Is woven round the world this sombre day.
Her children wearing of the maple-leaf
Stand with bowed heads by backwoods, lake
and bay.
Beneath the shining of the Southern Cross,
The peoples of her Island-Continent
Grief-stricken, brothers in a common loss
Deep in their bushland many a head is bent.
The cities of the mosque and minaret
Mourn for their Empress. On many a coral
shore,
Palm and lagoon, strange races lingering yet,
Hear that the Great White Mother is no more.
ii2 FINIS CORONAT OPUS
And mourners stand where English foot ne'er
stood
Mourners where her flag never was unfurl'd.
Her Queenhood was for us ; her Womanhood
For all the world.
V.
Take her unto her Rest :
The end of such a life comes not to-day.
Take her unto her Rest :
The end comes not when one shall say,
" Dust unto Dust" the end is far away.
Take her unto her Rest.
VI.
We hear the muffled bells that toll :
We hear the muffled drums that roll :
The cannon's sullen boom :
But through the gloom
There comes a note of triumph o'er the tomb :
We hear the Voice which saith :
" She has been faithful unto Death"
Lift up your hearts, ye people, for she comes,
A Queen unto her Crown of Life to-day.
The Dead March is a Coronation Lay
There is triumph in the rolling of the drums.
F. FRANKFORT MOOR
G. M. MATHIESON
XLIV.
THE drooping flags, the slow and solemn bells,
Hushed hamlets, and mute cities all proclaim
The grief that in an Empire's bosom dwells
The world's last tribute to a noble name.
No, not the last ; for we, Her people true,
Shall prize Her name and hold its saintly
worth
As faithful wardens, all the long years through,
Of the great heritage she left on earth :
An Empire wide as the world is wide, built on
of Right,
A syrord that frets at a craven sheath when
tyrants seek to smite ;
The will to do and the heart to dare to guard a
sacred cause,
A simple faith in the God who rules and His
immortal laws.
H
ii 4 At VICTORIA'S GRAVE
No braggart mien shall we seek to bear in
councils of the world
Patience shall curb our wounded pride ere yet
a blow be hurled ;
Jealous of honour but slow to wrath, making
allies of our foes,
But wakeful ever and steeled for fight if one
his gauntlet throws.
To dream of a Homeland peaceful, pure, and a
people happy, free
Eager to witness our dearest dreams weld with
reality ;
These be the beacons Her children light along
their Empire way,
These be the vows that Her people take beside
Her grave to-day.
The drooping flags, the slow and solemn bells,
Hushed hamlets, and mute cities all proclaim
The grief that in an Empire's bosom dwells
A universal tribute to Her name.
But when the trappings of our woe are shed,
And bells in triumph peal across the land,
Our footsteps by Her mem'ry shall be led
Her gracious spirit lead us by the hand.
G. M. MATHIESON.
HAROLD BOULTON 115
XLV.
WHERE be the plaudits of the crowd,
To hail with joy the pageant proud,
The voices glad that shout aloud,
" The Queen comes " ?
Bewildered, dumb the concourse vast,
For this State progress is her last,
'Mid half-choked sobs the word has passed
" The Queen comes."
Hush, countless throng, your breathing deep,
Lest wild and loud and long ye weep,
Borne through your midst as though in sleep,
The Queen comes.
Silent and slow the footsteps fall
Of mighty Kings that bear her pall :
The mightiest, noblest of them all
The Queen, comes.
n6 REQUIESCAT
Thus in the winter daylight brief,
Ere Spring puts forth her earliest leaf,
'Mid loyal millions plunged in grief
The Queen comes.
Take a last look upon her bier
Whose name the nations all revere :
Think it not shame to shed that tear !
The Queen comes.
HAROLD BOULTON.
XLVI.
DARK clouds are lowered o'er the land,
The mourners in our streets are seen,
Chill Death has laid his glacial hand
Upon our honoured, much-loved Queen.
He came not with sharp, sudden crush,
Nor dealt fierce, unexpected blow,
But softly, as in murmured hush,
With gentle touches laid Her low.
