14. MUSING ON A GREAT SOLDIER
Reading edition
Fear? Yes . . . I heard you saying In an Oxford common-room Where the hearth-light's kindly raying Stript the empanelled walls of gloom, Silver groves of candles playing In the soft wine turned to bloom— At the word I see you now Blandly push the wine-boat's prow Round the mirror of that scored Yellow old mahogany board— I confess to one fear! this, To be buried alive!
My Lord, Your fancy has played amiss.
Fear not. When in farewell While guns toll like a bell And the bell tolls like a gun Westminster towers call Folk and state to your funeral, And robed in honours won, Beneath the cloudy pall Of the lifted shreds of glory
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You lie in the last stall Of that grey dormitory— Fear not lest mad mischance Should find you lapt and shrouded Alive in helpless trance Though seeming death-beclouded:
For long ere so you rest On that transcendent bier Shall we not have addressed One summons, one last test, To your reluctant ear? O believe it! we shall have uttered In ultimate entreaty A name your soul would hear Howsoever thickly shuttered; We shall have stooped and muttered England! in your cold ear. . . . Then, if your great pulse leap No more, nor your cheek burn, Enough; then shall we learn 'Tis time for us to weep.
Herbert Trench.