Margaret


  1

  O sweet pale Margaret,
  O rare pale Margaret,
  What lit your eyes with tearful power,
  Like moonlight on a falling shower?
  Who lent you, love, your mortal dower
  Of pensive thought and aspect pale,
  Your melancholy sweet and frail
  As perfume of the cuckoo-flower?
  From the westward-winding flood,
  From the evening-lighted wood,
  From all things outward you have won
  A tearful grace, as tho' you stood
  Between the rainbow and the sun.
  The very smile before you speak,
  That dimples your transparent cheek,
  Encircles all the heart, and feedeth
  The senses with a still delight
  Of dainty sorrow without sound,
  Like the tender amber round,
  Which the moon about her spreadeth,
  Moving thro' a fleecy night.


  2

  You love, remaining peacefully,
  To hear the murmur of the strife,
  But enter not the toil of life.
  Your spirit is the calmed sea,
  Laid by the tumult of the fight.
  You are the evening star, alway
  Remaining betwixt dark and bright:
  Lull'd echoes of laborious day
  Come to you, gleams of mellow light
  Float by you on the verge of night.


  3

  What can it matter, Margaret,
  What songs below the waning stars
  The lion-heart, Plantagenet,
  Sang looking thro' his prison bars?
  Exquisite Margaret, who can tell
  The last wild thought of Chatelet,
  Just ere the falling axe did part
  The burning brain from the true heart,
  Even in her sight he loved so well?


  4

  A fairy shield your Genius made
  And gave you on your natal day.
  Your sorrow, only sorrow's shade,
  Keeps real sorrow far away.
  You move not in such solitudes,
  You are not less divine,
  But more human in your moods,
  Than your twin-sister, Adeline.
  Your hair is darker, and your eyes
  Touch'd with a somewhat darker hue,
  And less aerially blue,
  But ever trembling thro' the dew
  Of dainty-woeful sympathies.


  5

  O sweet pale Margaret,
  O rare pale Margaret,
  Come down, come down, and hear me speak:
  Tie up the ringlets on your cheek:
  The sun is just about to set.
  The arching lines are tall and shady,
  And faint, rainy lights are seen,
  Moving in the leavy beech.
  Rise from the feast of sorrow, lady,
  Where all day long you sit between
  Joy and woe, and whisper each.
  Or only look across the lawn,
  Look out below your bower-eaves,
  Look down, and let your blue eyes dawn
  Upon me thro' the jasmine-leaves.

The Blackbird.


O blackbird! sing me something well:
While all the neighbours shoot thee round,
I keep smooth plats of fruitful ground,
Where thou may'st warble, eat and dwell.

  The espaliers and the standards all
  Are thine; the range of lawn and park:
  The unnetted black-hearts ripen dark,
  All thine, against the garden wall.

  Yet, tho' I spared thee all the spring,
  Thy sole delight is, sitting still,
  With that gold dagger of thy bill
  To fret the summer jenneting.

  A golden bill! the silver tongue,
  Cold February loved, is dry:
  Plenty corrupts the melody
  That made thee famous once, when young:

  And in the sultry garden-squares,
  Now thy flute-notes are changed to coarse,
  I hear thee not at all, or hoarse
  As when a hawker hawks his wares.

  Take warning! he that will not sing
  While yon sun prospers in the blue,
  Shall sing for want, ere leaves are new,
  Caught in the frozen palms of Spring.

The Death of the Old Year


  Full knee-deep lies the winter snow,
  And the winter winds are wearily sighing:
  Toll ye the church-bell sad and slow,
  And tread softly and speak low,
  For the old year lies a-dying.
  Old year, you must not die;
  You came to us so readily,
  You lived with us so steadily,
  Old year, you shall not die.

  He lieth still: he doth not move:
  He will not see the dawn of day.
  He hath no other life above.
  He gave me a friend, and a true, true-love,
  And the New-year will take 'em away.
  Old year, you must not go;
  So long as you have been with us,
  Such joy as you have seen with us,
  Old year, you shall not go.

  He froth'd his bumpers to the brim;
  A jollier year we shall not see.
  But tho' his eyes are waxing dim,
  And tho' his foes speak ill of him,
  He was a friend to me.
  Old year, you shall not die;
  We did so laugh and cry with you,
  I've half a mind to die with you,
  Old year, if you must die.

