Poems ... Ninth edition

Front matter

THE POETICAL WOEKS OF THOMAS HOOD. BOSTON: PHILLIPS, SAMPSON AND COMPANY. 1 857. CONTENTS. POEMS. PAGE The Plea of the Midsummer Fairies 15 Hero and Leander 55 The Elm Tree: A Dream in the Woods 82 The Dream of Eugene Aram 98 The Haunted House : A Romance 106 The Bridge of Sighs 119 The Song of the Shirt , 123 The Lady's Dream 126 The Workhouse Clock : An Allegory 129 The Lay of the Laborer 132 Fair Ines 135 The Departure of Summer 137 Ode: Autumn 142 Song, for Music 144 Ballad 145 Hymn to the Sun 146 Autumn 147 To a cold Beauty 147 Ruth 148 Ballad 149 I Remember, I Remember 150 Ballad 151 The Water Lady 152 To an Absentee 153 Song 154 Ode to the Moon 155 To 157 The Forsaken 158 Autumn 159 Ode to Melancholy 160 CONTENTS. Sonnets. Written in a Volume of Shakspeare 164 To Fancy 164 To an Enthusiast 165 " It is not death, that sometime in a sigh " 165 " By every sweet tradition of true hearts " 166 On receiving a Gift 166 Silence 167 " The curse of Adam, the old curse of all " 167 " Love, dearest lady, such as 1 would speak " 168 The Lee Shore 168 The Death -Bed 169 I j I,,- ■ on seeing my Wife and two Children sleeping in the same Chamber 170 To my Daughter, on her Birthday 171 To a Child embracing his Mother 171 Stanzas 172 To a False Friend 173 The Poet's Portion 174 Time, Hope, and Memory 175 Song 175 Flowers 176 To 177 To 178 To 179 Serenade 179 Ballad 180 Sonnets.

To the Ocean 180 Lear 181 Sonnet to a Sonnet 181 False Poets and True 182 To 182 For the Fourteenth of February 183 To a Sleeping Child 183 " The world is with me, and its many cares " 184 HUMOROUS POEMS. Miss Kilmansegg and her Precious Leg 187 A Morning Thought 262 Love and Lunacy __ 2g3 Morning Meditations 2gg CONTENTS. 11 A Tale os a Trumpet 291 No! 316 The Irish Schoolmaster 316 To 325 Love 326 The Season i 327 Faithless Sally Brown : An Old Ballad 328 Bianca's Dream : A Venetian Story 330 Over the Way 339 Epicurean Reminiscences of a Sentimentalist 343 The Carelesse Nurse Mayd 345 Ode to Perry, the Inventor of the Patent Perryan Pen 346 Number One, versified from the Prose of a Young Lady 352 Lines on the Celebration of Peace 354 The Demon-Ship 355 Spring: A New Version 359 Faithless Nelly Gray : A Pathetic Ballad 361 The Flower 364 The Sea-Spell , 364 A Sailor's Apology for Bow _egs 369 The Bachelor's Dream 371 The Wee Man : A Romance 374 Death's Ramble 376 The Progress of Art 378 A Fairy Tale 382 The Turtles -.

A Fable 386 Love Lane. 391 Domestic Poems. I. Hymeneal Retrospections 393 II. " The sun was slumbering in the west, my daily labors past " 394 III. A Parental Ode to my Son, aged three Years and five Months 395 IV. A Serenade 397 A Plain Direction 398 Equestrian Courtship 401 An Open Question 402 A Black Job 407 Ode to Rae Wilson, Esquire 415 A Table of Errata 430 A Row at the Oxford Arms 434 Etching Moralized : To a Nbble Lady 441 Ode on a Distant Prospect of Clapham Academy CONTENTS. A Retrospective Review Fugitive Lines on Pawning my Watch The Broken Dish 458 Ode to Peace: written on the Night of my Mistress's Grand Rout 459 Pompey's Ghost: A Pathetic Ballad 461 Ode to Dr. Hahnemann, the Homœopathist 464 Ode for St. Cecilia's Eve 469 The Lost Heir 475 Those Evening Bells 48° THE PLEA 0 P THE MIDSUMMER FAIRIES.

