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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/16601-8.txt b/16601-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7a246f --- /dev/null +++ b/16601-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2926 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Death-Wake, by Thomas T Stoddart + +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: The Death-Wake + or Lunacy; a Necromaunt in Three Chimeras + +Author: Thomas T Stoddart + +Commentator: Andrew Lang + +Release Date: August 27, 2005 [EBook #16601] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DEATH-WAKE *** + + + + +Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Sankar Viswanathan and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + THE DEATH-WAKE + OR LUNACY + + A NECROMAUNT + IN THREE CHIMERAS + + + BY THOMAS T. STODDART + + + WITH AN INTRODUCTION + BY ANDREW LANG + + + + Is't like that lead contains her?... + It were too gross + To rib her cerecloth in the obscure grave. + + SHAKESPEARE + + + + + LONDON: JOHN LANE + CHICAGO: WAY & WILLIAMS + 1895 + + + + + + + +INTRODUCTION TO +THE DEATH-WAKE + + + + + +_Piscatori Piscator_ + + + + _An angler to an angler here, + To one who longed not for the bays, + I bring a little gift and dear, + A line of love, a word of praise, + A common memory of the ways, + By Elibank and Yair that lead; + Of all the burns, from all the braes, + That yield their tribute to the Tweed. + + His boyhood found the waters clean, + His age deplored them, foul with dye; + But purple hills, and copses green, + And these old towers he wandered by, + Still to the simple strains reply + Of his pure unrepining reed, + Who lies where he was fain to lie, + Like Scott, within the sound of Tweed._ + + A.L. + + + + + + +INTRODUCTION + + +The extreme rarity of _The Death-Wake_ is a reason for its +republication, which may or may not be approved of by collectors. Of +the original edition the Author says that more than seventy copies +were sold in the first week of publication, but thereafter the +publisher failed in business. Mr. Stoddart recovered the sheets of his +poem, and his cook gradually, and perhaps not injudiciously, expended +them for domestic purposes. + +Apart from its rarity, _The Death-Wake_ has an interest of its own for +curious amateurs of poetry. The year of its composition (1830) was the +great year of _Romanticisme_ in France, the year of _Hernani_, and of +Gautier's _gilet rouge_. In France it was a literary age given to +mediæval extravagance, to the dagger and the bowl, the cloak and +sword, the mad monk and the were-wolf; the age of Pétrus Borel and +MacKeat, as well as of Dumas and Hugo. Now the official poetry of our +country was untouched by and ignorant of the virtues and excesses of +1830. Wordsworth's bolt was practically shot; Sir Walter was ending +his glorious career; Shelley and Byron and Keats were dead, and the +_annus mirabilis_ of Coleridge was long gone by. Three young poets of +the English-speaking race were producing their volumes, destined at +first to temporary neglect. The year 1830 was the year of Mr. +Tennyson's _Poems, chiefly Lyrical_, his first book, not counting +_Poems by Two Brothers_. It was also the year of Mr. Browning's +_Pauline_ (rarer even than _The Death-Wake_); and it was the year +which followed the second, and perhaps the most characteristic, +poetical venture of Edgar Allan Poe. In Mr. Tennyson's early lyrics, +and in Mr. Poe's, any capable judge must have recognised new notes of +romance. Their accents are fresh and strange, their imaginations dwell +in untrodden regions. Untouched by the French romantic poets, they yet +unconsciously reply to their notes, as if some influence in the mental +air were at work on both sides of the Channel, on both sides of the +Atlantic. Now, in my opinion, this indefinite influence was also +making itself felt, faintly and dimly, in Scotland. _The Death-Wake_ +is the work of a lad who certainly had read Keats, Coleridge and +Shelley, but who is no imitator of these great poets. He has, in a few +passages, and at his best, an accent original, distinct, strangely +musical, and really replete with promise. He has a fresh unborrowed +melody and mastery of words, the first indispensable sign of a true +poet. His rhymed heroic verse is no more the rhymed heroic verse of +_Endymion_, than it is that of Mr. Pope, or of Mr. William Morris. He +is a new master of the old instrument. + +His mood is that of Scott when Scott was young, and was so anxious to +possess a death's head and cross-bones. The malady is "most incident" +to youth, but Mr. Stoddart wears his rue with a difference. The mad +monkish lover of the dead nun Agathé has hit on precisely the sort of +fantasy which was about to inspire Théophile Gautier's _Comédie de la +Mort_, or the later author of _Gaspard de la Nuit_, or Edgar Poe. +There is here no "criticism of life;" it is a criticism of strange +death; and, so far, may recall Beddoes's _Death's Jest-Book_, +unpublished, of course, in 1830. Naturally this kind of poetry is +"useless," as Mr. Ruskin says about Coleridge, but, in its _bizarre_ +way, it may be beautiful. + +The author, by a curious analogy with Théophile Gautier, was, in these +days, a humourist as well as a poet. In the midst of his mad fancies +and rare melodies he is laughing at himself, as Théophile mocked at +_Les Jeunes France_. The psychological position is, therefore, one of +the rarest. Mr. Stoddart was, first of all and before all, a hardy and +enthusiastic angler. Between 1830 and 1840 he wrote a few beautiful +angling songs, and then all the poetry of his character merged itself +in an ardent love of Nature: of hill, loch and stream--above all, of +Tweed, the fairest of waters, which he lived to see a sink of +pollution. After 1831 we have no more romanticism from Mr. Stoddart. +The wind, blowing where it listeth, struck on him as on an Æolian +harp, and "an uncertain warbling made," in the true Romantic manner. +He did write a piece with the alluring name of _Ajalon of the Winds_, +but not one line of it survives. The rest is not silence, indeed, for, +in addition to his lays of trout and salmon, of Tweed and Teviot, Mr. +Stoddart wrote a good deal of prose, and a good deal of perfectly +common and uninspired verse. The Muse, which was undeniably with him +for an hour, abandoned him, or he deserted her, being content to whip +the waters of Tweed, and Meggat, and Yarrow. Perhaps unfavourable and +unappreciative criticism, acting on a healthy and contented nature, +drove him back into the common paths of men. Whatever the cause, the +_Death-Wake_ alone (save for a few angling songs) remains to give +assurance of a poet "who died young." It is needless to rewrite the +biography, excellently done, in _Angling Songs_, by Miss Stoddart, the +poet's daughter (Blackwoods, Edinburgh, 1889). Mr. Stoddart was born +on St. Valentine's Day 1810, in Argyll Square, Edinburgh, nearly on +the site of the Kirk of Field, where Darnley was murdered. He came of +an old Border family. Miss Stoddart tells a painful tale of an aged +Miss Helen who burned family papers because she thought she was +bewitched by the seals and decorated initials. Similar follies are +reported of a living old lady, on whose hearth, after a night of +destruction, was once found the impression of a seal of Mary of +Modena. I could give only too good a guess at the _provenance_ of +_those_ papers, but nobody can interfere. Beyond 1500 the family +memories rely on tradition. The ancestors owned lands in the Forest of +Ettrick, and Williamhope, on the Tweed hard by Ashestiel. On the +Glenkinnon burn, celebrated by Scott, they hid the prophets of the +Covenant "by fifties in a cave." One Williamhope is said to have been +out at Drumclog, or, perhaps, Bothwell Brig. This laird, of enormous +strength, was called the Beetle of Yarrow, and was a friend of Murray +of Philiphaugh. His son, in the Fifteen, was out on the Hanoverian +side, which was _not_ in favour with the author of _The Death-Wake_. +He married a daughter of Veitch of The Glen, now the property of Sir +Charles Tennant. In the next generation but one, the Stoddarts sold +their lands and took to commerce, while the poet's father won great +distinction in the Navy. The great-great-grandfather of the poet +married a Miss Muir of Anniston, the family called cousins (on which +side of the blanket I know not) with Robert II. of Scotland, and, by +another line, were as near as in the sixth degree of James III. + +As a schoolboy, Mr. Stoddart was always rhyming of goblin, ghost, +fairy, and all Sir Walter's themes. At Edinburgh University he was a +pupil of Christopher North (John Wilson), who pooh-poohed _The +Death-Wake_ in _Blackwood_. He also knew Aytoun, Professor Ferrier, De +Quincey, Hartley Coleridge, and Hogg, and was one of the first guests +of Tibbie Sheils, on the spit of land between St. Mary's and the Loch +of the Lowes. In verses of this period (1827) Miss Stoddart detects +traces of Keats and Byron, but the lines quoted are much better in +_technique_ than Byron usually wrote. + +The summer of 1830 Mr. Stoddart passed in Hogg's company on Yarrow, +and early in 1831 he published _The Death-Wake_. There is no trace of +James Hogg in the poem, which, to my mind, is perfectly original. +Wilson places it "between the weakest of Shelley and the strongest of +Barry Cornwall." It is really nothing but a breath of the spirit of +romance, touching an instrument not wholly out of tune, but never to +be touched again. + +It is unnecessary to follow Mr. Stoddart through a long and happy life +of angling and of literary leisure. He only blossomed once. His poem +was plagiarised and inserted in _Graham's Magazine_, by a person named +Louis Fitzgerald Tasistro (vol. xx.). Mr. Ingram, the biographer of +Edgar Poe, observes that Poe praised the piece while he was exposing +Tasistro's "barefaced robbery." + +The copy of _The Death-Wake_ from which this edition is printed was +once the property of Mr. Aytoun, author of _Lays of the Scottish +Cavaliers_, and, I presume, of _Ta Phairshon_. Mr. Aytoun has written +a prefatory sonnet which will be found in its proper place, a set of +rhymes on the flyleaf at the end, and various cheerful but unfeeling +notes. After some hesitation I do not print these frivolities. + +The copy was most generously presented to me by Professor Knight of +St. Andrews, and I have only seen one other example, which I in turn +contributed to fill the vacant place in the shelves of Mr. Knight. His +example, however, is far the more curious of the twain, by virtue of +Aytoun's annotations. + +I had been wanting to see _The Death-Wake_ ever since, as a boy, I +read the unkind review of it in an ancient volume of _Blackwood's +Magazine_. In its "pure purple mantle" of glazed cloth, with paper +label, it is an unaffectedly neat and well-printed little volume. + +It would be unbecoming and impertinent to point out to any one who has +an ear for verse, the charm of such lines as-- + + "A murmur far and far, of those that stirred + Within the great encampment of the sea." + +Or-- + + "A love-winged seraph glides in glory by, + Striking the tent of its mortality." + +(An idea anticipated by the as yet unknown Omar Khayyam). + +Or-- + + "Dost thou, in thy vigil, hail + Arcturus in his chariot pale, + Leading him with a fiery flight + Over the hollow hill of night?" + +These are wonderful verses for a lad of twenty-one, living among +anglers, undergraduates, and, if with some society of the lettered, +apparently with none which could appreciate or applaud him. + +For the matter of the poem, the wild voyage of the mad monkish lover +with the dead Bride of Heaven, it strikes, of course, on the common +reef of the Romantic--the ridiculous. But the recurring contrasts of a +pure, clear peace in sea and sky, are of rare and atoning beauty. Such +a passage is-- + + "And the great ocean, like a holy hall, + Where slept a seraph host maritimal, + Was gorgeous with wings of diamond." + +Once more, when the mad monk tells the sea-waves + + "That ye have power and passion, and a sound + As of the flying of an angel round, + The mighty world, that ye are one with Time," + +we recognise genuine imagination. + +A sympathetic reader of _The Death-Wake_ would perhaps have expected +the leprosies and lunacies to drop off, and the genius, purged of its +accidents, to move into a pure transparency. The abnormal, the +monstrous, the boyish elements should have been burned away in the +fire of the genius of poetry. But the Muses did not so will it, and +the mystic wind of the spirit of song became of less moment to Mr. +Stoddart than the breeze on the loch that stirs the trout to feed. +Perhaps his life was none the less happy and fortunate. Of the many +brilliant men whom he knew intimately--Wilson, Aytoun, Ferrier, +Glassford Bell, and others--perhaps none, not even Hogg, recognised +the grace of the Muse which (in my poor opinion) Mr. Stoddart +possessed. His character was not in the least degree soured by neglect +or fretted by banter. Not to over-estimate oneself is a virtue very +rare among poets, and certainly does not lead to public triumphs. +Modesty is apt to accompany the sense of humour which alleviates +life, while it is an almost insuperable bar to success. + +Mr. Stoddart died on November 22nd, 1880. His last walk was to Kelso +Bridge "to look at the Tweed," which now murmurs by his grave the +self-same song that it sings beside Sir Walter's tomb in Dryburgh +Abbey. We leave his poem to the judgment of students of poetry, and to +him we say his own farewell-- + + Sorrow, sorrow speed away + To our angler's quiet mound, + With the old pilgrim, twilight grey, + Enter thou the holy ground. + + There he sleeps, whose heart was twined + With wild stream and wandering burn, + Wooer of the western wind, + Watcher of the April morn. + +A.L. + + + + +THE DEATH-WAKE + +OR LUNACY + + + + +_Sonnet to the Author_ + + _O wormy Thomas Stoddart who inheritest + Rich thoughts and loathsome, nauseous words, & rare! + Tell me, my friend, why is it that thou ferretest + And gropest in each death-corrupted lair? + Seek'st thou for maggots, such as have affinity + With those in thine own brain? or dost thou think + That all is sweet which hath a horrid stink? + Why dost thou make Hautgout thy sole divinity? + Here is enough of genius to convert + Vile dung to precious diamonds, and to spare, + Then why transform the diamond into dirt, + And change thy mind w^h. sh^d. be rich & fair + Into a medley of creations foul, + As if a Seraph would become a Goul?_ + + _W.E.A._ + +_1834_ + + + + +CHIMERA I + + + An anthem of a sister choristry! + And like a windward murmur of the sea, + O'er silver shells, so solemnly it falls! + A dying music shrouded in deep walls, + That bury its wild breathings! And the moon, + Of glow-worm hue, like virgin in sad swoon, + Lies coldly on the bosom of a cloud, + Until the elf-winds, that are wailing loud, + Do minister unto her sickly trance, + Fanning the life into her countenance; + And there are pale stars sparkling, far and few + In the deep chasms of everlasting blue, + Unmarshall'd and ungather'd, one and one, + Like outposts of the lunar garrison. + + A train of holy fathers windeth by + The arches of an aged sanctuary, + With cowl, and scapular, and rosary + On to the sainted oriel, where stood, + By the rich altar, a fair sisterhood-- + A weeping group of virgins! one or two + Bent forward to a bier, of solemn hue, + Whereon a bright and stately coffin lay, + With its black pall flung over:--Agathè + Was on the lid--a name. And who?--No more! + 'Twas only Agathè. + + 'Tis o'er, 'tis o'er,-- + Her burial! and, under the arcades, + Torch after torch into the moonlight fades; + And there is heard the music, a brief while, + Over the roofings of the imaged aisle, + From the deep organ panting out its last, + Like the slow dying of an autumn blast. + + A lonely monk is loitering within + The dusky area, at the altar seen, + Like a pale spirit kneeling in the light + Of the cold moon, that looketh wan and white + Through the deviced oriel; and he lays + His hands upon his bosom, with a gaze + To the chill earth. He had the youthful look + Which heartfelt woe had wasted, and he shook + At every gust of the unholy breeze, + That enter'd through the time-worn crevices. + + A score of summers only o'er his brow + Had pass'd--and it was summer, even now, + The one-and-twentieth--from a birth of tears, + Over a waste of melancholy years! + And _that_ brow was as wan as if it were + Of snowy marble, and the raven hair + That would have cluster'd over, was all shorn, + And his fine features stricken pale as morn. + + He kiss'd a golden crucifix that hung + Around his neck, and in a transport flung + Himself upon the earth, and said, and said + Wild, raving words, about the blessed dead: + And then he rose, and in the moonshade stood, + Gazing upon its light in solitude; + And smote his brow, at some idea wild + That came across: then, weeping like a child, + He falter'd out the name of Agathè; + And look'd unto the heaven inquiringly, + And the pure stars. + + "Oh shame! that ye are met, + To mock me, like old memories, that yet + Break in upon the golden dream I knew, + While she--_she_ lived: and I have said adieu + To that fair one, and to her sister Peace, + That lieth in her grave. When wilt thou cease + To feed upon my quiet!--thou Despair! + That art the mad usurper, and the heir, + Of this heart's heritage! Go, go--return, + And bring me back oblivion, and an urn! + And ye, pale stars, may look, and only find, + The wreck of a proud tree, that lets the wind + Count o'er its blighted boughs; for such was he + That loved, and loves, the silent Agathè!" + And he hath left the sanctuary, like one + That knew not his own purpose--The red sun + Rose early over incense of bright mist, + That girdled a pure sky of amethyst. + And who was he? A monk. And those who knew + Yclept him Julio; but they were few: + And others named him as a nameless one,-- + A dark, sad-hearted being, who had none + But bitter feelings, and a cast of sadness, + That fed the wildest of all curses--madness! + + But he was, what _none_ knew, of lordly line, + That fought in the far land of Palestine, + Where, under banners of the cross, they fell, + Smote by the armies of the infidel. + And Julio was the last; alone, alone! + A sad, unfriended orphan, that had gone + Into the world, to murmur and to die, + Like the cold breezes that are passing by! + + And few they were that bade him to their board; + His fortunes now were over, and the sword + Of his proud ancestry dishonour'd--left + To moulder in its sheath--a hated gift! + + Ay! it was so; and Julio had fain + Have been a warrior; but his very brain + Grew fever'd at the sickly thought of death, + And to be stricken with a want of breath!-- + To be the food of worms--inanimate, + And cold as winter,--and as desolate! + And then to waste away, and be no more + Than the dark dust!--The thought was like a sore + That gather'd in his heart; and he would say,-- + "A curse be on their laurels!" and decay + Came over them; the deeds that they had done + Had fallen with their fortunes; and anon + Was Julio forgotten, and his line-- + No wonder for this frenzied tale of mine! + + Oh! he was wearied of this passing scene! + But loved not death: his purpose was between + Life and the grave; and it would vibrate there, + Like a wild bird that floated far and fair + Betwixt the sun and sea! + + He went, and came, + And thought, and slept, and still awoke the same,-- + A strange, strange youth; and he would look all night + Upon the moon and stars, and count the flight + Of the sea waves, and let the evening wind + Play with his raven tresses, or would bind + Grottoes of birch, wherein to sit and sing: + And peasant girls would find him sauntering, + To gaze upon their features, as they met, + In laughter, under some green arboret. + + At last, he became monk, and, on his knees, + Said holy prayers, and with wild penances + Made sad atonement; and the solemn whim, + That, like a shadow, loiter'd over him, + Wore off, even like a shadow. He was cursed + With none of the mad thoughts that were at first + The poison of his quiet; but he grew + To love the world and its wild laughter too, + As he had known before; and wish'd again + To join the very mirth he hated then! + + He durst not break the vow--he durst not be + The one he would--and his heart's harmony + Became a tide of sorrow. Even so, + He felt hope die,--in madness and in woe! + But there came one--and a most lovely one + As ever to the warm light of the sun + Threw back her tresses,--a fair sister girl, + With a brow changing between snow and pearl, + And the blue eyes of sadness, fill'd with dew + Of tears,--like Heaven's own melancholy blue,-- + So beautiful, so tender; and her form + Was graceful as a rainbow in a storm, + Scattering gladness on the face of sorrow-- + Oh! I had fancied of the hues that borrow + Their brightness from the sun; but she was bright + In her own self,--a mystery of light! + With feelings tender as a star's own hue, + Pure as the morning star! as true, as true; + For it will glitter in each early sky, + And her first love be love that lasteth aye! + + And this was Agathè, young Agathè, + A motherless, fair girl: and many a day + She wept for her lost parent. It was sad + To see her infant sorrow; how she bade + The flow of her wild spirits fall away + To grief, like bright clouds in a summer day + Melting into a shower: and it was sad + Almost to think she might again be glad, + Her beauty was so chaste, amid the fall + Of her bright tears. Yet, in her father's hall, + She had lived almost sorrowless her days: + But he felt no affection for the gaze + Of his fair girl; and when she fondly smiled, + He bade no father's welcome to the child, + But even told his wish, and will'd it done, + For her to be sad-hearted--and a nun! + + And so it was. She took the dreary veil, + A hopeless girl! and the bright flush grew pale + Upon her cheek: she felt, as summer feels + The winds of autumn and the winter chills, + That darken his fair suns.--It was away, + Feeding on dreams, the heart of Agathè! + + The vesper prayers were said, and the last hymn + Sung to the Holy Virgin. In the dim, + Gray aisle was heard a solitary tread, + As of one musing sadly on the dead-- + 'Twas Julio; it was his wont to be + Often alone within the sanctuary; + But now, not so--another: it was she! + Kneeling in all her beauty, like a saint + Before a crucifix; but sad and faint + The tone of her devotion, as the trill + Of a moss-burden'd, melancholy rill. + + And Julio stood before her;--'twas as yet + The hour of the pale twilight--and they met + Each other's gaze, till either seem'd the hue + Of deepest crimson; but the ladye threw + Her veil above her features, and stole by + Like a bright cloud, with sadness and a sigh! + + Yet Julio still stood gazing and alone, + A dreamer!--"Is the sister ladye gone?" + He started at the silence of the air + That slumber'd over him--she is not there. + + And either slept not through the live-long night, + Or slept in fitful trances, with a bright, + Fair dream upon their eyelids: but they rose + In sorrow from the pallet of repose; + For the dark thought of their sad destiny + Came o'er them, like a chasm of the deep sea, + That was to rend their fortunes; and at eve + They met again, but, silent, took their leave, + As they did yesterday: another night, + And neither spake awhile--A pure delight + Had chasten'd love's first blushes: silently + Gazed Julio on the gentle Agathè-- + At length, "Fair Nun!"--She started, and held fast + Her bright hand on her lip--"the past, the past, + And the pale future! There be some that lie + Under those marble urns--I know not why, + But I were better in that only calm, + Than be as I have been, perhaps, and am. + The past!--ay! it hath perish'd; never, never, + Would I recall it to be blest for ever: + The future it must come--I have a vow"-- + And his cold hand rose trembling to his brow. + "True, true, I have a vow. Is not the moon + Abroad, fair Nun?"--"Indeed! so very soon?" + Said Agathè, and "I must then away."-- + "Stay, love! 'tis early yet; stay, angel, stay!" + But she was gone:--yet they met many a time + In the lone chapel, after vesper chime-- + They met in love and fear. + + One weary day, + And Julio saw not his loved Agathè; + She was not in the choir of sisterhood + That sang the evening anthem, and he stood + Like one that listen'd breathlessly awhile; + But stranger voices chanted through the aisle. + She was not there; and, after all were gone, + He linger'd: the stars came--he linger'd on, + Like a dark fun'ral image on the tomb + Of a lost hope. He felt a world of gloom + Upon his heart--a solitude--a chill. + The pale morn rose, and still, he linger'd still. + And the next vesper toll'd; nor yet, nor yet-- + "Can Agathè be faithless, and forget?" + + It was the third sad eve, he heard it said, + "Poor Julio! thy Agathè is dead," + And started. He had loiter'd in the train + That bore her to the grave: he saw her lain + In the cold earth, and heard a requiem + Sung over her--To him it was a dream! + A marble stone stood by the sepulchre; + He look'd, and saw, and started--she was there! + And Agathè had died; she that was bright-- + She that was in her beauty! a cold blight + Fell over the young blossom of her brow. + And the life-blood grew chill--She is not, now. + + She died, like zephyr falling amid flowers! + Like to a star within the twilight hours + Of morning--and she was not! Some have thought + The Lady Abbess gave her a mad draught, + That stole into her heart, and sadly rent + The fine chords of that holy instrument, + Until its music falter'd fast away, + And she--she died,--the lovely Agathè! + + Again, and through the arras of the gloom + Are the pale breezes moaning: by her tomb + Bends Julio, like a phantom, and his eye + Is fallen, as the moon-borne tides, that lie + At ebb within the sea. Oh! he is wan, + As winter skies are wan, like ages gone, + And stars unseen for paleness; it is cast, + As foliage in the raving of the blast, + All his fair bloom of thoughts! Is the moon chill, + That in the dark clouds she is mantled still? + And over its proud arch hath Heaven flung + A scarf of darkness? Agathè was young! + And there should be the virgin silver there, + The snow-white fringes delicately fair! + + He wields a heavy mattock in his hands, + And over him a lonely lanthorn stands + On a near niche, shedding a sickly fall + Of light upon a marble pedestal, + Whereon is chisel'd rudely, the essay + Of untaught tool, "Hic jacet Agathè!" + And Julio hath bent him down in speed, + Like one that doeth an unholy deed. + + There is a flagstone lieth heavily + Over the ladye's grave; I wist of three + That bore it, of a blessed verity! + But he hath lifted it in his pure madness, + As it were lightsome as a summer gladness, + And from the carved niche hath ta'en the lamp, + And hung it by the marble flagstone damp. + + And he is flinging the dark, chilly mould + Over the gorgeous pavement: 'tis a cold, + Sad grave, and there is many a relic there + Of chalky bones, which, in the wasting air, + Fell smouldering away; and he would dash + His mattock through them, with a cursed clash, + That made the lone aisle echo. But anon + He fell upon a skull,--a haggard one, + With its teeth set, and the great orbless eye + Revolving darkness, like eternity-- + And in his hand he held it, till it grew + To have the fleshy features and the hue + Of life. He gazed, and gazed, and it became + Like to his Agathè--all, all the same! + He drew it nearer,--the cold, bony thing!-- + To kiss the worm-wet lips. "Ay! let me cling-- + Cling to thee now, for ever!" but a breath + Of rank corruption from its jaws of death + Went to his nostrils, and he madly laugh'd, + And dash'd it over on the altar shaft, + Which the new risen moon, in her gray light, + Had fondly flooded, beautifully bright! + + Again he went + To his wild work, beside the monument. + "Ha! leave, thou moon! where thy footfall hath been + In sorrow amid heaven! there is sin + Under thy shadow, lying like a dew; + So come thou, from thy awful arch of blue, + Where thou art even as a silver throne + For some pale spectre-king; come thou alone, + Or bring a solitary orphan star + Under thy wings! afar, afar, afar, + To gaze upon this girl of radiancy, + In her deep slumbers--Wake thee, Agathè!" + + And Julio hath stolen the dark chest + Where the fair nun lay coffin'd, in the rest + That wakes not up at morning: she is there, + An image of cold calm! One tress of hair + Lingereth lonely on her snowy brow; + But the bright eyes are closed in darkness now; + And their long lashes delicately rest + On the pale cheek, like sun-rays in the west, + That fall upon a colourless, sad cloud. + Humility lies rudely on the proud, + But she was never proud; and there she is, + A yet unwither'd flower the autumn breeze + Hath blown from its green stem! 'T is pale, 't is pale, + But still unfaded, like the twilight veil + That falleth after sunset; like a stream + That bears the burden of a silver gleam + Upon its waters; and is even so,-- + Chill, melancholy, lustreless, and low! + + Beauty in death! a tenderness upon + The rude and silent relics, where alone + Sat the destroyer! Beauty on the dead! + The look of being where the breath is fled! + The unwarming sun still joyous in its light! + A time--a time without a day or night! + Death cradled upon Beauty, like a bee + Upon a flower, that looketh lovingly!-- + Like a wild serpent, coiling in its madness, + Under a wreath of blossom and of gladness! + + And there she is; and Julio bends o'er + The sleeping girl,--a willow on the shore + Of a Dead Sea! that steepeth its far bough + Into the bitter waters,--even now + Taking a foretaste of the awful trance + That was to pass on his own countenance! + + Yes! yes! and he is holding his pale lips + Over her brow; the shade of an eclipse + Is passing to his heart, and to his eye, + That is not tearful; but the light will die, + Leaving it like a moon within a mist,-- + The vision of a spell-bound visionist! + + He breathed a cold kiss on her ashy cheek, + That left no trace--no flush--no crimson streak, + But was as bloodless as a marble stone, + Susceptible of silent waste alone. + And on her brow a crucifix he laid-- + A jewel'd crucifix, the virgin maid + Had given him before she died. The moon + Shed light upon her visage--clouded soon, + Then briefly breaking from its airy veil, + Like warrior lifting up his aventayle. + + But Julio gazed on, and never lifted + Himself to see the broken clouds, that drifted + One after one, like infant elves at play + Amid the night-winds, in their lonely way-- + Some whistling and some moaning, some asleep, + And dreaming dismal dreams, and sighing deep + Over their couches of green moss and flowers, + And solitary fern, and heather bowers. + + The heavy bell toll'd two, and, as it toll'd, + Julio started, and the fresh-turn'd mould + He flung into the empty chasm with speed, + And o'er it dropt the flagstone. One could read + That Agathè lay there; but still the girl + Lay by him, like a precious and pale pearl, + That from the deep sea-waters had been rent-- + Like a star fallen from the firmament! + He hides the grave-tools in an aged porch, + To westward of the solitary church; + And he hath clasp'd around the melting waist + The beautiful, dead girl: his cheek is press'd + To hers--Life warming the cold chill of Death! + And over his pale palsy breathing breath + His eye is sunk upon her--"Thou must leave + The worm to waste for love of thee, and grieve + Without thee, as I may not. Thou must go, + My sweet betrothed, with me--but not below, + Where there is darkness, dream, and solitude, + But where is light, and life, and one to brood + Above thee till thou wakest--Ha! I fear + Thou wilt not wake for ever, sleeping here, + Where there are none but winds to visit thee, + And convent fathers, and a choristry + Of sisters, saying, 'Hush!'--But I will sing + Rare songs to thy pure spirit, wandering + Down on the dews to hear me; I will tune + The instrument of the ethereal moon, + And all the choir of stars, to rise and fall + In harmony and beauty musical." + + He is away--and still the sickly lamp + Is burning next the altar; there's a damp, + Thin mould upon the pavement; and, at morn, + The monks do cross them in their blessed scorn + And mutter deep anathemas, because + Of the unholy sacrilege, that was + Within the sainted chapel,--for they guess'd, + By many a vestige sad, how the dark rest + Of Agathè was broken,--and anon + They sought for Julio. The summer sun + Arose and and set, with his imperial disc + Toward the ocean-waters, heaving brisk + Before the winds,--but Julio came never: + He that was frantic as a foaming river-- + Mad as the fall of leaves upon the tide + Of a great tempest, that have fought and died + Along the forest ramparts, and doth still + In its death-struggle desperately reel + Round with the fallen foliage--he was gone, + And none knew whither. Still were chanted on + Sad masses, by pale sisters, many a day, + And holy requiems sung for Agathè! + + + + +CHIMERA II + + + A curse! a curse! the beautiful pale wing + Of a sea-bird was worn with wandering, + And, on a sunny rock beside the shore, + It stood, the golden waters gazing o'er; + And they were heaving a brown amber flow + Of weeds, that glitter'd gloriously below. + + It was the sunset, and the gorgeous hall + Of heaven rose up on pillars magical + Of living silver, shafting the fair sky + Between dark time and great eternity. + They rose upon their pedestal of sun, + A line of snowy columns! and anon + Were lost in the rich tracery of cloud + That hung along, magnificently proud, + Predicting the pure star-light, that beyond + The east was armouring in diamond + About the camp of twilight, and was soon + To marshal under the fair champion moon, + That call'd her chariot of unearthly mist, + Toward her citadel of amethyst. + + A curse! a curse! a lonely man is there + By the deep waters, with a burden fair + Clasp'd in his wearied arms--'Tis he; 'tis he + The brain-struck Julio, and Agathè! + His cowl is back--flung back upon the breeze, + His lofty brow is haggard with disease, + As if a wild libation had been pour'd + Of lightning on those temples, and they shower'd + A dismal perspiration, like a rain, + Shook by the thunder and the hurricane! + + He dropt upon a rock, and by him placed, + Over a bed of sea-pinks growing waste, + The silent ladye, and he mutter'd wild, + Strange words, about a mother, and no child. + "And I shall wed thee, Agathè! although + Ours be no God-blest bridal--even so!" + And from the sand he took a silver shell, + That had been wasted by the fall and swell + Of many a moon-borne tide into a ring-- + A rude, rude ring; it was a snow-white thing, + Where a lone hermit limpet slept and died, + In ages far away. "Thou art a bride, + Sweet Agathè! Wake up; we must not linger." + He press'd the ring upon her chilly finger, + And to the sea-bird, on its sunny stone, + Shouted, "Pale priest! thou liest all alone + Upon thy ocean altar, rise away + To our glad bridal!" and its wings of gray + All lazily it spread, and hover'd by + With a wild shriek--a melancholy cry! + Then swooping slowly o'er the heaving breast + Of the blue ocean, vanish'd in the west. + + And Julio is chanting to his bride, + A merry song of his wild heart, that died + On the soft breeze through pinks beside the sea, + All rustling in their beauty gladsomely. + + +SONG + + A rosary of stars, love! we'll count them as we go + Upon the laughing waters, that are wandering below, + And we'll o'er the pearly moon-beam, as it lieth in the sea, + In beauty and in glory, like a shadowing of thee! + + A rosary of stars, love! a prayer as we glide, + And a whisper in the wind, and a murmur on the tide! + And we'll say a fair adieu to the flowers that are seen, + With shells of silver sown in radiancy between. + + A rosary of stars, love! the purest they shall be, + Like spirits of pale pearls, in the bosom of the sea; + Now help thee, virgin mother! with a blessing as we go, + Upon the laughing waters, that are wandering below! + + He lifted the dead girl, and is away + To where a light boat, in its moorings lay, + Like a sea-cradle, rocking to the hush + Of the nurse waters. With a frantic rush + O'er the wild field of tangles he hath sped, + And through the shoaling waves that fell and fled + Upon the furrow'd beach. + + The snowy sail + Is hoisted to the gladly gushing gale, + That bosom'd its fair canvass with a breast + Of silver, looking lovely to the west; + And at the helm there sits the wither'd one, + Gazing and gazing on the sister nun, + With her fair tresses floating on his knee-- + The beautiful, death-stricken Agathè! + + Fast, fast, and far away, the bark hath stood + Out toward the great heaving solitude, + That gurgled in its deeps, as if the breath + Went through its lungs, of agony and death! + + The sun is lost within the labyrinth + Of clouds of purple and pale hyacinth, + That are the frontlet of the sister Sky + Kissing her brother Ocean; and they lie + Bathing in blushes, till the rival queen + Night, with her starry tiar, floateth in-- + A dark and dazzling beauty! that doth draw + Over the light of love a shade of awe + Most strange, that parts our wonder not the less + Between her mystery and loveliness! + + And she is there, that is a pyramid + Whereon the stars, the statues of the dead, + Are imaged over the eternal hall, + A group of radiances majestical! + And Julio looks up, and there they be, + And Agathè, and all the waste of Sea, + That slept in wizard slumber, with a shroud + Of night flung o'er his bosom, throbbing proud + Amid its azure pulses; and again + He dropt his blighted eye-orbs, with a strain + Of mirth upon the ladye:--Agathè! + Sweet bride! be thou a queen, and I will lay + A crown of sea-weed on thy royal brow; + And I will twine these tresses, that are now + Floating beside me, to a diadem; + And the sea foam will sprinkle gem on gem, + And so will the soft dews. Be thou the queen + Of the unpeopled waters, sadly seen + By star-light, till the yet unrisen moon + Issue, unveiled, from her anderoon, + To bathe in the sea fountains: let me say, + "Hail--hail to thee! thrice hail, my Agathè!" + + The warrior world was lifting to the bent + Of his eternal brow magnificent, + The fiery moon, that in her blazonry + Shone eastward, like a shield. The throbbing sea + Felt fever on his azure arteries, + That shadow'd them with crimson, while the breeze + Fell faster on the solitary sail. + But the red moon grew loftier and pale, + And the great ocean, like the holy hall, + Where slept a seraph host maritimal, + Was gorgeous, with wings of diamond + Fann'd over it, and millions beyond + Of tiny waves were playing to and fro, + All musical, with an incessant flow + Of cadences, innumerably heard + Between the shrill notes of a hermit bird, + That held a solemn paean to the moon. + + A few devotional fair clouds were soon + Breathed o'er the living countenance of Heaven, + And under the great galaxies were driven + Of stars that group'd together, and they went + Like voyagers along the firmament, + And grew to silver in the blessed light + Of the moon alchymist. It was not night, + Not the dark deathly shadow, that falls o'er + The eye-lid like a curse, but far before + In splendour, struggling through a fall of gloom, + In many a myriad gushes, that do come + Direct from the eternal stars beyond, + Like holy fountains pouring diamond! + + A sail! awake thee, Julio! a sail! + And be not bending to thy trances pale. + But he is gazing on the moonlit brow + Of his dead Agathè, and fondly now, + The light is silvering her bloodless face + And the cold grave-clothes. There is loveliness + As in a marble image, very bright! + But stricken with a phantasy of light + That is not given to the mortal hue, + To life and breathing beauty: and she too + Is more of the expressless lineament, + Than of the golden thoughts that came and went + Over her features like a living tide + No while before. + + A sail is on the wide + And moving waters, and it draweth nigh + Like a sea-cloud. The elfin billows fly + Before it, in their armories enthrall'd + Of radiant and moon-breasted emerald; + And many is the mariner that sees + The lone boat in the melancholy breeze, + Waving her snowy canvass, and anon + Their stately vessel with a gallant run + Crowds by in all her glory; but the cheer + Of men is pass'd into a sudden fear, + And whisperings, and shakings of the head-- + The moon was streaming on a virgin dead, + And Julio sat over her insane, + Like a sea demon! O'er and o'er again, + Each cross'd him, as the stately vessel stood + Far out into the murmuring solitude! + + But Julio saw not; he only heard + A rushing, like the passing of a bird, + And felt him heaving on the foam, that flew + Along the startled billows; and he knew + Of a strange sail, by broken oaths that fell + Beside him, on the coming of the swell. + + They knew thou wert a queen, my royal bride! + And made obeisance at thy holy side. + They saw thee, Agathè! and go to bring + Fair worshippers, and many a poet-king, + To utter music at thy pearly feet.