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260 But never yet rang laughter So sweet in gladdened ears Through wall and floor and rafter As all this household hears And rings response thereafter Till cloudiest weather clears.

When those your chosen of all men, Whose honey never cloys, Two lights whose smiles enthrall men, Were called at your age boys, Those mighty men, while small men, Could make no merrier noise.

Our Shakespeare, surely, daffed not More lightly pain aside From radiant lips that quaffed not Of forethought’s tragic tide: Our Dickens, doubtless, laughed not More loud with life’s first pride.

The dawn were not more cheerless With neither light nor dew Than we without the fearless Clear laugh that thrills us through: If ever child stood peerless, Love knows that child is you.