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  SEA SPRAY: VERSES
  AND TRANSLATIONS
  BY T. W. ROLLESTON


  MAUNSEL AND CO., LIMITED,
  96, MID. ABBEY ST., DUBLIN
  1909
  All rights reserved




TO

THE LADY OF THE RING




Thanks are due to Messrs. Harrap & Co.,
London, for permission to include in this volume
three poems which are introduced into the writer's
forthcoming prose book, "The High Deeds of Finn
and other Bardic Romances of Ancient Ireland." The
poems in question are _Cois na Teineadh_, _Midir the
Proud_, and the _Song of Finn_. Some others have
appeared in the _Spectator_, the _Irish Homestead_,
and the _Westminster Gazette_, to the editors of which
acknowledgments are due.




CONTENTS


                                                     PAGE

 SEA SPRAY                                              7
 MARCH WINDS                                           10
 MIDIR THE PROUD INVITES QUEEN ETAIN TO FAIRYLAND      12
 THE SPELL-STRUCK                                      14
 COIS AN TEINEADH                                      15
 WILLIAM MORRIS                                        17
 TO JOHN O'LEARY                                       18
 THE GRAVE OF RURY                                     19
 SONG OF MAELDUIN                                      21
 THE SHANNON AT FOYNES                                 22
 SONNET                                                23
 A RAILWAY JOURNEY                                     24
 CYCLING SONG                                          28
 BALLADE OF THE "CHESHIRE CHEESE"                      31
 DORA                                                  33
 A RING'S SECRET                                       34
 MOONRISE IN THE ELSTER TANNEN-WALD                    35
 AFTER ALL                                             36
 EVENSONG                                              37
 IN MEMORIAM: J. T. C. H.                              39




TRANSLATIONS


                                                     PAGE

 THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS                                 43
 THE DEAD AT CLONMACNOIS                               47
 SONG OF FINN IN PRAISE OF MAY                         48
 WENN ICH AN DEINEM HAUSE                              50
 EIN FICHTENBAUM STEHT EINSAM                          51
 ZWEI KAMMERN HAT DAS HERZ                             52
 LADY ISLAND                                           53
 THE THREE RINGS                                       54




SEA SPRAY


 What shall we do with our day? you ask--
   A June day fair to the heart's desire--
 Lie in the meadow, and lounge and bask
   Over books and tobacco? Or do you aspire
 To conquer the summit that yesterday
   We marked for our own ere your visit end?
 Or shall we go riding, or fishing? Nay,
   For the scent of the sea's on the air, my friend.
 We shall go to the head of the reedy lake,
   And there, in a brake by a fir-grove, find
 Two long canoes with arching deck,
   Sea-riders, strong for a day of wind;
 And oh, what a song shall the bright wind sing us
   When clear of the shallows and clear of the sedge,
 While the narrowing stream and the ebb-tide swing us
   'Twixt sea and mountain to Wicklow Bridge!

 But here beware! for the ebb goes roaring
   Through half the arches, and half are dry,
 And stakes and stones are ready for goring
   Your Rob-Roy's timbers as down you fly.
 And beyond the Bridge, in the deep sea-current,
   Where the rope-maze crosses from quay to quay,
 You'll need your head and your arm I warrant,
   To fight the eddies and find your way.
 There lifts your prow with the long pulsation
   That tells how near us the glad seas are!
 There lifts the heart with the old elation,
   To meet the surf at the harbour-bar!

 The North wind marshals the ranks of ocean,
   And on they sweep with a strength serene,
 Till the tide-race ruffles the mighty motion
   And curls the crests of the rollers green.
 The breakers flash on the sand-bank yonder,
   And the cavern'd curve of the rock-walled bay
 Is loud with clamour of hoarse sea-thunder
   As the wave recoils in a blast of spray.

 And I know a cleft among grim rock-masses,
   Where if wind blow strong and the light come fair,
 When the sea-cave roars and the spray-jet flashes,
   A rainbow floats in the sunny air.

 At the Head's wild verge, where the tideways quicken,
   And eddies hollow the smooth sea-caves,
 Our Rob-Roys plunge as the breakers thicken,
   And bury their decks in the rearing waves.
 We round the Point in the surge and welter
   Of clashing billows and blinding foam--
 Then mile on mile, in the cliff-wall's shelter,
   In calm new seas to the South we roam.

 O bays of Wicklow, and gorse-crown'd headlands
   Whose scent blows far on the seaward breeze,
 How oft have I yearned in the tranquil midlands
   For one brave shock of your lifting seas!
 How oft it may be in days hereafter
   Shall rise the thought of you, phantom-fair,
 Shall steal the sound of the sea-waves' laughter
   On ears grown dull with time and care!
 Waves, wash my spirit, and lonely places,
   If well I loved you, and aught you knew,
 Mark deep my heart with immortal traces
   Of shining days when I dwelt with you!




MARCH WINDS


 Wind, O wind of the Spring, thine old enchantment renewing,
   How at the shock of thy might wakens within me a cry!
 Out of what wonderful lands, never trodden by man, never told of,
   Lands where never a ship anchored or trafficker fared,
 Comest thou, breathing like flame till the brown earth flames into
                                                              blossom,
   Quick'ning the sap of old woods swayed in thy stormy embrace,
 Rousing in depths of the heart wild waves of an infinite longing,
   Longing for freedom and life, yearning for Springs that are dead!
 Surely the far blue sea, foam-fleck'd with the speed of thy coming
   Brighten'd in laughter abroad, sang at the feet of the isles,
 Sang in a tumult of joy as my soul sings trembling with passion,
   Trembling with passion and hope, wild with the spirit of Spring.
 Ah, what dreams re-arise, half pain half bliss to remember,
   Hearing the storm of thy song blown from the height of the skies:--
 _Something remains upon earth to be done, to be dared, to be sought
                                                                  for,
   Up with the anchor once more--out with the sails to the blast!
 Out to the shock of the seas that encircle the Fortunate Islands,
   Vision that burns in the blood, home of the Wind of the Spring._




MIDIR THE PROUD INVITES QUEEN ETAIN TO FAIRYLAND[1]


 Come with me, Etain, O come away,
   To that Oversea Land of mine!
 Where music haunts the happy day,
   And rivers run with wine.
 Careless we live, and young and gay,
   And none saith 'mine' or 'thine.'