Part II

, The scene is changed ! No green arcade, No trees all ranged a-row — But scattered like a beaten host, Dispersing to and fro ; With here and there a sylvan corse, That fell before the foe. The foe that down in yonder dell Pursues his daily tod ; As witness many a prostrate trunk, Bereft of leafy spoil, Hard by its wooden stump, whereon The adder loves to cod. Alone he works — his ringing blows Have banished bird and beast ; The hind and fawn have cantered off A hundred yards at least ; And on the maple's lofty top The linnet's song has ceased. No eye his labor overlooks, Or when he takes his rest ; Except the timid thrush that peeps Above her secret nest, Forbid by love to leave the young Beneath her speckled breast. The woodman's heart is in his work, His axe is sharp and good ; With sturdy arm and steady aim He smites the gaping wood ; From distant rocks His lusty knocks Reecho many a rood. '» His axe is keen, his arm is strong ; The muscles serve him weU; His years have reached an extra span, The number none can tell ; But still his life-long task has been The timber tree to fed.

Through summer's parching sultriness, And winter's freezing cold, From sapling youth To virile growth, And age's rigid mould, His energetic axe hath rung Within that forest old. Aloft, upon his poising steel The vivid sunbeams glance — About his head and round his feet The forest shadows dance ; And bounding from his russet coat The acorn drops askance. His face is like a Druid's face, AVith wrinkles furrowed deep, And tanned by scorching suns as brown As corn that's ripe to reap ; But the hair on brow, and cheek, and chin. Is white as wool of sheep. His frame is like a giant's frame ; His legs are long and stark ; His arms like limbs of knotted yew ; His hands like rugged bark ; So he felleth stid, With right good wffi, As if to build an ark ! 8* ! weU within his fatal path The fearful tree might quake Through every fibre, twig, and leaf, With aspen tremor shake ; Through trunk and root, And branch and shoot, A low complaining make !

O! wed to him the tree might breathe A sad and solemn sound, A sigh that murmured overhead, And groans from underground ; As in that shady avenue AVhere lofty elms abound ! But calm and mute the maple stands, The plane, the ash, the fir, The elm, the beech, the drooping birch, Without the least demur ; And e'en the aspen's hoary leaf Makes no unusual stir. The pines — those old gigantic pines, That writhe — recalling soon The famous human group that writhes AVith snakes in wild festoon — In ramous wrestlings interlaced A forest Laocoon — Like Titans of primeval girth By tortures overcome, Their brown enormous limbs they twine, Bedewed with tears of gum — Fierce agonies that ought to yed, But, like the marble, dumb. Nay, yonder blasted elm that stands So like a man of sin, Who, frantic, flings his arms abroad To feel the worm within — For ad that gesture, so intense, It makes no sort of din !

An universal silence reigns In rugged bark or peel, Except that very trunk which rings Beneath the biting steel — Meanwhile the woodman plies his axe AVith unrelenting zeal ! No rustic song is on his tongue, No whistle on his rips ; But, with a quiet thoughtfulness His trusty tool he grips, And, stroke on stroke, keeps hacking out The bright and flying chips. Stroke after stroke, with frequent dint He spreads the fatal gash ; Till, lo ! the remnant fibres rend, With harsh and sudden crash, And on the dull-resounding turf The jarring branches lash ! O ! now the forest trees may sigh, The ash, the poplar tall, The elm, the birch, the drooping beech, The aspens — one and ad, With solemn groan And hoUow moan Lament a comrade's fall ! A goodly elm, of noble girth, That, thrice the human span — While on their variegated course The constant seasons ran — Through gale, and hail, and fiery bolt, Had stood erect as man.

But now, like mortal man himself, Struck down by hand of God, Or heathen idol tumbled prone Beneath the Eternal's nod, In ad its giant bulk and length It. lies along the sod ! Ay, now the forest trees may grieve And make a common moan Around that patriarchal trunk So newly overthrown ; And with a murmur recognize A doom to be their own ! The echo sleeps : the idle axe, A disregarded tool, Lies crushing with its passive weight The toad's reputed stool — The woodman wipes his dewy brow AVithin the shadows cool. No zephyr stirs : the ear may catch The smallest insect hum ; But on the disappointed sense No mystic whispers come; No tone of sylvan sympathy, The forest trees are dumb. No leafy noise, nor inward voice, No sad and solemn sound, That sometimes murmurs overhead, And sometimes underground ; As in that shady avenue, AArhere lofty elms abound ! — ♦ —

