TO THE TRUE ROMANCE

Each strcke aright of toil and fight,
That was and that shall be,

And hope too high, wherefore we die,
Has birth and worth in Thee.

Who holds by Thee hath Heaven in fee
To gild his dross thereby,

And knowledge sure that he endure
A child until he die-

For to make plain that man's disdain

Is but new Beauty's birth

For to possess in loneliness

The joy of all the earth.

As Thou didst teach all lovers speech
And Life all mystery,

So shalt Thou rule by every school
Till love and longing die,

Who wast or yet the Lights were set,

A whisper in the Void,

Who shalt be sung through planets young When this is clean destroyed.⚫

Beyond the bounds our staring rounds,
Across the pressing dark,

The children wise of outer skies

Look hitherward and mark

A light that shifts, a glare that drifts,
Rekindling thus and thus,

Not all forlorn, for Thou hast borne
Strange tales to them of us.

Time hath no tide but must abide
The servant of Thy will;

Tide hath no time, for to Thy rhyme
The ranging stars stand still-
Regent of spheres that lock our fears,
Our hopes invisible,

Oh 'twas certes at Thy decrees

We fashioned Heaven and Hell!

Pure Wisdom hath no certain path
That lacks thy morning-eyne,
And captains bold by Thee controlled
Most like to Gods design;

Thou art the Voice to kingly boys
To lift them through the fight,
And Comfortress of Unsuccess,
To give the dead good-night-

A veil to draw 'twixt God His Law
And Man's infirmity,

A shadow kind to dumb and blind

The shambles where we die;

A rule to trick th' arithmetic

Too base of leaguing odds

The spur of trust, the curb of lust,
Thou handmaid of the Gods!

O Charity, all patiently

Abiding wrack and scaith!

O Faith, that meets ten thousand cheats

Yet drops no jot of faith!

TO THE TRUE ROMANCE

Devil and brute Thou dost transmute To higher, lordlier show,

Who art in sooth that lovely Truth The careless angels know!

Thy face is far from this our war,
Our call and counter-cry,

I may not find Thee quick and kind,
Nor know Thee till I die.

Yet may I look with heart unshook
On blow brought home or missed-
Yet may I hear with equal ear
The clarions down the List;
Yet set my lance above mischance
And ride the barriere—

Oh, hit or miss, how little 'tis,
My Lady is not there!

THE FLOWERS

To our private taste, there is always something a little exotic, almost artificial, in songs which, under an English aspect and dress, are yet so manifestly the product of other skies. They affect us like translations; the very fauna and flora are alien, remote; the dog's-tooth violet is but an ill substitute for the rathe primrose, nor can we ever believe that the wood-robin sings as sweetly in April as the English thrush.-THE ATHENÆUM.

Buy my English posies!
Kent and Surrey may—
Violets of the Undercliff

Wet with Channel spray;
Cowslips from a Devon combe-
Midland furze afire-

Buy my English posies

And I'll sell your heart's desire!

Buy my English posies!

You that scorn the May,

Won't you greet a friend from home

Half the world away?

THE FLOWERS

Green against the draggled drift,

Faint and frail and first

Buy my Northern blood-root

And I'll know where you were nursed:

Robin down the logging-road whistles, "Come to me!"

Spring has found the maple-grove, the sap is running free;

All the winds of Canada call the ploughing-rain.

Take the flower and turn the hour, and kiss your love again!

Buy my English posies!

Here's to match your need

Buy a tuft of royal heath,
Buy a bunch of weed
White as sand of Muysenberg

Spun before the gale-
Buy my heath and lilies

And I'll tell you whence you hail!

Under hot Constantia broad the vineyards lieThroned and thorned the aching berg props the speckless sky

Slow below the Wynberg firs trails the tilted wainTake the flower and turn the hour, and kiss your love again!

Buy my English posies!

You that will not turn-
Buy my hot-wood clematis,
Buy a frond o' fern