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 The Augustan Books of Poetry 
 Edited by Edward Thompson 
 
 Uniform with this volume 
 ROBERT BRIDGES 
 RABINDRANATH TAGORE 
 JOHN KEATS 
 PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 
 G. K. CHESTERTON 
 HILA1RE BELLOC 
 
 In Preparation 
 
 OMAR KHAYYAM (EDWARD FITZGERALD) 
 
 WILLIAM CANTON 
 
 A CHRISTMAS ANTHOLOGY 
 
 EDMUND BLUNDEN 
 
 J. C. SQUIRE 
 
 ANDREW MARVELL 
 
 THOMAS CAMPION 
 
 ANDREW LANG 
 
 SIR EDMUND GOSSE 
 
 ILLING AND SONS, LTD., CUILDFORD AKD KSHSR
 
 HILAIRE BELLOC 
 
 Born 1870; educated, The Oratory School, Edgbaston, and 
 Balliol College, Oxford. Served in the French Artillery; 
 M.P., South Salford, 1906. 
 
 ooj 
 
 Grateful acknowledgments are due to Messrs. Duck- 
 worth and Co., and to Mr. Belloc, for permission to print 
 this selection. 
 
 The publishers also wish to acknowledge the courtesy of 
 Messrs. Robert M. McBride and Company in agreeing to 
 the publication of this selection in the United States. 
 
 Ill
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 THE SOUTH COUNTRY - 5 
 
 TO THE BALLIOL MEN STILL IN AFRICA - 7 
 
 WEST SUSSEX DRINKING SONG - - 8 
 
 TARANTELLA - 9 
 
 LINES TO A DON - - IO 
 
 DEDICATION ON THE GIFT OF A BOOK TO A CHILD 12 
 HERETICS ALL - 1 3 
 
 THE DEATH AND LAST CONFESSION OF WANDERING 
 
 PETER - 
 SONNETS - 
 SONG 
 
 THE NIGHT 
 
 THE MOON'S FUNERAL 
 OUR LORD AND OUR LADY - 
 A BIVOUAC 
 IN A BOAT 
 
 BALLADE TO OUR LADY OF CZESTOCHOWA 
 HA'NACKER MILL 
 EPIGRAMS 
 
 STANZAS WRITTEN ON BATTERSEA BRIDGE DURING A 
 SOUTH-WESTERLY GALE - 
 
 IV
 
 The South Country 
 
 WHEN I am living in the Midlands 
 That are sodden and unkind, 
 I light my lamp at evening : 
 My work is left behind; 
 And the great hills of the South Country 
 Come back into my mind. 
 
 The great hills of the South Country 
 
 They stand along the sea; 
 And it's there walking in the high woods 
 
 That I could wish to be, 
 And the men that were boys when I was a boy 
 
 Walking along with me. 
 
 The men that live in North England 
 
 I saw them for a day : 
 Their hearts are set upon the waste fells, 
 
 Their skies are fast and grey; 
 From their castle-walls a man may see 
 
 The mountains far away. 
 
 The men that live in West England 
 
 They see the Severn strong, 
 A-rolling on rough water brown 
 
 Light aspen leaves along. 
 They have the secret of the Rocks, 
 
 And the oldest kind of song. 
 
 But the men that live in the South Country 
 
 Are the kindest and most wise, 
 They get their laughter from the loud surf, 
 
 And the faith in their happy eyes 
 Comes surely from our Sister the Spring 
 
 When over the sea she flies; 
 The violets suddenly bloom at her feet, 
 
 She blesses us with surprise. 
 
 5
 
 I never get between the pines 
 
 But I smell the Sussex air; 
 Nor I never come on a belt of sand 
 
 But my home is there, 
 And along the sky the line of the Downs 
 
 So noble and so bare. 
 
 A lost thing could I never find, 
 
 Nor a broken thing mend : 
 And I fear I shall be all alone 
 
 When I get towards the end. 
 Who will be there to comfort me 
 
 Or who will be my friend? 
 
