Complete Fictional Works of John Buchan (Illustrated)

by John Buchan

  We worshipped at the ancient shrines:

  For us the creads joined their dance

  At even in the moonlit pines.

  What darkling spell has rent thy skies

  And turned thy heart to steel and fire,

  And drawn across thy starry eyes

  The curtains of a wild desire?

  The Spirit Of Art

  I change not. I am old as Time

  And younger than the dews of mom.

  These lips will sing the world’s high prime

  Which blessed the toils when life was born.

  I am the priestess of the flame

  Which on the eternal alter springs;

  Beauty and truth and joy and fame

  Sleep in the shelter of my wings.

  I wear the mask of age and clime,

  But he who of my love is fain

  Must learn my heart which knows not time,

  And seek my path which fears not pain, —

  Till, bruised and worn with wandering

  In the dark wilds my feet have trod,

  He hears the songs the Immortals sing

  At even in the glades of God.

  Youth II

  Angel, that heart I seek to know,

  I fain would make thy word my stay,

  Upon thy path I yearn to go

  If thy clear eyes will light the way.

  But ancient loves my memory hold,

  And I am weak and thou art strong;

  I fear the blasts of mountain cold, —

  Say if the way be dark and long.

  The Spirit of Art II

  On mountain lawns, in meads of spring,

  With idle boys bedeck thy hair,

  Or in deep greenwood loitering

  Tell to thy heart the world is fair.

  That joy I give, but frail and poor

  Is such a boon, for youth must die;

  A little day the flowers endure,

  And clouds o’erride the April sky.

  Upon the windy ways of life,

  In dark abyss of toil and wrong,

  Through storm and sun, through death and strife,

  I seek the nobler spheral song.

  No dulcet lute with golden strings

  Can hymn the world that is to be.

  Out of the jarring soul of things

  I weave the eternal harmony. —

  In forest deeps, in wastes of sand,

  Where the cold snows outdare the skies:

  Where wanderers roam uncharted lands,

  And the last camp-fire flares and dies:

  In sweating mart, in camp and court,

  Where hopes forlorn have vanquished ease:

  Where ships, intent on desperate port,

  Strain through the quiet of lonely seas:

  Where’er o’erborne by sense and sin,

  With bruised head and aching hand,

  Guarding the holy fire within,

  Man dares to steel his heart and stand —

  Breasting the serried spears of fate,

  Broken and spent, yet joyous still,

  Matching against the blind world’s hate

  The stark battalions of his will: —

  Whoso hath ears, to him shall fall,

  When stars are hid and hopes are dim,

  To hear the heavenly voices call,

  And, faint and far, the cosmic hymn —

  That hymn of peace when wars are done,

  Of joy which breaks through tears of pain,

  Of dawns beyond the westering sun,

  Of skies clear shining after rain.

  No sinless Edens know the song,

  No Arcady of youth and light,

  But, born amid the glooms of wrong,

  It floats upon the glimmering height,

  Where they who faced the dust and scars,

  And shrank not from the fires of hate,

  Can walk among the kindred stars,

  Masters of Time and lords of Fate.

  And haply then will youth, reborn,

  Restore the world thou fain wouldst hold;

  The dawn of an auguster mom

  Will flush thy skies with fairy gold.

  The flute of Pan in wildwood glade

  Will pipe its ancient sweet refrain;

  Still, still for thee through April shade

  Will Venus and her sister train

  Lead the old dance of spring and youth.

  But thine the wiser, clearer eyes,

  Which having sought the shrine of truth

  And faced the unending sacrifice,

  Can see the myriad ways of man,

  The ecstasy, the fire, the rod,

  Of shadows of the timeless plan

  That broods within the mind of God.

  Kin to the dust, yet throned on high,

  Thy pride thy bonds, thy bonds release;

  Thou see’st the Eternal passing by,

  And in His Will behold’st thy peace.

  Babylon

  1906

  How many miles to Babylon?

  Three score and ten.

  Can I get there by candle-light?

  Yes, and back again.

  We are come back from Babylon,

  Out of the plains and the glare,

  To the little hills of our own country

  And the sting of our kindred air;

  To the rickle of stones on the red rock’s edge

  Which Kedron cleaves like a sword.

  We will build the walls of Zion again,

  To the glory of Zion’s Lord.

  Now is no more of dalliance

  By the reedy waters in spring,

  When we sang of home, and sighed, and dreamed,

  And wept on remembering.

  Now we are back in our ancient hills

  Out of the plains and the sun;

  But before we make it a dwelling-place

  There’s a wonderful lot to be done.

  The walls are to build from west to east,

  From Gihon to Olivet,

  Waters to lead and wells to clear,

  And the garden furrows to set.

