This Present, thou, forsooth, would fain arrest: Though a battle's to fight ere the guerdon be Machinery just meant To give thy soul its bent, gained, The reward of it all. Try thee and turn thee forth, sufficiently I was ever a fighter, so—one fight more, Grow out, in graver mood, obey the sterner Bear the brunt, in a minute pay glad life's stress? Look not thou down but up! To uses of a cup, The festal board, lamp's flash and trumpet's peal, The new wine's foaming flow, The Master's lips aglow! arrears Thou, heaven's consummate cup, what needst Shall change, shall become first a peace out of Where he stands, the Arch Fear in a visible Twenty-two good ships in all; 10 The victory of La Hogue was won off the north coast of Normandy by the British and Dutch Allies against Louis XIV. Hervé Riel, a Breton sailor from the village of Croisic, saved many of the fleeing French vessels by piloting them through the shallows at the mouth of the river Rance to the roadstead at St. Malo. Get us guidance, give us harbour, take us On my fingers every bank, every shallow, every quick-or, quicker still, Here's the English can and will!'' swell, 'Twixt the offing here and Grève where the river disembogues! Then the pilots of the place put out brisk and Are you bought by English gold? Is it love leapt on board; All that's left us of the fleet, linked together For a prize to Plymouth Sound? (Ended Damfreville his speech). "Not a minute more to wait! Let the Captains all and each the lying's for? 50 Entered free and anchored fast at the foot of Solidor. 30 Shove ashore, then blow up, burn the vessels Still the north-wind, by God's grace! See the noble fellow's face Clears the entry like a hound, 70 And "What mockery or malice have we here?" So, the storm subsides to calm: "Are you mad, you Malouins? Are you cow- They see the green trees wave Talk to me of rocks and shoals, me who took "Just our rapture to enhance, the soundings, tell Let the English rake the bay, 80 631 Gnash their teeth and glare askance As they cannonade away! 90 Go to Paris: rank on rank 'Neath rampired Solidor pleasant riding on the On the Louvre,' face and flank. Rance!" How hope succeeds despair on each Captain's countenance! Out burst all with one accord, "This is Paradise for Hell! Let France, let France's King Thank the man that did the thing!" What a shout, and all one word, "Hervé Riel!"' As he stepped in front once more, IX Then said Damfreville, "My friend, I must speak out at the end, Though I find the speaking hard. Praise is deeper than the lips: You have saved the King his ships, You must name your own reward. 'Faith, our sun was near eclipse! Demand whate 'er you will, France remains your debtor still. You shall look long enough ere you come to Hervé Riel. So, for better and for worse, Hervé Riel, accept my verse! In my verse, Hervé Riel, do thou once more Save the squadron, honour France, love thy wife, the Belle Aurore! Ask to heart's content and have! or my name's not Damfreville."' X Then a beam of fun out broke And from Malo Roads to Croisie Point, what is it but a run? Since 't is ask and have, I may Since the others go ashore Come! A good whole holiday! 120 -Where is the blot? 140 Beamy the world, yet a blank all the same, -Framework which waits for a picture to frame: What of the leafage, what of the flower? WHY I AM A LIBERAL "Why?" Because all I haply can and do, But little do or can the best of us: Leave to go and see my wife, whom I call That little is achieved through Liberty. In his Croisic keeps alive the feat as it be- At the midnight in the silence of the sleep-time, 632 Low he lies who once so loved you, whom you So weeping, how a mystic Shape did move loved so, -Pity me? Oh to love so, be so loved, yet so mistaken! Behind me, and drew me backward by the hair; I The silver answer rang,-"Not Death, but With the slothful, with the mawkish, the un- One who never turned his back but marched On one another, as they strike athwart breast forward, Never doubted clouds would break, Held we fall to rise, are baffled to fight better, Their wings in passing. Thou, bethink thee, art Of chief musician. What hast thou to do No, at noonday in the bustle of man's work- A poor, tired, wandering singer, singing through time Greet the unseen with a cheer! Bid him forward, breast and back as either should be, "Strive and thrive! cry "Speed,-fight on, fare ever There as here!" ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWN- SONNETS FROM THE PORTUGUESE* I I thought once how Theocritus had sung1 Who each one in a gracious hand appears 1 Idyls, xv, 104. The dark, and leaning up a cypress tree? And Death must dig the level where these agree. IV Thou hast thy calling to some palace-floor, To let thy music drop here unaware XIV If thou must love me, let it be for nought * These Sonnets. forty-four in number. were written by Miss Barrett during the time of Mr. Browning's courtship, but were not shown to him until after their marriage in 1846. The title under which they were published (1850) was adopted as a disguise. To understand them aright, it must be remembered that Miss Barrett was in middle life and May be unwrought so. Neither love me for had long been an invalid. See Eng. Lit., p. 307. F. G. Kenyon, in his edition of Mrs. Thine own dear pity's wiping my cheeks dry.— Browning's Letters, writes: "With the sin-A creature might forget to weep, who bore gle exception of Rossetti, no modern English poet has written of love with such genius. such beauty, and such sincerity, as the two who gave the most beautiful example of it in their own lives." Thy comfort long, and lose thy love thereby! 2 The sacred ointment; here figurative for poetic consecration. But love me for love's sake, that evermore XXII When our two souls stand up erect and strong, And, as the Cock crew, those who stood before You know how little while we have to stay, IV The angels would press on us and aspire Now the New Year2 reviving old Desires, Where the WHITE HAND OF MOSES on the XLIII How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. I love thee with a love I seemed to lose With my lost saints,-I love thee with the breath, Smiles, tears, of all my life!-and, if God choose, I shall but love thee better after death. Puts out, and Jesus from the Ground suspires.+ V And Jamshyd's Sev 'n-ring 'd Cup where no one But still a Ruby kindles in the Vine, * Omar Khayyám (i. e., Omar the Tent-maker) The opening stanza of the first edition is con- Awake! for Morning in the Bowl of Night |