Transcriber’s Note:
Footnotes have been moved from the bottom of the page to the end of the stanza.
Obvious spelling mistakes have been corrected.
Old or deprecated spellings have been preserved.
Periods have been added at the end of authors names which did not have them.

THE BLUE POETRY BOOK

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EDITED BY ANDREW LANG

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[See p. 151]

TO BEHOLD THE WANDERING MOON
RIDING NEAR HER HIGHEST NOON.

THE BLUE POETRY BOOK

EDITED BY

ANDREW LANG

WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS BY H. J. FORD AND LANCELOT SPEED

SEVENTH IMPRESSION

LONGMANS, GREEN AND CO.

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1918
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Made in Great Britain

INTRODUCTION

The purpose of this Collection is to put before children, and young people, poems which are good in themselves, and especially fitted to live, as Theocritus says, ‘on the lips of the young.’ The Editor has been guided to a great extent, in making his choice, by recollections of what particularly pleased himself in youth. As a rule, the beginner in poetry likes what is called ‘objective’ art—verse with a story in it, the more vigorous the story the better. The old ballads satisfy this taste, and the Editor would gladly have added more of them, but for two reasons. First, there are parents who would see harm, where children see none, in ‘Tamlane’ and ‘Clerk Saunders.’ Next, there was reason to dread that the volume might become entirely too Scottish. It is certainly a curious thing that, in Mr. Palgrave’s Golden Treasury, where some seventy poets are represented, scarcely more than a tenth of the number were born north of Tweed. In this book, however, intended for lads and lassies, the poems by Campbell, by Sir Walter Scott, by Burns, by the Scottish song-writers, and the Scottish minstrels of the ballad, are in an unexpectedly large proportion to the poems by English authors. The Editor believes that this predominance of Northern verse is not due to any exorbitant local patriotism of his own. The singers of the North, for some reason or other, do excel in poems of action and of adventure, or to him they seem to excel. He is acquainted with no modern ballad by a Southern Englishman, setting aside ‘[Christabel]’ and the ‘[Ancient Mariner]—’ poems hardly to be called ballads—which equals ‘[The Eve of St. John.]’ For spirit-stirring martial strains few Englishmen since Drayton have been rivals of Campbell, of Scott, of Burns, of Hogg with his song of ‘Donald McDonald.’ Two names, indeed, might be mentioned here: the names of the late Sir Francis Doyle and of Lord Tennyson. But the scheme of this book excludes a choice from contemporary poets. It is not necessary to dwell on the reasons for this decision. But the Editor believes that some anthologist of the future will find in the poetry of living English authors, or of English authors recently dead, a very considerable garden of that kind of verse which is good both for young and old. To think for a moment of this abundance is to conceive more highly of Victorian poetry. There must still, after all, be youth and mettle in the nation which could produce ‘The Ballad of the Revenge,’ ‘Lucknow,’ ‘The Red Thread of Honour,’ ‘The Loss of the Birkenhead,’ ‘The Forsaken Merman,’ ‘How they brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix,’ ‘The Pied Piper of Hamelin,’ and many a song of Charles Kingley’s, not to mention here the work of still later authors. But we only glean the fields of men long dead.

For this reason, then—namely, because certain admirable contemporary poems, like ‘Lucknow’ and ‘The Red Thread of Honour,’ are unavoidably excluded—the poems of action, of war, of adventure, chance to be mainly from Scottish hands. Thus Campbell and Scott may seem to hold a pre-eminence which would not have been so marked had the works of living poets, or of poets recently dead, been available. Yet in any circumstances these authors must have occupied a great deal of the field: Campbell for the vigour which the unfriendly Leyden had to recognise; Scott for that Homeric quality which, since Homer, no man has displayed in the same degree. Extracts from his long poems do not come within the scope of this selection. But, estimated even by his lyrics, Scott seems, to the Editor, to justify his right, now occasionally disdained, to rank among the great poets of his country. He has music, speed, and gaiety, as in ‘[The Hunting Song]’ or in ‘[Nora’s Vow:]’

For all the gold, for all the gear, For all the lands both far and near That ever valour lost or won, I would not wed the Earlie’s son!

Lines like these sing themselves naturally in a child’s memory, while there is a woodland freshness and a daring note in

O, Brignall banks are wild and fair, And Greta woods are green.

‘[Young Lochinvar]’ goes ‘as dauntingly as wantonly’ to his bridal, as the heir of Macpherson’s Rant to his death, in a wonderful swing and gallop of verse; while still, out of dim years of childhood far away, one hears how all the bells are ringing in Dunfermline town for the wedding of [Alice Brand]. From childhood, too, one remembers the quietism of Lucy Ashton’s song, and the monotone of the measure—

Vacant heart and hand and eye, Easy live and quiet die.

