10 Best Famous Gloriously Poems

Here is a collection of the top 10 all-time best famous Gloriously poems. This is a select list of the best famous Gloriously poetry. Reading, writing, and enjoying famous Gloriously poetry (as well as classical and contemporary poems) is a great past time. These top poems are the best examples of gloriously poems.

• All Famous Gloriously Poems

 Lo, here the gentle lark, weary of rest,
From his moist cabinet mounts up on high,
And wakes the morning, from whose silver breast
The sun ariseth in his majesty;
Who doth the world so gloriously behold
That cedar-tops and hills seem burnish'd gold.

Venus salutes him with this fair good-morrow;
"O thou clear god, and patron of all light,
From whom each lamp and shining star doth borrow
The beauteous influence that makes him bright,
There lives a son that suck'd an earthly mother,
May lend thee light, as thou dost lend to other."

This said, she hasteth to a myrtle grove,
Musing the morning is so much o'erworn,
And yet she hears no tidings of her love:
She hearkens for his hounds and for his horn:
Anon she hears them chant it lustily,
And all in haste she coasteth to the cry.

And as she runs, the bushes in the way
Some catch her by the neck, some kiss her face,
Some twine about her thigh to make her stay:
She wildly breaketh from their strict embrace,
Like a milch doe, whose swelling dugs do ache,
Hasting to feed her fawn, hid in some brake.

By this she hears the hounds are at a bay;
Whereat she starts, like one that spies an adder
Wreath'd up in fatal folds just in his way,
The fear whereof doth make him shake and shudder;
Even so the timorous yelping of the hounds
Appals her senses and her spirit confounds.

For now she knows it is no gentle chase,
But the blunt boar, rough bear, or lion proud,
Because the cry remaineth in one place,
Where fearfully the dogs exclaim aloud:
Finding their enemy to be so curst,
They all strain court'sy who shall cope him first.

This dismal cry rings sadly in her ear,
Through which it enters to surprise her heart;
Who, overcome by doubt and bloodless fear,
With cold-pale weakness numbs each feeling part:
Like soldiers, when their captain once doth yield,
They basely fly and dare not stay the field.

Thus stands she in a trembling ecstasy;
Till, cheering up her senses all dismay'd,
She tells them 'tis a causeless fantasy,
And childish error, that they are afraid;
Bids them leave quaking, bids them fear no more:--
And with that word she spied the hunted boar;

Whose frothy mouth, bepainted all with red,
Like milk and blood being mingled both together,
A second fear through all her sinews spread,
Which madly hurries her she knows not whither:
This way she runs, and now she will no further,
But back retires to rate the boar for murther.

A thousand spleens bear her a thousand ways;
She treads the path that she untreads again;
Her more than haste is mated with delays,
Like the proceedings of a drunken brain,
Full of respects, yet nought at all respecting;
In hand with all things, nought at all effecting.

Here kennell'd in a brake she finds a hound,
And asks the weary caitiff for his master,
And there another licking of his wound,
'Gainst venom'd sores the only sovereign plaster;
And here she meets another sadly scowling,
To whom she speaks, and he replies with howling.

When he hath ceas'd his ill-resounding noise,
Another flap-mouth'd mourner, black and grim,
Against the welkin volleys out his voice;
Another, and another, answer him,
Clapping their proud tails to the ground below,
Shaking their scratch'd ears, bleeding as they go.

Look, how the world's poor people are amazed
At apparitions, signs, and prodigies,
Whereon with fearful eyes they long have gazed,
Infusing them with dreadful prophecies;
So she at these sad signs draws up her breath
And sighing it again, exclaims on Death.

"Hard-favour'd tyrant, ugly, meagre, lean,
Hateful divorce of love,"--thus chides she Death,--
"Grim-grinning ghost, earth's worm, what dost thou mean
To stifle beauty and to steal his breath,
Who when he liv'd, his breath and beauty set
Gloss on the rose, smell to the violet?

"If he be dead,--O no, it cannot be,
Seeing his beauty, thou shouldst strike at it:--
O yes, it may; thou hast no eyes to see,
But hatefully at random dost thou hit.
Thy mark is feeble age, but thy false dart
Mistakes that aim and cleaves an infant's heart.

"Hadst thou but bid beware, then he had spoke,
And, hearing him, thy power had lost his power.
The Destinies will curse thee for this stroke;
They bid thee crop a weed, thou pluck'st a flower:
Love's golden arrow at him should have fled,
And not Death's ebon dart, to strike him dead.

