or go, 
 When thy thoughts I shall not know ; 
 And the love-light in thy face, 
 Will become a means of grace. 
 
 O my mother, thou and I 
 Still live in the years gone by ; 
 Though our wishes now are fled, 
 They shall blossom, Christ has said. 
 
 15 
 
Nepenthe 
 
 Come, Sorrow, smooth my brow and kiss my lips, 
 
 And on my bosom pillow thy sweet head ; 
 
 For in thy silent face and loving eyes 
 
 I trace the memories of long-fled years. 
 
 Ay, thou art kind as thou art beautiful, 
 
 And never Joy in its supremest hour 
 
 Gave aught of happiness as dear as thou. 
 
 For thou, the winsome shadow of my hope, 
 
 The sweet Ideal of the vanished years, 
 
 Art still an image of the loved and lost, 
 
 E'en though on evening wings the Real hath fled. 
 
 Yea, Sorrow, I will kiss thy pensive mouth, 
 
 And call thee steadfast friend and love thee well ; 
 
 For thou wert constant when all else were false. 
 
 But lo ! the while mine eyes with memory's tears 
 
 Are wet, I see thy sable raiment fall, 
 
 And in my arms I have unconscious clasped 
 
 The smiling, white-winged angel of the Lord. 
 
 Gethsemane 
 
 How strange that He of loftiest thought and 
 power, 
 Should have this bitter grief, — to tell His 
 friends, 
 (Yet Peter, afterwards, made full amends), 
 "Ye could not watch with me one little hour." 
 
 16 
 
My Mother's Hand 
 
 The Future's hand I fondly hold, 
 
 Soft, jeweled, white, of tender mold, 
 
 Whose warmth makes life's fair hopes unfold. 
 
 Beneath its rosy pressure rise 
 The visions of the morning skies, 
 The dreams that float where glory lies. 
 
 Across its taper fingers flee 
 
 The mists of golden joys to be, — 
 
 A king were wise to envy me ! 
 
 There is another hand I hold, 
 And on it are no gems of gold ; 
 'Tis only wrinkled, wan and old. 
 
 Yet sweeter than the Future's youth, 
 That hand that kept with tender ruth 
 My wandering feet in ways of truth. 
 
 My mother's hand! Fast on it drop 
 The blinding tears I cannot stop ; 
 It was life's early stay and prop. 
 
 mother, in thy patient eyes 
 
 1 read the years of sacrifice, 
 
 I see the prayers that upward rise. 
 
 And while life's changing years decay, 
 In grief's dark gloom or fortune's ray 
 Thy hand shall be my guide alway. 
 
 17 
 
In Lands of Afternoon 
 
 Across the light and shadow comes 
 
 The vision of a perfect day, — 
 A dream of thought in Grecian years, 
 When winsome April dried her tears 
 To kiss the smiling mouth of May. 
 
 For in the beauty of the Spring 
 
 With Loveliness — to me more sweet — 
 
 I wandered o'er a flowery lea 
 
 To golden-misted Arcady 
 
 With singing heart and tripping feet. 
 
 Oh, she was one of Dian's nymphs, 
 
 Of lightsome step and artless grace, 
 And nature in a glad surprise, 
 Charmed with the wonders of her eyes 
 Stole half its beauties from her face. 
 
 In lovelit lands of afternoon, 
 
 Careless, the way of joy we took, 
 And 'mid our laughter fair and free, 
 We plucked the sweet anemone 
 
 And heard the babbling of the brook. 
 
 'And did we speak of love ?" Why, no ! 
 
 How could you think of such a thing? 
 For there each shrub and flower and tree 
 All sing an old-world melody, 
 
 And Love, in Arcady, is King. 
 
 18 
 
"What realm is this whereof I rave?" 
 
 Tis sometimes called "Heart-Harmony"; 
 
 There buoyed not on Icarian wings, 
 
 Exultant Hope forever sings 
 By glade and stream of Arcady. 
 
 "How strayed I from those pleasaunce bowers ?" 
 Why do you ask ? Ah me ! ah me ! 
 
 A wicked spirit of the air 
 
 Hath led my feet all unaware 
 Out of the land of Arcady. 
 
 "And do I mourn?" O yes, and grieve; 
 
 But still I sing soul-minstrelsy, 
 And though the many seasons melt, 
 My joy fades not, for I have dwelt 
 
 In Arcady, in Arcady! 
 
 Some day a little laughing Love 
 
 Will lead me to that land again ; 
 "And shall I find it all as fair?" 
 Ah well, in hopes that she'll be there, 
 It will be Arcady till then ! 
 
 A Sigh 
 
 Farewell, dear face, through memory seen; 
 
 May fortune strew before thee flowers 
 Sweeter than those which might have been, 
 
 Had other fates been ours. 
 
 19 
 
On a Photograph 
 
 Shadows we are that out of shadows glide 
 
 Into the shadows present and to come; 
 Yea, with dim shadowy yearnings that abide 
 
 We conjure hopes that fleet with voices dumb. 
 But in this realm of silent-footed change, 
 
 Unshadowed friendship lasts unto the end ; 
 So let this face, as shadowy seasons range, 
 
 Be memory, but not shadow, of a friend. 
 
 To a Friend 
 
 I heard a voice of wondrous sweetness rise 
 Out of a realm of gathered melody, 
 And I who fared upon the wind-worn sea, 
 
 Whose phantom land of hope in distance lies, 
 
 Turned my bark's prow a moment, while mine 
 eyes 
 Caught sight of one whose song was gay and 
 
 free, 
 On that dear shore where never shipwrecks be. 
 
 For lo! he stood 'neath Glory's smiling skies. 
 
 Before my fearless ship, the rolling miles 
 Danced in the glamour of youth's fevered sun ; 
 For him the Hesperus of calm content. 
 That rose serene above Fame's Blessed Isles, 
 Brought toil's surcease, 'midst golden honors 
 won, 
 The proud reward of proud accomplishment. 
 
 20 
 
To a Fishergirl 
 
 (Heine's "Du Schones Fischerm'ddchen" ) 
 
 O lovely fishermaiden, 
 
 Thy shallop speed to land ! 
 
 Come hither, sit beside me, 
 We'll dally hand in hand. 
 
 Lay on my heart thy tresses, 
 Nor startle so with fright, 
 
 For fearlessly thou bravest 
 The tameless ocean's might. 
 
 My heart is like the ocean, 
 Hath storm and ebb and flow ; 
 
 Yet many a pearl of beauty 
 Sleeps in the depths below. 
 
 Like Art Thou to a Flower 
 
 (Heine's "Du bist wie eine Blwrne") 
 
 Like art thou to a flower, 
 So sweet and pure and fair; 
 
 I gaze on thee and sadness 
 Steals o'er me unaware. 
 
 'Twere meet that on thy forehead 
 I fold my hands in prayer, 
 
 That God may ever keep thee 
 So pure and sweet and fair. 
 
 21 
 
A Fragment from /Eschylus 
 
 (The "Agamemnon/' First Choral Song, 1-40.) 
 
 Now the tenth year has come since Priam's great 
 
 foes, Menelaus 
 And Agamemnon the King — that strengthful 
 
 yoke, the Atreidse — 
 Twain-throned by the favor of Zeus, with dual 
 
 scepters of power, 
 Led from this land their fleet, a thousand ships 
 
 of the Argives, 
 The might of a warrior band; screaming forth 
 
 in their anger 
 The din of a mighty war; after the manner of 
 
 eagles, 
 Which ( in f heir grief for their young, when reft 
 
 is the eyrie of nestlings,) 
 Borne on the oarage of wings far through the 
 
 dim Empyrean 
 Wheel in a circling flight above their home in 
 
 the mountains. 
 But when some divinity hears — either Pan or 
 
 Zeus or Apollo — 
 The shrill-voiced wail of the birds, he sends the 
 
 slow-footed Fury, 
 Because of the air-guests' woe, to scourge the 
 
 daring transgressor. 
 So the twin children of Atreus, great Zeus the 
 
 patron of strangers, 
 Sends to the war against Paris ; on Greek and 
 
 Trojan decreeing 
 
Many limb- wearying combats for the sake of a 
 
 woman oft-courted, 
 While the knee shall plough in the dust, and the 
 
 spear in the onset be shivered. 
 But whatso is, then it is, and will come to the 
 
 issue predestined, 
 And neither by moans nor tears nor the pouring 
 
 out of libations, 
 Will Agamemnon atone for the death of Iphige- 
 
 neia. 
 But we with the frame of age, unhonored in heat 
 
 of the warfare, 
 Were left behind in our homes when forth the 
 
 array were departing; 
 Since we were propping on staves the ebbing 
 
 strength that was childlike. 
 For, behold ! the marrow of youth that springeth 
 
 up in our bosoms, 
 Is weak with the flight of years, and gone are the 
 
 days of Ares ; 
 And age of many a winter, when the leaf on its 
 
 tree has been withered 
 Presses its three-footed path with a trembling 
 
 and faltering footstep, 
 And as in the state of a child, it flits before like 
 
 a day-dream. 
 
