There are several of Sidney Lanier’s (1842-81) poems that children love to learn. “Tampa Robins,” “The Tournament” (Joust 1.), “Barnacles,” “The Song of the Chattahoochee,” and “The First Steamboat Up the Alabama” are among them. At our “poetry contests” the children have plainly demonstrated that this great poet has reached his hand down to the youngest. The time will doubtless come when it will be a part of education to be acquainted with Lanier, as it is now to be acquainted with Longfellow or Tennyson.

I. Bright shone the lists, blue bent the skies,
And the knights still hurried amain
To the tournament under the ladies’ eyes,
Where the jousters were Heart and Brain.
II. Flourished the trumpets, entered Heart,
A youth in crimson and gold;
Flourished again; Brain stood apart,
Steel-armoured, dark and cold.
III. Heart’s palfrey caracoled gaily round,
Heart tra-li-ra’d merrily;
But Brain sat still, with never a sound,
So cynical-calm was he.
IV. Heart’s helmet-crest bore favours three
From his lady’s white hand caught;
While Brain wore a plumeless casque; not he
Or favour gave or sought.
V. The trumpet blew; Heart shot a glance
To catch his lady’s eye.
But Brain gazed straight ahead, his lance
To aim more faithfully.
VI. They charged, they struck; both fell, both bled;
Brain rose again, ungloved;
Heart, dying, smiled and faintly said,
“My love to my beloved.”

Sidney Lanier.

The Wind and the Moon.

Little Laddie, do you remember learning “The Wind and the Moon”? You were eight or nine years old, and you shut your eyes and puffed out your cheeks when you came to the line “He blew and He blew.” The saucy wind made a great racket and the calm moon never noticed it. That gave you a great deal of pleasure, didn’t it? We did not care much for the noisy, conceited wind. (1824-.)

Said the Wind to the Moon, “I will blow you out,
You stare
In the air
Like a ghost in a chair,
Always looking what I am about—
I hate to be watched; I’ll blow you out.”
The Wind blew hard, and out went the Moon.
So, deep
On a heap
Of clouds to sleep,
Down lay the Wind, and slumbered soon,
Muttering low, “I’ve done for that Moon.”
He turned in his bed; she was there again!
On high
In the sky,
With her one ghost eye,
The Moon shone white and alive and plain.
Said the Wind, “I will blow you out again.”
The Wind blew hard, and the Moon grew dim.
“With my sledge,
And my wedge,
I have knocked off her edge!
If only I blow right fierce and grim,
The creature will soon be dimmer than dim.”
He blew and he blew, and she thinned to a thread.
“One puff
More’s enough
To blow her to snuff!
One good puff more where the last was bred,
And glimmer, glimmer, glum will go the thread.”
He blew a great blast, and the thread was gone
In the air
Nowhere
Was a moonbeam bare;
Far off and harmless the shy stars shone—
Sure and certain the Moon was gone!
The Wind he took to his revels once more;
On down,
In town,
Like a merry-mad clown,
He leaped and hallooed with whistle and roar—
“What’s that?” The glimmering thread once more!
He flew in a rage—he danced and blew;
But in vain
Was the pain
Of his bursting brain;
For still the broader the Moon-scrap grew,
The broader he swelled his big cheeks and blew.
Slowly she grew—till she filled the night,
And shone
On her throne
In the sky alone,
A matchless, wonderful silvery light,
Radiant and lovely, the queen of the night.
Said the Wind: “What a marvel of power am I
With my breath,
Good faith!
I blew her to death—
First blew her away right out of the sky—
Then blew her in; what strength have I!”
But the Moon she knew nothing about the affair;
For high
In the sky,
With her one white eye,
Motionless, miles above the air,
She had never heard the great Wind blare.

George Macdonald.

Jesus the Carpenter.

“Jesus the Carpenter”—“same trade as me”—strikes a high note in favour of honest toil. (1848-.)

“Isn’t this Joseph’s son?”—ay, it is He;
Joseph the carpenter—same trade as me—
I thought as I’d find it—I knew it was here—
But my sight’s getting queer.
I don’t know right where as His shed must ha’ stood—
But often, as I’ve been a-planing my wood,
I’ve took off my hat, just with thinking of He
At the same work as me.
He warn’t that set up that He couldn’t stoop down
And work in the country for folks in the town;
And I’ll warrant He felt a bit pride, like I’ve done,
At a good job begun.
The parson he knows that I’ll not make too free,
But on Sunday I feels as pleased as can be,
When I wears my clean smock, and sits in a pew,
And has taught a few.
I think of as how not the parson hissen,
As is teacher and father and shepherd o’ men,
Not he knows as much of the Lord in that shed,
Where He earned His own bread.
And when I goes home to my missus, says she,
“Are ye wanting your key?”
For she knows my queer ways, and my love for the shed
(We’ve been forty years wed).
So I comes right away by mysen, with the book,
And I turns the old pages and has a good look
For the text as I’ve found, as tells me as He
Were the same trade as me.
Why don’t I mark it? Ah, many say so,
But I think I’d as lief, with your leaves, let it go:
It do seem that nice when I fall on it sudden—
Unexpected, you know!