80

90

To settle here on earth, or in mid air;
Though for possession put to try once more
What thou and thy gay legions dare against;
Whose easier business were to serve their Lord
High up in Heaven, with songs to hymn his
throne,

And practised distances to cringe, not fight. . . . Gabriel. To say and straight unsay, pretending first

Wise to fly pain, professing next the spy,
Argues no leader, but a liar traced,
Satan: and couldst thou 'faithful' add? O name,
O sacred name of faithfulness profaned!
Faithful to whom? to thy rebellious crew?
Army of fiends, fit body to fit head!

Was this your discipline and faith engaged,
Your military obedience, to dissolve
Allegiance to the acknowledged

supreme?

Power

And thou, sly hypocrite, who now wouldst seem
Patron of liberty, who more than thou
Once fawned, and cringed, and servilely adored
Heaven's awful Monarch? Wherefore, but in
hope

To dispossess him, and thyself to reign? But mark what I areed thee now: Avaunt! 100 Fly thither whence thou fled'st.

hour

If from this

See also ARCADES

COMUS

PARADISE LOST

IV.-31-112.

-'mortal sight.'

X.-504-584.

Serpents.)

-'dispels the dark !'

'three places led.'-(The

PARADISE REGAINED

IV.-44-87.

'removed:' 236-284.

Athens.)

SAMSON AGONISTES

'I come not, Samson'

-'small enforce.')—

BUT on a day
From out the goodly town he took his way,
To where, beneath the cliffs of Cenchreæ,
Lay Argo, looking o'er the ridgy sea;
Being fain once more to ponder o'er past days,
Ere he should set his face to winning praise
Among the shouts of men and clash of steel.
But when he reached the well-remembered
keel,

The sun was far upon his downward way,
At afternoon of a bright summer day.
Hot was it, and still o'er the long rank grass,
Beneath the hull, a widening shade did pass;
And further off, the sunny daisied sward,
The raised oars with their creeping shadows
barred;

And grey shade from the hills of Cenchrea
Began to move on toward the heaving sea.
So Jason, lying in the shadow dark
Cast by the stem, the warble of the lark,
The chirrup of the cricket, well could hear;
And now and then the sound would come anear
Of some hind shouting o'er his laden wain.
But looking o'er the blue and heaving plain,
Sailless it was, and beaten by no oar,
And on the yellow edges of the shore
The ripple fell in murmur soft and low,
As with wide-sweeping wings the gulls did go
About the breakers crying plaintively.

But Jason, looking out across the sea,
Beheld the signs of wind a-drawing nigh,
Gathering about the clear cold eastern sky;
And many an evening then he thought upon
Ere yet the quays of Æa they had won,
And longings that had long been gathering
Stirred in his heart, and now he felt the sting
Of life within him, and at last he said :—
'Why should I move about as move the
dead,

And take no heed of what all men desire?
Once more I feel within my heart the fire
That drave me forth unto the white-walled town,
Leaving the sunny slopes, and thick-leaved

crown

Of grey old Pelion, that alone I knew,
Great deeds and wild, and desperate things to do.

'Once did I win a noble victory;

I won a kingdom, and I cast it by

For rest and peace, and rest and peace are gone.

I had a fair love, that loved me alone,
And made me that I am in all men's eyes;
And like my hard-earned kingdom, my fair prize,
I cast my tender heart, my Love away;
Yet failed I not to love, until a day,
A day I nigh forget, took all from me
That once I had.-And she is gone, yea, she
Whose innocent sweet eyes and tender hands
Made me a mocking unto distant lands:
Alas, poor child! yet is that as a dream,
And still my life a happy life I deem,
But ah! so short, so short! for I am left
Of love, of honour, and of joy bereft-
And yet not dead-ah, if I could but see
But once again her who delivered me
From death and many troubles, then no more
Would I turn backward from the shadowy
shore,

And all my life would seem but perfect gain. 'Alas! what hope is this? is it in vain

I long to see her? Lo, am I not young?
In many a song my past deeds have been sung,
And these my hands that guided Argo through
The blue Symplegades, still deeds may do.
For now the world has swerved from truth
and right,
Cumbered with monsters, empty of delight,

And, 'midst all this, what honour may I win,
That she may know of and rejoice therein,
And come to seek me, and upon my throne
May find me sitting, worshipped, and alone.
Ah! if it should be, how should I rejoice
To hear once more that once beloved voice
Rise through the burden of dull words, well-
known:

How should I clasp again my love, mine own,
And set the crown upon her golden head,
And with the eyes of lovers newly wed,
How should we gaze each upon each again!
'O hope not vain! O surely not quite

vain!

Cast off my moody sorrow utterly,

And once more live my life as in times past, And 'mid the chance of war the die will cast. 'And surely, whatso great deeds have been done,

Since with my fellows the Gold Fleece I won, Still, here, some wild bull clears the frightened fields;

There, a great lion cleaves the sevenfold shields;

There, dwells some giant robber of the land; There, whirls some woman-slayer's red right hand.'

So saying, gazing still across the sea, Heavy with days and nights of misery, His eyes waxed dim, and calmer still he grew, Still pondering over times and things he knew; While now the sun had sunk behind the hill, And from a whitethorn nigh a thrush did fill The balmy air with echoing minstrelsy, And cool the night-wind blew across the sea, And round about the soft-winged bats did 1 sweep.