The wisdom of it is as perceptible to a child as that other lesson of Scott’s, which rings like a clarion:

To all the sensual world proclaim One glorious hour of crowded life Is worth an age without a name.

Then there are his martial pieces, as the ‘[Gathering Song of Donald Dhu]’ and ‘[The Cavalier],’ and there is the inimitable simplicity and sadness of ‘[Proud Maisie],’ like the dirge for Clearista by Meleager, but with a deeper tone, a stronger magic; and there is the song, which the Fates might sing in a Greek chorus, the song which Meg Merrilies sang,

Twist ye, twine ye, even so!

These are but a few examples of Scott’s variety, his spontaneity, his hardly conscious mastery of his art. Like Phemius of Ithaca, he might say ‘none has taught me but myself, and the God has put into my heart all manner of lays’—all but the conscious and elaborate ‘manner of lays,’ which has now such power over some young critics that they talk of Scott’s redeeming his bad verse by his good novels. The taste of childhood and of maturity is simpler and more pure.

In the development of a love of poetry it is probable that simple, natural, and adventurous poetry like Scott’s comes first, and that it is followed later—followed but not superseded—by admiration of such reflective poetry as is plain and even obvious, like that of Longfellow, from whom a number of examples are given. But, to the Editor at least, it seems that a child who cares for poetry is hardly ever too young to delight in mere beauty of words, in the music of metre and rhyme, even when the meaning is perhaps still obscure and little considered. A child, one is convinced, would take great pleasure in Mr. Swinburne’s choruses in ‘Atalanta,’ such as

Before the beginning of years,

and in Shelley’s ‘Cloud’ and his [‘Arethusa].’ For this reason a number of pieces of Edgar Poe’s are given, and we have not shrunk even from including the faulty ‘[Ulalume],’ because of the mere sound of it, apart from the sense. The three most famous poems of Coleridge may be above a child’s full comprehension, but they lead him into a world not realised, ‘an unsubstantial fairy place,’ bright in a morning mist, like our memories of childhood.

It is probably later, in most lives, that the mind wakens to delight in the less obvious magic of style, and the less ringing, the more intimate melody of poets like Keats and Lord Tennyson. The songs of Shakespeare, of course, are for all ages, and the needs of youth comparatively mature are met in Dryden’s ‘[Ode on Alexander’s Feast],’ and in ‘[Lycidas]’ and the ‘Hymn for the Nativity.’

It does not appear to the Editor that poems about children, or especially intended for children, are those which a child likes best. A child’s imaginative life is much spent in the unknown future, and in the romantic past. He is the contemporary of Leonidas, of [Agincourt], of [Bannockburn], of the ‘45; he is living in an heroic age of his own, in a Phæacia where the Gods walk visibly. The poems written for and about children, like Blake’s and some of Wordsworth’s, rather appeal to the old, whose own childhood is now to them a distant fairy world, as the man’s life is to the child. The Editor can remember having been more mystified and puzzled by ‘[Lucy Gray]’ than by the ‘[Eve of St. John],’ at a very early age. He is convinced that Blake’s ‘[Nurse’s Song],’ for example, which brings back to him the long, the endless evenings of the Northern summer, when one had to go to bed while the hills beyond Ettrick were still clear in the silver light, speaks more intimately to the grown man than to the little boy or girl. Hood’s ‘[I remember, I remember],’ in the same way, brings in the burden of reflection on that which the child cannot possibly reflect upon—namely, a childhood which is past. There is the same tone in Mr. Stevenson’s ‘Child’s Garden of Verse,’ which can hardly be read without tears—tears that do not come and should not come to the eyes of childhood. For, beyond the child and his actual experience of the world as the ballads and poems of battle are, he can forecast the years, and anticipate the passions. What he cannot anticipate is his own age, himself, his pleasures and griefs, as the grown man sees them in memory, and with a sympathy for the thing that he has been, and can never be again. It is his excursions into the untravelled world which the child enjoys, and this is what makes Shakespeare so dear to him—Shakespeare who has written so little on childhood. In The Midsummer Night’s Dream the child can lose himself in a world familiar to him, in the fairy age, and can derive such pleasure from Puck, or from Ariel, as his later taste can scarce recover in the same measure. Falstaff is his playfellow, ‘a child’s Falstaff, an innocent creature,’ as Dickens says of Tom Jones in David Copperfield.

