And then let fly at his face and his chest
Till I had to hold you down,

While he took off his cap and his gloves and his coat,
And his bag and his thonged Sam Browne.

We went upstairs to the studio,

The three of us, just as of old,

And you lay down and I sat and talked to him

As round the room he strolled.

Here in the room where, years ago

Before the old life stopped,

He worked all day with his slippers and his pipe,
He would pick up the threads he'd dropped,

Fondling all the drawings he had left behind,
Glad to find them all still the same,

And opening the cupboards to look at his belongings

...

Every time he came.

But now I know what a dog doesn't know,

Though you'll thrust your head on my knee, And try to draw me from the absent-mindedness

That you find so dull in me.

And all your life you will never know
What I wouldn't tell you even if I could,
That the last time we waved him away
Willy went for good.

But sometimes as you lie on the hearthrug
Sleeping in the warmth of the stove,
Even through your muddled old canine brain
Shapes from the past may rove.

You'll scarcely remember, even in a dream,
How we brought home a silly little pup,
With a big square head, and little crooked legs
That could scarcely bear him up,

But your tail will tap at the memory

Of a man whose friend you were,

Who was always kind, though he called you a naughty dog

When he found you on his chair;

Who'd make you face a reproving finger,

And solemnly lecture you,

Till your head hung downwards and you looked very sheepish:

And you'll dream of your triumphs too.

Of summer evening chases in the garden

When you dodged us all about with a bone:
We were three boys, and you were the cleverest,

But now we're two alone.

When summer comes again,

And the long sunsets fade,

We shall have to go on playing the feeble game for two

That since the war we've played.

And though you run expectant as you always do
To the uniforms we meet,

You'll never find Willy among all the soldiers
In even the longest street,

Nor in any crowd; yet, strange and bitter thought,
Even now were the old words said,

If I tried the old trick and said "Where's Willy ?"
You would quiver and lift your head,

And your brown eyes would look to ask if I was serious,
And wait for the word to spring.

Sleep undisturbed: I shan't say that again,
You innocent old thing.

I must sit, not speaking, on the sofa,

While you lie asleep upon the floor.

For he's suffered a thing that dogs couldn't dream of,
And he won't be coming here any more.

A very different poem produced by the war, an elegy which "throws back" to the old Scottish searching, haunting pathos, is Ewart Alan MacIntosh's Cha till Maccruimein, a lament for the 4th Camerons as they were piped away to the fatal fields of war:

The pipes in the street were playing bravely,
The marching lads went by,

With merry hearts and voices singing
My friends marched out to die;
But I was hearing a lonely pibroch
Out of an older war,
"Farewell, farewell, farewell, MacCrimmon,
MacCrimmon comes no more."

And every lad in his heart was dreaming
Of honour and wealth to come,
And honour and noble pride were calling
To the tune of the pipes and drum;

But I was hearing a woman singing

On dark Dunvegan shore,

"In battle or peace, with wealth or honour,
MacCrimmon comes no more."

And there in front of the men were marching,
With feet that made no mark,

The grey old ghosts of the ancient fighters
Come back again from the dark;
And in front of them MacCrimmon piping
A weary tune and sore,

"On the gathering day, for ever and ever,
MacCrimmon comes no more."

In the middle of the nineteenth century a poet, Lord de Tabley, worked for many years without ever publishing his poems. His interest lay chiefly among classical stories. Suddenly in the early nineties the poetry-reading public was startled by the appearance, in one of the monthly magazines, of Orpheus in Hades. The following lines are part of Orpheus' prayer to the Queen of Hades for the restoration of his lost bride Eurydice, snatched from him on their wedding morning. In this invocation, he first related the story of her death; then followed these lines of hopeless grief:

Sobbing cadence of funereal gloom,
We wind her in the raiment of the dead,
The shrouded mantle of eternal sleep,
Ay me, the dear one. Then as twilight fell,
With torch and taper rounded, crowned with yew,
Wailing we bore her to the cypress lines,
Sown with the urns and ash of fiery hearts
Of old-world lovers, cold and gone to dust.
Thither we bore her pallid on her bier,
A silver moon cradled in ebon cloud;
And over her we sprinkled marigolds,
Flowers of the dead, stars on the sable pall;
And there was one more gravestone, one more heart
Broken, and in the world no other change.

