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| HE sat among the woods; he heard | |
| The sylvan merriment; he saw | |
| The pranks of butterfly and bird, | |
| The humors of the ape, the daw. | |
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| And in the lion or the frog,— | 5 |
| In all the life of moor and fen,— | |
| In ass and peacock, stork and dog, | |
| He read similitudes of men. | |
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| “Of these, from those,” he cried, “we come, | |
| Our hearts, our brains descend from these.” | 10 |
| And, lo! the Beasts no more were dumb, | |
| But answered out of brakes and trees: | |
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| “Not ours,” they cried; “Degenerate, | |
| If ours at all,” they cried again, | |
| “Ye fools, who war with God and Fate, | 15 |
| Who strive and toil; strange race of men. | |
| |
| “For we are neither bond nor free, | |
| For we have neither slaves nor kings; | |
| But near to Nature’s heart are we, | |
| And conscious of her secret things. | 20 |
| |
| “Content are we to fall asleep, | |
| And well content to wake no more; | |
| We do not laugh, we do not weep, | |
| Nor look behind us and before: | |
| |
| “But were there cause for moan or mirth, | 25 |
| ’T is we, not you, should sigh or scorn, | |
| Oh, latest children of the Earth, | |
| Most childish children Earth has born.” * * * * * | |
| They spoke, but that misshapen slave | |
| Told never of the thing he heard, | 30 |
| And unto men their portraits gave, | |
| In likenesses of beast and bird! | |
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