 23 
 
Love's Palace 
 
 I have builded Love a palace 
 
 Fair and tall ; 
 Roses twine its marble pillars, 
 
 Springbirds call; 
 And throughout its sunlit spaces, 
 
 Statues all 
 Silver, bronze, or golden, tower ; 
 
 Fountains fall 
 Like the echo of old music ; 
 
 And this hall, 
 Filled with Grecian thought's possessions, 
 
 Holdls in thrall 
 Memories sweet of youth that fled 
 
 Its ivied wall. 
 
 I have waited many a springtide, 
 
 Love to know ; 
 Summer's glory hath departed; 
 
 Winter's snow, 
 April's smile full oft hath melted; 
 
 Brooklet's flow 
 Mingled with the fountain's murmur; 
 
 Soft and slow 
 Many an autumn sky hath faded ; 
 
 And although 
 Tenderly again the flowers 
 
 Bud and blow, — 
 In my waiting, Love hath perished 
 
 Long ago ! 
 
 24 
 
Easter Anthem 
 
 What sound is that which wakes the gladsome 
 morn, 
 Exultant strains from Judah's hilltops ringing ? 
 Ecstatic notes from joy ecstatic born, 
 
 A ransomed world, a ransomed world is sing- 
 ing! 
 
 For with sublimest love, 
 Christ came from thrones above; 
 And He to heal our mortal sin, 
 Received Death's wound His heart within, 
 
 Yet Victor rose from Hell ! 
 And Death is dead and Life is lord, — 
 Hail, hail to the Immortal Word ! 
 
 Let Earth's loud paeans swell! 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 Rejoice ! Rej oice ! 
 
 For burst is Death's dark prison ! 
 
 Rejoice! Rejoice! 
 
 Swell your triumphant voice : 
 
 The Christ, the Christ is risen! 
 
 What gleam is that whereat the round world 
 thrills, 
 His glorious, triumphal car adorning? 
 Lo! where His steeds have spurned the orient 
 hills, 
 Breaks showered light on dun-rolled clouds of 
 
 morning ! 
 
 25 
 
Now He who walked the earth 
 In guise of lowliest birth, 
 Is crowned the royal King of Kings, 
 For Whom the spacious Heaven rings ; 
 
 And they of low degree 
 With joy of joy His coming greet, 
 Who hurls the mighty from their seat, 
 And bids the slave be free. 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 Rejoice! Rejoice! 
 
 For burst is Hell's dread prison ! 
 
 Rej oice ! Re j oice ! 
 
 Swell your triumphant voice, 
 
 For Christ, our Lord, is risen ! 
 
 Christ God, for Thee the sun-browed nations 
 wait, 
 Who hail Thy name and own Thy reign for- 
 ever ! 
 O Thou, who flungest wide the sapphire gate 
 Of that new world, where Life and Love part 
 never ! 
 
 Thine awful power appalls, 
 And splendor dread enthralls; 
 Yet from the glory of Thy face, 
 There beams an all-redeeming grace, 
 That lightens woe's dark fen ; 
 And 'neath Thy sway, divinely mild, 
 Glads Earth, and Heaven, and Chaos wild, 
 And Eden blooms again ! 
 
 26 
 
CHORUS. 
 
 Rej oice ! Re j oice ! 
 
 For burst is Sin's foul prison ! 
 
 Rejoice! Rejoice! 
 
 Swell the triumphant voice, 
 
 That Christ, our God, is risen ! 
 
 Love Imprisoned 
 
 Love offended me one day 
 With his roguish, teasing play, 
 So I took the culprit fair 
 And despite his tearful prayer, 
 In a dungeon cold and bare 
 Of my heart immured him. 
 
 Round his prison door I placed 
 Pride and Anger, dragon- faced, 
 Warned them not to heed his moan, 
 Not to list sweet pity's tone, 
 But to leave him there alone 
 Till his sorrow cured him. 
 
 Then I sternly went away; 
 But eftsoons his laughter gay 
 On my soul like music fell, 
 For his gaolers 'neath his spell 
 Were his humble slaves, and — well, 
 He ruled all the citadel! 
 
 27 
 
The Charms of Rural Life 
 
 (Horace, Epod. I, 2.) 
 
 Blest is the man, from trade apart, 
 Whose life, amid the rural scene, 
 Recalls an elder age serene 
 
 And shuns the harvest of the mart. 
 
 Not brazen trump of war's alarm, 
 Nor ocean's terrors that appall, 
 Nor forum's din, nor splendor's hall 
 
 Can do his love of nature harm. 
 
 He weds ripe scions of the vine 
 
 To poplars tall, with trellised folds ; 
 Or in a vale remote beholds 
 
 His wand'ring herds of lowing kine. 
 
 Dead stems with sickle keen he clears 
 And makes his fertile graftings sure ; 
 Or cleanly jars with honey pure 
 
 He stores, or tender sheep he shears. 
 
 When Autumn lifts from his domain 
 A brow with mellow fruitage crowned, 
 Then in the pear his joys abound, 
 
 Or in the grape of purple stain. 
 
 With fruits like these, Priapus, thee 
 And sire Silvanus, he rewards ; 
 Or loves to lie on grassy swards 
 
 Or 'neath some patriarchal tree. 
 
 28 
 
Hard by, the stream in channels deep 
 Glides on ; the woods with notes resound ; 
 And plashing fountains heard around 
 
 Diffuse the spell of gentle sleep. 
 
 But when the year with thunder's roar 
 Collects the wintry rain and snow, 
 With many a hound he hastes to go 
 
 To drive and trap the savage boar. 
 
 To catch the greedy thrush he tries 
 His wide-looped meshes not in vain ; 
 The timid hare, the stranger crane 
 
 His booty are, a pleasant prize. 
 
 Ah, who amid such joys would fear 
 Love's all-distracting, anxious care? 
 Or, should a wife, chaste matron, share 
 
 His home and darling children rear, 
 
 Like Sabine dame, or sun-browned spouse 
 Of the Apulian farmer bold, 
 She heaps the hearth with fagots old, 
 
 And makes her lord a cheerful house. 
 
 Or if, when to their stanchions brought, 
 To milk the cattle is her task, 
 Or this year's vintage from its flask 
 
 She brings, and spreads a feast unbought — 
 
 Not dainties from the Lucrine lake, 
 Nor yet the turbot, nor the scar, 
 Nor what the Eastern waves afar 
 
 Bear hither in their stormy wake, 
 
 29 
 
No, not the fowl of Afric's land, 
 Nor moor-hen of Ionic race, 
 Could have of flavor sweeter grace 
 
 Than olives ready to the hand. 
 
 Not less a pleasure to my heart 
 
 The red-brown dock that loves the mead, 
 Or mallows which from marshy reed 
 
 The lively glow of health impart. 
 
 The vernal days bring their delight, 
 In offered lamb, or rescued kid, 
 For him who views — these joys amid — 
 
 His flocks returning at the night ; 
 
 Or sees his oxen homeward bring, 
 With weary neck, the heavy share, 
 And finds a happy circle there 
 
 About the ingle's blazing ring. 
 
 i/envoi. 
 
 Thus Alphius, man of gainful store, 
 Whose heart on rural charms intent, 
 All profits on the Ides forewent, 
 
 Yet on the Kalends yearned for more. 
 
 To Milton's Daughters 
 
 Oh, while we praise your father, we love you, 
 Gentle and patient girls, who bravely knew, — 
 The blind old man, in all his moods, rang true ! 
 
