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LATIN HYMN TO THE VIRGIN.


I.

    Virgin Mother, thou hast known
    Joy and sorrow like my own;
    In thy arms the bright Babe lay,
    As my own in mine to-day;
        So he wept and so he smiled;
        Ave Mary! guard my child!


II.

    From the pains and perils spread
    Round about our path and bed,
    Fierce desires, ambitious schemes,
    Moody doubts, fantastic dreams,
        Pleasures idle, passions wild,
        Ave Mary! guard my child!


III.

    Make him whatsoe’er may be
    Dearest to the saints and thee;
    Tell him, from the throne above,
    What to loathe and what to love;
        To be true and just and mild,
        Ave Mary! teach my child!


IV.

    By the wondrous mercy won
    For the world by thy blest son,
    By the rest his labours wrought,
    By the bliss his tortures bought,
        By the Heaven he reconciled,
        Ave Mary! bless my child!


V.

    If about his after fate
    Sin and sorrow darkly wait,
    Take him rather to thine arms
    From the world and the world’s harms;
        Thus unscathed, thus undefiled,
        Ave Mary! take my child!




THE NEWLY-WEDDED.

(1835.)


I.

    Now the rite is duly done;
      Now the word is spoken;
    And the spell has made us one
      Which may ne’er be broken:
    Rest we, dearest, in our home,--
      Roam we o’er the heather,--
    We shall rest, and we shall roam,
      Shall we not? together.


II.

    From this hour the summer rose
      Sweeter breathes to charm us;
    From this hour the winter snows
      Lighter fall to harm us:
    Fair or foul--on land or sea--
      Come the wind or weather,
    Best or worst, whate’er they be,
      We shall share together.


III.

    Death, who friend from friend can part,
      Brother rend from brother,
    Shall but link us, heart and heart,
      Closer to each other:
    We will call his anger play,
      Deem his dart a feather,
    When we meet him on our way
      Hand in hand together.




SKETCH OF A YOUNG LADY

FIVE MONTHS OLD.

(_October 10, 1836._)


    My pretty, budding, breathing flower,
      Methinks, if I to-morrow
    Could manage, just for half-an-hour,
      Sir Joshua’s brush to borrow,
    I might immortalise a few
      Of all the myriad graces
    Which Time, while yet they all are new,
      With newer still replaces.

    I’d paint, my child, your deep blue eyes,
      Their quick and earnest flashes;
    I’d paint the fringe that round them lies,
      The fringe of long dark lashes;
    I’d draw with most fastidious care
      One eyebrow, then the other,
    And that fair forehead, broad and fair,
      The forehead of your mother.

    I’d oft retouch the dimpled cheek
      Where health in sunshine dances;
    And oft the pouting lips, where speak
      A thousand voiceless fancies;
    And the soft neck would keep me long,
      The neck, more smooth and snowy
    Than ever yet in schoolboy’s song
      Had Caroline or Chloe.

    Nor less on those twin rounded arms
      My new-found skill would linger,
    Nor less upon the rosy charms
      Of every tiny finger;
    Nor slight the small feet, little one,
      So prematurely clever
    That, though they neither walk nor run,
      I think they’d jump for ever.

    But then your odd endearing ways--
      What study ere could catch them?
    Your aimless gestures, endless plays--
      What canvass ere could match them?
    Your lively leap of merriment,
      Your murmur of petition,
    Your serious silence of content,
      Your laugh of recognition.

    Here were a puzzling toil, indeed,
      For Art’s most fine creations!--
    Grow on, sweet baby; we will need,
      To note your transformations,
    No picture of your form or face,
      Your waking or your sleeping,
    But that which Love shall daily trace,
      And trust to Memory’s keeping.

    Hereafter, when revolving years
      Have made you tall and twenty,
    And brought you blended hopes and fears,
      And sighs and slaves in plenty,
    May those who watch our little saint
      Among her tasks and duties,
    Feel all her virtues hard to paint,
      As now we deem her beauties.




TO HELEN.

(_July 7th, 1836._)


    When some grim sorceress, whose skill
    Had bound a sprite to work her will,
    In mirth or malice chose to ask
    Of the faint slave the hardest task,

    She sent him forth to gather up
    Great Ganges in an acorn cup;
    Or Heaven’s unnumbered stars to bring
    In compass of a signet ring.