-- + Now, wake thee! for the moonlight cometh sweet, + To visit in thy temple of the sea; + Thy sister moon is watching over thee! + And she is spreading a fair mantle of + Pure silver, in thy lonely palace, love!-- + Now, wake thee! for the sea-bird is aloof, + In solitude, below the starry roof; + And on its dewy plume there is a light + Of palest splendour, o'er the blessed night. + Thy spirit, Agathè!--and yet, thou art + Beside me, and my solitary heart + Is throbbing near to thee: I must not feel + The sweet notes of thy holy music steal + Into my feverous and burning brain,-- + So wake not! and I'll hush thee with a strain + Of my wild fancy, till thou dream of me, + And I be loved as I have loved thee:-- + + +SONG + + 'Tis light to love thee living, girl, when hope is full and fair, + In the springtide of thy beauty, when there is no sorrow there-- + No sorrow on thy brow, and no shadow on thy heart! + When, like a floating sea-bird, bright and beautiful thou art! + + 'Tis light to love thee living, girl--to see thee ever so, + With health, that, like a crimson flower, lies blushing in the snow; + And thy tresses falling over, like the amber on the pearl-- + Oh! true it is a lightsome thing, to love thee living, girl! + + But when the brow is blighted, like a star of morning tide, + And faded is the crimson blush upon the cheek beside; + It is to love, as seldom love, the brightest and the best, + When our love lies like a dew upon the one that is at rest. + + Because of hopes, that, fallen, are changing to despair, + And the heart is always dreaming on the ruin that is there, + Oh, true! 'tis weary, weary, to be gazing over thee, + And the light of thy pure vision breaketh never upon me! + + He lifts her in his arms, and o'er and o'er, + Upon the brow of chilliness and hoar, + Repeats a silent kiss;--along the side + Of the lone bark, he leans that pallid bride, + Until the waves do image her within + Their bosom, like a spectre--'Tis a sin + Too deadly to be shadow'd or forgiven, + To do such mockery in the sight of Heaven! + And bid her gaze into the startled sea, + And say, "Thy image, from eternity, + Hath come to meet thee, ladye!" and anon, + He bade the cold corse kiss the shadowy one, + That shook amid the waters, like the light + Of borealis in a winter night! + + And after, he did strain her sea-wet hair + Between his chilly fingers, with a stare + Of mystery, that marvell'd how that she + Had drench'd it so amid the moonlit sea. + The morning rose, with breast of living gold, + Like eastern phoenix, and his plumage roll'd + In clouds of molted brilliance, very bright! + And on the waste of waters floated light.-- + + In truth, 'twas strange to see that merry bark + Skimming the silver ocean, like a shark + At play amid the beautiful sea-green, + And all so sadly desolate within. + + And hours flew after hours, a weary length, + Until the sunlight, in meridian strength, + Threw burning floods upon the wasted brow + Of that sea-hermit mariner; and now + He felt the fire-light feed upon his brain, + And started with intensity of pain, + And wash'd him in the sea; it only brought + Wild reason, like a demon, and he thought + Strange thoughts, like dreaming men--he thought how those + Were round him he had seen, and many rose + His heart had hated; every billow threw + Features before him, and pale faces grew + Out of the sea by myriads:--the self-same + Was moulded from its image, and they came + In groups together, and all said, like one, + "Be cursed!" and vanish'd in the deep anon. + Then thirst, intolerable as the breath + Of Upas, fanning the wild wings of death, + Crept up his very gorge,--like to a snake, + That stifled him, and bade the pulses ache + Through all the boiling current of his blood. + It was a thirst, that let the fever flood + Fall over him, and gave a ghastly hue + To his cramp'd lips, until their breathing grew + White as a mist, and short, and like a sigh, + Heaved with a struggle, till it falter'd by. + + And ever he did look upon the corse + With idiot visage, like the hag Remorse + That gloateth over on a nameless deed + Of darkness and of dole unhistoried. + And were there that might hear him, they would hear + The murmur of a prayer in deep fear, + Through unbarr'd lips, escaping by the half, + And all but smother'd by a maniac laugh, + That follow'd it, so sudden and so shrill, + That swarms of sea-birds, wandering at will + Upon the wave, rose startled, and away + Went flocking, like a silver shower of spray! + And aye he called for water, and the sea + Mock'd him with his brine surges tauntingly, + And lash'd them over on his fev'rous brow, + Volleying roars of curses:--"Stay thee, now, + Avenger! lest I die; for I am worn + Fainter than star-light at the birth of morn; + Stay thee, great angel! for I am not shriven, + But frantic as thyself: Oh Heaven! Heaven! + But thou hast made me brother of the sea, + That I may tremble at his tyranny; + Or am I slave? a very, very jest + To the sarcastic waters? let me breast + The base insulters, and defy them so, + In this lone little skiff--I am your foe! + Ye raving, lion-like, and ramping seas, + That open up your nostrils to the breeze, + And fain would swallow me! Do ye not fly, + Pale, sick, and gurgling, as I pass you by?" + + "Lift up! and let me see, that I may tell + Ye can be mad, and strange, and terrible; + That ye have power, and passion, and a sound + As of the flying of an angel round + The mighty world; that ye are one with time, + And in the great primordium sublime + Were nursed together, as an infant-twain,-- + A glory and a wonder! I would fain + Hold truce, thou elder brother! for we are, + In feature, as the sun is to a star, + So are we like, and we are touch'd in tune + With lunacy as music; and the moon, + That setteth the tides sentinel before + Thy camp of waters, on the pebbled shore, + And measures their great footsteps to and fro, + Hath lifted up into my brain the flow + Of this mad tide of blood.--Ay! we are like + In foam and frenzy; the same winds do strike, + The same fierce sun-rays, from their battlement + Of fire! so, when I perish impotent + Before the night of death, they'll say of me, + He died as mad and frantic, as the sea!" + + A cloud stood for the east, a cloud like night, + Like a huge vulture, and the blessed light + Of the great sun grew shadow'd awfully: + It seem'd to mount up from the mighty sea, + Shaking the showers from its solemn wings, + And grew, and grew, and many a myriad springs, + Were on its bosom, teeming full of rain. + There fell a terrible and wizard chain + Of lightning, from its black and heated forge, + And the dark waters took it to their gorge, + And lifted up their shaggy flanks in wonder + With rival chorus to the peal of thunder, + That wheel'd in many a squadron terrible + The stern black clouds, and as they rose and fell + They oozed great showers; and Julio held up + His wasted hands, in likeness of a cup, + And drank the blessed waters, and they roll'd + Upon his cheeks like tears, but sadly cold!-- + 'Twas very strange to look on Agathè! + How the quick lightnings, in their elfin play, + Stream'd pale upon her features, and they were + Sickly, like tapers in a sepulchre! + + The ship! that self same ship, that Julio knew + Had pass'd him, with her panic-stricken crew, + She gleams amid the storm, a shatter'd thing + Of pride and lordly beauty: her fair wing + Of sail is wounded--the proud pennon gone: + Dark, dark she sweepeth like an eagle, on + Through waters that are battling to and fro, + And tossing their great giant shrouds of snow + Over her deck. Ahead, and there is seen + A black, strange line of breakers, down between + The awful surges, lifting up their manes, + Like great sea lions. Quick and high she strains + Her foaming keel--that solitary ship! + As if, in all her frenzy, she would leap + The cursed barrier; forward, fast and fast-- + Back, back she reels; her timbers and her mast + Split in a thousand shivers! A white spring + Of the exulted sea rose bantering + Over her ruin; and the mighty crew, + That mann'd her decks, were seen, a straggling few, + Far scatter'd on the surges. Julio felt + The impulse of that hour, and low he knelt, + Within his own light bark--a prayful man! + And clasp'd his lifeless bride; and to her wan, + Cold cheek did lay his melancholy brow.-- + "Save thou a mariner!" He starteth now + To hear that dying cry; and there is one, + All worn and wave-wet, by his bark anon, + Clinging, in terror of the ireful sea, + A fair hair'd mariner! But suddenly + He saw the pale dead ladye, by a flame + Of blue and livid lightning, and there came + Over his features blindness, and the power + Of his strong hands grew weak,--a giant shower + Of foam rose up, and swept him far along; + And Julio saw him buffeting the throng + Of the great eddying waters, till they went + Over him--a wind-shaken cerement! + + Then terribly he laugh'd, and rose above + His soul-less bride--the ladye of his love + Lifting him up, in all his wizard glee; + And he did wave, before the frantic sea, + His wasted arm. "Adieu! adieu! adieu! + Thou sawest how we were; thou sawest, too, + Thou wert not so; for in the inmost shrine + Of my deep heart are thoughts that are not thine. + And thou art gone, fair mariner! in foam + And music-murmurs, to thy blessed home-- + Adieu! adieu! Thou sawest how that she + Sleeps in her holy beauty, tranquilly; + And when the fair and floating vision breaks + From her pure brow, and Agathè awakes-- + Till then, we meet not; so adieu, adieu!" + Still on before the sullen tempest flew, + Fast as a meteor star, the lonely bark: + And Julio bent over to the dark, + The solitary sea, for close beside + Floated the stringed harp of one that died + In that wild shipwreck, and he drew it home, + With madness, to his bosom: the white foam + Was o'er its strings; and on the streaming sail + He wiped them, running, with his fingers pale, + Along the tuneless notes, that only gave + Seldom responses to his wandering stave! + + + + + TO THE HARP + + + I + + Jewel! that lay before the heart + Of some romantic boy, + And startled music in her home, + Of mystery and joy! + + + II + + The image of his love was there; + And, with her golden wings, + She swept her tone of sorrow from + Thy melancholy strings! + + + III + + We drew thee, as an orphan one, + From waters that had cast + No music round thee, as they went + In their pale beauty past. + + + IV + + No music but the changeless sigh-- + That murmur of their own, + That loves not blending in the thrill + Of thine aerial tone. + + + V + + The girl that slumbers at our side + Will dream how they are bent, + That love her even as they love + Thy blessed instrument. + + + VI + + And music, like a flood, will break + Upon the fairy throne + Of her pure heart, all glowing, like + A morning star, alone! + + + VII + + Alone, but for the song of him + That waketh by her side, + And strikes thy chords of silver to + His fair and sea-borne bride. + + + VIII + + Jewel! that hung before the heart + Of some romantic boy; + Like him, I sweep thee with a storm + Of music and of joy! + + And Julio placed the trembling harp before + The ladye, till the minstrel winds came o'er + Its moisten'd strings, and tuned them with a sigh. + "I hear thee, how thy spirit goeth by, + In music and in love. Oh Agathè! + Thou sleepest long, long, long; and they will say + That seek thee,--'She is dead--she is no more!' + But thou art cold, and I will throw before + Thy chilly brow the pale and snowy sheet." + And he did lift it from her marble feet, + The sea-wet shroud! and flung it silently + Over her brow--the brow of Agathè! + + But, as a passion from the mooded mind, + The storm had died, and wearily the wind + Fell fast asleep at evening, like one + That hath been toiling in the fiery sun. + And the white sail dropt downward, as the wing + Of wounded sea-bird, feebly murmuring + Unto the mast. It was a deathly calm, + And holy stillness, like a shadow, swam + All over the wide sea, and the boat stood. + Like her of Sodom, in the solitude, + A snowy pillar, looking on the waste. + And there was nothing but the azure breast + Of ocean and the sky--the sea and sky, + And the lone bark; no clouds were floating by + Where the sun set, but his great seraph light, + Went down alone, in majesty and might; + And the stars came again, a silver troop, + Until, in shame, the coward shadows droop + Before the radiance of these holy gems, + That bear the images of diadems! + + And Julio fancied of a form that rose + Before him from the desolate repose + Of the deep waters--a huge ghastly form, + As of one lightning-stricken in a storm; + And leprosy cadaverous was hung + Before his brow, and awful terror flung + Around him like a pall--a solemn shroud!-- + A drapery of darkness and of cloud! + And agony was writhing on his lip, + Heart-rooted, awful agony and deep, + Of fevers, and of plagues, and burning blain, + And ague, and the palsy of the brain-- + A wierd and yellow spectre! And his eyes + Were orbless and unpupil'd, as the skies + Without the sun, or moon, or any star: + And he was like the wreck of what men are,-- + A wasted skeleton, that held the crest + Of Time, and bore his motto on his breast! + + There came a group before of maladies, + And griefs, and Famine empty as a breeze,-- + A double monster, with a gloating leer + Fix'd on his other half. They drew them near, + One after one, led onward by Despair, + That like the last of winter glimmer'd there,-- + A dismal prologue to his brother Death, + Which was behind, and, with the horrid breath + Of his wide baneful nostrils, plied them on. + And often as they saw the skeleton + Grisly beside them, the wild phantasies + Grew mad and howl'd; the fever of disease + Became wild frenzy--very terrible! + And, for a hell of agony--a hell + Of rage, was there, that fed on misty things, + On dreams, ideas, and imaginings. + + And some were raving on philosophy, + And some on love, and some on jealousy, + And some upon the moon; and these were they + That were the wildest; and anon alway + Julio knew them by a something dim + About their wasted features like to him! + + But Death was by, like shell of pyramid + Among old obelisks, and his eyeless head + Shook o'er the wiery ribs, where darkness lay + The image of a heart--He is away! + And Julio is watching, like Remorse, + Over the pale and solitary corse! + + Shower soft light, ye stars, that shake the dew + From your eternal blossoms! and thou, too, + Moon! minded of thy power, tide-bearing queen! + That hast a slave and votary within + The great rock-fetter'd deeps, and hearest cry + To thee the hungry surges, rushing by + Like a vast herd of wolves,--fall full and fair + On Julio as he sleepeth, even there, + Amid the suppliant bosom of the sea!-- + Sleep! dost thou come, and on thy blessed knee + With hush and whisper lull the troubled brain + Of this death-lover?--Still the eyes do strain + Their orbs on Agathè--those raven eyes! + All earnest on the ladye as she lies + In her white shroud. They see not, though they are + As if they saw; no splendour like a star + Is under their dark lashes: they are full + Of dream and slumber--melancholy, dull! + + * * * * * + + A wide, wide sea! and on its rear and van + Amid the stars, the silent meteors ran + All that still night, and Julio with a cry + Woke up, and saw them flashing fiercely by. + + * * * * * + + Full three times three, its awful veil of night + Hath Heaven hung before the blessed light; + And a fair breeze falls o'er the sleeping sea, + Where Julio is watching Agathè! + By sun and darkness hath he bent him over-- + A mad, moon-stricken, melancholy lover! + + And hardly hath he tasted, night or day, + Of drink or food, because of Agathè! + He sitteth in a dull and dreary mood, + Like statue in a ruin'd solitude, + Bearing the brent of sunlight and of shade + Over the marble of some colonnade. + + The ladye, she hath lost the pearly hue + Upon her gorgeous brow, where tresses grew + Luxuriantly as thoughts of tenderness, + That once were floating in the pure recess + Of her bright soul. These are not as they were, + But are as weeds above a sepulchre, + Wild waving in the breeze: her eyes are now + Sunk deeply under the discolour'd brow, + That is of sickly yellow, and pale blue, + Unnaturally blending. The same hue + Is on her cheek: it is the early breath + Of cold Corruption, the ban dog of Death, + Falling upon her features.--Let it be, + And gaze awhile on Julio, as he + Is gazing on the corse of Agathè! + + In truth, he seemeth like no living one, + But is the image of a skeleton: + A fearful portrait from the artist tool + Of Madness--terrible and wonderful! + + There was no passion there--no feeling traced + Under those eyelids, where had run to waste, + All that was wild, or beautiful, or bright; + A very cloud was cast upon their light, + That gave to them the heavy hue of lead; + And they were lorn, and lustreless, and dead! + He sate like vulture from the mountains gray, + Unsated, that had flown full many a day + O'er distant land and sea, and was in pride + Alighted by the lonely ladye's side. + + He sate like winter o'er the wasted year-- + Like melancholy winter, drawing near + To its own death.--"Oh me! the worm, at last, + Will gorge upon me, and the autumn blast + Howl by!--Where?--where?--there is no worm to creep + Amid the waters of the lonely deep; + But I will take me Agathè upon + This sorrowful, sore bosom, and anon, + Down, down, through azure silence, we shall go, + Unepitaph'd, to cities far below; + Where the sea triton, with his winding shell, + Shall sound our blessed welcome. We shall dwell + With many a mariner in his pearly home, + In bowers of amber weed and silver foam, + Amid the crimson corals; we shall be + Together, Agathè! fair Agathè!-- + But thou art sickly, ladye--thou art sad; + And I am weary, ladye--I am mad! + They bring no food to feed us, and I feel + A frost upon my vitals, very chill, + Like winter breaking on the golden year + Of life. This bark shall be our floating bier, + And the dark waves our mourners; and the white, + Pure swarm of sunny sea birds, basking bright + On some far isle, shall sorrowfully pour + Their wail of melancholy o'er and o'er, + At evening, on the waters of the sea,-- + While, with its solemn burden, silently, + Floats forward our lone bark.--Oh, Agathè! + Methinks that I shall meet thee far away, + Within the awful centre of the earth, + Where, earliest, we had our holy birth-- + In some huge cavern, arching wide below, + Upon whose airy pivot, years ago, + The world went round: 'tis infinitely deep, + But never dismal; for above it sleep, + And under it, blue waters, hung aloof, + And held below,--an amethystine roof, + A sapphire pavement; and the golden sun, + Afar, looks through alternately, like one + That watches round some treasure: often, too, + Through many a mile of ocean, sparkling through, + Are seen the stars and moon, all gloriously, + Bathing their angel brilliance in the sea!" + + "And there are shafted pillars, that beyond, + Are ranged before a rock of diamond, + Awfully heaving its eternal heights, + From base of silver strewn with chrysolites; + And over it are chasms of glory seen, + With crimson rubies clustering between, + On sward of emerald, with leaves of pearl, + And topazes hung brilliantly on beryl. + So Agathè!--but thou art sickly sad, + And tellest me, poor Julio is mad-- + Ay, mad!--was he not madder when he sware + A vow to Heaven? was there no madness there, + That he should do--for why?--a holy string + Of penances? No penances will bring + The stricken conscience to the blessed light + Of peace,--Oh! I am lost, and there is night, + Despair and darkness, darkness and despair, + And want, that hunts me to the lion-lair + Of wild perdition: and I hear them all-- + All cursing me! The very sun-rays fall + In curses, and the shadow of the moon, + And the pale star light, and the winds that tune + Their voices to the music of the sea,-- + And thou,--yes, thou! my gentle Agathè!-- + All curse me!--Oh! that I were never, never!-- + Or but a breathless fancy, that was ever + Adrift upon the wilderness of Time, + That knew no impulse, but was left sublime + To play at its own will!--that I were hush'd + At night by silver cataracts, that gush'd + Through flowers of fairy hue, and then to die + Away, with all before me passing by, + Like a fair vision I had lived to see, + And died to see no more!--It cannot be! + By this right hand! I feel it is not so, + And by the beating of a heart below, + That strangely feareth for eternity!" + + He said, and gazing on the lonely sea, + Far off he saw, like an ascending cloud, + To westward, a bright island, lifted proud + Amid the struggling waters, and the light + Of the great sun was on its clifted height, + Scattering golden shadow, like a mirror; + But the gigantic billows sprung in terror + Upon its rock-built and eternal shore, + With silver foams that fell in fury o'er + A thousand sunny breakers. Far above, + There stood a wild and solitary grove + Of aged pines, all leafless but their brows, + Where a green group of tempest-stricken boughs + Was waving now and then, and to and fro, + And the pale moss was clustering below. + + Then Julio saw, and bent his head away + To the cold wasted corse of Agathè, + And sigh'd; but ever he would turn again + A gaze to that green island on the main. + + The bark is drifting through the surf, beside + Its rocks of gray upon the coming tide; + And lightly is it stranded on the shore + Of pure and silver shells, that lie before, + Glittering in the glory of the sun; + And Julio hath landed him, like one + That aileth of some wild and weary pest; + And Agathè is folded on his breast,-- + A faded flower! with all the vernal dews + From its bright blossom shaken, and the hues + Become as colourless as twilight air-- + I marvel much, that she was ever fair! + + + + + CHIMERA III + + + Another moon! and over the blue night + She bendeth, like a holy spirit bright, + Through stars that veil them in their wings of gold; + As on she floateth with her image cold + Enamell'd on the deep. A sail of cloud + Is to her left, majestically proud! + Trailing its silver drapery away + In thin and fairy webs, that are at play + Like stormless waves upon a summer sea + Dragging their length of waters lazily. + + Ay! to the rocks! and thou wilt see, I wist, + A lonely one, that bendeth in the mist + Of moonlight, with a wild and raven pall + Flung round him. Is he mortal man at all? + For, by the meagre fire-light that is under + Those eyelids, and the vizor shade of wonder + Falling upon his features, I would guess, + Of one that wanders out of blessedness! + Julio! raise thee!--By the holy mass! + I wot not of the fearless one would pass + Thy wizard shadow. Where the raven hair + Was shorn before, in many a matted layer + It lieth now; and on a rock beside + The sea, like merman at the ebb of tide, + Feasting his wondrous vision on Decay, + So art thou gazing over Agathè! + + Ah me! but this is never the fair girl, + With brow of light, as lovely as a pearl, + That was as beautiful as is the form + Of sea-bird at the breaking of a storm. + The eye is open, with convulsive strain-- + A most unfleshly orb! the stars that wane + Have nothing of its hue; for it is cast + With sickly blood, and terribly aghast! + And sunken in its socket, like the light + Of a red taper in the lonely night! + And there is not a braid of her bright hair + But lieth floating in the moonlight air, + Like the long moss, beside a silver spring, + In elfin tresses, sadly murmuring. + The worm hath 'gan to crawl upon her brow-- + The living worm! and with a ripple now, + Like that upon the sea, are heard below, + The slimy swarms all ravening as they go, + Amid the stagnate vitals, with a rush; + And one might hear them echoing the hush + Of Julio, as he watches by the side + Of the dead ladye, his betrothed bride! + + And, ever and anon, a yellow group + Was creeping on her bosom, like a troop + Of stars, far up amid the galaxy, + Pale, pale, as snowy showers; and two or three + Were mocking the cold finger, round and round, + With likeness of a ring; and, as they wound + About its bony girth, they had the hue + Of pearly jewels glistering in dew. + That deathly stare! it is an awful thing + To gaze upon; and sickly thoughts will spring + Before it to the heart: it telleth how + There must be waste where there is beauty now. + The chalk! the chalk! where was the virgin snow + Of that once heaving bosom!--even so,-- + The cold pale dewy chalk, with yellow shade + Amid the leprous hues; and o'er it played + The straggling moonlight, and the merry breeze, + Like two fair elves, that, by the murmuring seas, + Woo'd smilingly together; but there fell + No life-gleam on the brow, all terrible + Becoming, through its beauty, like a cloud + That waneth paler even than a shroud, + All gorgeous and all glorious before; + For waste, like to the wanton night, was o'er + Her virgin features, stealing them away-- + Ah me! ah me! and this is Agathè? + + "Enough! enough! Oh God! but I have pray'd + To thee, in early daylight and in shade, + And the mad curse is on me still--and still! + I cannot alter the Eternal will-- + But--but--I hate thee, Agathè! I hate + What lunacy hath bade me consecrate: + I am _not_ mad!--_not now!_--I do not feel + That slumberous and blessed opiate steal + Up to my brain--Oh! that it only would, + To people this eternal solitude + With fancies, and fair dreams, and summer mirth, + Which is not now--And yet, my mother earth, + I would not love to lie above thee so, + As Agathè lies there--oh! no! no! no! + To have these clay-worms feast upon my heart! + And all the light of being, to depart + Into a dismal shadow! I could die + As the red lightnings, quenching amid sky + Their wild and wizard breath; I could away, + Like a blue billow, bursting into spray; + But, never--never have corruption here, + To feed her worms, and let the sunlight jeer + Above me so.--'Tis thou!--I owe thee, Moon, + To-night's fair worship; so be lifting soon + Thy veil of clouds, that I may kneel, as one + That seeketh for thy virgin benison!" + + He gathers the cold limpets, as they creep + On the grey rocks beside the lonely deep; + And with a flint breaks through into the shell, + And feeds him--by the mass! he feasteth well. + And he hath lifted water in a clam, + And tasted sweetly, from a stream that swam + Down to the sea; and now is turn'd away, + Again, again, to gaze on Agathè! + + There is a cave upon that isle--a cave + Where dwelt a hermit man; the winter wave + Roll'd to its entrance, casting a bright mound + Of snowy shells and fairy pebbles round; + And over were the solemn ridges strewn + Of a dark rock, that, like the wizard throne + Of some sea-monarch, stood, and from it hung + Wild thorn and bramble, in confusion flung + Amid the startling crevices--like sky, + Through gloom of clouds, that sweep in thunder by. + A cataract fell over, in a streak + Of silver, playing many a wanton freak; + Midway, and musical, with elfin glee + It bounded in its beauty to the sea, + Like dazzling angel vanishing away. + In sooth, 'twas pleasant in the moonlight gray + To see that fairy fountain leaping so, + Like one that knew not wickedness nor woe! + + The hermit had his cross and rosary; + I ween like other hermits, so was he; + A holy man, and frugal, and at night + He prayed, or slept, or, sometimes, by the light + Of the fair moon, went wandering beside + The lonely sea, to hear the silver tide + Rolling in gleesome music to the shore: + The more he heard, he loved to hear the more. + And there he is, his hoary beard adrift + To the night winds, that sportingly do lift + Its snow-white tresses; and he leaneth on + A rugged staff, all weakly and alone, + A childless, friendless man! + + He is beside + The ghastly Julio, and his ghastlier bride. + 'Twas wondrous strange to gaze upon the two! + And the old hermit felt a throbbing through + His pulses:--"Holy virgin! save me, save!" + He deem'd of spectre from the midnight wave, + And cross'd him thrice, and pray'd, and pray'd again:-- + "Hence! hence!" and Julio started, as the strain + Of exorcisms fell faintly on his ear:-- + "I knew thee, father, that thou beest here, + To gaze upon this girl, as I have been. + By yonder moon! it was a frantic sin + To worship so an image of the clay; + It was like beauty--but is now away-- + What lived upon her features, like the light + On yonder cloud, all tender and all bright; + But it is faded as the other must, + And she that was all beauty, is all dust." + + "Father! thy hand upon this brow of mine, + And tell me, is it cold?--But she will twine + No wreath upon these temples,--never, never! + For there she lieth, like a streamless river + That stagnates in its bed. Feel, feel me, here, + If I be madly throbbing in the fear + For that cold slimy worm. Ay! look and see + How dotingly it feeds, how pleasantly! + And where it is, have been the living hues + Of beauty, purer than the very dews. + So, father! seest thou that yonder moon + Will be on wane to-morrow, soon and soon? + And I, that feel my being wear away, + Shall droop beside to darkness; so, but say + A prayer for the dead, when I am gone, + And let the azure tide that floweth on + Cover us lightly with its murmuring surf + Like a green sward of melancholy turf. + Thou mayest, if thou wilt, thou mayest rear + A cenotaph on this lone island here, + Of some rude mossy stone, below a tree, + And carve an olden rhyme for her and me + Upon its brow." + + He bends, and gazes yet + Before his ghastly bride! the anchoret + Sate by him, and hath press'd a cross of wood + To his wan lips. + + * * * * * + + "My son! look up and tell thy dismal tale. + Thou seemest cold, and sorrowful, and pale. + Alas! I fear but thou hast strangely been + A child of curse, and misery, and sin. + And this--is she thy sister?"--"Nay! my bride." + "A nun! and thou:"--"True, true! but then she died, + And was a virgin, and is virgin still, + Chaste as the moon, that taketh her pure fill + Of light from the great sun. But now, go by, + And leave me to my madness, or to die! + This heart, this brain are sore.--Come, come, and fold + Me round, ye hydra billows! wrapt in gold, + That are so writhing your eternal gyres + Before the moon, which, with a myriad tiars + Is crowning you, as ye do fall and kiss + Her pearly feet, that glide in blessedness! + Let me be torture-eaten, ere I die! + Let me be mangled sore with agony! + And be so cursed, so stricken by the spell + Of my heart's frenzy, that a living hell + Be burning there!--Back! back! if thou art mad-- + Methought thou wast, but thou art only sad. + Is this thy child, old man? look, look, and see! + In truth it is a piteous thing for thee + To become childless--Well-a-well, go by! + Is there no grave? The quiet sea is nigh, + And I will bury her below the moon; + It may be but a trance or midnight swoon, + And she may wake. Wake, ladye! ha! methought + It was like _her_--Like her! and is it not? + My angel girl! my brain, my stricken brain!-- + I know thee now!--I know myself again." + + He flings him on the ladye, and anon, + With loathly shudder, from that wither'd one + Hath torn him back. "Oh me! no more--no more! + Thou virgin mother! Is the dream not o'er, + That I have dreamt, but I must dream again + For moons together, till this weary brain + Become distemper'd as the winter sea? + Good father! give me blessing; let it be + Upon me as the dew upon the moss. + Oh me! but I have made the holy cross + A curse, and not a blessing! let me kiss + The sacred symbol; for, by this--by this! + I sware, and sware again, as now I will-- + Thou Heaven! if there be bounty in thee still, + If thou wilt hear, and minister, and bring + The light of comfort on some angel wing + To one that lieth lone, do--do it now; + By all the stars that open on thy brow + Like silver flowers! and by the herald moon + That listeth to be forth at nightly noon, + Jousting the clouds, I swear! and be it true, + As I have perjured me, that I renew + Allegiance to thy God, and bind me o'er + To this same penance, I have done before! + That night and day I watch, as I have been + Long watching, o'er the partner of my sin! + That I taste never the delight of food, + But these wild shell-fish, that may make the mood + Of madness stronger, till it grapple Death-- + Despair--Eternity!" + + He saith, he saith, + And, on the jaundiced bosom of the corse, + Lieth all frenzied; one would see Remorse, + And hopeless Love, and Hatred, struggling there, + And Lunacy, that lightens up Despair, + And makes a gladness out of agony. + Pale phantom! I would fear and worship thee, + That hast the soul at will, and gives it play, + Amid the wildest fancies far away; + That thronest Reason, on some wizard throne + Of fairy land, within the milky zone,-- + Some spectre star, that glittereth beyond + The glorious galaxies of diamond. + + Beautiful Lunacy! that shapest flight + For love to blessed bowers of delight, + And buildest holy monarchies within + The fancy, till the very heart is queen + Of all her golden wishes. Lunacy! + Thou empress of the passions! though they be + A sister group of wild, unearthly forms, + Like lightnings playing in their home of storms! + I see thee, striking at the silver strings + Of the pure heart, and holy music springs + Before thy touch, in many a solemn strain, + Like that of sea-waves rolling from the main! + + But say, is Melancholy by thy side, + With tresses in a raven shower, that hide + Her pale and weeping features? Is she never + Flowing before thee, like a gloomy river, + The sister of thyself? but cold and chill, + And winter-born, and sorrowfully still, + And not like thee, that art in merry mood, + And frolicksome amid thy solitude! + + Fair Lunacy! I see thee, with a crown + Of hawthorn and sweet daisies, bending down + To mirror thy young image in a spring; + And thou wilt kiss that shadow of a thing + As soul-less as thyself. 'Tis tender, too, + The smile that meeteth thine! the holy hue + Of health! the pearly radiance of the brow! + All, all as tender--beautiful as thou! + + And wilt thou say, my sister, there is none + Will answer thee? Thou art--thou art alone, + A pure, pure being! but the God on high + Is with thee ever, as thou goest by. + + Thou poetess! that harpest to the moon, + And, in soft concert to the silver tune + Of waters, play'd on by the magic wind, + As he comes streaming, with his hair untwined, + Dost sing light strains of melody and mirth,-- + I hear thee, hymning on thy holy birth, + How thou wert moulded of thy mother Love, + That came, like seraph, from the stars above, + And was so sadly wedded unto Sin, + That thou wert born, and Sorrow was thy twin. + Sorrow and mirthful Lunacy! that be + Together link'd for time, I deem of ye + That ye are worshipp'd as none others are,-- + One as a lonely shadow, one a star! + + Is Julio glad, that bendeth, even now, + To his wild purpose, to his holy vow? + He seeth only in his ladye-bride + The image of the laughing girl, that died + A moon before--The same, the very same-- + The Agathè that lisp'd her lover's name, + To him and to her heart: that azure eye, + That shone through sunny tresses, waving by; + The brow, the cheek, that blush'd of fire and snow, + Both blending into one ethereal glow; + And that same breathing radiancy, that swam + Around her, like a pure and blessed calm + Around some halcyon bird. And, as he kiss'd + Her wormy lips, he felt that he was blest! + He felt her holy being stealing through + His own, like fountains of the azure dew, + That summer mingles with his golden light; + And he would clasp her, till the weary night + Was worn away. + + * * * * * + + And morning rose in form + Of heavy clouds, that knitted into storm + The brow of Heaven, and through her lips the wind + Came rolling westward, with a track behind + Of gloomy billows, bursting on the sea, + All rampant, like great lions terribly, + And gnashing on each other: and anon, + Julio heard them, rushing one by one, + And laugh'd and turn'd.--The hermit was away, + For he was old and weary, and he lay + Within his cave, and thought it was a dream, + A summer's dream? and so the quiet stream + Of sleep came o'er his eyelids, and in truth + He dreamt of that strange ladye, and the youth + That held a death-wake on her wasting form; + And so he slept and woke not, till the storm + Was over. + + But they came,--the wind and sea, + And rain and thunder, that in giant glee, + Sang o'er the lightnings pale, as to and fro + They writhed, like stricken angels!--White as snow + Roll'd billow after billow, and the tide + Came forward as an army deep and wide, + To charge with all its waters. There was heard + A murmur far and far, of those that stirr'd + Within the great encampment of the sea, + And dark they were, and lifted terribly + Their water-spouts like banners. It was grand + To see the black battalions, hand in hand + Striding to conflict, and their helmets bent + Below their foamy plumes magnificent! + + And Julio heard and laugh'd, "Shall I be king + To your great hosts, that ye are murmuring + For one to bear you to your holy war? + There is no sun, or moon, or any star, + To guide your iron footsteps as ye go; + But I, your king, will marshal you to flow + From shore to shore. Then bring my car of shell, + That I may ride before you terrible; + And bring my sceptre of the amber weed, + And Agathè, my virgin bride, shall lead + Your summer hosts, when these are ambling low, + In azure and in ermine, to and fro." + He said, and madly, with his wasted hand, + Swept o'er the tuneless harp, and fast he spann'd + The silver chords, until a rush of sound + Came from them, solemn--terrible--profound; + And then he dash'd the instrument away + Into the waters, and the giant play + Of billows threw it back unto the shore, + A shiver'd, stringless frame--its day of music o'er! + The tide, the rolling tide! the multitude + Of the sea surges, terrible and rude, + Tossing their chalky foam along the bed + Of thundering pebbles, that are shoring dread, + And fast retreating to the gloomy gorge + Of waters, sounding like a Titan forge! + + It comes! it comes! the tide, the rolling tide! + But Julio is bending to his bride, + And making mirthful whispers to her ear. + A cataract! a cataract is near, + Of one stupendous billow, and it breaks + Terribly furious, with a myriad flakes + Of foam, that fly about the haggard twain; + And Julio started, with a sudden pain, + That shot into his heart; his reason flew + Back to its throne; he rose, and wildly threw + His matted tresses over on his brow. + Another billow came, and even now + Was dashing at his feet. There was no shade + Of terror, as the serpent waters play'd + Before him, but his eye was calm as death. + Another, yet another! and the breath + Of the weird wind was with it; like a rock + Unriveted it fell--a shroud of smoke + Pass'd over--there was heard, and died away, + The voice of one, shrill shrieking, "Agathè!" + + The sea-bird sitteth lonely by the side + Of the far waste of waters, flapping wide + His wet and weary wings; but _he_ is gone, + The stricken Julio!