Classic Poem

An earl of England hath a crest
An infant in an eagle's nest;

And (hid to heraldry) the strange
Yet simple legend, “Without change.”

No herald, yet I hold amiss
The reading that traverses this.

No doubt the eagle caught away
The infant from its nurse that day,

And felt new softness at the touch,
Pervade his fiery spirit; much

As might the lion that relents,
A lamb, to Una's innocence.

And well, methinks, the nursling might
From the stern rapture of that flight

Some token of the eyrie bring
In dauntless eye and tireless wing;

And so through annals richly stored,
Of gown, of miter, and of sword,

Transmit, unchanged, to all his race
The eagle's fire, the infant's grace.