[To Mr. St. Loe Strachey.]

Dawn of the year that emerges, a fine and ebullient Phœnix,

Forth from the cinders of Self, out of the ash of the Past;

Year that discovers my Muse in the thick of purpureal sonnets,

Slating diplomacy’s sloth, blushing for ‘Abdul the d----d’;

Year that in guise of a herald declaring the close of the tourney

Clears the redoubtable lists hot with the Battle of Bays;

Binds on the brows of the Tory, the highly respectable Austin,

Laurels that Phœbus of old wore on the top of his tuft;

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Leaving the locks of the hydra, of Bodley the numerous-headed,

Clean as the chin of a boy, bare as a babe in a bath;

Year that––I see in the vista the principal verb of the sentence

Loom as a deeply-desired bride that is late at the post––

Year that has painfully tickled the lachrymal nerves of the Muses,

Giving Another the gift due to Respectfully Theirs;––

Hinc illæ lacrimæ! Ah, reader! I grossly misled you;

See, it was false; there is no principal verb after all!

His likewise is the anguish, who followed with soft serenading

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