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diff --git a/16376.txt b/16376.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..17d0827 --- /dev/null +++ b/16376.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7890 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Browning's Shorter Poems, by Robert Browning + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Browning's Shorter Poems + +Author: Robert Browning + +Editor: Franklin T. Baker + +Release Date: July 28, 2005 [EBook #16376] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BROWNING'S SHORTER POEMS *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Aldarondo, Keren Vergon, Lesley Halamek +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +BROWNING'S + +SHORTER POEMS + + + +SELECTED AND EDITED + +BY + +FRANKLIN T. BAKER, A.M. + +PROFESSOR OF ENGLISH IN TEACHERS COLLEGE, +COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY + +FOURTH EDITION. REVISED AND ENLARGED + +New York + +THE MACMILLAN COMPANY + +LONDON; MACMILLAN & CO., LTD. + +1917 + +COPYRIGHT 1899, +BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. + + * * * * * + +Set up and electrotyped October, 1899. Reprinted January, 1901; +April, 1902; May, 1903; May, 1904; January, 1905; January, June, +1906; January, July, 1907; February, 1908; September, 1909; +February, 1910; March, 1911; July, 1912; July, 1913; January, July, +1915; July, 1916; January, September, 1917. + + +Norwood Press +J.S. Cushing Co.--Berwick & Smith Co., +Norwood, Mass., U.S.A. + + * * * * * + + + + +PREFACE + +These selections from the poetry of Robert Browning have been made +with especial reference to the tastes and capacities of readers of the +high-school age. Every poem included has been found by experience to +be within the grasp of boys and girls. Most of Browning's best poetry +is within the ken of any reader of imagination and diligence. To the +reader who lacks these, not only Browning, but the great world of +literature, remains closed: Browning is not the only poet who requires +close study. The difficulties he offers are, in his best poems, not +more repellent to the thoughtful reader than the nut that protects and +contains the kernel. To a boy or girl of active mind, the difficulty +need rarely be more than a pleasant challenge to the exercise of a +little patience and ingenuity. + +Browning, when at his best in vigor, clearness, and beauty, is +peculiarly a poet for young people. His freedom from sentimentality, +his liveliness of conception and narration, his high optimism, and his +interest in the things that make for the life of the soul, appeal to +the imagination and the feelings of youth. + +The present edition, attempts but little in the way of criticism. The +notes cover such matters as are not readily settled by an appeal to +the dictionary, and suggest, in addition, questions that are designed +to help in interpretation and appreciation. + +TEACHERS' COLLEGE, NEW YORK, + +_July_, 1899. + + + + + +CONTENTS + + +LIFE OF BROWNING +BROWNING AS POET +APPRECIATIONS +CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF BROWNING'S WORKS +BIBLIOGRAPHY + +The Pied Piper of Hamelin +Tray +Incident of the French Camp +"How they brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix" +Herve Riel +Pheidippides +My Star +Evelyn Hope +Love among the Ruins +Misconceptions +Natural Magic +Apparitions +A Wall +Confessions +A Woman's Last Word +A Pretty Woman +Youth and Art +A Tale +Cavalier Tunes +Home-Thoughts, from the Sea +Summum Bonum +A Face +Songs from Pippa Passes +The Lost Leader +Apparent Failure +Fears and Scruples +Instans Tyrannus +The Patriot +The Boy and the Angel +Memorabilia +Why I am a Liberal +Prospice +Epilogue to "Asolando" +"De Gustibus--" +The Italian in England +My Last Duchess +The Bishop Orders his Tomb at Saint Praxed's Church +The Laboratory +Home Thoughts, from Abroad +Up at a Villa--Down in the City +A Toccata of Galuppi's +Abt Vogler +Rabbi Ben Ezra +A Grammarian's Funeral +Andrea del Sarto +Caliban upon Setebos +"Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came" +An Epistle +Saul +One Word More + +NOTES + + + + + + +INTRODUCTION + + +LIFE OF BROWNING + +Robert Browning was born in Camberwell, London, May 7, 1812. He was +contemporary with Tennyson, Dickens, Thackeray, Lowell, Emerson, +Hawthorne, Darwin, Spencer, Huxley, Dumas, Hugo, Mendelssohn, Wagner, +and a score of other men famous in art and science. + +Browning's good fortune began with his birth. His father, a clerk in +the Bank of England, possessed ample means for the education of his +children. He had artistic and literary tastes, a mind richly stored +with philosophy, history, literature, and legend, some repute as a +maker of verses, and a liberality that led him to assist his gifted +son in following his bent. From his father Robert inherited his +literary tastes and his vigorous health; in his father he found a +critic and companion. His mother was described by Carlyle as a type +of the true Scotch gentlewoman. Her "fathomless charity," her love of +music, and her deep religious feeling reappear in the poet. + +Free from struggles with adversity, and devoid of public or stirring +incidents, the story of Browning's life is soon told. It was the life +of a scholar and man of letters, devoted to the study of poetry, +philosophy, history; to the contemplation of the lives of men and +women; and to the exercise of his chosen vocation. + +His school life was of meagre extent. He attended a private academy, +read at home under a tutor, and for two years attended the University +of London. When asked in his later life whether he had been to Oxford +or Cambridge, he used to say, "Italy was my University," And, indeed, +his many poems on Italian themes bear testimony to the profound +influence of Italy upon him. In his teens, he came under the influence +of Pope and Byron, and wrote verses after their styles. Then Shelley +came by accident in his way, and became to the boy the model of poetic +excellence. + +In 1838 appeared his first published poem, _Pauline_. It bears +the marks of his peculiar genius; it has the germs of his merits and +his defects. Though not widely read, it received favorable notice +from some of the critics. In 1835 appeared _Paracelsus_, in 1837 +_Strafford_, in 1840 _Sordello_. From this time on, for the +fifty remaining years of his life, his poetic activity hardly ceased, +though his poetry was of uneven excellence. The middle period of his +work, beginning with _Bells and Pomegranates_ in 1842, and +ending with _Balaustion's Adventure_ (a transcript of Euripides' +_Alcestis_) in 1871, was by far the richest in poetic value. + +In 1846 he married Elizabeth Barrett, the poet. They left England for +Italy, where, because of Mrs. Browning's feeble health, they continued +to reside until her death in 1861. The remainder of his life was +divided between England and Italy, with frequent visits to southern +France. His reputation as a poet had steadily grown. He was now one of +the best known men in England. His mental activity continued unabated +to the end. Within the last thirty years of his life he wrote _The +Ring and the Book_--his longest work, one of the longest and, +intellectually, one of the greatest, of English poems; translated the +_Agamemnon_ of AEschylus and the _Alcestis_ of Euripides; +published many shorter poems; kept up the studies which had always +been his labor and his pastime; and found leisure also to know a wide +circle of men and women. William Sharp gives a pleasing picture of the +last years of his life: "Everybody wished him to come and dine; and he +did his utmost to gratify Everybody. He saw everything; read all the +notable books; kept himself acquainted with the leading contents of +the journals and magazines; conducted a large correspondence; read +new French, German, and Italian books of mark; read and translated +Euripides and AEschylus: knew all the gossip of the literary clubs, +salons, and the studios; was a frequenter of afternoon tea-parties; +and then, over and above it, he was Browning: the most profoundly +subtle mind that has exercised itself in poetry since Shakespeare."[1] + +He died in Venice, on December 12, 1889, and was buried in the poet's +corner of Westminster Abbey. + + [Footnote 1: Sharp's _Life of Browning_.] + + +BROWNING AS POET + +The three generations of readers who have lived since Browning's first +publication have seen as many attitudes taken toward one of the ablest +poetic spirits of the century. To the first he appeared an enigma, a +writer hopelessly obscure, perhaps not even clear in his own mind, +as to the message he wished to deliver; to the second he appeared a +prophet and a philosopher, full of all wisdom and subtlety, too deep +for common mortals to fathom with line and plummet,--concealing below +green depths of ocean priceless gems of thought and feeling; to the +third, a poet full of inequalities in conception and expression, who +has done many good things well and has made many grave failures. + +No poet in our generation has fared so ill at the hands of the +critics. Already the Browning library is large. Some of the criticism +is good; much of it, regarding the author as philosopher and +symbolist, is totally askew. Reams have been written in interpretation +of _Childe Roland_, an imaginative fantasy composed in one day. +Abstruse ideas have been wrested from the simple story of _My Last +Duchess_. His poetry has been the stamping-ground of theologians +and the centre of prattling literary circles. In this tortuous maze of +futile criticism the one thing lost sight of is the fact that a poet +must be judged by the standards of art. It must be confessed, however, +that Browning is himself to blame for much of the smoke of commentary +that has gathered round him. He has often chosen the oblique +expression where the direct would serve better; often interpolated +his own musing subtleties between the reader and the life he would +present; often followed his theme into intricacies beyond his own +power to resolve into the simple forms of art. Thus it has come about +that misguided readers became enigma hunters, and the poet their +Sphinx. + +The real question with Browning, as with any poet, is, What is his +work and worth as an artist? What of human life has he presented, +and how clear and true are his presentations? What passions, what +struggles, what ideals, what activities of men has he added to the art +world? What beauty and dignity, what light, has he created? How does +he view life: with what of hope, or aspiration, or strength? These +questions may be discussed under his sense and mastery of form, and +under his views of human life. + +Browning's sense of form has often been attacked and defended. The +first impression upon reading him is of harshness amounting to the +grotesque. Rhymes often clash and jangle like the music of savages. +Such rhymes as + + "Fancy the fabric... + Ere mortar dab brick," + +strain dignity and beauty to the breaking-point. Archaic and bizarre +words are pressed into service to help out the rhyme and metre; +instead of melodic rhythm there are harsh and jolting combinations; +until the reader brought up in the traditions of Shakespeare, Milton, +and Tennyson, is fain to cry out, This is not poetry! + +In internal form, as well, Browning often defies the established laws +of literature. Distorted and elliptical sentences, long and irrelevant +parentheses, curious involutions of thought, and irregular or +incoherent development of the narrative or the picture, often leave +the reader in despair even of the meaning. Nor can these departures +from orderly beauty always be defended by the exigencies of the +subjects. They do not fit the theme. They are the discords of a +musician who either has not mastered his instrument or is not +sensitive to all the finer effects. Some of his work stands out +clear from these faults: _A Toccata of Galuppi's_, _Love Among the +Ruins_, the Songs from _Pippa Passes_, _Apparitions_, _Andrea del +Sarto_, and a score of others might be cited to show that Browning +could write with a sense of form as true, and an ear as delicate, as +could any poet of the century, except Tennyson. + +To Browning belongs the credit of having created a new poetic +form,--the dramatic monologue. In this form the larger number of his +poems are cast. Among the best examples in this volume are _My +Last Duchess_, _The Bishop Orders his Tomb_, _The Laboratory_, and +_Confessions_. One person only is speaking, but reveals the +presence, action, and thoughts of the others who are in the scene at +the same time that he reveals his own character, as in a conversation +in which but one voice is audible. The dramatic monologue has in a +peculiar degree the advantages of compression and vividness, and is, +in Browning's hands, an instrument of great power. + +The charge of obscurity so often made against Browning's poetry must +in part be admitted. As has been said above he is often led off by his +many-sided interests into irrelevancies and subtleties that interfere +with simplicity and beauty. His compressed style and his fondness +for unusual words often make an unwarranted demand upon the reader's +patience. Such passages are a challenge to his admirers and a repulse +to the indifferent. Sometimes, indeed, the ore is not worth the +smelting; often it yields enough to reward the greatest patience. + +Browning, like all great poets, knew life widely and deeply through +men and books. He was born in London, near the great centres of the +intellectual movements of his time; he travelled much, especially in +Italy and France; he read widely in the literatures and philosophies +of many ages and many lands; and so grew into the cosmopolitanism of +spirit that belonged to Chaucer and to Shakespeare. + +In all art human life is the matter of ultimate interest. To Browning +this was so in a peculiar degree. In the epistolary preface to +_Sordello_, written thirty years after its first publication, he +said: "My stress lay on the incidents in the development of a soul: +little else is worth study." This interest in "the development of +a soul" is the keynote of nearly all his work. To it are directly +traceable many of the most obvious excellences and defects of his +poetry. He came to look below the surfaces of things for the soul +beneath them. He came to be "the subtlest assertor of the Soul in +Song," and like his own pair of lovers on the Campagna, "unashamed of +soul." His early preference of Shelley to Keats indicated this bent. +His readers are conscious always of revelations of the souls of the +men and women he portrays; the sweet and tender womanhood of the +Duchess, the sordid and material soul of the old Bishop of St. +Praxed's, the devoted and heroic soul of Napoleon's young soldier, the +weary and despairing soul of Andrea del Sarto,--and a host of others +stand before us cleared of the veil of habit and convention. The +souls of men appear as the victors over all material and immaterial +obstacles. Human affection transforms the bare room to a bower of +fruits and flowers; human courage and resolution carry Childe Roland +victoriously past the threats and terrors of malignant nature, and +the despair from accumulated memories of failure; death itself is +described in _Evelyn Hope_, in _Prospice_, in _Rabbi Ben +Ezra_, as a phase, a transit of the soul, wherein the material +aspects and the physical terrors disappear. In Browning's poetry, the +one real and permanent thing is the world of ideas, the world of the +spirit. He is in this one of the truest Platonists of modern times. + +To many young readers this method in art comes like a revelation. +Other poets also portray the souls of men; but Browning does it +more obviously, more intentionally, more insistently. It is well, +therefore, to have read Browning. To learn to read him aright is to +enter the gateway to other good and great poetry. + +Out of this predominating interest in the souls of men, and out of his +intense intellectual activity and scientific curiosity, grows one of +Browning's greatest defects. He is often led too far afield, into +intricacies and anomalies of character beyond the range of common +experience and sympathy. The criminal, the "moral idiot," belong to +the alienist rather than to the poet. The abnormalities of nature +have no place in the world of great art; they do not echo the common +experience of mankind. Already the interest is decreasing in that part +of his poetry which deals with such themes. Bishop Blougram and Mr. +Sludge will not take place in the ranks of artistic creations. Nor can +the poet's "special pleading" for such types, however ingenious it +may be, whatever philanthropy of soul it may imply, be regarded as +justification. Sometimes, indeed, the poet is led by his sympathy and +his intellectual ingenuity into defences that are inconsistent with +his own standards of the true and the beautiful. + +The trait in Browning which appeals to the largest number of readers +is his strenuous optimism. He will admit no evil or sorrow too +great to be borne, too irrational to have some ultimate purpose of +beneficence. "There shall never be one lost good," says Abt Vogler. +The suicides in the morgue only serve to call forth his declaration:-- + + "My own hope is, a sun will pierce + The thickest cloud earth ever stretched; + + * * * * * + + That what began best can't end worst, + Nor what God blessed once, prove accurst." + +He has no fear of death; he will face it gladly, in confidence of the +life beyond. His Grammarian is content to assume an order of things +which will justify in the next life his ceaseless toil in this, merely +to learn how to live. Rabbi Ben Ezra's old age is serene in the hope +of the continuity of life and the eternal development of character; he +finds life good, and the plan of things perfect. In brief, Browning +accepts life as it is, and believes it good, piecing out his +conception of the goodness of life by drawing without limit upon his +hopes of the other world. With the exception of a few poems like +_Andrea del Sarto_, this is the unbroken tone of his poetry. +Calvinism, asceticism, pessimism in any form, he rejects. He sustains +his position not by argument, but by hope and assertion. It is a +matter of temperament: he is optimistic because he was born so. +Different from the serene optimism of Shakespeare's later life, in +_The Tempest_ and _The Winter's Tale_, in that it is +not, like Shakespeare's, born of long and deep suffering from the +contemplation of the tragedies of human life, it bears, in that +degree, less of solace and conviction. + +To Browning's temperament, also, may be ascribed another prominent +trait in his work. He steadily asserts the right of the individual to +live out his own life, to be himself in fulfilling his desires and +aspirations. _The Statue and the Bust_ is the famous exposition +of this doctrine. It is a teaching that neither the poet's optimism +nor his acumen has justified in the minds of men. It is a return to +the unbridled freedom of nature advocated by Whitman and Rousseau; +an extreme assertion of the value of the individual man, and of +unregulated democracy; an outgrowth, it may be, of the robustness and +originality of Browning's nature, and interesting--not as a clew to +his life, which conformed to that of organized society--but as a +clew to his independence of classical and conventional forms in the +exercise of his art. + +Creative energy Browning has in high degree. With the poet's insight +into character and motives, the poet's grasp of the essential laws of +human life, the poet's vividness of imagination, he has portrayed a +host of types distinct from each other, true to life, strongly marked +and consistent. With fine dramatic instinct he has shown these +characters in true relation to the facts of life and to each other. In +this respect he has satisfied the most exigent demands of art, and +has already taken rank as one of the great creative minds of the +nineteenth century. + +True poet he is, also, in his depth of feeling and range of sympathy. +Beneath a ruggedness of intellect, like his landscape in _De +Gustibus_, there is always sympathy and tenderness. It is, indeed, +more like the serenity of Chaucer's emotions than like the tragic +fervor of Shakespeare's. Mrs. Browning's estimate of him in _Lady +Geraldine's Courtship_,-- + + "Or from Browning some 'Pomegranate,' which, if cut deep down the middle, + Shows a heart within blood-tinctured, of a veined humanity," + +is true criticism. + +His love of nature, and his sense of the joy and beauty of it, appear +often in his poetry; but not with the same insistence as in Wordsworth +and Burns, and seldom with the same pervasiveness, or with the same +beauty, as in Tennyson. He was rather the poet of men's souls. When +he does use nature, it is generally to illustrate some phase or +experience of the soul, and not for the sake of its beauty. He has, +however, some nature-descriptions so exquisite that English poetry +would be the poorer for their loss. Witness _De Gustibus_, _Up at a +Villa_, _Home Thoughts from Abroad_, _Pippa's Songs_, and _Saul_. + +It is too early to guess at Browning's permanent place in our +literature. But his vigor of intellect, his insight into the human +heart, his originality in phrase and conception, his unquenchable and +fearless optimism, and his grasp of the problems of his century, make +him beyond question one of its greatest figures. + + +APPRECIATIONS + + Shakespeare is not our poet, but the world's, + Therefore, on him no speech! and brief for thee, + Browning! Since Chaucer was alive and hale + No man has walked along our roads with step + So active, so inquiring eye, or tongue + So varied in discourse. But warmer climes + Give brighter plumage, stronger wing: the breeze + Of Alpine heights thou playest with, borne on + Beyond Sorrento and Amalfi, where + The Siren waits thee, singing song for song. + +--WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR. + + +Tennyson has a vivid feeling of the dignity and potency of +_law_.... Browning vividly feels the importance, the greatness +and beauty of passions and enthusiasms, and his imagination +is comparatively unimpressed by the presence of law and its +operations.... It is not the order and regularity in the processes of +the natural world which chiefly delight Browning's imagination, but +the streaming forth of power, and will, and love from the whole face +of the visible universe.... + +Tennyson considers the chief instruments of human progress to be a +vast increase of knowledge and of political organization. Browning +makes that progress dependent on the production of higher passions, +and aspirations,--hopes, and joys, and sorrows; Tennyson finds the +evidence of the truth of the doctrine of progress in the universal +presence of a self-evolving law. Browning obtains his assurance of +its truth from inward presages and prophecies of the soul, from +anticipations, types, and symbols of a higher greatness in store for +man, which even now reside within him, a creature ever unsatisfied, +ever yearning upward in thought, feeling, and endeavour. + +... Hence, it is not obedience, it is not submission to the law +of duty, which points out to us our true path of life, but rather +infinite desire and endless aspiration. Browning's ideal of manhood +in this world always recognizes the fact that it is the ideal of a +creature who never can be perfected on earth, a creature whom other +and higher lives await in an endless hereafter.... + +The gleams of knowledge which we possess are of chief value because +they "sting with hunger for full light." The goal of knowledge, as of +love, is God himself. Its most precious part is that which is least +positive--those momentary intuitions of things which eye hath not seen +nor ear heard. The needs of the highest parts of our humanity cannot +be supplied by ascertained truth, in which we might rest, or which we +might put to use for definite ends; rather by ventures of faith, which +test the courage of the soul, we ascend from surmise to assurance, and +so again to higher surmise.--Condensed from EDWARD DOWDEN, _Studies +in Literature_. + +... Browning has not cared for that poetic form which bestows +perennial charm, or else he was incapable of it. He fails in beauty, +in concentration of interest, in economy of language, in selection of +the best from the common treasure of experience. In those works where +he has been most indifferent, as in the _Red Cotton Night-Cap +Country_, he has been merely whimsical and dull; in those works +where the genius he possessed is most felt, as in _Saul_, _A Toccata +of Galuppi's_, _Rabbi Ben Ezra_, _The Flight of the Duchess_, _The Bishop +Orders his Tomb in Saint Praxed's Church_, _Herve Riel_, _Cavalier Tunes_, +_Time's Revenges_, and many more, he achieves beauty, or nobility, +or fitness of phrase such as only a poet is capable of. It is in these +last pieces and their like that his fame lies for the future. It +was his lot to be strong as the thinker, the moralist, with "the +accomplishment of verse," the scholar interested to rebuild the past +of experience, the teacher with an explicit dogma in an intellectual +form with examples from life, the anatomist of human passions, +instincts, and impulses in all their gamut, the commentator on his own +age; he was weak as the artist, often unnecessarily and by choice, in +the repulsive form,--in the awkward, the obscure, the ugly. He belongs +with Jonson, with Dryden, with the heirs of the masculine intellect, +the men of power not unvisited by grace, but in whom mind is +predominant. Upon the work of such poets time hesitates, conscious +of their mental greatness, but also of their imperfect art, their +heterogeneous matter; at last the good is sifted from that whence +worth has departed.--From GEORGE EDWARD WOODBERRY'S _Studies in +Letters and Life_. + +When it is urged that for a poet the intellectual energies are too +strong in Browning, that for poetry the play of intellectual interests +and activities is too great in his work, and that Browning often and +at times ruthlessly sacrifices the requirements and effects of art +for the expression of thought, that "though he refreshes the heart he +tires the brain," we should admit this with regard to a good deal of +the work of the third period. We should allow that this is the side +to which he leans generally, but still hold that, though to many his +intellectual quality and energy may well seem excessive, yet in great +part of his work, and that of course, his best, the passion of the +poet and his kind of imagination are just as fresh and powerful as +the intellectual force and subtlety are keen and abundant.--JAMES +FROTHINGHAM, _Studies of the Mind and Art of Robert Browning_. + + Now dumb is he who waked the world to speak, + And voiceless hangs the world beside his bier, + Our words are sobs, our cry or praise a tear: + We are the smitten mortal, we the weak. + We see a spirit on earth's loftiest peak + Shine, and wing hence the way he makes more clear: + See a great Tree of Life that never sere + Dropped leaf for aught that age or storms might wreak; + Such ending is not death: such living shows + What wide illumination brightness sheds + From one big heart,--to conquer man's old foes: + The coward, and the tyrant, and the force + Of all those weedy monsters raising heads + When Song is muck from springs of turbid source. + +--GEORGE MEREDITH. + + * * * * * + + + + +CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF BROWNING'S WORKS + +1833. Pauline. +1835. Paracelsus. +1837. Strafford (A tragedy). +1840. Sordello. +1841. Bells and Pomegranates, No I., + Pippa Passes. +1842. Bells and Pomegranates, No. II., + King Victor and King Charles. +1842. Bells and Pomegranates, No. III., + Dramatic Lyrics. + Cavalier Tunes. + Italy and France. + Camp and Cloister. + In a Gondola. + Artemis Prologises. + Waring. + Queen Worship. + Madhouse Cells. + Through the Metidja. + The Pied Piper of Hamelin. +1843. Bells and Pomegranates, No. IV., + The Return of the Druses (A tragedy). +1843. Bells and Pomegranates, No. V., + A Blot In the 'Scutcheon (A tragedy). +1844. Bells and Pomegranates, No. VI., + Colombe's Birthday (A play). +1845. Bells and Pomegranates, No. VII. + "How they Brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix." + Pictor Ignotos. + The Italian in England. + The Englishman in Italy. + The Lost Leader. + The Lost Mistress. + Home Thoughts from Abroad. + The Bishop Orders his Tomb. + Garden Fancies. + The Laboratory. + The Confessional. + The Flight of the Duchess. + Earth's Immortalities. + Song: "Nay, but you,--who do not love her." + The Boy and the Angel. + Night and Morning. + Claret and Tokay. + Saul. + Time's Revenges. + The Glove. +1846. Bells and Pomegranates, No. VIII., + Luria, and A Soul's Tragedy. +1850. Christmas Eve and Easterday. +1852. Introductory Essay to Shelley's Letters. +1855. Men and Women. + + + VOLUME I. + + Love among the Ruins. + A Lover's Quarrel. + Evelyn Hope. + Up at a Villa--Down in the City. + A Woman's Last Word. + Fra Lippo Lippi. + A Toccata of Galuppi's. + By the Fireside. + Any Wife to Any Husband. + An Epistle (Karshish). + Mesmerism. + A Serenade at the Villa. + My Star. + Instans Tyrannus. + A Pretty Woman. + "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came." + Respectability. + A Light Woman. + The Statue and the Bust. + Love in a Life. + Life in a Love. + How it Strikes a Contemporary. + The Last Ride Together. + The Patriot. + Master Hugues of Saxe-Gotha. + Bishop Blougram's Apology. + Memorabilia. + + + VOLUME II. + + Andrea del Sarto. + Before and After. + In Three Days. + In a Year. + Old Pictures in Florence. + In a Balcony. + Saul. + "De Gustibus--." + Women and Roses. + Protus. + Holy-Cross Day. + The Guardian Angel. + Cleon. + The Twins. + Popularity. + The Heretic's Tragedy. + Two in the Campagna. + A Grammarian's Funeral. + One Way of Love. + Another Way of Love. + "Transcendentalism." + Misconceptions. + One Word More. +1864. Dramatis Personae. + James Lee. + Gold Hair. + The Worst of It. + Dis Aliter Visum. + Too Late. + Abt Vogler. + Rabbi Ben Ezra. + A Death in the Desert. + Caliban upon Setebos. + Confessions. + May and Death. + Prospice. + Youth and Art. + A Face. + A Likeness. + Mr. Sludge, "The Medium." + Apparent Failure. + Epilogue. +1868-69. The Ring and the Book. +1871. Balaustion's Adventure. +1871. Prince Hohenstiel-Schwangau. +1872. Fifine at the Fair. +1873. Red Cotton Night-Cap Country. +1875. Aristophanes' Apology. +1875. The Inn Album. +1876. Pacchiarotto, and other Poems + (including Natural Magic and Herve Riel). +1877. The Agamemnon of AEschylus. +1878. La Saisiaz, and The Two Poets of Croisic. +1879-80. Dramatic Idyls. +1883. Jocoseria. +1884. Ferishtah's Fancies. +1887. Parleyings with Certain People. +1890. Asolando. + + + +BIBLIOGRAPHY + +The Poetical Works of Robert Browning (The Macmillan Company, + ten vols.). +Browning's Complete Poetical Works, Cambridge Edition (Houghton, + Mifflin & Co., one vol.). +Selections from Browning (Crowell & Co., one vol.). +Life of Browning, by William Sharp. +Life of Browning, by Mrs. Sutherland Orr. +Introduction to Browning, by Hiram Corson. +Guide Book to Browning, by George Willis Cook. +Browning Cyclopaedia, by Edward Berdoe. +Literary Studies, by Walter Bagehot. +Studies in Literature, by Edward Dowden. +Makers of Literature, by George Edward Woodberry (New York, 1901). +Boston Browning Society Papers. +A Handbook to the Works of Robert Browning, by Mrs Sutherland Orr. +Robert Browning: Personalia, by Edmund Gosse. +Life of the Spirit in Modern English Poets, by Vida D. Scudder. +Victorian Poetry, by Edmund Clarence Stedman. +Studies of the Mind and Art of Robert Browning, by James Fotheringham. +Browning Society Papers. +Our Living Poets, by H. Buxton Forman. +Browning's Message to his Times, by Edward Berdoe (London, 1897). +Browning Studies, by Edward Berdoe (London, 1895). +The Poetry of Robert Browning, by Stopford Brooke (New York, 1902). +Browning, Poet and Man, by E.L. Cary (New York, 1899). +(An extensive bibliography, biographical and critical, is given in the + Appendix to Sharp's Life of Browning; London, Walter Scott, 1890.) + + * * * * * + + + +THE PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN + +A CHILD'S STORY +_(Written for, and inscribed to W. M. the Younger)_ + + +I + +Hamelin deg. town's in Brunswick, deg.1 +By famous Hanover city; +The river Weser, deep and wide, +Washes its walls on either side; +A pleasanter spot you never spied; +But, when begins my ditty, +Almost five hundred years ago, +To see the townsfolk suffer so +From vermin, was a pity. + +II + + Rats! 10 +They fought the dogs and killed the cats, +And bit the babies in the cradles, +And ate the cheeses out of the vats, +And licked the soup from the cooks' own ladles, +Split open the kegs of salted sprats. +Made nests inside men's Sunday hats. +And even spoiled the women's chats +By drowning their speaking +With shrieking and squeaking +In fifty different sharps and flats. 20 + +III + +At last the people in a body +To the Town Hall came flocking: +"'Tis clear," cried they, "our Mayor's a noddy; +And as for our Corporation, shocking +To think we buy gowns lined with ermine +For dolts that can't or won't determine +What's best to rid us of our vermin! +You hope, because you're old and obese, +To find in the furry civic robe ease! +Rouse up, sirs! give your brains a racking 30 +To find the remedy we're lacking, +Or, sure as fate, we'll send you packing!" +At this the Mayor and Corporation +Quaked with a mighty consternation. + +IV + +An hour they sat in council; +At length the Mayor broke silence: +"For a guilder I'd my ermine gown sell, +I wish I were a mile hence! +It's easy to bid one rack one's brain-- +I'm sure my poor head aches again, 40 +I've scratched it so, and all in vain. +Oh for a trap, a trap, a trap!" +Just as he said this, what should hap +At the chamber door but a gentle tap? +"Bless us," cried the Mayor, "what's that?" +(With the Corporation as he sat, +Looking little, though wondrous fat; +Nor brighter was his eye, nor moister +Than a too-long-opened oyster, +Save when at noon his paunch grew mutinous 50 +For a plate of turtle, green and glutinous) +"Only a scraping of shoes on the mat? +Anything like the sound of a rat +Makes my heart go pit-a-pat!" + +V + +"Come in!"--the Mayor cried, looking bigger: +And in did come the strangest figure! +His queer long coat from heel to head +Was half of yellow and half of red, +And he himself was tall and thin, +With sharp blue eyes, each like a pin, 60 +With light loose hair, yet swarthy skin, +No tuft on cheek, nor beard on chin, +But lips where smiles went out and in; +There was no guessing his kith and kin: +And nobody could enough admire +The tall man and his quaint attire. +Quoth one: "It's as my great grandsire, +Starting up at the Trump of Doom's tone, +Had walked his way from his painted tombstone!" + +VI + +He advanced to the council-table: 70 +And, "Please your honors," said he, "I'm able, +By means of a secret charm, to draw +All creatures living beneath the sun, +That creep or swim or fly or run, +After me so as you never saw! +And I chiefly use my charm +On creatures that do people harm, +The mole and toad and newt and viper; +And people call me the Pied Piper." +(And here they noticed round his neck 80 +A scarf of red and yellow stripe, +To match with his coat of self-same cheque: +And at the scarf's end hung a pipe; +And his fingers, they noticed, were ever straying, +As if impatient to be playing +Upon this pipe, as low it dangled +Over his vesture so old-fangled.) +"Yet," said he, "poor piper as I am, +In Tartary I freed the Cham, deg. deg.89 +Last June, from his huge swarms of gnats; 90 +I eased in Asia the Nizam deg. deg.91 +Of a monstrous brood of vampire-bats: +And as for what your brain bewilders, +If I can rid your town of rats +Will you give me a thousand guilders?" +"One? fifty thousand!"