The Poetical Works of Walter C. Smith :: :: University of Virginia Library

Rarely is life compact into a plot
Carefully laid, with deepening interest,
Dramatic unities, and characters
Entangled in a tragic Fate that works
To a foredoomed catastrophe, and melts
All hearts with pity. Unto most of us
There comes no great event for winding up
The story—only chapter broken short,
And, one by one, the snapping of some thread,
Once twined with ours, making it full and strong,
And now by loss enfeebling it, till life,
Grown thin and lonely, tapers to its close
With lessening interest: a tragic tale,
And yet without a grand catastrophe.
So Raban judged it, when he summed his days
In broken ends whereat the once full life
Oozed out, and he went on his way alone,
Making no loud complainings, blaming none
But himself only, and seeing good in all—
Some touch of grace which showed that they were human,
Or broken link which proved them once divine.

RETROSPECT

The traveller in the desert lone
Looks back, regretful oft, to think
Of the sweet wells where he could drink,
Ere Fate had lured, or driven him on
Into a wan and wasted land
Of Wadys where the streams are sand.

And wistfully I, too, look back
From life, successful as they say,
That has no water by the way;
And it is water that I lack,
And there was water for my thirst,
When failure of my hope was worst.

There is no life so commonplace
But, if you search it, you shall find
A secret chamber of the mind,
Enshrining some fair sainted face,
Where worship still is done with tears
That freshen the grey dusky years.

That was its living water once,
Sweet-singing ever by the way,
And gleaming through its darkest day,—
The glory of its young Romance:
But oh, the desert wastes that spread
Where Love lives on, and Hope is dead!

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OMEN

A fair white dove came to my window sill
In the faint morning light,
Preening its feathers with a pale pink bill
Daintily in my sight,
Nodding its head with pretty curtsey still
To left and right,
And then took flight.
O fair, white dove, I meant to thee no ill;
Why did'st thou then take fright,
And vanish from my sight?

THE PUBLIC MEETING

I stood up to speak. At my back was a score
Of broadcloth respectables solemnly stewing,
For the vast hall was filled from the roof to the floor,
And they swarmed, thick as bees, at each window and door,
And I knew, at a glance, that a storm was a-brewing
For my certain undoing.

Yet I stood up to speak. Almost under my feet,
With pencil and notebook, were newspaper men;
Some staid-looking working lads kept the first seat,
Then students and snobs and the cads of the street,
With a woman, perhaps, for each three-score and ten,
And a child, now and then.

I was not ta'en aback, in the least, though I saw
That the meeting was packed with a loud senseless mob,
And standing near by, was a Limb-o'-the-Law
Who rubbed his sleek chin with a vulture-like claw,
And a grin of conceit at the well-managed job,
Which made my pulse throb.

So I stood up to speak. What a greeting I had!
They hooted, yelled, whistled, and cat-called and groaned,
Hissed, jeered at me, howled; cried
“His throat sure is bad!”
“Cough it up!” “Try an orange!” and “Was I not glad
To address my dear friends?” Then they hooted and moaned,
And sang and intoned.

Still I held my ground stoutly; replied as I could,
At times ready-witted, and then got a laugh,
But always good-humoured: I thought that their mood
Would change by and by, when they saw that I stood
With unruffled temper, and bore all the chaff
Of that stormy riff-raff.

I had often stood there with a ringing hurrah!
That greeted each hit; and I would not be beat,
As I watched that long Limb-o'-the-Law looking grey
While he signalled his Claque; so I stood there at bay,
Though the Kentish fire rung out from three thousand feet
With a fierce dust and heat.

But scanning their faces, I saw that the most
Were brainless or beery, or big-jowled, with low

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Brute foreheads, and felt that our cause must be lost
With a white-chokered Chairman as pale as a ghost,
And those broad-cloth respectables, ranged in a row,
Full of dismal dumb-show.

Never mind; I would try; I had lungs that would shout
Like a boatswain's, and ring with the storm at its height;
And I knew people liked me; and half of the rout
Was the clamour of friends who would have me hold out,
Though I had to gesticulate till the daylight
Broke on that stormy night.

So I plucked up my courage, and threw back the hair
From my brow, scanned the Lawyer from top down to toe,
Who gave back my gaze with an impudent stare;
Then I nodded, and smiled to my friends here and there,
While I watched the dim crowd as it swayed to and fro,
Seeming wilder to grow.