 Golden curls on the proud young head,
   And pearls in the tender mouth--
 Manhood, womanhood, white and red,
   And love that grows not loth
 When all the world's desires are dead,
   And all the dreams of youth.

 Away from the cloud of Adam's sin!
   Away from grief and care!
 This flowery land thou dwellest in
   Seems rude to us and bare,
 For the naked strand of the Happy Land
   Is twenty times as fair.

 Come, Etain, come to thine ancient home,
   And let these mortals be,
 Whose world is a glimmer of rainbow foam
   On the breast of a boundless Sea!
 We shall watch it go, as we watch'd it come,
   From the Kingdom of Faery.


FOOTNOTE:

[1] This poem is based on an Irish original in "The Courtship of
Etain." See Leahy's _Heroic Romances of Ireland_, vol. i., p. 26.




THE SPELL-STRUCK


 She walks as she were moving
   Some mystic dance to tread,
 So falls her gliding footstep,
   So leans her list'ning head;
 For once to fairy harping
   She danced upon the hill,
 And through her brain and bosom
   The music pulses still.

 Her eyes are bright and tearless,
   But wide with yearning pain:
 She longs for nothing earthly,
   But oh, to hear again
 The sound that held her breathless
   Upon her moonlit path--
 The golden fairy music
   That filled the lonely rath!

 Her lips have felt strange kisses
   And drunk the wine of death,
 Nor earthly love nor laughter
   Shall stir their tender breath.
 She's dead to all things living
   Since that November Eve,
 And when They call her earthward,
   No living thing will grieve.




COIS NA TEINEADH


 Where glows the Irish hearth with peat
   There lives a subtle spell--
 The faint blue smoke, the gentle heat
   The moorland odours tell

 Of white roads winding by the edge
   Of bare untamed land,
 Where dry stone wall or ragged hedge
   Runs wide on either hand

 To cottage lights that lure you in
   From rainy Western skies;
 And by the friendly glow within
   Of simple talk, and wise,

 And tales of magic, love or arms
   From days when princes met
 To listen to the lay that charms
   The Connacht peasant yet.

 There Honour shines through passions dire,
   There beauty blends with mirth--
 Wild hearts, ye never did aspire
   Wholly for things of earth!

 Cold, cold this thousand years--yet still
   On many a time-stained page
 Your pride, your truth, your dauntless will,
   Burn on from age to age.

 And still around the fires of peat
   Live on the ancient days;
 There still do living lips repeat
   The old and deathless lays.

 And when the wavering wreaths ascend,
   Blue in the evening air,
 The soul of Ireland seems to bend
   Above her children there.




WILLIAM MORRIS

+ _Oct. 4, 1896_


 Singer of Jason's quest and Sigurd's doom!
   Teller of vision-haunted wanderings!
   Who touched a strange new music from the strings
 Of old Romance--a space amidst the gloom
 Of cloudy centuries thou didst illume;
   And there thy word a dreamlike splendour flings
   On crown and helm--and even the tears of things
 Brighten thy morning world's immortal bloom.

 Yet some, great Craftsman, reverence thee more
   That Beauty, coldly throned among the stars,
   Came at thy lure to tread the homely earth:
 And, sweet and kindly as in days of yore,
   Played with our children, graced our household cares,
 And knelt content by many a quiet hearth.




TO JOHN O'LEARY

_Dedication of a Book of Irish Verses by various hands_[2]


 Because you suffered for the Cause;
   Because you strove with voice and pen
 To serve a Law above all laws
   That purifies the hearts of men;

 Because you failed, and grew not slack,
   Not sullen, not disconsolate,
 Nor stooped to seek a lower track,
   But showed your soul a match for Fate;

 Because you hated all things base,
   And held your country's honour high;
 Because you wrought in Time and Space
   Not heedless of Eternity;

 Because you loved the nobler part
   Of Erinn,--so we bring you here
 Words such as once the Irish heart
   On Irish lips rejoiced to hear:

 Strains that have little chance to live
   With those that Davis' clarion blew,
 But all the best we have to give
   To Mother Erinn and to you.


FOOTNOTE:

[2] "Poems and Ballads of Young Ireland, 1888."




THE GRAVE OF RURY


 Clear as air, the western waters
           evermore their sweet unchanging song
 Murmur in their stony channels
           round O'Conor's sepulchre in Cong.

 Crownless, hopeless, here he lingered;
           felt the years go by him like a dream,
 Heard the far-off roar of conquest
           murmur faintly like the singing stream.

 Here he died, and here they tomb'd him,
           men of Fechin, chanting round his grave.
 Did they know, ah, did they know it,
           what they buried by the babbling wave?

 Now above the sleep of Rury
           holy things and great have passed away;
 Stone by stone the stately Abbey
           falls and fades in passionless decay.

 Darkly grows the quiet ivy,
           pale the broken arches glimmer through;
 Dark upon the cloister-garden
           dreams the shadow of the ancient yew.

 Through the roofless aisles the verdure
           flows, the meadow-sweet and foxglove bloom;
 Earth, the mother and consoler,
           winds soft arms about the lonely tomb.

