Song

Little Boy Blue, come blow up your horn,Summon the day of deliverance in:We are weary of bearing the burden of scornAs we yearn for the home that we never shall win;For here there is weeping and sorrow and sin.And the poor and the weak are a spoil for the strong!Ah, when shall the song of the ransomed begin?The world is grown weary with waiting so long.

Little Boy Blue, you are gallant and brave,There was never a doubt in those clear bright eyes.Come, challenge the grim dark Gates of the GraveAs the skylark sings to those infinite skies!This world is a dream, say the old and the wise,And its rainbows arise o'er the false and the true;But the mists of the morning are made of our sighs,--Ah, shatter them, scatter them, Little Boy Blue!

Little Boy Blue, if the child-heart knows,Sound but a note as a little one may;And the thorns of the desert shall bloom with the rose,And the Healer shall wipe all tears away;Little Boy Blue, we are all astray,The sheep's in the meadow, the cow's in the corn,Ah, set the world right, as a little one may;Little Boy Blue, come blow up your horn!

Yes; and there between the treesCircled with a misty gleamLike the light a mourner seesRound an angel in a dream;Was it he? oh, brave and slim,Straight and clad in æry blue,Lifting to his lips the dimGolden horn? We never knew!

Never; for a witch's hairFlooded all the moonlit sky,And he vanished, then and there,In the twinkling of an eye:Just as either boyish cheekPuffed to set the world aright,Ere the golden horn could speakRound him flowed the purple night.

At last we came to a round black roadThat tunnelled through the woods and showed,Or so we thought, a good clear wayBack to the upper lands of day;Great silken cables overheadIn many a mighty mesh were spreadNetting the rounded arch, no doubtTo keep the weight of leafage out.And, as the tunnel narrowed down,So thick and close the cords had grownNo leaf could through their meshes stray,And the faint moonlight died away;Only a strange grey glimmer shoneTo guide our weary footsteps on,Until, tired out, we stood beforeThe end, a great grey silken door.

Then from out a weird old wicket, overgrown with shaggy hairLike a weird and wicked eyebrow round a weird and wicked eye,Two great eyeballs and a beardFor one ghastly moment peeredAt our faces with a sudden stealthy stare:Then the door was open wide,And a hideous hermit criedWith a shy and soothing smile from out his lair,Won't you walk into my parlour? I can make you cosy there!

And we couldn't quite remember where we'd heard that phrase before,As the great grey-bearded ogre stood beside his open door;But an echo seemed to answer from a land beyond the sky--Won't you walk into my parlour? said the spider to the fly!

Then we looked a little closer at the ogre as he stoodWith his great red eyeballs glowing like two torches in a wood,And his mighty speckled belly and his dreadful clutching clawsAnd his nose--a horny parrot's beak, his whiskers and his jaws;Yet he seemed so sympathetic, and we saw two tears descend,As he murmured, "I'm so ugly, but I've lost my dearest friend!I tell you most lymphatic'ly, I've yearnings in my soul,"--And right along his parrot's beak we saw the tear-drops roll;He's an arrant sentimentalist, we heard a distant sigh,Won't you weep upon my bosom? said the spider to the fly.

"If you'd dreamed my dreams of beauty, if you'd seen my works of art,If you'd felt the cruel hunger that is gnawing at my heart,And the grief that never leaves me and the love I can't forget,(For I loved with all the letters in the Chinese alphabet!)Oh, you'd all come in to comfort me: you ought to help the weak;And I'm full of melting moments; and--I--know--the--thing--you--seek!"And the haunting echo answered, Well, I'm sure you ought to try;There's a duty to one's neighbour, said the spider to the fly.

So we walked into his parlourThough a gleam was in his eye;And it was the prettiest parlourThat ever we did spy!

But we saw by the uncertainMisty light, shot through with gleamsOf many a silken curtainBroidered o'er with dreadful dreams,That he locked the door behind us! So we stood with bated breathIn a silence deep as death.

There were scarlet gleams and crimsonIn the curious foggy grey,Like the blood-red light that swims onOld canals at fall of day,Where the smoke of some great city loops and droops in gorgeous veilsRound the heavy purple barges' tawny sails.

