HE YEAR OF SHAME 
 
 "WILLIAM WATSON

 
 THE YEAR OF SHAME

 
 THE YEAR OF SHAME 
 
 BY 
 
 WILLIAM WATSON 
 
 WITH AN INTRODUCTION 
 BY 
 
 THE BISHOP OF HEREFORD 
 
 • 
 
 
 JOHN LANE 
 
 THE BODLEY HEAD 
 LONDON AND NEW YORK 
 
 1897
 
 Copyright, 1896, by 
 JOHN LANE 
 
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 Press of J. J. Little &• Co. 
 Astor Place, New York
 
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 CONTENTS 
 
 The Recording Angel . . . Frontispiece 
 
 (George Frederick Watts., R.A .) page 
 
 Introduction 7 
 
 Author's Note 19 
 
 I To a Lady 21 
 
 II The Turk in Armenia . . . .23 
 
 III Ignoble Ease 25 
 
 IV The Price of Prestige . . . .27 
 V How Long ? 29 
 
 VI Repudiated Responsibility . . .31 
 
 VII A Hurried Funeral 33 
 
 VIII England to America 35 
 
 IX A Birthday 37 
 
 X The Tired Lion 39 
 
 XI The Bard-in-Waiting 41 
 
 As
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 XII Leisured Justice 
 
 XIII The Plague of Apathy 
 
 XIV The Knell of Chivalry 
 XV To Russia . 
 
 XVI A Trial of Orthodoxy 
 XVII "If" . 
 
 XVIII A Wondrous Likeness 
 XIX Starving Armenia . 
 XX To the Sultan . 
 XXI On the Reported Expulsion of Ahmed 
 
 Riza by the French Government 
 XXII On a Certain European Alliance 
 
 XXIII To Our Sovereign Lady . 
 
 XXIV The Awakening .... 
 XXV How Weary is Our Heart . 
 
 XXVI Europe at the Play 
 
 43 
 
 45 
 47 
 49 
 5i 
 53 
 55 
 57 
 59 
 
 6i 
 
 63 
 65 
 
 67 
 70 
 
 73
 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 The words of a true poet, like a Greek 
 statue, need no framework or drapery. They 
 tell their own tale, and we prefer to read 
 them without note, or comment, or intro- 
 duction, or supplement ; because it is uni- 
 versally true that deep answereth to deep in 
 human hearts. 
 
 But this little volume goes out, as I un- 
 derstand, on the present occasion, not only 
 as a poet's impassioned utterance, but still 
 more as a patriotic appeal, intended to pro- 
 voke men to serious thought about national 
 honour and duty, and to move the fountains 
 of charity on behalf of those sufferers who, 
 having endured long agony and sore be-
 
 8 INTRODUCTION 
 
 reavement, and horrors that cannot be 
 plainly described, are now perishing in 
 misery and want amidst all the cruel rigour 
 of an Armenian winter, whilst the Pharaohs 
 of modern Christendom harden their hearts 
 against their bitter cry. 
 
 Such is my apology for this brief intro- 
 duction, written because it has been felt that 
 a few words of plain prose may assist in 
 carrying the book into some homes which 
 it would not otherwise have entered. 
 
 If so, my modest and humble share in the 
 matter will have served its purpose, and will 
 be abundantly justified. 
 
 Some readers of the poet's passionate out- 
 pourings, as they sit in their safe and unde- 
 nted English homes, may possibly feel that 
 one and another of his burning utterances 
 are hard sayings which they cannot endorse 
 or approve, and it may be fully acknowl-
 
 INTRODUCTION 9 
 
 edged that most of us, and not least the 
 poet himself, would desire in due place to 
 give full weight to every extenuating circum- 
 stance ; but when duty seems to be call- 
 ing to deaf ears, and when statesmen seem 
 to be afflicted with moral paralysis, it is 
 hardly the moment for extenuation, and 
 even if the historian extenuates he will not 
 acquit us. 
 
 If these poems could be edited and illus- 
 trated with all the lurid picture of the recur- 
 ring abominations and infamies that set the 
 writer's heart aflame in each case, if every 
 reader could see the pandemonium of lust 
 and cruelty, as he saw it, with its back- 
 ground of unfulfilled and disregarded moral 
 obligations on our part, and of cynical cal- 
 lousness and intrigue on the part of selfish 
 monarchs and diplomatists, who call them- 
 selves Christians, what may seem at first
 
 10 INTRODUCTION 
 
 sight to be the language of exaggeration, or 
 the cry of an over-sensitive spirit, would be 
 felt to be the plain words of truth and sober- 
 ness. At all events, when we have made 
 every possible deduction for the intensity of 
 poetic feeling, more highly strung, no doubt, 
 and more finely touched than that of com- 
 mon men, there remains in these poems the 
 unmistakeable voice of genuine native Eng- 
 lish patriotism and humanity, nursed on 
 the record of English story, and inspired by 
 our inheritance of honour and duty, as dis- 
 tinct from the pinchbeck patriotism of the 
 commercial jingo, who is unhappily becom- 
 ing very prominent in English life, and is 
 very militant, if any material interests are 
 threatened, but all for peace and patience 
 and concerted action, when the only thing 
 concerned is a question of old-fashioned 
 honour and moral obligation.
 
 INTRODUCTION II 
 
 To those who are possessed by this spirit, 
 and look upon international duty as some- 
 thing that is to be measured chiefly, if not 
 entirely, by financial and material interests, 
 these poems can hardly be welcome or at- 
 tractive reading. On the other hand, multi- 
 tudes of plain English folk of every degree, 
 saddened and humiliated by a spectacle 
 which looks so very like the lowering of the 
 flag of English chivalry at the secret dictates 
 of the bondholder and commercial specu- 
 lator, are beginning to feel that our country 
 greatly needs such moral tonics as that 
 which is furnished by these searching and 
 stirring poems. 
 
 We were told not long since by a distin- 
 guished historian, in language which has 
 been quoted with much approval, that the 
 traditional and characteristic policy of Eng- 
 lishmen, to which more than anything else
 
 12 INTRODUCTION 
 
 our country owes its high place among the 
 nations, has been their habit of going their 
 own way, following their own sense of duty, 
 and guarding their own honour, " uncaring 
 consequences " ; but it is impossible to read 
 the history of our share in Turkish affairs 
 during the last two years, and our long-con- 
 tinued acquiescence in Turkish barbarities — 
 an altogether ignoble acquiescence when 
 set side by side with our undertakings and 
 obligations — without feeling that this proud 
 and independent spirit seems to be in danger 
 of dying out ; and these poems will do a 
 great service to England if they compel men 
 to think of the ominous change thus sug- 
 gested, and to study the inner and true 
 meaning of such a change. 
 
 We are very loth to believe that our states- 
 men, affected by this insidious influence, and 
 involved in the enervating atmosphere of
 
 INTRODUCTION 13 
 
 Continental diplomacy, have lost their nerve 
 and resource, and yet this idea is spreading 
 in men's minds, as they wait in weariness of 
 heart through the long months and seasons, 
 which are fruitful in nothing but fresh inso- 
 lence and massacre. 
 
 We are willing to admit that they have 
 opposed to them at least two tremendous 
 forces, which make the situation very difficult ; 
 but such occasions are the brave and strong 
 man's opportunity, and he turns them into 
 those moments of noble action, which are the 
 leaven of his country's greatness. But, as 
 yet, we look in vain for the signs of this en- 
 nobling strength. Our statesmen seem to 
 be overawed on the one hand by the demoral- 
 ising influence of the financier, the bond- 
 holder, and the speculator, an influence 
 which threatens to become as disastrous in 
 modern Christendom as it was in ancient
 
 14 INTRODUCTION 
 
 Rome, and on the other hand by those great 
 military empires which have strangled the 
 conscience of Europe. 
 