 Peace and holy gloom possess him,
           last of Gaelic monarchs of the Gael,
 Slumbering by the young, eternal
           river-voices of the western vale.


Ruraidh O'Conchobhar, last High King of Ireland, spent the closing
fifteen years of his life in the monastery of St. Fechin at Cong, Co.
Mayo. His grave is still shown in that most beautiful and pathetic of
Irish ruins. Some accounts have it that his remains were afterwards
transferred to Clonmacnois by the Shannon.




SONG OF MAELDUIN


 There are veils that lift, there are bars that fall,
 There are lights that beckon and winds that call--
     Goodbye!
 There are hurrying feet, and we dare not wait;
 For the hour is on us, the hour of Fate,
 The circling hour of the flaming Gate--
     Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye!

 Fair, fair they shine through the burning zone,
 Those rainbow gleams of a world unknown--
     Goodbye!
 And oh, to follow, to seek, to dare,
 When step by step in the evening air
 Floats down to meet us the cloudy stair--
     Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye!

 The cloudy stair of the Brig o' Dread
 Is the dizzy path that our feet must tread--
     Goodbye!
 O all ye children of Nights and Days
 That gather and wonder and stand at gaze,
 And wheeling stars in your lonely ways--
     Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye!

 The music calls and the Gates unclose,
 Onward and upward the wild way goes--
     Goodbye!
 We die in the bliss of a great new birth.
 O fading phantoms of pain and mirth,
 O fading loves of the old green Earth,
     Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye!




THE SHANNON AT FOYNES


 Into the West, where o'er the wide Atlantic
   The lights of sunset gleam,
 From its high sources in the heart of Erinn
   Flows the great stream.

 Yet back in stormy cloud or viewless vapour
   The wandering waters come,
 And faithfully across the trackless heaven
   Find their old home.

 But ah, the tide of life that flows unceasing
   Into the luring West
 Returns no more, to swell with kindlier fulness
   The Mother's breast!




SONNET

_On reading a Dublin newspaper in the train, April 16, 1904_


 Night falls: the emerald pastures turn to grey,
   Young stars appear, a mystic beauty thrills
   The dusk above the line of far-off hills,
 Where late the splendours of the end of Day,
 Sad and majestic, flamed and passed away.
   In dust and thunder speeding to the Sea
   The train flies on, yet eve's serenity,
 Great and untroubled, holds the world in sway.

 Then, turning from that realm of lofty life,
   Again my eyes upon the printed page
   Fall, and again I hear but cries of rage,
 Brawlers and bigots, every word a knife;
   While Thought, the fair land's fairest heritage,
 Lies drowned in clamour of ignoble strife.




A RAILWAY JOURNEY


 We've cleared the station--free at last
   From darkness, din, and worry;
 By red-brick villas, shady roads
   And garden-plots we hurry.
 And now green miles of pasture-land
   Flit by, with budding hedges,
 And far to Southward I can see
   The purple mountain ridges.

 My fellow-travellers pretermit,
   Seeing there is no danger,
 That anxious glance with which we greet
   The presence of a stranger.
 Whom have we? First, some man of means
   (I guess), brow-wrinkled, dull-eyed,
 His face the index of a soul
   By cares unworthy sullied.

 And then a lady, whom I deem
   Some mask of Fashion merely;
 And last, a maid of nineteen years,
   Who, since I've seen her clearly,
 Has won the careless glance I gave
   To linger, as delighted
 As with some green-rimmed waterspring
   In midst of deserts blighted.

 What is her charm? Not very fair,
   Nor luring to the senses--
 And yet her frank and girlish grace,
   Her lack of small pretences,
 Her clear, unconscious hazel eyes,
   Pure lips, and simple neatness,
 Fill my heart as I gaze on her
   With deep and tender sweetness.
     .    .    .    .    .    .

 The train has rolled without a break
   For half an hour or more, perhaps;
 My wealthy cit has fall'n asleep,
   Will soon begin to snore, perhaps;
 Kind Morpheus touch'd him as he scanned
   The last returns of traffic--
 The lady clad in furs and silks
   Is trifling with her _Graphic_.

 The maiden looks with dreaming eyes
   As wood and field and river
 Flash past our roaring carriage-wheels
   In whirling dance forever.
 What are the thoughts that smooth her brows
   To such content, I wonder,
 While clangs about our silent group
   The railroad's rhythmic thunder?

 But now more slow the landscape moves--
   We reach a little station--
 And how the maiden's face has changed,
   Lit up with expectation!
 A brother, with his sister's eyes,
   Brown-cheeked from sun and heather,
 Awaits her; and with half a sigh
   I watch them leave together.

 The heavy train regathers speed,
   And minute after minute
 The country station drops behind--
   Some spell is surely in it!
 For now my fellow-travellers seem
   No mark for peevish scorning--
 Those withered lives had surely once
   The innocence of morning.

 But ah, the world's use, soon or late,
   Dispels the early glamour,
 And faint the spheral music rings
   In this incessant clamour!
 Save when, at times, in some strange lull
   Of tyrannous self-seeking,
 The heart of memory is thrilled
   By ancient voices speaking.

 And then the cloud in which we walk
   Rolls by us, and from dreaming
 We wake to see the primal world
   In beauty round us gleaming;
 Then common things to common eyes
   Their secret life surrender,
 And glow beneath the light of day
   With visionary splendour.

 .    .    .    .    .    .    .

 What wrought me so? I only know
   I bowed in homage ardent
 Before some high mysterious Power
   A heart a little hardened.
 That glory flashed upon a soul
   By doubt and self o'erladen,
 When all I saw in very sooth
   Was but a simple maiden.




