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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 10133 ***
+
+THE VIGIL OF VENUS
+
+AND OTHER POEMS BY
+
+"Q"
+
+
+1912
+
+
+
+TO MAURICE HEWLETT
+
+
+
+    HEWLETT! as ship to ship
+    Let us the ensign dip.
+    There may be who despise
+    For dross our merchandise,
+    Our balladries, our bales
+      Of woven tales;
+    Yet, Hewlett, the glad gales
+    Favonian! And what spray
+    Our dolphins toss'd in play,
+Full in old Triton's beard, on Iris' shimmering veils!
+
+    Scant tho' the freight of gold
+    Commercial in our hold,
+    Pæstum, Eridanus
+    Perchance have barter'd us
+   'Bove chrematistic care
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+THE VIGIL OF VENUS
+PERVIGILIUM VENERIS
+THE REGENT--A DRAMA IN ONE ACT
+POEMS
+  EXMOOR VERSES
+    VASHTI'S SONG
+    SATURN
+    DERELICTION
+  TWO FOLK SONGS
+    THE SOLDIER
+    THE MARINE
+  MARY LESLIE
+  JENIFER'S LOVE
+  TWO DUETS
+  THE STATUES AND THE TEAR
+  NUPTIAL NIGHT
+  HESPERUS
+  CHANT ROYAL OF HIGH VIRTUE
+  ENVOY
+  CORONATION HYMN
+  THREE MEN OF TRURO
+  ALMA MATER
+  CHRISTMAS EVE
+  THE ROOT
+  TO A FRIEND WHO SENT ME A BOX OF VIOLETS
+  OF THREE CHILDREN CHOOSING A CHAPLET OF VERSE
+EPILOGUE: TO A MOTHER, ON SEEING HER SMILE REPEATED
+IN HER DAUGHTER'S EYES
+
+
+
+
+THE VIGIL OF VENUS
+
+
+The _Pervigilium Veneris_--of unknown authorship, but clearly belonging
+to the late literature of the Roman Empire--has survived in two MSS.,
+both preserved at Paris in the _Bibliothèque Nationale_.
+
+Of these two MSS. the better written may be assigned (at earliest) to
+the close of the seventh century; the other (again at earliest) to the
+close of the ninth. Both are corrupt; the work of two illiterate
+copyists who--strange to say--were both smatterers enough to betray
+their little knowledge by converting _Pervigilium_ into _Per Virgilium_
+(_scilicet_, "by Virgil"): thus helping us to follow the process of
+thought by which the Middle Ages turned Virgil into a wizard. Here and
+there the texts become quite silly, separately or in consent; and just
+where they agree in the most surprising way--_i.e._ in the arrangement
+of the lines--the conjectural emendator is invited to do his worst by a
+note at the head of the older Codex, "Sunt vero versus xxii"--"There are
+rightly twenty-two lines."
+
+This has started much ingenious guess-work. But no really convincing
+rearrangement has been achieved as yet; and I have been content to take
+the text pretty well as it stands, with a few corrections upon which
+most scholars agree. With a poem of "paratactic structure" the best of
+us may easily go astray by transposing lines, or blocks of lines, to
+correspond with _our_ sequence of thought; and I shall be content if,
+following the only texts to which appeal can be made,[1] my translation
+be generally intelligible.
+
+It runs pretty closely, line for line, with the original; because one
+may love and emulate classical terseness even while despairing to rival
+it. But it does not attempt to be literal; for even were it worth doing,
+I doubt if it be possible for anyone in our day to hit precisely the
+note intended by an author or heard by a reader in the eighth century.
+Men change subtly as nations succeed to nations, religions to religions,
+philosophies to philosophies; and it is a property of immortal poetry to
+shift its appeal. It does not live by continuing to mean the some thing.
+It grows as we grow. We smile, for instance, when some interlocutor in a
+dialogue of Plato takes a line from the _Iliad_ and applies it seriously
+_au pied de la lettre_. We can hardly conceive what the great line
+conveyed to him; but it may mean something equally serious to us, though
+in a different way.
+
+[1] Facsimiles of the two Codices can be studied in a careful edition of
+the _Pervigilum_ by Mr Cecil Clementi, published by Mr B.H. Blackwell of
+Oxford, 1911.
+
+
+
+
+PERVIGILIUM VENERIS
+
+_Cras amet qui nunquam amavit; quique amavit cras amet_.
+Ver novum, ver jam canorurn, vere natus orbis est;
+Vere concordant amores, vere nubunt alites,
+Et nemus comam resolvit de maritis imbribus.
+Cras amorum copulatrix inter umbras arborum     5
+Inplicat casas virentes de flagello myrteo:
+Cras Dione jura dicit fulta sublimi throno.
+_Cras amet qui nunquam amavit; quique amavit cras amet_.
+
+_To-morrow--What news of to-morrow?
+Now learn ye to love who loved never--now ye who have loved, love anew_!
+It is Spring, it is chorussing Spring; 'tis the birthday of Earth, and
+    for you!
+It is Spring; and the Loves and the birds wing together and woo to accord
+Where the bough to the rain has unbraided her locks as a bride to
+    her lord.
+For she walks--she our Lady, our Mistress of Wedlock--the woodlands
+    atween,     5
+And the bride-bed she weaves them, with myrtle enlacing, with curtains
+    of green.
+Look aloft! list the law of Dione, sublime and enthroned in the blue:
+_Now learn ye to love who loved never--now ye who have loved, love anew_!
+
+Tunc liquore de superno spumeo et ponti globo,
+Cærulas inter catervas, inter et bipedes equos,     10
+Fecit undantem Dionen de maritis imbribus.
+_Cras amet qui nunquam amavit; quiqiie amavit cras amet_.
+
+Ipsa gemmis purpurantem pingit annum floribus,
+Ipsa surgentes papillas de Favoni spiritu
+Urget in toros tepentes; ipsa roris lucidi     15
+Noctis aura quem relinquit, spargit umentes aquas.
+Et micant lacrimæ trementes de caduco pondere:
+
+Time was that a rain-cloud begat her, impregning the heave of the deep,
+'Twixt hooves of sea-horses a-scatter, stampeding the dolphins as
+    sheep.     10
+Lo! arose of that bridal Dione, rainbow'd and besprent of its dew!
+_Now learn ye to love who loved never--now ye who have loved, love anew_!
+
+She, she, with her gem-dripping finger enamels the wreath of the year;
+She, she, when the maid-bud is nubile and swelling winds--whispers anear,
+Disguising her voice in the Zephyr's--"So secret the bed! And thou
+    shy?"     15
+She, she, thro' the hush'd humid Midsummer night draws the dew from on
+    high;
+Dew bright with the tears of its origin, dew with its weight on the bough,
+
+Gutta præceps orbe parvo sustinet casus suos.
+En, pudorem florulentæ prodiderunt purpuræ:
+Umor ille quern serenis astra rorant noctibus     20
+Mane virgineas papillas solvit umenti peplo.
+Ipsa jussit mane ut udas virgines nubant rosæ;
+Fusa Paphies de cruore deque Amoris osculis
+Deque gemmis deque flammis deque solis purpuris,
+Cras ruborem qui latebat veste tectus ignea     25
+Unico marita nodo non pudebit solvere.
+_Cras amet qui nunquam amavit; quique amavit cras amet_.
+
+Misdoubting and clinging and trembling--"Now, now must I fall? Is it now?"
+Star-fleck'd on the stem of the brier as it gathers and falters and flows,
+Lo! its trail runs a ripple of fire on the nipple it bids be a
+    rose,     20
+Yet englobes it diaphanous, veil upon veil in a tiffany drawn
+To bedrape the small virginal breasts yet unripe for the spousal of dawn;
+Till the vein'd very vermeil of Venus, till Cupid's incarnadine kiss,
+Till the ray of the ruby, the sunrise, ensanguine the bath of her bliss;
+Till the wimple her bosom uncover, a tissue of fire to the view,     25
+And the zone o'er the wrists of the lover slip down as they reach to undo.
+_Now learn ye to love who loved never--now ye who have loved, love anew_!
+
+Ipsa nymphas diva luco jussit ire myrteo:
+It puer comes puellis. Nee tamen credi potest
+Esse Amorem feriatum, si sagittas vexerit.     30
+Ite, nymphæ, posuit arma, feriatus est Amor;
+Jussus est inermis ire, nudus ire jussus est,
+Neu quid arcu, neu sagitta, neu quid igne Iæderet;
+Sed tamen nymphse cavete, quod Cupido pulcher est;
+Est in armis totus idem quando nudus est Amor!     35
+
+_Cras amet qui nunquam amavit; quique amavit eras amet_.
+
+Conpari Venus pudore mittit ad te virgines:
+
+"Go, maidens," Our Lady commands, "while the myrtle is green in the
+    groves,
+Take the Boy to your escort." "But ah!" cry the maidens, "what trust
+    is in Love's
+Keeping holiday too, while he weareth his archery, tools of his
+    trade?"     30
+"Go! he lays them aside, an apprentice released; ye may wend unafraid.
+See, I bid him disarm, he disarms; mother-naked I bid him to go,
+And he goes mother-naked. What flame can he shoot without arrow or bow?"
+Yet beware ye of Cupid, ye maidens! Beware most of all when he charms
+As a child: for the more he runs naked, the more he's a strong
+    man-at-arms.     35
+
+_Now learn ye to love who loved never--now ye who have loved, love anew!
+"Lady Dian"--Behold how demurely the damsels approach her and sue--
+
+Una res est quam rogamus: cede, virgo Delia,
+Ut nemus sit incruentum de ferinis stragibus.
+Ipsa vellet ut venires, si deceret virginem:     40
+Jam tribus choros videres feriatos noctibus
+Congreges inter catervas ire per saltus tuos,
+Floreas inter coronas, myrteas inter casas:
+Nee Ceres nee Bacchus absunt, nee poetarum Deus;
+De tenente tota nox est pervigilia canticis:     45
+Regnet in silvis Dione; tu recede, Delia.
+_Cras amet qui nunquam amavit; quique amavit cras amet_.
+
+Hear Venus her only petition! Dear maiden of
+   Delos, depart!
+Let the forest be bloodless to-day, unmolested the
+   roe and the hart!
+Holy huntress, thyself she would bid be her guest,     40
+   could thy chastity stoop
+To approve of our revels, our dances--three
+   nights that we weave in a troop
+Arm-in-arm thro' thy sanctu'ries whirling, till faint
+   and dispersed in the grove
+We lie with thy lilies for chaplets, thy myrtles for
+   arbours of love:
+And Apollo, with Ceres and Bacchus to chorus--
+   song, harvest, and wine--
+Hymns thee dispossess'd, "'Tis Dione who reigns!     45
+   Let Diana resign!"
+O, the wonderful nights of Dione! dark bough,
+   with her star shining thro'!
+_Now learn ye to love who loved never--now ye who have
+   loved, love anew!_
+
+Jussit Hyblæis tribunal stare diva floribus;
+Præses ipsa jura dicit, adsederunt Gratiæ.
