Charles Kingsley

There is no inn in Snowdon which is not awful dear,
Excepting Pen-y-gwrydd (you can't pronounce it, dear),
Which standeth in the meeting of noble valleys three -
One is the vale of Gwynant, so well beloved by me,
One goes to Capel-Curig, and I can't mind its name,
And one it is Llanberris Pass, which all men knows the same;
Between which radiations vast mountains does arise,
As full of tarns as sieves of holes, in which big fish will rise,
That is, just one day in the year, if you be there, my boy,
Just about ten o'clock at night; and then I wish you joy.
Now to this Pen-y-gwrydd inn I purposeth to write,
(Axing the post town out of Froude, for I can't mind it quite),
And to engage a room or two, for let us say a week,
For fear of gents, and Manichees, and reading parties me...

Espion aile de la jeune amante
De l'ombre des palmiers pourquoi ce cri?
Laisse en paix le beau garcon plaider et vaincre -
Pourquoi, pourquoi demander 'Qu'est qu'il dit?'

'Qu'est qu'il dit?'    Ce que tu dis toi-meme
Chaque mois de ce printemps eternel;
Ce que disent les papillons qui s'entre-baisent,
Ce que dit tout bel jeun etre a toute belle.

Importun!    Attende quelques lustres:
Quand les souvenirs 1'emmeneront ici -
Mere, grand'mere, pale, lasse, et fidele,
Demande mais doucement - 'Et le vieillard,
    Qu'est qu'il dit?'

Trinidad, January 10, 1870

Thank God!    Those gazers' eyes are gone at last!
The guards are crouching underneath the rock;
The lights are fading in the town below,
Around the cottage which this morn was ours.
Kind sun, to set, and leave us here alone;
Alone upon our crosses with our God;
While all the angels watch us from the stars.
Kind moon, to shine so clear and full on him,
And bathe his limbs in glory, for a sign
Of what awaits him!    Oh look on him, Lord!
Look, and remember how he saved thy lamb!
    Oh listen to me, teacher, husband, love,
Never till now loved utterly!    Oh say,
Say you forgive me!    No - you must not speak:
You said it to me hours ago - long hours!
Now you must rest, and when to-morrow comes
Speak to the people, call them home to God,
A deacon on the Cr...

She lay among the myrtles on the cliff;
Above her glared the noon; beneath, the sea.
Upon the white horizon Atho's peak
Weltered in burning haze; all airs were dead;
The cicale slept among the tamarisk's hair;
The birds sat dumb and drooping.    Far below
The lazy sea-weed glistened in the sun;
The lazy sea-fowl dried their steaming wings;
The lazy swell crept whispering up the ledge,
And sank again.    Great Pan was laid to rest;
And Mother Earth watched by him as he slept,
And hushed her myriad children for a while.
She lay among the myrtles on the cliff;
And sighed for sleep, for sleep that would not hear,
But left her tossing still; for night and day
A mighty hunger yearned within her heart,
Till all her veins ran fever; and her cheek,
Her long thin h...

Oh, forth she went like a braw, braw bride
    To meet her winsome groom,
When she was aware of twa bonny birds
    Sat biggin' in the broom.

The tane it built with the green, green moss,
    But and the bents sae fine,
And the tither wi' a lock o' lady's hair
    Linked up wi' siller twine.

'O whaur gat ye the green, green moss,
    O whaur the bents sae fine?
And whaur gat ye the bonny broun hair
    That ance was tress o' mine?'

'We gat the moss fra' the elditch aile,
    The bents fra' the whinny muir,
And a fause knight threw us the bonny broun hair,
    To please his braw new fere.'

'Gae pull, gae pull the simmer leaves,
    And strew them saft o'er me;
My token's tint, my love is fause,
    I'll lay me doon and dee...

Speak low, speak little; who may sing
    While yonder cannon-thunders boom?
Watch, shuddering, what each day may bring:
    Nor 'pipe amid the crack of doom.'

And yet - the pines sing overhead,
    The robins by the alder-pool,
The bees about the garden-bed,
    The children dancing home from school.

And ever at the loom of Birth
    The mighty Mother weaves and sings:
She weaves - fresh robes for mangled earth;
    She sings - fresh hopes for desperate things.