COUNTESS OF CORK 117
Some halting fainting scarcely pain,
Foreshadowing Life's web outspun,
Some wildering of a tired brain,
And lo ! the well-sped Race was run.
Half-masted Flag and tolling Bell,
The fatal tidings quickly spread,
Deep sadness greeted sound of Knell
And rev'rent list'ners bowed the head.
Wrapped l in dear relics of the Past,
In folded hands a cross on breast
Symbol of Faith Her soul held fast
That long-proved Soul hath gained its Rest.
Of many Lands the Rulers come
To watch, with homage justly due,
Her passing to the Silent Home
'Mid throng of loyal hearts and true.
Yet through all pomp of humankind
Her Sons who grieve, as Daughters weep,
Chief comfort in this thought may find,
" God giveth His Beloved sleep."
E. C. CORK.
1 Laid in her wedding veil, with the rings given by the
Prince Consort.
n8 THE LAST PAGEANT
XLVII.
criir Itast ^agrnnt.
OF all the mighty pageants of her reign,
This is the last, that we behold to-day.
Once more with regal state she comes again ;
Once more the people stand in long array.
Oh, not in maiden brightness as at first,
Crown on her head and sceptre in her hand,
While shouting thousands hail her, all athirst
To see and greet her, Queen of this fair land !
Nor yet as when she came in Jubilee,
To render thanks for sixty splendid years,
When the glad nations greeted her the free,
Whom freedom made more closely, surely,
hers!
Not even as when, in last year's darker days,
Whose darkness made her people grow more
dear,
She drove to greet them through the crowded
ways
Ah, not as then ! for then she heard them
cheer.
She comes with music only this last time,
And silently the Kings behind her ride ;
A. M. HARRIS 119
Yet is the pageantry no less sublime
Than when she passed in crowned pomp and
pride.
Lo, the regalia on her coffin laid !
Priceless the jewels there that once she wore,
The emblems of her Empire's power, displayed
Unto her people's wondering eyes once more !
Because she mourned at heart her soldiers' fate,
Who died afar, and whom she could not save,
She chose for this last ride a warrior's state,
Is like a soldier carried to her grave.
And well it was that first her stately fleet
Should swell the glory of her funeral train,
And the waves bear her, and the waters beat
About her vessel's prow but once again.
Oh, not for idle show of wealth and power,
Our streets are decked with purple gloom
to-day ;
It is a people's greeting in the hour
When she they loved so long is borne away !
Nothing we bring into the world indeed,
And nothing take away ; but she shall leave
Great deeds behind her ; for she sowed the seed
Of good that yet her people shall achieve.
120 THE LAST PAGEANT
Mother of Kings and Queens ! Her children sit
On many thrones ; her counsels moved the
world ;
O'er all the seas her merchant vessels flit,
On every continent her flag's unfurled.
Not only we lament her ; for our loss
Is also theirs who dwell in realms afar :
And there are tears beneath the Southern Cross,
And there is grief beneath the Northern Star.
All the dark nations loved her their true friend !
Their prayers went up for her from mosque
and shrine ;
In this her hour all warring worships blend,
And Love breaks down the creeds' dividing
line.
The end of life crowns all ; and to the end
She was our faithful Mother, Empress, Queen :
Wide as the world her golden deeds extend ;
The far lands felt her influence serene.
Surely the end crowns all ; we will not weep :
So long she worked for us ; now let her rest.
Not of her own desire she fell asleep,
She but obeyed a greater King's behest.
A. M. HARRIS.
W. S. CASE 121
anfc
ONE thought this day is graven on all minds,
One requiem note from every steeple rings ;
This day all hearts, the lowliest and the
King's,
One name Victoria together binds.
The floods of life are stilled, a shadowy hand
Touches the spring-tide of each English
heart ;
No clamorous voices jangle on the mart
The while Her name is lauded through the land.
She kept each jewel of Her girlhood's crown
Truth, Wisdom, Love resplendent all Her
years ;
She bore Her sceptre, as the shepherd bears
His sheltering staff, all heedless of renown.