+Hybla, totos funde floras quidquid annus adtulit;     50
+Hybla, florum rumpe vestem quantus Ætnæ campus est.
+
+Ruris hic erunt puellæ, vel puellæ montium,
+Quæque silvas, quæque lucos, quæque fontes incolunt:
+
+Jussit omnes adsidere mater alitis dei,
+Jussit et nudo puellas nil Amori credere.     55
+
+_Cras amet qui nunquam amavit; quique amavit cras amet._
+She has set up her court, has Our Lady, in Hybla,
+    and deckt it with blooms:--
+With the Graces at hand for assessors Dione dispenses
+    her dooms.
+Now burgeon, O Hybla! put forth and abound, till     50
+    Proserpina's field,
+To the foison thy lap overflowing its laurel of Sicily
+    yield.
+Call, assemble the nymphs--hamadryad and dryad--
+    the echoes who court
+From the rock, who the rushes inhabit, in ripples
+    who swim and disport.
+"I admonish you maids--I, his mother, who suckled
+    the scamp ere he flew--
+An ye trust to the Boy flying naked, some pestilent     55
+    prank ye shall rue."
+_Now learn ye to love who loved never--now ye who have
+    loved, love anew!_
+
+Et rigentibus virentes ducit umbras floribus:
+Cras erit quum primus Æther copulavit nuptias,
+Et pater totum creavit vernis annum nubibus,
+In sinum maritus imber fluxit almæ conjugis,     60
+Unde fetus mixtus omnes aleret magno corpore.
+Ipsa venas atque mentem permeanti spiritu
+Intus occultis gubernat procreatrix viribus,
+Perque coelum, perque terras, perque pontum
+    subditum
+Pervium sui tenorem seminali tramite     65
+
+She has coax'd her the shade of the hazel to cover
+    the wind-flower's birth.
+Since the day the Great Father begat it, descending
+    in streams upon Earth;
+When the Seasons were hid in his loins, and the
+    Earth lay recumbent, a wife,
+To receive in the searching and genital shower the     60
+    soft secret of life.
+As the terrible thighs drew it down, and conceived,
+    as the embryo ran
+Thoro' blood, thoro' brain, and the Mother gave all
+    to the making of man,
+She, she, our Dione, directed the seminal current to
+    creep,
+Penetrating, possessing, by devious paths all the
+    height, all the deep.
+She, of all procreation procuress, the share to the     65
+    furrow laid true;
+
+Inbuit, jussitque mundum nosse nascendi vias.
+_Cras amet qui nunquam amavit; quique amavit
+cras amet._
+
+Ipsa Trojanos nepotes in Latinos transtulit,
+Ipsa Laurentem puellam conjugem nato dedit;
+Moxque Marti de sacello dat pudicam virginem;     70
+Romuleas ipsa fecit cum Sabinis nuptias,
+Unde Ramnes et Quirites proque prole posterum
+Romuli matrem crearet et nepotem Cæsarem.
+_Cras amet qui nunquam amavit; quique amavit cras
+    amet._
+
+She, she, to the womb drave the knowledge, and open'd the ecstasy through.
+_Now learn ye to love who loved never--now ye who have loved, love anew!_
+
+Her favour it was fill'd the sail of the Trojan for Latium bound;
+Her favour that won her Aeneas a bride on Laurentian ground,
+And anon from the cloister inveigled the Virgin, the Vestal,
+    to Mars;     70
+As her wit by the wild Sabine rape recreated her Rome for its wars,
+With the Ramnes, Quirites, together ancestrally proud as they drew
+From Romulus down to our Caesar--last, best of that bone, of that thew.
+_Now learn ye to love who loved never--now ye who have loved, love anew!_
+
+Rura fecundat voluptas: rura Venerem sentiunt:     75
+Ipse Amor puer Dionse rure natus dicitur.
+Hunc ager, cum parturiret ipsa, suscepit sinu:
+Ipsa florum delicatis educavit osculis.
+_Cras amet qui nunquam amavit; quique amavit cras,
+amet_.
+
+Ecce jam super genestas explicant tauri latus,     80
+Quisque tutus quo tenetur conjugali foedere:
+Subter umbras cum maritis ecce balantum greges;
+Et canoras non tacere diva jussit alites.
+
+Pleasure planteth a field; it conceives to the passion,     75
+     the pang, of his joy.
+In a field was Dione in labour delivered of Cupid the
+     Boy;
+And the field in its fostering lap from her travail
+     received him: he drew
+Mother's milk from the delicate kisses of flowers;
+     and he prosper'd and grew--
+_Now learn ye to love who loved never--now ye who have
+     loved, love anew!_
+
+Lo! behold ye the bulls, with how lordly a flank     80
+     they besprawl on the broom!--
+Yet obey the uxorious yoke, and are tamed to
+     Dione her doom.
+Or behear ye the sheep, to the husbanding rams
+     how they bleat to the shade!
+Or behear ye the birds, at the Goddess' command
+     how they sing unafraid!
+
+Jam loquaces ore rauco stagna cycni perstrepunt;
+Adsonat Terei puella subter umbram populi,     85
+Ut putes motus amoris ore dici musico,
+Et neges queri sororem de marito barbaro.
+Ilia cantat, nos tacemus. Quando ver venit meum?
+Quando fiam uti chelidon, ut tacere desinam?
+Perdidi Musam tacendo, nec me Apollo respicit;     90
+Sic Amyclas, cum tacerent, perdidit silentium.
+_Cras amet qui nunquam amavit; quique amavit cras
+amet_.
+
+Be it harsh as the swannery's clamour that shatters the hush of the lake,
+Be it dulcet as where Philomela holds darkling the poplar awake,     85
+So melting her soul into music, you'd vow 'twas her passion, her own,
+She plaineth--her sister forgot, with the Daulian crime long-agone.
+Hark! Hush! Draw around to the circle ... Ah, loitering Summer! Say when
+For me shall be broken the charm, that I chirp with the swallow again?
+I am old; I am dumb; I have waited to sing till Apollo withdrew--     90
+So Amyclae a moment was mute, and for ever a wilderness grew.
+_Now learn ye to love who loved never--now ye who have loved, love anew,_
+  _To-morrow!--to-morrow!_
+
+
+
+
+TO
+CHARLES THURSBY
+
+THE "ONLIE BEGETTER"
+
+
+
+
+THE REGENT
+
+A DRAMA IN ONE ACT
+
+
+
+
+DRAMATIS PERSONAE
+
+CARL'ANTONIO, _Duke of Adria_
+
+TONINO, _his young son_
+
+LUCIO; _Count of Vallescura, brother to the Duchess_
+
+CESARIO, _Captain of the Guard_
+
+GAMBA, _a Fool_
+
+
+OTTILIA, _Duchess and Regent of Adria_
+
+LUCETTA, _a Lady-in-Waiting_
+
+FULVIA, _a Lady of the Court_
+
+
+_Courtiers, Priests, Choristers, Soldiers, Mariners,
+Townsfolk, etc._
+
+_The Scene is the Ducal Palace of Adria, in the N. Adriatic_
+
+_The Date, 1571_
+
+
+
+
+THE REGENT
+
+SCENE.--_A terraced courtyard before the Ducal Palace.
+Porch and entrance of Chapel, R. A semicircular
+balcony, L., with balustrade and marble seats, and an
+opening whence a flight of steps leads down to the
+city. The city lies out of sight below the terrace;
+from which, between its cypresses and statuary, is
+seen a straight stretch of a canal; beyond the canal are
+sand-hills and the line of the open sea. Mountains,
+L., dip down to the sea and form a curve of the
+coast._
+
+_As the curtain rises, a crowd of town and country
+folk is being herded to the back of the terrace by the
+Ducal Guard, under Cesario. Within the Chapel, to_
+_the sound of an organ, boys' voices are chanting the
+service of the Mass._
+
+_Cesario, Gamba the Fool, Guards, Populace._
+
+
+_Cesario._ Way there! Give room! The Regent comes from Mass.
+Guards, butt them on the toes--way there! give room!
+Prick me that laggard's leg-importunate fools!
+
+_Guards._ Room for the Regent! Room!
+
+[_The sacring bell rings within the Chapel._
+
+_Cesario._ Hark there, the bell!
+
+[_A pause. Men of the crowd take off their caps._
+
+Could ye not leave, this day of all the year,
+Your silly suits, petitions, quarrels, pleas?
+Could ye not leave, this once in seven years,
+Our Lady to come holy-quiet from Mass.
+Lean on the wall, and loose her cage-bird heart,
+To lift and breast and dance upon the breeze.
+Draws home her lord the Duke?
+
+_Crowd._ Long live the Duke!
+
+_Cesario._ The devil, then! Why darken his approach?
+
+
+_Gamba (from the bench where he has been mending his
+viol)._ Because, Captain, 'tis a property knaves
+and fools have in common--to stand in their own
+light, as 'tis of soldiers to talk bad logic. That
+knave, now--he with the red nose and the black
+eye--the Duke's colours, loyal man!--you clap
+an iron on his leg, and ask him why he is not
+down in the city, hanging them out of window!
+Go to: you are a soldier!
+
+_Cesario._ And you a Fool, and on your own showing
+stand in your own light.
+
+_Gamba._ Nay, neither in my own light, nor as a
+Fool. So should myself stand between the sun
+and my shadow; whereas I am not myself--these
+seven years have I been but the shadow of a
+Fool. Yet one must tune up for the Duke.
+
+_(Strikes his viol and sings.)_
+
+"Bird of the South, my Rondinello----"
+
+Flat-Flat!
+
+
+_Cesario (calling up to watchman on the Chapel roof)._ Ho there! What news?
+
+_A Voice._               Captain, no sail!
+
+_Cesario._                                 Where sits
+The wind?
+
+_Voice._    Nor' west, and north a point!
+
+_Cesario._                                Perchance
+They have down'd sail and creep around the flats.
+
+_Gamba (tuning his viol)._ Flats, flats! the straight horizon, and the life
+These seven years laid by rule!  The curst canal
+Drawn level through the drawn-out level sand
+And thistle-tufts that stink as soon as pluck'd!
+Give me the hot crag and the dancing heat,
+Give me the Abruzzi, and the cushioned thyme--
+Brooks at my feet, high glittering snows above.
+What were thy music, viol, without a ridge?
+
+
+[_Noise of commotion in the city below._
+
+
+_Cesario_. Watchman, what news?
+
+_A Voice_.                    Sir, on the sea no sail!
+
+_One of the Crowd_. But through the town below a horseman spurs--
+I think, Count Lucio! Yes--Count Lucio!
+He nears, draws rein, dismounts!
+
+_Cesario_.                  Sure, he brings news.
+
+
+_Gamba_. I think he brings word the Duke is sick;
+his loyal folk have drunk so much of his
+health.