  He was full of joke and jest,
  But all his merry quips are o'er.
  To see him die, across the waste
  His son and heir doth ride post-haste,
  But he'll be dead before.
  Every one for his own.
  The night is starry and cold, my friend,
  And the New-year blithe and bold, my friend,
  Comes up to take his own.

  How hard he breathes! over the snow
  I heard just now the crowing cock.
  The shadows flicker to and fro:
  The cricket chirps: the light burns low:
  'Tis nearly twelve o'clock.
  Shake hands, before you die.
  Old year, we'll dearly rue for you:
  What is it we can do for you?
  Speak out before you die.

  His face is growing sharp and thin.
  Alack! our friend is gone.
  Close up his eyes: tie up his chin:
  Step from the corpse, and let him in
  That standeth there alone,
  And waiteth at the door.
  There's a new foot on the floor, my friend,
  And a new face at the door, my friend,
  A new face at the door.

To J. S.


  The wind, that beats the mountain, blows
  More softly round the open wold,
  And gently comes the world to those
  That are cast in gentle mould.

  And me this knowledge bolder made,
  Or else I had not dared to flow
  In these words toward you, and invade
  Even with a verse your holy woe.

  'Tis strange that those we lean on most,
  Those in whose laps our limbs are nursed,
  Fall into shadow, soonest lost:
  Those we love first are taken first.

  God gives us love. Something to love
  He lends us; but, when love is grown
  To ripeness, that on which it throve
  Falls off, and love is left alone.

  This is the curse of time. Alas!
  In grief I am not all unlearn'd;
  Once thro' mine own doors Death did pass;
  One went, who never hath return'd.

  He will not smile--nor speak to me
  Once more. Two years his chair is seen
  Empty before us. That was he
  Without whose life I had not been.

  Your loss is rarer; for this star
  Rose with you thro' a little arc
  Of heaven, nor having wander'd far
  Shot on the sudden into dark.

  I knew your brother: his mute dust
  I honour and his living worth:
  A man more pure and bold and just
  Was never born into the earth.

  I have not look'd upon you nigh,
  Since that dear soul hath fall'n asleep.
  Great Nature is more wise than I:
  I will not tell you not to weep.

  And tho' mine own eyes fill with dew,
  Drawn from the spirit thro' the brain,
  I will not even preach to you,
  "Weep, weeping dulls the inward pain".

  Let Grief be her own mistress still.
  She loveth her own anguish deep
  More than much pleasure. Let her will
  Be done--to weep or not to weep.

  I will not say "God's ordinance
  Of Death is blown in every wind";
  For that is not a common chance
  That takes away a noble mind.

  His memory long will live alone
  In all our hearts, as mournful light
  That broods above the fallen sun,
  And dwells in heaven half the night.

  Vain solace! Memory standing near
  Cast down her eyes, and in her throat
  Her voice seem'd distant, and a tear
  Dropt on the letters as I wrote.

  I wrote I know not what. In truth,
  How _should_ I soothe you anyway,
  Who miss the brother of your youth?
  Yet something I did wish to say:

  For he too was a friend to me:
  Both are my friends, and my true breast
  Bleedeth for both; yet it may be
  That only silence suiteth best.

  Words weaker than your grief would make
  Grief more. 'Twere better I should cease;
  Although myself could almost take
  The place of him that sleeps in peace.

  Sleep sweetly, tender heart, in peace:
  Sleep, holy spirit, blessed soul,
  While the stars burn, the moons increase,
  And the great ages onward roll.

  Sleep till the end, true soul and sweet.
  Nothing comes to thee new or strange.
  Sleep full of rest from head to feet;
  Lie still, dry dust, secure of change.

"You Ask Me Why, Tho' Ill At Ease..."


  You ask me, why, tho' ill at ease,
  Within this region I subsist,
  Whose spirits falter in the mist,
  And languish for the purple seas?

  It is the land that freemen till,
  That sober-suited Freedom chose,
  The land, where girt with friends or foes
  A man may speak the thing he will;

  A land of settled government,
  A land of just and old renown,
  Where Freedom broadens slowly down
  From precedent to precedent:

  Where faction seldom gathers head,
  But by degrees to fulness wrought,
  The strength of some diffusive thought
  Hath time and space to work and spread.

  Should banded unions persecute
  Opinion, and induce a time
  When single thought is civil crime,
  And individual freedom mute;

  Tho' Power should make from land to land
  The name of Britain trebly great--
  Tho' every channel of the State
  Should almost choke with golden sand--

  Yet waft me from the harbour-mouth,
  Wild wind! I seek a warmer sky,
  And I will see before I die
  The palms and temples of the South.

