And place our trophies where men kneel Transfer it from the sword's appeal To Peace and Love. Peace, Love! the cherubim, that join Where they are not, The heart alone can make divine To incantations dost thou trust, See moldering stones and metal's rust Belie the vaunt, That man can bless one pile of dust With chime or chaunt. The ticking wood-worm mocks thee, man! Thy temples,-creeds themselves grow A temple given Thy faith, that bigots dare not ban,- space is Heaven! Its roof, star-pictured Nature's ceiling, The harmonious spheres wan Make music, though unheard their pealing Fair stars! are not your beings pure? Ye must be Heavens that make us sure ! And underneath the green graves rest; And through the place, with slow footfalls, With snowy cambric on his breast, The old gray Vicar crawls. And close at hand, to see him come, The boys their forelocks touch meanwhile, And smiles a sleepy smile. Slow as the hand on the clock's face, Laurels and yews make dark the ground; And from the portal, green and dark, He pauses, listening for the chime, The eternal voice of Time. Robert Buchanan [1841—1901] THE OLD CHURCHYARD OF BONCHURCH THE churchyard leans to the sea with its dead, It leans to the sea with its dead so long. Do they hear, I wonder, the first bird's song, onchurch 3225 est wind, g Pastb vadt sval ad April weather, bove them? e left to love them, there together? Ra Jadi diol sdt bal slipping seaward, Mada lls and its graves, to the waves,de var on them from leaward? hange that awaits them,- Anigo blo yor llinel ath the snow, or the bloom bryabrid boarmi als |