BALLADES AND VERSES VAIN

BY

ANDREW LANG

AUTHOR OF "HELEN OF TROY"

'Branles, virelais, Ballades, and Verses vain.'
—The Faerie Queene.

NEW YORK

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS

1902

CONTENTS.

To the Reader — Austin Dobson

XXXVI.—BALLADES:

BALLADE DEDICATORY
BALLADE OF LITERARY FAME
BALLADE OF BLUE CHINA
BALLADE OF THE BOOK-HUNTER
BALLADE TO THEOCRITUS
VALENTINE IN FORM OF BALLADE
BALLADE OF SUMMER
BALLADE OF AUTUMN
BALLADE OF OLD PLAYS
BALLADE OF ROULETTE
BALLADE OF FRÈRE LUBIN
BALLADE OF QUEEN ANNE
BALLADE OF PRIMITIVE MAN
BALLADE OF SLEEP
BALLADE OF CLEOPATRA'S NEEDLE
BALLADE OF TRUE WISDOM
BALLADE OF THE MUSE
BALLADE FOR A BABY
BALLADE OF HIS OWN COUNTRY
BALLADE OF THE TWEED
BALLADE OF THE ROYAL GAME OF GOLF
BALLADE OF THE MIDNIGHT FOREST
BALLADE OF CRICKET
BALLADE OF THE BOOK-MAN'S PARADISE
BALLADE OF WORLDLY WEALTH
BALLADE OF THE MAY TERM
BALLADE OF DEAD CITIES
BALLADE OF THE VOYAGE TO CYTHERA
BALLADE OF LIFE
BALLADE OF ÆSTHETIC ADJECTIVES
BALLADE OF DEAD LADIES
BALLADE OF GOOD COUNSEL
BALLADE AMOUREUSE
BALLADE AGAINST THE JESUITS
BALLADE OF BLIND LOVE
BALLADE OF HIS CHOICE OF A SEPULCHRE

Dizain — by Austin Dobson

VERSES VAIN:

ALMAE MATRES
NIGHTINGALE WEATHER
COLINETTE
FROM THE EAST TO THE WEST
A DREAM
TWILIGHT ON TWEED
A SUNSET OF WATTEAU
ROMANCE
A SUNSET ON YARROW
A PORTRAIT OF 1783
THE BARBAROUS BIRDS

POST HOMERICA:

HESPEROTHEN
THE SEEKERS FOR PHÆACIA
THE DEPARTURE FROM PHÆACIA
A BALLAD OF DEPARTURE
THEY HEAR THE SIRENS FOR THE SECOND TIME
CIRCE'S ISLE REVISITED
THE LIMIT of LANDS
THE SHADE OF HELEN
PISIDICÊ

SONNETS:

THE ODYSSEY
THE SIRENS
LOVE'S EASTER
TWILIGHT
BION
SAN TERENZO
NATURAL THEOLOGY
HOMER
RONSARD
GÉRARD DE NERVAL
IN ITHACA
DREAMS
HOMERIC UNITY
IDEAL

TRANSLATIONS:

HYMN TO THE WINDS
A VOW TO HEAVENLY VENUS
APRIL
OF HIS LADY'S OLD AGE
SHADOWS OF HIS LADY
MOONLIGHT
THE GRAVE AND THE ROSE
THE BIRTH OF BUTTERFLIES
AN OLD TUNE
SPRING IN THE STUDENT'S QUARTER
SPRING. (AFTER MELEAGER.)
OLD LOVES
IANNOULA
THE MILK WHITE DOE
A LA BELLE HÉLÈNE
BURIAL OF MOLIÈRE
BEFORE THE SNOW
THE CLOUD CHORUS

Laughter and song the poet brings,
And lends them form and gives them-wings;
Then sets his chirping squadron free
To post at will by land or sea,
And find their home, if that may be.

Laughter and song this poet, too,
O Western brothers, sends to you:
With doubtful flight the darting train
Have crossed the bleak Atlantic main,—
Now warm them in your hearts again!
A. D.

Mr. Austin Dobson has been so kind as to superintend the making of the following selection from "Ballads and Lyrics of Old France" (1872), "Ballades in Blue China" (1880, 1881, 1883), and from verses previously unprinted or not collected.

BALLADES.

BALLADE DEDICATORY


TO

MRS. ELTON

OF WHITE STAUNTON.


The painted Briton built his mound,
And left his celts and clay,
On yon fair slope of sunlit ground
That fronts your garden gay;
The Roman came, he bore the sway,
He bullied, bought, and sold,
Your fountain sweeps his works away
Beside your manor old!

But still his crumbling urns are found
Within the window-bay,
Where once he listened to the sound
That lulls you day by day;—
The sound of summer winds at play,
The noise of waters cold
To Yarty wandering on their way,
Beside your manor old!

The Roman fell: his firm-set bound
Became the Saxon's stay;
The bells made music all around
For monks in cloisters grey,
Till fled the monks in disarray
From their warm chantry's fold,
The Abbots slumber as they may,
Beside your manor old!

ENVOY.

Creeds, empires, peoples, all decay,
Down into darkness, rolled;
May life that's fleet be sweet, I pray,
Beside your manor old!

BALLADE OF LITERARY FAME


"All these for Fourpence."


Oh, where are the endless Romances
Our grandmothers used to adore?
The Knights with their helms and their lances,
Their shields and the favours they wore?
And the Monks with their magical lore?
They have passed to Oblivion and Nox
They have fled to the shadowy shore,—
They are all in the Fourpenny Box!

And where the poetical fancies
Our fathers were fond of, of yore?
The lyric's melodious expanses,
The Epics in cantos a score?
They have been and are not: no more
Shall the shepherds drive silvery flocks,
Nor the ladies their long words deplore,—
They are all in the Fourpenny Box!