 " How much is a man better than a 
 sheep?" said the Divine Word long ago; 
 but our modern diplomacy seems to say the 
 very opposite, as it sits guarding material 
 interests and leaves a helpless and innocent 
 people to perish in slow agony, miserably 
 and unspeakably. The burden of a vast 
 empire is laid upon us — such is the plea — 
 and our first duty is to safeguard our own 
 possessions and all our manifold and ever- 
 growing interests. We are so hard- pressed 
 by financial and other obligations that we 
 dare not run the risk of stepping apart or 
 acting alone, though it was alone that we 
 made our promises on behalf of this forsaken 
 people in the days of the Cyprus Convention. 
 
 In answer to all this line of argument,
 
 INTRODUCTION i 5 
 
 multitudes of silent Englishmen have been 
 asking, and will continue to ask with growing 
 indignation and sternness, what meanwhile 
 is becoming of English honour, and chivalry, 
 and independence, and sensitive regard for 
 moral obligations ; and such men are grate- 
 ful to a poet who gives voice to this higher 
 and nobler national feeling, because they 
 believe it to be as true for us to-day as it was 
 when Shakespeare wrote the words that 
 
 " Where great additions swell and virtue none 
 It is a dropsied honour." 
 
 But, rejoin the diplomatists, in exculpation 
 of their failure, confronted as we are by the 
 vast military organisations of the Continent, 
 our only hope is to hold on to the concert of 
 Europe, whatever betide ; and this notwith- 
 standing their admiration of those makers of 
 England whose proud characteristic it was
 
 16 INTRODUCTION 
 
 to go their own way. Had these diplomatists 
 lived in Jerusalem in the days of Hezekiah, 
 they would doubtless have urged with equal 
 emphasis that it was folly in Israel to have 
 the hardihood to stand aloof from the 
 concert of Asia as represented by Sen- 
 nacherib, and they would have had a very 
 poor opinion of the prophet Isaiah. 
 
 Yet it was the prophet who saved the 
 nation and added a new lustre to the name 
 of his people. And it is the spirit of Isaiah 
 that is represented in this book of poems, 
 warning us that the Lord's arm is not 
 shortened, and making us feel that behind 
 those desolated Armenian homes, those tor- 
 tured and murdered men, those dishonoured 
 and heart-broken women, there stands the 
 vision of a stern and unavoidable reckoning 
 for those who might have saved and would 
 not or dared not.
 
 INTRODUCTION 17 
 
 But it is not our part to apportion the 
 blame. To every one according to his guilt 
 I will repay, saith the Lord, whether it be 
 Tsar, or Emperor, or statesman, or financier, 
 who bars the way. 
 
 Those who believe in Christ as the great 
 life of love and sacrifice that came on earth 
 to save the perishing and to comfort the 
 mourner will not fail at this Christmas sea- 
 son to offer up their prayers and to send some 
 gift on behalf of the sufferers who still survive. 
 
 Sunt lacrimce rerum, etmentem mortalia tangunt. 
 
 Some who read these lines will be gathering 
 in happy homes — fathers, mothers, sons, and 
 daughters — for a joyful Christmas meeting, 
 others will be saddened as they look on the 
 vacant chair of some loved one; but whether 
 they meet in joy or sorrow, what a contrast 
 is furnished by those Christian households
 
 18 INTRODUCTION 
 
 in Armenia, some waiting in helpless and hope- 
 less dread for the threatened onslaught of 
 plunder, lust, and butchery, others fatherless 
 and brotherless, every surviving child an or- 
 phan, and every woman ravished and defiled. 
 
 It is for such as these, left in cold and 
 hunger and shame and nakedness, that the 
 appeal comes to us through all the sound of 
 Christmas bells; and it is the voice of the 
 Incarnate Christ Himself that is thus calling, 
 and to those who answer the call His reward 
 is that which He promised from the be- 
 ginning, the blessing of the Father. 
 
 " I was an hungered and ye gave Me meat ; 
 naked and ye clothed Me ; I was sick and ye 
 visited Me ; I was in prison and ye came unto 
 Me. Inasmuch as ye did it to these desolate 
 and forsaken ones ye did it unto Me." 
 
 J. Hereford. 
 
 December, 1896.
 
 AUTHOR'S NOTE 
 
 The sonnets and other poems in this book, though 
 they have a certain chronological sequence in point 
 of subject-matter and occasion, are not otherwise 
 meant to be understood as a series. 
 
 Sixteen of the sonnets are here reprinted — in 
 some cases with alteration — from my pamphlet, 
 " The Purple East" The remaining pieces have 
 not appeared before, except in newspapers. 
 
 I retain, in the sonnet to the Sultan, the inac- 
 curate use of "Abdul" upon which some critics 
 have very naturally commented. 
 
 W. W.
 
 TO A LADY 
 
 DAUGHTER of Ireland,— nay, 'twere better 
 
 said, 
 Daughter of Ireland's beauty, Ireland's grace, 
 Child of her charm, of her romance ; whose 
 
 face 
 Is legendary with her glories fled ! 
 The shadow of her living griefs and dead 
 I pray you to put by a little space,
 
 22 TO A LADY 
 
 And mourn with me an ancient Orient race 
 
 Outcast and doomed and disinherited. 
 
 Though Wrong be strong, though thrones 
 
 be built on crimes, 
 To know you, Lady, is to doubt no more 
 That in the world are mightier powers than 
 
 these ; 
 That heaven, the ocean, gains on earth, the 
 
 shore ; 
 And that deformity and hate are Time's, 
 And love and loveliness Eternity's.
 
 II 
 
 THE TURK IN ARMENIA 
 
 What profits it, England, to prevail 
 
 In arts and arms, and mighty realms subdue, 
 
 And ocean with thine argosies bestrew, 
 
 And wrest thy tribute from each golden gale, 
 
 If idly thou must hearken to the wail 
 
 Of women martyred by the turbaned crew 
 
 Whose tenderest mercy was the sword that 
 
 slew, 
 And hazard not the dinting of thy mail? 
 We deemed of old thou held'st a charge 
 
 from Him
 
 24 THE TURK IN ARMENIA 
 
 Who sits companioned by His seraphim, 
 To smite the wronger with thy destined rod. 
 Wait'st thou His sign ? Enough, the un- 
 answered cry 
 Of virgin souls for vengeance, and on high 
 The gathering blackness of the frown of 
 God!
 
 Ill 
 IGNOBLE EASE 
 
 Never henceforth, O England, nevermore 
 Prate thou of generous effort, righteous aim, 
 Whose shame is that thou knowest not thy 
 
 shame ! 
 Summer hath passed, and Autumn's thresh- 
 ing-floor 
 Been winnowed ; Winter at Armenia's door 
 Snarls like a wolf; and still the sword and 
 
 flame 
 Sleep not ; thou only sleepest ; and the same 
 Cry unto heaven ascends as heretofore;
 
 26 IGNOBLE EASE 
 
 And the red stream thou might'st have 
 
 staunched, yet runs: 
 And roused by no divinely beckoning 
 
 Wraith, 
 Stirred by no clarion blowing loud and 
 
 wide, 
 Lost in ignoble ease, behold thy sons, 
 Sitting among the shards of broken faith, 
 And by the ruins of forgotten pride.
 
 IV 
 THE PRICE OF PRESTIGE 
 
 You in high places ; you that drive the 
 
 steeds 
 Of Empire ; you that say unto our hosts, 
 " Go thither," and they go ; and from our 
 
 coasts 
 Bid sail the squadrons, and they sail, their 
 
 deeds 
 Shaking the world : lo ! from a land that 
 
 pleads 
 For mercy where no mercy is, the ghosts 
 Look in upon you faltering at your posts —
 
 28 THE PRICE OF PRESTIGE 
 
 Upbraid you parleying while a People 
 
 bleeds 
 To death. What stays the thunder in your 
 
 hand ? 
 A fear for England? Can her pillared fame 
 Only on faith forsworn securely stand, 
 On faith forsworn that murders babes and 
 
 men ? 
 Are such the terms of Glory's tenure? Then 
 Fall her accursed greatness, in God's name !
 
