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[First published 1849. Reprinted 1853, ’54, ’57.]
COME, dear children, let us away; | |
| Down and away below. | |
| Now my brothers call from the bay; | |
| Now the great winds shorewards blow; | |
| Now the salt tides seawards flow; | 5 |
| Now the wild white horses play, | |
| Champ and chafe and toss in the spray. | |
| Children dear, let us away. | |
| This way, this way. | |
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| Call her once before you go. | 10 |
| Call once yet. | |
| In a voice that she will know: | |
| ‘Margaret! Margaret!’ | |
| Children’s voices should be dear | |
| (Call once more) to a mother’s ear: | 15 |
| Children’s voices, wild with pain. | |
| Surely she will come again. | |
| Call her once and come away. | |
| This way, this way. | |
| ‘Mother dear, we cannot stay.’ | 20 |
| The wild white horses foam and fret. | |
| Margaret! Margaret! | |
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| Come, dear children, come away down, | |
| Call no more. | |
| One last look at the white-wall’d town, | 25 |
| And the little grey church on the windy shore. | |
| Then come down. | |
| She will not come though you call all day. | |
| Come away, come away. | |
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| Children dear, was it yesterday | 30 |
| We heard the sweet bells over the bay? | |
| In the caverns where we lay, | |
| Through the surf and through the swell, | |
| The far-off sound of a silver bell? | |
| Sand-strewn caverns, cool and deep, | 35 |
| Where the winds are all asleep; | |
| Where the spent lights quiver and gleam; | |
| Where the salt weed sways in the stream; | |
| Where the sea-beasts rang’d all round | |
| Feed in the ooze of their pasture-ground; | 40 |
| Where the sea-snakes coil and twine, | |
| Dry their mail and bask in the brine; | |
| Where great whales come sailing by, | |
| Sail and sail, with unshut eye, | |
| Round the world for ever and aye? | 45 |
| When did music come this way? | |
| Children dear, was it yesterday? | |
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| Children dear, was it yesterday | |
| (Call yet once) that she went away? | |
| Once she sate with you and me, | 50 |
| On a red gold throne in the heart of the sea, | |
| And the youngest sate on her knee. | |
| She comb’d its bright hair, and she tended it well, | |
| When down swung the sound of the far-off bell. | |
| She sigh’d, she look’d up through the clear green sea. | 55 |
| She said; ’I must go, for my kinsfolk pray | |
| In the little grey church on the shore to-day. | |
| ’Twill be Easter-time in the world—ah me! | |
| And I lose my poor soul, Merman, here with thee. | |
| I said; ‘Go up, dear heart, through the waves; | 60 |
| Say thy prayer, and come back to the kind sea-caves.’ | |
| She smil’d, she went up through the surf in the bay. | |
| Children dear, was it yesterday? | |
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| Children dear, were we long alone? | |
| ‘The sea grows stormy, the little ones moan. | 65 |
| Long prayers,’ I said, ‘in the world they say. | |
| Come,’ I said, and we rose through the surf in the bay. | |
| We went up the beach, by the sandy down | |
| Where the sea-stocks bloom, to the white-wall’d town. | |
| Through the narrow pav’d streets, where all was still, | 70 |
| To the little grey church on the windy hill. | |
| From the church came a murmur of folk at their prayers, | |
| But we stood without in the cold blowing airs. | |
| We climb’d on the graves, on the stones, worn with rains, | |
| And we gaz’d up the aisle through the small leaded panes. | 75 |
| 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, | 80 |
| 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. | |
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| Down, down, down. | 85 |
| 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. | 90 |
| 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, | 95 |
| Till the shuttle falls 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; | 100 |
| 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, | 105 |
| For the cold strange eyes of a little Mermaiden, | |
| And the gleam of her golden hair. | |
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| Come away, away children. | |
| Come children, come down. | |
| The hoarse wind blows colder; 1 | 110 |
| 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. | 115 |
| We shall see, while above us | |
| The waves roar and whirl, | |
| A ceiling of amber, | |
| A pavement of pearl. | |
| Singing, ‘Here came a mortal, | 120 |
| But faithless was she. | |
| And alone dwell for ever | |
| The kings of the sea.’ | |
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| But, children, at midnight, | |
| When soft the winds blow; | 125 |
| 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 | 130 |
| 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. | 135 |
| 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, | 140 |
| But cruel is she. | |
| She left lonely for ever | |
| The kings of the sea.’ | |