And the Music! The songs and the dances?
The tunes that Time may not restore?
And the tomes where Divinity prances?
And the pamphlets where Heretics roar?
They have ceased to be even a bore,—
The Divine, and the Sceptic who mocks,—
They are "cropped," they are "foxed" to core,—
They are all in the Fourpenny Box!

ENVOY.

Suns beat on them; tempests downpour,
On the chest without cover or locks,
Where they lie by the Bookseller's door,—
They are all in the Fourpenny Box!

BALLADE OF BLUE CHINA


There's a joy without canker or cark,
There's a pleasure eternally new,
'T is to gloat on the glaze and the mark
Of china that's ancient and blue;
Unchipp'd, all the centuries through
It has pass'd, since the chime of it rang,
And they fashion'd it, figure and hue,
In the reign of the Emperor Hwang.

These dragons (their tails, you remark,
Into bunches of gillyflowers grew),—
When Noah came out of the ark,
Did these lie in wait for his crew?
They snorted, they snapp'd, and they slew,
They were mighty of fin and of fang,
And their portraits Celestials drew
In the reign of the Emperor Hwangs.

Here's a pot with a cot in a park,
In a park where the peach-blossoms blew,
Where the lovers eloped in the dark,
Lived, died, and were changed into two
Bright birds that eternally flew
Through the boughs of the may, as they sang;
'T is a tale was undoubtedly true
In the reign of the Emperor Hwang.

ENVOY.

Come, snarl at my ecstasies, do,
Kind critic; your "tongue has a tang,"
But—a sage never heeded a shrew
In the reign of the Emperor Hwang.

BALLADE OF THE BOOK-HUNTER


In torrid heats of late July,
In March, beneath the bitter bise,
He book-hunts while the loungers fly,—
He book-hunts, though December freeze;
In breeches baggy at the knees,
And heedless of the public jeers,
For these, for these, he hoards his fees,—
Aldines, Bodonis, Elzevirs.

No dismal stall escapes his eye,
He turns o'er tomes of low degrees,
There soiled romanticists may lie,
Or Restoration comedies;
Each tract that flutters in the breeze
For him is charged with hopes and fears,
In mouldy novels fancy sees
Aldines, Bodonis, Elzevirs.

With restless eyes that peer and spy,
Sad eyes that heed not skies nor trees,
In dismal nooks he loves to pry,
Whose motto ever more is Spes!
But ah! the fabled treasure flees;
Grown rarer with the fleeting years,
In rich men's shelves they take their ease,—
Aldines, Bodonis, Elzevirs!

ENVOY.

Prince, all the things that tease and please,—
Fame, hope, wealth, kisses, cheers, and tears,
What are they but such toys as these—
Aldines, Bodonis, Elzevirs?

BALLADE TO THEOCRITUS, IN WINTER


ἐσορῶν τὰν Σικελὰν ἐς ἅλα.
Id. viii. 56.


Ah! leave the smoke, the wealth, the roar
Of London, leave the bustling street,
For still, by the Sicilian shore,
The murmur of the Muse is sweet.
Still, still, the suns of summer greet
The mountain-grave of Helikê,
And shepherds still their songs repeat
Where breaks the blue Sicilian sea.

What though they worship Pan no more,
That guarded once the shepherd's seat,
They chatter of their rustic lore,
They watch the wind among the wheat:
Cicalas chirp, the young lambs bleat,
Where whispers pine to cypress tree;
They count the waves that idly beat
Where breaks the blue Sicilian sea.

Theocritus! thou canst restore
The pleasant years, and over-fleet;
With thee we live as men of yore,
We rest where running waters meet:
And then we turn unwilling feet
And seek the world—so must it be—
We may not linger in the heat
Where breaks the blue Sicilian sea!

ENVOY.

Master,—when rain, and snow, and sleet
And northern winds are wild, to thee
We come, we rest in thy retreat,
Where breaks the blue Sicilian sea!

VALENTINE IN FORM OF BALLADE.


Te soft wind from the south land sped,
He set his strength to blow,
From forests where Adonis bled,
And lily flowers a-row:
He crossed the straits like streams that flow,
The ocean dark as wine,
To my true love to whisper low,
To be your Valentine.

The Spring half-raised her drowsy head,
Besprent with drifted snow,
"I'll send an April day," she said,
"To lands of wintry woe."
He came,—the winter's overthrow,—
With showers that sing and shine,
Pied daisies round your path to strow,
To be your Valentine.

Where sands of Egypt, swart and red,
'Neath suns Egyptian glow,
In places of the princely dead,
By the Nile's overflow,
The swallow preened her wings to go,
And for the North did pine,
And fain would brave the frost, her foe,
To be your Valentine.

ENVOY.

Spring, Swallow, South Wind, even so,
Their various voice combine;
But that they crave on me bestow,
To be your Valentine.

BALLADE OF SUMMER.


TO C. H. A.


When strawberry pottles are common and cheap,
Ere elms be black, or limes be sere,
When midnight dances are murdering sleep,
Then comes in the sweet o' the year!
And far from Fleet street, far from here,
The Summer is Queen in the length of the land,
And moonlit nights they are soft and clear,
When fans for a penny are sold in the Strand!

When clamour that doves in the lindens keep
Mingles with musical plash of the weir,
Where drowned green tresses of crowsfoot creep,
Then comes in the sweet o' the year!
And better a crust and a beaker of beer,
With rose-hung hedges on either hand,
Than a palace in town and a prince's cheer,
When fans for a penny are sold in the Strand!

When big trout late in the twilight leap,
When cuckoo clamoureth far and near,
When glittering scythes in the hayfield reap,
Then comes in the sweet o' the year!
And it's oh to sail, with the wind to steer,
While kine knee deep in the water stand,
On a Highland loch, on a Lowland mere,
When fans for a penny are sold in the Strand!