--was the exclamation +Of the astonished Mayor and Corporation. + +VII + +Into the street the Piper stept, +Smiling first a little smile, +As if he knew what magic slept 100 +In his quiet pipe the while: +Then, like a musical adept, +To blow the pipe his lips he wrinkled, +And green and blue his sharp eyes twinkled, +Like a candle-flame where salt is sprinkled; +And ere three shrill notes the pipe uttered, +You heard as if an army muttered: +And the muttering grew to a grumbling; +And the grumbling grew to a mighty rumbling; +And out of the houses the rats came tumbling. 110 +Great rats, small rats, lean rats, brawny rats, +Brown rats, black rats, gray rats, tawny rats, +Grave old plodders, gay young friskers, +Fathers, mothers, uncles, cousins, +Cocking tails and pricking whiskers, + Families by tens and dozens, +Brothers, sisters, husbands, wives-- +Followed the Piper for their lives. +From street to street he piped advancing, +And step for step they followed dancing, 120 +Until they came to the river Weser, +Wherein all plunged and perished! +--Save one, who, stout as Julius Caesar, +Swam across and lived to carry +(As he, the manuscript he cherished) +To Rat-land home his commentary: +Which was: "At the first shrill notes of the pipe, +I heard a sound as of scraping tripe, +And putting apples, wondrous ripe, +Into a cider press's gripe; 130 +And a moving away of pickle-tub-boards, +And a leaving ajar of conserve-cupboards, +And a drawing the corks of train-oil-flasks, +And a breaking the hoops of butter-casks: +And it seemed as if a voice +(Sweeter far than by harp or by psaltery +Is breathed) called out, 'Oh, rats, rejoice! +The world is grown to one vast drysaltery! +So munch on, crunch on, take your nuncheon, +Breakfast, supper, dinner, luncheon!' 140 +And just as a bulky sugar-puncheon, +Already staved, like a great sun shone +Glorious scarce an inch before me, +Just as methought it said, 'Come, bore me!' +--I found the Weser rolling o'er me." + +VIII + +You should have heard the Hamelin people +Ringing the bells till they rocked the steeple. +"Go," cried the Mayor, "and get long poles, +Poke out the nests and block up the holes! +Consult with carpenters and builders, 150 +And leave in our town, not even a trace +Of the rats!"--when suddenly, up the face +Of the Piper perked in the market-place, +With a, "First, if you please, my thousand guilders!" + +IX + +A thousand guilders! The Mayor looked blue; +So did the Corporation, too. +For council dinners made rare havoc +With Claret, deg. Moselle, deg. Vin-de-Grave, deg. Hock deg.; deg.158 +And half the money would replenish +Their cellar's biggest butt with Rhenish deg.. deg.160 +To pay this sum to a wandering fellow +With a gypsy coat of red and yellow! +"Beside," quoth the Mayor, with a knowing wink, +"Our business was done at the river's brink; +We saw with our eyes the vermin sink, +And what's dead can't come to life, I think. +So, friend, we're not the folks to shrink +From the duty of giving you something for drink, +And a matter of money to put in your poke; +But as for the guilders, what we spoke 170 +Of them, as you very well know, was in joke. +Beside, our losses have made us thrifty. +A thousand guilders! Come, take fifty!" + +X + +The Piper's face fell, and he cried, +"No trifling! I can't wait! Beside, +I've promised to visit by dinner-time +Bagdat, and accept the prime +Of the Head-Cook's pottage, all he's rich in, +For having left, in the Caliph's deg. kitchen, deg.179 +Of a nest of scorpions no survivor: 180 +With him I proved no bargain-driver, +With you, don't think I'll bate a stiver! +And folks who put me in a passion +May find me pipe after another fashion." + +XI + +"How?" cried the Mayor, "d'ye think I brook +Being worse treated than a cook? +Insulted by a lazy ribald +With idle pipe and vesture piebald? +You threaten us, fellow? Do your worst! +Blow your pipe there till you burst!" 190 + +XII + +Once more he stept into the street, + And to his lips again +Laid his long pipe of smooth straight cane; + And ere he blew three notes (such sweet, +Soft notes as yet musician's cunning + Never gave the enraptured air) +There was a rustling that seemed like a bustling +Of merry crowds justling at pitching and hustling; +Small feet were pattering, wooden shoes clattering, 200 +Little hands clapping, and little tongues chattering, +And, like fowls in a farm-yard, when barley is scattering, +Out came the children running. +All the little boys and girls. +With rosy cheeks and flaxen curls, +And sparkling eyes and teeth like pearls, +Tripping and skipping, ran merrily after +The wonderful music with shouting and laughter. + +XIII + +The Mayor was dumb, and the Council stood +As if they were changed into blocks of wood. +Unable to move a step, or cry 210 +To the children merrily skipping by, +--Could only follow with the eye +That joyous crowd at the piper's back. +But how the Mayor was on the rack, +And the wretched Council's bosom beat, +As the Piper turned from the High Street +To where the Weser rolled its waters, +Right in the way of their sons and daughters! +However, he turned from South to West, +And to Koppelberg Hill his steps addressed, 220 +And after him the children pressed: +Great was the joy in every breast. +"He never can cross that mighty top! +He's forced to let the piping drop, +And we shall see our children stop." +When lo, as they reached the mountain-side, +A wondrous portal opened wide, +As if a cavern were suddenly hollowed; +And the Piper advanced, and the children followed, +And when all were in, to the very last, 230 +The door in the mountain-side shut fast. +Did I say all? No! One was lame, +And could not dance the whole of the way; +And in after years, if you would blame +His sadness, he was used to say,-- +"It's dull in our town since my playmates left! +I can't forget that I'm bereft +Of all the pleasant sights they see, +Which the Piper also promised me. +For he led us, he said, to a joyous land. 240 +Joining the town, and just at hand, +Where waters gushed and fruit-trees grew, +And flowers put forth a fairer hue, +And everything was strange and new: +The sparrows were brighter than peacocks here, +And their dogs outran our fallow deer. +And honey-bees had lost their stings, +And horses were born with eagles' wings; +And just as I became assured, +My lame foot would be speedily cured, 250 +The music stopped and I stood still, +And found myself outside the hill, +Left alone against my will, +To go now limping as before. +And never hear of that country more!" + +XIV + +Alas, alas for Hamelin! + There came into many a burgher's pate + A text which says that Heaven's gate + Opes to the rich at as easy a rate +As the needle's eye takes a camel in! 260 +The Mayor sent East, West, North, and South, +To offer the Piper, by word of mouth, + Wherever it was men's lot to find him, +Silver and gold to his heart's content, +If he'd only return the way he went, + And bring the children behind him. +But when they saw 'twas a lost endeavor, +And Piper and dancers were gone forever, +They made a decree that lawyers never + Should think their records dated duly 270 +If, after the day of the month and year, +These words did not as well appear, + "And so long after what happened here + On the twenty-second of July, +Thirteen hundred and seventy-six;" +And the better in memory to fix +The place of the children's last retreat, +They called it the Pied Piper's Street-- +Where any one playing on pipe or tabor +Was sure for the future to lose his labour. 280 +Nor suffered they hostelry or tavern + To shock with mirth a street so solemn; +But opposite the place of the cavern + They wrote the story on a column, +And on the great church window painted +The same, to make the world acquainted +How their children were stolen away. +And there it stands to this very day. +And I must not omit to say +That in Transylvania there's a tribe 290 +Of alien people who ascribe +The outlandish ways and dress +On which their neighbours lay such stress, +To their fathers and mothers having risen +Out of some subterraneous prison +Into which they were trepanned +Long time ago in a mighty band +Out of Hamelin town in Brunswick land, +But how or why, they don't understand. + +XV + +So, Willy, let me and you be wipers 300 +Of scores out with all men--especially pipers! +And, whether they pipe us free from rats or from mice, +If we've promised them aught, let us keep our promise! + + * * * * * + + + + +TRAY + +Sing me a hero! Quench my thirst +Of soul, ye bards! + Quoth Bard the first: +"Sir Olaf, deg. the good knight, did don deg.3 +His helm, and eke his habergeon ..." +Sir Olaf and his bard----! + +"That sin-scathed brow" deg. (quoth Bard the second), deg.6 +"That eye wide ope as tho' Fate beckoned +My hero to some steep, beneath +Which precipice smiled tempting Death ..." +You too without your host have reckoned! 10 + +"A beggar-child" (let's hear this third!) +"Sat on a quay's edge: like a bird +Sang to herself at careless play, +And fell into the stream. 'Dismay! +Help, you the standers-by!' None stirred. + +"Bystanders reason, think of wives +And children ere they risk their lives. +Over the balustrade has bounced +A mere instinctive dog, and pounced +Plumb on the prize. 'How well he dives! 20 + +"'Up he comes with the child, see, tight +In mouth, alive too, clutched from quite +A depth of ten feet--twelve, I bet! +Good dog! What, off again? There's yet +Another child to save? All right! + +"'How strange we saw no other fall! +It's instinct in the animal. +Good dog! But he's a long while under: +If he got drowned I should not wonder-- +Strong current, that against the wall! 30 + +"'Here he comes, holds in mouth this time +--What may the thing be? Well, that's prime! +Now, did you ever? Reason reigns +In man alone, since all Tray's pains +Have fished--the child's doll from the slime!' + +"And so, amid the laughter gay, +Trotted my hero off,--old Tray,-- +Till somebody, prerogatived +With reason, reasoned: 'Why he dived, +His brain would show us, I should say. 40 + +"'John, go and catch--or, if needs be, +Purchase that animal for me! +By vivisection, at expense +Of half-an-hour and eighteen pence, +How brain secretes dog's soul, we'll see!'" + + * * * * * + + + + +INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH CAMP + +You know, we French stormed Ratisbon deg.: deg.1 + A mile or so away +On a little mound, Napoleon + Stood on our storming-day; +With neck out-thrust, you fancy how, + Legs wide, arms locked behind, +As if to balance the prone brow + Oppressive with its mind. + +Just as perhaps he mused "My plans + That soar, to earth may fall, 10 +Let once my army-leader Lannes deg. deg.11 + Waver at yonder wall"-- +Out 'twixt the battery-smokes there flew + A rider, bound on bound +Full-galloping; nor bridle drew + Until he reached the mound, + +Then off there flung in smiling joy, + And held himself erect +By just his horse's mane, a boy: + You hardly could suspect deg.-- deg.20 +(So tight he kept his lips compressed. + Scarce any blood came through) +You looked twice ere you saw his breast + Was all but shot in two. + +"Well," cried he, "Emperor, by God's grace + We've got you Ratisbon! +The Marshal's in the market-place, + And you'll be there anon +To see your flag-bird flap his vans + Where I, to heart's desire, 30 +Perched him!" The chief's eye flashed; his plans + Soared up again like fire. + +The chief's eye flashed; but presently + Softened itself, as sheathes +A film the mother-eagle's eye + When her bruised eaglet breathes. +"You're wounded!" "Nay," the soldier's pride + Touched to the quick, he said: +"I'm killed, Sire!" And his chief beside, + Smiling, the boy fell dead. 40 + + * * * * * + + + + +"HOW THEY BROUGHT THE GOOD NEWS FROM GHENT TO AIX" + +[16--] + + +I sprang to the stirrup, and Joris, and he; +I galloped, Dirck galloped, we galloped all three; +"Good speed!" cried the watch, as the gate-bolts undrew; +"Speed!" echoed the wall to us galloping through; +Behind shut the postern, the lights sank to rest, +And into the midnight we galloped abreast. + +Not a word to each other; we kept the great pace +Neck by neck, stride by stride, never changing our place; +I turned in my saddle and made its girths tight, +Then shortened each stirrup, and set the pique right, 10 +Rebuckled the cheek-strap, chained slacker the bit, +Nor galloped less steadily Roland a whit. + +'Twas moonset at starting; but while we drew near +Lokeren deg., the cocks crew and twilight dawned clear: deg.14 +At Boom deg., a great yellow star came out to see; deg.15 +At Dueffeld deg., 'twas morning as plain as could be; deg.16 +And from Mecheln deg. church-steeple we heard the half-chime, deg.17 +So, Joris broke silence with, "Yet there is time!" + +At Aershot deg. up leaped of a sudden the sun, deg.19 +And against him the cattle stood black every one, 20 +To stare through the mist at us galloping past, +And I saw my stout galloper Roland, at last, +With resolute shoulders, each butting away +The haze, as some bluff river headland its spray: + +And his low head and crest, just one sharp ear bent back +For my voice, and the other pricked out on his track; +And one eye's black intelligence,--ever that glance +O'er its white edge at me, his own master, askance! +And the thick heavy spume-flakes which aye and anon +His fierce lips shook upwards in galloping on. 30 + +By Hasselt, Dirck groaned; and cried Joris, "Stay spur! +Your Roos galloped bravely, the fault's not in her, +We'll remember at Aix"--for one heard the quick wheeze +Of her chest, saw the stretched neck and staggering knees, +And sunk tail, and horrible heave of the flank, +As down on her haunches she shuddered and sank. + +So, we were left galloping, Joris and I, +Past Looz and past Tongres, no cloud in the sky; +The broad sun above laughed a pitiless laugh, +'Neath our feet broke the brittle bright stubble like chaff; 40 +Till over by Dalhem a dome-spire sprang white, +And "Gallop," gasped Joris, "for Aix is in sight!" + +"How they'll greet us!"--and all in a moment his roan +Rolled neck and croup over, lay dead as a stone; +And there was my Roland to bear the whole weight +Of the news which alone could save Aix from her fate, +With his nostrils like pits full of blood to the brim, +And with circles of red for his eye-sockets' rim. + +Then I cast loose my buff-coat, each holster let fall, +Shook off both my jack-boots, let go belt and all, 50 +Stood up in the stirrup, leaned, patted his ear, +Called my Roland his pet-name, my horse without peer; +Clapped my hands, laughed and sang, any noise, bad or good, +Till at length, into Aix Roland galloped and stood. + +And all I remember is,--friends flocking round +As I sat with his head 'twixt my knees on the ground; +And no voice but was praising this Roland of mine, +As I poured down his throat our last measure of wine, +Which (the burgesses voted by common consent) +Was no more than his due who brought good news from Ghent. 60 + + * * * * * + + + + +HERVE RIEL + +On the sea and at the Hogue, sixteen hundred ninety two, +Did the English fight the French,--woe to France! +And, the thirty-first of May, helter-skelter thro' the blue. +Like a crowd of frightened porpoises a shoal of sharks pursue, + Came crowding ship on ship to St. Malo on the Rance, deg. deg.5 +With the English fleet in view. + +'Twas the squadron that escaped, with the victor in full chase; + First and foremost of the drove, in his great ship, Damfreville; + Close on him fled, great and small, + Twenty-two good ships in all; 10 +And they signalled to the place +"Help the winners of a race! + Get us guidance, give us harbor, take us quick--or, quicker still, + Here's the English can and will!" + +Then the pilots of the place put out brisk and leapt on board; + "Why, what hope or chance have ships like these to pass?" laughed they: +"Rocks to starboard, rocks to port, all the passage scarred and scored, +Shall the '_Formidable_' here, with her twelve and eighty guns + Think to make the river-mouth by the single narrow way, +Trust to enter where 'tis ticklish for a craft of twenty tons, 20 + And with flow at full beside? + Now 'tis slackest ebb of tide. + Reach the mooring? Rather say, +While rock stands or water runs, +Not a ship will leave the bay!" + +Then was called a council straight. +Brief and bitter the debate: +"Here's the English at our heels; would you have them take in tow +All that's left us of the fleet, linked together stern and bow, +For a prize to Plymouth Sound? 30 +Better run the ships aground!" + (Ended Damfreville his speech). +Not a minute more to wait! + "Let the Captains all and each + Shove ashore, then blow up, burn the vessels on the beach! +France must undergo her fate. + +"Give the word!" But no such word +Was ever spoke or heard; + For up stood, for out stepped, for in struck amid all these +--A Captain? A Lieutenant? A Mate--first, second, third? 40 + No such man of mark, and meet + With his betters to compete! + But a simple Breton sailor pressed deg. by Tourville for the fleet, deg.43 +A poor coasting-pilot he, Herve Riel the Croisickese. deg. deg.44 + +And, "What mockery or malice have we here?" cries Herve Riel: + "Are you mad, you Malouins deg.? Are you cowards, fools, or rogues? deg.46 +Talk to me of rocks and shoals, me who took the soundings, tell +On my fingers every bank, every shallow, every swell + 'Twixt the offing here and Greve where the river disembogues? +Are you bought by English gold? Is it love the lying's for? 50 + Morn and eve, night and day, + Have I piloted your bay, +Entered free and anchored fast at the foot of Solidor. + Burn the fleet and ruin France? That were worse than fifty Hogues! + Sirs, they know I speak the truth! Sirs, believe me there's a way! +Only let me lead the line, + Have the biggest ship to steer, + Get this '_Formidable_' clear, +Make the others follow mine, +And I lead them, most and least, by a passage I know well, 60 + Right to Solidor past Greve, + And there lay them safe and sound; + And if one ship misbehave, + --Keel so much as grate the ground. +Why, I've nothing but my life,--here's my head!" cries Herve Riel. + +Not a minute more to wait. +"Steer us in then, small and great! + Take the helm, lead the line, save the squadron!" cried its chief. +Captains, give the sailor place! + He is Admiral, in brief. 70 + +Still the north-wind, by God's grace! +See the noble fellow's face +As the big ship, with a bound, +Clears the entry like a hound, +Keeps the passage as its inch of way were the wide sea's profound! + See, safe thro' shoal and rock, + How they follow in a flock, +Not a ship that misbehaves, not a keel that grates the ground, + Not a spar that comes to grief! +The peril, see, is past, 80 +All are harboured to the last, +And just as Herve Kiel hollas "Anchor!"--sure as fate +Up the English come, too late! + +So, the storm subsides to calm: + They see the green trees wave + On the heights o'erlooking Greve. +Hearts that bled are staunched with balm. +"Just our rapture to enhance, + Let the English rake the bay, +Gnash their teeth and glare askance 90 + As they cannonade away! +'Neath rampired Solidor pleasant riding on the Rance!" +How hope succeeds despair on each Captain's countenance! +Out burst all with one accord, + "This is Paradise for Hell! + Let France, let France's King + Thank the man that did the thing!" +What a shout, and all one word, + "Herve Riel!" +As he stepped in front once more, 100 + Not a symptom of surprise + In the frank blue Breton eyes, +Just the same man as before. + +Then said Damfreville, "My friend, +I must speak out at the end, + Tho' I find the speaking hard. +Praise is deeper than the lips: +You have saved the King his ships, + You must name your own reward, +'Faith our sun was near eclipse! 110 +Demand whate'er you will, +France remains your debtor still. +Ask to heart's content and have! or my name's not Damfreville." + +Then a beam of fun outbroke +On the bearded mouth that spoke, +As the honest heart laughed through +Those frank eyes of Breton blue: +"Since I needs must say my say, + Since on board the duty's done, + And from Malo Roads to Croisic Point, what is it but a run?-- 120 +Since 'tis ask and have, I may-- +Since the others go ashore-- +Come! A good whole holiday! + Leave to go and see my wife, whom I call the Belle Aurore!" +That he asked and that he got,--nothing more. + +Name and deed alike are lost: +Not a pillar nor a post + In his Croisic keeps alive the feat as it befell; +Not a head in white and black +On a single fishing smack, 130 +In memory of the man but for whom had gone to wrack + All that France saved from the fight whence England bore the bell. +Go to Paris: rank on rank. + Search, the heroes flung pell-mell +On the Louvre, deg. face and flank! deg.135 + You shall look long enough ere you come to Herve Riel. +So, for better and for worse, +Herve Riel, accept my verse! +In my verse, Herve Riel, do thou once more +Save the squadron, honour France, love thy wife the Belle Aurore! 140 + + * * * * * + + + + +PHEIDIPPIDES + +[Greek: Chairete, nikomen] deg. + +First I salute this soil of the blessed, river and rock! +Gods of my birthplace, daemons and heroes, honour to all! +Then I name thee, claim thee for our patron, co-equal in praise +--Ay, with Zeus deg. the Defender, with Her deg. of the aegis and spear! deg.4 +Also, ye of the bow and the buskin, deg. praised be your peer, deg.5 + +Now, henceforth, and forever,--O latest to whom I upraise +Hand and heart and voice! For Athens, leave pasture and flock! +Present to help, potent to save, Pan deg.--patron I call! deg.8 +Archons deg. of Athens, topped by the tettix, deg. see, I return! deg.9 +See, 'tis myself here standing alive, no spectre that speaks! 10 +Crowned with the myrtle, did you command me, Athens and you, +"Run, Pheidippides, run and race, reach Sparta for aid! +Persia has come, deg. we are here, where is She?" Your command I obeyed, deg.13 +Ran and raced: like stubble, some field which a fire runs through, +Was the space between city and city: two days, two nights did I burn +Over the hills, under the dales, down pits and up peaks. + +Into their midst I broke: breath served but for "Persia has come! +Persia bids Athens proffer slaves'-tribute, water and earth deg.; deg.18 +Razed to the ground is Eretria. deg.--but Athens, shall Athens sink, deg.19 +Drop into dust and die--the flower of Hellas deg. utterly die, deg.20 +Die with the wide world spitting at Sparta, the stupid, the stander-by deg.? deg.21 +Answer me quick,--what help, what hand do you stretch o'er destruction's brink? +How,--when? No care for my limbs!--there's lightning in all and some-- +Fresh and fit your message to bear, once lips give it birth!" + +O my Athens--Sparta love thee? did Sparta respond? +Every face of her leered in a furrow of envy, mistrust, +Malice,--each eye of her gave me its glitter of gratified hate! +Gravely they turned to take counsel, to cast for excuses. I stood +Quivering,--the limbs of me fretting as fire frets, an inch from dry wood: +"Persia has come, Athens asks aid, and still they debate? 30 +Thunder, thou Zeus! Athene, are Spartans a quarry beyond +Swing of thy spear? Phoibos deg. and Artemis, deg. clang them 'Ye must'!" deg.32 + +No bolt launched from Olumpos deg.! Lo, their answer at last! deg.33 +"Has Persia come,--does Athens ask aid,--may Sparta befriend? +Nowise precipitate judgment--too weighty the issue at stake! +Count we no time lost time which lags thro' respect to the Gods! +Ponder that precept of old, 'No warfare, whatever the odds +In your favour, so long as the moon, half-orbed, is unable to take +Full-circle her state in the sky!' Already she rounds to it fast: +Athens must wait, patient as we--who judgment suspend." 40 + +Athens,--except for that sparkle,--thy name, I had mouldered to ash! +That sent a blaze thro' my blood; off, off and away was I back, +--Not one word to waste, one look to lose on the false and the vile! +Yet "O Gods of my land!" I cried, as each hillock and plain, +Wood and stream, I knew, I named, rushing past them again, +"Have ye kept faith, proved mindful of honours we paid you erewhile? +Vain was the filleted victim, the fulsome libation! Too rash +Love in its choice, paid you so largely service so slack! + +"Oak and olive and bay,--I bid you cease to en-wreathe +Brows made bold by your leaf! Fade at the Persian's foot, 50 +You that, our patrons were pledged, should never adorn a slave! +Rather I hail thee, Parnes, deg.--trust to thy wild waste tract! deg.52 +Treeless, herbless, lifeless mountain! What matter if slacked +My speed may hardly be, for homage to crag and to cave +No deity deigns to drape with verdure?--at least I can breathe, +Fear in thee no fraud from the blind, no lie from the mute!" + +Such my cry as, rapid, I ran over Parnes' ridge; +Gully and gap I clambered and cleared till, sudden, a bar +Jutted, a stoppage of stone against me, blocking the way. +Right! for I minded the hollow to traverse, the fissure across: 60 +"Where I could enter, there I depart by! Night in the fosse? +Athens to aid? Tho' the dive were thro' Erebos, deg. thus I obey-- deg.62 +Out of the day dive, into the day as bravely arise! No bridge +Better!"--when--ha! what was it I came on, of wonders that are? + +There, in the cool of a cleft, sat he--majestical Pan! +Ivy drooped wanton, kissed his head, moss cushioned his hoof; +All the great God was good in the eyes grave-kindly--the curl +Carved on the bearded cheek, amused at a mortal's awe +As, under the human trunk, the goat-thighs grand I saw. +"Halt, Pheidippides!"--halt I did, my brain of a whirl: 70 +"Hither to me! Why pale in my presence?"! he gracious began: +"How is it,--Athens, only in Hellas, holds me aloof? + +"Athens, she only, rears me no fane, makes me no feast! +Wherefore? Than I what godship to Athens more helpful of old? +Ay, and still, and forever her friend! Test Pan, trust me! +Go bid Athens take heart, laugh Persia to scorn, have faith +In the temples and tombs! Go, say to Athens, 'The Goat-God saith: +When Persia--so much as strews not the soil--Is cast in the sea, +Then praise Pan who fought in the ranks with your most and least, +Goat-thigh to greaved-thigh, made one cause with the free and the bold!' 80 + +"Say Pan saith: 'Let this, foreshowing the place, be the pledge!'" +(Gay, the liberal hand held out this herbage I bear +--Fennel,--I grasped it a-tremble with dew--whatever it bode), +"While, as for thee..." But enough! He was gone. If I ran hitherto-- +Be sure that the rest of my journey, I ran no longer, but flew. +Parnes to Athens--earth no more, the air was my road; +Here am I back. Praise Pan, we stand no more on the razor's edge! +Pan for Athens, Pan for me! I too have a guerdon rare! + + * * * * * + +Then spoke Miltiades. deg. "And thee, best runner of Greece, deg.89 +Whose limbs did duty indeed,--what gift is promised thyself? 90 +Tell it us straightway,--Athens the mother demands of her son!" +Rosily blushed the youth: he paused: but, lifting at length +His eyes from the ground, it seemed as he gathered the rest of his strength +Into the utterance--"Pan spoke thus: 'For what thou hast done +Count on a worthy reward! Henceforth be allowed thee release +From the racer's toil, no vulgar reward in praise or in pelf!' + +"I am bold to believe, Pan means reward the most to my mind! +Fight I shall, with our foremost, wherever this fennel may grow,-- +Pound--Pan helping us--Persia to dust, and, under the deep, +Whelm her away forever; and then,--no Athens to save,-- 100 +Marry a certain maid, I know keeps faith to the brave,-- +Hie to my house and home: and, when my children shall creep +Close to my knees,--recount how the God was awful yet kind, +Promised their sire reward to the full--rewarding him--so!" + + * * * * * + +Unforeseeing one! Yes, he fought on the Marathon day: +So, when Persia was dust, all cried "To Akropolis deg.! deg.106 +Run, Pheidippides, one race more! the meed is thy due! +'Athens is saved, thank Pan,' go shout!" He flung down his shield, +Ran like fire once more: and the space 'twixt the Fennel-field deg. deg.109 +And Athens was stubble again, a field which a fire runs through, 110 +Till in he broke: "Rejoice, we conquer!" Like wine thro' clay, +Joy in his blood bursting his heart, he died--the bliss! + +So, to this day, when friend meets friend, the word of salute +Is still "Rejoice!"--his word which brought rejoicing indeed. +So is Pheidippides happy forever,--the noble strong man +Who could race like a god, bear the face of a god, whom a god loved so well, +He saw the land saved he had helped to save, and was suffered to tell +Such tidings, yet never decline, but, gloriously as he began, +So to end gloriously--once to shout, thereafter be mute: +"Athens is saved!"--Pheidippides dies in the shout for his meed. 120 + + * * * * * + + + + +MY STAR + +All that I know + Of a certain star +Is, it can throw + (Like the angled spar deg.) deg.4 +Now a dart of red, + Now a dart of blue; +Till my friends have said + They would fain see, too, +My star that dartles the red and the blue! + +Then it stops like a bird; like a flower, hangs furled: 10 +They must solace themselves with the Saturn deg. above it. deg.11 +What matter to me if their star is a world? +Mine has opened its soul to me; therefore I love it. + + * * * * * + + + + +EVELYN HOPE + +Beautiful Evelyn Hope is dead! + Sit and watch by her side an hour. +That is her book-shelf, this her bed; + She plucked that piece of geranium-flower, +Beginning to die too, in the glass; + Little has yet been changed, I think: +The shutters are shut, no light may pass + Save two long rays thro' the hinge's chink. + +Sixteen years old when she died! + Perhaps she had scarcely heard my name; 10 +It was not her time to love; beside, + Her life had many a hope and aim, +Duties enough and little cares, + And now was quiet, now astir, +Till God's hand beckoned unawares,-- + And the sweet white brow is all of her. + +Is it too late then, Evelyn Hope? + What, your soul was pure and true, +The good stars met in your horoscope, + Made you of spirit, fire and dew-- 20 +And just because I was thrice as old + And our paths in the world diverged so wide, +Each was naught to each, must I be told? + We were fellow mortals, naught beside? + +No, indeed! for God above + Is great to grant, as mighty to make, +And creates the love to reward the love: + I claim you still, for my own love's sake! +Delayed it may be for more lives yet, + Thro' worlds I shall traverse, not a few: 30 +Much is to learn, much, to forget + Ere the time be come for taking you. + +But the time will come, at last it will, + When, Evelyn Hope, what meant (I shall say) +In the lower earth in the years long still, + That body and soul so pure and gay? +Why your hair was amber, I shall divine, + And your mouth of your own geranium's red-- +And what would you do with me, in fine, + In the new life come in the old one's stead. 40 + +I have lived (I shall say) so much since then, + Given up myself so many times, +Gained me the gains of various men, + Ransacked the ages, spoiled the climes; +Yet one thing, one, in my soul's full scope, + Either I missed or itself missed me: +And I want and find you, Evelyn Hope! + What is the issue? let us see! + +I loved you, Evelyn, all the while! + My heart seemed full as it could hold; 50 +There was place and to spare for the frank young smile, + And the red young mouth, and the hair's young gold. +So hush,--I will give you this leaf to keep: + See, I shut it inside the sweet cold hand! +There, that is our secret: go to sleep! + You will wake, and remember, and understand. + + * * * * * + + + + +LOVE AMONG THE RUINS + +Where the quiet-coloured end of evening smiles + Miles and miles +On the solitary pastures where our sheep + Half-asleep +Tinkle homeward thro' the twilight, stray or stop + As they crop-- +Was the site once of a city great and gay, + (So they say) +Of our country's very capital, its prince + Ages since 10 +Held his court in, gathered councils, wielding far + Peace or war. + +Now,--the country does not even boast a tree, + As you see, +To distinguish slopes of verdure, certain rills + From the hills +Intersect and give a name to (else they run + Into one), +Where the domed and daring palace shot its spires + Up like fires 20 +O'er the hundred-gated circuit of a wall + Bounding all, +Made of marble, men might march on nor be pressed, + Twelve abreast. + +And such plenty and perfection, see, of grass + Never was! +Such a carpet as, this summer-time, o'erspreads + And embeds +Every vestige of the city, guessed alone, + Stock or stone-- 30 +Where a multitude of men breathed joy and woe + Long ago; +Lust of glory pricked their hearts up, dread of shame + Struck them tame; +And that glory and that shame alike, the gold + Bought and sold. + +Now,--the single little turret that remains + On the plains, +By the caper overrooted, by the gourd + Overscored, 40 +While the patching houseleek's head of blossom winks + Thro' the chinks-- +Marks the basement whence a tower in ancient time + Sprang sublime, +And a burning ring, all round, the chariots traced + As they raced, +And the monarch and his minions and his dames + Viewed the games. + +And I know--while thus the quiet-coloured eve + Smiles to leave 50 +To their folding, all our many-tinkling fleece + In such peace, +And the slopes and rills in undistinguished gray + Melt away-- +That a girl with eager eyes and yellow hair + Waits me there +In the turret whence the charioteers caught soul + For the goal, +When the king looked, where she looks now, breathless, dumb + Till I come, 60 + +But he looked upon the city, every side, + Far and wide, +All the mountains topped with temples, all the glades' + Colonnades, +All the causeys, bridges, aqueducts,--and then, + All the men! +When I do come, she will speak not, she will stand, + Either hand +On my shoulder, give her eyes the first embrace + Of my face, 70 +Ere we rush, ere we extinguish sight and speech + Each on each. + +In one year they sent a million fighters forth + South and North, +And they built their gods a brazen pillar high + As the sky, +Yet reserved a thousand chariots in full force-- + Gold, of course. +Oh heart! oh blood that freezes, blood that burns! + Earth's returns 80 +For whole centuries of folly, noise, and sin! + Shut them in, +With their triumphs and their glories and the rest! + Love is best. + + * * * * * + + + + +MISCONCEPTIONS + +This is a spray the bird clung to, + Making it blossom with pleasure, +Ere the high tree-top she sprung to, + Fit for her nest and her treasure. + Oh, what a hope beyond measure +Was the poor spray's, which the flying feet hung to,-- +So to be singled out, built in, and sung to! + +This is a heart the Queen leant on, + Thrilled in a minute erratic, +Ere the true bosom she bent on, 10 + Meet for love's regal dalmatic. deg. deg.11 + Oh, what a fancy ecstatic +Was the poor heart's, ere the wanderer went on-- +Love to be saved for it, proffered to, spent on! + + * * * * * + + + + +NATURAL MAGIC + +All I can say is--I saw it! +The room was as bare as your hand. +I locked in the swarth little lady,--I swear, +From the head to the foot of her--well, quite as bare! +"No Nautch deg. shall cheat me," said I, "taking my stand deg.5 +At this bolt which I draw!" And this bolt--I withdraw it, +And there laughs the lady, not bare, but embowered +With--who knows what verdure, o'erfruited, o'erflowered? +Impossible! Only--I saw it! + +All I can sing is--I feel it! 10 +This life was as blank as that room; +I let you pass in here. Precaution, indeed? +Walls, ceiling, and floor,--not a chance for a weed! +Wide opens the entrance: where's cold, now, where's gloom? +No May to sow seed here, no June to reveal it, +Behold you enshrined in these blooms of your bringing, +These fruits of your bearing--nay, birds of your winging! +A fairy-tale! Only--I feel it! + + * * * * * + + + + +APPARITIONS + +(_Prologue to "The Two Poets of Croisic."