This is the Actor's gift; to share When Burbadge played! Austin Dobson. To Charles Kemble AREWELL! all good wishes go with him today, Rich in name, rich in fame, he has play'd out the play. Though the sock and the buskin for aye be Still he serves in the train of the drama he loved. Shall we never again see his spirit infuse Life, life in the gay gallant forms of the Muse, Let the curtain come down. Let the scene pass awayThere's an autumn when summer has squander'd her day: We sit by the fire when we can't by the lamp, And though he quit the gorgeous, and we may grow old, With our Shakespeare in hand, and bright forms in our brain, We can dream up our Siddons and Kembles again. J. Hamilton Reynolds. From "The Progress of Poesy" AR from the sun and summer gale, In thy green lap was Nature's Darling laid, To him the mighty Mother did unveil Stretch'd forth his little arms and smiled. Thine too these golden keys, immortal boy! This can unlock the gates of Joy; Of Horror that, and thrilling Fears, Or ope the sacred source of sympathetic Tears." Nor second he, that rode sublime Upon the seraph-wings of Ecstasy, He pass'd the flaming bounds of Place and Time: The living Throne, the sapphire-blaze, Where Angels tremble while they gaze, He saw; but, blasted with excess of light, Gray. H Milton E left the upland lawns and serene air Back to his mountain clomb, now bleak and frore, In darkness, listening to the thunder's roll. Ernest Myers. A To Ben Jonson H Ben! Say how, or when Shall we, thy guests, The Dog, the Triple Tun? As made us nobly wild, not mad; And yet each verse of thine Out-did the meat, out-did the frolic wine. My Ben! Or come again, Or send to us Lest we that talent spend; And having once brought to an end That precious stock,-the store Of such a wit the world should have no more. Herrick. The Tomb of Burns W HAT woos the world to yonder shrine? The cunning of the jewelled line And carven phrase? A searcher of our source and goal, A Shakespeare, flashing o'er the whole Of man's domain The splendour of his cloudless soul Some Keats, to Grecian gods allied, And heavenward hurling wild and wide A lonely Wordsworth, from the crowd Dipt, and with gorgeous ritual vowed Nay, none of these,-and little skilled Was he whose fiery heart lies stilled 'Neath yonder stone. No mystic torch through Time he bore, His soul no bright insignia wore Of starry birth; He saw what all men see-no more In heaven and earth: But as, when thunder crashes nigh, Did the old truths that we pass by To him appear. William Watson. |