ENVOY.

Friend, with the fops, while we dawdle here,
Then comes in the sweet o' the year!
And the Summer runs out, like grains of sand,
When fans for a penny are sold in the Strand!

BALLADE OF AUTUMN.


We built a castle in the air,
In summer weather, you and I,
The wind and sun were in your hair,—
Gold hair against a sapphire sky:
When Autumn came, with leaves that fly
Before the storm, across the plain,
You fled from me, with scarce a sigh—
My Love returns no more again!

The windy lights of Autumn flare:
I watch the moonlit sails go by;
I marvel how men toil and fare,
The weary business that they ply!
Their voyaging is vanity,
And fairy gold is all their gain,
And all the winds of winter cry,
"My Love returns no more again!"

Here, in my castle of Despair,
I sit alone with memory;
The wind-fed wolf has left his lair,
To keep the outcast company.
The brooding owl he hoots hard by,
The hare shall kindle on thy hearth-stane,
The Rhymer's soothest prophecy,—[1]
My Love returns no more again!

ENVOY.

Lady, my home until I die
Is here, where youth and hope were slain;
They flit, the ghosts of our July,
My Love returns no more again!

BALLADE OF OLD PLAYS.


TO BRANDER MATTHEWS.

(Les Œuvres de Monsieur Molière. A Paris,
chez Louys Billaine, à la Palme.
M.D.C.LXVI.)


LA COUR.

When these Old Plays were new, the King,
Beside the Cardinal's chair,
Applauded, 'mid the courtly ring,
The verses of Molière;
Point-lace was then the only wear,
Old Corneille came to woo,
And bright Du Parc was young and fair,
When these Old Plays were new!


LA COMÉDIE.

How shrill the butcher's cat-calls ring,
How loud the lackeys swear!
Black pipe-bowls on the stage they fling,
At Brecourt, fuming there!
The Porter's stabbed! a Mousquetaire
Breaks in with noisy crew—
'T was all a commonplace affair
When these Old Plays were new!


LA VILLE.

When these Old Plays were new! They bring
A host of phantoms rare:
Old jests that float, old jibes that sting,
Old faces peaked with care:
Menage's smirk, de Visé's stare,
The thefts of Jean Ribou,—[2]
Ah, publishers were hard to bear
When these Old Plays were new.

ENVOY.

Ghosts, at your Poet's word ye dare
To break Death's dungeons through,
And frisk, as in that golden air,
When these Old Plays were new!

BALLADE OF ROULETTE


TO R. R.


This life—one was thinking to-day,
In the midst of a medley of fancies—
Is a game, and the board where we play
Green earth with her poppies and pansies.
Let manque be faded romances,
Be passe remorse and regret;
Hearts dance with the wheel as it dances—
The wheel of Dame Fortune's roulette.

The lover will stake as he may
His heart on his Peggies and Nancies;
The girl has her beauty to lay;
The saint has his prayers and his trances;
The poet bets endless expanses
In Dreamland; the scamp has his debt:
How they gaze at the wheel as it glances—
The wheel of Dame Fortune's roulette!

The Kaiser will stake his array
Of sabres, of Krupps, and of lances;
An Englishman punts with his pay,
And glory the jeton of France is;
Your artists, or Whistlers or Vances,
Have voices or colours to bet;
Will you moan that its motion askance is—
The wheel of Dame Fortune's roulette?

ENVOY.

The prize that the pleasure enhances?
The prize is—at last to forget
The changes, the chops, and the chances—
The wheel of Dame Fortune's roulette.

BALLADE OF FRÈRE LUBIN.


(Clement Marot's Frère Lubin, though translated by Longfellow and others,
has not hitherto been rendered Into the original measure, of ballade à double
refrain.)


Some ten or twenty times a day,
To bustle to the town with speed,
To dabble in what dirt he may,—
Le Frère Lubin's the man you need!
But any sober life to lead
Upon an exemplary plan,
Requires a Christian indeed,—
Le Frère Lubin is not the man!

Another's "pile" on his to lay,
With all the craft of guile and greed,
To leave you bare of pence or pay,—
Le Frère Lubin's the man you need!
But watch him with the closest heed,
And dun him with what force you can,—
He 'll not refund, howe'er you plead—
Le Frère Lubin is not the man!

An honest girl to lead astray,
With subtle saw and promised mead,
Requires no cunning crone and grey,—
Le Frère Lubin's the man you need!
He preaches an ascetic creed,
But,—try him with the water can—
A dog will drink, whate'er his breed,—
Le Frère Lubin is not the man!

ENVOY.

In good to fail, in ill succeed,
Le Frère Lubin's the man you need!
In honest works to lead the van,
Le Frère Lubin is not the man!

BALLADE OF QUEEN ANNE.


The modish Airs,
The Tansey Brew,
The Swains and Fairs
In curtained Pew;
Nymphs KNELLER drew,
Books BENTLEY read,—
Who knows them, who?
QUEEN ANNE is dead!

We buy her Chairs,
Her China blue,
Her red-brick Squares
We build anew;
But ah! we rue,
When all is said,
The tale o'er-true,
QUEEN ANNE is dead!

Now Bulls and Bears,.
A ruffling Crew,
With Stocks and Shares,
With Turk and Jew,
Go bubbling through
The Town ill-bred:
The World's askew,
QUEEN ANNE is dead!

ENVOY.

Friend, praise the new;
The old is fled:
Vivat FROU-FROU!
QUEEN ANNE is dead!

BALLADE OF A PRIMITIVE MAN.


TO J. A. FARRER.