 I will gather and carefully make my friends 
 Of the men of the Sussex Weald, 
 
 They watch the stars from silent folds, 
 They stiffly plough the field. 
 
 By them and the God of the South Country 
 My poor soul shall be healed. 
 
 If I ever become a rich man, 
 
 Or if ever I grow to be old, 
 I will build a house with deep thatch 
 
 To shelter me from the cold, 
 And there shall the Sussex songs be sung 
 
 And the story of Sussex told. 
 
 I will hold my house in the high wood 
 
 Within a walk of the sea, 
 And the men that were boys when I was a boy 
 
 Shall sit and drink with me.
 
 To the Balliol Men Still in Africa 
 (1900) 
 
 YEARS ago when I was at Balliol, 
 Balliol men and I was one 
 Swam together in winter rivers, 
 
 Wrestled together under the sun. 
 And still in the heart of us, Balliol, Balliol, 
 
 Loved already, but hardly known, 
 
 Welded us each of us into the others : 
 
 Called a levy and chose her own. 
 
 Here is a House that armours a man 
 
 With the eyes of a boy and the heart of a ranger, 
 And a laughing way in the teeth of the world 
 
 And a holy hunger and thirst for danger: 
 Balliol made me, Balliol fed me, 
 
 Whatever I had she gave me again : 
 And the best of Balliol loved and led me. 
 
 God be with you, Balliol men. 
 
 I have said it before, and I say it again, 
 
 There was treason done, and a false word spoken, 
 And England under the dregs of men, 
 
 And bribes about, and a treaty broken : 
 But angry, lonely, hating it still, 
 
 I wished to be there in spite of the wrong. 
 My heart was heavy for Cumnor Hill 
 
 And the hammer of galloping all day long. 
 
 Galloping outward into the weather, 
 
 Hands a-ready and battle in all : 
 Words together and wine together 
 
 And song together in Balliol Hall. 
 
 7
 
 Rare and single! Noble and few! . . . 
 
 Oh! they have wasted you over the sea! 
 The only brothers ever I knew, 
 
 The men that laughed and quarrelled with me. 
 
 * * * * 
 
 Balliol made me, Balliol fed me, 
 Whatever I had she gave me again; 
 
 And the best of Balliol loved and led me. 
 God be with you, Balliol men. 
 
 West Sussex Drinking Song 
 
 THEY sell good Beer at Haslemere 
 And under Guildford Hill. 
 At Little Cowfold as Pve been told 
 
 A beggar may drink his fill : 
 There is a good brew in Amberley too, 
 
 And by the bridge also; 
 
 But the swipes they take in at Washington Inn 
 Is the very best Beer I know. 
 
 Chorus. 
 
 With my here it goes, there it goes, 
 
 All the fun's before us: 
 
 The Tipple's Aboard and the night is young, 
 The door's ajar and the Barrel is sprung, 
 I am singing the best song ever was sung, 
 
 And it has a rousing chorus. 
 
 If I were what I never can be, 
 
 The master or the squire: 
 If you gave me the hundred from here to the sea, 
 
 Which is more than I desire: 
 8
 
 Then all my crops should be barley and hops, 
 
 And did my harvest fail 
 Pd sell every rood of mine acres I would 
 
 For a bellyful of good Ale. 
 
 Chorus. 
 
 With my here it goes, there it goes, 
 
 All the fun's before us: 
 The Tipple's Aboard and the night is young, 
 The door's ajar and the Barrel is sprung, 
 I am singing the best song ever was sung, 
 
 And it has a rousing chorus. 
 
 Tarantella 
 
 DO you remember an Inn, 
 Miranda? 
 
 Do you remember an Inn ? 
 And the tedding and the spreading 
 Of the straw for a bedding, 
 And the fleas that tease in the High Pyrenees, 
 And the wine that tasted of the tar? 
 And the cheers and the jeers of the young muleteers 
 (Under the vine of the dark verandah) . 
 Do you remember an Inn, Miranda, 
 Do you remember an Inn? 
 
