O the glorious gift of release
From the chains that encircle the thrall,
To be quiet, and cool, and at peace,
And to loaf, and do nothing at all!

I am clear of that infamous lark;
I am far from the blare of the Band;
And the bugles are silent, the bark
Of the Colonel is hushed in the land.

And--I say it again--I am free,
In the valleys of wandering bliss;
And most gratefully 'own, if there _be_
An Elysium on earth, it is this!'

TO MY LADY OF THE HILLS

'... O she,
To me myself, for some three careless moons,
The summer pilot of an empty heart
Unto the shores of Nothing.'--_Tennyson_.

'Tis the hour when golden slumbers
Through th' Hesperian portals creep,
And the youth who lisps in numbers
Dreams of novel rhymes to 'sleep';
_I_ shall merely note, at starting,
That responsive Nature thrills
To the _twilight_ hour of parting
From my Lady of the Hills.

Lady, 'neath the deepening umbrage
We have wandered near and far,
To the ludicrously dumb rage
Of your truculent Mamma;
We have urged the long-tailed gallop;
Lightly danced the still night through;
Smacked the ball, and oared the shallop
(In a vis-a-vis canoe);

We have walked this fair Oasis,
Keeping, more by skill than chance,
To the non-committal basis
Of indefinite romance;
Till, as love within me ripened,
I have wept the hours away,
Brooding on my meagre stipend,
Mourning mine exiguous pay.

Dear, 'tis hard, indeed, to stifle
Fervour such as mine has grown,
And I 'd freely give a trifle
Could I win you for mine own;
But the question simply narrows
Down to one persistent fact,
That we cannot say we're sparrows,
And we oughtn't so to act.

Married bliss is born of incomes;
While to drag the long years through
Till some hypothetic tin comes,
Seems a childish thing to do;
Rather let us own as lasting
Our unpardonable crime,
Giving thanks, with prayer and fasting,
For so very high a time.

Fare you well. Your dreadful Mother,
If I know that woman's mind,
Has her eye upon Another
_Vice_ me, my dear, resigned;
And I see you mated shortly
To some covenanted swain,
Not