I pledge her, and she comes and dips Her laurel in the wine,

And lays it thrice upon my lips,

These favour'd lips of mine; Until the charm have power to make New lifeblood warm the bosom, And barren commonplaces break In full and kindly blossom.

I pledge her silent at the board;
Her gradual fingers steal
And touch upon the master-chord
Of all I felt and feel.

Old wishes, ghosts of broken plans,
And phantom hopes assemble;
And that child's heart within the man's
Begins to move and tremble.

Thro' many an hour of summer suns,

By many pleasant ways,
Against its fountain upward runs
The current of my days:
I kiss the lips I once have kiss'd;
The gas-light wavers dimmer;
And softly, thro' a vinous mist,

My college friendships glimmer.

I grow in worth, and wit, and sense,
Unboding critic-pen,

Or that eternal want of pence,
Which vexes public men,
Who hold their hands to all, and cry
For that which all deny them –
Who sweep the crossings, wet or dry,
And all the world go by them.

Ah yet, tho' all the world forsake,
Tho' fortune clip my wings,

I will not cramp my heart, nor take

Half-views of men and things. Let Whig and Tory stir their blood; There must be stormy weather; But for some true result of good

All parties work together.

Let there be thistles, there are grapes;
If old things, there are new;
Ten thousand broken lights and shapes,
Yet glimpses of the true.
Let raffs be rife in prose and rhyme,
We lack not rhymes and reasons,

As on this whirligig of Time

We circle with the seasons.

This earth is rich in man and maid;

With fair horizons bound:

This whole wide earth of light and shade

Comes out a perfect round. High over roaring Temple-bar,

And set in Heaven's third story, I look at all things as they are, But thro' a kind of glory.

Head-waiter, honour'd by the guest
Half-mused, or reeling ripe,
The pint, you brought me, was the best
That ever came from pipe.
But tho' the port surpasses praise,
My nerves have dealt with stiffer.
Is there some magic in the place?
Or do my peptics differ?

For since I came to live and learn,
No pint of white or red

Had ever half the power to turn

This wheel within my head, Which bears a season'd brain about,

Unsubject to confusion,

Tho' soak'd and saturate, out and out, Thro' every convolution.

For I am of a numerous house,

With many kinsmen gay, Where long and largely we carouse As who shall say me nay: Each month, a birth-day coming on, We drink defying trouble, Or sometimes two would meet in one, And then we drank it double;

Whether the vintage, yet unkept,
Had relish fiery-new,

Or elbow-deep in sawdust, slept,
As old as Waterloo;

Or stow'd, when classic Canning died,
In musty bins and chambers,
Had cast upon its crusty side

The gloom of ten Decembers.

The Muse, the jolly Muse, it is!
She answer'd to my call,
She changes with that mood or this,
Is all-in-all to all:

She lit the spark within my throat,
To make my blood run quicker,

So mix for ever with the past,

Like all good things on earth! For should I prize thee, couldst thou last,

At half thy real worth?

I hold it good, good things should pass : With time I will not quarrel:

It is but yonder empty glass

That makes me maudlin-moral.

Head-waiter of the chop-house here,
To which I most resort,

I too must part: I hold thee dear
For this good pint of port.
For this, thou shalt from all things suck
Marrow of mirth and laughter;
And wheresoe'er thou move, good luck
Shall fling her old shoe after.

But thou wilt never move from hence,
The sphere thy fate allots:
Thy latter days increased with pence
Go down among the pots:
Thou battenest by the greasy gleam
In haunts of hungry sinners,
Old boxes, larded with the steam
Of thirty thousand dinners.

We fret, we fume, would shift our skins,
Would quarrel with our lot;
Thy care is, under polish'd tins,

To serve the hot-and-hot;
To come and go, and come again,
Returning like the pewit,
And watch'd by silent gentlemen,
That trifle with the cruet.

Live long, ere from thy topmost head
The thick-set hazel dies;

Long, ere the hateful crow shall tread
The corners of thine eyes:

Live long, nor feel in head or chest
Our changeful equinoxes,
Till mellow Death, like some late guest,
Shall call thee from the boxes..

But when he calls, and thou shalt cease
To pace the gritted floor,
And, laying down an unctuous lease

Of life, shalt earn no more;
No carved cross-bones, the types of Death,
Shall show thee past to Heaven:

But carved cross-pipes, and, underneath, A pint-pot neatly graven.

LADY CLARE.

IT was the time when lilies blow,
And clouds are highest up in air,
Lord Ronald brought a lily-white doe
To give his cousin, Lady Clare.

I trow they did not part in scorn: Lovers long-betroth'd were they: They two will wed the morrow morn: God's blessing on the day!

'He does not love me for my birth,

Nor for my lands so broad and fair; He loves me for my own true worth, And that is well,' said Lady Clare.

In there came old Alice the nurse,

Said, Who was this that went from thee?'

'It was my cousin,' said Lady Clare, 'To-morrow he weds with me.'

'O God be thank'd!' said Alice the nurse, 'That all comes round so just and fair: Lord Ronald is heir of all your lands, And you are not the Lady Clare.'

'Are ye out of your mind, my nurse, my nurse?'

Said Lady Clare, that ye speak so wild?'

'As God's above,' said Alice the nurse, 'I speak the truth: you are my child.

'The old Earl's daughter died at my breast;

I speak the truth, as I live by bread! I buried her like my own sweet child, And put my child in her stead.'

'Falsely, falsely have ye done,

O mother,' she said, "if this be true, To keep the best man under the sun So many years from his due.'

'Nay now, my child,' said Alice the

nurse,

But keep the secret for your life,

And all you have will be Lord Ronald's, When you are man and wife.'

