THE VISIONS OF ENGLAND (continued 3)

St. 8 Clan Colla; general name for the sept of the Macdonalds.

St. 10 Caer Luel; Urien ap Urbgen is an early hero of Strathclyde or Alcluith, the British kingdom lying between Dumbarton and Carlisle, then Caer Luel.

St. 12 Ben Aille; a mountain over Loch Ericht in the central Highlands.

St. 13 Ice-brook-temper’d; ‘It is a sword of Spain, the ice-brook’s temper’: (Othello: A. 5: S. 2).

St. 14 At Falkirk; Jan 17, 1746. ‘On the eve after his victory Charles again encamped on Bannockburn.’

St. 16 The mortal moor; named Culloden and Drummossie: Ap. 16, 1746. The cold at that time was very severe.

St. 17 A nation’s craven rage; See Appendix F.

St. 21 Love’s gentler judgment; We may perhaps quote on his behalf Vergil’s beautiful words

. . . utcumque ferent ea facta minores, Vincet amor patriae laudumque inmensa cupido.

—It is also pleasant to record that over the coffin of Charles in S. Peter’s, Rome, a monument was placed by George the Fourth, upon which, by a graceful and gallant ‘act of oblivion,’ are inscribed the names of James the Third, Charles the Third, and Henry the Ninth, ‘Kings of England.’

On the simple monument set up by his brother Henry in S. Pietro, Frascati, it may be worth notice that Charles is only described as Paterni iuris et regiae | dignitatis successor et heres:—the title, King, (given to his Father in the inscription), not being assigned to Charles, or assumed by the Cardinal.

TRAFALGAR

October 21: 1805

Heard ye the thunder of battle Low in the South and afar? Saw ye the flash of the death-cloud Crimson o’er Trafalgar? Such another day never England will look on again, When the battle fought was the hottest, And the hero of heroes was slain!

For the fleet of France and the force of Spain were gather’d for fight, A greater than Philip their lord, a new Armada in might:— And the sails were aloft once more in the deep Gaditanian bay, Where Redoubtable and Bucentaure and great Trinidada lay; Eager-reluctant to close; for across the bloodshed to be Two navies beheld one prize in its glory,—the throne of the sea! Which were bravest, who should tell? for both were gallant and true; But the greatest seaman was ours, of all that sail’d o’er the blue.

From Cadiz the enemy sallied: they knew not Nelson was there; His name a navy to us, but to them a flag of despair. ’Twixt Algeziras and Ayamonte he guarded the coast, Till he bore from Tavira south; and they now must fight, or be lost;— Vainly they steer’d for the Rock and the Midland sheltering sea, For he headed the Admirals round, constraining them under his lee, Villeneuve of France, and Gravina of Spain: so they shifted their ground, They could choose,—they were more than we;—and they faced at Trafalgar round; Rampart-like ranged in line, a sea-fortress angrily tower’d! In the midst, four-storied with guns, the dark Trinidada lower’d.

So with those.—But meanwhile, as against some dyke that men massively rear, From on high the torrent surges, to drive through the dyke as a spear, Eagled-eyed e’en in his blindness, our chief sets his double array, Making the fleet two spears, to thrust at the foe, any way, . . . ‘Anyhow!—without orders, each captain his Frenchman may grapple perforce: Collingwood first’ (yet the Victory ne’er a whit slacken’d her course) ‘Signal for action! Farewell! we shall win, but we meet not again!’ —Then a low thunder of readiness ran from the decks o’er the main, And on,—as the message from masthead to masthead flew out like a flame, England expects every man will do his duty,—they came.

—Silent they come:—While the thirty black forts of the foeman’s array Clothe them in billowy snow, tier speaking o’er tier as they lay; Flashes that thrust and drew in, as swords when the battle is rife;— But ours stood frowningly smiling, and ready for death as for life. —O in that interval grim, ere the furies of slaughter embrace, Thrills o’er each man some far echo of England; some glance of some face! —Faces gazing seaward through tears from the ocean-girt shore; Faces that ne’er can be gazed on again till the death-pang is o’er. . . . Lone in his cabin the Admiral kneeling, and all his great heart As a child’s to the mother, goes forth to the loved one, who bade him depart . . . O not for death, but glory! her smile would welcome him home! —Louder and thicker the thunderbolts fall:—and silent they come.

As when beyond Dongola the lion, whom hunters attack, Plagued by their darts from afar, leaps in, dividing them back; So between Spaniard and Frenchman the Victory wedged with a shout, Gun against gun; a cloud from her decks and lightning went out; Iron hailing of pitiless death from the sulphury smoke; Voices hoarse and parch’d, and blood from invisible stroke. Each man stood to his work, though his mates fell smitten around, As an oak of the wood, while his fellow, flame-shatter’d, besplinters the ground:— Gluttons of danger for England, but sparing the foe as he lay; For the spirit of Nelson was on them, and each was Nelson that day.

