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النشر الإلكتروني

CXLV.

HIGH TIDE AT MIDNIGHT.

No breath is on the glimmering ocean-floor,
No blast beneath the windless Pleiades,
But thro' dead night a melancholy roar,

A voice of moving and of marching seas,-
The boom of thundering waters on the shore
Sworn with slow force by desolate degrees
Once to go on, and whelm for evermore

Earth and her folk and all their phantasies. Then half asleep in the great sound I seem Lost in the starlight, dying in a dream

Where overmastering Powers abolish me,Drown, and thro' dim euthanasy redeem My merged life in the living ocean-stream And soul-environing of shadowy sea.

K

CXLVI,

SUBSTANCE AND SHADOW.

THEY do but grope in learning's pedant round
Who on the phantasies of sense bestow
An idol substance, bidding us bow low
Before those shades of being which are found,
Stirring or still, on man's brief trial-ground;
As if such shapes and modes, which come and go,
Had aught of Truth or Life in their poor show,
To sway or judge, and skill to sain or wound.

Son of immortal seed, high-destined man!
Know thy dread gift,—a creature, yet a cause :
Each mind is its own centre, and it draws
Home to itself, and moulds in its thought's span,
All outward things, the vassals of its will,
Aided by Heaven, by earth unthwarted still.

CXLVII.

SAN SEBATIAN.

THE Atlantic rolls around a fort of Spain:
Old towers and bastions looming o'er the sea;
The yellow banner floating, torn yet free;
Cannon and shell, the trumpet's martial strain
Bring memories of thy greatness back, in vain.
The shadow of the past is over thee,
Grey cenotaph of Rowland's chivalry,
And glories than can never come again.
Balconied streets, the scenes of stubborn fight
In the red days of siege, and terraced squares,
And bright eyes gleaming through the veil of night,
And feet that climb the long cathedral stairs
So softly;-every sight and sound recalls
Spain's worn-out flag above the ruined walls.

CXLVIII.

LONDON.

DIM miles of smoke behind-I look before,
Through looming curtains of November rain,
Till eyes and ears are weary with the strain :
Amid the glare and gloom, I hear the roar
Of life's sea, beating on a barren shore.

Terrible arbiter of joy and pain!

A thousand hopes are wrecks of thy disdain ; A thousand hearts have learnt to love no more. Over thy gleaming bridges, on the street

That ebbs and flows beneath the silent dome, Life's pulse is throbbing at a fever heat.

City of cities-battlefield and home

Of England's greatest, greatly wear their spoils, Thou front and emblem of an Empire's toils.

CXLIX.

CROWNED.

ΤΟ

I THOUGHT to track a world-disdaining Light,
A dreadless Spirit, till our work was done.—
Grown greater in men's eyes, his battle won,
My hero fails me, wearied of the fight,
And, late succeeding, finds Success is Right.

Honoured and wise, his days unruffled run
With grace and mellow music, tamed to shun
The obdurate heart that wrestles with the night.
I was his homager, and shall remain,

Through chance of time and change, his debtor still:

But the old days can never come again

Of love in exile knit, whose memories will

Shine on the way, though shrinking throngs disown, That lies for me across the seas alone.

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