_) + +Such a starved bank of moss + Till, that May-morn, +Blue ran the flash across: + Violets were born! + +Sky--what a scowl of cloud + Till, near and far, +Ray on ray split the shroud: + Splendid, a star! + +World--how it walled about + Life with disgrace, 10 +Till God's own smile came out: + That was thy face! + + * * * * * + + + + +A WALL + +O the old wall here! How I could pass + Life in a long midsummer day, +My feet confined to a plot of grass, + My eyes from a wall not once away! + +And lush and lithe do the creepers clothe + Yon wall I watch, with a wealth of green: +Its bald red bricks draped, nothing loath, + In lappets of tangle they laugh between. + +Now, what is it makes pulsate the robe? + Why tremble the sprays? What life o'erbrims 10 +The body,--the house no eye can probe,-- + Divined, as beneath a robe, the limbs? + +And there again! But my heart may guess + Who tripped behind; and she sang, perhaps: +So the old wall throbbed, and its life's excess + Died out and away in the leafy wraps. + +Wall upon wall are between us: life + And song should away from heart to heart! +I--prison-bird, with a ruddy strife + At breast, and a lip whence storm-notes start-- 20 + +Hold on, hope hard in the subtle thing + That's spirit: tho' cloistered fast, soar free; +Account as wood, brick, stone, this ring + Of the rueful neighbours, and--forth to thee! + + * * * * * + + + + +CONFESSIONS + +What is he buzzing in my ears? + "Now that I come to die, +Do I view the world as a vale of tears?" + Ah, reverend sir, not I! + +What I viewed there once, what I view again + Where the physic bottles stand +On the table's edge,--is a suburb lane, + With a wall to my bedside hand. + +That lane sloped, much as the bottles do, + From a house you could descry 10 +O'er the garden-wall: is the curtain blue + Or green to a healthy eye? + +To mine, it serves for the old June weather + Blue above lane and wall; +And that farthest bottle labelled "Ether" + Is the house o'er-topping all. + +At a terrace, somewhere near the stopper, + There watched for me, one June, +A girl: I know, sir, it's improper, + My poor mind's out of tune. 20 + +Only, there was a way ... you crept + Close by the side, to dodge +Eyes in the house, two eyes except: + They styled their house "The Lodge." + +What right had a lounger up their lane? + But, by creeping very close, +With the good wall's help,--their eyes might strain + And stretch themselves to Oes, + +Yet never catch her and me together, + As she left the attic, there, 30 +By the rim of the bottle labelled "Ether," + And stole from stair to stair + +And stood by the rose-wreathed gate. Alas, + We loved, sir--used to meet; +How sad and bad and mad it was-- + But then, how it was sweet! + + * * * * * + + + + +A WOMAN'S LAST WORD + +Let's contend no more, Love, + Strive nor weep: +All be as before, Love, + --Only sleep! + +What so wild as words are? + I and thou +In debate, as birds are, + Hawk on bough! + +See the creature stalking + While we speak! 10 +Hush and hide the talking, + Cheek on cheek. + +What so false as truth is, + False to thee? +Where the serpent's tooth is, + Shun the tree-- + +Where the apple reddens, + Never pry-- +Lest we lose our Edens, + Eve and I. 20 + +Be a god and hold me + With a charm! +Be a man and fold me + With thine arm! + +Teach me, only teach, Love! + As I ought +I will speak thy speech, Love, + Think thy thought-- + +Meet, if thou require it, + Both demands, 30 +Laying flesh and spirit + In thy hands. + +That shall be to-morrow, + Not to-night: +I must bury sorrow + Out of sight: + +--Must a little weep, Love, + (Foolish me!) +And so fall asleep, Love, + Loved by thee. 40 + + * * * * * + + + + +A PRETTY WOMAN + +That fawn-skin-dappled hair of hers, + And the blue eye + Dear and dewy, +And that infantine fresh air of hers! + +To think men cannot take you, Sweet, + And infold you, + Ay, and hold you, +And so keep you what they make you, Sweet! + +You like us for a glance, you know-- + For a word's sake 10 + Or a sword's sake: +All's the same, whate'er the chance, you know. + +And in turn we make you ours, we say-- + You and youth too, + Eyes and mouth too, +All the face composed of flowers, we say. + +All's our own, to make the most of, Sweet-- + Sing and say for, + Watch and pray for, +Keep a secret or go boast of, Sweet! 20 + +But for loving, why, you would not, Sweet, + Tho' we prayed you, + Paid you, brayed you +In a mortar--for you could not, Sweet! + +So, we leave the sweet face fondly there, + Be its beauty + Its sole duty! +Let all hope of grace beyond, lie there! + +And while the face lies quiet there, + Who shall wonder 30 + That I ponder +A conclusion? I will try it there. + +As,--why must one, for the love foregone + Scout mere liking? + Thunder-striking +Earth,--the heaven, we looked above for, gone! + +Why, with beauty, needs there money be, + Love with liking? + Crush the fly-king +In his gauze, because no honey-bee? 40 + +May not liking be so simple-sweet, + If love grew there + 'Twould undo there +All that breaks the cheek to dimples sweet? + +Is the creature too imperfect, say? + Would you mend it + And so end it? +Since not all addition perfects aye! + +Or is it of its kind, perhaps, + Just perfection-- 50 + Whence, rejection +Of a grace not to its mind, perhaps? + +Shall we burn up, tread that face at once + Into tinder, + And so hinder +Sparks from kindling all the place at once? + +Or else kiss away one's soul on her? + Your love-fancies! + --A sick man sees +Truer, when his hot eyes roll on her! 60 + +Thus the craftsman thinks to grace the rose,-- + Plucks a mould-flower + For his gold flower, +Uses fine things that efface the rose. + +Rosy rubies make its cup more rose. + Precious metals + Ape the petals,-- +Last, some old king locks it up, morose! + +Then how grace a rose? I know a way! + Leave it, rather. 70 + Must you gather? +Smell, kiss, wear it--at last, throw away. + + * * * * * + + + + +YOUTH AND ART + +It once might have been, once only: + We lodged in a street together, +You, a sparrow on the housetop lonely, + I, a lone she-bird of his feather. + +Your trade was with sticks and clay, + You thumbed, thrust, patted, and polished, +Then laughed "They will see some day, + Smith made, and Gibson deg. demolished." deg.8 + +My business was song, song, song; + I chirped, cheeped, trilled, and twittered, 10 +"Kate Brown's on the boards ere long, + And Grisi's deg. existence embittered!" deg.12 + +I earned no more by a warble + Than you by a sketch in plaster; +You wanted a piece of marble, + I needed a music-master. + +We studied hard in our styles, + Chipped each at a crust like Hindoos, deg. deg.18 +For air, looked out on the tiles, + For fun, watched each other's windows. 20 + +You lounged, like a boy of the South, + Cap and blouse--nay, a bit of beard too; +Or you got it, rubbing your mouth + With fingers the clay adhered to. + +And I--soon managed to find + Weak points in the flower-fence facing, +Was forced to put up a blind + And be safe in my corset-lacing. + +No harm! It was not my fault + If you never turned your eye's tail up 30 +As I shook upon E _in alt_, + Or ran the chromatic scale up: + +For spring bade the sparrows pair. + And the boys and girls gave guesses, +And stalls in our street looked rare + With bulrush and watercresses. + +Why did not you pinch a flower + In a pellet of clay and fling it? +Why did not I put a power + Of thanks in a look or sing it? 40 + +I did look, sharp as a lynx, + (And yet the memory rankles) +When models arrived, some minx + Tripped up stairs, she and her ankles. + +But I think I gave you as good! + "That foreign fellow,--who can know +How she pays, in a playful mood, + For his tuning her that piano?" + +Could you say so, and never say + "Suppose we join hands and fortunes, 50 +And I fetch her from over the way, + Her, piano, and long tunes and short tunes?" + +No, no: you would not be rash, + Nor I rasher and something over; +You've to settle yet Gibson's hash, + And Grisi yet lives in clover. + +But you meet the Prince at the Board, + I'm queen myself at _bals-pares_, deg. deg.58 +I've married a rich old lord, + And you're dubbed knight and an R.A. 60 + +Each life unfulfilled, you see; + It hangs still, patchy and scrappy: +We have not sighed deep, laughed free, + Starved, feasted, despaired,--been happy + +And nobody calls you a dunce, + And people suppose me clever; +This could but have happened once, + And we missed it, lost it forever. + + * * * * * + + + + +A TALE + +(_Epilogue to "The Two Poets of Croisic."_) + +What a pretty tale you told me + Once upon a time +--Said you found it somewhere (scold me!) + Was it prose or was it rhyme, +Greek or Latin? Greek, you said, +While your shoulder propped my head. + +Anyhow there's no forgetting + This much if no more, +That a poet (pray, no petting!) + Yes, a bard, sir, famed of yore, 10 +Went where suchlike used to go, +Singing for a prize, you know. + +Well, he had to sing, nor merely + Sing but play the lyre; +Playing was important clearly + Quite as singing: I desire, +Sir, you keep the fact in mind +For a purpose that's behind. + +There stood he, while deep attention + Held the judges round, 20 +--Judges able, I should mention, + To detect the slightest sound +Sung or played amiss: such ears +Had old judges, it appears! + +None the less he sang out boldly, + Played in time and tune, +Till the judges, weighing coldly + Each note's worth, seemed, late or soon, +Sure to smile "In vain one tries +Picking faults out: take the prize!" 30 + +When, a mischief! Were they seven + Strings the lyre possessed? +Oh, and afterwards eleven, + Thank you! Well, sir,--who had guessed +Such ill luck in store?--it happed +One of those same seven strings snapped. + +All was lost, then! No! a cricket + (What "cicada"? Pooh!) +--Some mad thing that left its thicket + For mere love of music--flew 40 +With its little heart on fire, +Lighted on the crippled lyre. + +So that when (Ah joy!) our singer + For his truant string +Feels with disconcerted finger, + What does cricket else but fling +Fiery heart forth, sound the note +Wanted by the throbbing throat? + +Ay and, ever to the ending, + Cricket chirps at need, 50 +Executes the hand's intending, + Promptly, perfectly,--indeed +Saves the singer from defeat +With her chirrup low and sweet. + +Till, at ending, all the judges + Cry with one assent +"Take the prize--a prize who grudges + Such a voice and instrument? +Why, we took your lyre for harp, +So it shrilled us forth F sharp!" 60 + +Did the conqueror spurn the creature + Once its service done? +That's no such uncommon feature + In the case when Music's son +Finds his Lotte's deg. power too spent deg.65 +For aiding soul development. + +No! This other, on returning + Homeward, prize in hand, +Satisfied his bosom's yearning: + (Sir, I hope you understand!) 70 +--Said "Some record there must be +Of this cricket's help to me!" + +So, he made himself a statue: + Marble stood, life size; +On the lyre, he pointed at you, + Perched his partner in the prize; +Never more apart you found +Her, he throned, from him, she crowned. + +That's the tale: its application? + Somebody I know 80 +Hopes one day for reputation + Thro' his poetry that's--Oh, +All so learned and so wise +And deserving of a prize! + +If he gains one, will some ticket + When his statue's built, +Tell the gazer "'Twas a cricket + Helped my crippled lyre, whose lilt +Sweet and low, when strength usurped +Softness' place i' the scale, she chirped? 90 + +"For as victory was nighest, + While I sang and played,-- +With my lyre at lowest, highest, + Right alike,--one string that made +'Love' sound soft was snapt in twain +Never to be heard again,-- + +"Had not a kind cricket fluttered, + Perched upon the place +Vacant left, and duly uttered + 'Love, Love, Love,' whene'er the bass 100 +Asked the treble to atone +For its somewhat sombre drone." + +But you don't know music! Wherefore + Keep on casting pearls +To a--poet? All I care for + Is--to tell him that a girl's +"Love" comes aptly in when gruff +Grows his singing, (There, enough!) + + * * * * * + + + + +CAVALIER TUNES + +I. MARCHING ALONG + +Kentish Sir Byng deg. stood for his King, deg.1 +Bidding the crop-headed deg. Parliament swing: deg.2 +And, pressing a troop unable to stoop +And see the rogues flourish and honest folk droop, +Marched them along, fifty score strong, +Great-hearted gentlemen, singing this song. + +God for King Charles! deg. Pym deg. and such carles deg.7 +To the Devil that prompts 'em their treasonous parles! +Cavaliers, up! Lips from the cup, +Hands from the pasty, nor bite take nor sup 10 +Till you're-- + +CHORUS.--Marching along, fifty score strong, + Great-hearted gentlemen, singing this song. + +Hampden deg. to hell, and his obsequies knell. deg.14 +Serve Hazelrig, deg. Fiennes, deg. and young Harry deg. as well! deg.15 +England, good cheer! Rupert deg. is near! deg.16 +Kentish and loyalists, keep we not here, + +CHO.--Marching along, fifty score strong, + Great-hearted gentlemen, singing this song. + +Then, God for King Charles! Pym and his snarls 20 +To the Devil that pricks on such pestilent carles! +Hold by the right, you double your might; +So, onward to Nottingham, deg. fresh for the fight, deg.23 + +CHO.--March we along, fifty score strong, + Great-hearted gentlemen, singing this song! + + + + +II. GIVE A ROUSE + +I + +King Charles, and who'll do him right now? +King Charles, and who's ripe for fight now? +Give a rouse; here's, in hell's despite now, +King Charles! + +II + +Who gave me the goods that went since? +Who raised me the house that sank once? +Who helped me to gold I spent since? +Who found me in wine you drank once? + +CHO.--King Charles, and who'll do him right now? + King Charles, and who's ripe for fight now? 10 + Give a rouse; here's, in hell's despite now, + King Charles! + +III + +To whom used my boy George quaff else, +By the old fool's side that begot him? +For whom did he cheer and laugh else, +While Noll's deg. damned troopers shot him? deg.16 + +CHO.--King Charles, and who'll do him right now? + King Charles, and who's ripe for fight now? + Give a rouse: here's, in hell's despite now, + King Charles! 20 + + + + +III. BOOT AND SADDLE + +I + +Boot, saddle, to horse, and away! +Rescue my castle before the hot day +Brightens to blue from its silvery gray, + +CHO.--Boot, saddle, to horse, and away! + +II + +Ride past the suburbs, asleep as you'd say; +Many's the friend there, will listen and pray +"God's luck to gallants that strike up the lay-- + +CHO.--Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!" + +III + +Forty miles off, like a roebuck at bay, +Flouts castle Brancepeth the Roundheads' array: 10 +Who laughs, "Good fellows ere this, by my fay, + +CHO.--Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!" + +IV + +Who? My wife Gertrude; that, honest and gay, +Laughs when you talk of surrendering, "Nay! +I've better counsellors; what counsel they? + +CHO.-- Boot, saddle, to horse, and away!" + + * * * * * + + + + +HOME-THOUGHTS, FROM THE SEA + +Nobly, nobly, Cape Saint Vincent to the Northwest died away; +Sunset ran, one glorious blood-red, reeking into Cadiz Bay; +Bluish 'mid the burning water, full in face Trafalgar deg. lay; deg.3 + +In the dimmest Northeast distance dawned Gibraltar deg. grand and gray; deg.4 +"Here and here did England help me: how can I help England?"--say, +Whoso turns as I, this evening, turn to God and pray, +While Jove's planet rises yonder, silent over Africa. + + * * * * * + + + + +SUMMUM BONUM + +All the breath and the bloom of the year in the bag of one bee: +All the wonder and wealth of the mine in the heart of one gem: +In the core of one pearl all the shade and the shine of the sea: +Breath and bloom, shade and shine,--wonder, wealth, and--how far above them-- + Truth, that's brighter than gem, + Trust, that's purer than pearl,-- +Brightest truth, purest trust in the universe,--all were for me + In the kiss of one girl. + + * * * * * + + + + +A FACE + +If one could have that little head of hers +Painted upon a background of pure gold, +Such as the Tuscan's early art prefers! +No shade encroaching on the matchless mould +Of those two lips, which should be opening soft +In the pure profile; not as when she laughs, +For that spoils all: but rather as if aloft +Yon hyacinth, she loves so, leaned its staff's +Burden of honey-colored buds to kiss +And capture 'twixt the lips apart for this. +Then her little neck, three fingers might surround, +How it should waver on the pale gold ground +Up to the fruit-shaped, perfect chin it lifts! +I know, Correggio loves to mass, in rifts +Of heaven, his angel faces, orb on orb +Breaking its outline, burning shades absorb: +But these are only massed there, I should think, +Waiting to see some wonder momently +Grow out, stand full, fade slow against the sky +(That's the pale ground you'd see this sweet face by), +All heaven, meanwhile, condensed into one eye +Which fears to lose the wonder, should it wink. + + * * * * * + + + + +SONGS FROM PIPPA PASSES + +Day! +Faster and more fast, +O'er night's brim, day boils at last: +Boils, pure gold, o'er the cloud-cup's brim. +Where spurting and suppressed it lay, +For not a froth-flake touched the rim +Of yonder gap in the solid gray +Of the eastern cloud, an hour away; +But forth one wavelet, then another, curled, +Till the whole sunrise, not to be suppressed, 10 +Rose, reddened, and its seething breast +Flickered in bounds, grew gold, then overflowed the world. + + + All service ranks the same with God: + If now, as formerly He trod + Paradise, His presence fills + Our earth, each only as God wills + Can work--God's puppets, best and worst, + Are we: there is no last nor first. + + The year's at the spring + And day's at the morn: 20 + Morning's at seven; + The hillside's dew-pearled; + The lark's on the wing; + The snail's on the thorn: + God's in His heaven-- + All's right with the world! + + + +Give her but a least excuse to love me! + When--where-- +How--can this arm establish her above me, + If fortune fixed her as my lady there, 30 +There already, to eternally reprove me? + ("Hist!"--said Kate the queen; +But "Oh," cried the maiden, binding her tresses, + "'Tis only a page that carols unseen, +Crumbling your hounds their messes!") + +Is she wronged?--To the rescue of her honour, + My heart! +Is she poor?--What costs it to be styled a donor? + Merely an earth to cleave, a sea to part. +But that fortune should have thrust all this upon her! + ("Nay, list!"--bade Kate the queen; 41 +And still cried the maiden, binding her tresses, + "'Tis only a page that carols unseen, +Fitting your hawks their jesses!") + + * * * * * + + + + +THE LOST LEADER + +Just for a handful of silver he left us, + Just for a riband to stick in his coat-- +Found the one gift of which fortune bereft us, + Lost all the others she lets us devote; +They, with the gold to give, doled him out silver, + So much was theirs who so little allowed; +How all our copper had gone for his service! + Rags--were they purple, his heart had been proud! +We that had loved him so, followed him, honoured him, + Lived in his mild and magnificent eye, 10 +Learned his great language, caught his clear accents, + Made him our pattern to live and to die! +Shakespeare deg. was of us, Milton deg. was for us, deg.13 + Burns, deg. Shelley, deg. were with us,--they watch from their graves! deg.14 +He alone breaks from the van and the freemen, + He alone sinks to the rear and the slaves! + +We shall march prospering--not through his presence; + Songs may inspirit us,--not from his lyre: +Deeds will be done,--while he boasts his quiescence, + Still bidding crouch whom the rest bade aspire: 20 +Blot out his name, then, record one lost soul more, + One task more declined, one more footpath untrod, +One more devil's-triumph and sorrow for angels, + One wrong more to man, one more insult to God! +Life's night begins: let him never come back to us! + There would be doubt, hesitation, and pain, +Forced praise on our part--the glimmer of twilight, + Never glad confident morning again! +Best fight on well, for we taught him--strike gallantly, + Menace our heart ere we master his own; 30 +Then let him receive the new knowledge and wait us, + Pardoned in heaven, the first by the throne! + + * * * * * + + + + +APPARENT FAILURE + +"We shall soon lose a celebrated building." + --_Paris Newspaper_. + + +No, for I'll save it! Seven years since + I passed through Paris, stopped a day +To see the baptism of your Prince, deg. deg.3 + Saw, made my bow, and went my way: +Walking the heat and headache off, + I took the Seine-side, you surmise, +Thought of the Congress, deg. Gortschakoff, deg. deg.7 + Cavour's deg. appeal and Buol's deg. replies, deg.8 + So sauntered till--what met my eyes? + +Only the Doric little Morgue! 10 + The dead-house where you show your drowned: +Petrarch's Vaucluse deg. makes proud the Sorgue, deg. deg.12 + Your Morgue has made the Seine renowned. +One pays one's debt deg. in such a case; deg.14 + I plucked up heart and entered,--stalked, +Keeping a tolerable face + Compared with some whose cheeks were chalked: + Let them! No Briton's to be balked! + +First came the silent gazers; next, + A screen of glass, we're thankful for; 20 +Last, the sight's self, the sermon's text, + The three men who did most abhor +Their life in Paris yesterday, + So killed themselves: and now, enthroned +Each on his copper couch, they lay + Fronting me, waiting to be owned. + I thought, and think, their sin's atoned. + +Poor men, God made, and all for that! + The reverence struck me; o'er each head +Religiously was hung its hat, 30 + Each coat dripped by the owner's bed, +Sacred from touch: each had his berth, + His bounds, his proper place of rest, +Who last night tenanted on earth + Some arch, where twelve such slept abreast,-- + Unless the plain asphalt seemed best. + +How did it happen, my poor boy? + You wanted to be Buonaparte +And have the Tuileries deg. for toy, deg.39 + And could not, so it broke your heart? 40 +You, old one by his side, I judge, + Were, red as blood, a socialist, +A leveller! Does the Empire grudge + You've gained what no Republic missed? + Be quiet, and unclench your fist! + +And this--why, he was red in vain, + Or black,--poor fellow that is blue deg.! deg.47 +What fancy was it, turned your brain? + Oh, women were the prize for you! +Money gets women, cards and dice 50 + Get money, and ill-luck gets just +The copper couch and one clear nice + Cool squirt of water o'er your bust, + The right thing to extinguish lust! + +It's wiser being good than bad; + It's safer being meek than fierce: +It's fitter being sane than mad. + My own hope is, a sun will pierce +The thickest cloud earth ever stretched; + That, after Last, returns the First, 60 +Tho' a wide compass round be fetched; + That what began best, can't end worst, + Nor what God blessed once, prove accurst. + + * * * * * + + + + +FEARS AND SCRUPLES + +Here's my case. Of old I used to love him. + This same unseen friend, before I knew: +Dream there was none like him, none above him,-- + Wake to hope and trust my dream was true. + +Loved I not his letters deg. full of beauty? deg.5 + Not his actions famous far and wide? +Absent, he would know I vowed him duty, + Present, he would find me at his side. + +Pleasant fancy! for I had but letters, + Only knew of actions by hearsay: 10 +He himself was busied with my betters; + What of that? My turn must come some day. + +"Some day" proving--no day! Here's the puzzle. + Passed and passed my turn is. Why complain? +He's so busied! If I could but muzzle + People's foolish mouths that give me pain! + +"Letters?" (hear them!) "You a judge of writing? + Ask the experts!--How they shake the head +O'er these characters, your friend's inditing-- + Call them forgery from A to Z deg.! deg.20 + +"Actions? Where's your certain proof" (they bother) + "He, of all you find so great and good, +He, he only, claims this, that, the other + Action--claimed by men, a multitude?" + +I can simply wish I might refute you, + Wish my friend would,--by a word, a wink,-- +Bid me stop that foolish mouth,--you brute you! + He keeps absent,--why, I cannot think. + +Never mind! Tho' foolishness may flout me. + One thing's sure enough; 'tis neither frost, 30 +No, nor fire, shall freeze or burn from out me + Thanks for truth--tho' falsehood, gained--tho' lost. + +All my days, I'll go the softlier, sadlier, + For that dream's sake! How forget the thrill +Thro' and thro' me as I thought, "The gladlier + Lives my friend because I love him still!" + +Ah, but there's a menace some one utters! + "What and if your friend at home play tricks? +Peep at hide-and-seek behind the shutters? + Mean your eyes should pierce thro' solid bricks? 40 + +'What and if he, frowning, wake you, dreamy? + Lay on you the blame that bricks--conceal? +Say '_At least I saw who did not see me, + Does see now, and presently shall feel_'?" + +"Why, that makes your friend a monster!" say you; + "Had his house no window? At first nod, +Would you not have hailed him?" Hush, I pray you! + What if this friend happen to be--God? + + * * * * * + + + + +INSTANS TYRANNUS + +Of the million or two, more or less, +I rule and possess, +One man, for some cause undefined, +Was least to my mind. + +I struck him, he grovelled of course-- +For, what was his force? +I pinned him to earth with my weight +And persistence of hate; +And he lay, would not moan, would not curse, +As his lot might be worse. 10 + +"Were the object less mean? would he stand +At the swing of my hand! +For obscurity helps him, and blots +The hole where he squats." +So, I set my five wits on the stretch. +To inveigle the wretch. +All in vain! Gold and jewels I threw, +Still he couched there perdue; +I tempted his blood and his flesh, +Hid in roses my mesh, 20 +Choicest cates and the flagon's best spilth: +Still he kept to his filth. + +Had he kith now or kin, were access +To his heart, did I press: +Just a son or a mother to seize! +No such booty as these. +Were it simply a friend to pursue +'Mid my million or two, +Who could pay me, in person or pelf, +What he owes me himself! 30 +No: I could not but smile thro' my chafe: +For the fellow lay safe +As his mates do, the midge and the nit, +--Thro' minuteness, to wit. + +Then a humour more great took its place +At the thought of his face: +The droop, the low cares of the mouth, +The trouble uncouth +'Twixt the brows, all that air one is fain +To put out of its pain, 40 +And, "no!" I admonished myself, +"Is one mocked by an elf. +Is one baffled by toad or by rat? +The gravamen's deg. in that! deg.44 +How the lion, who crouches to suit +His back to my foot, +Would admire that I stand in debate! +But the small turns the great +If it vexes you,--that is the thing! +Toad or rat vex the king? 50 +Tho' I waste half my realm to unearth +Toad or rat, 'tis well worth!" + +So, I soberly laid my last plan +To extinguish the man. +Round his creep-hole, with never a break +Ran my fires for his sake; +Overhead, did my thunder combine +With my under-ground mine: +Till I looked from my labour content +To enjoy the event. 60 + +When sudden ... how think ye, the end? +Did I say "without friend?" +Say rather, from marge to blue marge +The whole sky grew his targe +With the sun's self for visible boss, +While an Arm ran across +Which the earth heaved beneath like a breast! +Where the wretch was safe prest! +Do you see! Just my vengeance complete, deg.69 +The man sprang to his feet, 70 +Stood erect, caught at God's skirts, and prayed! +--So, _I_ was afraid! + + * * * * * + + + + +THE PATRIOT + +AN OLD STORY + +It was roses, roses, all the way, + With myrtle mixed in my path like mad; +The house-roofs seemed to heave and sway, + The church-spires flamed, such flags they had, +A year ago on this very day. + +The air broke into a mist with bells, + The old walls rocked with the crowd and cries. +Had I said, "Good folk, mere noise repels-- + But give me your sun from yonder skies!" +They had answered "And afterward, what else?" 10 + +Alack, it was I who leaped at the sun + To give it my loving friends to keep! +Naught man could do, have I left undone: + And you see my harvest, what I reap +This very day, now a year is run. + +There's nobody on the house-tops now-- + Just a palsied few at the windows set; +For the best of the sight is, all allow, + At the Shambles' Gate--or, better yet, +By the very scaffold's foot, I trow. 20 + +I go in the rain, and, more than needs, + A rope cuts both my wrists behind; +And I think, by the feel, my forehead bleeds, + For they fling, whoever has a mind, +Stones at me for my year's misdeeds. + +Thus I entered, and thus I go! + In triumphs, people have dropped down dead, +"Paid by the world, what dost thou owe + Me? "--God might question; now instead, +'Tis God shall repay: I am safer so. 30 + + * * * * * + + + + +THE BOY AND THE ANGEL + +Morning, evening, noon, and night, +"Praise God!" sang Theocrite. + +Then to his poor trade he turned, +Whereby the daily meal was earned. + +Hard he laboured, long and well; +O'er his work the boy's curls fell. + +But ever, at each period, +He stopped and sang, "Praise God!" + +Then back again his curls he threw, +And cheerful turned to work anew. 10 + +Said Blaise, the listening monk, "Well done; +I doubt not thou art heard, my son: + +"As well as if thy voice to-day +Were praising God, the Pope's great way. + +"This Easter Day, the Pope at Rome +Praises God from Peter's dome." + +Said Theocrite, "Would God that I +Might praise Him that great way, and die!" + +Night passed, day shone, +And Theocrite was gone. 20 + +With God a day endures alway, +A thousand years are but a day. + +God said in heaven, "Nor day nor night +Now brings the voice of my delight." deg. deg.24 + +Then Gabriel, like a rainbow's birth, +Spread his wings and sank to earth; + +Entered, in flesh, the empty cell, +Lived there, and played the craftsman well; + +And morning, evening, noon, and night, +Praised God in place of Theocrite. 30 + +And from a boy, to youth he grew: +The man put off the stripling's hue: + +The man matured and fell away +Into the season of decay: + +And ever o'er the trade he bent, +And ever lived on earth content. + +(He did God's will; to him, all one +If on the earth or in the sun.) + +God said, "A praise is in mine ear; +There is no doubt in it, no fear: 40 + +"So sing old worlds, and so +New worlds that from my footstool go. + +"Clearer loves sound other ways: +I miss my little human praise." + +Then forth sprang Gabriel's wings, off fell +The flesh disguise, remained the cell. + +'Twas Easter day: he flew to Rome, +And paused above Saint Peter's dome. + +In the tiring-room close by +The great outer gallery, 50 + +With his holy vestments dight, +Stood the new Pope, Theocrite: + +And all his past career +Came back upon him clear, + +Since when, a boy, he plied his trade, +Till on his life the sickness weighed; + +And in his cell, when death drew near, +An angel in a dream brought cheer: + +And rising from the sickness drear, +He grew a priest, and now stood here. 60 + +To the East with praise he turned, +And on his sight the angel burned. + +"I bore thee from thy craftsman's cell, +And set thee here; I did not well. + +"Vainly I left my angel-sphere, +Vain was thy dream of many a year, + +"Thy voice's praise seemed weak; it dropped-- +Creation's chorus stopped! + +"Go back and praise again +The early way, while I remain. 70 + +"With that weak voice of our disdain, +Take up creation's pausing strain. + +"Back to the cell and poor employ: +Resume the craftsman and the boy!" + +Theocrite grew old at home; +A new Pope dwelt in Peter's dome. + +One vanished as the other died: +They sought God side by side. + + * * * * * + + + +MEMORABILIA + +Ah, did you once see Shelley plain, + And did he stop and speak to you, +And did you speak to him again? + How strange it seems and new! + +But you were living before that, + And also you are living after; +And the memory I started at-- + My starting moves your laughter! + +I crossed a moor with a name of its own + And a certain use in the world, no doubt, 10 +Yet a hand's-breadth of it shines alone + 'Mid the blank miles round about. + +For there I picked upon the heather + And there I put inside my breast +A moulted feather, an eagle-feather! + Well, I forget the rest. + + * * * * * + + + + +WHY I AM A LIBERAL + +"Why?" Because all I haply can and do, + All that I am now, all I hope to be,-- + Whence comes it save from fortune setting free +Body and soul the purpose to pursue, +God traced for both? If fetters, not a few, + Of prejudice, convention, fall from me, + These shall I bid men--each in his degree +Also God-guided--bear, and gayly too? + But little do or can the best of us: +That little is achieved thro' Liberty. 