"Of Old Sat Freedom on the Heights..."


  Of old sat Freedom on the heights,
  The thunders breaking at her feet:
  Above her shook the starry lights:
  She heard the torrents meet.

  There in her place she did rejoice,
  Self-gather'd in her prophet-mind,
  But fragments of her mighty voice
  Came rolling on the wind.

  Then stept she down thro' town and field
  To mingle with the human race,
  And part by part to men reveal'd
  The fullness of her face--

  Grave mother of majestic works,
  From her isle-altar gazing down,
  Who, God-like, grasps the triple forks,
  And, King-like, wears the crown:

  Her open eyes desire the truth.
  The wisdom of a thousand years
  Is in them. May perpetual youth
  Keep dry their light from tears;

  That her fair form may stand and shine,
  Make bright our days and light our dreams,
  Turning to scorn with lips divine
  The falsehood of extremes!

"Love Thou Thy Land, With Love Far-Brought..."


  Love thou thy land, with love far-brought
  From out the storied Past, and used
  Within the Present, but transfused
  Thro' future time by power of thought.

  True love turn'd round on fixed poles,
  Love, that endures not sordid ends,
  For English natures, freemen, friends,
  Thy brothers and immortal souls.

  But pamper not a hasty time,
  Nor feed with crude imaginings
  The herd, wild hearts and feeble wings,
  That every sophister can lime.

  Deliver not the tasks of might
  To weakness, neither hide the ray
  From those, not blind, who wait for day,
  Tho' sitting girt with doubtful light.

  Make knowledge circle with the winds;
  But let her herald, Reverence, fly
  Before her to whatever sky
  Bear seed of men and growth of minds.

  Watch what main-currents draw the years:
  Cut Prejudice against the grain:
  But gentle words are always gain:
  Regard the weakness of thy peers:

  Nor toil for title, place, or touch
  Of pension, neither count on praise:
  It grows to guerdon after-days:
  Nor deal in watch-words overmuch;

  Not clinging to some ancient saw;
  Not master'd by some modern term;
  Not swift nor slow to change, but firm:
  And in its season bring the law;

  That from Discussion's lip may fall
  With Life, that, working strongly, binds--
  Set in all lights by many minds,
  To close the interests of all.

  For Nature also, cold and warm,
  And moist and dry, devising long,
  Thro' many agents making strong,
  Matures the individual form.

  Meet is it changes should control
  Our being, lest we rust in ease.
  We all are changed by still degrees,
  All but the basis of the soul.

  So let the change which comes be free
  To ingroove itself with that, which flies,
  And work, a joint of state, that plies
  Its office, moved with sympathy.

  A saying, hard to shape an act;
  For all the past of Time reveals
  A bridal dawn of thunder-peals,
  Wherever Thought hath wedded Fact.

  Ev'n now we hear with inward strife
  A motion toiling in the gloom--
  The Spirit of the years to come
  Yearning to mix himself with Life.

  A slow-develop'd strength awaits
  Completion in a painful school;
  Phantoms of other forms of rule,
  New Majesties of mighty States--

  The warders of the growing hour,
  But vague in vapour, hard to mark;
  And round them sea and air are dark
  With great contrivances of Power.

  Of many changes, aptly join'd,
  Is bodied forth the second whole,
  Regard gradation, lest the soul
  Of Discord race the rising wind;

  A wind to puff your idol-fires,
  And heap their ashes on the head;
  To shame the boast so often made,
  That we are wiser than our sires.

  Oh, yet, if Nature's evil star
  Drive men in manhood, as in youth,
  To follow flying steps of Truth
  Across the brazen bridge of war--

  If New and Old, disastrous feud,
  Must ever shock, like armed foes,
  And this be true, till Time shall close,
  That Principles are rain'd in blood;

  Not yet the wise of heart would cease
  To hold his hope thro' shame and guilt,
  But with his hand against the hilt,
  Would pace the troubled land, like Peace;

  Not less, tho' dogs of Faction bay,
  Would serve his kind in deed and word,
  Certain, if knowledge bring the sword,
  That knowledge takes the sword away--

  Would love the gleams of good that broke
  From either side, nor veil his eyes;
  And if some dreadful need should rise
  Would strike, and firmly, and one stroke:

  To-morrow yet would reap to-day,
  As we bear blossom of the dead;
  Earn well the thrifty months, nor wed
  Raw haste, half-sister to Delay.

