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XXX.

COME from my First, ay, come!

The battle dawn is nigh;

And the screaming trump and the thund'ring drum Are calling thee to die!

Fight as thy father fought,

Fall as thy father fell,

Thy task is taught, thy shroud is wrought;

So-forward! and farewell!

Toll ye, my Second! toll!

Fling high the flambeau's light;

And sing the hymn for a parted soul,

Beneath the silent night!

The helm upon his head,

The cross upon his breast,

Let the prayer be said, and the tear be shed:

Now take him to his rest!

15*

Call ye my Whole, go, call!
The lord of lute and lay;

And let him greet the sable pall
With a noble song to-day;
Go, call him by his name;

No fitter hand may crave

To light the flame of a soldier's fame

On the turf of a soldier's

grave.

(1829.)

G

D

My First, in its usual quiet way,

E

Was creeping along on a wintry day,

When a minstrel came to its muddy bed,

With a harp on his shoulder, a wreath on his head ;
And "How shall I cross," the poor bard cried,
"To the cloisters and courts on the other side?"

Old Euclid came; he frowned a frown;

He flung the harp and the green wreath down;
And he led the boy with a stately march

Το my Second's neat and narrow Arch;
And "See," quoth the sage,
“how every ass
Over the sacred stream must pass."

The youth was mournful, the youth was mute;
He sighed for his laurel, and sobbed for his lute;
The youth took courage, the youth took snuff;
He followed in faith his teacher gruff;

And he sits ever since on my Whole's kind lap,
In a silken gown, and a trencher cap.

XXXII.

AN aged man, with locks of snow,
Sits o'er his glass serenely gay;
Plain Tom, the weaver, long ago,

Sir Thomas Clover, Knight, to-day:
My First beside his grandsire stands,
A comely stripling, stout and tall,
The future lord of his broad lands,
And of his hospitable hall.

"What can it mean, my pretty toy,

With all its wheels, and threads, and springs ?"

And, as he speaks, the wondering boy

His arms around his grandsire flings:
He's puzzled, puzzled, more and more;
And putting on a look of thought,
He turns my Second o'er and o'er,
A silver model deftly wrought.

The good Knight hears with placid smile,
And bids him in the plaything view
A proud memorial of the toil

By which his grandsire's fortunes grew:
And tells them this, my Whole, shall be
Still handed down from son to son,

To teach them by what industry

Their titles and their lands were won.

XXXIII.

THE Palmer comes from the Holy Land;
Scarce on my First can the Palmer stand:
The Prior will take the air to-day;

On

my Second the Prior trots away;

'Tis pleasanter, under a summer sun,
With robes to ride, than with rags to run.

My Whole leaped out of the road-side ditch, With "Stand!" to the poor man, and "Stand!" to the rich:

From the Prior he strips his mantle fair;

From the Palmer he wins but pity and prayer:

"Tis safer, when crime is prowling wide,

With rags to run, than with robes to ride.

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