--a wave-swept stone + Stands there, on which he sat, and nakedly + It rises looking to the lonely sea; + But Julio is gone, and Agathè! + The waters swept them madly to their core,-- + The dead and living with a frantic roar! + And so he died, his bosom fondly set + On her's; and round her clay-cold waist were met + His bare and wither'd arms, and to her brow + His lips were press'd. Both, both are perish'd now! + + He died upon her bosom in a swoon; + And fancied of the pale and silver moon, + That went before him in her hall of blue: + He died like golden insect in the dew, + Calm, calm, and pure; and not a chord was rung + In his deep heart, but love. He perish'd young, + But perish'd, wasted by some fatal flame + That fed upon his vitals; and there came + Lunacy sweeping lightly, like a stream, + Along his brain--He perish'd in a dream! + + In sooth, I marvel not, + If death be only a mysterious thought, + That cometh on the heart, and turns the brow + Brightless and chill, as Julio's is now; + For only had the wasting struggle been + Of one wild feeling, till it rose within + Into the form of death, and nature felt + The light of the immortal being melt + Into its happier home, beyond the sea, + And moon, and stars, into eternity! + + The sun broke through his dungeon long enthrall'd + By dismal cloud, and on the emerald + Of the great living sea was blazing down, + To gift the lordly billows with a crown + Of diamond and silver. From his cave + The hermit came, and by the dying wave + Lone wander'd, and he found upon the sand, + Below a truss of sea-weed, with his hand + Around the silent waist of Agathè, + The corse of Julio! Pale, pale, it lay + Beside the wasted girl. The fireless eye + Was open, and a jewell'd rosary + Hung round the neck; but it was gone,--the cross + That Agathè had given. + + Amid the moss, + The hermit scoop'd a solitary grave + Below the pine-trees, and he sang a stave, + Or two, or three, of some old requiem + As in their narrow home he buried them. + And many a day, before that blessed spot + He sate, in lone and melancholy thought, + Gazing upon the grave; and one had guess'd + Of some dark secret shadowing his breast. + And yet, to see him, with his silver hair + Adrift and floating in the sea-borne air, + And features chasten'd in the tears of woe, + In sooth 'twas merely sad to see him so! + A wreck of nature, floating far and fast, + Upon the stream of Time--to sink at last! + + And he is wandering by the shore again, + Hard leaning on his staff; the azure main + Lies sleeping far before him, with his seas + Fast folded in the bosom of the breeze, + That like the angel Peace hath dropt his wings + Around the warring waters. Sadly sings + To his own heart that lonely hermit man, + A tale of other days, when passion ran + Along his pulses, like a troubled stream, + And glory was a splendour, and a dream! + He stoop'd to gather up a shining gem, + That lay amid the shells, as bright as them,-- + It was a cross, the cross that Agathè + Had given to her Julio: the play + Of the fierce sunbeams fell upon its face, + And on the glistering jewels--But the trace + Of some old thought came burning to the brain + Of the pale hermit, and he shrunk in pain + Before the holy symbol. It was not + Because of the eternal ransom wrought + In ages far away, or he had bent + In pure devotion sad and reverent; + But now, he started, as he look'd upon + That jewell'd thing, and wildly he is gone + Back to the mossy grave, away, away:-- + "My child! my child! my own, own Agathè!" + + It is her father,--he,--an alter'd man! + His quiet had been wounded, and the ban + Of misery came over him, and froze + The bright and holy tides, that fell and rose + In joy amid his heart. To think of her, + That he had injured so, and all so fair, + So fond, so like the chosen of his youth,-- + It was a very dismal thought, in truth, + That he had left her hopelessly, for aye, + Within the cloister-wall to droop, and die! + And so he could not bear to have it be; + But sought for some lone island in the sea, + Where he might dwell in doleful solitude, + And do strange penance in his mirthless mood, + For this same crime, unnaturally wild, + That he had done unto his saintly child. + And ever he did think, when he had laid + These lovers in the grave, that, through the shade + Of ghastly features melting to decay, + He saw the image of his Agathè. + + And now the truth had flash'd into his brain: + And he is fallen, with a shriek of pain, + Upon the lap of pale and yellow moss; + For long ago he gave that blessed cross + To his fair girl, and knew the relic still, + By many a thousand thoughts, that rose at will + Before it, of the one that was not now, + But, like a dream, had floated from the brow + Of Time, that seeth many a lovely thing + Fade by him, like a sea-wave murmuring. + + The heart is burst!--the heart that stood in steel + To woman's earnest tears, and bade her feel + The curse of virgin solitude,--a veil; + And saw the gladsome features growing pale + Unmoved: 'tis rent, like some eternal tower + The sea hath shaken, and its stately power + Lies lonely, fallen, scatter'd on the shore: + 'Tis rent, like some great mountain, that, before + The Deluge, stood in glory and in might, + But now is lightning-riven, and the night + Is clambering up its sides, and chasms lie strewn, + Like coffins, here and there: 'tis rent! the throne + Where passions, in their awful anarchy, + Stood sceptred! There was heard an inward sigh, + That took the being, on its troubled wings, + Far to the land of dim imaginings! + + All three are dead; that desolate green isle + Is only peopled by the passing smile + Of sun and moon, that surely have a sense, + They look so radiant with intelligence,-- + So like the soul's own element,--so fair! + The features of a God lie veiled there! + + And mariners that have been toiling far + Upon the deep, and lost the polar star, + Have visited that island, and have seen + That lover's grave: and many there have been + That sat upon the gray and crumbling stone, + And started, as they saw a skeleton + Amid the long sad moss, that fondly grew + Through the white wasted ribs; but never knew + Of those who slept below, or of the tale + Of that brain-stricken man, that felt the pale + And wandering moonlight steal his soul away,-- + Poor Julio, and the ladye Agathè! + + * * * * * + + We found them,--children of toil and tears, + Their birth of beauty shaded; + We left them in their early years + Fallen and faded. + + We found them, flowers of summer hue: + Their golden cups were lighted + With sparkles of the pearly dew-- + We left them blighted! + + We found them,--like those fairy flowers; + And the light of morn lay holy + Over their sad and sainted bowers-- + We left them, lowly. + + We found them,--like twin stars, alone, + In brightness and in feeling; + We left them,--and the curse was on + Their beauty stealing. + + They rest in quiet, where they are: + Their lifetime is the story + Of some fair flower--some silver star, + Faded in glory! + + + + +POEMS + + + + +THE IRIS + + A pale and broken Iris in the mirror + Of a gray cloud,--as gray as death, + Slow sailing in the breath + Of thunder! Like a child, that lies in terror + Through the dark night, an Iris fair + Trembled midway in air. + The blending of its elfin hues + Was as the pure enamel on + The early morning dews; + And gloriously they shone, + Waving everyone his wing, + Like a young aërial thing! + That Iris came + Over the shells of gold, beside + The blue and waveless tide; + Its girdle, of resplendent flame, + Met shore and sea, afar, + Like angel that shall stand + On flood and land, + Crown'd with a meteor star. + + The sea-bird, from her snowy stone, + Beheld it floating on, + Like a bride that bent her way + To the altar, standing lone, + In some cathedral gray. + The melancholy wave + Started at the cry she gave, + Hailing the lovely child + Of the immortal sun,-- + A tender and a tearful one, + Bounding away, with footsteps wild! + + Old Neptune on his silver bed + The dazzling image threw; + It laid like sunbeam on the dew, + Its young tress-waving head. + The god upon the shadow gazed, + And silently upraised + A gentle wave, that came and kiss'd + Fair Iris in her holy rest. + Her pearly brow grew pale: + It felt the sinful fire, + And from her queenly tiar + She drew the veil. + The sun-wing'd steeds her sacred car + Wheel'd to her throne of star. + + + + +TO A SPIRIT + + + Spirit! in deathless halo zoned, + A chain of stars with wings of diamond,-- + Is music blended into thee + With holy light and immortality? + For, as thy shape of glory swept + Through seas of darkness, magic breathings fell + Around it, like the notes that slept + In the wild caverns of a silver shell. + + Thou camest, as a lightning spring + Through chasms of horrid cloud, on scathless wing; + Old Chaos round him, like a tiar, + Swathed the long rush of immaterial fire; + As thou, descending from afar, + Wast canopied with living arch of light, + Pale pillars of immortal star, + Burst through the curtains of the moonless night. + + Phantom of wonder! over thee, + Trembles the shadow of the Deity; + For face to face, on lifted throne, + Thou gazest to the glory-shrouded One, + Where highest in the azure height + Of universe, eternally he turns + Myriads of worlds; with blaze of light + Filling the hollow of their golden urns. + + Why comest thou, with feelings bound + On thy birth-shore, the long unenter'd ground? + To visit where thy being first, + Through the pale shell of embryo nothing, burst? + Or, on celestial errand bent, + To win to faith a sin enraptured son, + And point the angel lineament + Of mercy on a cross,--the Bleeding One? + + Spirit! I breathe no sad adieu: + The altars where thou bendest never knew + Sigh, tear, or sorrow, and the night + No chariot drives behind the wheel of light; + Where every seraph is a sun, + And every soul an everlasting star.-- + Go to thy home, thou peerless one! + Where glory and the Great Immortal are! + + + + +HER, A STATUE + + + Her life is in the marble! yet a fall + Of sleep lies on the heart's fair arsenal, + Like new shower'd snow. You hear no whisper through + Those love-divided lips; no pearly dew + Trembles on her pale orbs, that seem to be + Bent on a dream of immortality! + + She sleeps: her life is sleep,--a holy rest! + Like that of wing-borne cloud, that, in the west + Laves his aërial image, till afar + The sunlight leaves him, melting into star. + Did Phidias from her brow the veil remove, + Uncurtaining the peerless queen of love? + The fluent stone in marble waves recoil'd, + Touch'd by his hand, and left the wondrous child, + A Venus of the foam! How softly fair + The dove-like passion on the sacred air + Floats round her, nesting in her wreathed hair, + That tells, though shadeless, of its auburn hue, + Bathed in a hoar of diamond-dropping dew! + + How beautiful!--Was this not one of eld, + That Chaos on his boundless bosom held, + Till Earth came forward in a rush of storm, + Closing his ribs upon her wingless form? + How beautiful!--The very lips do speak + Of love, and bid us worship: the pale cheek + Seems blushing through the marble--through the snow! + And the undrap'ried bosom feels a flow + Of fever on its brightness; every vein + At the blue pulse swells softly, like a chain + Of gentle hills. I would not fling a wreath + Of jewels on that brow, to flash beneath + Those queenly tresses; for itself is more + Than sea-born pearl of some Elysian shore! + + Such, with a heart like woman! I would cast + Life at her foot, and, as she glided past, + Would bid her trample on the slavish thing-- + Tell her, I'd rather feel me withering + Under her step, than be unknown for aye: + And, when her pride had crush'd me, she might see + A love-wing'd spirit glide in glory by + Striking the tent of its mortality! + + + + +TO A STORM-STAID BIRD + + + Trembler! a month is past, and thou + Wert singing on the thorn, + And shaking dew-drops from the bough + In the golden haze of morn! + + My heart was just as thou, as light-- + As loving of the breeze, + That kiss'd thee in its elfin flight, + Through the green acacia trees. + + And now the winter snow-flakes lie + All on thy widow'd wing; + Trembler! methinks I hear thee sigh + For the silver days of spring. + + But shake thy plume--the world is free + Before thee--warbler, fly! + Blest by a sunbeam and by me, + Bird of my heart! good-bye! + + + + +THE WOLF-DROVE + + + No night-star in the welkin blue! no moonshade round the trees + That grew down to the sea-swept foot of the ancient Pyrenees! + The cold gray mantle of the mist, along the shoulders cast + Of those wild mountains, to and fro, hung waving in the blast. + + A snow-crown rising on their brows, in royalty they stood, + As if they vice-reign'd on a throne of winter solitude; + Those hills that rose far upward, till in majesty they bent + Their world's great eye-orb on her own immortal lineament! + + The howl, the long deep howl was heard, the rushing like a wave + Of the wolf train from their forest haunt, in some old mountain cave; + Like a sea-wave, when the wind is horsed behind its foamy crest, + And it lifts upon the shell-built shore, its azure-spotted breast. + + They came with war-whoop, following each other, like a thread, + Through the long labyrinth of trees, in sunless archway spread; + Their gnarled trunks in shadowy lines rose dimly, few by few, + Mail'd in their mossy armouring,--a pathless avenue! + + In sooth, there was a shepherd girl by her aged father's side; + He gazed upon her deep dark eyes, in glory and in pride; + The mother's soul was living there,--the image full and wild, + Of one he loved--of one no more, was beaming in her child. + + And she was at her father's side, her raven tresses felt + Upon his care-worn cheek, as gay and joyfully she knelt, + Kissing the old man's tears away, by the embers burning faint, + While she sung the holy aves, and a vesper to her saint. + + "Now bar the breezy lattice, love!--but hist! how fares the night? + Methought I heard the wolf abroad. Heaven help! I heard aright-- + My mantle!--By the Mother Saint! our flock is in the fold? + How think you, love? wake up the hound, I ween the wolf is bold." + + "Stay, stay; 'tis past!" "I hear it still; to rest, I pray, to rest." + "Nay, father! hold; thou must not go;" and silently she press'd + The old man's arm, and bade him stay, for love of Heaven and her: + His danger was too wild a thought, for so fond a girl to bear. + + He kiss'd her, and they parted then; but, through the lattice low, + She gazed amid the vine-twigs pale, all cradled to and fro; + The holy whisper of the wind stole lightly by the eaves,-- + A sad dirge, sighing to the fall of the winter-blighted leaves. + + He comes not! 'Tis a dreadful thing to hear them as they rave, + The savage wolf-train howling, like the near burst of a wave. + She thought it was a father's cry she heard--a father's cry! + And she flung her from the cottage door, in startled agony. + + Good Virgin save thee, gentle girl! they are no knightly train + That mark thee for their sinless prey--thou wilt not smile again; + The blood is streaming on thy cheek; the heart it ceases slow; + A father gazes on his child--God help a father's woe! + + + + +HYMN TO ORION + + + Orion! old Orion! who dost wait + Warder at heaven's star-studded gate, + On a throne where worlds might meet + At thy silver sandal'd feet, + All invisible to thee, + Gazing through immensity; + For thy crowned head is higher + Than the ramparts of earth-searching fire, + And the comet his blooded banner, there + Flings back upon the waveless air. + + Old Orion! holy hands + Have knit thy everlasting bands, + Belted by the King of kings, + Under thy azure-sheathed wings, + With a zone of living light, + Such as bound the Apostate might, + When from highest tower of heaven, + His vaunting shape was wrathly driven + To its wane, woe-wall'd abode, + Rended from the eye of God! + + Dost thou, in thy vigils, hail + Arcturus on his chariot pale, + Leading his sons--a fiery flight-- + Over the hollow hill of night? + Or tellest of their watches long, + To the sleepless, nameless throng, + Shoaling in a wond'rous gleam, + Like channel through the azure stream + Of life reflected, as it flows, + In one broad ocean of repose, + Gushing from thy lips, Orion! + To the holy walls of Zion? + + + + _Printed by_ BALLANTYNE, HANSON & CO. + _London & Edinburgh_ + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Death-Wake, by Thomas T Stoddart + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DEATH-WAKE *** + +***** This file should be named 16601-8.txt or 16601-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/6/6/0/16601/ + +Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Sankar Viswanathan 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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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: The Death-Wake + or Lunacy; a Necromaunt in Three Chimeras + +Author: Thomas T Stoddart + +Commentator: Andrew Lang + +Release Date: August 27, 2005 [EBook #16601] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DEATH-WAKE *** + + + + +Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Sankar Viswanathan and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +</pre> + + + + + +<p> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1"></a>[1]</span></p> + + +<h1>THE DEATH-WAKE</h1> +<h2>OR LUNACY</h2> + +<h2>A NECROMAUNT</h2> + +<h4>IN THREE CHIMERAS</h4> + +<h2>BY THOMAS T. STODDART</h2> + +<h4> </h4> +<h4>WITH AN INTRODUCTION</h4> +<h3>BY ANDREW LANG</h3> + + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <p><span class="i15">Is't like that lead contains her?...<br /> + </span> + <span class="i22">It were too gross<br /> + </span> + <span class="i15">To rib her cerecloth in the obscure grave.<br /> + </span> + <span class="i29 smcap">Shakespeare</span><br /> + + </p> +</div> + +</div> + + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<h3>LONDON: JOHN LANE<br /> +CHICAGO: WAY & WILLIAMS<br /> +1895</h3> + + + + + + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> +<table > + <tr> + <td><a href="#INTRODUCTION"><b>INTRODUCTION</b></a></td> + <td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_2">2</a></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><a href="#THE_DEATH-WAKE"><b>THE DEATH-WAKE</b></a></td> + <td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_18">18</a></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><a href="#CHIMERA_I"><b>CHIMERA I</b></a></td> + <td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_19">19</a></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><a href="#CHIMERA_II"><b>CHIMERA II</b></a></td> + <td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_41">41</a></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><a href="#CHIMERA_III"><b>CHIMERA III</b></a></td> + <td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_77">77</a></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><a href="#POEMS"><b>POEMS</b></a></td> + <td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_105">105</a></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><a href="#THE_IRIS"><b>THE IRIS</b></a></td> + <td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_107">107</a></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><a href="#TO_A_SPIRIT"><b>TO A SPIRIT</b></a></td> + <td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_110">110</a></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><a href="#HER_A_STATUE"><b>HER, A STATUE</b></a></td> + <td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_113">113</a></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><a href="#TO_A_STORM-STAID_BIRD"><b>TO A STORM-STAID BIRD</b></a></td> + <td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_116">116</a></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><a href="#THE_WOLF-DROVE"><b>THE WOLF-DROVE</b></a></td> + <td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_118">118</a></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><a href="#HYMN_TO_ORION"><b>HYMN TO ORION</b></a></td> + <td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_123">123</a></td> + </tr> +</table> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> + +<h2>INTRODUCTION TO +THE DEATH-WAKE</h2> +<p> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2"></a>[2]</span> </p> + + + +<h3><i>Piscatori <br />Piscator</i></h3> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0"><i>An angler to an angler here,<br /> +</i></span> +<i><span class="i2">To one who longed not for the bays,<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">I bring a little gift and dear,<br /> +</span> +<span class="i2">A line of love, a word of praise,<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">A common memory of the ways,<br /> +</span> +<span class="i2">By Elibank and Yair that lead;<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">Of all the burns, from all the braes,<br /> +</span> +<span class="i2">That yield their tribute to the Tweed.<br /> +</span> +</i></div><div class="stanza"> + <i><span class="i0">His boyhood found the waters clean,<br /> + </span> + <span class="i2">His age deplored them, foul with dye;<br /> + </span> + <span class="i0">But purple hills, and copses green,<br /> + </span> + <span class="i2">And these old towers he wandered by,<br /> + </span> + <span class="i0">Still to the simple strains reply<br /> + </span> + <span class="i2">Of his pure unrepining reed,<br /> + </span> + <span class="i0">Who lies where he was fain to lie,<br /> + </span> + <span class="i2">Like Scott, within the sound of Tweed.<br /> + </span> + </i><br /> +<span class="t16"><br />A. L.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3"></a>[3]</span> </p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="INTRODUCTION" id="INTRODUCTION"></a>INTRODUCTION</h2> + + +<p>The extreme rarity of <i>The Death-Wake</i> is a reason for its +republication, which may or may not be approved of by collectors. Of +the original edition the Author says that more than seventy copies +were sold in the first week of publication, but thereafter the +publisher failed in business. Mr. Stoddart recovered the sheets of his +poem, and his cook gradually, and perhaps not injudiciously, expended +them for domestic purposes.</p> + +<p>Apart from its rarity, <i>The Death-Wake</i> has an interest of its own for +curious amateurs of poetry. The year of its composition (1830) was the +great year of <i>Romanticisme</i> in France, the year of <i>Hernani</i>, and of +Gautier's <i>gilet rouge</i>. In France it was a literary age <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4"></a>[4]</span> given to +mediæval extravagance, to the dagger and the bowl, the cloak and +sword, the mad monk and the were-wolf; the age of Pétrus Borel and +MacKeat, as well as of Dumas and Hugo. Now the official poetry of our +country was untouched by and ignorant of the virtues and excesses of +1830. Wordsworth's bolt was practically shot; Sir Walter was ending +his glorious career; Shelley and Byron and Keats were dead, and the +<i>annus mirabilis</i> of Coleridge was long gone by. Three young poets of +the English-speaking race were producing their volumes, destined at +first to temporary neglect. The year 1830 was the year of Mr. +Tennyson's <i>Poems, chiefly Lyrical</i>, his first book, not counting +<i>Poems by Two Brothers</i>. It was also the year of Mr. Browning's +<i>Pauline</i> (rarer even than <i>The Death-Wake</i>); and it was the year +which followed the second, and perhaps the most characteristic, +poetical venture of Edgar Allan Poe. In Mr. <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5"></a>[5]</span> Tennyson's early lyrics, +and in Mr. Poe's, any capable judge must have recognised new notes of +romance. Their accents are fresh and strange, their imaginations dwell +in untrodden regions. Untouched by the French romantic poets, they yet +unconsciously reply to their notes, as if some influence in the mental +air were at work on both sides of the Channel, on both sides of the +Atlantic. Now, in my opinion, this indefinite influence was also +making itself felt, faintly and dimly, in Scotland. <i>The Death-Wake</i> +is the work of a lad who certainly had read Keats, Coleridge and +Shelley, but who is no imitator of these great poets. He has, in a few +passages, and at his best, an accent original, distinct, strangely +musical, and really replete with promise. He has a fresh unborrowed +melody and mastery of words, the first indispensable sign of a true +poet. His rhymed heroic verse is no more the rhymed heroic verse of + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6"></a>[6]</span> <i>Endymion</i>, than it is that of Mr. Pope, or of Mr. William Morris. He +is a new master of the old instrument.</p> + +<p>His mood is that of Scott when Scott was young, and was so anxious to +possess a death's head and cross-bones. The malady is "most incident" +to youth, but Mr. Stoddart wears his rue with a difference. The mad +monkish lover of the dead nun Agathé has hit on precisely the sort of +fantasy which was about to inspire Théophile Gautier's <i>Comédie de la +Mort</i>, or the later author of <i>Gaspard de la Nuit</i>, or Edgar Poe. +There is here no "criticism of life;" it is a criticism of strange +death; and, so far, may recall Beddoes's <i>Death's Jest-Book</i>, +unpublished, of course, in 1830. Naturally this kind of poetry is +"useless," as Mr. Ruskin says about Coleridge, but, in its <i>bizarre</i> +way, it may be beautiful.</p> + +<p>The author, by a curious analogy with Théophile Gautier, was, in these +days, a <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7"></a>[7]</span> humourist as well as a poet. In the midst of his mad fancies +and rare melodies he is laughing at himself, as Théophile mocked at +<i>Les Jeunes France</i>. The psychological position is, therefore, one of +the rarest. Mr. Stoddart was, first of all and before all, a hardy and +enthusiastic angler. Between 1830 and 1840 he wrote a few beautiful +angling songs, and then all the poetry of his character merged itself +in an ardent love of Nature: of hill, loch and stream—above all, of +Tweed, the fairest of waters, which he lived to see a sink of +pollution. After 1831 we have no more romanticism from Mr. Stoddart. +The wind, blowing where it listeth, struck on him as on an Æolian +harp, and "an uncertain warbling made," in the true Romantic manner. +He did write a piece with the alluring name of <i>Ajalon of the Winds</i>, +but not one line of it survives. The rest is not silence, indeed, for, +in addition to his lays of trout and salmon, of Tweed and Teviot, Mr. +Stoddart wrote a <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8"></a>[8]</span> good deal of prose, and a good deal of perfectly +common and uninspired verse. The Muse, which was undeniably with him +for an hour, abandoned him, or he deserted her, being content to whip +the waters of Tweed, and Meggat, and Yarrow. Perhaps unfavourable and +unappreciative criticism, acting on a healthy and contented nature, +drove him back into the common paths of men. Whatever the cause, the +<i>Death-Wake</i> alone (save for a few angling songs) remains to give +assurance of a poet "who died young." It is needless to rewrite the +biography, excellently done, in <i>Angling Songs</i>, by Miss Stoddart, the +poet's daughter (Blackwoods, Edinburgh, 1889). Mr. Stoddart was born +on St. Valentine's Day 1810, in Argyll Square, Edinburgh, nearly on +the site of the Kirk of Field, where Darnley was murdered. He came of +an old Border family. Miss Stoddart tells a painful tale of an aged +Miss Helen who burned family papers because she <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9"></a>[9]</span> thought she was +bewitched by the seals and decorated initials. Similar follies are +reported of a living old lady, on whose hearth, after a night of +destruction, was once found the impression of a seal of Mary of +Modena. I could give only too good a guess at the <i>provenance</i> of +<i>those</i> papers, but nobody can interfere. Beyond 1500 the family +memories rely on tradition. The ancestors owned lands in the Forest of +Ettrick, and Williamhope, on the Tweed hard by Ashestiel. On the +Glenkinnon burn, celebrated by Scott, they hid the prophets of the +Covenant "by fifties in a cave." One Williamhope is said to have been +out at Drumclog, or, perhaps, Bothwell Brig. This laird, of enormous +strength, was called the Beetle of Yarrow, and was a friend of Murray +of Philiphaugh. His son, in the Fifteen, was out on the Hanoverian +side, which was <i>not</i> in favour with the author of <i>The Death-Wake</i>. +He married a daughter of <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10"></a>[10]</span> Veitch of The Glen, now the property of Sir +Charles Tennant. In the next generation but one, the Stoddarts sold +their lands and took to commerce, while the poet's father won great +distinction in the Navy. The great-great-grandfather of the poet +married a Miss Muir of Anniston, the family called cousins (on which +side of the blanket I know not) with Robert II. of Scotland, and, by +another line, were as near as in the sixth degree of James III.</p> + +<p>As a schoolboy, Mr. Stoddart was always rhyming of goblin, ghost, +fairy, and all Sir Walter's themes. At Edinburgh University he was a +pupil of Christopher North (John Wilson), who pooh-poohed <i>The +Death-Wake</i> in <i>Blackwood</i>. He also knew Aytoun, Professor Ferrier, De +Quincey, Hartley Coleridge, and Hogg, and was one of the first guests +of Tibbie Sheils, on the spit of land between St. Mary's and the Loch +of the Lowes. In verses of this period (1827) <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11"></a>[11]</span> Miss Stoddart detects +traces of Keats and Byron, but the lines quoted are much better in +<i>technique</i> than Byron usually wrote.</p> + +<p>The summer of 1830 Mr. Stoddart passed in Hogg's company on Yarrow, +and early in 1831 he published <i>The Death-Wake</i>. There is no trace of +James Hogg in the poem, which, to my mind, is perfectly original. +Wilson places it "between the weakest of Shelley and the strongest of +Barry Cornwall." It is really nothing but a breath of the spirit of +romance, touching an instrument not wholly out of tune, but never to +be touched again.</p> + +<p>It is unnecessary to follow Mr. Stoddart through a long and happy life +of angling and of literary leisure. He only blossomed once. His poem +was plagiarised and inserted in <i>Graham's Magazine</i>, by a person named +Louis Fitzgerald Tasistro (vol. xx.). Mr. Ingram, the biographer of +Edgar Poe, observes that Poe praised the piece while <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12"></a>[12]</span> he was exposing +Tasistro's "barefaced robbery."</p> + +<p>The copy of <i>The Death-Wake</i> from which this edition is printed was +once the property of Mr. Aytoun, author of <i>Lays of the Scottish +Cavaliers</i>, and, I presume, of <i>Ta Phairshon</i>. Mr. Aytoun has written +a prefatory sonnet which will be found in its proper place, a set of +rhymes on the flyleaf at the end, and various cheerful but unfeeling +notes. After some hesitation I do not print these frivolities.</p> + +<p>The copy was most generously presented to me by Professor Knight of +St. Andrews, and I have only seen one other example, which I in turn +contributed to fill the vacant place in the shelves of Mr. Knight. His +example, however, is far the more curious of the twain, by virtue of +Aytoun's annotations.</p> + +<p>I had been wanting to see <i>The Death-Wake</i> ever since, as a boy, I +read the unkind review of it in an ancient volume of <i>Blackwood's + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13"></a>[13]</span> Magazine</i>. In its "pure purple mantle" of glazed cloth, with paper +label, it is an unaffectedly neat and well-printed little volume.</p> + +<p>It would be unbecoming and impertinent to point out to any one who has +an ear for verse, the charm of such lines as—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"A murmur far and far, of those that stirred<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Within the great encampment of the sea."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Or—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"A love-winged seraph glides in glory by,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Striking the tent of its mortality."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>(An idea anticipated by the as yet unknown Omar Khayyam).</p> + +<p>Or—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Dost thou, in thy vigil, hail<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Arcturus in his chariot pale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Leading him with a fiery flight<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over the hollow hill of night?"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>These are wonderful verses for a lad of twenty-one, living among +anglers, <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14"></a>[14]</span> undergraduates, and, if with some society of the lettered, +apparently with none which could appreciate or applaud him.</p> + +<p>For the matter of the poem, the wild voyage of the mad monkish lover +with the dead Bride of Heaven, it strikes, of course, on the common +reef of the Romantic—the ridiculous. But the recurring contrasts of a +pure, clear peace in sea and sky, are of rare and atoning beauty. Such +a passage is—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"And the great ocean, like a holy hall,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where slept a seraph host maritimal,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was gorgeous with wings of diamond."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Once more, when the mad monk tells the sea-waves</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"That ye have power and passion, and a sound<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As of the flying of an angel round,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The mighty world, that ye are one with Time,"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>we recognise genuine imagination.</p> +<p> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15"></a>[15]</span> </p> + +<p>A sympathetic reader of <i>The Death-Wake</i> would perhaps have expected +the leprosies and lunacies to drop off, and the genius, purged of its +accidents, to move into a pure transparency. The abnormal, the +monstrous, the boyish elements should have been burned away in the +fire of the genius of poetry. But the Muses did not so will it, and +the mystic wind of the spirit of song became of less moment to Mr. +Stoddart than the breeze on the loch that stirs the trout to feed. +Perhaps his life was none the less happy and fortunate. Of the many +brilliant men whom he knew intimately—Wilson, Aytoun, Ferrier, +Glassford Bell, and others—perhaps none, not even Hogg, recognised +the grace of the Muse which (in my poor opinion) Mr. Stoddart +possessed. His character was not in the least degree soured by neglect +or fretted by banter. Not to over-estimate oneself is a virtue very +rare among poets, and certainly does not lead to public triumphs. +Modesty <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16"></a>[16]</span> is apt to accompany the sense of humour which alleviates +life, while it is an almost insuperable bar to success.</p> + +<p>Mr. Stoddart died on November 22nd, 1880. His last walk was to Kelso +Bridge "to look at the Tweed," which now murmurs by his grave the +self-same song that it sings beside Sir Walter's tomb in Dryburgh +Abbey. We leave his poem to the judgment of students of poetry, and to +him we say his own farewell—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sorrow, sorrow speed away<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To our angler's quiet mound,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With the old pilgrim, twilight grey,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Enter thou the holy ground.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There he sleeps, whose heart was twined<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With wild stream and wandering burn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wooer of the western wind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Watcher of the April morn.<br /></span> + + +<span class="t16"><br />A. L</span> +</div></div> +<p> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17"></a>[17]</span> </p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18"></a>[18]</span> </p> +<h2><a name="THE_DEATH-WAKE" id="THE_DEATH-WAKE"></a>THE DEATH-WAKE</h2> + +<h3>OR LUNACY</h3> + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="Sonnet_to_the_Author" id="Sonnet_to_the_Author"></a><i>Sonnet to the Author</i></h2> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0"><i>O wormy Thomas Stoddart who inheritest<br /> +</i></span> +<i><span class="i2">Rich thoughts and loathsome, nauseous words, & rare!<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">Tell me, my friend, why is it that thou ferretest<br /> +</span> +<span class="i2">And gropest in each death-corrupted lair?<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">Seek'st thou for maggots, such as have affinity<br /> +</span> +<span class="i2">With those in thine own brain? or dost thou think<br /> +</span> +<span class="i2">That all is sweet which hath a horrid stink?<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">Why dost thou make Hautgout thy sole divinity?<br /> +</span> +<span class="i2">Here is enough of genius to convert<br /> +</span> +<span class="i4">Vile dung to precious diamonds, and to spare,<br /> +</span> +<span class="i2">Then why transform the diamond into dirt,<br /> +</span> +<span class="i4">And change thy mind w<sup>h</sup>. sh<sup>d</sup>. be rich & fair<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">Into a medley of creations foul,<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">As if a Seraph would become a Goul?<br /> +</span> +</i> +</div> +</div> + +<p> <span class="t16"><i>W.E.A<br /></i></span> + +<span class="t6"><i>1834</i></span></p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19"></a>[19]</span> </p> +<h2><a name="CHIMERA_I" id="CHIMERA_I"></a>CHIMERA I</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An anthem of a sister choristry!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And like a windward murmur of the sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O'er silver shells, so solemnly it falls!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A dying music shrouded in deep walls,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That bury its wild breathings! And the moon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of glow-worm hue, like virgin in sad swoon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lies coldly on the bosom of a cloud,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Until the elf-winds, that are wailing loud,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Do minister unto her sickly trance,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fanning the life into her countenance;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And there are pale stars sparkling, far and few<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In the deep chasms of everlasting blue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unmarshall'd and ungather'd, one and one,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like outposts of the lunar garrison.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A train of holy fathers windeth by<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The arches of an aged sanctuary,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With cowl, and scapular, and rosary<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On to the sainted oriel, where stood,<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20"></a>[20]</span> +<span class="i0">By the rich altar, a fair sisterhood—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A weeping group of virgins! one or two<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bent forward to a bier, of solemn hue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whereon a bright and stately coffin lay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With its black pall flung over:—Agathè<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was on the lid—a name. And who?—No more!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Twas only Agathè.