Which only Saints of God may wear,
And all the flowers on which you tread
In pleasaunce more than ours have fed,
And supped the essential air
Whose summer is a-pulse with music everywhere.
II
For you are younger than the mornings are
That in the mountains break;
When upland shepherds see their only star
Pale on the dawn, and make
In his surcease the hours,
The early hours of all their happy circuit take.
THE MOON’S FUNERAL
I
The Moon is dead. I saw her die.
She in a drifting cloud was drest,
She lay along the uncertain west,
A dream to see.
And very low she spake to me:
“I go where none may understand,
I fade into the nameless land,
And there must lie perpetually.”
And therefore I,
And therefore loudly, loudly I
And high
And very piteously make cry:
“The Moon is dead. I saw her die.”
II
And will she never rise again?
The Holy Moon? Oh, never more!
Perhaps along the inhuman shore
Where pale ghosts are
Beyond the low lethean fen
She and some wide infernal star....
To us who loved her never more,
The Moon will never rise again.
Oh! never more in nightly sky
Her eye so high shall peep and pry
To see the great world rolling by.
For why?
The Moon is dead. I saw her die.
THE HAPPY JOURNALIST
I love to walk about at night
By nasty lanes and corners foul,
All shielded from the unfriendly light
And independent as the owl.
By dirty grates I love to lurk;
I often stoop to take a squint
At printers working at their work.
I muse upon the rot they print.
The beggars please me, and the mud:
The editors beneath their lamps
As--Mr Howl demanding blood,
And Lord Retender stealing stamps,
And Mr Bing instructing liars,
His elder son composing trash;
Beaufort (whose real name is Meyers)
Refusing anything but cash.
I like to think of Mr Meyers,
I like to think of Mr Bing.
I like to think about the liars:
It pleases me, that sort of thing.
Policemen speak to me, but I,
Remembering my civic rights,
Neglect them and do not reply.
I love to walk about at nights!
At twenty-five to four I bunch
Across a cab I can’t afford.
I ring for breakfast after lunch.
I am as happy as a lord!
LINES TO A DON
Remote and ineffectual Don
That dared attack my Chesterton,
With that poor weapon, half-impelled,
Unlearnt, unsteady, hardly held,
Unworthy for a tilt with men--
Your quavering and corroded pen;
Don poor at Bed and worse at Table,
Don pinched, Don starved, Don miserable;
Don stuttering, Don with roving eyes,
Don nervous, Don of crudities;
Don clerical, Don ordinary,
Don self-absorbed and solitary;
Don here-and-there, Don epileptic;
Don puffed and empty, Don dyspeptic;
Don middle-class, Don sycophantic,
Don dull, Don brutish, Don pedantic;
Don hypocritical, Don bad,
Don furtive, Don three-quarters mad;
Don (since a man must make an end),
Don that shall never be my friend.
* * * * *
Don different from those regal Dons!
With hearts of gold and lungs of bronze,
Who shout and bang and roar and bawl
The Absolute across the hall,
Or sail in amply bellowing gown
Enormous through the Sacred Town,
Bearing from College to their homes
Deep cargoes of gigantic tomes;
Dons admirable! Dons of Might!
Uprising on my inward sight
Compact of ancient tales, and port
And sleep--and learning of a sort.
Dons English, worthy of the land;
Dons rooted; Dons that understand.
Good Dons perpetual that remain
A landmark, walling in the plain--
The horizon of my memories--
Like large and comfortable trees.
* * * * *
Don very much apart from these,
Thou scapegoat Don, thou Don devoted,
Don to thine own damnation quoted,
Perplexed to find thy trivial name
Reared in my verse to lasting shame.
Don dreadful, rasping Don and wearing,
Repulsive Don--Don past all bearing.
Don of the cold and doubtful breath,
Don despicable, Don of death;
Don nasty, skimpy, silent, level;
Don evil; Don that serves the devil.
Don ugly--that makes fifty lines.
There is a Canon which confines
A Rhymed Octosyllabic Curse
If written in Iambic Verse
To fifty lines. I never cut;
I far prefer to end it--but
Believe me I shall soon return.
