"'T is clear," cried they, "our Mayor's a By means of a secret charm, to draw

All creatures living beneath the sun,
That creep or swim or fly or run,
After me so as you never saw!
And I chiefly use my charm

On creatures that do people harm,
The mole and toad and newt and viper;
And people call me the Pied Piper."

30 (And here they noticed round his neck
A scarf of red and yellow stripe,

The Piper's face fell, and he cried,
"No trifling! I can't wait, beside!
130 I've promised to visit by dinner time
Bagdad, and accept the prime

A thousand guilders! The Mayor looked blue; Small feet were pattering, wooden shoes clatter

From the duty of giving you something for The Mayor was dumb, and the Council stood

1 This happened in Egypt, according to Plutarch, But how the Mayor was on the rack.

As the Piper turned from the High Street
To where the Weser rolled its waters
Right in the way of their sons and daughters!
However, he turned from South to West,

They made a decree that lawyers never
Should think their records dated duly
If, after the day of the month and year,
These words did not as well appear,

On the Twenty-second of July,
Thirteen hundred and seventy-six: '
And the better in memory to fix

And to Koppelberg Hill his steps addressed, 220 "And so long after what happened here
And after him the children pressed;
Great was the joy in every breast.
"He never can cross that mighty top!
He's forced to let the piping drop,
And we shall see our children stop!''
When, lo, as they reached the mountain-side,
A wondrous portal opened wide,

As if a cavern was suddenly hollowed;
And the Piper advanced and the children fol-
lowed,

And when all were in to the very last,
The door in the mountain-side shut fast.
Did I say all? No! One was lame,
And could not dance the whole of the way;
And in after years if you would blame
His sadness, he was used to say,-

230

"It's dull in our town since my playmates left!

The place of the children's last retreat,
They called it, the Pied Piper's Street-
Where any one playing on pipe or tabour
Was sure for the future to lose his labour.
Nor suffered they hostelry or tavern

To shock with mirth a street so solemn;
But opposite the place of the cavern
They wrote the story on a column.
And on the great church-window painted
The same, to make the world acquainted
How their children were stolen away,
And there it stands to this very day.
And I must not omit to say
That in Transylvania there's a tribe
Of alien people who ascribe
The outlandish ways and dress

On which their neighbours lay such stress,
To their fathers and mothers having risen
240 Out of some subterraneous prison
Into which they were trepanned
Long time ago in a mighty band
Out of Hamelin town in Brunswick land,
But how or why, they don't understand.

I can't forget that I'm bereft
Of all the pleasant sights they see,
Which the Piper also promised me.
For he led us, he said, to a joyous land,
Joining the town and just at hand,
Where waters gushed and fruit-trees grew
And flowers put forth a fairer hue,
And everything was strange and new;
The sparrows were brighter than peacocks here,
And their dogs outran our fallow deer,
And honey-bees had lost their stings,
And horses were born with eagles' wings;
And just as I became assured

My lame foot would be speedily cured,
The music stopped and I stood still,
And found myself outside the hill,
Left alone against my will,

To go now limping as before,

And never hear of that country more!''

XIV

Alas, alas for Hamelin!

250

There came into many a burgher's pate
A text which says that heaven's gate
Opes to the rich at as easy rate
As the needle's eye takes a camel in!
The Mayor sent East, West, North and South,
To offer the Piper, by word of mouth,

Wherever it was men's lot to find him,
Silver and gold to his heart's content,
If he'd only return the way he went,
And bring the children behind him.

But when they saw 't was a lost endeavour,
And Piper and dancers were gone forever,

260

X7

270

280

290

300

So, Willy, let me and you be wipers
Of scores out with all men-especially pipers!
And, whether they pipe us free from rats or
fróm mice,

If we've promised them aught, let us keep our
promise!

Not a word to each other; we kept the great So, we were left galloping, Joris and I, pace Past Looz and past Tongres, no cloud in the sky; Neck by neck, stride by stride, never changing The broad sun above laughed a pitiless laugh, our place; 'Neath our feet broke the brittle bright stubble like chaff; 40

I turned in my saddle and made its girths tight,

10

Till over by Dalhem a dome-spire sprang white, gasped Joris, "for Aix is in

sight!"'

Then shortened each stirrup, and set the pique And ".
"Gallop,
right,
Rebuckled the cheek-strap, chained slacker the
bit,

Nor galloped less steadily Roland a whit.

"How they'll greet us!"-and all in a moment his roan

Rolled neck and croup over, lay dead as a stone;

And there was my Roland to bear the whole weight

Of the news which alone could save Aix from her fate,

With his nostrils like pits full of blood to the brim,

And with circles of red for his eye-sockets'

Then

rim.

I cast loose my buffcoat, each holster let fall,

Shook off both my jack-boots, let go belt and all,

50

Stood up in the stirrup, leaned, patted his ear, Called my Roland his pet-name, my horse without peer;

Clapped my hands, laughed and sang, any noise, bad or good,

Till at length into Aix Roland galloped and

stood.

And his low head and crest, just one sharp ear And all I remember is-friends flocking round

bent back

For my voice, and the other pricked out on his track;

And one eye's black intelligence,-ever that glance

O'er its white edge at me, his own master, askance!

And the thick heavy spume-flakes which aye and anon

As I sat with his head 'twixt my knees on the

ground;

And no voice but was praising this Roland of mine,

As I poured down his throat our last measure of wine,

Which (the burgesses voted by common consent)

29 Was no more than his due who brought good news from Ghent.

His fierce lips shook upwards in galloping on.

THE LOST LEADER*

Just for a handful of silver he left us,

Just for a riband to stick in his coat

60

Found the one gift of which fortune bereft us,
Lost all the others she lets us devote;
*This poem was suggested by Wordsworth's
change from very radical views to conserva-
tism and Toryism. Browning later apologized
for its great injustice to Wordsworth: it was
the effusion of "hasty youth," and was, more.
over, not intended as an exact characteriza-
tion. Compare Browning's poem, Why I am a
Liberal, below. Whittier's poem, Ichabod, on
the defection of Daniel Webster, is written
in a similar strain.

They, with the gold to give, doled him out While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough silver, In England-now!

We that had loved him so, followed him, hon- Hark, where my blossomed pear-tree in the oured him,

Pardoned in heaven, the first by the throne! Then to his poor trade he turned,