 HOW LONG? 
 
 HEAPED in their ghastly graves they lie, the 
 
 breeze 
 Sickening o'er fields where others vainly 
 
 wait 
 For burial : and the butchers keep high 
 
 state 
 In silken palaces of perfumed ease. 
 The panther of the desert, matched with 
 
 these, 
 Is pitiful ; beside their lust and hate, 
 Fire and the plague-wind are compassionate,
 
 30 HOW LONG? 
 
 And soft the fang'd lips of the ravening seas. 
 
 How long shall they be borne? Is not the 
 
 cup 
 Of crime yet full? Doth devildom still lack 
 Some consummating crown, that we hold 
 
 back 
 The scourge, and in Christ's borders give 
 
 them room ? 
 How long shall they be borne, O England? 
 
 Up, 
 Tempest of God, and sweep them to their 
 
 doom !
 
 VI 
 REPUDIATED RESPONSIBILITY 
 
 I HAD not thought to hear it voiced so plain, 
 Uttered so forthright, on their lips who 
 
 steer 
 This nation's course: I had not thought to 
 
 hear 
 That word re-echoed by an English thane, 
 Guilt's maiden-speech when first a man lay- 
 slain, 
 "Am I my brother's keeper?" Yet full near 
 It sounded, and the syllables rang clear 
 As the immortal rhetoric of Cain.
 
 32 REPUDIATED RESPONSIBILITY 
 
 " Wherefore should we, sirs, more than they 
 
 — or they — 
 Unto these helpless reach a hand to save?" 
 An English thane, in this our English air, 
 Speaking for England ? Then indeed her 
 
 day 
 Slopes to its twilight, and, for Honour, there 
 Is needed but a requiem, and a grave.
 
 VII 
 
 A HURRIED FUNERAL 
 
 A LITTLE deeper, sexton. You forget, 
 She you would bury 'neath so thin a crust 
 Of loam, was fiery-souled, and ev'n in dust 
 She may lie restless, she may toss and fret, 
 Nay, she might break a seal too lightly set, 
 And vex, unmannerly, our ease ! She must 
 Beneath no lack of English earth lie thrust, 
 Would we unhaunted sleep ! Nay, deeper 
 
 yet. 
 Quick, friend, the cortege comes. There — 
 
 that will serve ;
 
 34 A HURRIED FUNERAL 
 
 Deep enough now ; and thou'lt need all thy 
 
 nerve, 
 If, in her coffin, at the last, amid 
 The mourners in the customary suits, 
 And to the scandal of these decent mutes, 
 This corpse of England's Honour burst the 
 
 lid!
 
 vni 
 
 ENGLAND TO AMERICA 
 
 O TOWERING daughter, Titan of the West, 
 Behind a thousand leagues of foam secure ; 
 Thou toward whom our inmost heart is pure 
 Of ill intent : although thou threatenest 
 With most unfilial hand thy mother's breast, 
 Not for one breathing-space may Earth 
 
 endure 
 The thought of War's intolerable cure 
 For such vague pains as vex to-day thy rest ! 
 But if thou hast more strength than thou 
 
 canst spend
 
 36 ENGLAND TO AMERICA 
 
 In tasks of Peace, and find'st her yoke too 
 
 tame, 
 Help us to smite the cruel, to befriend 
 The succourless, and put the false to shame. 
 So shall the ages laud thee, and thy name 
 Be lovely among nations to the end.
 
 IX 
 
 A BIRTHDAY 
 
 It is the birthday of the Prince of Peace : 
 Full long ago He lay with steeds in stall, 
 And universal Nature knew through all 
 Her borders that the reign of Pan must 
 
 cease. 
 The fatness of the land, the earth's increase, 
 Cumbers the board ; the holly hangs in hall ; 
 Somewhat of her abundance Wealth lets 
 
 fall; 
 It is the birthday of the Prince of Peace. 
 The dead rot by the wayside ; the unblest 
 
 432081
 
 38 A BIRTHDAY 
 
 Who live, in caves and desert mountains 
 
 lurk 
 Trembling, His foldless flock, shorn of their 
 
 fleece. 
 Women in travail, babes that suck the 
 
 breast, 
 Are spared not. Famine hurries to her 
 
 work. 
 It is the birthday of the Prince of Peace.
 
 X 
 THE TIRED LION 
 
 Speak once again, with that great note of 
 
 thine, 
 Hero withdrawn from Senates and their 
 
 sound 
 Unto thy home by Cambria's northern 
 
 bound, 
 Speak once again, and wake a world supine. 
 Not always, not in all things, was it mine 
 To follow where thou led'st: but who hath 
 
 found 
 Another man so shod with fire, so crowned
 
 40 THE TIRED LION 
 
 With thunder, and so armed with wrath 
 
 divine? 
 Lift up thy voice once more ! The nation's 
 
 heart 
 Is cold as Anatolia's mountain snows. 
 Oh, from these alien paths of base repose 
 Call back thy England, ere thou too depart — 
 Ere, on some secret mission, thou too start 
 With silent footsteps, whither no man knows.
 
 XI 
 THE BARD-IN-WAITING 
 
 Treachery's apologist, whose numbers 
 
 rung, 
 But yesterday, remonstrant in my ear; 
 Thou to whom England seems a mistress 
 
 dear, 
 Insatiable of honey from thy tongue: 
 Because I crouch not fawning slaves among, 
 How is my service proved the less sincere? 
 Have not I also deemed her without peer? 
 Her beauty have not I too seen and sung? 
 But for the love I bore her lofty ways,
 
 42 THE BARD-IN-WAITING 
 
 What were to me her stumblings and her 
 
 slips? 
 And lovely is she still, her maiden lips 
 Pressed to the lips whose foam around her 
 
 plays ! 
 But on her brow's benignant star whose 
 
 rays 
 Lit them that sat in darkness, lo ! the 
 
 eclipse.
 
 XII 
 LEISURED JUSTICE 
 
 " She bides her hour." And must I then 
 
 believe 
 That when the day of peril is o'erpast, 
 She who was great because so oft she cast 
 All thought of peril to the waves that heave 
 Against her feet, shall greatly undeceive 
 Her purblind son who dreamed she shrank 
 
 aghast 
 From Duty's signal, and shall act at last, 
 When there is naught remaining to retrieve? 
 At last ! when the last altar is defiled,
 
 44 LEISURED JUSTICE 
 
 And there are no more maidens to deflower — 
 
 When the last mother folds with famished 
 
 arms 
 To her dead bosom her last butchered 
 
 child- 
 Then shall our England, throned beyond 
 
 alarms, 
 Rise in her might ! Till then, " she bides 
 
 her hour."
 
 XIII 
 THE PLAGUE OF APATHY 
 
 The dewfall of compassion, is it o'er 
 
 So soon ? jo soon is dead indifference 
 
 come? 
 From wintry sea to sea the land lies numb. 
 With palsy of the spirit stricken sore, 
 The land lies numb from iron shore to 
 
 shore. 
 The unconcerned, they flourish : loud are 
 
 some, 
 And without shame. The multitude stand 
 
 dumb.
 
 46 THE PLAGUE OF APATHY 
 
 The England that we vaunted is no more. 
 
 Only the witling's sneer, the worldling's 
 
 smile, 
 The weakling's tremors, fail him not who 
 
 fain 
 Would rouse to noble deed. And all the 
 
 while, 
 A homeless people, in their mortal pain, 
 Toward one far and famous ocean isle 
 Stretch hands of prayer, and stretch those 
 hands in vain.
 
