The Curfew-Song of England

Hark! from the dim church-tower,
The deep, slow Curfew’s chime!
--A heavy sound unto hall and bower
In England’s olden time!
Sadly ’twas heard by him who came
From the fields of his toil at night,
And who might not see his own hearth-flame
In his children’s eyes make light.

Sternly and sadly heard,
As it quench’d the wood-fire’s glow,
Which had cheer’d the board with the mirthful word,
And the red wine’s foaming flow!
Until that sullen, boding knell,
Flung out from every fane,
On harp, and lip, and spirit, fell,
With a weight and with a chain.

Woe for the pilgrim then
In the wild-deer’s forest far!
No cottage lamp, to the haunts of men,
Might guide him, as a star.
And woe for him whose wakeful soul,
With lone aspirings fill’d,
Would have lived o’er some immortal scroll,
While the sounds of earth were still’d!

And yet a deeper woe
For the watcher by the bed,
Where the fondly-loved in pain lay low,
In pain and sleepless dread!
For the mother, doom’d unseen to keep
By the dying babe, her place,
And to feel its flitting pulse, and weep,
Yet not behold its face!

Darkness in chieftain’s hall!
Darkness in peasant’s cot!
While freedom, under that shadowy pall,
Sat mourning o’er her lot.
Oh! the fireside’s peace we well may prize!
For blood hath flow’d like rain,
Pour’d forth to make sweet sanctuaries
Of England’s homes again.

Heap the yule-faggots high
Till the red light fills the room!
It is home’s own hour when the stormy sky
Grows thick with evening gloom.
Gather ye round the holy hearth,
And by its gladdening blaze,
Unto thankful bliss we will change our mirth,
With a thought of the olden days!