My fires are banked, but still they burn
To write some more about the Don
That dared attack my Chesterton.
NEWDIGATE POEM
A PRIZE POEM SUBMITTED BY MR LAMBKIN, THEN SCHOLAR AND LATER FELLOW
OF BURFORD COLLEGE, TO THE EXAMINERS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD ON
THE PRESCRIBED POETIC THEME SET BY THEM IN 1893, “THE BENEFITS OF
THE ELECTRIC LIGHT”
Hail, Happy Muse, and touch the tuneful string!
The benefits conferred by Science[E] I sing.
Under the kind Examiners’ direction[F]
I only write about them in connection
With benefits which the Electric Light
Confers on us; especially at night.
These are my theme, of these my song shall rise.
My lofty head shall swell to strike the skies.[G]
And tears of hopeless love bedew the maiden’s eyes.
Descend, O Muse, from thy divine abode,
To Osney, on the Seven Bridges Road;
For under Osney’s solitary shade
The bulk of the Electric Light is made.
Here are the works;--from hence the current flows
Which (so the Company’s prospectus goes)
Can furnish to Subscribers hour by hour
No less than sixteen thousand candle power,[H]
All at a thousand volts. (It is essential
To keep the current at this high potential
In spite of the considerable expense.)
The Energy developed represents,
Expressed in foot-tons, the united forces
Of fifteen elephants and forty horses.
But shall my scientific detail thus
Clip the dear wings of Buoyant Pegasus?
Shall pure statistics jar upon the ear
That pants for Lyric accents loud and clear?
Shall I describe the complex Dynamo
Or write about its Commutator? No!
To happier fields I lead my wanton pen,
The proper study of mankind is men.
Awake, my Muse! Portray the pleasing sight
That meets us where they make Electric Light.
Behold the Electrician where he stands:
Soot, oil, and verdigris are on his hands;
Large spots of grease defile his dirty clothes,
The while his conversation drips with oaths.
Shall such a being perish in its youth?
Alas! it is indeed the fatal truth.
In that dull brain, beneath that hair unkempt,
Familiarity has bred contempt.
We warn him of the gesture all too late:
Oh, Heartless Jove! Oh, Adamantine Fate!
A random touch--a hand’s imprudent slip--
The Terminals--a flash--a sound like “Zip!”
A smell of burning fills the started Air--
The Electrician is no longer there!
But let us turn with true Artistic scorn
From facts funereal and from views forlorn
Of Erebus and Blackest midnight born.[I]
Arouse thee, Muse! and chaunt in accents rich
The interesting processes by which
The Electricity is passed along:
These are my theme: to these I bend my song.
It runs encased in wood or porous brick
Through copper wires two millimetres thick,
And insulated on their dangerous mission
By indiarubber, silk, or composition.
Here you may put with critical felicity
The following question: “What is Electricity?”
“Molecular Activity,” say some,
Others when asked say nothing, and are dumb.
Whatever be its nature, this is clear:
The rapid current checked in its career,
Baulked in its race and halted in its course[J]
Transforms to heat and light its latent force:
It needs no pedant in the lecturer’s chair
To prove that light and heat are present there.
The pear-shaped vacuum globe, I understand,
Is far too hot to fondle with the hand.
While, as is patent to the meanest sight,
The carbon filament is very bright.
As for the lights they hang about the town,
Some praise them highly, others run them down.
This system (technically called the Arc),
Makes some passages too light, others too dark.
But in the house the soft and constant rays
Have always met with universal praise.
For instance: if you want to read in bed
No candle burns beside your curtain’s head,
Far from some distant corner of the room
The incandescent lamp dispels the gloom,
And with the largest print need hardly try
The powers of any young and vigorous eye.
Aroint thee, Muse! Inspired the poet sings!
I cannot help observing future things!
Life is a vale, its paths are dark and rough
Only because we do not know enough:
When Science has discovered something more
We shall be happier than we were before.
Hail, Britain, Mistress of the Azure Main,
Ten thousand Fleets sweep over thee in vain!
Hail, Mighty Mother of the Brave and Free,
That beat Napoleon, and gave birth to me!
Thou that canst wrap in thine emblazoned robe
One quarter of the habitable globe.
