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, The best and the last! 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 Croisie, 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!'' "Not a minute more to wait! Let the Captains all and each 30 swell, "Twixt the offing here and Grève where the river disembogues? Are you bought by English gold? Morn and eve, night and day, Is it love 50 Entered free and anchored fast at the foot of Solidor. Not a minute more to wait. "Steer us in, then, small and great! Take the helm, lead the line, save the squadron ! "' cried its chief. Captains, give the sailor place! He is Admiral, in brief. Shove ashore, then blow up, burn the vessels | Still the north-wind, by God's grace! on the beach! See the noble fellow's face 70 Keeps the passage as its inch of way were the wide sea's profound! See, safe through shoal and rock, Not a ship that misbehaves, not a keel that grates the ground, Not a spar that comes to grief! The peril, see, is past, All are harboured to the last, 80 And just as Hervé Riel hollas "Anchor!"'— sure as fate, Up the English come-too late! VIII And "What mockery or malice have we here?" So, the storm subsides to calm: cries Hervé Riel: "Are you mad, you Malouins? Are you cowards, fools, or rogues? Talk to me of rocks and shoals, me who took the soundings, tell They see the green trees wave On the heights o'erlooking Grève. Hearts that bled are stanched with balm. "Just our rapture to enhance, Let the English rake the bay, Then a beam of fun out broke Since on board the duty 's done, 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. the Belle Aurore!"' That he asked and that he got,-nothing more. XI Name and deed alike are lost: Not a pillar nor a post Who, then, dares hold, emancipated thus, EPILOGUE* In his Croisie keeps alive the feat as it be- At the midnight in the silence of the sleep-time, fell; When you set your fancies free, Will they pass to where-by death, fools think, imprisoned 1 An ancient roval palace, now mainly an artgallery, adorned with the statues of eminent Frenchmen. *This is the Epilogue to Asolando, which was published at London on the day when Browning died at Venice. Low he lies who once so loved you, whom you So weeping, how a mystic Shape did move Like the aimless, helpless, hopeless, did I drivel Unlike are we, unlike, O princely Heart! One who never turned his back but marched On one another, as they strike athwart breast forward, Never doubted clouds would break, Never dreamed, though right were worsted, wrong would triumph, Held we fall to rise, are baffled to fight better, Sleep to wake. 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*ING (1809-1861) SONNETS FROM THE PORTUGUESE* I I thought once how Theocritus had sung1 The dark, and leaning up a cypress tree? The chrism is on thine head,-on mine, the dew, 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 In folds of golden fulness at my door? Of the sweet years, the dear and wished for The bats and owlets builders in the roof! * 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 had long been an invalid. See Eng. Lit., p. 307. F. G. Kenyon, in his edition of Mrs. Browning's Letters, writes'; "With the single 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." But love me for love's sake, that evermore XXII When our two souls stand up erect and strong, II Before the phantom of False morning died,1 III 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, XLIII How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. I love thee with a love I seemed to lose Smiles, tears, of all my life!-and, if God 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 Iram was an ancient garden, planted by King |