"Do you see yon vessel riding, Anchored in our island bay, Like a sleeping sea-bird biding For the morrow’s onward way ? See her white wings folded round her As she rocks upon the deep; Slumber with a spell hath bound her, With a spell of peace and sleep."

"Already much for man has been effected; The weak and poor man's cause Is strengthened by the laws, The equal right, born with us all, respected."

"Yet thou art on thy course majestic keeping, Unruffled by the breath Of man's vain life or death, Calm as the heaven upon thy bosom sleeping. Still dost thou keep thy calm and onward motion, Amid the ancient ranks Of forests on thy banks, Till thou hast gained thy home—the mighty ocean."

"The crowded city in its streets, The valley, in its green retreats, Alike thy words retain. What need hast thou of sculptured stone ?— Thy temple, is thy name alone."

"Until thy hand unlocked its store, What glorious music slept ! Music that can be hushed no more Was from our knowledge kept."

"His home — our English poet's home — Amid these hills is made ; Here, with the morning, hath he come, There, with the night delayed. On all things is his memory cast, For every place wherein he past, Is with his mind arrayed, That, wandering in a summer hour, Asked wisdom of the leaf and flower."

"Will not your giant columns yet behold The world's old age, enlightened, calm, and free; More glorious than the glories known of old— The spirit's placid rule o'er land and sea. All that the past has taught is not in vain— Wisdom is garnered up from centuries gone: Love, Hope, and Mind prepare a nobler reign Than ye have known—Cedars of Lebanon!"

"Sadly the captive o'er the flowers is bending, While her soft eye with sudden sorrow fills; They are not those that grew beneath her tending In the green valley of her native hills. …. What are the glittering trifles that surround her— What the rich shawl—and what the golden chain— Would she could break the fetters that have bound her, And see her household and her hills again!"

"By the aqueduct, of old, Where the silver river rolled, Long since laid in ruins low— But there still the waters flow. Soon decayeth man's endeavour, Nature's works endure for ever."

"Our moral progress has a glorious scope, Much has the past by thought and labour done; Knowledge and Peace pursue the steps of Hope, Whose noblest victories are yet unwon."

"Of Europe's childhood was the feudal age, When the world's sceptre was the sword; and power, Unfit for human weakness, wrong, and rage, Knew not that curb which waits a wiser hour."

"They have opened the quarries of lime and stone ; There is nothing that man will leave alone : He buildeth the house—he tilleth the soil ; No place is free from care and toil. …. Wo on our wretched and busy race. That will not leave Nature a resting-place. We roam over earth, we sail o’er the wave, Till there is not a quiet spot but the grave."

"Round are the woods of the ancient oak, And pines that scorn at the woodman’s stroke ; And yet the axe is on its way, Those stately trees in the dust to lay."

"Within that lonely garden what happy hours went by, While we fancied that around us spread foreign sea and sky. Ah! the dreaming and the distant no longer haunt the mind We leave, in leaving childhood, life’s fairy-land behind."

"What is the social world thou hast forsaken?— A scene of wrong and sorrow, guilt and guile ; Whence Love a long and last farewell has taken, Where friends can smile, and “murder while they smile.”"

"What should the fruit of victory be ? What spoil should it command ?— Commerce upon the sweeping sea, And peace upon the land."

"Now the monarch must surrender All his golden state, Yet the mockeries of splendour On the pageant wait That attends him to the tomb. Music on the air is swelling, ’Tis the funeral song, As to his ancestral dwelling, Is he borne along. They must share life’s common doom. The kings of fair Golconda, Golconda’s ancient kings."

"The fable of Prometheus and the vulture Reveals the poet’s and the woman’s heart. Unkindly are they judged—unkindly treated— By careless tongues and by ungenerous words; While cruel sneer, and hard reproach, repeated, Jar the fine music of the spirit’s chords."

"Yet what is mind in woman, but revealing In sweet clear light the hidden world below, By quicker fancies and a keener feeling Than those around, the cold and careless, know?"

"A general bond of union is the poet, By its immortal verse is language known, And for the sake of song do others know it— One glorious poet makes the world his own."

"Thou hast been round us, like a viewless spirit, Known only by the music on the air; The leaf or flowers which thou hast named inherit A beauty known but from thy breathing there: For thou didst on them fling thy strong emotion, The likeness from itself the fond heart gave; As planets from afar look down on ocean, And give their own sweet image to the wave."

"But on the ocean never track remaining Attests the progress of the human race ; The ship will pass without a wave retaining The lovely likeness mirrored on its face. And thus, O Time, that hast our world in keeping, So dost thou roll the current of thy years ; Away, away, in thy dark waters sweeping, All mortal cares and sorrows, hopes and fears."

