ds and wait,
Nor care for wind, or tide, or sea;
I rave no more 'gainst time or fate,
For lo! my own shall come to me.

I stay my haste, I make delays,
For what avails this eager pace?
I stand amid the eternal ways,
And what is mine shall know my face.

Asleep, awake, by night or day,
The friends I seek are seeking me;
No wind can drive my bark astray,
Nor change the tide of destiny.

What matter if I stand alone?
I wait with joy the coming years;
My heart shall reap where it has sown,
And garner up its fruit of tears.

The waters know their own, and draw
The brook that springs in yonder height;
So flows the good with equal law
Unto the soul of pure delight.

The stars come nightly to the sky;
The tidal wave unto the sea;
Nor time, nor space, nor deep, nor high,
Can keep my own away from me.

Republished by courtesy of John Burroughs.

SIR RICHARD F. BURTON

(1821-1890)

It has sometimes been said that the roving propensities of Sir Richard
Burton are attributable to a slight infusion of gipsy blood; but if this
pedigree were to be assumed for all instinctively nomadic Englishmen, it
would make family trees as farcical in general as they often are now. At
any rate, Burton early showed a love for travel which circumstances
strengthened. Although born in Hertfordshire, England, he spent much of
his boyhood on the Continent, where he was educated under tutors. He
returned for a course at Oxford, after which, at twenty-one, he entered
the Indian service. For nineteen years he was in the Bombay army corps,
the first ten in active service, principally in the Sindh Survey, on Sir
Charles Napier's staff. He also served in the Crimea as Chief of Staff
to General Blatsom, and was chief organizer of the irregular cavalry.
For nearly twenty-six years he was in the English consular service in
Africa, Asia, South America, and Europe.

[Illustration: RICHARD BURTON]

In 1852, when upon leave, Captain Burton accomplished one of his most
striking feats. Disguised as an Afghan Moslem, he went on a pilgrimage
to Mecca and Medina, in the hope of finding out "something of the great
eastern wilderness marked 'Ruba el Khala' (the Empty Abode) on our
maps." For months he successfully braved the imminent danger of
detection and death. Conspicuous among his explorations is his trip of
1856, when with S