He lived in a cave by the seas,
He lived upon oysters and foes,
But his list of forbidden degrees,
An extensive morality shows;
Geological evidence goes
To prove he had never a pan,
But he shaved with a shell when he chose,—
'T was the manner of Primitive Man.

He worshipp'd the rain and the breeze,
He worshipp'd the river that flows,
And the Dawn, and the Moon, and the trees,
And bogies, and serpents, and crows;
He buried his dead with their toes
Tucked-up, an original plan,
Till their knees came right under their nose,—
'T was the manner of Primitive Man.

His communal wives, at his ease,
He would curb with occasional blows;
Or his State had a queen, like the bees
(As another philosopher trows):
When he spoke, it was never in prose,
But he sang in a strain that would scan,
For (to doubt it, perchance, were morose)
'T was the manner of Primitive Man!

ENVOY.

MAX, proudly your Aryans pose,
But their rigs they undoubtedly ran,
For, as every Darwinian knows,
'T was the manner of Primitive Man!

BALLADE OF SLEEP.


"Of all Gods, Sleep is dearest to the Muses."—Pausanias.


The hours are passing slow,
I hear their weary tread
Clang from the tower, and go
Back to their kinsfolk dead.
Sleep! death's twin brother dread!
Why dost thou scorn me so?
The wind's voice overhead
Long wakeful here I know,
And music from the steep
Where waters fall and flow.
Wilt thou not hear me, Sleep?

All sounds that might bestow
Rest on the fever'd bed,
All slumb'rous sounds and low
Are mingled here and wed,
And bring no drowsihed.
Shy dreams flit to and fro
With shadowy hair dispread;
With wistful eyes that glow,
And silent robes that sweep.
Thou wilt not hear me; no?
Wilt thou not hear me, Sleep?

What cause hast thou to show
Of sacrifice unsped?
Of all thy slaves below
I most have laboured
With service sung and said;
Have cull'd such buds as blow,
Soft poppies white and red,
Where thy still gardens grow,
And Lethe's waters weep.
Why, then, art thou my foe?
Wilt thou not hear me, Sleep?

ENVOY.

Prince, ere the dark be shred
By golden shafts, ere low
And long the shadows creep:
Lord of the wand of lead,
Soft-footed as the snow,
Wilt thou not hear me, Sleep?

BALLADE OF CLEOPATRA'S NEEDLE.


Ye ghosts of gods Egyptian,
Ye giant shades of RA and TUM,
If murmurs of our planet come
To exiles in the precincts wan
Where, fetish or Olympian,
To help or harm no more ye list,
Look down, if look ye may, and scan
This monument in London mist!

Behold, the hieroglyphs are dumb
That once were read of him that ran
When seistron, cymbal, trump, and drum
Wild music of the Bull began;
When through the chanting priestly clan
Walk'd Ramses, and the high sun kiss'd
This stone, with blessing scored and ban—
This monument in London mist.

The stone endures though gods be numb;
Though human effort, plot, and plan
Be sifted, drifted, like the sum
Of sands in wastes Arabian.
What king may deem him more than man,
What priest says Faith can Time resist
While this endures to mark their span—
This monument in London mist?

ENVOY.

Prince, the stone's shade on your divan
Falls; it is longer than ye wist:
It preaches, as Time's gnomon can,
This monument in London mist!

BALLADE OF TRUE WISDOM.


While others are asking for beauty or fame,
Or praying to know that for which they should pray,
Or courting Queen Venus, that affable dame,
Or chasing the Muses the weary and grey,
The sage has found out a more excellent way—
To Pan and to Pallas his incense he showers,
And his humble petition puts up day by day,
For a house full of books, and a garden of flowers.

Inventors may bow to the God that is lame,
And crave from the fire on his stithy a ray;
Philosophers kneel to the God without name,
Like the people of Athens, agnostics are they;
The hunter a fawn to Diana will slay,
The maiden wild roses will wreathe for the Hours;
But the wise man will ask, ere libation he pay,
For a house full of books, and a garden of flowers.

Oh! grant me a life without pleasure or blame
(As mortals count pleasure who rush through their day
With a speed to which that of the tempest is tame)!
O grant me a house by the beach of a bay,
Where the waves can be surly in winter, and play
With the sea-weed in summer, ye bountiful powers!
And I'd leave all the hurry, the noise, and the fray,
For a house full of books, and a garden of flowers.

ENVOY.

Gods, grant or withhold it; your "yea" and your "nay"
Are immutable, heedless of outcry of ours:
But life is worth living, and here we would stay
For a house full of books, and a garden of flowers.

BALLADE OF THE MUSE.


Quem tu, Melpomene, semel.


The man whom once, Melpomene,
Thou look'st on with benignant sight,
Shall never at the Isthmus be
A boxer eminent in fight,
Nor fares he foremost in the flight
Of Grecian cars to victory,
Nor goes with Delian laurels dight,
The man thou lov'st, Melpomene!

Not him the Capitol shall see,
As who hath crush'd the threats and might
Of monarchs, march triumphantly;
But Fame shall crown him, in his right
Of all the Roman lyre that smite
The first; so woods of Tivoli
Proclaim him, so her waters bright,
The man thou lov'st, Melpomene!

The sons of queenly Rome count me,
Me too, with them whose chants delight,—
The poets' kindly company;
Now broken is the tooth of spite,
But thou, that temperest aright
The golden lyre, all, all to thee
He owes—life, fame, and fortune's height—
The man thou lov'st, Melpomene!

ENVOY.

Queen, that to mute lips could'st unite
The wild swan's dying melody!
Thy gifts, ah! how shall he requite—
The man thou lov'st, Melpomene?

BALLADE FOR A BABY.


(FROM "THE GARLAND OF RACHEL.")