 30 
 
The Gates of Dreams 
 
 — II^veA.07rcta, 
 ^Sv fxd\a kv<x><t<tov<t iv ovupeirjcri 7rv\r](Tiv. 
 
 (Od. IV, 808-9.) 
 
 Where memory's silver ripples flow 
 O'er golden sands of recollection; 
 Where fairy shapes in visions glow, 
 Where murmuring voices sweet and low, 
 Float from the realms of long ago, 
 
 And lend the scene perfection; 
 In borderlands of pure delight, 
 Of rainbow day and sapphire night, 
 Imagination's rosy beams 
 Fall on the golden gates of dreams. 
 
 A Salutation 
 
 Sweet friend, across the purple years 
 
 Of life's dissolving dream, 
 All shining through a mist of tears 
 
 The stars of friendship gleam. 
 
 In splendor's sun their light is lost, 
 
 In trouble's night their ray 
 Shines on Hope's bark rough tempest toss'd, 
 
 With light more sweet than day. 
 
 So where my ship hath onward sped 
 
 Toward prosperous lands afar, 
 Thy friendship through the storm hath led 
 
 A pure and guiding star. 
 
 31 
 
Fifty Lines from Homer 
 
 (Iliad, 1-50.) 
 
 Achilles' fateful wrath, oh goddess, sing, 
 Which on the Greeks unnumbered woes 'en- 
 tailed, 
 And sent to hades' realm before their time 
 The mighty souls of heroes, and their forms 
 Gave up a prey to dogs and carrion birds. 
 And thus his purpose mighty Jove fulfilled, 
 What time had parted first in bitter wrath, 
 Divine Achilles and the king of men. 
 
 Say what one of the gods, together brought 
 In sullen fury, the great chiefs to strive ? 
 The child of Leto and the son of Jove. 
 For angered 'gainst the king, he through the 
 
 camp 
 Broadcast a deadly pestilence sent down 
 Whereby the people perished ; this because 
 Chryses, his priest, by Atreus' son was scorned, 
 For Chryses to the Grecian fleet had come 
 With countless meed, his daughter to release, 
 And on a golden scepter in his hands 
 He bore the fillet of the Archer King. 
 With lowly mien, the assembled strength of 
 
 Greece 
 He then addressed, but chief preferred his 
 
 prayer 
 To Atreus' sons, the monarehs of the host : 
 'Great sons of Atreus, and ye well-mailed 
 
 Greeks, 
 
 32 
 
May the Olympian dwellers grant to you 
 To sack old Priam's city and return 
 In safety homeward, to your native land. 
 But oh, to me my child belov'd release ; 
 Accept this shining ransom, and revere 
 Apollo, mighty archer, son of Jove." 
 Then all the other Greeks approval cheered, 
 The reverend sire to honor and receive 
 The gift resplendent, but not so it pleased 
 The soul of Agamemnon, Atreus' son ; 
 Sternly rebuking, he the priest dismissed, 
 With words insulting and a grievous threat : 
 
 'Here at the graceful-curving vessel's side, 
 Let me not find thee lingering now, old man, 
 Nor e'er returning hither, lest thou prove 
 Of no avail to shield thee from my wrath, 
 The scepter and the fillet of thy god. 
 Her I will not restore, until old age, 
 Within my hall at Argos far away, 
 Shall find her active at the busy loom, 
 And sharer of my bed. Now hence depart, 
 And that thou safer go, provoke me not." 
 
 Such words he spake; with awe the sire 
 
 obeyed ; 
 Along the hoarse-resounding ocean's shore, 
 He took his silent way, till far removed 
 From hostile harm, he poured his soul in 
 
 prayer, 
 To king Apollo, fair Latona's son : 
 'Lord of the silver bow, whose kingly power, 
 Chrysa surrounds and Cilia's sacred shrine, 
 
 33 
 
And over Tenedos wide empire holds, — 
 O Sminthian Apollo, hear my moan ! 
 If e'er a source of pleasure in thy sight 
 I've reared a stately temple, and to thee 
 Burned the rich thighs of bulls and perfect 
 
 goats, 
 Accomplish this request ; let now the Greeks 
 Beneath thy deadly bolts atone my tears." 
 
 Such prayer he made, and him Apollo heard. 
 And from Olympus' battlements came down 
 With bow and ample quiver at his back ; 
 Upon the shoulders of the wrathful god 
 Fierce clanged the arrows as he onward moved. 
 Sullen as night he came ; then from the ships 
 Standing at distance, he a shaft discharged, 
 And dire and awful twanged the silver bow. 
 
 To One Dreading Old Age 
 
 What though it be that Time with shining hand 
 Shall lay his silver radiance on thy brow? 
 Thy soul is beautiful within and grows not old. 
 
 What though for thee swift come the dreamful 
 
 years ? 
 All thine are laughing angels, lily-crowned, 
 And each new guest but swells the joyous com- 
 pany. 
 
 34 
 
The Wish 
 
 Long I wished thee, long I sought thee, 
 
 Long I loved thee, friend divine ! 
 And though never, now, forever 
 
 Shall I taste love's wine, — 
 Still I send thee, to attend thee, 
 
 This last wish of mine : 
 All thy griefs fall to my portion, 
 
 All my joys to thine! 
 
 In Tempe's Vale 
 
 In Tempe's vale, a-long ago, 
 
 Sweet love and I were singing, 
 And all the hours swift and slow, 
 In dappled dawn or evening glow, 
 Their way of joy were winging. 
 
 But what do memories avail, 
 
 Wan ghosts of our warm dreaming, — 
 When once the stars of youth are pale, 
 When olden pulses faint and fail, 
 
 And life is but a seeming ! 
 
 O long ago ! O Tempe's bowers, 
 For which my soul is yearning, 
 Across thy honey-laden flowers, 
 For me no more the vanished hours 
 Breathe hope of a returning. 
 
 35 
 
Palm Sunday 
 
 Dear Lord, out of innumerable ills, 
 
 Thy grace hath led my feeble steps and slow, 
 Vouchsafed to me Thy loveliness to show, 
 
 And given that peace, unpriced, whose gladness 
 thrills 
 
 My spirit, so that all its essence wills 
 The world no more, but only Thee, to know : 
 Before Thy feet of glory, palms I strow, 
 
 While my rapt heart with high Hosanna fills. 
 
 To-day Jerusalem hails Thee divine, 
 
 Yet storm of death awaits to rend the calm ! 
 
 What, then, if grief and bitterness like Thine 
 To me shall come, I shall not lack this balm, — 
 
 To know, that if Thy way of peace be mine, 
 The amaranth is sweeter than the palm ! 
 
 My Purchase 
 
 I bought a little bird of black and red, 
 From a street vendor sitting in the shade ; 
 
 And all my friends laughed heartily, and said 
 That I, by far, too much for it had paid. 
 
 Next day it died ; and more they laughed thereat ; 
 
 Yet while I sorrowed for it, I could say, 
 There are more foolish purchases than that 
 
 Which lightened up of life a summer day. 
 
 36 
 
Joseph O'Connor 
 
 Thou gentle man, and oh, thou wert a man ! 
 It is the very sadness of this earth, 
 That one who had such perfectness of worth, 
 
 Should pass beyond, in God's all-knowing plan. 
 
 None knew thee but to reverence thy soul, 
 Thy kindly heart and nature without stain ; 
 How beautiful it is, a life so plain 
 
 That God can place approval on the whole. 
 
 Chimborazo 
 
 Lord of the Hills, thou mountain king of kings, 
 Old Emperor of immemorial days, 
 In primal silence, thou with placid gaze 
 
 Hast seen Creation's years on glinting wings. 
 
 Age after age, — vain, insubstantial things, — 
 Flee by thee like the mists thy vales upraise ; 
 But thou remainest in eternal ways, 
 
 Though thunders roar, and lightning 'round thee 
 clings. 
 
 Yet better than thy pulseless majesty, 
 
 One little hour wherein man's soul hath trod 
 
 The heights of noble action ! Thou art free 
 To keep insentient glory ; I, poor clod, — 
 
 Yet thy superior, — hold no awe of thee, 
 Thou but a symbol, I a son of God! 
 
 Quito, March 20, 1893. 
 