Thy mountains, wafted by a favouring breeze,
Like mighty rocks withstand the stormy seas.
Thou art a Christian Commonwealth; and yet
Be thou not all unthankful--nor forget
As thou exultest in Imperial Might
The Benefits of the Electric Light.
THE YELLOW MUSTARD
Oh! ye that prink it to and fro,
In pointed flounce and furbelow,
What have ye known, what can ye know
That have not seen the mustard grow?
The yellow mustard is no less
Than God’s good gift to loneliness;
And he was sent in gorgeous press
To jangle keys at my distress.
I heard the throstle call again,
Come hither, Pain! come hither, Pain!
Till all my shameless feet were fain
To wander through the summer rain.
And far apart from human place,
And flaming like a vast disgrace,
There struck me blinding in the face
The livery of the mustard race.
* * * * *
To see the yellow mustard grow
Beyond the town, above, below;
Beyond the purple houses, oh!
To see the yellow mustard grow!
THE POLITICIAN OR THE IRISH EARLDOM
A strong and striking Personality,
Worth several hundred thousand pounds--
Of strict political Morality--
Was walking in his park-like Grounds;
When, just as these began to pall on him
(I mean the Trees, and Things like that),
A Person who had come to call on him
Approached him, taking off his Hat.
He said, with singular veracity:
“I serve our Sea-girt Mother-Land
In no conspicuous capacity.
I am but an Attorney; and
I do a little elementary
Negotiation, now and then,
As Agent for a Parliamentary
Division of the Town of N....
“Merely as one of the Electorate--
A member of the Commonweal--
Before completing my Directorate,
I want to know the way you feel
On matters more or less debatable;
As--whether our Imperial Pride
Can treat as taxable or rateable
The Gardens of....” His host replied:
“The Ravages of Inebriety
(Alas! increasing day by day!)
Are undermining all Society.
I do not hesitate to say
My country squanders her abilities,
Observe how Montenegro treats
Her Educational Facilities....
... As to the African defeats,
“I bitterly deplored their frequency;
On Canada we are agreed,
The Laws protecting Public Decency
Are very, very lax indeed!
The Views of most of the Nobility
Are very much the same as mine,
On Thingumbob’s eligibility....
I trust that you remain to dine?”
His Lordship pressed with importunity,
As rarely he had pressed before.
* * * * *
It gave them both an opportunity
To know each other’s value more.
THE LOSER
He lost his money first of all
--And losing that is half the story--
And later on he tried a fall
With Fate, in things less transitory.
He lost his heart--and found it dead--
(His one and only true discovery),
And after that he lost his head,
And lost his chances of recovery.
He lost his honour bit by bit
Until the thing was out of question.
He worried so at losing it,
He lost his sleep and his digestion.
He lost his temper--and for good--
The remnants of his reputation,
His taste in wine, his choice of food,
And then, in rapid culmination,
His certitudes, his sense of truth,
His memory, his self-control,
The love that graced his early youth,
And lastly his immortal soul.
III
SONGS
NOËL
I
On a winter’s night long time ago
(_The bells ring loud and the bells ring low_),
When high howled wind, and down fell snow
(Carillon, Carilla).
Saint Joseph he and Nostre Dame,
Riding on an ass, full weary came
From Nazareth into Bethlehem.
And the small child Jesus smile on you.
II
And Bethlehem inn they stood before
(_The bells ring less and the bells ring more_),
The landlord bade them begone from his door
(Carillon, Carilla).
“Poor folk” (says he), “must lie where they may,
For the Duke of Jewry comes this way,
With all his train on a Christmas Day.”
And the small child Jesus smile on you.
III
Poor folk that may my carol hear
(_The bells ring single and the bells ring clear_),
See! God’s one child had hardest cheer!
(Carillon, Carilla).
Men grown hard on a Christmas morn;
The dumb beast by and a babe forlorn.
It was very, very cold when our Lord was born.
And the small child Jesus smile on you.
IV
Now these were Jews as Jews must be
(_The bells ring merry and the bells ring free_).
But Christian men in a band are we
(Carillon, Carilla).
Empty we go, and ill be-dight,
Singing Noël on a Winter’s night.
