The Marching Morrows.

Now gird thee well for courage,     My knight of twenty year,     Against the marching morrows     That fill the world with fear!     The flowers fade before them;     The summer leaves the hill;     Their trumpets range the morning,     And those who hear grow still.     Like pillagers of harvest,     Their fame is far abroad,     As gray remorseless troopers     That plunder and maraud.     The dust is on their corselets;     Their marching fills the world;     With conquest after conquest     Their banners are unfurled.     They overthrow the battles     Of every lord of war,     From world-dominioned cities     Wipe out the names they bore.     Sohrab, Rameses, Roland,     Ramoth, Napoleon, Tyre,     And the Romeward Huns of Attila--     Alas, for their desire!     By April and by autumn     They perish in their pride,     And still they close and gather     Out of the mountain-side.     The tanned and tameless children     Of the wild elder earth,     With stature of the northlights,     They have the stars for girth.     There's not a hand to stay them,     Of all the hearts that brave;     No captain to undo them,     No cunning to off-stave.     Yet fear thou not! If haply     Thou be the kingly one,     They'll set thee in their vanguard     To lead them round the sun.