The Goose



  I knew an old wife lean and poor,
  Her rags scarce held together;
  There strode a stranger to the door,
  And it was windy weather.

  He held a goose upon his arm,
  He utter'd rhyme and reason,
  "Here, take the goose, and keep you warm,
  It is a stormy season".

  She caught the white goose by the leg,
  A goose--'twas no great matter.
  The goose let fall a golden egg
  With cackle and with clatter.

  She dropt the goose, and caught the pelf,
  And ran to tell her neighbours;
  And bless'd herself, and cursed herself,
  And rested from her labours.

  And feeding high, and living soft,
  Grew plump and able-bodied;
  Until the grave churchwarden doff'd,
  The parson smirk'd and nodded.

  So sitting, served by man and maid,
  She felt her heart grow prouder:
  But, ah! the more the white goose laid
  It clack'd and cackled louder.

  It clutter'd here, it chuckled there;
  It stirr'd the old wife's mettle:
  She shifted in her elbow-chair,
  And hurl'd the pan and kettle.

  "A quinsy choke thy cursed note!"
  Then wax'd her anger stronger:
  "Go, take the goose, and wring her throat,
  I will not bear it longer".

  Then yelp'd the cur, and yawl'd the cat;
  Ran Gaffer, stumbled Gammer.
  The goose flew this way and flew that,
  And fill'd the house with clamour.

  As head and heels upon the floor
  They flounder'd all together,
  There strode a stranger to the door,
  And it was windy weather:

  He took the goose upon his arm,
  He utter'd words of scorning;
  "So keep you cold, or keep you warm,
  It is a stormy morning".

  The wild wind rang from park and plain,
  And round the attics rumbled,
  Till all the tables danced again,
  And half the chimneys tumbled.

  The glass blew in, the fire blew out,
  The blast was hard and harder.
  Her cap blew off, her gown blew up,
  And a whirlwind clear'd the larder;

  And while on all sides breaking loose
  Her household fled the danger,
  Quoth she, "The Devil take the goose,
  And God forget the stranger!"

The Epic



  At Francis Allen's on the Christmas-eve,--
  The game of forfeits done--the girls all kiss'd
  Beneath the sacred bush and past away--
  The parson Holmes, the poet Everard Hall,
  The host, and I sat round the wassail-bowl,
  Then half-way ebb'd: and there we held a talk,
  How all the old honour had from Christmas gone,
  Or gone, or dwindled down to some odd games
  In some odd nooks like this; till I, tired out
  With cutting eights that day upon the pond,
  Where, three times slipping from the outer edge,
  I bump'd the ice into three several stars,
  Fell in a doze; and half-awake I heard
  The parson taking wide and wider sweeps,
  Now harping on the church-commissioners,
  Now hawking at Geology and schism;
  Until I woke, and found him settled down
  Upon the general decay of faith
  Right thro' the world, "at home was little left,
  And none abroad: there was no anchor, none,
  To hold by". Francis, laughing, clapt his hand
  On Everard's shoulder, with "I hold by him".
  "And I," quoth Everard, "by the wassail-bowl."
  "Why, yes," I said, "we knew your gift that way
  At college: but another which you had,
  I mean of verse (for so we held it then),
  What came of that?"  "You know," said Frank, "he burnt
  His epic, his King Arthur, some twelve books "--
  And then to me demanding why? "Oh, sir,
  He thought that nothing new was said, or else
  Something so said 'twas nothing--that a truth
  Looks freshest in the fashion of the day:
  God knows: he has a mint of reasons: ask.
  It pleased _me_ well enough." "Nay, nay," said Hall,
  "Why take the style of those heroic times?
  For nature brings not back the Mastodon,
  Nor we those times; and why should any man
  Remodel models? these twelve books of mine
  Were faint Homeric echoes, nothing-worth,
  Mere chaff and draff, much better burnt."
  "But I," Said Francis, "pick'd the eleventh from this hearth,
  And have it: keep a thing its use will come.
  I hoard it as a sugar-plum for Holmes."
  He laugh'd, and I, though sleepy, like a horse
  That hears the corn-bin open, prick'd my ears;
  For I remember'd Everard's college fame
  When we were Freshmen: then at my request
  He brought it; and the poet little urged,
  But with some prelude of disparagement,
  Read, mouthing out his hollow oes and aes,
  Deep-chested music, and to this result.

