POEMS OLD AND NEW

And wives still pray to Juno

For boys with hearts as bold
As his who kept the bridge so well

In the brave days of old.

LORD MAGAULAY

SHAMEFUL DEATH
THERE were four of us about that bed ;
The mass-priest knelt at the side,
I and his mother stood at the head,
Over his feet lay the bride ;
We were quite sure that he was dead,
Though his eyes were open wide. 10
He did not die in the night,
He did not die in the day,
But in the morning twilight
His spirit pass'd away,
When neither sun nor moon was bright,
And the trees were merely grey.
He was not slain with the sword,
Knight's axe, or the knightly spear,
Yet spoke he never a word
After he came in here ; sťo
I cut away the cord
From the neck of my brother dear.
He did not strike one blow,
For the recreants came behind,
In a place where the hornbeams grow,
A path right hard to find,
For the hornbeam boughs swing so,
That the twilight makes it blind.
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