And thou, too:    if through Nature's calm
    Some strain of music touch thine ears,
Accept and share that soothing balm,
    And sing, though choked with pitying tears.

Eversley, 1870.

There sits a bird on every tree;
    Sing heigh-ho!
There sits a bird on every tree,
And courts his love as I do thee;
    Sing heigh-ho, and heigh-ho!
    Young maids must marry.

There grows a flower on every bough;
    Sing heigh-ho!
There grows a flower on every bough,
Its petals kiss - I'll show you how:
    Sing heigh-ho, and heigh-ho!
    Young maids must marry.

From sea to stream the salmon roam;
    Sing heigh-ho!
From sea to stream the salmon roam;
Each finds a mate, and leads her home;
    Sing heigh-ho, and heigh-ho!
    Young maids must marry.

The sun's a bridegroom, earth a bride;
    Sing heigh-ho!
They court from morn till eventide:
The earth shall pass, but love abide.
    Sing heigh-ho, and heigh...

Oh, thou hadst been a wife for Shakspeare's self!
No head, save some world-genius, ought to rest
Above the treasures of that perfect breast,
Or nightly draw fresh light from those keen stars
Through which thy soul awes ours:    yet thou art bound -
O waste of nature! - to a craven hound;
To shameless lust, and childish greed of pelf;
Athene to a Satyr:    was that link
Forged by The Father's hand?    Man's reason bars
The bans which God allowed. - Ay, so we think:
Forgetting, thou hadst weaker been, full blest,
    Than thus made strong by suffering; and more great
    In martyrdom, than throned as Caesar's mate.

Eversley, 1851.

The baby sings not on its mother's breast;
Nor nightingales who nestle side by side;
Nor I by thine:    but let us only part,
Then lips which should but kiss, and so be still,
As having uttered all, must speak again -
O stunted thoughts!    O chill and fettered rhyme
Yet my great bliss, though still entirely blest,
Losing its proper home, can find no rest:
    So, like a child who whiles away the time
With dance and carol till the eventide,
Watching its mother homeward through the glen;
Or nightingale, who, sitting far apart,
Tells to his listening mate within the nest
The wonder of his star-entranced heart
Till all the wakened woodlands laugh and thrill -
    Forth all my being bubbles into song;
    And rings aloft, not smooth, yet clear and strong.

The merry brown hares came leaping
    Over the crest of the hill,
Where the clover and corn lay sleeping
    Under the moonlight still.

Leaping late and early,
    Till under their bite and their tread
The swedes and the wheat and the barley
    Lay cankered and trampled and dead.

A poacher's widow sat sighing
    On the side of the white chalk bank,
Where under the gloomy fir-woods
    One spot in the ley throve rank.

She watched a long tuft of clover,
    Where rabbit or hare never ran;
For its black sour haulm covered over
    The blood of a murdered man.

She thought of the dark plantation,
    And the hares, and her husband's blood,
And the voice of her indignation
    Rose up to the throne of God.

'I am l...

The Day of the Lord is at hand, at hand:
    Its storms roll up the sky:
The nations sleep starving on heaps of gold;
    All dreamers toss and sigh;
The night is darkest before the morn;
When the pain is sorest the child is born,
    And the Day of the Lord at hand.

Gather you, gather you, angels of God -
    Freedom, and Mercy, and Truth;
Come! for the Earth is grown coward and old,
    Come down, and renew us her youth.
Wisdom, Self-Sacrifice, Daring, and Love,
Haste to the battle-field, stoop from above,
    To the Day of the Lord at hand.

Gather you, gather you, hounds of hell -
    Famine, and Plague, and War;
Idleness, Bigotry, Cant, and Misrule,
    Gather, and fall in the snare!
Hireling and Mammonite, Bigot and Knave,
Crawl...

Wild wild wind, wilt thou never cease thy sighing?
    Dark dark night, wilt thou never wear away?
Cold cold church, in thy death sleep lying,
    The Lent is past, thy Passion here, but not thine Easter-day.

Peace, faint heart, though the night be dark and sighing;
    Rest, fair corpse, where thy Lord himself hath lain.
Weep, dear Lord, above thy bride low lying;
    Thy tears shall wake her frozen limbs to life and health again.

