He fell among Thieves E have robbed," said he, "ye have slaughtered and made an end, Take your ill-got plunder, and bury the dead: What will ye more of your guest and sometime friend?" "Blood for our blood," they said. He laughed: "If one may settle the score for five, He flung his empty revolver down the slope, He climbed alone to the Eastward edge of the trees; All night long in a dream untroubled of hope He brooded, clasping his knees. He did not hear the monotonous roar that fills He saw the April noon on his books aglow, He saw the grey little church across the park, The mounds that hide the loved and honoured dead; The Norman arch, the chancel softly dark, The brasses black and red. He saw the School Close, sunny and green, The runner beside him, the stand by the parapet wall, The distant tape, and the crowd roaring between, He saw the dark wainscot and timbered roof, He watched the liner's stem ploughing the foam, He saw the flag she flew. And now it was dawn. He rose strong on his feet, And strode to his ruined camp below the wood; He drank the breath of the morning cool and sweet; Light on the Laspur hills was broadening fast, The blood-red snow-peaks chilled to a dazzling white; He turned, and saw the golden circle at last, Cut by the eastern height. "O glorious Life, Who dwellest in earth and sun, I have lived, I praise and adore Thee." A sword swept. Over the pass the voices one by one Faded, and the hill slept. Henry Newbolt. A Gentleman of Somerset [In the old burying-ground at Calcutta] ON this dark, weed-grown wilderness, Laid down his life, and saw no more Though one of that stern fellowship- Come up in hushed societies, To worship God in Somerset. Now lies he here, dead utterly, And passed from love and memory; And dead his friends in Somerset. Yet still, methinks, half-wonderingly, W. G. Hole. Charles's Wain To a Child "By this the Northerne wagoner had set But firme is fixt, and sendeth light from farre -Faerie Queene. N the early spring, as the nights grow shorter, There you high, Just as you're going to bed, my daughter, will see, if the stars you 're wise in, Over the edge of the darkened plain One by one in the heavens uprising The seven bright beacons of Charles's Wain. All the night long you may watch them turning, Often they guide me, by dim tracks wending, Then, as they dip, I may take their warning, Swiftly they vanish, and cometh the morning, But the Wain's last lustre fitfully glances Thus when you look at the seven stars yonder Here in the dark how often I wander, Sleep when they rise, and start as they set. In the West there is clanging of clocks from the steeple, Ringing of bells and rushing of train; In the East the journeys of simple people Are timed and lighted by Charles's Wain. Sir Alfred Lyall. |