Never feeling of unrest

Broke the pleasant dream he dreamed;

Only made to be his nest,

All the lovely valley seemed;
No desire

Of soaring higher
Stirred or fluttered in his breast.

True, his songs were not divine;
Were not songs of that high art,
Which, as winds do in the pine,
Find an answer in each heart;
But the mirth

Of this green earth
Laughed and revelled in his line.

From the alehouse and the inn,
Opening on the narrow street,
Came the loud, convivial din,
Singing and applause of feet,
The laughing lays
That in those days

Sang the poet Basselin.

In the castle, cased in steel,
Knights, who fought at Agincourt,

Watched and waited, spur on heel;
But the poet sang for sport

Songs that rang
Another clang,

Songs that lowlier Learts could feel.

In the convent, clad in gray,

Sat the monks in lonely cells,

Paced the cloisters, knelt to pray,
And the poet heard their bells;

But his rhymes
Found other chimes,
Nearer to the earth than they.

Gone are all the barons bold,

Gone are all the knights and squires,

Gone the abbot stern and cold,

And the brotherhood of friars;
Not a name

Remains to fame,

From those mouldering days of old!

But the poet's memory here

Of the landscape makes a part;
Like the river, swift and clear,

Flows his song through many a heart;
Haunting still

That ancient mill,

In the Valley of the Vire.

MY LOST YOUTH.

OFTEN I think of the beautiful town
That is seated by the sea;

Often in thought go up and down
The pleasant streets of that dear old town,
And my youth comes back to me.
And a verse of a Lapland song

Is haunting my memory still:

"A boy's will is the wind's will,

And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

I can see the shadowy lines of its trees,
And catch, in sudden gleams,
The sheen of the far-surrounding seas,
And islands that were the Hesperides
Of all my boyish dreams.

And the burden of that old song,
It murmurs and whispers still:

"A boy's will is the wind's will,

And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

I remember the black wharves and the slips

And the sea-tiles tossing free;

And Spanish sailors with bearded lips,

And the beauty and mystery of the ships,
And the magic of the sea.

And the voice of that wayward song

Is singing and saying still:

"A boy's will is the wind's will,

And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

I remember the bulwarks by the shore,

And the fort upon the hill;
The sun-rise gun, with its hollow roar,
The drum-beat repeated o'er and o'er,
And the bugle wild and shrill.

And the music of that old song

Throbs in my memory still:

"A boy's will is the wind's will,

And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

I remember the sea-fight far away,
How it thundered o'er the tide!
And the dead captains as they lay
In their graves, o'erlooking the tranquil bay,
Where they in battle died.

And the sound of that mournful song

Goes through me with a thrill:

"A boy's will is the wind's will,

And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

I can see the breezy dome of groves,

The shadows of Deering's Woods;

And the friendships old and the early loves

Come back with a sabbath sound, as of doves

In quiet neighborhoods.

And the verse of that sweet old song,
It flutters and murmurs still:

"A boy's will is the wind's will,

And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

I remember the gleams and glooms that dart

Across the schoolboy's brain;

The song and the silence in the heart,

That in part are prophecies, and in part
Are longings wild and vain.

And the voice of that fitful song

Sings on, and is never still:

"A boy's will is the wind's will,

And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

There are things of which I may not speak;

There are dreams that cannot die;

There are thoughts that make the strong heart weak,

And bring a pallor into the cheek,

And a mist before the eye.

And the words of that fatal song

Come over me like a chill:

"A boy's will is the wind's will,

And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

Strange to me now are the forms I meet
When I visit the dear old town;

But the native air is pure and sweet,

And the trees that o'ershadow each well-known street,

As they balance up and down,

Are singing the beautiful song,

Are sighing and whispering still:

"A boy's will is the wind's will,

And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

And Deering's Woods are fresh and fair,

And with joy that is almost pain

My heart goes back to wander there,

And among the dreams of the days that were,

I find my lost youth again.

And the strange and beautiful song,
The groves are repeating it still:

"A boy's will is the wind's will,

And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

THE GOLDEN MILE-STONE.

LEAFLESS are the trees; their purple branches
Spread themselves abroad, like reefs of coral,

Rising silent

In the Red Sea of the Winter sunset.
From the hundred chimneys of the village,
Like the Afreet in the Arabian story,

Smoky columns

Tower aloft into the air of amber.

At the window winks the flickering fire-light;
Here and there the lamps of evening glimmer,

Social watch-fires

Answering one another through the darkness.