Morte D'Arthur



  So all day long the noise of battle roll'd
  Among the mountains by the winter sea;
  Until King Arthur's table, man by man,
  Had fall'n in Lyonness about their Lord,
  King Arthur: then, because his wound was deep,
  The bold Sir Bedivere uplifted him,
  Sir Bedivere, the last of all his knights,
  And bore him to a chapel nigh the field,
  A broken chancel with a broken cross,
  That stood on a dark strait of barren land.
  On one side lay the Ocean, and on one
  Lay a great water, and the moon was full.
  Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere:
  "The sequel of to-day unsolders all
  The goodliest fellowship of famous knights
  Whereof this world holds record. Such a sleep
  They sleep--the men I loved. I think that we
  Shall never more, at any future time,
  Delight our souls with talk of knightly deeds,
  Walking about the gardens and the halls
  Of Camelot, as in the days that were.
  I perish by this people which I made,--
  Tho' Merlin sware that I should come again
  To rule once more--but let what will be, be,
  I am so deeply smitten thro' the helm
  That without help I cannot last till morn.
  Thou therefore take my brand Excalibur,
  Which was my pride: for thou rememberest how
  In those old days, one summer noon, an arm
  Rose up from out the bosom of the lake,
  Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful,
  Holding the sword--and how I row'd across
  And took it, and have worn it, like a king:
  And, wheresoever I am sung or told
  In aftertime, this also shall be known:
  But now delay not: take Excalibur,
  And fling him far into the middle mere:
  Watch what thou seëst, and lightly bring me word."
  To him replied the bold Sir Bedivere:
  "It is not meet, Sir King, to leave thee thus,
  Aidless, alone, and smitten thro' the helm.
  A little thing may harm a wounded man.
  Yet I thy hest will all perform at full,
  Watch what I see, and lightly bring thee word."
  So saying, from the ruin'd shrine he stept
  And in the moon athwart the place of tombs,
  Where lay the mighty bones of ancient men,
  Old knights, and over them the sea-wind sang
  Shrill, chill, with flakes of foam. He, stepping down
  By zig-zag paths, and juts of pointed rock,
  Came on the shining levels of the lake.
  There drew he forth the brand Excalibur,
  And o'er him, drawing it, the winter moon,
  Brightening the skirts of a long cloud, ran forth
  And sparkled keen with frost against the hilt:
  For all the haft twinkled with diamond sparks,
  Myriads of topaz-lights, and jacinth-work
  Of subtlest jewellery. He gazed so long
  That both his eyes were dazzled, as he stood,
  This way and that dividing the swift mind,
  In act to throw: but at the last it seem'd
  Better to leave Excalibur conceal'd
  There in the many-knotted waterflags,
  That whistled stiff and dry about the marge.
  So strode he back slow to the wounded king.
  Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere:
  "Hast thou perform'd my mission which I gave?
  What is it thou hast seen? or what hast heard?"
  And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere:
  "I heard the ripple washing in the reeds,
  And the wild water lapping on the crag."
  To whom replied King Arthur, faint and pale:
  "Thou hast betray'd thy nature and thy name,
  Not rendering true answer, as beseem'd
  Thy fëalty, nor like a noble knight:
  For surer sign had follow'd, either hand,
  Or voice, or else a motion of the mere.
  This is a shameful thing for men to lie.
  Yet now, I charge thee, quickly go again
  As thou art lief and dear, and do the thing
  I bade thee, watch, and lightly bring me word."
  Then went Sir Bedivere the second time
  Across the ridge, and paced beside the mere,
  Counting the dewy pebbles, fix'd in thought;
  But when he saw the wonder of the hilt,
  How curiously and strangely chased, he smote
  His palms together, and he cried aloud,
  "And if indeed I cast the brand away,
  Surely a precious thing, one worthy note,
  Should thus be lost for ever from the earth,
  Which might have pleased the eyes of many men.
  What good should follow this, if this were done?
  What harm, undone? deep harm to disobey,
  Seeing obedience is the bond of rule,
  Were it well to obey then, if a king demand
  An act unprofitable against himself?
  The king is sick, and knows not what he does.
  What record, or what relic of my lord
  Should be to aftertime, but empty breath
  And rumours of a doubt? but were this kept,
  Stored in some treasure-house of mighty kings,
  Some one might show it at a joust of arms,
  Saying, 'King Arthur's sword, Excalibur,
  Wrought by the lonely maiden of the Lake.
  Nine years she wrought it, sitting in the deeps
  Upon the hidden bases of the hills."
  So might some old man speak in the aftertime
  To all the people, winning reverence.
  But now much honour and much fame were lost."
  So spake he, clouded with his own conceit,
  And hid Excalibur the second time,
  And so strode back slow to the wounded King.
  Then spoke King Arthur, breathing heavily:
  "What is it thou hast seen? or what hast heard?"
  And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere:
  "I heard the water lapping on the crag,
  And the long ripple washing in the reeds."
  To whom replied King Arthur, much in wrath:
  "Ah, miserable and unkind, untrue,
  Unknightly, traitor-hearted! Woe is me!
  Authority forgets a dying king,
  Laid widow'd of the power in his eye
  That bow'd the will. I see thee what thou art,
  For thou, the latest-left of all my knights,
  In whom should meet the offices of all,
  Thou wouldst betray me for the precious hilt;
  Either from lust of gold, or like a girl
  Valuing the giddy pleasure of the eyes.
  Yet, for a man may fail in duty twice,
  And the third time may prosper, get thee hence:
  But, if thou spare to fling Excalibur,
  I will arise and slay thee with my hands."
  Then quickly rose Sir Bedivere, and ran,
  And, leaping down the ridges lightly, plunged
  Among the bulrush-beds, and clutch'd the sword,
  And strongly wheel'd and threw it. The great brand
  Made lightnings in the splendour of the moon,
  And flashing round and round, and whirl'd in an arch,
  Shot like a streamer of the northern morn,
