46 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



Impatient of her rule, and waiteth still 



Her slow commands. She gives him measurements, 



True to the thickness of the golden dust 



Which studs the wings of summer butterflies, 



That he may know with mathematic truth 



Exactly where those tapering summits lie. 



Then bids she him so tilt this bit of rock, 



So lift it up and fix it, that her eye, 



Centred upon this microscopic field, 



May see those towering spirals and discern 



What underlies them. All too eagerly, 



Action obeys, and levers up the world. 



I watch it through my glass. The mountains shake, 



Uprear, o'erturn, till sight itself is sick, 



And with an awful plunge they disappear 



And leave me gazing on vacuity. 



Now rack and pinion work, and I descend, 



As in a mine, when the explosion's o'er, 



To see the havoc done. Those fragile spires 



Nor greet me all unharm'd, nor shatter'd lie 



Among the rocks. Ill hath the work been done. 



Pois'd on an edge to bring those spires erect, 



The whole hath toppled o'er. The tiny world 



Appears intractable. Yet Action, ever quick, 



Dauntless, unteachable, hath seiz'd the stone 



Between his horrid finger and his thumb, 



E'er pale Reflection, paralysed, can speak. 



In such a grasp Mount Everest would melt 



And crumble into powder; Fate might spare 



The marble beauty of the Taj Mahal, 



But Art would weep that such a hand should fling 



Even its shadow on it. But 'tis done. 



And now, at last, the rock is duly set 



At the right angle, on a base secure 



Which that intrepid engineer hath built 



Out of the ribs of pine-trees, such as lay 



Shaped ready to his hand, common as clay, 



Yet such as gods might envy, sulphur-tipp'd 



By magic alchemy to carry fire, 



The gift of science, for the needs of man. 



The microscope invites, and yet I pause; 



