Each party snarling at other's heel;
None seeming loving, few looking leal.
Poverty spreading athwart the land,
With mutterings few dared understand,
Though they palsied Charity's helpful hand.
And the good old greybeard stood and gazed
At the thousand hearths where no Yule-fire blazed,
At the hate-led nations, the classes crazed.
"And oh!" he cried, "is it come, the time
When the land low grovels in greed and grime,