    Thus Helen bids her poet write
    The thanks he owes this morning’s light;
    And “Give me,”--so he hears her say,--
    “Four verses, only four, to-day.”

    Dearest and best! she knows, if wit
    Could ever half love’s debt acquit,
    Each of her tones and of her looks
    Would have its four, not lines, but books.




TO HELEN.

(WITH A SMALL CANDLESTICK, A BIRTHDAY PRESENT.)

_February 12th, 1838._


    If, wand’ring in a wizard’s car
      Through yon blue ether, I were able
    To fashion of a little star
      A taper for my Helen’s table,--
    “What then?” she asks me, with a laugh:--
      Why then, with all Heaven’s lustre glowing,
    It would not gild her path with half
      The light her love o’er mine is throwing!




TO HELEN.

(_July 7th, 1839._)


    Dearest, I did not dream, four years ago,
      When through your veil I saw your bright tear shine,
    Caught your clear whisper, exquisitely low,
      And felt your soft hand tremble into mine,
    That in so brief--so very brief a space,
      He who in love both clouds and cheers our life,
    Would lay on you, so full of light, joy, grace,
      The darker, sadder duties of the wife,--
    Doubts, fears, and frequent toil, and constant care
      For this poor frame, by sickness sore bestead;
    The daily tendance on the fractious chair,
      The nightly vigil by the feverish bed.

    Yet not unwelcomed doth this morn arise,
      Though with more gladsome beams it might have shone;
    Strength of these weak hands, light of these dim eyes,
      In sickness, as in health,--bless you, My own!




GOD SAVE THE QUEEN.

(1839.)


    That she may see, our bright and fair,
      How arduous is her path to fame,
    How much of solemn thought and care
      An empire’s interests fitly claim,--
    That she may know how poor ’twould seem
      In one who graces Britain’s throne
    To patronise a party’s scheme
      Or make a favourite’s cause her own,--
    That she may feel to whom belong
      Alike the contest and the prize,
    Whence springs the valour of the strong,
      Whence flows the counsel of the wise,--
    That she may keep in womanhood
      The heaven-born impulses of youth,
    The zeal for universal good,
      The reverence for eternal truth,--
    That she may seek the right and just,--
      That she may shun the false and mean,--
    That she may win all love and trust,
      Blessing and blest,--God save the Queen.




CHARADES.


I.

    Sir Hilary charged at Agincourt;
      Sooth, ’twas an awful day!
    And though in that old age of sport
    The rufflers of the camp and court
      Had little time to pray,
    ’Tis said Sir Hilary muttered there
    Two syllables by way of prayer:

    My First to all the brave and proud
      Who see to-morrow’s sun:
    My next, with her cold and quiet cloud,
    To those who find their dewy shroud
      Before to-day’s be done:
    And both together to all blue eyes,
    That weep when a warrior nobly dies.


II.

    My First in torrents bleak and black
      Was rustling from the sky,
    When with my Second at his back
      Young Cupid wandered by;
    “Now take me in; the moon hath past;
      I pray ye, take me in!
    The lightnings flash, the hail falls fast,
    All Hades rides the thunder-blast;
      I’m dripping to the skin!”

    “I know thee well, thy songs and sighs;
      A wicked god thou art,
    And yet most welcome to the eyes,
      Most witching to the heart!”
    The wanderer prayed another prayer,
      And shook his drooping wing;
    The Lover bade him enter there,
    And wrung my First from out his hair,
      And dried my Second’s string.
    And therefore--(so the urchin swore,
      By Styx, the fearful river,
    And by the shafts his quiver bore,
      And by his shining quiver)--
    That Lover aye shall see my Whole
      In life’s tempestuous Heaven;
    And when the lightnings cease to roll,
    Shall fix thereon his dreaming soul
      In the deep calm of even.


III.

    Alas! for that forgotten day
      When chivalry was nourished,
    When none but friars learned to pray,
      And beef and beauty flourished;
    And fraud in kings was held accurst,
      And falsehood sin was reckoned,
    And mighty chargers bore my First,
      And fat monks wore my Second!

    Oh, then I carried sword and shield,
      And casque with flaunting feather,
    And earned my spurs in battlefield,
      In winter and rough weather;
    And polished many a sonnet up
      To ladies’ eyes and tresses,
    And learned to drain my father’s cup,
      And loose my falcon’s jesses.
    But dim is now my grandeur’s gleam;
      The mongrel mob grows prouder;
    And everything is done by steam,
      And men are killed by powder:
    And now I feel my swift decay,
      And give unheeded orders,
    And rot in paltry state away,
      With Sheriffs and Recorders.