So 'midst all this at last he fell asleep,
Nor did his eyes behold another day;
For Argo, slowly rotting all away,

Had dropped a timber here, and there an oar,
All through that year, but people of the shore
Set all again in order as it fell.

But now the stempost, that had carried well
The second rafter in King Pelias' hall,
Began at last to quiver towards its fall,
And whether loosed by some divinity,
Or that the rising wind from off the sea
Blew full upon it, surely I know not-
But, when the day dawned, still on the same

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IT fell in the year of Mutiny,

At darkest of the night,

John Nicholson by Jalandhar came

On his way to Delhi fight.

And as he by Jalandhar came

He thought what he must do,
And he sent to the Rajah fair greeting,
To try if he were true.

'God grant your Highness length of days,
And friends when need shall be;
And I pray you send your Captains hither,
That they may speak with me.'

On the morrow through Jalandhar town
The Captains rode in state;
They came to the house of John Nicholson
And stood before the gate.

The chief of them was Mehtab Singh,
He was both proud and sly;
His turban gleamed with rubies red,
He held his chin full high.

He marked his fellows how they put
Their shoes from off their feet;
'Now wherefore make ye such ado
These fallen lords to greet?

'They have ruled us for a hundred years, In truth I know not how;

But though they be fain of mastery,
They dare not claim it now.'

Right haughtily before them all
The durbar hall he trod,
With rubies red his turban gleamed,
His feet with pride were shod.

They had not been an hour together,
A scanty hour or so,
When Mehtab Singh rose in his place
And turned about to go.

Then swiftly came John Nicholson
Between the door and him,
With anger smouldering in his eyes
That made the rubies dim.

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'You are overhasty, Mehtab Singh,'Oh, but his voice was low!

He held his wrath with a curb of iron, That furrowed cheek and brow.

'You are overhasty, Mehtab Singh,
When that the rest are gone,
I have a word that may not wait
To speak with you alone.'

The Captains passed in silence forth
And stood the door behind;
To go before the game was played
Be sure they had no mind.

But there within John Nicholson
Turned him on Mehtab Singh,
'So long as the soul is in my body
You shall not do this thing.

'Have ye served us for a hundred years
And yet ye know not why?
We brook no doubt of our mastery,
We rule until we die.

'Were I the one last Englishman Drawing the breath of life, And you the master-rebel of all That stir this land to strife

'Were I,' he said, but a Corporal,
And you a Rajput King,

So long as the soul was in my body
You should not do this thing.

'Take off, take off those shoes of pride,
Carry them whence they came;
Your Captains saw your insolence,
And they shall see your shame.'

When Mehtab Singh came to the door
His shoes they burned his hand,
For there in long and silent lines
He saw the Captains stand.

When Mehtab Singh rode from the gate
His chin was on his breast:

RIDING at dawn, riding alone,
Gillespie left the town behind;
Before he turned by the westward road

A horseman crossed him, staggering blind.

'The Devil's abroad in false Vellore,
The Devil that stabs by night,' he said,
'Women and children, rank and file,
Dying and dead, dying and dead.'

Without a word, without a groan,

Sudden and swift Gillespie turned; The blood roared in his ears like fire, Like fire the road beneath him burned.

He thundered back to Arcot gate,

He thundered up through Arcot town, Before he thought a second thought

In the barrack yard he lighted down. 'Trumpeter, sound for the Light Dragoons, Sound to saddle and spur,' he said; 'He that is ready may ride with me, And he that can may ride ahead.'

Fierce and fain, fierce and fain,

Behind him went the troopers grim, They rode as ride the Light Dragoons,

But never a man could ride with him.

Their rowels ripped their horses' sides,
Their hearts were red with a deeper goal,
But ever alone before them all
Gillespie rode, Gillespie rode.

Heavily came the Sergeant's voice: 'There are two living, and forty dead.' 'A rope, a rope!' Gillespie cried: They bound their belts to serve his need; There was not a rebel behind the wall

But laid his barrel and drew his bead.

There was not a rebel among them all
But pulled his trigger and cursed his aim,
For lightly swung and rightly swung
Over the gate Gillespie came.

He dressed the line, he led the charge,
They swept the wall like a stream in spate
And roaring over the roar they heard
The galloper guns that burst the gate.
Fierce and fain, fierce and fain,

The troopers rode the reeking flight:
The very stones remember still

The end of them that stab by night.

They've kept the tale a hundred years,
They'll keep the tale a hundred more:
Riding at dawn, riding alone,
Gillespie came to false Vellore.

We now saw the enemy bearing ahead,
And to East of them Cape Traflagar, it was said;
'Tis a name we remember from father to son,
That the days of old England may never be
done.

The Victory led, to her flag it was due,
Tho' the Téméraires thought themselves
Admirals too,

But Lord Nelson he hailed them with masterful grace,

'Cap'n Harvey, I'll thank you to keep in your place.'

To begin with we closed the Bucentaure alone, An eighty-gun ship, and their Admiral's own; We raked her but once, and the rest of the day Like a hospital hulk on the water she lay.

To our battering next the Redoubtable struck, But her sharpshooters gave us the worst of the luck,

Lord Nelson was wounded, most cruel to tell, 'They've done for me, Hardy,' he cried as he fell.

To the cockpit in silence they carried him past, And sad were the looks that were after him cast; His face with a kerchief he tried to conceal, But we knew him too well from the truck to the keel.

4