‘She has struck!’—he shouted—‘She burns, the Redoubtable! Save whom we can, Silence our guns’:—for in him the woman was great in the man, In that heroic heart each drop girl-gentle and pure, Dying by those he spared;—and now Death’s triumph was sure! From the deck the smoke-wreath clear’d, and the foe set his rifle in rest, Dastardly aiming, where Nelson stood forth, with the stars on his breast,— ‘In honour I gain’d them, in honour I die with them’ . . . Then, in his place, Fell . . . ‘Hardy! ’tis over; but let them not know’: and he cover’d his face. Silent, the whole fleet’s darling they bore to the twilight below: And above the war-thunder came shouting, as foe struck his flag after foe.

To his heart death rose: and for Hardy, the faithful, he cried in his pain,— ‘How goes the day with us, Hardy?’ . . . ‘’Tis ours’:—Then he knew, not in vain Not in vain for his comrades and England he bled: how he left her secure, Queen of her own blue seas, while his name and example endure. O, like a lover he loved her! for her as water he pours Life-blood and life and love, lavish’d all for her sake, and for ours! —‘Kiss me, Hardy!—Thank God!—I have done my duty!’—And then Fled that heroic soul, and left not his like among men.

Hear ye the heart of a nation Groan, for her saviour is gone; Gallant and true and tender, Child and chieftain in one? Such another day never England will weep for again, When the triumph darken’d the triumph, And the hero of heroes was slain.

TORRES VEDRAS

1810

As who, while erst the Achaians wall’d the shore, Stood Atlas-like before, A granite face against the Trojan sea Of foes who seethed and foam’d, From that stern rock refused incessantly;

So He, in his colossal lines, astride From sea to river-side, Alhandra past Aruda to the Towers, Our one true man of men Frown’d back bold France and all the Imperial powers.

For when that Eagle, towering in his might Beyond the bounds of Right, O’ercanopied Europe with his rushing wings, And all the world was prone Before him as a God, a King of Kings;

When Freedom to one isle, her ancient shrine, O’er the free favouring brine Fled, as a girl by lustful war and shame Discloister’d from her home, Barefoot, with glowing eyes, and cheeks on flame,

And call’d aloud, and bade the realm awake To arms for Freedom’s sake: —Yet,—for the land had rusted long in rest, The nerves of war unstrung, Faint thoughts or rash alternate in her breast,

While purblind party-strife with venomous spite Made plausible wrong seem right,— O then for that unselfish hero-chief Tender and true, and lost At Trafalgar,—or him, whose patriot grief

Died with the prayer for England, as he died, In vain we might have cried! But this one pillar rose, and bore the war Upon himself alone; Supreme o’er Fortune and her idle star.

For not by might but mind, by skill, not chance, He headed stubborn France From Tagus back by Douro to Garonne; And on the last, worst, field, The crown of all his hundred victories won,

World-calming Waterloo!—Then, laying by War’s fearful enginery, In each state-tempest mann’d the wearying helm; E’en through life’s winter-years Serving with all his strength the ungrateful realm.

O firm and foursquare mind! O solid will Fix’d, inexpugnable By crowns or censures! only bent to do The day’s work in the day;— Fame with her idiot yelp might come, or go!

O breast that dared with Nature’s patience wait Till the slow wheels of Fate Struck the consummate hour; in leash the while Reining his eager bands, The prey in view,—with that foreseeing smile!

And when for blood on Salamanca ridge Morn broke, or Orthez’ bridge, He read the ground, and his stern squadrons moved And placed with artist-skill, Red counters in the perilous game they loved,

Impassive, iron, he and they!—and then With eagle-keener ken Glanced through the field, the crisis-instant knew, And through the gap of war His thundering legions on their victory threw.

Not iron, he, but adamant! Diamond-strong, And diamond-clear of wrong: For truth he struck right out, whate’er befall! Above the fear of fear: Duty for duty’s sake his all-in-all.

Among the many wonders of Wellington’s Peninsular campaign, from Vimiera (1808) to Toulouse (1814), the magnificent unity of scheme preserved throughout is, perhaps, the most wonderful: the dramatic coherence, development, and final catastrophe of triumph. For this, however, readers must be referred to Napier’s History; Enough here to add that one of the most decisive steps was the formation of the lines in defence of Lisbon, of which the most northerly ran from Alhandra on the Tagus by Aruda and Zibreira to Torres Vedras near the sea-coast at the mouth of the Zizandre.

When Freedom; the unwise and uncertain management of the campaign by the English home Government has been set forth by Napier with so much emphasis as, in some degree, to impair the reader’s full conviction. Yet the amazing superiority in energy and wisdom with which Wellington towered over his contemporaries, (the field being, however, cleared by the recent deaths of Nelson and Pitt), is so patent, that this attempt to do justice to his greatness is offered with hesitation and apology.

Orthez’ Bridge; crosses the river named Gave de Pau;—and covered Soult’s forces then lying north of it.

THE SOLDIERS’ BATTLE

November 5: 1854

In the solid sombre mist And the drizzling dazzling shower They may mass them as they list, The gray-coat Russian power; They are fifties ’gainst our tens, they, and more! And from the fortress-town In silent squadrons down O’er the craggy mountain-crown Unseen, they pour.

