Part 8

We knew and did not know, We saw and did not see, The nets that long ago Fate wove for you and me; The cruel nets that keep The birds that sob and moan, And I would we were asleep, Forgotten and alone!

THE SINGING ROSE.

‘La Rose qui chante et l’herbe qui égare.’

WHITE Rose on the grey garden wall, Where now no night-wind whispereth, Call to the far-off flowers, and call With murmured breath and musical Till all the Roses hear, and all Sing to my Love what the White Rose saith.

White Rose on the grey garden wall That long ago we sung! Again you come at Summer’s call,— Again beneath my windows all With trellised flowers is hung, With clusters of the roses white Like fragrant stars in a green night.

Once more I hear the sister towers Each unto each reply, The bloom is on those limes of ours, The weak wind shakes the bloom in showers, Snow from a cloudless sky; There is no change this happy day Within the College Gardens grey!

St. Mary’s, Merton, Magdalen—still Their sweet bells chime and swing, The old years answer them, and thrill A wintry heart against its will With memories of the Spring— That Spring we sought the gardens through For flowers which ne’er in gardens grew!

For we, beside our nurse’s knee, In fairy tales had heard Of that strange Rose which blossoms free On boughs of an enchanted tree, And sings like any bird! And of the weed beside the way That leadeth lovers’ steps astray!

In vain we sought the Singing Rose Whereof old legends tell, Alas, we found it not mid those Within the grey old College close, That budded, flowered, and fell,— We found that herb called ‘Wandering’ And meet no more, no more in Spring!

Yes, unawares the unhappy grass That leadeth steps astray, We trod, and so it came to pass That never more we twain, alas, Shall walk the self-same way. And each must deem, though neither knows, That neither found the Singing Rose!

A REVIEW IN RHYME.

A LITTLE of Horace, a little of Prior, A sketch of a Milkmaid, a lay of the Squire— These, these are ‘on draught’ ‘At the Sign of the Lyre!’

A child in Blue Ribbons that sings to herself, A talk of the Books on the Sheraton shelf, A sword of the Stuarts, a wig of the Guelph,

A lai, a pantoum, a ballade, a rondeau, A pastel by Greuze, and a sketch by Moreau, And the chimes of the rhymes that sing sweet as they go,

A fan, and a folio, a ringlet, a glove, ’Neath a dance by Laguerre on the ceiling above, And a dream of the days when the bard was in love,

A scent of dead roses, a glance at a pun, A toss of old powder, a glint of the sun, They meet in the volume that Dobson has done!

If there’s more that the heart of a man can desire, He may search, in his Swinburne, for fury and fire; If he’s wise—he’ll alight ‘At the Sign of the Lyre!’

COLINETTE.

FOR A SKETCH BY MR. G. LESLIE, R.A.

FRANCE your country, as we know; Room enough for guessing yet, What lips now or long ago, Kissed and named you—Colinette. In what fields from sea to sea, By what stream your home was set, Loire or Seine was glad of thee, Marne or Rhone, O Colinette?

Did you stand with maidens ten, Fairer maids were never seen, When the young king and his men Passed among the orchards green? Nay, old ballads have a note Mournful, we would fain forget; No such sad old air should float Round your young brows, Colinette.

Say, did Ronsard sing to you, Shepherdess, to lull his pain, When the court went wandering through Rose pleasances of Touraine? Ronsard and his famous Rose Long are dust the breezes fret; You, within the garden close, You are blooming, Colinette.

Have I seen you proud and gay, With a patched and perfumed beau, Dancing through the summer day, Misty summer of Watteau? Nay, so sweet a maid as you Never walked a minuet With the splendid courtly crew; Nay, forgive me, Colinette.

Not from Greuze’s canvases Do you cast a glance, a smile; You are not as one of these, Yours is beauty without guile. Round your maiden brows and hair Maidenhood and Childhood met Crown and kiss you, sweet and fair, New art’s blossom, Colinette.

A SUNSET OF WATTEAU.

LUI.

The silk sail fills, the soft winds wake, Arise and tempt the seas; Our ocean is the Palace lake, Our waves the ripples that we make Among the mirrored trees.

ELLE.