Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Arthur Quiller-Couch, comp. The Oxford Book of Victorian Verse. 1922.

On a Nightingale in April

Fiona MacLeod (William Sharp) (1855–1905)

THE YELLOW moon is a dancing phantom

Down secret ways of the flowing shade;

And the waveless stream has a murmuring whisper

Where the alders wade.

Not a breath, not a sigh, save the slow stream’s whisper:

Only the moon is a dancing blade

That leads a host of the Crescent warriors

To a phantom raid.

Out of the lands of Faerie a summons,

A long strange cry that thrills thro’ the glade:—

The grey-green glooms of the elm are stirring,

Newly afraid.

Last heard, white music, under the olives

Where once Theocritus sang and play’d—

Thy Thracian song is the old new wonder—

O moon-white maid!