What right have I to live, so crushed with woe ?
I dare not see the light now she is gone.
I hate to watch the flower set up its face.
I loathe the trembling shimmer of the sea,
Its heaving roods of intertangled weed
And orange sea-wrack with its necklace fruit;

The stale, insipid cadence of the dawn,
The ringdove, tedious harper on five tones,
The eternal havoc of the sodden leaves,
Rotting the floors of Autumn. I am weary,
Weary and incomplete and desolate.
To me Spring, sceptred with her daffodil,
Droops with a blight of dim mortality,
And the birds sing Death and Eurydice.

Throughout this book one claim has been specially made for our literature, that it offers an immense variety of methods, matters, standpoints. This quality is as notable in our elegies as elsewhere. There is, even in the few here quoted, a striking dissimilarity one from another. This restrained paragraph, the last from John Morley's essay on the death of the great nineteenthcentury philosopher John Stuart Mill, adds yet another note in the orchestra of English lamentation. It is, in its restraint, in its controlled idealism, worthy of the man who wrote it, and of the man about whom it was written:

Alas, the sorrowful day which ever dogs our delight followed very quickly. The nightingale that he longed for fills the darkness with music, but not for the ear of the dead master: he rests in the deeper darkness where the silence is unbroken for ever. We may console ourselves with the reflection offered by the dying Socrates to his sorrowful companions: he who has arrayed the soul in her own proper jewels of moderation and justice and courage and nobleness and truth, is ever ready for the journey when his time comes. have lost a great teacher and example of knowledge and virtue, but men will long feel the presence of his character about them, making them ashamed of what is indolent and selfish, and encouraging them to all disinterested labour, both in trying to do good and in trying to find out what the good is, which is harder.

We

B

CHAPTER XIII

IDYLLS

Y the word Idyll is meant a description in prose or verse of some scene or event which is striking, picturesque, and complete in itself. Such an idyll may stand alone, or it may form a kind of interlude in a longer composition. In our literature idyllic passages are commoner than isolated idylls. Indeed, the actual name is best known to us by the Idylls of the King, and Browning's Dramatic Idylls.

A nation which has cared so truly and comprehendingly for the beauties and charms of its own native land could not help producing idyllic scenes and passages; and as early as the ninth century, probably from our great poet Cynewulf, we find this description of the fabled phœnix's home:

...

I have heard that there is far hence in eastern realms a land most noble, widely known to men. That plain is full of beauty blest with joys, with the fairest fragrance of earth. Unique is that island. That is a winsome plain, the woods are green, far-stretching 'neath the sky. Nor there may any rain nor snow, nor breath of frost, nor blast of fire, nor storm of hail nor fall of rime, nor heat of sun, nor everlasting cold, nor warm weather, nor winter shower work harm a whit, but the plain endureth blessed and wholesome. That noble land is starred with blossoms. There stand no hills nor mountains steep, no stony cliffs rise high as here with us, nor dales nor glens nor mountain gorges, caves nor crags. No whit of roughness bideth there; but the pleasant field blossoming with delights bringeth forth beneath the clouds. Serene is that pleasant plain; its sunny grove gleameth, winsome its woodland glades. Its increase faileth not, its pleasant fruit; but ever the trees stand green as God gave bidding. In winter and in summer are the groves in like wise hung with fruit; never a leaf fadeth in the air, nor shall flame work them harm for ever, ere that the ending of the world shall be. As of old, the turmoil of the waters, the sea-flood