Give us to sup by the warm firelight,
And the small child Jesus smile on you.
THE BIRDS
When Jesus Christ was four years old,
The angels brought Him toys of gold,
Which no man ever had bought or sold.
And yet with these He would not play.
He made Him small fowl out of clay,
And blessed them till they flew away:
_Tu creasti Domine_.
Jesus Christ, Thou child so wise,
Bless mine hands and fill mine eyes,
And bring my soul to Paradise.
IN A BOAT
Lady! Lady!
Upon Heaven-height,
Above the harsh morning
In the mere light.
Above the spindrift
And above the snow,
Where no seas tumble,
And no winds blow.
The twisting tides,
And the perilous sands
Upon all sides
Are in your holy hands.
The wind harries
And the cold kills;
But I see your chapel
Over far hills.
My body is frozen,
My soul is afraid:
Stretch out your hands to me,
Mother and maid.
Mother of Christ,
And Mother of me,
Save me alive
From the howl of the sea.
If you will Mother me
Till I grow old,
I will hang in your chapel
A ship of pure gold.
SONG
INVITING THE INFLUENCE OF A YOUNG LADY UPON THE OPENING YEAR
I
You wear the morning like your dress
And are with mastery crowned;
Whenas you walk your loveliness
Goes shining all around.
Upon your secret, smiling way
Such new contents were found,
The Dancing Loves made holiday
On that delightful ground.
II
Then summon April forth, and send
Commandment through the flowers;
About our woods your grace extend
A queen of careless hours.
For oh, not Vera veiled in rain,
Nor Dian’s sacred Ring,
With all her royal nymphs in train
Could so lead on the Spring.
THE RING
When I was flying before the King
In the wood of Valognes in my hiding,
Although I had not anything
I sent a woman a golden ring.
A Ring of the Moors beyond Leon
With emerald and with diamond stone,
And a writing no man ever had known,
And an opal standing all alone.
The shape of the ring the heart to bind:
The emerald turns from cold to kind:
The writing makes her sure to find:--
But the evil opal changed her mind.
Now when the King was dead, was he,
I came back hurriedly over the sea
From the long rocks in Normandy
To Bosham that is by Selsey.
And we clipt each other knee to knee.
But what I had was lost to me.
CUCKOO!
In woods so long time bare.
Cuckoo!
Up and in the wood, I know not where
Two notes fall.
Yet I do not envy him at all
His phantasy.
Cuckoo!
I too,
Somewhere,
I have sung as merrily as he
Who can dare,
Small and careless lover, so to laugh at care,
And who
Can call
Cuckoo!
In woods of winter weary,
In scented woods, of winter weary, call
Cuckoo!
In woods so long time bare.
THE LITTLE SERVING MAID
I
There was a Queen of England,
And a good Queen too.
She had a house in Powis Land
With the Severn running through;
And Men-folk and Women-folk
Apprenticed to a trade;
But the prettiest of all
Was a Little Serving Maid.
II
“Oh Madam, Queen of England!
Oh will you let me go!
For there’s a Lad in London
And he would have it so.
And I would have it too, Madam,
And with him would I bide;
And he will be the Groom, Madam,
And I shall be the Bride!”
III
“Oh fie to you and shame to you,
You Little Serving Maid!
And are you not astonied?
And are you not afraid?
For never was it known
Since Yngelonde began
That a Little Serving Maid
Should go a-meeting of a man!
IV
Then the Little Serving Maid
She went and laid her down,
With her cross and her bede,
In her new courting gown.
And she called in Mother Mary’s name
And heavily she sighed:
“I think that I have come to shame!”
And after that she died.
V
The good Queen of England
Her women came and ran:
“The Little Serving Maid is dead
From loving of a man!”
Said the good Queen of England
“That is ill news to hear!
Take her out and shroud her,
And lay her on a bier.”
VI
They laid her on a bier,
In the court-yard all;
Some came from Foresting,
And some came from Hall.
And Great Lords carried her,
And proud Priests prayed.
And that was the end
Of the Little Serving Maid.
AUVERGNAT
There was a man was half a clown
(It’s so my father tells of it).
