Two sullen bullocks led the line, Their great eyes shining bright like wine; Two sullen captive kings were they, That had in time held herds at bay, And even now they crush’d the sod With stolid sense of majesty, And stately stepp’d and stately trod, As if ’twere something still to be Kings even in captivity. FROM “_BYRON_” In men whom men condemn as ill I find so much of goodness still, In men whom men pronounce divine I find so much of sin and blot, I do not dare to draw a line Between the two, where God has not. _Edward Rowland Sill_ Edward Rowland Sill was born at Windsor, Connecticut, in 1841. In 1861 he was graduated from Yale and shortly thereafter his poor health compelled him West. After various unsuccessful experiments, he drifted into teaching, first in the high schools in Ohio, later in the English department of the University of California. His uncertain physical condition added to his mental uncertainty. Unable to ally himself either with the lethargic, conservative forces whom he hated or with the radicals whom he distrusted, Sill became an uncomfortable solitary; half rebellious, half resigned. During the last decade of his life, his brooding seriousness was less pronounced, a lighter irony took the place of his dark reflections. _The Hermitage_, his first volume, was published in 1867, a later edition (including later poems) appearing in 1889. His two posthumous books are _Poems_ (1887) and _Hermione and Other Poems_ (1899). Sill died, after bringing something of the Eastern culture to the West, in 1887. SOLITUDE All alone—alone, Calm, as on a kingly throne, Take thy place in the crowded land, Self-centred in free self-command. Let thy manhood leave behind The narrow ways of the lesser mind: What to thee are its little cares, The feeble love or the spite it bears? Let the noisy crowd go by: In thy lonely watch on high, Far from the chattering tongues of men, Sitting above their call or ken, Free from links of manner and form Thou shalt learn of the wingéd storm— God shall speak to thee out of the sky. DARE YOU? Doubting Thomas and loving John, Behind the others walking on:—