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i8">'Tis o'er, 'tis o'er,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her burial! and, under the arcades,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Torch after torch into the moonlight fades;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And there is heard the music, a brief while,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over the roofings of the imaged aisle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From the deep organ panting out its last,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like the slow dying of an autumn blast.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A lonely monk is loitering within<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The dusky area, at the altar seen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like a pale spirit kneeling in the light<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the cold moon, that looketh wan and white<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through the deviced oriel; and he lays<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His hands upon his bosom, with a gaze<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To the chill earth. He had the youthful look<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21"></a>[21]</span> +<span class="i0">Which heartfelt woe had wasted, and he shook<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At every gust of the unholy breeze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That enter'd through the time-worn crevices.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A score of summers only o'er his brow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had pass'd—and it was summer, even now,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The one-and-twentieth—from a birth of tears,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over a waste of melancholy years!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And <i>that</i> brow was as wan as if it were<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of snowy marble, and the raven hair<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That would have cluster'd over, was all shorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And his fine features stricken pale as morn.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He kiss'd a golden crucifix that hung<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Around his neck, and in a transport flung<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Himself upon the earth, and said, and said<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wild, raving words, about the blessed dead:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then he rose, and in the moonshade stood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gazing upon its light in solitude;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And smote his brow, at some idea wild<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That came across: then, weeping like a child,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He falter'd out the name of Agathè;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And look'd unto the heaven inquiringly,<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22"></a>[22]</span> +<span class="i0">And the pure stars.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i8">"Oh shame! that ye are met,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To mock me, like old memories, that yet<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Break in upon the golden dream I knew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While she—<i>she</i> lived: and I have said adieu<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To that fair one, and to her sister Peace,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That lieth in her grave. When wilt thou cease<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To feed upon my quiet!—thou Despair!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That art the mad usurper, and the heir,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of this heart's heritage! Go, go—return,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bring me back oblivion, and an urn!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ye, pale stars, may look, and only find,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The wreck of a proud tree, that lets the wind<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Count o'er its blighted boughs; for such was he<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That loved, and loves, the silent Agathè!"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And he hath left the sanctuary, like one<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That knew not his own purpose—The red sun<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rose early over incense of bright mist,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That girdled a pure sky of amethyst.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And who was he? A monk. And those who knew<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23"></a>[23]</span> +<span class="i0">Yclept him Julio; but they were few:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And others named him as a nameless one,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A dark, sad-hearted being, who had none<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But bitter feelings, and a cast of sadness,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That fed the wildest of all curses—madness!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But he was, what <i>none</i> knew, of lordly line,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That fought in the far land of Palestine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where, under banners of the cross, they fell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Smote by the armies of the infidel.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Julio was the last; alone, alone!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A sad, unfriended orphan, that had gone<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Into the world, to murmur and to die,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like the cold breezes that are passing by!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And few they were that bade him to their board;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His fortunes now were over, and the sword<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of his proud ancestry dishonour'd—left<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To moulder in its sheath—a hated gift!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ay! it was so; and Julio had fain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Have been a warrior; but his very brain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Grew fever'd at the sickly thought of death,<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24"></a>[24]</span> +<span class="i0">And to be stricken with a want of breath!—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To be the food of worms—inanimate,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And cold as winter,—and as desolate!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then to waste away, and be no more<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than the dark dust!—The thought was like a sore<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That gather'd in his heart; and he would say,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"A curse be on their laurels!" and decay<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Came over them; the deeds that they had done<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had fallen with their fortunes; and anon<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was Julio forgotten, and his line—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No wonder for this frenzied tale of mine!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh! he was wearied of this passing scene!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But loved not death: his purpose was between<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Life and the grave; and it would vibrate there,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like a wild bird that floated far and fair<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Betwixt the sun and sea!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i10">He went, and came,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thought, and slept, and still awoke the same,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A strange, strange youth; and he would look all night<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon the moon and stars, and count the flight<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the sea waves, and let the evening wind<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25"></a>[25]</span> +<span class="i0">Play with his raven tresses, or would bind<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Grottoes of birch, wherein to sit and sing:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And peasant girls would find him sauntering,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To gaze upon their features, as they met,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In laughter, under some green arboret.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">At last, he became monk, and, on his knees,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Said holy prayers, and with wild penances<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Made sad atonement; and the solemn whim,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That, like a shadow, loiter'd over him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wore off, even like a shadow. He was cursed<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With none of the mad thoughts that were at first<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The poison of his quiet; but he grew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To love the world and its wild laughter too,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As he had known before; and wish'd again<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To join the very mirth he hated then!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He durst not break the vow—he durst not be<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The one he would—and his heart's harmony<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Became a tide of sorrow. Even so,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He felt hope die,—in madness and in woe!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But there came one—and a most lovely one<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26"></a>[26]</span> +<span class="i0">As ever to the warm light of the sun<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Threw back her tresses,—a fair sister girl,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With a brow changing between snow and pearl,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the blue eyes of sadness, fill'd with dew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of tears,—like Heaven's own melancholy blue,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So beautiful, so tender; and her form<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was graceful as a rainbow in a storm,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Scattering gladness on the face of sorrow—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh! I had fancied of the hues that borrow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their brightness from the sun; but she was bright<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In her own self,—a mystery of light!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With feelings tender as a star's own hue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pure as the morning star! as true, as true;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For it will glitter in each early sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And her first love be love that lasteth aye!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And this was Agathè, young Agathè,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A motherless, fair girl: and many a day<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She wept for her lost parent. It was sad<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To see her infant sorrow; how she bade<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The flow of her wild spirits fall away<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To grief, like bright clouds in a summer day<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Melting into a shower: and it was sad<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27"></a>[27]</span> +<span class="i0">Almost to think she might again be glad,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her beauty was so chaste, amid the fall<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of her bright tears. Yet, in her father's hall,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She had lived almost sorrowless her days:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But he felt no affection for the gaze<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of his fair girl; and when she fondly smiled,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He bade no father's welcome to the child,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But even told his wish, and will'd it done,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For her to be sad-hearted—and a nun!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And so it was. She took the dreary veil,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A hopeless girl! and the bright flush grew pale<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon her cheek: she felt, as summer feels<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The winds of autumn and the winter chills,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That darken his fair suns.—It was away,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Feeding on dreams, the heart of Agathè!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The vesper prayers were said, and the last hymn<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sung to the Holy Virgin. In the dim,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gray aisle was heard a solitary tread,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As of one musing sadly on the dead—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Twas Julio; it was his wont to be<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28"></a>[28]</span> +<span class="i0">Often alone within the sanctuary;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now, not so—another: it was she!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Kneeling in all her beauty, like a saint<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Before a crucifix; but sad and faint<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tone of her devotion, as the trill<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of a moss-burden'd, melancholy rill.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And Julio stood before her;—'twas as yet<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hour of the pale twilight—and they met<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Each other's gaze, till either seem'd the hue<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of deepest crimson; but the ladye threw<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her veil above her features, and stole by<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like a bright cloud, with sadness and a sigh!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yet Julio still stood gazing and alone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A dreamer!—"Is the sister ladye gone?"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He started at the silence of the air<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That slumber'd over him—she is not there.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And either slept not through the live-long night,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or slept in fitful trances, with a bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fair dream upon their eyelids: but they rose<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In sorrow from the pallet of repose;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For the dark thought of their sad destiny<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29"></a>[29]</span> +<span class="i0">Came o'er them, like a chasm of the deep sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That was to rend their fortunes; and at eve<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They met again, but, silent, took their leave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As they did yesterday: another night,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And neither spake awhile—A pure delight<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had chasten'd love's first blushes: silently<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gazed Julio on the gentle Agathè—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At length, "Fair Nun!"—She started, and held fast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her bright hand on her lip—"the past, the past,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the pale future! There be some that lie<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Under those marble urns—I know not why,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I were better in that only calm,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than be as I have been, perhaps, and am.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The past!—ay! it hath perish'd; never, never,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would I recall it to be blest for ever:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The future it must come—I have a vow"—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And his cold hand rose trembling to his brow.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"True, true, I have a vow. Is not the moon<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Abroad, fair Nun?"—"Indeed! so very soon?"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Said Agathè, and "I must then away."—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Stay, love! 'tis early yet; stay, angel, stay!"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But she was gone:—yet they met many a time<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30"></a>[30]</span> +<span class="i0">In the lone chapel, after vesper chime—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They met in love and fear.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i11">One weary day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Julio saw not his loved Agathè;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She was not in the choir of sisterhood<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That sang the evening anthem, and he stood<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like one that listen'd breathlessly awhile;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But stranger voices chanted through the aisle.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She was not there; and, after all were gone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He linger'd: the stars came—he linger'd on,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like a dark fun'ral image on the tomb<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of a lost hope. He felt a world of gloom<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon his heart—a solitude—a chill.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The pale morn rose, and still, he linger'd still.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the next vesper toll'd; nor yet, nor yet—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Can Agathè be faithless, and forget?"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It was the third sad eve, he heard it said,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Poor Julio! thy Agathè is dead,"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And started. He had loiter'd in the train<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That bore her to the grave: he saw her lain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In the cold earth, and heard a requiem<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31"></a>[31]</span> +<span class="i0">Sung over her—To him it was a dream!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A marble stone stood by the sepulchre;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He look'd, and saw, and started—she was there!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Agathè had died; she that was bright—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She that was in her beauty! a cold blight<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fell over the young blossom of her brow.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the life-blood grew chill—She is not, now.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She died, like zephyr falling amid flowers!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like to a star within the twilight hours<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of morning—and she was not! Some have thought<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Lady Abbess gave her a mad draught,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That stole into her heart, and sadly rent<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fine chords of that holy instrument,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Until its music falter'd fast away,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And she—she died,—the lovely Agathè!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Again, and through the arras of the gloom<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are the pale breezes moaning: by her tomb<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bends Julio, like a phantom, and his eye<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is fallen, as the moon-borne tides, that lie<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At ebb within the sea. Oh! he is wan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As winter skies are wan, like ages gone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And stars unseen for paleness; it is cast,<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32"></a>[32]</span> +<span class="i0">As foliage in the raving of the blast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All his fair bloom of thoughts! Is the moon chill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That in the dark clouds she is mantled still?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And over its proud arch hath Heaven flung<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A scarf of darkness? Agathè was young!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And there should be the virgin silver there,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The snow-white fringes delicately fair!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He wields a heavy mattock in his hands,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And over him a lonely lanthorn stands<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On a near niche, shedding a sickly fall<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of light upon a marble pedestal,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whereon is chisel'd rudely, the essay<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of untaught tool, "Hic jacet Agathè!"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Julio hath bent him down in speed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like one that doeth an unholy deed.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There is a flagstone lieth heavily<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over the ladye's grave; I wist of three<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That bore it, of a blessed verity!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But he hath lifted it in his pure madness,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As it were lightsome as a summer gladness,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And from the carved niche hath ta'en the lamp,<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33"></a>[33]</span> +<span class="i0">And hung it by the marble flagstone damp.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And he is flinging the dark, chilly mould<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over the gorgeous pavement: 'tis a cold,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sad grave, and there is many a relic there<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of chalky bones, which, in the wasting air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fell smouldering away; and he would dash<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His mattock through them, with a cursed clash,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That made the lone aisle echo. But anon<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He fell upon a skull,—a haggard one,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With its teeth set, and the great orbless eye<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Revolving darkness, like eternity—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in his hand he held it, till it grew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To have the fleshy features and the hue<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of life. He gazed, and gazed, and it became<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like to his Agathè—all, all the same!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He drew it nearer,—the cold, bony thing!—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To kiss the worm-wet lips. "Ay! let me cling—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cling to thee now, for ever!" but a breath<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of rank corruption from its jaws of death<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Went to his nostrils, and he madly laugh'd,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And dash'd it over on the altar shaft,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which the new risen moon, in her gray light,<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34"></a>[34]</span> +<span class="i0">Had fondly flooded, beautifully bright!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i12">Again he went<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To his wild work, beside the monument.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Ha! leave, thou moon! where thy footfall hath been<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In sorrow amid heaven! there is sin<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Under thy shadow, lying like a dew;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So come thou, from thy awful arch of blue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where thou art even as a silver throne<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For some pale spectre-king; come thou alone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or bring a solitary orphan star<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Under thy wings! afar, afar, afar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To gaze upon this girl of radiancy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In her deep slumbers—Wake thee, Agathè!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And Julio hath stolen the dark chest<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the fair nun lay coffin'd, in the rest<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That wakes not up at morning: she is there,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An image of cold calm! One tress of hair<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lingereth lonely on her snowy brow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the bright eyes are closed in darkness now;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And their long lashes delicately rest<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35"></a>[35]</span> +<span class="i0">On the pale cheek, like sun-rays in the west,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That fall upon a colourless, sad cloud.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Humility lies rudely on the proud,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But she was never proud; and there she is,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A yet unwither'd flower the autumn breeze<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hath blown from its green stem! 'T is pale, 't is pale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But still unfaded, like the twilight veil<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That falleth after sunset; like a stream<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That bears the burden of a silver gleam<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon its waters; and is even so,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Chill, melancholy, lustreless, and low!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Beauty in death! a tenderness upon<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The rude and silent relics, where alone<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sat the destroyer! Beauty on the dead!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The look of being where the breath is fled!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The unwarming sun still joyous in its light!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A time—a time without a day or night!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Death cradled upon Beauty, like a bee<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon a flower, that looketh lovingly!—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like a wild serpent, coiling in its madness,<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36"></a>[36]</span> +<span class="i0">Under a wreath of blossom and of gladness!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And there she is; and Julio bends o'er<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sleeping girl,—a willow on the shore<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of a Dead Sea! that steepeth its far bough<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Into the bitter waters,—even now<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Taking a foretaste of the awful trance<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That was to pass on his own countenance!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yes! yes! and he is holding his pale lips<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over her brow; the shade of an eclipse<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is passing to his heart, and to his eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That is not tearful; but the light will die,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Leaving it like a moon within a mist,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The vision of a spell-bound visionist!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He breathed a cold kiss on her ashy cheek,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That left no trace—no flush—no crimson streak,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But was as bloodless as a marble stone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Susceptible of silent waste alone.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And on her brow a crucifix he laid—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A jewel'd crucifix, the virgin maid<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had given him before she died. The moon<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37"></a>[37]</span> +<span class="i0">Shed light upon her visage—clouded soon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then briefly breaking from its airy veil,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like warrior lifting up his aventayle.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But Julio gazed on, and never lifted<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Himself to see the broken clouds, that drifted<br /></span> +<span class="i0">One after one, like infant elves at play<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amid the night-winds, in their lonely way—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some whistling and some moaning, some asleep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And dreaming dismal dreams, and sighing deep<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over their couches of green moss and flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And solitary fern, and heather bowers.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The heavy bell toll'd two, and, as it toll'd,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Julio started, and the fresh-turn'd mould<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He flung into the empty chasm with speed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And o'er it dropt the flagstone. One could read<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That Agathè lay there; but still the girl<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lay by him, like a precious and pale pearl,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That from the deep sea-waters had been rent—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like a star fallen from the firmament!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He hides the grave-tools in an aged porch,<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38"></a>[38]</span> +<span class="i0">To westward of the solitary church;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And he hath clasp'd around the melting waist<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The beautiful, dead girl: his cheek is press'd<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To hers—Life warming the cold chill of Death!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And over his pale palsy breathing breath<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His eye is sunk upon her—"Thou must leave<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The worm to waste for love of thee, and grieve<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Without thee, as I may not. Thou must go,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My sweet betrothed, with me—but not below,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where there is darkness, dream, and solitude,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But where is light, and life, and one to brood<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Above thee till thou wakest—Ha! I fear<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou wilt not wake for ever, sleeping here,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where there are none but winds to visit thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And convent fathers, and a choristry<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of sisters, saying, 'Hush!'—But I will sing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rare songs to thy pure spirit, wandering<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Down on the dews to hear me; I will tune<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The instrument of the ethereal moon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all the choir of stars, to rise and fall<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In harmony and beauty musical."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He is away—and still the sickly lamp<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39"></a>[39]</span> +<span class="i0">Is burning next the altar; there's a damp,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thin mould upon the pavement; and, at morn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The monks do cross them in their blessed scorn<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And mutter deep anathemas, because<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the unholy sacrilege, that was<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Within the sainted chapel,—for they guess'd,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By many a vestige sad, how the dark rest<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of Agathè was broken,—and anon<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They sought for Julio. The summer sun<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Arose and and set, with his imperial disc<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Toward the ocean-waters, heaving brisk<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Before the winds,—but Julio came never:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He that was frantic as a foaming river—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mad as the fall of leaves upon the tide<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of a great tempest, that have fought and died<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Along the forest ramparts, and doth still<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In its death-struggle desperately reel<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Round with the fallen foliage—he was gone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And none knew whither. Still were chanted on<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sad masses, by pale sisters, many a day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And holy requiems sung for Agathè!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + + + +<p> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41"></a>[41]</span> </p> +<h2><a name="CHIMERA_II" id="CHIMERA_II"></a>CHIMERA II</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A curse! a curse! the beautiful pale wing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of a sea-bird was worn with wandering,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, on a sunny rock beside the shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It stood, the golden waters gazing o'er;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And they were heaving a brown amber flow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of weeds, that glitter'd gloriously below.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It was the sunset, and the gorgeous hall<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of heaven rose up on pillars magical<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of living silver, shafting the fair sky<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Between dark time and great eternity.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They rose upon their pedestal of sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A line of snowy columns! and anon<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were lost in the rich tracery of cloud<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That hung along, magnificently proud,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Predicting the pure star-light, that beyond<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The east was armouring in diamond<br /></span> +<span class="i0">About the camp of twilight, and was soon<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42"></a>[42]</span> +<span class="i0">To marshal under the fair champion moon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That call'd her chariot of unearthly mist,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Toward her citadel of amethyst.