Once a Week (magazine)/Series 1/Volume 1/Tamise ripe

by Cholmeney A. Leigh

70

TAMISE RIPE.

“——A praty town by Tamise ripe.”
                              Leland.

             I.
Of “Tamise ripe” old Leland tells;
I read, and many a thought ups wells
Of Nature in her gentlest dress,
Of peaceful homes of happiness,
Deep-meadow’d farms, sheep-sprinkled downs,
Fair bridges with their “praty towns,”
     By Tamise ripe.

           II.
Stirr’d by the pulse of many oars
That glide between the summer shores,
I love the waters fresh and clear,
And all the changes of the year,
Down to late autumn’s ruddy woods, —
The volume of the winter floods,
     By Tamise bright.

III.

The waving tresses of the weeds,
The water’s ripple in the reeds,
The plunging “lasher,” cold and bright,
Making sweet music to the night,
Old spires, and many a lordly grove
All these there are, and more to love,
     On Tamise ripe.

IV.

Fair Oxford with her crown of towers,
Fair Eton in her happy bowers,
The “reach“ by Henley broadly spread,
High Windsor, with her royal dead,
And Richmond’s lawns, and Hampton’s glades; —
What shore has memories and shades
     Like Tamise ripe?

V.

Not vine-crown’ d Rhine, nor Danube’s flood,
Nor sad Ticino, red with blood;
Not ice-born Rhone, or laughing Seine,
Nor all the golden streams of Spain: —
Far dearer to our English eyes,
And bound with English destinies,
     Is Tamise ripe.

VI.
High up on Danesfield’s guarded post
Great Alfred turn’d the heathen host;—
Below, the vaults of Hurley sent
A tyrant into banishment;
And still more sacred was the deed
Done on the isle by Runnymule,
     On Tamise ripe.

VII.
And down, where commerce stains the tide,
Lies London in her dusky pride,
Deep in dim wreaths of smoke infurl’d,
The wonder of the modern world:
How much to love within the walls
That lie beneath the shade of “Paul’s,”
     By Tamise ripe!

VIII.
And if, which God in Heaven forfend,
On us an alien foe descend,
The ancient stream has many a son
To fight and win as Alfred won;
High deeds shall illustrate the shore,
And freedom shall he saved once more
     On Tamise ripe.

Cholmeney a. Leigh.

 

---