Tears and thanksgiving mingle at Her tomb ;
Our grief is pride, Her funeral song our
praise :
E'en as we mourn, the lustre of Her days
Shines like the star of ev'ning through the
gloom.
W. S. CASE.
122 NORA HOPPER
XLIX.
f^att antr JTarrlurlL
IN PACE REQUIESCAT. Eyes have seen
No nobler Queen,
No tenderer mother, no more loving wife,
No sweeter woman in all ways of life.
Wars you have wept for yea, with tears of blood ;
You have been tried with fire ; the bitter flood
Has risen to your lips that all must drink.
Where other women failed you did not sink,
But drank and flinched not, and again did drink.
One sorrow only has your master been.
IN PACE REQUIESCAT. Every bell
Hail and farewell
Says over all its tolling ; none dare cry
Ichabod ! All the glory is gone by.
You built yourself a fair and lasting fame
In all our hearts, and round about your name
Light lingers as the sea's voice in a shell.
None shall gainsay that it is well with you,
Seeing again the lover that you knew,
When a bride's quick and happy breath you drew.
You gentle heart, tried long and wounded deep,
Lie still. God giveth His beloved sleep.
NORA HOPPER.
CHARLES CAMP TARELLI 123
L.
o Fictorta*
ENGLAND girt with her seas,
And the far fair lands by all the seas of the
world
Washed, that are trodden of English limbs,
Or tilled of the myriad tribes that have reaped
in English bonds
Peace and an equal law,
Suddenly darkened and hushed to a silence
heavy with tears,
Mourn, as children mourn
Who watch the last light die from the eyes
their eyes beheld
When they opened first on a world unknown
and dark ;
Who feel the cold invade the breasts that have
given them suck,
The pale brows crowned with hair for them
grown grey.
O Lady loved as a mother of all thy lands,
Hardly in dreams had we deemed that thou
couldst die
We who have known but thy day, who were
born in the shadow of thee;
i2 4 TO VICTORIA
Who have seen on the throne of our turbulent
kings
No form but thine, and under a crown that has
clasped
Tragic and terrible brows no face but thine
Thy face that, sweet with the tremulous beauty
of youth,
Dawned on an ancient kingdom big with change;
Grew, in the changing clamour of difficult days,
More loved, more honoured of all thy realm,
more fair,
With a deeper life looking out at the eyes
From a heart grown rich with ripening years
and sweet
With joys and fruitful griefs of home and
throne,
Of wifehood, motherhood, queenhood. O my
Queen,
All that we worship in woman the virginal soul,
And royal grace of high simplicity,
The love that exalts and ennobles and blesses
the heart that it loves,
The smile of the mother who clasps to her
breast the fruit of her pain,
The faith that feels God near in the night of
anguish and loss,
CHARLES CAMP TARELLI 125
The fervour of hope and remembrance that
joins the living and dead
These in thee we beheld enthroned, and the
throne with these
Made lovely grew for us all
A centre of holy influence exquisite,
The shrine of a heart that beat with all our
hearts,
That pulsed with an Empire's glory and
grief,
And knew all pains, all cares that are known of
the humblest heart;
That the widow bowed in the hush of a lonely
home,
And the mother who knelt for her son in peril
of wave or of war,
And the soldier fall'n in thy battles with alien
shouts in his ears,
And the lowliest toiler at rest in a haven of
circling smiles,
Ay, all in thy far-strewn realm who laboured or
wept or rejoiced
Looked to a crowned grey head that even as
theirs had endured
Labour and sorrow and joy in the flight of the
changing hours ;
iz6 TO VICTORIA
Felt in all that they felt a bond that bound
them to thee,
O Woman whose white hairs hallowed with
sacred grief
Are twined so close with all the threads of our
fate,
We cannot think 'tis thou,
Yonder, through thronged and silent streets,
With muffled thunder of guns in the air,
With mournful splendour of kingly pageantry,
And music of solemn instruments,
Borne to thine endless rest.
