These lines are by the author of that exquisite little book “Ionica”—­a book about which I hope to talk to you in another lecture.  His real name was William Cory, and he was long the head-master of an English public school, during which time he composed and published anonymously the charming verses which have made him famous—­modelling his best work in close imitation of the Greek poets.  A few expressions in these lines need explanation.  For instance, the allusion to Hermes and his rod.  I think you know that Hermes is the Greek name of the same god whom the Romans called Mercury,—­commonly represented as a beautiful young man, naked and running quickly, having wings attached to the sandals upon his feet.  Runners used to pray to him for skill in winning foot races.  But this god had many forms and many attributes, and one of his supposed duties was to bring the souls of the dead into the presence of the king of Hades.  So you will see some pictures of him standing before the throne of the king of the Dead, and behind him a long procession of shuddering ghosts.  He is nearly always pictured as holding in his hands a strange sceptre called the caduceus, a short staff about which two little serpents are coiled, and at the top of which is a tiny pair of wings.  This is the golden rod referred to by the poet; when Hermes touched anybody with it, the soul of the person touched was obliged immediately to leave the body and follow after him.  So it is a very beautiful stroke of art in this poem to represent the touch of the hand of great love as having the magical power of the golden rod of Hermes.  It is as if the poet were to say:  “Should she but touch me, I know that my spirit would leap out of my body and follow after her.”  Then there is the expression “crescent-browed.”  It means only having beautifully curved eyebrows—­arched eyebrows being considered particularly beautiful in Western countries.

Now we will consider another poem of the ideal.  What we have been reading referred to ghostly ideals, to memories, or to hopes.  Let us now see how the poets have talked about realities.  Here is a pretty thing by Thomas Ashe.  It is entitled “Pansie”; and this flower name is really a corruption of a French word “Penser,” meaning a thought.  The flower is very beautiful, and its name is sometimes given to girls, as in the present case.

MEET WE NO ANGELS, PANSIE?

  Came, on a Sabbath noon, my sweet,
    In white, to find her lover;
  The grass grew proud beneath her feet,
    The green elm-leaves above her:—­
       Meet we no angels, Pansie?

  She said, “We meet no angels now;”
    And soft lights stream’d upon her;
  And with white hand she touch’d a bough;
    She did it that great honour:—­
       What! meet no angels, Pansie?

  O sweet brown hat, brown hair, brown eyes,
    Down-dropp’d brown eyes, so tender! 
  Then what said I?  Gallant replies
    Seem flattery, and offend her:—­
       But—­meet no angels, Pansie?