10 + Who then dares hold, emancipated thus, +His fellow shall continue bound? not I, + Who live, love, labour freely, nor discuss +A brother's right to freedom. That is "Why." + + * * * * * + + + + +PROSPICE + +Fear death? to feel the fog in my throat, + The mist in my face, +When the snows begin, and the blasts denote + I am nearing the place, +The power of the night, the press of the storm, + The post of the foe; +Where he stands, the Arch Fear in a visible form, + Yet the strong man must go: +For the journey is done and the summit attained, + And the barriers fall, 10 +Though a battle's to fight ere the guerdon be gained, + The reward of it all. +I was ever a fighter, so--one fight more, + The best and the last! + +I would hate that death bandaged my eyes, and forbore, + And bade me creep past, +No! let me taste the whole of it, fare like my peers + The heroes of old, +Bear the brunt, in a minute pay glad life's arrears + Of pain, darkness, and cold. 20 +For sudden the worst turns the best to the brave, + The black minute's at end, +And the elements' rage, the fiend-voices that rave, + Shall dwindle, shall blend, +Shall change, shall become first a peace out of pain, + Then a light, then thy breast, +O thou soul of my soul! I shall clasp thee again, + And with God be the rest! + + * * * * * + + + + +EPILOGUE TO "ASOLANDO" + +At the midnight in the silence of the sleep-time, + When you set your fancies free, +Will they pass to where--by death, fools think, imprisoned-- +Low he lies who once so loved you whom you loved so, + --Pity me? + +Oh to love so, be so loved, yet so mistaken! + What had I on earth to do +With the slothful, with the mawkish, the unmanly? +Like the aimless, helpless, hopeless, did I drivel + --Being--who? 10 + +One who never turned his back but marched breast forward, + Never doubted clouds would break, +Never dreamed, tho' right were worsted, wrong would triumph, + Held we fall to rise, are baffled to fight better, + Sleep to wake. + +No, at noonday in the bustle of man's work-time + Greet the unseen with a cheer! +Bid him forward, breast and back as either should be, + "Strive and thrive!" cry "Speed,--fight on, fare ever + There as here!" 20 + + * * * * * + + + + +"DE GUSTIBUS--" + +Your ghost will walk, you lover of trees, + (If our loves remain) + In an English lane, +By a cornfield-side a-flutter with poppies. +Hark, those two in the hazel coppice-- +A boy and a girl, if the good fates please, + Making love, say,-- + The happier they! +Draw yourself up from the light of the moon. +And let them pass, as they will too soon, 10 + With the beanflower's boon, + And the blackbird's tune, + And May, and June! + +What I love best in all the world +Is a castle, precipice-encurled, +In a gash of the wind-grieved Apennine. +Or look for me, old fellow of mine, +(If I get my head from out the mouth +O' the grave, and loose my spirit's bands, +And come again to the land of lands)-- 20 +In a sea-side house to the farther South, +Where the baked cicala dies of drouth, +And one sharp tree--'tis a cypress--stands, +By the many hundred years red-rusted, +Bough iron-spiked, ripe fruit-o'ercrusted, +My sentinel to guard the sands +To the water's edge. For, what expands +Before the house, but the great opaque +Blue breadth of sea without a break? +While, in the house, forever crumbles 30 +Some fragment of the frescoed walls, +From blisters where a scorpion sprawls. +A girl bare-footed brings, and tumbles +Down on the pavement, green-flesh melons, +And says there's news to-day--the king +Was shot at, touched in the liver-wing, +Goes with his Bourbon arm in a sling: +--She hopes they have not caught the felons. +Italy, my Italy! +Queen Mary's saying serves for me-- 40 + (When fortune's malice + Lost her, Calais) +Open my heart and you will see +Graved inside of it, "Italy." +Such lovers old are I and she: +So it always was, so shall ever be! + + * * * * * + + + + +THE ITALIAN IN ENGLAND + +That second time they hunted me +From hill to plain, from shore to sea, +And Austria, hounding far and wide +Her blood-hounds thro' the country-side, +Breathed hot an instant on my trace,-- +I made, six days, a hiding-place +Of that dry green old aqueduct +Where I and Charles, deg. when boys, have plucked deg.8 +The fire-flies from the roof above, +Bright creeping thro' the moss they love: 10 +--How long it seems since Charles was lost! +Six days the soldiers crossed, and crossed +The country in my very sight; +And when that peril ceased at night, +The sky broke out in red dismay +With signal-fires. Well, there I lay +Close covered o'er in my recess, +Up to the neck in ferns and cress. +Thinking on Metternich, deg. our friend, deg.19 +And Charles's miserable end, 20 +And much beside, two days; the third, +Hunger o'ercame me when I heard +The peasants from the village go +To work among the maize: you know, +With us in Lombardy, deg. they bring deg.25 +Provisions packed on mules, a string, +With little bells that cheer their task, +And casks, and boughs on every cask +To keep the sun's heat from the wine; +These I let pass in jingling line; 30 +And, close on them, dear noisy crew, +The peasants from the village, too; +For at the very rear would troop +Their wives and sisters in a group +To help, I knew. When these had passed, +I threw my glove to strike the last, +Taking the chance: she did not start, +Much less cry out, but stooped apart, +One instant rapidly glanced round, +And saw me beckon from the ground. 40 +A wild bush grows and hides my crypt; +She picked my glove up while she stripped +A branch off, then rejoined the rest +With that; my glove lay in her breast: +Then I drew breath; they disappeared: +It was for Italy I feared. + + An hour, and she returned alone +Exactly where my glove was thrown. +Meanwhile came many thoughts: on me +Rested the hopes of Italy. 50 +I had devised a certain tale +Which, when 'twas told her, could not fail +Persuade a peasant of its truth; +I meant to call a freak of youth +This hiding, and give hopes of pay, +And no temptation to betray. +But when I saw that woman's face, +Its calm simplicity of grace, +Our Italy's own attitude +In which she walked thus far, and stood, 60 +Planting each naked foot so firm, +To crush the snake and spare the worm-- +At first sight of her eyes, I said, +"I am that man upon whose head +They fix the price, because I hate +The Austrians over us; the State +Will give you gold--oh, gold so much!-- +If you betray me to their clutch. +And be your death, for aught I know, +If once they find you saved their foe. 70 +Now, you must bring me food and drink, +And also paper, pen and ink, +And carry safe what I shall write +To Padua, which you'll reach at night +Before the duomo shuts; go in, +And wait till Tenebrae deg. begin; deg.76 +Walk to the third confessional, +Between the pillar and the wall, +And kneeling whisper, _Whence comes peace?_ +Say it a second time, then cease; 80 +And if the voice inside returns, +_From Christ and Freedom; what concerns +The cause of Peace?_--for answer, slip +My letter where you placed your lip; +Then come back happy we have done +Our mother service--I, the son, +As you the daughter of our land!" + + Three mornings more, she took her stand +In the same place, with the same eyes: +I was no surer of sun-rise 90 +Than of her coming. We conferred +Of her own prospects, and I heard +She had a lover--stout and tall, +She said--then let her eyelids fall, +"He could do much"--as if some doubt +Entered her heart,--then, passing out, +"She could not speak for others, who +Had other thoughts; herself she knew;" +And so she brought me drink and food. +After four days, the scouts pursued 100 +Another path; at last arrived +The help my Paduan friends contrived +To furnish me: she brought the news. +For the first time I could not choose +But kiss her hand, and lay my own +Upon her head--"This faith was shown +To Italy, our mother; she +Uses my hand and blesses thee." +She followed down to the sea-shore; +I left and never saw her more. 110 + + How very long since I have thought +Concerning--much less wished for--aught +Beside the good of Italy, +For which I live and mean to die! +I never was in love; and since +Charles proved false, what shall now convince +My inmost heart I have a friend? +However, if I pleased to spend +Real wishes on myself--say, three-- +I know at least what one should be. 120 +I would grasp Metternich until +I felt his red wet throat distil +In blood thro' these two hands. And next, +--Nor much for that am I perplexed-- +Charles, perjured traitor, for his part, +Should die slow of a broken heart +Under his new employers. Last +--Ah, there, what should I wish? For fast +Do I grow old and out of strength. +If I resolved to seek at length 130 +My father's house again, how scared +They all would look, and unprepared! +My brothers live in Austria's pay +--Disowned me long ago, men say; +And all my early mates who used +To praise me so--perhaps induced +More than one early step of mine-- +Are turning wise: while some opine +"Freedom grows license," some suspect +"Haste breeds delay," and recollect 140 +They always said, such premature +Beginnings never could endure! +So, with a sullen "All's for best," +The land seems settling to its rest. +I think then, I should wish to stand +This evening in that dear, lost land, +Over the sea the thousand miles, +And know if yet that woman smiles +With the calm smile; some little farm +She lives in there, no doubt: what harm 150 +If I sat on the door-side bench, +And while her spindle made a trench +Fantastically in the dust, +Inquired of all her fortunes--just +Her children's ages and their names, +And what may be the husband's aims +For each of them. I'd talk this out, +And sit there, for an hour about, +Then kiss her hand once more, and lay +Mine on her head, and go my way. 160 + + So much for idle wishing--how +It steals the time! To business now. + + * * * * * + + + + +MY LAST DUCHESS + +FERRARA + +That's my last Duchess painted on the wall, +Looking as if she were alive. I call +That piece a wonder, now: Fra Pandolf's deg. hands deg.3 +Worked busily a day, and there she stands. +Will't please you sit and look at her? I said +"Fra Pandolf" by design: for never read +Strangers like you that pictured countenance, +The depth and passion of its earnest glance, +But to myself they turned (since none puts by +The curtain I have drawn for you, but I) 10 +And seemed as they would ask me, if they durst, +How such a glance came there; so, not the first +Are you to turn and ask thus. Sir, 'twas not +Her husband's presence only, called that spot +Of joy into the Duchess' cheek: perhaps +Fra Pandolf chanced to say "Her mantle laps +Over my lady's wrist too much," or "Paint +Must never hope to reproduce the faint +Half-flush that dies along her throat:" such stuff +Was courtesy, she thought, and cause enough 20 +For calling up that spot of joy. She had +A heart--how shall I say?--too soon made glad, +Too easily impressed; she liked whate'er +She looked on, and her looks went everywhere. +Sir, 'twas all one! My favour at her breast, +The dropping of the daylight in the West, +The bough of cherries some officious fool +Broke in the orchard for her, the white mule +She rode with round the terrace--all and each +Would draw from her alike the approving speech, 30 +Or blush, at least. She thanked men,--good! but thanked +Somehow--I know not how--as if she ranked +My gift of a nine-hundred-years-old name +With anybody's gift. Who'd stoop to blame +This sort of trifling? Even had you skill +In speech--(which I have not)--to make your will +Quite clear to such an one, and say, "Just this +Or that in you disgusts me; here you miss, +Or there exceed the mark"--and if she let +Herself be lessoned so, nor plainly set 40 +Her wits to yours, forsooth, and made excuse, +--E'en then would be some stooping: and I choose +Never to stoop. Oh, sir, she smiled, no doubt, +Whene'er I passed her; but who passed without +Much the same smile? This grew; I gave commands; +Then all smiles stopped together. deg. There she stands deg.46 +As if alive. Will't please you rise? We'll meet +The company below, then. I repeat, +The Count your master's known munificence +Is ample warrant that no just pretence 50 +Of mine for dowry will be disallowed; +Though his fair daughter's self, as I avowed +At starting, is my object. Nay, we'll go +Together down, sir. Notice Neptune, though, +Taming a sea-horse, thought a rarity, +Which Claus of Innsbruck deg. cast in bronze for me! deg.56 + + * * * * * + + + + +THE BISHOP ORDERS HIS TOMB AT SAINT PRAXED'S CHURCH + +ROME, 15-- + +Vanity, saith the preacher, vanity! +Draw round my bed: is Anselm keeping back? +Nephews--sons mine ... ah God, I know not! Well, +She, men would have to be your mother once, +Old Gandolf deg. envied me, so fair she was! deg.5 +What's done is done, and she is dead beside, +Dead long ago, and I am Bishop since. +And as she died so must we die ourselves, +And thence ye may perceive the world's a dream. +Life, how and what is it? As here I lie 10 +In this state-chamber, dying by degrees, +Hours and long hours in the dead night, I ask +"Do I live, am I dead?" Peace, peace seems all. +Saint Praxed's ever was the church for peace; +And so, about this tomb of mine. I fought +With tooth and nail to save my niche, ye know: +--Old Gandolf cozened me, despite my care; +Shrewd was that snatch from out the corner South +He graced his carrion with, God curse the same! +Yet still my niche is not so cramped but thence 20 +One sees the pulpit o' the epistle-side, +And somewhat of the choir, those silent seats, +And up into the aery dome where live +The angels, and a sunbeam's sure to lurk: +And I shall fill my slab of basalt there, +And 'neath my tabernacle take my rest, +With those nine columns round me, two and two, +The odd one at my feet where Anselm stands: +Peach-blossom marble all, the rare, the ripe +As fresh-poured red wine of a mighty pulse, 30 +--Old Gandolf with his paltry onion-stone, deg. deg.31 +Put me where I may look at him! True peach, +Rosy and flawless: how I earned the prize! +Draw close: that conflagration of my church +--What then? So much was saved if aught were missed! +My sons, ye would not be my death? Go dig +The white-grape vineyard where the oil-press stood, +Drop water gently till the surface sink, +And if ye find... Ah God, I know not, I!... +Bedded in store of rotten fig-leaves soft, 40 +And corded up in a tight olive-frail, deg. deg.41 +Some lump, ah God, of _lapis lazuli_, deg. deg.42 +Big as a Jew's head cut off at the nape, +Blue as a vein o'er the Madonna's breast... +Sons, all have I bequeathed you, villas, all, +That brave Frascati deg. villa, with its bath, deg.46 +So, let the blue lump poise between my knees, +Like God the Father's globe on both his hands +Ye worship in the Jesu Church, so gay, +For Gandolf shall not choose but see and burst! 50 +Swift as a weaver's shuttle fleet our years: +Man goeth to the grave, and where is he? +Did I say, basalt for my slab, sons? Black-- +'Twas ever antique-black I meant! How else +Shall ye contrast my frieze to come beneath? +The bas-relief in bronze ye promised me, +Those Pans and Nymphs ye wot of, and perchance +Some tripod, thyrsus, with a vase or so, +The Saviour at his sermon on the mount, +Saint Praxed in a glory, and one Pan 60 +Ready to twitch the Nymph's last garment off, +And Moses with the tables deg. ... but I know deg.62 +Ye mark me not! What do they whisper thee, +Child of my bowels, Anselm? Ah, ye hope +To revel down my villas while I gasp +Bricked o'er with beggar's mouldy travertine +Which Gandolf from his tomb-top chuckles at! +Nay, boys, ye love me--all of jasper, then! +'Tis jasper ye stand pledged to, lest I grieve +My bath must needs be left behind, alas! 70 +One block, pure green as a pistachio-nut, +There's plenty jasper somewhere in the world-- +And have I not Saint Praxed's ear to pray +Horses for ye, and brown Greek manuscripts, +And mistresses with great smooth marbly limbs? +--That's if ye carve my epitaph aright, +Choice Latin, picked phrase, Tully's deg. every word, deg.77 +No gaudy ware like Gandolf's second line-- +Tully, my masters? Ulpian deg. serves his need! deg.79 +And then how I shall lie thro' centuries, 80 +And hear the blessed mutter of the mass, +And see God made and eaten all day long, +And feel the steady candle-flame, and taste +Good strong thick stupefying incense-smoke! +For as I lie here, hours of the dead night, +Dying in state and by such slow degrees, +I fold my arms as if they clasped a crook, +And stretch my feet forth straight as stone can point, +And let the bedclothes, for a mortcloth, drop +Into great laps and folds of sculptor's-work: 90 +And as yon tapers dwindle, and strange thoughts +Grow, with a certain humming in my ears, +About the life before I lived this life, +And this life too, popes, cardinals, and priests, +Saint Praxed at his sermon on the mount, +Your tall pale mother with her talking eyes, +And new-found agate urns as fresh as day, +And marble's language, Latin pure, discreet, +--Aha, ELUCESCEBAT deg. quoth our friend? deg.99 +No Tully, said I, Ulpian at the best! 100 +Evil and brief hath been my pilgrimage. +All _lapis_, all, sons! Else I give the Pope +My villas! Will ye ever eat my heart? +Ever your eyes were as a lizard's quick, +They glitter like your mother's for my soul. +Or ye would heighten my impoverished frieze, +Piece out its starved design, and fill my vase +With grapes, and add a visor and a Term, +And to the tripod ye would tie a lynx +That in his struggle throws the thyrsus down, 110 +To comfort me on my entablature +Whereon I am to lie till I must ask +"Do I live, am I dead?" There, leave me, there! +For ye have stabbed me with ingratitude +To death--ye wish it--God, ye wish it! stone-- +Gritstone, a-crumble! clammy squares which sweat +As if the corpse they keep were oozing through-- +And no more _lapis_ to delight the world! +Well, go! I bless ye. Fewer tapers there, +But in a row: and, going, turn your backs 120 +--Ay, like departing altar-ministrants, +And leave me in my church, the church for peace, +That I may watch, at leisure if he leers-- +Old Gandolf--at me, from his onion-stone, +As still he envied me, so fair she was! + + * * * * * + + + + +THE LABORATORY + +ANCIEN REGIME + +Now that I, tying thy glass mask tightly, +May gaze through these faint smokes curling whitely, +As thou pliest thy trade in this devil's-smithy-- +Which is the poison to poison her, prithee? + +He is with her, and they know that I know +Where they are, what they do: they believe my tears flow +While they laugh, laugh at me, at me fled to the drear +Empty church, to pray God in, for them!--I am here! + +Grind away, moisten and mash up thy paste, +Pound at thy powder, I am not in haste! 10 +Better sit thus and observe thy strange things, +Than go where men wait me, and dance at the King's. + +That in the mortar--you call it a gum? +Ah, the brave tree whence such gold oozings come! +And yonder soft phial, the exquisite blue, +Sure to taste sweetly,--is that poison, too? +Had I but all of them, thee and thy treasures, +What a wild crowd of Invisible pleasures! +To carry pure death in an earring, a casket, +A signet, a fan-mount, a filigree basket! 20 + +Soon, at the King's, a mere lozenge to give +And Pauline should have just thirty minutes to live! +But to light a pastille, and Elise, with her head +And her breast and her arms and her hands, should drop dead! + +Quick--is it finished? The colour's too grim! +Why not soft like the phial's, enticing and dim? +Let it brighten her drink, let her turn it and stir, +And try it and taste, ere she fix and prefer! + +What a drop! She's not little, no minion like me! +That's why she ensnared him: this never will free 30 +The soul from those masculine eyes,--say "No!" +To that pulse's magnificent come-and-go. + +For only last night, as they whispered, I brought +My own eyes to bear on her so that I thought +Could I keep them one half-minute fixed, she would fall +Shrivelled; she fell not: yet this does it all! + +Not that I bid you spare her the pain; +Let death be felt and the proof remain: +Brand, burn up, bite into its grace-- +He is sure to remember her dying face! 40 + +Is it done? Take my mask off! Nay, be not morose; +It kills her, and this prevents seeing it close: +The delicate droplet, my whole fortune's fee! +If it hurts her, beside, can it ever hurt me? + +Now, take all my jewels, gorge gold to your fill, +You may kiss me, old man, on my mouth if you will! +But brush this dust off me, lest horror it brings +Ere I know it--next moment I dance at the King's! + + * * * * * + + + + +HOME THOUGHTS, FROM ABROAD + +Oh, to be in England +Now that April's there, +And whoever wakes in England +Sees, some morning, unaware, +That the lowest boughs and the brushwood sheaf +Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf, +While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough +In England--now! + +And after April, when May follows, +And the white-throat builds, and all the swallows! 10 +Hark I where my blossomed pear tree in the hedge +Leans to the field and scatters on the clover +Blossoms and dewdrops--at the bent spray's edge-- +That's the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over, +Lest you should think he never could recapture +The first fine careless rapture! +And though the fields look rough with hoary dew, +All will be gay when noontide wakes anew +The buttercups, the little children's dower +--Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower! 20 + + * * * * * + + + + +UP AT A VILLA--DOWN IN THE CITY + +_(As distinguished by an Italian person of quality.)_ + +Had I but plenty of money, money enough and to spare, +The house for me, no doubt, were a house in the city square; +Ah, such a life, such a life, as one leads at the window there! +Something to see, by Bacchus deg., something to hear, at least! deg.4 +There, the whole day long, one's life is a perfect feast; +While up at a villa one lives, I maintain it, no more than a beast. + +Well now, look at our villa! stuck like the horn of a bull +Just on a mountain edge as bare as the creature's skull, +Save a mere shag of a bush with hardly a leaf to pull! +--I scratch my own, sometimes, to see if the hair's turned wool. 10 + +But the city, oh the city--the square with the houses! Why? +They are stone-faced, white as a curd, there's something to take the eye! +Houses in four straight lines, not a single front awry; +You watch who crosses and gossips, who saunters, who hurries by; +Green blinds, as a matter of course, to draw when the sun gets high; +And the shops with fanciful signs which are painted properly. + +What of a villa? Tho' winter be over in March, by rights, +'Tis May perhaps ere the snow shall have withered well off the heights: +You've the brown ploughed land before, where the oxen steam and wheeze, +And the hills over-smoked behind by the faint gray olive trees. 20 + +Is it better in May, I ask you? You've summer all at once; +In a day he leaps complete with a few strong April suns, +'Mid the sharp short emerald wheat, scarce risen three fingers well, +The wild tulip, at end of its tube, blows out its great red bell +Like a thin clear bubble of blood, for the children to pick and sell. + +Is it ever hot in the square? There's a fountain to spout and splash! +In the shade it sings and springs; in the shine such foam-bows flash +On the horses with curling fish-tails, that prance and paddle and pash +Round the lady atop in her conch--fifty gazers do not abash, +Tho' all that she wears is some weeds round her waist in a sort of sash. 30 + +All the year long at the villa, nothing to see though you linger, +Except yon cypress that points like death's lean lifted forefinger. +Some think fireflies pretty, when they mix i' the corn and mingle, +Or thrid the stinking hemp till the stalks of it seem a-tingle. +Late August or early September, the stunning cicala is shrill, +And the bees keep their tiresome whine round the resinous firs on the hill. +Enough of the seasons,--I spare you the months of the fever and chill. + +Ere you open your eyes in the city, the blessed church-bells begin: +No sooner the bells leave off than the diligence rattles in: +You get the pick of the news, and it costs you never a pin. 40 +By and by there's the travelling doctor gives pills, lets blood, draws teeth; +Or the Pulcinello deg.-trumpet breaks up the market beneath. deg.42 +At the post-office such a scene-picture--the new play, piping hot! +And a notice how, only this morning, three liberal thieves were shot. +Above it, behold the Archbishop's most fatherly of rebukes, +And beneath, with his crown and his lion, some little new law of the Duke's! +Or a sonnet with flowery marge, to the Reverend Don So-and-so, +Who is Dante, deg. Boccaccio, deg. Petrarca, deg. St. Jerome deg. and Cicero, deg. deg.48 +"And moreover" (the sonnet goes rhyming), "the skirts of St. Paul has + reached, deg. deg.49 +Having preached us those six Lent-lectures more unctuous than ever he + preached." 50 +Noon strikes,--here sweeps the procession! our Lady deg. borne smiling and smart. + deg.51 +With a pink gauze gown all spangles, and seven swords deg. stuck in her heart! deg.52 +_Bang-whang-whang_ goes the drum, _tootle-te-tootle_ the fife; +No keeping one's haunches still: it's the greatest pleasure in life. + +But bless you, it's dear--it's dear! fowls, wine, at double the rate. +They have clapped a new tax upon salt, and what oil pays passing the gate +It's a horror to think of. And so, the villa for me, not the city! +Beggars can scarcely be choosers: but still--ah, the pity, the pity! +Look, two and two go the priests, then the monks with cowls and sandals, +And the penitents dressed in white shirts, a-holding the yellow candles; 60 +One, he carries a flag up straight, and another a cross with handles, +And the Duke's guard brings up the rear, for the better prevention of scandals: +_Bang-whang-whang_ goes the drum, _tootle-te-tootle_ the fife. +Oh, a day in the city square, there is no such pleasure in life! + + * * * * * + + + + +A TOCCATA OF GALUPPI'S + +Oh Galuppi, deg. Baldassaro, this is very sad to find! deg.1 +I can hardly misconceive you; it would prove me deaf and blind; +But altho' I take your meaning, 'tis with such a heavy mind! + +Here you come with your old music, and here's all the good it brings. +What, they lived once thus at Venice where the merchants were the kings, +Where St. Mark's deg. is, where the Doges used to wed the sea with rings deg.? deg.6 + +Ay, because the sea's the street there; and 'tis arched by ... what you call +... Shylock's bridge deg. with houses on it, where they kept the carnival: deg.8 +I was never out of England--it's as if I saw it all. + +Did young people take their pleasure when the sea was warm in May? 10 +Balls and masks begun at midnight, burning ever to mid-day, +When they make up fresh adventures for the morrow, do you say? + +Was a lady such a lady, cheeks so round and lips so red,-- +On her neck the small face buoyant, like a bell-flower on its bed, +O'er the breast's superb abundance where a man might base his head? + +Well, and it was graceful of them: they'd break talk off and afford +--She, to bite her mask's black velvet--he, to finger on his sword, +While you sat and played Toccatas, stately at the clavichord deg.? deg.18 + +What? Those lesser thirds deg. so plaintive, sixths deg. diminished sigh on sigh, deg.19 +Told them something? Those suspensions, deg. those solutions deg.--"Must we die?" deg.20 +Those commiserating sevenths deg.--"Life might last! we can but try!" deg.21 + +"Were you happy?"--"Yes."--"And are you still as happy?"--"Yes. And you?" +--"Then, more kisses !"--"Did _I_ stop them, when, a million seemed so few?" +Hark, the dominant's persistence till it must be answered to! + +So, an octave struck the answer. Oh, they praised you, I dare say! +"Brave Galuppi! that was music! good alike at grave and gay! +I can always leave off talking when I hear a master play!" + +Then they left you for their pleasure: till in due time, one by one, +Some with lives that came to nothing, some with deeds as well undone, +Death, stepped tacitly and took them where they never see the sun. deg. deg.30 + +But when I sit down to reason, think to take my stand nor swerve, +While I triumph o'er a secret wrung from nature's close reserve, +In you come with your cold music till I creep thro' every nerve. + +Yes, you, like a ghostly cricket, creaking where a house was burned: +"Dust and ashes, dead and done with, Venice spent what Venice earned. +The soul, doubtless, is immortal--where a soul can be discerned. + +"Yours, for instance: you know physics, something of geology, +Mathematics are your pastime; souls shall rise in their degree; +Butterflies may dread extinction,--you'll not die, it cannot be! deg. deg.39 + +"As for Venice and her people, merely born to bloom and drop, 40 +Here on earth they bore their fruitage, mirth and folly were the crop: +What of soul was left, I wonder, when the kissing had to stop? + +"Dust and ashes!" So you creak it, and I want the heart to scold. +Dear dead women, with such hair, too--what's become of all the gold +Used to hang and brush their bosoms? I feel chilly and grown old. + + * * * * * + + + + +ABT VOGLER + +(AFTER HE HAS BEEN EXTEMPORIZING UPON THE +MUSICAL INSTRUMENT OF HIS INVENTION) + +Would that the structure brave, the manifold music I build, + Bidding my organ obey, calling its keys to their work, +Claiming each slave of the sound, at a touch, as when Solomon deg. willed deg.3 + Armies of angels that soar, legions of demons that lurk, +Man, brute, reptile, fly,--alien of end and of aim, + Adverse, each from the other heaven-high, hell-deep removed,-- +Should rush into sight at once as he named the ineffable Name, + And pile him a palace deg. straight, to pleasure the princess he loved! deg.8 + +Would it might tarry like his, the beautiful building of mine, + This which my keys in a crowd pressed and importuned to raise! 10 +Ah, one and all, how they helped, would dispart now and now combine, + Zealous to hasten the work, heighten their master his praise! +And one would bury his brow with a blind plunge down to hell, + Burrow awhile and build, broad on the roots of things, +Then up again swim into sight, having based me my palace well, + Founded it, fearless of flame, flat on the nether springs. + +And another would mount and march, like the excellent minion he was, + Ay, another and yet another, one crowd but with many a crest, +Raising my rampired deg. walls of gold as transparent as glass, deg.19 + Eager to do and die, yield each his place to the rest: 20 +For higher still and higher (as a runner tips with fire, + When a great illumination surprises a festal night-- +Outlining round and round Rome's dome deg. from space to spire) deg.23 + Up, the pinnacled glory reached, and the pride of my soul was in sight. + +In sight? Not half! for it seemed, it was certain, to match man's birth, + Nature in turn conceived, obeying an impulse as I; +And the emulous heaven yearned down, made effort to reach the earth. + As the earth had done her best, in my passion, to scale the sky: +Novel splendours burst forth, grew familiar and dwelt with mine. + Not a point nor peak but found and fixed its wandering star; 30 +Meteor-moons, balls of blaze: and they did not pale nor pine, + For earth had attained to heaven, there was no more near nor far. + +Nay more; for there wanted not who walked, in the glare and glow, + Presences plain in the place; or, fresh, from the Protoplast, +Furnished for ages to come, when a kindlier wind should blow, + Lured now to begin and live, in a house to their liking at last: +Or else the wonderful Dead who have passed thro' the body and gone, + But were back once more to breathe in an old world worth their new: +What never had been, was now; what was, as it shall be anon; + And what is,--shall I say, matched both? for I was made perfect too. 40 + +All thro' my keys that gave their sounds to a wish of my soul, + All thro' my soul that praised as its wish flowed visibly forth, +All thro' music and me! For think, had I painted the whole, + Why, there it had stood, to see, nor the process so wonder-worth: +Had I written the same, made verse--still, effect proceeds from cause, + Ye know why the forms are fair, ye hear how the tale is told; +It is all triumphant art, but art in obedience to laws, + Painter and poet are proud, in the artist-list enrolled:-- + +But here is the finger of God, a flash of the will that can, + Existent behind all laws, that made them, and, lo, they are! 50 +And I know not if, save in this, such gift be allowed to man, + That out of three sounds he frame, not a fourth sound, but a star. +Consider it well: each tone of our scale in itself is naught; + It is everywhere in the world--loud, soft, and all is said: +Give it to me to use! I mix it with two in my thought, + And, there! Ye have heard and seen; consider and bow the head! + +Well, it is gone at last, the palace of music I reared; + Gone! and the good tears start, the praises that come too slow; +For one is assured at first, one scarce can say that he feared, + That he even gave it a thought, the gone thing was to go. 60 +Never to be again! But many more of the kind + As good, nay, better perchance: is this your comfort to me? +To me, who must be saved because I cling with my mind + To the same, same self, same love, same God: ay, what was, shall be. + +Therefore to whom turn I but to Thee, the ineffable Name? + Builder and maker, Thou, of houses not made with hands! +What, have fear of change from Thee who art ever the same? + Doubt that Thy power can fill the heart that Thy power expands? +There shall never be one lost good! What was, shall live as before; + The evil is null, is naught, is silence implying sound; 70 +What was good, shall be good, with, for evil, so much good more; + On the earth the broken arcs; in the heaven, a perfect round. + +All we have willed or hoped or dreamed of good shall exist; + Not its semblance, but itself; no beauty, nor good, nor power +Whose voice has gone forth, but each survives for the melodist, + When eternity affirms the conception of an hour. +The high that proved too high, the heroic for earth too hard. + The passion that left the ground to lose itself in the sky, +Are music sent up to God by the lover and the bard; + Enough that he heard it once; we shall hear it by and by. 80 + +And what is our failure here but a triumph's evidence + For the fulness of the days? Have we withered or agonized? +Why else was the pause prolonged but that singing might issue thence? + Why rushed the discords in but that harmony should be prized? +Sorrow is hard to bear, and doubt is slow to clear, + Each sufferer says his say, his scheme of the weal and woe: +But God has a few of us whom He whispers in the ear; + The rest may reason and welcome; 'tis we musicians know. + +Well, it is earth with me; silence resumes her reign: + I will be patient and proud, and soberly acquiesce. 90 +Give me the keys. I feel for the common chord again, + Sliding by semitones, till I sink to the minor,--yes, +And I blunt it into a ninth, and I stand on alien ground, + Surveying awhile the heights I rolled from into the deep: +Which, hark, I have dared and done, for my resting-place is found, + The C Major of this life: so, now I will try to sleep. + + * * * * * + + + + +RABBI BEN EZRA + +Grow old along with me deg.! deg.1 +The best is yet to be, +The last of life, for which the first was made: +Our times are in His hand +Who saith "A whole I planned, +Youth shows but half; trust God: see all, nor be afraid!" + +Not that, amassing flowers, +Youth sighed, "Which rose make ours, +Which lily leave and then as best recall!" +Not that, admiring stars, 10 +It yearned "Nor Jove, nor Mars; +Mine be some figured flame which blends, transcends them all!" + +Not for such hopes and fears +Annulling youth's brief years, +Do I remonstrate: folly wide the mark! +Rather I prize the doubt +Low kinds exist without, +Finished and finite clods, untroubled by a spark. + +Poor vaunt of life indeed, +Were man but formed to feed 20 +On joy, to solely seek and find and feast: +Such feasting ended, then +As sure an end to men; +Irks care the crop-full bird? Frets doubt the maw-crammed beast? + +Rejoice we are allied +To That which doth provide +And not partake, effect and not receive! +A spark disturbs our clod; +Nearer we hold of deg. God. deg.29 +Who gives, than of His tribes that take, I must believe. 