ΤΟ THE MOST NOBLE The Marquis of Lansdowne THIS LITTLE POEM IS AFFECTIONATELY AND GRATEFULLY INSCRIBED. B DEDICATION. FRIEND of old days, of suffering, storm, and strife, Patient and kind through many a wild appeal ; In the arena of thy brilliant life Never too busy or too cold to feel: Companion from whose ever teeming store Of thought and knowledge, happy memory brings So much of social wit and sage's lore, Garnered and gleaned by me as precious things: Kinsman of him whose very name soon grew Unreal as music heard in pleasant dreams, So vain the hope my girlish fancy drew, To thee I dedicate this record brief Of foreign scenes and deeds too little known; This tale of noble souls who conquered grief By dint of tending sufferings not their own. Thou hast known all my life: its pleasant hours, (How many of them have I owed to thee!) Its exercise of intellectual powers, With thoughts of fame and gladness not to be. Thou knowest how Death for ever dogged my way, And how of those I loved the best, and those |