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The Ballad of St. Barbara

by G. K. Chesterton

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Dedication

TO F. C. IN MEMORIAM PALESTINE, ’19

Do you remember one immortal
Lost moment out of time and space,
What time we thought, who passed the portal
Of that divine disastrous place
Where Life was slain and Truth was slandered
On that one holier hill than Rome,
How far abroad our bodies wandered
That evening when our souls came home?

The mystic city many-gated,
With monstrous columns, was your own:
Herodian stones fell down and waited
Two thousand years to be your throne.
In the grey rocks the burning blossom
Glowed terrible as the sacred blood:
It was no stranger to your bosom
Than bluebells of an English wood.

Do you remember a road that follows
The way of unforgotten feet,
Where from the waste of rocks and hollows
Climb up the crawling crooked street
The stages of one towering drama
Always ahead and out of sight...
Do you remember Aceldama
And the jackal barking in the night?

Life is not void or stuff for scorners:
We have laughed loud and kept our love,
We have heard singers in tavern corners
And not forgotten the birds above:
We have known smiters and sons of thunder
And not unworthily walked with them,
We have grown wiser and lost not wonder;
And we have seen Jerusalem.

CONTENTSPAGE
To F. C. In Memoriam Palestine, ’19 vii
The Ballad of St. Barbara 1
Elegy in a Country Churchyard 13
The Sword of Surprise 14
A Wedding in War-time 15
The Mystery 18
“The Myth of Arthur”19
The Old Song 20
The Trinkets 24
The Philanthropist 26
On the Downs 27
The Red Sea 30
For a War Memorial 32
Memory 33
The English Graves 35
Nightmare 37
A Second Childhood 40
“Mediævalism”43
Poland 46
The Hunting of the Dragon 48
Sonnet 51
Fantasia 52
A Christmas Carol 54
To Captain Fryatt 56
For Four Guilds:
I.The Glass-Stainers 57
II.The Bridge-Builders 59
III.The Stone-Masons 62
IV.The Bell-Ringers 64
The Convert 67
Songs of Education:
I.History 71
II.Geography 74
III.For the Crêche 76
IV.Citizenship 78
V.The Higher Mathematics 80
VI.Hygiene 82

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