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A curse! a curse! a lonely man is there<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By the deep waters, with a burden fair<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Clasp'd in his wearied arms—'Tis he; 'tis he<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The brain-struck Julio, and Agathè!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His cowl is back—flung back upon the breeze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His lofty brow is haggard with disease,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As if a wild libation had been pour'd<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of lightning on those temples, and they shower'd<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A dismal perspiration, like a rain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shook by the thunder and the hurricane!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He dropt upon a rock, and by him placed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over a bed of sea-pinks growing waste,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The silent ladye, and he mutter'd wild,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Strange words, about a mother, and no child.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"And I shall wed thee, Agathè! although<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ours be no God-blest bridal—even so!"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And from the sand he took a silver shell,<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43"></a>[43]</span> +<span class="i0">That had been wasted by the fall and swell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of many a moon-borne tide into a ring—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A rude, rude ring; it was a snow-white thing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where a lone hermit limpet slept and died,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In ages far away. "Thou art a bride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sweet Agathè! Wake up; we must not linger."<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He press'd the ring upon her chilly finger,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And to the sea-bird, on its sunny stone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shouted, "Pale priest! thou liest all alone<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon thy ocean altar, rise away<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To our glad bridal!" and its wings of gray<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All lazily it spread, and hover'd by<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With a wild shriek—a melancholy cry!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then swooping slowly o'er the heaving breast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the blue ocean, vanish'd in the west.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And Julio is chanting to his bride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A merry song of his wild heart, that died<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On the soft breeze through pinks beside the sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All rustling in their beauty gladsomely.<br /></span> +</div></div><p> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44"></a>[44]</span> </p> + + +<h3>SONG</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A rosary of stars, love! we'll count them as we go<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon the laughing waters, that are wandering below,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And we'll o'er the pearly moon-beam, as it lieth in the sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In beauty and in glory, like a shadowing of thee!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A rosary of stars, love! a prayer as we glide,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a whisper in the wind, and a murmur on the tide!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And we'll say a fair adieu to the flowers that are seen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With shells of silver sown in radiancy between.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A rosary of stars, love! the purest they shall be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like spirits of pale pearls, in the bosom of the sea;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now help thee, virgin mother! with a blessing as we go,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon the laughing waters, that are wandering below!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He lifted the dead girl, and is away<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To where a light boat, in its moorings lay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like a sea-cradle, rocking to the hush<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45"></a>[45]</span> +<span class="i0">Of the nurse waters. With a frantic rush<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O'er the wild field of tangles he hath sped,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And through the shoaling waves that fell and fled<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon the furrow'd beach.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i12">The snowy sail<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is hoisted to the gladly gushing gale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That bosom'd its fair canvass with a breast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of silver, looking lovely to the west;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And at the helm there sits the wither'd one,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gazing and gazing on the sister nun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With her fair tresses floating on his knee—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The beautiful, death-stricken Agathè!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fast, fast, and far away, the bark hath stood<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Out toward the great heaving solitude,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That gurgled in its deeps, as if the breath<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Went through its lungs, of agony and death!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sun is lost within the labyrinth<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of clouds of purple and pale hyacinth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That are the frontlet of the sister Sky<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Kissing her brother Ocean; and they lie<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bathing in blushes, till the rival queen<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46"></a>[46]</span> +<span class="i0">Night, with her starry tiar, floateth in—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A dark and dazzling beauty! that doth draw<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over the light of love a shade of awe<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Most strange, that parts our wonder not the less<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Between her mystery and loveliness!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And she is there, that is a pyramid<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whereon the stars, the statues of the dead,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are imaged over the eternal hall,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A group of radiances majestical!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Julio looks up, and there they be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Agathè, and all the waste of Sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That slept in wizard slumber, with a shroud<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of night flung o'er his bosom, throbbing proud<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amid its azure pulses; and again<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He dropt his blighted eye-orbs, with a strain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of mirth upon the ladye:—Agathè!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sweet bride! be thou a queen, and I will lay<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A crown of sea-weed on thy royal brow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I will twine these tresses, that are now<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Floating beside me, to a diadem;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the sea foam will sprinkle gem on gem,<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47"></a>[47]</span> +<span class="i0">And so will the soft dews. Be thou the queen<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the unpeopled waters, sadly seen<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By star-light, till the yet unrisen moon<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Issue, unveiled, from her anderoon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To bathe in the sea fountains: let me say,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Hail—hail to thee! thrice hail, my Agathè!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The warrior world was lifting to the bent<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of his eternal brow magnificent,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fiery moon, that in her blazonry<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shone eastward, like a shield. The throbbing sea<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Felt fever on his azure arteries,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That shadow'd them with crimson, while the breeze<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fell faster on the solitary sail.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the red moon grew loftier and pale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the great ocean, like the holy hall,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where slept a seraph host maritimal,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was gorgeous, with wings of diamond<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fann'd over it, and millions beyond<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of tiny waves were playing to and fro,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All musical, with an incessant flow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of cadences, innumerably heard<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48"></a>[48]</span> +<span class="i0">Between the shrill notes of a hermit bird,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That held a solemn paean to the moon.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A few devotional fair clouds were soon<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Breathed o'er the living countenance of Heaven,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And under the great galaxies were driven<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of stars that group'd together, and they went<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like voyagers along the firmament,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And grew to silver in the blessed light<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the moon alchymist. It was not night,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not the dark deathly shadow, that falls o'er<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The eye-lid like a curse, but far before<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In splendour, struggling through a fall of gloom,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In many a myriad gushes, that do come<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Direct from the eternal stars beyond,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like holy fountains pouring diamond!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A sail! awake thee, Julio! a sail!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And be not bending to thy trances pale.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But he is gazing on the moonlit brow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of his dead Agathè, and fondly now,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The light is silvering her bloodless face<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the cold grave-clothes. There is loveliness<br /></span> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49"></a>[49]</span> +<span class="i0">As in a marble image, very bright!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But stricken with a phantasy of light<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That is not given to the mortal hue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To life and breathing beauty: and she too<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is more of the expressless lineament,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than of the golden thoughts that came and went<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over her features like a living tide<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No while before.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i8">A sail is on the wide<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And moving waters, and it draweth nigh<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like a sea-cloud. The elfin billows fly<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Before it, in their armories enthrall'd<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of radiant and moon-breasted emerald;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And many is the mariner that sees<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lone boat in the melancholy breeze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Waving her snowy canvass, and anon<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their stately vessel with a gallant run<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Crowds by in all her glory; but the cheer<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of men is pass'd into a sudden fear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And whisperings, and shakings of the head—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The moon was streaming on a virgin dead,<br /></span> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50"></a>[50]</span> +<span class="i0">And Julio sat over her insane,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like a sea demon! O'er and o'er again,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Each cross'd him, as the stately vessel stood<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far out into the murmuring solitude!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But Julio saw not; he only heard<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A rushing, like the passing of a bird,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And felt him heaving on the foam, that flew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Along the startled billows; and he knew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of a strange sail, by broken oaths that fell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beside him, on the coming of the swell.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They knew thou wert a queen, my royal bride!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And made obeisance at thy holy side.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They saw thee, Agathè! and go to bring<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fair worshippers, and many a poet-king,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To utter music at thy pearly feet.—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now, wake thee! for the moonlight cometh sweet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To visit in thy temple of the sea;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy sister moon is watching over thee!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And she is spreading a fair mantle of<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pure silver, in thy lonely palace, love!—<br /></span> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51"></a>[51]</span> +<span class="i0">Now, wake thee! for the sea-bird is aloof,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In solitude, below the starry roof;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And on its dewy plume there is a light<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of palest splendour, o'er the blessed night.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy spirit, Agathè!—and yet, thou art<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beside me, and my solitary heart<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is throbbing near to thee: I must not feel<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sweet notes of thy holy music steal<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Into my feverous and burning brain,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So wake not! and I'll hush thee with a strain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of my wild fancy, till thou dream of me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I be loved as I have loved thee:—<br /></span> +</div></div> + + +<h3>SONG</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">'Tis light to love thee living, girl, when hope is full and fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In the springtide of thy beauty, when there is no sorrow there—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No sorrow on thy brow, and no shadow on thy heart!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When, like a floating sea-bird, bright and beautiful thou art!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">'Tis light to love thee living, girl—to see thee ever so,<br /></span> + <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52"></a>[52]</span> +<span class="i0">With health, that, like a crimson flower, lies blushing in the snow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thy tresses falling over, like the amber on the pearl—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh! true it is a lightsome thing, to love thee living, girl!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But when the brow is blighted, like a star of morning tide,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And faded is the crimson blush upon the cheek beside;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It is to love, as seldom love, the brightest and the best,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When our love lies like a dew upon the one that is at rest.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Because of hopes, that, fallen, are changing to despair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the heart is always dreaming on the ruin that is there,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53"></a>[53]</span> +<span class="i0">Oh, true! 'tis weary, weary, to be gazing over thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the light of thy pure vision breaketh never upon me!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He lifts her in his arms, and o'er and o'er,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon the brow of chilliness and hoar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Repeats a silent kiss;—along the side<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the lone bark, he leans that pallid bride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Until the waves do image her within<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their bosom, like a spectre—'Tis a sin<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Too deadly to be shadow'd or forgiven,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To do such mockery in the sight of Heaven!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bid her gaze into the startled sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And say, "Thy image, from eternity,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hath come to meet thee, ladye!" and anon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He bade the cold corse kiss the shadowy one,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That shook amid the waters, like the light<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of borealis in a winter night!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And after, he did strain her sea-wet hair<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Between his chilly fingers, with a stare<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of mystery, that marvell'd how that she<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had drench'd it so amid the moonlit sea.<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54"></a>[54]</span> +<span class="i0">The morning rose, with breast of living gold,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like eastern phoenix, and his plumage roll'd<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In clouds of molted brilliance, very bright!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And on the waste of waters floated light.—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In truth, 'twas strange to see that merry bark<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Skimming the silver ocean, like a shark<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At play amid the beautiful sea-green,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all so sadly desolate within.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And hours flew after hours, a weary length,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Until the sunlight, in meridian strength,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Threw burning floods upon the wasted brow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of that sea-hermit mariner; and now<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He felt the fire-light feed upon his brain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And started with intensity of pain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wash'd him in the sea; it only brought<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wild reason, like a demon, and he thought<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Strange thoughts, like dreaming men—he thought how those<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were round him he had seen, and many rose<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His heart had hated; every billow threw<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Features before him, and pale faces grew<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55"></a>[55]</span> +<span class="i0">Out of the sea by myriads:—the self-same<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was moulded from its image, and they came<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In groups together, and all said, like one,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Be cursed!" and vanish'd in the deep anon.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then thirst, intolerable as the breath<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of Upas, fanning the wild wings of death,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Crept up his very gorge,—like to a snake,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That stifled him, and bade the pulses ache<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through all the boiling current of his blood.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It was a thirst, that let the fever flood<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fall over him, and gave a ghastly hue<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To his cramp'd lips, until their breathing grew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">White as a mist, and short, and like a sigh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Heaved with a struggle, till it falter'd by.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And ever he did look upon the corse<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With idiot visage, like the hag Remorse<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That gloateth over on a nameless deed<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of darkness and of dole unhistoried.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And were there that might hear him, they would hear<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The murmur of a prayer in deep fear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through unbarr'd lips, escaping by the half,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all but smother'd by a maniac laugh,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56"></a>[56]</span> +<span class="i0">That follow'd it, so sudden and so shrill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That swarms of sea-birds, wandering at will<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon the wave, rose startled, and away<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Went flocking, like a silver shower of spray!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And aye he called for water, and the sea<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mock'd him with his brine surges tauntingly,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And lash'd them over on his fev'rous brow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Volleying roars of curses:—"Stay thee, now,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Avenger! lest I die; for I am worn<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fainter than star-light at the birth of morn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Stay thee, great angel! for I am not shriven,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But frantic as thyself: Oh Heaven! Heaven!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But thou hast made me brother of the sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That I may tremble at his tyranny;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or am I slave? a very, very jest<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To the sarcastic waters? let me breast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The base insulters, and defy them so,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In this lone little skiff—I am your foe!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye raving, lion-like, and ramping seas,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That open up your nostrils to the breeze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And fain would swallow me! Do ye not fly,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pale, sick, and gurgling, as I pass you by?<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57"></a>[57]</span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Lift up! and let me see, that I may tell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye can be mad, and strange, and terrible;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That ye have power, and passion, and a sound<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As of the flying of an angel round<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The mighty world; that ye are one with time,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in the great primordium sublime<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were nursed together, as an infant-twain,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A glory and a wonder! I would fain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hold truce, thou elder brother! for we are,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In feature, as the sun is to a star,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So are we like, and we are touch'd in tune<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With lunacy as music; and the moon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That setteth the tides sentinel before<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy camp of waters, on the pebbled shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And measures their great footsteps to and fro,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hath lifted up into my brain the flow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of this mad tide of blood.—Ay! we are like<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In foam and frenzy; the same winds do strike,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The same fierce sun-rays, from their battlement<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of fire! so, when I perish impotent<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Before the night of death, they'll say of me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He died as mad and frantic, as the sea!"<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58"></a>[58]</span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A cloud stood for the east, a cloud like night,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like a huge vulture, and the blessed light<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the great sun grew shadow'd awfully:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It seem'd to mount up from the mighty sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shaking the showers from its solemn wings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And grew, and grew, and many a myriad springs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were on its bosom, teeming full of rain.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There fell a terrible and wizard chain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of lightning, from its black and heated forge,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the dark waters took it to their gorge,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And lifted up their shaggy flanks in wonder<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With rival chorus to the peal of thunder,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That wheel'd in many a squadron terrible<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The stern black clouds, and as they rose and fell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They oozed great showers; and Julio held up<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His wasted hands, in likeness of a cup,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And drank the blessed waters, and they roll'd<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon his cheeks like tears, but sadly cold!—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Twas very strange to look on Agathè!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How the quick lightnings, in their elfin play,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Stream'd pale upon her features, and they were<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sickly, like tapers in a sepulchre!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59"></a>[59]</span> +<span class="i0">The ship! that self same ship, that Julio knew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had pass'd him, with her panic-stricken crew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She gleams amid the storm, a shatter'd thing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of pride and lordly beauty: her fair wing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of sail is wounded—the proud pennon gone:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dark, dark she sweepeth like an eagle, on<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through waters that are battling to and fro,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And tossing their great giant shrouds of snow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over her deck. Ahead, and there is seen<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A black, strange line of breakers, down between<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The awful surges, lifting up their manes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like great sea lions. Quick and high she strains<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her foaming keel—that solitary ship!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As if, in all her frenzy, she would leap<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The cursed barrier; forward, fast and fast—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Back, back she reels; her timbers and her mast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Split in a thousand shivers! A white spring<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the exulted sea rose bantering<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over her ruin; and the mighty crew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That mann'd her decks, were seen, a straggling few,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far scatter'd on the surges. Julio felt<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The impulse of that hour, and low he knelt,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60"></a>[60]</span> +<span class="i0">Within his own light bark—a prayful man!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And clasp'd his lifeless bride; and to her wan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cold cheek did lay his melancholy brow.—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Save thou a mariner!" He starteth now<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To hear that dying cry; and there is one,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All worn and wave-wet, by his bark anon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Clinging, in terror of the ireful sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A fair hair'd mariner! But suddenly<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He saw the pale dead ladye, by a flame<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of blue and livid lightning, and there came<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over his features blindness, and the power<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of his strong hands grew weak,—a giant shower<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of foam rose up, and swept him far along;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Julio saw him buffeting the throng<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the great eddying waters, till they went<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over him—a wind-shaken cerement!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then terribly he laugh'd, and rose above<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His soul-less bride—the ladye of his love<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lifting him up, in all his wizard glee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And he did wave, before the frantic sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His wasted arm. "Adieu! adieu! adieu!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou sawest how we were; thou sawest, too,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61"></a>[61]</span> +<span class="i0">Thou wert not so; for in the inmost shrine<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of my deep heart are thoughts that are not thine.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thou art gone, fair mariner! in foam<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And music-murmurs, to thy blessed home—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Adieu! adieu! Thou sawest how that she<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sleeps in her holy beauty, tranquilly;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And when the fair and floating vision breaks<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From her pure brow, and Agathè awakes—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till then, we meet not; so adieu, adieu!"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still on before the sullen tempest flew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fast as a meteor star, the lonely bark:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Julio bent over to the dark,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The solitary sea, for close beside<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Floated the stringed harp of one that died<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In that wild shipwreck, and he drew it home,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With madness, to his bosom: the white foam<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was o'er its strings; and on the streaming sail<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He wiped them, running, with his fingers pale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Along the tuneless notes, that only gave<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Seldom responses to his wandering stave!<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62"></a>[62]</span> +<p> </p> +</div></div> + + + +<h3>TO THE HARP</h3> + + + + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="t6">I<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Jewel! that lay before the heart<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of some romantic boy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And startled music in her home,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of mystery and joy!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> + +<span class="t6">II<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The image of his love was there;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And, with her golden wings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She swept her tone of sorrow from<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy melancholy strings!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> + +<span class="t6">III<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We drew thee, as an orphan one,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From waters that had cast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No music round thee, as they went<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In their pale beauty past.<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63"></a>[63]</span> +</div><div class="stanza"> + +<span class="t6">IV<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No music but the changeless sigh—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That murmur of their own,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That loves not blending in the thrill<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of thine aerial tone.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> + +<span class="t6">V<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The girl that slumbers at our side<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Will dream how they are bent,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That love her even as they love<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy blessed instrument.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> + +<span class="t6">VI<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And music, like a flood, will break<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon the fairy throne<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of her pure heart, all glowing, like<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A morning star, alone!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> + +<span class="t6">VII<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Alone, but for the song of him<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That waketh by her side,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And strikes thy chords of silver to<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His fair and sea-borne bride.