Who knows what lurks beneath the tide?--
Who knows what tale? Belike,
Those "antres vast" and shadows hide
Some patriarchal Pike;--

Some tough old tyrant, wrinkle-jawed,
To whom the sky, the earth,
Have but for aim to look on awed
And see him wax in girth;--

Hard ruler there by right of might;
An ageless Autocrat,
Whose "good old rule" is "Appetite,
And subjects fresh and fat;"--

While they--poor souls!--in wan despair
Still watch for signs in him;
And dying, hand from heir to heir
The day undawned and dim,

When the pond's terror too must go;
Or creeping in by stealth,
Some bolder brood, with common blow,
Shall found a Commonwealth.

* * * * *

Or say,--perchance the liker this!--
That these themselves are gone;
That Amurath _in minimis_,--
Still hungry,--lingers on,

With dwindling trunk and wolfish jaw
Revolving sullen things,
But most the blind unequal law
That rules the food of Kings;--

The blot that makes the cosmic All
A mere time-honoured cheat;--
That bids the Great to eat the Small,
Yet lack the Small to eat!

* * * * *

Who knows! Meanwhile the mosses bead
Around the granite brink;
And 'twixt the isles of water-weed
The wood-birds dip and drink.

AN EASTERN APOLOGUE.

(To E. H. P.)

Melik the Sultan, tired and wan,
Nodded at noon on his divan.

Beside the fountain lingered near
JAMIL the bard, and the vizier--

Old YUSUF, sour and hard to please;
Then JAMIL sang, in words like these.

_Slim is Butheina--slim is she
As boughs of the Araka tree!_

"Nay," quoth the other, teeth between,
"Lean, if you will,--I call her lean."

_Sweet is Butheina--sweet as wine,
With smiles that like red bubbles shine!_

"True,--by the Prophet!" YUSUF said,
"She makes men wander in the head!"

_Dear is Butheina--ah! more dear
Than all the maidens of Kashmeer!_

"Dear," came the answer, quick as thought,
"Dear ... and yet always to be bought."

So JAMIL ceased. But still Life's page
Shows diverse unto YOUTH and AGE:

And,--be the song of Ghouls or Gods,--
TIME, like the Sultan, sits ... and nods.

TO A MISSAL OF THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY.