Ah! since dark days still bring to light Man’s prudence and man’s fiery might, Time may restore us in his course Goethe’s sage mind and Byron’s force; But where will Europe’s latter hour Again find Wordsworth’s healing power? Others will teach us how to dare, And against fear our breast to steel: Others will strengthen us to bear-- But who, ah! who will make us feel? The cloud of mortal destiny, Others will front it fearlessly; But who, like him, will put it by? Keep fresh the grass upon his grave, O Rotha, with thy living wave! Sing him thy best! for few or none Hear thy voice right, now he is gone. _STANZAS._ IN MEMORY OF EDWARD QUILLINAN. I saw him sensitive in frame, I knew his spirits low; And wished him health, success, and fame-- I do not wish it now. For these are all their own reward, And leave no good behind; They try us, oftenest make us hard, Less modest, pure, and kind. Alas! yet to the suffering man, In this his mortal state, Friends could not give what fortune can,-- Health, ease, a heart elate. But he is now by fortune foiled No more; and we retain The memory of a man unspoiled, Sweet, generous, and humane; With all the fortunate have not, With gentle voice and brow. --Alive, we would have changed his lot: We would not change it now. _STANZAS FROM CARNAC._ Far on its rocky knoll descried, Saint Michael’s chapel cuts the sky. I climbed; beneath me, bright and wide, Lay the lone coast of Brittany. Bright in the sunset, weird and still, It lay beside the Atlantic wave, As though the wizard Merlin’s will Yet charmed it from his forest-grave. Behind me on their grassy sweep, Bearded with lichen, scrawled and gray, The giant stones of Carnac sleep, In the mild evening of the May. No priestly stern procession now Streams through their rows of pillars old; No victims bleed, no Druids bow: Sheep make the daisied aisles their fold. From bush to bush the cuckoo flies, The orchis red gleams everywhere; Gold furze with broom in blossom vies, The bluebells perfume all the air. And o’er the glistening, lonely land, Rise up, all round, the Christian spires; The church of Carnac, by the strand, Catches the westering sun’s last fires. And there, across the watery way, See, low above the tide at flood, The sickle-sweep of Quiberon Bay, Whose beach once ran with loyal blood! And beyond that, the Atlantic wide!-- All round, no soul, no boat, no hail; But, on the horizon’s verge descried, Hangs, touched with light, one snowy sail. Ah! where is he who should have come[20] Where that far sail is passing now, Past the Loire’s mouth, and by the foam Of Finistère’s unquiet brow,--