 XIV 
 
 THE KNELL OF CHIVALRY 
 
 O VANISHED morn of crimson and of gold, 
 
 youth of roselight and romance, wherein 
 
 1 read of paynim and of paladin, 
 
 And Beauty snatched from ogre's dungeoned 
 
 hold! 
 Ever the recreant would in dust be rolled, 
 Ever the true knight in the joust would 
 
 win, 
 Ever the scaly shape of monstrous Sin 
 At last lie vanquished, fold on writhing fold. 
 Was it all false, that world of princely deeds,
 
 48 THE KNELL OF CHIVALRY 
 
 The splendid quest, the good fight ringing 
 
 clear? 
 Yonder the Dragon ramps with fiery gorge, 
 Yonder the victim faints and gasps and 
 
 bleeds ; 
 But in his merry England our St. George 
 Sleeps a base sleep beside his idle spear.
 
 XV 
 
 TO RUSSIA 
 
 RUSSIA that wast the opener of the door 
 Through which the captive peoples went 
 
 forth freed ; 
 How art thou changed and fall'n, who giv'st 
 
 no heed 
 Though in the dust a nation stricken sore 
 Dies at thy feet ; though the red torrents pour 
 Continual, and to stay them does but need 
 Thy whisper, thy " Enough ! " O fall'n 
 
 indeed, 
 
 Russia the Liberator now no more ! 
 4
 
 5 o TO RUSSIA 
 
 Hear thou a parable. A savage hound 
 Did rend a babe ; and one that with a word 
 Or gesture could have called the brute to 
 
 heel, 
 Stood watching ; and behold he never stirred 
 A finger, and his lips vouchsafed no sound. 
 Shall hound or man God's heaviest judgment 
 
 feel?
 
 XVI 
 
 A TRIAL OF ORTHODOXY 
 
 The clinging children at their mother's knee 
 Slain ; and the sire and kindred one by one 
 Flayed or hewn piecemeal ; and things 
 
 nameless done, 
 Not to be told : while imperturbably 
 The nations gaze, where Rhine unto the sea, 
 Where Seine and Danube, Thames and 
 
 Tiber run, 
 And where great armies glitter in the sun, 
 And great kings rule, and man is boasted 
 
 free !
 
 52 A TRIAL OF ORTHODOXY 
 
 What wonder if yon torn and naked throng 
 
 Should doubt a Heaven that seems to wink 
 and nod, 
 
 And having moaned at noontide, " Lord, 
 how long?" 
 
 Should cry, "Where hidest Thou?" at even- 
 fall, 
 
 At midnight, " Is He deaf and blind, our 
 God?" 
 
 And ere day dawn, " Is He indeed at all ? "
 
 XVII 
 "IF" 
 
 Yea, if ye could not, though ye would, lift 
 
 r iand — 
 Ye halting leaders — to abridge Hell's reign ; 
 If, for some cause ye may not yet make 
 
 plain, 
 Yearning to strike, ye stood as one may 
 
 stand 
 Who in a nightmare sees a murder planned 
 And hurrying to its issue, and though fain 
 To stay the knife, and fearless, must 
 
 remain
 
 54 "IF" 
 
 Madly inert, held fast by ghostly band ; — 
 
 If such your plight, most hapless ye of 
 
 men ! 
 But if ye could and would not, oh, what 
 
 plea, 
 Think ye, shall stead you at your trial, 
 
 when 
 The thunder-cloud of witnesses shall loom, 
 With Ravished Childhood on the seat of 
 
 doom, 
 At the Assizes of Eternity ?
 
 XVIII 
 
 A WONDROUS LIKENESS 
 
 Still, on Life's loom, the infernal warp and 
 
 weft 
 Woven each hour ! Still, in august renown, 
 A great realm watching, under God's great 
 
 frown ! 
 Ever the same ! The little children cleft 
 In twain : the little tender maidens reft 
 Of maidenhood ! And through a little town 
 A stranger journeying, wrote this record 
 
 down, 
 u In all the place there was not one man left."
 
 56 A WONDROUS LIKENESS 
 
 friend, the sudden lightning of whose pen 
 Makes Horror's countenance visible afar, 
 And Desolation's face familiar, 
 
 1 think this very England of my ken 
 
 Is wondrous like that little town, where are 
 In all the streets and houses no more men.
 
 XIX 
 STARVING ARMENIA 
 
 Open your hearts, ye clothed from head to 
 
 feet, 
 Ye housed and whole who listen to the cry 
 Of them that not yet slain and mangled lie, 
 Only despoiled of all that made life sweet — 
 Only left bare to snow, and wind, and sleet, 
 And roofless to the inhospitable sky. 
 Give them of your abundance, lest they die, 
 And famine make this mighty woe com- 
 plete ; 
 And lest — if truly, as your creeds aver,
 
 58 STARVING ARMENIA 
 
 A day of reckoning come — it be your lot 
 To hear the voice of the uprisen dead : 
 "We were the naked whom ye covered not, 
 The sick to whom ye did not minister, 
 Yea, and the hungry whom ye gave not 
 bread."
 
 XX 
 
 TO THE SULTAN 
 
 Caliph, I did thee wrong. I hailed thee late 
 "Abdul the Damned," and would recall my 
 
 word. 
 It merged thee with the unillustrious herd 
 Who crowd the approaches to the infernal 
 
 gate- 
 Spirits gregarious, equal in their state 
 As is the innumerable ocean bird, 
 Gannet or gull, whose wandering plaint is 
 
 heard 
 On Ailsa or Iona desolate.
 
 60 TO THE SULTAN 
 
 For, in a world where cruel deeds abound, 
 
 The merely damned are legion : with such 
 
 souls 
 Is not each hollow and cranny of Tophet 
 
 crammed ? 
 Thou with the brightest of Hell's aureole^ 
 Dost shine supreme, incomparably crowned, 
 Immortally, beyond all mortals, damned.
 
 XXI 
 
 ON THE REPORTED EXPULSION OF 
 AHMED RIZA BY THE FRENCH 
 GOVERNMENT 
 
 WHEN, from supreme disaster, France uprose, 
 Shook her great wings and faced the world 
 
 anew, 
 Who, if not we, rejoiced at heart to view 
 Her proud resilience after mightiest woes ? 
 When 'neath the anarch's knife we saw the 
 
 close 
 Of Carnot's day, amid her weepings who 
 Wept if not we, for the just man and true
 
 62 EXPULSION OF AHMED RIZA 
 
 That masked his strength in most urbane 
 
 repose ? 
 And now again we mourn, but not with her, 
 Nay, not with her, though for her! — mourn 
 
 to see 
 A tyrant, Hell's most perfect minister, 
 A man-fiend, sun him in her countenance ; 
 And Freedom, whose impassioned name was 
 
 France, 
 Lie soiled and desecrate by France the Free.
 
 XXII 
 
 ON A CERTAIN EUROPEAN 
 ALLIANCE 
 
 The Hercules of nations, shaggy-browed, 
 Enormous-limbed, supreme on Steppe and 
 
 plain 
 Dwelt without consort, in his narrow brain 
 Nursing wide dreams he might not dream 
 
 aloud ; 
 Till him the radiant western Venus vowed 
 (So strange is love !) she pined for : and 
 
 these twain
 
 64 ON A CERTAIN EUROPEAN ALLIANCE 
 
 Were wedded — Neptune, with his nereid- 
 
 train, 
 Gracing the pageant of their nuptials proud. 
 
 Perfect in amorous arts, through eyes and 
 
 ears 
 She fans her giant's not too fierce desire. 
 
