"For years, long years, Years that make centuries—those dimlit aisles, Where rainbows play, from coloured windows flung, Have echoed to the voice of prayer and praise ; With the last lights of evening flitting round, Making a rosy atmosphere of hope."

"Few save the poor feel for the poor, The rich know not how hard It is to be of needful food And needful rest debarred."

"Mournfully they pass away, The dearest and the fairest ; Beauty, thou art common clay, Common doom thou sharest."

"Sympathy is the softener of death, and memory of the loved and the lost is the earthly shadow of their immortality. But who turns aside amid those crowds that hurry through the thronged and noisy streets?—No one can love London better than I do; but never do I wish to be buried there. It is the best place in the world for a house, and the worst for a grave."

"I come from my home in the depth of the sea, I come that thy dreams may be haunted by me ; Not as we parted, the rose on my brow, But shadowy, silent, I visit thee now."

"Alas, alas ! those ancient towers, Where never now the vespers ring, But lonely at the midnight hours, Flits by the bat on dusky wing. No more beneath the moonlight dim, No more beneath the planet ray, Those arches echo with the hymn That bears life’s meaner cares away."

"See, he bears the line away, Round him flies the snowy spray. I have given him length and line, One last struggle, he is mine. Fling the green arbutus bough On the glowing ashes now ; Let the cup with red wine foam,— I have brought the salmon home."

"You must come back, my brother, For Christmas is so near, And Christmas is the crowning time, The purple of the year ;"

"She comes with the midnight—meet not her cold eye, It shines but on those who are fated to die. She comes with the midnight, when spirits have power— She comes with the midnight, and evil the hour."

"Little the present careth for the past, Too little,—’tis not well! For careless ones we dwell Beneath the mighty shadow it has cast."

"For the present doth inherit All the glories of the past ; We retain what was its spirit, While its dust to dust is cast, All good angels guard the sleep Of the ancient warriors, The warriors of olden time"

"Life in its many shapes was there, The busy and the gay; Faces that seemed too young and fair To ever know decay. …. There came a slow and silent band In sad procession by: Reversed the musket in each hand, And downcast every eye. They bore the soldier to his grave; The sympathising crowd Divided like a parted wave By some dark vessel ploughed. …. Again, all filled with light and breath, I passed the crowded street— Oh, great extremes of life and death, How strangely do ye meet!"

"It is the minstrel’s part to fling Around the present’s common cope, The solemn hues on Memory’s wing, The spiritual light of Hope. The scene that to a careless eye Seems nothing but itself to be, Has charmed earth and haunted sky — Seen as the minstrel’s eye can see. Himself is but an instrument Inspired by that diviner hour, When first Imagination lent To earth its passion and its power."

"Thus with some sweet dream’s assistance, Float they down life’s stream; Would to heaven our whole existence Could be such a dream!"

"’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."

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

"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."

"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."

"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."

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

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

"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."

"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."

"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."

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

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

"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."

"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."

"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."

"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."

"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."

"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."

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

"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."

"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."

"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."

"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."

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

"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 !"

"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."

"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."

"’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."

"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."

"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."

"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."

"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?"

"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."

"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."