HYMN {338}
Accept this building, gracious Lord,
No temple
though it be;
We raised it for our suffering kin,
And
so, Good Lord, for Thee.
Accept our little gift, and give
To all who
here may dwell,
The will and power to do their work,
Or
bear their sorrows well.
From Thee all skill and science flow;
All
pity, care, and love,
All calm and courage, faith and hope,
Oh!
pour them from above.
And part them, Lord, to each and all,
As each
and all shall need,
To rise like incense, each to Thee,
In
noble thought and deed.
And hasten, Lord, that perfect day,
When pain
and death shall cease;
And Thy just rule shall fill the earth
With
health, and light, and peace.
When ever blue the sky shall gleam,
And ever
green the sod;
And man’s rude work deface no more
The
Paradise of God.
Eversley, 1870.
THE DELECTABLE DAY
The boy on the famous gray pony,
Just bidding
good-bye at the door,
Plucking up maiden heart for the fences
Where
his brother won honour of yore.
The walk to ‘the Meet’ with fair children,
And
women as gentle as gay,—
Ah! how do we male hogs in armour
Deserve
such companions as they?
The afternoon’s wander to windward,
To
meet the dear boy coming back;
And to catch, down the turns of
the valley,
The last weary chime of the pack.
The climb homeward by park and by moorland,
And
through the fir forests again,
While the south-west wind roars
in the gloaming,
Like an ocean of seething champagne.
And at night the septette of Beethoven,
And
the grandmother by in her chair,
And the foot of all feet on the
sofa
Beating delicate time to the air.
Ah, God! a poor soul can but thank Thee
For
such a delectable day!
Though the fury, the fool, and the swindler,
To-morrow
again have their way!
Eversley, 6th November 1872.
JUVENTUS MUNDI
List a tale a fairy sent us
Fresh from dear Mundi Juventus.
When
Love and all the world was young,
And birds conversed as well as
sung;
And men still faced this fair creation
With humour,
heart, imagination.
Who come hither from Morocco
Every spring
on the sirocco?
In russet she, and he in yellow,
Singing ever
clear and mellow,
‘Sweet, sweet, sweet, sweet, sweet you,
sweet you,
Did he beat you? Did he beat you?’
Phyllopneustes
wise folk call them,
But don’t know what did befall them,
Why
they ever thought of coming
All that way to hear gnats humming,
Why
they built not nests but houses,
Like the bumble-bees and mousies.
Nor
how little birds got wings,
Nor what ’tis the small cock
sings—
How should they know—stupid fogies?
They
daren’t even believe in bogies.
Once they were a girl and
boy,
Each the other’s life and joy.
He a Daphnis, she
a Chloe,
Only they were brown, not snowy,
Till an Arab found
them playing
Far beyond the Atlas straying,
Tied the helpless
things together,
Drove them in the burning weather,
In his
slave-gang many a league,
Till they dropped from wild fatigue.
Up
he caught his whip of hide,
Lashed each soft brown back and side
Till
their little brains were burst
With sharp pain, and heat, and thirst,
Over
her the poor boy lay,
Tried to keep the blows away,
Till they
stiffened into clay,
And the ruffian rode away:
Swooping o’er
the tainted ground,
Carrion vultures gathered round,
And the
gaunt hyenas ran
Tracking up the caravan.
But—ah, wonder!
that was gone
Which they meant to feast upon.
And, for each,
a yellow wren,
One a cock, and one a hen,
Sweetly warbling,
flitted forth
O’er the desert toward the north.
But
a shade of bygone sorrow,
Like a dream upon the morrow,
Round
his tiny brainlet clinging,
Sets the wee cock ever singing,
‘Sweet,
sweet, sweet, sweet, sweet you, sweet you,
Did he beat you?
Did he beat you?’
Vultures croaked, and hopped, and flopped,
But
their evening meal was stopped.
And the gaunt hyenas foul
Sat
down on their tails to howl.
Northward towards the cool spring
weather,
Those two wrens fled on together,
On to England o’er
the sea,
Where all folks alike are free.
There they built
a cabin, wattled
Like the huts where first they prattled,
Hatched
and fed, as safe as may be,
Many a tiny feathered baby.
But
in autumn south they go
Past the Straits and Atlas’ snow,
Over
desert, over mountain,
To the palms beside the fountain,
Where,
when once they lived before, he
Told her first the old, old story.
‘What
do the doves say? Curuck Coo,
You love me and I love you.’
1872.
VALENTINE’S DAY
Oh! I wish I were a tiny browny bird from out the south,
Settled
among the alder-holts, and twittering by the stream;
I would put
my tiny tail down, and put up my tiny mouth,
And
sing my tiny life away in one melodious dream.
I would sing about the blossoms, and the sunshine and the sky,
And
the tiny wife I mean to have in such a cosy nest;
And if some one
came and shot me dead, why then I could but die,
With
my tiny life and tiny song just ended at their best.
Eversley, 1873
BALLAD: LORRAINE, LORRAINE, LORRÈE
1
‘Are you ready for your steeple-chase, Lorraine, Lorraine,
Lorrèe?
Barum, Barum, Barum, Barum, Barum,
Barum, Baree,
You’re booked to ride your capping race to-day
at Coulterlee,
You’re booked to ride Vindictive, for all
the world to see,
To keep him straight, to keep him first, and
win the run for me.
