| |
| BOOT and saddle, see the slanting | |
| Rays begin to fall, | |
| Flinging lights and colours flaunting | |
| Through the shadows tall, | |
| Onward! onward! must we travel? | 5 |
| When will come the goal? | |
| Riddle I may not unravel, | |
| Cease to vex my soul. | |
| |
| Harshly break those peals of laughter | |
| From the jays aloft, | 10 |
| Can we guess what they cry after, | |
| We have heard them oft; | |
| Perhaps some strain of rude thanksgiving | |
| Mingles in their song, | |
| Are they glad that they are living? | 15 |
| Are they right or wrong? | |
| Right, ’tis joy that makes them call so, | |
| Why should they be sad? | |
| Certes! we are living also, | |
| Shall not we be glad? | 20 |
| Onward! onward! must we travel? | |
| Is the goal more near? | |
| Riddle we may not unravel, | |
| Why so dark and drear? | |
| |
| Yon small bird his hymn outpouring | 25 |
| On the branch close by | |
| Recks not for the kestrel soaring | |
| In the nether sky, | |
| Though the hawk with wings extended | |
| Poises overhead, | 30 |
| Motionless as though suspended | |
| By a viewless thread. | |
| See, he stoops, nay, shooting forward | |
| With the arrow’s flight, | |
| Swift and straight away to nor’ward | 35 |
| Sails he out of sight. | |
| Onward! onward! thus we travel, | |
| Comes the goal more nigh? | |
| Riddle we may not unravel, | |
| Who shall make reply? | 40 |
| |
| Ha! Friend Ephraim, saint or sinner, | |
| Tell me if you can— | |
| Tho’ we may not judge the inner | |
| By the outer man, | |
| Yet by girth of broadcloth ample, | 45 |
| And by cheeks that shine, | |
| Surely you set no example | |
| In the fasting line— | |
| Could you, like yon bird, discov’ring | |
| Fate, as close at hand | 50 |
| As the kestrel o’er him hov’ring, | |
| Still, as he did, stand? | |
| Trusting grandly, singing gaily, | |
| Confident and calm, | |
| Not one false note in your daily | 55 |
| Hymn or weekly psalm? | |
| |
| Oft your oily tones are heard in | |
| Chapel, where you preach, | |
| This the everlasting burden | |
| Of the tale you teach: | 60 |
| ‘We are d—d, our sins are deadly, | |
| You alone are heal’d’— | |
| ’Twas not thus their gospel redly | |
| Saints and martyrs seal’d— | |
| You had seem’d more like a martyr | 65 |
| Than you seem to us, | |
| To the beasts that caught a Tartar | |
| Once at Ephesus; | |
| Rather than the stout apostle | |
| Of the Gentiles, who, | 70 |
| Pagan-like, could cuff and wrestle, | |
| They’d have chosen you. | |
| |
| Yet I ween on such occasion | |
| Your dissenting voice | |
| Would have been, in mild persuasion, | 75 |
| Raised against their choice; | |
| Man of peace, and man of merit, | |
| Pompous, wise, and grave, | |
| Ephraim! Is it flesh or spirit | |
| You strive most to save? | 80 |
| Vain is half this care and caution | |
| O’er the earthly shell, | |
| We can neither baffle nor shun | |
| Dark-plumed Azrael. | |
| Onward! onward! still we wonder, | 85 |
| Nearer draws the goal; | |
| Half the riddle’s read, we ponder | |
| Vainly on the whole. | |
| |
| Eastward! in the pink horizon, | |
| Fleecy hillocks shame | 90 |
| This dim range dull earth that lies on | |
| Tinged with rosy flame. | |
| Westward! as a stricken giant | |
| Stoops his bloody crest, | |
| And, tho’ vanquished, frowns defiant, | 95 |
| Sinks the sun to rest. | |
| Distant yet, approaching quickly, | |
| From the shades that lurk, | |
| Like a black pall gathers thickly | |
| Night, when none may work, | 100 |
| Soon our restless occupation | |
| Shall have ceased to be; | |
| Units! in God’s vast creation, | |
| Ciphers! what are we? | |
| Onward! onward! oh! faint-hearted; | 105 |
| Nearer and more near | |
| Has the goal drawn since we started, | |
| Be of better cheer. | |
| |
| Preacher! all forbearance ask, for | |
| All are worthless found, | 110 |
| Man must aye take man to task for | |
| Faults while earth goes round. | |
| On this dank soil thistles muster, | |
| Thorns are broadcast sown, | |
| Seek not figs where thistles cluster, | 115 |
| Grapes where thorns have grown. | |
| Sun and rain and dew from heaven, | |
| Light and shade and air, | |
| Heat and moisture freely given, | |
| Thorns and thistles share. | 120 |
| Vegetation rank and rotten | |
| Feels the cheering ray; | |
| Not uncared for, unforgotten, | |
| We too have our day. | |
| Unforgotten! though we cumber | 125 |
| Earth, we work His will. | |
| Shall we sleep through night’s long slumber | |
| Unforgotten still? | |
| Onward! onward! toiling ever, | |
| Weary steps and slow, | 130 |
| Doubting oft, despairing never, | |
| To the goal we go! | |
| |
| Hark! the bells on distant cattle | |
| Waft across the range, | |
| Through the golden-tufted wattle, | 135 |
| Music low and strange; | |
| Like the marriage peal of fairies | |
| Comes the tinkling sound, | |
| Or like chimes of sweet St. Mary’s | |
| On far English ground. | 140 |
| How my courser champs the snaffle, | |
| And with nostril spread, | |
| Snorts and scarcely seems to ruffle | |
| Fern leaves with his tread; | |
| Cool and pleasant on his haunches | 145 |
| Blows the evening breeze, | |
| Through the overhanging branches | |
| Of the wattle trees: | |
| Onward! to the Southern Ocean, | |
| Glides the breath of Spring, | 150 |
| Onward, with a dreamy motion, | |
| I, too, glide and sing— | |
| Forward! forward! still we wander— | |
| Tinted hills that lie | |
| In the red horizon yonder— | 155 |
| Is the goal so nigh? | |
| |
| Whisper, spring-wind, softly singing, | |
| Whisper in my ear; | |
| Respite and nepenthe bringing, | |
| Can the goal be near? | 160 |
| Laden with the dew of vespers, | |
| From the fragrant sky, | |
| In my ear the wind that whispers | |
| Seems to make reply— | |
| |
| ‘Question not, but live and labour | 165 |
| Till yon goal be won, | |
| Helping every feeble neighbour, | |
| Seeking help from none; | |
| Life is mostly froth and bubble, | |
| Two things stand like stone, | 170 |
| KINDNESS in another’s trouble, | |
| COURAGE in your own.’ | |
| Courage, comrades, this is certain, | |
| All is for the best— | |
| There are lights behind the curtain— | 175 |
| Gentles, let us rest, | |
| As the smoke-rack veers to seaward, | |
| From ‘the ancient clay’, | |
| With its moral drifting leeward, | |
| Ends the wanderer’s lay. | 180 |
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