+
+[_A murmur has been growing in the town below. It
+breaks into cheers as Count Lucio comes springing
+up to the terrace._
+
+_Enter Lucio._
+
+
+_Lucio._ News! Where's the Regent? Eh? is Mass not said?
+Cesario, news! I rode across the dunes;
+A pilot--Nestore--you know the man--
+Came panting. Sixteen sail beyond the point!
+That's not a galley lost!
+
+_Crowd._            Long live the Duke!
+
+_Lucio._ Hark to the tocsin!  I have carried fire--
+Wildfire! Why, where's my sister? I've a mind--
+
+
+[_He strides towards the door of the Chapel; but
+pauses at the sound of chanting within, and
+comes back to Cesario._
+
+
+Man, are you mute? I say the town's aflame
+Below! But here, up here, you stand and stare
+Like prisoners loosed to daylight. Rub your eyes,
+Believe!
+
+_Cesario (musing)._ It has been long.
+
+_Lucio._                            As tapestry
+Pricked out by women's needles; point-device
+As saints in fitted haloes. Yet they stab,
+Those needles. Oh, the devil take their tongues!
+
+_Cesario._ Why, what's the matter?
+
+_Lucio._ P'st! another lie
+Against the Countess Fulvia; and the train
+Laid to my sister's ear. Cesario,
+My sister is a saint--and yet she married:
+Therefore should understand ... Would saints, like cobblers,
+Stick but to business in this naughty world!
+Ah, well! the Duke comes home.
+
+_Cesario._ And what of that?
+
+_Lucio._ Release!
+
+_Cesario._ Release?
+
+_Lucio (mocking a chant within the Chapel)._ From priests and petticoats
+Deliver us, Good Lord!
+
+_Gamba (strikes a chord on viol). AMEN!_
+
+_Cesario._ Count Lucio,
+These seven years agone, when the Duke sailed,
+You were a child--a pretty, forward boy;
+And I a young lieutenant of the Guard,
+Burning to serve abroad. But that day, rather,
+I clenched my nails over an inward wound:
+For that a something manlier than my years--
+Look, bearing, what-not--by the Duke not miss'd,
+Condemned me to promotion: I must bide
+At home, command the Guard! 'Tis an old hurt,
+But scalded on my memory.... Well, they sailed!
+And from the terrace here, sick with self-pity,
+Wrapped in my wrong, forgetful of devoir,
+I watch'd them through a mist--turned with a sob--
+Uptore my rooted sight--
+                         There, there she stood;
+Her hand press'd to her girdle, where the babe
+Stirred in her body while she gazed--she gazed--
+But slowly back controlled her eyes, met mine;
+So--with how wan, how small, how brave a smile!--
+Reached me her hands to kiss ...
+                                O royal hands!
+What burdens since they have borne let Adria tell.
+But hear me swear by them, Count Lucio--
+Who slights our Regent throws his glove to me.
+
+_Lucio._ Why, soothly, she's my sister!
+
+_Cesario._ 'But the court
+Is dull? No masques, few banquetings--and prayers
+Be long, and youth for pastime leaps the gate?'
+Yet if the money husbanded on feasts
+Have fed our soldiery against the Turk,
+Year after year, and still the State not starved;
+Was't not well done? And if, responsible
+To God, and lonely, she has leaned on God
+Too heavily for our patience, was't not wise?--
+And well, though weary?
+
+_Lucio._ I tell you, she's my sister!
+
+_Cesario._ Well, an you will, bridle on that. Lord Lucio,
+You named the Countess Fulvia. To my sorrow,
+Two hours ago I called on her and laid her
+Under arrest.
+
+_Lucio._ The devil! For what?
+
+_Cesario._ For that
+A lady, whose lord keeps summer in the hills
+To nurse a gouty foot, should penalize
+His dutiful return by shutting doors
+And hanging out a ladder made of rope,
+Or prove its safety by rehearsing it
+Upon a heavier man.
+
+_Lucio._ I'll go to her.
+Oh, this is infamous!
+
+_Cesario._ Nay, be advised:
+No hardship irks the lady, save to sit
+At home and feed her sparrows; nor no worse
+Annoy than from her balcony to spy
+(Should the eye rove) a Switzer of the Guard
+At post between her raspberry-canes, to watch
+And fright the thrushes from forbidden fruit.
+
+_Lucio._ Infamous! infamous!
+
+_Cesario._ Enough, my lord:
+The Regent!
+
+
+[_Doors of the Chapel open. The organ sounds,
+with voices of choir chanting the recessional.
+The Court enters from Mass, attending the
+Regent Ottilia and her son Tonino. She wears
+a crown and heavy dalmatic. Her brother
+Lucio, controlling himself with an effort, kisses
+her hand and conducts her to the marble bench,
+which serves for her Chair of State. She bows,
+receiving the homage of the crowd; but, after
+seating herself, appears for a few moments unconscious
+of her surroundings. Then, as her
+rosary slips from her fingers and falls heavily
+at her feet, she speaks._
+
+_Regent._ So slips the chain linking this world with Heaven,
+And drops me back to earth: so slips the chain
+That hangs my spirit to the Redeemer's cross
+Above pollution in the pure swept air
+Whereunder frets this hive: so slips the chain--
+_(She starts up)_--God! the dear sound! Was that his anchor dropped?
+Speak to the watchman, one! Call to the watch!
+What news?
+
+_Cesario._ Aloft! What news?
+
+_Voice above._ No sail as yet!
+
+_Regent._ Ah, pardon, sirs! My ears are strung to-day,
+And play false airs invented by the wind.
+Methought a hawse-pipe rattled ...
+
+_Gamba (chants to his viol). Shepherds, see--
+Lo! What a mariner love hath made me!_
+
+_Regent._ What chants the Fool?
+
+_Gamba._ Madonna, 'tis a trifle
+Made by a silly poet on wives that stand
+All night at windows listening the surf--
+_Now he comes! Will he come? Alas! no, no!_
+
+_Lucio._ Peace, lively! Madam, there is news--brave news!
+I'm from the watch-house. There the pilots tell
+Of sixteen sail to the southward! Sixteen sail,
+And nearing fast!
+
+_Regent._ Praise God! dear Lucio!
+
+
+[_She has seated herself again. She takes Lucio's
+hand and speaks, petting it._
+
+
+What?  Glowing with my happiness?  That's like you.
+But for yourself the hour, too, holds release.
+
+_Lucio (between sullenness and shame, with a glance at
+Cesario)._ "Release?"
+
+_Regent._          You will forgive? I have great need
+To be forgiven: sadly I have been slack
+In guardianship, and by so much betrayed
+My promise to our mother's passing soul.
+Myself in cares immersed, I left the child
+Among his toys--and turn to find him man--
+But yet so much a boy that boyhood can
+_(Wistfully)_ Laugh in his honest eyes? Forgive me, Lucio!
+Tell me, whate'er have slackened, there has slipped
+No knot of love. To-morrow we'll make sport,
+Be playmates and invent new games, and old--
+Wreath flowers for crowns--
+
+
+[_He drags his hand away. She gazes at him
+wistfully, and turns to the Captain of the
+Guard._
+
+
+                              Cesario,
+What are the suits?
+
+_Cesario._        They are but three to-day,
+Madonna. First, a scoundrel here in irons
+For having struck the Guard.
+
+_Regent (eying the culprit)._            His name, I think,
+Is Donatello Crocco. Hey? You improve,
+Good man. The last time 'twas your wife you basted.
+At this rate, in another year or two
+You'll bang the Turk. Do you confess the assault?
+
+_Prisoner._ I do.
+
+_Regent._ Upon a promise we dismiss you.
+Your tavern, as it comes into our mind,
+Is the 'Three Cups.' So many, and no more,
+You'll drink to-day--have we your word? Three cups,
+And each a _Viva_ for the Duke's return.
+
+_Prisoner._ Your Highness, I'll not take it at the price
+Of my good manners. I'm a gallant man:
+And who in Adria calls. 'Three cheers for the Duke!'
+But adds a fourth for the Duchess? Lady, nay;
+Grant me that fourth, or back I go to the cells!
+
+
+[_The Regent laughs and nods to the Guard to release
+him._
+
+
+_Regent._ What next?
+
+_An Old Woman (very rapidly)._ Your Highness will not know me--Zia
+Agnese, Giovannucci's wife that was;
+And feed a two-three cows, as a widow may,
+On the marshes where the grass is salt and sweet
+As your Highness knows--and always true to pail
+Until this Nicolo--
+
+_Nicolo._ Lies! lies, your Highness!
+
+_Old Woman._ Having a quarrel, puts the evil eye
+On Serafina. She's my best of cows,
+In stall with calf but ten days weaned.
+
+_Nicolo._ Lies! lies!
+
+_Old Woman._ I would your Highness saw her! When that thief
+Hangs upon Lazarus' bosom, he'll be bidding
+A ducat for each drop of milk he's cost me,
+To cool his tongue.
+
+_Regent._ Ay--ay, the cow is sick,
+I think; and mind me, being country-bred,
+Of a cure for such: which is, to buy a comb
+And comb the sufferer's tail at feeding-time.
+If Zia Agnese do but this, she'll counter
+The Evil Eye, and maybe with her own
+Detect who thieves her Serafina's hay.
+
+_Old Woman._ God bless your Highness!
+
+_Nicolo._ God bless your Highness!
+
+_Regent (taking up a fresh suit)._Why, what's here? "_Costanza,
+Wife of Giuseppe Boni, citeth him
+And sueth to live separate, for neglect
+And divers beatings, as to wit----_" H'm, h'm--
+_Likewise to keep the child Geronimo,
+Begotten of his body._ You defend
+The suit, Giuseppe?
+
+_A Young Peasant (shrugs his shoulders)._ As the woman will!
+I'll not deny I beat her.
+
+_Regent._ But neglect!
+How came you to neglect her? Look on her--
+The handsome, frowsy slut, that, by appearance,
+Hath never washed her body since she wed.
+A beating we might pass. But how neglect
+To take her by the neck unto the pump
+And hold her till her wet and furious face
+Were once again worth kissing? Well--well--well!
+Neglect is proven. She shall have deserts:
+_(To a Clerk)_ But--write, "Defendant keeps his lawful child."
+
+_Young Peasant._ My lady--
+
+_Wife._ Nay, my lady--
+
+_Regent._ Eh? What's this?
+
+_Wife._ The poor _bambino_! Nay, 'twas not the suit!
+How should Giuseppe, being a fool, a man--
+
+_Young Peasant._ Aye, aye: that's sense. I love him: still, you see--
+
+_Regent._ An if my judgment suit you not, go home,
+The pair. _(As they are going she calls the woman back.)_
+         Costanza! hath your husband erred
+With other woman?
+
+_Young Peasant_.    Never!
+
+_Wife_.                    I'll not charge him
+With that.
+
+_Regent_.    But, yes, you may. This man hath held
+Another woman to his breast.
+
+_Wife_.                        Her name?
+That I may tear her eyes!
+
+_Regent_.                   Her name's Costanza.