 And the cheers and the jeers of the young muleteers 
 Who hadn't got a penny, 
 And who weren't paying any, 
 And the hammer at the doors and the Din ? 
 And the Hip! Hop! Hap! 
 Of the clap 
 Of the hands to the twirl and the swirl
 
 Of the girl gone chancing, 
 
 Glancing, 
 
 Dancing, 
 
 Backing and advancing, 
 
 Snapping of a clapper to the spin 
 
 Out and in 
 
 And the Ting, Tong, Tang of the Guitar! 
 
 Do you remember an Inn, 
 
 Miranda ? 
 
 Do you remember an Inn.? 
 
 Never more, 
 
 Miranda; 
 
 Never more. 
 
 Only the high peaks hoar: 
 
 And Aragon a torrent at the door. 
 
 No sound 
 
 In the walls of the Halls where falls 
 
 The tread 
 
 Of the feet of the dead to the ground. 
 
 No sound: 
 
 But the boom 
 
 Of the far Waterfall like Doom. 
 
 Lines to a Don 
 
 REMOTE and ineffectual Don 
 That dared attack my Chesterton, 
 With that poor weapon, half-impelled, 
 Unlearnt, unsteady, hardly held, 
 Unworthy for a tilt with men 
 Your quavering and corroded pen; 
 Don poor at Bed and worse at Table, 
 Don pinched, Don starved, Don miserable; 
 
 10
 
 Don stuttering, Don with roving eyes, 
 Don nervous, Don of crudities; 
 Don clerical, Don ordinary, 
 Don self-absorbed and solitary; 
 Don here-and- there, Don epileptic; 
 Don puffed and empty, Don dyspeptic; 
 Don middle-class, Don sycophantic, 
 Don dull, Don brutish, Don pedantic; 
 Don hypocritical, Don bad, 
 Don furtive, Don three-quarters mad; 
 Don (since a man must make an end), 
 Don that shall never be my friend. 
 
 Don different from those regal Dons! 
 With hearts of gold and lungs of bronze, 
 Who shout and bang and roar and bawl 
 The Absolute across the hall, 
 Or sail in amply bellowing gown 
 Enormous through the Sacred Town, 
 Bearing from College to their homes 
 Deep cargoes of gigantic tomes; 
 Dons admirable! Dons of Might! 
 Uprising on my inward sight 
 Compact of ancient tales, and port 
 And sleep and learning of a sort. 
 Dons English, worthy of the land; 
 Dons rooted; Dons that understand. 
 Good Dons perpetual that remain 
 A landmark, walling in the plain 
 The horizon of my memories 
 Like large and comfortable trees. 
 
 Don very much apart from these, 
 Thou scapegoat Don, thou Don devoted, 
 Don to thine own damnation quoted, 
 ii
 
 Perplexed to find thy trivial name 
 
 Reared in my verse to lasting shame. 
 
 Don dreadful, rasping Don and wearing, 
 
 Repulsive Don Don past all bearing. 
 
 Don of the cold and doubtful breath, 
 
 Don despicable, Don of death; 
 
 Don nasty, skimpy, silent, level; 
 
 Don evil; Don that serves the devil. 
 
 Don ugly that makes fifty lines. 
 
 There is a Canon which confines 
 
 A Rhymed Octosyllabic Curse 
 
 If written in Iambic Verse 
 
 To fifty lines. I never cut; 
 
 I far prefer to end it but 
 
 Believe me I shall soon return. 
 
 My fires are banked, but still they burn 
 
 To write some more about the Don 
 
 That dared attack my Chesterton. 
 
 Dedication on the Gift of a Book 
 to a Child 
 
 do not throw this book about! 
 Refrain from the unholy pleasure 
 Of cutting all the pictures out! 
 
 Preserve it as your chiefest treasure. 
 
 Child, have you never heard it said 
 That you are heir to all the ages? 
 
 Why, then, your hands were never made 
 To tear these beautiful thick pages! 
 
 12
 
 Your little hands were made to take 
 
 The better things and leave the worse ones 
 
 They also may be used to shake 
 
 The Massive Paws of Elder Persons. 
 