 37 
 
In Arcady 
 
 I wandered in Arcadia's dreamful realm, 
 When dew of morning lay upon the world, 
 And in it every floweret was empearled 
 By that bright sun of promise whose sweet rays 
 Lightened with life of love and beauty all my 
 days. 
 
 There rippling rills the daisies overwhelm. 
 That skirt the shores of the enameled mead ; 
 There Pan blew music from his oaten reed, 
 And all the chorus of the nymphs and fauns 
 Gleamed in the mazy dance on those enchar^r .; 
 lawns. 
 
 Adown the joyous pathway of that past 
 A glory fell, that filled the hours with pride ; 
 For lo! one came more fair than Tithon's 
 bride. 
 And her white brow was love's imperial shrine. 
 And nameless grace was blent in face and form 
 divine. 
 
 Her witching words an echoing cadence cas:. 
 Blown from the harp iEolian of the soul 
 To chords of mine that owned her sweet con- 
 trol. 
 In that auroral prime ; and when she smiled, 
 Lilies and maribelles bloomed forth upon the 
 :'d. 
 
 38 
 
Yet like a river slipping 'neath the hand, 
 These visions of a fair dissolving view 
 Elapse, nor will they evermore be true, 
 Till memory, the enchanter, lifts the screen, 
 And swiftly backward glide the glittering years 
 between. 
 
 Life is the thinker's thought : then, golden land 
 Where love hung on the rosy lips of youth, 
 They who have quaffed thy magic wells of 
 truth, 
 
 Still by thy singing streams will aye sojourn. 
 
 Return, Arcadian days ! Arcadian hours, return ! 
 
 To a Lady 
 
 'Tis but in happy hours we live, — 
 
 Those moments all too flying, 
 While time that slips through sorrow's sieve, 
 
 Is measure of our dying ; 
 Then praise to pleasure let us give, 
 
 Since joy is death-defying. 
 
 Sweet friend, thy beauty lent a charm, 
 
 Thy gentleness a power, 
 To breathe a calm o'er care's alarm, 
 
 To rainbow-arch the shower, 
 And grief, life's enemy, disarm 
 
 For one ideal hour. 
 
 39 
 
Goddesses 
 
 I, too, have walked with goddesses, and known 
 The'glancing tread of their Olympian feet; 
 Have dreamed in awe before the splendors 
 sweet 
 
 Of eyes that with immortal beauty shone ; 
 
 Have worshipped them in ways devout, alone, 
 And at their shrines rose-garlanded, secrete, 
 My soul's dear homage laid in gift complete, — 
 
 Yea, yielded them life's sceptre, crown and 
 throne ! 
 
 Yet, more than bitterness of death, to find 
 These forms of beauty, lovelier than the day, 
 
 Not owning essence with the ethereal mind, 
 But of brute, sordid selfishness the prey. 
 
 Ah, who, 'mid dis enchantments so unkind, 
 Can boast a goddess fashioned not of clay ? 
 
 To An Easter Violet 
 
 What subtle solace doth distil 
 From thy dew-spray, O violet! 
 
 Why doth thy perfume gently fill 
 
 My soul with peace that lulls regret? 
 
 Thy message soothes the sting of death, — 
 Yea, love greets love across the tomb. 
 
 And mingled with thine Easter breath, 
 Past sorrows into fragrance bloom. 
 
 40 
 
To a Flower 
 
 GIVEN BY A SOUTHERN GIRL. 
 
 A dewy violet, sweet as youth, 
 She gave with winsome witchery 
 And said, "A pansy let it be !" 
 Alas, 'twas no heart's-ease to me, 
 
 For then I knew in very truth 
 The North was "slave," the South was "free" ! 
 
 When Herrick Sang 
 
 RONDEAU. 
 
 When Herrick sang, the skies were blue 
 And flowers wore a lovelier hue, 
 Nor was affection then a tale 
 Like down of thistle on the gale, 
 For swains and maidens all were true. 
 
 Each haply did a path pursue 
 Where nature's beauties sprang to view ; 
 Nor did life's fragrance ever fail, 
 When Herrick sang. 
 
 Quaint bard of love, to him are due 
 The thanks that breathe the ages through ; 
 For roses red and lilies pale, 
 And all the blooms that scent the dale, 
 To sweet and sweeter perfume grew, 
 When Herrick sang. 
 
 41 
 
Friends After-wise 
 
 Some friends there are who measure out 
 
 By the apothecary's scales, 
 In parts exact their trust or doubt 
 
 As one they know succeeds or fails. 
 
 The more he proves himself, the more 
 He finds himself on their probation, 
 
 And seldom from their niggard store 
 Gets aught but frosty commendation. 
 
 They pause in giving what his foes 
 
 At once and cheerfully concede; 
 And while his struggle lonely goes, 
 
 Their criticism is his meed. 
 
 Their ears are wide to hearken blame, 
 
 Their minds judicial to his worth, 
 And while they spread each stranger's fame, 
 
 Their friend they give but friendship's dearth. 
 
 But when, at last, the battle o'er, 
 He stands, a victor, laurel-crowned, 
 
 They wake to virtues which, before, 
 Their sight contracted never found. 
 
 Their greetings take a genial glow, 
 
 They see in him a hero grown, — 
 Poor fools, they do not seem to know 
 
 Their after-wisdom is a stone. 
 
 42 
 
The bread he asked, the world has given, 
 Not they have spread his triumph feast ; 
 
 On weary way that he has striven, 
 Their inspiration has been least. 
 
 Too late they play a friendly part, 
 His old affection they win never ; 
 
 And if he opens wide his heart, 
 'Tis one view, ere it shuts forever. 
 
 Wellington 
 
 "Not only that thy puissant arm could bind 
 The tyrant of a world." 
 
 — Lord Beaconsneld's Sonnet. 
 
 Not thine, nor Europe's arm was it, could bind 
 The Forest Lion or subdue his rage ; 
 Each minute of his years had been an age, 
 
 And every thought an epoch ; flesh, resigned, 
 
 Bore long the labors of that Titan mind, 
 Then Nature, in mortality's last stage, 
 Even as Russian Winter, put a gauge 
 
 To what had else been Empire unconfmed. 
 
 To say that thou his conqueror wast or art, 
 Is much as though a mountain climber stood 
 On some amort volcano's crater thin, 
 And at the giant's last convulsive start, 
 
 A pebble hurled or some slight wisp of wood, 
 And said: "Behold! I crushed the summit 
 in!" 
 
 43 
 
Lexington 
 
 Red broke the sun of Freedom's morn, 
 Red fell the blows of England's hate 
 With savage might upon the patriot bands 
 Whose blood made red the fields of Lexington ! 
 
 Yet from that seed Cad-mean sprung 
 
 Host after host of armed men, 
 
 Who thronging up the heights where Freedom 
 
 led, 
 Placed her proud standards on eternity. 
 
 Fate's Enmity 
 
 Fate, monster horrible and deform, 
 With goblin jaws my birth attended; 
 
 My mother's love preserved me then, — 
 That love which all my life befriended ! 
 
 And from that day to manhood's prime, 
 The demon's plots and malice cruel 
 
 Have made existence 'gainst his hate, 
 One bitter, long, continuous duel. 
 
 But now, at length, I laugh to scorn 
 The beaten monster's late affection, 
 
 And chain him to my chariot wheels, 
 In symbol of his sheer subjection. 
 
 44 
 
Deception 
 
 Her face was sweeter than the dreams of Ind, 
 Her voice more dear than the Ionian lute, 
 
 And as she pleaded, it seemed I who sinned, 
 Whose heart with dumb uncertainty was mute. 
 
 Then from her glory turned I, though in ruth, 
 While this fixed purpose walled my soul about, 
 
 Better sojourn in deepest Hell with Truth 
 Than bide in Eden with the serpent Doubt. 
 
 The Mirth of the Gods 
 
 The laughter of the gods is clear 
 
 And sweet, to those who do not know 
 How, underneath its limpid flow, 
 
 Lurk envy, hatred, hope and fear. 
 
 To a Lily of the Valley 
 
 (Poeta Loquitur.) 
 