Now, a score of cocks crew, as to welcome the day,
Then a wild caterwauling of cats in the dark
Through the galleries ran; then a donkey would bray,
Or dogs yelped and howled in a horrible way,
As if all the creatures shut up in the Ark
Came to yell, scream, or bark.

After that arose a chorus of “God save the Queen,”
With a tramping of boots keeping time. How the dust
Rose in clouds, until hardly a face could be seen!
How they roared themselves hoarse! What a coughing between
Each verse as they sang out of tune! for they must
Clear their throats of the rust.

It was all in the programme, of course; so I stood
And patiently edged in a word here and there,
Now lost in the clamour, now half-understood,
Now caught by the grinning reporters, now good,
But as often bad; and I did not much care;
It was spent on the air.

Should I try any longer? What hope there to speak
Words of reason to men who all reason eschew?
Highest truths to such ears were but Hebrew and Greek,
And logic no more than the doors when they creak,
And pathos like wind in a cranny that blew;
And they'd laugh at it too.

Leave the fools to the fate they are fain to provoke!
They will know what it is in the coming distress,
When they've damped down the furnace, and cleared off the smoke,
And emptied the yards, and begin then to croak
That taxes grow bigger as wages grow less,
And the hard times press!

Let them be till the workshop is empty and still,
And the clock on the wall does not wag any more,

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And the fire does not burn, though the winter is chill,
And there's nothing to pawn, and there's nothing to fill
The pale and pinched children that cry at the door,
Or squat on the floor!

Just then, looking down, my eye caught in the aisle
A white oval face sweetly turned up to mine,
Lips parted in eagerness, tipped with a smile
As the great purple eyes beamed upon me a while,
Or flashed on the crowd with an anger divine
That warmed me like wine.

'Twas the face I had loved in the House in the Square!
Just that look it had worn when her soul was inspired,
As we read of the heroes of old who could dare
The rage of the Demos, when madness was there,
Or wrath of the gods, when their anger was fired,
And their patience expired.

She had haunted my dreams, as I struggled to rise,
She had cheered me in vision, what time I had failed,
And now there she sat, and I saw in her eyes
The fond love of youth without let or disguise,
Till she wist that I saw it, and trembled and quailed,
And the glowing face paled.

Then I said in my heart: “No, I will not be beat;
She shall not regret to have trusted me so;
I have stood for an hour in the roar and the heat,
I will stand till the day dash its light at my feet;
But she shall not go home with her faith sinking low
In the dear long ago.

That moment a lull came, and stir near the door;
Some were weary of shouting, some went out for beer;
So I slipt in a joke, setting some in a roar,
Then a story that tickled their humour; that o'er,
For one that still hissed, there were twenty cried Hear!
And my way was all clear.

But my blood now was up: Ware! my Limb-o'-the-Law!
Who would drown voice of reason with clamour and shout;
With the laugh on my side now, at each hit I saw
His cheek grew more livid, his vulture-like claw
Twitch and clutch at the chin it went feeling about,
As my wrath was poured out.

“'Twas the way of all Tyrants to gag our free speech,
And the sign of a bad cause to shrink from debate;
Let them look to their freedom when those who should preach
Law and order, brought rowdies whom nothing could teach,
Beered up to the lips, to roar like a spate,
Drowning truth which they hate.”

Then I tossed him aside, and took up the great theme
Of Justice and Peace, till they thrilled at my words;

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Yet I saw but the flush on her face, and the gleam
Of the great purple eyes, as she drank in the stream
That reasoned against the unreason of swords
For man's law, and the Lord's.

“There was a wild madness abroad in the air,
A longing for war which the rulers had nursed;
They had roused up the wild beast that still had his lair
In the civilised heart, without cause that would bear
The quarrel of nations; and with a blood-thirst
The land was accursed.”

Then I sat down at last, 'mid a ringing Hurrah!
And kindly pet names, and a hum of content,
As the motion was carried; and hasting away,
I watched by the great door, and stood in the grey
Watery light of the moon, till the last of them went—
Very weary and spent.

I peered at each veiled face, but met not her gaze,
Poked my head in each bonnet, but she was not there,
Saw white figures point at me, heard whispered praise,
And remarks on my pluck from a cab or a chaise;
But my heart sank within me in very despair,
And I heard unaware.