<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64"></a>[64]</span> +</div><div class="stanza"> + +<span class="t6">VIII<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Jewel! that hung before the heart<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of some romantic boy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like him, I sweep thee with a storm<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of music and of joy!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And Julio placed the trembling harp before<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The ladye, till the minstrel winds came o'er<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Its moisten'd strings, and tuned them with a sigh.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"I hear thee, how thy spirit goeth by,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In music and in love. Oh Agathè!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou sleepest long, long, long; and they will say<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That seek thee,—'She is dead—she is no more!'<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But thou art cold, and I will throw before<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy chilly brow the pale and snowy sheet."<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And he did lift it from her marble feet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sea-wet shroud! and flung it silently<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over her brow—the brow of Agathè!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But, as a passion from the mooded mind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The storm had died, and wearily the wind<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fell fast asleep at evening, like one<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That hath been toiling in the fiery sun.<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65"></a>[65]</span> +<span class="i0">And the white sail dropt downward, as the wing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of wounded sea-bird, feebly murmuring<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unto the mast. It was a deathly calm,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And holy stillness, like a shadow, swam<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All over the wide sea, and the boat stood.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like her of Sodom, in the solitude,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A snowy pillar, looking on the waste.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And there was nothing but the azure breast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of ocean and the sky—the sea and sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the lone bark; no clouds were floating by<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the sun set, but his great seraph light,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Went down alone, in majesty and might;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the stars came again, a silver troop,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Until, in shame, the coward shadows droop<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Before the radiance of these holy gems,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That bear the images of diadems!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And Julio fancied of a form that rose<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Before him from the desolate repose<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the deep waters—a huge ghastly form,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As of one lightning-stricken in a storm;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And leprosy cadaverous was hung<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Before his brow, and awful terror flung<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66"></a>[66]</span> +<span class="i0">Around him like a pall—a solemn shroud!—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A drapery of darkness and of cloud!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And agony was writhing on his lip,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Heart-rooted, awful agony and deep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of fevers, and of plagues, and burning blain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ague, and the palsy of the brain—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A wierd and yellow spectre! And his eyes<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were orbless and unpupil'd, as the skies<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Without the sun, or moon, or any star:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And he was like the wreck of what men are,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A wasted skeleton, that held the crest<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of Time, and bore his motto on his breast!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There came a group before of maladies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And griefs, and Famine empty as a breeze,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A double monster, with a gloating leer<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fix'd on his other half. They drew them near,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">One after one, led onward by Despair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That like the last of winter glimmer'd there,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A dismal prologue to his brother Death,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which was behind, and, with the horrid breath<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of his wide baneful nostrils, plied them on.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And often as they saw the skeleton<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67"></a>[67]</span> +<span class="i0">Grisly beside them, the wild phantasies<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Grew mad and howl'd; the fever of disease<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Became wild frenzy—very terrible!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, for a hell of agony—a hell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of rage, was there, that fed on misty things,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On dreams, ideas, and imaginings.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And some were raving on philosophy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And some on love, and some on jealousy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And some upon the moon; and these were they<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That were the wildest; and anon alway<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Julio knew them by a something dim<br /></span> +<span class="i0">About their wasted features like to him!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But Death was by, like shell of pyramid<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Among old obelisks, and his eyeless head<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shook o'er the wiery ribs, where darkness lay<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The image of a heart—He is away!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Julio is watching, like Remorse,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over the pale and solitary corse!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Shower soft light, ye stars, that shake the dew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From your eternal blossoms! and thou, too,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68"></a>[68]</span> +<span class="i0">Moon! minded of thy power, tide-bearing queen!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That hast a slave and votary within<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The great rock-fetter'd deeps, and hearest cry<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To thee the hungry surges, rushing by<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like a vast herd of wolves,—fall full and fair<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On Julio as he sleepeth, even there,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amid the suppliant bosom of the sea!—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sleep! dost thou come, and on thy blessed knee<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With hush and whisper lull the troubled brain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of this death-lover?—Still the eyes do strain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their orbs on Agathè—those raven eyes!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All earnest on the ladye as she lies<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In her white shroud. They see not, though they are<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As if they saw; no splendour like a star<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is under their dark lashes: they are full<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of dream and slumber—melancholy, dull!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A wide, wide sea! and on its rear and van<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amid the stars, the silent meteors ran<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69"></a>[69]</span> +<span class="i0">All that still night, and Julio with a cry<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Woke up, and saw them flashing fiercely by.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Full three times three, its awful veil of night<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hath Heaven hung before the blessed light;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a fair breeze falls o'er the sleeping sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where Julio is watching Agathè!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By sun and darkness hath he bent him over—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A mad, moon-stricken, melancholy lover!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And hardly hath he tasted, night or day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of drink or food, because of Agathè!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He sitteth in a dull and dreary mood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like statue in a ruin'd solitude,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bearing the brent of sunlight and of shade<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over the marble of some colonnade.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The ladye, she hath lost the pearly hue<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon her gorgeous brow, where tresses grew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Luxuriantly as thoughts of tenderness,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That once were floating in the pure recess<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of her bright soul. These are not as they were,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But are as weeds above a sepulchre,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70"></a>[70]</span> +<span class="i0">Wild waving in the breeze: her eyes are now<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sunk deeply under the discolour'd brow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That is of sickly yellow, and pale blue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unnaturally blending. The same hue<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is on her cheek: it is the early breath<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of cold Corruption, the ban dog of Death,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Falling upon her features.—Let it be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gaze awhile on Julio, as he<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is gazing on the corse of Agathè!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In truth, he seemeth like no living one,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But is the image of a skeleton:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A fearful portrait from the artist tool<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of Madness—terrible and wonderful!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There was no passion there—no feeling traced<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Under those eyelids, where had run to waste,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All that was wild, or beautiful, or bright;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A very cloud was cast upon their light,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That gave to them the heavy hue of lead;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And they were lorn, and lustreless, and dead!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He sate like vulture from the mountains gray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unsated, that had flown full many a day<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71"></a>[71]</span> +<span class="i0">O'er distant land and sea, and was in pride<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alighted by the lonely ladye's side.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He sate like winter o'er the wasted year—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like melancholy winter, drawing near<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To its own death.—"Oh me! the worm, at last,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will gorge upon me, and the autumn blast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Howl by!—Where?—where?—there is no worm to creep<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amid the waters of the lonely deep;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I will take me Agathè upon<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This sorrowful, sore bosom, and anon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Down, down, through azure silence, we shall go,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unepitaph'd, to cities far below;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the sea triton, with his winding shell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall sound our blessed welcome. We shall dwell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With many a mariner in his pearly home,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In bowers of amber weed and silver foam,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amid the crimson corals; we shall be<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Together, Agathè! fair Agathè!—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But thou art sickly, ladye—thou art sad;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I am weary, ladye—I am mad!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They bring no food to feed us, and I feel<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A frost upon my vitals, very chill,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72"></a>[72]</span> +<span class="i0">Like winter breaking on the golden year<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of life. This bark shall be our floating bier,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the dark waves our mourners; and the white,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pure swarm of sunny sea birds, basking bright<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On some far isle, shall sorrowfully pour<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their wail of melancholy o'er and o'er,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At evening, on the waters of the sea,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While, with its solemn burden, silently,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Floats forward our lone bark.—Oh, Agathè!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Methinks that I shall meet thee far away,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Within the awful centre of the earth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where, earliest, we had our holy birth—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In some huge cavern, arching wide below,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon whose airy pivot, years ago,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The world went round: 'tis infinitely deep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But never dismal; for above it sleep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And under it, blue waters, hung aloof,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And held below,—an amethystine roof,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A sapphire pavement; and the golden sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Afar, looks through alternately, like one<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That watches round some treasure: often, too,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through many a mile of ocean, sparkling through,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73"></a>[73]</span> +<span class="i0">Are seen the stars and moon, all gloriously,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bathing their angel brilliance in the sea!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"And there are shafted pillars, that beyond,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are ranged before a rock of diamond,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Awfully heaving its eternal heights,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From base of silver strewn with chrysolites;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And over it are chasms of glory seen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With crimson rubies clustering between,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On sward of emerald, with leaves of pearl,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And topazes hung brilliantly on beryl.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So Agathè!—but thou art sickly sad,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And tellest me, poor Julio is mad—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ay, mad!—was he not madder when he sware<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A vow to Heaven? was there no madness there,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That he should do—for why?—a holy string<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of penances? No penances will bring<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The stricken conscience to the blessed light<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of peace,—Oh! I am lost, and there is night,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Despair and darkness, darkness and despair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And want, that hunts me to the lion-lair<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of wild perdition: and I hear them all—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All cursing me! The very sun-rays fall<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74"></a>[74]</span> +<span class="i0">In curses, and the shadow of the moon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the pale star light, and the winds that tune<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their voices to the music of the sea,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thou,—yes, thou! my gentle Agathè!—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All curse me!—Oh! that I were never, never!—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or but a breathless fancy, that was ever<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Adrift upon the wilderness of Time,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That knew no impulse, but was left sublime<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To play at its own will!—that I were hush'd<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At night by silver cataracts, that gush'd<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through flowers of fairy hue, and then to die<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Away, with all before me passing by,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like a fair vision I had lived to see,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And died to see no more!—It cannot be!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By this right hand! I feel it is not so,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And by the beating of a heart below,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That strangely feareth for eternity!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He said, and gazing on the lonely sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far off he saw, like an ascending cloud,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To westward, a bright island, lifted proud<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amid the struggling waters, and the light<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the great sun was on its clifted height,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75"></a>[75]</span> +<span class="i0">Scattering golden shadow, like a mirror;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the gigantic billows sprung in terror<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon its rock-built and eternal shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With silver foams that fell in fury o'er<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A thousand sunny breakers. Far above,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There stood a wild and solitary grove<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of aged pines, all leafless but their brows,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where a green group of tempest-stricken boughs<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was waving now and then, and to and fro,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the pale moss was clustering below.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then Julio saw, and bent his head away<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To the cold wasted corse of Agathè,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sigh'd; but ever he would turn again<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A gaze to that green island on the main.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The bark is drifting through the surf, beside<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Its rocks of gray upon the coming tide;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And lightly is it stranded on the shore<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of pure and silver shells, that lie before,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Glittering in the glory of the sun;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Julio hath landed him, like one<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76"></a>[76]</span> +<span class="i0">That aileth of some wild and weary pest;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Agathè is folded on his breast,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A faded flower! with all the vernal dews<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From its bright blossom shaken, and the hues<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Become as colourless as twilight air—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I marvel much, that she was ever fair!<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77"></a>[77]</span> +</div></div> + + + +<h2><a name="CHIMERA_III" id="CHIMERA_III"></a>CHIMERA III</h2> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> + +<span class="i0">Another moon! and over the blue night<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She bendeth, like a holy spirit bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through stars that veil them in their wings of gold;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As on she floateth with her image cold<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Enamell'd on the deep. A sail of cloud<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is to her left, majestically proud!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Trailing its silver drapery away<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In thin and fairy webs, that are at play<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like stormless waves upon a summer sea<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dragging their length of waters lazily.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ay! to the rocks! and thou wilt see, I wist,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A lonely one, that bendeth in the mist<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of moonlight, with a wild and raven pall<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Flung round him. Is he mortal man at all?<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78"></a>[78]</span> +<span class="i0">For, by the meagre fire-light that is under<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Those eyelids, and the vizor shade of wonder<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Falling upon his features, I would guess,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of one that wanders out of blessedness!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Julio! raise thee!—By the holy mass!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wot not of the fearless one would pass<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy wizard shadow. Where the raven hair<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was shorn before, in many a matted layer<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It lieth now; and on a rock beside<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sea, like merman at the ebb of tide,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Feasting his wondrous vision on Decay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So art thou gazing over Agathè!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ah me! but this is never the fair girl,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With brow of light, as lovely as a pearl,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That was as beautiful as is the form<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of sea-bird at the breaking of a storm.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The eye is open, with convulsive strain—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A most unfleshly orb! the stars that wane<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Have nothing of its hue; for it is cast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With sickly blood, and terribly aghast!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sunken in its socket, like the light<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of a red taper in the lonely night!<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79"></a>[79]</span> +<span class="i0">And there is not a braid of her bright hair<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But lieth floating in the moonlight air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like the long moss, beside a silver spring,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In elfin tresses, sadly murmuring.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The worm hath 'gan to crawl upon her brow—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The living worm! and with a ripple now,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like that upon the sea, are heard below,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The slimy swarms all ravening as they go,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amid the stagnate vitals, with a rush;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And one might hear them echoing the hush<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of Julio, as he watches by the side<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the dead ladye, his betrothed bride!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And, ever and anon, a yellow group<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was creeping on her bosom, like a troop<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of stars, far up amid the galaxy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pale, pale, as snowy showers; and two or three<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were mocking the cold finger, round and round,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With likeness of a ring; and, as they wound<br /></span> +<span class="i0">About its bony girth, they had the hue<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of pearly jewels glistering in dew.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That deathly stare! it is an awful thing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To gaze upon; and sickly thoughts will spring<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80"></a>[80]</span> +<span class="i0">Before it to the heart: it telleth how<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There must be waste where there is beauty now.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The chalk! the chalk! where was the virgin snow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of that once heaving bosom!—even so,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The cold pale dewy chalk, with yellow shade<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amid the leprous hues; and o'er it played<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The straggling moonlight, and the merry breeze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like two fair elves, that, by the murmuring seas,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Woo'd smilingly together; but there fell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No life-gleam on the brow, all terrible<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Becoming, through its beauty, like a cloud<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That waneth paler even than a shroud,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All gorgeous and all glorious before;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For waste, like to the wanton night, was o'er<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her virgin features, stealing them away—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ah me! ah me! and this is Agathè?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Enough! enough! Oh God! but I have pray'd<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To thee, in early daylight and in shade,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the mad curse is on me still—and still!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I cannot alter the Eternal will—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But—but—I hate thee, Agathè! I hate<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What lunacy hath bade me consecrate:<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81"></a>[81]</span> +<span class="i0">I am <i>not</i> mad!—<i>not now!</i>—I do not feel<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That slumberous and blessed opiate steal<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Up to my brain—Oh! that it only would,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To people this eternal solitude<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With fancies, and fair dreams, and summer mirth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which is not now—And yet, my mother earth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I would not love to lie above thee so,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As Agathè lies there—oh! no! no! no!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To have these clay-worms feast upon my heart!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all the light of being, to depart<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Into a dismal shadow! I could die<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As the red lightnings, quenching amid sky<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their wild and wizard breath; I could away,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like a blue billow, bursting into spray;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, never—never have corruption here,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To feed her worms, and let the sunlight jeer<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Above me so.—'Tis thou!—I owe thee, Moon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To-night's fair worship; so be lifting soon<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy veil of clouds, that I may kneel, as one<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That seeketh for thy virgin benison!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He gathers the cold limpets, as they creep<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On the grey rocks beside the lonely deep;<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82"></a>[82]</span> +<span class="i0">And with a flint breaks through into the shell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And feeds him—by the mass! he feasteth well.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And he hath lifted water in a clam,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And tasted sweetly, from a stream that swam<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Down to the sea; and now is turn'd away,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Again, again, to gaze on Agathè!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There is a cave upon that isle—a cave<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where dwelt a hermit man; the winter wave<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Roll'd to its entrance, casting a bright mound<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of snowy shells and fairy pebbles round;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And over were the solemn ridges strewn<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of a dark rock, that, like the wizard throne<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of some sea-monarch, stood, and from it hung<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wild thorn and bramble, in confusion flung<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amid the startling crevices—like sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through gloom of clouds, that sweep in thunder by.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A cataract fell over, in a streak<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of silver, playing many a wanton freak;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Midway, and musical, with elfin glee<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It bounded in its beauty to the sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like dazzling angel vanishing away.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In sooth, 'twas pleasant in the moonlight gray<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83"></a>[83]</span> +<span class="i0">To see that fairy fountain leaping so,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like one that knew not wickedness nor woe!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The hermit had his cross and rosary;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I ween like other hermits, so was he;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A holy man, and frugal, and at night<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He prayed, or slept, or, sometimes, by the light<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the fair moon, went wandering beside<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lonely sea, to hear the silver tide<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rolling in gleesome music to the shore:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The more he heard, he loved to hear the more.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And there he is, his hoary beard adrift<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To the night winds, that sportingly do lift<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Its snow-white tresses; and he leaneth on<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A rugged staff, all weakly and alone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A childless, friendless man!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i12">He is beside<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The ghastly Julio, and his ghastlier bride.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Twas wondrous strange to gaze upon the two!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the old hermit felt a throbbing through<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His pulses:—"Holy virgin! save me, save!"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He deem'd of spectre from the midnight wave,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84"></a>[84]</span> +<span class="i0">And cross'd him thrice, and pray'd, and pray'd again:—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Hence! hence!" and Julio started, as the strain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of exorcisms fell faintly on his ear:—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"I knew thee, father, that thou beest here,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To gaze upon this girl, as I have been.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By yonder moon! it was a frantic sin<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To worship so an image of the clay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It was like beauty—but is now away—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What lived upon her features, like the light<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On yonder cloud, all tender and all bright;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But it is faded as the other must,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And she that was all beauty, is all dust."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Father! thy hand upon this brow of mine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And tell me, is it cold?—But she will twine<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No wreath upon these temples,—never, never!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For there she lieth, like a streamless river<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That stagnates in its bed. Feel, feel me, here,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If I be madly throbbing in the fear<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For that cold slimy worm. Ay! look and see<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How dotingly it feeds, how pleasantly!<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85"></a>[85]</span> +<span class="i0">And where it is, have been the living hues<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of beauty, purer than the very dews.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So, father! seest thou that yonder moon<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will be on wane to-morrow, soon and soon?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I, that feel my being wear away,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall droop beside to darkness; so, but say<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A prayer for the dead, when I am gone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And let the azure tide that floweth on<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cover us lightly with its murmuring surf<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like a green sward of melancholy turf.