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IN MEMORIAM, EPILOGUE / 1177
55
We steered her toward a crimson cloud That landlike slept along the deep.
104
The time draws near the birth of Christ;2 The moon is hid, the night is still; A single church below the hill
Is pealing, folded in the mist.
5 A single peal of bells below, That wakens at this hour of rest A single murmur in the breast,
That these are not the bells I know.
Like strangers' voices here they sound, io In lands where not a memory strays, Nor landmark breathes of other days, But all is new unhallowed ground.
105
Tonight ungathered let us leave This laurel, let this holly stand:3 We live within the stranger's land, And strangely falls our Christmas eve. 5 Our father's dust is left alone And silent under other snows: There in due time the woodbine blows,0The violet comes, but we are gone. blooms ioNo more shall wayward grief abuse The genial hour with mask and mime; For change of place, like growth of time, Has broke the bond of dying use. 15Let cares that petty shadows cast, By which our lives are chiefly proved, A little spare the night I loved, And hold it solemn to the past. But let no footstep beat the floor, Nor bowl of wassail mantle warm;4
2. The third Christmas (1835) after Hallam's new home the customary observances lapse. death. 4. I.e., let no bowl of hot punch warm the man3. Cf. section 29, in which the family in their for-telpiece. mer home still continued to gather holly. In the
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1 138 / ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON
For who would keep an ancient form 20 Through which the spirit breathes no more?
Be neither song, nor game, nor feast; Nor harp be touched, nor flute be blown; No dance, no motion, save alone
What lightens in the lucid east
25 Of rising worlds5 by yonder wood. Long sleeps the summer in the seed; Run out your measured arcs, and lead
The closing cycle rich in good.
106
Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky, The flying cloud, the frosty light: The year is dying in the night; Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.
5 Ring out the old, ring in the new, Ring, happy bells, across the snow: The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.
Ring out the grief that saps the mind, io For those that here we see no more; Ring out the feud of rich and poor, Ring in redress to all mankind.
Ring out a slowly dying cause, And ancient forms of party strife; 15 Ring in the nobler modes of life, With sweeter manners, purer laws.
Ring out the want, the care, the sin, The faithless coldness of the times: Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes,
20 But ring the fuller minstrel in.
Ring out false pride in place and blood, The civic slander and the spite; Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.
25 Ring out old shapes of foul disease; Ring out the narrowing lust of gold; Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.
5. The scintillating motion of the stars that rise [Tennyson's note].
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IN MEMORIAM, 108 / 1 179
Ring in the valiant man and free, 30
The larger heart, the kindlier hand; Ring out the darkness of the land, Ring in the Christ that is to be.6
107
It is the day when he was born.? February 1 A bitter day that early sank Behind a purple-frosty bank
Of vapor, leaving night forlorn.
s The time admits not flowers or leaves To deck the banquet. Fiercely flies The blast of North and East, and
