Page:Twilight Hours (1868).djvu/235

Rh I fought, and I failed, and am vanquished ! They will not be better for me ; The people will go to destruction, The multitude will not be free. Perhaps I mistook my vocation, Was " meant for a worker for bread, And not for a Moses or Aaron " — 'Twas wise, though 'twas sneeringly said. One friend did believe in me truly, But that must have been a mistake, As she must herself have discovered, Or else she would never forsake. Well, others have suffered as I do ; I am but a sheep-dog grown old ; Grown old in the spring of my manhood, I shrivel up here in the cold : The cold, and the sleet, and the darkness, The oozing and fog-laden rain ; Fit adjuncts of this, mine attainment, And meet for my bridal of pain.