For I had hope, by something rare, But, while I plan and plan, my hair So fares it since the years began, The truth, that flies the flowing can, Nor much their wisdom teaches; And most, of sterling worth, is what Our own experience preaches. Ah, let the rusty theme alone! But for my pleasant hour, 't is gone, 'T is gone, and let it go. 'T is gone: a thousand such have slipt Away from my embraces, And fallen into the dusty crypt Of darkened forms and faces. Go, therefore, thou! thy betters went From misty men of letters; Thine elders and thy betters. Hours, when the poet's words and looks Had yet their native glow: Had made him talk for show; So mix forever with the past, Like all good things on earth! For should I prize thee, couldst thou last, At half thy real worth? I hold it good, good things should pass: With time I will not quarrel: It is but yonder empty glass That makes me maudlin-moral. Head-waiter of the chop-house here, I too must part: I hold thee dear For this, thou shalt from all things suck But thou wilt never move from hence, Thy latter days increased with pence Thou battenest by the greasy gleam We fret, we fume, would shift our skins, To serve the hot-and-hot; To come and go, and come again, Live long, ere from thy topmost head Long, ere the hateful crow shall tread Live long, nor feel in head or chest Our changeful equinoxes, Till mellow Death, like some late guest, But when he calls, and thou shalt cease And, laying down an unctuous lease No carvéd cross-bones, the types of Death, But carvéd cross-pipes, and, underneath, A pint-pot, neatly graven. Alfred Tennyson. London Tower. CLARENCE'S DREAM. METHOUGHT that I had broken from the Tower And was embarked to cross to Burgundy; And in my company, my brother Gloster: Upon the hatches: thence we looked toward England. Methought that Gloster stumbled; and, in falling, O Heaven! methought what pain it was to drown! All scattered in the bottom of the sea. Some lay in dead men's skulls; and in those holes And mocked the dead bones that lay scattered by. I passed, methought, the melancholy flood, The first that there did greet my stranger soul Dabbled in blood; and he shrieked out aloud, Clarence is come, false, fleeting, perjured Clarence, – That stabbed me in the field by Tewksbury; Seize on him, Furies, take him to your torments!" William Shakespeare. THE MURDER OF THE YOUNG PRINCES. HE tyrannous and bloody act is done; THE The most arch deed of piteous massacre |