A boy prefers the wild Prince and Poins to Barbara Lewthwaite, the little girl who moralised to the lamb. We make a mistake when we ‘write down’ to children; still more do we err when we tell a child not to read this or that because he cannot understand it. He understands far more than we give him credit for, but nothing that can harm him. The half-understanding of it, too, the sense of a margin beyond, as in a wood full of unknown glades, and birds, and flowers unfamiliar, is great part of a child’s pleasure in reading. For this reason many poems are included here in which the Editor does not suppose that the readers will be able to pass an examination. For another reason a few pieces of no great excellence as poetry are included. Though they may appear full of obviousness to us, there is an age of dawning reflection to which they are not obvious. Longfellow, especially, seems to the Editor to be a kind of teacher to bring readers to the more reflective poetry of Wordsworth, while he has a sort of simple charm in which there is a foretaste of the charm of Tennyson and Keats. But everyone who attempts to make such a collection must inevitably be guided by his own recollections of childhood, of his childish likings, and the development of the love of poetry in himself. We have really no other criterion, for children are such kind and good-natured critics that they will take pleasure in whatever is given or read to them, and it is hard for us to discern where the pleasure is keenest and most natural.

The Editor trusts that this book may be a guide into romance and fairyland to many children. Of a child’s enthusiasm for poetry, and the life which he leads by himself in poetry, it is very difficult to speak. Words cannot easily bring back the pleasure of it, now discerned in the far past like a dream, full of witchery, and music, and adventure. Some children, perhaps the majority, are of such a nature that they weave this dream for themselves, out of their own imaginings, with no aid or with little aid from the poets. Others, possibly less imaginative, if more bookish, gladly accept the poet’s help, and are his most flattering readers. There are moments in that remote life which remain always vividly present to memory, as when first we followed the chase with Fitz-James, or first learned how ‘The Baron of Smaylho’me rose with day,’ or first heard how

All day long the noise of battle roll’d Among the mountains by the winter sea.

Almost the happiest of such moments were those lulled by the sleepy music of ‘The Castle of Indolence,’ a poem now perhaps seldom read, at least by the young. Yet they may do worse than visit the drowsy castle of him who wrote

So when a shepherd of the Hebrid isles Placed far amid the melancholy main.

Childhood is the age when a love of poetry may be born and strengthened—a taste which grows rarer and more rare in our age, when examinations spring up and choke the good seed. By way of lending no aid to what is called Education, very few notes have been added. The child does not want everything to be explained; in the unexplained is great pleasure. Nothing, perhaps, crushes the love of poetry more surely and swiftly than the use of poems as school-books. They are at once associated in the mind with lessons, with long, with endless hours in school, with puzzling questions and the agony of an imperfect memory, with grammar and etymology, and everything that is the enemy of joy. We may cause children to hate Shakespeare or Spenser as Byron hated Horace, by inflicting poets on them, not for their poetry, but for the valuable information in the notes. This danger, at least, it is not difficult to avoid in the Blue Poetry Book.

CONTENTS

LIST OF PLATES

the
Blue Poetry Book

[NURSE’S SONG]

When the voices of children are heard on the green And laughing is heard on the hill, My heart is at rest within my breast, And everything else is still.

Then come home, my children, the sun is gone down, And the dews of night arise; Come, come, leave off play, and let us away Till the morning appears in the skies.

No, no, let us play, for it is yet day, And we cannot go to sleep; Besides in the sky the little birds fly, And the hills are all covered with sheep.

Well, well, go and play till the light fades away, And then go home to bed. The little ones leap’d and shouted and laugh’d; And all the hills echoèd.

W. Blake.

[A BOY’S SONG]

Where the pools are bright and deep, Where the grey trout lies asleep, Up the river and o’er the lea, That’s the way for Billy and me.

Where the blackbird sings the latest, Where the hawthorn blooms the sweetest Where the nestlings chirp and flee, That’s the way for Billy and me.

Where the mowers mow the cleanest, Where the hay lies thick and greenest; There to trace the homeward bee, That’s the way for Billy and me.

Where the hazel bank is steepest, Where the shadow falls the deepest, Where the clustering nuts fall free, That’s the way for Billy and me.

Why the boys should drive away Little sweet maidens from the play, Or love to banter and fight so well, That’s the thing I never could tell.

But this I know, I love to play, Through the meadow, among the hay; Up the water and o’er the lea, That’s the way for Billy and me.

J. Hogg.

[ I REMEMBER, I REMEMBER]

I I remember, I remember The house where I was born, The little window where the sun Came peeping in at morn; He never came a wink too soon, Nor brought too long a day, But now, I often wish the night Had borne my breath away!

II I remember, I remember The roses, red and white, The vi’lets, and the lily-cups, Those flowers made of light! The lilacs where the robin built, And where my brother set The laburnum on his birthday,— The tree is living yet!

III I remember, I remember Where I was used to swing, And thought the air must rush as fresh To swallows on the wing; My spirit flew in feathers then, That is so heavy now, And summer pools could hardly cool The fever on my brow!

IV I remember, I remember The fir trees dark and high; I used to think their slender tops Were close against the sky: It was a childish ignorance, But now ‘tis little joy To know I’m farther off from heav’n Than when I was a boy.