I had seen her once more, but to lose her again,
Through the storm she had burst like a sunblink on me;
And the joy of young Love flushed my heart and my brain,
Like a fresh aftermath breathing sweet after rain,
With all the birds singing on bush and tree—
And now where was she?

Could my eyes have played false? Could there be a mistake?
No; there was none else with those wonderful eyes,
And there was none else in the world that could make
My heart so to flutter and beat for her sake,
And there was none else could my soul so surprise
With dear memories.

Later on in the night I sat by the fire,
Alone, and in silence, my heart very low,
All the triumph gone out in a longing desire,
As I saw the moon pale, and her glory expire
In the dull drizzling rain falling steady and slow,
When the wind ceased to blow.

I mused on the past; on the House in the Square,
On the hope that had clung to me all the long years,
Unspoken, 'mid struggle and failure and care;
And now in the hour when I felt I might dare,
She had come—she had gone—as a phantom appears;
And my eyes swam in tears.

Then there came to my door just the faintest of taps,
Like the sound of small fingers that timidly knock;

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“Come in”; I look up, and some moments elapse
In stillness; and then again two or three raps,
But never a movement of latch or of lock
On the dull silence broke.

“Oh, the housemaid, of course; she is wanting to bed;
No wonder, poor drudge!” So I opened the door;
“No supper to-night, Jane,” I wearily said:
But it was not the housemaid I saw: in her stead
Was the white oval face of the sweet days of yore,
Gazing at me once more.

I breathed a long breath: was I dreaming? or what?
Tongue-tied there I stood, as if bound by a spell:
Then she dropped me a curtsey; still stood on the mat;
Called me “Sir”; and “Felt sure I had seen where she sat;
And she could not go home without coming to tell
I did bravely and well.

“Her husband was waiting her out in the street;
And oh she was proud to have heard me that night;
Had her mother but witnessed my triumph complete,
Who had always believed in me!” Then, with a sweet
Smile, she glided away like a ghost out of sight,
Ere my senses came right.

I had been quite bemazed: she had curtseyed to me!
Called me “Sir”—me that would have gone down at her feet,
And grovelled to kiss her wet frock, or to be
Trod upon, for it had been an honour if she
Should use me to carpet the stones on the street,
And go dainty and neat!

Did she speak of a husband? I groaned at the thought,
Sick at heart—I who loved so had never once kissed
Her lips, save in dreams of a happier lot;
And now all my loving and waiting had brought—
What was it?—a vision that passed ere I wist,
Like a vanishing mist.

I rushed out of door, up the street, and then down,
But saw not a form in the dull drizzling rain,
And heard not a footfall: the watch of the town
Flashed his bull's-eye upon me from toe up to crown;
“No, no one had passed”; so I crept home again
In wonder and pain.

She had gone from my life, and its light was all gone;
She had gone from my life, and I saw her no more;
Drip, drip! let it pelt!—it was eerie and lone;
So was I; and my heart lay within me like stone;
And I cared not although the slow pitiless pour
Should drip evermore.

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MISGIVING

Has he done wrong, who, as the years go past,
In loneliness, knowing it all in vain,
As he has loved before, to love again,
Brings to his home another bride at last?

Tender and kind, he cherishes his mate
More tenderly, the more he feels that she
Gets not the perfect love which ought to be
The guerdon and the bliss of wife's estate.

For while he gently kisses her fond lips,
It is another face that meets his gaze;
And he is stung by words of love or praise
Which the truth known would darken with eclipse.

O sorrow and shame! that, while he lies beside
The trusting one, he in the silence hears
His heart throb for the love of other years,
And calm to her whom he has made his bride.

REMORSE

Alas! she did not long with me abide,
But pining slowly,
Like waning moon, she faded by my side
With melancholy,
And in our fifth spring, died.

I lifted up the face-cloth from her face;
Upon its beauty,
Stony and still, yet lay the tender grace
Of love and duty,
And patient sorrow's trace.

O heart, I said, that gavest me all thy wealth,
Of love's rich treasure,
And now by open service, now by stealth,
Were't fain to pleasure
My sickness or my health;

O faithful heart! and yet thou had'st from me
Observance only:
And still thy wistful, hungry look would be
Like one who, lonely,
Gazes far out at sea—

Gazes far out to catch the hoped-for sail
Film the horizon,
But only ocean, fretting in the gale
She sets her eyes on,
And hears the sea-mew wail.

