in France in October 1916, and when you have grown intimate with him in his verse you will feel it is the veriest truth of him that shines in the lines written on his death by an anonymous friend who fancies him arriving earth-dusty in Paradise with quick, impulsive stride and a deprecating, rather derisive smile for any acclamations that greet him when the word is passed:
...'This man knew joy and grief; was wise
Where others stumbled, loved the fragrant earth
And flowers and winds and quiet autumnal skies;
He gave men laughter, nursed the frailest birth
Of fancy—joyed in comradeship; his mind
Was quick in mystery, pondered in the shade,
Loathed war and cruelty—was unafraid.'
And as the whisper passed, the dreaming ways,
Perchance, awoke as magic; all your days
Came hurrying with phantom feet to bind
A wreath of flowers on your reluctant head.
I like to think how you, who loved not praise,
Endured the welcome of the clear-eyed dead.
He loved Sedbergh, and Sedbergh loved him, and you may be sure there will not be lacking some who will henceforth see him return to it as he saw other shadows return in such nights as he commemorates in 'The Old Schoolroom':