+The same Costanza that, with body washed,
+With ribbon in her hair, light in her eyes,
+Arrayed a cottage to allure his heart.
+Go home, poor fools, and find her!...
+          Heigh! No others?       [_Heaves a sigh._
+Captain, dismiss the Guard. The watch, aloft--
+Set him elsewhere. We would not be o'erlooked.
+You only, Lucio--you, Lucetta--stay;
+You for a while, Cesario.
+
+                [_Exeunt Courtiers, Guard, Crowd, etc._
+
+Heigh! that's over--
+The last Court of the Regent; and the books
+Accounts of stewardship, my seven years all,
+Closed here for audit.
+               Nay, there's one thing more--
+Brother, erewhile I spoke you sisterly,
+You turned away, and still you bite your lip:
+Signs that may short my preface. It concerns
+The Countess Fulvia.
+
+_Lucio_. Ha!
+
+_Regent_. Go, bring her, Captain.
+
+                                   [_Exit Cesario_.
+
+List to me, Lucio: listen, brother dear,
+First playmate-child, tending whose innocence
+Myself learned motherhood. Shall I deny
+Youth to be loved and follow after love?
+There is a love breaks like a morning beam
+On the husht novice kneeling by his arms;
+And worse there is, whose kisses strangle love,
+Whose feet take hold of hell. My Lucio,
+    Follow not that!
+
+_Lucio_. Why, who--who hath maligned
+    The Countess?
+
+_Regent_ Not maligned. Lucetta, here--
+
+_Lucio_. Lucetta! Curse Lucetta and her tongue!
+    Am I a child, to be nagged by waiting-maids?
+
+_Regent_. No, but a man, and shall weigh evidence.
+
+_Lucio_. But I'll not hear it! If her viper tongue
+    Can kill, why kill it must. But send me a man,
+    And I will smite his mouth--ay, slit his tongue--
+    That dares defame the Countess!
+
+_Regent_. Stay: she comes.
+
+           [_Enter the Countess Fulvia, Cesario attending._
+
+    Madam, the reason wherefore you are summoned
+    No doubt you guess, from a rude earlier call
+    Our Captain paid you. Certain practices,
+    Which you may force me name, are charged upon
+         you
+On testimony you may force me call
+    And may with freedom question.
+
+_Fulvia_. I'll not question:
+    No, nor I will not answer.
+
+_Lucio_. Then I'll answer!'
+    For me, for all, she is innocent!
+
+_Regent_. For you?
+    We'll hope it: but 'for all' 's more wide an oath
+    Than you can swear, sir. I'll not bandy you
+    Words nor debate. Myself the ladder saw;
+    Lucetta, here, the ladder and the man.
+    _What_ man she will not say. Cesario
+    Has tracked his footprint on her garden plots.
+    Must we say more?
+
+_Fulvia_. No need. Her fingering mind
+    Is a close cupboard turning all things rancid.
+
+_Lucio_. Yea, for such wry-necks all the world's a lawn
+    To peek and peer and pounce a sinful worm;
+    The fatter, the more luscious.
+
+_Regent. _ Lucio,
+    This woman nought gainsays.
+
+_Fulvia (fiercely)._ As why should I?
+    I'll question not, nor answer. 'Neath your brow
+    My sentence hunches, crawls, like cat to spring.
+    Pah! there's no prude will match your virtuous wife
+    You'd banish me?
+
+_Regent._ I do. Cesario,
+    See to it the City gate shuts not to-night.
+    And she this side.
+
+_Fulvia (laughs recklessly)._ To-night? To-night's your own.
+    Most modest woman! Duchess, there's a well
+    By the road, some seven miles beyond the town.
+    There, 'neath the stars, I'll dip a hand and drink
+    To the good Duke's disport. But have a care!
+    That cup's not yet to lip.
+
+_Regent.        _ Captain, remove her.
+    Lucio, remain.
+
+_[Exeunt the Countess Fulvia, Cesario following]_
+
+_Lucio._ I'll not remain--When ice
+    Sits judge of fire, what justice shall be done?
+    Sister, there be your books--peruse them. There
+    The sea-line--bide you so with back to it.
+    While the cold inward heat of cruelty
+    Warms what was once your heart, now crusted o'er
+    With duty and slimed with poisonous drip of tongues.
+    God help the Duke, if what he left he'd find!
+
+                                               _[Exit Lucio]_
+
+_Regent._ Is't so, I wonder? Go, Lucetta, fetch
+    My glass, if haply I may tell.
+
+                                             _[Exit Lucetta.]_
+
+                                              Is't so?
+    And have these years enforced, encrusted me
+    To something monstrous, neither woman nor man?
+My lord, my lord! too heavy was the load
+    You laid! Yet I'll not blame you: for myself
+    Ruled the straight path the long account correct
+    As in these books, my ledgers....
+
+  [_While she turns the pages, Gamba the Fool creeps
+  in and hoists himself on the balustrade. He
+  tries his viol, and sings_.
+
+SONG: _Gamba_.
+
+    Bird of the South, my Rondinello--
+
+_Regent_. Hey? That Song!
+
+_Gamba_. Hie to me, fly to me, steel-blue mate!
+    Under my breast-knot flutters thy fellow;
+      Here can I rest not, and thou so late.
+        Home, to me, home!
+       'Love, love, I come!'
+       --Dear one, I wait!
+_Quanno nacesti tu, nacqui pur io:
+La lundananza tua, 'l desiderio mio_!
+You know the song, madonna?
+
+_Regent_. Ay, fool. Sit
+    Here at my feet, sing on.
+
+_Gamba (sings)._
+
+    Bird of the South, my Rondinello
+      Under thy wing my heart hath lain
+    Till the rain falling on last leaves yellow
+      Drumm'd to thee, calling southward again.
+            Home, to me, home!
+           'Love, love, I come!'
+            Ah, love, the pain!
+        _Addio, addio! ed un' altra volt' addio!
+        La lundananza tua, 'l desiderio mio!
+(Pause)._
+    A foolish rustic thing the shepherd wives
+    In our Abruzzi croon by winter fires,
+    Of their husbands in the plains.
+
+_Regent_. Gamba!
+
+_Gamba_. Madonna?
+
+_Regent_. I'd make thee my confessor. Mindest thou,
+    By Villalago, where from Sanno's lake
+    The stream, our Tasso, hurls it down the glen?
+    One noon, with Lucio--ever in those days
+    With Lucio--on a rock within the spray,
+    I wove a ferny garland, while the boy
+    Roamed, but returned in triumph, having trapped
+    A bee in a bell-flower--held it to my ear,
+    Laughing, dissembling that he feared to loose
+    The hairy thief. So laughed we--and were still,
+    As deep in Vallescura wound a horn,
+    And up the pathway 'neath the dappling bough
+    Came riding--flecked with sunshine, man and horse,--
+    My lord, my lover; and that song, that song
+    Upon his lips....
+
+_Voice of Watchman_.        Sail ho! a sail! a sail!
+
+  _[Murmur of populace below. It grows and swells to
+  a roar as enter hurriedly courtiers, guards, and
+  others: Cesario; Lucetta with mirror._]
+
+_Lucetta_. My lady! O my lady!--
+
+_Cesario_. See, they near!
+    Galley on galley--look, there, by the point!
+
+_Regent_. O, could my heart keep tally with the surge
+    That here comes crowding!
+
+_Lucetta_. Joy, my lady! Joy!
+
+_All_. Joy! Joy, my lady!
+
+  _[They press flowers on her. A pause, while they
+  watch. On the canal the galleys come into
+  sight. They near: and as the oars rise and
+  fall, the rowers' chorus is borne from the distance.
+  It is the Rondinello song_
+
+_Chorus in Distance. La lundananza tua, 'l desiderio mio!_
+
+_Regent_. Thanks, my good, good friends!
+    And deem it not discourteous if alone
+I'd tune my heart to bliss.
+                            My glass, Lucetta!
+
+  _[Takes mirror.]_
+
+    Some thoughts there are--some thoughts----
+
+_Courtiers_. God save you, madam!
+
+  _[They go out, leaving the Regent alone._]
+
+_Regent (she loosens the clasp of her robe)._ Some thoughts
+--some thoughts--
+                    Fall from me, envious robe!
+    Rest there, my crown--thou more than leaden ache!
+      Ah!--
+    God! What a mountain drops! I float--I am lifted
+    Like thistledown on nothing. Back, my crown--
+    Weight me to earth! Nay, nay, thy rim shall bite
+    No more upon this forehead ... Where's my glass?
+    O mirror, mirror, hath it bit so deep?
+    My love is coming, hark! O, say not grey,
+Sweet mirror! Tell, what time to cure it now?
+    And he so near, so near!
+                    How shall I meet him?
+    Why how but as the river leaps to sea,
+    Steel to its magnet, child to mother's arms?
+
+  [_She catches up flowers from the baskets left by the
+    courtiers, and decks herself mildly._
+
+    Flowers for my hair, flowers at the breast! Sweet flowers,
+    He'll crush you 'gainst his corslet. He has arms
+    Like bands of iron for clasping, has my love.
+    He'll hurt, he'll hurt ... But oh, sweet flowers, to lie
+    And feel you helpless while he grips and bruises
+    Your weak protesting breasts! You'll die in bliss,
+    Panting your fragrance out.--
+                        Wh'st! Hush, poor fool!
+    I have unlearned love's very alphabet.
+    Men like us coy, demure ... Then I'll coquet
+And play Madam Disdain--but not to-day.
+    To-morrow I'll be shrewish, shy, perverse,
+    Exacting, cold--all April in my moods:
+    We'll walk the forest, and I'll slip from him,
+    Hide me like Dryad 'mid the oaks, and mark
+    His hot dark face pursuing; or I'll couch
+    In covert green, and hold my breath to hear
+    His blundering foot go by; then up I'll leap,
+    And run--and he'll run after. O this lightness!
+    I'll draw him like a fairy, dance and double--
+    Yet not so fast but he shall overtake
+    At length, and catch me panting. O, I charge you,
+    I charge you, daughters of Jerusalem,
+    Wake not my love beneath the forest bough
+    Where we lie dreaming!
+
+    _[Fanfare of trumpets in the distance.]_
+
+                     Trumpets, hark! and drums!
+    They have landed! From the quay they march!
+      Flowers! flowers!
+They are near ... I see him!... Carlo! lord and love!
+    He looks--waves--O 'tis he! O foolish heart!--
+    I had feared he'd ta'en a wound.
+                           What is't they shout?
+    Eh? 'Victory!'--yes, yes. He's browner, thinner;
+    And the dear eyes, how gaunt!... Yes
+        'Victory!'
+    'Victory!' ... lord, and love!,..
+
+_[The shouts of acclamation are heard now close
+under the terrace. Spears and banners are
+seen trooping past. Beside herself, she throws
+flowers to them, laughing, weeping the while.
+Then, running to the Chapel door, she
+prostrates herself before the image of the
+Virgin that crowns its archway.]_
+
+                                    O Mary, Mother!
