And  soon  to  fall  ;  beside  it  lay

II


1 62  Essays  and  Historiettes

A  young  bud  trembling  on  the  bough —
I  watched  the  petals  bursting  through,

The  young  flower  is  the  fairer  now,
So  man  is  ;  new,  and  ever  new.'

'Alas!'  says  his  muse;  'always  a  man:
always  tears  :  always  struggles.  .  .  .  My  beloved,
thou  art  no  more  a  poet.  Life  is  wasted  in  an
inconstant  dream,  and  woman's  love  changes  and
dissipates  into  tears  the  treasures  of  thy  soul.'

Returns  the  poet :

'  Down  in  the  valley  as  I  stood,

I  marked  how,  high  above  her  nest,
A  bird  was  singing,  but  her  brood

Lay  dead  in  an  eternal  rest.
And  yet  she  sang  to  greet  the  morn.
Then  weep  no  more,  my  muse  ;  for  so
God  still  remains,  all  else  forlorn,

Our  God  above — our  hope  below.'

It  is  next  to  impossible,  without  giving  the  whole
poem,  to  convey  any  adequate  idea  either  of  its
thought  or  of  its  beauty.  There  is  the  double  source
of  inspiration  :  the  poet,  on  the  one  hand,  saddened
with  his  memories  ;  his  muse,  on  the  other,  filling
him  with  new  impulses,  opening  his  heart  to  the  in-
fluences of  Nature,  and  urging  him  to  fresh  effort.
The  contest  is  between  the  certain  past  and  the
possible  future  :  one  half  of  his  soul  speaks  to  the
other  half :  the  voice  of  hope  remonstrates  with
the  voice  of  sorrow  :  and  while  we  read  the  lines
the  air   is  resonant  with  the  music  of  his  thought.
