Page:Poems, now first collected, Stedman, 1897.djvu/145

 BYRON

years, 't is writ,—O presage vain!—

Earth wills her offspring life, ere one complete

His term, and rest from travail, and be fain

To lay him down in natural death and sweet.

What of her child whose swift divining soul

With triple fervor burns the torch apace,

And in one radiant third compacts the whole

Ethereal flame that lights him on his race?

Ay, what of him who to the winds upheld

A star-like brand, with pride and joy and tears,

And lived in that fleet course from youth to eld,

Count them who will, his century of years?

The Power that arches heaven's orbway round

Gave to this planet's brood its soul of fire, 125