  The sandy spits, the shore-lock'd lakes, Melt into open, moonlit sea; The soft Mediterranean breaks At my feet, free. Dotting the fields of corn and vine, Like ghosts the huge, gnarl'd olives stand. Behind, that lovely mountain-line! While, by the strand, Cette, with its glistening houses white, Curves with the curving beach away Far in the bay. Ah! such a night, so soft, so lone, So moonlit, saw me once of yore Wander unquiet, and my own Vext heart deplore. But now that trouble is forgot; Thy memory, thy pain, to-night, My brother! and thine early lot, Possess me quite. The murmur of this Midland deep Is heard to-night around thy grave, There, where Gibraltar's cannon'd steep O'erfrowns the wave. For there, with bodily anguish keen, With Indian heats at last fordone, With public toil and private teen— Thou sank'st, alone. Slow to a stop, at morning grey, I see the smoke-crown'd vessel come; Slow round her paddles dies away The seething foam. A boat is lower'd from her side; Ah, gently place him on the bench! That spirit—if all have not yet died— A breath might quench. Is this the eye, the footstep fast, The mien of youth we used to see, Poor, gallant boy!—for such thou wast, Still art, to me. The limbs their wonted tasks refuse; The eyes are glazed, thou canst not speak; And whiter than thy white burnous That wasted cheek! Enough! The boat, with quiet shock, Unto its haven coming nigh, Touches, and on Gibraltar's rock Lands thee to die. Ah me! Gibraltar's strand is far, But farther yet across the brine Thy dear wife's ashes buried are, Remote from thine. For there, where morning's sacred fount Its golden rain on earth confers, The snowy Himalayan Mount O'ershadows hers. Strange irony of fate, alas, Which, for two jaded English, saves, When from their dusty life they pass, Such peaceful graves! In cities should we English lie, Where cries are rising ever new, And men's incessant stream goes by— We who pursue Our business with unslackening stride, Traverse in troops, with care-fill'd breast, The soft Mediterranean side, The Nile, the East, And glance, and nod, and bustle by, And never once possess our soul Before we die. Not by those hoary Indian hills, Not by this gracious Midland sea Whose floor to-night sweet moonshine fills, Should our graves be. Some sage, to whom the world was dead, And men were specks, and life a play; Who made the roots of trees his bed, And once a day With staff and gourd his way did bend To villages and homes of man, For food to keep him till he end His mortal span And the pure goal of being reach; Hoar-headed, wrinkled, clad in white, Without companion, without speech, By day and night Pondering God's mysteries untold, And tranquil as the glacier-snows He by those Indian mountains old Might well repose. Some grey crusading knight austere, Who bore Saint Louis company, And came home hurt to death, and here Landed to die; Fill'd Europe once with his love-pain, Who here outworn had sunk, and sung His dying strain; Some girl, who here from castle-bower, With furtive step and cheek of flame, 'Twixt myrtle-hedges all in flower By moonlight came To meet her pirate-lover's ship; And from the wave-kiss'd marble stair Beckon'd him on, with quivering lip And floating hair; And lived some moons in happy trance, Then learnt his death and pined away— Such by these waters of romance 'Twas meet to lay. But you—a grave for knight or sage, Romantic, solitary, still, O spent ones of a work-day age! Befits you ill. So sang I; but the midnight breeze, Down to the brimm'd, moon-charmed main, Comes softly through the olive-trees, And checks my strain. I think of her, whose gentle tongue All plaint in her own cause controll'd; Of thee I think, my brother! young In heart, high-soul'd That comely face, that cluster'd brow, |
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