ENVOY
Gloriana!—the Don may attack us Whenever his stomach be fain; He must reach us before he can rack us, ... And where are the galleons of Spain?
Dobson.
[CXXII]
THE WHITE PACHA
Vain is the dream! However Hope may rave, He perished with the folk he could not save, And though none surely told us he is dead, And though perchance another in his stead, Another, not less brave, when all was done, Had fled unto the southward and the sun, Had urged a way by force, or won by guile To streams remotest of the secret Nile, Had raised an army of the Desert men, And, waiting for his hour, had turned again And fallen on that False Prophet, yet we know Gordon is dead, and these things are not so! Nay, not for England's cause, nor to restore Her trampled flag—for he loved Honour more— Nay, not for Life, Revenge, or Victory, Would he have fled, whose hour had dawned to die. He will not come again, whate'er our need, He will not come, who is happy, being freed From the deathly flesh and perishable things, And lies of statesmen and rewards of kings. Nay, somewhere by the sacred River's shore He sleeps like those who shall return no more, No more return for all the prayers of men— Arthur and Charles—they never come again! They shall not wake, though fair the vision seem: Whate'er sick Hope may whisper, vain the dream!
Lang.
[CXXIII]
MOTHER AND SON
It is not yours, O mother, to complain, Not, mother, yours to weep, Though nevermore your son again Shall to your bosom creep, Though nevermore again you watch your baby sleep.
Though in the greener paths of earth Mother and child, no more We wander; and no more the birth Of me whom once you bore, Seems still the brave reward that once it seemed of yore;
Though as all passes, day and night, The seasons and the years, From you, O mother, this delight, This also disappears— Some profit yet survives of all your pangs and tears.