Part III

The deed is done : the tree is low That stood so long and firm ; The woodman and his axe are gone, His toil has found its term ; And where he wrought the speckled thrush Securely hunts the worm. The cony from the sandy bank Has run a rapid race, Through thistle, bent, and tangled fern, To seek the open space ; And on its haunches sits erect To clean its furry face. The dappled fawn is close at hand, The hind is browsing near, — And on the larch's lowest bough The ousel whistles clear ; But checks the note Within its throat, As choked with sudden fear ! AVith sudden fear her wormy quest The thrush abruptly quits — Through thistle, bent, and tangled fern The startled cony flits ; And on the larch's lowest bough No more the ousel sits. With sudden fear The dappled deer Effect a swift escape ; But well might bolder creatures start And fly, or stand agape, With rising hair and curdled blood, To see so grim a Shape !

The very sky turns pale above ; The earth grows dark beneath ; The human terror thrills with cold, And draws a shorter breath — ' An universal panic owns The dread approach of Death ! With silent pace, as shadows come, And dark as shadows be, The grisly phantom takes his stand Beside the fallen tree, And scans it with his gloomy eyes, And laughs with horrid glee — A dreary laugh and desolate, Where mirth is void and null, As hollow as its echo sounds AVithin the hollow skull — " AArhoever laid this tree along, His hatchet was not dull ! " The human arm and human tool Have done their duty well ! But after sound of ringing axe Must sound the ringing kned ; AVhen elm or oak Have felt the stroke My turn it is to fed. " No passive unregarded tree, A senseless thing of wood, AVherein the sluggish sap ascends To swell the vernal bud — But conscious, moving, breathing trunks, That throb with bring blood !

" No forest monarch yearly clad In mantle green or brown ; That unrecorded rives, and falls By hand of rustic clown — But kings who don the purple robe, And wear the jeweded crown. " Ah ! little recks the royal mind, Within his banquet hall, While tapers shine, and music breathes, And beauty leads the bad, — He little recks the oaken plank Shad be his palace wall ! " Ah, little dreams the haughty peer, The while his falcon flies — Or on the blood-bedabbled turf The antlered quarry dies — That in his own ancestral park The narrow dwelling lies. " But haughty peer and mighty king One doom shall overwhelm ! The oaken cell Shad lodge him well Whose sceptre ruled a realm — While he who never knew a home Shall find it in the elm ! "The tattered, lean, dejected wretch, Who begs from door to door, And dies within the cressy ditch, Or on the barren moor, The friendly elm shad lodge and clothe That houseless man and poor !

" Yea, this recumbent, ragged trunk, That lies so long and prone, AVith many a fallen acorn-cup, And mast and firry cone — This rugged trunk shall hold its share Of mortal flesh and bone ! " A miser hoarding heaps of gold, But pale with ague-fears — A wife lamenting love's decay, AVith secret, cruel tears, Distilling bitter, bitter drops From sweets of former years — " A man within whose gloomy mind Offence had darkly sunk, Who out of fierce Revenge's cup Hath madly, darkly drunk — Grief, Avarice, and Hate shad sleep Within this very trunk ! " This massy trunk that lies along, And many more must fall — For the very knave AA'ho digs the grave, The man who spreads the pall, And he who tods the funeral bell, The elm shall have them all ! " The tall abounding elm that grows In hedge-rows up and down : In field and forest, copse and park, And in the peopled town, With colonies of noisy rooks That nestle on its crown.

" And well the abounding elm may grow In field and hedge so rife, In forest, copse, and wooded park, And 'mid the city's strife, For every hour that passes by Shad end a human life ! " The phantom ends : the shade is gone ; The sky is clear and bright ; On turf, and moss, and faUen tree, There glows a ruddy light ; And bounding through the golden fern The rabbit comes to bite. The thrush's mate beside her sits And pipes a merry lay ; The dove is in the evergreens ; And on the larch's spray The fly-bird flutters up and down, To catch its tiny prey. The gentle hind and dappled fawn Are coming up the glade ; Each harmless furred and feathered thing Is glad, and not afraid — But on my saddened spirit still The shadow leaves a shade. A secret, vague, prophetic gloom, As though by certain mark I knew the fore-appointed tree AVithin whose rugged bark This warm and living frame shall find Its narrow house and dark.