T. Hood.

[THE LAMB]

Little Lamb, who made thee? Dost thou know who made thee, Gave thee life, and bid thee feed By the stream and o’er the mead; Gave thee clothing of delight, Softest clothing, woolly, bright; Gave thee such a tender voice Making all the vales rejoice; Little Lamb, who made thee? Dost thou know who made thee?

Little Lamb, I’ll tell thee. Little Lamb, I’ll tell thee. He is called by thy name, For He calls Himself a Lamb:— He is meek and He is mild; He became a little child. I a child, and thou a lamb, We are called by His name. Little Lamb, God bless thee; Little Lamb, God bless thee.

W. Blake.

[NIGHT]

The sun descending in the west, The evening star does shine; The birds are silent in their nest, And I must seek for mine.

The moon, like a flower In heaven’s high bower, With silent delight Sits and smiles on the night.

Farewell, green fields and happy groves, Where flocks have ta’en delight; Where lambs have nibbled, silent moves The feet of angels bright; Unseen, they pour blessing, And joy without ceasing, On each bud and blossom, And each sleeping bosom.

They look in every thoughtless nest, Where birds are cover’d warm, They visit caves of every beast, To keep them all from harm:— If they see any weeping That should have been sleeping, They pour sleep on their head, And sit down by their bed.

W. Blake.

[ ON A SPANIEL CALLED ‘BEAU’
KILLING A YOUNG BIRD]

A spaniel, Beau, that fares like you, Well fed, and at his ease, Should wiser be than to pursue Each trifle that he sees.

But you have killed a tiny bird, Which flew not till to-day, Against my orders, whom you heard Forbidding you the prey.

Nor did you kill that you might eat, And ease a doggish pain, For him, though chased with furious heat, You left where he was slain.

Nor was he of the thievish sort, Or one whom blood allures, But innocent was all his sport Whom you have torn for yours.

My dog! what remedy remains, Since, teach you all I can, I see you, after all my pains, So much resemble man?

BEAU’S REPLY Sir, when I flew to seize the bird In spite of your command, A louder voice than yours I heard, And harder to withstand.

You cried—‘Forbear!’—but in my breast A mightier cried—‘Proceed!’— ‘Twas Nature, sir, whose strong behest Impell’d me to the deed.

Yet much as Nature I respect, I ventured once to break (As you perhaps may recollect) Her precept for your sake;

And when your linnet on a day, Passing his prison door, Had flutter’d all his strength away, And panting pressed the floor;

Well knowing him a sacred thing, Not destined to my tooth, I only kiss’d his ruffled wing, And lick’d the feathers smooth.

Let my obedience then excuse My disobedience now, Nor some reproof yourself refuse From your aggrieved Bow-wow;

If killing birds be such a crime, (Which I can hardly see), What think you, sir, of killing Time With verse address’d to me?

W. Cowper.

[ LUCY GRAY; OR, SOLITUDE]

Oft I had heard of Lucy Gray: And, when I crossed the wild, I chanced to see at break of day The solitary child.

No mate, no comrade Lucy knew; She dwelt on a wide moor, —The sweetest thing that ever grew Beside a human door!

You yet may spy the fawn at play, The hare upon the green; But the sweet face of Lucy Gray Will never more be seen.

‘To-night will be a stormy night— You to the town must go; And take a lantern, Child, to light Your mother through the snow.’

‘That, Father! will I gladly do: ‘Tis scarcely afternoon— The minster-clock has just struck two, And yonder is the moon!’

At this the Father raised his hook, And snapped a faggot-band; He plied his work;—and Lucy took The lantern in her hand.

Not blither is the mountain roe: With many a wanton stroke Her feet disperse the powdery snow, That rises up like smoke.

The storm came on before its time: She wandered up and down; And many a hill did Lucy climb, But never reached the town.

The wretched parents all that night Went shouting far and wide; But there was neither sound nor sight To serve them for a guide.

At day-break on a hill they stood That overlooked the moor; And thence they saw the bridge of wood, A furlong from their door.

They wept—and, turning homeward, cried, ‘In heaven we all shall meet!’ —When in the snow the mother spied The print of Lucy’s feet.

Then downwards from the steep hill’s edge They tracked the footmarks small; And through the broken hawthorn hedge, And by the long stone wall;

And then an open field they crossed: The marks were still the same; They tracked them on, nor ever lost; And to the bridge they came.

They followed from the snowy bank Those footmarks, one by one, Into the middle of the plank; And further there were none!

—Yet some maintain that to this day She is a living child; That you may see sweet Lucy Gray Upon the lonesome wild.

O’er rough and smooth she trips along, And never looks behind; And sings a solitary song That whistles in the wind.

W. Wordsworth.

[HUNTING SONG]

Waken, lords and ladies gay! On the mountain dawns the day; All the jolly chase is here, With hawk, and horse, and hunting spear! Hounds are in their couples yelling, Hawks are whistling, horns are knelling; Merrily, merrily, mingle they, ‘Waken, lords and ladies gay.’

