als of dream,
To clothe her in the wistful hour,
When girlhood steals from bud to flower.
Bring her the tunes of elfin dances,
Bring her the faery Gleam!_

_II_

_At the world's gate she stands,
Silent and very still;
And lone as that one star that lights
The delicate dusk of April nights.
Oh, let love bind her holy hands,
And fetter her from ill!_

_Her tumbled tresses cling
Adown her like a veil.
And cheeks and curls as sweetly chime
As verses with a rounding rhyme.
Surely there is not anything
So valiant and so frail._

_In faith and without fear,
She brings to a rude throng,
At war with beauty and with truth,
The wonder of her blossomy youth.
And faith shall wither to a sneer,
And need shall silence song._

_III_

_Her soul is a soft flame,
Set in a world of grey.
Help her, O Life, to keep its shrine
That her white window's vigilant sign
May pierce the tangled mists of shame,
Where we have lost our way!_

_So linger at this day,
My little maid serene!
Or, since the dancing feet must go,
Take Childhood with you still, and so
Live in a year-worn world, but stay
For ever Seventeen!_

A WORKER'S NIGHT

THE ISLE OF DOGS

I am not of those who share the prevailing opinions of the Isle of Dogs:
I do not see it as a haunt of greyness and distress. To the informed
mind it is full and passionate. Every one of its streets is a
sharp-flavoured adventure. Where others find insipidity I find salt and
fire. Its shapes and sounds and silences and colours have allured me
from first acquaintance. For here, remember, are the Millwall Docks, and
here, too, is Cubitt Town.... Of course, like all adorable things, it
has faults. I am ready to confess that the cheap mind, which finds
Beauty only in that loathly quality called Refinement, will suffer many
pains by a sojourn in its byways. It will fill them with ashen despair.
In the old jolly days it was filthy; it was full of perils, smelly,
insanitary, crumbling; but at least one could live in it. To-day it has
been taken in hand by those remote Authorities who make life miserable
for us. It is reasonably clean; it is secure; the tumbling cottages have
been razed, and artisans' dwellings have arisen in their stead. Its
high-ways--Glengall Road, East Ferry Ro