CYCLING SONG


 In the airy whirling wheel is the springing strength of steel,
   And the sinews grow to steel, day by day,
 Till you feel your pulses leap at the easy swing and sweep
   As the hedges flicker past upon the way.
     Then it's out to the kiss of the morning breeze,
        And the rose of the morning sky,
     And the long brown road, where the tired spirit's load
     Slips off as the leagues go by!

 Black-and-silver, swift and strong, with a pleasant undersong
   From the steady rippling murmur of the chain--
 Half a thing of life and will, you may feel it start and thrill
   With a quick elastic answer to the strain,
     As you ride to the kiss of the morning breeze,
        And the rose of the morning sky,
        And the long brown road, where the tired spirit's load
     Slips off as the leagues go by!

 Miles a hundred you may run from the rising of the sun
   To the gleam of the first white star;
 You may ride through twenty towns, meet the sun upon the downs
   And the wind on the mountain scaur.
     Then it's out to the kiss of the morning breeze
       And the rose of the morning sky,
     And the long brown road, where the tired spirit's load
       Slips off as the leagues go by!

 Down the fragrant country-side, through the woodland's summer pride
   You have come in your forenoon spin;
 And you never would have guessed how delicious is the rest
   In the shade by the wayside inn,
     When you've sought the kiss of the morning breeze
       And the rose of the morning sky,
     And the long brown road, where the tired spirit's load
     Slips off as the leagues go by!

 Oh, there's many a one who teaches that the shining river-reaches
   Are the place to spend a long June day;
 But give me the whirling wheel and a boat of air and steel
   To float upon the King's highway!
     Oh, give me the kiss of the morning breeze
       And the rose of the morning sky,
     And the long brown road, where the tired spirit's load
       Slips off as the leagues go by!




BALLADE OF THE "CHESHIRE CHEESE" IN FLEET STREET[3]


 I know a home of antique ease
   Within the smoky city's pale,
 A spot wherein the spirit sees
   Old London through a thinner veil.
   The modern world, so stiff and stale,
 You leave behind you, when you please,
   For long clay pipes and great old ale
 And supper in the "Cheshire Cheese."

 Beneath this board, Burke's, Goldsmith's knees
   Were often thrust--so runs the tale--
 'Twas here the Doctor took his ease,
   And wielded speech that, like a flail,
   Thresh'd out the golden truth: All hail
 Great souls! that met on nights like these,
   For talk and laughter, pipes and ale,
 And supper in the "Cheshire Cheese."

 By kindly sense, and old decrees
   Of England's use you set your sail--
 _We_ press to never-furrow'd seas,
   For vision-worlds we breast the gale;
   And still we seek, and still we fail,
 For still the "glorious phantom" flees[4]--
   Ah, well! no phantoms are the ale
 And suppers of the "Cheshire Cheese."

               _Envoi_

 If doubts or debts thy soul assail,
   If Fashion's forms its current freeze,
 Try a long pipe, a glass of ale,
   And supper at the "Cheshire Cheese."


FOOTNOTES:

[3] Meeting-place of The Rhymers' Club, 1892, 3.

[4]  ... "Graves from which a glorious phantom may
     Burst to illumine our tempestuous day."--Shelley.




DORA


 I know not whether I love you, Dora:
   Your beauty moves me, I know not how--
 Your eyes that shine with a joy unspoken,
   Your pride and sweetness of bosom and brow.
 But I had not deemed that our earth could fashion
   Of flesh and spirit so rare a thing--
 And you lift my heart with the nameless passion
   That stirs young blood in the dawn of spring.

 I know not whether I love you, Dora,
   Nor if you be what a man may wed.
 Whence came that glory of ancient Hellas
   That seems to hover about your head?
 Have you roamed with Artemis, talked with Pallas?
   Did Hera lend you that look sublime?
 Did Bacchus give in a rose-wreathed chalice
   That conquering charm of the youth of Time?

 I know not whether I love you, Dora,
   But well I know you are not for me,
 So darken'd and marr'd with the bitter travail
   Of things that are not, and fain would be.
 Keep, keep for ever your grace and gladness,
   Bend once to bless me your brow of snow--
 Then meet me next like some far-off sadness,
   Some dead ambition of long ago.




A RING'S SECRET


 Can you forgive me, that I wear,
 Dearest, a curl of sunny hair,
 Not yours--yet for the sake of Love,
 And tender faith it minds me of?
 'Tis in this quaint old signet ring,
 A curious, chased, engraven thing
 That in some window charm'd my eye
 And told of the last century.
 Pure gold it was, but dull and blotch'd,
 And bright'ning it one day, I touch'd
 A spring that oped a little lid;
 And there, for generations hid
 In its small shrine of pallid gold--
 They made such toys in days of old--
 A shred of golden hair lay curl'd;
 Worth all the gold of all the world,
 Perchance, to him who shrin'd it so:

 Ah, 'twas a hundred years ago!
 But, dearest, if he loved as I,
 He loves unto eternity.




MOONRISE IN THE ELSTER TANNEN-WALD


 Darker than midnight, to the midnight sky
     Rises the valley-ridge with all its pines.
     Above that gloom a growing radiance shines,
 Where the full moon floats up invisibly.
 Now, half-revealed, she lifts her disk on high,
     When on it, lo! in black and spectral lines
     One blasted tree so wild a form designs,
 That fear and wonder hold the watcher's eye.

 The minutes pass--and nothing looks the same,
   But tangled in a web of silver light
     Lies the great forest, dreaming and at rest.
   Yet deep in memory's core abides that sight
     One moment outlined on the mountain crest--
 A Shape that writhed upon a pool of flame.




AFTER ALL--


 When the time comes for me to die
   To-morrow or some other day,
 If God should bid me make reply,
   'What wilt thou?' I shall say:

 O God, Thy world was great and fair,
   Yet give me to forget it clean;
 Vex me no more with things that were,
   And things that might have been.

