Upon the pier stood two stern-visaged men, Looking to where a little craft lay moored, Swayed by the lazy current of the Thames, 50 Which weltered by in muddy listlessness. Grave men they were, and battlings of fierce thought Had trampled out all softness from their brows, And ploughed rough furrows there before their time, For other crop than such as home-bred Peace Sows broadcast in the willing soil of Youth. Care, not of self, but for the common-weal, Had robbed their eyes of youth, and left instead A look of patient power and iron will, And something fiercer, too, that gave broad hint 60 Of the plain weapons girded at their sides. The younger had an aspect of command,-- Not such as trickles down, a slender stream, In the shrunk channel of a great descent, But such as lies entowered in heart and head, And an arm prompt to do the 'hests of both. His was a brow where gold were out of place, And yet it seemed right worthy of a crown (Though he despised such), were it only made Of iron, or some serviceable stuff That would have matched his brownly rugged face 71 The elder, although such he hardly seemed (Care makes so little of some five short years), Had a clear, honest face, whose rough-hewn strength Was mildened by the scholar's wiser heart To sober courage, such as best befits The unsullied temper of a well-taught mind, Yet so remained that one could plainly guess The hushed volcano smouldering underneath. He spoke: the other, hearing, kept his gaze 80 Still fixed, as on some problem in the sky. 'O CROMWELL we are fallen on evil times! There was a day when England had a wide room For honest men as well as foolish kings: But now the uneasy stomach of the time Turns squeamish at them both. Therefore let us Seek out that savage clime, where men as yet Are free: there sleeps the vessel on the tide, Her languid canvas drooping for the wind; Give us but that, and what need we to fear 90 This Order of the Council? The free waves Will not say No to please a wayward king, Nor will the winds turn traitors at his beck: All things are fitly cared for, and the Lord Will watch us kindly o'er the exodus Of us his servants now, as in old time. We have no cloud or fire, and haply we May not pass dry-shod through the ocean-stream; But, saved or lost, all things are in His hand.' So spake he, and meantime the other stood 100 With wide gray eyes still reading the blank air. As if upon the sky's blue wall he saw Some mystic sentence, written by a hand, Such as of old made pale the Assyrian king, Girt with his satraps in the blazing feast.