POETRY.
OXFORD, PAST AND PRESENT.
! the rush, of old men with the kindly anxious faces, Bald heads, and white heads, or turning fast to grey ; Wandering here and there in the old familiar places, Knowing, alas ! nothing of the Oxford of to-day !
Oh, alas ! the thronging of so many men, so wrong in
Just the very questions where RO right they wish to go ! Women here corrupted ! all our studies interrupted
By their lightness, by their brightness ! Nay, dear friends, it is not so !
Oxford still is Oxford, as you knew it, as you loved it ; For its great and high ideals, ever earnest, struggling on ;
Women check our aim ? Nay ! rather they will help to p-oh it farther, And from Oxford's light illumined light their to 11, and hand it on.
In the quiet peaceful village, where the men are rude with tillage, In the factory's din and discord, in the chill and dingy town, They will spread the light and knowledge they (as you did) learnt at college, And with bright refining touches slowly tone the darkness down.
Yet their charm the while. unaltered ! Still the joy crf life domestic,
Truer wife, and wiser mother, through the student's added lore! If, as some one says, a woman knowing little is "majestic,"
! what will she be in future, when she knows a little more?
Fare ye well, then, dear opponents (we'll not call you foes), and ever, Ever, though in mind divided, may our hearts united stay ! Still (believe !) we too love Oxford ; only use our best endeavour, To keep Oxford's touch with England, with the England of
Previous page
