THE GOOD IN GRAVES AS HEAVENLY SEED ARE SOWN."-DAVENANT.

THE PRIVATE OF THE BUFFS.

327

And we talked of joy and splendour

That the years unborn would render,

And the blackbirds helped us with the story, for they knew it
well.

Piping, fluting, bees are humming,

April's here, and summer's coming;

Don't forget us when you walk, a man with men, in pride and

joy;

Think on us in alleys shady,

When you step a graceful lady;

For no fairer day have we to hope for, little girl and boy.

Laugh and play, O lisping waters,

Lull our downy sons and daughters;

Come, O wind, and rock their leafy cradle in thy wanderings

And a

coy;

When they wake we'll end the measure

With a wild sweet cry of pleasure,

'Hey down derry, let's be merry! little girl and boy!" [JEAN INGELOW, born about 1830. From "A Story of Doom, and Other Poems."]

"THE TROUBLED STREAM IS STILL IMPURE; WITH VIRTUE FLIES AWAY CONTENT."-W. HABINGTON.

"LIFE IS A WEARY INTERLUDE, WHICH DOTH SHORT JOYS, LONG WOES INCLUDE."-HENRY KING.

THE PRIVATE OF THE BUFFS.

[Some Sikhs, and a private of the Buffs, during the last Chinese war, fell
into the hands of the enemy. On the next morning they were brought be-
fore the authorities, and commanded to prostrate themselves. The Sikhs
obeyed; but Moyse, the English soldier, heroically declared he would not
humble himself before any Chinaman alive. He was immediately led out
and executed.]

|AST NIGHT, among his fellow roughs,
He jested, quaffed, and swore ;

A drunken private of the Buffs,

Who never looked before.

66 BEAUTY IS ITS OWN EXCUSE FOR BEING."-R. W. EMERSON.

"IT IS CONTENT ALONE THAT MAKES OUR PILGRIMAGE A PLEASURE HERE-CHARLES COTTON)

328

64 POETS THEMSELVES MUST FALL, LIKE THOSE THEY SUNG,

THE PRIVATE OF THE buffs.

To-day, beneath the foeman's frown,
He stands in Elgin's* place,
Ambassador from Britain's crown,
And type of all her race.

Poor, reckless, rude, low-born, untaught,
Bewildered, and alone,

A heart, with English instinct fraught,

He yet can call his own.
Ay, tear his body limb from limb,
Bring cord, or axe, or flame :
He only knows, that not through him
Shall England come to shame.

For Kentish hop-fields round him seemed,
Like dreams, to come and go;
Bright leagues of cherry-blossom gleamed,

One sheet of living snow;

The smoke above his father's door,
In gray soft eddyings hung:
Must he then watch it rise no more,
Doomed by himself, so young?

Yes, honour calls!-with strength like steel
He put the vision by;

Let dusky Indians whine and kneel-
An English lad must die.

And thus, with eyes that would not shrink,
With knee to man unbent,
Unfaltering on its dreadful brink,

To his red grave he went.

* The Earl of Elgin accompanied the British army (which was manded by Sir Hope Grant) as ambassador to the Emperor of China.

com

DEAF THE PRAISED EAR, AND MUTE THE TUNEFUL TONGUE.”—POPE.

AND WHO BUYS SORROW CHEAPEST, TAKES AN ILL COMMODITY TOO dear.”—CHARLES COTTON.

WHERE SOIL IS MEN GROW, WHETHER TO WEEDS OR FLOWERS."-KEATS.

APOLLO AND MARSYAS.

329

Vain, mightiest fleets of iron framed ;
Vain, those all-shattering guns;
Unless proud England keep, untamed,

The strong heart of her sons.
So, let his name through Europe ring-

A man of mean estate,

Who died, as firm as Sparta's king,

Because his soul was great.

*

[Sir FRANCIS HASTINGS DOYLE, Professor of Poetry at the University of Oxford. This spirited ballad first appeared in Macmillan's Magazine.]

"THE SILVER FLOW OF HERO'S TEARS, THE SWOON OF IMOGEN, ARE THINGS-(JOHN KEATS)

TO BROOD ON WITH MORE ARDENCY THAN THE DEATH-DAY OF EMPIRES."-JOHN KEATS.

APOLLO AND MARSYAS.

