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Our elder boy has got the clear

Great brow; tho' when his brother's black Full eye shows scorn, it... Gismond here? And have you brought my tercel back? I just was telling Adela

How many birds it struck since May.

INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH CAMP

You know, we French stormed Ratis

bon:

A mile or so away,

On a little mound, Napoleon

Stood on our storming-day;
With neck out-thrust, you fancy how,
Legs wide, arms locked behind,
As if to balance the prone brow
Oppressive with its mind.

Just as perhaps he mused "My plans
"That soar, to earth may fall,
"Let once my army-leader Lannes
"Waver at yonder wall,"

Out 'twixt the battery-smokes there flew
A rider, bound on bound
Full-galloping; nor bridle drew

Until he reached the mound.

Then off there flung in smiling joy,
And held himself erect

By just his horse's mane, a boy:
You hardly could suspect-
(So tight he kept his lips compressed,
Scarce any blood came through)

You looked twice ere you saw his breast
Was all but shot in two.

"Well," cried he, "Emperor, by God's grace "We've got you Ratisbon!

"The Marshal's in the market-place,

"And you'll be there anon

"To see your flag-bird flap his vans
"Where I, to heart's desire,

"Perched him!" The chief's eye flashed; his
plans

Soared up again like fire.

The chief's eye flashed; but presently
Softened itself, as sheathes

A film the mother-eagle's eye

When her bruised eaglet breathes;
"You're wounded!""Nay," the soldier's pride
Touched to the quick, he said:

"I'm killed, Sire!" And his chief beside
Smiling the boy fell dead.

SOLILOQUY OF THE SPANISH CLOISTER

GRRR-four ego, med flower-pots, do!

R-R-R-there go, my heart's abhorrence!

If hate killed men, Brother Lawrence,
God's blood, would not mine kill you!
What? your myrtle-bush wants trimming?
Oh, that rose has prior claims-
Needs its leaden vase filled brimming?
Hell dry you up with its flames!

At the meal we sit together:
Salve tibi! I must hear

Wise talk of the kind of weather,
Sort of season, time of year:
Not a plenteous cork-crop: scarcely
Dare we hope oak-galls, I doubt:

What's the Latin name for "parsley"?

What's the Greek name for Swine's Snout?

SOLILOQUY OF THE SPANISH CLOISTER

Whew! We'll have our platter burnished,
Laid with care on our own shelf!
With a fire-new spoon we're furnished,
And a goblet for ourself,
Rinsed like something sacrificial
Ere 'tis fit to touch our chaps-
Marked with L. for our initial!
(He, he! There his lily snaps!)

Saint, forsooth! While brown Dolores
Squats outside the Convent bank,
With Sanchicha, telling stories,
Steeping tresses in the tank,

Blue-black, lustrous, thick like horsehairs,
-Can't I see his dead eye glow

Bright, as 'twere a Barbary corsair's?
(That is, if he'd let it show!)

When he finishes refection,
Knife and fork he never lays
Cross-wise, to my recollection,
As do I, in Jesu's praise.
I, the Trinity illustrate,

Drinking watered orange-pulp-
In three sips the Arian frustrate;
While he drains his at one gulp!

Oh, those melons! If he's able
We're to have a feast; so nice!
One goes to the Abbot's table,
All of us get each a slice.

How go on your flowers? None double?
Not one fruit-sort can you spy?
Strange! And I, too, at such trouble,

Keep 'em close-nipped on the sly!

There's a great text in Galatians,
Once you trip on it, entails

Twenty-nine distinct damnations,
One sure, if another fails.

If I trip him just a-dying,

Sure of Heaven as sure can be,
Spin him round and send him flying
Off to Hell, a Manichee?

Or, my scrofulous French novel,
On grey paper with blunt type!
Simply glance at it, you grovel
Hand and foot in Belial's gripe:
If I double down its pages

At the woeful sixteenth print,
When he gathers his greengages,
Ope a sieve and slip it in't?

Or, there's Satan!-one might venture
Pledge one's soul to him, yet leave
Such a flaw in the indenture

As he'd miss till, past retrieve,
Blasted lay that rose-acacia

We're so proud of! Hy, Zy, Hine...
'St, there's Vespers! Plena gratiâ
Ave, Virgo! Gr-r-r-you swine!

IN A GONDOLA

He sings

SEND my heart up to thee, all my heart
In this my singing.

For the stars help me, and the sea bears part;
The very night is clinging

Closer to Venice' streets to leave one space

Above me, whence thy face

May light my joyous heart to thee its dwellingplace.

She speaks

Say after me, and try to say My very words, as if each word Came from you of your own accord, In your own voice, in your own way: This woman's heart and soul and brain "Are mine as much as this gold chain "She bids me wear; which" (say again) "I choose to make by cherishing "A precious thing, or choose to fling "Over the boat-side, ring by ring."

And yet once more say... no word more! Since words are only words. Give o'er!

Unless you call me, all the same,
Familiarly by my pet name,

Which if the Three should hear you call,
And me reply to, would proclaim
At once our secret to them all.

Ask of me, too, command me, blame-
Do, break down the partition-wall
'Twixt us, the daylight world beholds
Curtained in dusk and splendid folds!
What's left but-all of me to take?
I am the Three's: prevent them, slake
Your thirst! 'Tis said, the Arab sage,
In practising with gems, can loose
Their subtle spirit in his cruce
And leave but ashes: so, sweet mage,
Leave them my ashes when thy use
Sucks out my soul, thy heritage!

He sings

Past we glide, and past, and past!
What's that poor Agnese doing
Where they make the shutters fast?
Grey Zanobi's just a-wooing

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