I gave thee what I had; but that was not
What love expected;
And when the fond heart for a fond heart sought,
Thy love detected
The emptiness it got.

I took thy gold, and gave thee but my brass;
Though deep indebted,
When thou would'st look for more, I let thee pass,
Or even fretted
That thou should'st sigh, alas!

I gave thee kisses, but my kiss was cold,
And dainty dresses,
I did not grudge thee jewels set in gold
For thy caresses,
As if they had been sold.

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But that alacrity which doth prevent
Our wishes even,
That pleasure which on pleasing still is bent,
That was not given,
Which might thy soul content.

Thy heart for love was longing, and mine had
No love to give it—
A ruin haunted by a memory sad,
That would not leave it
Though truth and duty bade.

I called it sentimental, silly, wrong;
But yet it nestled
The closer, and I think it grew more strong
The more I wrestled,
And I did wrestle long.

O pardon! that I was not true to thee;
I tried to will it,
And then the Past arose and wailed in me,
Nor could I still it
More than the sounding sea.

Ah! to be true to thee, and false to her!—
I could not do it;
Yet to be false to thee a baseness were,
And I should rue it
In life and character!

So life is ravelled almost ere we wot;
And with our vexing
To disentangle it, we make the knot
But more perplexing,
Embittering our lot.

Farewell, true heart; my sorrow stirs in me
With no self-pity,
But shamed and self-condemning. But I see
The Holy City
Opening its gates to thee—

Opening its gates to show thee all the truth
And all the folly;
The secret of the sorrow of thy youth,
And melancholy
Which touches me with ruth.

Farewell; while thou had'st being here and breath,
The truth was hidden,
But now before the majesty of death
My soul, God-bidden,
Speaks out its better faith.

AFTER DINNER

Returned from Ballarat, where he had found
Gold nuggets in the early rush, and more
Golden experience, Martin Lusk, one day,
Bearded and bronzed, dropt in upon the quiet
Where I with treasured books—mine ancient friends—
Was communing. At first, I knew him not,
But soon the name recalled a form, a face
From the dim past, that might perhaps have grown
Into this son of Anak. So we fell
A-talking, and I found his mind well stored
With fresh, quaint pictures of that Digger-life
Fighting with Death and Fortune, gambling, drinking,
Thieving and pistolling, in dirt and squalor,
Brutal-heroic, yet with touching gleams
Of human tenderness, and gradual sway
Of Law that, self-evolved, yet mastered self,

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And rough-shaped that wild chaos. I could see
This keen observer was a thinker too,
Patient and tolerant, with the stuff in him
For building up an empire. Being lonely
In his hotel, and so conversible,
I made him promise he would dine with me.
Reluctant he agreed, reluctant came,
And sat uneasy and silent, changed as much
From the clear-sighted man I met at noon
As from the bright-eyed youth of early days.
Lusk, as a lad, was bold and confident,
An only son, spoilt by a doting mother,
Spoilt, too, by sisters proud of him, even spoilt
By admiration of his college mates
For a rich nature foremost in all games,
Well forward too in studies and in speech,
And yet not greatly spoilt by all their spoiling,
Just frank and bold and sure of his position.
But now he sat there, like a bashful girl
At her first ball, blushing, and hardly spoke
Save yea and nay, until we were alone.
Then I: What ails you, Martin? What is wrong?
Have we done aught to vex you, that you sit
Dumb as a moulting raven? My home-bred girls,
Untravelled, when they heard that you were coming,
Donned their best muslins, and their gayest ribbons,
Meaning to show their best, and talk their best,
And listen at their best. For they were all
Eager to hear of pouchèd kangaroos,
And duck-billed quadrupeds, and great emus
Piling their eggs amid the sandy scrub,
Black fellows, and the pig-tailed Chinamen,
Bush-rangers, and the cradling and the crushing,
And nugget-finding in the deep-delved loam,
And other strange adventures of your life,
As they romanced it; for the less they know,
The more their fancy bubbles up and glitters.
Yet there you sat, and stammered curt replies
As frightened at their feather-heads. They'll vow
That my old friends are stupid as myself:
And oh, if they had seen what you had seen!
If girls might only do what men may do,
They would have tongues to tell it.