Alas ! to us 'tis hard
To know thee gone from a world thou hast
served so well,
From an Empire that in thee its oneness knew ;
Yet to the longest day
Night comes, and an end to the longest task ;
And thou thy long day rilled with its arduous
task well done
At last is closed, and the solemn night is here
Ah rest, with the heart thou hast mourned so
long
Rejoined, and with all thou hast loved and
bidden adieu ;
CHARLES CAMP TARELLI 127
Rest if rest be indeed the reward of the faith-
ful dead ;
Rest, if thou wilt, if thou canst for who knows
if love, set free
From the weight of cumbering flesh, from the
tired limbs bent with age,
Rests, or desires to rest, nor rather yearns,
In that great day beyond the night we fear,
For larger tasks and nobler ministries,
Free service of free love
In all the many mansions of God's house ?
O Spirit in that ampler world unseen
At rest, or ruler of kingdoms ten times ten
If aught of our dark earth can touch thee yet,
Forget not this thy kingdom, lorn of thee
In a troubled and dubious time, with mighty toils
Unfinished, stubborn foes unquelled, and lands
Bleeding and torn with lingering war to atone
To our wide Imperial peace ah, still,
A centre of holy influence exquisite,
Hover about the King thy son, who now
With eyes still wet with thy loss puts on thy
crown and thy cares,
In the sight of us thy people, one with him
In grief and tremulous hope.
CHARLES CAMP TARELLI.
128 VALE VICTORIA
LI.
Fale F(ctotta,
THROUGH all the pomp and pageantry of woe
And martial trappings, festival of death,
The solemn march, majestically slow,
The sob repressed, the million's bated breath,
Hope bravely proud looks up amid the gloom,
Remembers ever all the golden days,
The path unto and far beyond the tomb,
The Monarch's crown and Virtue's queenlier
praise.
On fairest scroll of History emblazed,
Her name VICTORIA, radiant as gold,
Refined and sun-kissed, on our standard raised,
Shall spur our souls to emulation bold
Of knightly deeds, the stress of hand and heart
Which make our country famous, and her
youth
The stalwarts of the earth, till should depart
Our zeal for Justice, Chivalry, and Truth.
W. C. SAVILLE 129
Britannia weeps, but, hopeful through her tears,
Faith in the future lumes with Heaven's light
Her progress in the century's dawning years
In sweet remembrance Victor in the right.
Dead ! No, Immortal Earth and Heaven cry,
Twice crowned VICTORIA, blest for evermore :
Not till the crash of worlds, when all must die
Shall fade her name from Legend's richest
lore.
W. C. SAVILLE.
LII.
"Quae te tarn laeta tulerunt
Saecula ? qui tanti talem genuere parentes ? "
id, I. 605-6.
LAY her to rest. O hour of grief and awe !
We say not England's happier days are done ;
But who with that magnetic touch shall draw
And weld our world-spread Empire into
one?
May He, who gave the mother, grace the son !
So simply noble that almost she made
Of earth-born sovereignty a thing divine.
Love was her law, by purity she swayed,
i
1 30 JAMES RHOADES
A power nor grief nor age could undermine
Her throne an altar, and her hearth a shrine.
Queen, wife, and mother peerless : even so :
And this shall be her fame in after years
Or alien or akin, or friend or foe,
Old jealousies forgot, old feuds and fears,
The whole earth wrote her epitaph in tears.
Lay her to rest. Her memory shall be blown
Like pure sweet air upon a tortured clime.
She made for peace, and passes to her own
With those who reign O recompense sub-
lime !
Beyond the folding gates of space and time.
JAMES RHOADES.
LIII.
THROUGH the grim avenue of naval power,
'Mid roar of guns in one sad thunder blent ;
By dock and arsenal, by fort and tower ;
Past field and down, past town and tenement ;
Past park and palace and empurpled street
Of that great city where the silent crowd
In serried ranks of black, wait, sorrow-bow'd,
The passing of the Well-Belov'd to greet ;
A. CAPES TARBOLTON 131
Up the steep slope to Windsor's castled gate
By stalwart arms of martial liegemen borne,
While Europe's greatest, come from far to
mourn,
Press round her bier and hold her pall of
State.