  Seen where the moving isles of winter shock
  By night, with noises of the northern sea.
  So flash'd and fell the brand Excalibur:
  But ere he dipt the surface, rose an arm
  Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful,
  And caught him by the hilt, and brandish'd him
  Three times, and drew him under in the mere.
  And lightly went the other to the King.
  Then spoke King Arthur, drawing thicker breath:
  "Now see I by thine eyes that this is done.
  Speak out: what is it thou hast heard, or seen?"
  And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere:
  "Sir King, I closed mine eyelids, lest the gems
  Should blind my purpose, for I never saw,
  Nor shall see, here or elsewhere, till I die,
  Not tho' I live three lives of mortal men,
  So great a miracle as yonder hilt.
  Then with both hands I flung him, wheeling him;
  But when I look'd again, behold an arm,
  Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful,
  That caught him by the hilt, and brandish'd him
  Three times, and drew him under in the mere."
  And answer made King Arthur, breathing hard:
  "My end draws nigh;'tis time that I were gone.
  Make broad thy shoulders to receive my weight,
  And bear me to the margin; yet I fear
  My wound hath taken cold, and I shall die."
  So saying, from the pavement he hath rose,
  Slowly, with pain, reclining on his arm,
  And looking wistfully with wide blue eyes
  As in a picture. Him Sir Bedivere
  Remorsefully regarded thro' his tears,
  And would have spoken, but he found not words,
  Then took with care, and kneeling on one knee,
  O'er both his shoulders drew the languid hands,
  And rising bore him thro' the place of tombs.
  But, as he walk'd, King Arthur panted hard,
  Like one that feels a nightmare on his bed
  When all the house is mute. So sigh'd the King,
  Muttering and murmuring at his ear"
  Quick, quick! I fear it is too late, and I shall die ".
  But the other swiftly strode from ridge to ridge,
  Clothed with his breath, and looking, as he walk'd,
  Larger than human on the frozen hills.
  He heard the deep behind him, and a cry
  Before. His own thought drove him like a goad.
  Dry clash'd his harness in the icy caves
  And barren chasms, and all to left and right
  The bare black cliff clang'd round him, as he based
  His feet on juts of slippery crag that rang
  Sharp-smitten with the dint of armed heels--
  And on a sudden, lo! the level lake,
  And the long glories of the winter moon.
  Then saw they how there hove a dusky barge,
  Dark as a funeral scarf from stem to stern,
  Beneath them; and descending they were ware
  That all the decks were dense with stately forms
  Black-stoled, black-hooded, like a dream--by these
  Three Queens with crowns of gold--and from them rose
  A cry that shiver'd to the tingling stars,
  And, as it were one voice, an agony
  Of lamentation, like a wind, that shrills
  All night in a waste land, where no one comes,
  Or hath come, since the making of the world.
  Then murmur'd Arthur, "Place me in the barge,"
  And to the barge they came. There those three Queens
  Put forth their hands, and took the King, and wept.
  But she, that rose the tallest of them all
  And fairest, laid his head upon her lap,
  And loosed the shatter'd casque, and chafed his hands,
  And call'd him by his name, complaining loud,
  And dropping bitter tears against his brow
  Striped with dark blood: for all his face was white
  And colourless, and like the wither'd moon
  Smote by the fresh beam of the springing east;
  And all his greaves and cuisses dash'd with drops
  Of onset; and the light and lustrous curls--
  That made his forehead like a rising sun
  High from the däis-throne--were parch'd with dust;
  Or, clotted into points and hanging loose,
  Mix'd with the knightly growth that fringed his lips.
  So like a shatter'd column lay the King;
  Not like that Arthur who, with lance in rest,
  From spur to plume a star of tournament,
  Shot thro' the lists at Camelot, and charged
  Before the eyes of ladies and of kings.
  Then loudly cried the bold Sir Bedivere,
  "Ah! my Lord Arthur, whither shall I go?
  Where shall I hide my forehead and my eyes?
  For now I see the true old times are dead,
  When every morning brought a noble chance,
  And every chance brought out a noble knight.
  Such times have been not since the light that led
  The holy Elders with the gift of myrrh.
  But now the whole ROUND TABLE is dissolved
  Which was an image of the mighty world;
  And I, the last, go forth companionless.
  And the days darken round me, and the years,
  Among new men, strange faces, other minds."
  And slowly answer'd Arthur from the barge:
  "The old order changeth, yielding place to new,
  And God fulfils Himself in many ways,
  Lest one good custom should corrupt the world.
  Comfort thyself: what comfort is in me?
  I have lived my life, and that which I have done
  May He within Himself make pure! but thou,
  If thou shouldst never see my face again,
  Pray for my soul. More things are wrought by prayer
  Than this world dreams of. Wherefore, let thy voice
  Rise like a fountain for me night and day.
  For what are men better than sheep or goats
  That nourish a blind life within the brain,
  If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer
  Both for themselves and those who call them friend?
  For so the whole round earth is every way
  Bound by gold chains about the feet of God.
  But now farewell. I am going a long way
  With these thou seëst--if indeed I go--
  (For all my mind is clouded with a doubt)
  To the island-valley of Avilion;
  Where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow,
  Nor ever wind blows loudly; but it lies
  Deep-meadow'd, happy, fair with orchard-lawns
  And bowery hollows crown'd with summer sea,
  Where I will heal me of my grievous wound."
  So said he, and the barge with oar and sail
  Moved from the brink, like some full-breasted swan
  That, fluting a wild carol ere her death,
  Ruffles her pure cold plume, and takes the flood
  With swarthy webs. Long stood Sir Bedivere
  Revolving many memories, till the hull
  Look'd one black dot against the verge of dawn.
  And on the mere the wailing died away.