 I loved, I toiled--throve ill and well,
   Lived certain years, and murmur'd not.
 Now grant me in that land to dwell
   Where all things are forgot.

 For others, Lord, Thy purging fires,
   The loves reknit, the crown, the palm.
 For me, the death of all desires
   In deep, eternal calm.




EVENSONG


 In the heart of a German forest I followed the winding ways
 Deep-cushioned with moss, and barr'd with the sunset's slanting rays,

 When out of the distance dim, where no end to the path was seen,
 But the breath of the Springtime clung like a motionless mist of
                                                                green,

 I heard a sound of singing, unearthly-sad and clear,
 Rise from the forest deeps and float on the evening air.

 And I thought of the spirits told of in dark old forest lore
 Who roam the greenwood singing for ever and evermore;

 And I stopped and wondered and waited, as nearer the music grew,
 Louder and still more loud--till at last came into view

 A troop of Saxon maidens, tanned with the rain and sun,
 A burden of billeted wood on the shoulders of every one!

 The strong steps never falter'd, the chanting passed away
 In the fragrant depths of the woodland, and died with the dying day.

 No spirits in truth! yet it seem'd, as awhile in dreams I stood,
 That a music more than earthly had passed through the dark'ning wood.

 And it seemed that the Day to the Morrow bequeathed in that solemn
                                                               strain
 The whole world's hope and labour, its love, and its ancient pain.




IN MEMORIAM: J. T. C. H.


 In hours of respite from the strife
 That kills the careless joy of life,
 How often, friend, have you and I
 Lived o'er those golden days gone by,
 When eager hand and eager eye
 Against the humming salt sea-breeze
 Drove our light craft through breaking seas;
 Or when beneath enchanted woods
 We floated, where the shadow broods
 On still black waters, and delayed
 A little in the chequer'd shade
 To watch, far down the shining stream,
 The golden summer sunlight gleam
 On the green banks of storied Boyne.
   Ah, in those happy days how well
 Did wood and field and water join
 To weave the wild earth's mighty spell!
 Gone, gone! and you are also gone,
 On dark tides that you sailed alone;
 And scarcely more for you than me
 Those days are done! O, morning sea,
 Where all the morning in our blood
 Sang, as we faced the glittering flood!
 O, bays the wild sea-murmur fills,
 And hot gorse-perfume from the hills!
 O, lonely places, echoing
 With sound of waters, wave or stream,
 Haunted by timid foot and wing,
 I see you now but in a dream--
 Old days, old friends, we part, we part;
 Yet still your memory in my heart
 Lives, till the heart be dust; and then
 Beyond this realm of Where and When,
 Something of you shall linger yet,
 And something in me not forget,
 When all the suns of earth have set.




TRANSLATIONS




THE BATTLE OF SALAMIS

_From "The Persians" of Aeschylus_


[Except for inscriptions, this contemporary narrative of the Battle
of Salamis is the earliest piece of written Greek history extant. The
splendour and force of the original make it one of the greatest pieces
of battle-narrative in the world, and defy adequate rendering. But it
is noticeable that not only is the description ablaze with the passion
of war, but the plan and tactics of the fight, which was probably even
a more decisive event in world-history than that of Marathon, are given
with a map-like precision and clearness.

The narrative is placed in the mouth of a messenger sent by Xerxes to
his mother, Atossa, to tell her of the catastrophe. I have followed the
text of Paley.]


 ATOSSA

 And is Athena's city yet unsacked?

 MESSENGER

 Men were her city-wall--unbroken yet.

 ATOSSA

 Then tell me of the fight at Salamis.
 Who first began the onslaught--was't the Greeks?
 Or made his swollen fleet my son too bold?

 MESSENGER

 Began? Some Power malign began it all!
 Some God that hated Persia. First, there came
 A Greek deserter from the Athenian host.
 "Keep watch," he said, "for at the dead of night
 Our benches shall be manned, our fleet dispersed;
 They will escape you in the narrow seas."
 This Xerxes heard, O Queen, and never saw
 The Greek man's guile, nor knew the Gods his foe.
 To all the captains of the fleet he sent
 This order: "When the sun his fiery beams
 Hath hidden from the earth, and night holds all
 The empire of the air, then set your ships,
 Some ranged in threefold line to guard the friths
 And close up all the roaring waterways,
 Some to patrol the Isle of Salamis.
 And mark ye, should the Greeks escape their doom
 By one unguarded outlet, 'tis decreed
 Your heads shall fall for it." So spake the King,
 Haughty, infatuate, knowing not the end.
 And dutifully they obeyed his word.
 Supper was first prepared; each oarsman then
 Looked to his tholepin and bound fast the oar.
 Then, as the sunlight faded from the earth,
 And night came on, the rowers went on board,
 And with them every well-trained fighting man;
 And soon from squadron unto squadron rolled
 Down the vast lines the cheering of the fleet,
 As each one rowed to his appointed place.
   So all night long the captains made us cruise
 Hither and thither, every ship we had;
 And now the night was spent, yet never once
 The Greeks had tried our watch in secret flight.
 But when the white steeds of the God of Day
 Mounted the sky, and light possessed the land,
 Then from the Greeks a mighty chant was borne,
 Triumphant, to our ears, and every cliff
 Of sea-girt Salamis pealed back the strain.
 And fear possessed us every one, O Queen,
 And staggering doubt; for not as if in flight
 Rose the great paean then among the Greeks,
 But as when brave men cheer themselves for fight.
 Then the heart-kindling trumpet spake, and then
 We heard the thunder of a thousand oars
 That swung together at the steersman's cry,
 And all at once the sounding furrows smote.
 Then soon full clear their charging line we saw,
 The right wing leading, and the main array
 A little after; and ere long we heard
 Such cries as these: "On, children of the Greek!
 Now for your fatherland, for freedom now!
 For wife and child, and for your fathers' homes!
 Now for the temples of your fathers' Gods!
 To-day we fight for all!" So cried they still,
 Nor were we Persians dumb, but sent them back
 Shouting for shouting. Little time there was
 To range our lines, until the brazen beaks
 Crash'd in among us. First, a ship of Greece,
 Leading the onset, rent off all the prow
 From a Phoenician. Each then sought a foe;
 And first we stemm'd the torrent of their charge,
 But soon our multitudes in the narrow seas
 Were thronged and hampered, nor could any now
 Bear help to other--yea, and many a time
 Friend hurtled upon friend, or rent away
 With shearing prow her whole array of oars.
 Meanwhile the Greeks around us fiercely charged
 From every side at once; the lighter barques
 Were soon o'erset; the very seas were hid,
 So strewn with wreck and slaughter; every strand
 And jutting rock-ledge was with corpses piled.
 We pressed in ruinous disordered flight,
 All that was left of Persia's mighty fleet;
 While they, like fishers when the tunnies swarm
 Within some narrow inlet, slew amain
 With aught that hand could seize--with shivered oars,
 Fragments of wreck, they stabb'd, they stunn'd, they clove;
 And out beyond the channel shrieks and wails
 And panic fear possessed the open sea.
 Gods! could I speak, nor cease for ten full days,
 I had not told how thick disasters came!
 Know this, that never since the world began
 Perished in one day such a host of men!