+    Thou, in whose breast all women's thoughts have moved,
+    All woman's passions heaved. Lo! I adore!
+    Sweet Mother, hold my hands, rejoice with me:
+    My bridegroom cometh!
+
+[_During this invocation the Countess Fulvia has
+crept in, a stiletto in her hand. She leans
+over the Regent and stabs her twice in the
+breast.]_
+
+_Fulvia._   Then with that!--and that!
+    Go meet him!
+
+_Regent_ (_turns, looks up, and falls on her face_).
+    Oh! I am slain!
+
+_Fulvia._   And I am worse!
+    But there's my flower, my red flower, on your breast.--
+    Go, meet your lord and show it!
+
+[_She passes down the steps as Lucetta runs in.]_
+
+_Lucetta._ Madam! Madam!
+    The Duke is at the gate--Madam!--
+    Christ! she is murdered! Murder! Murder!
+
+_Regent._ Fie,
+Lucetta! peace! What word to greet the Duke
+For his home-coming! Lift me ... Quick, my robe--
+My Crown! Call no one. O, but hasten!
+
+_Lucetta_ (_helpless, wringing her hands_). Madam!
+
+_Regent._ I need your strength, and must I steady you?
+Lucetta, years ago you disarrayed me
+Upon my bridal night. I would you'd whisper
+The rogueries your tongue invented then.
+I have few moments, girl ... I'd have them wanton.
+Make jest this mantle hides the maid I was.
+I'll have no priest, no doctor--Fetch Tonino!
+I must present his son--
+[_Lucetta runs out._
+All's acted quick:
+Bride-bed, conception, birth--and death! But he
+Shall sum it in one moment death not takes ...
+What noise of trumpets!... Is the wound not covered?
+
+[_She wraps herself carefully in her mantle as the
+courtiers pour in. The child Tonino runs to
+her and stands by her side. Lucio, Cesario,
+all the Court, group themselves round her as
+the Duke enters. He rushes in eagerly; but
+she sets her teeth on her anguish, and receives
+him with a low reverence._
+
+Welcome my lord!
+
+_Duke._ Ottilia!
+
+_Regent._ Good my lord,
+Welcome! This day is bright restores you to
+Your loyal Duchy.
+
+Duke (_impatient_). Wife! Ottilia!
+
+_Regent_ (_she lifts a hand to keep him at distance_).
+There must be forms, my lord--some forms! Cesario,
+Render the Duke his sceptre. As bar to socket,
+When the gate closes on a town secure,
+So locks this rod back to his manly clutch--
+Cry all, 'Long live the Duke!'
+
+_All._ Long live the Duke!
+
+_Duke._ Wife, make an end with forms!
+
+_Lucio_ (_to Cesario_). And so say I!
+A man would think my sister had no blood
+In her body.
+
+_Cesario_ (_watching the Regent_). Peace, man: something
+there's amiss.
+
+_Regent._ Yet here is he that sceptre shall inherit.
+Lucetta, lead his first-born to the Duke.
+His first-born!--Nay but look on him how straight
+Of limb, how set and shoulder-square, tho' slender!
+He'll sit a horse, in time, and toss a lance
+Even with his father.
+
+_Duke._ There's my blessing, boy!
+But stand aside. Look in my face, Ottilia--
+Hearken me, all! One thing these seven years
+My life hath lacked, which wanting, all your cannon,
+Your banners, _vivas_, bells that rock the roofs,
+Throng'd windows, craning faces--all--all--all
+Were phantasms, were noise.--
+
+_Lucio_ (_exclaims_). Why look, here's blood!
+Here, on the boy's hand!
+
+_Regent._   Ay! a scratch, no worse,
+Here, when I pinned my robe.
+
+_Duke_ (_continuing_). Nay, friends, this moment
+My Duchy her dear hand restores to me
+To me's a dream. More buoyant would I tread
+Dumb street, deserted square, climb ruin'd wall,
+Where in a heap beneath a broken flag
+Lay Adria.--
+So that amid the ruins stood my love
+And stretched her hands so faintly--stretched her hands
+So faintly. See! She's mine! She lifts them--
+
+_Regent_ (_totters and falls into his arms with a tired, happy
+laugh, which ends in a cry as his arms enfold her_). Ah!
+
+                                             [_She faints._
+
+_Duke_. (_after a moment, releasing her a little_). What's
+here? Ottilia!
+
+_Lucetta._ My mistress swoons!
+
+_A Courtier._ 'Tis happiness--
+
+_Duke._ Fetch water!
+
+_Lucio._ Nay this blood--
+    Came of no scratch!
+
+_Lucetta._ Loosen her bodice--
+
+_Duke._ Blood?
+    Why blood? Where's blood?
+
+(_Stares as the mantle is imclasped and falls open_).
+                                     Ah, my God!
+
+_Lucetta._ Murder! murder!
+The Countess Fulvia--
+
+_Cesario._ Speak!
+
+_Lucetta._ There--while she knelt--
+Stabbed her, and fled.
+
+_Cesario._ Which way?
+
+[_Lucetta points to the stairs. He dashes off in
+pursuit._
+
+_Duke._ All-seeing God!
+Where were thine eyes, or else thy justice? Dead?
+O, never dead!
+
+_Lucio._ Ay, Duke, push God aside,
+As I push thee. I have the better right:
+I killed her--I. O never pass, sweet soul,
+Till thou hast drunk a shudder of this wretch,
+Thy brother, playmate, murderer!
+
+_Duke._ Wine! bring wine--
+
+_Regent_ (_as the wine is brought and revives her_).
+Flower, he will crush thee--but the bliss, the bliss!
+I swim in bliss. What ... Lucio? Where's my lord?
+Dear, bring him: he was here awhile and held me.
+Say he must hold, or the light air will lift
+And bear me quite away.
+
+[_Re-enter Cesario. In one hand he carries his
+sword, in the other a dagger._
+
+_Lucio._ Cesario!
+What! Is that devil escaped? To think--to think
+I drank her kisses!--What? Where is she?
+
+_Cesario._ Dead.
+I raised the cry: the people pointed after;
+Ran with me, ravening. Just this side the bridge
+She heard our howl and turned--drew back the dagger
+Red with our lady's blood, then drove it home
+Clean to her own black heart.
+
+_Regent._   God pardon her!
+I would what blood of mine clung to the blade
+Might mix with hers and sweeten it for mercy.
+
+_Lucio._ Will you forgive her? Then forgive not me!
+
+_Regent._ Dear Lucio!--You'll not pluck away your hand
+This time? Hush! Where's Cesario?... Friend, farewell.
+Where lies the body?
+
+_Cesario._ Sooth, madonna, I flung it
+To the river's will, to roll it down to sea
+Or cast on muddy bar, for dogs to gnaw.
+
+_Regent._ The river? Ah! How strong the river rolls!
+Hold me, my lord--
+
+_Duke._ Love, love, I hold you
+
+_Regent._--Ay!
+The child, too--You will hold the child?...
+  This roar
+Deafens but will not drown us.
+
+[_Within the Chapel the choir is chanting a dirge.
+Gamba goes and closes the door on the sound:
+then creeps to the foot of the couch. The
+dying woman gently motions aside the cross
+a priest is holding to her, and looks up at her
+husband._
+
+[_Below the terrace a voice is heard singing the
+Rondinello song._
+
+  Look! beyond
+Be waters where no galley moves with oar,
+So wide, so waveless,--and, between the woods,
+Meadows--O land me there!... Hark, my lord's voice
+Singing in Vallescura! Soft my, love,
+I am so tired--so tired! Love, let me play!
+[_Dies._
+
+[_The Courtiers lift the body in silence and bear it
+to the Chapel, the Duke and his train following.
+The doors close on them. On the stage are
+left only Cesario, standing by the balustrade;
+and Gamba, who has seated himself with his
+viol and touches it, as still the voice sings
+below--_
+
+Addio, Addio! ed un'altra volt'addio!
+La lundananza tua, 'l desiderio mio!
+
+[_On the last note a string of the viol cracks, and with
+a cry the Fool flings himself, heart-broken, on
+the empty couch. Cesario steps forward and
+stands over him, touching his shoulder gently._
+
+CURTAIN.
+
+
+
+
+POEMS
+
+
+
+
+EXMOOR VERSES
+
+I. VASHTI'S SONG
+
+
+Over the rim of the Moor,
+  And under the starry sky,
+Two men came to my door
+  And rested them thereby.
+
+Beneath the bough and the star,
+  In a whispering foreign tongue,
+They talked of a land afar
+  And the merry days so young!
+
+Beneath the dawn and the bough
+  I heard them arise and go:
+And my heart it is aching now
+  For the more it will never know.
+
+Why did they two depart
+  Before I could understand?
+Where lies that land, O my heart?
+  --O my heart, where lies that land?
+
+
+
+II. SATURN
+
+
+From my farm, from hèr farm
+  Furtively we came.
+In either home a hearth was warm:
+  We nursed a hungrier flame.
+
+Our feet were foul with mire,
+  Our faces blind with mist;
+But all the night was naked fire
+  About us where we kiss'd.
+
+To her farm, to my farm,
+  Loathing we returned;
+Pale beneath a gallow's arm
+  The planet Saturn burned.
+
+
+
+III. DERELICTION
+
+
+O'er the tears that we shed, dear
+  The bitter vines twist,
+And the hawk and the red deer
+  They keep where we kiss'd:
+All broken lies the shieling
+  That sheltered from rain,
+With a star to pierce the ceiling,
+  And the dawn an empty pane.
+
+Thro' the mist, up the moorway,
+  Fade hunters and pack;
+From the ridge to thy doorway
+  Happy voices float back ...
+O, between the threads o' mist, love,
+  Reach your hands from the house.
+Only mind that we kiss'd, love,
+  And forget the broken vows!
+
+
+
+
+TWO FOLK SONGS
+
+I. THE SOLDIER
+
+(_Roumanian_)
+
+
+_When winter trees bestrew the path,
+  Still to the twig a leaf or twain
+Will cling and weep, not Winter's wrath,
+  But that foreknown forlorner pain--
+  To fall when green leaves come again._
+
+I watch'd him sleep by the furrow--
+  The first that fell in the fight.
+His grave they would dig to-morrow:
+  The battle called them to-night.
+
+They bore him aside to the trees, there,
+  By his undigg'd grave content
+To lie on his back at ease there,
+  And hark how the battle went.
+
+The battle went by the village,
+  And back through the night were borne
+Far cries of murder and pillage,
+  With smoke from the standing corn.
+
+But when they came on the morrow,
+  They talk'd not over their task,
+As he listen'd there by the furrow;
+  For the dead mouth could not ask--
+
+_How went the battle, my brothers?_
+  But that he will never know:
+For his mouth the red earth smothers
+  As they shoulder their spades and go.
+
+Yet he cannot sleep thereunder,
+  But ever must toss and turn.
+_How went the battle, I wonder?_
+  --And that he will never learn!
