Valour and Hope are my henchmen; I am the Angel of Rest.

'I am life, I am wealth, I am fame :
For I captain an army

Of shining and generous dreams;
And mine, too, all mine, are the keys
Of that secret spiritual shrine,
Where, his work-a-day soul put by,
Shut in with his saint of saints—
With his radiant and conquering self-
Man worships, and talks, and is glad.

'Come, sit with me, ye that are lonely, Ye that are paid with disdain,

Ye that are chained and would soar !
I am beauty and love;

I am friendship, the comforter;

I am that which forgives and forgets.'

The Spirit of Wine

Sang in my heart, and I triumphed
In the savour and scent of his music,
His magnetic and mastering song.

XLII

A WINK from Hesper, falling
Fast in the wintry sky,
Comes through the even blue,
Dear, like a word from you.
Is it good-bye?

Across the miles between us

I send you sigh for sigh.

Good-night, sweet friend, good-night: Till life and all take flight,

Never good-bye.

One sees how it ends.

A woman looks

Or a man tells lies,
And the pleasant brooks
And the quiet skies,
Ruined with brawling
And caterwauling,

Enchant no more
As they did before.

And so it ends
With friends.

Friends . . old friends
And what if it ends?
Shall we dare to shirk
What we live to learn?
It has done its work,
It has served its turn;
And, forgive and forget
Or hanker and fret,

So it breaks, so it ends.

There let it rest!

It has fought and won,

And is still the best

That either has done.

Each as he stands

The work of its hands,
Which shall be more

As he was before?

What is it ends

With friends?

D

XLIV

If it should come to be,
This proof of you and ine,
This type and sign

Of hours that smiled and shone,
And yet seemed dead and gone
As old-world wine:

Of Them Within the Gate

Ask we no richer fate,

No boon above,

For girl child or for boy,
My gift of life and joy,

Your gift of love.