By this the sun was all one glitter, The little birds were all in twitter; Out of a tuft a little lark Went higher up than I could mark, His little throat was all one thirst To sing until his heart should burst, To sing aloft in golden light His song from blue air out of sight. The mist drove by, and now the cows Came plodding up to milking house, Followed by Frank, the Callows’ cowman, Who whistled ’Adam was a ploughman.’ There come such cawing from the rooks, Such running chuck from little brooks, One thought it March, just budding green With hedgerows full of celandine. An otter out of stream and played, Two hares come loping up and stayed; Wide-eyed and tender-eared but bold. Sheep bleated up by Penny’s fold. I heard a partridge covey call; The morning sun was bright on all. Down the long slope the plough team drove The tossing rooks arose and hove. A stone struck on the share. A word Came to the team. The red earth stirred. I crossed the hedge by shooter’s gap, I hitched my boxer’s belt a strap, I jumped the ditch and crossed the fallow I took the hales from farmer Callow. How swift the summer goes, Forget-me-not, pink, rose. The young grass when I started And now the hay is carted, And now my song is ended, And all the summer spended; The blackbird’s second brood Routs beech-leaves in the wood The pink and rose have speeded, Forget-me-not has seeded. Only the winds that blew, The rain that makes things new, The earth that hides things old, And blessings manifold. O lovely lily clean, O lily springing green, O lily bursting white, Dear lily of delight, Spring in my heart agen That I may flower to men. GREAT HAMPDEN. June 1911. NOTE ’The Everlasting Mercy’ first appeared in _The English Review_ for October 1911. I thank the Editor and Proprietors of that paper for permitting me to reprint it here. The persons and events described in the poem are entirely imaginary, and no reference is made or intended to any living person. JOHN MASEFIELD. THE RIVERSIDE PRESS LIMITED, EDINBURGH FROM SIDGWICK & JACKSON’S LIST JOHN MASEFIELD THE WIDOW IN THE BYE STREET. Crown 8vo, cloth, 3s. 6d. net. Third Impression "Mr Masefield is no common realist, but universalizes his tragedy in the grand manner.... We are convinced that he is writing truly of human nature, which is the vital thing.... The last few stanzas show us pastoral poetry in the very perfection of simplicity."--_Spectator_. "In ’The Widow in the Bye Street’ all Mr Masefield’s passionate love of loveliness is utterly fused with the violent and unlovely story, which glows with an inner harmony. The poem, it is true, ends on a note of idyllism which recalls Theocritus; but this is no touch of eternal decoration. Inevitably the story has worked towards this culmination."--_Bookman_. THE TRAGEDY OF POMPEY THE GREAT.