30 + +Then, welcome each rebuff +That turns earth's smoothness rough, +Each sting that bids nor sit nor stand but go! +Be our joys three-parts pain! +Strive, and hold cheap the strain; +Learn, nor account the pang; dare, never grudge the throe! + +For thence,--a paradox +Which comforts while it mocks,-- +Shall life succeed in that it seems to fail: +What I aspired to be, 40 +And was not, comforts me: +A brute I might have been, but would not sink i' the scale. + +What is he but a brute +Whose flesh has soul to suit, +Whose spirit works lest arms and legs want play? +To man, propose this test-- +Thy body at its best, +How far can that project thy soul on its lone way? + +Yet gifts should prove their use: +I own the Past profuse 50 +Of power each side, perfection every turn: +Eyes, ears took in their dole, +Brain treasured up the whole; +Should not the heart beat once "How good to live and learn?" + +Not once beat "Praise be Thine! +I see the whole design, +I, who saw power, see now love perfect too: +Perfect I call Thy plan: +Thanks that I was a man! +Maker, remake, complete,--I trust what Thou shall do!" 60 + +For pleasant is this flesh; +Our soul, in its rose-mesh +Pulled ever to the earth, still yearns for rest: +Would we some prize might hold +To match those manifold +Possessions of the brute,--gain most, as we did best! + +Let us not always say, +"Spite of this flesh to-day +I strove, made head, gained ground upon the whole!" +As the bird wings and sings, 70 +Let us cry "All good things +Are ours, nor soul helps flesh more, now, than flesh helps soul!" + +Therefore I summon age +To grant youth's heritage, +Life's struggle having so far reached its term: +Thence shall I pass, approved +A man, for aye removed +From the developed brute; a God tho' in the germ. + +And I shall thereupon +Take rest, ere I be gone 80 +Once more on my adventure brave and new: +Fearless and unperplexed, +When I wage battle next, +What weapons to select, what armour to indue. + +Youth ended, I shall try +My gain or loss thereby; +Leave the fire ashes, what survives is gold: +And I shall weigh the same, +Give life its praise or blame: +Young, all lay in dispute; I shall know, being old. 90 + +For, note when evening shuts, +A certain moment cuts +The deed off, calls the glory from the gray: +A whisper from the west +Shoots--"Add this to the rest, +Take it and try its worth: here dies another day." + +So, still within this life, +Tho' lifted o'er its strife, +Let me discern, compare, pronounce at last, +"This rage was right i' the main, 100 +That acquiescence vain: +The Future I may face now I have proved the Past." + +For more is not reserved +To man, with soul just nerved +To act to-morrow what he learns to-day: +Here, work enough to watch +The Master work, and catch +Hints of the proper craft, tricks of the tool's true play. + +As it was better, youth +Should strive, thro' acts uncouth, 110 +Toward making, than repose on aught found made: +So, better, age, exempt +From strife, should know, than tempt +Further. Thou waitedst age: wait death, nor be afraid! + +Enough now, if the Right +And Good and Infinite +Be named deg. here, as thou callest thy hand thine own, deg.117 +With knowledge absolute, +Subject to no dispute +From fools that crowded youth, nor let thee feel alone. 120 + +Be there, for once and all, +Severed great minds from small, +Announced to each his station in the Past! +Was I, deg. the world arraigned, deg.124 +Were they, my soul disdained, +Right? Let age speak the truth and give us peace at last! + +Now, who shall arbitrate? +Ten men love what I hate, +Shun what I follow, slight what I receive; +Ten, who in ears and eyes 130 +Match me: we all surmise, +They, this thing, and I, that: whom shall my soul believe? + +Not on the vulgar mass +Called "work," must sentence pass, +Things done, that took the eye and had the price; +O'er which, from level stand, +The low world laid its hand, +Found straight way to its mind, could value in a trice: + +But all, the world's coarse thumb +And finger failed to plumb, 140 +So passed in making up the main account: +All instincts immature, +All purposes unsure, +That weighed not as his work, yet swelled the man's amount deg.: deg.144 + +Thoughts hardly to be packed +Into a narrow act, +Fancies that broke thro' language and escaped: +All I could never be, +All, men ignored in me, +This, I was worth to God, whose wheel the pitcher shaped. 150 + +Ay, note that Potter's wheel, deg. deg.151 +That metaphor! and feel +Why time spins fast, why passive lies our clay,-- +Thou, to whom fools propound, +When the wine makes its round, +"Since life fleets, all is change; the Past gone, seize to-day!" + +Fool! All that is, at all, +Lasts ever, past recall; +Earth changes, but thy soul and God stand sure: +What entered into thee, 160 +_That_ was, is, and shall be: +Time's wheel runs back or stops: Potter and clay endure. + +He fixed thee mid this dance +Of plastic circumstance, +This Present, thou forsooth, wouldst fain arrest: +Machinery just meant +To give thy soul its bent, +Try thee and turn thee forth, sufficiently impressed. + +What tho' the earlier grooves +Which ran the laughing loves 170 +Around thy base, no longer pause and press deg.? deg.171 +What tho' about thy rim, +Scull-things in order grim +Grow out, in graver mood, obey the sterner stress deg.? deg.174 + +Look not thou down but up! +To uses of a cup +The festal board, lamp's flash and trumpet's peal, +The new wine's foaming flow, +The Master's lips a-glow! +Thou, heaven's consummate cup, what needst thou with earth's wheel? 180 + +But I need, now as then, +Thee, God, who mouldest men! +And since, not even while the whirl was worst, +Did I,--to the wheel of life +With shapes and colours rife, +Bound dizzily,--mistake my end, to slake Thy thirst. + +So take and use Thy work, +Amend what flaws may lurk, +What strain o' the stuff, what warpings past the aim! +My times be in Thy hand! 190 +Perfect the cup as planned! +Let age approve of youth, and death complete the same! + + * * * * * + + + + +A GRAMMARIAN'S FUNERAL + +SHORTLY AFTER THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING IN EUROPE + +Let us begin and carry up this corpse, + Singing together. +Leave we the common crofts, the vulgar thorpes, + Each in its tether +Sleeping safe on the bosom of the plain, + Cared-for till cock-crow: +Look out if yonder be not day again + Rimming the rock-row! +That's the appropriate country; there, man's thought, + Rarer, intenser, 10 +Self-gathered for an outbreak, as it ought, + Chafes in the censer. + +Leave we the unlettered plain its herd and crop; + Seek we sepulture +On a tall mountain, citied to the top, + Crowded with culture! +All the peaks soar, but one the rest excels; + Clouds overcome it; +No! yonder sparkle is the citadel's + Circling its summit. 20 +Thither our path lies; wind we up the heights: + Wait ye the warning? +Our low life deg. was the level's and the night's: deg.23 + He's for the morning. +Step to a tune, square chests, erect each head, + 'Ware the beholders! +This is our master, famous calm and dead, + Borne on our shoulders. + +Sleep, crop and herd! sleep, darkling thorpe and croft, + Safe from the weather! 30 +He, whom we convoy to his grave aloft, + Singing together, +He was a man born with thy face and throat, + Lyric Apollo! +Long he lived nameless: how should spring take note + Winter would follow? +Till lo, the little touch, and youth was gone! + Cramped and diminished, +Moaned he, "New measures, other feet anon! + My dance is finished?" 40 +No, that's the world's way; (keep the mountain-side, + Make for the city!) +He knew the signal, and stepped on with pride + Over men's pity; +Left play for work, and grappled with the world + Bent on escaping deg.: deg.46 +"What's in the scroll," quoth he, "thou keepest furled? + Show me their shaping, deg. deg.48 +Theirs who most studied man, the bard and sage,-- + Give!"--So, he gowned him, 50 +Straight got by heart that book to its last page: + Learned, we found him. +Yea, but we found him bald too, eyes like lead, + Accents uncertain: +"Time to taste life," another would have said, + "Up with the curtain!" +This man said rather, "Actual life comes next? + Patience a moment! +Grant I have mastered learning's crabbed text, + Still there's the comment. 60 + +Let me know all! Prate not of most or least, + Painful or easy! +Even to the crumbs I'd fain eat up the feast, + Ay, nor feel queasy." +Oh, such a life as he resolved to live, + When he had learned it, +When he had gathered all books had to give! + Sooner, he spurned it. +Image the whole, then execute the parts-- + Fancy the fabric 70 +Quite, ere you build, ere steel strikes fire from quartz, + Ere mortar dab brick. + +(Here's the town-gate reached; there's the market-place + Gaping before us.) +Yea, this in him was the peculiar grace + (Hearten our chorus!) +That before living he'd learn how to live-- + No end to learning: +Earn the means first--God surely will contrive + Use for our earning. 80 +Others mistrust and say, "But time escapes! + Live now or never!" +He said, "What's time? Leave Now for dogs and apes! + Man has Forever." + +Back to his book then: deeper drooped his head: + _Calculus_ racked him: +Leaden before, his eyes grew dross of lead: + _Tussis_ attacked him. +"Now, master, take a little rest!"--not he! + (Caution redoubled! 90 +Step two abreast, the way winds narrowly!) + Not a whit troubled, +Back to his studies, fresher than at first, + Fierce as a dragon +He (soul-hydroptic with a sacred thirst) + Sucked at the flagon. +Oh, if we draw a circle premature, + Heedless of far gain, deg. deg.98 +Greedy for quick returns of profit, sure + Bad is our bargain! 100 +Was it not great? did not he throw on God + (He loves the burthen)-- +God's task to make the heavenly period + Perfect the earthen? +Did not he magnify the mind, show clear + Just what it all meant? +He would not discount life, as fools do here, + Paid by instalment. +He ventured neck or nothing--heaven's success + Found, or earth's failure: 110 +"Wilt thou trust death or not?" He answered "Yes! + Hence with life's pale lure!" +That low man seeks a little thing to do, + Sees it and does it: +This high man, with a great thing to pursue, + Dies ere he knows it. +That low man goes on adding one to one, + His hundred's soon hit: +This high man, aiming at a million, + Misses an unit. 120 +That, has the world here--should he need the next, + Let the world mind him! +This, throws himself on God, and unperplexed + Seeking shall find Him. +So, with the throttling hands of death at strife, + Ground he at grammar; +Still, thro' the rattle, parts of speech were rife: + While he could stammer +He settled _Hoti's_ deg. business--let it be!-- deg.129 + Properly based _Oun_ deg.-- deg.130 +Gave as the doctrine of the enclitic _De_ deg. deg.131 + Dead from the waist down. +Well, here's the platform, here's the proper place: + Hail to your purlieus, +All ye highfliers of the feathered race, + Swallows and curlews: +Here's the top-peak; the multitude below + Live, for they can, there: +This man decided not to Live, but Know-- + Bury this man there? 140 +Here--here's his place, where meteors shoot, clouds form, + Lightnings are loosened, +Stars come and go! Let joy break with the storm, + Peace let the dew send! +Lofty designs must close in like effects: + Loftily lying, +Leave him--still loftier than the world suspects, + Living and dying. + + * * * * * + + + + +ANDREA DEL SARTO + +(CALLED "THE FAULTLESS PAINTER") + +But do not let us quarrel any more, +No, my Lucrezia! bear with me for once: +Sit down and all shall happen as you wish. +You turn your face, but does it bring your heart? +I'll work then for your friend's friend, never fear. +Treat his own subject after his own way, +Fix his own time, accept too his own price, +And shut the money into this small hand +When next it takes mine. Will it? tenderly? +Oh, I'll content him,--but to-morrow, Love! 10 +I often am much wearier than you think, +This evening more than usual: and it seems +As if--forgive now--should you let me sit +Here by the window, with your hand in mine, +And look a half-hour forth on Fiesole, deg. deg.15 +Both of one mind, as married people use, +Quietly, quietly the evening through, +I might get up to-morrow to my work +Cheerful and fresh as ever. Let us try. +To-morrow, how you shall be glad for this! 20 +Your soft hand is a woman of itself, +And mine the man's bared breast she curls inside. +Don't count the time lost, neither; you must serve +For each of the five pictures we require: +It saves a model. So! keep looking so-- +My serpentining beauty, rounds on rounds! +--How could you ever prick those perfect ears, +Even to put the pearl there! oh, so sweet-- +My face, my moon, my everybody's moon. +Which everybody looks on and calls his, 30 +And, I suppose, is looked on by in turn, +While she looks--no one's: very dear, no less. +You smile? why, there's my picture ready made, +There's what we painters call our harmony! +A common grayness silvers everything,-- +All in a twilight, you and I alike +--You, at the point of your first pride in me +(That's gone, you know)--but I, at every point; +My youth, my hope, my art, being all toned down +To yonder sober pleasant Fiesole. 40 +There's the bell clinking from the chapel-top; +That length of convent-wall across the way +Holds the trees safer, huddled more inside; +The last monk leaves the garden; days decrease, +And autumn grows, autumn in everything. +Eh? the whole seems to fall into a shape, +As if I saw alike my work and self +And all that I was born to be and do, +A twilight-piece. Love, we are in God's hand. +How strange now, looks the life he makes us lead; 50 +So free we seem, so fettered fast we are! +I feel he laid the fetter: let it lie! +This chamber for example--turn your head-- +All that's behind us! You don't understand +Nor care to understand about my art, +But you can hear at least when people speak: +And that cartoon, the second from the door +--It is the thing, Love! so such things should be-- +Behold Madonna!--I am bold to say. +I can do with my pencil what I know, 60 +What I see, what at bottom of my heart +I wish for, if I ever wish so deep-- +Do easily, too--when I say, perfectly, +I do not boast, perhaps: yourself are judge, +Who listened to the Legate's talk last week; +And just as much they used to say in France. +At any rate 'tis easy, all of it! +No sketches first, no studies, that's long past: +I do what many dream of, all their lives, +--Dream? strive to do, and agonize to do, 70 +And fail in doing. I could count twenty such +On twice your fingers, and not leave this town, +Who strive--you don't know how the others strive +To paint a little thing like that you smeared +Carelessly passing with your robes afloat,-- +Yet do much less, so much less. Someone says, +(I know his name, no matter)--so much less! +Well, less is more, Lucrezia: I am judged. +There burns a truer light of God in them, +In their vexed beating stuffed and stopped-up brain, 80 +Heart, or whate'er else, than goes on to prompt +This low-pulsed forthright craftsman's hand of mine. +Their works drop groundward, but themselves, I know, +Reach many a time a heaven that's shut to me, +Enter and take their place there sure enough, +Tho' they come back and cannot tell the world. +My works are nearer heaven, but I sit here. +The sudden blood of these men! at a word-- +Praise them, it boils, or blame them, it boils too. +I, painting from myself and to myself, 90 +Know what I do, am unmoved by men's blame +Or their praise either. Somebody remarks +Morello's outline there is wrongly traced, +His hue mistaken; what of that? or else, +Rightly traced and well ordered; what of that? +Speak as they please, what does the mountain care? +Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp, +Or what's a heaven for? All is silver-gray, +Placid and perfect with my art: the worse! +I know both what I want and what might gain, 100 +And yet how profitless to know, to sigh +"Had I been two, another and myself, +Our head would have o'erlooked the world!" No doubt. + +Yonder's a work now, of that famous youth +The Urbinate who died five years ago. +('Tis copied, George Vasari sent it me.) +Well, I can fancy how he did it all, +Pouring his soul, with kings and popes to see, +Reaching, that heaven might so replenish him, +Above and thro' his art--for it gives way; 110 +That arm is wrongly put--and there again-- +A fault to pardon in the drawing's lines, +Its body, so to speak: its soul is right, +He means right--that, a child may understand. +Still, what an arm! and I could alter it: +But all the play, the insight and the stretch-- +Out of me, out of me! And wherefore out? +Had you enjoined them on me, given me soul, +We might have risen to Rafael deg., I and you! deg.119 +Nay, Love, you did give all I asked, I think-- 120 +More than I merit, yes, by many times. +But had you--oh, with the same perfect brow, +And perfect eyes, and more than perfect mouth, +And the low voice my soul hears, as a bird +The fowler's pipe, and follows to the snare-- +Had you, with these the same, but brought a mind! +Some women do so. Had the mouth there urged +"God and the glory! never care for gain. + +The present by the future, what is that? +Live for fame, side by side with Agnolo deg.! deg.130 +Rafael is waiting: up to God, all three!" +I might have done it for you. So it seems: +Perhaps not. All is as God over-rules. +Beside, incentives come from the soul's self; +The rest avail not. Why do I need you? +What wife had Rafael, or has Agnolo? +In this world, who can do a thing, will not; +And who would do it, cannot, I perceive: +Yet the will's somewhat--somewhat, too, the power-- +And thus we half-men struggle. At the end, 140 +God, I conclude, compensates, punishes. +'Tis safer for me, if the award be strict, +That I am something underrated here, +Poor this long while, despised, to speak the truth. +I dared not, do you know, leave home all day, +For fear of chancing on the Paris lords. +The best is when they pass and look aside; +But they speak sometimes; I must bear it all. +Well may they speak. That Francis, that first time, +And that long festal year at Fontainebleau deg.! deg.150 +I surely then could sometimes leave the ground, +Put on the glory, Rafael's daily wear, +In that humane great monarch's golden look,-- +One finger in his beard or twisted curl +Over his mouth's good mark that made the smile. +One arm, about my shoulder, round my neck, +The jingle of his gold chain in my ear, +I painting proudly with his breath on me, +All his court round him, seeing with his eyes. +Such frank French eyes, and such a fire of souls 160 +Profuse, my hand kept plying by those hearts,-- +And, best of all, this, this, this face beyond, +This in the background, waiting on my work, +To crown the issue with a last reward! +A good tune, was it not, my kingly days? +And had you not grown restless ... but I know-- +'Tis done and past; 'twas right, my instinct said; +Too live the life grew, golden and not gray: +And I'm the weak-eyed bat no sun should tempt +Out of the grange whose four walls make his world, 170 +How could it end in any other way? +You called me, and I came home to your heart, +The triumph was--to reach and stay there; since +I reached it ere the triumph, what is lost? +Let my hands frame your face in your hair's gold, +You beautiful Lucrezia that are mine! +"Rafael did this, Andrea painted that; +The Roman's is the better when you pray, +But still the other's Virgin was his wife--" +Men will excuse me. I am glad to judge 180 +Both pictures in your presence; clearer grows +My better fortune, I resolve to think. +For, do you know, Lucrezia, as God lives, +Said one day Agnolo, his very self, +To Rafael... I have known it all these years... +(When the young man was flaming out his thoughts +Upon a palace-wall for Rome to see, +Too lifted up in heart because of it) +"Friend, there's a certain sorry little scrub +Goes up and down our Florence, none cares how, 190 +Who, were he set to plan and execute +As you are, pricked on by your popes and kings, +Would bring the sweat into that brow of yours!" +To Rafael's!--And indeed the arm is wrong. +I hardly dare ... yet, only you to see, +Give the chalk here--quick, thus the line should go! +Ay, but the soul! he's Rafael! rub it out! +Still, all I care for, if he spoke the truth, +(What he? why, who but Michel Agnolo? +Do you forget already words like those?) 200 +If really there was such a chance so lost,-- +Is, whether you're--not grateful--but more pleased. +Well, let me think so. And you smile indeed! + +This hour has been an hour! Another smile? +If you would sit thus by me every night +I should work better, do you comprehend? +I mean that I should earn more, give you more. +See, it is settled dusk now; there's a star; +Morello's gone, the watch-lights show the wall, +The cue-owls speak the name we call them by. 210 +Come from the window, Love,--come in, at last, +Inside the melancholy little house +We built to be so gay with. God is just. +King Francis may forgive me: oft at nights +When I look up from painting, eyes tired out, +The walls become illumined, brick from brick +Distinct, instead of mortar, fierce, bright gold, +That gold of his I did cement them with! +Let us but love each other. Must you go? +That Cousin here again? he waits outside? 220 +Must see you--you, and not with me? Those loans? +More gaming debts to pay? you smiled for that? +Well, let smiles buy me! have you more to spend? +While hand and eye and something of a heart +Are left me, work's my ware, and what's it worth? +I'll pay my fancy. Only let me sit +The gray remainder of the evening out, +Idle, you call it, and muse perfectly +How I could paint, were I but back in France, +One picture, just one more--the Virgin's face, 230 +Not yours this time! I want you at my side +To hear them--that is, Michel Agnolo-- +Judge all I do and tell you of its worth. +Will you? To-morrow, satisfy your friend. +I take the subjects for his corridor, +Finish the portrait out of hand--there, there, +And throw him in another thing or two +If he demurs; the whole should prove enough +To pay for this same Cousin's freak. Beside, +What's better and what's all I care about, 240 +Get you the thirteen scudi deg. for the ruff! deg.241 +Love, does that please you? Ah, but what does he, +The Cousin! what does he to please you more? + +I am grown peaceful as old age to-night. +I regret little, I would change still less. +Since there my past life lies, why alter it? +The very wrong to Francis!--it is true +I took his coin, was tempted and complied, +And built this house and sinned, and all is said +My father and my mother died of want. 250 +Well, had I riches of my own? you see +How one gets rich! Let each one bear his lot. +They were born poor, lived poor, and poor they died: +And I have laboured somewhat in my time +And not been paid profusely. Some good son +Paint my two hundred pictures--let him try! +No doubt, there's something strikes a balance. Yes, +You love me quite enough, it seems to-night. +This must suffice me here. What would one have? +In heaven, perhaps, new chances, one more chance-- +Four great walls in the New Jerusalem, 260 +Meted on each side by the angel's reed, +For Leonard, deg. Rafael, Agnolo, and me deg.262 +To cover--the three first without a wife, +While I have mine! So--still they overcome +Because there's still Lucrezia,--as I choose. + + Again the Cousin's whistle! Go, my Love. + + * * * * * + + + + +CALIBAN UPON SETEBOS; + +OR, + +NATURAL THEOLOGY IN THE ISLAND + +"Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself." + +['Will sprawl, now that the heat of day is best, +Flat on his belly in the pit's much mire, +With elbows wide, fists clenched to prop his chin, +And, while he kicks both feet in the cool slush, +And feels about his spine small eft-things course, +Run in and out each arm, and make him laugh: +And while above his head a pompion-plant, +Coating the cave-top as a brow its eye, +Creeps down to touch and tickle hair and beard, +And now a flower drops with a bee inside, 10 +And now a fruit to snap at, catch and crunch,-- +He looks out o'er yon sea which sunbeams cross +And recross till they weave a spider-web, +(Meshes of fire, some great fish breaks at times) +And talks, to his own self, howe'er he please, +Touching that other, whom his dam called God. +Because to talk about Him, vexes--ha, +Could He but know! and time to vex is now, +When talk is safer than in winter-time. +Moreover Prosper and Miranda sleep 20 +In confidence, he drudges at their task, +And it is good to cheat the pair, and gibe, +Letting the rank tongue blossom into speech.] + + Setebos, Setebos, and Setebos! +'Thinketh, He dwelleth i' the cold o' the moon. + + 'Thinketh He made it, with the sun to match, +But not the stars; the stars came otherwise; +Only made clouds, winds, meteors, such as that: +Also this isle, what lives and grows thereon, +And snaky sea which rounds and ends the same. 30 + +'Thinketh, it came of being ill at ease: +He hated that He cannot change His cold, +Nor cure its ache. 'Hath spied an icy fish +That longed to 'scape the rock-stream where she lived, +And thaw herself within the lukewarm brine +O' the lazy sea her stream thrusts far amid, +A crystal spike 'twixt two warm walls of wave; +Only, she ever sickened, found repulse +At the other kind of water, not her life, +(Green-dense and dim-delicious, bred o' the sun) 40 +Flounced back from bliss she was not born to breathe, +And in her old bounds buried her despair, +Hating and loving warmth alike: so He. + +'Thinketh, He made thereat the sun, this isle, +Trees and the fowls here, beast and creeping thing. +Yon otter, sleek-wet, black, lithe as a leech; +Yon auk, one fire-eye in a ball of foam, +That floats and feeds; a certain badger brown, +He hath watched hunt with that slant white-wedge eye +By moonlight; and the pie with the long tongue 50 +That pricks deep into oakwarts for a worm, +And says a plain word when she finds her prize, +But will not eat the ants; the ants themselves +That build a wall of seeds and settled stalks +About their hole--He made all these and more, +Made all we see, and us, in spite: how else? +He could not, Himself, make a second self +To be His mate: as well have made Himself: +He would not make what He mislikes or slights, +An eyesore to Him, or not worth His pains; 60 +But did, in envy, listlessness, or sport, +Make what Himself would fain, in a manner, be-- +Weaker in most points, stronger in a few, +Worthy, and yet mere playthings all the while, +Things He admires and mocks too,--that is it! +Because, so brave, so better tho' they be, +It nothing skills if He begin to plague. +Look now, I melt a gourd-fruit into mash, +Add honeycomb and pods, I have perceived, +Which bite like finches when they bill and kiss,-- 70 +Then, when froth rises bladdery, drink up all, +Quick, quick, till maggots scamper thro' my brain; +Last, throw me on my back i' the seeded thyme. +And wanton, wishing I were born a bird. +Put case, unable to be what I wish, +I yet could make a live bird out of clay: +Would not I take clay, pinch my Caliban +Able to fly?--for there, see, he hath wings, +And great comb like the hoopoe's to admire, +And there, a sting to do his foes offence, 80 +There, and I will that he begin to live, +Fly to yon rock-top, nip me off the horns +Of grigs high up that make the merry din, +Saucy thro' their veined wings, and mind me not. +In which feat, if his leg snapped, brittle clay, +And he lay stupid-like,--why, I should laugh; +And if he, spying me, should fall to weep, +Beseech me to be good, repair his wrong, +Bid his poor leg smart less or grow again,-- +Well, as the chance were, this might take or else 90 +Not take my fancy: I might hear his cry, +And give the mankin three sound legs for one, +Or pluck the other off, leave him like an egg, +And lessoned he was mine and merely clay. +Were this no pleasure, lying in the thyme, +Drinking the mash, with brain become alive, +Making and marring clay at will? So He. + +'Thinketh such shows nor right nor wrong in Him, +Nor kind, nor cruel: He is strong and Lord. +'Am strong myself compared to yonder crabs 100 +That march now from the mountain to the sea; +'Let twenty pass, and stone the twenty-first, +Loving not, hating not, just choosing so. +'Say, the first straggler that boasts purple spots +Shall join the file, one pincer twisted off; +'Say, this bruised fellow shall receive a worm. +And two worms he whose nippers end in red: +As it likes me each time, I do: so He. + +Well then, 'supposeth He is good i' the main, +Placable if His mind and ways were guessed, 110 +But rougher than His handiwork, be sure! +Oh, He hath made things worthier than Himself, +And envieth that, so helped, such things do more +Than He who made them! What consoles but this? +That they, unless thro' Him, do naught at all, +And must submit: what other use in things? +'Hath cut a pipe of pithless elder-joint +That, blown through, gives exact the scream o' the jay +When from her wing you twitch the feathers blue; +Sound this, and little birds that hate the jay 120 +Flock within stone's throw, glad their foe is hurt: +Put case such pipe could prattle and boast forsooth +"I catch the birds, I am the crafty thing, +I make the cry my maker cannot make +With his great round mouth; he must blow thro' mine!" +Would not I smash it with my foot? So He. + + But wherefore rough, why cold and ill at ease? +Aha, that is a question! Ask, for that, +What knows,--the something over Setebos +That made Him, or He, may be, found and fought, 130 +Worsted, drove off and did to nothing, perchance. +There may be something quiet o'er His head, +Out of His reach, that feels nor joy nor grief, +Since both derive from weakness in some way. +I joy because the quails come; would not joy +Could I bring quails here when I have a mind: +This Quiet, all it hath a mind to, doth. +'Esteemeth stars the outposts of its couch, +But never spends much thought nor care that way. +It may look up, work up,--the worse for those 140 +It works on! 'Careth but for Setebos +The many-handed as a cuttle-fish, +Who, making Himself feared thro' what He does, +Looks up, first, and perceives he cannot soar +To what is quiet and hath happy life; +Next looks down here, and out of very spite +Makes this a bauble-world to ape yon real, +These good things to match those as hips do grapes. +'Tis solace making baubles, ay, and sport. +Himself peeped late, eyed Prosper at his books 150 +Careless and lofty, lord now of the isle: +Vexed, 'stitched a book of broad leaves, arrow-shaped, +Wrote thereon, he knows what, prodigious words; +Has peeled a wand and called it by a name; +Weareth at whiles for an enchanter's robe +The eyed skin of a supple oncelot; +And hath an ounce sleeker than youngling mole, +A four-legged serpent he makes cower and couch, +Now snarl, now hold its breath and mind his eye, +And saith she is Miranda and my wife: 160 +'Keeps for his Ariel a tall pouch-bill crane +He bids go wade for fish and straight disgorge; +Also a sea-beast, lumpish, which he snared, +Blinded the eyes of, and brought somewhat tame, +And split its toe-webs, and now pens the drudge +In a hole o' the rock, and calls him Caliban; +A bitter heart that bides its time and bites. +'Plays thus at being Prosper in a way, +Taketh his mirth with make-believes: so He. + +His dam held that the Quiet made all things 170 +Which Setebos vexed only: 'holds not so. +Who made them weak, meant weakness He might vex. +Had He meant other, while His hand was in, +Why not make horny eyes no thorn could prick, +Or plate my scalp with bone against the snow, +Or overscale my flesh 'neath joint and joint, +Like an orc's armour? Ay,--so spoil His sport! +He is the One now: only He doth all. + +'Saith, He may like, perchance, what profits Him. +Ay, himself loves what does him good; but why? 180 +'Gets good no otherwise. This blinded beast +Loves whoso places flesh-meat on his nose. +But, had he eyes, would want no help, but hate +Or love, just as it liked him: He hath eyes. +Also it pleaseth Setebos to work, +Use all His hands, and exercise much craft, +By no means for the love of what is worked. +'Tasteth, himself, no finer good i' the world +When all goes right, in this safe summer-time, +And he wants little, hungers, aches not much, 190 +Than trying what to do with wit and strength. +'Falls to make something; 'piled yon pile of turfs, +And squared and stuck there squares of soft white chalk, +And, with a fish-tooth, scratched a moon on each, +And set up endwise certain spikes of tree, +And crowned the whole with a sloth's skull a-top, +Found dead i' the woods, too hard for one to kill. +No use at all i' the work, for work's sole sake; +'Shall some day knock it down again: so He. + +'Saith He is terrible: watch His feats in proof! 200 +One hurricane will spoil six good months' hope. +He hath a spite against me, that I know. +Just as He favours Prosper, who knows why? +So it is, all the same, as well I find. +'Wove wattles half the winter, fenced them firm +With stone and stake to stop she-tortoises +Crawling to lay their eggs here: well, one wave, +Feeling the foot of Him upon its neck, +Gaped as a snake does, lolled out its large tongue, +And licked the whole labour flat; so much for spite! 210 +'Saw a ball flame down late (yonder it lies) +Where, half an hour before, I slept i' the shade: +Often they scatter sparkles: there is force! +'Dug up a newt He may have envied once +And turned to stone, shut up inside a stone. +Please Him and hinder this?--What Prosper does? +Aha, if he would tell me how! Not he! +There is the sport: discover how or die! +All need not die, for of the things o' the isle +Some flee afar, some dive, some run up trees; 220 +Those at His mercy,--why, they please Him most +When ... when ... well, never try the same way twice! +Repeat what act has pleased, He may grow wroth. +You must not know His ways, and play Him off, +Sure of the issue. 'Doth the like himself: +'Spareth a squirrel that it nothing fears +But steals the nut from underneath my thumb, +And when I threat, bites stoutly in defence: +'Spareth an urchin that contrariwise, +Curls up into a ball, pretending death 230 +For fright at my approach: the two ways please. +But what would move my choler more than this, +That either creature counted on its life +To-morrow, next day and all days to come, +Saying forsooth in the inmost of its heart, +"Because he did so yesterday with me, +And otherwise with such another brute, +So must he do henceforth and always." Ay? +'Would teach the reasoning couple what "must" means! +'Doth as he likes, or wherefore Lord? So He. 240 + +'Conceiveth all things will continue thus, +And we shall have to live in fear of Him +So long as He lives, keeps His strength: no change, +If He have done His best, make no new world +To please Him more, so leave off watching this,-- +If He surprise not even the Quiet's self +Some strange day,--or, suppose, grow into it +As grubs grow butterflies: else, here are we, +And there is He, and nowhere help at all. + +'Believeth with the life the pain shall stop. 250 +His dam held different, that after death +He both plagued enemies and feasted friends: +Idly! He doth His worst in this our life, +Giving just respite lest we die thro' pain, +Saving last pain for worst,--with which, an end. +Meanwhile, the best way to escape His Ire +Is, not to seem too happy. 