Then the high fane, the anthem's rise and fall,
The prayer sent heavenward with united
breath,
The lights that gleam on roof and sculptured
wall,
The last long pomp of Majesty in death.
And then, ah, then ! one more brief journey
done
An end to all Imperial state and pride.
Love, love alone remains, love's goal is won ;
True wife, she slumbers, resting at his side.
O death, who long didst part them, now by thee,
Not only in the tomb rejoined they lie,
United through the love that cannot die.
They live and love in God's eternity !
A. CAPES TARBOLTON.
132 THROUGH THE STAR-VEIL
LIV.
" Quo nihil majus meliusve terris." HOR.
IT was a palace grey and olden,
And a century new born ;
And the brumal clouds lay folden
On the dim brow of the morn j
And tearful stars looked weary
In their vigil in the sky,
And the mournful wind sighed eerie
In the tree-tops weird and high.
Then fell a hush supernal,
And the awed wind held her breath
'Fore the eye of the Eternal
And the sable wing of Death.
On the earth were woe and weeping,
Through the star-veil was a rent,
Through the star-veil, regal sweeping,
To her rest the Good Queen went.
W. STEWART ROSS 133
There were cries of lamentation,
And burning tears were shed
By a stricken, wailing nation
Over her royal dead ;
And the muffled bells rang sorrow,
And black banners waved in gloom
In the dawn of that dim morrow
That opened on the tomb.
There was a Queen in years of old, 1
The stately, proud, and brave,
Who, cased in steel and flashing gold,
Her bloody chariot drave
Sheer on thy ranks, invading Rome,
In all her queenly pride ;
For crown and altar, hearth and home,
She strave, and striving died :
And, down since then our crown hath been
On many a noble brow,
But never graced so loved a Queen
As her we mourn for now.
O pure of deed and pure of soul,
Thy life is with us still,
And shall be as the aeons roll
Thy purpose to fulfil,
1 Boadicea.
134 THROUGH THE STAR-VEIL
Proving the Good alone are Great,
Hymning in anthem tones :
Wifehood is nobler yet than State,
And Motherhood than Thrones !
We grudge thee, Death, her dear, dear dust ;
Sad hearts, the wide world o'er,
Yield unto thee in tender trust
Her for thy vaults, Frogmore.
O'er the world is woe and weeping ;
Through the star-veil is a rent,
Through the star-veil, regal sweeping,
To her rest the Good Queen went.
W. STEWART Ross.
COTSFORD DICK 135
LV.
Falrtrtction,
FROM bud to bloom, from flower to fruit, we
grow;
Then from Life's tree Death culls the choicest
sprays.
So, now, a Nation turns with tristful gaze
Towards the inevitable tomb where, low,
All majesty must lie. With love's o'erflow,
Kings, Commons, Councillors and crowd, there,
raise
One tribute of commemorative praise
To Her the noblest Queen the world can
know.
Farewell! Most honoured of an honoured
realm !
No more shall bow thy head with toils of State,
Nor lapse of loved ones stress thy strenuous
heart.
Thy rest is won. With words that overwhelm,
Thy people from thy cherished presence part,
Commending thee to Peace inviolate.
COTSFORD DICK.
136 ARTHUR G. SYMONS
LVI.
DEATH parted us whom none but Death could
part,
And Death that parted makes us one again.
I knsw that thou wouldst come to me, dear
heart !
For since thou laid'st me in this stately fane
Where Death and silence fill the vasty dome,
Oft in the silent hours when mortals sleep
My soul to thine hath called, like deep to
deep,
And thine hath answered " Dear one, come ! "
" I come ! "
And thou art come ! Now in this silent land,
Wherein the measured spans of mortal life
Are lost in limitless eternity,
Where comes no echo of the fretful strife
Of the outer world, rewedded, thou and I
Will lie and dream for ever hand in hand.
ARTHUR G. SYMONS.
W. E. HENLEY 139
LVII.
Ffrtorur.
