'Far and far away,' said the dainty little maiden,

'All among the meadows, the clover and the clematis,

Daisies and kingcups and honeysuckleflowers.'

II

MINNIE AND WINNIE

MINNIE and Winnie Slept in a shell. Sleep, little ladies! And they slept well.

Pink was the shell within,
Silver without;
Sounds of the great sea
Wander'd about.

Sleep, little ladies! Wake not soon! Echo on echo

Dies to the moon.

Two bright stars

Peep'd into the shell. 'What are they dreaming of? Who can tell?'

Started a green linnet

Out of the croft; Wake, little ladies!

The sun is aloft !

THE SPITEFUL LETTER

Contributed to 'Once a Week' in January, 1868, and reprinted in 1884.

Attempts have been made to identify the writer of the letter; but the poet wrote to the editor of 'Once a Week': 'It is no particular letter that I meant. I have had dozens of them from one quarter and another.'

HERE, it is here, the close of the year,
And with it a spiteful letter.

My name in song has done him much wrong,
For himself has done much better.

O little bard, is your lot so hard,
If men neglect your pages?
I think not much of yours or of mine,
I hear the roll of the ages.

IV

The King return'd from out the wild,

He bore but little game in hand; The mother said, 'They have taken the child

To spill his blood and heal the land.
The land is sick, the people diseased,

And blight and famine on all the lea;
The holy Gods, they must be appeased,
So I pray you tell the truth to me.
They have taken our son,
They will have his life.
Is he your dearest ?
Or I, the wife?'

V

The King bent low, with hand on brow,

He stay'd his arms upon his knee: 'O wife, what use to answer now?

For now the Priest has judged for me.' The King was shaken with holy fear;

'The Gods,' he said, 'would have chosen well;

Yet both are near, and both are dear,
And which the dearest I cannot tell!'
But the Priest was happy,

His victim won:
'We have his dearest,
His only son!'

VI

The rites prepared, the victim bared,
The knife uprising toward the blow,
To the altar-stone she sprang alone:
'Me, not my darling, no!

He caught her away with a sudden cry;
Suddenly from him brake his wife,
And shrieking, 'I am his dearest, I —

I am his dearest !' rush'd on the knife.
And the Priest was happy:
'O Father Odin,

We give you a life.
Which was his nearest ?
Who was his dearest ?
The Gods have answer'd;
We give them the wife!'

WAGES

Contributed to Macmillan's Magazine' for February, 1868; and reprinted in the 'Holy Grail' volume.

GLORY of warrior, glory of orator, glory of

song,

Paid with a voice flying by to be lost on an endless sea

Glory of Virtue, to fight, to struggle, to right the wrong

Nay, but she aim'd not at glory, no lover of glory she;

Give her the glory of going on, and still to be.

The wages of sin is death: if the wages of Virtue be dust,

Would she have heart to endure for the life of the worm and the fly? She desires no isles of the blest, no quiet seats of the just,

To rest in a golden grove, or to bask in a summer sky;

Give her the wages of going on, and not to die.

THE HIGHER PANTHEISM

First published in the 'Holy Grail' volume.

THE sun, the moon, the stars, the seas, the hills and the plains,

Are not these, O Soul, the Vision of Him who reigns?

Is not the Vision He, tho' He be not that which He seems ?

Dreams are true while they last, and do we not live in dreams?

Earth, these solid stars, this weight of body and limb,

Are they not sign and symbol of thy division from Him?

Dark is the world to thee; thyself art the reason why,

For is He not all but thou, that hast power to feel I am I'?

Glory about thee, without thee; and thou fulfillest thy doom,

Making Him broken gleams and a stifled splendor and gloom.

Speak to Him, thou, for He hears, and
Spirit with Spirit can meet
Closer is He than breathing, and nearer
than hands and feet.

They are raised for ever and ever, And sink again into sleep.'

VII

Not raised for ever and ever,

But when their cycle is o'er, The valley, the voice, the peak, the star Pass, and are found no more.

VIII

The Peak is high and flush'd

At his highest with sunrise fire; The Peak is high, and the stars are high, And the thought of a man is higher.

IX

A deep below the deep,

And a height beyond the height! Our hearing is not hearing,

And our seeing is not sight.

X

The voice and the Peak

Far into heaven withdrawn, The lone glow and long roar Green-rushing from the rosy thrones of dawn!

First published in the 'Holy Grail' volume. FLOWER in the crannied wall,

I pluck you out of the crannies,

I hold you here, root and all, in my hand, Little flower but if I could understand What you are, root and all, and all in all, I should know what God and man is.

LUCRETIUS

First published in 'Macmillan's Magazine' for May, 1868, and afterwards included in the Holy Grail' volume of 1869.

The story on which the poem is founded is taken from Jerome's additions to the 'Eusebian Chronicle,' under the year B. C. 94: 'Titus Lucretius poeta nascitur; postea amatorio poculo in furorem versus, cum aliquot libellos per intervalla insaniae conscripsisset, quos postea Cicero emendavit, propria se manu interfecit anno aetatis xliii.'

LUCILIA, wedded to Lucretius, found Her master cold; for when the morning flush