'Sees, himself, +Yonder two flies, with purple films and pink, +Bask on the pompion-bell above: kills both. +'Sees two black painful beetles roll their ball 260 +On head and tail as if to save their lives: +'Moves them the stick away they strive to clear. + +Even so, 'would have him misconceive, suppose +This Caliban strives hard and ails no less, +And always, above all else, envies Him; +Wherefore he mainly dances on dark nights, +Moans in the sun, gets under holes to laugh, +And never speaks his mind save housed as now: +Outside, 'groans, curses. If He caught me here, +O'erheard this speech, and asked "What chucklest at?" 270 +'Would to appease Him, cut a finger off, +Or of my three kid yearlings burn the best, +Or let the toothsome apples rot on tree, +Or push my tame beast for the orc to taste: +While myself lit a fire, and made a song +And sung it, _"What I hate, be consecrate +To celebrate Thee and Thy state, no mate +For Thee; what see for envy in poor me?"_ +Hoping the while, since evils sometimes mend, +Warts rub away and sores are cured with slime, 280 +That some strange day, will either the Quiet catch +And conquer Setebos, or likelier He +Decrepit may doze, doze, as good as die. + +[What, what? A curtain o'er the world at once! +Crickets stop hissing; not a bird--or, yes, +There scuds His raven, that hath told Him all! +It was fool's play, this prattling! Ha! The wind +Shoulders the pillared dust, death's house o' the move, +And fast invading fires begin! White blaze-- +A tree's head snaps--and there, there, there, there, there, 290 +His thunder follows! Fool to gibe at Him! +So! 'Lieth flat and loveth Setebos! +'Maketh his teeth meet thro' his upper lip, +Will let those quails fly, will not eat this month +One little mess of whelks, so he may 'scape!] + + * * * * * + + + + +"CHILDE ROLAND TO THE DARK TOWER CAME" + +_(See Edgar's song in "Lear.")_ + +My first thought was, he lied in every word, + That hoary cripple, with malicious eye + Askance to watch the working of his lie +On mine, and mouth scarce able to afford +Suppression deg. of the glee, that pursed and scored deg.5 + Its edge, at one more victim gained thereby. + +What else should he be set for, with his staff? + What, save to waylay with his lies, ensnare + All travellers who might find him posted there, +And ask the road? I guessed what skull-like laugh 10 +Would break, what crutch 'gin write deg. my epitaph deg.11 + For pastime in the dusty thoroughfare, + +If at his counsel I should turn aside + Into that ominous tract which, all agree, + Hides the Dark Tower. Yet acquiescingly +I did turn as he pointed: neither pride +Nor hope rekindling at the end descried. + So much as gladness that some end might be. + +For, what with my whole world-wide wandering, + What, with my search drawn out thro' years, my hope 20 + Dwindled into a ghost not fit to cope +With that obstreperous joy success would bring,-- +I hardly tried now to rebuke the spring + My heart made, finding failure in its scope. + +As when a sick man very near to death + Seems dead indeed, and feels begin and end + The tears, and takes the farewell of each friend, +And hears one bid the other go, draw breath +Freelier outside, ("since all is o'er," he saith, + "And the blow fallen no grieving can amend;") 30 + +While some discuss if near the other graves + Be room enough for this, and when a day + Suits best for carrying the corpse away, +With care about the banners, scarves, and staves: +And still the man hears all, and only craves + He may not shame such tender love and stay. + +Thus, I had so long suffered in this quest, + Heard failure prophesied so oft, been writ + So many times among "The Band"--to wit, +The knights who to the Dark Tower's search addressed 40 +Their steps--that just to fail as they, seemed best, + And all the doubt was now--should I be fit? + +So, quiet as despair, I turned from him, + That hateful cripple, out of his highway + Into the path he pointed. All the day +Had been a dreary one at best, and dim +Was settling to its close, yet shot one grim + Red leer to see the plain catch its estray. deg. deg.48 + +For mark! no sooner was I fairly found + Pledged to the plain, after a pace or two, 50 + Than, pausing to throw backward a last view +O'er the safe road, 'twas gone; gray plain all round: +Nothing but plain to the horizon's bound, + I might go on; naught else remained to do. + +So, on I went. I think I never saw + Such starved ignoble nature; nothing throve: + For flowers--as well expect a cedar grove! +But cockle, spurge, according to their law +Might propagate their kind, with none to awe, + You'd think; a burr had been a treasure trove. 60 + +No! penury, inertness, and grimace, + In some strange sort, were the land's portion. "See + Or shut your eyes," said Nature peevishly, +"It nothing skills: I cannot help my case: +'Tis the Last Judgment's fire must cure this place, + Calcine its clods and set my prisoners deg. free." deg.66 + +If there pushed any ragged thistle-stalk + Above its mates, the head was chopped; the bents deg. deg.68 + Were jealous else. What made those holes and rents +In the dock's harsh swarth leaves, bruised as deg. to balk 70 +All hope of greenness? 'tis a brute must walk + Pashing their life out, with a brute's intents. + +As for the grass, it grew as scant as hair + In leprosy; thin dry blades pricked the mud + Which underneath looked kneaded up with blood. +One stiff blind horse, his every bone a-stare, +Stood stupefied, however he came there: + Thrust out past service from the devil's stud! + +Alive? he might be dead for aught I know, + With that red gaunt and colloped neck a-strain, 80 + And shut eyes underneath the rusty mane; +Seldom went such grotesqueness with such woe; +I never saw a brute I hated so; + He must be wicked to deserve such pain. + +I shut my eyes and turned them on my heart. + As a man calls for wine before he fights, + I asked one draught of earlier, happier sights, +Ere fitly I could hope to play my part. +Think first, fight afterwards--the soldier's art: + One taste of the old time sets all to rights. 90 + +Not it deg.! I fancied Cuthbert's reddening face deg.91 + Beneath its garniture of curly gold, + Dear fellow, till I almost felt him fold +An arm in mine to fix me to the place, +That way he used. Alas, one night's disgrace! + Out went my heart's new fire and left it cold. + +Giles then, the soul of honour--there he stands + Frank as ten years ago when knighted first. + What honest man should dare (he said) he durst. +Good--but the scene shifts--faugh! what hangman hands 100 +Pin to his breast a parchment? His own bands + Read it. Poor traitor, spit upon and curst! + +Better this present than a past like that; + Back therefore to my darkening path again! + No sound, no sight so far as eye could strain. +Will the night send a howlet deg. or a bat? deg.106 +I asked: when something on the dismal flat + Came to arrest my thoughts and change their train. + +A sudden little river crossed my path + As unexpected as a serpent comes. 110 + No sluggish tide congenial to the glooms; +This, as it frothed by, might have been a bath +For the fiend's glowing hoof--to see the wrath + Of its black eddy bespate deg. with flakes and spumes. deg.114 + +So petty, yet so spiteful! All along, + Low scrubby alders kneeled down over it; + Drenched willows flung them headlong in a fit +Of mute despair, a suicidal throng: +The river which had done them all the wrong, + Whate'er that was, rolled by, deterred no whit. 120 + +Which, while I forded,--good saints, how I feared + To set my foot upon a dead man's cheek, + Each step, or feel the spear I thrust to seek +For hollows, tangled in his hair or beard! +--It may have been a water-rat I speared, + But, ugh! it sounded like a baby's shriek. + +Glad was I when I reached the other bank. + Now for a better country. Vain presage! + Who were the strugglers, what war did they wage +Whose savage trample thus could pad the dank 130 +Soil to a plash? Toads in a poisoned tank, + Or wild cats in a red-hot iron cage-- + +The fight must so have seemed in that fell cirque. deg. deg.133 + What penned them there, with all the plain, to choose? + No foot-print leading to that horrid mews, +None out of it. Mad brewage set to work +Their brains, no doubt, like galley-slaves the Turk deg. deg.137 + Pits for his pastime, Christians against Jews. + +And more than that--a furlong on--why, there! + What bad use was that engine deg. for, that wheel, deg.140 + Or brake, not wheel--that harrow fit to reel +Men's bodies out like silk? with all the air +Of Tophet's deg. tool, on earth left unaware, deg.143 + Or brought to sharpen its rusty teeth of steel. + +Then came a bit of stubbed ground, once a wood, + Next a marsh, it would seem, and now mere earth + Desperate and done with; (so a fool finds mirth, +Makes a thing and then mars it, till his mood +Changes, and off he goes!) within a rood-- + Bog, clay, and rubble, sand, and stark black dearth. 150 + +Now blotches rankling, coloured gay and grim, + Now patches where some leanness of the soil's + Broke into moss or substances like boils; +Then came some palsied oak, a cleft in him +Like a distorted mouth that splits its rim + Gaping at death, and dies while it recoils. + +And just as far as ever from the end, + Naught in the distance but the evening, naught + To point my footstep further! At the thought, +A great black bird, Apollyon's deg. bosom-friend, deg.160 +Sailed past, nor beat his wide wing dragon-penned + That brushed my cap--perchance the guide I sought. + +For, looking up, aware I somehow grew, + 'Spite of the dusk, the plain had given place + All round to mountains--with such name to grace +Mere ugly heights and heaps now stolen in view. +How thus they had surprised me,--solve it, you! + How to get from them was no clearer case. + +Yet half I seemed to recognize some trick + Of mischief happened to me, Gods knows when-- 170 + In a bad dream, perhaps. Here ended, then, +Progress this way. When, in the very nick +Of giving up, one time more, came a click + As when a trap shuts--you're inside the den. + +Burningly it came on me all at once, + This was the place! those two hills on the right, + Crouched like two bulls locked horn in horn in fight; +While, to the left, a tall scalped mountain ... Dunce, +Dotard, a-dozing at the very nonce, + After a life spent training for the sight! 180 + +What in the midst lay but the Tower itself? + The round squat turret, blind as the fool's heart, + Built of brown stone, without a counterpart +In the whole world. The tempest's mocking elf +Points to the shipman thus the unseen shelf + He strikes on, only when the timbers start. + +Not see? because of night perhaps?--why, day + Came back again for that! before it left, + The dying sunset kindled thro' a cleft: +The hills, like giants at a hunting, lay, 190 +Chin upon hand, to see the game at bay, + "Now stab and end the creature--to the heft!" + +Not hear? when noise was everywhere! it tolled + Increasing like a bell. Names in my ears, + Of all the lost adventurers my peers,-- +How such a one was strong, and such was bold, +And such was fortunate, yet each of old + Lost, lost! one moment knelled the woe of years. + +There they stood, ranged along the hillsides, met + To view the last of me, a living frame 200 + For one more picture! in a sheet of flame +I saw them and I knew them all. And yet +Dauntless the slug-horn to my lips I set, + And blew. "_Childe Roland to the Dark Tower came._" + + * * * * * + + + + +AN EPISTLE + +CONTAINING THE STRANGE MEDICAL EXPERIENCE OF +KARSHISH, THE ARAB PHYSICIAN + +Karshish, the picker up of learning's crumbs, +The not incurious in God's handiwork +(This man's flesh he hath admirably made, +Blown like a bubble, kneaded like a paste, +To coop up and keep down on earth a space +That puff of vapour from his mouth, man's soul) +--To Abib, all sagacious in our art, +Breeder in me of what poor skill I boast, +Like me inquisitive how pricks and cracks +Befall the flesh through too much stress and strain, 10 +Whereby the wily vapour fain would slip +Back and rejoin its source before the term,-- +And aptest in contrivance (under God) +To baffle it by deftly stopping such deg.-- deg.14 +The vagrant Scholar to his Sage deg. at home deg.15 +Sends greeting (health and knowledge, fame with peace) +Three samples of true snake-stone deg.--rarer still, deg.17 +One of the other sort, the melon-shaped, +(But fitter, pounded fine, for charms deg. than drugs) deg.19 +And writeth now the twenty-second time. 20 + +My journeyings were brought to Jericho: +Thus I resume. Who studious in our art +Shall count a little labour unrepaid? +I have shed sweat enough, left flesh and bone +On many a flinty furlong of this land. +Also, the country-side is all on fire +With rumours of a marching hitherward: +Some say Vespasian deg. cometh, some, his son. deg.28 +A black lynx snarled and pricked a tufted ear: +Lust of my blood inflamed his yellow balls: 30 +I cried and threw my staff and he was gone. +Twice have the robbers stripped and beaten me, +And once a town declared me for a spy deg.; deg.33 +But at the end, I reach Jerusalem, +Since this poor covert where I pass the night, +This Bethany, lies scarce the distance thence +A man with plague-sores at the third degree +Runs till he drops down dead. deg. Thou laughest here! deg.38 +'Sooth, it elates me, thus reposed and safe, +To void the stuffing of my travel-scrip 40 +And share with thee whatever Jewry yields. +A viscid choler is observable +In tertians, I was nearly bold to say; +And falling-sickness hath a happier cure deg. deg.44 +Than our school wots of: there's a spider here +Weaves no web, watches on the ledge of tombs, +Sprinkled with mottles on an ash-gray back; +Take five and drop them deg. ... but who knows his mind, deg.48 +The Syrian run-a-gate I trust this to? +His service payeth me a sublimate 50 +Blown up his nose to help the ailing eye. +Best wait: I reach Jerusalem at morn, +There set in order my experiences, +Gather what most deserves, and give thee all-- +Or I might add, Judaea's gum-tragacanth +Scales off in purer flakes, shines clearer-grained, +Cracks 'twixt the pestle and the porphyry. +In fine exceeds our produce. Scalp-disease +Confounds me, crossing so with leprosy: +Thou hadst admired one sort I gained at Zoar-- 60 +But zeal outruns discretion. Here I end. + +Yet stay! my Syrian blinketh gratefully, +Protested his devotion is my price-- +Suppose I write, what harms not, tho' he steal? +I half resolve to tell thee, yet I blush, deg. deg.65 +What set me off a-writing first of all. +An itch I had, a sting to write, a tang! +For, be it this town's barrenness--or else +The man had something in the look of him-- +His case has struck me far more than 'tis worth. 70 +So, pardon if--(lest presently I lose, +In the great press of novelty at hand, +The care and pains this somehow stole from me) +I bid thee take the thing while fresh in mind. +Almost in sight--for, wilt thou have the truth? +The very man is gone from me but now, +Whose ailment is the subject of discourse. +Thus then, and let thy better wit help all! + +'Tis but a case of mania: subinduced +By epilepsy, at the turning-point 80 +Of trance prolonged unduly some three days +When, by the exhibition of some drug +Or spell, exorcisation, stroke of art +Unknown to me and which 'twere well to know, +The evil thing, out-breaking all at once, +Left the man whole and sound of body indeed,-- +But, flinging (so to speak) life's gates too wide, +Making a clear house of it too suddenly, +The first conceit that entered might inscribe +Whatever it was minded on the wall 90 +So plainly at that vantage, as it were, +(First come, first served) that nothing subsequent +Attaineth to erase those fancy-scrawls +The just-returned and new-established soul +Hath gotten now so thoroughly by heart +That henceforth she will read or these or none. +And first--the man's own firm conviction rests +That he was dead (in fact they buried him) +--That he was dead and then restored to life +By a Nazarene physician of his tribe: 100 +--'Sayeth, the same bade "Rise," and he did rise, +"Such cases are diurnal," thou wilt cry. +Not so this figment!--not, that such a fume, +Instead of giving way to time and health, +Should eat itself into the life of life. +As saffron tingeth flesh, blood, bones, and all! +For see, how he takes up the after-life, +The man--it is one Lazarus, a Jew, +Sanguine, proportioned, fifty years of age, +The body's habit wholly laudable, 110 +As much, indeed, beyond the common health. +As he were made and put aside to show. +Think, could we penetrate by any drug +And bathe the wearied soul and worried flesh, +And bring it clear and fair, by three days' sleep! +Whence has the man the balm that brightens all? +This grown man eyes the world now like a child. +Some elders of his tribe, I should premise, +Led in their friend, obedient as a sheep, +To bear my inquisition. While they spoke, 120 +Now sharply, now with sorrow,--told the case,-- +He listened not except I spoke to him, +But folded his two hands and let them talk, +Watching the flies that buzzed: and yet no fool. +And that's a sample how his years must go. + +Look if a beggar, in fixed middle-life, +Should find a treasure,--can he use the same +With straitened habits and with tastes starved small, +And take at once to his impoverished brain +The sudden element that changes things, 130 +That sets the undreamed-of rapture at his hand, +And puts the cheap old joy in the scorned dust? +Is he not such an one as moves to mirth-- +Warily parsimonious, when no need, +Wasteful as drunkenness at undue times? +All prudent counsel as to what befits +The golden mean, is lost on such an one: +The man's fantastic will is the man's law. +So here--we call the treasure knowledge, say, +Increased beyond the fleshly faculty-- 140 +Heaven opened to a soul while yet on earth, +Earth forced on a soul's use while seeing heaven: +The man is witless of the size, the sum, +The value in proportion of all things, +Or whether it be little or be much. +Discourse to him of prodigious armaments +Assembled to besiege his city now, +And of the passing of a mule with gourds-- +'Tis one! Then take it on the other side, +Speak of some trifling fact,--he will gaze rapt 150 +With stupor at its very littleness, +(Far as I see) as if in that indeed +He caught prodigious import, whole results. +And so will turn to us the bystanders +In ever the same stupor (note this point) +That we too see not with his opened eyes. +Wonder and doubt come wrongly into play, +Preposterously, at cross purposes. +Should his child sicken unto death,--why, look +For scarce abatement of his cheerfulness, 160 +Or pretermission of the daily craft! +While a word, gesture, glance from that same child +At play or in the school or laid asleep, +Will startle him to an agony of fear, +Exasperation, just as like. Demand +The reason why--"'tis but a word," object-- +"A gesture"--he regards thee as our lord +Who lived there in the pyramid alone, +Looked at us (dost thou mind?) when, being young +We both would unadvisedly recite 170 +Some charm's beginning, from that book of his, deg. deg.171 +Able to bid the sun throb wide and burst +All into stars, as suns grown old are wont. +Thou and the child have each a veil alike +Thrown o'er your heads, from under which ye both +Stretch your blind hands and trifle with a match +Over a mine of Greek fire, deg. did ye know! deg.177 +He holds on firmly to some thread of life +(It is the life to lead perforcedly) +Which runs across some vast distracting orb 180 +Of glory on either side that meagre thread, +Which, conscious of, he must not enter yet-- +The spiritual life around the earthly life: +The law of that is known to him as this, +His heart and brain move there, his feet stay here. +So is the man perplext with impulses +Sudden to start off crosswise, not straight on, +Proclaiming what is right and wrong across, +And not along, this black thread thro' the blaze-- +"It should be" balked by "here it cannot be." 190 +And oft the man's soul springs into his face +As if he saw again and heard again +His sage that bade him "Rise" and he did rise. +Something, a word, a tick o' the blood within +Admonishes: then back he sinks at once +To ashes, who was very fire before, +In sedulous recurrence to his trade +Whereby he earneth him the daily bread; +And studiously the humbler for that pride, +Professedly the faultier that he knows 200 +God's secret, while he holds the thread of life. +Indeed the especial marking of the man +Is prone submission to the heavenly will-- +Seeing it, what it is, and why it is. +'Sayeth, he will wait patient to the last +For that same death, which must restore his being +To equilibrium, body loosening soul +Divorced even now by premature full growth: +He will live, nay, it pleaseth him to live +So long as God please, and just how God please. 210 +He even seeketh not to please God more +(Which meaneth, otherwise) than as God please. +Hence, I perceive not he affects to preach +The doctrine of his sect whate'er it be, +Make proselytes as madmen thirst to do: +How can he give his neighbour the real ground, +His own conviction? Ardent as he is-- +Call his great truth a lie, why, still the old +"Be it as God please" reassureth him. +I probed the sore as thy disciple should: 220 +"How, beast," said I, "this stolid carelessness +Sufficeth thee, when Rome is on her march +To stamp out like a little spark thy town, +Thy tribe, thy crazy tale and thee at once?" +He merely looked with his large eyes on me, +The man is apathetic, you deduce? +Contrariwise, he loves both old and young, +Able and weak, affects the very brutes +And birds--how say I? flowers of the field-- +As a wise workman recognizes tools 230 +In a master's workshop, loving what they make. +Thus is the man as harmless as a lamb: +Only impatient, let him do his best, +At ignorance and carelessness and sin-- +An indignation which is promptly curbed: +As when in certain travel I have feigned +To be an ignoramus in our art +According to some preconceived design, +And happed to hear the land's practitioners +Steeped in conceit sublimed by ignorance, 240 +Prattle fantastically on disease, +Its cause and cure--and I must hold my peace! + +Thou wilt object--Why have I not ere this +Sought out the sage himself, the Nazarene +Who wrought this cure, inquiring at the source, +Conferring with the frankness that befits? +Alas! it grieveth me, the learned leech +Perished in a tumult many years ago, +Accused--our learning's fate--of wizardry, +Rebellion, to the setting up a rule 250 +And creed prodigious as described to me. +His death, which happened when the earthquake fell +(Prefiguring, as soon appeared, the loss +To occult learning in our lord the sage +Who lived there in the pyramid alone deg.), deg.255 +Was wrought by the mad people--that's their wont! +On vain recourse, as I conjecture it. +To his tried virtue, for miraculous help-- +How could he stop the earthquake? That's their way! +The other imputations must be lies: 260 +But take one, tho' I loathe to give it thee, +In mere respect for any good man's fame. +(And after all, our patient Lazarus +Is stark mad; should we count on what he says? +Perhaps not: tho' in writing to a leech +'Tis well to keep back nothing of a case.) +This man so cured regards the curer, then, +As--God forgive me! who but God Himself, +Creator and sustainer of the world, deg. deg.269 +That came and dwelt in flesh on it awhile. 270 +--'Sayeth that such an one was born, and lived, +Taught, healed the sick, broke bread at his own house, +Then died; with Lazarus by, for aught I know, +And yet was ... what I said nor choose repeat, +And must have so avouched himself, in fact, +In hearing of this very Lazarus +Who saith--but why all this of what he saith? +Why write of trivial matters, things of price +Calling at every moment for remark? +I noticed on the margin of a pool 280 +Blue-flowering borage, the Aleppo sort, +Aboundeth, very nitrous. It is strange! + +Thy pardon for this long and tedious case, +Which, now that I review it, needs must seem +Unduly dwelt on, prolixly set forth! +Nor I myself discern in what is writ +Good cause for the peculiar interest +And awe indeed this man has touched me with. +Perhaps the journey's end, the weariness +Had wrought upon me first. I met him thus: 290 +I crossed a ridge of short sharp broken hills +Like an old lion's cheek teeth. Out there came +A moon made like a face with certain spots +Multiform, manifold, and menacing: +Then a wind rose behind me. So we met +In this old sleepy town at unaware, +The man and I. I send thee what is writ. +Regard it as a chance, a matter risked +To this ambiguous Syrian: he may lose, +Or steal, or give it thee with equal good. 300 +Jerusalem's repose shall make amends +For time this letter wastes, thy time and mine; +Till when, once more thy pardon and farewell! + +The very God! think, Abib; dost thou think? +So, the All-Great, were the All-Loving too-- +So, through the thunder comes a human voice +Saying, "O heart I made, a heart beats here! +Face, my hands fashioned, see it in myself! +Thou hast no power nor mayst conceive of mine, +But love I gave thee, with myself to love, 310 +And thou must love me who have died for thee!" +The madman saith He said so; it is strange. + + * * * * * + + + + +SAUL + +I + +Said Abner, "At last thou art come! Ere I tell, ere thou speak. +Kiss my cheek, wish me well!" Then I wished it, and did kiss his cheek. +And he, "Since the King, O my friend, for thy countenance sent, +Neither drunken nor eaten have we; nor until from his tent +Thou return with the joyful assurance the King liveth yet, +Shall our lip with the honey be bright, with the water be wet. +For out of the black mid-tent's silence, a space of three days, +Not a sound hath escaped to thy servants, of prayer nor of praise, +To betoken that Saul and the Spirit have ended their strife, +And that, faint in his triumph, the monarch sinks back upon life. 10 + + +II + +"Yet now my heart leaps, O beloved! God's child with his dew +On thy gracious gold hair, and those lilies still living and blue +Just broken to twine round thy harp-strings, as if no wild heat +Were now raging to torture the desert!" + + +III + + Then I, as was meet, +Knelt down to the God of my fathers, and rose on my feet, +And ran o'er the sand burnt to powder. The tent was unlooped; +I pulled up the spear that obstructed, and under I stooped; +Hands and knees on the slippery grass-patch, all withered and gone, +That extends to the second enclosure. I groped my way on +Till I felt where the foldskirts fly open. Then once more I prayed, 20 +And opened the foldskirts and entered, and was not afraid +But spoke, "Here is David, thy servant!" And no voice replied. +At the first I saw naught but the blackness; but soon I descried +A something more black than the blackness--the vast, the upright +Main prop which sustains the pavilion: and slow into sight +Grew a figure against it, gigantic and blackest of all. +Then a sunbeam, that burst thro' the tent roof, showed Saul. + + +IV + +He stood erect as that tent-prop, both arms stretched out wide +On the great cross-support in the centre, that goes to each side; +He relaxed not a muscle, but hung there as, caught in his pangs 30 +And waiting his change, the king serpent all heavily hangs, +Far away from his kind, in the pine, till deliverance come +With the spring-time,--so agonized Saul, drear and stark, blind and dumb. + + +V + +Then I tuned my harp,--took off the lilies we twine round its chords +Lest they snap 'neath the stress of the noontide--those sunbeams like swords! +And I first played the tune all our sheep know, as, one after one, +So docile they come to the pen-door till folding be done. +They are white and untorn by the bushes, for lo, they have fed +Where the long grasses stifle the water within the stream's bed; +And now one after one seeks its lodging, as star follows star 40 +Into eve and the blue far above us,--so, blue and so far! + + +VI + +--Then the tune, for which quails on the cornland will each leave his mate +To fly after the player; then, what makes the crickets elate +Till for boldness they fight one another: and then, what has weight +To set the quick jerboa a-musing outside his sand house-- +There are none such as he for a wonder, half bird and half mouse! +God made all the creatures and gave them our love and our fear, +To give sign, we and they are his children, one family here. + + +VII + +Then I played the help-tune of our reapers, their wine-song, when hand +Grasps at hand, eye lights eye in good friendship, and great hearts expand 50 +And grow one in the sense of this world's life.--And then, the last song +When the dead man is praised on his journey--"Bear, bear him along +With his few faults shut up like dead flowerets!" Are balm-seeds not here +To console us? The land has none left such as he on the bier. +"Oh, would we might keep thee, my brother!"--And then, the glad chaunt +Of the marriage,--first go the young maidens, next, she whom we vaunt +As the beauty, the pride of our dwelling.--And then, the great march +Wherein man runs to man to assist him and buttress an arch +Naught can break; who shall harm them, our friends?--Then, the chorus intoned +As the Levites go up to the altar in glory enthroned. 60 +But I stopped here: for here in the darkness Saul groaned. + + +VIII + +And I paused, held my breath in such silence, and listened apart; +And the tent shook, for mighty Saul shuddered: and sparkles 'gan dart +From the jewels that woke in his turban, at once with a start, +All its lordly male-sapphires, and rubies courageous at heart. +So the head: but the body still moved not, still hung there erect. +And I bent once again to my playing, pursued it unchecked, +As I sang,-- + + +IX + + "Oh, our manhood's prime vigor! No spirit feels waste, +Not a muscle is stopped in its playing nor sinew unbraced. +Oh, the wild joys of living! the leaping from rock up to rock, 70 +The strong rending of boughs from the fir-tree, the cool silver shock +Of the plunge in a pool's living water, the hunt of the bear, +And the sultriness showing the lion is couched in his lair. +And the meal, the rich dates yellowed over with gold-dust divine, +And the locust-flesh steeped in the pitcher, the full draught of wine, +And the sleep in the dried river-channel where bulrushes tell +That the water was wont to go warbling so softly and well. +How good is man's life, the mere living! how fit to employ +All the heart and the soul and the senses for ever in joy! +Hast thou loved the white locks of thy father, whose sword thou didst guard 80 +When he trusted thee forth with the armies, for glorious reward? +Didst thou see the thin hands of thy mother, held up as men sung +The low song of the nearly departed, and hear her faint tongue +Joining in while it could to the witness, 'Let one more attest, +I have lived, seen God's hand thro' a lifetime, and all was for best!' +Then they sung thro' their tears in strong triumph, not much, but the rest. +And thy brothers, the help and the contest, the working whence grew +Such result as, from seething grape-bundles, the spirit strained true: +And the friends of thy boyhood--that boyhood of wonder and hope, +Present promise and wealth of the future beyond the eye's scope,-- 90 +Till lo, thou art grown to a monarch; a people is thine: +And all gifts which the world offers singly, on one head combine! +On one head, all the beauty and strength, love and rage (like the throe +That, a-work in the rock, helps its labour and lets the gold go), +High ambition and deeds which surpass it, fame crowning them,--all +Brought to blaze on the head of one creature--King Saul!" + + +X + +And lo, with that leap of my spirit,--heart, hand, harp, and voice, +Each lifting Saul's name out of sorrow, each bidding rejoice +Saul's fame in the light it was made for----as when, dare I say, +The Lord's army, in rapture of service, strains thro' its array, 100 +And upsoareth the cherubim-chariot--"Saul!" cried I, and stopped, +And waited the thing that should follow. Then Saul, who hung propped +By the tent's cross-support in the centre, was struck by his name. +Have ye seen when Spring's arrowy summons goes right to the aim, +And some mountain, the last to withstand her, that held (he alone, +While the vale laughed in freedom and flowers) on a broad bust of stone +A year's snow bound about for a breastplate,--leaves grasp of the sheet? +Fold on fold all at once it crowds thunderously down to his feet, +And there fronts you, stark, black, but alive yet, your mountain of old, +With his rents, the successive bequeathings of ages untold: 110 +Yea, each harm got in fighting your battles, each furrow and scar +Of his head thrust 'twixt you and the tempest--all hail, there they are! +--Now again to be softened with verdure, again hold the nest +Of the dove, tempt the goat and its young to the green on his crest +For their food in the ardours of summer. One long shudder thrilled. +All the tent till the very air tingled, then sank and was stilled +At the King's self left standing before me, released and aware. +What was gone, what remained? All to traverse 'twixt hope and despair. +Death was past, life not come; so he waited. Awhile his right hand +Held the brow, helped the eyes left too vacant, forthwith to remand 120 +To their place what new objects should enter: 'twas Saul as before. +I looked up, and dared gaze at those eyes, nor was hurt any more +Than by slow pallid sunsets in autumn, ye watch from the shore, +At their sad level gaze o'er the ocean--a sun's slow decline +Over hills which, resolved in stern silence, o'erlap and entwine +Base with base to knit strength more intensely: so, arm folded arm +O'er the chest whose slow heavings subsided. + + +XI + + What spell or what charm, +(For, awhile there was trouble within me) what next should I urge +To sustain him where song had restored, him? Song filled to the verge +His cup with the wine of this life, pressing all that it yields 130 +Of mere fruitage, the strength and the beauty: beyond, on what fields +Glean a vintage more potent and perfect to brighten the eye, +And bring blood to the lip, and commend them the cup they put by? +He saith, "It is good:" still he drinks not: he lets me praise life, +Gives assent, yet would die for his own part. + + +XII + + Then fancies grew rife +Which had come long ago on the pasture, when round me the sheep +Fed in silence--above, the one eagle wheeled slow as in sleep; +And I lay in my hollow and mused on the world that might lie +'Neath his ken, tho' I saw but the strip 'twixt the hill and the sky: +And I laughed--"Since my days are ordained to be passed with my flocks, 140 +Let me people at least, with my fancies, the plains and the rocks, +Dream the life I am never to mix with, and image the show +Of mankind as they live in those fashions I hardly shall know! +Schemes of life, its best rules and right uses, the courage that gains, +And the prudence that keeps what men strive for!" And now these old trains +Of vague thought came again; I grew surer; so, once more the string +Of my harp made response to my spirit, as thus-- + + +XIII + + "Yea, my King," +I began--"thou dost well in rejecting mere comforts that spring +From the mere mortal life held in common by man and by brute: +In our flesh grows the branch of this life, in our soul it bears fruit. 150 +Thou hast marked the slow rise of the tree,--how its stem trembled first +Till it passed the kid's lip, the stag's antler; then safely outburst +The fan-branches all round; and thou mindest when these too, in turn +Broke a-bloom and the palm-tree seemed perfect: yet more was to learn, +E'en the good that comes in with the palm-fruit. Our dates shall we slight, +When their juice brings a cure for all sorrow? or care for the plight +Of the palm's self whose slow growth produced them? Not so! stem and branch. +Shall decay, nor be known in their place, while the palm-wine shall staunch +Every wound of man's spirit in winter. I pour thee such wine. +Leave the flesh to the fate it was fit for! the spirit be thine! 