 And when your prayers complete the day, 
 
 Darling, your little tiny hands 
 Were also made, I think, to pray 
 
 For men that lose their fairylands. 
 
 Heretics All 
 
 HERETICS all, whoever you be, 
 In Tarbes or Nimes, or over the sea, 
 You never shall have good words from me. 
 Caritas non conturbat me. 
 
 But Catholic men that live upon wine 
 Are deep in the water, and frank, and fine; 
 Wherever I travel I find it so, 
 Beyedicamus Domino. 
 
 On childing women that are forlorn, 
 And men that sweat in nothing but scorn 
 That is on all that ever were born, 
 Miserere Domine. 
 
 To my poor self on my deathbed, 
 And all my dear companions dead, 
 Because of the love that I bore them, 
 Dona Els Requiem.
 
 The Death and Last Confession of 
 Wandering Peter 
 
 WHEN Peter Wanderwide was young 
 He wandered everywhere he would : 
 And all that he approved was sung, 
 And most of what he saw was good. 
 
 When Peter Wanderwide was thrown 
 By Death himself beyond Auxerre, 
 
 He chanted in heroic tone 
 
 To priests and people gathered there : 
 
 " If all that I have loved and seen 
 Be with me on the Judgment Day, 
 
 I shall be saved the crowd between 
 From Satan and his foul array. 
 
 " Almighty God will surely cry, 
 
 St. Michael ! Who is this that stands 
 
 With Ireland in his dubious eye, 
 And Perigord between his hands, 
 
 " * And on his arm the stirrup-thongs, 
 
 And in his gait the narrow seas, 
 And in his mouth Burgundian songs, 
 
 But in his heart the Pyrenees?' 
 
 " St. Michael then will answer right 
 (And not without angelic shame), 
 * I seem to know his face by sight : 
 I cannot recollect his name . . . ?> 
 
 " St. Peter will befriend me then, 
 
 Because my name is Peter too : 
 ' I know him for the best of men 
 That ever walloped barley brew.
 
 " ' And though I did not know him well, 
 
 And though his soul were clogged with sin, 
 
 7 hold the keys of Heaven and Hell. 
 Be welcome, noble Peterkin.' 
 
 " Then shall I spread my native wings 
 And tread secure the heavenly floor, 
 
 And tell the Blessed doubtful things 
 Of Val d'Aran and Perigord." 
 
 This was the last and solemn jest 
 Of weary Peter Wanderwide. 
 
 He spoke it with a failing zest, 
 And having spoken it, he died. 
 
 Sonnets 
 
 XVIII 
 
 WHEN you to Acheron's ugly water come 
 Where darkness is and formless mourners brood 
 And down the shelves of that distasteful flood 
 Survey the human rank in order dumb. 
 When the pale dead go forward, tortured more 
 By nothingness and longing than by fire, 
 Which bear their hands in suppliance with desire, 
 With stretched desire for the ulterior shore. 
 
 Then go before them like a royal ghost 
 And tread like Egypt or like Carthage crowned; 
 Because in your Mortality the most 
 Of all we may inherit has been found 
 
 Children for memory : the Faith for pride. 
 
 Good land to leave : and young Love satisfied. 
 
 15
 
 xix 
 
 We will not whisper, we have found the place 
 Of silence and the endless halls of sleep; 
 And that which breathes alone throughout the deep 
 The end and the beginning : and the face 
 Between the level brows of whose blind eyes 
 Lie plenary contentment, full surcease 
 Of violence, and the passionless long peace 
 Wherein we lose our human lullabies. 
 
 Look up and tell the immeasurable height 
 Between the vault of the world and your dear head; 
 That's death, my little sister, and the night 
 Which was our Mother beckons us to bed, 
 
 Where large oblivion in her house is laid 
 
 For us tired children, now our games are played. 
 