Nothing ails me,
He said; I did not know I was so rude:
But coming from our rough unmannered life
Among a group of happy girls like yours,
Free in their innocence, is like the passing,
Sudden, from dark into the blaze of noon;
Your eyes blink and are blinded. It is long
Since I have sat beside pure-hearted maids;
And, listening to their words, my thoughts went back
To dear old times; I seemed to hear again,

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Dreamily, echoes of old fireside mirth,
And chatter of the table. Was I rude?
I did not mean it. Half I envied you,
And half I feared that some ill-sorted word
Of mine might break the charm. 'Tis strange that we
May wallow with the swine, and grunt with them,
Till those fair customs which were native to us,
Grown unfamiliar, make us pick our steps
In fear and silence.

Laughing, I replied
It was the last thing I'd have dreamed, that he
Who, like a young Greek strong in grace of mind
And manhood, used to fire young maiden fancies,
While he himself was cool amid their tremors,
Should sit abashed with home-bred girls.

This led
To talk of College days and College friends—
How one was mossing in a drowsy manse;
Another loud on platforms, half a priest,
Half demagogue, who played on prejudice
With evil skill; another, wigged and gowned,
Bade fair to lead the Bar, and win the Bench;
And this, a kindly humorist whose speech
Was charming to the lecture-hearing Public:
Some doctored west-end patients, some the east;
While some were dead, and others worse than dead,
Turning up, now and then, in rusty black
And dirty linen, rubicund of face,
Begging a paltry loan. We wondered much
How the world-school reversed the classic school,
And jumbled reputations; fancied what
If, by some chance, another pair were met,
That evening, in the bush, beneath the Cross,
Or Indian dusky city, or London club,
They might of us be saying, as we of them;
Then we sat silent, musing for a space.

Then he: What came of Muriel Lumisden?
You used to haunt the widow's house, I think,
With the fair daughters. What a flirt she was!
And how she kept a score of silly lads
Dangling about her, every one quite sure
He was the favoured, and the rest were gulls!
Flirting came natural to her; you could see it
In every movement, every dainty curl
And fold of her black hair, in every tone,
And glance and turn of the eyebrows, and in all
The gesture of her lithe and supple beauty.
To flirt was in the marrow of her bones;
Even as a child she'd make eyes to her doll;
And just to keep her hand in, I have known her
Beam on the butcher's boy a winning glance
That sent him half-way heavenward to his calves.

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And yet there have been times when she has seemed
A noble creature to me, all compact
Of womanly grace, with heart that answered true
To every noblest impulse, and inspired
High-souled enthusiasm, till I have felt
I could have been content to do some deed
That she would smile upon, and then to die,
Keeping that smile for ever. How she fooled us!
Yet oh how beautiful she was! those eyes
Melting with tenderness, or flashing scorn
At any baseness, and those lips for all
Emotions eloquent! But such a flirt!

Hearing this passionate strain, which had been lying
In wait for opportunity, I think,
All through the night's discourse, the storm broke out
So unexpectedly, I called to mind
Some passages between them, and the talk
That buzzed about them when he went away—
How people said that she had wrecked a life
Of splendid promise; how they pitied him,
All blaming her, and yet they nothing knew,
But that he loved, and that he loved in vain,
And that he wooed, but had not won her hand,
And that he rushed off, when his luck had failed,
To the far ends o' the earth. Musing on this,
And on his passionate upbraiding now,
I marvelled how he kept this open wound
Rankling, unhealed, through all the changeful years,
Wronging himself and her. What should I say?
Better the old pain Custom helps to bear?
Or the fresh anguish which the truth will give?
So my mind balanced it. But I resolved;
Better the truth restoring the old faith,
Even though it shame and break him.

Then I said:
Poor Muriel! so you have not heard her story:
And you have held her but a wanton flirt,
Heartless, and with her beauty breaking hearts;
So high an inspiration, yet so mean
A nature too! Well; maybe; only flirts
Have not such souls as make one feel one's-self
Little beside them—as a rule, at least.
And Muriel who, you say, was such a flirt,
Rebuked me by the greatness of her soul,
And of her sorrow. Shall I tell you what,
I fear, may pain alike by gain and loss?

