180 GEOEGE JOHN EOMANES I88I- 



They knew thee well, those weedy rocks, 

 And now they rear their rugged blocks 



When I pass by, 



To ask me why 

 They never feel thy tender hands ; 

 And all the yellow of the sands 



Is spread to greet 



Thy tireless feet, 

 Which loved to walk them when the tide was low. 



Now when I walk alone. 

 To hear the ocean moan, 

 The sea-birds circling round 

 Sweep almost to the ground, 

 And peep and pry above my head to know 

 Why thou dost never come, 

 To watch them flying home, 

 Upon the purple breast, 

 Where daylight sinks to rest.' 



The Journal 1887, 1888, and 1889 is fuU of men- 

 tion of pleasant dinners and meetings with interesting 

 people. Young as Mr. Eomanes was, he attained long 

 before he died 'that which should accompany old age — 

 honour, love, obedience, troops of friends,' and as one 

 turns over the brief records of the Journal one is struck 

 with the brightness of his outward hfe. He enjoyed con- 

 stant pleasant intercourse with men and women differ- 

 ing widely in pursuits, in opinions, in social position ; 

 he was full of plans for work, work which led him into 

 many different phases of intellectual life, and he had 

 every year an admixture of country life and country 

 pursuits, and the love for music and for poetry, which 

 increased each year, kept him from growing too 

 absorbed in science, from being at all one-sided. He 

 used sometimes to say he had too many interests, but 

 be that as it may, these interests gave him much 

 enjoyment and made him the most delightful of 

 companions. 



A dear friend wrote of him after his death that 

 ' In the home few men have been more surrounded by 