Waken, lords and ladies gay! The mist has left the mountain grey, Springlets in the dawn are steaming, Diamonds on the brake are gleaming; And foresters have busy been, To track the buck in thicket green; Now we come to chant our lay, ‘Waken, lords and ladies gay.’

Waken, lords and ladies gay! To the greenwood haste away; We can show you where he lies, Fleet of foot, and tall of size; We can show the marks he made, When ’gainst the oak his antlers fray’d; You shall see him brought to bay— ‘Waken, lords and ladies gay.’

Louder, louder chant the lay, Waken, lords and ladies gay! Tell them youth, and mirth, and glee, Run a course as well as we; Time, stern huntsman! who can baulk, Stanch as hound, and fleet as hawk? Think of this, and rise with day, Gentle lords and ladies gay!

Sir W. Scott.

[ LORD ULLIN’S DAUGHTER]

A chieftain, to the Highlands bound, Cries, ‘Boatman, do not tarry! And I’ll give thee a silver pound, To row us o’er the ferry.’

‘Now who be ye, would cross Lochgyle, This dark and stormy water?’ ’O, I’m the chief of Ulva’s isle, And this Lord Ullin’s daughter.—

‘And fast before her father’s men Three days we’ve fled together, For should he find us in the glen, My blood would stain the heather.

‘His horsemen hard behind us ride; Should they our steps discover, Then who will cheer my bonny bride When they have slain her lover?’

Outspoke the hardy Highland wight, ‘I’ll go, my chief—I’m ready; It is not for your silver bright, But for your winsome lady:

‘And by my word! the bonny bird In danger shall not tarry; So though the waves are raging white, I’ll row you o’er the ferry.’—

By this the storm grew loud apace, The water-wraith was shrieking;[1] And in the scowl of heaven each face Grew dark as they were speaking.

But still as wilder blew the wind, And as the night grew drearer, Adown the glen rode armèd men, Their trampling sounded nearer.—

‘O haste thee, haste!’ the lady cries, ‘Though tempests round us gather; I’ll meet the raging of the skies, But not an angry father.’—

The boat has left a stormy land, A stormy sea before her,— When, oh! too strong for human hand, The tempest gather’d o’er her.

And still they row’d amidst the roar Of waters fast prevailing: Lord Ullin reach’d that fatal shore, His wrath was changed to wailing.—

For sore dismay’d, through storm and shade, His child he did discover:— One lovely hand she stretch’d for aid, And one was round her lover.

‘Come back! come back!’ he cried in grief, ‘Across this stormy water: And I’ll forgive your Highland chief, My daughter!—oh my daughter!’—

‘Twas vain: the loud waves lashed the shore, Return or aid preventing;— The waters wild went o’er his child,— And he was left lamenting.

T. Campbell.

[ THE CHIMNEY-SWEEPER]

When my mother died I was very young, And my father sold me while yet my tongue Could scarcely cry, ‘’weep! ’weep! ’weep! ’weep!’ So your chimneys I sweep, and in soot I sleep.

There’s little Tom Dacre, who cried when his head, That curl’d like a lamb’s back, was shaved; so I said, ‘Hush, Tom! never mind it, for when your head’s bare, You know that the soot cannot spoil your white hair.’

And so he was quiet: and that very night, As Tom was a-sleeping, he had such a sight, That thousands of sweepers, Dick, Joe, Ned, and Jack, Were all of them lock’d up in coffins of black.

And by came an angel, who had a bright key, And he open’d the coffins, and set them all free; Then down a green plain, leaping, laughing they run, And wash in a river, and shine in the sun.

Then, naked and white, all their bags left behind, They rise upon clouds, and sport in the wind; And the angel told Tom, if he’d be a good boy, He’d have God for his father, and never want joy.

And so Tom awoke; and we rose in the dark, And got with our bags and our brushes to work; Though the morning was cold, Tom was happy and warm: So, if all do their duty, they need not fear harm.

W. Blake.

[NORA’S VOW]

I Hear what Highland Nora said,— ‘The Earlie’s son I will not wed, Should all the race of nature die, And none be left but he and I. For all the gold, for all the gear, And all the lands both far and near, That ever valour lost or won, I would not wed the Earlie’s son.’

II ‘A maiden’s vows,’ old Callum spoke, ‘Are lightly made, and lightly broke; The heather on the mountain’s height Begins to bloom in purple light; The frost-wind soon shall sweep away That lustre deep from glen and brae; Yet Nora, ere its bloom be gone, May blithely wed the Earlie’s son.’—

III ‘The swan,’ she said, ‘the lake’s clear breast May barter for the eagle’s nest; The Awe’s fierce stream may backward turn, Ben-Cruaichan fall, and crush Kilchurn; Our kilted clans, when blood is high, Before their foes may turn and fly; But I, were all these marvels done, Would never wed the Earlie’s son.’

