SONG.

False Friend! wilt thou smile or weep
When my life is laid asleep?

Little cares for a smile or a tear

The clay-cold corpse upon the bier.
Farewell! heigh ho!

What is this whispers low?

There is a snake in thy smile, my Dear!
And bitter poison within thy tear.

Sweet Sleep! were Death like to thee,
Or if thou couldst mortal be,
I would close these eyes of pain:
When to wake? Never again.
O World! farewell!

Listen to the passing bell!

It says thou and I must part,
With a light and a heavy heart.

POLITICAL GREATNESS.

Nor happiness, nor majesty, nor fame,

Nor peace, nor strength, nor skill in arms or arts,
Shepherd those herds whom Tyranny makes tame :
Verse echoes not one beating of their hearts;
History is but the shadow of their shame;
Art veils her glass, or from the pageant starts,
As to Oblivion their millions fleet

Staining that heaven with obscene imagery

Of their own likeness. What are numbers knit
By force or custom? Man, who man would be,
Must rule the empire of himself; in it
Must be supreme, establishing his throne
On vanquish'd will, quelling the anarchy
Of hopes and fears,-being Himself alone.

A WAIL.

Rough Wind! that moanest loud
Grief too sad for song,-
Wild Wind, when sullen cloud
Knells all the night long!
Sad Storm, whose tears are vain!
Bare Woods, whose branches strain !
Deep Caves! and dreary Main!
Wail for the world's wrong!

JOHN KEATS.

1795-1821.

HYMN TO PAN.

O Thou! whose mighty palace-roof doth hang
From jagged trunks, and overshadoweth
Eternal whispers, glooms, the birth, life, death,
Of unseen flowers in heavy peacefulness,-

Who lovest to see the Hamadryads dress

Their ruffled locks where meeting hazels darken,—

And through whole solemn hours dost sit and hearken

The dreary melody of bedded reeds,

In desolate places where dank moisture breeds

The pipy hemlock to strange overgrowth,

Bethinking thee how melancholy loath

Thou wast to lose fair Syrinx,-do thou now,
By thy Love's milky brow,

By all the trembling mazes that she ran,
Hear us, great Pan!

O Thou! for whose soul-soothing quiet turtles
Passion their voices cooingly 'mong myrtles,
What time thou wanderest at eventide

Through sunny meadows that outskirt the side
Of thine enmossed realms,-O Thou! to whom

Broad-leafed fig-trees even now foredoom
Their ripen'd fruitage, yellow-girted bees
Their golden honeycombs, our village leas
Their fairest-blossom'd beans and poppied corn,
The chuckling linnet its five young unborn
(To sing for thee), low-creeping strawberries
Their summer coolness, pent up butterflies
Their freckled wings,-yea! the fresh-budding year
All its completions,—be quickly near!
By every wind that nods the mountain pine,
O forester divine!

Thou! to whom every faun and satyr flies
For willing service, whether to surprise
The squatted hare while in half-sleeping fit,
Or upward ragged precipices flit

To save poor lambkins from the eagle's maw,
Or by mysterious enticement draw

Bewilder'd shepherds to their path again,
Or to tread breathless round the frothy main
And gather up all fancifullest shells

For thee to tumble into Naiads' cells

And (being hidden) laugh at their out-peeping,—
Or to delight thee with fantastic leaping

The while they pelt each other on the crown
With silvery oak-apples and fir-cones brown,—
By all the echoes that about thee ring,
Hear us, O Satyr King!

O hearkener to the loud-clapping shears!
While ever and anon to his shorn peers
A ram goes bleating,-winder of the horn!
When snouted wild boars, routing tender corn,
Anger our huntsmen,-breather round our farms!
To keep off mildews and all weather harms,—
Strange ministrant of undescribed sounds
That come a-swooning over hollow grounds
And wither drearily on barren moors!

Dread opener of the mysterious doors
Leading to universal knowledge! see
Great Son of Dryopè !

The many that are come to pay their vows,
With leaves about their brows.

Be still the unimaginable lodge

For solitary thinkings, such as dodge

Conception to the very bourne of heaven,

Then leave the naked brain! be still the leaven
That, spreading in this dull and clodded earth,
Gives it a touch ethereal, a new birth!

Be still a symbol of immensity,

A firmament reflected in a sea,

An element filling the space between!

An unknown-But, no more! We humbly screen
With uplift hands our foreheads, lowly bending,
And, giving out a shout most heaven-rending,
Conjure thee to receive our humble pæan

Upon thy Mount Lycean!

ROUNDELAY.

O, Sorrow!

Why dost borrow

The natural hue of health from vermeil lips?—

To give maiden blushes

To the white rose bushes?

Or is it thy dewy hand the daisy tips?

O, Sorrow!

Why dost borrow

The lustrous passion from a falcon eye?—
To give the glow-worm light?

Or on a moonless night

To tinge, on syren shores, the salt sea-spry?

O, Sorrow!

Why dost borrow

The mellow ditties from a mourning tongue ?—
To give at evening pale

Unto the nightingale,

That thou mayst listen the cold dews among?

O, Sorrow!

Why dost borrow

Heart's lightness from the merriment of May ?—
A lover would not tread

A cowslip on the head,

Though he should dance from eve till peep of day,— Nor any drooping flower

Held sacred for thy bower,

Wherever he may sport himself and play.

To Sorrow

I bade Good-morrow!

And thought to leave her far away behind :
But, cheerly! cheerly!

She loves me dearly,

She is so constant to me and so kind :
I would deceive her,

And so leave her,

But, ah! she is so constant and so kind.

Beneath my palm-trees, by the river side,
I sat a-weeping in the whole world wide
There was no one to ask me why I wept;
And so I kept

Brimming the water-lily cups with tears
Cold as my fears.

Beneath my palm-trees, by the river side,
I sat a-weeping: what enamour'd bride,
Cheated by shadowy wooer from the clouds,
But hides and shrouds

Beneath dark palm-trees by a river side?