e silent tomb
In little Pauntley church.
There, to his Arms,
The Gules and Azure, and the Lion's Head
So proudly blazoned on the painted panes;
(O, sirs, the simple wistfulness of it
Might move hard hearts to laughter, but I think
Tears tremble through it, for the Mermaid Inn)
He added his new crest, the hard-won sign
And lowly prize of his own industry,
_The Honey-bee_. And, far away, the bells
Peal softly from the pure white City of God:--
_Ut fragrans nardus
Fama fuit iste Ricardus._
With folded hands he waits the Judgment now.
Slowly our dark bells toll across the world,
For him who waits the reckoning, his accompt
Secure, his conscience clear, his ledger spread
A _Liber Albus_ flooded with pure light.

_Flos Mercatorum,
Fundator presbyterorum_,...

Slowly the dark bells toll for him who asks
No more of men, but that they may sometimes
Pray for the souls of Richard Whittington,
Alice, his wife, and (as themselves of old
Had prayed) the father and mother of each of them.
Slowly the great notes fall and float away:--

_Omnibus exemplum
Barathrum vincendo morosum
Condidit hoc templum ...
Pauperibus pater ...
Finiit ipse dies
Sis sibi Christe quies. Amen._"

IX

RALEIGH

Ben was our only guest that day. His tribe
Had flown to their new shrine--the Apollo Room,
To which, though they enscrolled his golden verse
Above their doors like some great-fruited vine,
Ben still preferred our _Mermaid_, and to smoke
Alone in his old nook; perhaps to hear
The voices of the dead,
The voices of his old companions.
Hovering near him,--Will and Kit and Rob.

"Our Ocean-shepherd from the Main-deep sea,
Raleigh," he muttered, as I brimmed his cup,
"Last of the men that broke the fleets of Spain,
'Twas not enough to cage him, sixteen years,
Rotting his heart out in the Bloody Tower,
But they must fling him forth in his old age
To hunt for El Dorado. Then, mine host,
Because his poor old ship _The Destiny_
Smashes the Spaniard, but comes tottering home
Without the Spanish gold, our gracious king,
To please a catamite,
Sends the old lion back to the Tower again.