IV Still in the water-lily’s shade Her wonted nest the wild-swan made; Ben-Cruaichan stands as fast as ever, Still downward foams the Awe’s fierce river; To shun the clash of foeman’s steel, No Highland brogue has turn’d the heel: But Nora’s heart is lost and won, —She’s wedded to the Earlie’s son!

Sir W. Scott.

[ BALLAD OF AGINCOURT]

Fair stood the wind for France, When we our sails advance, Nor now to prove our chance Longer will tarry; But putting to the main, At Caux, the mouth of Seine, With all his martial train, Landed King Harry.

And, taking many a fort, Furnished in warlike sort, Marcheth tow’rds Agincourt In happy hour, (Skirmishing day by day, With those oppose his way) Where the French general lay With all his power.

Which in his height of pride, King Henry to deride, His ransom to provide To the king sending; Which he neglects the while, As from a nation vile, Yet with an angry smile Their fall portending,

And, turning to his men, Quoth our brave Henry then: Though they to one be ten, Be not amazèd! Yet have we well begun; Battles so bravely won, Have ever to the sun By fame been raisèd.

And for myself (quoth he),— This my full rest shall be, England ne’er mourn for me, Nor more esteem me;— Victor I will remain, Or on this earth lie slain: Never shall she sustain Loss to redeem me.

Poitiers and Cressy tell, When most their pride did swell, Under our swords they fell; No less our skill is Than when our grandsire great, Claiming the regal seat, By many a warlike feat Lopp’d the French lilies.

The Duke of York so dread The eager vanward led, With the main Henry sped, Amongst his henchmen. Exceter had the rear, A braver man not there,— O Lord! how hot they were, On the false Frenchmen!

They now to fight are gone: Armour on armour shone, Drum now to drum did groan— To hear was wonder; That with the cries they make, The very earth did shake; Trumpet to trumpet spake— Thunder to thunder.

Well it thine age became, O noble Erpingham! Which didst the signal aim To our hid forces,— When from a meadow by, Like a storm suddenly, The English archery Stuck the French horses.

With Spanish yew so strong, Arrows a cloth-yard long, That like to serpents stung, Piercing the weather,— None from his fellow starts, But, playing manly parts, And like true English hearts Stuck close together.

When down their bows they threw, And forth their bilboes drew, And on the French they flew, Not one was tardy; Arms from the shoulders sent, Scalps to the teeth were rent, Down the French peasants went,— Our men were hardy.

This while our noble king, His broadsword brandishing, Into the host did fling, As to o’erwhelm it, And many a deep wound lent, His arms with blood besprent, And many a cruel dent Bruizèd his helmet.

Gloster, that duke so good, Next of the royal blood, For famous England stood, With his brave brother; Clarence, in steel so bright, Though but a maiden knight Yet in that furious fight Scarce such another.

Warwick in blood did wade; Oxford the foe invade, And cruel slaughter made Still as they ran up; Suffolk his axe did ply; Beaumont and Willoughby Bare them right doughtily, Ferrars and Fanhope.

Upon Saint Crispin’s day Fought was this noble fray, Which fame did not delay To England to carry. O when shall Englishmen, With such acts fill a pen, Or England breed again Such a King Harry?

M. Drayton.

[ YE MARINERS OF ENGLAND]

A NAVAL ODE I Ye Mariners of England! That guard our native seas; Whose flag has braved, a thousand years, The battle and the breeze! Your glorious standard launch again To meet another foe! And sweep through the deep, While the stormy tempests blow; While the battle rages loud and long, And the stormy tempests blow.

II The spirits of your fathers Shall start from every wave!— For the deck it was their field of fame, And Ocean was their grave: Where Blake and mighty Nelson fell, Your manly hearts shall glow, As ye sweep through the deep, While the stormy tempests blow While the battle rages loud and long, And the stormy tempests blow.

III Britannia needs no bulwark, No towers along the steep; Her march is o’er the mountain-waves, Her home is on the deep. With thunders from her native oak She quells the floods below,— As they roar on the shore, When the stormy tempests blow; When the battle rages loud and long, And the stormy tempests blow.

AND THE STAR OF PEACE RETURN.

IV The meteor flag of England Shall yet terrific burn; Till danger’s troubled night depart, And the star of peace return. Then, then, ye ocean-warriors! Our song and feast shall flow To the fame of your name, When the storm has ceased to blow; When the fiery fight is heard no more, And the storm has ceased to blow.

T. Campbell.

[ THE GIRL DESCRIBES HER FAWN]

With sweetest milk and sugar first I it at my own fingers nursed; And as it grew, so every day It wax’d more white and sweet than they. It had so sweet a breath! and oft I blush’d to see its foot more soft And white, shall I say, than my hand? Nay, any lady’s of the land! It is a wond’rous thing how fleet ’Twas on those little silver feet: With what a pretty skipping grace It oft would challenge me the race; And when ’t had left me far away ’Twould stay, and run again, and stay, For it was nimbler much than hinds; And trod as if on the four winds.

I have a garden of my own, But so with roses overgrown, And lilies, that you would it guess To be a little wilderness, And all the spring-time of the year It only loved to be there. Among the beds of lilies I Have sought it oft, where it should lie; Yet could not, till itself would rise, Find it, although before mine eyes. For, in the flaxen lilies’ shade It like a bank of lilies laid. Upon the roses it would feed, Until its lips e’en seem’d to bleed; And then to me ’twould boldly trip, And print those roses on my lip. But all its chief delight was still On roses thus itself to fill; And its pure virgin limbs to fold In whitest sheets of lilies cold. Had it lived long, it would have been Lilies without, roses within.

A. Marvell.

[ THE SOLDIER’S DREAM]

Our bugles sang truce, for the night-cloud had lower’d, And the sentinel stars set their watch in the sky; And thousands had sunk on the ground overpower’d, The weary to sleep, and the wounded to die.

When reposing that night on my pallet of straw By the wolf-scaring faggot that guarded the slain, At the dead of the night a sweet Vision I saw; And thrice ere the morning I dreamt it again.

Methought from the battle-field’s dreadful array Far, far, I had roam’d on a desolate track: ’Twas Autumn,—and sunshine arose on the way To the home of my fathers, that welcomed me back.

I flew to the pleasant fields traversed so oft In life’s morning march, when my bosom was young; I heard my own mountain-goats bleating aloft, And knew the sweet strain that the corn-reapers sung.

Then pledged we the wine-cup, and fondly I swore From my home and my weeping friends never to part; My little ones kiss’d me a thousand times o’er, And my wife sobb’d aloud in her fulness of heart.

‘Stay—stay with us!—rest!—thou art weary and worn!’— And fain was their war-broken soldier to stay;— But sorrow return’d with the dawning of morn, And the voice in my dreaming ear melted away.

T. Campbell.

[ JOHN GILPIN]

John Gilpin was a citizen Of credit and renown, A train-band Captain eke was he Of famous London town.

John Gilpin’s spouse said to her dear, Though wedded we have been These twice ten tedious years, yet we No holiday have seen.

To-morrow is our wedding-day, And we will then repair Unto the Bell at Edmonton, All in a chaise and pair.

My sister and my sister’s child, Myself, and children three, Will fill the chaise; so you must ride On horseback after we.

He soon replied,—I do admire Of womankind but one, And you are she, my dearest dear, Therefore it shall be done.

I am a linendraper bold, As all the world doth know, And my good friend, the Callender, Will lend his horse to go.

Quoth Mistress Gilpin,—That’s well said; And for that wine is dear, We will be furnish’d with our own, Which is both bright and clear.

John Gilpin kiss’d his loving wife; O’erjoy’d was he to find That though on pleasure she was bent, She had a frugal mind.

The morning came, the chaise was brought, But yet was not allow’d To drive up to the door, lest all Should say that she was proud.

So three doors off the chaise was stay’d, Where they did all get in, Six precious souls, and all agog To dash through thick and thin.

Smack went the whip, round went the wheels; Were never folks so glad, The stones did rattle underneath, As if Cheapside were mad.

John Gilpin at his horse’s side, Seized fast the flowing mane, And up he got in haste to ride, But soon came down again.

For saddle-tree scarce reach’d had he, His journey to begin, When turning round his head he saw Three customers come in.

So down he came, for loss of time Although it grieved him sore, Yet loss of pence, full well he knew, Would trouble him much more.

’Twas long before the customers Were suited to their mind, When Betty screaming came downstairs, The wine is left behind.

Good lack! quoth he, yet bring it me, My leathern belt likewise In which I bear my trusty sword When I do exercise.

Now Mistress Gilpin, careful soul, Had two stone bottles found, To hold the liquor that she loved, And keep it safe and sound.

Each bottle had a curling ear, Through which the belt he drew, And hung a bottle on each side To make his balance true.

Then over all, that he might be Equipp’d from top to toe, His long red cloak well-brush’d and neat, He manfully did throw.

Now see him mounted once again Upon his nimble steed, Full slowly pacing o’er the stones, With caution and good heed.

But finding soon a smoother road Beneath his well-shod feet, The snorting beast began to trot, Which gall’d him in his seat.

So, Fair and softly! John he cried, But John he cried in vain; That trot became a gallop soon, In spite of curb and rein.

So stooping down, as needs he must Who cannot sit upright, He grasp’d the mane with both his hands And eke with all his might.

His horse, who never in that sort Had handled been before, What thing upon his back had got Did wonder more and more.