Were those creatures gagged and muffled,See--there--by that severed head?Was it but a breeze that ruffledThose dark curtains, splashed with red,Ruffled the dark figures on them, made them moan like things in pain?How we wished that we were safe at home again.

"Oh, we want to hear of Peterkin; good sir, you say you know;Won't you tell us, won't you put us in the way we want to go?"So we pleaded, for he seemed so very full of sighs and tearsThat we couldn't doubt his kindness, and we smothered all our fears;But he said, "You must be crazy if you come to me for help;Why should I desire to send you to your horrid little whelp?"And again, the foolish echo made a far-away reply,Oh, don't come to me for comfort,Pray don't look to me for comfort,Heavens! you mustn't be so selfish, said the spider to the fly.

"Still, when the King of Scotland, so to speak, was in a hole,He was aided by my brother; it's a story to consoleThe convict of the treadmill and the infant with a sum,For it teaches you to try again until your kingdom's come!The monarch dawdled in that hole for centuries of timeUntil my own twin-brother rose and showed him how to climb:He showed him how to swing and sway upon a tiny threadAcross a mighty precipice, and light upon his headWithout a single fracture and without a single painIf he only did it frequently and tried and tried again:"And once again the whisper like a moral wandered by,Perseverance is a virtue, said the spider to the fly.

Then he moaned, "My heart is hungry; but I fear I cannot eat,(Of course I speak entirely now of spiritual meat!)For I only fed an hour ago, but if we calmly satWhile I told you all my troubles in a confidential chatIt would give me such an appetite to hear you sympathise,And I should sleep the better--see, the tears are in my eyes!Dead yearnings are such dreadful things, let's keep 'em all alive,--Let's sit and talk awhile, my dears; we'll dine, I think, at five."And he brought his chair beside us in his most engaging style,And began to tell his story with a melancholy smile.--

"You remember Miss MuffetWho sat on a tuffetPartaking of curds and whey;Well, I am the spiderWho sat down beside herAnd frightened Miss Muffet away!

"There was nothing against her!An elderly spinsterWere such a grammatical mateFor a spider and spinner,I swore I would win her,I knew I had met with my fate!

"That love was the purestAnd strongest and surestI'd felt since my first thread was spun;I know I'm a bogey,But she's an old fogey,So why in the world did she run?

"When Bruce was in trouble,A spider, my double,Encouraged him greatly, they say!Now, why should the spiderWho sat down beside herHave frightened Miss Muffet away?"

He seemed to have much more to tell,But we could scarce be listening well,Although we tried with all our mightTo look attentive and polite;For still afar we heard the thinClear fairy-call to Peterkin;Clear as a skylark's mounting songIt drew our wandering thoughts along.Afar, it seemed, yet, ah, so nigh,Deep in our dreams it scaled the sky,In captive dreams that brooked no barsIt touched the love that moves the stars,And with sweet music's golden tetherIt bound our hearts and heaven together.

Wake, arise, the lake, the skiesFade into the faery day;Come and sing before our king,Heed not Time, the dotard grey;Time has given his crown to heaven--Ah, how long? Awake, away!

Then, as the Hermit rambled onIn one long listless monotone,We heard a wild and mournful groanCome rumbling down the tunnelled way;A voice, an awful mournful bray,Singing some old funereal lay;Then solemn footsteps, muffled, dull,Approached as if they trod on wool,And as they nearer, nearer drew,We saw our Host was listening too!

His bulging eyes began to glowLike great red match-heads rubbed at night,And then he stole with a grim "O-ho!"To that grey old wicket where, out of sight,Blandly rubbing his hands and humming,He could see, at one glance, whatever was coming.

He had never been so jubilant or frolicsome before,As he scurried on his cruel hairy crutches to the door;And flung it open wideAnd most hospitably cried,"Won't you walk into my parlour? I've some little friends to tea,--They'll be highly entertaining to a man of sympathy,Such as you yourself must be!"

Then the man, for so he seemed,(Doubtless one who'd lost his wayAnd was dwarfed as we had been!)In his ancient suit of black,Black upon the verge of green,Entered like a ghost that dreamedSadly of some bygone day;And he never ceased to singIn that awful mournful bray.

The door closed behind his back;He walked round us in a ring,And we hoped that he might free us,But his tears appeared to blind him,For he didn't seem to see us,And the Hermit crept behind himLike a cat about to spring.