 When swift a season's sun grows old, 
 This human blossom shall grow cold, — 
 Thy beauties vanish from the wold ; 
 
 But on thy brow 
 The smile of God serene shall lie, 
 And thou shalt sinless pass, but I, — 
 Ah me, I weep I cannot die 
 
 As pure as thou ! 
 
 45 
 
The Lonesome Valley 
 
 I've a little sweetheart in Virginia, 
 In Virginia, 
 
 In Virginia, 
 I've a little sweetheart in Virginia, 
 Way down in the Lonesome Valley. 
 
 Let me play my guitar at thy window, 
 At thy window, 
 
 At thy window, 
 Let me play my guitar at thy window, 
 Way down in the Lonesome Valley. 
 
 Fairy-like is the beauty of the evening, 
 Of the evening, 
 
 Of the evening, 
 Fairy-like is the beauty of the evening, 
 Way down in the Lonesome Valley. 
 
 Here the sweetness of the world hath all been 
 gathered, 
 
 All been gathered, 
 
 All been gathered, 
 Here the sweetness of the world hath all been 
 gathered, 
 Way down in the Lonesome Valley. 
 
 The roses are in passion with the moonbeams, 
 With the moonbeams, 
 
 With the moonbeams, 
 The roses are in passion with the moonbeams, 
 Way down in the Lonesome Valley. 
 
 46 
 
And soft is the breath of the magnolia, 
 The magnolia, 
 
 The magnolia, 
 
 soft is the breath of the magnolia, 
 Way down in the Lonesome Valley. 
 
 They told me that my sweetheart would deceive 
 me, 
 
 Would deceive me, 
 
 Would deceive me, 
 They told me that my sweetheart would deceive 
 me, 
 Way down in the Lonesome Valley. 
 
 1 shall never love thee more, O my sweetheart, 
 
 O my sweetheart, 
 
 O my sweetheart, 
 I shall never love thee more, O my sweetheart, 
 Way down in the Lonesome Valley. 
 
 From thy loveliness how bitter is the parting, 
 Is the parting, 
 
 Is the parting, 
 From thy loveliness how bitter is the parting, 
 Way down in the Lonesome Valley. 
 
 All thy gentleness of nature I'll remember, 
 I'll remember, 
 
 I'll remember, 
 All thy gentleness of nature I'll remember, 
 Way down in the Lonesome Valley. 
 
 47 
 
Fare thee well, then, my sweetheart of Virginia, 
 Of Virginia, 
 
 Of Virginia, 
 Fare thee well, then, my sweetheart of Virginia, 
 Way down in the Lonesome Valley. 
 
 [ An old Virginia melody. The first, second and seventh 
 stanzas, with the words slightly changed, are the old song. The 
 other stanzas I have added.— R. B. M.] 
 
 Ozymandias 
 
 Shelley, to show that of all human things 
 Pride is the emptiest, recounts that where 
 Old Nilus dreams, a Pharaoh builded there 
 
 His statue, whose long ruined base still flings : 
 
 'My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings: 
 
 Gaze on my works, ye mighty, and despair!" 
 While o'er the fragments, which the sands 
 leave bare, 
 
 The desert wind a mocking requiem sings. 
 
 And yet, methinks, this King was wise to render 
 Unto himself such heritage of glory. 
 
 What matters now to him, if none rehearse 
 His wars, his loves, his triumph and his splen- 
 dor, 
 Or anything that graced his olden story, — 
 He lives immortal still in Shelley's verse. 
 
 48 
 
My Heart Will Know 
 
 Some day, when skies are blue, 
 And gentle winds bend violets and rue, 
 
 Perchance to that lone spot 
 
 Where I shall lie forgot, 
 She whom I loved will come to take a moment's 
 view. 
 
 In sunset's afterglow; 
 Or when the splendors of noon's triumph show; 
 
 Or in the rosy dawn, 
 
 O'er the empurpled lawn, — 
 No matter when she comes, my silent heart will 
 know. 
 
 On a Portrait of a Maid 
 
 Beauty and youth are thine, a sweet estate, 
 A flower-like kingdom worthy of its queen, 
 
 And love thereto is the enchanted gate, 
 But who shall win it, sovereign serene? 
 
 The Voyagers 
 
 And what a winsome picture thou didst make, 
 
 Upon the little, serviceable beast ; 
 And then at the albergos, free from care, 
 
 The joy that comes when happy travelers feast ! 
 
 49 
 
Right Reverend Stephen Vincent Ryan 
 
 ON HIS SILVER JUBILEE. 
 I. 
 
 Prelate and priest, man, citizen, and friend, 
 In all approved, — we hail thy Jubilee ! 
 Thy years like silver trumpets clear and free, 
 
 The grace and glory of their music blend ; 
 
 And all the stately memories that attend 
 Attune their voices to the melody 
 Of thy high truth, unstained sincerity, 
 
 Thy gentle worth and kindness without end. 
 
 Now in the argent luster of thy days, 
 
 Men bring the tribute of their unbought love, 
 
 Give thee the meed of that unstinted praise 
 Which comes to those whose souls, like Jor- 
 dan's dove, 
 
 The spirit of God diffuse in peaceful ways, 
 A light and benediction from above. 
 
 II. 
 
 Live thou, and flourish ! For thy heart is wide, 
 Liberal thy nature and thy purpose just ; 
 Humanity's great mission is thy trust, 
 
 Yea, thy one sacred thought, the which beside 
 
 No lesser, narrower, impulse can abide ; 
 
 For in thy kindly glance such motives must 
 Sink back again into their primal dust, 
 
 And faith soar up, unto no earth allied. 
 
 50 
 
Wear, then, the laurels of thy Jubilee, 
 
 A woven chaplet from all kinds and creeds ; 
 
 Count thyself happy, also, for to thee 
 Along that life to higher life that leads, 
 
 It hath been granted life's best fruit to see, 
 Of holy thoughts made real by holy deeds. 
 
 November 8, 1893. 
 
 Birthday Greeting to a Young Girl 
 
 Spring's grace and youth 
 
 And rainbow truth 
 The morning of thy life extol ! 
 
 For what are years 
 
 But smiles and tears, 
 That mellow harvests of the soul ? 
 
 By stream and glade 
 
 The hours fade, 
 But thou shalt keep the better part ; 
 
 Though seasons range, 
 
 Time cannot change 
 The springtime beauty of thy heart. 
 
 51 
 
The Sanity of Genius 
 
 I talked with one who made of life "success" 
 Along convention's smooth and hedge-trimmed 
 
 road; 
 Type of that class who bear but their own load, 
 And "shrewdly" shun the fiery storm and stress, 
 When hearts and souls unselfish forward press, 
 To mitigate Oppression's stinging goad ; 
 "Reformers" he called "geniuses" ; but showed 
 That "genius" is a kind of "foolishness." 
 
 Well, when I thought how soon he would be 
 cold; 
 How soon forgotten ; and, in how few years 
 His idiot heirs would spend his hoardings 
 vain, 
 While "the eccentrics" would in ways untold 
 Make ever less the sum of human tears, — 
 It seemed to me, genius alone is sane ! 
 
 Sweetly Laughing Lalage 
 
 (Horace, Od. I, 22.) 
 
 "Dulce ridentem Lalagen amabo, 
 Dulce loquentem." 
 
 Lucy laughs, and says she loves me ; 
 
 I reply with laugh, 
 That the girl who laughs and loves me, 
 
 Loves me only half. 
 
 52 
 
James G. Blaine 
 
 Now broken is the golden bowl, 
 
 And loos'd the silver cord, 
 And fled for aye the royal soul 
 
 Whom all our souls adored, — 
 The knightly man of knightly men, 
 
 The prince among his peers : 
 We shall not see his like again 
 
 In half a thousand years. 
 
 Guaranda, Ecuador, January 30, 1893. 
 
 General Gordon 
 
 Soldier of Fortune, yet in fortune poor, 
 
 But rich in glory's immortality, 
 
 And richer in thy sours nobility 
 That scorned the prizes lesser men allure, — 
 'Twas thine, long years, with patience to endure 
 
 Neglect and sneer of those not fit to be 
 
 The lackeys of a spirit like to thee, 
 High-hearted hero, in high faith secure. 
 
 To hold the balance true of right and wrong, 
 Censure or praise swayed not thy just intent ; 
 
 Thy lion-fronted courage swept along 
 
 On wider ways than intrigue's mean extent ; 
 
 And though these virtues led thee to thy doom, 
 
 A pillar'd light to men shines from Khartoum. 
 