 " How long, O Venus ? What impassioned 
 
 years, 
 What ages of such rapture, ere thou tire ? " 
 Thus the lewd gods : thus Mars and all his 
 
 peers, 
 Gazing profane, at fault 'twixt mirth and ire.
 
 XXIII 
 
 TO OUR SOVEREIGN LADY 
 
 Queen, that from Spring to Autumn of Thy 
 
 reign 
 Hast taught Thy people how 'tis queenlier far 
 Than any golden pomp of peace or war, 
 Simply to be a woman without stain ! 
 Queen whom we love, Who lovest us again ! 
 We pray that yonder, by Thy wild Braemar, 
 The lord of many legions, the White Czar, 
 At this red hour, hath tarried not in vain. 
 We dream that from Thy words, perhaps 
 
 Thy tears, 
 
 5
 
 66 TO OUR SOVEREIGN LADY 
 
 Ev'n in the King's inscrutable heart, shall 
 
 grow 
 Harvest of succour, weal, and gentler days! 
 So shall Thy lofty name to latest years 
 Still loftier sound, and ever sweetlier blow 
 The rose of Thy imperishable praise.
 
 XXIV 
 
 THE AWAKENING 
 
 BEHOLD, she is risen who lay asleep so long, 
 Our England, our Beloved ! We have 
 
 seen 
 The swelling of the waters, we have heard 
 The thundering cataracts call. Behold, she 
 
 is risen, 
 Lovelier in resurrection than the face 
 Of vale or mountain, when, with storming 
 
 tears, 
 At all Earth's portals knocks the impor- 
 tunate Spring.
 
 68 THE AWAKENING 
 
 We watched her sleeping. Day and 
 night we strove 
 
 With the dread spell that drowsed her heart. 
 
 And thrice 
 In the unrest of her sick dreams she stirred, 
 Half raised herself, half oped her lips and lids, 
 And thrice the evil charm prevailed, and 
 
 thrice 
 She fell back forceless. But behold, she is 
 
 risen, 
 The Hope of the World is risen, is risen 
 
 anew. 
 
 O England ! O Beloved ! O Re-born ! 
 Look that thou fall not upon sleep again ! 
 Thou art a star among the nations yet :
 
 THE AWAKENING 69 
 
 Be thou a light of succour unto them 
 That else are lost in blind and whelming 
 
 seas. 
 Around them is the tempest; over them, 
 Cold splendours of the inhospitable night, 
 Augustly unregardful : thou alone 
 Art still the North Star to the labouring 
 
 ship, 
 In friendless ocean the befriending orb, 
 And if thou shine not, whither is she steered ? 
 Shine in thy glory, shine on her despair, 
 Shine lest she perish — lest of her no more 
 Than some lorn flotsam of mortality 
 Remain to catch the first auroral gleam, 
 When, in the East, flames the reluctant 
 
 dawn.
 
 XXV 
 HOW WEARY IS OUR HEART 
 
 Of kings and courts ; of kingly, courtly ways 
 In which the life of man is bought and 
 
 sold ; 
 How weary is our heart these many days ! 
 
 Of ceremonious embassies that hold 
 Parley with Hell in fine and silken phrase, 
 How weary is our heart these many days ! 
 
 Of wavering counsellors neither hot nor 
 cold,
 
 HOW WEARY IS OUR HEART 71 
 
 Whom from His mouth God speweth, be it 
 
 told 
 How weary is our heart these many days ! 
 
 Yea, for the ravelled night is round the 
 
 lands, 
 And sick are we of all the imperial story. 
 The tramp of Power, and its long trail of 
 
 pain ; 
 The mighty brows in meanest arts grown 
 
 hoary ; 
 The mighty hands, 
 
 That in the dear, affronted name of Peace 
 Bind down a people to be racked and slain ; 
 The emulous armies waxing without cease, 
 All-puissant all in vain ;
 
 72 HOW WEARY IS OUR HEART 
 
 The pacts and leagues to murder by delays, 
 
 And the dumb throngs that on the deaf 
 
 thrones gaze ; 
 The common, loveless lust of territory ; 
 The lips that only babble of their mart, 
 While to the night the shrieking hamlets 
 
 blaze ; 
 The bought allegiance, and the purchased 
 
 praise, 
 False honour, and shameful glory ; — 
 Of all the evil whereof this is part, 
 How weary is our heart, 
 How weary is our heart these many days !
 
 XXVI 
 EUROPE AT THE PLAY 
 
 O languid audience, met to see 
 
 The last act of the tragedy 
 
 On that terrific stage afar, 
 
 Where burning towns the footlights are,- 
 
 O listless Europe, day by day 
 
 Callously sitting out the play ! 
 
 So sat, with loveless count'nance cold, 
 Round the arena, Rome of old. 
 Pain, and the ebb of life's red tide, 
 So, with a calm regard, she eyed,
 
 74 EUROPE AT THE PLAY 
 
 Her gorgeous vesture, million-pearled, 
 Splashed with the blood of half the world. 
 High was her glory's noon : as yet 
 She had not dreamed her sun could set! 
 As yet she had not dreamed how soon 
 Shadows should vex her glory's noon. 
 Another's pangs she counted nought ; 
 Of human hearts she took no thought ; 
 But God, at nightfall, in her ear 
 Thundered His thought exceeding clear. 
 
 Perchance in tempest and in blight, 
 On Europe, too, shall fall the night ! 
 She sees the victim overborne, 
 By worse than ravening lions torn. 
 She sees, she hears, with soul unstirred,
 
 EUROPE AT THE PLAY 75 
 
 And lifts no hand, and speaks no word, 
 But vaunts a brow like theirs who deem 
 Men's wrongs a phrase, men's rights a dream. 
 Yet haply she shall learn, too late, 
 In some blind hurricane of Fate, 
 How fierily alive the things 
 She held as fool's imaginings, 
 And, though circuitous and obscure, 
 The feet of Nemesis how sure.
 
 A 
 
 List of Books 
 
 IN 
 
 BELLES LETTRES 
 
 JOHN LANE: THE BODLEY HEAD 
 
 140 FIFTH AVENUE 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 1897
 
 List of Books in Belles Lettres 
 
 ADAMS (FRANCIS). 
 
 Essays in Modernity. Crown Svo. $1.50. 
 
 [In preparation. 
 
 ALLEN (GRANT). 
 
 The Lower Slopes. With a Titlepage by J. Illing- 
 worth Kay. Crown Svo. $1.50. 
 
 That Mr. Allen is a poet, quite individual, if limited, these ex- 
 cursions leave no manner of doubt. — Bookman (London). 
 
 The power of passionate and pointed utterance displayed in 
 this little volume ought certainly not to be allowed to run to 
 waste. — Westminster Gazette (London). 
 
 ATHERTON (GERTRUDE). 
 
 Patience Sparhawk and her Times. A Novel. 
 Crown 8vo. $1.50. 
 
 BEECHING (REV. H. C). 
 
 St. Augustine at Ostia : Oxford Sacred Poem. 
 Crown Svo, wrappers. 50 cents. 
 
 The work of a man of genuine poetic feeling and of erudition 
 besides, who has known how to give a gracefully imaginative ren- 
 dering to that struggle between conflicting ideas and faiths of 
 which St. Augustine was the outcome. — Times (London). 
 
 BENNETT (E. A.). 
 
 A Man from the North. A Novel. Crown 8vo. 
 $1.25. [/;; preparation. 
 
 BENSON (ARTHUR CHRISTOPHER). 
 
 Lord Vyet and other Poems. Fcap. 8vo. $1.25. 
 
 BODLEY BOOKLETS (THE). 
 
 With Cover Design by Will H. Bradley. 
 
 I. The Happy Hypocrite : A Fairy Tale for Tired 
 
 Men. By Max Beerbohm. 32mo, wrappers. 
 