That mystic tree which breathed to me A sad and solemn sound, That sometimes murmured overhead, And sometimes underground ; Within that shady avenue Where lofty elms abound. THE DREAM OF EUGENE ARAM. Twas in the prime of summer time, An evening calm and cool, And four and twenty happy boys Came bounding out of school : There were some that ran, and some that leapt Like troutlets in a pool. Away they sped with gamesome minds And souls untouched by sin ; To a level mead they came, and there They drave the wickets in : Pleasantly shone the setting sun Over the town of Lynn. Like sportive deer they coursed about, And shouted as they ran, — Turning to mirth ad things of earth, As only boyhood can ; But the Usher sat remote from all, A melancholy man ! His hat was off, his vest apart, To catch heaven's blessed breeze ; For a burning thought was in his brow, And his bosom ill at ease : So he leaned his head on his hands, and read The book between his knees !

Leaf after leaf he turned it o'er, Nor ever glanced aside, For the peace of his soul he read that book In the golden eventide : Much study had made him very lean, And pale, and leaden-eyed. At last he shut the ponderous tome, AVith a fast and fervent grasp He strained the dusky covers close, And fixed the brazen hasp : " O, God ! could I so close my mind, And clasp it with a clasp ! " Then leaping on his feet upright, Some moody turns he took — Now up the mead, then down the mead, And past a shady nook, — And, lo ! he saw a httle boy That pored upon a book ! " My gentle lad, what is't you read — Romance or fairy fable ? Or is it some historic page, Of kings and crowns unstable ? " The young boy gave an upward glance, " It is ' The Death of Abel.' " The Usher took six hasty strides, As smit with sudden pain, — Six hasty strides beyond the place, Then slowly back again ; And down he sat beside the lad,- And talked with him of Cain ; And, long since then, of bloody men, Whose deeds tradition saves ; Of lonely folk cut off unseen, And hid in sudden graves ; Of horrid stabs in groves forlorn, And murders done in caves ; And how the sprites of injured men Shriek upward from the sod, — Ay, how the ghostly hand will point To show the burial clod ; And unknown facts of guilty acts Are seen in dreams from God !

He told how murderers walk the earth Beneath the curse of Cain, — With crimson clouds before their eyes, And flames about their brain ; For blood has left upon their souls Its everlasting stain ! " And well," quoth he, " I know, for truth, Their pangs must be extreme, — Woe, woe, unutterable woe, — Who spill life's sacred stream ! For why ? Methought, last night, I wrought A murder, in a dream ! " One that had never done me wrong — A feeble man and old ; I led him to a lonely field, — The moon shone clear and cold : Now here, said I, this man shall die, And I will have his gold ! "Two sudden blows with a ragged stick, And one with a heavy stone, One hurried gash with a hasty knife, — And then the deed was done : There was nothing lying at my foot But lifeless flesh and bone ! " Nothing but lifeless flesh and bone, That could not do me ill ; And yet I feared him all the more, For lying there so still : There was a manhood in his look, That murder could not kill !

" And, lo, the universal air Seemed ht with ghastly flame; — 9* Ten thousand thousand dreadful eyes Were looking down in blame : I took the dead man by his hand, And called upon his name ! " O, God ! it made me quake to see Such sense within the slain ! But when I touched the lifeless clay, The blood gushed out amain ! For every clot, a burning spot Was scorching in my brain ! " My head was like an ardent coal, My heart as solid ice ; My wretched, wretched soul, I knew, Was at the devil's price : A dozen times I groaned ; the dead Had never groaned but twice ! " And now, from forth the frowning sky, From the heaven's topmost height, I heard a voice — the awful voice Of the blood-avenging sprite : — ' Thou guilty man ! take up thy dead And hide it from my sight ! ' " I took the dreary body up, And cast it in a stream, — A sluggish water, black as ink, The depth was so extreme : — My gentle Boy, remember this Is nothing but a dream !