On the meagre British line That northern ocean press’d; But we never knew how few Were we who held the crest! While within the curtain-mist dark shadows loom Making the gray more gray, Till the volley-flames betray With one flash the long array: And then, the gloom.

For our narrow line too wide On the narrow crest we stood, And in pride we named it Home, As we sign’d it with our blood. And we held-on all the morning, and the tide Of foes on that low dyke Surged up, and fear’d to strike, Or on the bayonet-spike Flung them, and died.

It was no covert, that, ’Gainst the shrieking cannon-ball! But the stout hearts of our men Were the bastion and the wall:— And their chiefs hardly needed give command; For they tore through copse and gray Mist that before them lay, And each man fought, that day, For his own hand!

Yet should we not forget ’Gainst that dun sea of foes How Egerton bank’d his line, Till in front a cloud uprose From the level rifle-mouths; and they dived With bayonet-thrust beneath; Clench’d teeth and sharp-drawn breath, Plunging to certain death,— And yet survived!

Nor the gallant chief who led Those others, how he fell; When our men the captive guns Set free they loved so well, And embraced them as live things, by loss endear’d:— Nor, when the crucial stroke On their last asylum broke, And e’en those hearts of oak Might well have fear’d,—

How Stanley to the fore The citadel rush’d to guard, With that old Albuera cry Fifty-seventh! Die hard! Yet saw not how his lads clear the crest, And, each one confronting five, The stubborn squadrons rive, And backward, downward, drive,— —Death-call’d to rest!

—O proud and sad for thee! And proud and sad for those Who on that stern foreign field Not seeking, found repose, As for England dear their life they gladly shed! Yet in death bethought them where, Not on these hillsides bare, But within sweet English air Their own home-dead

In a green and sure repose Beside God’s house are laid:— Then faced the charging foes Unmoved, unhelp’d, unafraid:— For they knew that God would rate each shatter’d limb Death-torn for England’s sake, And in Christ’s own mercy take On the day when souls shall wake, Their souls to Him!

The battle of Inkermann was mainly fought on a ridge of rock which projects from the south-eastern angle of Sebastapol: the English centre of operations being the ill-fortified line named the ‘Home Ridge.’ The numbers engaged in field-operations, roughly speaking, were 4,000 English against 40,000 Russians.

The curtain-mist; The battle began about 6 a.m. under heavy mist and drizzling rain, which lasted for several hours. Through this curtain the Russian forces coming down from the hill were seen only when near enough to darken the mist by their masses.

Egerton; He commanded four companies of the 77th, and charged early in the battle with brilliant success;—his men, about 250, scattering 1500 Russians.

The gallant chief; General Soimonoff, killed just after Egerton’s charge.

With that old Albuera cry; Prominent in the defence of the English main base of operations, the Home Ridge, against a weighty Russian advance, was Captain Stanley, commanding the 57th. This regiment, it was said, at the battle of Albuera had been encouraged by its colonel with the words, ‘Fifty-seventh, die hard’:—and Stanley, having less than 400 against 2000, thought the time had come to remind his ‘Die-hards’ of their traditional gallantry;—after which he himself at once fell mortally wounded.

AFTER CAWNPORE

June: 1857

Fourteen, all told, no more, Pack’d close within the door Of that old idol-shrine: And at them, as they stand, And from that English band, The leaden shower went out, and Death proclaim’d them Mine! Fourteen against an army; they, no more, Had ’scaped Cawnpore.

With each quick volley-flash The bullets ping and plash: Yet, though the tropic noon With furnace-fury broke The sulphur-curling smoke, Scarr’d, sear’d, thirst-silenced, hunger-faint, they stood: And soon A dusky wall,—death sheltering life,—uprose Against their foes.

Behind them now is cast The horror of the past; The fort that was no fort, The deep dark-heaving flood Of foes that broke in blood On our devoted camp, victims of fiendish sport; From that last huddling refuge lured to fly, —And help so nigh!

Down toward the reedy shore That fated remnant pour, Had Fear and Death beside; And other spectres yet Of darker vision flit,— Old unforgotten wrongs, the harshness and the pride Of that imperial race which sway’d the land By sheer command!

O little hands that strain A mother’s hand in vain With terror vague and vast:— Parch’d eyes that cannot shed One tear upon the head, A young child’s head, too bright for such fell death to blast! Ah! sadder captive train ne’er filed to doom Through vengeful Rome!

From Ganges’ reedy shore The death-boats they unmoor, Stack’d high with hopeless hearts; A slowly-drifting freight Through the red jaws of Fate, Death-blazing banks between, and flame-wing’d arrow-darts:— Till down the holy stream those cargoes pour Their flame and gore.

In feral order slow The slaughter-barges go, Martyrs of heathen scorn: While, saved from flood and fire To glut the tyrant’s ire, The quick and dead in one, from their red shambles borne, Maiden and child, in that dark grave they throw, Our well of woe!

Ah spot on which we gaze Through Time’s all-softening haze, In peace, on them at peace And taken home to God! —O whether ’neath the sod, Or sea, or desert sand, what care,—if that release From this dim shadow-land, through pathways dim, Bear us to Him!