 35 cents. 
 Printed by Will H. Bradley, at the Wayside Press.
 
 BOOKS IN BELLES LETTRES 
 
 BROTHERTON (MARY). 
 
 Rosemary for Remembrance. With Titlepage and 
 Cover Design by Walter West. Fcap. Svo. 
 
 $1.25. 
 
 A rarely beautiful little volume of verse. Suggests the work of 
 one or two very famous women poets. — Realm {London). 
 
 BROWN (VINCENT). 
 
 Two in Captivity. A Novel. i6mo. 75 cents. 
 
 \_In preparation. 
 
 CHAPMAN (ELIZABETH RACHEL). 
 
 Marriage Questions in Modern Fiction. Crown 
 8vo. $1.50. [In preparation. 
 
 CHARLES (JOSEPH F.). 
 
 The Duke of Linden. A Novel. Crown 8vo. $1.25. 
 
 [/« p?-eparation. 
 
 CRACKANTHORPE (HUBERT). 
 
 Vignettes : a Miniature Journal of Whim and Sen- 
 timent. Fcap. 8vo. Boards. $1.00. 
 
 CRANE (WALTER). 
 
 Toy Books. A Re-issue. Each with new Cover 
 Design and end papers. 
 
 Mother Hubbard's Picture Book, containing: 
 I. Mother Hubbard. 
 II. The Three Bears. 
 III. The Absurd A. B.C. 
 
 The group of three bound in one volume, with a deco- 
 rative cloth cover, end papers, and a newly written 
 and designed Titlepage and Preface. 4to. $1.25. 
 Separately, 25 cents each. 
 
 CROSKEY (JULIAN). 
 
 Max. A Novel. Crown Svo. $1.50. 
 
 [In preparation . 
 
 CUSTANCE (OLIVE). 
 
 Love's First Fruits. Poems. Fcap. Svo. $1.25. 
 
 [/n pi-eparation. 
 DAVIDSON (JOHN). 
 
 New Ballads. With a Titlepage and Cover Design 
 by Walter West. Fcap. 8vo. $1.50.
 
 PUBLISHED BY JOHN LANE 
 
 DAVIDSON (JOHN), continued. 
 
 Ballads and Songs. With a Titlepage and Cover 
 , Design by Walter West. Fcap. 8vo. $1.50. 
 
 [Foitrth edition. 
 We must acknowledge that Mr.Davidson's work in this volume 
 
 displays great power There is strength and to spare. — 
 
 Times (London). 
 
 Mr. Davidson's new book is the best he has done, and to say 
 this, is a good deal. Here, at all events, is a poet who is never tame 
 or dull ; who, at all events, never leaves us indifferent. His verse 
 speaks to the blood, and there are times when " the thing becomes 
 a trumpet." — Saturday Review (London). 
 
 A Random Itinerary and a Ballad. With a 
 Frontispiece and Titlepage by Laurence Hous- 
 man. Fcap. 8vo. $1.50. 
 One part of " A Random Itinerary " should not be praised above 
 
 the others The whole volume is of wholesome flavour, and 
 
 is beautiful withal. — Literary World (London). 
 
 Plays : An Unhistorical Pastoral ; A Romantic Farce ; 
 Bruce, a Chronicle Play ; Smith, a Tragic Farce ; 
 Scaramouch in Naxos, a Pantomime. With a Fron- 
 tispiece and Cover Design by Aubrey Beardsley. 
 Small 4to. $2.50. 
 The best play in the present volume is entitled " Smith, a 
 Tragic Farce." The motive is as modem as Ibsen, the method is 
 as ancient as Shakespeare; and yet, in spite of this incongruity, 
 the play must be pronounced a fine one. — Liverpool Daily Post. 
 
 A notable volume " The " Unhistorical Pastoral " is a 
 
 charming conception, delicately wrought. — Saturday Review 
 (London). 
 
 DAWE (W. CARLTON). 
 
 Kakemonos : Tales of the Far East. i6mo. $1.00. 
 DAWSON (A. J.). 
 
 Mere Sentiment. Crown 8vo. $1.00. 
 Middle Greyness. A Novel. Crown 8vo. $1.50. 
 
 \Jn preparation. 
 DOWIE (MENIE MURIEL). 
 
 Some Whims of Fate. With Designed Cover. 
 Fcap. 8vo. $1.00. 
 
 EGERTON (GEORGE) . 
 
 Symphonies. Crown 8vo. $1.00. [In preparation. 
 
 EGLINTON (JOHN). 
 
 Two Essays on the Remnant. Post 8vo, wrappers. 
 
 50 cents. [Second edition. 
 
 The appreciation of Wordsworth and the caustic criticism of 
 
 Goethe are particularly delightful, and from first to last the book 
 
 is simply a work of genius. — Pall Mall Budget (London).
 
 BOOKS IN BELLES LETTRES 
 
 FEA (ALLAN). 
 
 The Flight of the King. A full, true, and par- 
 ticular Account of the Escape of His Most 
 Sacred Majesty King Charles II., after the Battle 
 of Worcester. With sixteen Portraits in Photo- 
 gravure, and nearly ioo other Illustrations. Demy 
 8vo. $7.50. 
 
 FIFTH (GEORGE). 
 
 The Martyr's Bible. A Novel. CrownSvo. $1.50. 
 
 [In preparatioii. 
 FLETCHER (J. S.). 
 
 God's Failures. Fcap. 8vo. $1.00. 
 
 Ballads of Revolt. Square 32010. $1.00. 
 
 FLOWERDEW (HERBERT). 
 
 A Celibate's Wife. A Novel. Crown 8 vo. $1.50. 
 
 [In preparation. 
 GARNETT (RICHARD). 
 
 Poems. With Titlepage by J. Illingworth Kay. 
 
 Crown 8vo. $1.50. 
 
 A book of high poetic merit and charm. — Academy (London). 
 
 Dante, Petrarch, Camoens, cxxiv Sonnets rendered 
 
 in English. With Titlepage and Cover Design by 
 
 Patten Wilson. Crown 8vo. $1.50. 
 
 Dr. Gamett once more shows his versatility and his gift of fine 
 workmanship in verse by this book. — Times (Loudon). 
 
 Quite apart from their value as translations, Dr. Garnett's 
 sonnets, Petrarchan in form but saturated with the Shakespearian 
 spirit, form a notable contribution to the treasury of English poetic 
 literature. — Graphic (London). 
 
 GRAHAME (KENNETH). 
 
 The Golden Age. i6mo. $1.25. [New edition. 
 
 Transferred to the present publisher. 
 
 The art of writing adequately and acceptably about children is 
 among the rarest and most precious of all arts. . . . " The Golden 
 Age " is one of the few books which are well-nigh too praiseworthy 
 for praise. . . . The fit reader — and the " fit " readers should be 
 far from " few " — finds himself a child again while reading it. Im- 
 mortality should be the reward — but it must have been the birth- 
 right — of the happy genius which perceived the burglars vanishing 
 " silently with horrid implications." . . . Praise would be as 
 superfluous as analysis would be impertinent. — Mr. Swinburne, 
 in tlie Daily Chronicle, March 3 1. 
 
 GRIMSHAWE (BEATRICE). 
 
 Broken Away. A Novel. Crown 8vo. $1.25.
 
 PUBLISHED BY JOHN LANE 
 
 HAYES (ALFRED). 
 
 The Vale of Arden and other Poems. With 
 ^ a Titlepage and Cover designed by E. H. New. 
 *Fcap. 8vo. $1.25. 
 
 Mr. Hayes is a refined writer of unpretentious verse, and his 
 contented mood is sufficiently rare in modern poetry to make his 
 volume notable. — Daily Chronicle (London). 
 