He saw the church in Clermont town
And laughed to hear the bells of it.
He laughed to hear the bells that ring
In Clermont Church and round of it;
He heard the verger’s daughter sing,
And loved her for the sound of it.
The verger’s daughter said him nay;
She had the right of choice in it.
He left the town at break of day:
He hadn’t had a voice in it.
The road went up, the road went down,
And there the matter ended it.
He broke his heart in Clermont town,
At Pontgibaud they mended it.
DRINKING SONG
ON THE EXCELLENCE OF BURGUNDY WINE
My jolly fat host with your face all a-grin,
Come, open the door to us, let us come in.
A score of stout fellows who think it no sin
If they toast till they’re hoarse, and they drink till they spin,
Hoofed it amain,
Rain or no rain,
To crack your old jokes, and your bottles to drain.
Such a warmth in the belly that nectar begets
As soon as his guts with its humour he wets,
The miser his gold, and the student his debts,
And the beggar his rags and his hunger forgets.
For there’s never a wine
Like this tipple of thine
From the great hill of Nuits to the River of Rhine.
Outside you may hear the great gusts as they go
By Foy, by Duerne, and the hills of Lerraulx,
But the rain he may rain, and the wind he may blow,
If the Devil’s above there’s good liquor below.
So it abound,
Pass it around,
Burgundy’s Burgundy all the year round.
DRINKING DIRGE
A thousand years ago I used to dine
In houses where they gave me such regale
Of dear companionship and comrades fine
That out I went alone beyond the pale;
And riding, laughed and dared the skies malign
To show me all the undiscovered tale--
But my philosophy’s no more divine,
I put my pleasure in a pint of ale.
And you, my friends, oh! pleasant friends of mine,
Who leave me now alone, without avail,
On Californian hills you gave me wine,
You gave me cider-drink in Longuevaille;
If after many years you come to pine
For comradeship that is an ancient tale--
You’ll find me drinking beer in Dead Man’s Chine.
I put my pleasure in a pint of ale.
In many a briny boat I’ve tried the brine,
From many a hidden harbour I’ve set sail,
Steering towards the sunset where there shine
The distant amethystine islands pale.
There are no ports beyond the far sea-line,
Nor any halloa to meet the mariner’s hail;
I stand at home and slip the anchor-line.
I put my pleasure in a pint of ale.
ENVOI
Prince! Is it true when you go out to dine
You bring your bottle in a freezing pail?
Why then you cannot be a friend of mine.
_I_ put my pleasure in a pint of ale.
WEST SUSSEX DRINKING SONG
They sell good Beer at Haslemere
And under Guildford Hill.
At Little Cowfold as I’ve been told
A beggar may drink his fill:
There is a good brew in Amberley too,
And by the bridge also;
But the swipes they take in at Washington Inn
Is the very best Beer I know.
_Chorus._
With my here it goes, there it goes,
All the fun’s before us:
The Tipple’s Aboard and the night is young,
The door’s ajar and the Barrel is sprung,
I am singing the best song ever was sung
And it has a rousing chorus.
If I were what I never can be,
The master or the squire:
If you gave me the hundred from here to the sea,
Which is more than I desire:
Then all my crops should be barley and hops,
And did my harvest fail
I’d sell every rood of mine acres I would
For a belly-full of good Ale.
_Chorus._
With my here it goes, there it goes,
All the fun’s before us:
The Tipple’s aboard and the night is young,
The door’s ajar and the Barrel is sprung,
I am singing the best song ever was sung
And it has a rousing Chorus.
A BALLAD ON SOCIOLOGICAL ECONOMICS
A while ago it came to pass
(Merry we carol it all the day),
There sat a man on the top of an ass
(Heart be happy and carol be gay
In spite of the price of hay).
And over the down they hoofed it so
(Happy go lucky has best of fare),
The man up above and the brute below
(And singing we all forget to care
A man may laugh if he dare).
Over the stubble and round the crop
(Life is short and the world is round),
The donkey beneath and the man on the top
(Oh! let good ale be found, be found,
Merry good ale and sound).
It happened again as it happened before
(Tobacco’s a boon but ale is bliss),
The moke in the ditch and the man on the floor
(And that is the moral to this, to this
Remarkable artifice).
