THE MARCHING MORROWS.

Now gird thee well for courage,

My knight of twenty year,

Against the marching morrows

That fill the world with fear!

The flowers fade before them;

The summer leaves the hill;

Their trumpets range the morning,

And those who hear grow still.

Like pillagers of harvest,

Their fame is far abroad,

As gray remorseless troopers

That plunder and maraud.

The dust is on their corselets;

Their marching fills the world;

With conquest after conquest

Their banners are unfurled.

They overthrow the battles

Of every lord of war,

From world-dominioned cities

Wipe out the names they bore.

Sohrab, Rameses, Roland,

Ramoth, Napoleon, Tyre,

And the Romeward Huns of Attila —

Alas, for their desire!

By April and by autumn

They perish in their pride,

And still they close and gather

Out of the mountain-side.

The tanned and tameless children

Of the wild elder earth,

With stature of the northlights,

They have the stars for girth.

There's not a hand to stay them,

Of all the hearts that brave;

No captain to undo them,

No cunning to off-stave.

Yet fear thou not! If haply

Thou be the kingly one,

They'll set thee in their vanguard

To lead them round the sun.