The British classical authors

There she weaves by night and day A magic web with colours gay. She has heard a whisper say, 40 A curse is on her if she stay

To look down to Camelot. She knows not what the curse may be, And so she weaveth steadily, 44 And little other care hath she, The Lady of Shalott.

And moving thro' a mirror clear That hangs before her all the year, 48 Shadows of the world appear. There she sees the highway near Winding down to Camelot: There the river eddy whirls, 52 And there the surly village-churls, And the red cloaks of market girls, Pass onward from Shalott.

As often thro' the purple night,
Below the starry clusters bright,
Some bearded meteor, trailing light,
Moves over still Shalott.

100 His broad clear brow in sunlight glow'd; On burnish'd hooves his war-horse trode;

104

From underneath his helmet flow'd
His coal-black curls as on he rode,

As he rode down to Camelot. From the bank and from the river He flash'd into the crystal mirror, 'Tirra lirra,' by the river 108 Sang Sir Lancelot.

She left the web, she left the loom, She made three paces thro' the room, She saw the water-lily bloom, 112 She saw the helmet and the plume,

She look'd down to Camelot. Out flew the web and floated wide; The mirror crack'd from side to side; 116 "The curse is come upon me,' cried The Lady of Shalott.

Part IV.

In the stormy east-wind straining, The pale yellow woods were waning, 120 The broad stream in his banks complaining, Heavily the low sky raining

Över tower'd Camelot;

Down she came and found a boat 124 Beneath a willow left afloat,

And round about the prow she wrote

The Lady of Shalott.

And down the river's dim expanse 128 Like some bold seër in a trance, Seeing all his own mischance With a glassy countenance

Did she look to Camelot.

ULYSSES.

[From Poems (1842)]

It little profits that an idle king,

By this still hearth, among these barren crags, Match'd with an aged wife, I mete and dole

Unequal laws unto a savage race,

That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me.
I cannot rest from travel: I will drink

Life to the lees: all times I have enjoy'd
Greatly, have suffer'd greatly, both with those
That loved me, and alone; on shore, and when
10 Thro' scudding drifts the rainy Hyades
Vext the dim sea: I am become a name;
For always roaming with a hungry heart
Much have I seen and known; cities of men
And manners, climates, councils, governments,
15 Myself not least, but honour'd of them all;
And drunk delight of battle with my peers,
Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.
I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro

20 Gleams that untravell'd world, whose margin fades
For ever and for ever when I move.

How dull it is to pause, to make an end,

To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use!

As tho' to breathe were life. Life piled on life 25 Were all too little, and of one to me

Little remains: but every hour is saved
From that eternal silence, something more,
A bringer of new things; and vile it were
For some three suns to store and hoard myself,

80 And this gray spirit yearning in desire
To follow knowledge like a sinking star,
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.
This is my son, mine own Telemachus,
To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle
85 Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfil
This labour, by slow prudence to make mild
A rugged people, and thro' soft degrees
Subdue them to the useful and the good.
Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere
40 Of common duties, decent not to fail
In offices of tenderness, and pay

Meet adoration to my household gods,

When I am gone. He works his work, I mine.
There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail:

45 There gloom the dark broad seas. My mariners,
Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and thought with me--
That ever with a frolic welcome took

The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed
Free hearts, free foreheads

you and I are old;

50 Old age hath yet his honour and his toil; Death closes all: but something ere the end, Some work of noble note, may yet be done,

Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks:

55 The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep
Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,
"Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
60 To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.

It may be that the gulfs will wash us down: It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles, And see the great Achilles, whom we knew. 65 Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho' We are not now that strength which in old days Moved earth and heaven; that which we are, we are; One equal temper of heroic hearts,

Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will 70 To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

THE PASSING OF ARTHUR.

[From Idylls of the King (1869), Bk. XII, II, 170—541 = Morte D'Arthur (1842)]

So all day long the noise of battle roll'd
Among the mountains by the winter sea;
Until King Arthur's Table, man by man,
Had fall'n in Lyonnesse about their lord,

6 King Arthur. Then, because his wound was deep,
The bold Sir Bedivere uplifted him,

Sir Bedivere, the last of all his knights,
And bore him to a chapel nigh the field,
A broken chancel with a broken cross,

10 That stood on a dark strait of barren land:
On one side lay the Ocean, and on one
Lay a great water, and the moon was full.

Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere:
"The sequel of to-day unsolders all

15 The goodliest fellowship of famous knights
Whereof this world holds record. Such a sleep
They sleep the men I loved. I think that we
Shall never more, at any future time,

Delight our souls with talk of knightly deeds,

20 Walking about the gardens and the halls Of Camelot, as in the days that were.

Which was my pride: for thou rememberest how
In those old days, one summer noon, an arm
30 Rose up from out the bosom of the lake,
Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful,
Holding the sword ́ and how I row'd across
And took it, and have worn it, like a king;
And, wheresoever I am sung or told
85 In aftertime, this also shall be known:
But now delay not: take Excalibur,

And fling him far into the middle mere:
Watch what thou seëst, and lightly bring me word.'
To him replied the bold Sir Bedivere:

40 'It is not meet, Sir King, to leave thee thus,
Aidless, alone, and smitten thro' the helm
A little thing may harm a wounded man;
Yet I thy hest will all perform at full,
Watch what I see, and lightly bring thee word.'
So saying, from the ruin'd shrine he stept,
And in the moon athwart the place of tombs,
Where lay the mighty bones of ancient men,
Old knights, and over them the sea-wind sang
Shrill, chill, with flakes of foam. He, stepping down
60 By zigzag paths, and juts of pointed rock,
Came on the shining levels of the lake.

There drew he forth the brand Excalibur,
And o'er him, drawing it, the winter moon,
Brightening the skirts of a long cloud, ran forth
55 And sparkled keen with frost against the hilt:
For all the haft twinkled with diamond sparks,
Myriads of topaz-lights, and jacinth-work
Of subtlest jewellery. He gazed so long
That both his eyes were dazzled as he stood,
This way and that dividing the swift mind,
In act to throw: but at the last it seem'd
Better to leave Excalibur conceal'd

100

There in the many-knotted waterflags, That whistled stiff and dry about the marge. 65 So strode he back slow to the wounded King. Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere: 'Hast thou perform'd my mission which I gave? What is it thou hast seen? or what hast heard?' And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere: 70 'I heard the ripple washing in the reeds, And the wild water lapping on the crag.'

To whom replied King Arthur, faint and pale: "Thou hast betray'd thy nature and thy name, Not rendering true answer, as beseem'd 76 Thy fealty, nor like a noble knight: For surer sign had follow'd, either hand,

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The British classical authors: with biographical notices. On the basis of a ...