 53 
 
Joy and Pain 
 
 {Neumann 's "Das Herz. ,y ) 
 
 The heart hath chambers twain, 
 
 Where dwelling 
 Are tenants, Joy and Pain. 
 
 If Joy awake in one, 
 
 Then slumbers 
 Pain, quiet in its own. 
 
 O Joy, precaution take! 
 
 Speak gently, 
 Lest Woe should else awake. 
 
 When Love Dies 
 
 "Well, this clay- cold clod 
 Was man's heart. 
 Crumble it and what comes next? 
 Is it God?" 
 
 — R. Browning. 
 
 When Love dies, 
 What has God to offer ? 
 What has Time to proffer? 
 
 Nature lies ! 
 
 Change awaits? 
 Is there balm where change is ? 
 Wide the spirit ranges, 
 
 Questioning fates. 
 
 54 
 
What atones 
 For the dream that's banished, 
 If the Truth, too, vanished 
 
 With its moans? 
 
 Break to dust 
 Glorified ideal! 
 Is there in the real 
 
 Hope or trust? 
 
 Doubt abides ! 
 Nevermore contentment ; 
 Memory's resentment 
 
 Yearning chides. 
 
 What heart-leaven 
 Maketh whole where scathe is ? 
 If there be where faith is, 
 
 That is heaven ! 
 
 The Critics of Bonaparte 
 
 When you have settled to your satisfaction, 
 That he was neither noble, wise, nor great, 
 Remember this, ye sticks of stupefaction : 
 Freedom, for his iconoclastic action, 
 
 His name a myriad years will celebrate ! 
 
 55 
 
The Roseleaf and the Rock 
 
 Rock that jutteth in the river 
 Speaketh not, but dreameth ever. 
 
 Where the eddies swirled and shifted 
 Once a roseleaf lightly drifted, 
 Touched the rock with lip of sweetness, 
 Filled its soul with life's completeness ; 
 And the rock in its wild fashion. 
 With its centuries of passion, 
 Yearned to keep the leaf forever, 
 There beside the sunlit river. 
 
 Tenderly the dream was cherished, 
 But in one brief hour it perished. 
 Clot of sea-weed, idly glancing, 
 Set the roseleaf 's spirit dancing; 
 Where the eddies swirled and shifted, 
 Off to its new love it drifted, 
 And adown the sunlit river 
 Floated, disappeared forever. 
 
 And the rock with memories teeming, 
 Of the roseleaf aye is dreaming, 
 And a requiem hereafter 
 Is the water's old-time laughter. 
 
 l'envoi. 
 
 Less the pathos fate discloses, 
 
 Had the rock known there are roses ! 
 
 56 
 
To One Who Loves Italy 
 
 WITH A HISTORY OF VENICE. 
 
 In afterwhiles, when thou shalt dwell 
 
 Perchance in fair Italian lands, 
 And memory weaves its magic spell 
 
 Where Venice in her beauty stands, 
 O then, from out the vanished maze 
 
 Of years, let recollection tell 
 The tale of sweet and olden days, 
 
 And one who loved thee well. 
 
 Serenity 
 
 Now I am come unto the outmost bound, 
 Nor evermore for me the gentle sun 
 Will smile on life's sweet ways, for I, undone, 
 
 Fare forth to meet hereafter ; I have found 
 
 Where my tall bark o'er wandering seas has 
 wound, 
 The sails with which Hesperian Isles are won, 
 For me are silken dreams the Fates have spun 
 
 And cut, at last, on oceans void of sound. 
 
 So go I now unto death's polar sea 
 And that long night whence cometh no bright 
 ray; 
 The path behind is closed, but even so, 
 With steady brow, I'll summon victory; 
 My soul is firm as in life's fairer day, — 
 Kingly to pass, though I alone shall know. 
 
 57 
 
La Belle Bretonne 
 
 Dear Anne of Brittany and elder France, 
 
 True saint and all that makes a woman sweet ; 
 And then to crown a loveliness complete, — 
 
 Thou hast of France, old-fashioned, fine romance. 
 
 On a Silhouette 
 
 He's not so very good, you know, 
 
 And never will be sainted. 
 And yet, my friend, pray do not laugh, 
 When I assure you, he's not half 
 
 So black as he is painted ! 
 
 To Her in Dreamless Slumber 
 
 Twine lilies in her hair, 
 Strew roses at her feet, 
 Fold violets in her hand ; 
 For never maid more fair, 
 For never maid more sweet, 
 Bloomed in the lotus land. 
 
 What matters now to me 
 Beauty of earth or sky, 
 
 Whisper of wind or wave? 
 Heart of my heart was she, 
 My soul, my dream, my sigh ; 
 Of love, the queen and slave. 
 
 58 
 
La Fiorentina 
 
 I wandered with thee once through Arno's bow- 
 ers, 
 
 Slim Florentine, Madonna of my dreams ; 
 
 Nor was there blossom by the valleyed streams 
 Could rival thee, thou soul of summer flowers ; 
 The skies that blended with Italian hours, 
 
 The wonder of thy beauty, the dark gleams 
 
 Of eyes that melted with love's perfect beams, 
 Made all of heaven, 'neath the Tuscan towers. 
 
 And in old gardens graced with marbles old, — 
 The stately memories of thy princely line, — 
 
 We walked, where sunlight fell like sifted gold 
 On terraced lawns, in autumn's mood divine; 
 
 And there where fountains breathed a whispered 
 melody, 
 
 Was consecration of my soul to thee ! 
 
 Florence, September 22, 1903. 
 
 The Rose of Love 
 
 O Rose, O Love, I give to thee 
 
 The rose of love's eternity; 
 
 Nor any rosebud of the spring 
 
 Hath perfume of such blossoming ; 
 
 Then guard its petals tenderly, 
 
 It bloomed for thee, it blooms for thee. 
 
 59 
 
Aux Heros Sans Gloire 
 
 Hail to that unsaluted throng 
 For whom no memories melt in song, 
 Yet from the silence of whose deeds 
 Godlike an influence proceeds 
 To lift the truth and smite the wrong ! 
 
 Unthrilled by triumph's bugle strain, 
 They hear but moan of bitter pain 
 
 In that obscurity of life, 
 
 Wherein they wage unequal strife, 
 And scarce a doubtful battle gain. 
 
 They win not glories, wrongs they bear, 
 Yet keep their honor white and fair ; 
 Their souls are sacrificial wine 
 That makes of life a thing divine, — 
 A paradise they may not share. 
 
 They break the pathway of advance; 
 
 They scorn tradition's icy glance; 
 Yet feel their generous impulse faint 
 Beneath the walls of old restraint, 
 
 The bastions grim of circumstance. 
 
 But in despite of fortune's frown, 
 They wear the thorns of duty's crown ; 
 Unlaureled meet life's cold eclipse, 
 And die with "courage" on their lips, 
 And faith too proud to be cast down. 
 
 60 
 
What if such strugglers leave behind 
 No name, the wonder of mankind ! 
 
 To mortals what is glory's breath? 
 
 A far-heard murmur stilled in death, 
 An echo dying on the wind ! 
 
 O heroes reft of fame's caress, 
 Weigh not the world's f orgetfulness ! 
 Though with but tears on cliffs of time, 
 You bravely trace one thought sublime, 
 God will not view your labor less. 
 
 The Choice 
 
 Why weariness, distress and grief, 
 
 And why disquiet ever ? 
 Lives he not best who, like a leaf, 
 
 Toils 'gainst the current never ? 
 
 Ay, blest is he whose calm of life 
 Portends disquiet never; 
 
 But surer he, who braves the strife 
 That holds a peace forever ! 
 
 The Sovereign Love 
 
 She whom forever I would fain 
 Adore, nor ever from her part, 
 
 Must pass the icebergs of my brain, 
 To win the tropics of my heart. 
 
 61 
 
Two Epitaphs 
 
 ON DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON. 
 
