English

Would you know how I, Buchanan,
Met the Devil here in London
Chatted with him, interview'd him?
Listen, then, and you shall her!

Not in great heroic measures
Shall I sing on this occasion,
But in roguish rhymeless stanzas
Much esteem'd by Greeks and Germans.

Genius of the Greeks and Germans,
Lend me, then, your light trochaics,
Loose, an easy-fitting raiment
Fit to lounge in, as I sing!

For my perilous subject-matter
Mingled is of jest and earnest,
To be treated in a manner

And lo! while all men come and pass away,
That Phantom of the Christ, forlorn and grey,
Haunteth the Earth with desolate footfall. . . .

God help the Christ, that Christ may help us all!

Then, pointing with dark finger thro' the gloom
On Him who stood erect with hoary head,
The Judge gazed down with dreadful eyes, and said:

" Ere yet I speak thy Doom that must be spoken
Before the World whose great heart thou hast broken,
Hast thou another word to say, O Jew?"

And the Jew answer'd, while the heavenly blue
Fill'd like an eye with starry crystal tears,
" Far have I wander'd thro' the sleepless years
Be pitiful, O Judge, and let me die!"

" Death to him, Death!" I heard the voices cry

Even then, methought, that angry living Sea
Surged round Him, and again I did discern
The Phantoms of Golgotha! — Soldiers stern
Who pointed with their spears and pricked Him on,
While on His shoulders drooping woe-begone
They thrust the great black Cross! Upon His head
A crown of thorns was set, and dript its red
Dark drops upon His brow, while loud they cried
" Lo, this is Jesus whom we crucified,
And lo, he hath risen, and shall die once more!"
And as a wall is cast on some dark shore
By breaking waves of Ocean and is ta'en

Then said that Form who sat in Judgment there:
" Ye saw a mirage and ye thought it fair,
He brought a gospel and ye found it sweet,
Yea, deemed it heavenly manoa and did eat,
Yet were ye empty still and never fed.
This man has given ye husks to eat, not bread.
He said " There is no Death! " yet Death doth reign.
He promised you a gift no man may gain,
Yea, Life that shall endure eternally,
And told ye of a God no eye shall see,
Because He is not! Bid him lift his hand
And show the Life Divine and Heavenly Land,

Far as the sight
Could penetrate the blackness of the Night,
Stretched the multitudinous living Sea,
The angry waters of Humanity,
And lo! their voice was as the ocean's roar
Thund'rously beating on some sleepless shore;
And He, the Man Divine, whose eyes were dim
With shining down on those who worshipt, Him,
Seem'd as a lonely pharos on a rock,
Firm in its place, yet shaken by the shock,
And ever blinded by the pitiless foam
Of waves that surge and thunder as they come!
And as I have seen, on some lone ocean-isle

Then, as He bent
His brow like one who kneels for sacrament,
And on His feeble form and hoary head
The benediction of the Night was shed,
Methought I saw a Shape behind Him stand,
Grim as a godhead graven in brass, his hand
Uplifted, and his wrinkled face set stern,
While terrible his deep black eyes did burn
In scornful wrath, Naked as any stone
He stood, save for a beast's skin loosely thrown
Around his dusky shoulders, and he said:

" Thy Witnesses? — Lord of the Quick and Dead,

Then said that Form who sat in Judgment:


" Jew!
Once judged and slain, yet risen and judged anew,
Thou hast heard the Accuser and his Witnesses
Hast thou a word to utter answering these?
Hast thou a living Soul beneath the sky
To rise upon thy side and testify?
Summon thy Witnesses, if such there he,
Ere I pronounce the doom of Man on thee!"

The Jew gazed round, and wheresoe'er His gaze
Shed on that throng its gentle suffering rays
Tumult and wrath were hush'd, as in deep Night

Then instantly, as if some swift hand drew
A curtain back, the Darkness of the Night
Was cloven, and thronging in the starry light
New legions of the ghostly Dead appear'd
And ever, as the Judgment Seat they near'd,
They shriek'd " M ESSIAH ;" and with lips apart
Startled as if a knife had prick'd His heart,
That pale Jew listen'd and His wan face turn'd
To those who cried; but when those hosts discern'd
His human lineaments they shriek'd anew:
" One God we worship, and this Man we slew,
Seeing he took the Holy Name in vain!

" Thou hearest, Jew?"

But Jesus made no sign.

With woe unutterable and pity vast
As the still Heaven on which His eyes were cast,
He listen'd dumbly, while new voices cried,
" We too were slain, and by his Priests we died!"
And like to cloud on cloud, blown by the wind
And broken, dusky swarms of Humankind
Still came and went; and then rose walling crowds
Who bare the lighted candle, and in their shrouds
Walk'd naked-footed to the martyr's pyre;
With men whose entrails Famine's hidden fire