Then he: What mean you? Loss is long since lost,
And gain can never be from her to me.
You knew her not as I did. What remains
When bubbles burst i' the hand? not even the glitter.
Is she a maiden still, and fancy-free?
Why, so am I, and free of her for ever.
Is she a widow? I should gain a loss,
Indeed, to be her second. Is that your riddle?

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Or is she mated to a life-long sorrow?
What else could come of such a way as hers?

Listen, I said: You were not gone a year
When one came from New Zealand, who had been
Sheep-farming in a patriarchal way
To win his Rachel, long since won to love,
What time the lad was schooling at her father's.
A fine young fellow, cheery as the spring
At pairing time, when songs are in the woods,
And in the air, and in the furze and broom;
Manly and kindly too, and full of trust
In Muriel, though she went on as before
With speech and smile and charm of witching beauty,
And winning manner; but behind the scenes
They knew each other, and he knew her love
Was his alone. He liked to see her worshipped,
Being proud of her, and sure of her. Perhaps
She liked, too, being worshipped; who can tell?
You say she was a flirt—and you knew best:
I tell but what I saw. Well, by and by,
The wedding came, and every one was bidden,
And every one was there of her old friends,
Or lovers, and the joy was very great.
But from that moment she became to all
The staidest matron, with a kindly distance
And dignity of noble womanhood
Hedging her round. It seems that he had said
She must not play the nun, when he was gone,
And sit apart, as ticketed “Engaged,”
But take life as it came, like other girls,
Not making him, far off, a haunting fear,
A shadow on the sunshine of her days,
But being joyous in her truth to him,
Which was her freedom; so would he be glad,
Thinking her glad.

A happier man than he
Now there was none, nor yet a brighter home
Than that she made him, with her pretty ways,
And pretty babes, and large intelligence.

Pshaw! he broke in; of course, a blessed pair
Of doves; the usual fashion; haunted they
By no regrets for broken lives, the while
They twain sat cooing. Pass to something else;
It does not interest me—'tis all so common.
Tell me about yourself, for you alone
Have made a name that even our wild lads
Have kindly in their mouths.

But I: Nay, you
Must hear me out, seeing I have begun—
There came a day when he must go again
Back to his flocks: there had been summer droughts
That parched the grass, and heavy winter snows,
When many weaklings perished in the drift;
And over all the Colony a cloud
Hung lowering, for the Maori threatened war,
Fenced his strong Pah, and sent his fighting men
To waste and burn and stealthily to kill

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So they went off together: at first he urged
That she should stay behind, for war was ill
To face, with wife and children in the rear
Plucking your heart, and savages in front
Who had no law or pity: she would find
It hard to be alone i' the bush, and quake
For her dear babes at every whispering wind,
Or rustling leaf, dreading the cunning foe.
A year or two, and all would right itself,
And he would sell his run, and live at home
With nought to do but love her. Thus he spake
In reason and right feeling, though his heart
Was sore at parting. But she answered him,
With the great heart which used to fire our youth:
If war were coming, he would better fight
That his wife bound his sword on, and was near
To bind his wounds, and to call pitying thoughts
Up in his mind, amid the storm of wrath,
For savage women wailing in their kraals;
Exile would be to part her now from him,
And home was just where he was; for herself,
She would not lose a year of happiness,
Nor give a year of loneliness to him,
For worlds; and life was there where duty was,
Not elsewhere; and their God was also there,
I' the bush as in the city. So they sailed
In a great ship crowded with emigrants,
That down the Mersey dropt with favouring breeze,
And ringing cheers upon the crowded wharf,
And blinding tears upon the crowded deck,
And many hopes, and many a sad regret.

But in the night she, bearing down the Channel
Through a thick fog, struck on a hidden rock,
Yet in a quiet sea. The sailors thought,
With the next tide she would be floated off;
And many went to sleep again, scarce heeding
Whether she sank or swam, if they might rest,
And sleep and dream of home. But by and by,
The Master grew uneasy, muttered somewhat
Of cranky ships that scarce would float in ponds,
Dry-rotten in the docks—of useless boats
That were but painted tinder; and one heard him
Murmur a prayer for wife and babes, the while
He paced the deck alone, and resolute
Issued his orders. Then a whisper went,
Gloomy, that she was leaking, and would soon
Break up amidships; but as yet there was
No panic, for the land was not far off.
But as the day broke, eerie, on the fog,
The timbers 'gan to crack, and great seams yawned,
And with the rushing tide the terror rose.
Then hands unhandy loosed the painted boats,
And swamped them; and from near four hundred throats

