Page:Old Melbourne Memories.djvu/257

"All men shall roll in the gold mire—
The height, the depth of man's desire—
Till come the famine years;
Then all the land shall curse the day
When first they rifled the dull clay,
With deep remorseful tears.

"Fell want shall wake to fearful life
The fettered demons. Civil strife
Rears high a gory hand!
I see a blood-splashed barricade,
While dimly lights the twilight glade
The soldier's flashing brand.

"But thou, son of the forest free!
Thou art not, wert not foe to me,
Frank tamer of the wild!
Thou hast not sought the sunless home
Where darkly delves the toiling Gnome,
The mid-earth's swarthy child.

"Then, be thou ever, as of yore,
A dweller in the woods, and o'er
Fresh plains thy herds shall roam.
Join not the vain and reckless crowd
Who swell the city's pageant proud,
But prize thy forest home."

He said: and, with an eldritch scream,
The Gnome-king vanished—and my dream:
Dawn's waking hour returned;
Yet still the wild tones echoed clear,
For many a day in reason's ear,
And my heart inly burned.