HERETICS ALL
Heretics all, whoever you be,
In Tarbes or Nimes, or over the sea,
You never shall have good words from me.
_Caritas non conturbat me._
But Catholic men that live upon wine
Are deep in the water, and frank, and fine;
Wherever I travel I find it so,
_Benedicamus Domino_.
On childing women that are forlorn,
And men that sweat in nothing but scorn:
That is on all that ever were born,
_Miserere Domine_.
To my poor self on my deathbed,
And all my dear companions dead,
Because of the love that I bore them,
_Dona Eis Requiem_.
HA’NACKER MILL
Sally is gone that was so kindly
Sally is gone from Ha’nacker Hill.
And the Briar grows ever since then so blindly
And ever since then the clapper is still,
And the sweeps have fallen from Ha’nacker Mill
Ha’nacker Hill is in Desolation:
Ruin a-top and a field unploughed.
And Spirits that call on a fallen nation
Spirits that loved her calling aloud:
Spirits abroad in a windy cloud.
Spirits that call and no one answers;
Ha’nacker’s down and England’s done.
Wind and Thistle for pipe and dancers
And never a ploughman under the Sun.
Never a ploughman. Never a one.
TARANTELLA
Do you remember an Inn,
Miranda?
Do you remember an Inn?
And the tedding and the spreading
Of the straw for a bedding,
And the fleas that tease in the High Pyrenees,
And the wine that tasted of the tar?
And the cheers and the jeers of the young muleteers
(Under the vine of the dark verandah)?
Do you remember an Inn, Miranda,
Do you remember an Inn?
And the cheers and the jeers of the young muleteers
Who hadn’t got a penny,
And who weren’t paying any,
And the hammer at the doors and the Din?
And the Hip! Hop! Hap!
Of the clap
Of the hands to the twirl and the swirl
Of the girl gone chancing,
Glancing,
Dancing,
Backing and advancing,
Snapping of the clapper to the spin
Out and in----
And the Ting, Tong, Tang of the Guitar!
Do you remember an Inn,
Miranda?
Do you remember an Inn?
Never more;
Miranda,
Never more.
Only the high peaks hoar:
And Aragon a torrent at the door.
No sound
In the walls of the Halls where falls
The tread
Of the feet of the dead to the ground
No sound:
But the boom
Of the far Waterfall like Doom.
THE CHAUNTY OF THE “NONA”
I
Come list all ye Cullies and Doxies so dear,
You shall hearken to the tale of the Bold Marineer
That took ship out of Holyhead and drove her so hard
Past Bardsey, Pwlheli, Port Madoc, and Fishguard--
_Past Bardsey, Pwlheli, Port Madoc, and Fishguard_.
II
Then he dropped out of Fishguard on a calm Summer’s day,
By St David’s and Strumbles and across St Bride’s Bay;
Circumnavigating Skomer, that Island, around,
With the heart of a Lion he threaded Jack Sound--
_With the heart of a Lion he threaded Jack Sound_.
III
But from out the Main Ocean there rolled a great cloud,
So he clawed into Milford Haven by the Fog Blast so loud,
Until he dropped anchor in a deep-wooded bay,
Where all night with Old Sleep and Quiet Sadness he lay--
_Where all night with Old Sleep and Quiet Sadness he lay_.
IV
Next morning was a Doldrum, and he whistled for a breeze,
Which came from the N.N.W.’ard all across the high seas;
And in passing St Govan’s lightship he gave them good night,
But before it was morning he raised Lundy Light--
_Before it was morning he had raised Lundy Light_.
V
Then he tossed for twelve hours in that horrible place
Which is known to the Mariner as the Great White Horse Race,
Till with a slant about three bells, or maybe near four,
He saw white water breaking upon Loud Appledore--
_He saw white water breaking upon Loud Appledore_.
VI
The Pirates of Appledore, the Wines of Instow;
But her nose is for Bideford with the tide at the flow.
Rattle anchor, batten hatches, and leave your falls curled.
The Long Bridge of Bideford is the end of the World--
_The Long Bridge of Bideford is the end of the World_.
THE WINGED HORSE