 Here lies poor Johnson ; reader, have a care ; 
 Tread lightly, lest you rouse a sleeping bear. 
 Religious, moral, generous and humane 
 He was ; but self-sufficient, rude and vain ; 
 Ill-bred and overbearing in dispute, 
 A scholar, and a Christian, and a brute. 
 Would you know all his wisdom and his folly, 
 His actions, sayings, mirth and melancholy? 
 Boswell and Thrale, retailers of his wit, 
 Will tell you how he wrote and talked and 
 coughed and spit. 
 
 — Soame Jenyns. 
 
 ON SOAME JENYNS. 
 
 Here lies poor Jenyns, whose good taste and wit 
 In Johnson emphasized the ''cough and spit," 
 Held cheap the sweetness of that monarch mind 
 And found delight in mocking at the rind ; 
 Rude was the Doctor, yet in kindly wise ; 
 In Jenyns, sooth, the case is otherwise ; 
 P'or he, whom Jenyns rudely calls a brute 
 Is all that makes important this dispute. 
 Well had it been for Jenyns if his art 
 Supplied such lack of manners with such heart. 
 
 62 
 
James N. Johnston 
 
 The fools of Shakespeare's time were number- 
 less, 
 
 They did not dream that giant mind was there ; 
 And yet the age had, too, a race of men, 
 
 For that they called the great Ben Jonson rare. 
 
 We are not fools. We know our James is rare, 
 And he is so, because his ample mind, 
 
 In this the age of unremorseful gain, 
 
 Still cherishes the things that make life kind. 
 
 Rudolph W. Wolffsohn . 
 
 Friend of my heart, from out the silence here 
 
 Across eternity I bid thee hail ; 
 
 Not long I knew thee, but I proved the mail 
 That girt thy knightly nature and the spear 
 Gleaming that charged for friendship without 
 fear; 
 
 Not thine was it to turn with questionings pale 
 
 At hate's envenomed hint or slander's tale, — 
 Thou steadfast to thy colors stoodist, sincere! 
 
 Thou art not dead nor canst thou ever die. 
 
 Somewhere thy soul dispenseth mirth and light, 
 Gladness and music ; thou wert born to give 
 In sojourn here or in thy distant sky 
 
 Beauty of heart to make the hours more bright 
 And memories sweet that in affection live. 
 
 63 
 
A Vision in a Dream 
 
 I heard the dreadful winds of death 
 
 Sweep round the midnight tombs, 
 And the drear voice that muttereth 
 
 From out the hollow glooms : 
 'Here see the wreck of greater powers, 
 
 This fate before thee looms ; 
 What matter now life's revelled hours, 
 
 Its blossoms and its blooms?" 
 
 And yet I smiled amid it all, 
 
 With youth and glory fled, 
 And felt my soul grow great and tall 
 
 Surrounded by the dead ; 
 For I had lived, the gift divine, 
 
 Earth's beauty and delight 
 With all their sweetness had been mine,- 
 
 Fond prelude to the night ! 
 
 Youth and Glory 
 
 Youth and Glory came together, 
 
 Smiling, hand in hand, 
 All the dreams of all the ages 
 
 Love-lit all the land. 
 
 Glory stayed, but Youth departed, 
 End of life's sweet story! 
 
 Reft of the enchantments olden, 
 Glory was not Glory. 
 
 64 
 
Isabel 
 
 Isabel 
 
 Whom I love well, 
 If my soul's soul's voice could reach you, 
 It would tell you, it would teach you, 
 In the grave where you are sleeping, 
 That fond memories I am keeping 
 Of the love that once you cherished, 
 Of the love that hath not perished. 
 
 Not the past, 
 Which did not last, 
 Nor the smiling of the morrow, 
 Nor the present with its sorrow, 
 Can avail to dull the aching 
 Of the heart when it is breaking 
 With the thoughts of all your sweetness 
 In the days of love's completeness. 
 
 Fare you well, 
 Isabel ! 
 For the years we cannot number, 
 Soft and dreamless be your slumber, 
 Where the oriole is winging 
 And the southern flowers are springing ; 
 Till hereafter I shall meet you, 
 And with tears and kisses greet you. 
 
 Rome, Italy, Aug. 12, 1903. 
 
 65 
 
Roma Antiqua 
 
 By yellow Tiber's storied stream 
 How seems the pride of man a dream ; 
 Here temples old when earth was young 
 Their shadows o'er this river flung, 
 Lone ruins now of crumbling mold, 
 Save Angelo, the grim and old, — 
 Nor does that even keep in trust 
 Its mighty builder's scattered dust. 
 
 Here science, letters, art and song 
 Amused the weak, entrenched the strong ; 
 Here Caesar reared his lofty throne, — 
 His "Golden House" the lizards own ; 
 Here Emperor, Prince and Prelate slew 
 The millions of the false or true, — 
 Yea, and the chosen of the Lord 
 In the red record of the sword. 
 
 Above the unremembered dead 
 
 The roses bloom where kings have bled ; 
 
 The stately river winds its way 
 
 As in the old imperial day, 
 
 And nature laughs at man's pretense 
 
 To an immortal permanence : 
 
 O Love, thy dreams can never die, 
 
 Still shines the blue Italian sky ! 
 
 Rome. Italy, July 23, 1903. 
 
 66 
 
t i 
 
 My Love of Olden Time " 
 
 "O then to be 
 
 Again with thee 
 My love of olden time !" 
 
 To know the truth 
 
 Of Life and Youth 
 And prize their gifts sublime ! 
 'Twould end the tears 
 
 Of bitter years, 
 Make earth's new morning gay ; 
 
 And all the flowers 
 
 Of all the hours 
 Would breathe the dreams of May. 
 
 When We Shall Part 
 
 When we shall part 
 Nor grief nor wailing 
 
 Will touch the heart, 
 Nor yet swift paling, 
 
 Nor tears that start. 
 
 We shall not know ; 
 
 Our lips as ever 
 Will meet, and so, 
 
 Through a forever, 
 A lost love grow. 
 
 67 
 
The Return 
 
 The Plotter's path with flowers spread. 
 With vines and fruitage overhead, 
 We revel down with dancing tread, 
 
 Nor dream the future's bitter moan, 
 
 The drear retreat — alone! 
 
 Then in the twinkling of an eye, 
 Heart, soul, life, love, in one wild cry 
 Hearken the dreadful summons — die! 
 
 Black is the path! The flowers dead! 
 
 And all the sweetness fled ! 
 
 Through the dark night that ends the dawn, 
 We struggle with the Devil's spawn ; 
 Fiercely we fight for days agone, 
 With final loyalty to truth, 
 And hope that prays God's ruth. 
 
 The pathway back — soul-sickening thought, 
 With all its stabbing memories fraught, 
 Must with dumb agony be fought ; 
 
 Yet happy he — though evil-starred, 
 
 Who finds it is not barred ! 
 
 To an Empress 
 
 Thou wise old mother, how I reverence thee ! 
 Oft at the kitchen table of white pine 
 I dozed and dreamed, until the moment came, 
 
 While thy love watched, believed, and trusted me. 
 
 68 
 
Love to Love 
 
 Hold this heart, or rude or gently, 
 
 So it please thy will, 
 And its beating will contently 
 
 Yearn in worship still. 
 
 But let thou another harm it, 
 Slight the wound may be, 
 
 Yet thy graces shall not charm it 
 Through eternity. 
 
 Mors Haud Molesta 
 
 I shall not grieve if my last sunlight sees 
 But strangers with me when it all shall end; 
 
 I shall at least escape old memories, — 
 The Judas-kiss of relative or friend. 
 
 Rose of the World 
 
 O Rosamund and Rosamonde, 
 Rose-mouth and World-of-Roses, 
 
 You little dream what rapture fond 
 Your name in me discloses. 
 
 A wealth of memoried delights, 
 All scenes of sylvan bowers, 
 
 The golden suns, the silver nights, 
 And love to rule the hours ! 
 
 69 
 
The Poets 
 
 The poets have one quality sublime : 
 
 They have no envy when from out their ranks 
 One moves, with words that win the applause of 
 time; 
 
 They lead the world in chorus of their thanks. 
 
 Sin's Son and Azrael 
 
 I fear not death, dear Lord, nor his sweet call, 
 So that he be Thy messenger divine ; 
 For such as come from Thee still bear the sign 
 
 Of that far morning, when in Eden's hall 
 
 Thy mercy tempered justice; and on all 
 The future sons of Adam's ruined line 
 Thy pledge of grace bestowed; this, too, is 
 mine, 
 
 Therefore I come, Thy ransomed, not Death's 
 thrall ! 
 
