XII. A Book of Verses underneath the Bough, XIII. Some for the Glories of This World; and some Ah, take the Cash, and let the Credit go, XVII. Think, in this batter'd Caravanserai XXI. Ah, my Belovéd, fill the cup that clears XXIV. Ah, make the most of what we yet may spend, Dust into Dust, and under Dust, to lie, Sans Wine, sans Song, sans Singer, and-sans End! Sir Francis Hastings Charles Doyle 1810-1888 THE PRIVATE OF THE BUFFS (1866) Last night, among his fellow roughs, To-day, beneath the foeman's frown, Poor, reckless, rude, low-born, untaught, A heart, with English instinct fraught, Ay, tear his body limb from limb, Far Kentish hop-fields round him seem'd, The smoke, above his father's door, Doom'd by himself, so young? Yes, honour calls!-with strength like steel He put the vision by. Let dusky Indians whine and kneel; An English lad must die. And thus, with eyes that would not shrink, With knee to man unbent, Vain, mightiest fleets, of iron fram'd; So, let his name through Europe ring- Who died, as firm as Sparta's king, William Makepeace Thackeray 1811-1863 AT THE CHURCH GATE (From Pendennis, 1849-1850) Although I enter not, The Minster bell tolls out And noise and humming: The organ 'gins to swell: She's coming, she's coming! My lady comes at last, She comes-she's here—she's past— Kneel, undisturb'd, fair Saint! I will not enter there, To sully your pure prayer But suffer me to pace Like outcast spirits who wait THE END OF THE PLAY (From Dr. Birch and His Young Friends, 1848-1849) The play is done; the curtain drops, And looks around, to say farewell. And, when he's laughed and said his say, One word, ere yet the evening ends, As fits the merry Christmas time. Good night!-I'd say, the griefs, the joys, Just hinted in this mimic page, The triumphs and defeats of boys, At forty-five played o'er again. I'd say, we suffer and we strive, And if, in time of sacred youth, We learned at home to love and pray, Pray Heaven that early Love and Truth May never wholly pass away. And in the world, as in the school, I'd say, how fate may change and shift; The strong may yield, the good may fall, The knave be lifted over all, The kind cast pitilessly down. |