 XXI 
 
 Almighty God, whose justice like a sun 
 Shall coruscate along the floors of Heaven, 
 Raising what's low, perfecting what's undone, 
 Breaking the proud and making odd things even. 
 The poor of Jesus Christ along the street 
 In your rain sodden, in your snows unshod, 
 They have nor hearth, nor sword, nor human meat, 
 Nor even the bread of men : Almighty God. 
 
 The poor of Jesus Christ whom no man hears 
 Have waited on your vengeance much too long. 
 Wipe out not tears but blood : our eyes bleed tears. 
 Come smite our damned sophistries so strong 
 That thy rude hammer battering this rude wrong 
 Ring down the abyss of twice ten thousand years. 
 16
 
 XXII 
 
 Mother of all my cities, once there lay 
 
 About your weedy wharves an orient shower 
 Of spice and languorous silk and all the dower 
 
 That Ocean gave you on his bridal day. 
 
 And now the youth and age have passed away 
 And all the sail superb and all the power; 
 Your time's a time of memory like that hour 
 
 Just after sunset, wonderful and grey. 
 
 Too tired to rise and much too sad to weep, 
 With strong arm nerveless on a nerveless knee, 
 
 Still to your slumbering ears the spousal deep 
 Murmurs his thoughts of eld eternally; 
 
 But your soul wakes not from its holy sleep 
 
 Dreaming of dead delights along a tideless sea. 
 
 XXIII 
 
 November is that historied Emperor 
 
 Conquered in age but foot to foot with fate 
 Who from his refuge high has heard the roar 
 
 Of squadrons in pursuit, and now, too late, 
 Stirrups the storm and calls the winds to war, 
 
 And arms the garrison of his last heirloom, 
 And shakes the sky to its extremest shore 
 
 With battle against irrevocable doom. 
 
 Till, driven and hurled from his strong citadels, 
 He flies in hurrying cloud and spurs him on, 
 
 Empty of lingerings, empty of farewells 
 And final benedictions and is gone. 
 
 But in my garden all the trees have shed 
 
 Their legacies of the light and all the flowers are dead.
 
 XXIV 
 
 Hoar Time about the House betakes him slow 
 Seeking an entry for his weariness. 
 And in that dreadful company distress 
 And the sad night with silent footsteps go. 
 On my poor fire the brands are scarce aglow 
 And in the woods without what memories press 
 Where, waning in the trees from less to less 
 Mysterious hangs the horned moon and low. 
 
 For now December, full of aged care, 
 Comes in upon the year and weakly grieves; 
 Mumbling his lost desires and his despair 
 And with mad trembling hand still interweaves 
 The dank sear flower-stalks tangled in his hair, 
 While round about him whirl the rotten leaves. 
 
 xxv 
 
 It freezes : all across a soundless sky 
 
 The birds go home. The governing dark's begun. 
 
 The steadfast dark that waits not for a sun; 
 
 The ultimate dark wherein the race shall die. 
 
 Death with his evil finger to his lip 
 
 Leers in at human windows, turning spy 
 
 To learn the country where his rules shall lie 
 
 When he assumes perpetual generalship. 
 
 The undefeated enemy, the chill 
 That shall benumb the voiceful earth at last, 
 Is master of our moment, and has bound 
 The viewless wind itself. There is no sound. 
 It freezes. Every friendly stream is fast. 
 It freezes, and the graven twigs are still. 
 18
 
 XXX 
 
 The world's a stage and I'm the Super man, 
 And no one seems responsible for salary. 
 I roar my part as loudly as I can 
 And all I mouth I mouth it to the gallery. 
 I haven't got another rhyme in " alery," 
 It would have made a better job, no doubt, 
 If I had left attempt at Rhyming out, 
 Like Alfred Tennyson adapting Malory. 
 
 The world's a stage, the company of which 
 Has very little talent and less reading : 
 But many a waddling heathen painted bitch 
 And many a standing cad of gutter breeding. 
 
 We sweat to learn our book : for all our pains 
 We pass. The Chucker-out alone remains. 
 
