What sign of those that fought and died
At shift of sword and sword?
The barrow and the camp abide,
The sunlight and the sward.

Here leaps ashore the full Sou'west
All heavy-winged with brine,
Here lies above the folded crest
The Channel's leaden line;
And here the sea-fogs lap and cling,
And here, each warning each,
The sheep-bells and the ship-bells ring
Along the hidden beach.

We have no waters to delight

Our broad and brookless vales

Only the dewpond on the height
Unfed, that never fails-
Whereby no tattered herbage tells
Which way the season flies—
Only our close-bit thyme that smells
Like dawn in Paradise.

Here through the strong and shadeless days

The tinkling silence thrills;

Or little, lost, Down churches praise

The Lord who made the hills:

But here the Old Gods guard their round,
And, in her secret heart,

The heathen kingdom Wilfrid found.
Dreams, as she dwells, apart.

Though all the rest were all my share,
With equal soul I'd see

Her nine-and-thirty sisters fair,

Yet none more fair than she.

Choose ye your need from Thames to Tweed,
And I will choose instead

Such lands as lie 'twixt Rake and Rye,
Black Down and Beachy Head.

I will go out against the sun
Where the rolled scarp retires,
And the Long Man of Wilmington
Looks naked toward the shires;
And east till doubling Rother crawls
To find the fickle tide,

By dry and sea-forgotten walls,
Our ports of stranded pride.

I will go north about the shaws
And the deep ghylls that breed
Huge oaks and old, the which we hold
No more than Sussex weed;

Or south where windy Piddinghoe's
Begilded dolphin veers

And red beside wide-bankèd Ouse
Lie down our Sussex steers.

So to the land our hearts we give
Till the sure magic strike,

And Memory, Use, and Love make live
Us and our fields alike-

That deeper than our speech and thought,

Beyond our reason's sway,

Clay of the pit whence we were wrought
Yearns to its fellow-clay.

God gives all men all earth to love,

But since man's heart is small,

Ordains for each one spot shall prove
Beloved over all.

Each to his choice, and I rejoice

The lot has fallen to me

In a fair ground-in a fair ground—
Yea, Sussex by the sea!

MY BOY JACK

1914-18

HAVE you news of my boy Jack?"

Not this tide.

"When d'you think that he'll come back?" Not with this wind blowing, and this tide.

"Has any one else had word of him?” Not this tide.

For what is sunk will hardly swim,

Not with this wind blowing, and this tide.

"Oh, dear, what comfort can I find?”

None this tide,

Nor any tide,

Except he did not shame his kind

Not even with that wind blowing, and that tide.

Then hold your head up all the more,

This tide,

And every tide;

Because he was the son you bore,

And gave to that wind blowing and that tide!

A NATIVITY ·

1914-18

THE Babe was laid in the Manger
Between the gentle kine-

All safe from cold and danger-
“But it was not so with mine,

(With mine! With mine!)

"Is it well with the child, is it well?"

The waiting mother prayed.

“For I know not how he fell,

And I know not where he is laid."

A Star stood forth in Heaven;
The Watchers ran to see

The Sign of the Promise given—

"But there comes no sign to me.

(To me! To me!)

"My child died in the dark.

Is it well with the child, is it well?
There was none to tend him or mark,
And I know not how he fell."

The Cross was raised on high;
The Mother grieved beside-
"But the Mother saw Him die
And took Him when He died.
(He died! He died!)

"Seemly and undefiled

His burial-place was made

Is it well, is it well with the child?
For I know not where he is laid."

On the dawning of Easter Day
Comes Mary Magdalene;
But the Stone was rolled away,
And the Body was not within-

(Within! Within!)

"Ah, who will answer my word?
The broken mother prayed.
"They have taken away my Lord,

And I know not where He is laid."

"The Star stands forth in Heaven.
The watchers watch in vain
For Sign of the Promise given
Of peace on Earth again-

(Again! Again!)
"But I know for Whom he fell"-

The steadfast mother smiled,
"Is it well with the child-is it well?
It is well-it is well with the child!"

DIRGE OF DEAD SISTERS

1902

(For the Nurses who died in the South African War)

WHO recalls the twilight and the rangèd tents in order

(Violet peaks uplifted through the crystal evening air?) And the clink of iron teacups and the piteous, noble laughter, And the faces of the Sisters with the dust upon their hair?

Now and not hereafter, while the breath is in our nostrils,
Now and not hereafter, ere the meaner years go by-

Let us now remember many honourable women,
Such as bade us turn again when we were like to die.)