JULY 25, 1881. (The Day of Burial, in the Abbey, of ARTHUR PENRHYN STANLEY, Dean of Westminster.) What! for a term so scant Our shining visitant Cheer’d us, and now is pass’d into the night? Couldst thou no better keep, O Abbey old, The boon thy dedication-sign foretold,[a] The presence of that gracious inmate, light?– […]

Four years!–and didst thou stay above The ground, which hides thee now, but four? And all that life, and all that love, Were crowded, Geist! into no more? Only four years those winning ways, Which make me for thy presence yearn, Call’d us to pet thee or to praise, Dear little friend! at every turn? […]

Poor Matthias!–Found him lying Fall’n beneath his perch and dying? Found him stiff, you say, though warm– All convulsed his little form? Poor canary! many a year Well he knew his mistress dear; Now in vain you call his name, Vainly raise his rigid frame, Vainly warm him in your breast, Vainly kiss his golden […]

April 6, 1887. What, Kaiser dead? The heavy news Post-haste to Cobham calls the Muse, From where in Farringford she brews The ode sublime, Or with Pen-bryn’s bold bard pursues A rival rhyme. Kai’s bracelet tail, Kai’s busy feet, Were known to all the village-street. “What, poor Kai dead?” say all I meet; “A loss […]

So I sang; but the Muse, Shaking her head, took the harp– Stern interrupted my strain, Angrily smote on the chords. April showers Rush o’er the Yorkshire moors. Stormy, through driving mist, Loom the blurr’d hills; the rain Lashes the newly-made grave. Unquiet souls! –In the dark fermentation of earth, In the never idle workshop […]