But those fourteen, the while, Wrapt in the present, smile On their grim baffled foe; Till o’er the wall he heaps The fuel-pile, and steeps With all that burns and blasts;—and now, perforce, they go Hack’d down and thinn’d, beyond that temple-door But Seven,—no more.

O Elements at strife With this poor human life, Stern laws of Nature fair! By flame constrain’d to fly The treacherous stream they try,— And those dark Ganges waves suck down the souls they bear!— Ah, crowning anguish! Dawn of hope in sight; Then, final night!

And now, Four heads, no more, Life’s flotsam flung ashore, They lie:—But not as they Who o’er a dreadful past The heart’s-ease sigh may cast! Too worn! too tried!—their lives but given them as a prey! Whilst all seems now a dream, a nought of nought, For which they fought!

—O stout Fourteen, who bled O’erwhelm’d, not vanquishéd! In those dark days of blood How many dared, and died, And others at their side Fresh heroes, sprang,—a race that cannot be subdued! —Like them who pass’d Death’s vale, and lived;—the Four Saved from Cawnpore!

The English garrison at Cawnpore, with a large number of sick, women, and children, were besieged in their hastily made and weak earthworks by Nana Sahib from June 6 to June 25, 1857. Compelled to surrender, under promise of safe convoy down the Ganges, on the 27th they were massacred by musketry from the banks; the thatch of the river-boats being also fired. The survivors were murdered and thrown into the well upon Havelock’s approach on July 15.

One boat managed to escape unburnt on June 27. It was chased through the 28th and 29th, by which time the crowd on board was reduced to fourteen men, one of whom, Mowbray-Thomson, has left a narrative equally striking from its vividness and its modesty. Seven escaped from the small temple in which they defended themselves; four only finally survived to tell the story.

A dusky wall; ‘After a little time they stood behind a rampart of black and bloody corpses, and fired, with comparative security, over this bulwark:’ (Kaye: Sepoy War: B. V: ch. ii).

MOUNT VERNON

October 5: 1860

Before the hero’s grave he stood, —A simple stone of rest, and bare To all the blessing of the air,— And Peace came down in sunny flood From the blue haunts of heaven, and smiled Upon the household reconciled.

—A hundred years have hardly flown Since in this hermitage of the West ’Mid happy toil and happy rest, Loving and loved among his own, His days fulfill’d their fruitful round, Seeking no move than what they found.

Sweet byways of the life withdrawn! Yet here his country’s voice,—the cry Of man for natural liberty,— That great Republic in her dawn, The immeasurable Future,—broke; And to his fate the Leader woke.

Not eager, yet, the blade to bare Before the Father-country’s eyes,— —E’en if a parent’s rights, unwise, With that bold Son he grudged to share, In manhood strong beyond the sea, And ripe to wed with Liberty!

—Yet O! when once the die was thrown, With what unselfish patient skill, Clear-piercing flame of changeless will, The one high heart that moved alone Sedate through the chaotic strife,— He taught mankind the hero-life!

As when the God whom Pheidias moulds, Clothed in marmoreal calm divine, Veils all that strength ’neath beauty’s line, All energy in repose enfolds;— So He, in self-effacement great, Magnanimous to endure and wait.

O Fabius of a wider world! Master of Fate through self-control And utter stainlessness of soul! And when war’s weary sign was furl’d, Prompt with both hands to welcome in The white-wing’d Peace he warr’d to win!

Then, to that so long wish’d repose! The liberal leisure of the farm, The garden joy, the wild-wood charm; Life ebbing to its perfect close Like some white altar-lamp that pales And self-consumed its light exhales.

No wrathful tempest smote its wing Against life’s tender flickering flame; No tropic gloom in terror came; Slow waning as a summer-spring The soul breathed out herself, and slept, And to the end her beauty kept.

Then, as a mother’s love and fears Throng round the child, unseen but felt, So by his couch his nation knelt, Loving and worshipping with her tears:— Tears!—late amends for all that debt Due to the Liberator yet!

For though the years their golden round O’er all the lavish region roll, And realm on realm, from pole to pole, In one beneath thy stars be bound: The far-off centuries as they flow, No whiter name than this shall know!

—O larger England o’er the wave, Larger, not greater, yet!—With joy Of generous hearts ye hail’d the Boy Who bow’d before the sacred grave, With Love’s fair freight across the sea Sped from the Fatherland to thee!

And Freedom on that Empire-throne Blest in his Mother’s rule revered, On popular love a kingdom rear’d, And rooted in the years unknown,— Land rich in old Experience’ store And holy legacies of yore,

And youth eternal, ever-new,— From the high heaven look’d out:—and saw This other later realm of Law, Of that old household first-born true, And lord of half a world!—and smiled Upon the nations reconciled.

The date prefixed is that of the visit which the Prince of Wales paid to the tomb of Washington: carrying home thence, as one of the most distinguished of his hosts said, ‘an unwritten treaty of amity and alliance.’

