s noble in birth as in worth,
And each of them boasted he sprang from the oldest race upon earth.
Each was as brave in the fight as the bravest hero of song,
And each of them liefer had died than have done one another a wrong.
_He_ lived on an isle in the ocean--we sail'd on a Friday morn--
He that had slain my father the day before I was born.

And we came to the isle in the ocean, and there on the shore was he.
But a sudden blast blew us out and away through a boundless sea.

And we came to the Silent Isle that we never had touched before,
Where a silent ocean always broke on a silent shore,
And the brooks glittered on in the light without sound, and the long
waterfalls
Poured in a thunderless plunge to the base of the mountain walls,
And the poplar and cypress unshaken by storm flourished up beyond sight
And the pine shot aloft from the crag to an unbelievable height,
And high in the heaven above it there flickered a songless lark,
And the cock couldn't crow, and the bull couldn't low, and the dog
couldn't bark.
And round it we went, and thro' it, but never a murmur, a breath,
It was all of it fair as life, it was all of it quiet as death,
And we hated the beautiful Isle, for whenever we strove to speak
Our voices were thinner and fainter than any flittermouse shriek;
And the men that were mighty of tongue, and could raise such a battle-cry
That a hundred who heard it would rush on a thousand lances and die--
Oh, they to be dumb'd by the charm!--so fluster'd with anger were they
They almost fell on each other; but, after, we sailed away.

And we came to the Isle of Shouting, we landed, a score of wild birds
Cried from the topmost summit with human voices and words;
Once in an hour they cried, and whenever their voices peal'd
The steer fell down at the plough and the harvest died from the field,
And the men dropt dead in the valleys and half of the cattle went lame,
And the roof sank in on the hearth, and the dwelling broke into flame;
And the shouting of these wild birds ran into the hearts of my crew,
Till they shouted along with the shouting, and seized one another and
slew;
But I drew them the one from the other; I saw that we could not stay,
And we left the dead to the birds and we sail'd with our wounded away.

And we came to the Isle of Flowers, their breath met us out on the seas,
For the Spring and the middle Summer sat eac