"Dost thou drink tears, that thou provok'st such weeping?
What may a heavy groan advantage thee?
Why hast thou cast into eternal sleeping
Those eyes that taught all other eyes to see?
Now nature cares not for thy mortal vigour,
Since her best work is ruin'd with thy rigour."

Here overcome, as one full of despair,
She vail'd her eyelids, who, like sluices, stopt
The crystal tide that from her two cheeks fair
In the sweet channel of her bosom dropt;
But through the flood-gates breaks the silver rain,
And with his strong course opens them again.

O, how her eyes and tears did lend and borrow!
Her eyes seen in the tears, tears in her eye;
Both crystals, where they view'd each other's sorrow,
Sorrow that friendly sighs sought still to dry;
But like a stormy day, now wind, now rain,
Sighs dry her cheeks, tears make them wet again.

Variable passions throng her constant woe,
As striving who should best become her grief;
All entertain'd, each passion labours so,
That every present sorrow seemeth chief,
But none is best: then join they all together,
Like many clouds consulting for foul weather.

By this, far off she hears some huntsman hollo;
A nurse's song ne'er pleased her babe so well:
The dire imagination she did follow
This sound of hope doth labour to expel;
For now reviving joy bids her rejoice,
And flatters her it is Adonis' voice.

Whereat her tears began to turn their tide,
Being prison'd in her eye like pearls in glass;
Yet sometimes falls an orient drop beside,
Which her cheek melts, as scorning it should pass,
To wash the foul face of the sluttish ground,
Who is but drunken when she seemeth drown'd.

O hard-believing love, how strange it seems
Not to believe, and yet too credulous!
Thy weal and woe are both of them extremes;
Despair and hope make thee ridiculous:
The one doth flatter thee in thoughts unlikely,
In likely thoughts the other kills thee quickly.

Now she unweaves the web that she hath wrought;
Adonis lives, and Death is not to blame;
It was not she that call'd him all to naught:
Now she adds honours to his hateful name;
She clepes him king of graves and grave for kings,
Imperious supreme of all mortal things.

"No, no," quoth she, "sweet Death, I did but jest;
Yet pardon me I felt a kind of fear
When as I met the boar, that bloody beast,
Which knows no pity, but is still severe;
Then, gentle shadow,--truth I must confess,--
I rail'd on thee, fearing my love's decease.

"'Tis not my fault: the boar provok'd my tongue;
Be wreak'd on him, invisible commander;
'Tis he, foul creature, that hath done thee wrong;
I did but act, he's author of thy slander:
Grief hath two tongues, and never woman yet
Could rule them both without ten women's wit."

Thus hoping that Adonis is alive,
Her rash suspect she doth extenuate;
And that his beauty may the better thrive,
With Death she humbly doth insinuate;
Tells him of trophies, statues, tombs, and stories
His victories, his triumphs and his glories.

"O Jove," quoth she, "how much a fool was I
To be of such a weak and silly mind
To wail his death who lives and must not die
Till mutual overthrow of mortal kind;
For he being dead, with him is beauty slain,
And, beauty dead, black chaos comes again.

"Fie, fie, fond love, thou art so full of fear
As one with treasure laden, hemm'd with thieves;
Trifles, unwitnessed with eye or ear,
Thy coward heart with false bethinking grieves."
Even at this word she hears a merry horn,
Whereat she leaps that was but late forlorn.

As falcon to the lure, away she flies;
The grass stoops not, she treads on it so light;
And in her haste unfortunately spies
The foul boar's conquest on her fair delight;
Which seen, her eyes, as murder'd with the view,
Like stars asham'd of day, themselves withdrew;

Or, as the snail, whose tender horns being hit,
Shrinks backward in his shelly cave with pain,
And there, all smother'd up, in shade doth sit,
Long after fearing to creep forth again;
So, at his bloody view, her eyes are fled
Into the deep dark cabins of her head:

Where they resign their office and their light
To the disposing of her troubled brain;
Who bids them still consort with ugly night,
And never wound the heart with looks again;
Who, like a king perplexed in his throne,
By their suggestion gives a deadly groan,

Whereat each tributary subject quakes;
As when the wind, imprison'd in the ground,
Struggling for passage, earth's foundation shakes,
Which with cold terror doth men's minds confound.
This mutiny each part doth so surprise
That from their dark beds once more leap her eyes;

And, being open'd, threw unwilling light
Upon the wide wound that the boar had trench'd
In his soft flank; whose wonted lily white
With purple tears, that his wound wept, was drench'd:
No flower was nigh, no grass, herb, leaf, or weed,
But stole his blood and seem'd with him to bleed.