'Tis distance lends, the poet says,
Enchantment to the view,
And this makes possible the praise
Which I bestow on you.
For babies rosy-pink of hue
I do not always care,
But distance paints the mountains blue,
And Rachel always fair.

Ah Time, speed on her flying days,
Bring back my youth that flew,
That she may listen to my lays
Where Merton stock-doves coo;
That I may sing afresh, anew,
My songs, now faint and rare,
Time, make me always twenty-two,
And Rachel always fair.

Nay, long ago, down dusky ways
Fled Cupid and his crew;
Life brings not back the morning haze,
The dawning and the dew;
And other lips must sigh and sue,
And younger lovers dare
To hint that Love is always true,
And Rachel always fair.

ENVOY.

Princess, let Age bid Youth adieu,
Adieu to this despair,
To me, who thus despairing woo,
And Rachel always fair.

BALLADE OF HIS OWN COUNTRY.


I scribbled on a fly-book's leaves
Among the shining salmon-flies;
A song for summer-time that grieves
I scribbled on a fly-book's leaves.
Between grey sea and golden sheaves,
Beneath the soft wet Morvern skies,
I scribbled on a fly-book's leaves
Among the shining salmon-flies.


TO C. H. ARKCOLL.


Let them boast of Arabia, oppressed
By the odour of myrrh on the breeze;
In the isles of the East and the West
That are sweet with the cinnamon trees
Let the sandal-wood perfume the seas;
Give the roses to Rhodes and to Crete,
We are more than content, if you please,
With the smell of bog-myrtle and peat!

Though Dan Virgil enjoyed himself best
With the scent of the limes, when the bees
Hummed low 'round the doves in their nest,
While the vintagers lay at their ease,
Had he sung in our northern degrees,
He'd have sought a securer retreat,
He'd have dwelt, where the heart of us flees,
With the smell of bog-myrtle and peat!

Oh, the broom has a chivalrous crest
And the daffodil's fair on the leas,
And the soul of the Southron might rest,
And be perfectly happy with these;
But we, that were nursed on the knees
Of the hills of the North, we would fleet
Where our hearts might their longing appease
With the smell of bog-myrtle and peat!

ENVOY.

Princess, the domain of our quest
It is far from the sounds of the street,
Where the Kingdom of Galloway's blest
With the smell of bog-myrtle and peat!

BALLADE OF THE TWEED.


(LOWLAND SCOTCH.)


TO T. W. LANG.


The ferox rins in rough Loch Awe,
A weary cry frae ony toun;
The Spey, that loups o'er linn and fa',
They praise a' ither streams aboon;
They boast their braes o' bonny Doon:
Gie me to hear the ringing reel,
Where shilfas sing, and cushats croon
By fair Tweed-side, at Ashiesteel!

There's Ettrick, Meggat, Ail, and a',
Where trout swim thick in May and June;
Ye 'll see them take in showers o' snaw
Some blinking, cauldrife April noon:
Rax ower the palmer and march-broun,
And syne we 'll show a bonny creel,
In spring or simmer, late or soon,
By fair Tweed-side, at Ashiesteel!

There's mony a water, great or sma',
Gaes singing in his siller tune,
Through glen and heugh, and hope and shaw,
Beneath the sun-licht or the moon:
But set us in our fishing-shoon
Between the Caddon-burn and Peel,
And syne we 'll cross the heather broun
By fair Tweed-side at Ashiesteel!

ENVOY.

Deil take the dirty, trading loon
Wad gar the water ca' his wheel,
And drift his dyes and poisons doun
By fair Tweed-side at Ashiesteel!

BALLADE OF THE ROYAL GAME OF GOLF.


TO LESLIE BALFOUR.


(East Fifes hire.)


There are laddies will drive ye a ba'
To the burn frae the farthermost tee,
But ye mauna think driving is a',
Ye may heel her, and send her ajee,
Ye may land in the sand or the sea;
And ye 're dune, sir, ye 're no worth a preen,
Tak' the word that an auld man 'll gie,
Tak' aye tent to be up on the green!

The auld folk are crouse, and they craw
That their putting is pawky and slee;
In a bunker they 're nae gude ava',
But to girn, and to gar the sand flee.
And a lassie can putt—ony she,—
Be she Maggy, or Bessie, or Jean,
But a cleek-shot's the billy for me,
Tak' aye tent to be up on the green!

I hae play'd in the frost and the thaw,
I hae play'd since the year thirty-three,
I hae play'd in the rain and the snaw,
And I trust I may play till I dee;
And I tell ye the truth and nae lee,
For I speak o' the thing I hae seen—
Tom Morris, I ken, will agree—
Tak' aye tent to be up on the green!

ENVOY.

Prince, faith you 're improving a wee,
And, Lord, man, they tell me you 're keen;
Tak' the best o' advice that can be,
Tak' aye tent to be up on the green!

BALLADE OF THE MIDNIGHT FOREST.


AFTER THÉODORE DE BANVILLE.


Still sing the mocking fairies, as of old,
Beneath the shade of thorn and holly-tree;
The west wind breathes upon them, pure and cold,
And wolves still dread Diana roaming free
In secret woodland with her company.
'T is thought the peasants' hovels know her rite
When now the wolds are bathed in silver light,
And first the moonrise breaks the dusky grey.
Then down the dells, with blown soft hair and bright,
And through the dim wood Dian threads her way.

With water-weeds twined in their locks of gold,
The strange cold forest-fairies dance in glee;
Sylphs over-timorous and over-bold
Haunt the dark hollows where the dwarf may be,
The wild red dwarf, the nixies' enemy;
Then 'mid their mirth, and laughter, and affright,
The sudden Goddess enters, tall and white,
With one long sigh for summers pass'd away;
The swift feet tear the ivy nets outright,
And through the dim wood Dian threads her way.