269

A cry rose to high heaven—a pitiful cry
Of anguish that might touch the heart of Fate,
As to and fro they reeled, and wrung their hands.
Muriel stood with her husband and her babes,
Calm, on the poop. She saw the dim grey sea
Deceitful, and the shore loomed through the mist,
Uncertain, for there was no gleam of light
From fisher's hut or farm; a lone waste land
Of unthrift and neglected husbandry,
Where neither glebe nor sea was harvested.
Then, holding fast her little ones, her face
Just a shade paler—it was always pale—
She said in a low voice: You can swim, Malcolm;
The shore is near, I think a sandy shore
By the dull thud o' the waves; could you not save
Some mother and her child, setting example
Others might follow? Oh, we're not afraid,
My little ones and I; God cares for us;
And you will come too ere the danger comes.
The Captain says the ship will float an hour
At least, and it is misery to see
Those faces, and to hear the bitter cries.
Nay, not us first! but speak a word to them,
And show them what to do; we can be still,
But they are frantic, and their madness works
Their ruin; we will wait in patience here.
Try, dearest; you are strong and brave; but yet
Be not too bold, your life is all to us.
Oh, can God hear that cry, and help them not?

Fain would he still have borne her first to land
With her two boys, but that she would not hear of.
Thrice, therefore, from the ship he swam ashore,
Burdened with child or mother, or with both;
And thrice again he left to seek the ship,
Strong swimmer borne up by his work of pity,
For nature makes the brave heart strong to save.
And, at the next time, Muriel from the poop
Lowered the children to his loving arms,
Her great eyes swimming in the pride of him
And love of them, until she hardly saw
Aught else, or heard a warning cry; and then,
Just as he, confident and cheerful, held
The children, and was waiting for her coming,
A spar fell from the falling mast, and smote
Him smiling up to her, and with a cry,
And flinging up his arms, before her eyes
He sank with their two babes. Yet she was spared
A tragic agony by tragic fact,
For the great ship that instant brake in twain.
In death they were not separate; and soon
The quiet waters, smiling in the sun,
Rippled where they had been.

270

Here Martin rose,
Pale as a ghost, and shivering as a reed,
Alone in withered Autumn, that is smote
By sudden gust of storm.

And I have railed,
He gasped, at such an one as this! for years
Have rated her and called her worthless flirt
Who broke my worthless life! have quoted her
To lads who still had faith in truth and love,
To cure them of their folly, and have held
Myself the one wise man! O God, my God!
To have so wronged the woman that I loved!
To have so 'stranged my nature from all love!
To have so grossly slandered truth and love!
God's beautiful one!—My broken life, forsooth!
O poor self-pitying fool! But lost is lost;
And this is gain though it be shame to me,
Sorrowful gain by loss of evil thought,
And love restored; yet better so restored
Amid my self-contempt, than as before
Blurred in my self-conceit. O Muriel, yet
I loved you through it all—a hateful love!
But clinging to thee, seeing no one worthy
Save thee, and thee unworthy, and with this
So worthless love still wronging thee!—Good-night!
I thank you, friend; yes, you have done me good;
There's healing in such sorrow; but to-night
I could not meet your girls; I have done wrong
Unto all women by my thoughts, and dare not
Look in their eyes. And I must be alone:
Beg my forgiveness; I must be alone;
God help me! I will to the old seashore,
And hear the dull waves thudding on the sand
As my thoughts break in me. O Muriel!—
With that he gave my hand a silent grip,
And gulping something down, pulled his hat low
Over his brows, and strode into the dark.

Alone, alone, I fell into a strain
Of musing melancholy,
Recalling, with keen sense of shame and pain,
A man whom, living, I had reckoned vain,
And to his calling holy
Untrue, until I read, with blinding tears
Which give clear sight, the story of his fears
And clingings unto God through weary years,
Till peace came slowly
To him grown meek and lowly.
And I have sinned against a soul, I said,
Noble and good and true,
Whom God has gathered with the blessèd dead,
And put the crown of glory on his head,
And I am humbled too:

271

But by this shame, O Lord, thou teachest me,
He only walks aright who walks with Thee,
Meek, in the judgments of that Charity
Which unto all is due,
And never heart shall rue.