Chapter I: STOOD On Sarum's treeless plain,

The waste that careless Nature owns; Lone tenants of her bleak domain, Loomed huge and gray the Druid stones.

Upheaved in many a billowy mound The sea-like, naked turf arose, Where wandering flocks went nibbling round The mingled graves of friends and foes.

The Briton, Roman, Saxon, Dane, This windy desert roamed in turn; Unmoved these mighty blocks remain Whose story none that lives may learn.

Erect, half buried, slant or prone, These awful listeners, blind and dumb, Hear the strange tongues of tribes unknown, As wave on wave they go and come.

"Who are you, giants, whence and why?" I stand and ask in blank amaze; My soul accepts their mute reply "A mystery, as are you that gaze.

"A silent Orpheus wrought the charm From riven rocks their spoils to bring; A nameless Titan lent his arm To range us in our magic ring.

"But Time with still and stealthy stride, That climbs and treads and levels all, That bids the loosening keystone slide, And topples down the crumbling wall,--

"Time, that unbuilds the quarried past, Leans on these wrecks that press the sod; They slant, they stoop, they fall at last, And strew the turf their priests have trod.

"No more our altar's wreath of smoke Floats up with morning's fragrant dew; The fires are dead, the ring is broke, Where stood the many stand the few."

My thoughts had wandered far away, Borne off on Memory's outspread wing, To where in deepening twilight lay The wrecks of friendship's broken ring.

Ah me! of all our goodly train How few will find our banquet hall! Yet why with coward lips complain That this must lean, and that must fall?

Cold is the Druid's altar-stone, Its vanished flame no more returns; But ours no chilling damp has known,-- Unchanged, unchanging, still it burns.

So let our broken circle stand A wreck, a remnant, yet the same, While one last, loving, faithful hand Still lives to feed its altar-flame!

THE ANGEL-THIEF

1888

TIME is a thief who leaves his tools behind him; He comes by night, he vanishes at dawn; We track his footsteps, but we never find him Strong locks are broken, massive bolts are drawn,

And all around are left the bars and borers, The splitting wedges and the prying keys, Such aids as serve the soft-shod vault-explorers To crack, wrench open, rifle as they please.

Ah, these are tools which Heaven in mercy lends us When gathering rust has clenched our shackles fast, Time is the angel-thief that Nature sends us To break the cramping fetters of our past.

Mourn as we may for treasures he has taken, Poor as we feel of hoarded wealth bereft, More precious are those implements forsaken, Found in the wreck his ruthless hands have left.

Some lever that a casket's hinge has broken Pries off a bolt, and lo! our souls are free; Each year some Open Sesame is spoken, And every decade drops its master-key.

So as from year to year we count our treasure, Our loss seems less, and larger look our gains; Time's wrongs repaid in more than even measure,-- We lose our jewels, but we break our chains.

AFTER THE CURFEW

1889

THE Play is over. While the light Yet lingers in the darkening hall, I come to say a last Good-night Before the final _Exeunt all_.

We gathered once, a joyous throng: The jovial toasts went gayly round; With jest, and laugh, and shout, and song, We made the floors and walls resound.

We come with feeble steps and slow, A little band of four or five, Left from the wrecks of long ago, Still pleased to find ourselves alive.

Alive! How living, too, are they Whose memories it is ours to share! Spread the long table's full array,-- There sits a ghost in every chair!

One breathing form no more, alas! Amid our slender group we see; With him we still remained "The Class,"-- Without his presence what are we?

The hand we ever loved to clasp,-- That tireless hand which knew no rest,-- Loosed from affection's clinging grasp, Lies nerveless on the peaceful breast.

The beaming eye, the cheering voice, That lent to life a generous glow, Whose every meaning said "Rejoice," We see, we hear, no more below.

The air seems darkened by his loss, Earth's shadowed features look less fair, And heavier weighs the daily cross His willing shoulders helped us bear.

Why mourn that we, the favored few Whom grasping Time so long has spared Life's sweet illusions to pursue, The common lot of age have shared?

In every pulse of Friendship's heart There breeds unfelt a throb of pain,-- One hour must rend its links apart, Though years on years have forged the chain.

. . . . . . . . . . . .

So ends "The Boys,"--a lifelong play. We too must hear the Prompter's call To fairer scenes and brighter day Farewell! I let the curtain fall.