Mount Vernon on the Potomac, named after the Admiral, was the family seat of Augustine, father to George Washington, and the residence of the latter from 1752. But all his early years also had been spent in that neighbourhood, in those country pursuits which formed his ideal of life: and thither, on resigning his commission as Commander-in-Chief, he retired in 1785; devoting himself to farming and gardening with all the strenuousness and devoted passion of a Roman of Vergil’s type. And there (Dec. 1799) was he buried.

Not eager; When the ill-feeling between England and America deepened after 1765, Washington ‘was less eager than some others in declaring or declaiming against the mother country;’ (Mahon: Hist. ch. lii).

Ripe to wed with Liberty; See Appendix G.

And to the end; See Petrarch’s beautiful lines: Trionfo della Morte, cap. I.

Due to the Liberator; Compare the epitaph by Ennius on Scipio:

Hic est ille situs, cui nemo civi’ neque hostis Quivit pro factis reddere opis pretium.

History, it may be said with reasonable confidence, records no hero more unselfish, no one less stained with human error and frailty, than George Washington.

The years unknown; It is to Odin, whatever date be thereby signified, that our royal genealogy runs back.

SANDRINGHAM

1871

In the drear November gloom And the long December night, There were omens of affright, And prophecies of doom; And the golden lamp of life burn’d spectre-dim, Till Love could hardly mark The little sapphire spark That only made the dark More dark and grim.

There not around alone Watch’d sister, brother, wife, And she who gave him life, White as if wrought in stone Unheard, invisible, by the bed of death Stood eager millions by; And as the hour drew nigh, Dreading to see him die, Held their breath.

Where’er in world-wide skies The Lion-Banner burns, A common impulse turns All hearts to where he lies:— For as a babe the heir of that great throne Is weak and motionless; And they feel the deep distress On wife and mother press, As ’twere their own.

O! not the thought of race From Asian Odin drawn In History’s mythic dawn, Nor what we downward trace, —Plantagenet, York, Edward, Elizabeth,— Heroic names approved,— The blood of the people moved; But that, ’mongst those he loved, He fought with death.

And if the Reason said ‘’Gainst Nature’s law and death Prayer is but idle breath,’— Yet Faith was undismayed, Arm’d with the deeper insight of the heart:— Nor can the wisest say What other laws may sway The world’s apparent way, Known but in part.

Nor knew we on that life What burdens may be cast; What issues wide and vast Dependent on that strife:— This only:—’Twas the son of those we loved! That in his Mother’s hand Peace set her golden wand; ’Mid heaving realms, one land Law-ruled, unmoved.

—He fought, and we with him! And other Powers were by, Courage, and Science high, Grappling the spectre grim On the battle-field of quiet Sandringham: And force of perfect Love, And the will of One above, Chased Death’s dark squadrons off, And overcame.

—O soul, to life restored And love, and wider aim Than private care can claim, —And from Death’s unsheath’d sword! By suffering and by safety dearer made:— O may the life new-found Through life be wisdom-crown’d,— Till in the common ground Thou too art laid!

A DORSET IDYL

HARCOMBE NEAR LYME

September: 1878

Before me with one happy heave Of golden green the hillside curves, Where slowly, smoothly, rounding swerves The shadow of each perfect tree, By slanting shafts of eve Flame-fringed and bathed in pale transparency.

And that long ridge that crowns the hill Stands fir-dark ’gainst the falling rays; Above, a waft of pearly haze Lies on the sapphire field of air, So radiant and so still As though a star-cloud took its station there.

Up wold and wild the valley goes, ’Mid heath and mounded slopes of oak, And light ash-thicket, where the smoke Wreathes high in evening’s air serene, Floating in white repose O’er the blue reek of cottage-hearths unseen.

Another landscape at my feet Unfolds its nearer grace the while, Where gorses gleam with golden smile; Where Inula lifts a russet head The shepherd’s spikenard sweet; And closing Centaury points her rosy red.

One light cicada’s simmering cry, Survivor of the summer heat, Chimes faint; the robin, shrill and sweet, Pipes from green holly; whilst from far The rookery croaks reply, Hoarse, deep, as veterans readying for war.

—Grief on a happier future dwells; The happy present haunts the past; And those old minstrels who outlast Our looser-textured webs of song, Nursed in Hellenic dells, Sicilian, or Italian, hither throng.

Why care if Turk and Tartar fume, Barbarian ’gainst barbarian set, Or how our politic prophets fret, When on this tapestry-thyme and heath, Fresh work of Nature’s loom, Thus, thus, we can diffuse ourselves, and breathe

Autumnal sparkling freshness?—while The page by some bless’d miracle saved When Goth and Frank ’gainst Hellas raved. Paints how the wanderer-chief divine, Snatch’d from Circaean guile, Led by Nausicaa past Athéné’s shrine,

In that delicious garden sate Where summer link’d to summer glows, Grapes ever ripe, and rose on rose; And all the wonders of thy tale —O greatest of the great— Whose splendour ne’er can fade, nor beauty fail!

Or by the city of God above In rose-red meadows, where the day Eternal burns, the bless’d ones stray; The harp lets loose its silver showers From the dark incense-grove; And happiness blooms forth with all her flowers.