  From the Sheep Gate to the Fish Gate

  Is a welter of mire and mess;

  And southward over the common lands

  Is a dragon’s wilderness.

  The Courts of the Lord are a heap of dust

  Where the hill winds whistle and race,

  And the noble pillars of God His House

  Stand in a ruined place.

  In the Holy of Holies foxes lair,

  And owls and night-birds build.

  There’s a deal to do ere we patch it anew

  As our father Solomon willed.

  Now is the day of the ordered life

  And the law which all obey.

  We toil by rote and speak by note

  And never a soul dare stray.

  Ever among us a lean old man

  Keepeth his watch and ward,

  Crying, “The Lord hath set you free:

  Prepare ye the way of the Lord.”

  A goodly task we are called unto,

  A task to dream on o’ nights, —

  Work for Judah and Judah’s God,

  Setting our land to rights;

  Everything fair and all things square

  And straight as a plummet string. —

  Is it mortal guile, if once in a while

  Our thoughts go wandering?...

  We were not slaves in Babylon,

  For the gate of our souls lay free,

  There in that vast and sunlit land

  On the edges of mystery.

  Daily we wrought and daily we thought,

  And we chafed not at rod and power,

  For Sinim, Sabaea, and dusky Hind

  Talked to us hour by hour.

  The man who lives in Babylon

  May poorly sup and fare,

  But loves and lures from the ends of the earth

  Beckon him everywhere.

&n
bsp; Next year he too may have sailed strange seas

  And conquered a diadem;

  For kings are as common in Babylon

  As crows in Bethlehem.

  Here we are bound to the common round

  In a land which knows not change.

  Nothing befalleth to stir the blood

  Or quicken the heart to range;

  Never a hope that we cannot plumb

  Or a stranger visage in sight, —

  At the most a sleek Samaritan

  Or a ragged Amorite.

  Here we are sober and staid of soul,

  Working beneath the law,

  Settled amid our fathers’ dust,

  Seeing the hills they saw.

  All things fixed and determinate,

  Chiseled and squared by rule; —

  Is it mortal guile once in a while

  To try and escape from school?

  We will go back to Babylon,

  Silently one by one,

  Out from the hills and the laggard brooks

  To the streams that brim in the sun.

  Only a moment, Lord, we crave,

  To breath and listen and see. —

  Then we start anew with muscle and thew

  To hammer trestles for Thee.

  Processional

  1906

  In the ancient orderly places, with a blank and orderly mind,

  We sit in our green walled gardens and our com and oil increase;

  Sunset nor dawn can wake us, for the face of the heavens is kind.

  We light our taper at even and call our comfort peace.

  Peaceful our clear horizon; calm as our sheltered days

  Are the lilied meadows we dwell in, the decent highways we tread.

  Duly we make our offerings, but we know not the God we praise,

  For He is the God of the living, but we, His children, are dead.

  I will arise and get me beyond this country of dreams,

  Where all is ancient and ordered and hoar with the frost of years,

  To the land where loftier mountains cradle their wilder streams,

  And the fruitful earth is blessed with more bountiful smiles and tears, —

  There in the home of the lightnings, where the fear of the Lord is set

  free,

  Where the thunderous midnights fade to the turquoise magic of the

  mom,

  The days of man are a vapour, blown from a shoreless sea,

  A little cloud before sunrise, a cry in the void forlorn —

  I am weary of men and cities and the service of little things,

  Where the flamelike glories of life are shrunk to a candle’s ray.

  Smite me, my God, with Thy presence, blind my eyes with Thy wings,

  In the heart of Thy virgin earth show me Thy secret way!

  The Herd of Farawa

  1907

  Losh, man! Did ever mortal see

  Sic blasts o’ snaw? Ye’ll bide a wee.

  Afore ye think to cross the lea,

  And mount the slack!

  Kin’le your pipe, and straucht your knee,

  And gie’s your crack!

  Hoo lang, ye spier! An unco while!

  It’s seeventy-sax ‘ear came Aprile

  That I came frae Auchentyle —

  A bairn o’ nine;

  And mony’s the dreich and dreary mile

  I’ve gaed sin’ syne.

  My folk were herds, sae roond the fauld

  Afore I was twae towmonts auld

  They fand me snowkin’, crouse and bauld

  In snaw and seep —

  As Dauvid was to kingdoms called,

  Sae I to sheep.

  I herdit first on Etterick side.

  Dod, man, I mind the stound o’ pride

  Gaed through my hert, when near and wide

  My dowgs I ran.

  Though no seeventeen till Lammastide

  I walked a man.

  I got a wife frae Eskdalemuir,

  O’ dacent herdin’ folk, and sair

  We wrocht for lang, baith late and ‘ear,

  For weans cam fast,

  And we were never aucht but puir

  Frae first to last

  Tales I could tell would gaur ye grue

  O’ snawy lambin’s warstled through,

  O’ drifty days, and win’s that blew

  Frae norlan’ sky,

  And spates thet filled the haughlands fou

  And drooned the kye.

