Homewards

From day to day, the golden sun
   His chariot ne’er restraineth,
From night to night the pale white moon
   Now waxeth and now waneth,
From hour to hour the bright stars turn
   In distances unending,
And all the mighty works of God,
   Are ever homeward tending.

The tiny streamlet on the hill
   Its wandering way pursueth,
The mighty river far below
   Adown the valley floweth,
The winds roam ever in the sky,
   The clouds are onward driving,
And towards some quiet shore—­at home
   The raging sea is striving.

Daybreak.

Yonder on fair Snowdon’s height,
      Ere breaks the light,
Stars that through the darkness swim
Are sinking in the distance dim.

See! the day its spears hath hurled
      From the Eastern world;
And each shaft is flaming red
As though the night had dying bled.

Matin song of skylark gay
      Proclaims the day;
Fled the dragons of the dark
And quenched the firefly’s glimmering spark.

White its head now Snowdon rears,
      The sun appears! 
Day and brightness, lo, he brings
To pauper’s cot and hall of kings.

The White Stone.

Though far from my poor, feeble hand,
   My country’s harp of gold,
Though far from that dear home I stand,
   Where it was played of old,
My mother tongue hath yet a spell
And inward voice, which bids me tell
My tale in song that Wales loves well,
   Whatever aliens hold.

A tiny streamlet wandering strayed
   Beneath our garden wall,
Where one of my forefathers made
   A mimic waterfall. 
Above the spot the willows weep,
Where down its height the water poured,
And on the bank beside the deep
   Fair apple trees keep ward.

Across the pool where fell the spate
   A bridge of wood was thrown;
And marble-like, to bear its weight,
   There stood a big white stone. 
Here all my boyhood’s hours sped by,
Here would I sit contentedly,
And on this stone as happy I
   As king upon his throne!

Where’er in this wide world I be,
   Where’er I yet may roam,
The great white stone I ever see,
   And hear the stream at home. 
And when to strangers I confess
That in my dreams I thither fly,
They pardon me, for all men bless
   Each childish memory.

Far off, far off are childhood’s days,
   And starry as the sky,
Nor lives the man but loves to raise
   His head with wistful eye
Towards the days that are no more: 
And as I turn towards that shore,
For me one star burns evermore—­
   My childhood’s dear white stone.

The Traitors of Wales.

You know the fate of Caractacus,
A name immortal for each of us,
Before whose face Rome’s legions dread
For nine long years in terror fled.