+
+_When winter trees bestrew the path,
+  Still to the twig a leaf or twain
+Will cling and weep, not Winter's wrath,
+  But that foreknown, forlorner pain--
+To fall when green leaves come again!_
+
+
+
+II. THE MARINE
+
+(_Poitevin_)
+
+
+The bold Marine comes back from war,
+        So kind:
+The bold Marine comes back from war,
+        So kind:
+With a raggety coat and a worn-out shoe.
+"Now, poor Marine, say, whence come you,
+        All so kind?"
+
+I travel back from the war, madame,
+        So kind:
+I travel back from the war, madame,
+        So kind:
+For a glass of wine and a bowl of whey,
+'Tis I will sing you a ballad gay,
+        All so kind.
+
+The bold Marine he sips his whey,
+        So kind:
+He sips and he sings his ballad gay,
+        So kind:
+But the dame she turns toward the wall,
+To wipe her tears that fall and fall,
+        All so kind.
+
+What aileth you at my song, madame,
+        So kind?
+I hope that I sing no wrong, madame,
+        So kind?
+
+Or grieves it you a beggar should dine
+On a bowl of whey and the good white wine,
+        All so kind?
+
+It ails me not at your ballad gay,
+        So kind:
+It ails me not for the wine and whey,
+        So kind:
+
+But it ails me sore for the voice and eyes
+Of a good man long in Paradise.--
+        Ah, so kind!
+
+You have fair children five, madame,
+        So kind:
+You have fair children five, madame,
+        So kind:
+
+Your good man left you children three;
+Whence came these twain for company,
+        All so kind?
+
+"A letter came from the war, Marine,
+        So kind:
+A letter came from the war, Marine,
+        So kind:
+A while I wept for the good man dead,
+But another good man in a while I wed,
+        All so kind."
+
+The bold Marine he drained his glass,
+        So kind:
+The bold Marine he drained his glass,
+        So kind.
+He said not a word, though the tears they flowed,
+But back to his regiment took the road,
+        All so kind.
+
+
+
+
+MARY LESLIE
+
+
+_Before Vittoria, June_ 20, 1813
+
+
+O Mary Leslie, blithe and shrill
+  The bugles blew for Spain:
+And you below the Castle Hill
+  Stood in the crowd your lane.
+Then hearts were wild to watch us pass,
+  Yet laith to let us go!
+While mine said, "Fare-ye-well, my lass!"
+  And yours, "God keep my Jo!"
+
+Here by the bivouac fire, above
+  These fields of savage play,
+I'll lift my love to meet thy love
+  Twa thousand miles away,
+
+Where yonder, yonder by the stars,
+  Nightlong there rins a burn,
+And maids with lovers at the wars
+  May list their wraiths' return.
+
+More careless yet my spirit grows
+  Of fame, more sick of blood:
+But I can think of Badajoz,
+  And yet that God is good.
+Beyond the siege, beyond the stour,
+  Beyond the sack of towns,
+I reach to pluck ae lily-floo'r
+  Where leaders press for crowns.
+
+O Mary! lily! bow'd and wet
+  With mair than mornin's rain!
+The bugles up the Lawnmarket
+  Shall sound us home again.
+
+Then fare-ye-well, these foreign lands,
+  And be damn'd their bitter drouth.
+With your dear face between my hands
+  And the cup held to my mouth,
+                           My love,
+It's clean cup to my mouth!
+
+
+
+
+JENIFER'S LOVE
+
+
+Small is my secret--let it pass--
+  Small in your life the share I had,
+Who sat beside you in the class,
+  Awed by the bright superior lad:
+    Whom yet with hot and eager face
+    I prompted when he missed his place.
+
+For you the call came swift and soon:
+  But sometimes in your holidays
+You meet me trudging home at noon
+  To dinner through the dusty ways,
+    And recognized, and with a nod
+    Passed on, but never guessed--thank God!
+
+Truly our ways were separate.
+  I bent myself to hoe and drill,
+
+Yea, with an honest man to mate,
+  Fulfilling God Almighty's will;
+    And bore him children. But my prayers
+    Were yours--and, only after, theirs.
+
+While you--still loftier, more remote,
+  You sprang from stair to stair of fame,
+And you've a riband on your coat,
+  And you've a title to your name;
+    But have you yet a star to shine
+    Above your bed, as I o'er mine?
+
+
+
+
+TWO DUETS
+
+
+_From "Arion," an unpublished Masque_
+
+I
+
+
+_He._ Aglai-a! Aglai-a!
+      Sweet, awaken and be glad.
+_She._ Who is this that calls Aglaia?
+      Is it thou, my dearest lad?
+_He._ 'Tis Arion, 'tis Arion,
+      Who calls thee from sleep--
+    From slumber who bids thee
+    To follow and number
+      His kids and his sheep.
+_She._ Nay, leave to entreat me!
+      If mother should spy on
+    Us twain, she would beat me.
+_He._ Then come, my love, come!
+     And hide with Arion
+       Where green woods are dumb!
+
+_She._ Ar-i-on! Ar-i-on!
+         Closer, list! I am afraid!
+
+_He._ Whisper, then, thy love Arion,
+         From thy window, lily maid.
+
+_She._ Yet Aglaia, yet Aglaia
+         Hath heard them debate
+       Of wooing repenting--
+       "Who trust to undoing,
+        Lament them too late."
+
+_He._ Nay, nay, when I woo thee,
+         Thy mother might spy on
+       All harm I shall do thee.
+
+_She._ I come, then--I come!
+       To follow Arion
+         Where green woods be dumb.
+
+
+
+
+SONG
+
+      Sparrow of Love, so sharp to peck,
+      Arrow of Love--I bare my neck
+      Down to the bosom. See, no fleck
+
+      Of blood! I have never a wound; I go
+      Forth to the greenwood. Yet, heigh-ho!
+      What 'neath my girdle flutters so?
+
+      'Tis not a bird, and yet hath wings,
+      'Tis not an arrow, yet it stings;
+      While in the wound it nests and sings--
+                               Heigh-ho!
+
+_He._ Of Arion, of Arion
+        That wound thou shalt learn;
+      What nothings 'tis made of,
+      And soft pretty soothings
+        In shade of the fern.
+
+_She._ When maids have a mind to,
+         Man's word they rely on,
+       Old warning are blind to--
+         I come, then--I come
+           To walk with Arion
+         Where green woods are dumb!
+
+
+                            II
+
+
+_He._ Dear my love, and O my love,
+        And O my love so lately!
+      Did we wander yonder grove
+        And sit awhile sedately?
+      For either you did there conclude
+        To do at length as I did,
+      Or passion's fashion's turn'd a prude,
+        And troth's an oath derided.
+
+_She._ Yea, my love--and nay, my love--
+         And ask me not to tell, love,
+       While I delay'd an idle day
+         What 'twixt us there befell, love.
+       Yet either I did sit beside
+         And do at length as you did,
+       Or my delight is lightly by
+         An idle lie deluded!
+
+
+
+
+THE STATUES AND THE TEAR
+
+
+    All night a fountain pleads,
+         Telling her beads,
+Her tinkling beads monotonous 'neath the moon;
+    And where she springs atween,
+         Two statues lean--
+Two Kings, their marble beards with moonlight
+    strewn.
+
+    Till hate had frozen speech,
+        Each hated each,
+Hated and died, and went unto his place:
+    And still inveterate
+        They lean and hate
+With glare of stone implacable, face to face.
+
+One, who bade set them here
+        In stone austere,
+To both was dear, and did not guess at all:
+    Yet with her new-wed lord
+        Walking the sward
+Paused, and for two dead friends a tear let fall.
+
+    She turn'd and went her way.
+        Yet in the spray
+The shining tear attempts, but cannot lie.
+    Night-long the fountain drips,
+        But even slips
+Untold that one bead of her rosary:
+    While they, who know it would
+        Lie if it could,
+Lean on and hate, watching it, eye to eye.
+
+
+
+
+NUPTIAL NIGHT
+
+
+Hush! and again the chatter of the starling
+    Athwart the lawn!
+Lean your head close and closer. O my darling!--
+    It is the dawn.
+Dawn in the dusk of her dream,
+    Dream in the hush of her bosom, unclose!
+Bathed in the eye-bright beam,
+    Blush to her cheek, be a blossom, a rose!
+
+Go, nuptial night! the floor of Ocean tressing
+    With moon and star;
+With benediction go and breathe thy blessing
+    On coasts afar.
+
+Hark! the theorbos thrum
+    O'er the arch'd wave that in white smother booms
+"Mother of Mystery, come!
+    Fain for thee wait other brides, other grooms!"
+
+Go, nuptial night, my breast of hers bereaving!
+    Yet, O, tread soft!
+Grow day, blithe day, the mountain shoulder heaving
+    More gold aloft!
+Gold, rose, bird of the dawn,
+    All to her balcony gather unseen--
+Thrill through the curtain drawn,
+    Bless her, bedeck her, and bathe her, my Queen!
+
+
+
+
+HESPERUS
+
+
+Down in the street the last late hansoms go
+    Still westward, but with backward eyes of red
+    The harlot shuffles to her lonely bed;
+The tall policeman pauses but to throw
+A flash into the empty portico;
+    Then he too passes, and his lonely tread
+    Links all the long-drawn gas-lights on a thread
+And ties them to one planet swinging low.
+
+O Hesperus! O happy star! to bend
+    O'er Helen's bosom in the trancèd west--
+    To watch the hours heave by upon her breast
+And at her parted lip for dreams attend:
+    If dawn defraud thee, how shall I be deem'd.
+    Who house within that bosom, and am dreamed?
+
+
+
+
+CHANT ROYAL OF HIGH VIRTUE
+
+
+Who lives in suit of armour pent
+  And hides himself behind a wall,
+For him is not the great event,
+  The garland nor the Capitol.
+And is God's guerdon less than they?
+  Nay, moral man, I tell thee Nay:
+Nor shall the flaming forts be won
+  By sneaking negatives alone,
+By Lenten fast or Ramazàn;
+  But by the challenge proudly thrown--
+_Virtue is that becrowns a Man!_
+
+God, in His Palace resident
+  Of Bliss, beheld our sinful ball,
+And charged His own Son innocent
+  Us to redeem from Adam's fall.
+
+"Yet must it be that men Thee slay."
+"Yea, tho' it must, must I obey,"
+Said Christ; and came, His royal Son,
+To die, and dying to atone
+  For harlot, thief, and publican.
+Read on that rood He died upon--
+  _Virtue is that becrowns a Man!_
+
+Beneath that rood where He was bent
+  I saw the world's great captains all
+Pass riding home from tournament
+  Adown the road from Roncesvalles--
+Lord Charlemagne, in one array
+Lords Caesar, Cyrus, Attila,
+Lord Alisaundre of Macedon ...
+With flame on lance and habergeon
+  They passed, and to the rataplan
+Of drums gave salutation--
+  _"Virtue is that becrowns a Man!"_
+Had tall Achilles lounged in tent
+  For aye, and Xanthus neigh'd in stall,
+The towers of Troy had ne'er been shent,
+  Nor stay'd the dance in Priam's hall.
