The shattering trumpet shrilleth high, The hard brands shiver on the steel, The splinter'd spear-shafts crack and fly, The horse and rider reel: They reel, they roll in clanging lists, And when the tide of combat stands, Perfume and flowers fall in showers, That lightly rain from ladies' hands. How sweet are looks that ladies bend To save from shame and thrall: But all my heart is drawn above, My knees are bow'd in crypt and shrine: I never felt the kiss of love, Nor maiden's hand in mine. More bounteous aspects on me beam, A virgin heart in work and will. When down the stormy crescent goes, Between dark stems the forest glows, The silver vessels sparkle clean, Sometimes on lonely mountain-meres I find a magic bark ; I leap on board no helmsman steers : I float till all is dark. A gentle sound, an awful light! Three angels bear the holy Grail : With folded feet, in stoles of white, On sleeping wings they sail. Ah, blessed vision! blood of God! My spirit beats her mortal bars, As down dark tides the glory slides, And star-like mingles with the stars. When on my goodly charger borne And, ringing, springs from brand and But o'er the dark a glory spreads, And gilds the driving hail. I leave the plain, I climb the height; Fly o'er waste fens and windy fields. A maiden knight-to me is given I yearn to breathe the airs of heaven I muse on joy that will not cease, Whose odours haunt my dreams; This mortal armour that I wear, The clouds are broken in the sky, A rolling organ-harmony Swells up, and shakes and falls. So pass I hostel, hall, and grange; By bridge and ford, by park and pale, All-arm'd I ride, whate'er betide, Until I find the holy Grail. EDWARD GRAY. SWEET Emma Moreland of yonder town Met me walking on yonder way, ‘And have you lost your heart?' she said ; 'And are you married yet, Edward Gray?' Sweet Emma Moreland spoke to me : Bitterly weeping I turn'd away : 'Sweet Emma Moreland, love no more Can touch the heart of Edward Gray. 'Ellen Adair she loved me well, Against her father's and mother's will : To-day I sat for an hour and wept, By Ellen's grave, on the windy hill. 'Shy she was, and I thought her cold; Thought her proud, and fled over the sea; Fill'd I was with folly and spite, When Ellen Adair was dying for me. 'Cruel, cruel the words I said! Cruelly came they back to-day : "You're too slight and fickle," I said, "To trouble the heart of Edward Gray." 'There I put my face in the grass--Whisper'd, "Listen to my despair : I repent me of all I did: Speak a little, Ellen Adair !" 'Then I took a pencil, and wrote On the mossy stone, as I lay, "Here lies the body of Ellen Adair ; And here the heart of Edward Gray !" 'Love may come, and love may go, And fly, like a bird, from tree to tree : But I will love no more, no more, Till Ellen Ad air come back to me. 'Bitterly wept I over the stone: Bitterly weeping I turn'd away : There lies the body of Ellen Adair ! And there the heart of Edward Gray!' WILL WATERPROOF'S LYRICAL MONOLOGUE. MADE AT THE COCK. O PLUMP head-waiter at The Cock, How goes the time? 'Tis five o'clock. But let it not be such as that You set before chance-comers, But such whose father-grape grew fat On Lusitanian summers. No vain libation to the Muse, Her influence on the mind, To make me write my random rhymes, I pledge her, and she comes and dips And lays it thrice upon my lips, These favour'd lips of mine; I pledge her silent at the board; Thro' many an hour of summer suns, 126 WILL WATERPROOF'S LYRICAL MONOLOGUE. I kiss the lips I once have kiss'd; The gas-light wavers dimmer And softly, thro' a vinous mist, My college friendships glimmer. I grow in worth, and wit, and sense, Unboding critic-pen, Or that eternal want of pence, Which vexes public men, Who hold their hands to all, and cry Ah yet, tho' all the world forsake, I will not cramp my heart, nor take Let Whig and Tory stir their blood; There must be stormy weather; But for some true result of good All parties work together. Let there be thistles, there are grapes; If old things, there are new; Ten thousand broken lights and shapes, Yet glimpses of the true. Let raffs be rife in prose and rhyme, As on this whirligig of Time We circle with the seasons. This earth is rich in man and maid; With fair horizons bound: This whole wide earth of light and shade Comes out, a perfect round. High over roaring Temple-bar, I look at all things as they are, Head-waiter, honour'd by the guest Half-mused, or reeling ripe, The pint, you brought me, was the best That ever came from pipe. But tho' the port surpasses praise, My nerves have dealt with stiffer. Is there some magic in the place? Or do my peptics differ? For since I came to live and learn, Tho' soak'd and saturate, out and out, For I am of a numerous house, With many kinsmen gay, Where long and largely we carouse As who shall say me nay: Each month, a birth-day coming on, We drink defying trouble, Or sometimes two would meet in one, And then we drank it double; Whether the vintage, yet unkept, Had relish fiery-new, Or, elbow-deep in sawdust, slept, Or stow'd, when classic Canning died, The gloom of ten Decembers. The Muse, the jolly Muse, it is! She changes with that mood or this, She lit the spark within my throat, And hence this halo lives about The waiter's hands, that reach To each his perfect pint of stout, His proper chop to each. |