This solemn sympathy poor Venus noteth;
Over one shoulder doth she hang her head;
Dumbly she passions, franticly she doteth;
She thinks he could not die, he is not dead:
Her voice is stopt, her joints forget to bow;
Her eyes are mad that they have wept till now.

 AS I walk these broad, majestic days of peace, 
(For the war, the struggle of blood finish’d, wherein, O terrific Ideal! 
Against vast odds, having gloriously won, 
Now thou stridest on—yet perhaps in time toward denser wars, 
Perhaps to engage in time in still more dreadful contests, dangers,
Longer campaigns and crises, labors beyond all others; 
—As I walk solitary, unattended, 
Around me I hear that eclat of the world—politics, produce, 
The announcements of recognized things—science, 
The approved growth of cities, and the spread of inventions.

I see the ships, (they will last a few years,) 
The vast factories, with their foremen and workmen, 
And here the indorsement of all, and do not object to it. 

But I too announce solid things; 
Science, ships, politics, cities, factories, are not nothing—I watch them,
Like a grand procession, to music of distant bugles, pouring, triumphantly moving—and
 grander heaving in sight; 
They stand for realities—all is as it should be. 

Then my realities; 
What else is so real as mine? 
Libertad, and the divine average—Freedom to every slave on the face of the earth,
The rapt promises and luminé of seers—the spiritual world—these centuries
 lasting songs, 
And our visions, the visions of poets, the most solid announcements of any. 

For we support all, fuse all, 
After the rest is done and gone, we remain; 
There is no final reliance but upon us;
Democracy rests finally upon us (I, my brethren, begin it,) 
And our visions sweep through eternity.

 To that gaunt House of Art which lacks for naught
Of all the great things men have saved from Time,
The withered body of a girl was brought
Dead ere the world's glad youth had touched its prime,
And seen by lonely Arabs lying hid
In the dim womb of some black pyramid.

But when they had unloosed the linen band
Which swathed the Egyptian's body, - lo! was found
Closed in the wasted hollow of her hand
A little seed, which sown in English ground
Did wondrous snow of starry blossoms bear
And spread rich odours through our spring-tide air.

With such strange arts this flower did allure
That all forgotten was the asphodel,
And the brown bee, the lily's paramour,
Forsook the cup where he was wont to dwell,
For not a thing of earth it seemed to be,
But stolen from some heavenly Arcady.

In vain the sad narcissus, wan and white
At its own beauty, hung across the stream,
The purple dragon-fly had no delight
With its gold dust to make his wings a-gleam,
Ah! no delight the jasmine-bloom to kiss,
Or brush the rain-pearls from the eucharis.

For love of it the passionate nightingale
Forgot the hills of Thrace, the cruel king,
And the pale dove no longer cared to sail
Through the wet woods at time of blossoming,
But round this flower of Egypt sought to float,
With silvered wing and amethystine throat.

While the hot sun blazed in his tower of blue
A cooling wind crept from the land of snows,
And the warm south with tender tears of dew
Drenched its white leaves when Hesperos up-rose
Amid those sea-green meadows of the sky
On which the scarlet bars of sunset lie.

But when o'er wastes of lily-haunted field
The tired birds had stayed their amorous tune,
And broad and glittering like an argent shield
High in the sapphire heavens hung the moon,
Did no strange dream or evil memory make
Each tremulous petal of its blossoms shake?

Ah no! to this bright flower a thousand years
Seemed but the lingering of a summer's day,
It never knew the tide of cankering fears
Which turn a boy's gold hair to withered grey,
The dread desire of death it never knew,
Or how all folk that they were born must rue.

For we to death with pipe and dancing go,
Nor would we pass the ivory gate again,
As some sad river wearied of its flow
Through the dull plains, the haunts of common men,
Leaps lover-like into the terrible sea!
And counts it gain to die so gloriously.

We mar our lordly strength in barren strife
With the world's legions led by clamorous care,
It never feels decay but gathers life
From the pure sunlight and the supreme air,
We live beneath Time's wasting sovereignty,
It is the child of all eternity.

 Aunt Imogen was coming, and therefore 
The children—Jane, Sylvester, and Young George— 
Were eyes and ears; for there was only one 
Aunt Imogen to them in the whole world, 
And she was in it only for four weeks
In fifty-two. But those great bites of time 
Made all September a Queen’s Festival; 
And they would strive, informally, to make 
The most of them.—The mother understood, 
And wisely stepped away. Aunt Imogen
Was there for only one month in the year, 
While she, the mother,—she was always there; 
And that was what made all the difference. 
She knew it must be so, for Jane had once 
Expounded it to her so learnedly
That she had looked away from the child’s eyes 
And thought; and she had thought of many things. 