+Bend o'er thy book till thou be grey,
+Read, mark, perpend, digest, survey,
+Instruct thee deep as Solomon,
+One only chapter thou canst con,
+  One lesson learn, one sentence scan,
+One title and one colophon--
+  _Virtue is that becrowns a Man!_
+
+High Virtue's best is eloquent
+  With spur and not with martingall:
+Swear not to her thou'rt continent:
+  BE COURTEOUS, BRAVE, AND LIBERAL.
+God fashion'd thee of chosen clay
+For service, nor did ever say,
+"Deny thee this," "Abstain from yon,"
+But to inure thee, thew and bone.
+  To be confirmèd of the clan
+That made immortal Marathon--
+  _Virtue is that becrowns a Man!_
+
+
+               ENVOY
+
+
+Young Knight, the lists are set to-day!
+Hereafter shall be time to pray
+In sepulture, with hands of stone.
+Ride, then! outride the bugle blown!
+  And gaily dinging down the van,
+Charge with a cheer--_"Set on! Set on!
+  Virtue is that becrowns a Man!"_
+
+
+
+
+CORONATION HYMN
+
+
+     _Tune_--Luther's Chorale
+     "Ein' feste burg ist unser Gott"
+
+                    I
+
+Of old our City hath renown.
+  Of God are her foundations,
+Wherein this day a King we crown
+  Elate among the nations.
+      Acknowledge, then, thou King--
+      And you, ye people, sing--
+      What deeds His arm hath wrought:
+      Yea, let their tale be taught
+        To endless generations.
+
+                     II
+
+So long, so far, Jehovah guides
+  His people's path attending,
+By pastures green and water-sides
+  Toward His hill ascending;
+      Whence they beneath the stars
+      Shall view their ancient wars,
+      Their perils, far removed.
+      O might of mercy proved!
+        O love past comprehending!
+
+                           III
+
+He was that God, for man which spake
+  From Sinai forth in thunder;
+He was that Love, for man which brake
+  The dreadful grave asunder.
+      Lord over every lord,
+      His consecrating word
+      An earthly prince awaits;
+      Lift then your heads, ye gates!
+        Your King comes riding under.
+
+IV
+
+Be ye lift up, ye deathless doors;
+  Let wave your banners o'er Him!
+Exult, ye streets; be strewn, ye floors,
+  With palm, with bay, before Him!
+       With transport fetch Him in,
+       Ye ransom'd folk from sin--
+       Your Lord, return'd to bless!
+       O kneeling king, confess--
+         O subject men, adore Him!
+
+
+
+
+THREE MEN OF TRURO
+
+I
+
+E. W. B.
+
+_Archbishop of Canterbury: sometime the First Bishop
+of Truro. October_ 1896
+
+           The Church's outpost on a neck of land--
+             By ebb of faith the foremost left the last--
+           Dull, starved of hope, we watched the driven sand
+             Blown through the hour-glass, covering our past,
+               Counting no hours to our relief--no hail
+               Across the hills, and on the sea no sail!
+
+             Sick of monotonous days we lost account,
+               In fitful dreams remembering days of old
+And nights--th' erect Archangel on the Mount
+            With sword that drank the dawn; the Vase of Gold
+               The moving Grail athwart the starry fields
+               Where all the heavenly spearmen clashed their
+                   shields.
+
+          In dereliction by the deafening shore
+            We sought no more aloft, but sunk our eyes,
+          Probing the sea for food, the earth for ore.
+            Ah, yet had one good soldier of the skies
+              Burst through the wrack reporting news of them,
+              How had we run and kissed his garment's hem!
+
+          Nay, but he came! Nay, but he stood and cried,
+            Panting with joy and the fierce fervent race,
+          "Arm, arm! for Christ returns!"--and all our pride,
+            Our ancient pride, answered that eager face:
+              "Repair His battlements!--Your Christ is near!"
+              And, half in dream, we raised the soldiers' cheer.
+
+Far, as we flung that challenge, fled the ghosts--
+            Back, as we built, the obscene foe withdrew--
+          High to the song of hammers sang the hosts
+            Of Heaven--and lo! the daystar, and a new
+              Dawn with its chalice and its wind as wine;
+              And youth was hope, and life once more divine!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+          Day, and hot noon, and now the evening glow,
+            And 'neath our scaffolding the city spread
+          Twilit, with rain-wash'd roofs, and--hark!--below,
+            One late bell tolling. "Dead? Our Captain dead?"
+              Nay, here with us he fronts the westering sun
+              With shaded eyes and counts the wide fields won.
+
+           Aloft with us! And while another stone
+             Swings to its socket, haste with trowel and hod!
+           Win the old smile a moment ere, alone,
+             Soars the great soul to bear report to God.
+               Night falls; but thou, dear Captain, from thy star
+               Look down, behold how bravely goes the war!
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+A. B. D.
+
+_Canon Residentiary and Precentor of Truro
+December_ 1903
+
+          Many had builded, and, the building done,
+            Through our adornèd gates with din
+          Came Prince and Priest, with pipe and clarion
+            Leading the right God in.
+
+          Yet, had the perfect temple quickened then
+            And whispered us between our song,
+          _"Give God the praise. To whom of living men
+            Shall next our thanks belong?"_
+
+          Then had the few, the very few, that wist
+            His Atlantean labour, swerved
+          Their eyes to seek, and in the triumph missed,
+            The man that most deserved.
+
+He only of us was incorporate
+            In all that fabric; stone by stone
+          Had built his life in her, had made his fate
+            And her perfection one;
+
+          Given all he had; and now--when all was given--
+            Far spent, within a private shade,
+          Heard the loud organ pealing praise to Heaven,
+            And learned why man is made.--
+
+         To break his strength, yet always to be brave;
+           To preach, and act, the Crucified ...
+         Sweep by, O Prince and Prelate, up the nave,
+           And fill it with your pride!
+
+         Better than ye what made th' old temples great,
+           Because he loved, he understood;
+         Indignant that his darling, less in state,
+           Should lack a martyr's blood.
+
+She hath it now. O mason, strip away
+            Her scaffolding, the flower disclose!
+          Lay by the tools with his o'er-wearied clay--
+          But She shall bloom unto its Judgment Day,
+            His ever-living Rose!
+
+
+III
+
+C. W. S.
+
+_The Fourth Bishop of Truro
+May_ 1912
+
+          Prince of courtesy defeated,
+          Heir of hope untimely cheated,
+          Throned awhile he sat, and, seated,
+
+          Saw his Cornish round him gather;
+          "Teach us how to live, good Father!"
+          How to die he taught us rather:
+
+Heard the startling trumpet sound him,
+          Smiled upon the feast around him,
+          Rose, and wrapp'd his coat, and bound him
+
+          When beyond the awful surges,
+          Bathed in dawn on Syrian verges,
+          God! thy star, thy Cross emerges.
+
+_And so sing we all to it--_
+
+          Crux, in coelo lux superna,
+          Sis in carnis hac taberna
+          Mihi pedibus lucerna:
+
+          Quo vexillum dux cohortis
+          Sistet, super flumen Mortis,
+          Te, flammantibus in portis!
+
+
+
+
+ALMA MATER
+
+          _Know you her secret none can utter?_
+            Hers of the Book, the tripled Crown?
+          Still on the spire the pigeons flutter,
+            Still by the gateway flits the gown;
+          Still on the street, from corbel and gutter,
+            Faces of stone look down.
+
+          Faces of stone, and stonier faces--
+            Some from library windows wan
+          Forth on her gardens, her green spaces,
+            Peer and turn to their books anon.
+          Hence, my Muse, from the green oases
+            Gather the tent, begone!
+
+Nay, should she by the pavement linger
+            Under the rooms where once she played,
+          Who from the feast would rise to fling her
+            One poor _sou_ for her serenade?
+          One short laugh for the antic finger
+            Thrumming a lute-string frayed?
+
+          Once, my dear--but the world was young then--
+            Magdalen elms and Trinity limes--
+          Lissom the blades and the backs that swung then,
+            Eight good men in the good old times--
+          Careless we, and the chorus flung then
+            Under St Mary's chimes!
+
+          Reins lay loose and the ways led random--
+            Christ Church meadow and Iffley track,
+          "Idleness horrid and dog-cart" (tandem),
+            Aylesbury grind and Bicester pack--
+          Pleasant our lines, and faith! we scanned 'em:
+            Having that artless knack.
+
+Come, old limmer, the times grow colder;
+            Leaves of the creeper redden and fall.
+          Was it a hand then clapped my shoulder?--
+            Only the wind by the chapel wall!
+          Dead leaves drift on the lute ... So, fold her
+            Under the faded shawl.
+
+          Never we wince, though none deplore us,
+            We who go reaping that we sowed;
+          Cities at cock-crow wake before us--
+            Hey, for the lilt of the London road!
+          One look back, and a rousing chorus!
+            Never a palinode!
+
+          Still on her spire the pigeons hover;
+            Still by her gateway haunts the gown.
+          Ah! but her secret? You, young lover,
+            Drumming her old ones forth from town,
+          Know you the secret none discover?
+            Tell it--when _you_ go down.
+
+Yet if at length you seek her, prove her,
+            Lean to her whispers never so nigh;
+          Yet if at last not less her lover
+            You in your hansom leave the High;
+          Down from her towers a ray shall hover--
+            Touch you, a passer-by!
+
+
+
+
+CHRISTMAS EVE
+
+     Friend, old friend in the Manse by the fireside sitting,
+       Hour by hour while the grey ash drips from the log;
+     You with a book on your knee, your wife with her knitting,
+     Silent both, and between you, silent, the dog.
+
+     Silent here in the south sit I; and, leaning,
+       One sits watching the fire, with chin upon hand;
+     Gazes deep in its heart--but ah! its meaning
+       Rather I read in the shadows and understand.
+
+     Dear, kind she is; and daily dearer, kinder,
+       Love shuts the door on the lamp and our two selves:
+
+Not my stirring awakened the flame that behind her
+       Lit up a face in the leathern dusk of the shelves.
+
+     Veterans are my books, with tarnished gilding:
+       Yet there is one gives back to the winter grate
+     Gold of a sunset flooding a college building,
+       Gold of an hour I waited--as now I wait--
+
+     For a light step on the stair, a girl's low laughter,
+       Rustle of silk, shy knuckles tapping the oak,
+     Dinner and mirth upsetting my rooms and, after,
+       Music, waltz upon waltz, till the June day broke.
+
+     Where is her laughter now? Old tarnished covers--
+       You that reflect her with fresh young face unchanged--
+     Tell that we met, that we parted, not as lovers;
+       Time, chance, brought us together, and these estranged.
+
+
+
+
+Loyal were we to the mood of the moment granted,
+       Bruised not its bloom, but danced on the wave of its joy;
+     Passion--wisdom--fell back like a fence enchanted,
+       Ringing a floor for us both--whole Heaven for the boy!