She gleans her silvan trophies; down the wold
She hears the sobbing of the stags that flee
Mixed with the music of the hunting roll'd,
But her delight is all in archery,
And naught of ruth and pity wotteth she
More than her hounds that follow on the flight;
The Goddess draws a golden bow of might
And thick she rains the gentle shafts that slay.
She tosses loose her locks upon the night,
And through the dim wood Dian threads her way.

ENVOY.

Prince, let us leave the din, the dust, the spite,
The gloom and glare of towns, the plague, the blight:
Amid the forest leaves and fountain spray
There is the mystic home of our delight,
And through the dim wood Dian threads her way.

BALLADE OF THE CRICKET.


TO T. W. LANG.


The burden of hard hitting: slog away!
Here shalt thou score a "five" and there a "four,"
And then upon thy bat shalt lean, and say,
That thou art in for an uncommon score.
Yea, the loud ring applauding thee shall roar,
And thou to rival THORNTON shalt aspire,
When lo, the Umpire gives thee "leg before,"—
"This is the end of every man's desire!"

The burden of much bowling, when the stay
Of all thy team is "collared," swift or slower,
When "bailers" break not in their wonted way,
And "Yorkers" come not off as here-to-fore,
When length balls shoot no more, ah never more,
When all deliveries lose their former fire,
When bats seem broader than the broad ton-door,—
"This is the end of every man's desire!

The burden of long fielding, when the clay
Clings to thy shoon in sudden shower's downpour,
And running still thou stumblest, or the ray
Of blazing suns doth bite and burn thee sore,
And blind thee till, forgetful of thy lore,
Thou dost most mournfully misjudge a "skyer,"
And lose a match the Fates cannot restore,—
"This is the end of every man's desire!"

ENVOY.

Alas, yet liefer on Life's hither shore
Would I be some poor Player on scant hire,
Than King among the old, who play no more,—
"This is the end of every man's desire!"

BALLADE OF THE BOOK-MAN'S PARADISE.


Here is a Heaven, or here, or there,—
A Heaven there is, for me and you,
Where bargains meet for purses spare,
Like ours, are not so far and few.
Thuanus' bees go humming through
The learned groves, 'neath rainless skies,
O'er volumes old and volumes new,
Within that Book-man's Paradise!

There treasures bound for Longepierre
Keep brilliant their morocco blue,
There Hookes' Amanda is not rare,
Nor early tracts upon Peru!
Racine is common as Rotrou,
No Shakespeare Quarto search defies,
And Caxtons grow as blossoms grew,
Within that Book-man's Paradise!

There's Eve,—not our first mother fair,—
But Clovis Eve, a binder true;
Thither does Bauzonnet repair,
Derome, Le Gascon, Padeloup!
But never come the cropping crew
That dock a volume's honest size,
Nor they that "letter" backs askew,
Within that Book-man's Paradise!

ENVOY.

Friend, do not Heber and De Thou,
And Scott, and Southey, kind and wise,
La chasse au bouquin still pursue
Within that Book-man's Paradise?

BALLADE OF WORLDLY WEALTH.


(OLD FRENCH.)


Money taketh town and wall,
Fort and ramp without a blow;
Money moves the merchants all,
While the tides shall ebb and flow;
Money maketh Evil show
Like the Good, and Truth like lies:
These alone can ne'er bestow
Youth, and health, and Paradise.

Money maketh festival,
Wine she buys, and beds can strow;
Round the necks of captains tall,
Money wins them chains to throw,
Marches soldiers to and fro,
Gaineth ladies with sweet eyes:
These alone can ne'er bestow
Youth, and health, and Paradise.

Money wins the priest his stall;
Money mitres buys, I trow,
Red hats for the Cardinal,
Abbeys for the novice low;
Money maketh sin as snow,
Place of penitence supplies:
These alone can ne'er bestow
Youth, and health, and Paradise.

BALLADE OF THE MAY TERM.


(Being a Petition, in the form of a Ballade, praying the University
Commissioners to spare the Summer Term.)


When Lent and Responsions are ended,
When May with fritillaries waits,
When the flower of the chestnut is splendid,
When drags are at all of the gates
(Those drags the philosopher "slates"
With a scorn that is truly sublime),[3]
Life wins from the grasp of the Fates
Sweet hours and the fleetest of time!

When wickets are bowl'd and defended,
When Isis is glad with "the Eights,"
When music and sunset are blended,
When youth and the summer are mates,
When Freshmen are heedless of "Greats,"
And when note-books are cover'd with rhyme,
Ah, these are the hours that one rates
Sweet hours and the fleetest of time!

When the brow of the Dean is unbended
At luncheons and mild tête-à-têtes,
When the Tutor's in love, nor offended
By blunders in tenses or dates;
When bouquets are purchased of Bates,
When the bells in their melody chime,
When unheeded the Lecturer prates—
Sweet hours and the fleetest of time!

ENVOY.

Reformers of Schools and of States,
Is mirth so tremendous a crime?
Ah! spare what grim pedantry hates—
Sweet hours and the fleetest of time.

BALLADE OF DEAD CITIES.


TO E. W. GOSSE.


He dust of Carthage and the dust
Of Babel on the desert wold,
The loves of Corinth, and the lust,
Orchomenos increased with gold;
The town of Jason, over-bold,
And Cherson, smitten in her prime—
What are they but a dream half-told?
Where are the cities of old time?

In towns that were a kingdom's trust,
In dim Atlantic forests' fold,
The marble wasteth to a crust,
The granite crumbles into mould;
O'er these—left nameless from of old—
As over Shinar's brick and slime,
One vast forgetfulness is roll'd—
Where are the cities of old time?