THE DEAD AT CLONMACNOIS

_From the Irish of Angus O'Gillan_


 In a quiet-water'd land, a land of roses,
   Stands Saint Kieran's city fair,
 And the warriors of Erinn in their famous generations
     Slumber there.

 There beneath the dewy hillside sleep the noblest
     Of the Clan of Conn,
 Each below his stone: his name in branching Ogham
     And the sacred knot thereon.

 There they laid to rest the Seven Kings of Tara,
     There the sons of Cairbre sleep--
 Battle-banners of the Gael, that in Kieran's plain of crosses
     Now their final hosting keep.

 And in Clonmacnois they laid the men of Teffia,
     And right many a lord of Breagh;
 Deep the sod above Clan Creide and Clan Connall,
     Kind in hall and fierce in fray.

 Many and many a son of Conn the Hundred-Fighter
     In the red earth lies at rest;
 Many a blue eye of Clan Colman the turf covers,
     Many a swan-white breast.




SONG OF FINN IN PRAISE OF MAY[5]

_From the Irish._


 May Day! delightful day!
   Bright colours play the vales along.
 Now wakes at morning's slender ray,
   Wild and gay, the blackbird's song.

 Now comes the bird of dusty hue,
   The loud cuckoo, the summer-lover;
 Branching trees are thick with leaves;
   The bitter, evil time is over.

 Swift horses gather nigh
   Where half dry the river goes;
 Tufted heather crowns the height;
   Weak and white the bogdown blows.

 Corncrake sings from eve till morn,
   Deep in corn, a strenuous bard!
 Sings the virgin waterfall,
   White and tall, her one sweet word.

 Loaded bees of little power
   Goodly flower-harvest win;
 Cattle roam with muddy flanks;
   Busy ants go out and in.

 Through the wild harp of the wood
   Making music roars the gale--
 Now it slumbers without motion,
   On the ocean sleeps the sail.

 Men grow mighty in the May,
   Proud and gay the maidens grow;
 Fair is every wooded height,
   Fair and bright the plain below.

 A bright shaft has smit the streams,
   With gold gleams the water-flag;
 Leaps the fish, and on the hills
   Ardour thrills the flying stag;

 And you long to reach the courses
   Where the slim swift horses race,
 And the crowd is ranked applauding
   Deep about the meeting-place.

 Carols loud the lark on high,
   Small and shy, his tireless lay,
 Singing in wildest, merriest mood
   Of delicate-hued, delightful May.


FOOTNOTE:

[5] I am much indebted to the beautiful prose translation of this song
by Dr. Kuno Meyer which appears in _Eriu_ (the Journal of the School
of Irish Learning), vol. i., Part ii. In my free poetic version an
attempt has been made to render the rhyming and metrical effect of the
original, which is believed to date from about the ninth century.




WENN ICH AN DEINEM HAUSE

_From the German of Heinrich Heine_


 I Pass beneath thy dwelling
   Each morning, and am fain,
 My child, to see thee watching
   Still at thy window-pane.

 With black-brown eyes of wonder
   Thou dost my going scan:
 "Who art thou, and what ails thee,
   Thou sorrowful foreign man?"

 I am a German poet,
   Among the Germans famed--
 There, when they count their greatest,
   My name is also named.

 And, little one, what ails me
   Ails Germans not a few;
 Count they the sorest sorrows,
   They name my sorrows too.




EIN FICHTENBAUM STEHT EINSAM

_From the German of Heinrich Heine_


 There stands a lonely Pine-tree
   On a bare northern height.
 'Mid ice and snow he slumbers,
   Wrapped in his mantle white.

 He dreams about a Palm-tree
   In far-off Eastern lands,
 That droops, alone and silent,
   Above her burning sands.




ZWEI KAMMERN HAT DAS HERZ

_From the German of P. Neumann_

 [Greek: mala ge toi to megalas hugeias
   akoreston terma, nosos gar aei
     geiton homotoichos ereidei.]

                           AEsch., _Ag._


 Two chambers hath the heart:
   There dwelling
 Live Joy and Pain apart.

 Is Joy in one awake?
   Then only
 Doth Pain his slumber take.

 Joy, in thine hour, refrain--
   Speak softly,
 Lest thou awaken Pain.