 This little volume contains very beautiful workmanship. It is 
 especially beautiful in the piece which gives its title to the volume. 
 — Daily News (London). 
 
 HOUSMAN (A. E.). 
 
 A Shropshire Lad: Poems. Fcap. 8vo. $1.25. 
 
 HOUSMAN (LAURENCE). 
 
 Gods and their Makers. With a Frontispiece by the 
 Author. Crown Svo. $1.25. [In preparation. 
 
 JAMES (W. P.). 
 
 Romantic Professions : A Volume of Essays. 
 With Titlepage designed by J. Illingworth 
 Kay. Crown Svo. $1.50. 
 
 These essays are chiefly remarkable for the charm of their style 
 and their wealth of illustration. The author's knowledge of fiction 
 of all kinds, and his critical insight into the merits and demerits of 
 writers of fiction, are considerable. — Morning Post (London.) 
 
 JOHNSTONE (C. E.). 
 
 Ballads of Boy and Beak. With a Titlepage by 
 F. H. Townsend. Square 32mo. 75 cents. 
 
 It is impossible to do other than covet the juvenile spirit of a 
 grown-up poet who lingers so lovingly over the experiences of desk 
 and playground, and whose every written page only lacks the inky 
 smudge of the schoolboy-hand to make it perfect. — Dundee 
 A dvertiser. 
 
 LANDER (HARRY). 
 
 Weighed in the Balance. A Novel. Crown Svo. 
 $1.50. 
 
 LEFROY (EDWARD CRACROFT). 
 
 Poems. With a Memoir by W. A. Gill, and a reprint 
 of J. A. Symonds' Critical Essay on Echoes 
 from Theocritus. Crown Svo. $1.50. 
 
 LE GALLIENNE (RICHARD). 
 
 The Quest of the Golden Girl. With a Cover 
 designed by Will H. Bradley. Crown Svo. 
 $ 1 . 50. [Second edition.
 
 8 BOOKS IN BELLES LETTRES 
 
 LE GALLIENNE (RICHARD) continued. 
 
 English Poems. Revised. Crown 8vo. Purple 
 cloth. $1.50. [Fourth edition. 
 
 In " English Poems" rhyme, rhythm, and diction are worthy of 
 a writer of ability and high ambition. — Athen&um (London). 
 
 There is plenty of accomplishment, there is abundance of tuneful 
 
 notes, sentiment often very pleasing, delicacy, grace The 
 
 best thing in the book to one's own taste is the last half of " Sunset 
 in the City." "Paolo and Francesca " is very clever. — Mr. 
 Andrew Lang, in New Review (London). 
 
 Robert Louis Stevenson: An Elegy. And other 
 Poems, mainly Personal. Crown 8vo. $1.50. 
 
 Few, indeed, could be more fit to sing the dirge of that "Virgil 
 of prose" than the poet whose airiosa felicitas is so close akin to 
 Stevenson's own charm. — Daily Chronicle (London). 
 
 George Meredith : Some Characteristics. With a 
 Bibliography (much enlarged) by John Lane. 
 Portrait, etc. Crown 8vo, purple cloth. $2.00. 
 
 [Fourth Edition. 
 LOCKE (W. J.). 
 
 Derelicts. A Novel. Crown 8 vo. $1.50. 
 
 [In preparation. 
 LOWRY (H. D.). 
 
 Make Believe. With 30 Illustrations by Charles 
 Robinson. i6mo. $1.50. 
 
 The Happy Exile. With etched Illustrations by 
 E. Philip Pimlott. (Arcady Library.) Crown 
 8vo. $1.50. [In preparation. 
 
 LUCAS (WINIFRED). 
 
 Units. Poems. Fcap. 8vo. $1.25. 
 
 MARZIALS (THEO.). 
 
 The Gallery of Pigeons and other Poems. 
 Post 8vo. $1.50. 
 
 Endless combinations of wonderfully vivid perceptions, and the 
 picturesque inventions of a joyous fancy. Picturesque and vivid 
 are only words — they are not definite enough to give a clear con- 
 ception of the peculiar quality or the peculiar limits of the pleasure 
 to be found in it. — Academy (London). 
 
 MEREDITH (GEORGE). 
 
 The first Published Portrait of this Author. 
 Engraved on the wood by W. Biscombe Gard- 
 ner, after the painting by G. F. Watts. Proof 
 copies on Japanese vellum, signed by Painter and 
 Engraver. $7.50.
 
 PUBLISHED BY JOHN LANE 
 
 MEYNELL (ALICE). 
 
 The Children. With Cover, End Papers, Titlepage, 
 -..Initials, and other Ornaments designed by Will 
 H.Bradley. Fcap. Svo. $1.25. 
 This is the first book printed at the Wayside Press, by 
 Will II. Bradley. 
 
 Poems. Fcap. Svo. $1.25. [Fourth edition. 
 
 To the metrical themes attempted by her she brings emotion, 
 sincerity, together with an exquisite play upon our finer chords 
 quite her own, not to be heard from another. Some of her lines 
 have the living tremor in them. The poems are beautiful in idea 
 as in grace of touch. — Mr. George Meredith, in The National 
 Review, August, 1896. 
 
 She sings with a very human sincerity, a singular religious 
 intensity — rare, illusive, curiously perfumed verse, so simple 
 always, yet so subtle in its simplicity. — Athenceum {London). 
 
 The Rhythm of Life and other Essays. Fcap. 
 8vo. $1.25. [Fourth edition. 
 
 Full of profound, searching, sensitive appreciation of all kinds 
 of subjects. Exercises in close thinking and exact expression, 
 almost unique in the literature of the day. — Athentzum(Londo>i). 
 
 I am about to direct attention to one of the very rarest products 
 of nature and grace, — a woman of genius, one who I am bound to 
 confess has falsified the assertion I made some time ago that no 
 female writer of our time has attained to true "distinction." .... 
 Mrs. Meynell has shown an amount of perceptive reason and 
 ability to discern self-evident things as yet undiscerned, a reticence, 
 fulness, and effectiveness of expression which place her in the 
 very front rank of living writers in prose. At least half of the 
 volume is classical work, embodying as it does new thought in 
 perfect language, and bearing in every sentence the hall-mark of 
 genius, namely, the marriage of masculine force of insight with 
 feminine grace and tact of expression. — Mr. Coventry Patmore, 
 in Fortnightly Review. 
 
 The Colour of Life and other Essays. Fcap. 
 Svo. $1.25. [Fourth edition. 
 
 Mrs. MeynelFs papers are little sermons, ideal sermons, — let no 
 one uninstructed by them take fright at the title, — they are not 
 preachments ; they are of the sermon's right length, about as long 
 as the passage of a cathedral chant in the ear, and keeping 
 throughout to the plain step of daily speech, they leave a sense of 
 stilled singing in the mind they fill. The writing is limpid in its 
 depths. She must be a diligent reader of the Saintly Lives. Her 
 manner presents to me the image of one accustomed to walk in holy 
 places and keep the eye of a fresh mind on our tangled world, 
 happier in observing than in speaking. And I can fancy Matthew 
 Arnold lighting on such Essays as I have named, saying with 
 refreshment, " She can write ! " It does not seem to me too bold 
 to imagine Carlyle listening, without the weariful gesture, to his 
 wife's reading of the same, hearing them to the end, and giving 
 his comment, " That woman thinks." — Mr. George Meredith, 
 in The National Review, August, 1896.
 
 10 BOOKS IN BELLES LETTRES 
 
 MAKOWER (STANLEY V.). 
 
 Cecilia. A Novel. Crown Svo. $1.50. 
 
 \_In preparation. 
 MILMAN (HELEN). 
 
 In the Garden of Peace. With twenty-four Illus- 
 trations by Edmund H. New. (Arcady Library.) 
 Crown 8vo. $1.50. 
 