Eversley, 1848.

The boy on the famous gray pony,
    Just bidding good-bye at the door,
Plucking up maiden heart for the fences
    Where his brother won honour of yore.

The walk to 'the Meet' with fair children,
    And women as gentle as gay, -
Ah! how do we male hogs in armour
    Deserve such companions as they?

The afternoon's wander to windward,
    To meet the dear boy coming back;
And to catch, down the turns of the valley,
    The last weary chime of the pack.

The climb homeward by park and by moorland,
    And through the fir forests again,
While the south-west wind roars in the gloaming,
    Like an ocean of seething champagne.

And at night the septette of Beethoven,
    And the grandmother by in her chair,
And the foot of all feet...

    Yon sound's neither sheep-bell nor bark,
    They're running - they're running, Go hark!
    The sport may be lost by a moment's delay;
    So whip up the puppies and scurry away.
Dash down through the cover by dingle and dell,
There's a gate at the bottom - I know it full well;
And they're running - they're running,
    Go hark!

    They're running - they're running, Go hark!
    One fence and we're out of the park;
    Sit down in your saddles and race at the brook,
    Then smash at the bullfinch; no time for a look;
Leave cravens and skirters to dangle behind;
He's away for the moors in the teeth of the wind,
And they're running - they're running,
    Go hark!

    They're running - they're running, Go hark!
    Let them run on and run ...

Come away with me, Tom,
Term and talk are done;
My poor lads are reaping,
Busy every one.
Curates mind the parish,
Sweepers mind the court;
We'll away to Snowdon
For our ten days' sport;
Fish the August evening
Till the eve is past,
Whoop like boys, at pounders
Fairly played and grassed.
When they cease to dimple,
Lunge, and swerve, and leap,
Then up over Siabod,
Choose our nest, and sleep.
Up a thousand feet, Tom,
Round the lion's head,
Find soft stones to leeward
And make up our bed.
Eat our bread and bacon,
Smoke the pipe of peace,
And, ere we be drowsy,
Give our boots a grease.
Homer's heroes did so,
Why not such as we?
What are sheets and servants?
Superfluity!
Pray for wives and children
Sa...

'So the foemen have fired the gate, men of mine;
    And the water is spent and gone?
Then bring me a cup of the red Ahr-wine:
    I never shall drink but this one.

'And reach me my harness, and saddle my horse,
    And lead him me round to the door:
He must take such a leap to-night perforce,
    As horse never took before.

'I have fought my fight, I have lived my life,
    I have drunk my share of wine;
From Trier to Coln there was never a knight
    Led a merrier life than mine.

'I have lived by the saddle for years two score;
    And if I must die on tree,
Then the old saddle tree, which has borne me of yore,
    Is the properest timber for me.

'So now to show bishop, and burgher, and priest,
    How the Altenahr hawk can die:<...

Hark! hark! hark!
The lark sings high in the dark.
The were wolves mutter, the night hawks moan,
The raven croaks from the Raven-stone;
What care I for his boding groan,
Riding the moorland to come to mine own?
Hark! hark! hark!
The lark sings high in the dark.

Hark! hark! hark!
The lark sings high in the dark.
Long have I wander'd by land and by sea,
Long have I ridden by moorland and lea;
Yonder she sits with my babe on her knee,
Sits at the window and watches for me!
Hark! hark! hark!
The lark sings high in the dark.

Written for music, 1857.

Oh England is a pleasant place for them that's rich and high,
But England is a cruel place for such poor folks as I;
And such a port for mariners I ne'er shall see again
As the pleasant Isle of Aves, beside the Spanish main.

There were forty craft in Aves that were both swift and stout,
All furnished well with small arms and cannons round about;
And a thousand men in Aves made laws so fair and free
To choose their valiant captains and obey them loyally.

Thence we sailed against the Spaniard with his hoards of plate and gold,
Which he wrung with cruel tortures from Indian folk of old;
Likewise the merchant captains, with hearts as hard as stone,
Who flog men and keel-haul them, and starve them to the bone.

Oh the palms grew high in Aves, and fruits that shone lik...