Aubrey Herbert

Aubrey Herbert Poems

Aubrey Herbert Biography

Aubrey Nigel Henry Molyneux Herbert (1880 – 26 September 1923) was a British diplomat, traveller and intelligence officer associated with Albanian independence. Twice he was offered the throne of Albania. From 1911 until his death he was a Conservative Member of Parliament. Aubrey Herbert was the second son of Henry Herbert, 4th Earl of Carnarvon, a wealthy landowner, British cabinet minister and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland and his second wife, Elizabeth Howard of Greystoke Castle, Cumberland, sister of Esme Howard, 1st Baron Howard of Penrith. He was a half-brother to George Herbert, 5th Earl of Carnarvon, the famous Egyptologist who discovered King Tutankhamen's tomb. He was afflicted with eye problems which left him nearly blind from early childhood, losing all his sight towards the end of his life. Herbert was educated at Eton College and Balliol College, Oxford University, where he obtained a first class degree in modern history. He was famous for climbing the roofs of the university buildings, despite his near blindness. He numbered among his friends Adrian Carton De Wiart, Raymond Asquith, John Buchan and Hilaire Belloc. Reginald Farrer remained close throughout his life. His friendship with Middle Eastern traveller and advisor Sir Mark Sykes dates from his entry into parliament in 1911 when, with George Lloyd, they were the three youngest Conservative MPs. They shared an interest in foreign policy and worked closely together in the Arab Bureau (1916). Herbert was also a close friend of T. E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia); their letters do not feature in the standard Lawrence collections , but are quoted by Margaret Fitzherbert in the biography of her grandfather, The Man Who Was Greenmantle.)

The Best Poem Of Aubrey Herbert

R.B.

It was April we left Lemnos, shining sea and snow-white camp,
Passing onward into darkness. Lemnos shone a golden lamp,
As a low harp tells of thunder, so the lovely Lemnos air
Whispered of the dawn and battle; and we left a comrade there.

He who sang of dawn and evening, English glades and light of Greece,
Changed his dreaming into sleeping, left his sword to rest in peace.
Left his visions of the springtime, Holy Grail and Golden Fleece,
Took the leave that has no ending, till the waves of Lemnos cease.

There will be enough recorders ere this fight of ours be done,
And the deeds of men made little, swiftly cheapened one by one;
Bitter loss his golden harpstrings and the treasure of his youth;
Gallant foe and friend may mourn him, for lie sang the knightly truth.

Joy was his in his clear singing, clean as is the swimmer's joy;
Strong the wine he drank of battle, fierce as that they poured in Troy.
Swift the shadows steal from Athos, but his soul was morning-swift,
Greek and English he made music, caught the cloudthoughts we let drift.

Sleep you well, you rainbow comrade, where the wind and light is strong,
Overhead and high above you, let the lark take up your song.
Something of your singing lingers, for the men like me who pass,
Till all singing ends in sighing, in the sighing of the grass.

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