I

      The thick lids of Night closed upon me
        Alone at the Bill
        Of the Isle by the Race {1} -
       Many-caverned, bald, wrinkled of face -
And with darkness and silence the spirit was on me
         To brood and be still.

II

      No wind fanned the flats of the ocean,
        Or promontory sides,
        Or the ooze by the strand,
      Or the bent-bearded slope of the land,
Whose base took its rest amid everlong motion
        Of criss-crossing tides.

III

      Soon from out of the Southward seemed nearing
        A whirr, as of wings
        Waved by mighty-vanned flies,
      Or by night-moths of measureless size,
And in softness and smoothness well-nigh beyond hearing
        Of corporal things.
IV

      And they bore to the bluff, and alighted -
        A dim-discerned train
        Of sprites without mould,
      Frameless souls none might touch or might hold -
On the ledge by the turreted lantern, farsighted
        By men of the main.

V

      And I heard them say "Home!" and I knew them
        For souls of the felled
        On the earth's nether bord
       Under Capricorn, whither they'd warred,
And I neared in my awe, and gave heedfulness to them
         With breathings inheld.

VI

      Then, it seemed, there approached from the northward
        A senior soul-flame
        Of the like filmy hue:
      And he met them and spake: "Is it you,
O my men?" Said they, "Aye! We bear homeward and hearthward
        To list to our fame!"
VII

      "I've flown there before you," he said then:
        "Your households are well;
        But—your kin linger less
      On your glory arid war-mightiness
Than on dearer things."—"Dearer?" cried these from the dead then,
        "Of what do they tell?"

VIII

      "Some mothers muse sadly, and murmur
        Your doings as boys -
        Recall the quaint ways
      Of your babyhood's innocent days.
Some pray that, ere dying, your faith had grown firmer,
        And higher your joys.

IX

      "A father broods: 'Would I had set him
        To some humble trade,
        And so slacked his high fire,
      And his passionate martial desire;
Had told him no stories to woo him and whet him
        To this due crusade!"
X

      "And, General, how hold out our sweethearts,
        Sworn loyal as doves?"
         —"Many mourn; many think
      It is not unattractive to prink
Them in sables for heroes. Some fickle and fleet hearts
        Have found them new loves."

XI

      "And our wives?" quoth another resignedly,
        "Dwell they on our deeds?"
        —"Deeds of home; that live yet
      Fresh as new—deeds of fondness or fret;
Ancient words that were kindly expressed or unkindly,
        These, these have their heeds."

XII

       —"Alas! then it seems that our glory
        Weighs less in their thought
        Than our old homely acts,
       And the long-ago commonplace facts
Of our lives—held by us as scarce part of our story,
        And rated as nought!"

XIII

      Then bitterly some: "Was it wise now
        To raise the tomb-door
        For such knowledge? Away!"
      But the rest: "Fame we prized till to-day;
Yet that hearts keep us green for old kindness we prize now
        A thousand times more!"
XIV

      Thus speaking, the trooped apparitions
        Began to disband
        And resolve them in two:
      Those whose record was lovely and true
Bore to northward for home: those of bitter traditions
        Again left the land,

XV

      And, towering to seaward in legions,
        They paused at a spot
        Overbending the Race -
      That engulphing, ghast, sinister place -
Whither headlong they plunged, to the fathomless regions
        Of myriads forgot.

XVI

      And the spirits of those who were homing
        Passed on, rushingly,
        Like the Pentecost Wind;
      And the whirr of their wayfaring thinned
And surceased on the sky, and but left in the gloaming
        Sea-mutterings and me.

December 1899.