Habington.
We bore him to the grave while yet ’twas morn,
The winter sunlight shining on his coffin:
The weight of grief was heavy to be borne,
And the salt tears rose in our eyelids often.
We slowly walked in mutely sad procession;
The pitying people freely made us way;
And the blest child, yet guiltless of transgression,
We softly placed between the walls of clay.
We sang a hymn—we bowed our heads to pray;
And God, who had our bitter grief appointed,
Sent also strengthening grace by lips anointed.
We looked again on George as low he lay
Deep in the earth; and when we homeward went,
We felt his home was better ’yond the firmament.
Mistletoe.... I climb to greatness.
The Mistletoe is a creeping plant which grows on the tops of the tallest trees. The proud oak is its slave, and nourishes it with his own substance. The Druids paid a kind of adoration to it, as the emblem of a weakness that was superior to strength: they regarded the tyrant of the oak as equally formidable to men and gods.
’Tis a common proof,
That lowliness is young ambition’s ladder,
Whereto the climber upwards turns his face:
But when he once attains the upmost round,
He then unto the ladder turns his back,
Looks in the clouds, scorning the base degrees
By which he did ascend.
Shakspeare.
He who ascends to mountain-tops shall find
The loftiest peaks most wrapt in clouds and snow;
He who surpasses or subdues mankind
Must look down on the hate of those below.
Though high above the sun of glory glow,
And far beneath the earth and ocean spread,
Round him are icy rocks, and loudly blow
Contending tempests on his naked head,
And thus reward the toils which to those summits led.
Ye gods, it doth amaze me,
A man of such a feeble temper should
So get the start of the majestic world,
And bear the palm alone.