I said then to myself, and I say it again,
Gainsay it you, gainsay it who will,
I shall say it over and over still,
And will say it ever; I know it true,
That I did all that a man could do

(Some good men's doings are done in vain)
To save that passionate child of the sun,
With her love as deep as the doubled main,
And as strong and fierce as a troubled sea-
That beautiful bronze with its soul of fire,
Its tropical love and its kingly ire—
That child as fix'd as a pyramid,

As tall as a tula and pure as a nun--
And all there is of it, the all I did,
As often happens was done in vain.

So there is no bit of her blood on me.

"She is marvelous young and is wonderful

fair,'

I said again, and my heart grew bold,

And beat and beat a charge for my feet. 'Time that defaces us, places, and replaces us, And trenches our faces in furrows for tears, Has traced here nothing in all these years. 'Tis the hair of gold that I vex'd of old,

The marvelous flowing flower of hair,

And the peaceful eyes in their sweet surprise
That I have kiss'd till the head swam round.
And the delicate curve of the dimpled chin,
And the pouting lips and the pearls within
Are the same, the same, but so young, so fair!'
My heart leapt out and back at a bound,
As a child that starts, then stops, then lingers.
'How wonderful young!' I lifted my fingers
And fell to counting the round years down
That I had dwelt where the sun tans brown.

"Four full hands, and a finger over!
'She does not know me, her truant lover,'

I said to myself, for her brow was a-frown
As I stepp'd still nearer, with my head held
down,

All abash'd and in blushes my brown face

over;

'She does not know me, her long lost lover, For my beard's so long and my skin's so brown That I well might pass myself for another.' So I lifted my voice and I spake aloud: "Annette, my darling! Annette Macleod!' She started, she stopped, she turn'd, amazed,

She stood all wonder, her eyes wild-wide, Then turn'd in terror down the dusk wayside, And cried as she fled, 'The man he is crazed, And he calls the maiden name of my mother!'

"Let the world turn over, and over, and over,
And toss and tumble like beasts in pain,
Crack, quake, and tremble, and turn full over
And die, and never rise up again;

Let her dash her peaks through the purple

cover,

Let her plash her seas in the face of the sun—
I have no one to love me now, not one,
In a world as full as a world can hold;
So I will get gold as I erst have done,
I will gather a coffin top-full of gold;
To take to the door of Death, to buy--
Buy what, when I double my hands and die?

"Go down, go down to the fields of clover, Go down with your kine to the pastures fine, And give no thought, or care, or labor For maid or man, good name or neighbor; For I gave all as the years went overGave all my youth, my years and labor,

And a heart as warm as the world is cold,
For a beautiful, bright, and delusive lie.
Gave youth, gave years, gave love for gold;
Giving and getting, yet what have I?

"The red ripe stars hang low overhead, Let the good and the light of soul reach up. Pluck gold as plucking a butter-cup:

And the days go out and the tides come in,
And the pale moon rubs on her purple cover
Till worn as thin and as bright as tin;
But the ways are dark and the days are dreary,
And the dreams of youth are but dust in age,
And the heart grows harden'd and the hands
grow weary,

Holding them up for their heritage.

"For you promise so great and we gain so little;

For you promise so great of glory and gold, And we gain so little that the hands grow cold, And the strained heart-strings wear bare and

brittle,

And for gold and glory we gain instead.

A fond heart sicken'd and a fair hope dead.

"So I have said, and I say it over,

And can prove it over and over again,

That the four-footed beasts in the red-crown'd

clover,

The pied and horned beasts on the plain
That lie down, rise up, and repose again,

And do never take care or toil or spin,

Nor buy, nor build, nor gather in gold,
Though the days go out and the tides come in,
Are better than we by a thousand fold;
For what is it all, in the words of fire,

But a vexing of soul and a vain desire?"