There was a demonstration every time 
Aunt Imogen appeared, and there was more 
Than one this time. And she was at a loss
Just how to name the meaning of it all: 
It puzzled her to think that she could be 
So much to any crazy thing alive— 
Even to her sister’s little savages 
Who knew no better than to be themselves;
But in the midst of her glad wonderment 
She found herself besieged and overcome 
By two tight arms and one tumultuous head, 
And therewith half bewildered and half pained 
By the joy she felt and by the sudden love
That proved itself in childhood’s honest noise. 
Jane, by the wings of sex, had reached her first; 
And while she strangled her, approvingly, 
Sylvester thumped his drum and Young George howled. 
But finally, when all was rectified,
And she had stilled the clamor of Young George 
By giving him a long ride on her shoulders, 
They went together into the old room 
That looked across the fields; and Imogen 
Gazed out with a girl’s gladness in her eyes,
Happy to know that she was back once more 
Where there were those who knew her, and at last 
Had gloriously got away again 
From cabs and clattered asphalt for a while; 
And there she sat and talked and looked and laughed
And made the mother and the children laugh. 
Aunt Imogen made everybody laugh. 

There was the feminine paradox—that she 
Who had so little sunshine for herself 
Should have so much for others. How it was
That she could make, and feel for making it, 
So much of joy for them, and all along 
Be covering, like a scar, and while she smiled, 
That hungering incompleteness and regret— 
That passionate ache for something of her own,
For something of herself—she never knew. 
She knew that she could seem to make them all 
Believe there was no other part of her 
Than her persistent happiness; but the why 
And how she did not know. Still none of them
Could have a thought that she was living down— 
Almost as if regret were criminal, 
So proud it was and yet so profitless— 
The penance of a dream, and that was good. 
Her sister Jane—the mother of little Jane,
Sylvester, and Young George—might make herself 
Believe she knew, for she—well, she was Jane. 

Young George, however, did not yield himself 
To nourish the false hunger of a ghost 
That made no good return. He saw too much:
The accumulated wisdom of his years 
Had so conclusively made plain to him 
The permanent profusion of a world 
Where everybody might have everything 
To do, and almost everything to eat,
That he was jubilantly satisfied 
And all unthwarted by adversity. 
Young George knew things. The world, he had found out, 
Was a good place, and life was a good game— 
Particularly when Aunt Imogen
Was in it. And one day it came to pass— 
One rainy day when she was holding him 
And rocking him—that he, in his own right, 
Took it upon himself to tell her so; 
And something in his way of telling it—
The language, or the tone, or something else— 
Gripped like insidious fingers on her throat, 
And then went foraging as if to make 
A plaything of her heart. Such undeserved 
And unsophisticated confidence
Went mercilessly home; and had she sat 
Before a looking glass, the deeps of it 
Could not have shown more clearly to her then 
Than one thought-mirrored little glimpse had shown, 
The pang that wrenched her face and filled her eyes
With anguish and intolerable mist. 
The blow that she had vaguely thrust aside 
Like fright so many times had found her now: 
Clean-thrust and final it had come to her 
From a child’s lips at last, as it had come
Never before, and as it might be felt 
Never again. Some grief, like some delight, 
Stings hard but once: to custom after that 
The rapture or the pain submits itself, 
And we are wiser than we were before.
And Imogen was wiser; though at first 
Her dream-defeating wisdom was indeed 
A thankless heritage: there was no sweet, 
No bitter now; nor was there anything 
To make a daily meaning for her life—
Till truth, like Harlequin, leapt out somehow 
From ambush and threw sudden savor to it— 
But the blank taste of time. There were no dreams, 
No phantoms in her future any more: 
One clinching revelation of what was
One by-flash of irrevocable chance, 
Had acridly but honestly foretold 
The mystical fulfilment of a life 
That might have once … But that was all gone by: 
There was no need of reaching back for that:
The triumph was not hers: there was no love 
Save borrowed love: there was no might have been. 

