10
II.
Et certamen erat, Corydon cum Thyrside, magnum.
MORN, in yellow and white came broadening out from the mountains,
Long ere music and reel were hushed in the barn of the dancers.
Duly in matutine bathed before eight some two of the party,
There where in mornings was custom, where over a ledge of granite
Into a granite bason descended the amber torrent
Duly there two plunges each took Philip and Arthur,
Duly in matutine bathed, and read, and wished for breakfast;
Breakfast commencing at nine lingered lazily on to noon-day.
Tea and coffee was there; a jug of water for Hewson;
Tea and coffee; and four cold grouse upon the sideboard;
Cranberry-jam was reserved for tea, and for festive occasions:
Gaily they talked, as they sat, some late and lazy at breakfast,
Some professing a book, some smoking outside at the window.
'Neath an aurora soft pouring a still sheeny tide to the zenith,
Hewson and Arthur, with Adam, had walked and got home by eleven;
Hope and the others had staid till the round sun lighted them bedward.
They of the lovely aurora, but these of the lovelier women
Spoke—of noble ladies and rustic girls, their partners.
Turned to them Hewson, the chartist, the poet, the eloquent speaker.
Sick of the very names of your Lady Augustas and Floras
Am I, as ever I was of the dreary botanical titles
Of the exotic plants, their antitypes, in the hothouse:
Roses, violets, lilies for me! the out-of-door beauties;
Meadow and woodland sweets, forget-me-nots and heartsease!
Pausing awhile, he proceeded anon, for none made answer.
Oh, if our high-born girls knew only the grace, the attraction,
Labour, and labour alone, can add to the beauty of women,
Truly the milliner's trade would quickly, I think, be at discount,
All the waste and loss in silk and satin be saved us,
Saved for purposes truly and widely productive
That's right,
Take off your coat to it, Philip, cried Lindsay, outside in the garden,
Lindsay, cigar-loving hero, the Piper, the Dialectician,
Take off your coat to it, Philip.