  But, still and on, the life was fine,

  For yon were happier days langsyne;

  For gear to hain, and gear to tine

  I had nae care —

  Content I was wi’ what was mine.

  And blithe to share.

  Sic flocks ye’ll never see the day,

  Nae fauncy ills to mak ye wae,

  Nae fauncy dips wi’ stawsome broo,

  Wad fricht the French;

  We wrocht alang the auld guid way,

  And fand it stench.

  Nae mawkit kets, nae scabbit een,

  But ilka yowe as trig’s a preen;

  Sic massy tups as ne’er were seen

  Sin’ Job’s allowance,

  And lambs as thick on ilka green

  As simmer gowans.

  Whaur noo ae hirsel jimp can bide

  Three hirsels were the countra’s pride,

  And mony a yaird was wavin’ wide,

  And floo’rs were hingin’,

  Whaur noo is but the bare hillside,

  And linties singin’.

  And God! the men! Whaur could ye find

  Sic hertsome lads, sae crouse and kind;

  Sic skeel o’ sheep, sic sarious mind

  At kirk and prayer —

  Yet aiblins no to haud or bind

  At Boswells fair?

  Frae Galloway to Aiberdeen

  (I mind the days as ‘twere yestreen)

  I’ve had my cantrips — Lord a wheen!

  But through them a’,

  The fear o’ God afore my een,

  I keep’t the Law.

  My nieves weel hoddit in my breeks,

  The Law I keep’t, and turned baith cheeks

  Until the smiter, saft and meek’s

  A bairn at schule;

  Syne struck, and laid him bye for weeks

  To learn the fule.

  Frae Melrose Cauld to Linkumdoddie,

  I’d fecht and drink wi’ony body;

  Was there a couthy lad? then, dod, he

  Sune fand his fellow,

  What time the tippenny or the toddy

  Had garred us mellow.

  Nae wark or ploy e’er saw me shirk;

  I had an airm wad fell a stirk;

  I traivelled ten lang mile to kirk

  In wind and snaw;

  I tell ‘e, sir, frae mom to mirk,

  I keep’t the Law.

  Weekly we gat, and never fail,

  Screeds marrowy as a pat o’ kail,

  And awfu’ as the Grey Meer’s Tail

  In Lammas rain,

  And stey and lang as Moffatdale,

  And stieve’s a stane.

  Nae Gospel sowens fit for weans,

  But doctrines teuch as channel-stanes;

  We heard the word wi’ anxious pains,

  Sarious and happy.

  And half the week we piked the banes,

  And fand them sappy.

  Lang years aneath a man o’ God

  I sat, my bible on the brod;

  He wasna feared to lift the rod

  And scaud the errin’;

  He walked whaur our great forbears trod,

  And blest his fairin’.

  But noo we’ve got a baimly breed,

  Whase wee-bit shilpit greetin’ screed

  Soughs like a wast wind ower the heid,

  Lichter than ‘oo’;

  Lassies and weans, it suits their need,

  No me and you!

  My docht
er’s servin’ in the toun,

  She gangs to hear a glaikit loon,

  Whae rows his een, and twirls him roun’

  Like ane dementit.

  Nae word o’ Hell, nae sicht or soun’

  O’ sin repentit.

  But juist a weary, yammerin’ phrase

  O’”Saunts” and “Heaven” and “love” and

  “praise,”

  Words that a grown man sudna use

  God! sic a scunner!

  I had to rise and gang my ways

  To haud my denner.

  At halesome fauts they lift their han’,

  Henceforth, they cry, this new comman’,

  Bide quate and doucely in the lan’

  And love your brither —

  This is the total end o’ man,

  This and nae ither.

  And that’s their creed! an owercome braw

  For folks that kenna fear or fa’,

  Crouse birds that on their midden craw

  Nor think o’ scaith,

  That keep the trimmin’ o’ the Law

  And scorn the pith.

  It’s no for men that nicht and day

  See the Almichty’s awesome way,

  And ken themselves but ripps o’ strae

  Afore His wind,

  And, dark or licht, maun watch and pray

  His grace to find.

  My forbear, hunkerin’ in a hag,

  Was martyred by the laird o’ Lagg;

  He dee’d afore his heid wad wag

  In God’s denial.

  D’ye think the folk that rant and brag

  Wad thole yon trial?

  Man, whiles I’d like to gang mysel

  And wile auld Claverse back frae Hell;

  Claverse, or maybe Tam Dalziel,

  Wad stop their fleechin’;

  I wager yon’s the lads to mell

  And mend sic preachin’.

  Whaure’er I look I find the same,