O Theban strain,—remote and pure, Voice of the higher soul, that shames Our downward, dry, material aims, The bestial creed of earth-to-earth,— Owning with insight sure The signs that speak of Man’s celestial birth!

Or white Colonos here through green Green Dorset winds his holy vale, Where the divine deep nightingale Heaps note on note and love on love, In ivy thick unseen, While goddesses with Dionysos rove.

Another music then we hear, A cry from the Sicilian dell, ‘Here ’mid sweet grapes and laurel dwell; Slips by from wood-girt Aetna’s dome Snow-cold the stream and clear:— Hither to me, come, Galataea, come!’

—Voices and dreams long fled and gone! And other echoes make reply, The low Maenalian melody ‘’Twas in our garth, a twelve-year child, I saw thee, little one, Pick the red fruit that to thy fancy smiled,

‘Thee and thy mother: I, your guide:’— O sweet magician! Happy heart! Content with that unrivall’d art,— The soul of grace in music shrined,— And notes of modest pride, To sing the life he loved to all mankind!

There, shading pine and torrent-song Breathe midday slumber, sudden, sweet; Deep meadows woo the wayward feet; In giant elm the ring-doves moan; There, peace secure from wrong, The life that keeps its promise, there, alone!

—O loftier than the wordy strife That floats o’er capitals; the chase Of florid pleasure; the blind race Of gold for gold by gamblers run, This fair Vergilian life, Where heaven and we and nature are at one!

On that deep soil great Rome was sown; Our England her foundations laid:— Hence, while the nations, change-dismay’d, To tyrant or to quack repair, A healthier heart we own, And the plant Man grows stronger than elsewhere.

Should changeful commerce shun the shore, And newer, mightier races meet To push us from our empire-seat, England will round her call her own, And as in days of yore The sea-girt Isle be Freedom’s central throne.

Freedom, fair daughter-wife of Law; One bright face on the future cast, One reverent fix’d upon the past, And that for Hope, for Wisdom this:— While counsels wild and raw Fly those keen eyes, and leave the land to bliss:—

Dear land, where new is one with old: Land of green hillside and of plain, Gray tower and grange and tree-fringed lane, Red crag and silver streamlet sweet, Wild wood and ruin bold, And this repose of beauty at my feet:—

Fair Vale, for summer day-dreams high, For reverie in solitude Fashion’d in Nature’s finest mood; Or, sweeter yet, for fond excess Of glee, and vivid cry, Whilst happy children find more happiness

Ranging the brambled hollows free For purple feast;—till, light as Hope, The little footsteps scale the slope; And from the highest height we view Our island-girdling sea Bar the green valley with a wall of blue.

The poets whose landscape-pictures are here contrasted with English scenery, are Homer, Pindar, Sophocles, Theocritus, and Vergil.

A HOME IN THE PALACE

1840-1861

Thrice fortunate he Who, in the palace born, has early learn’d The lore of sweet simplicity: From smiling gold his eyes inviolate turn’d, Turn’d unreturning:—Who the people’s cause, The sovereign-levelling laws,

Above the throne, —He made for them, not they for him,—has set; Life-lavish for his land alone, Whether she crown with gratitude, or forget:— He, who in courts beneath the purple weight Of precedence moves sedate,

By all that glare Of needful pageantry less stirr’d than still’d, Bringing a waft of natural air Through halls with pomp and flattering incense fill’d; And in the central heart’s calm secret, waits The closure of the gates,

The music mute, The darkling lamps, the festal tables clear:— Then,—glad as one who from pursuit Breathes safe, and lets himself himself appear,— Turns to the fireside jest, the laughing eyes, The love without disguise,—

On home alone, The loyal partnership of man with wife, Building a throne beyond the throne; All happiness in that common household life By peasant shared with prince,—when toil and health, True parents of true wealth,

To its fair close Round the long day, and all are in the nest, And care relaxes to repose, And the blithe restless nursery lulls to rest; Prayer at the mother’s knee; and on their beds We kiss the shining heads!

—Thrice fortunate he Who o’er himself thus won his masterdom, Earning that rare felicity E’en in the palace walls to find the Home! Who shaped his life in calmness, firm and true, Each day, and all day through,

To that high goal Where self, for England’s sake, was self-effaced, In silence reining-in his soul On the strait difficult line by wisdom traced, ’Twixt gulf and siren, avalanche and ravine, Guarding the golden mean.

Hence, as the days Went by, with insight time-enrich’d and true, O’er Europe’s policy-tangled maze He glanced, and touch’d the central shining clue: And when the tides of party roar’d and surged, ’Gainst the state-bulwarks urged

By factious aim Masquing beneath some specious patriot cloke, Or flaunting a time-honour’d name,— Athwart the flood he held an even stroke; Between extremes on her old compass straight Aiding to steer the state.

With equal mind, Hence,—sure of those he loved on earth, and then His loved ones sure again to find,— For Christ’s and England’s cause, Goodwill to men, To the end he strove, and put the fever by,— Ready to live or die.

