Children's voices should be dear (Call once more) to a mother's ear: Children's voices wild with pain. Surely she will come again. 'Mother dear, we cannot stay.' Come dear children, come away down. One last look at the white-walled town, She will not come though you call all day. Children dear, was it yesterday We heard the sweet bells over the bay? Through the surf and through the swell, Where the spent lights quiver and gleam; When did music come this way? Children dear, was it yesterday On a red gold throne in the heart of the sea. She comb'd its bright hair, and she tended it well, Children dear, were we long alone? 'The sea grows stormy, the little ones moan; Long prayers,' I said, 'in the world they say.' Come,' I said, and we rose through the surf in the bay. We went up the beach in the sandy down Where the sea-stocks bloom, to the white-walled town, Through the narrow paved streets, where all was still To the little grey church on the windy hill. From the church came a murmur of folk at their prayers, But we stood without in the cold blowing airs. We climb'd on the graves on the stones worn with rains, And we gazed up the aisle through the small leaded panes. She sat by the pillar; we saw her clear; 'Margaret, hist! come quick, we are here. Dear heart,' I said, 'we are here alone. The sea grows stormy, the little ones moan.' But, ah, she gave me never a look, For her eyes were seal'd to the holy book. 'Loud prays the priest; shut stands the door.' Come away, children, call no more, Come away, come down, call no more. Down, down, down, Down to the depths of the sea, She sits at her wheel in the humming town, Singing most joyfully. Hark what she sings: 'O joy, O joy, From the humming street, and the child with its toy, From the priest and the bell, and the holy well, From the wheel where I spun, And the blessed light of the sun.' And so she sings her fill, Singing most joyfully, Till the shuttle falls from her hand, And the whizzing wheel stands still. She steals to the window and looks at the sand; And over the sand at the sea; And her eyes are set in a stare ; A long, long sigh, For the cold strange eyes of a little Mermaiden, And the gleam of her golden hair. Come away, away children, She will start from her slumber A pavement of pearl. Singing, Here came a mortal, And alone dwell forever But children, at midnight, We will gaze from the sand-hills, At the church on the hill-side- Singing, 'There dwells a loved one, She left lonely forever The kings of the sea.' M. Arnold XXXV THE SANDS O' DEE I 'O Mary, go and call the cattle home, And call the cattle home, And call the cattle home, Across the sands o' Dee!' The western wind was wild and dank with foam, And all alone went she. 2 The creeping tide came up along the sand, And o'er and o'er the sand, And round and round the sand, As far as eye could see; The blinding mist came down and hid the land And never home came she. 3 Oh, is it weed, or fish, or floating hair?--- A tress o' golden hair, O' drowned maiden's hair, Above the nets at sea. Was never salmon yet that shone so fair Among the stakes on Dee. |