I never saw a brute I hated so; He must be wicked to deserve such pain.

I shut my eyes and turned them on my heart.

As a

man calls for wine before he fights,

I asked one draught of earlier, happier sights,

Ere fitly I could hope to play my part. Think first, fight afterwards the soldier's art:

One taste of the old time sets all to rights.

Not it! I fancied Cuthbert's reddening face

Beneath its garniture of curly gold, Dear fellow, till I almost felt him told An arm in mine to fix me to the place, That way he used. Alas, one night's disgrace!

Out went my heart's new fire and left it cold.

Giles then, the soul of honor-there he stands

Frank as ten years ago when knighted first.

What honest man should dare (he said) he durst.

Good-but the scene shifts-faugh! what hangman hands

Pin to his breast a parchment? His own bands

Read it. Poor traitor, spit upon and curst!

Better this present than a past like that; Back therefore to my darkening path again!

No sound, no sight as far as eye could strain.

Will the night send a howlet or a bat?
I asked: when something on the dismal

flat

Came to arrest my thoughts and change their train.

A sudden little river crossed my path
As unexpected as a serpent comes.
No sluggish tide congenial to the
glooms:

This, as it frothed by, might have been a bath

For the fiend's glowing hoof-to see the wrath

Of its black eddy bespate with flakes and spumes.

So petty, yet so spiteful! All along, Low scrubby alders kneeled down over it;

Drenched willows flung them headlong in a fit

Of mute despair, a suicidal throng:
The river which had done them all the

wrong,

Whate'er that was, rolled by, deterred no whit.

Which, while I forded,-good saints, how I feared

To set my foot upon a dead man's cheek,

Each step, or feel the spear I thrust to seek

For hollows, tangled in his hair or beard! -It may have been a water-rat I speared,

But, ugh, it sounded like a baby's shriek.

Glad was I when I reached the other bank.

Now for a better country. Vain presage!

Who were the strugglers, what war did they wage,

Whose savage trample thus could pad the dank

Soil to a plash? Toads in a poisoned

tank,

Or wild cats in a red-hot iron cage

The fight must so have seemed in that

fell cirque.

What penned them there, with all the plain to choose?

No footprint leading to that horrid

mews,

None out of it. Mad brewage set to work

Their brains, no doubt, like galleyslaves the Turk

Pits for his pastime, Christians against Jews.

And more than that-a furlong onwhy, there!

What bad use was that engine for, that wheel,

Or brake, not wheel-that harrow fit to reel fair

Men's bodies out like silk? with all the Of Tophet's tool, on earth left unaware. Or brought to sharpen its rusty teeth of steel.

Then came a bit of stubbed ground, once a wood,

Crouched like two bulls locked horn in horn in fight;

While to the left, a tall scalped mountain . . Dunce,

Dotard, a-dozing at the very nonce,

After a life spent training for the sight!

What in the midst lay but the Tower itself?

The round squat turret, blind as the fool's heart,

Built of brown stone, without a counterpart

In the whole world. The tempest's mocking elf

Points to the shipman thus the unseen shelf

He strikes on, only when the timbers start.

Not see? because of night perhaps?— why, day

Came back again for that! before it left

The dying sunset kindled through a cleft:

The hills, like giants at a hunting, lay, Chin upon hand, to see the game at bay,

"Now stab and end the creature-to the heft!"

Not hear? when noise was everywhere! it tolled

Increasing like a bell. Na.mes in my

Pick up a manner nor discredit you: Zooks, are we pilchards, that they sweep

the streets

And count fair prize what comes into their net?

He's Judas to a tittle, that man is! Just such a face! Why, sir, you make amends.

Lord, I'm not angry! Bid your hangdogs go

Drink out this quarter-florin to the health

Of the munificent House that harbors

me

(And many more beside, lads! more beside!)

And all 's come square again. I'd like his face

His, elbowing on his comrade in this

door

With the pike and lantern,-for the slave that holds

John Baptist's head a-dangle by the hair With one hand ("Look you, now," as who should say)

my mew,

A-painting for the great man, saints and saints

And saints again. I could not paint all night

Ouf! I leaned out of window for fresh air.

There came a hurry of feet and little feet,

A sweep of lute strings, laughs, and whifts of song,— Flower o' the broom,

Take away love, and our earth is a tomb! Flower o' the quince,

I let Lisa go, and what good in life since? Flower o' the thyme-and so on. Round

they went.

'T was not for nothing-the good bellyful, The warm serge and the rope that goes

all round,

And day-long blessed idleness beside! "Let's see what the urchin 's fit for"

-that came next.

Not overmuch their way, I must confess.