Laudabunt Alii Poem by Alec de Candole

Let others tell of far away,
Of peoples strange and cities gay,
Of mighty hills and rushing streams,
More fair than hope, more grand than dreams.
But England — give me England yet.
Land the heart can ne'er forget;
Where bounteous nature's riches all,
With man's to aid, are found in small.
As where wood and ferned hill
Grace the gently flowing folds
Of slumberous Wye, whose bosom holds
All wealth of green by Tintern, till
A view majestic bursts upon
The sight to Chepstow, and 'tis gone,
Clear from the hills, to join its course
With rolling Severn, and the force
Of endless ocean, past the home
Of princely merchants, whence have come
Men who ventured lands unknown,
And threatening hills, and isles alone.
And over seas uncharted went,
And left enduring monument
In Canynge's soaring house of prayer.
And Temple's rounded pillars fair.
Of pious faith and love their own.
Southward thence my steps I turn
Where Mendip calls me, and I burn
To see once more the stretching plain
Beneath me, and behold again
The hill, where yet dead ages reign
By haunted Glaston — there the rest
Of Arthur and of Guinevere,
And Lancelot, of his knights the best ;
Remains the spell. And now I go
O'er the old stone fences low
By Cheddar's cliffs, as yester year,
And by the lonely mines, and so
To where, 'neath Mendip's nestling breast,
I'll find the fairest and the best,
Methinks, of all the lovely west;
For there it crouches — ay, 'tis there.
Fragrant with beauty, safe from care
Beside the waters, ever-sweet
Beloved Wells ! And there 'tis meet
Where saints have praised of old, I praise
The God who thus inspired to raise
These living arches' span, and mould
These breathing capitals of old.
And plan the Chapter's octave-sweep.
Here, in the place I love the best,
The home of sweetness and of rest.
Or may I awful silence keep
Amid the brown, mysterious waves
Of Purbeck's hills, where Lulworth laves
Its curved shores, and Corfe uprears
Its windy turrets, grey with years.
Or bid me seek the early flow
Of 'stripling Thames,' and happy go
Where swelling Cotswold hides his birth.
And loving hollows of the earth
Hold me alone from all but heaven.
Thence, by many a hidden town,
Where his silvery path is driven,
Down I'll go, and gently down
To Oxford city, home of peace
And patient learning's still increase,
Where Newman strove and Keble prayed,
And Morris, in that cloistered shade
Of Beauty, found it 'mid the past.
And toiled to make the world at last
Lovely, through work and beauty wed,
As once, he dreamed, in days long dead.
And on I'll go to Dorchester,
And bid adieu the river there.
And enter the long Church and pray
'Mid beauty of an earlier day.
So to those bare hills I come,
Whence I may view my final home.
I shall stand where runs the Horse
In ceaseless and unmoving course
By Uffington, and gaze around
On many leagues of smiling ground,
Bleak hills and leafy vale, as forth
I gaze on pasture to the north,
And Chiltern east and Cotswold west ;
Yet from all the lovely rest
Southward with sudden joy I turn
To where I dimly can discern
The tufted trees that shade on high.
Distant against the clouds and sky,
The mighty head of Barbury !
And so to those dear lands I know
I'll go, as once I used to go.
By Liddington and hidden Snap
(Lost in the rolling downs' green lap).
By Poulton, or Four Miler's head,
Where I seem to grandly tread
Above the earth, or Savernake;
And so my joyful road I'll take
To happy Marlborough, name to wake
Sweet ghosts of memory, for the sake
Of pleasures gone, but dwelling yet
Secure where heart can ne'er forget !
There I'll go, and there I'U dwell
Amid the ever-happy spell
Of friendship's laughter, ever-new,
As in memory, firm and true.
So, in weak and faltering phrase,
Have I dreamed that I would praise
With loving heart the glorious land
Of England, where the generous hand
Of nature still has lavished free
All beauty, and has given me
To love it, wood and field and sea.
And flowing stream and barren hill.
Alive or dead, I'll love them still.