“Come and I shall show thee the dead of the desert”.

'Tis no herd of lions and whelps that covers the eye of the plain,
Nor the glory of Bashan, brave oaks, that have crashed to their fall, mighty fall.
By the side of their scorching black tents lie giants stretched out in the sun.
They crouch on the cold desert sands, lionesses are crouching secure;
The sand sinks away 'neath the place where the bodies and bulk of bone lie.
The mighty are clinging to earth, deep in slumber; their weapons are by,

On every tree, in every plain,
I trace the jovial spring in vain;
A sickly langour veils mine eyes
And fast my waning vigour flies.

Nor flowery plain, nor budding tree,
That smile on others, smile on me;
Mine eyes from death shall court repose,
Nor shed a tear before they close.

What bliss to me can seasons bring?
Or what the needless pride of spring?
The cypress bough, that suits the bier,
Retains its verdure all the year.

'Tis true, my vine, so fresh and fair,
Might claim awhile my wonted care;

Awake with the sunrise! Clamber on the hills
To find the gold orient,
And being first to greet the sunlight, each
Will guaff to his soul's content.
The dear morn of God like a sapful freshet goes
Around you, and o'erflows;
For all the aged and withered in your heart
Its sunlight will revive,
And all idolatrous and vile therein
The morning star will shrive.
Guard ye the golden treasure hid away
As succour for your heart.
Ye who approached, burdened with sin and care,
Guiltless and rich will part.

From Lincoln to London rode forth our young squire,
To bring down a wife whom the swains might admire;
But, in spite of whatever the mortal could say,
The goddess objected the length of the way.

To give up the op'ra, the park, and the ball,
For to view the stag's horns in an old country hall;
To have neither China nor India to see,
Nor a laceman to plague in a morning — not she!

To forsake the dear playhouse, Quin, Garrick, and Clive.
Who by dint of mere humour had kept her alive;
To forego the full box for his lonesome abode,

Ever, through darkness and unmeasured gloom,
When after soft arms' scent and warm embrace
I meet the eyeless mute deliberate face
That waits and threatens where no bounteous bloom
Of summer fills the fields no suns illume,
May I bear with me to the joyless place
Eternal dreams of one white goddess grace
Whom I have served, — and will serve to the tomb.

For she the queen, when once her lips have smiled,
Forbids the soul she smiles on ever to flee:
She lures him as the flowers' smile lures a child

'Twas in a land of learning,
The Muse's favourite city,
Such pranks of late
Were play'd by a rat,
As — tempt one to be witty

All in a college study,
Where books were in great plenty;
This rat would devour
More sense in an hour,
Than I could write — in twenty.

Corporeal food, 'tis granted,
Serves vermin less refined, Sir;
But this, a rat of taste,
All other rats surpass'd,
And he prey'd on the food of the mind, Sir.

His breakfast, half the morning
He constantly attended;
And when the bell rung

A BALLAD, ALLUDING TO A STORY RECORDED OF HER WHEN SHE WAS PRISONER AT WOODSTOCK, 1554

Will you hear how once repining
Great Eliza captive lay?
Each ambitious thought resigning,
Foe to riches, pomp, and sway.

While the nymphs and swains delighted
Tript around in all their pride,
Envying joys by others slighted,
Thus the royal maiden cried:

" Bred on plains, or born in valleys,
Who would bid those scenes adieu?

A PROFESSIONAL BALLAD

There was a young man in Boston town,
He bought him a stethoscope nice and new,
All mounted and finished and polished down,
With an ivory cap and a stopper too.

It happened a spider within did crawl,
And spun him a web of ample size,
Wherein there chanced one day to fall
A couple of very imprudent flies.

The first was a bottle-fly, big and blue,
The second was smaller, and thin and long;
So there was a concert between the two,
Like an octave flute and a tavern gong.

Of steel and iron, cold and hard and dumb,
Now forge thyself a heart, O man! and come
And walk the town of slaughter. Thou shalt see
With waking eyes, and touch with conscious hands,
On fences, posts, and doors,
On paying in the street, on wooden floors,
The black, dried blood, commingled here and there
With brains and splintered bone.
And thou shalt wander in and out of ruins
Of broken walls, doors wrenched from off their hinges,
Stoves overturned, dilapidated hearths,
And singed beams laid bare, and half-burnt bricks,

A maiden wandering from the East,
A saint immaculately white,
I saw in holy dream last night,
Who rode upon a milk-white beast;
Across the woods her shadow fell,
And wrought a strange and silent spell,
A miracle.

With firm-set eyes, and changeless face,
She passed the cities one by one;
Her hair was coloured like the sun,
And shed a glory round the place;
Where'er she came, she was so fair,
That men fell down and worshipped there
In silent prayer.

And ever in her sacred hands
She bore a quaintly carven pyx