But there was yet Young George—and he had gone 
Conveniently to sleep, like a good boy; 
And there was yet Sylvester with his drum,
And there was frowzle-headed little Jane; 
And there was Jane the sister, and the mother,— 
Her sister, and the mother of them all. 
They were not hers, not even one of them: 
She was not born to be so much as that,
For she was born to be Aunt Imogen. 
Now she could see the truth and look at it; 
Now she could make stars out where once had palled 
A future’s emptiness; now she could share 
With others—ah, the others!—to the end
The largess of a woman who could smile; 
Now it was hers to dance the folly down, 
And all the murmuring; now it was hers 
To be Aunt Imogen.—So, when Young George 
Woke up and blinked at her with his big eyes,
And smiled to see the way she blinked at him, 
’T was only in old concord with the stars 
That she took hold of him and held him close, 
Close to herself, and crushed him till he laughed.

 LIFE, believe, is not a dream
So dark as sages say;
Oft a little morning rain
Foretells a pleasant day. 
Sometimes there are clouds of gloom,
But these are transient all;
If the shower will make the roses bloom,
O why lament its fall ? 

Rapidly, merrily,
Life's sunny hours flit by,
Gratefully, cheerily,
Enjoy them as they fly ! 

What though Death at times steps in
And calls our Best away ?
What though sorrow seems to win,
O'er hope, a heavy sway ?
Yet hope again elastic springs,
Unconquered, though she fell;
Still buoyant are her golden wings,
Still strong to bear us well.
Manfully, fearlessly,
The day of trial bear,
For gloriously, victoriously,
Can courage quell despair !

 KILMARNOCK wabsters, fidge an’ claw,
 An’ pour your creeshie nations;
An’ ye wha leather rax an’ draw,
 Of a’ denominations;
Swith to the Ligh Kirk, ane an’ a’
 An’ there tak up your stations;
Then aff to Begbie’s in a raw,
 An’ pour divine libations
 For joy this day.


Curst Common-sense, that imp o’ hell,
 Cam in wi’ Maggie Lauder; 1
But Oliphant 2 aft made her yell,
 An’ Russell 3 sair misca’d her:
This day Mackinlay 4 taks the flail,
 An’ he’s the boy will blaud her!
He’ll clap a shangan on her tail,
 An’ set the bairns to daud her
 Wi’ dirt this day.


Mak haste an’ turn King David owre,
 And lilt wi’ holy clangor;
O’ double verse come gie us four,
 An’ skirl up the Bangor:
This day the kirk kicks up a stoure;
 Nae mair the knaves shall wrang her,
For Heresy is in her pow’r,
 And gloriously she’ll whang her
 Wi’ pith this day.


Come, let a proper text be read,
 An’ touch it aff wi’ vigour,
How graceless Ham 5 leugh at his dad,
 Which made Canaan a ******;
Or Phineas 6 drove the murdering blade,
 Wi’ whore-abhorring rigour;
Or Zipporah, 7 the scauldin jad,
 Was like a bluidy tiger
 I’ th’ inn that day.


There, try his mettle on the creed,
 An’ bind him down wi’ caution,
That stipend is a carnal weed
 He taks by for the fashion;
And gie him o’er the flock, to feed,
 And punish each transgression;
Especial, rams that cross the breed,
 Gie them sufficient threshin;
 Spare them nae day.


Now, auld Kilmarnock, cock thy tail,
 An’ toss thy horns fu’ canty;
Nae mair thou’lt rowt out-owre the dale,
 Because thy pasture’s scanty;
For lapfu’s large o’ gospel kail
 Shall fill thy crib in plenty,
An’ runts o’ grace the pick an’ wale,
 No gi’en by way o’ dainty,
 But ilka day.


Nae mair by Babel’s streams we’ll weep,
 To think upon our Zion;
And hing our fiddles up to sleep,
 Like baby-clouts a-dryin!
Come, screw the pegs wi’ tunefu’ cheep,
 And o’er the thairms be tryin;
Oh, rare to see our elbucks wheep,
 And a’ like lamb-tails flyin
 Fu’ fast this day.


Lang, Patronage, with rod o’ airn,
 Has shor’d the Kirk’s undoin;
As lately Fenwick, sair forfairn,
 Has proven to its ruin: 8
Our patron, honest man! Glencairn,
 He saw mischief was brewin;
An’ like a godly, elect bairn,
 He’s waled us out a true ane,
 And sound, this day.


Now Robertson 9 harangue nae mair,
 But steek your gab for ever;
Or try the wicked town of Ayr,
 For there they’ll think you clever;
Or, nae reflection on your lear,
 Ye may commence a shaver;
Or to the Netherton 10 repair,
 An’ turn a carpet weaver
 Aff-hand this day.


