Part 11 (1/2)

O why not speak?--is it so great a thing To cross death's stream and whisper in the ear Of us weak mortals some faint hope or cheer?

Or tell us, dead ones, if the hopes that spring Froht and clear Have any truth O speak, ye dead, and say If that in hope of dying, live we may

(_aetat_ 15)

A metrical essay of which I am more proud is a poe of 1875 With a daring which now seems to me incredible I undertook to write in that most difficult of measures, the Spenserian stanza The matter of the coht to congratulate e the triple rhymes and the twelve-syllable line at the end of each stanza without co a complete cropper I could not do it now, even if my life depended on it

TO THE POWERS OF SONG

I

Spirit, whose har of a song That lifts to thee its voice, and strives to find Aught thatWho seek on earth but living to prolong

For the, as the earth along They move to their dull tasks; they live, they wane, They die, and dying, not a thought of thee retain

II

Thou art the Muse of who heart; Fros drew

Thou mak'st life tuneful by the poet's art

Without thy aid the love-God's fiery dart Wakes but a savage and a blind desire, Where nought of beauty e'er can claim a part

Without thee, all to which frail her

III

Unhappy they ander without light, And know thee not, thou Goddess of sweet life; Cursed are they all that live not in thy sight, Cursed by themselves they cannot drown the strife In thee, of passion, of the ills so rife On earth; they have no star, no hope, no love, To guide them in the stormy ways of life; They are but as the beasts who slowly ht above

IV

I aht, But none appears, no rays for ht; I fain would be that glorious host a

But woe, alas, I cannot, I no power Of singing have, all ht have known a happier hour, And sungspirit cower

(_aetat_ 14)

A bad poe from the number of poets mentioned, is a satiric effort entitled _The Exa poets have been suo a competitive examination The bards, summoned by postcards, which had just then been introduced, repair to Parnassus and are shown to the Hall Rossetti and Morris, however, make a fuss because the paper is not to their taste

Walt Whit a jingle,” is hailed as ”the singer of songs for all time” Proteus (Wilfrid Blount) is

A other poets who appear, but who have since died to faleton, and Martin Tupper In the end Apollo becomes ”fed up” with his versifiers, and dismisses them all with the intimation that any who have passed will receive printed cards The curtain is rung doith the gloomy couplet:

Six months have elapsed, but no poet or bard, So far as I know, has yet got a card

Another set of verses, written between the ages of fourteen and fifteen, which are worth recalling frolish hexameters I was inspired to write thee_, an adreater, not lesser, with years

As I have started upon the subject of verse, I think I had better pursue the course of the strearaphers used to say about the Rhine, its waters were lost in the sands, in my case not of Holland but of Prose