"’Tis strange how much of this wide world is lonely, Earth hath its trackless forests dark and green, And its wild deserts of the sand, where only The wind, a weary wanderer, hath been."

"High in the azure heavens, ye ancient mountains, Do ye uplift your old ancestral snows, Gathering amid the clouds those icy fountains, Whence many a sunny stream through India flows."

"He wears the green robe of the Prophet’s high line, He is sprung from the chieftain of Mecca’s far shrine ; His horse, on whose bridle the white pearls are sown, Has a lineage as distant and pure as his own."

"The warrior, sage, and poet fill their story With all the various honours of mankind ; — May thy young reign achieve yet truer glory, The pure, enlightened triumphs of the mind ! Too much in this wide world yet needs redressing ; But with thy reign Hope’s loveliest promise came. May thy sweet youth be sheltered by the blessing A nation breathes upon Victoria’s name !"

"Still let love—song—and hope—make thee their mirror, Oh, life and earth, what were ye without dreams!"

"Trouble and discontent, and hours whose dial Is in the feverish heart which knows not rest ; These give the midnight’s sinking sleep denial, These leave the midnight’s dreaming couch unprest."

"A generous inspiration Is on the outward world ; It waketh thoughts and feelings In careless coldness furled. To love and to admire Seems natural to the heart ; Life’s small and selfish interests From such a scene depart."

"Heavily rung the old church bells, But no one came to prayer: The weeds were growing in the street, Silence and Fate were there. O’er the first grave by which I stood, Tears fell, and flowers were thrown, The last grave held six hundred lives, And there I stood alone."

"Still their silent thread entwining Of our wretched life ; With their cold pale hands combining Hate, and fear, and strife. Hovers the avenging day O’er the glorious island Where Ulysses was the king."

"By another light surrounded Than our actual sky; With the purple ocean bounded Does the island lie, Like a dream of the old world."

"Look to the past—if present there Be visible one great despair : Look to the future—if it give Nothing which charmeth thee to live. Then come—the present knows its doom, Thy heart already is a tomb."

"And such is still the recompense appointed for the mind, That seeketh, with its eyes afar, the glory of its kind. The poet yields the beautiful that in his being lives : Unthankful, cold, and careless, are they to whom he gives."

"Yet that old chivalric hour Hath upon the present power Changed—and softened and refined It has left its best behind. What may its bequeathings be ? Honour, song, and courtesy. Like the spirit of its clay, Yesterday redeems to-day."

"Vainly did the augur seek In its path the will of heaven ; Not to that fierce eye and beak, Was the fated future given. No, the future’s depths were stirred By the white wings of the dove ; When the troubled earth first heard Words of peace and words of love."

"It is pleasant through the city In a sunny day to roam ; And yet my full heart turns to thee, My own, my greenwood home."

"Lay her in the gentle earth, Where the summer maketh mirth ; Where young violets have birth ; Where the lily bendeth. Lay her there, the lovely one ! With the rose, her funeral stone ; And for tears, such showers alone As the rain of April lendeth."

"The prayer for another, to Heaven addrest, Comes back to the breather thrice blessing and blest."

"It shall never be lowered, the black flag we bear ; If the sea be denied us, we sweep through the air."

"And such a task it is to steer A people in their high career, When old opinions war, and change Is sudden, violent, and strange ; And men recall the past, to say, So shall not be the coming day."

"Low it lieth—earth to earth— And to which that earth gave birth— Palace, market-street, and fane ; Dust that never asks in vain, Hath reclaimed its own again. Dust, the wide world’s king."

"He cometh from the purple hills, Where the fight has been to-day; He bears the standard in his hand— Shout round the victor’s way. The sun-set of a battle won, Is round his steps from Marathon."

"How many are the lovely lays That haunt our English tongue, Defrauded of their poet’s praise Forgotten he who sung."

"They were poor, and by their cabin, Pale want sat at the door ; And the summer to their harvest Brought insufficient store."

"A little while hast thou to be a child, Thy lot is all too high ; Thy face is very fair, thine eyes are mild, But duties on thine arduous path are piled— A nation’s hopes and fears blend with thy destiny."

"Again I am beside the lake, The lonely lake which used to be The wide world of the beating heart, When I was, love, with thee."

"Human heart this history Is thy fated lot, Even such thy watching For what cometh not Till with anxious waiting dull Round thee fades the beautiful."

"Hither, famed Ulysses, steer, Pass not, pride of Greece, along To our haven come and hear, Come and hear the Sirens' song."

"’Twas the deep forest bodied forth that fane, So rose the arches of the old oak trees, So wreathed the close set branches at their side, So through the open spaces gleamed the sun ; While like an anthem sang the morning birds."