When troubled in spirit, when weary of life,
When I faint 'neath its burdens, and shrink from its strife,
When its fruits, turned to ashes, are mocking my taste,
And its fairest scene seems but a desolate waste,
Then come ye not near me, my sad heart to cheer,
With friendship's soft accents, or sympathy's tear.
No pity I ask, and no counsel I need,
But bring me, O, bring me, my gallant young steed,
With his high arched neck, and his nostril spread wide,
His eye full of fire, and his step full of pride!

I hate the knave whose private life
Is noted for its lack of morals,
Who starves his children, beats his wife,
Who fights and drinks and quarrels;
But oh! I view more sternly far
(How hostile grow my eyes of hazel!)
The rogue who suffers from catarrh —
The kind that's known as " nasal " !
With looks of loathing I behold
The wretched man who's got a cold!

Though criminals I can forgive,
And gladly suffer fools who bore me,
At peace with him I cannot live
Who scatters microbes o'er me!
He should be exiled, out of reach,

The sculptor paused before his finished work, —
A wondrous statue of divinest mould.
Like Cytherea's were the rounded limbs,
The hands, in whose soft fulness, still and deep,
Like sleeping Loves, the chiselled dimples lay,
The hair's rich fall, the lip's exquisite curve.
But most like Juno's were the brow of pride,
And lofty bearing of the matchless head; —
While over all, a mystic holiness,
Like Dian's purest smile, around her hung,
And hushed the idle gazer, like the air
Which haunts at night the temples of the gods.

Though most of us may disbelieve in fairies,
And label Luck a superstitious myth,
If we 'd had an experience like Mary's
(I mean, of course, my cousin Mary Smith)
We certainly should realize, like her,
How of the Unexpected does occur.

An aunt of hers, old Mrs Smith (of Barnet),
Had given her a bracelet, subtly chased —
Two aluminium snakes with eyes of garnet
Whose bodies were adroitly interlaced —
A bangle which poor Mary couldn't bear

I went to Murren (Switzerland)
For winter sports, you'll understand.
(I'm very fond of snow and ice,
Of alpenstocks and edelweiss.)
I booked my rooms at the hotel,
Unpacked, and, having rung the bell,

I asked the waiter would he please
To oil my skates and air my skis.
" Alas! " said he, " I greatly fear
You'll neither skate nor ski this year!
The thaw has melted ice and snow!
Now, if you'd come a year ago...! "

The sunny South of France I sought;
Blue goggles and a helmet bought;
Prepared to loiter, book in hand,

MADAM ,

Some of these Papers coming to your view,
Receiv'd incouragement from you,
You first commended them unto the Press
And therefore I could do no less
Then give them these commands,
First that they kiss your hands,
Then at your Honour's feet let them fall low,
Confessing they their being to you owe.

Nor is this all, but let them further say,

Daughter of Crete, how one brief hour,
 E'en in thy young love's early morn,
Sends storm and darkness o'er thy bower,—
 O doomed, O desolate, O lorn!
The breast which pillowed thy fair head
 Rejects its burden, and the eye
 Which looked its love so earnestly
Its last cold glance hath on thee shed;
The arms which were thy living zone,
Around thee closely, warmly thrown,
Shall others clasp, deserted one!

Yet, Ariadne, worthy thou
Of the dark fate which meets thee now,
For thou art grovelling in thy woe;

Some poet dreams come to the soul
 In mystic beauty clad,
Unearthly in their loveliness,
 So exquisitely sad.
Shadowy and dim and cloud-like things
Floating about on unseen wings,
 They tremble on our sight;
As in our nightly visions come
Pale spirits from their starry home,
 To vanish with the light,
And by the waking heart forgot,
E'en as a rose remembers not,
 In sunshine rich and warm,
The moonbeams that through night's long hours
Came still and cold, in silver showers,
 Upon her slumbering form.

Know ye the Red Cloud — Red Cloud of Afric —
Endless, unfathom'd, unceasing, borne on the warm wind;
Whelming the corn and fruit-land, farm and rick,
With the green veld before it, and the brown veld behind.
Green are the mealies, green the fields of corn,
Pink hangs the peach-blossom, and white the bloom of the plum,
And the garden whispers with things new-born,
When swift through the Spring air the scouts of the Red Cloud come.

Bright is the day, and rich the wind with flowers —
Roses and grenadillas, and woodbine on the wall,

1.

THE PRESENT. 1.

Magnify not the times in which we live:
The Present is a double shadow cast,
Part from the Future, partly from the Past,
And deeply blended is the light they give.
The shadow is across our spirits thrown,
We know not how much further it hath gone.
The great ennobling Past is only then
A misty pageant, an unreal thing,
When it is measured in the narrow ring
And limit of the Present by weak men.
The Future is the open trench, the ground
Whereon our deeds are built, wherein we cast,