  Here ended Hall, and our last light, that long
  Had wink'd and threaten'd darkness, flared and fell:
  At which the Parson, sent to sleep with sound,
  And waked with silence, grunted "Good!" but we
  Sat rapt: It was the tone with which he read--
  Perhaps some modern touches here and there
  Redeem'd it from the charge of nothingness--
  Or else we loved the man, and prized his work;
  I know not: but we sitting, as I said,
  The cock crew loud; as at that time of year
  The lusty bird takes every hour for dawn:
  Then Francis, muttering, like a man ill-used,
  "There now--that's nothing!" drew a little back,
  And drove his heel into the smoulder'd log,
  That sent a blast of sparkles up the flue;
  And so to bed; where yet in sleep I seem'd
  To sail with Arthur under looming shores.
  Point after point; till on to dawn, when dreams
  Begin to feel the truth and stir of day,
  To me, methought, who waited with a crowd,
  There came a bark that, blowing forward, bore,
  King Arthur, like a modern gentleman
  Of stateliest port; and all the people cried,
  "Arthur is come again: he cannot die".
  Then those that stood upon the hills behind
  Repeated--"Come again, and thrice as fair";
  And, further inland, voices echoed--
  "Come With all good things, and war shall be no more".
  At this a hundred bells began to peal,
  That with the sound I woke, and heard indeed
  The clear church-bells ring in the Christmas morn.