 Song 
 
 Inviting the Influence of a Young Lady 
 Upon the Opening Tear 
 
 YOU wear the morning like your dress 
 And are with mastery crowned; 
 Whenas you walk your loveliness 
 Goes shining all around. 
 Upon your secret, smiling way 
 Such new contents were found, 
 The Dancing Loves made holiday 
 On that delightful ground.
 
 II 
 
 Then summon April forth, and send 
 
 Commandment through the flowers; 
 
 About our woods your grace extend 
 
 A queen of careless hours. 
 
 For oh, not Vera veiled in rain, 
 
 Nor Dian's sacred Ring, 
 
 With all her royal nymphs in train 
 
 Could so lead on the Spring. 
 
 The Night 
 
 MOST holy Night, that still dost keep 
 The keys of all the doors of sleep, 
 To me when my tired eyelids close 
 Give thou repose. 
 
 And let the far lament of them 
 That chaunt the dead day's requiem 
 Make in my ears, who wakeful lie, 
 Soft lullaby. 
 
 Let them that guard the horned moon 
 By my bedside their memories croon. 
 So shall I have new dreams and blest 
 In my brief rest. 
 
 Fold your great wings about my face, 
 Hide dawning from my resting-place, 
 And cheat me with your false delight, 
 Most Holy Night. 
 
 20
 
 The Moons Fuiieral 
 
 THE Moon is dead. I saw her die. 
 She in a drifting cloud was drest, 
 She lay along the uncertain west, 
 A dream to see. 
 
 And very low she spake to me : 
 " I go where none may understand, 
 I fade into the nameless land, 
 And there must lie perpetually." 
 And therefore I, 
 And therefore loudly, loudly I 
 And high 
 
 And very piteously make cry : 
 "The Moon is dead. I saw her die." 
 
 And will she never rise again? 
 
 The Holy Moon? Oh, never more! 
 
 Perhaps along the inhuman shore 
 
 Where pale ghosts are 
 
 Beyond the low lethean fen 
 
 She and some wide infernal star . . 
 
 To us who loved her never more, 
 
 The Moon will never rise again. 
 
 Oh ! never more in nightly sky 
 
 Her eye so high shall peep and pry 
 
 To see the great world rolling by. 
 
 For why? 
 
 The Moon is dead. I saw her die- 
 
 21
 
 Our Lord and Our Lady 
 
 THEY warned Our Lady for the Child 
 That was Our blessed Lord, 
 And She took Him into the desert wild, 
 Over the camel's ford. 
 
 And a long song She sang to Him 
 
 And a short story told : 
 And She wrapped Him in a woollen cloak 
 
 To keep Him from the cold. 
 
 But when Our Lord was grown a man 
 The Rich they dragged Him down, 
 
 And they crucified Him in Golgotha, 
 Out and beyond the Town. 
 
 They crucified Him on Calvary, 
 
 Upon an April day; 
 And because He had been her little Son 
 
 She followed Him all the way. 
 
 Our Lady stood beside the Cross, 
 
 A little space apart, 
 And when She heard Our Lord cry out 
 
 A sword went through Her Heart. 
 
 They hid Our Lord in a marble tomb, 
 
 Dead, in a winding-sheet; 
 But Our Lady stands above the world 
 
 With the white moon at Her feet. 
 
 A Bivouac 
 
 YOU came without a human sound, 
 You came and brought my soul to me: 
 I only woke, and all around 
 They slumbered on the firelit ground, 
 Beside the guns in Burgundy. 
 
 22
 
 I felt the gesture of your hands, 
 
 You signed my forehead with the Cross; 
 The gesture of your holy hands 
 Was bounteous like the misty lands 
 
 Along the Hills in Calvados. 
 
 But when I slept I saw your eyes, 
 Hungry as death, and very far. 
 I saw demand in your dim eyes 
 Mysterious as the moons that rise 
 At midnight, in the Pines of Var. 
 
 In a Boat 
 
 LADY! Lady! 
 Upon Heaven-height, 
 Above the harsh morning 
 In the mere light. 
 
 Above the spindrift 
 And above the snow, 
 Where no seas tumble, 
 And no winds blow. 
 