 MONKHOUSE (ALLAN). 
 
 Books and Plays. A Volume of Essays. Crown 
 8vo. $1.50. 
 
 A Deliverance. A Novel. Crown Svo. $1.25. 
 
 \_In preparation. 
 OPPENHEIM (M.). 
 
 A History of the Administration of the Royal 
 Navy, and of Merchant Shipping in relation to 
 the Navy from MDIX. to MDCLX.,with an In- 
 troduction treating of the earlier period. Plates. 
 Demy Svo. $6.00. 
 
 RISLEY (R. V.). 
 
 The Sentimental Vikings. Crown Svo. $1.00. 
 
 ROBERTSON (JOHN M.). 
 
 Essays towards a Critical Method. (New 
 Series.) Crown 8vo. $1.50. \In preparation. 
 
 ST. CYRES (LORD). 
 
 The Little Flowers of St. Francis. A new 
 rendering into English of the Fiorettidi San Fran- 
 cesco. Crown Svo. $1.50. [In preparation. 
 
 SEAMAN (OWEN). 
 
 The Battle of the Bays. With Titlepage and 
 Cover Design by Patten Wilson. Fcap. Svo. 
 
 £1.25. 
 
 SETOUN (GABRIEL). 
 
 The Child World : Poems. Illustrated by Charles 
 Robinson. Crown Svo, gilt top. $1.50. 
 
 SHARP (EVELYN). 
 
 Wymps: Fairy Tales. With 8 Coloured Illustrations 
 and Decorative Cover by Mrs. Percy Dearmer. 
 4to. #1.50.
 
 PUBLISHED BY JOHN LANE I I 
 
 SHORE (LOUISA). 
 
 Poems. With a Memoir by her Sister, and an Appre- 
 m ciation by Frederick Harrison, and a Portrait. 
 " Crown 8vo. #1.50. 
 
 STEVENSON (ROBERT LOUIS). 
 
 Prince Otto. A Rendering in French by Egerton 
 Castle. Crown 8vo. With Frontispiece, Title- 
 page, and Cover Design by D. Y. Cameron. $2.50. 
 
 Also 50 copies on large paper, uniform in size with the 
 Edinburgh Edition of the works. $7.50. 
 
 Mr. Egerton Castle's excellent translation of Stevenson's " Prince 
 Otto" will undoubtedly bring many new readers to the book. Is 
 beautifully printed. — Morning Post (London). 
 
 To say that the French is worthy of the English is to pay it a 
 compliment which is fully deserved. — Yorkshire Herald. 
 
 Mr. Castle's French is perfect, and he preserves in his translation 
 all the virility of the author. — Pall Mall Gazette (London). 
 
 A Mountain Town in France. A Fragment. 
 With 5 Illustrations by the Author. Demy Svo, 
 wrappers. Only 350 copies printed. $i.$o net. 
 
 An account of the author's stay at Le Monastier in the 
 autumn of 1S78. It was intended to serve as the opening 
 chapter of his well-known volume, Travels with a Donkey in 
 the Cevennes ; but the intention was abandoned in favor of a 
 more abrupt beginning, and the fragment is now printed for 
 the first time. 
 
 STREET (G. S.) 
 
 The Wise and the Wayward. A Novel. Crown 
 8vo. $1.50. 
 
 SYRETT (NETTA). 
 
 The Tree of Life. A Novel. Crown Svo. 50 cents. 
 
 [In preparation. 
 
 TENNYSON (FREDERICK). 
 
 Poems of the Day and Year. With a Titlepage 
 designed by Patten Wilson. Crown 8vo. $1.50. 
 
 His soul is satisfied with the contemplation of beautiful things, 
 and the utterance in flowing imagery of the emotions they excite 
 in him. Lovers of pure poetry will find much to satisfy them. — 
 Daily Chronicle (London). 
 
 He has no small share of the Tennysonian music, and in two 
 points at least he falls short of no writer of his generation, — in his 
 love of nature and in his belief in the dignity of the poet's function. 
 — Times (London).
 
 12 BOOKS IN BELLES LETTRES 
 
 THIMM (CARL A.). 
 
 A Complete Bibliography of Fencing and Duel- 
 ling, as Practiced by all European Nations from 
 the Middle Ages to the Present Day. With a 
 Classified Index, arranged Chronologically accord- 
 ing to Languages. Illustrated with numerous 
 Portraits of Ancient and Modern Masters of the 
 Art. Titlepages and Frontispieces of some of 
 the earliest works. Portrait of the Author by 
 Wilson Steer, and Titlepage designed by 
 Patten Wilson. 4to. $7.50. 
 
 THOMPSON (FRANCIS). 
 
 Poems. With Frontispiece, Titlepage, and Cover 
 Design by Laurence Housman. Post 4to. 
 $1.50. [Fourth edition. 
 
 I can hardly doubt that at least that minority who can recognise 
 the essentials under the accidents of poetry, and who feel that it is 
 to poetic Form only, and not to forms, that eternity belongs, will 
 agree that, alike in wealth and dignity of imagination, in depth 
 and subtlety of thought, and in magic and mastery of language, 
 a new poet of the first rank is to be welcomed in the author of this 
 volume. — Mr. H. D. Traill, in Nineteenth Century. 
 
 Profound thought and far-fetched splendour of imagery, and 
 nimble-witted discernment of those analogies which are the roots 
 
 of the poet's language, abound Qualities which ought to 
 
 place him, even should he do no more than he has done, in the 
 prominent ranks of fame, with Cowley and Crawshaw. — Mr. 
 Coventry Patmore, hi Fortnightly Review. 
 
 Sister Songs. An Offering to Two Sisters. With 
 Frontispiece, Titlepage, and Cover Design by 
 Laurence Housman. Post 410. Buckram. $1.50. 
 
 Mr. Thompson is the only one of the young poets of the day 
 who persistently tempts one, page after page, to waive one's critic 
 right, and contentedly to stand and admire. — A cademy (London). 
 
 If any were uncertain, after the publication of Mr. Thompson's 
 " Poems," that a new star was added to the galaxy, the splendid 
 succession of which has never failed in the English poetic firma- 
 ment, let them read " Sister Songs " and be assured. — Speaker 
 (London). 
 
 TRAILL (H. D.). 
 
 The Barbarous Britishers. A Tip-top Novel. 
 With Title and Cover Design by Aubrey 
 Beardsley. Crown 8vo, wrapper. 50 cents. 
 
 Nothing funnier has been written. — Daily Telegraph (London). 
 
 A cleverer or more genuinely mirth-provoking, and withal useful 
 parody, we have not read for many a long day. A very large cir- 
 culation may be predicted. — St. James's Gazette (London).
 
 PUBLISHED BY JOHN LANE 
 
 TYNAN HINKSON (KATHARINE). 
 
 Cuckoo Songs. With Titlepage by Laurence 
 Housman. Fcap. 8vo. $1.25. 
 
 Enchantingly simple, innocent, and light, a book of aerial 
 music in delicate cadencies. — Illustrated London News. 
 
 Our Lord's Coming and Childhood. Six Miracle 
 Plays. With six Illustrations and a Titlepage by 
 Patten Wilson. Crown 8vo. $2.00. 
 
 WALTON AND COTTON. 
 
 The Compleat Angler. Edited by Richard Le 
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 14 BOOKS IN BELLES LETTRES 
 
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 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 
 
 This book is DUE on the last date stamped below 
 
 y rm L-0 
 
 111 -2, '43(5205) 
 
 LOS ANGELES 
 LIBRARY
 
 £252 
 Y32 
 
 year of shame. iS«5ffi l ? NALLIBR ARV'FAciLiT 
 
 DEMCO 234N 
 
 000 368 905 6 
 
 PR 
 
 5752 
 
 Y32
 
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