The Abbey and the Palace: Standing away from the cornfields

This and nos. 4-9, 13, 14, and 16-18 below are all written in a large, loose, symmetrical script, quite different from that used by the copyist of "The Mosque Rising in the Place of the Temple of Solomon" (formerly known as "The Dedication of the Temple"), a poem which May Morris received in the same batch of poems from her niece Effie Morris in 1921, and which she describes as written out "for or by" her aunt. May Morris apparently hesitated to identify her aunt's handwriting, but at least did not assume that the very different "Fame" script was hers. The uncertainty is resolved, however, by the one surviving Emma Morris letter (to her niece Jenny, 1887, William Morris Gallery MS J77), written in the script of "The Mosque Rising" copyist. Emma was not the copyist for "Fame" or the other poems in the same handwriting which were found in her drawer; other possibilities include Henrietta Morris or Morris himself. Morris's handwriting varied widely; although the handwriting of "Fame" is less compressed than that of the Fitzwilliam early script, the capital letters are similarly formed. May Morris often mentioned whether drafts were in her father's hand, but here said nothing. See also the note on 10.

B. L. Add. MS. 45,298A, 33v-34.

[f. 33v] Stands a house among the trees[,]
Many-gabled, in the breeze
Over it the long cloud sweeps,
Over it the sun-shower weeps;
There is no one there within,
Long ago the roof fell in,
All adown the ruined hall
Archless stand the broken pillars tall.

Up the wall the ivy climbs
As the tapestry in old times;
Half-uprooted 'cross the wall
Lieth now a pine tree tall;
Where the banners used to wave,
Telling tales about the grave,
Now the wind is in the tree
Telling quiet tales about the sea[.]

Many tales the banners told
Of the gallant deeds of old;
But that wind within the tree
Wondrous stories telleth he:
O! the banners told of love,
[f. 34] Now the wind is light above,
And he cometh from the Sea
Singing well of what shall be.
But the banners rot below
And the story of the banners no man shall ever know.

Pub. AWS, I, 531.

Stands a house among the trees,
Many gabled, in the breeze
Over it the long cloud sweeps,
Over it the sun-shower weeps;
There is no one there within,
Long ago the roof fell in,
All adown the ruined hall
Archless stand the broken pillars tall.

Up the wall the ivy climbs
The tapestry in old times;
Half-uprooted ‘cross the wall
Lieth now a pine tree tall;
Where the banners used to wave,
Telling tales about the grave;
Now the wind is in the tree
Telling quiet tales about the sea.

Many tales the banners told
Of the gallant deeds of old;
But that wind within the tree
Wondrous stories telleth he:
O! the banners told of love,
      Now the wind is light above,
      And he cometh from the Sea
      Singing well of what shall be.
      But the banners rot below
And the story of the banners no man shall ever know.