 The twisting tides, 
 And the perilous sands 
 Upon all sides 
 Are in your holy hands. 
 
 The wind harries 
 And the cold kills; 
 But I see your chapel 
 Over far hills. 
 
 23
 
 My body is frozen, 
 
 My soul is afraid : 
 
 Stretch out your hands to me, 
 
 Mother and maid. 
 
 Mother of Christ, 
 
 And Mother of me, 
 
 Save me alive 
 
 From the howl of the sea. 
 
 If you will Mother me 
 Till I grow old, 
 I will hang in your chapel 
 A ship of pure gold. 
 
 Ballade to Our Lady of Czestochowa 
 
 LADY and Queen and Mystery manifold 
 And very Regent of the untroubled sky, 
 Whom in a dream St Hilda did behold 
 And heard a woodland music passing by: 
 You shall receive me when the clouds are high 
 With evening and the sheep attain the fold. 
 This is the faith that I have held and hold, 
 And this is that in which I mean to die. 
 
 n 
 
 Steep are the seas and savaging and cold 
 
 In broken waters terrible to try; 
 And vast against the winter night the wold, 
 
 And harbourless for any sail to lie. 
 
 But you shall lead me to the lights, and I 
 Shall hymn you in a harbour story told. 
 This is the faith that I have held and hold, 
 
 And this is that in which I mean to die. 
 
 24
 
 Ill 
 
 Help of the half-defeated, House of gold, 
 
 Shrine of the Sword, and Tower or Ivory; 
 Splendour apart, supreme and aureoled, 
 
 The Battler's vision and the World's reply. 
 
 You shall restore me, O my last Ally, 
 To vengeance and the glories of the bold. 
 This is the faith that I have held and hold, 
 
 And this is that in which I mean to die. 
 
 Envoi 
 
 Prince of the degradations, bought and sold, 
 These verses, written in your crumbling sty, 
 
 Proclaim the faith that I have held and hold 
 And publish that in which I mean to die. 
 
 Hanacker Mill 
 
 SALLY is gone that was so kindly, 
 Sally is gone from Ha'nacker Hill. 
 And the Briar grows ever since then so blindly 
 And ever since then the clapper is still, 
 And the sweeps have fallen from Ha'nacker Mill. 
 
 Ha'nacker Hill is in Desolation : 
 
 Ruin a-top and a field unploughed. 
 And Spirits that call on a fallen nation, 
 
 Spirits that loved her calling aloud : 
 
 Spirits abroad in a windy cloud. 
 
 Spirits that call and no one answers; 
 
 Ha'nacker's down and England's done. 
 Wind and Thistle for pipe and dancers 
 
 And never a ploughman under the Sun. 
 
 Never a ploughman. Never a one* 
 
 25
 
 w 
 
 Epigrams 
 
 On His Books 
 
 HEN I am dead, I hope it may be said : 
 
 " His sins were scarlet, but his books were read." 
 
 'A Trinity 
 
 Of three in One and One in three 
 My narrow mind would doubting be 
 Till Beauty, Grace and Kindness met 
 And all at once were Juliet. 
 
 On Hygiene 
 
 Of old when folk lay sick and sorely tried 
 The doctors gave them physic, and they died. 
 But here's a happier age : for now we know 
 Both how to make men sick and keep them so. 
 
 On Lady Poltagrue, a Public Peril 
 
 The Devil, having nothing else to do, 
 Went off to tempt My Lady Poltagrue. 
 My Lady, tempted by a private whim, 
 To his extreme annoyance, tempted him. 
 
 The Telephone 
 
 To-night in million-voiced London I 
 Was lonely as the million-pointed sky 
 Until your single voice. Ah! So the Sun 
 Peoples all heaven, although he be but one. 
 26
 
 The Statue 
 
 When we are dead, some Hunting-boy will pass 
 And find a stone half-hidden in tall grass 
 And grey with age : but having seen that stone 
 (Which was your image), ride more slowly on. 
 
