The clock struck twelve. The bells began to peal. We drank a cup of sack to the New Year. "New songs, new voices, all as fresh as may," Said Ben to Brome, "but I shall never live To hear them."
All was not so well, indeed, With Ben, as hitherto. Age had come upon him. He dragged one foot as in paralysis. The critics bayed against the old lion, now, And called him arrogant. "My brain," he said, "Is yet unhurt although, set round with pain, It cannot long hold out." He never stooped, Never once pandered to that brainless hour. His coat was thread-bare. Weeks had passed of late Without his voice resounding in our inn.
"The statues are defiled, the gods dethroned, The Ionian movement reigns, not the free soul. And, as for me, I have lived too long," he said. "Well--I can weave the old threnodies anew." And, filling his cup, he murmured, soft and low, A new song, breaking on an ancient shore:
Marlowe is dead, and Greene is in his grave, And sweet Will Shakespeare long ago is gone! Our Ocean-shepherd sleeps beneath the wave; Robin is dead, and Marlowe in his grave. Why should I stay to chant an idle stave, And in my Mermaid Tavern drink alone? For Kit is dead and Greene is in his grave, And sweet Will Shakespeare long ago is gone.
Where is the singer of the Faërie Queen? Where are the lyric lips of Astrophel? Long, long ago, their quiet graves were green; Ay, and the grave, too, of their Faërie Queen! And yet their faces, hovering here unseen, Call me to taste their new-found oenomel; To sup with him who sang the Faërie Queen; To drink with him whose name was Astrophel.
I drink to that great Inn beyond the grave! --If there be none, the gods have done us wrong.-- Ere long I hope to chant a better stave, In some great Mermaid Inn beyond the grave; And quaff the best of earth that heaven can save, Red wine like blood, deep love of friends and song. I drink to that great Inn beyond the grave; And hope to greet my golden lads ere long.
He raised his cup and drank in silence. Brome Drank with him, too. The bells had ceased to peal. Galen shook hands, and bade us all good-night. Then Brome, a little wistfully, I thought, Looked at his old-time master, and prepared To follow. "Good-night--Ben," he said, a pause Before he spoke the name. "Good-night! Good-night! My dear old Brome," said Ben. And, at the door, Brome whispered to me, "He is lonely now. There are not many left of his old friends. We all go out--like this--into the night. But what a fleet of stars!" he said, and shook My hand, and smiled, and pointed to the sky. And, when I looked into the room again, The lights were very dim, and I believed That Ben had fallen asleep. His great grey head Was bowed across the table, on his arms. Then, all at once, I knew that he was weeping; And like a shadow I crept back again, And stole into the night. There as I stood Under the painted sign, I could have vowed That I, too, heard the voices of the dead, The voices of his old companions, Gathering round him in that lonely room, Till all the timbers of the Mermaid Inn Trembled above me with their ghostly song: