As onward silently stars aloft, eastward new ones upward stole;

Vigil final for you, brave boy, (I could not save you, swift

was your death,

I faithfully loved you and cared for you living, I think we shall surely meet again,)

Til at latest lingering of the night, indeed just as the dawn appear'd,

My comrade I wrapt in his blanket, envelop'd well his

form,

Folded the blanket well, tucked it carefully over head and carefully under feet,

And there and then and bathed by the rising sun, my son in his grave, in his rude-dug grave I deposited; Ending my strange vigil with that, vigil of night and battlefield dim,

Vigil for boy of responding kisses (never again on earth responding),

Vigil for comrade swiftly slain, vigil I never forget, how as day brighten'd,

I rose from the chill ground and folded my soldier well in his blanket,

And buried him where he fell.

94

SHAMEFUL DEATH

WILLIAM MORRIS

There were four of us about that bed;
The mass-priest knelt at the side,
I and his mother stood at the head,
Over his feet lay the bride;

We were quite sure that he was dead,
Though his eyes were open wide.

He did not die in the night,

He did not die in the day,
But in the morning twilight
His spirit pass'd away,

When neither sun nor moon was bright,
And the trees were merely gray.

He was not slain with the sword, Knight's axe, or the knightly spear, Yet spoke he never a word

After he came in here;

I cut away the cord

From the neck of my brother dear.

He did not strike one blow,

For the recreants came behind,
In a place where the hornbeams grow,
A path right hard to find,

For the hornbeam boughs swing so,
That the twilight makes it blind.

They lighted a great torch then,
When his arms were pinion'd fast,
Sir John the knight of the Fen,

Sir Guy of the Dolorous Blast,
With knights threescore and ten,
Hung brave Lord Hugh at last.

I am threescore and ten,

And my hair is all turn'd gray, But I met Sir John of the Fen

Long ago on a summer day,

And am glad to think of the moment when I took his life away.

I am threescore and ten,

And my strength is mostly pass'd,

But long ago I and my men,

When the sky was overcast,

And the smoke roll'd over the reeds of the fen,

Slew Guy of the Dolorous Blast.

And now, knights all of you,
I pray you pray for Sir Hugh,
A good knight and a true,
And for Alice, his wife, pray too.

95

THE HIGHWAYMAN

ALFRED NOYES

PART ONE

I

1

The wind was a torrent of darkness among the gusty trees, The moon was a ghostly galleon 1 tossed upon cloudy seas, The road was a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor, And the highwayman came riding—

Riding-riding—

The highwayman came riding, up to the old inn door.

II

He'd a French cocked hat on his forehead, a bunch of lace at his chin,

A coat of the claret velvet, and breeches of brown doe

skin;

1. Galleon. A sailing vessel, sometimes with three or four decks

They fitted with never a wrinkle: his boots were up to

the thigh!

And he rode with a jeweled twinkle,

His pistol butts a-twinkle,

His rapier hilt a-twinkle, under the jeweled sky.

III

Over the cobbles he clattered and clashed in the dark inn

yard,

And he tapped with his whip on the shutters, but all was locked and barred;

He whistled a tune to the window, and who should be waiting there

But the landlord's black-eyed daughter,

Bess, the landlord's daughter,

Plaiting a dark red love knot into her long black hair.

IV

And dark in the dark old inn yard a stable-wicket creaked Where Tim the ostler listened; his face was white and peaked;

His eyes were hollows of madness, his hair like moldy hay, But he loved the landlord's daughter,

The landlord's red-lipped daughter,

Dumb as a dog he listened, and he heard the robber say—

V

"One kiss, my bonny sweetheart, I'm after a prize tonight, But I shall be back with the yellow gold before the morning light;

Yet, if they press me sharply, and harry me through the

day,

Then look for me by moonlight,

Watch for me by moonlight,

I'll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the way."

VI

He rose upright in the stirrups; he scarce could reach her hand,

But she loosened her hair i' the casement! His face

burned like a brand

As the black cascade of perfume came tumbling over his

breast;

And he kissed its waves in the moonlight,

(Oh, sweet black waves in the moonlight!)

Then he tugged at his rein in the moonlight, and galloped away to the West.

PART TWO

I

He did not come in the dawning; he did not come at noon; And out o' the tawny sunset, before the rise o' the moon, When the road was a gypsy's ribbon, looping the purple moor,

A redcoat troop came marching—

Marching-marching—

King George's men came marching, up to the old inn door.

II

They said no word to the landlord, they drank his ale instead,

But they gagged his daughter and bound her to the foot of her narrow bed;

Two of them knelt at her casement, with muskets at their side!

There was death at every window;

And hell at one dark window;

For Bess could see, through her casement, the road that he would ride.