Works

(To A. L.)


The shopman shambled from the doorway out
And twitched it down--
Snapped in the blade! 'Twas scarcely dear, I doubt,
At half-a-crown.
...

(To W. E. H.)


Here, in this sequestered close
Bloom the hyacinth and rose;
Here beside the modest stock
Flaunts the flaring hollyhock;
Here, without a pang, one sees...

(XVIII. CENT.)


When first in CELIA'S ear I poured
A yet unpractised pray'r,
My trembling tongue sincere ignored
The aids of "sweet" and "fair."
I only said, as in me lay,...

To the Burden of "Rogues All."


Come hither ye gallants, come hither ye maids,
To the trim gravelled walks, to the shady arcades;
Come hither, come hither, the nightingales call;--...

As I went a-walking on Lavender Hill,
O, I met a Darling in frock and frill;
And she looked at me shyly, with eyes of blue,
"Are you going a-walking? Then take me too!"
...

When first I came to Court,
Fa la!
When first I came to Court,
I deemed Dan Cupid but a boy,
And Love an idle sport,
A sport whereat a man might toy
With little hurt and mickle joy--...

FRANK (on the Lawn).
Come to the Terrace, May,--the sun is low.

MAY (in the House).
Thanks, I prefer my Browning here instead.

FRANK.
There are two peaches by the strawberry bed.
...

"Sic visum Veneri: cui placet impares
Formas atque animos sub juga a'nea
Saevo mittere cum joco."
--Hor. i. 33.


"Love mocks us all"--as Horace said of old:...

"At the Sign of the Lyre,"
Good Folk, we present you
With the pick of our quire,
And we hope to content you!

Here be Ballad and Song,
The fruits of our leisure,
Some short and some long--...

All night through Daisy's sleep, it seems,
Have ceaseless "rat-tats" thundered;
All night through Daisy's rosy dreams
Have devious Postmen blundered,
Delivering letters round her bed,--...

"For old sake's sake!" 'Twere hard to choose
Words fitter for an old-world Muse
Than these, that in their cadence bring
Faint fragrance of the posy-ring,
And charms that rustic lovers use.
...

"--the music of the moon
Sleeps in the plain eggs of the nightingale."
Aylmer's Field.


Five geese,--a landscape damp and wild,--
A stunted, not too pretty, child,
Beneath a battered gingham;...

In the year Seventeen Hundred and Seventy and Three,
When the GEORGES were ruling o'er Britain the free,
There was played a new play, on a new-fashioned plan,...

Even as one in city pent,
Dazed with the stir and din of town,
Drums on the pane in discontent,
And sees the dreary rain come down,
Yet, through the dimmed and dripping glass,...

(To E. G., With A Collection Of Essays.)


When You and I have wandered beyond the reach of call,
And all our Works immortal lie scattered on the Stall,
It may be some new Reader, in that remoter age,...

By A Gentleman Of The Temple.


While cynic CHARLES still trimm'd the vane
'Twixt Querouaille and Castlemaine,
In days that shocked JOHN EVELYN,
My First Possessor fixed me in....

Monsieur the Cur' down the street
Comes with his kind old face,--
With his coat worn bare, and his straggling hair,
And his green umbrella-case.

You may see him pass by the little "Grande Place,"...

A Proper New Ballad Of The Country And The Town.

"Phyllida amo ante alias."
Virg.


The ladies of St. James's
Go swinging to the play;
Their footmen run before them,...

I drink of the Ale of Southwark, I drink of the Ale of Chepe;
At noon I dream on the settle; at night I cannot sleep;
For my love, my love it groweth; I waste me all the day;...

Across the grass I see her pass;
She comes with tripping pace,--
A maid I know,--and March winds blow
Her hair across her face;--
With a hey, Dolly! ho, Dolly!
Dolly shall be mine,...