And the song he sang was this;And his nose looked very grandAs he sang it, with a blissWhich we could not understand;For his voice was very sad,While his nose was proud and glad.

Rain, April, rain, thy sunny, sunny tears!Through the black boughs the robe of Spring appears,Yet, for the ghosts of all the bygone years,Rain, April, rain.

Rain, April, rain; the rose will soon be glad;Spring will rejoice, a Spring I, too, have had;A little while, till I no more be sad,Rain, April, rain.

And then the spider sprangBefore we could breathe or speak,And one great scream out-rangAs the terrible horny beakCrunched into the Sad Man's head,And the terrible hairy clawsClutched him around his middle;And he opened his lantern-jaws,And he gave one twist, one twiddle,One kick, and his sorrow was dead.

And there, as he sucked his bleeding prey,The spider leered at us--"You will do,My sweet little dears, for another day;But this is the sort I like; huh! huh!"

And there we stood, in frozen fear,Whiter than death,With bated breath;And lo! as we thought of Peterkin,Father and home and Peterkin,Once more that music clear and thin,Clear as a skylark's mounting song,But nearer now, more sweet, more strong,Drew all our wandering thoughts along,Until it seemed, a mystic seaOf hidden delight and harmonyBegan to ripple and rise all roundThe prison where our hearts lay bound;And from sweet heaven's most rosy rimThere swelled a distant marching hymnWhich made the hideous Hermit pauseAnd listen with lank down-dropt jaws,Till, with great bulging eyes of fear,He sought the wicket again to peerAlong the tunnel, as like sweet rainWe heard the still approaching strain,And, under it, the rhythmic beatOf multitudinous marching feet.Nearer, nearer, they rippled and rang,And this was the marching song they sang:--

A fairy band are weIn fairy-land:Singing march we, hand in hand;Singing, singing all day long:(Some folk never heard a fairy-song!)

Singing, singing,When the merry thrush is swingingOn a springing spray;Or when the witch that lives in gloomy cavesAnd creeps by night among the gravesCalls a cloud across the day;Cease we never our fairy song,March we ever, along, along,Down the dale, or up the hill,Singing, singing still.

And suddenly the Hermit turned and ran with all his mightThrough the back-door of his parlour as we thought of little Peterkin;And the great grey roof was shattered by a shower of rosy light,And the spider-house went floating, torn and tattered through the nightIn a flight of prismy streamers, as a shout went up for Peterkin;And lo, the glistening fairy-host stood there arrayed for fight,In arms of rose and green and gold, to lead us on to Peterkin.

And all around us, rippling like a pearl and opal sea,The host of fairy faces winked a kindly hint of Peterkin;And all around the rosy glade a laugh of fairy gleeWatched spider-streamers floating up from fragrant tree to treeTill the moonlight caught the gossamers and, oh we wished for Peterkin!Each rope became a rainbow; but it made us ache to seeSuch a fairy forest-pomp without explaining it to Peterkin.

Then all the glittering crowdWith a courtly gesture bowedLike a rosy jewelled cloudRound a flame,As the King of Fairy-land,Very dignified and grand,Stepped forward to demandWhence we came.

He'd a cloak of gold and greenSuch as caterpillars spin,For the fairy ways, I ween,Are very frugal;He'd a bow that he had borneSince the crimson Eden morn,And a honeysuckle hornFor his bugle.

So we told our tale of faëry to the King of Fairy-land,And asked if he could let us know the latest news of Peterkin;And he turned him with a courtly smile and waved his jewelled wandAnd cried, Pease-blossom, Mustard-seed! You know the old command;Well; these are little children; you must lead them on to Peterkin.Then he knelt, the King of Faëry knelt; his eyes were great and grandAs he took our hands and kissed them, saying, Father loves yourPeterkin!

So out they sprang, on either side,A light fantastic fairy guide,To lead us to the land unknownWhere little Peterkin was gone;And, as we went with timid pace,We saw that every fairy faceIn all that moonlit host was wetWith tears: we never shall forgetThe mystic hush that seemed to fadeAway like sound, as down the gladeWe passed beyond their zone of light.Then through the forest's purple nightWe trotted, at a pleasant speed,With gay Pease-blossom and Mustard-seed.