on the stones worn with rains,
    And we gaz’d up the aisle through the small leaded panes. 
    She sate by the pillar; we saw her clear: 
   “Margaret, hist! come quick, we are here! 
    Dear heart,” I said, “we are long alone;
    The sea grows stormy, the little ones moan.” 
    But, ah, she gave me never a look,
    For her eyes were seal’d to the holy book! 
    Loud prays the priest:  shut stands the door. 
    Come away, children, call no more! 
    Come away, come down, call no more!

    Down, down, down! 
    Down to the depths of the sea! 
    She sits at her wheel in the humming town,
    Singing most joyfully. 
    Hark what she sings:  “O joy, O joy,
    For the humming street, and the child with its toy! 
    For the priest, and the bell, and the holy well;
    For the wheel where I spun,
    And the blessed light of the sun!”
    And so she sings her fill,
    Singing most joyfully,
    Till the spindle drops from her hand,
    And the whizzing wheel stands still. 
    She steals to the window, and looks at the sand,
    And over the sand at the sea;
    And her eyes are set in a stare;
    And anon there breaks a sigh,
    And anon there drops a tear,
    From a sorrow-clouded eye,
    And a heart sorrow-laden,
    A long, long sigh;
    For the cold strange eyes of a little Mermaiden,
    And the gleam of her golden hair.

    Come away, away, children;
    Come, children, come down! 
    The hoarse wind blows colder;
    Lights shine in the town. 
    She will start from her slumber
    When gusts shake the door;
    She will hear the winds howling,
    Will hear the waves roar. 
    We shall see, while above us
    The waves roar and whirl,
    A ceiling of amber,
    A pavement of pearl. 
    Singing:  “Here came a mortal,
    But faithless was she! 
    And alone dwell forever
    The kings of the sea.”

    But, children, at midnight,
    When soft the winds blow,
    When clear falls the moonlight,
    When spring-tides are low;
    When sweet airs come seaward
    From heaths starr’d with broom,
    And high rocks throw mildly
    On the blanch’d sands a gloom;
    Up the still, glistening beaches,
    Up the creeks we will hie,
    Over banks of bright seaweed
    The ebb-tide leaves dry. 
    We will gaze, from the sand-hills,
    At the white, sleeping town;
    At the church on the hill-side—­
    And then come back down. 
    Singing:  “There dwells a lov’d one,
    But cruel is she! 
    She left lonely forever
    The kings of the sea.”

MATTHEW ARNOLD.

 THE BANKS O’ DOON.