160 +By the spirit, when age shall o'ercome thee, thou still shalt enjoy +More indeed, than at first when, inconscious, the life of a boy. +Crush that life, and behold its wine running! Each deed thou hast done +Dies, revives, goes to work in the world; until e'en as the sun +Looking down on the earth, tho' clouds spoil him, tho' tempests efface, +Can find nothing his own deed produced not, must everywhere trace +The results of his past summer-prime,--so, each ray of thy will. +Every flash of thy passion and prowess, long over, shall thrill +Thy whole people, the countless, with ardour, till they too give forth +A like cheer to their sons: who in turn, fill the South and the North 170 +With the radiance thy deed was the germ of. Carouse in the past! +But the license of age has its limit; thou diest at last. +As the lion, when age dims his eyeball, the rose at her height, +So with man--so his power and his beauty forever take flight. +No! Again a long draught of my soul-wine! Look forth o'er the years! +Thou hast done now with eyes for the actual; begin with the seer's! +Is Saul dead? In the depth of the vale make his tomb--bid arise +A gray mountain of marble heaped four-square, till, built to the skies, +Let it mark where the great First King slumbers: whose fame would ye know? +Up above see the rock's naked face, where the record shall go 180 +In great characters cut by the scribe,--Such was Saul, so he did; +With the sages directing the work, by the populace chid,-- +For not half, they'll affirm, is comprised there! Which fault to amend, +In the grove with his kind grows the cedar, whereon they shall spend +(See, in tablets 'tis level before them) their praise, and record +With the gold of the graver, Saul's story,--the statesman's great word. +Side by side with the poet's sweet comment. The river's a-wave +With smooth paper-reeds grazing each other when prophet-winds rave; +So the pen gives unborn generations their due and their part +In thy being! Then, first of the mighty, thank God that thou art!" 190 + + +XIV + +And behold while I sang ... but O Thou who didst grant me that day, +And before it not seldom had granted Thy help to essay. +Carry on and complete an adventure,--my shield and my sword +In that act where my soul was Thy servant, Thy word was my word,-- +Still be with me, who then at the summit of human endeavour +And scaling the highest, man's thought could, gazed hopeless as ever +On the new stretch of heaven above me--till, mighty to save, +Just one lift of Thy hand cleared that distance--God's throne from man's grave! +Let me tell out my tale to its ending--my voice to my heart +Which can scarce dare believe in what marvels last night I took part, 200 +As this morning I gather the fragments, alone with my sheep, +And still fear lest the terrible glory evanish like sleep! +For I wake in the gray dewy covert, while Hebron, upheaves +The dawn struggling with night on his shoulder, and Kidron retrieves +Slow the damage of yesterday's sunshine. + + +XV + + I say then,--my song +While I sang thus, assuring the monarch, and, ever more strong, +Made a proffer of good to console him--he slowly resumed. +His old motions and habitudes kingly. The right hand replumed +His black locks to their wonted composure, adjusted the swathes +Of his turban, and see--the huge sweat that his countenance bathes, 210 +He wipes off with the robe; and he girds now his loins as of yore, +And feels slow for the armlets of price, with the clasp set before, +He is Saul, ye remember in glory,--ere error had bent +The broad brow from the daily communion; and still, tho' much spent +Be the life and bearing that front you, the same, God did choose, +To receive what a man may waste, desecrate, never quite lose. +So sank he along by the tent-prop, till, stayed by the pile +Of his armour and war-cloak and garments, he leaned there awhile, +And sat out my singing,--one arm round the tent-prop, to raise +His bent head, and the other hung slack--till I touched on the praise 220 +I foresaw from all men in all time, to the man patient there; +And thus ended, the harp falling forward. Then first I was 'ware +That he sat, as I say, with my head just above his vast knees +Which were thrust out each side around me, like oak roots which please +To encircle a lamb when it slumbers. I looked up to know +If the best I could do had brought solace: he spoke not, but slow +Lifted up the hand slack at his side, till he laid it with care +Soft and grave, but in mild settled will, on my brow: thro' my hair +The large fingers were pushed, and he bent back my head, with kind power-- +All my face back, intent to peruse it, as men do a flower. 230 +Thus held he me there with his great eyes that scrutinized mine-- +And oh, all my heart how it loved him! but where was the sign? +I yearned--"Could I help thee, my father, inventing a bliss, +I would add, to that life of the past, both the future and this; +I would give thee new life altogether, as good, ages hence. +As this moment,--had love but the warrant, love's heart to dispense!" + + +XVI + +Then the truth came upon me. No harp more--no song more! outbroke-- + + +XVII + +"I have gone the whole round of creation: I saw and I spoke; +I, a work of God's hand for that purpose, received in my brain +And pronounced on the rest of his handwork--returned him again 240 +His creation's approval or censure: I spoke as I saw, +Reported, as man may of God's work--all's love, yet all's law. +Now I lay down the judgeship he lent me. Each faculty tasked +To perceive him has gained an abyss, where a dewdrop was asked. +Have I knowledge? confounded it shrivels at Wisdom laid bare. +Have I forethought? how purblind, how blank, to the Infinite Care! +Do I task any faculty highest, to image success? +I but open my eyes,--and perfection, no more and no less, +In the kind I imagined, full-fronts me, and God is seen God +In the star, in the stone, in the flesh, in the soul and the clod. 250 +And thus looking within and around me, I ever renew +(With that stoop of the soul which in bending upraises it too) +The submission of man's nothing-perfect to God's all complete, +As by each new obeisance in spirit, I climb to His feet. +Yet with all this abounding experience, this deity known, +I shall dare to discover some province, some gift of my own, +There's a faculty pleasant to exercise, hard to hoodwink, +I am fain to keep still in abeyance (I laugh as I think), +Lest, insisting to claim and parade in it, wot ye, I worst +E'en the Giver in one gift.--Behold, I could love if I durst! 260 +But I sink the pretension as fearing a man may o'ertake +God's own speed in the one way of love; I abstain for love's sake. +--What, my soul? see thus far and no farther? when doors great and small, +Nine-and-ninety flew ope at our touch; should the hundredth appal? +In the least things have faith, yet distrust in the greatest of all? +Do I find love so full in my nature, God's ultimate gift, +That I doubt His own love can compete with it? Here, the parts shift? +Here, the creature surpass the creator,--the end, what began? +Would I fain in my impotent yearning do all for this man, +And dare doubt He alone shall not help him, who yet alone can? 270 +Would it ever have entered my mind, the bare will, much less power, +To bestow on this Saul what I sang of, the marvellous dower +Of the life he was gifted and filled with? to make such a soul, +Such a body, and then such an earth for insphering the whole? +And doth it not enter my mind (as my warm tears attest), +These good things being given, to go on, and give one more, the best? +Ay, to save and redeem and restore him, maintain at the height +This perfection,--succeed with life's dayspring, death's minute of night? +Interpose at the difficult minute, snatch Saul the mistake, +Saul the failure, the ruin he seems now,--and bid him awake 280 +From the dream, the probation, the prelude, to find himself set +Clear and safe in new light and new life,--a new harmony yet +To be run and continued, and ended--who knows?--or endure! +The man taught enough by life's dream, of the rest to make sure; +By the pain-throb, triumphantly winning intensified bliss, +And the next world's reward and repose, by the struggles in this. + + +XVIII + +"I believe it! 'Tis Thou, God, that givest, 'tis I who receive; +In the first is the last, in Thy will is my power to believe. +All's one gift: Thou canst grant it, moreover, as prompt to my prayer, +As I breathe out this breath, as I open these arms to the air. 290 +From Thy will stream the worlds, life and nature, Thy dread Sabaoth: +_I_ will?--the mere atoms despise me! Why am I not loath +To look that, even that in the face too? Why is it I dare +Think but lightly of such impuissance? What stops my despair? +This;--'tis not what man Does which exalts him, but what man Would do! +See the King--I would help him, but cannot, the wishes fall through. +Could I wrestle to raise him from sorrow, grow poor to enrich, +To fill up his life, starve my own out, I would--knowing which, +I know that my service is perfect. Oh, speak thro' me now! +Would I suffer for him that I love? So wouldst Thou--so wilt Thou! 300 +So shall crown Thee the topmost, ineffablest, uttermost crown-- +And Thy love fill infinitude wholly, nor leave up nor down +One spot for the creature to stand in! It is by no breath, +Turn of eye, wave of hand, that salvation joins issue with death! +As Thy love is discovered almighty, almighty be proved +Thy power, that exists with and for it, of being Beloved! +He who did most, shall bear most; the strongest shall stand the most weak, +'Tis the weakness in strength, that I cry for! my flesh, that I seek +In the Godhead! I seek and I find it, O Saul, it shall be +A Face like my face that receives thee: a Man like to me, 310 +Thou shalt love and be loved by, forever: a Hand like this hand +Shall throw open the gates of new life to thee! See the Christ stand!" + + +XIX + +I know not too well how I found my way home in the night. +There were witnesses, cohorts about me, to left and to right, +Angels, powers, the unuttered, unseen, the alive, the aware: +I repressed, I got thro' them as hardly, as stragglingly there, +As a runner beset by the populace famished for news-- +Life or death. The whole earth was awakened, hell loosed with her crews; +And the stars of night beat with emotion, and tingled and shot +Out in fire the strong pain of pent knowledge: but I fainted not, 320 +For the Hand still impelled me at once and supported, suppressed +All the tumult, and quenched it with quiet, and holy behest, +Till the rapture was shut in itself, and the earth sank to rest. +Anon at the dawn, all that trouble had withered from earth-- +Not so much, but I saw it die out in the day's tender birth; +In the gathered intensity brought to the gray of the hills; +In the shuddering forests' held breath; in the sudden wind-thrills; +In the startled wild beasts that bore off, each with eye sidling still +Though averted with wonder and dread; in the birds stiff and chill +That rose heavily, as I approached them, made stupid with awe: 330 +E'en the serpent that slid away silent--he felt the new law. +The same stared in the white humid faces upturned by the flowers; +The same worked in the heart of the cedar and moved the vine-bowers; +And the little brooks witnessing murmured, persistent and low. +With their obstinate, all but hushed voices--"E'en so, it is so!" + + + * * * * * + + + + +ONE WORD MORE + +TO E.B.B. + +I + +There they are, my fifty men and women +Naming me the fifty poems finished! +Take them, Love, the book and me together; +Where the heart lies, let the brain lie also. + + +II + +Rafael deg. made a century of sonnets, deg.5 +Made and wrote them in a certain volume +Dinted with the silver-pointed pencil +Else he only used to draw Madonnas; +These, the world might view--but one, the volume. +Who that one, deg. you ask? Your heart instructs you. deg.10 +Did she live and love it all her lifetime? +Did she drop, his lady of the sonnets, +Die, and let it drop beside her pillow +Where it lay in place of Rafael's glory, +Rafael's cheek so duteous and so loving-- +Cheek, the world was wont to hail a painter's, +Rafael's cheek, her love had turned a poet's? + + +III + +You and I would rather read that volume +(Taken to his beating bosom by it), +Lean and list the bosom-beats of Rafael, 20 +Would we not? than wonder at Madonnas-- +Her, San Sisto names, and Her, Foligno, +Her, that visits Florence in a vision, +Her, that's left with lilies in the Louvre-- +Seen by us and all the world in circle. + + +IV + +You and I will never read that volume. +Guido Reni, deg. like his own eye's apple, deg.27 +Guarded long the treasure-book and loved it. +Guido Reni dying, all Bologna +Cried, and the world cried too, "Ours, the treasure!" 30 +Suddenly, as rare things will, it vanished. + + +V + +Dante deg. once prepared to paint an angel: deg.32 +Whom to please? You whisper "Beatrice." deg. deg.33 +While he mused and traced it and retraced it +(Peradventure with a pen corroded +Still by drops of that hot ink he dipped for, +When, his left-hand i' the hair o' the wicked, deg. deg.37 +Back he held the brow and pricked its stigma, +Bit into the live man's flesh for parchment, +Loosed him, laughed to see the writing rankle, 40 +Let the wretch go festering through Florence)-- +Dante, who loved well because he hated, +Hated wickedness that hinders loving, +Dante, standing, studying his angel,-- +In there broke the folk of his Inferno. deg. deg.45 +Says he--"Certain people of importance" +(Such he gave his daily dreadful line to) +"Entered and would seize, forsooth, the poet." +Says the poet--"Then I stopped my painting." + + +VI + +You and I would rather see that angel, 50 +Painted by the tenderness of Dante, +Would we not?--than read a fresh Inferno. + + +VII + +You and I will never see that picture. +While he mused on love and Beatrice, +While he softened o'er his outlined angel, +In they broke, those "people of importance": +We and Bice deg. bear the loss forever. deg.57 + + +VIII + +What of Rafael's sonnets, Dante's picture? +This: no artist lives and loves, that longs not +Once, and only once, and for one only, 60 +(Ah, the prize!) to find his love a language +Fit and fair and simple and sufficient-- +Using nature that's an art to others, +Not, this one time, art that's turned his nature. +Ay, of all the artists living, loving, +None but would forego his proper dowry,-- +Does he paint? he fain would write a poem, +Does he write? he fain would paint a picture,-- +Put to proof art alien to the artist's, +Once, and only once, and for one only, 70 +So to be the man and leave the artist, +Gain the man's joy, miss the artist's sorrow. + + +IX + +Wherefore? Heaven's gift takes earth's abatement! +He who smites the rock deg. and spreads the water, deg.74 +Bidding drink and live a crowd beneath him, +Even he, the minute makes immortal, +Proves, perchance, but mortal in the minute, +Desecrates, belike, the deed in doing. +While he smites, how can he but remember, +So he smote before, in such a peril, 80 +When they stood and mocked--"Shall smiting help us?" +When they drank and sneered--"A stroke is easy!" +When they wiped their mouths and went their journey, +Throwing him for thanks--"But drought was pleasant." +Thus old memories mar the actual triumph; +Thus the doing savors of disrelish; +Thus achievement lacks a gracious somewhat; +O'er-importuned brows becloud the mandate, +Carelessness or consciousness--the gesture. +For he bears an ancient wrong about him, 90 +Sees and knows again those phalanxed faces, +Hears, yet one time more, the 'customed prelude-- +"How shouldst thou, of all men, smite, and save us?" +Guesses what is like to prove the sequel-- +"Egypt's flesh-pots deg.--nay, the drought was better." deg.95 + + +X + +Oh, the crowd must have emphatic warrant! +Theirs, the Sinai-forhead's cloven brilliance, deg. deg.97 +Right-arm's rod-sweep, tongue's imperial fiat. +Never dares the man put off the prophet. + + +XI + +Did he love one face from out the thousands, 100 +(Were she Jethro's daughter, deg. white and wifely, deg.101 +Were she but the AEthiopian bondslave), +He would envy yon dumb, patient camel, +Keeping a reserve of scanty water +Meant to save his own life in the desert; +Ready in the desert to deliver +(Kneeling down to let his breast be opened) +Hoard and life together for his mistress. + + +XII + +I shall never, in the years remaining, +Paint you pictures, no, nor carve you statues. 110 +Make you music that should all-express me; +So it seems; I stand on my attainment. +This of verse alone, one life allows me; +Verse and nothing else have I to give you; +Other heights in other lives, God willing; +All the gifts from all the heights, your own, Love. + + +XIII + +Yet a semblance of resource avails us-- +Shade so finely touched, love's sense must seize it. +Take these lines, look lovingly and nearly, +Lines I write the first time and the last time. 120 +He who works in fresco steals a hair-brush, +Curbs the liberal hand, subservient proudly, +Cramps his spirit, crowds its all in little, +Makes a strange art of an art familiar, +Fills his lady's missal-marge with flowerets, +He who blows through bronze may breathe through silver, +Fitly serenade a slumbrous princess. +He who writes, may write for once as I do. + + +XIV + +Love, you saw me gather men and women, +Live or dead or fashioned by my fancy, 130 +Enter each and all, and use their service, +Speak from every mouth,--the speech, a poem. +Hardly shall I tell my joys and sorrows, +Hopes and fears, belief and disbelieving: +I am mine and yours--the rest be all men's, +Karshish, deg. Cleon, deg. Norbert, deg. and the fifty. deg.136 +Let me speak this once in my true person, +Not as Lippo, deg. Roland, or Andrea, deg.138 +Though the fruit of speech be just this sentence: +Pray you, look on these my men and women, 140 +Take and keep my fifty poems finished; +Where my heart lies, let my brain lie also! +Poor the speech; be how I speak, for all things. + + +XV + +Not but that you know me! Lo, the moon's self! +Here in London, yonder late in Florence, +Still we find her face, the thrice-transfigured. +Curving on a sky imbrued with color, +Drifted over Fiesole by twilight, +Came she, our new crescent of a hair's-breadth. +Full she flared it, lamping Samminiato, deg. deg.150 +Rounder 'twixt the cypresses and rounder, +Perfect till the nightingales applauded. +Now, a piece of her old self, impoverished, +Hard to greet, she traverses the house-roofs, +Hurries with unhandsome thrift of silver, +Goes dispiritedly, glad to finish. + + +XVI + +What, there's nothing in the moon noteworthy? +Nay: for if that moon could love a mortal, +Use, to charm him (so to fit a fancy), +All her magic ('tis the old sweet mythos), deg. deg.160 +She would turn a new side to her mortal, +Side unseen of herdsman, huntsman, steersman,-- +Blank to Zoroaster deg. on his terrace, deg.163 +Blind to Galileo deg. on his turret. deg.164 +Dumb to Homer, dumb to Keats deg.--him, even! deg.165 +Think, the wonder of the moonstruck mortal-- +When she turns round, comes again in heaven, +Opens out anew for worse or better! +Proves she like some portent of an iceberg +Swimming full upon the ship it founders, 170 +Hungry with huge teeth of splintered crystals? +Proves she as the paved work of a sapphire, +Seen by Moses when he climbed the mountain? +Moses, deg. Aaron, deg. Nadab, deg. and Abihu deg. deg.174 +Climbed and saw the very God, the Highest, +Stand upon the paved work of a sapphire. +Like the bodied heaven in his clearness +Shone the stone, the sapphire of that paved work, +When they ate and drank and saw God also! + + +XVII + +What were seen? None knows, none ever will know. 180 +Only this is sure--the sight were other, +Not the moon's same side, born late in Florence, +Dying now impoverished here in London. +God be thanked, the meanest of his creatures +Boasts two soul-sides, one to face the world with, +One to show a woman when he loves her. deg. deg.186 + + +XVIII + +This I say of me, but think of you, Love! +This to you--yourself my moon of poets! +Ah, but that's the world's side, there's the wonder, +Thus they see you, praise you, think they know you! 190 +There, in turn I stand with them and praise you-- +Out of my own self, I dare to phrase it. +But the best is when I glide from out them, +Cross a step or two of dubious twilight, +Come out on the other side, the novel +Silent silver lights and darks undreamed of, +Where I hush and bless myself with silence. + + +XIX + +Oh, their Rafael of the dear Madonnas, +Oh, their Dante of the dread Inferno, +Wrote one song--and in my brain I sing it, 200 +Drew one angel--borne, see, on my bosom! + + * * * * * + + + + + + +NOTES + + * * * * * + +THE PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN. (PAGE 1.) + +The poem is based on an old myth found in many forms, all turning +upon the attempt to cheat a magician out of his promised reward. See +Brewer's _Reader's Handbook_, Baring-Gould's _Curious Myths +of the Middle Ages_, Grimm's _Deutsche Sagen_, and the +_Encyclopaedia Britannica_. There are Persian and Chinese +analogues. + +The eldest son of William Macready, the actor, was confined to the +house by illness, and Browning wrote this _jeu d'esprit_ to amuse +the boy and to give him a subject for illustrative drawings. + +LINE 1. =Hamelin=. A town in Hanover, Prussia. + +89. =Cham=, or Khan. The title of the rulers of Tartary. + +91. =Nizam=. The title of the sovereign of Hyderabad, the principal +state of India. + +158. =Claret, Moselle=, etc. Names of wines. + +179. =Caliph=. The title given to the successor of Mohammed, as +head of the Moslem state, and defender of the faith. _Century +Dictionary_. + + +TRAY. (PAGE 15.) + +The poem tells in detail an actual incident, and was written as a +protest against vivisection. + +3. =Sir Olaf=. A conventional name in romances of mediaeval chivalry. + +6. A satire upon Byronism. _Manfred_ and _Childe Harold_ are +heroes of this type. + +Note the abruptness and vigor of the style. Where does it seem +effective? Where unduly harsh? Why does the poet welcome the third +bard? What things does the poem satirize? + + + +INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH CAMP. (PAGE 17.) + +The incident is real, except that the actual hero was a man, not a +boy. + +1. =Ratisbon= (German Regensburg). A city in Austria, stormed by +Napoleon in 1809. + +11. =Lannes=. Duke of Montebello, a general in Napoleon's army. + +20. This sentence is incomplete. The idea is begun anew in line 23. + +What two ideals are contrasted in Napoleon and the boy? By what means +is sympathy turned from one to the other? Show how rapidity and +vividness are given to the story. + + + +HOW THEY BROUGHT THE GOOD NEWS FROM GHENT TO AIX. (PAGE 19.) + +Browning thus explains the origin of the poem: "There is no sort of +historical foundation about _Good News from Ghent_. I wrote it +under the bulwark of a vessel off the African coast, after I had been +at sea long enough to appreciate even the fancy of a gallop on the +back of a certain good horse 'York,' then in my stable, at home." It +would require a skilful imagination to create a set of circumstances +which could give any other plausible reason for the ride to "save Aix +from her fate." + +14. =Lokeren=. Twelve miles from Ghent. + +15. =Boom=. Sixteen miles from Lokeren. + +16. =Dueffeld=. Twelve miles from Boom. + +17. 19, 31, etc. =Mecheln= (Fr. Malines), =Aershot=, =Hasselt=, etc. +The reader may trace the direction and length of the ride in any large +atlas. Minute examinations of the route are, however, of no special +value. + +Note the rapidity of narration and the galloping movement of the +verse; the time of starting, and the anxious attention to the +_time_ as the journey proceeds. How are we given a sense of the +effort and distress of the horses? How do we see Roland gradually +emerging as the hero? Where is the climax of the story? Note, +especially, the power or beauty of lines 2, 5, 7, 15, 23, 25, 39, 40, +47, 51-53, 54-56. + + + +HERVE RIEL. (PAGE 22.) + +(Published in the _Cornhill Magazine_, 1871. Browning gave the +L100 received for the poem to the fund for the relief of the people of +Paris, who were starving after the siege of 1870.) + +The cause of James II., who had been removed from the English throne +in 1688, and succeeded by William and Mary, was taken up by the +French. The story is strictly historical, except that Herve Riel asked +a holiday for the rest of his life. + +5. =St. Malo on the Rance=. On the northern coast of France, in +Brittany. See any large atlas. + +43. =pressed=. Forced to enter service in the navy. + +44. =Croisickese=. A native of Croisic, in Brittany. Browning has used +the legends of Croisic for poetic material in his Gold Hair of Pornic +and in The Two Poets of Croisic. + +46. =Malouins=. Inhabitants of St. Malo. + +135. =The Louvre=. The great palace and art gallery of Paris. + +Note the suggestion of the sea, and of eager hurry, in the movement +of the verse. Compare the directness of the opening with that of the +preceding poem: What is the advantage of such a beginning? How much +is told of the hero? By what means is his heroism emphasized? How is +Browning's departure from the legend a gain? Observe the abrupt energy +of lines 39-40; the repetition, in 79-80; the picture of Herve Riel in +stanzas viii and x. + + + +PHEIDIPPIDES. (PAGE 30.) + +The story is from Herodotus, told there in the third person. See +Herodotus, VI., 105-106. The final incident and the reward asked by +the runner are Browning's addition. + +[Greek: =Chairete, nikomen=]. Rejoice, we conquer. + +4. =Zeus=. The chief of the Greek gods (Roman Jupiter). =Her of the aegis +and spear=. These were the emblems of Athena (Roman Minerva), the +goddess of wisdom and of warfare. + +5. =Ye of the bow and the buskin=. Apollo and Diana. + +8. =Pan=. The god of nature, of the fields and their fruits. + +9. =Archons=. Rulers. =tettix=, the grasshopper, whose image +symbolized old age, and was worn by the senators of Athens. See the +myth of Tithonus and Tennyson's poem of that name. + +13. =Persia= attempted a conquest of Athens in 490 B.C. and was +defeated by the Athenians in the famous battle of Marathon, under +Miltiades. + +18. To bring earth and water to an invading enemy was a symbol of +submission. + +19. =Eretria=. A city on the island of Eub[oe]a, twenty-nine miles +north of Athens. + +20. =Hellas=. The Greek name for Greece. + +21. The Greeks of the various provinces long regarded themselves as of +one blood and quality, superior to the outer barbarians. + +32. =Phoibos=, or Ph[oe]bus. Apollo, god of the sun and the arts. +=Artemis= (Roman Diana), goddess of the moon and patroness of hunting. + +33. =Olumpos=. Olympus. A mountain of Greece which was the abode of +Zeus and the other gods. + +52. =Parnes=. A mountain on the ridge between Attica and B[oe]otia, +now called Ozia. + +62. =Erebos=. The lower world; the place of night and the dead. + +80. =Miltiades= (?-489 B.C.). The Greek general who won the victory +over the Persians at Marathon in 490 B.C. + +106. =Akropolis=. The citadel of Athens, where stood the court of +justice and the temple of the goddess Athene. + +109. =Fennel-field=. The Greek name for fennel was [Greek: ho +Marathon] (Marathon). Hence the prophetic significance of Pan's gift +to the runner. + +Compare the story in Herodotus (VI., 105-106) with Browning's more +spirited and poetic version. Observe how the strong patriotism, the +Greek love of nature, and the Greek reverence for the gods are brought +to the fore. What imagery in the poem is especially effective? What is +the claim of Pheidippides--as Browning presents him--to memory as a +hero? What ideals are most prominent in the poem? + + + +MY STAR. (PAGE 40.) + +4. =angled spar=. The Iceland spar has the power of polarizing light +and producing great richness and variety of color. + +11. =Saturn=. The planet next beyond Jupiter; here chosen, perhaps, +for its changing aspects. See an encyclopaedia or dictionary. + +This dainty love lyric is said to have been written with Mrs. Browning +in mind. It needs, however, no such narrow application for its +interpretation. It is the simple declaration of the lover that the +loved one reveals to him qualities of soul not revealed to others. +Observe the "order of lyric progress" in speaking first of nature, +then of the feelings. + + + +EVELYN HOPE. (PAGE 41.) + +The lover denies the evanescence of human love. He implies that in +some future time the love will reappear and be rewarded. Browning's +optimism lays hold sometimes of the present, sometimes of the future, +for the fulfilment of its hope. Especially strong is his "sense of the +continuity of life." "There shall never be one lost good," he makes +Abt Vogler say. The charm of this poem is more, perhaps, in its +tenderness of tone and purity of atmosphere than in its doctrine of +optimism. + + + +LOVE AMONG THE RUINS. (PAGE 43.) + +This poem was written in Rome in the winter of 1853-1854. The scene is +the Roman Campagna. The verse has a softness and a melody unusual in +Browning. Compare its structure with that of Holmes's _The Last +Leaf_. Note the elements of pastoral peace and gentleness in the +opening, and in the coloring of the scene. What two scenes are brought +into contrast? Note how the scenes alternate throughout the poem, and +how each scene is gradually developed according to the ordinary laws +of description. What ideals are thus compared? What does the poem +mean? + + +MISCONCEPTIONS. (PAGE 47.) + +11. =Dalmatic=. A robe worn by mediaeval kings on solemn occasions, and +still worn by deacons at the mass in the Roman Catholic church. + +The lyric order appears sharply developed here in the parallelism of +the two stanzas. Point out this parallelism of idea. Does it fail +at any point? Note the chivalrous absence of reproach by the lover. +Observe the climax up to which each stanza leads, and the climax +within the last line of each stanza. + + + +NATURAL MAGIC. (PAGE 48.) + +5. =Nautch=. An Indian dancing-girl, to whom Browning ascribes the +skill of a magician. + +The poem celebrates the transforming and life-giving power of +affection. Note the abrupt and excited manner of utterance, and how +the speaker begins in the midst of things. He has already told +his story once, when the poem opens. Note also the parallelism of +structure, as in _Misconceptions_, the climax in each stanza, and +the echo in the last line of each. Tell the story in the common order +of prose narrative. + + + +APPARITIONS. (PAGE 49.) + +Study the development of the idea in the same manner as in +_Misconceptions_ and _Natural Magic_. Note the felicity of +imagery and diction. + + + +A WALL. (PAGE 50.) + +The clew to the meaning is to be sought in the last two stanzas. This +is one of the best examples of Browning's "assertion of the soul in +song." + + + +CONFESSIONS. (PAGE 51.) + +First construct the scene of the poem. What has the priest said? What +is the sick man's answer? What evidence is there that his imagination +is struggling to recall the old memory? What view of life does the +priest offer, and he reject? Does Browning indicate his preference for +either view, or tell the story impartially? + + + +A WOMAN'S LAST WORD. (PAGE 53.) + +What key to the situation in the first line? Who are the speaker and +the one addressed? What mood and feeling are in control? Comment upon +the condensation of the thought and the movement of the verse. + + + +A PRETTY WOMAN. (PAGE 55.) + +25-27. Compare Emerson's lines in _The Rhodora:_-- + + "If eyes were made for seeing, + Then beauty is its own excuse for being." + +To what things is the "Pretty Woman" compared? Of what use is she? How +is she to be judged? + + + +YOUTH AND ART. (PAGE 58.) + +8. =Gibson, John= (1790-1866). A famous sculptor. + +12. =Grisi, Giulia=. A celebrated singer (1811-1869). + +18. In allusion to the asceticism of the Hindoo religious devotees. + +58. =bals-pares=. Fancy-dress balls. + +The poem is half-humorous, half-serious. The speaker, in her imaginary +conversation, gives her own history and that of the man she thinks she +might have loved. The story is on the "Maud Muller" motive, but with +less of sentimentality. The setting suggests the life of art students +in Paris, or in some Italian city. The poem is a plea for the freedom +of the individuality of a soul against the restrictions imposed by +conventional standards of value. Its touches of humor, of human +nature, and its summary of two lives in brief, are admirably done. Its +rhymes sometimes need the indulgence accorded to humorous writing. + + + +A TALE. (PAGE 61.) + +The source of the story is an epigram given in Mackail's _Select +Epigrams from Greek Anthology_. It is one of the happiest pieces of +Browning's lighter work. + +65. =Lotte=, or Charlotte. A character in Goethe's _Sorrows of +Werther_, said to be drawn from the heroine of one of Goethe's +earlier love-affairs. + +Who are the speaker and the one addressed? Whom does the cicada of the +tale symbolize? Whom the singer helped by the cicada? What application +is made of the story? What serious meanings and feelings underlie the +tone of raillery? What things mark the light and humorous tone of the +speaker? Point out the harmony between style and theme. + + +CAVALIER TUNES. (PAGE 67.) + +Note the swinging, martial movement, and the energetic spirit in these +lyrics. For an account of the history of the period, see Green's +_Short History of the English People_, Chapter VIII, and +Macaulay's _History of England_, Chapter I. For an account of the +qualities of the Cavaliers, see Macaulay's _Essay on Milton_. + + +I. MARCHING ALONG + +1. =Kentish Sir Byng=. The first of the family known to fame was +George Byng, Viscount Torrington (1663-1733), who could not be the man +meant here by Browning. + +2. =crop-headed=. In allusion to the close-cropped hair of the +Puritans. Long wigs were the fashion among the Cavaliers; hence the +Puritans were nicknamed "Roundheads." + +7. =King Charles= the First. =Pym=, John (1584-1643). Leader of the +Parliament in its actions against King Charles and the Royalist party. + +13. =Hampden=, John (1594-1643). One of the leaders of Parliament, +known principally for his resistance to the illegal taxations of +Charles I. + +14. =Hazelrig=, Sir Arthur. One of the members of Parliament whom +Charles tried to impeach. =Fiennes=, Nathaniel. One of the leading +members of Parliament. =young Harry=. Son of Sir Henry Vane, and a +member of the Puritan party. + +15. =Rupert=. Prince of the Palatinate (1619-1682), and nephew of +Charles I. He served in the King's army during the civil war. + +23. =Nottingham=. "Charles I raised his standard here, in 1642, as the +beginning of the civil war."