What if skies be wan and chill?
What if winds be harsh and stale?
Presently the East will thrill,
And the sad and shrunken sail,
Bellying with a kindly gale,
Bear you sunwards, while your chance
Sends you back the hopeful hail—
"Fate's a fiddler, Life's a dance."
Idle shot or coming bill,
Hapless love or broken bail,
Gulp it (never chew your pill!)
And if Burgundy should fail,
Try a humble pot of ale!
Over all is heaven's expanse.
Gold exists among the shale.
Fate's a fiddler, Life's a dance.
Dull Sir Joskin sleeps his fill,
Good Sir Galahad seeks the Grail,
Proud Sir Pertinax flaunts his frill,
Hard Sir Æger dints his mail;
And the while, by hill and dale,
Tristram's braveries gleam and glance,
And his blithe horn tells its tale....
Fate's a fiddler, Life's a dance.
Araminta's grand and shrill,
Delia's passionate and frail,
Doris drives an earnest quill,
Athanasia takes the veil;
Wiser Phyllis o'er her pail,
At the heart of all romance
Reading, sings to Strephon's flail—
Fate's a fiddler, Life's a dance.
Every Jack must have his Jill,
(Even Johnson had his Thrale!)
Forward, couples—with a will!
This, the world, is not a jail.
Hear the music, sprat and whale!
Hands across, retire, advance!
Though the doomsman's on your trail,
Fate's a Fiddler, Life's a dance.
Envoy.
Boys and girls, at slug and snail
And their compeers look askance.
Pay your footing on the nail:
Fate's a fiddler, Life's a dance.
W. E. Henley.
DOUBLE BALLADE OF THE NOTHINGNESS OF THINGS.
The big teetotum twirls,
And epochs wax and wane
As chance subsides or swirls;
But of the loss and gain
The sum is always plain.
Read on the mighty pall,
The weed of funeral
That covers praise and blame,
The isms and the anities,
Magnificence and shame,
"O Vanity of Vanities!"