—And if in death We were not so alone, who might not quit, Smiling, this tediousness of breath, These bubble joys that flash and burst and flit,— This tragicomedy of life, where scarce We know if it be farce,

A puppet-sight Of nerve-pull’d dolls that o’er the world dance by, Or Good in that unequal fight With Ill . . . who from such theatre would not fly? —But those dear faces round the bed disarm Death of his natural charm!

—O Prince, to Her First placed, first honour’d in our love and faith, True stay, true constant counseller, From that first love of boyhood’s prime,—to death! O if thy soul on earth permitted gaze In these less-fortunate days

When, hour by hour, The million armaments of the world are set Skill-weapon’d with new demon-power, Mouthing around this little isle, . . . and yet On dream-security our fate we cast, Of all that glory-past

With light fool-heart Oblivious! . . . O in spirit again restored, Insoul us to the nobler part, The chivalrous loyalty of thy life and word! Thou, who in Her to whom first love was due, Didst love her England too,

If earthly care In that eternal home, where thou dost wait Renewal of the days that were, Move thee at all,—upon the realm estate The wisdom of thy virtue, the full store Thy life’s experience bore!

O known when lost, Lost, yet not fully known, in all thy grace Of bloom by cruel early frost, Best prized and most by Her, to whom thy face Was love and life and counsel:—If this strain Renew not all in vain

The bitter cry Of yearning for the loss we yet deplore,— Yet for her heart, who stood too nigh For comfort, till God’s hour thy face restore. Man has no lenitive! He, who wrought the grief, . . . Alone commands relief.

—Thou, as the rose Lies buried in her fragrance, when on earth The summer-loosen’d blossom flows, Art sepulchred and embalm’d in native worth: While to thy grave, in England’s anxious years, We bring our useless tears.

Above the throne; ‘He knows that if Princes exist, it is for the good of the people. . . . Well for him that he does so,’ was the remark made by an observing foreigner on Prince Albert: (Martin: Life of H.R.H. the Prince Consort: ch. xi).

On home alone; ‘She who reigns over us,’ said the then Mr. Disraeli when seconding the Address on the death of the Duchess of Kent, (March, 1861), ‘She who reigns over us has elected, amid all the splendour of empire, to establish her life on the principle of domestic love’ (Martin: ch. cxi).

Firm and true, ‘Treu und Fest’ is the motto of the Saxe-Coburg family.

Goodwill to men; A revision of the despatch to the Cabinet of the United States, remonstrating on the ‘Trent affair,’ whilst the fatal fever was on him, was the last of Prince Albert’s many services (Nov. 30, 1861) to England. To the temperate and conciliatory tone which he gave to this message, its success in the promotion of peace between the two countries was largely due: (Martin: ch. cxvi).

ODE

FOR THE TWENTY-FIRST OF JUNE 1887

. . . Sunt hic sua praemia laudi, Sunt lacrimae rerum . . .

As when the snowdrop from the snowy ground Lifting a maiden face, foretells the flowers That lurk and listen, till the chaffinch sound Spring’s advent with the glistening willow crown’d, Sheathed in their silken bowers:— E’en so the promise of her life appears Through those white childhood-years; —Whether in seaside happiness, and air Rosing the fair cheek,—sand, and spade, and shell,— Or race with sister-feet, that flash’d and fell Printing the beach, while the gay comrade-wind Play’d in the soft light hair:— Or if with sunbeam-smile and kind Small hand at cottage-door Her simple alms she tender’d to the poor: Love’s healthy happy heart in all her steps was seen, And God, in life’s fresh springtime, bless’d our Queen.

Lo! the quick months their order’d dance pursue, And Spring’s bright apple-blossoms flush to fruit; The bay-tree thrives ’neath Heaven’s own gracious dew, And her young shoots the parent-life renew Around the fostering root. —The Girl from care in youth’s sweet sleep withdrawn Wakes to a crown at dawn! But Love is at her side, strong, faithful, wise, To share the world-wide burden of command, The sceptre’s weight in the unlesson’d hand; To aid each nursery inmate,—each in turn Dear pride of watchful eyes,— To clasp the innocent hands, and learn The words of love and grace, Lifting their souls to the compassionate Face:— While o’er the fortunate fold the Shepherd watch’d unseen; And home, in all its beauty, bless’d a Queen.

Ah! Happy she, who wedded finds in one Wisest and dearest! happy, happy years! But summer whirlwinds wait on summer’s sun; Where the Five Rivers from Himala run, His snow where Everest rears, Or Alma’s echoing crags with war-cry wake The wind-vext Euxine lake. —O Death in myriad forms! O brutal roar Of battle! throes of race, and crash of thrones! Imploring hands, and wreck of whitening bones In Khyber pass;—Or woman’s stifled cry, And that dark pit of gore! —Yet night had light; for He was by, Her heart, her strength, her shield, Twin-star in the Throne’s radiance self-conceal’d; Love’s hand laid light on hers, guiding the ship unseen— For God’s best grace in Albert bless’d the Queen.

