She might have hated, I who can tell?

Where had I been now if the worst befell?

And here we are riding, she and I.

5.

Fail I alone, in words and deeds?
Why, all men strive and who succeeds?

We rode; it seemed my spirit flew,
Saw other regions, cities new,

As the world rushed by on either side.
I thought, All labour, yet no less
Bear up beneath their unsuccess.
Look at the end of work, contrast
The petty Done the Undone vast,

This present of theirs with the hopeful past!
I hoped she would love me. Here we ride.

6.

What hand and brain went ever paired?
What heart alike conceived and dared?
What act proved all its thought had been?
What will but felt the fleshly screen ?

We ride and I see her bosom heave.
There's many a crown for who can reach
Ten lines, a statesman's life in each!
The flag stuck on a heap of bones,
A soldier's doing! what atones?

They scratch his name on the Abbey-stones.
My riding is better, by their leave.

7.

What does it all mean, poet? well,
Your brain's beat into rhythm
What we felt only; you expressed

-you tell

You hold things beautiful the best,

And pace them in rhyme so, side by side. 'Tis something, nay 'tis much-but then, Have you yourself what's best for men?

Are you

poor, sick, old ere your time

Nearer one whit your own sublime

Than we who never have turned a rhyme? Sing, riding's a joy! For me, I ride.

And

8.

you, great sculptor - so you gave
A score of years to art, her slave,
And that's your Venus whence we turn
To yonder girl that fords the burn!

You acquiesce and shall I repine?
What, man of music, you, grown gray
With notes and nothing else to say,
Is this your sole praise from a friend,
Greatly his opera's strains intend,

"But in music we know how fashions end!"

Who knows what's fit for us? Had fate

Proposed bliss here should sublimate

My being; had I signed the bond-
Still one must lead some life beyond,

Have a bliss to die with, dim-descried. This foot once planted on the goal, This glory-garland round my soul, Could I descry such? Try and test! I sink back shuddering from the questEarth being so good, would Heaven seem best? Now, Heaven and she are beyond this ride.

10.

And yet she has not spoke so long!

What if Heaven be, that, fair and strong
At life's best, with our eyes upturned
Whither life's flower is first discerned,
We, fixed so, ever should so abide ?
What if we still ride on, we two,
With life forever old yet new,

Changed not in kind but in degree,
The instant made eternity,

And Heaven just prove that I and she
Ride, ride together, forever ride?

THE PATRIOT.

AN OLD STORY.

1.

Ir was roses, roses, all the way,

With myrtle mixed in my path like mad. The house-roofs seemed to heave and sway, The church-spires flamed, such flags they had, A year ago on this very day!

2.

The air broke into a mist with bells,

The old walls rocked with the crowds and cries. Had I said, "Good folks, mere noise repels

But give me your sun from yonder skies!" They had answered, "And afterward, what else?"

3.

Alack, it was I who leaped at the sun,

To give it my loving friends to keep. Nought man could do, have I left undone,

And you see my harvest, what I reap This very day, now a year is run.

4.

There's nobody on the house-tops now
Just a palsied few at the windows set
For the best of the sight is, all allow,
At the Shambles' Gate-or,
By the very scaffold's foot, I trow.

5.

better yet,

I go in the rain, and, more than needs,
A rope cuts both my wrists behind,
And I think, by the feel, my forehead bleeds,
For they fling, whoever has a mind,
Stones at me for my year's misdeeds.

6.

Thus I entered Brescia, and thus I go!

In such triumphs, people have dropped down dead.

Me?" God might have questioned: but now instead

'Tis God shall requite! I am safer so.