" Down went the corse with a hollow plunge, And vanished in the pool ; Anon I cleansed my bloody hands, And washed my forehead cool, And sat among the urchins young, That evening, in the school. " 0, Heaven ! to think of their white souls, And mine so black and grim ! I could not share in childish prayer, Nor join in evening hymn : Like a devil of the pit I seemed, 'Mid holy cherubim ! " And peace went with them, one and all, And each calm pillow spread ; But Guilt was my grim chamberlain That hghted me to bed ; And drew my midnight curtains round, With fingers bloody red ! " All night I lay in agony, In anguish dark and deep ; My fevered eyes I dared not close, But stared aghast at Sleep : For Sin had rendered unto her The keys of hell to keep ! " All night I lay in agony, From weary chime to chime, With one besetting horrid hint, That racked me all the time ; A mighty yearning, like the first Fierce impulse unto crime !

" One stern tyrannic thought, that made All other thoughts its slave ; ■> Stronger and stronger every pulse Did that temptation crave, — Still urging me to go and see The Dead Man in his grave ! " Heavily I rose up, as soon As hght was in the sky, And sought the black accursed pool With a wild misgiving eye ; And I saw the Dead in the river bed, For the faithless stream was dry. " Merrily rose the lark, and shook The dew-drop from its wing ; But I never marked its morning flight, I never heard it sing : For I was stooping once again Under the horrid thing. "With breathless speed, like a soul in chase, I took him up and ran ; — There was no time to dig a grave Before the day began : In a lonesome wood, with heaps of leaves, I hid the murdered man ! " And all that day I read in school, But my thought was other where ; As soon as the mid-day task was done, In secret I was there : And a mighty wind had swept the leaves, And still the corse was bare !

" Then down I cast me on my face, And first began to weep, For I knew my secret then was one That earth refused to keep : Or land or sea, though he should be Ten thousand fathoms deep. " So wills the fierce avenging Sprite, Till blood for blood atones ! Ay, though he's buried in a cave, And trodden down with stones, And years have rotted off his flesh, — The world shall see his bones ! " O, God ! that horrid, horrid dream Besets me now awake ! Again — again, with dizzy brain, The human life I take ; And my red right hand grows raging hot, Like Cranmer's at the stake. " And still no peace for the restless clay Will wave or mould allow ; The horrid thing pursues my soul, — It stands before me now ! " The fearful Boy looked up, and saw Huge drops upon his brow. That very night, while gentle sleep The urchin eyelids kissed, Two stern-faced men set out from Lynn, Through the cold and heavy mist : And Eugene Aram walked between, With gyves upon his wrist.

THE HAUNTED HOUSE. A ROMANCE. " A jolly place," said he, " in times of old, But something ails it now ; the place is curst." Hart-Leap Well, bt Words tv orth.

Part I

Some dreams we have are nothing else but dreams, Unnatural and full of contradictions ; Yet others of our most romantic schemes Are something more than fictions. It might be only on enchanted gound ; It might be merely by a thought's expansion ; But in the spirit, or the flesh, I found An old deserted mansion. A residence for woman, child, and man, A dwelling-place, — and yet no habitation ; A house, — but under some prodigious ban Of excommunication. Unhinged the iron gates half open hung, Jarred by the gusty gales of many winters, That from its crumbled pedestal had flung One marble globe in splinters. No dog was at the threshold, great or small ; No pigeon on the roof — no household creature — No cat demurely dozing on the wall — Not one domestic feature. No human figure stirred, to go or come ; No face looked forth from shut or open casement : No chimney smoked — there was no sign of home From parapet to basement.

With shattered panes the grassy court was starred j The time-worn coping-stone had tumbled after ; And through the ragged roof the sky shone, barred With naked beam and rafter. O'er all there hung a shadow and a fear ; A sense of mystery the spirit daunted, And said, as plain as whisper in the ear, The place is haunted ! The flower grew wild and rankly as the weed, Roses with thistles struggled for espial, And vagrant plants of parasitic breed Had overgrown the dial. But, gay or gloomy, steadfast or infirm, No heart was there to heed the hour's duration ; All times and tides were lost in one long term Of stagnant desolation. The wren had built within the porch, she found Its quiet loneliness so sure and thorough ; And on the lawn, — within its turfy mound, — The rabbit made his burrow. The rabbit wild and gray, that flitted through The shrubby clumps, and frisked, and sat, and vanished, But leisurely and bold, as if he knew His enemy was banished.