But at man’s side each hour with ambush’d sword Death hurries, nor for prayer nor love delays; In God’s own time His harvest-sheaves are stored, ‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts,’ saith the Lord, ‘Nor are your ways My ways.’ He Who spared not the Son His bitter cup, The broken heart binds up In His fit hour, All-Merciful!—And she, The desolate faithful Mother, in the nest By children’s love soft-woven, has found rest; Some constant to her side, if some have flown The Angels’ road, and see The Vision of the Eternal Throne:— With them, ’tis well!—But thou, Strong through submission, to His will dost bow, Till God renew the home in that far realm unseen, And bless with all her lost ones England’s Queen.

Yet in great Nature’s changeful mystic dance Joy circles grief, gay dawn outsmiles the night: ’Tis meet our song should build its radiance Like some high palace-porch, and walls that glance With gold and marble light: Now fifty suns ’neath one firm patriot sway Have whirl’d their shining way. —Lo Commerce with the golden girdling chain That links all nations for the good of each; While Science boasts her silent lightning speech Swifter than thought; and how her patience rein’d To post o’er earth and main The panting white-breath’d Titan, chain’d Bondslave to man:—and won The magic spark o’erdazzling star and sun From its dark cave: for He, the all-seeing Lord unseen Enlightening, bless’d the years of England’s Queen.

Freedom of England! from thy sacred source Where Alfred arm’d in Athelney, welling pure, With hero-blood dyed in thy widening course, —What loyaler hand than her’s to guide thy force Down ancient channels sure? Honour of England! in what bosom stirs Thy soul more quick than her’s? Yet in her days . . . O greater grief, than when In years of woe, the years of happiness Flash o’er us,—to behold,—and no redress,— Some deed of shame we cannot cure nor stay! Our best, our man of men, Martyr’d inch-meal by dull delay! Ah, sacred, hidden grave! Ah gallant comrade feet, love-wing’d to save, Too late, too late!—But Thou, Whose counsels work unseen, Spare us henceforth such pangs, spare England’s Queen

O much enduring, much revered! To thee Bring sun-dyed millions love more sweet than fame, And happy isles that star the purple sea Homage;—and children at the mother’s knee With her’s unite thy name; And faithful hearts, that throb ’neath palm and pine, From East to West, are thine. For as some pillar-star o’er sea and storm Whole fleets to haven guides, so from that height One great example points the path of Right, And purifies the home; with gracious aid Lifting the fallen form. See Death by finer skill delay’d; Kind hearts to wait on woe, And feet of Love that in Christ’s footsteps go; Wild wastes of life reclaim’d by Woman’s hand unseen: All England bless’d with England’s Empress Queen.

And now, as one who through some fruitful field Has urged the fifty furrows of the grain,— Look round with joy, and know thy care will yield A thousandfold in its due day reveal’d, The harvest laugh again:— E’en now thy great crown’d ancestors on high Watch with exultant eye Thy hundred Englands o’er the broad earth sown, And Arthur lives anew to hail his heir! —O then for her and us we chant the prayer,— Keep Thou this sea-girt citadel of the free Safe ’neath her ancient throne, Love-link’d in loyal unity; Let eve’s calm after-glow Arch all the heaven with Hope’s wide roseate bow: Till in Time’s fulness Thou, Almighty Lord unseen, With glory and life immortal crown the Queen.

Published (June, 1887) under sanction of the Delegates of the Clarendon Press, Oxford; and intended as an humble offering of loyalty and hearty good-wishes on the part of the University.

ENGLAND ONCE MORE

Old if this England be The Ship at heart is sound, And the fairest she and gallantest That ever sail’d earth round! And children’s children in the years Far off will live to see Her silver wings fly round the world, Free heralds of the free! While now on Him who long has bless’d To bless her as of yore, Once more we cry for England, England once more!

They are firm and fine, the masts; And the keel is straight and true; Her ancient cross of glory Rides burning through the blue:— And that red sign o’er all the seas The nations fear and know, And the strong and stubborn hero-souls That underneath it go:— While now on Him who long has bless’d To bless her as of yore, Once more we cry for England, England once more!

Prophets of dread and shame, There is no place for you, Weak-kneed and craven-breasted, Amongst this English crew! Bluff hearts that cannot learn to yield, But as the waves run high, And they can almost touch the night, Behind it see the sky. While now on Him who long has bless’d To bless her as of yore, Once more we cry for England, England once more!

As Past in Present hid, As old transfused to new, Through change she lives unchanging, To self and glory true; From Alfred’s and from Edward’s day Who still has kept the seas, To him who on his death-morn spoke Her watchword on the breeze! While now on Him who long has bless’d To bless her as of yore, Once more we cry for England, England once more!

What blasts from East and North, What storms that swept the land Have borne her from her bearings Since Caesar seized the strand! Yet that strong loyal heart through all Has steer’d her sage and free, —Hope’s armour’d Ark in glooming years, And whole world’s sanctuary! While now on Him who long has bless’d To bless her as of yore, Once more we cry for England, England once more!

Old keel, old heart of oak, Though round thee roar and chafe All storms of life, thy helmsman Shall make the haven safe! Then with Honour at the head, and Faith, And Peace along the wake, Law blazon’d fair on Freedom’s flag, Thy stately voyage take:— While now on Him who long has bless’d To bless Thee as of yore, Once more we cry for England, England once more!