Works

It is the Police Commissioners,
All on a winter's day;
And they to prove the town water
Have set themselves away.

They went to the north, they went to the south,
And into the west went they,...

On the field of Waterloo we made Napoleon rue
That ever out of Elba he decided for to come,
For we finished him that day, and he had to run away,
And yield himself to Maitland on the Billy-ruffium.
...

Where she sleeps, no moonlight shines
No pale beam unbidden creeps.
Darkest shade the place enshrines
Where she sleeps.

Like a diamond in the deeps
Of the rich unopened mines...

This morning, while we sat in talk
Of spring and apple-bloom,
Lo! Death stood in the garden walk,
And peered into the room.

Your back was turned, you did not see
The shadow that he made....

He brought a team from Inversnaid
To play our Third Fifteen,
A man whom none of us had played
And very few had seen.

He weighed not less than eighteen stone,
And to a practised eye...

O Love, thine empire is not dead,
Nor will we let thy worship go,
Although thine early flush be fled,
Thine ardent eyes more faintly glow,
And thy light wings be fallen slow...

O swallow-tailed purveyor of college sprees,
O skilled to please the student fraternity,
Most honoured publican of Scotland,
Milton, a name to adorn the Cross Keys;
Whose chosen waiters, Samuel, Archibald,...

Oh, who may this dead warrior be
That to his grave they bring?
'Tis William, Duke of Normandy,
The conqueror and king.

Across the sea, with fire and sword,
The English crown he won;...

The Red King's gone a-hunting, in the woods his father made
For the tall red deer to wander through the thicket and the glade,
The King and Walter Tyrrel, Prince Henry and the rest...

It was a phantom of delight
When first it gleamed upon my sight,
A scholarly distinction, sent
To be a student's ornament.
The hood was rich beyond compare,
The gown was a unique affair....

Another day let slip! Its hours have run,
Its golden hours, with prodigal excess,
All run to waste. A day of life the less;
Of many wasted days, alas, but one!
...

Loud he sang the song Ta Phershon
For his personal diversion,
Sang the chorus U-pi-dee,
Sang about the Barley Bree.

In that hour when all is quiet
Sang he songs of noise and riot,...

Loud he sang the song Ta Phershon
For his personal diversion,
Sang the chorus U-pi-dee,
Sang about the Barley Bree.

In that hour when all is quiet
Sang he songs of noise and riot,...

I shall be spun. There is a voice within
Which tells me plainly I am all undone;
For though I toil not, neither do I spin,
I shall be spun.

April approaches. I have not begun...

The fire burns bright
And the hearth is clean swept,
As she likes it kept,
And the lamp is alight.
She is coming to-night.

The wind's east of late.
When she comes, she'll be cold,...

Oh, where's the use of having gifts that can't be turned to money?
And where's the use of singing, when there's no one wants to hear?
It may be one or two will say your songs are sweet as honey,...

The city once again doth wear
Her wonted dress of winter's bride,
Her mantle woven of misty air,
With saffron sunlight faintly dyed.
She sits above the seething tide,
Of all her summer robes forlorn--...