Nor sound of human sorrow mounts to

mar

Their sacred everlasting calm! and such,
Not all so fine, nor so divine a calm,
Not such, nor all unlike it, man may gain
Letting his own life go. The Gods, the
Gods!

If all be atoms, how then should the
Gods

Being atomic not be dissoluble,

Not follow the great law? My master held

That Gods there are, for all men so believe.

I prest my footsteps into his, and meant
Surely to lead my Memmius in a train
Of flowery clauses onward to the proof
That Gods there are, and deathless.
Meant? I meant?

I have forgotten what I meant: my mind
Stumbles, and all my faculties are lamed.

The mountain there has cast his cloudy slough,

Now towering o'er him in serenest air, A mountain o'er a mountain, -ay, and within

All hollow as the hopes and fears of men?

'But who was he, that in the garden

snared

Picus and Faunus, rustic Gods? a tale To laugh at more to laugh at in myself

For look! what is it? there? yon arbutus Totters; a noiseless riot underneath Strikes through the wood, sets all the tops quivering

The mountain quickens into Nymph and Faun;

And here an Oread-how the sun de

lights

To glance and shift about her slippery sides,

And rosy knees and supple roundedness, And budded bosom-peaks - who this

way runs

Before the rest - A satyr, a satyr, see,
Follows; but him I proved impossible;
Twy-natured is no nature: yet he draws
Nearer and nearer, and I scan him now
Beastlier than any phantom of his kind
That ever butted his rough brother-brute
For lust or lusty blood or provender:
I hate, abhor, spit, sicken at him; and
she

Loathes him as well; such a precipitate heel,

Fledged as it were with Mercury's anklewing,

Whirls her to me: but will she fling herself,

Shameless upon me? Catch her, goatfoot: nay,

Hide, hide them, million-myrtled wilder

I thought I lived securely as yourselves No lewdness, narrowing envy, monkeyspite,

No madness of ambition, avarice, none:
No larger feast than under plane or pine
With neighbours laid along the grass, to
take

Only such cups as left us friendly-warm,
Affirming each his own philosophy -
Nothing to mar the sober majesties
Of settled, sweet, Epicurean life.
But now it seems some unseen monster
Tays

His vast and filthy hands upon my will, Wrenching it backward into his; and spoils

My bliss in being; and it was not great; For save when shutting reasons up in rhythm,

Or Heliconian honey in living words,
To make a truth less harsh, I often grew
Tired of so much within our little life,
Or of so little in our little life-
Poor little life that toddles half an hour
Crown'd with a flower or two, and there
an end-

-

Spout from the maiden fountain in her heart.

And from it sprang the Commonwealth, which breaks

As I am breaking now!

'And therefore now Let her, that is the womb and tomb of all, Great Nature, take, and forcing far apart

Shall stand: ay, surely: then it falls at last
And perishes as I must; for O Thou,
Passionless bride, divine Tranquillity,
Yearn'd after by the wisest of the wise,
Who fail to find thee, being as thou art
Without one pleasure and without one
pain,

Howbeit I know thou surely must be mine
Or soon or late, yet out of season, thus
I woo thee roughly, for thou carest not
How roughly men may woo thee so they
win-

Thus thus: the soul flies out and dies in the air.'

With that he drove the knife into his

side:

She heard him raging, heard him fall; ran in,

Beat breast, tore hair, cried out upon herself

As having fail'd in duty to him, shriek'd That she but meant to win him back, fell on him,

Clasp'd, kiss'd him, wail'd: he answer'd, 'Care not thou!

Thy duty? What is duty? Fare thee well!'

Laborious orient ivory sphere in sphere, The cursed Malayan crease, and battleclubs

From the isles of palm: and higher on the walls,

Betwixt the monstrous horns of elk and deer,

His own forefathers' arms and armour hung.

And 'This,' he said, 'was Hugh's at

Agincourt;

And that was old Sir Ralph's at Ascalon : A good knight he! we keep a chronicle With all about him'. - which he brought, and I

Dived in a hoard of tales that dealt with

knights,

Half-legend, half-historic, counts and kings

Who laid about them at their wills and died;

And mixt with these, a lady, one that arm'd

Her own fair head, and sallying thro' the

gate,

Had beat her foes with slaughter from her walls.

'O miracle of women,' said the book, 'O noble heart who, being strait-besieged By this wild king to force her to his wish, Nor bent, nor broke, nor shunn'd a soldier's death,

But now when all was lost or seem'd as lost

Her stature more than mortal in the burst Of sunrise, her arm lifted, eyes on fire Brake with a blast of trumpets from the gate,

And, falling on them like a thunderbolt, She trampled some beneath her horses' heels,

And some were whelm'd with missiles of the wall,

And some were push'd with lances from the rock,

And part were drown'd within the whirling brook:

O miracle of noble womanhood!'

So sang the gallant glorious chronicle; And, I all rapt in this, 'Come out,' he said,

For azure views; and there a group of girls

In circle waited, whom the electric shock Dislink'd with shrieks and laughter: round the lake

A little clock-work steamer paddling plied And shook the lilies: perch'd about the knolls

A dozen angry models jetted steam :
A petty railway ran: a fire-balloon
Rose gem-like up before the dusky groves
And dropt a fairy parachute and past:
And there thro' twenty posts of telegraph
They flash'd a saucy message to and fro
Between the mimic stations; so that sport
Went hand in hand with Science; other-
where

Pure sport: a herd of boys with clamour bowl'd

And stump'd the wicket; babies roll'd about

Like tumbled fruit in grass; and men and maids

Arranged a country dance, and flew thro'

light

And shadow, while the twanging violin