Song Before Death

"I.     Is the sound a trumpet blown, or a bell for burial tolled,     Whence the whole air vibrates now to the clash of words like swords     Let"

"Kind, wise, and true as truth's own heart,     A soul that here     Chose and held fast the better part     And cast out fear,     Has left us"

"I     Out of hell a word comes hissing, dark as doom,     Fierce as fire, and foul as plague-polluted gloom;     Out of hell wherein the sinless da"

"A faint sea without wind or sun;     A sky like flameless vapour dun;     A valley like an unsealed grave     That no man cares to weep upon,"

"Here morning in the ploughman's songs is met     Ere yet one footstep shows in all the sky,     And twilight in the east, a doubt as yet,     S"

"The Text is taken from Percy's Reliques (1765), vol. i. p. 71, 'given from two MS. copies, transmitted from Scotland.' Herd had a very similar bal"