Mu’trie 11 and you were just a match,
 We never had sic twa drones;
Auld Hornie did the Laigh Kirk watch,
 Just like a winkin baudrons,
And aye he catch’d the tither wretch,
 To fry them in his caudrons;
But now his Honour maun detach,
 Wi’ a’ his brimstone squadrons,
 Fast, fast this day.


See, see auld Orthodoxy’s faes
 She’s swingein thro’ the city!
Hark, how the nine-tail’d cat she plays!
 I vow it’s unco pretty:
There, Learning, with his Greekish face,
 Grunts out some Latin ditty;
And Common-sense is gaun, she says,
 To mak to Jamie Beattie
 Her plaint this day.


But there’s Morality himsel’,
 Embracing all opinions;
Hear, how he gies the tither yell,
 Between his twa companions!
See, how she peels the skin an’ fell,
 As ane were peelin onions!
Now there, they’re packed aff to hell,
 An’ banish’d our dominions,
 Henceforth this day.


O happy day! rejoice, rejoice!
 Come bouse about the porter!
Morality’s demure decoys
 Shall here nae mair find quarter:
Mackinlay, Russell, are the boys
 That heresy can torture;
They’ll gie her on a rape a hoyse,
 And cowe her measure shorter
 By th’ head some day.


Come, bring the tither mutchkin in,
 And here’s—for a conclusion—
To ev’ry New Light 12 mother’s son,
 From this time forth, Confusion!
If mair they deave us wi’ their din,
 Or Patronage intrusion,
We’ll light a *****, and ev’ry skin,
 We’ll rin them aff in fusion
 Like oil, some day.


 Note 1. Alluding to a scoffing ballad which was made on the admission of the late reverend and worthy Mr. Lihdsay to the “Laigh Kirk.”—R. B. [back]
Note 2. Rev. James Oliphant, minister of Chapel of Ease, Kilmarnock. [back]
Note 3. Rev. John Russell of Kilmarnock. [back]
Note 4. Rev. James Mackinlay. [back]
Note 5. Genesis ix. 22.—R. B. [back]
Note 6. Numbers xxv. 8.—R. B. [back]
Note 7. Exodus iv. 52.—R. B. [back]
Note 8. Rev. Wm. Boyd, pastor of Fenwick. [back]
Note 9. Rev. John Robertson. [back]
Note 10. A district of Kilmarnock. [back]
Note 11. The Rev. John Multrie, a “Moderate,” whom Mackinlay succeeded. [back]
Note 12. “New Light” is a cant phrase in the west of Scotland for those religious opinions which Dr. Taylor of Norwich has so strenuously defended.—R. B. [back]

 Keen, fitful gusts are whisp'ring here and there 
Among the bushes half leafless, and dry; 
The stars look very cold about the sky, 
And I have many miles on foot to fare. 
Yet feel I little of the cool bleak air, 
Or of the dead leaves rustling drearily, 
Or of those silver lamps that burn on high, 
Or of the distance from home's pleasant lair: 
For I am brimfull of the friendliness 
That in a little cottage I have found; 
Of fair-hair'd Milton's eloquent distress, 
And all his love for gentle Lycid drown'd; 
Of lovely Laura in her light green dress, 
And faithful Petrarch gloriously crown'd.

 He had offices in Sydney, not so many years ago, 
And his shingle bore the legend `Peter Anderson and Co.', 
But his real name was Careless, as the fellows understood -- 
And his relatives decided that he wasn't any good. 
'Twas their gentle tongues that blasted any `character' he had -- 
He was fond of beer and leisure -- and the Co. was just as bad. 
It was limited in number to a unit, was the Co. -- 
'Twas a bosom chum of Peter and his Christian name was Joe. 

'Tis a class of men belonging to these soul-forsaken years: 
Third-rate canvassers, collectors, journalists and auctioneers. 
They are never very shabby, they are never very spruce -- 
Going cheerfully and carelessly and smoothly to the deuce. 
Some are wanderers by profession, `turning up' and gone as soon, 
Travelling second-class, or steerage (when it's cheap they go saloon); 
Free from `ists' and `isms', troubled little by belief or doubt -- 
Lazy, purposeless, and useless -- knocking round and hanging out. 
They will take what they can get, and they will give what they can give, 
God alone knows how they manage -- God alone knows how they live! 
They are nearly always hard-up, but are cheerful all the while -- 
Men whose energy and trousers wear out sooner than their smile! 
They, no doubt, like us, are haunted by the boresome `if' or `might', 
But their ghosts are ghosts of daylight -- they are men who live at night! 