LADY ISLAND, ON THE CHIEMSEE, BAVARIA

_From the German of Victor Scheffel_


 O'er the placid lake at even glides our boat, alone and slow,
 In the sunset stand empurpled domes of everlasting snow,
 From an island in the twilight dimly rise a convent's walls:
 With the chimes the chant of vespers from the grey old minster falls--
 _Sempiterni Fons amoris, Consolatrix tristium,
 Pia Mater Salvatoris, ave Virgo virginum!_
 Softly rising, falling, mingling, dying, comes the solemn song,
 And in dreamy undulations air and lake the tones prolong.
 Still the oars, and still the heart in worship, as the sweet bells
                                                                  toll,
 And I feel as though God's angels bore to heaven a blessed soul.




THE THREE RINGS: A FABLE

_From Lessing's "Nathan der Weise"_[6]


[Since Plato, no writer has understood better than Lessing the dramatic
conduct of a philosophic dialogue. The following colloquy is a
beautiful example of his art and of his thought.

Nathan is a Jew, famed for his wealth and for his wisdom, living in
Jerusalem at the time of the Third Crusade. In the following scene
he has just been summoned to the presence of the Sultan Saladin. He
supposes that a loan of money is the Sultan's object. Instead of
this, he finds that it is his reputed wisdom which has gained him
the interview. Nathan is a man who cannot have taken his beliefs in
spiritual things without examination; here, then, says Saladin, are
three faiths contending for mastery, the Jewish, the Christian, and
the Mahommedan. Each claims to be the true and only true religion. The
claim cannot be true of more than one of them. Which of them, in his
inmost soul, does Nathan hold to be justified? That he may have time to
collect his thoughts, Saladin leaves the Jew alone for a while before
he answers. Nathan, who does not yet know Saladin, is at first very
doubtful of the _bona fides_ of the Musalman prince in making this
inquiry of him.]


ACT III, SCENE 6


 NATHAN (_alone_)

 H'm, h'm. A strange request. Where do I stand?
 What will the Sultan with me ... what? I come
 Prepared for money, and he asks for ... Truth!
 And this he needs must have as bare and bright
 As if the truth were coin!... Aye, were it coin,
 Old, well-worn coin, that men tell out by weight,
 Such might I find him! But new-minted coin--
 The stamp's enough: you fling it on the board
 And there's an end--not thus can Truth be told!
 Doth he conceive that truth is to be poured
 From head to head like gold into a bag?
 Who's here the Jew, I or the Sultan?... Yet
 Suppose in very truth he asks for Truth?
 How then? And verily it were too little,
 Too paltry a suspicion, to believe
 He used the truth but as a snare.... Too little!
 Ah, what is then too little for the great?
 Why should he break into my house? A friend
 Would surely knock and listen at the door
 Before he entered. I must tread with care.
 But how? but how? To play the stolid Jew,
 That ne'er will pass ... still less, no Jew at all;
 For 'then' he'll say, 'why not a Musalman?'
 Let me think.... Ha! I have it now. That saves me!
 Not children only can one satisfy
 With fables.... He is coming. Let him come!

 _Enter Saladin._

 SALADIN

 I have not come too quickly? Thou hast brought
 Thy meditation to an end? Then speak!
 None hears but I.

 NATHAN

                   Nay, all the world may hear
 For aught I care!

 SALADIN

                   So clear and confident
 Is Nathan in his wisdom? Ha! this I deem
 To be a sage indeed! Nothing to hide,
 Never to palter--but to stake his life,
 His blood, his goods, and all, upon the truth!

 NATHAN

 Yea ... if need were ... and if the truth were served....

 SALADIN

 One of my titles, Betterer of the World
 And of the Law, I hope from this day forth
 To bear with right.

 NATHAN

                     Truly, a noble title!
 Yet, Sultan, ere I trust myself with thee,
 Wholly and unreserved, I ask thee first
 To hear a fable from me.

 SALADIN

                          Wherefore not?
 From childhood I have ever loved to hear
 Fables, well told.

 NATHAN

                    Well told? ah, that indeed
 Is scarce a quality of mine!

 SALADIN

                              Again
 So proudly modest? Well, speak on, speak on!

 NATHAN

 In the grey morn of Time, there lived i' the East
 A man, who owned a ring of priceless worth,
 Gift of a well-loved hand. For stone it bore
 An opal, where a hundred lovely tints
 Played, and where dwelt the magic power to make
 Well-pleasing in the sight of God and man
 Whoever wore it in this faith--What wonder
 It never left the owner's hand? what wonder
 He made provision to retain it ever
 In his own House, an heirloom for all time?
 Thus did he order it: He left the Ring
 First to his best-beloved son, ordaining
 That he in turn should leave it to the son
 He dearliest loved; and so to the dearest ever.
 And still the owner of the Ring, apart
 From precedence of birth, by that alone
 Should bear the sway.... Sultan, you follow me?

 SALADIN

 I follow thee. Proceed!

 NATHAN

                         And so the Ring
 Descended, till at length it came to one
 Who had three sons, all dutiful alike,
 Whom therefore he, perforce, must love alike;
 Only, from time to time the first would seem
 Most worthy of the Ring, and then the next,
 And then again the third,--as each he found
 Alone with him, the other two not by
 To share his overflowing love. To each
 His heart's fond weakness made him pledge the Ring.
 Thus all went smoothly ... while it could. But now
 His time to die draws near, and, sore perplexed,
 The good man rues that two of the three sons
 That trusted in his word, must soon be left
 Deceived, affronted.... Mark, now, his device!
 All secretly he summons to his aid
 A cunning craftsman, and commands him fashion
 After the pattern of his Ring, two others;
 No cost, no labour to be spared, to make them
 Like to the first, in every point alike.
 And so 'tis done; and when the craftsman brings
 The finished work, not even the father's eye
 Can tell his own ring from the copies. Now
 Joyfully doth he summon to his side
 His three sons, one by one, and, one by one,
 Gives each his blessing--and a ring--and dies.
 Sultan, thou hearest me?

