* * * * *

THE LOST LEADER

Just for a handful of silver he left us,
  Just for a riband to stick in his coat—­
Found the one gift of which fortune bereft us,
  Lost all the others she lets us devote;
They, with the gold to give, doled him out silver,
  So much was theirs who so little allowed;
How all our copper had gone for his service! 
  Rags—­were they purple, his heart had been proud! 
We that had loved him so, followed him, honoured him,
  Lived in his mild and magnificent eye, 10
Learned his great language, caught his clear accents,
  Made him our pattern to live and to die! 
Shakespeare deg. was of us, Milton deg. was for us, deg.13
  Burns, deg.  Shelley, deg. were with us,—­they watch from their graves! deg.14
He alone breaks from the van and the freemen,
  He alone sinks to the rear and the slaves!

We shall march prospering—­not through his presence;
  Songs may inspirit us,—­not from his lyre: 
Deeds will be done,—­while he boasts his quiescence,
  Still bidding crouch whom the rest bade aspire:  20
Blot out his name, then, record one lost soul more,
  One task more declined, one more footpath untrod,
One more devil’s-triumph and sorrow for angels,
  One wrong more to man, one more insult to God! 
Life’s night begins:  let him never come back to us! 
  There would be doubt, hesitation, and pain,
Forced praise on our part—­the glimmer of twilight,
  Never glad confident morning again! 
Best fight on well, for we taught him—­strike gallantly,
  Menace our heart ere we master his own; 30
Then let him receive the new knowledge and wait us,
  Pardoned in heaven, the first by the throne!

* * * * *

APPARENT FAILURE

“We shall soon lose a celebrated building.”
                     —­Paris Newspaper.

No, for I’ll save it!  Seven years since
  I passed through Paris, stopped a day
To see the baptism of your Prince, deg. deg.3
  Saw, made my bow, and went my way: 
Walking the heat and headache off,
  I took the Seine-side, you surmise,
Thought of the Congress, deg.  Gortschakoff, deg. deg.7
  Cavour’s deg. appeal and Buol’s deg. replies, deg.8
  So sauntered till—­what met my eyes?

Only the Doric little Morgue! 10
  The dead-house where you show your drowned: 
Petrarch’s Vaucluse deg. makes proud the Sorgue, deg. deg.12
  Your Morgue has made the Seine renowned. 
One pays one’s debt deg. in such a case; deg.14
  I plucked up heart and entered,—­stalked,
Keeping a tolerable face
  Compared with some whose cheeks were chalked: 
  Let them!  No Briton’s to be balked!