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou mayest, if thou wilt, thou mayest rear<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A cenotaph on this lone island here,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of some rude mossy stone, below a tree,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And carve an olden rhyme for her and me<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon its brow."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i8">He bends, and gazes yet<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Before his ghastly bride! the anchoret<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sate by him, and hath press'd a cross of wood<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To his wan lips.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"My son! look up and tell thy dismal tale.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou seemest cold, and sorrowful, and pale.<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86"></a>[86]</span> +<span class="i0">Alas! I fear but thou hast strangely been<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A child of curse, and misery, and sin.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And this—is she thy sister?"—"Nay! my bride."<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"A nun! and thou:"—"True, true! but then she died,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And was a virgin, and is virgin still,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Chaste as the moon, that taketh her pure fill<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of light from the great sun. But now, go by,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And leave me to my madness, or to die!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This heart, this brain are sore.—Come, come, and fold<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Me round, ye hydra billows! wrapt in gold,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That are so writhing your eternal gyres<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Before the moon, which, with a myriad tiars<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is crowning you, as ye do fall and kiss<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her pearly feet, that glide in blessedness!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let me be torture-eaten, ere I die!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let me be mangled sore with agony!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And be so cursed, so stricken by the spell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of my heart's frenzy, that a living hell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be burning there!—Back! back! if thou art mad—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Methought thou wast, but thou art only sad.<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87"></a>[87]</span> +<span class="i0">Is this thy child, old man? look, look, and see!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In truth it is a piteous thing for thee<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To become childless—Well-a-well, go by!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is there no grave? The quiet sea is nigh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I will bury her below the moon;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It may be but a trance or midnight swoon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And she may wake. Wake, ladye! ha! methought<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It was like <i>her</i>—Like her! and is it not?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My angel girl! my brain, my stricken brain!—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I know thee now!—I know myself again."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He flings him on the ladye, and anon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With loathly shudder, from that wither'd one<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hath torn him back. "Oh me! no more—no more!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou virgin mother! Is the dream not o'er,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That I have dreamt, but I must dream again<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For moons together, till this weary brain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Become distemper'd as the winter sea?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Good father! give me blessing; let it be<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon me as the dew upon the moss.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh me! but I have made the holy cross<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88"></a>[88]</span> +<span class="i0">A curse, and not a blessing! let me kiss<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sacred symbol; for, by this—by this!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I sware, and sware again, as now I will—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou Heaven! if there be bounty in thee still,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If thou wilt hear, and minister, and bring<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The light of comfort on some angel wing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To one that lieth lone, do—do it now;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By all the stars that open on thy brow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like silver flowers! and by the herald moon<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That listeth to be forth at nightly noon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Jousting the clouds, I swear! and be it true,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As I have perjured me, that I renew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Allegiance to thy God, and bind me o'er<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To this same penance, I have done before!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That night and day I watch, as I have been<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Long watching, o'er the partner of my sin!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That I taste never the delight of food,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But these wild shell-fish, that may make the mood<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of madness stronger, till it grapple Death—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Despair—Eternity!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i8">He saith, he saith,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89"></a>[89]</span> +<span class="i0">And, on the jaundiced bosom of the corse,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lieth all frenzied; one would see Remorse,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And hopeless Love, and Hatred, struggling there,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Lunacy, that lightens up Despair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And makes a gladness out of agony.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pale phantom! I would fear and worship thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That hast the soul at will, and gives it play,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amid the wildest fancies far away;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That thronest Reason, on some wizard throne<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of fairy land, within the milky zone,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some spectre star, that glittereth beyond<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The glorious galaxies of diamond.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Beautiful Lunacy! that shapest flight<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For love to blessed bowers of delight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And buildest holy monarchies within<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fancy, till the very heart is queen<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of all her golden wishes. Lunacy!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou empress of the passions! though they be<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A sister group of wild, unearthly forms,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like lightnings playing in their home of storms!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I see thee, striking at the silver strings<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the pure heart, and holy music springs<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90"></a>[90]</span> +<span class="i0">Before thy touch, in many a solemn strain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like that of sea-waves rolling from the main!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But say, is Melancholy by thy side,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With tresses in a raven shower, that hide<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her pale and weeping features? Is she never<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Flowing before thee, like a gloomy river,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sister of thyself? but cold and chill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And winter-born, and sorrowfully still,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And not like thee, that art in merry mood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And frolicksome amid thy solitude!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fair Lunacy! I see thee, with a crown<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of hawthorn and sweet daisies, bending down<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To mirror thy young image in a spring;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thou wilt kiss that shadow of a thing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As soul-less as thyself. 'Tis tender, too,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The smile that meeteth thine! the holy hue<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of health! the pearly radiance of the brow!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All, all as tender—beautiful as thou!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And wilt thou say, my sister, there is none<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will answer thee? Thou art—thou art alone,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91"></a>[91]</span> +<span class="i0">A pure, pure being! but the God on high<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is with thee ever, as thou goest by.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou poetess! that harpest to the moon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, in soft concert to the silver tune<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of waters, play'd on by the magic wind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As he comes streaming, with his hair untwined,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dost sing light strains of melody and mirth,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I hear thee, hymning on thy holy birth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How thou wert moulded of thy mother Love,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That came, like seraph, from the stars above,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And was so sadly wedded unto Sin,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That thou wert born, and Sorrow was thy twin.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sorrow and mirthful Lunacy! that be<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Together link'd for time, I deem of ye<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That ye are worshipp'd as none others are,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">One as a lonely shadow, one a star!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Is Julio glad, that bendeth, even now,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To his wild purpose, to his holy vow?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He seeth only in his ladye-bride<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The image of the laughing girl, that died<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92"></a>[92]</span> +<span class="i0">A moon before—The same, the very same—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Agathè that lisp'd her lover's name,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To him and to her heart: that azure eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That shone through sunny tresses, waving by;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The brow, the cheek, that blush'd of fire and snow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Both blending into one ethereal glow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And that same breathing radiancy, that swam<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Around her, like a pure and blessed calm<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Around some halcyon bird. And, as he kiss'd<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her wormy lips, he felt that he was blest!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He felt her holy being stealing through<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His own, like fountains of the azure dew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That summer mingles with his golden light;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And he would clasp her, till the weary night<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was worn away.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i8">And morning rose in form<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of heavy clouds, that knitted into storm<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The brow of Heaven, and through her lips the wind<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Came rolling westward, with a track behind<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of gloomy billows, bursting on the sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All rampant, like great lions terribly,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93"></a>[93]</span> +<span class="i0">And gnashing on each other: and anon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Julio heard them, rushing one by one,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And laugh'd and turn'd.—The hermit was away,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For he was old and weary, and he lay<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Within his cave, and thought it was a dream,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A summer's dream? and so the quiet stream<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of sleep came o'er his eyelids, and in truth<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He dreamt of that strange ladye, and the youth<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That held a death-wake on her wasting form;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And so he slept and woke not, till the storm<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was over.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i6">But they came,—the wind and sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And rain and thunder, that in giant glee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sang o'er the lightnings pale, as to and fro<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They writhed, like stricken angels!—White as snow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Roll'd billow after billow, and the tide<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Came forward as an army deep and wide,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To charge with all its waters. There was heard<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A murmur far and far, of those that stirr'd<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Within the great encampment of the sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And dark they were, and lifted terribly<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94"></a>[94]</span> +<span class="i0">Their water-spouts like banners. It was grand<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To see the black battalions, hand in hand<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Striding to conflict, and their helmets bent<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Below their foamy plumes magnificent!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And Julio heard and laugh'd, "Shall I be king<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To your great hosts, that ye are murmuring<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For one to bear you to your holy war?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There is no sun, or moon, or any star,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To guide your iron footsteps as ye go;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I, your king, will marshal you to flow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From shore to shore. Then bring my car of shell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That I may ride before you terrible;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bring my sceptre of the amber weed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Agathè, my virgin bride, shall lead<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your summer hosts, when these are ambling low,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In azure and in ermine, to and fro."<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He said, and madly, with his wasted hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Swept o'er the tuneless harp, and fast he spann'd<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The silver chords, until a rush of sound<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Came from them, solemn—terrible—profound;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then he dash'd the instrument away<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Into the waters, and the giant play<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95"></a>[95]</span> +<span class="i0">Of billows threw it back unto the shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A shiver'd, stringless frame—its day of music o'er!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tide, the rolling tide! the multitude<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the sea surges, terrible and rude,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tossing their chalky foam along the bed<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of thundering pebbles, that are shoring dread,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And fast retreating to the gloomy gorge<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of waters, sounding like a Titan forge!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It comes! it comes! the tide, the rolling tide!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Julio is bending to his bride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And making mirthful whispers to her ear.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A cataract! a cataract is near,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of one stupendous billow, and it breaks<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Terribly furious, with a myriad flakes<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of foam, that fly about the haggard twain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Julio started, with a sudden pain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That shot into his heart; his reason flew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Back to its throne; he rose, and wildly threw<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His matted tresses over on his brow.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Another billow came, and even now<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was dashing at his feet. There was no shade<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of terror, as the serpent waters play'd<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96"></a>[96]</span> +<span class="i0">Before him, but his eye was calm as death.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Another, yet another! and the breath<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the weird wind was with it; like a rock<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unriveted it fell—a shroud of smoke<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pass'd over—there was heard, and died away,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The voice of one, shrill shrieking, "Agathè!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sea-bird sitteth lonely by the side<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the far waste of waters, flapping wide<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His wet and weary wings; but <i>he</i> is gone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The stricken Julio!—a wave-swept stone<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Stands there, on which he sat, and nakedly<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It rises looking to the lonely sea;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Julio is gone, and Agathè!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The waters swept them madly to their core,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The dead and living with a frantic roar!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And so he died, his bosom fondly set<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On her's; and round her clay-cold waist were met<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His bare and wither'd arms, and to her brow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His lips were press'd. Both, both are perish'd now!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He died upon her bosom in a swoon;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And fancied of the pale and silver moon,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97"></a>[97]</span> +<span class="i0">That went before him in her hall of blue:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He died like golden insect in the dew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Calm, calm, and pure; and not a chord was rung<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In his deep heart, but love. He perish'd young,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But perish'd, wasted by some fatal flame<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That fed upon his vitals; and there came<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lunacy sweeping lightly, like a stream,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Along his brain—He perish'd in a dream!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i8">In sooth, I marvel not,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If death be only a mysterious thought,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That cometh on the heart, and turns the brow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Brightless and chill, as Julio's is now;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For only had the wasting struggle been<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of one wild feeling, till it rose within<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Into the form of death, and nature felt<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The light of the immortal being melt<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Into its happier home, beyond the sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And moon, and stars, into eternity!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sun broke through his dungeon long enthrall'd<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By dismal cloud, and on the emerald<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the great living sea was blazing down,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To gift the lordly billows with a crown<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98"></a>[98]</span> +<span class="i0">Of diamond and silver. From his cave<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hermit came, and by the dying wave<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lone wander'd, and he found upon the sand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Below a truss of sea-weed, with his hand<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Around the silent waist of Agathè,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The corse of Julio! Pale, pale, it lay<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beside the wasted girl. The fireless eye<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was open, and a jewell'd rosary<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hung round the neck; but it was gone,—the cross<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That Agathè had given.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i10">Amid the moss,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hermit scoop'd a solitary grave<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Below the pine-trees, and he sang a stave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or two, or three, of some old requiem<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As in their narrow home he buried them.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And many a day, before that blessed spot<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He sate, in lone and melancholy thought,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gazing upon the grave; and one had guess'd<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of some dark secret shadowing his breast.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And yet, to see him, with his silver hair<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Adrift and floating in the sea-borne air,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99"></a>[99]</span> +<span class="i0">And features chasten'd in the tears of woe,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In sooth 'twas merely sad to see him so!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A wreck of nature, floating far and fast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon the stream of Time—to sink at last!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And he is wandering by the shore again,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hard leaning on his staff; the azure main<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lies sleeping far before him, with his seas<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fast folded in the bosom of the breeze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That like the angel Peace hath dropt his wings<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Around the warring waters. Sadly sings<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To his own heart that lonely hermit man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A tale of other days, when passion ran<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Along his pulses, like a troubled stream,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And glory was a splendour, and a dream!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He stoop'd to gather up a shining gem,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That lay amid the shells, as bright as them,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It was a cross, the cross that Agathè<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had given to her Julio: the play<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the fierce sunbeams fell upon its face,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And on the glistering jewels—But the trace<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of some old thought came burning to the brain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the pale hermit, and he shrunk in pain<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100"></a>[100]</span> +<span class="i0">Before the holy symbol. It was not<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Because of the eternal ransom wrought<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In ages far away, or he had bent<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In pure devotion sad and reverent;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now, he started, as he look'd upon<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That jewell'd thing, and wildly he is gone<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Back to the mossy grave, away, away:—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"My child! my child! my own, own Agathè!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It is her father,—he,—an alter'd man!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His quiet had been wounded, and the ban<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of misery came over him, and froze<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The bright and holy tides, that fell and rose<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In joy amid his heart. To think of her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That he had injured so, and all so fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So fond, so like the chosen of his youth,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It was a very dismal thought, in truth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That he had left her hopelessly, for aye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Within the cloister-wall to droop, and die!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And so he could not bear to have it be;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But sought for some lone island in the sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where he might dwell in doleful solitude,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And do strange penance in his mirthless mood,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101"></a>[101]</span> +<span class="i0">For this same crime, unnaturally wild,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That he had done unto his saintly child.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ever he did think, when he had laid<br /></span> +<span class="i0">These lovers in the grave, that, through the shade<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of ghastly features melting to decay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He saw the image of his Agathè.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And now the truth had flash'd into his brain:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And he is fallen, with a shriek of pain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon the lap of pale and yellow moss;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For long ago he gave that blessed cross<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To his fair girl, and knew the relic still,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By many a thousand thoughts, that rose at will<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Before it, of the one that was not now,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, like a dream, had floated from the brow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of Time, that seeth many a lovely thing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fade by him, like a sea-wave murmuring.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The heart is burst!—the heart that stood in steel<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To woman's earnest tears, and bade her feel<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The curse of virgin solitude,—a veil;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And saw the gladsome features growing pale<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102"></a>[102]</span> +<span class="i0">Unmoved: 'tis rent, like some eternal tower<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sea hath shaken, and its stately power<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lies lonely, fallen, scatter'd on the shore:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Tis rent, like some great mountain, that, before<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Deluge, stood in glory and in might,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now is lightning-riven, and the night<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is clambering up its sides, and chasms lie strewn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like coffins, here and there: 'tis rent! the throne<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where passions, in their awful anarchy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Stood sceptred! There was heard an inward sigh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That took the being, on its troubled wings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far to the land of dim imaginings!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">All three are dead; that desolate green isle<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is only peopled by the passing smile<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of sun and moon, that surely have a sense,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They look so radiant with intelligence,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So like the soul's own element,—so fair!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The features of a God lie veiled there!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And mariners that have been toiling far<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon the deep, and lost the polar star,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103"></a>[103]</span> +<span class="i0">Have visited that island, and have seen<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That lover's grave: and many there have been<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That sat upon the gray and crumbling stone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And started, as they saw a skeleton<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amid the long sad moss, that fondly grew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through the white wasted ribs; but never knew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of those who slept below, or of the tale<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of that brain-stricken man, that felt the pale<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wandering moonlight steal his soul away,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Poor Julio, and the ladye Agathè!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We found them,—children of toil and tears,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their birth of beauty shaded;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We left them in their early years<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Fallen and faded.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We found them, flowers of summer hue:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their golden cups were lighted<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With sparkles of the pearly dew—<br /></span> +<span class="i8">We left them blighted!<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104"></a>[104]</span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We found them,—like those fairy flowers;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the light of morn lay holy<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over their sad and sainted bowers—<br /></span> +<span class="i8">We left them, lowly.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We found them,—like twin stars, alone,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In brightness and in feeling;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We left them,—and the curse was on<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Their beauty stealing.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They rest in quiet, where they are:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their lifetime is the story<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of some fair flower—some silver star,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Faded in glory!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105"></a>[105]</span></p> + +<h2><a name="POEMS" id="POEMS"></a>POEMS</h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107"></a>[107]</span> </p> +<h2><a name="THE_IRIS" id="THE_IRIS"></a>THE IRIS</h2> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A pale and broken Iris in the mirror<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of a gray cloud,—as gray as death,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Slow sailing in the breath<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of thunder! Like a child, that lies in terror<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Through the dark night, an Iris fair<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Trembled midway in air.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The blending of its elfin hues<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was as the pure enamel on<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The early morning dews;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And gloriously they shone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Waving everyone his wing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like a young aërial thing!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That Iris came<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over the shells of gold, beside<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The blue and waveless tide;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Its girdle, of resplendent flame,<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108"></a>[108]</span> +<span class="i0">Met shore and sea, afar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like angel that shall stand<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On flood and land,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Crown'd with a meteor star.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sea-bird, from her snowy stone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beheld it floating on,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Like a bride that bent her way<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To the altar, standing lone,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In some cathedral gray.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The melancholy wave<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Started at the cry she gave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hailing the lovely child<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of the immortal sun,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A tender and a tearful one,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bounding away, with footsteps wild!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Old Neptune on his silver bed<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The dazzling image threw;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It laid like sunbeam on the dew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Its young tress-waving head.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The god upon the shadow gazed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And silently upraised<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109"></a>[109]</span> +<span class="i0">A gentle wave, that came and kiss'd<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fair Iris in her holy rest.