—Voices and dreams long fled and gone!
And other echoes make reply,
The low Maenalian melody
‘’Twas in our garth, a twelve-year child,
I saw thee, little one,
Pick the red fruit that to thy fancy smiled,
‘Thee and thy mother: I, your guide:’—
O sweet magician! Happy heart!
Content with that unrivall’d art,—
The soul of grace in music shrined,—
And notes of modest pride,
To sing the life he loved to all mankind!
There, shading pine and torrent-song
Breathe midday slumber, sudden, sweet;
Deep meadows woo the wayward feet;
In giant elm the ring-doves moan;
There, peace secure from wrong,
The life that keeps its promise, there, alone!
—O loftier than the wordy strife
That floats o’er capitals; the chase
Of florid pleasure; the blind race
Of gold for gold by gamblers run,
This fair Vergilian life,
Where heaven and we and nature are at one!
On that deep soil great Rome was sown;
Our England her foundations laid:—
Hence, while the nations, change-dismay’d,
To tyrant or to quack repair,
A healthier heart we own,
And the plant Man grows stronger than elsewhere.
Should changeful commerce shun the shore,
And newer, mightier races meet
To push us from our empire-seat,
England will round her call her own,
And as in days of yore
The sea-girt Isle be Freedom’s central throne.
Freedom, fair daughter-wife of Law;
One bright face on the future cast,
One reverent fix’d upon the past,
And that for Hope, for Wisdom this:—
While counsels wild and raw
Fly those keen eyes, and leave the land to bliss:—
Dear land, where new is one with old:
Land of green hillside and of plain,
Gray tower and grange and tree-fringed lane,
Red crag and silver streamlet sweet,
Wild wood and ruin bold,
And this repose of beauty at my feet:—
Fair Vale, for summer day-dreams high,
For reverie in solitude
Fashion’d in Nature’s finest mood;
Or, sweeter yet, for fond excess
Of glee, and vivid cry,
Whilst happy children find more happiness