The Land of Song Volume Iii Part 33

Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!

Rescue my castle before the hot day Brightens to blue from its silvery gray, (_Chorus_) _Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!_

Ride past the suburbs, asleep as you'd say; Many's the friend there will listen and pray "G.o.d's luck to gallants that strike up the lay-- (_Chorus_) '_Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!_'"

Forty miles off, like a roebuck at bay, Flouts Castle Brancepeth the Roundheads' array: Who laughs, "Good fellows ere this, by my fay, (_Chorus_) '_Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!_'"

Who? My wife Gertrude; that, honest and gay, Laughs when you talk of surrendering, "Nay!

I've better counselors; what counsel they?

(_Chorus_) '_Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!_'"

ROBERT BROWNING.

A JACOBITE IN EXILE.

The weary day rins down and dies, The weary night wears through: And never an hour is fair wi' flower And never a flower wi' dew.

I would the day were night for me, I would the night were day: For then would I stand in my ain fair land, As now in dreams I may.

O lordly flow the Loire and Seine, And loud the dark Durance: But bonnier shine the braes of Tyne Than a' the fields of France; And the waves of Till that speak sae still Gleam goodlier where they glance.

O weel were they that fell fighting On dark Drumossie's day: They keep their hame ayont the faem And we die far away.

O sound they sleep, and saft, and deep, But night and day wake we; And ever between the sea banks green Sounds loud the sundering sea.

And ill we sleep, sae sair we weep, But sweet and fast sleep they; And the mool that haps them roun' and laps them Is e'en their country's clay; But the land we tread that are not dead Is strange as night by day.

Strange as night in a strange man's sight, Though fair as dawn it be: For what is here that a stranger's cheer Should yet wax blithe to see?

The hills stand steep, the dells lie deep, The fields are green and gold; The hill streams sing, and the hillsides ring, As ours at home of old.

But hills and flowers are nane of ours, And ours are over sea: And the kind strange land whereon we stand, It wotsna what were we Or ever we came, wi' scathe and shame, To try what end might be.

Scathe and shame, and a waefu' name, And a weary time and strange, Have they that seeing a weird for dreeing Can die, and cannot change.

Shame and scorn may we thole that mourn, Though sair be they to dree: But ill may we bide the thoughts we hide, Mair keen than wind and sea.

Ill may we thole the night's watches, And ill the weary day: And the dreams that keep the gates of sleep, A waefu' gift gie they; For the songs they sing us, the sights they bring us, The morn blaws all away.

On Aikenshaw the sun blinks braw, The burn rins blithe and fain; There's naught wi' me I wadna gie To look thereon again.

On Keilder-side the wind blaws wide: There sounds nae hunting horn That rings sae sweet as the winds that beat Round banks where Tyne is born.

The Wansbeck sings with all her springs, The bents and braes give ear; But the wood that rings wi' the sang she sings I may not see nor hear; For far and far thae blithe burns are, And strange is a' thing near.

The light there lightens, the day there brightens, The loud wind there lives free: Nae light comes nigh me or wind blaws by me That I wad hear or see.

But O gin I were there again, Afar ayont the faem, Cauld and dead in the sweet saft bed That haps my sires at hame!

We'll see nae mair the sea banks fair, And the sweet gray gleaming sky, And the lordly strand of Northumberland, And the goodly towers thereby; And none shall know but the winds that blow The graves wherein we lie.

ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE.]

A JACOBITE'S EPITAPH.

To my true king I offered free from stain Courage and faith; vain faith, and courage vain.

For him, I threw lands, honors, wealth, away, And one dear hope, that was more prized than they.

For him I languished in a foreign clime, Gray-haired with sorrow in my manhood's prime; Heard on Lavernia Scargill's whispering trees, And pined by Arno for my lovelier Tees; Beheld each night my home in fevered sleep, Each morning started from the dream to weep; Till G.o.d, who saw me tried too sorely, gave The resting place I asked--an early grave.

Oh thou, whom chance leads to this nameless stone, From that proud country which was once mine own, By those white cliffs I never more must see, By that dear language which I speak like thee, Forget all feuds, and shed one English tear O'er English dust. A broken heart lies here.

THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY.

THE THREE FISHERS.

Three fishers went sailing out into the west, Out into the west as the sun went down; Each thought on the woman who loved him the best, And the children stood watching them out of the town; For men must work, and women must weep, And there's little to earn, and many to keep, Though the harbor bar be moaning.

Three wives sat up in the lighthouse tower, And they trimmed the lamps as the sun went down; They looked at the squall, and they looked at the shower, And the night-rack came rolling up ragged and brown.

But men must work and women must weep, Though storms be sudden and waters deep, And the harbor bar be moaning.

Three corpses lay out on the shining sands In the morning gleam as the tide went down, And the women are weeping and wringing their hands, For those who will never come home to the town; For men must work, and women must weep, And the sooner 'tis over, the sooner to sleep And good-by to the bar and its moaning.

CHARLES KINGSLEY.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CHARLES KINGSLEY.]

THE DESERTED HOUSE.

Life and Thought have gone away Side by side, Leaving door and windows wide: Careless tenants they!

All within is dark as night; In the windows is no light; And no murmur at the door, So frequent on its hinge before.

Close the door, the shutters close, Or thro' the windows we shall see The nakedness and vacancy Of the dark, deserted house.