Smile yet again, my sweetheart Joan,

Ere night and Nursie’s doom

Shall leave these orphan’d eyes alone

To chase the twilight gloom;

Good-night! Another dawn shall speed

That we in ardour blest

May follow brave Uleydi’s lead,

And find the hidden West;

And as, with tender lip and chaste

Beyond this earth’s alloy,

For one brief time you bid me taste

The dear Madonna’s joy,

Lend me your innocence to pray

The thing her babe has told,—

That, though the head be Autumn grey,

The heart be never old.

—Vautier Golding.

Bournville, Sept. 1906