24TH MAY 1819 : 22ND JANUARY 1901.
SCEPTRE and orb and crown,
High ensigns of a sovran ty impaling
The beauty and strength and wealth 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 function ENGLAND'S self,
Home-coloured, ENGLAND in look and deed
and dream ;
Like the good meadows and woods, and the
mild rivers
And sea-charmed cliffs and beaches, that still
bring
A gush of tender pride to the heart
That beats in ENGLAND'S airs, to ENGLAND'S
ends;
1 40 REGIME DILECTISSIM^E
August, familiar, irremovable,
Like the dear stars that shine
In the dear skies that only ENGLAND knows :
So that we held it sure
GOD'S aim, GOD'S will, GOD'S way,
When Empire from her footstool, realm on
realm,
Spread, even as from her notable womb
Sprang line on line of kings ;
For she was ENGLAND ENGLAND and our
Queen.
* * *
IV.
Be that your chief of mourning that !
ENGLAND, O Mother, and you,
The daughter Princedoms born and reared
Of ENGLAND'S travail and sweet blood
And never will you realms,
The live earth over and round,
Wherethrough for sixty royal and regnant years
Her drum-tap made the dawns
English O, never, never will you
So fittingly and well have paid your debt
Of grief and gratitude to the souls
That sink in ENGLAND'S harness into the
dream :
W. E. HENLEY 141
" I die for ENGLAND'S sake, and it is well : "
As now to this valiant, wonderful piece of earth,
To which the assembling nations bare the head
And bend the knee
In absolute veneration once your Queen.
Sceptre and orb and crown,
High ensigns of a sovranty impaling
The glory and state and praise of a whole half-
world,
Fall from her, and, preceding, she departs
Into the old, indissoluble peace.
W. E. HENLEY.
LVIII.
HAVE a care, all of ye ! Never a tear must fall
Over the garlands we string in Her praise ;
I, Veru, will it so Veru, the oldest here,
Grand-dam to half of ye, wise in long days.
For, see you, sisterlings ! though She was new
to us
Here in the villages, though the glad word
That She would help us folk, ease the Birth-
gates for us,
Widen all life for us, scarce had been heard ;
142 THE VILLAGE MOTHER SPEAKS
Yet She was old, they say, weary as women
grow,
Weary as I am ! So speed Her to rest
After the ancient way as to Her Bridal bed l
Seeing Death holds all Her dearest, Her best.
Chuh ! little daughterling ! What means yon
crystal drop
Gemming the champak - bud ? Is this thy
dread
Bride of my grandson's son lest in the Birth-
giving
Death close the door on thee now She is dead ?
Fear not Suheli child ! E'en if it close on
thee,
Truly Her guardianship now is twice worth ;
Living or dying She now keeps the gate for us,
Mother of many in Death as in Birth.
Lo ! Are our garlands strung ? Then let us
forth with them,
Raise high our platters, and sing as we go,
Swinging the petticoats, clashing the anklet-
bells,
Challenging Kali, our Mother-of-woe,
1 In India the old are buried with rejoicing, as at a
wedding.
FLORA ANNIE STEEL 143
Right to Her Altar-steps. There let us lay our
gifts,
After old fashion, to make the gods kind,
Offerings twice given to both our Great Mothers,
Fearing no whit if the elder should mind,
Since queens know a queen's touch, and hath
not Victoria
Claimed us of Kali again and again ?
Is She not equal ? And is not Parameshwar 1
Giver to Queens of their joy or their pain ?
Raise our brass platters, then ! clashing our
anklet-bells,
Swinging our petticoats as for a bride,
Mothers of many for Death or Life-giving,
Kali ! Victoria ! Stand side by side !
FLORA ANNIE STEEL.
LIX.
Fictorta,
THIS is no Queen, that was, and is no more ;
No mere anointed Monarch, from a Throne
On this poor planet, wafted to a shore
Where the Eternal Spirit reigns alone ;
1 The God of Gods.
i 4 4 VICTORIA
And no mere mother, wife, or faithful friend
Tho' all of these in her one name combined