Away went Gilpin neck or nought, Away went hat and wig; He little dreamt, when he set out, Of running such a rig.

The wind did blow, the cloak did fly, Like streamer long and gay, Till, loop and button failing both, At last it flew away.

Then might all people well discern The bottles he had slung; A bottle swinging at each side As hath been said or sung.

The dogs did bark, the children scream’d, Up flew the windows all, And every soul cried out, Well done! As loud as he could bawl.

Away went Gilpin—who but he? His fame soon spread around, He carries weight, he rides a race, ’Tis for a thousand pound.

And still as fast as he drew near, ’Twas wonderful to view How in a trice the turnpike-men Their gates wide open threw.

And now as he went bowing down His reeking head full low, The bottles twain behind his back Were shatter’d at a blow.

Down ran the wine into the road Most piteous to be seen, Which made his horse’s flanks to smoke As they had basted been.

But still he seem’d to carry weight, With leathern girdle braced, For all might see the bottle-necks Still dangling at his waist.

Thus all through merry Islington These gambols he did play, And till he came unto the Wash Of Edmonton so gay.

And there he threw the Wash about On both sides of the way, Just like unto a trundling mop, Or a wild-goose at play.

At Edmonton his loving wife From the balcòny spied Her tender husband, wondering much To see how he did ride.

Stop, stop, John Gilpin!—Here’s the house— They all at once did cry, The dinner waits, and we are tired; Said Gilpin—So am I!

But yet his horse was not a whit Inclined to tarry there, For why? his owner had a house Full ten miles off, at Ware.

So like an arrow swift he flew Shot by an archer strong, So did he fly—which brings me to The middle of my song.

Away went Gilpin, out of breath, And sore against his will, Till at his friend the Callender’s His horse at last stood still.

The Callender, amazed to see His neighbour in such trim, Laid down his pipe, flew to the gate, And thus accosted him—

What news? what news? your tidings tell, Tell me you must and shall— Say, why bareheaded you are come, Or why you come at all?

Now Gilpin had a pleasant wit, And loved a timely joke, And thus unto the Callender In merry guise he spoke—

I came because your horse would come; And if I well forbode, My hat and wig will soon be here, They are upon the road.

The Callender, right glad to find His friend in merry pin, Return’d him not a single word, But to the house went in.

Whence straight he came with hat and wig, A wig that flow’d behind, A hat not much the worse for wear, Each comely in its kind.

He held them up, and in his turn Thus show’d his ready wit, My head is twice as big as yours, They therefore needs must fit.

But let me scrape the dirt away, That hangs upon your face; And stop and eat, for well you may Be in a hungry case.

Said John—It is my wedding-day, And all the world would stare, If wife should dine at Edmonton And I should dine at Ware.

So, turning to his horse, he said, I am in haste to dine, ’Twas for your pleasure you came here, You shall go back for mine.

Ah, luckless speech, and bootless boast! For which he paid full dear, For while he spake a braying ass Did sing most loud and clear.

Whereat his horse did snort as he Had heard a lion roar, And gallop’d off with all his might, As he had done before.

Away went Gilpin, and away Went Gilpin’s hat and wig; He lost them sooner than at first, For why? they were too big.

Now Mistress Gilpin, when she saw Her husband posting down Into the country far away, She pull’d out half-a-crown;

And thus unto the youth she said, That drove them to the Bell, This shall be yours, when you bring back My husband safe and well.

The youth did ride, and soon did meet John coming back amain, Whom in a trice he tried to stop By catching at his rein.

But not performing what he meant, And gladly would have done, The frighten’d steed he frighten’d more And made him faster run.

Away went Gilpin, and away Went postboy at his heels, The postboy’s horse right glad to miss The lumbering of the wheels.

Six gentlemen upon the road Thus seeing Gilpin fly, With postboy scampering in the rear, They raised the hue and cry.

Stop thief!—stop thief!—a highwayman! Not one of them was mute, And all and each that pass’d that way Did join in the pursuit.

And now the turnpike gates again Flew open in short space, The toll-men thinking as before That Gilpin rode a race.

And so he did and won it too, For he got first to town, Nor stopp’d till where he had got up He did again get down.

—Now let us sing, Long live the king, And Gilpin long live he, And when he next doth ride abroad, May I be there to see!

W. Cowper.

[ HOHENLINDEN]

On Linden, when the sun was low, All bloodless lay th’ untrodden snow; And dark as winter was the flow Of Iser, rolling rapidly.

But Linden saw another sight, When the drum beat, at dead of night Commanding fires of death to light The darkness of her scenery.

By torch and trumpet fast array’d Each horseman drew his battle-blade, And furious every charger neigh’d To join the dreadful revelry.

Then shook the hills with thunder riven; Then rush’d the steed to battle driven, And louder than the bolts of Heaven, Far flash’d the red artillery.