In Memoriam George Warrington Steevens

London, December 10, 1869.
Ladysmith, January 15, 1900.

We cheered you forth - brilliant and kind and brave.
Under your country's triumphing flag you fell.
It floats, true Heart, over no dearer grave -
Brave and brilliant and kind, hail and farewell!

William Ernest Henley

William Ernest Henley was an English poet, critic, and editor. Despite battling tuberculosis from a young age, Henley is best known for his resilience and strength, qualities exemplified in his most famous poem, 'Invictus'. Henley was also a notable figure in the literary circles of his time, befriending and influencing key writers, such as Robert Louis Stevenson, who modeled the character Long John Silver after him.

William Ernest Henley

Double Ballade Of The Nothingness Of Things

William Ernest Henley, Simple Poetry

The Past Was Goodly Once

William Ernest Henley, Simple Poetry

London Types - XIII. Barmaid

William Ernest Henley, Simple Poetry

On The Way To Kew

William Ernest Henley, Simple Poetry

English

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In Memoriam Thomas Edward Brown

(Ob. October 30, 1897)

He looked half-parson and half-skipper: a quaint,
Beautiful blend, with blue eyes good to see,
And old-world whiskers.    You found him cynic, saint,
Salt, humourist, Christian, poet; with a free,
Far-glancing, luminous utterance; and a heart
Large as ST. FRANCIS'S: withal a brain
Stored with experience, letters, fancy, art,
And scored with runes of human joy and pain.
Till six-and-sixty years he used his gift,
His gift unparalleled, of laughter and tears,
And left the world a high-piled, golden drift
Of verse: to grow more golden with the years,
Till the Great Silence fallen upon his ways
Break into song, and he that had Love have Praise.

William Ernest Henley

In Memoriam. - Mr. George Beach,

Died at Hartford, May 4th, 1860.


Aye, robe yourselves in black, light messengers
Whose letter'd faces to the people tell
The pulse and pressure of the passing hour.
'Tis fitting ye should sympathize with them,
And tint your tablets with a sable hue
Who bring them tidings of a loss so great.

What have they lost?
                    An upright man, who scorn'd
All subterfuge, who faithful to his trust
Guarded the interests they so highly prized,
With power and zeal unchang'd, from youth to age.

Yet there's a sadder sound of bursting tears
From woe-worn helpless ones, from widow'd forms
O'er whom he threw a shelter, for his name
Long mingled with their prayers, both night and morn.
The Missionary toward the setting sun
Will miss his l...

Lydia Howard Sigourney

George L. Stearns

He has done the work of a true man,
Crown him, honor him, love him.
Weep, over him, tears of woman,
Stoop manliest brows above him!

O dusky mothers and daughters,
Vigils of mourning keep for him!
Up in the mountains, and down by the waters,
Lift up your voices and weep for him,

For the warmest of hearts is frozen,
The freest of hands is still;
And the gap in our picked and chosen
The long years may not fill.

No duty could overtask him,
No need his will outrun;
Or ever our lips could ask him,
His hands the work had done.

He forgot his own soul for others,
Himself to his neighbor lending;
He found the Lord in his suffering brothers,
And not in the clouds descending.

So the bed was sweet to die on,
Whence he ...

John Greenleaf Whittier

Last Post

The day's high work is over and done,
And these no more will need the sun:
Blow, you bugles of ENGLAND, blow!
These are gone whither all must go,
Mightily gone from the field they won.
So in the workaday wear of battle,
Touched to glory with GOD'S own red,
Bear we our chosen to their bed.
Settle them lovingly where they fell,
In that good lap they loved so well;
And, their deliveries to the dear LORD said,
And the last desperate volleys ranged and sped,
Blow, you bugles of ENGLAND, blow
Over the camps of her beaten foe -
Blow glory and pity to the victor Mother,
Sad, O, sad in her sacrificial dead!

Labour, and love, and strife, and mirth,
They gave their part in this goodly Earth -
Blow, you bugles of ENGLAND, blow! -
That her Name as a su...

William Ernest Henley

In Memoriam Reginae Dilectissimae Victoriae

(May 24, 1819 - January 22, 1901)

Sceptre and orb and crown,
High ensigns of a sovranty containing
The beauty and strength and state of half a World,
Pass from her, and she fades
Into the old, inviolable peace.

I

She had been ours so long
She seemed a piece of ENGLAND: spirit and blood
And message ENGLAND'S self,
Home-coloured, ENGLAND in look and deed and dream;
Like the rich meadows and woods, the serene rivers,
And sea-charmed cliffs and beaches, that still bring
A rush of tender pride to the heart
That beats in ENGLAND'S airs to ENGLAND'S ends:
August, familiar, irremovable,
Like the good stars that shine
In the good skies that only ENGLAND knows:
So that we held it sure
GOD'S aim, GOD'S will, GOD'S way,
When Empire fr...

William Ernest Henley

On The Loss Of The Royal George.

Written When The News Arrived. To the March in Scipio.


Toll for the brave!
The brave that are no more;
All sunk beneath the wave,
Fast by their native shore!


Eight hundred of the brave,
Whose courage well was tried,
Had made the vessel heel,
And laid her on her side.


A land-breeze shook the shrouds,
And she was overset;
Down went the Royal George,
With all her crew complete.


Toll for the brave!
Brave Kempenfelt is gone;
His last sea-fight is fought;
His work of glory done.


It was not in the battle;
No tempest gave the shock;
She sprang no fatal leak;
She ran upon no rock.


His sword was in its sheath;
His fingers held the pen,
When Kempenfelt went down

William Cowper