The Years Between | Page 5

pick the worst of all?
'In sight of peace--from the Narrow Seas
O'er half the world to run--

With a cheated crew, to league anew
With the Goth and the
shameless Hun!'
THE VETERANS
[Written for the gathering of survivors of the Indian Mutiny, Albert
Hall, 1907.]
To-day, across our fathers' graves,
The astonished years reveal
The
remnant of that desperate host
Which cleansed our East with steel.
Hail and farewell! We greet you here,
With tears that none will
scorn--
O Keepers of the House of old,
Or ever we were born!
One service more we dare to ask--
Pray for us, heroes, pray,
That

when Fate lays on us our task
We do not shame the Day!
THE DECLARATION OF LONDON
JUNE 29, 1911
('On the re-assembling of Parliament after the Coronation, the
Government have no intention of allowing their followers to vote
according to their convictions on the Declaration of London, but insist
on a strictly party vote'--_Daily Papers_.)
We were all one heart and one race
When the Abbey trumpets blew.

For a moment's breathing-space
We had forgotten you
Now you
return to your honoured place
Panting to shame us anew.
We have walked with the Ages dead--
With our Past alive and ablaze,

And you bid us pawn our honour for bread;
This day of all the days!

And you cannot wait till our guests are sped,
Or last week's wreath
decays?
The light is still in our eyes
Of Faith and Gentlehood,
Of Service
and Sacrifice,
And it does not match our mood,
To turn so soon to
your treacheries
That starve our land of her food.
Our ears still carry the sound
Of our once Imperial seas,
Exultant
after our King was crowned,
Beneath the sun and the breeze.
It is
too early to have them bound
Or sold at your decrees.
Wait till the memory goes,
Wait till the visions fade,
We may
betray in time, God knows,
But we would not have it said,
When
you make report to our scornful foes,
That we kissed as we betrayed!
ULSTER
1912

('Their webs shall not become garments, neither shall they cover
themselves with their works; their works are works of iniquity, and the
act of violence is in their hands.'--_Isaiah lix 6_)
The dark eleventh hour
Draws on and sees us sold
To every evil
power
We fought against of old.
Rebellion, rapine, hate,

Oppression, wrong and greed
Are loosed to rule our fate,
By
England's act and deed.
The Faith in which we stand,
The laws we made and guard,
Our
honour, lives, and land
Are given for reward
To Murder done by
night,
To Treason taught by day,
To folly, sloth, and spite,
And
we are thrust away.
The blood our fathers spilt,
Our love, our toils, our pains,
Are
counted us for guilt,
And only bind our chains.
Before an Empire's
eyes
The traitor claims his price.
What need of further lies?
We
are the sacrifice.
We asked no more than leave
To reap where we had sown,
Through
good and ill to cleave
To our own flag and throne.
Now England's
shot and steel
Beneath that flag must show
How loyal hearts should
kneel
To England's oldest foe.
We know the war prepared
On every peaceful home,
We know the
hells declared
For such as serve not Rome--
The terror, threats, and
dread
In market, hearth, and field--
We know, when all is said,

We perish if we yield.
Believe, we dare not boast,
Believe, we do not fear--
We stand to
pay the cost
In all that men hold dear.
What answer from the North?

One Law, one Land, one Throne.
If England drive us forth
We
shall not fall alone.
THE COVENANT

1914
We thought we ranked above the chance of ill.
Others might fall, not
we, for we were wise--
Merchants in freedom. So, of our free-will

We let our servants drug our strength with lies.
The pleasure and the
poison had its way
On us as on the meanest, till we learned
That he
who lies will steal, who steals will slay.
Neither God's judgment nor
man's heart was turned.
Yet there remains His Mercy--to be sought
Through wrath and peril
till we cleanse the wrong
By that last right which our forefathers
claimed
When their Law failed them and its stewards were bought.
This is our cause. God help us, and make strong
Our wills to meet
Him later, unashamed!
FRANCE
1913
_Broke to every known mischance, lifted over all
By the light sane
joy of life, the buckler of the Gaul; Furious in luxury, merciless in toil,

Terrible with strength that draws from her tireless soil; Strictest
judge of her own worth, gentlest of man's mind, First to follow Truth
and last to leave old Truths behind-- France, beloved of every soul that
loves its fellow-kind!_
Ere our birth (rememberest thou?) side by side we lay
Fretting in the
womb of Rome to begin our fray.
Ere men knew our tongues apart,
our one task was known-- Each must mould the other's fate as he
wrought his own
To this end we stirred mankind till all Earth was
ours, Till our world-end strifes begat wayside thrones and powers--
Puppets that we made or broke to bar the other's path-- Necessary,
outpost folk, hirelings of our wrath
To this end we stormed