Αἴλινον, αἴινον εἰπὲ, Τὸ δ᾽ ευ̉ νικάτω
O well for him who lives at ease
With garnered gold in wide domain,
Nor heeds the plashing of the rain,
The crashing down of forest trees.
O well for him who ne’er hath known
The travail of the hungry years,
A father grey with grief and tears,
A mother weeping all alone.
But well for him whose feet hath trod
The weary road of toil and strife,
Yet from the sorrows of his life
Builds ladders to be nearer God.
Oscar F. O’F. Wills Wilde.
S. M. Magdalen College,
Oxford.
Note
M. Gide’s Study of Mr. Oscar Wilde (perhaps the best account yet written of the poet’s latter days) appeared first in L’Ermitage, a monthly literary review, in June, 1902. It was afterwards reprinted with some few slight alterations in a volume of critical essays, entitled Prétextes, by M. Gide. It is now published in English for the first time, by special arrangement with the author.
S. M.