IV.

    On the casement frame the wind beat high;
    Never a star was in the sky;
    All Kenneth Hold was wrapt in gloom,
    And Sir Everard slept in the Haunted Room.

    I sat and sang beside his bed;
    Never a single word I said,
      Yet did I scare his slumber;
    And a fitful light in his eyeball glistened,
    And his cheek grew pale as he lay and listened,
    For he thought or dreamt that Fiends and Fays
    Were reckoning o’er his fleeting days
      And telling out their number.
    Was it my Second’s ceaseless tone?
    On my Second’s hand he laid his own;
    The hand that trembled in his clasp
    Was crushed by his convulsive grasp.

    Sir Everard did not fear my First;--
    He had seen it in shapes that men deem worst,
      In many a field and flood;
    Yet in the darkness of that dread
    His tongue was parched and his reason fled,
    And he watched, as the lamp burned low and dim,
    To see some Phantom, gaunt and grim,
      Come dabbled o’er with blood.

    Sir Everard kneeled, and strove to pray;
    He prayed for light and he prayed for day,
      Till terror checked his prayer;
    And ever I muttered, clear and well,
    “Click, click,” like a tolling bell,
    Till, bound by fancy’s magic spell,
      Sir Everard fainted there.

    And oft from that remembered night,
    Around the taper’s flickering light
      The wrinkled beldames told,
    Sir Everard had knowledge won
    Of many a murder darkly done,
    Of fearful sights, and fearful sounds,
    And ghosts that walk their midnight rounds
      In the tower of Kenneth Hold!


V.

    The canvas rattled on the mast
      As rose the swelling sail,
    And gallantly the vessel past
      Before the cheering gale;
    And on my First Sir Florice stood,
      As the far shore faded now,
    And looked upon the lengthening flood
      With a pale and pensive brow:--
    “When I shall bear thy silken glove
      Where the proudest Moslem flee,
    My lady love, my lady love,--
      O waste one thought on me!”

    Sir Florice lay in a dungeon cell
      With none to soothe or save,
    And high above his chamber fell
      The echo of the wave;
    But still he struck my Second there,
      And bade its tones renew
    These hours when every hue was fair
      And every hope was true:--
    “If still your angel footsteps move
      Where mine may never be,
    My lady love, my lady love,
      O dream one dream of me!”

    Not long the Christian captive pined!
      My Whole was round his neck;
    A sadder necklace ne’er was twined
      So white a skin to deck:
    Queen Folly ne’er was yet content
      With gems or golden store,
    But he who wears this ornament
      Will rarely sigh for more:--
    “My spirit to the Heaven above,
      My body to the sea,
    My heart to thee, my lady love,--
      O weep one tear for me!”


VI.

    Row on, row on!--The First may light
    My shallop o’er the wave to-night,
    But she will hide in a little while
    The lustre of her silent smile;
    For fickle she is, and changeful still,
    As a madman’s wish, or a woman’s will.

    Row on, row on!--The Second is high
    In my own bright lady’s balcony;
    And she beside it, pale and mute,
    Untold her beads, untouched her lute,
    Is wondering why her lover’s skiff
    So slowly glides to the lonely cliff.

    Row on, row on!--When the Whole is fled,
    The song will be hushed and the rapture dead,
    And I must go in my grief again
    To the toils of day and the haunts of men,--
    To a future of fear and a present of care,
    And Memory’s dream of the things that were.


VII.

    I graced Don Pedro’s revelry
      All drest in fur and feather,
    When Loveliness and Chivalry
      Were met to feast together;
    He flung the slave who moved the lid
      A purse of maravedis,--
    And this that gallant Spaniard did
      For me, and for the Ladies.

    He vowed a vow, that noble knight,
      Before he went to table,
    To make his only sport the fight,
      His only couch the stable,
    Till he had dragged, as he was bid,
      Five score of Turks to Cadiz,--
    And this that gallant Spaniard did,
      For me, and for the Ladies.

    To ride through mountains, where my First
      A banquet would be reckoned,--
    Through deserts where to quench their thirst,
      Men vainly turn my Second;--
    To leave the gates of fair Madrid,
      To dare the gate of Hades,--
    And this that gallant Spaniard did,
      For me and for the Ladies.