For to me spoke the Duke, as I told you before;

I always wanted to make a clean breast of it,

And now it is made-why, my heart's-blood, that went trickle,

Trickle, but anon, in such muddy dribblets,

Is pumped up brisk now, thro' the main ventricle,

And genially floats me about the giblets!

I'll tell you what I intend to do:

I must see this fellow his sad life thro'

-He is our Duke after all,

And I, as he says, but a serf and thrall;
My father was born here and I inherit
His fame, a chain he bound his son with,—
Could I pay in a lump I should prefer it,

But there's no mine to blow up and get done with,
So I must stay till the end of the chapter:
For, as to our middle-age-manners-adapter,
Be it a thing to be glad on or sorry on,
One day or other, his head in a morion,

And breast in a hauberk, his heels he 'll kick up

Slain by some onslaught fierce of hiccup.

And then, when red doth the sword of our Duke rust, And its leathern sheath lies o'ergrown with a blue crust,

Then, I shall scrape together my earnings;

For, you see, in the Churchyard Jacynth reposes,
And our children all went the way of the roses-
It's a long lane that knows no turnings-

One needs but little tackle to travel in,

So, just one stout cloak shall I indue,

And for a staff, what beats the javelin

With which his boars my father pinned you?
And then, for a purpose you shall hear presently,
Taking some Cotnar, a tight plump skinfull,

I shall go journeying, who but I, pleasantly?
Sorrow is vain and despondency sinful.

What's a man's age? He must hurry more, that's all
Cram in a day, what his youth took a year to hold;
When we mind labour, then only, we 're too old—
What age had Methusalem when he begat Saul?
And at last, as its haven some buffeted ship sees,
(Come all the way from the north-parts with sperm oil)
I shall get safely out of the turmoil

And arrive one day at the land of the gypsies

And find my lady, or hear the last news of her
From some old thief and son of Lucifer,

His forehead chapletted green with wreathy hop,
Sunburned all over like an Æthiop:

And when my Cotnar begins to operate

And the tongue of the rogue to run at a proper rate, And our wine-skin, tight once, shows each flaccid dent, I shall drop in with-as if by accident"You never knew then, how it all ended, "What fortunes good or bad attended "The little lady your Queen befriended?" -And when that's told me, what's remaining? This world's too hard for my explainingThe same wise judge of matters equine Who still preferred some slim four-year-old

To the big-boned stock of mighty Berold,

And for strong Cotnar drank French weak wine,
He also must be such a Lady's scorner!

Smooth Jacob still robs homely Esau,

Now up, now down, the world's one see-saw !
-So, I shall find out some snug corner
Under a hedge, like Orson the wood-knight,
Turn myself round and bid the world good night;
And sleep a sound sleep till the trumpet's blowing
Wakes me (unless priests cheat us laymen)
To a world where 's to be no further throwing
Pearls before swine that can't value them, Amen!

EARTH'S IMMORTALITIES.

FAME.

SEE, as the prettiest graves will do in time,
Our poet's wants the freshness of its prime;
Spite of the sexton's browsing horse, the sods
Have struggled thro' its binding osier-rods;
Headstone and half-sunk footstone lean awry,
Wanting the brick-work promised by and by;
How the minute grey lichens, plate o'er plate,
Have softened down the crisp-cut name and date!

LOVE.

So, the year's done with!
(Love me for ever!)
All March begun with,

April's endeavour;
May-wreaths that bound me

June needs must sever!

Now snows fall round me,
Quenching June's fever-
(Love me for ever!)

SONG

I.

NAY but you, who do not love her,

Is she not pure gold, my mistress?
Holds earth aught—speak truth—above her?
Aught like this tress, see, and this tress,
And this last fairest tress of all,

So fair, see, ere I let it fall!

II.

Because, you spend your lives in praising;
To praise, you search the wide world over;
So, why not witness, calmly gazing,

If earth holds aught-speak truth-above her? Above this tress, and this I touch

But cannot praise, I love so much!

THE BOY AND THE ANGEL.

MORNING, evening, noon, and night, "Praise God," sang Theocrite.

Then to his poor trade he turned,
By which the daily meal was earned.

Hard he laboured, long and well;
O'er his work the boy's curls fell:

But ever, at each period,

He stopped and sang, "Praise God."

Then back again his curls he threw,
And cheerful turned to work anew.

Said Blaise, the listening monk, “Well done; “I doubt not thou art heard, my son:

"As well as if thy voice to-day

"Were praising God, the Pope's great way.

"This Easter Day, the Pope at Rome "Praises God from Peter's dome."

Said Theocrite," Would God that I "Might praise Him, that great way, and die!"