Barum, Barum,’ etc.
2
She clasped her new-born baby, poor Lorraine, Lorraine, Lorrèe,
‘I
cannot ride Vindictive, as any man might see,
And I will not ride
Vindictive, with this baby on my knee;
He’s killed a boy,
he’s killed a man, and why must he kill me?’
3
‘Unless you ride Vindictive, Lorraine, Lorraine, Lorrèe,
Unless
you ride Vindictive to-day at Coulterlee,
And land him safe across
the brook, and win the blank for me,
It’s you may keep your
baby, for you’ll get no keep from me.’
4
‘That husbands could be cruel,’ said Lorraine, Lorraine,
Lorrèe,
‘That husbands could be cruel, I have known
for seasons three;
But oh! to ride Vindictive while a baby cries
for me,
And be killed across a fence at last for all the world
to see!’
5
She mastered young Vindictive—Oh! the gallant lass was she,
And
kept him straight and won the race as near as near could be;
But
he killed her at the brook against a pollard willow-tree,
Oh! he
killed her at the brook, the brute, for all the world to see,
And
no one but the baby cried for poor Lorraine, Lorrèe.
Last poem written in illness.
Colorado, U.S.A.
June
1874.
MARTIN LIGHTFOOT’S SONG {346}
Come hearken, hearken, gentles all,
Come hearken
unto me,
And I’ll sing you a song of a Wood-Lyon
Came
swimming out over the sea.
He rangèd west, he rangèd east,
And
far and wide ranged he;
He took his bite out of every beast
Lives
under the greenwood tree.
Then by there came a silly old wolf,
‘And
I’ll serve you,’ quoth he;
Quoth the Lyon, ‘My
paw is heavy enough,
So what wilt thou do for
me?’
Then by there came a cunning old fox,
‘And
I’ll serve you,’ quoth he;
Quoth the Lyon, ‘My
wits are sharp enough
So what wilt thou do for
me?’
Then by there came a white, white dove,
Flew
off Our Lady’s knee;
Sang ‘It’s I will be your
true, true love,
If you’ll be true to me.’
‘And what will you do, you bonny white dove?
And
what will you do for me?’
‘Oh, it’s I’ll
bring you to Our Lady’s love,
In the ways
of chivalrie.’
He followed the dove that Wood-Lyon
By mere
and wood and wold,
Till he is come to a perfect knight,
Like
the Paladin of old.
He rangèd east, he rangèd west,
And
far and wide ranged he—
And ever the dove won him honour
and fame
In the ways of chivalrie.
Then by there came a foul old sow,
Came rookling
under the tree;
And ‘It’s I will be true love to you,
If
you’ll be true to me.’
‘And what wilt thou do, thou foul old sow?
And
what wilt thou do for me?’
‘Oh, there hangs in my snout
a jewel of gold,
And that will I give to thee.’
He took to the sow that Wood-Lyon;
To the
rookling sow took he;
And the dove flew up to Our Lady’s
bosom;
And never again throve he.
Footnotes:
{211} This and the following poem were written at school in early boy-hood.
{216} Lines supposed to be found written in an illuminated missal.
{260} Found among Sandy Mackaye’s papers, of a hairy oubit who would not mind his mother.
{282} The Christian Socialist, started by the Council of Associates for promotion of Co-operation.
{295} Bishop of Labuan, in Borneo.
{303} This Ode was set to Professor Sterndale Bennet’s music, and sung in the Senate House, Cambridge, on the Day of Installation.
{306} His Royal Highness the Prince Consort, Chancellor of Cambridge University.
{319} Impromptu lines written in the album of the Crown Princess of Germany.
{325} Time of the Franco-Prussian War.
{330} The Qu’est qu’il dit is a Tropical bird.
{331a} This myth about the famous Pitch Lake of Trinidad was told almost word for word to a M. Joseph by an aged half-caste Indian who went by the name of Señor Trinidada. The manners and customs which the ballad described, and the cruel and dangerous destruction of the beautiful birds of Trinidad, are facts which may be easily verified by any one who will take the trouble to visit the West Indies.
{331b} A magnificent wood of the Mauritia Fanpalm, on the south shore of the Pitch Lake.
{331c} Humming-birds.
{331d} Maximiliana palms.
{332} Hut of timber and palm-leaves.
{333} From the Eriodendron, or giant silk-cotton.
{334} Spigelia anthelmia, a too-well-known poison-plant.
{335a} Cœlogenys Paca.
{335b} Wild cavy.
{335c} Armadillo.
{335d} Peccary hog.
{335e} Trigonia.
{335f} Penelope.
{335g} Palamedea.
{335h} Dove.
{335i} Mimusops.
{335j} Spondias.
{335k} An esculent Arum.
{335l} Jatropha manihot, ‘Cassava.’
{335m} Vitis Caribæa.
{335n} Euterpe, ‘mountain cabbage’ palm.
{335o} Mauritia palm.
{336a} Musa.
{336b} Pine-apple.
{337} Food.
{338} Sung by 1000 School Children at the Opening of the New Wing of the Children’s Hospital, Birmingham.
{346} Supposed to be sung at Crowland Minster to Leofric, the Wake’s Mass Priest, when news was received of Hereward’s second marriage to Alftruda.