O, I see the crescent promise of my spirit hath not set. Ancient founts of inspiration well thro' all my fancy yet. Howsoever these things be, a long farewell to 190 Now for me the woods may wither, now for me the roof-tree fall. Comes a vapour from the margin, blackening over heath and holt, Cramming all the blast before it, in its breast a thunderbolt. Let it fall on Locksley Hall, with rain or hail, or fire or snow; For the mighty wind arises, roaring seaward, and I go. ULYSSES (From the same) It little profits that an idle king, By this still hearth, among these barren crags, 5 That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me. I cannot rest from travel: I will drink Life to the lees: all times I have enjoy'd Greatly, have suffer'd greatly, both with those That loved me, and alone; on shore, and when 10 Thro' scudding drifts the rainy Hyades Vext the dim sea: I am become a name; For always roaming with a hungry heart Much have I seen and known; cities of men And manners, climates, councils, governments, 15 Myself not least, but honour'd of them all; And drunk delight of battle with my peers, Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy. I am a part of all that I have met; Yet all experience is an arch wherethro' 20 Gleams that untravell'd world, whose margin fades Forever and forever when I move. How dull it is to pause, to make an end, To rust unburnished, not to shine in use! As tho' to breathe were life. Life piled on life 25 Were all too little, and of one to me Little remains: but every hour is saved From that eternal silence, something more, A bringer of new things; and vile it were For some three suns to store and hoard myself, 30 And this gray spirit yearning in desire To follow knowledge like a sinking star, Beyond the utmost bound of human thought. This is my son, mine own Telemachus, To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle35 Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfil This labour, by slow prudence to make mild A rugged people, and thro' soft degrees Subdue them to the useful and the good. Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere 40 Of common duties, decent not to fail In offices of tenderness, and pay Meet adoration to my household gods, When I am gone. He works his work, I mine. There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail: 45 There gloom the dark broad seas. My mariners, Souls that have toil'd and wrought, and thought with me That ever with a frolic welcome took The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed Free hearts, free foreheads-you and I are old; 50 Old age hath yet his honour and his toil; Death closes all: but something ere the end, Some work of noble note, may yet be done, Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods. The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks: 55 The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends, 'Tis not too late to seek a newer world. Push off, and sitting well in order smite It may be that the gulfs will wash us down: We are not now that strength which in old days are; One equal temper of heroic hearts, Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will 70 To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield. THE EPIC (INTRODUCTION TO MORTE D'Arthur) (From Poems, 1842) At Francis Allen's on the Christmas-eve,- 5 The host, and I sat round the wassail-bowl, Then half-way ebb'd: and there we held a talk, Until I woke, and found him settled down Right thro' the world, at home was little left, 20 And none abroad: there was no anchor, none, To hold by.' Francis, laughing, clapt his hand On Everard's shoulder, with 'I hold by him.' And I,' quoth Everard, by the wassail-bowl.' 'Why yes,' I said, 'we knew your gift that way 25 At college: but another which you had, I mean of verse (for so we held it then), His epic, his King Arthur, some twelve books '- God knows: he has a mint of reasons: ask. It pleased me well enough.' 'Nay, nay,' said Hall, 35 'Why take the style of those heroic times? 40 Mere chaff and draff, much better burnt.' 'But I,' Said Francis, 'pick'd the eleventh from this And have it; keep a thing, its use will come. He laugh'd, and I, tho' sleepy, like a horse MORTE D'ARTHUR So all day long the noise of battle roll'd Sir Bedivere, the last of all his knights, 10 That stood on a dark strait of barren land. |