The lapse of ages, and the rust,
The fire, the frost, the waters cold,
Efface the evil and the just;
From Thebes, that Eriphyle sold,
To drown'd Caer-Is, whose sweet bells toll'd
Beneath the wave a dreamy chime
That echo'd from the mountain-hold,—
"Where are the cities of old time?"

ENVOY.

Prince, all thy towns and cities must
Decay as these, till all their crime,
And mirth, and wealth, and toil are thrus'
Where are the cities of old time.

BALLADE OF THE VOYAGE TO CYTHERA.


AFTER THÉODORE DE BANVILLE.


I know Cythera long is desolate;
I know the winds have stripp'd the gardens green.
Alas, my friends! beneath the fierce sun's weight
A barren reef lies where Love's flowers have been,
Nor ever lover on that coast is seen!
So be it, but we seek a fabled shore,
To lull our vague desires with mystic lore,
To wander where Love's labyrinths beguile;
There let us land, there dream for evermore:
"It may be we shall touch the happy isle."

The sea may be our sepulchre. If Fate,
If tempests wreak their wrath on us, serene
We watch the bolt of heaven, and scorn the hate
Of angry gods that smite us in their spleen,
Perchance the jealous mists are but the screen
That veils the fairy coast we would explore.
Come, though the sea be vex'd, and breakers roar,
Come, for the air of this old world is vile,
Haste we, and toil, and faint not at the oar;
"It may be we shall touch the happy isle."

Grey serpents trail in temples desecrate
Where Cypris smiled, the golden maid, the queen,
And ruined is the palace of our state;
But happy Loves flit round the mast, and keen
The shrill wind sings the silken cords between.
Heroes are we, with wearied hearts and sore,
Whose flower is faded and whose locks are hoar,
Yet haste, light skiffs, where myrtle thickets smile
Love's panthers sleep 'mid roses, as of yore:
"It may be we shall touch the happy isle!"

ENVOY.

Sad eyes! the blue sea laughs, as heretofore.
Ah, singing birds your happy music pour!
Ah, poets, leave the sordid earth awhile;
Flit to these ancient gods we still adore:
"It may be we shall touch the happy isle!"

BALLADE OF LIFE.


"'Dead and gone,'—a sorry burden of the Ballad of Life."
Death's Jest Book.


Say, fair maids, maying
In gardens green,
In deep dells straying,
What end hath been
Two Mays between
Of the flowers that shone
And your own sweet queen—
"They are dead and gone!"

Say, grave priests, praying
In dule and teen,
From cells decaying
What have ye seen
Of the proud and mean,
Of Judas and John,
Of the foul and clean?—
"They are dead and gone!"

Say, kings, arraying
Loud wars to win,
Of your manslaying
What gain ye glean?
"They are fierce and keen,
But they fall anon,
On the sword that lean,—
They are dead and gone!"

ENVOY.

Through the mad world's scene,
We are drifting on,
To this tune, I ween,
"They are dead and gone!"

BALLADE OF ÆSTHETIC ADJECTIVES.


There be "subtle" and "sweet," that are bad ones to beat,
There are "lives unlovely," and "souls astray";
There is much to be done yet with "moody" and "meet,"
And "ghastly," and "grimly," and "gaunt," and "grey";
We should ever be "blithesome," but never be gay,
And "splendid" is suited to "summer" and "sea";
"Consummate," they say, is enjoying its day,—
"Intense" is the adjective dearest to me!

The Snows and the Rose they are "windy" and "fleet,"
And "frantic" and "faint" are Delight and Dismay;
Yea, "sanguine," it seems, as the juice of the beet,
Are "the hands of the King" in a general way:
There be loves that quicken, and sicken, and slay;
"Supreme" is the song of the Bard of the free;
But of adjectives all that I name in my lay,
"Intense" is the adjective dearest to me!

The Matron intense—let us sit at her feet,
And pelt her with lilies as long as we may;
The Maiden intense—is not always discreet;
But the Singer intense, in his "singing array,"
Will win all the world with his roundelay:
While "blithe" birds carol from tree to tree,
And Art unto Nature doth simper, and say,—
"'Intense' is the adjective dearest to me!"

ENVOY.

Prince, it is surely as good as a play
To mark how the poets and painters agree;
But of plumage æsthetic that feathers the jay,
"Intense" is the adjective dearest to me!

BALLADE OF DEAD LADIES.


AFTER VILLON.


Nay, tell me now in what strange air
The Roman Flora dwells to-day.
Where Archippiada hides, and where
Beautiful Thais has passed away?
Whence answers Echo, afield, astray,
By mere or stream,—around, below?
Lovelier she than a woman of clay;
Nay, but where is the last year's snow?

Where is wise Héloïse, that care
Brought on Abeilard, and dismay?
All for her love he found a snare,
A maimed poor monk in orders grey;
And where's the Queen who willed to slay
Buridan, that in a sack must go
Afloat down Seine,—a perilous way—
Nay, but where is the last year's snow?

Where's that White Queen, a lily rare,
With her sweet song, the Siren's lay?
Where's Bertha Broad-foot, Beatrice fair?
Alys and Ermengarde, where are they?
Good Joan, whom English did betray
In Rouen town, and burned her? No,
Maiden and Queen, no man may say;
Nay, but where is the last year's snow?

ENVOY.

Prince, all this week thou need'st not pray,
Nor yet this year the thing to know.
One burden answers, ever and aye,
"Nay, but where is the last year's snow?"

VILLON'S BALLADE.


GOOD COUNSEL, TO HIS FRIENDS OF EVIL LIFE.


Nay be you pardoner or cheat,
Or cogger keen, or mumper shy,
You 'll burn your fingers at the feat,
And howl like other folks that fry.
All evil folks that love a lie!
And where goes gain that greed amasses,
By wile, and guile, and thievery?
'T is all to taverns and to lasses!