The wary crow, — the pheasant from the woods, — Lulled by the still and everlasting sameness, Close to the mansion, like domestic broods, Fed with a " shocking tameness." The coot was swimming in the reedy pond, Beside the water-hen, so soon affrighted ; And in the weedy moat the heron, fond Of solitude, ahghted. The moping heron, motionless and stiff, That on a stone, as silently and stilly, Stood, an apparent sentinel, as if To guard the water lily. No sound was heard, except, from far away, The ringing of the whitwall's shrilly laughter, Or, now and then, the chatter of the jay, That Echo murmured after. But Echo never mocked the human tongue ; Some weighty crime, that Heaven could not pardon, A secret curse on that old building hung, And its deserted garden. The beds were all untouched by hand or tool ; No footstep marked the damp and mossy gravel, Each walk as green as is the mantled pool For want of human travel.

The vine unpruned, and the neglected peach, Drooped from the wall with which they used to grapple ; And on the cankered tree, in easy reach, Rotted the golden apple. But awfully the truant shunned tlie ground, The vagrant kept aloof, and daring poacher : In spite of gaps that through the fences round Invited the encroacher. For over all there hung a cloud of fear ; A sense of mystery the spirit daunted, And said, as plain as whisper in the ear, The place is haunted ! The pear and quince lay squandered on the grass The mould was purple with unheeded showers Of bloomy plums — a wilderness it was Of fruits, and weeds, and flowers ! The marigold amidst the nettles blew, The gourd embraced the rose-bush in its ramble, The thistle and the stock together grew, The hollyhock and bramble. The bear-bine with the lilac interlaced ; The sturdy burdock choked its slender neighbor, The spicy pink.

All tokens were eflaced Of human care and labor. The very yew formality had trained To such a rigid pyramidal stature, For want of trimming had almost regained The raggedness of nature. The fountain was a-dry — neglect and time Had marred the work of artisan and mason, And efts and croaking frogs, begot of slime, Sprawled in the ruined basia. The statue, fallen from its marble base, Amidst the refuse leaves, and herbage rotten, Lay like the idol of some bygone race, Its name and rites forgotten. On every side the aspect was the same, All ruined, desolate, forlorn and savage : No hand or foot within the precinct came To rectify or ravage. For over all there hung a cloud of fear ; A sense of mystery the spirit daunted, And said, as plain as whisper in the ear, The place is haunted ! — •—

Part II. O

very gloomy is the house of woe, Where tears are falling while the bell is knelling, With all the dark solemnities which show That Death is in the dwelling ! O, very, very dreary is the room Where love, domestic love, no longer nestles, But, smitten by the common stroke of doom, The corpse hes on the trestles ! But house of woe, and hearse, and sable pall, The narrow home of the departed mortal, Ne'er looked so gloomy as that ghostly hall, With its deserted portal ! The centipede along the threshold crept, The cobweb hung across in mazy tangle, And in its winding-sheet the maggot slept, At every nook and angle. The keyhole lodged the earwig and her brood ; The emmets of the steps had old possession, And marched in search of their diurnal food In undisturbed procession. As undisturbed as the prehensile cell Of moth or maggot, or the spider's tissue ; For never foot upon that threshold fell, To enter or to issue.

O'er all there hung the shadow of a fear ; A sense of mystery the spirit daunted, And said, as plain as whisper in the ear, The place is haunted ! Howbeit, the door I pushed — or so I dreamed — Which slowly, slowly gaped, — the hinges creaking With such a rusty eloquence, it seemed That Time himself was speaking. But Time was dumb within that mansion old, Or left his tale to the heraldic banners That hung from the corroded walls, and told Of former men and manners. Those tattered flags, that with the opened door Seemed the old wave of battle to remember, While fallen fragments danced upon the floor Like dead leaves in December. The startled bats flew out — bird after bird — The screech-owl overhead began to flutter, And seemed to mock the cry that she had heard Some dying victim utter ! A shriek that echoed from the joisted roof, And up the stair, and further still and further, Till in some ringing chamber far aloof It ceased its tale of murther !