 Epitaph on the Politician Himself 
 
 Here richly, with ridiculous display, 
 
 The Politician's corpse was laid away. 
 
 While all of his acquaintance sneered and slanged 
 
 I wept : for I had longed to see him hanged. 
 
 On a Rose for Her Bosom 
 
 Go, lovely rose, and tell the lovelier fair 
 
 That he which loved her most was never there. 
 
 On the Little God 
 
 Of all the gods that gave me all their glories 
 To-day there deigns to walk with me but one. 
 I lead him by the hand and tell him stories. 
 It is the Queen of Cyprus' little son. 
 
 On a Prophet 
 
 Of old 'twas Samuel sought the Lord : to-day 
 The Lord runs after Samuel so they say. 
 
 On a Dead Hostess 
 
 Of this bad world the loveliest and the best 
 Has smiled and said " Good Night," and gone to rest. 
 27
 
 On a Great Election 
 
 The accursed power which stands on Privilege 
 
 (And goes with Women, and Champagne and Bridge) 
 
 Broke and Democracy resumed her reign : 
 
 (Which goes with Bridge, and Women and Champagne) 
 
 On a Sleeping Friend 
 
 Lady, when your lovely head 
 Droops to sink among the Dead, 
 And the quiet places keep 
 You that so divinely sleep; 
 Then the dead shall blessed be 
 With a new solemnity, 
 For such Beauty, so descending, 
 Pledges them that Death is ending. 
 Sleep your fill but when you wake 
 Dawn shall over Lethe break. 
 
 The False Heart 
 
 I said to Heart, " How goes it?" Heart replied 
 " Right as a Ribstone Pippin ! " But it lied. 
 
 Partly from ihs Greek 
 
 She would be as the stars in your sight 
 That turn in the endless hollow; 
 That tremble, and always follow 
 The quiet wheels of the Night. 
 
 28
 
 Stanzas Written on Battersea Bridge 
 during a South-Westerly Gale 
 
 THE woods and downs have caught the mid-December, 
 The noisy woods and high sea-downs of home; 
 The wind has found me and I do remember 
 The strong scent of the foam. 
 
 Woods, darlings of my wandering feet, another 
 Possesses you, another treads the Down; 
 
 The South West Wind that was my elder brother 
 Has come to me in town. 
 
 The wind is shouting from the hills of morning, 
 
 I do remember and I will not stay. 
 I'll take the Hampton road without a warning 
 
 And get me clean away. 
 
 The Channel is up, the little seas are leaping, 
 
 The tide is making over Arun Bar; 
 And there's my boat, where all the rest are sleeping 
 
 And my companions are. 
 
 I'll board her, and apparel her, and I'll mount her, 
 My boat, that was the strongest friend to me 
 
 That brought my boyhood to its first encounter 
 And taught me the wide sea. 
 
 Now shall I drive her, roaring hard a' weather, 
 Right for the salt and leave them all behind; 
 
 We'll quite forget the treacherous streets together 
 And find or shall we find? 
 
 There is no Pilotry my soul relies on 
 
 Whereby to catch beneath my bended hand, 
 
 Faint and beloved along the extreme horizon 
 That unforgotten land. 
 
 29
 
 We shall not round the granite piers and paven 
 To lie to wharves we know with canvas furled. 
 
 My little Boat, we shall not make the haven 
 It is not of the world. 
 
 Somewhere of English forelands grandly guarded 
 It stands, but not for exiles, marked and clean; 
 
 Oh! not for us. A mist has risen and marred it- 
 My youth lies in between. 
 
 So in this snare that holds me and appals me, 
 Where honour hardly lives nor loves remain, 
 
 The Sea compels me and my County calls me, 
 But stronger things restrain. 
 
 England, to me that never have malingered, 
 Nor spoken falsely, nor your flattery used, 
 
 Nor even in my rightful garden lingered : 
 What have you not refused? 
 
 3
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
 
 Los Angeles 
 This book is DUE on the last date stamped below. 
 
 SEP 9 W9 
 
 m L9-Series 444
 
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