[According to an old Greek legend, Apollo, the god of poetry, contended with Marsyas, a Phrygian faun, for the prize of music, and Marsyas being vanquished, was flayed alive by order of his cruel conqueror. The fable is reproduced in the following stanzas with all the elegance and fine colouring of the Greek poetry.]

S the sky-brightening south wind clears the day,

And makes the massed clouds roll,
The music of the lyre blows away

The clouds that wrap the soul.

Oh, that Fate had let me see

The triumph of the sweet persuasive lyre!
That famous, final victory

When jealous Pan with Marsyas did conspire!

When, from far Parnassus' side,
Young Apollo, all the pride
Of the Phrygian flutes to tame,
To the Phrygian highlands came!

* Leonidas, king of Sparta, who, with his famous Three Hundred, de-
fended the Pass of Thermopyla against the Persians.

"PLACES OF NESTLING GREEN FOR POETS MADE. -LEIGH HUNT.

"O ACHING TIME! O MOMENTS BIG AS YEARS! ALL AS YE PASS SWELL OUT THE MONSTROUS TRUTH,

330

WHAT MORE FELICITY CAN FALL TO CREATURE,

APOLLO AND MARSYAS.

Where the long green reed-beds sway
In the rippled waters gray

Of that solitary lake

Where Meander's springs are born ;*
Where the ridged pine-wooded roots
Of Messogis westward break,

Mounting westward, high and higher.
There was held the famous strife;

There the Phrygian brought his flutes,
And Apollo brought his lyre;

And, when now the westering sun
Touched the hills, the strife was done,
And the attentive Muses said-
"Marsyas! thou art vanquishèd."
Then Apollo's minister

Hanged upon a branching fir
Marsyas, that unhappy faun,
And began to whet his knife.
But the Monads, who were there,
Left their friend, and with robes flowing
In the wind, and loose dark hair
O'er their polished bosoms blowing,
Each her ribboned tambourine
Flinging on the mountain-sod,
With a lovely frightened mien
Came about the youthful god.
But he turned his beauteous face
Haughtily another way,

From the grassy sun-warmed place
Where in proud repose he lay,

With one arm over his head,

Watching how the whetting sped.

* A river in Asia Minor, famous for its winding course; whence our word meandering. It flows into the Archipelago.

THAN TO ENJOY DELIGHT WITH LIBERTY?"-SPENSER.

AND PRESS IT SO UPON OUR WEARY griefs that unbelief has not a space to breATHE."—KEATS,

"WHAT IS MORE TRANQUIL THAN A MUSK-ROSE BLOWING IN A GREEN ISLAND, FAR FROM ALL MEN'S KNOWING?"—KEATS.

BEAUTY IS TRUTH, TRUTH BEAUTY-THAT IS ALL

APOLLO AND MARSYAS.

331

But aloof, on the lake strand,
Did the young Olympus stand,

Weeping at his master's end;
For the faun had been his friend.
For he taught him how to sing,
And he taught him flute-playing.

Many a morning had they gone
To the glimmering mountain lakes,
And had torn up by the roots
The tall crested water reeds

With long plumes, and soft brown seeds,
And had carved them into flutes,
Sitting on a tabled stone

Where the shoreward ripple breaks.
And he taught him how to please
The red-snooded Phrygian girls,
Whom the summer evening sees
Flashing in the dance's whirls
Underneath the starlit trees
In the mountain villages.
Therefore now Olympus stands,
At his master's piteous cries
Pressing fast with both his hands
His white garment to his eyes,
Not to see Apollo's scorn;

Ah, poor faun, poor faun! ah, poor faun!

[MATTHEW ARNOLD, born 1822, son of the late illustrious Dr. Thomas Arnold, Head Master of Rugby School. Mr. Arnold is the author of a tragedy named "Merope," of "Empedocles on Etna"-the poem from which the foregoing extract is taken-and of several minor poems, as well as of various prose essays, remarkable for their elegance of style and keenHe was Professor of Poetry at Oxford from 1857-1867.]

ness of criticism.

YE KNOW ON EARTH, AND ALL YE NEED TO KNOW."-KEATS.

"WHAT BUT THEE, SLEEP? SOFT CLOSER OF OUR EYES! LOW MURMURER OF TENDER LULLABIES!"-JOHN KEATS.