Peter met you with the comic smile of one who knows you well, 
And is mighty glad to see you, and has got a joke to tell; 
He could laugh when all was gloomy, he could grin when all was blue, 
Sing a comic song and act it, and appreciate it, too. 
Only cynical in cases where his own self was the jest, 
And the humour of his good yarns made atonement for the rest. 
Seldom serious -- doing business just as 'twere a friendly game -- 
Cards or billiards -- nothing graver. And the Co. was much the same. 

They tried everything and nothing 'twixt the shovel and the press, 
And were more or less successful in their ventures -- mostly less. 
Once they ran a country paper till the plant was seized for debt, 
And the local sinners chuckle over dingy copies yet. 

They'd been through it all and knew it in the land of Bills and Jims -- 
Using Peter's own expression, they had been in `various swims'. 
Now and then they'd take an office, as they called it, -- make a dash 
Into business life as `agents' -- something not requiring cash. 
(You can always furnish cheaply, when your cash or credit fails, 
With a packing-case, a hammer, and a pound of two-inch nails -- 
And, maybe, a drop of varnish and sienna, too, for tints, 
And a scrap or two of oilcloth, and a yard or two of chintz). 
They would pull themselves together, pay a week's rent in advance, 
But it never lasted longer than a month by any chance. 

The office was their haven, for they lived there when hard-up -- 
A `daily' for a table cloth -- a jam tin for a cup; 
And if the landlord's bailiff happened round in times like these 
And seized the office-fittings -- well, there wasn't much to seize -- 
They would leave him in possession. But at other times they shot 
The moon, and took an office where the landlord knew them not. 
And when morning brought the bailiff there'd be nothing to be seen 
Save a piece of bevelled cedar where the tenant's plate had been; 
There would be no sign of Peter -- there would be no sign of Joe 
Till another portal boasted `Peter Anderson and Co.' 

And when times were locomotive, billiard-rooms and private bars -- 
Spicy parties at the cafe -- long cab-drives beneath the stars; 
Private picnics down the Harbour -- shady campings-out, you know -- 
No one would have dreamed 'twas Peter -- 
no one would have thought 'twas Joe! 
Free-and-easies in their `diggings', when the funds began to fail, 
Bosom chums, cigars, tobacco, and a case of English ale -- 
Gloriously drunk and happy, till they heard the roosters crow -- 
And the landlady and neighbours made complaints about the Co. 
But that life! it might be likened to a reckless drinking-song, 
For it can't go on for ever, and it never lasted long. 

. . . . . 

Debt-collecting ruined Peter -- people talked him round too oft, 
For his heart was soft as butter (and the Co.'s was just as soft); 
He would cheer the haggard missus, and he'd tell her not to fret, 
And he'd ask the worried debtor round with him to have a wet; 
He would ask him round the corner, and it seemed to him and her, 
After each of Peter's visits, things were brighter than they were. 
But, of course, it wasn't business -- only Peter's careless way; 
And perhaps it pays in heaven, but on earth it doesn't pay. 
They got harder up than ever, and, to make it worse, the Co. 
Went more often round the corner than was good for him to go. 

`I might live,' he said to Peter, `but I haven't got the nerve -- 
I am going, Peter, going -- going, going -- no reserve. 
Eat and drink and love they tell us, for to-morrow we may die, 
Buy experience -- and we bought it -- we're experienced, you and I.' 
Then, with a weary movement of his hand across his brow: 
`The death of such philosophy's the death I'm dying now. 
Pull yourself together, Peter; 'tis the dying wish of Joe 
That the business world shall honour Peter Anderson and Co. 

`When you feel your life is sinking in a dull and useless course, 
And begin to find in drinking keener pleasure and remorse -- 
When you feel the love of leisure on your careless heart take holt, 
Break away from friends and pleasure, though it give your heart a jolt. 
Shun the poison breath of cities -- billiard-rooms and private bars, 
Go where you can breathe God's air and see the grandeur of the stars! 
Find again and follow up the old ambitions that you had -- 
See if you can raise a drink, old man, I'm feelin' mighty bad -- 
Hot and sweetened, nip o' butter -- squeeze o' lemon, Pete,' he sighed. 
And, while Peter went to fetch it, Joseph went to sleep -- and died 
With a smile -- anticipation, maybe, of the peace to come, 
Or a joke to try on Peter -- or, perhaps, it was the rum. 

. . . . . 

Peter staggered, gripped the table, swerved as some old drunkard swerves -- 
At a gulp he drank the toddy, just to brace his shattered nerves. 
It was awful, if you like. But then he hadn't time to think -- 
All is nothing! Nothing matters! Fill your glasses -- dead man's drink. 

