THE FIREMAN.

(An impression of the street.)

His foe is fire, fire, fire!
Hark his hoarse dispersing cry,
From his path asunder fly!
Speed! or men and women die,
For his foe is fire, fire!

His foe is fire, fire, fire!

He is armed and helmed in brass;
Let his thundering chargers pass;
Be the iron Strand as grass,
For their foe is fire, fire!

His foe is fire, fire, fire!

On he rushes as in gold,
Under him a chariot rolled,
As in Roman triumph old,
But his foe is fire, fire!

His foe is fire, fire, fire!

Red the vault above him reels,

Now the blistering stairway peels
But the battle-bliss he feels,
For his foe is fire, fire!

His foe is fire, fire, fire!
Up the ladder flies he light,
Disappears in dreadful night,
Now re-starts upon the sight,
Sudden out of fire, fire!

His foe is fire, fire, fire!
And no word the hero saith,
Only on his arm hath breath
Something between life and death,
Snatched from fire, fire, fire!

His foe is fire, fire, fire!
Bring him to the victor's car,
Richer is his spoil of war,
Than from Roman battle far,
Who has triumphed over fire.

PENELOPE TO ULYSSES.

Thou marvellest, husband, that I sit so mute
And motionless, but gazing on that face
Which now the pine-fire throws up in a flame,
Now leaves in darkest night as thou dost lean
Massily drooping toward the log-fed blaze.
Such silence has come down upon us two!
Yet a good silence after so long years.

We only are awake and the live sea!

But thou who hast borne all things may'st perhaps
Bear with a woman's fancies while she speaks them.
Think not, my man of men, that I am cold
In passion or heart! Far otherwise! I see,
And nothing else I see, the brow that took
The blow of strange waves and the furious kiss
Of different winds, the sad heaven-roaming eyes,
The mighty hands that piloted all night.
Yet art thou paler than my dream of thee.
Forgive me, O my lord, but I must speak.
Well-all these years have I imagined thee
So constantly that now thy visible form,
How noble! seems but shadow of such sight.
For I have seen thee in the deep of night
Leap silent, sudden up the stair, and I
Fell toward thee in the darkness with a cry,
Fluttering upon thy bosom like a bird.
And I have seen thee spring upon this earth;
Then have I often just upon daybreak
Started and run down to the beach and heard
Thy boat grate on the pebbles: or again
It has been noon and thou hast come in arms
Over the sweet fields calling out my name.

Sometimes in tragic nights of surf and cloud
Thou hast been thrown headlong in howling wind
On the sharp coast and up the sea-bank streamed,
Alone. This then I strive to shape to words—
Thou hadst become with passing days and years,
With night and tempest, and with sun and sea,
A presence hovering in all lights and airs.
Thou wert the soul then of the evening star,
And thou didst roam heaven in the seeking moon,
Thou secretly wouldst speak from stirring leaves,
And what was dawn but some surprise of thee?
So, husband, though this heart beats wild at thee,
Yet lesser in imagination

Art thou returned than evermore returning,

Nature is but a body from henceforth,
The soul departed, the spirit gone of her.
The waves cry unintelligibly now,
That then 'Ulysses' and 'Ulysses' still
Hissed sweetly, privately, the livelong night.
Ah! but thou hear'st me not, canst only hear
A roar of memories, and for thee this house
Still plunges and takes the sea-spray evermore.
Yet come! How thou art weary none can tell,
How wise, how sad, how deaf to babbled words.
Yet come, and fold me, not as in old nights,
But now with perils kiss me, wind me round
With wonder, murmur magic in my ear,
And clasp me with the world, with nothing less!

BEATRICE CENCI.

Who stealeth from the turret-stair
In raiment white with streaming hair?
The moon is hid, the stars are pale,
The night-wind hath forgot to wail.
Like to a priestess seemeth she
Addressed to some dread ministry.
What solemn sacrifice or rite
Comes she to celebrate this night?

A deed of Hell, and yet of Heaven,
Into these slender hands is given;
Blood must she spill, but evil blood,
As evil as hath ever flowed.
Now enters she the moonlit room;
She sees a bed bright in the gloom,
Whereon an old man slumbers deep;
Ah, God, how well the wicked sleep!
But a faint breathing all she hears,
As silently the couch she nears.
Now the bright dagger at her breast
She plucks from out her maiden vest.
Why hesitates she? and a space
Uncertain stands above that face?
Is it some memory of youth,

That brings upon her heart this ruth?
Some far-off picture that she sees,
When she was dandled on his knees?
Is it the hair, so utter white,

Hair that should seem a holy sight?
Then the red shame leaps to her heart,
And furious thoughts again upstart.
O'er him she leans; no eyelid he
Stirs as tho' warned of destiny.

What cry was that? A single cry,
That pierced the palace to the sky?
And then came down a silence deep,
Yet had each sleeper leapt from sleep,
And wandering lights and hurrying feet,
Hither and thither shadows fleet.
But she in silence pure and clean
Passed to her chamber all unseen.

THE PARTING OF LAUNCELOT AND GUINEVERE.

Into a high-walled nunnery had fled

Queen Guinevere, amid the shade to weep,
And to repent 'mid solemn boughs, and love
The cold globe of the moon; but now as she
Meekly the scarcely-breathing garden walked,
She saw, and stood, and swooned at Launcelot,
Who burned in sudden steel like a blue flame
Amid the cloister. Then, when she revived,
He came and looked on her in the dark place
So pale her beauty was, the sweetness such
That he half-closed his eyes and deeply breathed;
And as he gazed, there came into his mind
That night of May, with pulsing stars, the strange
Perfumed darkness, and delicious guilt

In silent hour; but at the last he said:
'Suffer me, lady, but to kiss thy lips
Once, and to go away for evermore.'
But she replied, ‘Nay, I beseech thee, go!
Sweet were those kisses in the deep of night;
But from those kisses is this ruin come.
Sweet was thy touch, but now I wail at it,
And I have hope to see the face of Christ :
Many are saints in heaven who sinned as I.'
Then said he,'Since it is thy will, I go.'
But those that stood around could scarce endure
To see the dolour of these two; for he
Swooned in his burning armour to her face,
And both cried out as at the touch of spears:
And as two trees at midnight, when the breeze
Comes over them, now to each other bend,
And now withdraw; so mournfully these two
Still drooped together and still drew apart.
Then like one dead her ladies bore away
The heavy queen; and Launcelot went out
And through a forest weeping rode all night.