--_Century Dictionary_. + + +II. GIVE A ROUSE + +16. =Noll= was a contemptuous nickname for Oliver Cromwell, the leader +of the Puritans. + + +HOME-THOUGHTS, FROM THE SEA. (PAGE 70.) + +This poem is a companion piece to _Home Thoughts, from Abroad_. +It is, however, distinctly inferior to it in clearness, vividness of +feeling, and lyric sweetness. + +3. =Trafalgar=, The scene of the famous victory of the English +admiral, Nelson, over the French fleet in 1805. + +4. =Gibraltar=. The famous rocky promontory at the entrance of the +Mediterranean. It has been held as an English fort since 1704. + + +SUMMUM BONUM. (PAGE 71.) + +This little poem, published in 1890, is one of the good examples of a +love lyric written by an old man whose spirit is still youthful. There +are some similar things by Tennyson, in _Gareth and Lynette_, and +elsewhere in his later publications. + +Note here the somewhat exaggerated art of the poem in the +alliterations and in the multiple comparisons. + +SONGS FROM PIPPA PASSES. (PAGE 73.) + +The drama of _Pippa Passes_ is a succession of scenes, each +representing some crisis of human life, into which breaks, with +beneficent influence, a song of the girl Felippa, or "Pippa," on her +holiday from the silk-mills. She is unconscious of the influence she +exerts. William Sharp says these songs "are as pathetically fresh +and free as a thrush's song in a beleaguered city, and with the same +unconsidered magic." + + +THE LOST LEADER. (PAGE 75.) + +The desertion of the liberal cause by Wordsworth, Southey, and others, +is the germinal idea of this poem. But Browning always strenuously +insisted that the resemblance went no further; that _The Lost +Leader_ is no true portrait of Wordsworth, though he became +poet-laureate. _The Lost Leader_ is a purely ideal conception, +developed by the process of idealization from an individual who serves +as a "lay figure." + +13. =Shakespeare= was more of an aristocrat, surely, than a democrat. +Milton had championed the cause of liberty in prose and poetry, and +had worked for it as Cromwell's Latin secretary. + +14. =Burns, Shelley=. What poems can you cite of either poet to place +him in this list? + +Who is the speaker? What is the cause? Why does he not wish the "lost +leader" to return? How does he judge him? What does he expect for his +cause? What does he mean by lines 29-30? lines 31-32? Point out the +climax in the second stanza. + +APPARENT FAILURE. (PAGE 77.) + +3. =your Prince=. Son of Napoleon III., born in March, 1856. + +7. =The Congress= assembled to discuss Italy's unity and freedom. +=Gortschakoff= represented Russia; =Count Cavour=, Italy; =Buol=, +Austria. Austria had conquered Italy. See Browning's _The Italian in +England_. + +12. =Petrarch's Vaucluse=. The fountain from which the Sorgue rises. +The town of Vaucluse (Valclusa) was the home of the poet Petrarch +(1304-1374). + +14. =debt=. The obligation to visit a famous place. + +39. =Tuileries=. The imperial palace in Paris. + +43-44. What is meant? Death? Freedom? + +46-47. In allusion to the game of _rouge-et-noir_. Criticise the +taste shown here. + +In what sense does the poet intend to "save" the building? Describe +the scene that he recalls. What three types are the suicides? How does +the poet know? Why does he deny the failure of their lives? Does he +base his optimistic hope on reason or feeling? Note the climax in +line's 55-57. State in your own words the meaning of the last six +lines. + + +FEARS AND SCRUPLES. (PAGE 80.) + +The problem of the religions doubter is here set forth by an analogy. + +5. =letters=. The reference is of course to the Scriptures. + +17 ff. In +reference to sceptical criticism. + +What are the "fears and scruples" held by the speaker? What proof does +he desire to allay his doubts? Does he settle the doubt or put it +aside? Where is his spirit of reverence best shown? + + +INSTANS TYRANNUS. (PAGE 82.) + +="Instans Tyrannus"=, the threatening tyrant. The phrase is from +Horace's _Odes_, Book III., iii., as is probably the idea of the +poem. Gladstone translates the passage:-- + + "The just man in his purpose strong, + No madding crowd can turn to wrong. + The forceful tyrant's brow and word + . . . . . . . + His firm-set spirit cannot move." + +There is novelty of conception in giving the situation from the +tyrant's point of view. Compare also the seventh Ode of Horace in Book +II. + +44. =gravamen=. Latin for burden, difficulty, annoyance. + +69. =Just= (as) =my vengeance= (was) =complete=. + +What conception do you get of the tyrant? What is his motive? What +things aggravate his hatred? How does he seek to "extinguish the man"? +What baffles him at first? What defeats him finally? Is he deterred +by physical or moral fear? By what means is the poem given vigor and +clearness? Note the dramatic effect in the last stanza. + + +THE PATRIOT. (PAGE 85.) + +At what point in his career does the speaker give his story? What have +been his motives? How was he at first treated? What indicates that +the change is not in him, but in the fickle mob? How does he view his +downfall? In what thought lies his sense of triumph? How does his +greatness of soul appear? + + +THE BOY AND THE ANGEL. (PAGE 87.) + +24. ="the voice of my delight"=. That is, the boy's simple praises. + +What quality did the praise of the Pope and of the angel lack? What is +the meaning of the legend? + + +MEMORABILIA. (PAGE 91.) + +In Browning's early youth, while he was under the influence of Byron +and Pope, he found, at a bookstall, a stray copy of Shelley's _Daemon +of the World_. From this time on, Shelley's poetry was his ideal. +The term "moulted feather" has peculiar significance from the fact +that this was a poem which Shelley afterwards rejected. + +How is childlike wonder expressed in the first two stanzas? How is the +difference between the speaker and his friend indicated? Why does the +name of Shelley mean so much more to one than to the other? In the +figure that follows, what do the moor and the eagle's feather stand +for? + + +WHY I AM A LIBERAL. (PAGE 92.) + +Note the essential elements of sonnet structure in metre, rhyme, and +number of lines. See the Introduction to Sharp's _Sonnets of this +Century_. Compare the idea of the poem with that of _The Lost +Leader_. + + +PROSPICE. (PAGE 93.) + +Written shortly after the death of Mrs. Browning. + +Note the vividness of the imagery, the swiftness of the movement, the +rise to the climax, the change in spirit after the climax, and the +note of courage and hope that informs this poem. Compare it with +Tennyson's _Crossing the Bar_. What difference in spirit between +the two? + + +EPILOGUE TO ASOLANDO. (PAGE 94.) + +Sharp's _Life of Browning_ has the following passage: "Shortly +before the great bell of San Marco struck ten, he turned and asked if +any news had come concerning _Asolando_, published that day. His +son read him a telegram from the publishers, telling how great the +demand was, and how favorable were the advance articles in the leading +papers. The dying poet turned and muttered, 'How gratifying!' When the +last toll of St. Mark's had left a deeper stillness than before, those +by the bedside saw a yet profounder silence on the face of him whom +they loved." + +What claim does Browning make for himself? Do you find this spirit in +any of his poetry which you have read? + + +"DE GUSTIBUS--." (PAGE 96.) + +Image the scene in the first stanza. Why are the poppies known by +their flutter, rather than their color? Note the rhyme effect and +climax in lines 11-13. What qualities predominate in the first scene? +How does the second scene differ from it? What are the characteristic +objects in the second? Has it more or less of the romantic, or of +grandeur? Compare the human element introduced in each scene. Note +the effectiveness of the epithets _a-flutter_, _wind-grieved_, _baked_, +_red-rusted_, _iron-spiked_. Show how the poem explains its title. + + +THE ITALIAN IN ENGLAND. (PAGE 98.) + +The setting of the story is Italy's struggle against Austria for her +liberty, known as the Revolution of 1848. + +8. =Charles=. Carlo Alberto, Prince of Carignano, of the house of +Savoy. + +19. =Metternich= (1773-1859). The Austrian diplomatist, and the enemy +of Italian liberty. + +25. =Lombardy=. See the Atlas. + +76. =Tenebrae= = darkness. A religious service in the Roman Catholic +church, commemorating the crucifixion. + + +MY LAST DUCHESS. (PAGE 105.) + +Ferrara still preserves the mediaeval traditions and appearance in +a marked degree. The Dukes of Ferrara were noted art patrons. Both +Ariosto and Tasso were members of their household; but neither poet +was fully appreciated by his master. + +8. =Fra Pandolf=. An imaginary artist. + +45-46. Professor Corson, in his _Introduction to Browning_, +quotes an answer from the poet himself: "'Yes, I meant that the +commands were that she should be put to death.' And then, after a +pause, he added, with a characteristic dash of expression, as if the +thought had just started in his mind, 'Or he might have had her shut +up in a convent.'" + +56. =Claus of Innsbruck=. An imaginary artist. + +This poem is a fine example of Browning's skill in the use of dramatic +monologue. (See Introduction.) The Duke is skilfully made to reveal +his own character and motives, and those of the Duchess, and at the +same time to indicate the actions of himself and his listener. + +Construct in imagination the scene and the action of the poem. What +has brought the Duke and the envoy together? What things indicate the +Duke's pride? Was his jealousy due to pride or to affection? Does he +prize the picture as a work of art or as a memory of the Duchess? What +faults did he find in her? What character do these criticisms show her +to have had? What did he wish her to he? Note the anti-climax in +lines 25-28: what is the effect? What shows the Duke's difficulty in +breaking his reserve on this matter? What motive has he for so doing? +Where does the poet show skill in condensation, in character drawing, +in vividness, in enlisting the reader's sympathy? + +_The Flight of the Duchess_ should be read as a development and +variation of this theme. + + +THE BISHOP ORDERS HIS TOMB AT SAINT PRAXED'S. (PAGE 107.) + +Ruskin gives this poem high praise: "Robert Browning is unerring in +every sentence he writes of the Middle Ages.... I know no other piece +of modern English prose or poetry in which there is so much told, +as in these lines, of the Renaissance spirit--its worldliness, +inconsistency, pride, hypocrisy, ignorance of itself, love of art, of +luxury, and of good Latin. It is nearly all that I have said of the +central Renaissance, in thirty pages of _The Stones of Venice_, +put into as many lines; Browning's also being the antecedent work." + +It is not, however, for its historical accuracy that a poem is mainly +to be judged. The full and imaginative portrayal of a type, belonging +not to one age only, but to human nature, is a greater achievement. +And this achievement Browning has undoubtedly performed. + +5. =Old Gandolf=. Evidently one of the Bishop's colleagues in holy +orders, and like him in holiness. + +31. =onion-stone=. See the dictionary for descriptions of this and +other stones named in the poem. + +41. =olive-frail=. A crate, made of rushes, for packing olives. + +42. =lapis lazuli=. A very beautiful and valuable blue stone. + +46. =Frascati=. A town near Rome, celebrated for its villas. + +56-62. Such mixture of Christian and Pagan elements was a common +feature in Renaissance art and literature. + +58. =tripod=. The triple-footed seat from which the priestesses of +Apollo at Delphi delivered the oracles. =thyrsus=. A staff entwined +with ivy and vines, and borne in the Bacchic processions. + +77. =Tully=. Marcus Tullius Cicero, the Roman orator, statesman, and +philosopher. + +79. =Ulpian=. A celebrated Roman jurist of the third century. + +99. =Elucescebat=. Late Latin, from =elucesco=. The classical or +Ciceronian form would be =elucebat=, from =eluceo=. Here appears the +Bishop's love of good Latin. + +108. =Term=. A pillar, widening toward the top, upon which is placed a +figure or a bust. + +Who are grouped about the Bishop's bed? What does he desire? Why? What +tastes does he show? Point out evidences of his crimes, his suspicion, +his sensual ideals, his artistic tastes, his canting hypocrisy, his +confusion of the material and the immaterial, and the persistency of +his passions and feelings. Note the subtlety with which these things +are suggested, especially lines 18-19, 29-30, 33-44, 50-52, 59-62, +80-84, 122-125. + + +THE LABORATORY. (PAGE 113.) + +This is a little masterpiece in its vividness and condensation. The +passions of hate and jealousy have seldom been so well portrayed. The +time and place are probably France and the sixteenth or seventeenth +century. Berdoe has called attention in his _Browning +Cyclopaedia_, to the number of fine antitheses in the second stanza. + +Who are present in the scene? Who are to be the victims? Account for +the speaker's _patience_ in stanza iii. Point out the things that +show the intensity of her hate. Does she display any other feeling +than hate and jealousy? + + +HOME THOUGHTS, FROM ABROAD. (PAGE 115.) + +Where is the speaker? What scene is in his imagination? Trace the +growth in his mind of this scene: in color effects, in the kind of +life introduced, in the intensity of the feeling, in the vividness +with which he enters into it. What is the charm in lines 12-14? + + +UP AT A VILLA--DOWN IN THE CITY. (PAGE 116.) + +4. =Bacchus=. The Roman god of wine, frequently invoked in the +garnishment of Latin and Italian speech. + +42. =Pulcinello= is the Italian for clown or puppet, and the prototype +of the English Punch. + +48, =Dante=, =Boccaccio=, and =Petrarch=. Italy's first three great +authors. See a biographical dictionary or encyclopaedia for their dates +and their works. + +=St. Jerome= (340-420.) One of the fathers of the Roman, church. +He prepared the Latin translation of the Bible known as the +_Vulgate_. + +48. =the skirts of St. Paul has reached=. Has done almost as well as +St. Paul. + +51. =Our Lady=. The image of the Virgin Mary. Observe our hero's taste +and his religions solemnity. + +52. =seven swords=, etc. Representing the seven "legendary sorrows" +of the Virgin. See Berdoe's _Browning Cyclopaedia_, or Brewer's +_Reader's Handbook_, or _Dictionary of Phrase and Fable_ for +the list. + +UP AT A VILLA is one of the best humorous poems in the language. The +hero's desires and sorrows are so _naive_, his tastes so gravely +held, that he provokes our sympathy as well as our laughter. One of +the charms of the poem is the way in which he is made to testify, in +spite of himself, to the beauties of the country (as in lines 7-9, +19-20, 22-25, 32-33, 36) and to the monotony or clanging emptiness of +the city (as in lines 12-14, 38-54). Compare lines 8 and 82 with the +picture in _De Gustibus_. + + +A TOCCATA OF GALUPPI'S. (PAGE 122.) + +=Toccata=. See an unabridged dictionary. + +1. =Galuppi=. Baldassare Galuppi, Venice, 1706-1785, a celebrated +musician and prolific composer. + +6. =St. Mark's=. The famous cathedral of Venice. =Doges ... rings=. +The Doge was chief magistrate of Venice. The annual ceremony of +"wedding the Adriatic" by casting into it a gold ring was instituted +in 1174, in commemoration of the victory of the Venetian fleet over +Frederick Barbarossa, Emperor of Germany. + +8. =Shylock's bridge=. By the Rialto. A house by the bridge, said to +be Shylock's, is still pointed out to visitors. + +18. =clavichord=. An instrument of the type of the piano. + +19 ff. =thirds=, =sixths=, etc. For the musical terms see an unabridged +dictionary or a musical dictionary. + +30. Compare the lines in Fitzgerald's translation of the +_Rubaiyat_:-- + + "For some we loved, the loveliest and the best + That from his vintage rolling Time hath prest, + Have drunk their cup a round or two before, + And one by one crept silently to rest." + +This is the characteristic note of poetic melancholy, found again and +again from Virgil to Tennyson. + +37-39. Is the ironical tone of these lines in harmony with the spirit +of the rest of the poem? + +What does Galuppi's music mean to Browning? What does it recall of the +life in Venice? Is the lightness of tone in the music itself or in +the poet's idea of Venice? What emotions are aroused? What causes +the poet's sadness? Is the verse musical? Does it suit the ideas it +conveys? + + +ABT VOGLER. (PAGE 126.) + +George Joseph Vogler, known also as Abbe (or Abt) Vogler (1748-1816), +was a German musician. He composed operas and other musical pieces, +became famous as an organist, and invented an organ with pedals and +several keyboards. Browning seems to have in mind the complex musical +harmonies of which the instrument was capable. See lines 10, 13, 52, +55, and 84 of the poem. See also the _Encyclopaedia Britannica_. + +3. =Solomon=. Legends about Solomon and his power over the spirits of +earth and air are common in Jewish and Arabic literature. + +9 ff. =building=. The idea of building by music is an old one. See +the classical story of Amphion and the walls of Thebes, Coleridge's +_Kubla Khan_, and Tennyson's _Gareth and Lynette_, lines +272-274. + +19. =rampired=. Furnished with _ramparts_. + +23. The reference is to St. Peter's in Rome. + +The musician's imagination takes fire from his playing, and his music +seems like a glorious palace which he is building. The notes are +conceived as spirits doing his bidding (stanzas i-iii). As he proceeds +the images change, and heaven and earth seem to unite with him in his +creative activity: light flashes forth, and heaven and earth draw +nearer together. Now he sees the past, the beginnings of things, +and the future; even the dead are back again in his presence. His +imagination has anulled time and space. As he thinks of his art, it +seems more glorious to him than painting and poetry: these work by +laws that can be explained and followed, while music is a direct +expression of the will, an act of higher creative power. + +When the music ends he cannot be consoled by the thought that as good +music will come again. So he turns to the one unchanging thing, "the +ineffable Name." Thus he gains confidence to say, "there shall never +be one lost good." All failure and all evil are but a prelude to the +good that shall in the end prevail. So he returns in hope and patience +to the C major, the common chord of life. + +ART VOGLER is famous, not only for its confident optimism, but as +an example of Browning's power of annexing a new domain--that of +music--to poetry. + +Where does the musician cease to speak of Solomon's building and begin +to describe his own? Note, in stanza ii, how he speaks first of the +"keys," and afterwards has in mind the notes; how he speaks of the +bass notes as the foundation, and the upper notes as the structure. +Where is the climax of his creative vision? What does he mean in line +40? Is he right in saying music is less subject to laws than poetry +and painting? Why is he sad when his music ceases? Why does he turn to +God for consolation? Follow carefully the argument in stanza ix. Is +it convincing? What analogy does he find between music, and good and +evil? + + +RABBI BEN EZRA. (PAGE 133.) + +Abraham Ben Meir Ben Ezra, into whose mouth Browning puts the +reflections in this poem, was born in Toledo, Spain, in 1090, and +died about 1168. He was distinguished as philosopher, astronomer, +physician, and poet. The ideas of the poem are drawn largely from the +writings of Rabbi Ben Ezra. See Berdoe's _Browning Cyclopaedia_. + +1. =Grow old along with me=. Come, and let us talk of old age. + +7-15. =Not that=. Connect "not that" of lines 7 and 10, and the "not +for, etc.," of 13, with "Do I remonstrate" in line 15. + +29. =hold of=. Are like, share the nature of. + +39-41. Compare _A Grammarian's Funeral_. + +117. =be named=. That is, known, or distinguished. + +124. =Was I= (whom) =the world arraigned=. Browning frequently omits +the relative. + +139-144. Compare lines 36-41. Note here and elsewhere in this poem the +frequent repetition, and variation of the same idea. + +151. =Potter's wheel=. The figure of the _Potter's wheel_ is +frequent in Oriental literature. See Isaiah lxiv. 8, and Jeremiah +xviii, 2-6; see also Fitzgerald's _Rubaiyat_, stanzas xxxvii, +xxxviii, lxxxii-xc. + +169-171. In the period of youth. + +172-174. In old age. + +What cares agitate youth? Why is it better so? Wherein does man +partake of the nature of God? What plea is made for the "value and +significance of flesh"? Show how Browning denies the doctrine of +asceticism. What is meant by "the whole design," line 56? Why does +Rabbi Ben Ezra pause at the threshold of old age? What has youth +achieved? What advantage has old age? What are its pleasures? Its +employments? Explain the figure in lines 91-5. By what are the man and +his work to be judged? Compare the use of the figure of the Potter's +wheel with that in the Old Testament. What has Browning added? Point +out the element of optimism in the poem. How does its view of old age +differ from the pagan view? See Browning's _Cleon_. + + +A GRAMMARIAN'S FUNERAL. (PAGE 143.) + +The Grammarian is a type of the early scholars who gave to Europe the +treasures of Greek thought by translating the manuscripts recovered +after the fall of Constantinople. The time is therefore the +Renaissance, the latter part of the fifteenth century, and the place +probably Italy. The Grammarian was a scholar and thinker, not a mere +student of grammar in the modern sense. + +23. =Our low life=. Lacking the learning and high endeavor of their +master. + +45-46. =the world bent on escaping=. That is, the world of the past. + +48. =shaping=, their mind and character. + +97-98. Compare with lines 65-72, 77-84, and 103-4. + +129-131. The Greek particles [Greek: oti, oun, and de.] + +Describe the scene and action of the poem. Note the march-like and +irregular movement of the verse: does it fit the theme? Why do they +carry the Grammarian up from the plain? What was his work? What was +his aim? What is the value of such work (1) in presenting an ideal of +life, (2) in the history of culture? What circumstances in his life +enhance his praise? Did he make any mistake? Does Browning think +so? How does Browning defend him? What imagery in the poem seems +especially effective? Are you reminded of anything in "Rabbi Ben +Ezra"? Criticise the rhymes and metre. + + +ANDREA DEL SARTO. (PAGE 149.) + +An Italian painter, of the Florentine school; born 1487, died 1531. +His merits and defects as an artist are given in the poem. The crime +to which he is here made to refer was the use, for building himself +a house, of the money intrusted to him by the French king for the +purchase of works of art. For an account of his life and work see the +article in the _Encyclopaedia Britannica_, and Vasari's _Lives +of the Painters_. + +15. =Fiesole= (pronounced Fe-[='a]-so-l[ve]). A small Italian town +near Florence. + +119. =Rafael=. The great painter, Raphael (1483-1520). + +130. =Agnolo=. Michael Angelo (1475-1584), one of Italy's greatest +men: famous as sculptor, painter, architect, and poet. + +150. =Fontainebleau=. A town southeast of Paris, formerly the +residence of French kings, and still famous for its Renaissance +architecture and for the landscapes around it. + +241. =scudi=. The _scudo_ is an Italian silver coin worth about +one dollar. + +262. =Leonard=. Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519), another of Italy's +great men: artist, poet, musician, and scientist. + +Construct the scene and action of the poem. How does the coloring +harmonize with the artist's mood? Why is he weary? How does he think +of his art: what merit has it? What does it lack? How does he explain +this lack? What clew to it does his life afford? Is his art soulless +because he has done wrong? Or, do the lack of soul in his painting, +and the wrongdoing, and the infatuation with Lucrezia's beauty, all +arise from the same thing,--the man's own nature? Does he appeal to +your sympathy, or provoke your condemnation? Does he blame himself, or +another, or circumstances? + +What idea have you of Lucrezia? What does she think of Andrea? Of his +art? What things does he desire of her? + +What problems of life are here presented? Which is principal: the +relation of man and woman, the need of _soul_ for great work, +or the interrelation between character and achievement? Or, is there +something else for which the poem stands? + +Can you cite any lines that embody the main idea of the poem? Does +anything in it remind you of _The Grammarian_, or of _Rabbi Ben +Ezra?_ + + +CALIBAN UPON SETEBOS. (PAGE 161.) + +Setebos was the god of Caliban's mother, the witch Sycorax, on +Prospero's island. + +Read Shakespeare's _The Tempest_. Observe especially all that is +said by or about Caliban. Observe that Browning makes Caliban usually +speak of himself in the third person, and prefixes an apostrophe to +the initial verb, as in the first line. + +Tylor's _Primitive Culture_ and _Early History of Mankind_ +give interesting accounts of the religions of savages. + +How is Caliban's savage nature indicated in the opening scene? What +things does he think Setebos has made? From what motives? What limit +to the power of Setebos? Why does Caliban imagine these limits? How +does Setebos govern? Out of what materials does Caliban build his +conceptions of his deity? Why does he fear him? How does he propitiate +him? Why is he terrified at the end? Compare this passage with the +latter part of the Book of Job. What, in general, is the meaning +of the poem? Can you cite anything in the history of religions to +parallel Caliban's theology? + + +"CHILDE ROLAND TO THE DARK TOWER CAME." (PAGE 174.) + +When Browning was asked by Rev. Dr. J.W. Chadwick whether the central +idea of this poem was constancy to an ideal,--"He that endureth to the +end shall be saved,"--he answered, "Yes, just about that." + +4-5. =to afford suppression of=. To suppress. + +11. ='gin write=. Write. + +48. =its estray=. That is, Childe Roland himself. + +66. =my prisoners=. Those who had met their death on the plain? Or, +its imprisoned vegetation? + +68. =bents=. A kind of grass. + +70. =as=. As if. + +91. =Not it!= Memory did not give hope and solace. + +106. =howlet=. A small owl. + +114. =bespate=. Spattered. + +133. =cirque=. A circle or enclosure. + +137. =galley-slaves= whom =the Turk=, etc. + +140. =engine=. Machine. + +143. =Tophet=. Hell. + +160. =Apollyon=. The Devil. + +Note the hero's mood of doubt and despair. At what point in his quest +do we see him? What does he do after meeting the cripple? How does the +landscape seem as he goes on? What _moral_ quality does it seem +to have? See lines 56-75. What new elements are introduced to add to +the horror of the scene? What memories come to him of the failures of +his friends? Was their disgrace in physical or moral failure? How does +he come to find the Tower? Why does Browning represent it as a "dark +tower"? Does his courage fail at the end of his quest? Or does he win +the victory in finding the tower and blowing the challenge? + + +AN EPISTLE. (PAGE 183.) + +The Arabs were among the earliest in the cultivation of mathematical +and medical science. This fact, together with their monotheism, makes +Karshish an appropriate character for the experience of the poem. + +1-14. An ancient and oriental idea of the soul and its relation to the +body. + +15. =Sage=. Abib, to whom the letter is sent. + +17. =snake-stone=. A stone used to cure snake-bites. + +19. =charms=. Note here and elsewhere the mixture of science and +superstition. + +21-33. The poet has given local color to the journey. + +28. =Vespasian= was appointed general-in-chief against the insurgent +Jews in 67 A.D., and began the great siege of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. The +date of the poem and the length of time since Lazarus's return to +life may thus be estimated. + +37-38. Note the vividness gained by making Karshish keep the +physician's point of view. + +44. =falling-sickness ... cure=. Epilepsy. Karshish is already +admitting into his letter the story of Lazarus. + +48. Not only spiders, but many other animals or parts of animals were +formerly used as medicines. + +64-65. Karshish, still half ashamed of his interest in the marvellous +story he has to tell, first gives this as a pretext, and then, in the +next lines confesses. + +171 ff. Belief in magic survived in some degree among the educated +until a century or two ago. + +177. =Greek-fire=. A violently inflammable substance, supposed to +have been a compound of naphtha, sulphur, and nitre, which was hurled +against the enemy in battle. As it was first used in 673, in the siege +of Constantinople, Browning is guilty of an unimportant anachronism. + +252-255. A good touch, to make the earthquake mean to Karshish an omen +of the gravest event within his ken. + +268-269. Karshish, still unconvinced by the story of Lazarus, +naturally regards it as irreverent. + +304-311. This comes to Karshish as an afterthought, a corollary to the +idea in the body of the poem. + +How is the general style of the verse-letter maintained? What is +Karshish's mission in Judea? How does he show his devotion to his art? +Point out instances of local color. Are they in harmony with the main +current of the poem, or do they detract from the interest in the +story? Why does Karshish work up to his story so diffidently? Why has +the incident taken such hold upon him? What do you conceive to be his +character and worth as a man? + +What of Lazarus? What change has been wrought in him? Is he in any way +unfitted for this life? To what does Karshish compare him, with his +sudden wealth of insight behind the veil of the next world? Which of +the two men is better fitted for the condition in which he is placed? +What religious significance does the story of Lazarus come to have to +Karshish? What parallel ideas do you find in Rabbi Ben Ezra and in +this poem? Compare George Eliot's story, _The Lifted Veil_. + + +SAUL. (PAGE 196.) + +This is generally regarded as one of Browning's greatest poems. Even +his detractors concede to it beauty of form, fervor of feeling, and +richness of imagery. The incident upon which it is based is found in +1 Samuel, chapter xvi. Saul is in the depths of mental eclipse, and +David has been summoned to cure him by music. The young shepherd sings +to him first the songs that appeal to the gentle animals; then the +songs that men use in their human relationships,--songs of labor, of +the wedding-feast, of the burial-service, of worship; then he sings +the joy of physical life, ending in an appeal to the ambition of King +Saul. Saul is roused, but not yet brought to _will_ to live. So +David sings anew of the life of the spirit, the spirit of Saul living +for his people. Then a touch of tenderness from the king flashes into +David a prophetic insight: If he, the imperfect, would do so much for +love of Saul, what would God, the all-perfect, do for men? And so he +reaches the conception of the Christ, the incarnation. + +The poem is full of echoes of the Old Testament, fused with the spirit +of modern Christianity and modern thinking. It is touched here and +there with bits of beauty from Oriental landscape. The long, even +swell of the lines carries one along with no sense of the roughness so +common in Browning's verse. Rising by steady degrees to the climax, we +feel, like David, some sense of the "terrible glory," some sense of +the unseen presences that hovered around him as he made his way home +in the night. + + +ONE WORD MORE. (PAGE 224). + +_One Word More_ was appended to Browning's volume _Men and +Women_ (1855), by way of dedication of the book to his wife. It is +characteristic of its author in its reality of feeling, in its seeking +an unusual point of view, in its parenthetic and allusive style, and +its occasional high felicity of expression. Those who feel overpowered +by Browning's vigor and profundity of thought, might stop here to note +the exquisite inconsistency between the examples cited and the thing +thus illustrated. The painter turning poet, the poet turning painter, +the moon turning her unseen face to a mortal lover; these are compared +to Browning the poet,--writing another poem. The only difference in +his art is that the poet here speaks for himself in the first person, +and not, as usual, dramatically in the third person. The idea of the +poem may be found, stripped of digression and fanciful comparisons, in +the eighth, twelfth, fourteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth stanzas. +Something of the same idea appears in _My Star_. + +5. =Rafael,= etc. More commonly spelled Raphael. Born in Italy in +1483, died in 1520; generally regarded as the greatest of painters. +The Sistine Madonna, at Dresden, is considered his greatest work. See +lines 21-24. + +Only four of his sonnets exist. A translation of these is given in +Cooke's _Guide Book to Browning_. There is no authentic record of +such a "century of sonnets" having ever existed. + +10. Tradition is dim and uncertain as to the identity of this love of +Raphael's. + +27. =Guido Reni= (1576-1642). A celebrated Italian painter. Berdoe +says that the volume owned by Guido Reni was a collection of a hundred +drawings by Raphael. + +32-33. =Dante= (1265-1321). The greatest of Italian poets. His +_Divina Commedia_, consisting of the _Inferno_, _Purgatorio_, +and _Paradiso_, is his most famous work. His romantic passion +for Beatrice (pronounced B[=a]-[.a]-tr[=e]-che) is referred to in his +_Divina Commedia_, and is recounted in his _Vita Nuova_. + +37-43. In allusion to the fact that Dante freely consigned his +enemies, political and personal, living or dead, to appropriate places +in his _Inferno_ and _Purgatorio_. + +45-48. This interruption of his work is described in the thirty-fifth +section of the _Vita Nuova_. The hostile nature of the visit +seems to be of Browning's invention.--COOKE. + +57. =Bice=. Beatrice. + +74 ff. In allusion to Moses smiting the rock and bringing forth water. +See Exodus, chapter xvii. + +95. =Egypt's flesh-pots=. See Exodus, chapter xvi. + +97. =Sinai's cloven brilliance=. See Exodus, chapter six. 16-25. + +101. =Jethro's daughter=, Zipporah. See Exodus, chapters ii and xviii. + +136. =Cleon=. See the poem of that name. =Norbert=. See _In a +Balcony_. + +138. =Lippo=. See _Fra Lippo Lippi_. + +150. =Samminiato=. San Miniato, a church in Florence. + +160. =Mythos=. In reference to the myths of Endymion, the mortal +with whom the goddess Diana (the moon) fell in love. See a classical +dictionary, and Keats's poem _Endymion_. + +163. =Zoroaster=. The founder of the Persian religion. Reference is +here made to his observations of the heavenly bodies while meditating +on religious things. + +164. =Galileo= (1564-1642). The great Italian physicist and +astronomer. + +165. =Keats=. See note on line 160. + +174. =Moses, Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu=. See Exodus, chapter xxiv. + +186. Compare the idea in _My Star_. + + * * * * * + + + +[Illustration: ROBERT BROWNING.] + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Browning's Shorter Poems, by Robert Browning + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BROWNING'S SHORTER POEMS *** + +***** This file should be named 16376.txt or 16376.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/6/3/7/16376/ + +Produced by Charles Aldarondo, Keren Vergon, Lesley Halamek +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +https://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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