Rhyme, rail, dance, play the cymbals sweet,
With game, and shame, and jollity,
Go jigging through the field and street,
With mysfry and morality;
Win gold at gleek,—and that will fly,
Where all you gain at passage passes,
And that's? You know as well as I,
'T is all to taverns and to lasses!

Nay, forth from all such filth retreat,
Go delve and ditch, in wet or dry,
Turn groom, give horse and mule their meat,
If you've no clerkly skill to ply;
You 'll gain enough, with husbandry,
But—sow hempseed and such wild grasses,
And where goes all you take thereby?—
'T is all to taverns and to lasses!

ENVOY.

Your clothes, your hose, your broidery,
Your linen that the snow surpasses,
Or ere they 're worn, off, off they fly,
'T is all to taverns and to lasses!

BALLADE AMOUREUSE.


AFTER FROISSART.


Not Jason nor Medea wise,
I crave to see, nor win much lore,
Nor list to Orpheus' minstrelsies;
Nor Her'cles would I see, that o'er
The wide world roamed from shore to shore;
Nor, by St. James, Penelope,—
Nor pure Lucrece, such wrong that bore:
To see my Love suffices me!

Virgil and Cato, no man vies
With them in wealth of clerkly store;
I would not see them with mine eyes;
Nor him that sailed, sans sail nor oar,
Across the barren sea and hoar,
And all for love of his ladye;
Nor pearl nor sapphire takes me more:
To see my Love suffices me!

I heed not Pegasus, that flies
As swift as shafts the bowmen pour;
Nor famed Pygmalion's artifice,
Whereof the like was ne'er before;
Nor Oléus, that drank of yore
The salt wave of the whole great sea:
Why? dost thou ask? 'T is as I swore
To see my Love suffices me!

BALLADE AGAINST THE JESUITS.


AFTER LA FONTAINE.


Rome does right well to censure all the vain
Talk of Jansenius, and of them who preach
That earthly joys are damnable! 'T is plain
We need not charge at Heaven as at a breach;
No, amble on! We '11 gain it, one and all;
The narrow path's a dream fantastical,
And Arnauld's quite superfluously driven
Mirth from the world. We 'll scale the heavenly wall.
Escobar makes a primrose path to heaven!

He does not hold a man may well be slain
Who vexes with unseasonable speech,
You may do murder for five ducats gain,
Not for a pin, a ribbon, or a peach;
He ventures (most consistently) to teach
That there are certain cases which befall
When perjury need no good man appal,
And life of love (he says) may keep a leaven.
Sure, hearing this, a grateful world will bawl,
"Escobar makes a primrose path to heaven!"

"For God's sake read me somewhat in the strain
Of his most cheering volumes, I beseech!"
Why should I name them all? a mighty train—
So many, none may know the name of each.
Make these your compass to the heavenly beach,
These only in your library instal:
Burn Pascal and his fellows, great and small,
Dolts that in vain with Escobar have striven;
I tell you, and the common voice doth call,
Escobar makes a primrose path to heaven!

ENVOY.

SATAN, that pride did hurry to thy fall,
Thou porter of the grim infernal hall—
Thou keeper of the courts of souls unshriven!
To shun thy shafts, to 'scape thy hellish thrall,
Escobar makes a primrose path to heaven!

BALLADE OF BLIND LOVE.


Who have loved and ceased to love, forget
That ever they loved in their lives, they say;
Only remember the fever and fret,
And the pain of Love, that was all his pay;
All the delight of him passes away
From hearts that hoped, and from lips that met—
Too late did I love you, my love, and yet
I shall never forget till my dying day.

Too late were we 'ware of the secret net
That meshes the feet in the flowers that stray;
There were we taken and snared, Lisette,
In the dungeon of La Fausse Amistie;
Help was there none in the wide world's fray,
Joy was there none in the gift and the debt;
Too late we knew it, too long regret—
I shall never forget till my dying day!

We must live our lives, though the sun be set,
Must meet in the masque where parts we play,
Must cross in the maze of Life's minuet;
Our yea is yea, and our nay is nay:
But while snows of winter or flowers of May
Are the sad year's shroud or coronet,
In the season of rose or of violet,
I shall never forget till my dying day!

ENVOY.

Queen, when the clay is my coverlet,
When I am dead, and when you are grey,
Vow, where the grass of the grave is wet,
"I shall never forget till my dying day!"

BALLADE OF HIS CHOICE OF A SEPULCHRE.


Here I'd come when weariest!
Here the breast
Of the Windburg's[4] tufted over
Deep with bracken; here his crest
Takes the west,
Where the wide-winged hawk doth hover.

Silent here are lark and plover;
In the cover
Deep below the cushat best
Loves his mate, and croons above her
O'er their nest,
Where the wide-winged hawk doth hover.

Bring me here, Life's tired-out guest,
To the blest
Bed that waits the weary rover,
Here should failure be confessed;
Ends my quest,
Where the wide-winged hawk doth hover!

ENVOY.

Friend, or stranger kind, or lover,
Ah, fulfil a last behest,
Let me rest
Where the wide-winged hawk doth hover!

GRACE A LA MUSE, ET JE LUI DIS MERCI,
J'AI COMPOSÉ MES TRENTE SIX BALLADES

DIZAIN

As, to the pipe, with rhythmic feet
In windings of some old-world dance,
The smiling couples cross and meet,
Join hands, and then in line advance,
Si, to these fair old tunes of France,
Through all their maze of to-and-fro,
The light-heeled numbers laughing go,
Retreat, return, and ere they flee,
moment pause in panting row,
And seem to say,—VOS PLAUDITE.
AUSTIN DOBSON.