. . . . . 

Yet, to show his heart was not of human decency bereft, 
Peter paid the undertaker. He got drunk on what was left; 
Then he shed some tears, half-maudlin, on the grave where lay the Co., 
And he drifted to a township where the city failures go. 
Where, though haunted by the man he was, the wreck he yet might be, 
Or the man he might have been, or by each spectre of the three, 
And the dying words of Joseph, ringing through his own despair, 
Peter `pulled himself together' and he started business there. 

But his life was very lonely, and his heart was very sad, 
And no help to reformation was the company he had -- 
Men who might have been, who had been, but who were not in the swim -- 
'Twas a town of wrecks and failures -- they appreciated him. 
They would ask him who the Co. was -- that ***** company he kept -- 
And he'd always answer vaguely -- he would say his partner slept; 
That he had a `sleeping partner' -- jesting while his spirit broke -- 
And they grinned above their glasses, for they took it as a joke. 
He would shout while he had money, he would joke while he had breath -- 
No one seemed to care or notice how he drank himself to death; 
Till at last there came a morning when his smile was seen no more -- 
He was gone from out the office, and his shingle from the door, 
And a boundary-rider jogging out across the neighb'ring run 
Was attracted by a something that was blazing in the sun; 
And he found that it was Peter, lying peacefully at rest, 
With a bottle close beside him and the shingle on his breast. 
Well, they analysed the liquor, and it would appear that he 
Qualified his drink with something good for setting spirits free. 
Though 'twas plainly self-destruction -- `'twas his own affair,' they said; 
And the jury viewed him sadly, and they found -- that he was dead.

 I saw from the beach, when the morning was shining, 
A bark o'er the waters move gloriously on; 
I came when the sun o'er that beach was declining, 
The bark was still there, but the waters were gone. 

And such is the fate of our life's early promise, 
So passing the spring-tide of joy we have known; 
Each wave that we danced on at morning ebbs from us, 
And leaves us, at eve, on the bleak shore alone. 

Oh, who would not welcome that moment's returning 
When passion first waked a new life through his frame, 
And his soul, like the wood that grows precious in burning, 
Gave out all its sweets to love's exquisite flame.

 OH how comely it is and how reviving 
To the Spirits of just men long opprest! 
When God into the hands of thir deliverer 
Puts invincible might 
To quell the mighty of the Earth, th' oppressour, 
The brute and boist'rous force of violent men 
Hardy and industrious to support 
Tyrannic power, but raging to pursue 
The righteous and all such as honour Truth; 
He all thir Ammunition 
And feats of War defeats 
With plain Heroic magnitude of mind 
And celestial vigour arm'd, 
Thir Armories and Magazins contemns, 
Renders them useless, while 
With winged expedition 
Swift as the lightning glance he executes 
His errand on the wicked, who surpris'd 
Lose thir defence distracted and amaz'd. 

ALL is best, though we oft doubt, 
What th' unsearchable dispose 
Of highest wisdom brings about, 
And ever best found in the close. 
Oft he seems to hide his face, 
But unexpectedly returns 
And to his faithful Champion hath in place 
Bore witness gloriously; whence Gaza mourns 
And all that band them to resist 
His uncontroulable intent. 
His servants he with new acquist 
Of true experience from this great event 
With peace and consolation hath dismist, 
And calm of mind all passion spent. 

O FOR some honest lover's ghost, 
 Some kind unbodied post 
 Sent from the shades below! 
 I strangely long to know 
Whether the noble chaplets wear 
Those that their mistress' scorn did bear 
 Or those that were used kindly. 

For whatsoe'er they tell us here 
 To make those sufferings dear, 
 'Twill there, I fear, be found 
 That to the being crown'd 
T' have loved alone will not suffice, 
Unless we also have been wise 
 And have our loves enjoy'd. 

What posture can we think him in 
 That, here unloved, again 
 Departs, and 's thither gone 
 Where each sits by his own? 
Or how can that Elysium be 
Where I my mistress still must see 
 Circled in other's arms? 

For there the judges all are just, 
 And Sophonisba must 
 Be his whom she held dear, 
 Not his who loved her here. 
The sweet Philoclea, since she died, 
Lies by her Pirocles his side, 
 Not by Amphialus. 

Some bays, perchance, or myrtle bough 
 For difference crowns the brow 
 Of those kind souls that were 
 The noble martyrs here: 
And if that be the only odds 
(As who can tell?), ye kinder gods, 
 Give me the woman here!