Hope is our life, when first our life grows clear; Hope and delight, scarce crossed by lines of fear, Yet the day comes when fain we would not hope, But forasmuch as we with life must cope, Struggling with this and that, and who knows why? Hope will not give us up to certainty, But still must bide with us: and with this man, Whose life amid such promises began Great things she wrought; but now the time has come When he no more on earth may have his home. Great things he suffered, great delights he had, Unto great kings he gave good deeds for bad; He ruled o'er kingdoms where his name no more Is had in memory, and on many a shore He left his sweat and blood to win a name Passing the bounds of earthly creatures' fame. A love he won and lost, a well-loved son Whose little day of promise soon was done: A tender wife he had, that he must leave Before his heart her love could well receive; Those promised gifts, that on his careless head In those first hours of his fair life were shed He took unwitting, and unwitting spent, Nor gave himself to grief and discontent Because he saw the end a-drawing nigh. Where is he now? in what land must he die, To leave an empty name to us on earth? A tale half true, to cast across our mirth Some pensive thoughts of life that might have been; Where is he now, that all this life has seen? Behold, another eve I bid you see Than that calm eve of his nativity; The sun is setting in the west, the sky Is clear and hard, and no clouds come anigh The golden orb, but further off they lie, Steel-grey and black with edges red as blood, And underneath them is the weltering flood Of some huge sea, whose tumbling hills, as they Turn restless sides about, are black or grey, Or green, or glittering with the golden flame; The wind has fallen now, but still the same The mighty army moves, as if to drown This lone, bare rock, whose shear scarped sides of brown Cast off the weight of waves in clouds of spray. Alas! what ships upon an evil day Bent over to the wind in this ill sea? What navy, whose rent bones lie wretchedly Beneath these cliffs? a mighty one it was, A fearful storm to bring such things to pass.