prolonged thy stay.

XXIX

THE POET WHO SLEEPS

One day, when I was young, I read
About a poet, long since dead,
Who fell asleep, as poets do
In writing--and make others too.
But herein lies the story's gist,
How a gay queen came up and kist
The sleeper.
'Capital!' thought I.
'A like good fortune let me try.'
Many the things we poets feign.
I feign'd to sleep, but tried in vain.
I tost and turn'd from side to side,
With open mouth and nostrils wide.
At last there came a pretty maid,
And gazed; then to myself I said,
'Now for it!' She, instead of kiss,
Cried, 'What a lazy lout is this!'

XXX

DANIEL DEFOE

Few will acknowledge what they owe
To persecuted, brave Defoe.
Achilles, in Homeric song,
May, or he may not, live so long
As Crusoe; few their strength had tried
Without so staunch and safe a guide.
What boy is there who never laid
Under his pillow, half afraid,
That precious volume, lest the morrow
For unlearnt lessons might bring sorrow?
But nobler lessons he has taught
Wide-awake scholars who fear'd naught:
A Rodney and a Nelson may
Without him not have won the day.

XXXI

IDLE WORDS

They say that every idle word
Is numbered by the Omniscient Lord.
O Parliament! 'tis well that He
Endureth for Eternity,
And that a thousand Angels wait
To write them at thy inner gate.

XXXII

TO THE RIVER AVON

Avon! why runnest thou away so fast?
Rest thee before that Chancel where repose
The bones of him whose spirit moves the world.
I have beheld thy birthplace, I have seen
Thy tiny ripples where they play amid
The golden cups and ever-waving blades.
I have seen mighty rivers, I have seen
Padus, recovered from his fiery wound,
And Tiber, prouder than them all to bear
Upon his tawny bosom men who crusht
The world they trod on, heeding not the cries
Of culprit kings and nations many-tongued.
What are to me these rivers, once adorn'd
With crowns they would not wear but swept away?
Worthier art thou of worship, and I bend
My knees upon thy bank, and call thy name,
And hear, or think I hear, thy voice reply.

Transcriber's Note:

Minor errors (missi