d away where the last dreams die ...
Ah yet, will ye watch, when the mist lifts high
On Christmas Day, on Christmas Day?
Will ye see three ships come sailing by
On Christmas Day in the morning?

SLUMBER-SONGS OF THE MADONNA

PRELUDE

Dante saw the great white Rose
Half unclose;
Dante saw the golden bees
Gathering from its heart of gold
Sweets untold,
Love's most honeyed harmonies.

Dante saw the threefold bow
Strangely glow,
Saw the Rainbow Vision rise,
And the Flame that wore the crown
Bending down
O'er the flowers of Paradise.

Something yet remained, it seems;
In his dreams
Dante missed--as angels may
In their white and burning bliss--
Some small kiss
Mortals meet with every day.

Italy in splendour faints
'Neath her saints!
O, her great Madonnas, too,
Faces calm as any moon
Glows in June,
Hooded with the night's deep blue!

What remains? I pass and hear
Everywhere,
Ay, or see in silent eyes
Just the song she still would sing
Thus--a-swing
O'er the cradle where He lies.

I

Sleep, little baby, I love thee.
Sleep, little king, I am bending above thee.
How should I know what to sing
Here in my arms as I swing thee to sleep?
Hushaby low,
Rockaby so,
Kings may have wonderful jewels to bring,
Mother has only a kiss for her king!
Why should my singing so make me to weep?
Only I know that I love thee, I love thee,
Love thee, my little one, sleep.

II

Is it a dream? Ah yet, it seems
Not the same as other dreams!
I can but think that angels sang,
When thou wast born, in the starry sky,
And that their golden harps out-rang
While the silver clouds went by!

The morning sun shuts out the stars,
Which are much loftier than the sun;
But, could we burst our prison-bars
And find the Light whence light begun,
The dreams that heralded thy birth
Were truer than the truths of earth;
And, by that far immortal Gleam,
Soul of my soul, I still would dream!

A ring of light was round thy head,
The great-eyed oxen nigh thy bed
Their cold and innocent noses bowed!
Thei