'If I'm a beggar born,' she said,

'I will speak out, for I dare not lie. Pull off, pull off, the brooch of gold,

And fling the diamond necklace by.'

'Nay now, my child,' said Alice the

nurse,

'But keep the secret all ye can.' She said, 'Not so: but I will know If there be any faith in man.'

'Nay now, what faith?' said Alice the

nurse,

'The man will cleave unto his right.' And he shall have it,' the lady replied, 'Tho' I should die to-night.'

'Yet give one kiss to your mother dear! Alas, my child, I sinn'd for thee.' 'O mother, mother, mother,' she said, So strange it seems to me.

'Yet here's a kiss for my mother dear,
My mother dear, if this be so,
And lay your hand upon my head,
And bless me, mother, ere I go.'

She clad herself in a russet gown,

She was no longer Lady Clare: She went by dale, and she went by down, With a single rose in her hair.

The lily-white doe Lord Ronald had brought

Leapt up from where she lay,
Dropt her head in the maiden's hand,
And follow'd her all the way.

Down stept Lord Ronald from his tower: 'O Lady Clare, you shame your worth! Why come you drest like a village maid, That are the flower of the earth?'

'If I come drest like a village maid, I am but as my fortunes are:

I am a beggar born,' she said,

And not the Lady Clare.'

'Play me no tricks,' said Lord Ronald, For I am yours in word and in deed.

Play me no tricks,' said Lord Ronald, 'Your riddle is hard to read.'

O and proudly stood she up!

Her heart within her did not fail: She look'd into Lord Ronald's eyes, And told him all her nurse's tale.

He laugh'd a laugh of merry scorn:
He turn'd and kiss'd her where she
stood:

'If you are not the heiress born,
And I,' said he, the next in blood-

'If you are not the heiress born,

And I,' said he, 'the lawful heir, We two will wed to-morrow morn, And you shall still be Lady Clare.'

THE CAPTAIN.

A LEGEND OF THE NAVY.

HE that only rules by terror

Doeth grievous wrong.
Deep as Hell I count his error.
Let him hear my song.

Brave the Captain was: the seamen
Made a gallant crew,

Gallant sons of English freemen,

Sailors bold and true.
But they hated his oppression,

Stern he was and rash;
So for every light transgression
Doom'd them to the lash.
Day by day more harsh and cruel
Seem'd the Captain's mood.
Secret wrath like smother'd fuel
Burnt in each man's blood.
Yet he hoped to purchase glory,
Hoped to make the name
Of his vessel great in story,
Wheresoe'er he came.

So they past by capes and islands,
Many a harbour-mouth,
Sailing under palmy highlands

Far within the South.

On a day when they were going

O'er the lone expanse,

In the north, her canvas flowing,

Rose a ship of France.

Then the Captain's colour heighten'd, Joyful came his speech:

But a cloudy gladness lighten'd

In the eyes of each.

'Chase,' he said: the ship flew forward,

And the wind did blow;
Stately, lightly, went she Norward,

Till she near'd the foe.

Then they look'd at him they hated,

Had what they desired:

Mute with folded arms they waited

Not a gun was fired.

But they heard the foeman's thunder
Roaring out their doom;

All the air was torn in sunder,

Crashing went the boom,

Spars were splinter'd, decks were shatter'd,

Bullets fell like rain;

Over mast and deck were scatter'd

Blood and brains of men.

Spars were splinter'd; decks

broken:

Each beside his gun.

were

On the decks as they were lying,

Were their faces grim.

In their blood, as they lay dying,

Did they smile on him.

Those, in whom he had reliance

For his noble name,

With one smile of still defiance

Sold him unto shame.

Shame and wrath his heart confounded,

Pale he turn'd and red,

Till himself was deadly wounded
Falling on the dead.
Dismal error! fearful slaughter!
Years have wander'd by,
Side by side beneath the water

Crew and Captain lie;
There the sunlit ocean tosses

O'er them mouldering,
And the lonely seabird crosses
With one waft of the wing.

THE LORD OF BURLEIGH.

In her ear he whispers gaily,

If my heart by signs can tell, Maiden, I have watch'd thee daily, And I think thou lov'st me well.'

She replies, in accents fainter,
'There is none I love like thee.'
He is but a landscape-painter,
And a village maiden she.
He to lips, that fondly falter,
Presses his without reproof:
Leads her to the village altar,

And they leave her father's roof.
'I can make no marriage present:
Little can I give my wife.
Love will make our cottage pleasant,

And I love thee more than life.' They by parks and lodges going

See the lordly castles stand: Summer woods, about them blowing, Made a murmur in the land. From deep thought himself he rouses, Says to her that loves him well, 'Let us see these handsome houses Where the wealthy nobles dwell.' So she goes by him attended,

Hears him lovingly converse, Sees whatever fair and splendid Lay betwixt his home and hers; Parks with oak and chestnut shady, Parks and order'd gardens great, Ancient homes of lord and lady,

Built for pleasure and for state. All he shows her makes him dearer : Evermore she seems to gaze On that cottage growing nearer, Where they twain will spend their

days.

O but she will love him truly!

He shall have a cheerful home; She will order all things duly, When beneath his roof they come. Thus her heart rejoices greatly, Till a gateway she discerns With armorial bearings stately, And beneath the gate she turns; Sees a mansion more majestic

Than all those she saw before: Many a gallant gay domestic

Bows before him at the door. And they speak in gentle murmur, When they answer to his call, While he treads with footstep firmer, Leading on from hall to hall. And, while now she wonders blindly, Nor the meaning can divine, Proudly turns he round and kindly, 'All of this is mine and thine.'