 Only, my Father, give me strength to shun 
 Sin's servitude, so at the latter day 
 
 When I shall see the splendor of Thy face, 
 I may approach free as a trusting son, 
 
 Nor in Thy Presence dragged, for his dis- 
 play 
 In Satan's chains, — eternity's disgrace! 
 
 70 
 
To Father Cronin 
 
 How little did they know thee, Man Sublime ! 
 They saw thy lion front ; entranced they heard 
 The eloquence of thine uplifting word — 
 
 The trumpet-tongue of truth that graced thy 
 time. 
 
 They did not know that, like a little child, 
 
 Thy heart was meek and gentle, and thy soul 
 Cared naught for fame, and only had this 
 goal — 
 
 To enter into Heaven, undefiled. 
 
 A Dear Woman 
 
 Thou good and faithful servant, enter in 
 The kingdom of thy Lord, whom thou hast 
 
 served 
 Nobly and high, and from no duty swerved, 
 
 Oh, thou, — if mortals may be, — without sin. 
 
 Thy blameless life, now drawn to peaceful end, 
 Was filled with the unselfish aim to bless ; 
 And this, earth's truest measure of success, 
 
 Crowns thee as wife, as mother, and as friend. 
 
 71 
 
Io Triumphe ! 
 
 The world; awakes, its shadows flee 
 Across the meadowlands of thought, 
 
 To where, on bleeding Calvary, 
 Our victory was wrought. 
 
 On bitter tree of toil and wrong, 
 
 We likewise feel the lance and thorn ; 
 
 Yet lifting high our triumph song, 
 We hail the Easter morn. 
 
 This day is Life the crowned King, 
 And Death creation's conquered slave ; 
 
 Yea, Love hath fled with flashing wing, 
 The portals of the grave. 
 
 The glory of that hope sublime, 
 
 O Christ, Thou claimest for Thine own ; 
 And far beyond the shock of time, 
 
 Is set Thy changeless throne. 
 
 William A. King 
 
 And Philip said to his immortal son: 
 
 "Get thee a kingdom, boy, 
 Less strait than Macedon." 
 
 So thou hast won by worth respect so wide. 
 
 Thou needs must sympathize 
 With Alexander's pride. 
 
 72 
 
Keats 
 
 Thy "name was writ in water." Even so, 
 Thy words were wise, as later ages know ; 
 For while the ceaseless sea hath ebb and flow, 
 Oh, Wounded Heart, thy memory shall grow. 
 
 73 
 
Harvard Memories 
 
To Harvard College 
 
 On storied heights of knowledge thou dost stand, 
 O Mother-Queen, who from thy throne of 
 
 fame 
 Shedst light of learning's soul-exalting flame 
 
 O'er many realms, but chief upon that land 
 
 Whose burning hopes ideals high demand; 
 The young Republic, stainless yet of shame, 
 Comes, as Prometheus to old Gaia came, 
 
 To find the truth of truth in thy fair hand. 
 
 As high thy state, so be thy high emprise ! 
 
 Nor faiths outworn, nor dreams of things 
 agone, 
 Find ceaseless habitation in thy halls! 
 Morn-fronted progress mirrored in thine eyes, 
 Is but the presage of thy greater dawn 
 If thou art true when trump of action calls. 
 
 Charles F. Dunbar 
 
 Dunbar, to thy sage mind and candid heart 
 The world presents no problems difficult ; 
 
 Thy simple rule of fairness doth result 
 In giving due to all, and each his part. 
 
 April 22, 1893. 
 
 77 
 
On a Banquet Card 
 
 rich the feast, and fair the festal show, 
 
 And bright the wine, and sweet the laughter's 
 
 flow; 
 Yet joy like this can soothe but earthly pain, 
 Its glamours fall upon the soul, — in vain! 
 
 1 listen to the laughter in a dream, 
 
 And all its notes like mingled echoes seem 
 Of far-off sighings and of myriad tears 
 Wind-blown across the desert of my years. 
 
 Memorial Hall, Christmas, 1885. 
 
 John J. Hayes 
 
 Many a golden hour has fled 
 
 Since last I saw thee, honored friend ; 
 And though the ways of men I tread, 
 But few I've found of heart and head 
 
 And conscience, such as thou dost blend. 
 
 Receive this greeting o'er the seas, 
 
 Nor dream its fervor e'er shall wane; 
 Though silence winters friendship's trees, 
 Thy memory, like Spring's perfumed breeze, 
 Reverts, again, and yet again. 
 
 April 17, 1893. 
 
 78 
 
George Martin Lane 
 
 Lane, from thy leaching glorious there blooms 
 The flower of culture, delectation rare, 
 And long dead centuries with life are fair, 
 
 Nor is Rome now a heap of heroes' tombs. 
 
 By magic of thy learning and thy taste, 
 We talk with Pliny, Terence, Tacitus, 
 As friend to friend, and open unto us 
 
 Are templed shrines whose memories are not 
 waste. 
 
 Scholars and poets, conquerors and sages, 
 Who made a purple history their theme, 
 Crowd to thy gardens, noble Academe, — 
 
 Oblivious of the intervening ages ! 
 
 April 13, 1893. 
 
 Ephraim Emerton 
 
 Thy knowledge, Emerton, exact yet wide, 
 
 Hath Mil-man's charm and Hallam's spirit 
 caught ; 
 No mere array of facts for ages dried, 
 
 But Church and State in living splendor 
 wrought ; 
 And Emperor and Pope of knightly days, 
 Again the heart enchant, the mind amaze. 
 
 April 25, 1893. 
 
 79 
 
Freeman Snow 
 
 Honor hath known thee long to be her friend, 
 And Valor found thee equal to the test ; 
 
 While Modesty doth all thy ways attend, — 
 Type of the man thy country loveth best. 
 
 April 22, 1893. 
 
 Silas Marcus Macvane 
 
 Not thine to palter when thy duty spake, 
 But quick with generous instinct at her call, 
 Thy human heart was big ; and braving all 
 
 The yelping pack whose rancors were awake, 
 
 Thy courage, that did neither bend nor break, 
 Gave them no prey but disappointment's gall, — 
 Ay, checked them snarling each o'er each to 
 fall, 
 
 While their pent sides with venom balk'd did 
 shake. 
 
 Noble thou art in genius and in soul ; 
 One who in quiet ways exerts a force 
 
 Whose virtue not with centuries shall wane ; 
 Tender, and sunny also, with a shoal 
 
 Of playful wits, like dolphins on their course, — 
 Who would not praise thee, equal-poised 
 Macvane ! 
 
 April 22, 1893. 
 
 80 
 
Charles Pomeroy Parker 
 
 Parker, thy memory is blent 
 
 With waving trees and sunny days 
 
 Of my first year at Harvard spent, 
 Reading the old Horatian lays. 
 
 And oft with pleasure I recall 
 
 Thy loyal friendship and thy worth,- 
 
 Thou type of spirits nobly tall, 
 That bless and dignify the earth. 
 
 April 17, 1893. 
 
 Nathaniel Southgate Shaler 
 
 Shaler, impetuous yet always true, 
 
 Thy spirit's scorn of wrong and love of right 
 Are like twin swords of flame; consuming 
 light, 
 
 Whereat lies tremble; ay, and liars, too! 
 
 April 14, 1893. 
 
 81 
 
Le Baron Russell Briggs 
 
 Lover of justice, when I think of thee, 
 The faith that sickens oft in fellow-men, 
 Like knight refreshed, springs up full-armed 
 again ; 
 
 For thy clean soul from every blemish free, 
 
 Sane as the sun that all the world may see, 
 Gives light and courage in this age, as when 
 In Golden Arthur's reign the strength of ten 
 
 Girt Gallahad, the flower of chivalry. 
 
 Gentle and patient, noble, brave and wise, 
 No littleness can touch thee with its breath ; 
 Yea, at thy name the storms of meanness 
 lull; 
 And wrong, abashed before thy steady eyes, 
 Seeks of itself the ways of its own death, — 
 Thou upright man and incorruptible ! 
 
 April 10, 1893. 
 
 82 
 
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