THE ISLANDERS

Then ye returned to your trinkets; then ye contented your souls

With the flannelled fools at the wicket or the muddied oafs at the goals.

Given to strong delusion, wholly believing a lie,

Ye saw that the land lay fenceless, and ye let the months go by

Waiting some easy wonder: hoping some saving sign-
Idle-openly idle-in the lee of the forespent Line.
Idle-except for your boasting-and what is your boast-
ing worth

If ye grudge a year of service to the lordliest life on earth?

Ancient, effortless, ordered, cycle on cycle set,

Life so long untroubled, that ye who inherit forget

It was not made with the mountains, it is not one with the deep.

Men, not gods, devised it. Men, not gods, must keep. Men, not children, servants, or kinsfolk called from afar, But each man born in the Island broke to the matter of

war.

Soberly and by custom taken and trained for the same; Each man born in the Island entered at youth to the

game

As it were almost cricket, not to be mastered in haste, But after trial and labour, by temperance, living chaste. As it were almost cricket-as it were even your play, Weighed and pondered and worshipped, and practised day and day.

So ye shall bide sure-guarded when the restless lightnings wake

In the womb of the blotting war-cloud, and the pallid

nations quake.

So, at the haggard trumpets, instant your soul shall leap

Forthright, accoutred, accepting-alert from the wells. of sleep.

So at the threat ye shall summon-so at the need ye shall send

Men, not children or servants, tempered and taught to the end;

Cleansed of servile panic, slow to dread or despise,

Humble because of knowledge, mighty by sacrifice. But ye say, 'It will mar our comfort.' Ye say, 'It will minish our trade.'

Do ye wait for the spattered shrapnel ere ye learn how a gun is laid?

For the low, red glare to southward when the raided coast-towns burn?

(Light ye shall have on that lesson, but little time to

learn.)

Will ye pitch some white pavilion, and lustily even the

odds,

With nets and hoops and mallets, with rackets and bats and rods?

Will the rabbit war with your foemen-the red deer

horn them for hire?

Your kept cock-pheasant keep you?-he is master of many a shire.

Arid, aloof, incurious, unthinking, unthanking, gelt,

Will ye loose your schools to flout them till their browbeat columns melt?

Will ye pray them or preach them, or print them, or ballot them back from your shore?

Will your workmen issue a mandate to bid them strike no more?

THE ISLANDERS

Will ye rise and dethrone your rulers? (Because ye were idle both?

Pride by insolence chastened? Indolence purged by

sloth?)

No doubt but ye are the People; who shall make you afraid?

Also your gods are many; no doubt but your gods shall

aid.

Idols of greasy altars built for the body's ease;

Proud little brazen Baals and talking fetishes;

Teraphs of sept and party and wise wood-pavement gods

These shall come down to the battle and snatch you from under the rods?

From the gusty, flickering gun-roll with viewless salvoes

rent,

And the pitted hail of the bullets that tell not whence they were sent.

When ye are ringed as with iron, when ye are scourged as with whips,

When the meat is yet in your belly, and the boast is yet on your lips;

When ye go forth at morning and the noon beholds you broke,

Ere ye lie down at even, your remnant, under the yoke.

No doubt but ye are the People-absolute, strong, and wise;

Whatever your heart has desired ye have not withheld from your eyes.

On your own heads, in your own hands, the sin and the saving lies!

THE PEACE OF DIVES

(1903)

HE Word came down to Dives in Torment where he lay:

TH

'Our World is full of wickedness, My Children maim and slay,

And the Saint and Seer and Prophet

Can make no better of it

Than to sanctify and prophesy and pray.

'Rise up, rise up, thou Dives, and take again thy gold,

And thy women and thy housen as they were to thee of old.

It may be grace hath found thee

In the furnace where We bound thee,

And that thou shalt bring the peace My Son foretold.'

Then merrily rose Dives and leaped from out his fire, And walked abroad with diligence to do the Lord's desire;

And anon the battles ceased,

And the captives were released,

And Earth had rest from Goshen to Gadire.

THE PEACE OF DIVES

The Word came down to Satan that raged and roared alone, 'Mid the shouting of the peoples by the cannon overthrown

(But the Prophets, Saints, and Seers

Set each other by the ears,

For each would claim the marvel as his own):

'Rise up, rise up, thou Satan, upon the Earth to go, And prove the peace of Dives if it be good or no: For all that he hath planned

We deliver to thy hand,

As thy skill shall serve to break it or bring low.'

Then mightily rose Satan, and about the Earth he hied, And breathed on Kings in idleness and Princes drunk with pride;

But for all the wrong he breathed

There was never sword unsheathed,

And the fires he lighted flickered out and died.

Then terribly rose Satan, and he darkened Earth afar, Till he came on cunning Dives where the moneychangers are;

And he saw men pledge their gear

For the gold that buys the spear,

And the helmet and the habergeon of war.

Yea to Dives came the Persian and the Syrian and the Mede

And their hearts were nothing altered, nor their cunning

nor their greed

And they pledged their flocks and farms

For the king-compelling arms,

And Dives lent according to their need.