Part 3 (1/2)

Eversley, 1845.

CHILD BALLAD

Jesus, He loves one and all, Jesus, He loves children small, Their souls are waiting round His feet On high, before His mercy-seat.

While He wandered here below Children small to Him did go, At His feet they knelt and prayed, On their heads His hands He laid.

Came a Spirit on them then, Better than of mighty men, A Spirit faithful, pure and mild, A Spirit fit for king and child.

Oh! that Spirit give to me, Jesu Lord, where'er I be!

1847.

AIRLY BEACON

Airly Beacon, Airly Beacon; Oh the pleasant sight to see s.h.i.+res and towns from Airly Beacon, While my love climbed up to me!

Airly Beacon, Airly Beacon; Oh the happy hours we lay Deep in fern on Airly Beacon, Courting through the summer's day!

Airly Beacon, Airly Beacon; Oh the weary haunt for me, All alone on Airly Beacon, With his baby on my knee!

1847.

SAPPHO

She lay among the myrtles on the cliff; Above her glared the noon; beneath, the sea.

Upon the white horizon Atho's peak Weltered in burning haze; all airs were dead; The cicale slept among the tamarisk's hair; The birds sat dumb and drooping. Far below The lazy sea-weed glistened in the sun; The lazy sea-fowl dried their steaming wings; The lazy swell crept whispering up the ledge, And sank again. Great Pan was laid to rest; And Mother Earth watched by him as he slept, And hushed her myriad children for a while.

She lay among the myrtles on the cliff; And sighed for sleep, for sleep that would not hear, But left her tossing still; for night and day A mighty hunger yearned within her heart, Till all her veins ran fever; and her cheek, Her long thin hands, and ivory-channelled feet, Were wasted with the wasting of her soul.

Then peevishly she flung her on her face, And hid her eyeb.a.l.l.s from the blinding glare, And fingered at the gra.s.s, and tried to cool Her crisp hot lips against the crisp hot sward: And then she raised her head, and upward cast Wild looks from homeless eyes, whose liquid light Gleamed out between deep folds of blue-black hair, As gleam twin lakes between the purple peaks Of deep Parna.s.sus, at the mournful moon.

Beside her lay her lyre. She s.n.a.t.c.hed the sh.e.l.l, And waked wild music from its silver strings; Then tossed it sadly by.--'Ah, hus.h.!.+' she cries; 'Dead offspring of the tortoise and the mine!

Why mock my discords with thine harmonies?

Although a thrice-Olympian lot be thine, Only to echo back in every tone The moods of n.o.bler natures than thine own.'

Eversley, 1847 From Yeast.

THE BAD SQUIRE

The merry brown hares came leaping Over the crest of the hill, Where the clover and corn lay sleeping Under the moonlight still.

Leaping late and early, Till under their bite and their tread The swedes and the wheat and the barley Lay cankered and trampled and dead.