To S. McK.

I.     Shall we forget how, in our day,     The Sabine fields about us lay      In amaranth and asphodel,      And bubbling, cold Bandusian well,     Fair Pyrrhas haunting every way?     In dells of forest faun and fay,     Moss-lounged within the fountain's spray,      How drained we wines too rare to tell,                 Shall we forget?     The fine Falernian or the ray     Of fiery Ccuban, while gay      We heard Bacchantes shout and yell,      Filled full of Bacchus, and so fell     To dreaming of some Lydia;                 Shall we forget?              II.     If we forget in after years,     My comrade, all the hopes and fears      That hovered all our walks around      When ent'ring on that mystic ground     Of ghostly legends, where one hears     By bandit towers the chase that nears     Thro' cracking woods, the oaths and cheers      Of demon huntsman, horn and hound;                 If we forget.     Lenora's lover and her tears,     Fierce Wallenstein, satanic sneers      Of the red devil Goethe bound, -      Why then, forsooth, they soon are found     In burly stoops of German beers,                 If we forget!