+
+     Where is she now? Regretted not, though departed,
+       Blessings attend and follow her all her days!
+    --Look to your hound: he dreams of the hares he started,
+       Whines, and awakes, and stretches his limbs to the blaze.
+
+     Far old friend in the Manse, by the green ash peeling
+       Flake by flake from the heat in the Yule log's core,
+     Look past the woman you love. On wall and ceiling
+       Climbs not a trellis of roses--and ghosts--of yore?
+
+Thoughts, thoughts! Whistle them back like hounds returning--
+       Mark how her needles pause at a sound upstairs.
+     Time for bed, and to leave the log's heart burning!
+       Give ye good-night, but first thank God in your prayers!
+
+
+
+
+THE ROOT
+
+
+    Deep, Love, yea, very deep.
+      And in the dark exiled,
+I have no sense of light but still to creep
+And know the breast, but not the eyes. Thy child
+Saw ne'er his mother near, nor if she smiled;
+      But only feels her weep.
+
+    Yet clouds and branches green
+      There be aloft, somewhere,
+And winds, and angel birds that build between,
+As I believe--and I will not despair;
+For faith is evidence of things not seen.
+      Love! if I could be there!
+
+I will be patient, dear.
+      Perchance some part of me
+Puts forth aloft and feels the rushing year
+And shades the bird, and is that happy tree
+Then were it strength to serve and not appear,
+      And bliss, though blind, to be.
+
+
+
+
+TO A FRIEND WHO SENT ME A BOX OF VIOLETS
+
+
+Nay, more than violets
+These thoughts of thine, friend!
+Rather thy reedy brook--
+Taw's tributary--
+At midnight murmuring,
+Descried them, the delicate
+Dark-eyed goddesses,
+There by his cressy bed
+Dissolved and dreaming
+Dreams that distilled into dew
+All the purple of night,
+All the shine of a planet.
+
+Whereat he whispered;
+And they arising--
+
+Of day's forget-me-nots
+The duskier sisters--
+Descended, relinquished
+The orchard, the trout-pool,
+Torridge and Tamar,
+The Druid circles,
+Sheepfolds of Dartmoor,
+Granite and sandstone;
+By Roughtor, Dozmare,
+Down the vale of the Fowey
+Moving in silence,
+Brushing the nightshade
+By bridges cyclopean,
+By Trevenna, Treverbyn,
+Lawharne and Largin,
+By Glynn, Lanhydrock,
+Restormel, Lostwithiel,
+Dark wood, dim water, dreaming town;
+Down the vale of the Fowey
+To the tidal water
+Washing the feet
+Of fair St Winnow--
+Each, in her exile
+Musing the message,
+Passed, as the starlit
+Shadow of Ruth from the land of the Moabite.
+
+So they came,
+Valley-born, valley-nurtured--
+Came to the tideway
+The jetties, the anchorage,
+The salt wind piping,
+Snoring in Equinox,
+By ships at anchor,
+By quays tormented,
+Storm-bitten streets;
+Came to the Haven
+Crying, "Ah, shelter us,
+The strayed ambassadors,
+Love's lost legation
+On a comfortless coast!"
+
+Nay, but a little sleep,
+A little folding
+Of petals to the lull
+Of quiet rainfalls--
+Here in my garden,
+In angle sheltered
+From north and east wind--
+Softly shall recreate
+The courage of charity,
+Henceforth not to me only
+Breathing the message.
+
+Clean-breath'd Sirens!
+Hencefore the mariner.
+
+
+
+
+TO A FRIEND
+
+
+Here in the fairway
+Fetching--foul of keel,
+Long-stray but fortunate--
+Out of the fogs, the vast
+Atlantic solitudes.
+Shall, by the hawser-pin
+Waiting the signal
+_Leave--go--anchor!_
+Scent the familiar,
+The unforgettable
+Fragrance of home;
+So in a long breath
+Bless us unknowing:
+Bless them, the violets,
+Bless me, the gardener,
+Bless thee, the giver.
+
+
+
+
+OF THREE CHILDREN
+
+OF THREE CHILDREN CHOOSING
+A CHAPLET OF VERSE
+
+
+You and I and Burd so blithe--
+  Burd so blithe, and you, and I--
+The Mower he would whet his scythe
+  Before the dew was dry.
+
+And he woke soon, but we woke soon
+  And drew the nursery blind,
+All wondering at the waning moon
+  With the small June roses twined:
+Low in her cradle swung the moon
+  With an elfin dawn behind.
+
+In whispers, while our elders slept,
+  We knelt and said our prayers,
+And dress'd us and on tiptoe crept
+  Adown the creaking stairs.
+
+The world's possessors lay abed,
+  And all the world was ours--
+"Nay, nay, but hark! the Mower's tread!
+  And we must save the flowers!"
+
+The Mower knew not rest nor haste--
+  That old unweary man:
+But we were young. We paused and raced
+  And gather'd while we ran.
+
+O youth is careless, youth is fleet,
+  With heart and wing of bird!
+The lark flew up beneath our feet,
+  To his copse the pheasant whirr'd;
+
+The cattle from their darkling lairs
+  Heaved up and stretch'd themselves;
+Almost they trod at unawares
+  Upon the busy elves
+
+That dropp'd their spools of gossamer,
+  To dangle and to dry,
+And scurried home to the hollow fir
+  Where the white owl winks an eye.
+
+Nor you, nor I, nor Burd so blithe
+  Had driven them in this haste;
+But the old, old man, so lean and lithe,
+  That afar behind us paced;
+So lean and lithe, with shoulder'd scythe,
+  And a whetstone at his waist.
+
+Within the gate, in a grassy round
+  Whence they had earliest flown,
+He upside-down'd his scythe, and ground
+  Its edge with careful hone.
+But we heeded not, if we heard, the sound,
+  For the world was ours alone;
+The world was ours!--and with a bound
+  The conquering Sun upshone!
+
+And while as from his level ray
+  We stood our eyes to screen.
+The world was not as yesterday
+  Our homelier world had been--
+So grey and golden-green it lay
+  All in his quiet sheen,
+That wove the gold into the grey,
+  The grey into the green.
+Sure never hand of Puck, nor wand
+  Of Mab the fairies' queen,
+Nor prince nor peer of fairyland
+Had power to weave that wide riband
+  Of the grey, the gold, the green.
+
+But the Gods of Greece had been before
+  And walked our meads along,
+The great authentic Gods of yore
+That haunt the earth from shore to shore
+  Trailing their robes of song.
+
+And where a sandall'd foot had brush'd,
+  And where a scarfed hem,
+The flowers awoke from sleep and rush'd
+  Like children after them.
+
+Pell-mell they poured by vale and stream,
+  By lawn and steepy brae--
+"O children, children! while you dream,
+  Your flowers run all away!"
+
+But afar and abed and sleepily
+  The children heard us call;
+And Burd so blithe and you and I
+  Must be gatherers for all.
+
+The meadow-sweet beside the hedge,
+  The dog-rose and the vetch,
+The sworded iris 'mid the sedge,
+  The mallow by the ditch--
+
+With these, and by the wimpling burn,
+  Where the midges danced in reels,
+With the watermint and the lady fern
+  We brimm'd out wicker creels:
+
+Till, all so heavily they weigh'd,
+  On a bank we flung us down,
+Shook out our treasures 'neath the shade
+  And wove this Triple Crown.
+
+Flower after flower--for some there were
+  The noonday heats had dried,
+And some were dear yet could not bear
+  A lovelier cheek beside,
+And some were perfect past compare--
+Ah, darlings! what a world of care
+  It cost us to decide!
+
+Natheless we sang in sweet accord,
+  Each bending o'er her brede--
+"O there be flowers in Oxenford,
+  And flowers be north of Tweed,
+And flowers there be on earthly sward
+  That owe no mortal seed!"
+
+And these, the brightest that we wove,
+  Were Innocence and Truth,
+And holy Peace and angel Love,
+  Glad Hope and gentle Ruth.
+Ah, bind them fast with triple twine
+Of Memory, the wild woodbine
+That still, being human, stays divine,
+  And alone is age's youth!...
+
+But hark! but look! the warning rook
+  Wings home in level flight;
+The children tired with play and book
+  Have kiss'd and call'd Good-night!
+
+Ah, sisters, look! What fields be these
+  That lie so sad and shorn?
+What hand has cut our coppices,
+And thro' the trimm'd, the ruin'd, trees
+  Lets wail a wind forlorn?
+
+'Tis Time, 'tis Time has done this crime
+  And laid our meadows waste--
+The bent unwearied tyrant Time,
+  That knows nor rest nor haste.
+
+Yet courage, children; homeward bring
+  Your hearts, your garlands high;
+For we have dared to do a thing
+  That shall his worst defy.
+
+We cannot nail the dial's hand;
+  We cannot bind the sun
+By Gibeon to stay and stand,
+  Or the moon o'er Ajalon;
+
+We cannot blunt th' abhorred shears,
+  Nor shift the skeins of Fate,
+Nor say unto the posting years
+  "Ye shall not desolate."
+
+We cannot cage the lion's rage,
+  Nor teach the turtle-dove
+Beside what well his moan to tell
+  Or to haunt one only grove;
+But the lion's brood will range for food
+  As the fledged bird will rove.
+
+And east and west we three may wend--
+  Yet we a wreath have wound
+For us shall wind withouten end
+  The wide, wide world around:
+
+Be it east or west, and ne'er so far,
+In east or west shall peep no star,
+No blossom break from ground,
+But minds us of the wreath we wove
+Of innocence and holy love
+  That in the meads we found,
+And handsell'd from the Mower's scythe,
+And bound with memory's living withe--
+You and I and Burd so blithe--
+  Three maidens on a mound:
+And all of happiness was ours
+Shall find remembrance 'mid the flowers,
+Shall take revival from the flowers
+  And by the flowers be crown'd.
+
+
+
+
+EPILOGUE
+
+TO A MOTHER, ON SEEING HER SMILE REPEATED
+IN HER DAUGHTER'S EYES
+
+
+A thousand songs I might have made
+  Of You, and only You;
+A thousand thousand tongues of fire
+That trembled down a golden wire
+  To lamp the night with stars, to braid
+The morning bough with dew.
+
+Within the greenwood girl and boy
+  Had loiter'd to their lure,
+And men in cities closed their books
+To dream of Spring and running brooks
+And all that ever was of joy
+  For manhood to abjure.
+
+And I'd have made them strong, so strong
+  Outlasting towers and towns--
+Millennial shepherds 'neath the thorn
+Had piped them to a world reborn,
+And danced Delight the dale along
+  And up the daisied downs.
+
+A thousand songs I might have made...
+  But you required them not;
+Content to reign your little while
+Ere, abdicating with a smile,
+You pass'd into a shade, a shade
+  Immortal--and forgot!
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Vigil of Venus and Other Poems by "Q", by Q
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 10133 ***