 SALADIN

                          Yes, yes, I hear!
 Come, will thy fable soon be told?

 NATHAN

                                    'Tis told
 Already, for the rest is evident.
 Scarce is the father dead when comes each son
 Bearing his ring, and claims to be the lord
 And ruler of the house! What follows then?
 Examinations, quarrellings, complaints--
 In vain! Among the rings, the one true Ring
 Remains for all eyes indistinguishable.--

         [_After a pause in which he waits for
               the Sultan's reply._

 Well-nigh as indistinguishable, Sultan,
 As here, for us, to-day, the one true Faith.

 SALADIN

 How? This shall be thine answer to my question?

 NATHAN

 Nay, this shall but excuse me, if I trust not
 My judgment to decide among the rings,
 Made by the Father to the very intent
 That they should never be distinguished.

 SALADIN

                                          Yea,
 The rings!... Thou playest with me! I had deemed
 The three religions, whereof question is,
 Were easily distinguished, even to points
 Of food, and drink, and clothing!

 NATHAN

                                   Only not
 In this one thing--their proofs. All rest alike
 On history, or written or handed down.
 And history we take--is it not so?--
 On faith and trust alone. Whose faith, whose truth,
 Shall we confide in most? Surely in those
 Of our own folk, whose blood we are, whose proofs
 Of love were given us from our childhood up,
 Who ne'er deceived us, saving when, perchance,
 'Twere better for our weal. If this be so,
 How can I less in my forefathers trust
 Than thou in thine? Or take the other side:
 Can I demand from thee that thou shouldst charge
 Thine ancestors with lying, but for this,
 That mine be justified? Again, the Christian
 To both of us may plead the like defence.
 Art thou not answered?

 SALADIN (_aside_)

                        By the living God
 The man is right! I must be dumb.

 NATHAN

                                   Now turn we
 Back to our rings again.--I said, the sons
 Made their complaints: each one before the Judge
 Made oath that from his father's very hand
 He had the Ring--and so in truth he had--
 After his father's promise, long before,
 That one day he should own the Ring and all
 Its rights--and this no less was true. The father,
 Each one averr'd, could ne'er have played him false.
 Rather than credit this--rather than nurse
 Against so loved a father, such a thought,
 How fain soever he had been to think
 Nothing but good of them, he must believe
 His brothers guilty of foul treachery.
 But surely one day he would find a way
 To unmask the villains--he would be avenged!

 SALADIN

 And now, the Judge? I am intent to hear
 What thou wilt put into his mouth. Speak on!

 NATHAN

 On this wise spake the Judge: "Either ye bring
 Right soon your father here before me, else
 I spurn you from my seat. What! think ye I
 Am here to answer riddles? Or do ye wait
 Until the true Ring find a tongue and speak?
 Yet stay! 'Tis said that in the true Ring lives
 A magic gift, to make the owner loved--
 Well-pleasing before God and man. So good,
 This shall decide the cause; for never, surely,
 In this the false can emulate the true.
 Which of the three of ye is best beloved
 By the other twain? Marry, speak out! Ye are dumb!
 Mysterious power, that only backward works,
 Not outward from within! Lo, each of you
 Loves best of all--himself! So are ye all
 Deceived, and all deceivers. All your rings
 Are manifestly false. Belike the true
 Was irrecoverably lost; and so
 Your father, to conceal the loss, made three
 In place of one."

 SALADIN

                 Excellent, excellent!

 NATHAN

 "And so," the Judge continued, "if ye now
 Are bent on Law, on that alone, and counsel
 Such as I can, will none--I bid you hence.
 But, if I counselled you, my rede were this:
 Take ye the matter simply as it lies.
 Each from your father had his ring--let each
 Be well persuaded that the ring he holds
 Is the true Ring. It may be that your father
 Was minded to maintain the tyranny
 Of the one Ring no longer. And 'tis certain
 He loved you all, and loved you each alike.
 Would not have one exalted, one oppressed.
 Mark that! and be it yours to emulate
 His great impartial love. Strive, each of you,
 To show the Ring's benignant might his own;
 Yea, help the mystic power to do its kind,
 With gentleness, with loving courtesy,
 Beneficence to man, and unto God
 The deep devotion of the inmost soul.
 And when, full many a generation hence,
 Within your children's children's children's hearts
 The mystery of the Ring is manifest,
 Lo! in a thousand thousand years, again
 Before this judgment-seat I summon you,
 Where one more wise than I shall sit and speak.
 Now go your ways." So spake the modest Judge.

 SALADIN

 God! God!

 NATHAN

               And now, O Saladin, if thou
 Art confident that thou indeed art he,
 The wise, the promised Judge....

 SALADIN

                               I? dust! I? nothing!
 O God!

 NATHAN

        What moves the Sultan?

 SALADIN

                                 Nathan, Nathan,
 The thousand thousand years are not yet done!
 Not mine that judgment-seat! Enough--farewell!
 But henceforth be my friend.


FOOTNOTE:

[6] The concluding twenty lines of this translation have appeared in
the writer's "Life of Lessing" (Walter Scott).




FINIS.




  Transcriber's notes:

    Italic text is marked with _underscores_.

    Text originally in Greek is transliterated and enclosed in
    "[Greek: ]" markers.

    A small number of long lines of poetry (greater than 72 characters)
    have been broken into two lines, which is made apparent by the
    extreme right indentation of the broken line (e.g. the lines
    containing "flames into blossom").





End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Sea Spray: Verses and Translations, by
Thomas William Rolleston

*** 