The friend whose friendship gave me thine, With kindness past all telling, Pursues me since the “auld lang syne” When first with him I fell in. Ah! while we watched the summer tide Lap thy gray rocks, Kinvara, We recked not that o’er oceans wide He’d fly to Yarra-Yarra! He tells me that the sky above Is bluer far and brighter Than that which spans the isle we love; The air is warmer, lighter. Gay flowers along the margin float And many an _avis rara_ Of brilliant plume but tuneless throat, Skims o’er the sparkling Yarra. When shall I breathe that purer air? Quite lately I have had some Fair chance of being summoned there. If summoned, _ecce adsum_? The motto of our Bedford race Is this: _Che sara sara_. (The accent slightly I misplace To coax a rhyme for Yarra.) More musical than new Adare Its olden name Athdara, And Tennyson’s meek Lady Clare Grows statelier as Clara. Had not my Muse such gems to spare For gemming thy tiara, She would not waste a double share On this one stanza, Yarra! There is not unity of theme I grant it, in these stanzas, The subjects as far sundered seem As Kensington and Kansas. ’Twere better if in graceful round My thoughts could move――but arrah! What can a poet do who’s bound To close each verse with Yarra? And notice here our rhythmic chords Are strict in orthodoxy, Nor do they force two little words For one to act as proxy. An article to harshly treat (As in this line) would mar a Most conscientious rhyming feat Achieved to honour Yarra. But now, at last, we must give o’er With our Wordsworthian sapphic, Though sundry rhymes remain in store Historic, topographic, Like those we’ve hitherto impressed, A Lara and Bokhara, Carrara, Marat, and the rest: But how link these with Yarra? My trickling thread of metre wells As if ’twould well for ever: So mountain streamlet swells and swells Into a stream, a river. But now my harp as mute must grow As that which hangs at Tara. Farewell, dear Maid from Bendigo! Farewell, O Yarra-Yarra! W. L. This imitation of Wordsworth’s poems, _Yarrow Unvisited_, _Yarrow Visited_, and _Yarrow Revisited_, appeared originally in _The Month_, May and June, 1872. The allusion in the first verse is to J. J. Callanan, an Irish poet, who wrote _Gougaune Barra_, which is inserted in _Bell’s Standard Elocutionist_. (Belfast, 1874) p. 436. ――――:o:―――― A SONNET ON THE SONNET.