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her pearly brow grew pale:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It felt the sinful fire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And from her queenly tiar<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She drew the veil.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sun-wing'd steeds her sacred car<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wheel'd to her throne of star.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110"></a>[110]</span></p> +<h2><a name="TO_A_SPIRIT" id="TO_A_SPIRIT"></a>TO A SPIRIT</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Spirit! in deathless halo zoned,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A chain of stars with wings of diamond,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is music blended into thee<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With holy light and immortality?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For, as thy shape of glory swept<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through seas of darkness, magic breathings fell<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Around it, like the notes that slept<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In the wild caverns of a silver shell.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou camest, as a lightning spring<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through chasms of horrid cloud, on scathless wing;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Old Chaos round him, like a tiar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Swathed the long rush of immaterial fire;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As thou, descending from afar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wast canopied with living arch of light,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Pale pillars of immortal star,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Burst through the curtains of the moonless night.<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111"></a>[111]</span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Phantom of wonder! over thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Trembles the shadow of the Deity;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For face to face, on lifted throne,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou gazest to the glory-shrouded One,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where highest in the azure height<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of universe, eternally he turns<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Myriads of worlds; with blaze of light<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Filling the hollow of their golden urns.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Why comest thou, with feelings bound<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On thy birth-shore, the long unenter'd ground?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To visit where thy being first,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through the pale shell of embryo nothing, burst?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or, on celestial errand bent,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To win to faith a sin enraptured son,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And point the angel lineament<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of mercy on a cross,—the Bleeding One?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Spirit! I breathe no sad adieu:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The altars where thou bendest never knew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sigh, tear, or sorrow, and the night<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No chariot drives behind the wheel of light;<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112"></a>[112]</span> +<span class="i2">Where every seraph is a sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And every soul an everlasting star.—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Go to thy home, thou peerless one!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where glory and the Great Immortal are!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113"></a>[113]</span></p> +<h2><a name="HER_A_STATUE" id="HER_A_STATUE"></a>HER, A STATUE</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her life is in the marble! yet a fall<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of sleep lies on the heart's fair arsenal,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like new shower'd snow. You hear no whisper through<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Those love-divided lips; no pearly dew<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Trembles on her pale orbs, that seem to be<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bent on a dream of immortality!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She sleeps: her life is sleep,—a holy rest!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like that of wing-borne cloud, that, in the west<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Laves his aërial image, till afar<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sunlight leaves him, melting into star.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Did Phidias from her brow the veil remove,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Uncurtaining the peerless queen of love?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fluent stone in marble waves recoil'd,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Touch'd by his hand, and left the wondrous child,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114"></a>[114]</span> +<span class="i0">A Venus of the foam! How softly fair<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The dove-like passion on the sacred air<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Floats round her, nesting in her wreathed hair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That tells, though shadeless, of its auburn hue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bathed in a hoar of diamond-dropping dew!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How beautiful!—Was this not one of eld,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That Chaos on his boundless bosom held,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till Earth came forward in a rush of storm,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Closing his ribs upon her wingless form?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How beautiful!—The very lips do speak<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of love, and bid us worship: the pale cheek<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Seems blushing through the marble—through the snow!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the undrap'ried bosom feels a flow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of fever on its brightness; every vein<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At the blue pulse swells softly, like a chain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of gentle hills. I would not fling a wreath<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of jewels on that brow, to flash beneath<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Those queenly tresses; for itself is more<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than sea-born pearl of some Elysian shore!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Such, with a heart like woman! I would cast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Life at her foot, and, as she glided past,<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115"></a>[115]</span> +<span class="i0">Would bid her trample on the slavish thing—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tell her, I'd rather feel me withering<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Under her step, than be unknown for aye:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And, when her pride had crush'd me, she might see<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A love-wing'd spirit glide in glory by<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Striking the tent of its mortality!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116"></a>[116]</span></p> +<h2><a name="TO_A_STORM-STAID_BIRD" id="TO_A_STORM-STAID_BIRD"></a>TO A STORM-STAID BIRD</h2> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Trembler! a month is past, and thou<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wert singing on the thorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And shaking dew-drops from the bough<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In the golden haze of morn!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My heart was just as thou, as light—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As loving of the breeze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That kiss'd thee in its elfin flight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Through the green acacia trees.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And now the winter snow-flakes lie<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All on thy widow'd wing;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Trembler! methinks I hear thee sigh<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For the silver days of spring.<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117"></a>[117]</span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But shake thy plume—the world is free<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Before thee—warbler, fly!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Blest by a sunbeam and by me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bird of my heart! good-bye!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118"></a>[118]</span></p> +<h2><a name="THE_WOLF-DROVE" id="THE_WOLF-DROVE"></a>THE WOLF-DROVE</h2> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No night-star in the welkin blue! no moonshade round the trees<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That grew down to the sea-swept foot of the ancient Pyrenees!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The cold gray mantle of the mist, along the shoulders cast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of those wild mountains, to and fro, hung waving in the blast.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A snow-crown rising on their brows, in royalty they stood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As if they vice-reign'd on a throne of winter solitude;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Those hills that rose far upward, till in majesty they bent<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their world's great eye-orb on her own immortal lineament!<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119"></a>[119]</span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The howl, the long deep howl was heard, the rushing like a wave<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the wolf train from their forest haunt, in some old mountain cave;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like a sea-wave, when the wind is horsed behind its foamy crest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And it lifts upon the shell-built shore, its azure-spotted breast.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They came with war-whoop, following each other, like a thread,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through the long labyrinth of trees, in sunless archway spread;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their gnarled trunks in shadowy lines rose dimly, few by few,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mail'd in their mossy armouring,—a pathless avenue!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In sooth, there was a shepherd girl by her aged father's side;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He gazed upon her deep dark eyes, in glory and in pride;<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120"></a>[120]</span> +<span class="i0">The mother's soul was living there,—the image full and wild,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of one he loved—of one no more, was beaming in her child.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And she was at her father's side, her raven tresses felt<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon his care-worn cheek, as gay and joyfully she knelt,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Kissing the old man's tears away, by the embers burning faint,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While she sung the holy aves, and a vesper to her saint.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Now bar the breezy lattice, love!—but hist! how fares the night?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Methought I heard the wolf abroad. Heaven help! I heard aright—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My mantle!—By the Mother Saint! our flock is in the fold?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How think you, love? wake up the hound, I ween the wolf is bold."<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121"></a>[121]</span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Stay, stay; 'tis past!" "I hear it still; to rest, I pray, to rest."<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Nay, father! hold; thou must not go;" and silently she press'd<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The old man's arm, and bade him stay, for love of Heaven and her:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His danger was too wild a thought, for so fond a girl to bear.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He kiss'd her, and they parted then; but, through the lattice low,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She gazed amid the vine-twigs pale, all cradled to and fro;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The holy whisper of the wind stole lightly by the eaves,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A sad dirge, sighing to the fall of the winter-blighted leaves.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He comes not! 'Tis a dreadful thing to hear them as they rave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The savage wolf-train howling, like the near burst of a wave.<br /></span> <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122"></a>[122]</span> +<span class="i0">She thought it was a father's cry she heard—a father's cry!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And she flung her from the cottage door, in startled agony.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Good Virgin save thee, gentle girl! they are no knightly train<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That mark thee for their sinless prey—thou wilt not smile again;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The blood is streaming on thy cheek; the heart it ceases slow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A father gazes on his child—God help a father's woe!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123"></a>[123]</span></p> +<h2><a name="HYMN_TO_ORION" id="HYMN_TO_ORION"></a>HYMN TO ORION</h2> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Orion! old Orion! who dost wait<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Warder at heaven's star-studded gate,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On a throne where worlds might meet<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At thy silver sandal'd feet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All invisible to thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gazing through immensity;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For thy crowned head is higher<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than the ramparts of earth-searching fire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the comet his blooded banner, there<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Flings back upon the waveless air.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Old Orion! holy hands<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Have knit thy everlasting bands,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Belted by the King of kings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Under thy azure-sheathed wings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With a zone of living light,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Such as bound the Apostate might,<br /></span> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124"></a>[124]</span> +<span class="i0">When from highest tower of heaven,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His vaunting shape was wrathly driven<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To its wane, woe-wall'd abode,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rended from the eye of God!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Dost thou, in thy vigils, hail<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Arcturus on his chariot pale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Leading his sons—a fiery flight—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Over the hollow hill of night?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or tellest of their watches long,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To the sleepless, nameless throng,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shoaling in a wond'rous gleam,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like channel through the azure stream<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of life reflected, as it flows,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In one broad ocean of repose,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gushing from thy lips, Orion!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To the holy walls of Zion?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + +<h4><i>Printed by</i> <span class="smcap">Ballantyne, Hanson & Co.<br /> +<i>London & Edinburgh</i></span></h4> + + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Death-Wake, by Thomas T Stoddart + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DEATH-WAKE *** + +***** This file should be named 16601-h.htm or 16601-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/6/6/0/16601/ + +Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Sankar Viswanathan 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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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: The Death-Wake + or Lunacy; a Necromaunt in Three Chimeras + +Author: Thomas T Stoddart + +Commentator: Andrew Lang + +Release Date: August 27, 2005 [EBook #16601] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DEATH-WAKE *** + + + + +Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Sankar Viswanathan and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + THE DEATH-WAKE + OR LUNACY + + A NECROMAUNT + IN THREE CHIMERAS + + + BY THOMAS T. STODDART + + + WITH AN INTRODUCTION + BY ANDREW LANG + + + + Is't like that lead contains her?... + It were too gross + To rib her cerecloth in the obscure grave. + + SHAKESPEARE + + + + + LONDON: JOHN LANE + CHICAGO: WAY & WILLIAMS + 1895 + + + + + + + +INTRODUCTION TO +THE DEATH-WAKE + + + + + +_Piscatori Piscator_ + + + + _An angler to an angler here, + To one who longed not for the bays, + I bring a little gift and dear, + A line of love, a word of praise, + A common memory of the ways, + By Elibank and Yair that lead; + Of all the burns, from all the braes, + That yield their tribute to the Tweed. + + His boyhood found the waters clean, + His age deplored them, foul with dye; + But purple hills, and copses green, + And these old towers he wandered by, + Still to the simple strains reply + Of his pure unrepining reed, + Who lies where he was fain to lie, + Like Scott, within the sound of Tweed._ + + A.L. + + + + + + +INTRODUCTION + + +The extreme rarity of _The Death-Wake_ is a reason for its +republication, which may or may not be approved of by collectors. Of +the original edition the Author says that more than seventy copies +were sold in the first week of publication, but thereafter the +publisher failed in business. Mr. Stoddart recovered the sheets of his +poem, and his cook gradually, and perhaps not injudiciously, expended +them for domestic purposes. + +Apart from its rarity, _The Death-Wake_ has an interest of its own for +curious amateurs of poetry. The year of its composition (1830) was the +great year of _Romanticisme_ in France, the year of _Hernani_, and of +Gautier's _gilet rouge_. In France it was a literary age given to +mediaeval extravagance, to the dagger and the bowl, the cloak and +sword, the mad monk and the were-wolf; the age of Petrus Borel and +MacKeat, as well as of Dumas and Hugo. Now the official poetry of our +country was untouched by and ignorant of the virtues and excesses of +1830. Wordsworth's bolt was practically shot; Sir Walter was ending +his glorious career; Shelley and Byron and Keats were dead, and the +_annus mirabilis_ of Coleridge was long gone by. Three young poets of +the English-speaking race were producing their volumes, destined at +first to temporary neglect. The year 1830 was the year of Mr. +Tennyson's _Poems, chiefly Lyrical_, his first book, not counting +_Poems by Two Brothers_. It was also the year of Mr. Browning's +_Pauline_ (rarer even than _The Death-Wake_); and it was the year +which followed the second, and perhaps the most characteristic, +poetical venture of Edgar Allan Poe. In Mr. Tennyson's early lyrics, +and in Mr. Poe's, any capable judge must have recognised new notes of +romance. Their accents are fresh and strange, their imaginations dwell +in untrodden regions. Untouched by the French romantic poets, they yet +unconsciously reply to their notes, as if some influence in the mental +air were at work on both sides of the Channel, on both sides of the +Atlantic. Now, in my opinion, this indefinite influence was also +making itself felt, faintly and dimly, in Scotland. _The Death-Wake_ +is the work of a lad who certainly had read Keats, Coleridge and +Shelley, but who is no imitator of these great poets. He has, in a few +passages, and at his best, an accent original, distinct, strangely +musical, and really replete with promise. He has a fresh unborrowed +melody and mastery of words, the first indispensable sign of a true +poet. His rhymed heroic verse is no more the rhymed heroic verse of +_Endymion_, than it is that of Mr. Pope, or of Mr. William Morris. He +is a new master of the old instrument. + +His mood is that of Scott when Scott was young, and was so anxious to +possess a death's head and cross-bones. The malady is "most incident" +to youth, but Mr. Stoddart wears his rue with a difference. The mad +monkish lover of the dead nun Agathe has hit on precisely the sort of +fantasy which was about to inspire Theophile Gautier's _Comedie de la +Mort_, or the later author of _Gaspard de la Nuit_, or Edgar Poe. +There is here no "criticism of life;" it is a criticism of strange +death; and, so far, may recall Beddoes's _Death's Jest-Book_, +unpublished, of course, in 1830. Naturally this kind of poetry is +"useless," as Mr. Ruskin says about Coleridge, but, in its _bizarre_ +way, it may be beautiful. + +The author, by a curious analogy with Theophile Gautier, was, in these +days, a humourist as well as a poet. In the midst of his mad fancies +and rare melodies he is laughing at himself, as Theophile mocked at +_Les Jeunes France_. The psychological position is, therefore, one of +the rarest. Mr. Stoddart was, first of all and before all, a hardy and +enthusiastic angler. Between 1830 and 1840 he wrote a few beautiful +angling songs, and then all the poetry of his character merged itself +in an ardent love of Nature: of hill, loch and stream--above all, of +Tweed, the fairest of waters, which he lived to see a sink of +pollution. After 1831 we have no more romanticism from Mr. Stoddart. +The wind, blowing where it listeth, struck on him as on an AEolian +harp, and "an uncertain warbling made," in the true Romantic manner. +He did write a piece with the alluring name of _Ajalon of the Winds_, +but not one line of it survives. The rest is not silence, indeed, for, +in addition to his lays of trout and salmon, of Tweed and Teviot, Mr. +Stoddart wrote a good deal of prose, and a good deal of perfectly +common and uninspired verse. The Muse, which was undeniably with him +for an hour, abandoned him, or he deserted her, being content to whip +the waters of Tweed, and Meggat, and Yarrow. Perhaps unfavourable and +unappreciative criticism, acting on a healthy and contented nature, +drove him back into the common paths of men. Whatever the cause, the +_Death-Wake_ alone (save for a few angling songs) remains to give +assurance of a poet "who died young." It is needless to rewrite the +biography, excellently done, in _Angling Songs_, by Miss Stoddart, the +poet's daughter (Blackwoods, Edinburgh, 1889). Mr. Stoddart was born +on St. Valentine's Day 1810, in Argyll Square, Edinburgh, nearly on +the site of the Kirk of Field, where Darnley was murdered. He came of +an old Border family. Miss Stoddart tells a painful tale of an aged +Miss Helen who burned family papers because she thought she was +bewitched by the seals and decorated initials. Similar follies are +reported of a living old lady, on whose hearth, after a night of +destruction, was once found the impression of a seal of Mary of +Modena. I could give only too good a guess at the _provenance_ of +_those_ papers, but nobody can interfere. Beyond 1500 the family +memories rely on tradition. The ancestors owned lands in the Forest of +Ettrick, and Williamhope, on the Tweed hard by Ashestiel. On the +Glenkinnon burn, celebrated by Scott, they hid the prophets of the +Covenant "by fifties in a cave." One Williamhope is said to have been +out at Drumclog, or, perhaps, Bothwell Brig. This laird, of enormous +strength, was called the Beetle of Yarrow, and was a friend of Murray +of Philiphaugh. His son, in the Fifteen, was out on the Hanoverian +side, which was _not_ in favour with the author of _The Death-Wake_. +He married a daughter of Veitch of The Glen, now the property of Sir +Charles Tennant. In the next generation but one, the Stoddarts sold +their lands and took to commerce, while the poet's father won great +distinction in the Navy. The great-great-grandfather of the poet +married a Miss Muir of Anniston, the family called cousins (on which +side of the blanket I know not) with Robert II. of Scotland, and, by +another line, were as near as in the sixth degree of James III. + +As a schoolboy, Mr. Stoddart was always rhyming of goblin, ghost, +fairy, and all Sir Walter's themes. At Edinburgh University he was a +pupil of Christopher North (John Wilson), who pooh-poohed _The +Death-Wake_ in _Blackwood_. He also knew Aytoun, Professor Ferrier, De +Quincey, Hartley Coleridge, and Hogg, and was one of the first guests +of Tibbie Sheils, on the spit of land between St. Mary's and the Loch +of the Lowes. In verses of this period (1827) Miss Stoddart detects +traces of Keats and Byron, but the lines quoted are much better in +_technique_ than Byron usually wrote. + +The summer of 1830 Mr. Stoddart passed in Hogg's company on Yarrow, +and early in 1831 he published _The Death-Wake_. There is no trace of +James Hogg in the poem, which, to my mind, is perfectly original. +Wilson places it "between the weakest of Shelley and the strongest of +Barry Cornwall." It is really nothing but a breath of the spirit of +romance, touching an instrument not wholly out of tune, but never to +be touched again. + +It is unnecessary to follow Mr. Stoddart through a long and happy life +of angling and of literary leisure. He only blossomed once. His poem +was plagiarised and inserted in _Graham's Magazine_, by a person named +Louis Fitzgerald Tasistro (vol. xx.). Mr. Ingram, the biographer of +Edgar Poe, observes that Poe praised the piece while he was exposing +Tasistro's "barefaced robbery." + +The copy of _The Death-Wake_ from which this edition is printed was +once the property of Mr. Aytoun, author of _Lays of the Scottish +Cavaliers_, and, I presume, of _Ta Phairshon_. Mr. Aytoun has written +a prefatory sonnet which will be found in its proper place, a set of +rhymes on the flyleaf at the end, and various cheerful but unfeeling +notes. After some hesitation I do not print these frivolities. + +The copy was most generously presented to me by Professor Knight of +St. Andrews, and I have only seen one other example, which I in turn +contributed to fill the vacant place in the shelves of Mr. Knight. His +example, however, is far the more curious of the twain, by virtue of +Aytoun's annotations. + +I had been wanting to see _The Death-Wake_ ever since, as a boy, I +read the unkind review of it in an ancient volume of _Blackwood's +Magazine_. In its "pure purple mantle" of glazed cloth, with paper +label, it is an unaffectedly neat and well-printed little volume. + +It would be unbecoming and impertinent to point out to any one who has +an ear for verse, the charm of such lines as-- + + "A murmur far and far, of those that stirred + Within the great encampment of the sea." + +Or-- + + "A love-winged seraph glides in glory by, + Striking the tent of its mortality." + +(An idea anticipated by the as yet unknown Omar Khayyam). + +Or-- + + "Dost thou, in thy vigil, hail + Arcturus in his chariot pale, + Leading him with a fiery flight + Over the hollow hill of night?" + +These are wonderful verses for a lad of twenty-one, living among +anglers, undergraduates, and, if with some society of the lettered, +apparently with none which could appreciate or applaud him. + +For the matter of the poem, the wild voyage of the mad monkish lover +with the dead Bride of Heaven, it strikes, of course, on the common +reef of the Romantic--the ridiculous. But the recurring contrasts of a +pure, clear peace in sea and sky, are of rare and atoning beauty. Such +a passage is-- + + "And the great ocean, like a holy hall, + Where slept a seraph host maritimal, + Was gorgeous with wings of diamond." + +Once more, when the mad monk tells the sea-waves + + "That ye have power and passion, and a sound + As of the flying of an angel round, + The mighty world, that ye are one with Time," + +we recognise genuine imagination. + +A sympathetic reader of _The Death-Wake_ would perhaps have expected +the leprosies and lunacies to drop off, and the genius, purged of its +accidents, to move into a pure transparency. The abnormal, the +monstrous, the boyish elements should have been burned away in the +fire of the genius of poetry. But the Muses did not so will it, and +the mystic wind of the spirit of song became of less moment to Mr. +Stoddart than the breeze on the loch that stirs the trout to feed. +Perhaps his life was none the less happy and fortunate. Of the many +brilliant men whom he knew intimately--Wilson, Aytoun, Ferrier, +Glassford Bell, and others--perhaps none, not even Hogg, recognised +the grace of the Muse which (in my poor opinion) Mr. Stoddart +possessed. His character was not in the least degree soured by neglect +or fretted by banter. Not to over-estimate oneself is a virtue very +rare among poets, and certainly does not lead to public triumphs. +Modesty is apt to accompany the sense of humour which alleviates +life, while it is an almost insuperable bar to success. + +Mr. Stoddart died on November 22nd, 1880. His last walk was to Kelso +Bridge "to look at the Tweed," which now murmurs by his grave the +self-same song that it sings beside Sir Walter's tomb in Dryburgh +Abbey. We leave his poem to the judgment of students of poetry, and to +him we say his own farewell-- + + Sorrow, sorrow speed away + To our angler's quiet mound, + With the old pilgrim, twilight grey, + Enter thou the holy ground. + + There he sleeps, whose heart was twined + With wild stream and wandering burn, + Wooer of the western wind, + Watcher of the April morn. + +A.L. + + + + +THE DEATH-WAKE + +OR LUNACY + + + + +_Sonnet to the Author_ + + _O wormy Thomas Stoddart who inheritest + Rich thoughts and loathsome, nauseous words, & rare! + Tell me, my friend, why is it that thou ferretest + And gropest in each death-corrupted lair? + Seek'st thou for maggots, such as have affinity + With those in thine own brain? or dost thou think + That all is sweet which hath a horrid stink? + Why dost thou make Hautgout thy sole divinity? + Here is enough of genius to convert + Vile dung to precious diamonds, and to spare, + Then why transform the diamond into dirt, + And change thy mind w^h. sh^d. be rich & fair + Into a medley of creations foul, + As if a Seraph would become a Goul?_ + + _W.E.A._ + +_1834_ + + + + +CHIMERA I + + + An anthem of a sister choristry! + And like a windward murmur of the sea, + O'er silver shells, so solemnly it falls! + A dying music shrouded in deep walls, + That bury its wild breathings! And the moon, + Of glow-worm hue, like virgin in sad swoon, + Lies coldly on the bosom of a cloud, + Until the elf-winds, that are wailing loud, + Do minister unto her sickly trance, + Fanning the life into her countenance; + And there are pale stars sparkling, far and few + In the deep chasms of everlasting blue, + Unmarshall'd and ungather'd, one and one, + Like outposts of the lunar garrison. + + A train of holy fathers windeth by + The arches of an aged sanctuary, + With cowl, and scapular, and rosary + On to the sainted oriel, where stood, + By the rich altar, a fair sisterhood-- + A weeping group of virgins! one or two + Bent forward to a bier, of solemn hue, + Whereon a bright and stately coffin lay, + With its black pall flung over:--Agathe + Was on the lid--a name. And who?--No more! + 'Twas only Agathe. + + 'Tis o'er, 'tis o'er,-- + Her burial! and, under the arcades, + Torch after torch into the moonlight fades; + And there is heard the music, a brief while, + Over the roofings of the imaged aisle, + From the deep organ panting out its last, + Like the slow dying of an autumn blast. + + A lonely monk is loitering within + The dusky area, at the altar seen, + Like a pale spirit kneeling in the light + Of the cold moon, that looketh wan and white + Through the deviced oriel; and he lays + His hands upon his bosom, with a gaze + To the chill earth. He had the youthful look + Which heartfelt woe had wasted, and he shook + At every gust of the unholy breeze, + That enter'd through the time-worn crevices. + + A score of summers only o'er his brow + Had pass'd--and it was summer, even now, + The one-and-twentieth--from a birth of tears, + Over a waste of melancholy years! + And _that_ brow was as wan as if it were + Of snowy marble, and the raven hair + That would have cluster'd over, was all shorn, + And his fine features stricken pale as morn. + + He kiss'd a golden crucifix that hung + Around his neck, and in a transport flung + Himself upon the earth, and said, and said + Wild, raving words, about the blessed dead: + And then he rose, and in the moonshade stood, + Gazing upon its light in solitude; + And smote his brow, at some idea wild + That came across: then, weeping like a child, + He falter'd out the name of Agathe; + And look'd unto the heaven inquiringly, + And the pure stars. + + "Oh shame! that ye are met, + To mock me, like old memories, that yet + Break in upon the golden dream I knew, + While she--_she_ lived: and I have said adieu + To that fair one, and to her sister Peace, + That lieth in her grave. When wilt thou cease + To feed upon my quiet!--thou Despair! + That art the mad usurper, and the heir, + Of this heart's heritage! Go, go--return, + And bring me back oblivion, and an urn! + And ye, pale stars, may look, and only find, + The wreck of a proud tree, that lets the wind + Count o'er its blighted boughs; for such was he + That loved, and loves, the silent Agathe!" + And he hath left the sanctuary, like one + That knew not his own purpose--The red sun + Rose early over incense of bright mist, + That girdled a pure sky of amethyst. + And who was he? A monk. And those who knew + Yclept him Julio; but they were few: + And others named him as a nameless one,-- + A dark, sad-hearted being, who had none + But bitter feelings, and a cast of sadness, + That fed the wildest of all curses--madness! + + But he was, what _none_ knew, of lordly line, + That fought in the far land of Palestine, + Where, under banners of the cross, they fell, + Smote by the armies of the infidel. + And Julio was the last; alone, alone! + A sad, unfriended orphan, that had gone + Into the world, to murmur and to die, + Like the cold breezes that are passing by! + + And few they were that bade him to their board; + His fortunes now were over, and the sword + Of his proud ancestry dishonour'd--left + To moulder in its sheath--a hated gift! + + Ay! it was so; and Julio had fain + Have been a warrior; but his very brain + Grew fever'd at the sickly thought of death, + And to be stricken with a want of breath!-- + To be the food of worms--inanimate, + And cold as winter,--and as desolate! + And then to waste away, and be no more + Than the dark dust!--The thought was like a sore + That gather'd in his heart; and he would say,-- + "A curse be on their laurels!" and decay + Came over them; the deeds that they had done + Had fallen with their fortunes; and anon + Was Julio forgotten, and his line-- + No wonder for this frenzied tale of mine! + + Oh! he was wearied of this passing scene! + But loved not death: his purpose was between + Life and the grave; and it would vibrate there, + Like a wild bird that floated far and fair + Betwixt the sun and sea! + + He went, and came, + And thought, and slept, and still awoke the same,-- + A strange, strange youth; and he would look all night + Upon the moon and stars, and count the flight + Of the sea waves, and let the evening wind + Play with his raven tresses, or would bind + Grottoes of birch, wherein to sit and sing: + And peasant girls would find him sauntering, + To gaze upon their features, as they met, + In laughter, under some green arboret. + + At last, he became monk, and, on his knees, + Said holy prayers, and with wild penances + Made sad atonement; and the solemn whim, + That, like a shadow, loiter'd over him, + Wore off, even like a shadow. He was cursed + With none of the mad thoughts that were at first + The poison of his quiet; but he grew + To love the world and its wild laughter too, + As he had known before; and wish'd again + To join the very mirth he hated then! + + He durst not break the vow--he durst not be + The one he would--and his heart's harmony + Became a tide of sorrow. Even so, + He felt hope die,--in madness and in woe! + But there came one--and a most lovely one + As ever to the warm light of the sun + Threw back her tresses,--a fair sister girl, + With a brow changing between snow and pearl, + And the blue eyes of sadness, fill'd with dew + Of tears,--like Heaven's own melancholy blue,-- + So beautiful, so tender; and her form + Was graceful as a rainbow in a storm, + Scattering gladness on the face of sorrow-- + Oh! I had fancied of the hues that borrow + Their brightness from the sun; but she was bright + In her own self,--a mystery of light! + With feelings tender as a star's own hue, + Pure as the morning star! as true, as true; + For it will glitter in each early sky, + And her first love be love that lasteth aye! + + And this was Agathe, young Agathe, + A motherless, fair girl: and many a day + She wept for her lost parent. It was sad + To see her infant sorrow; how she bade + The flow of her wild spirits fall away + To grief, like bright clouds in a summer day + Melting into a shower: and it was sad + Almost to think she might again be glad, + Her beauty was so chaste, amid the fall + Of her bright tears. Yet, in her father's hall, + She had lived almost sorrowless her days: + But he felt no affection for the gaze + Of his fair girl; and when she fondly smiled, + He bade no father's welcome to the child, + But even told his wish, and will'd it done, + For her to be sad-hearted--and a nun! + + And so it was. She took the dreary veil, + A hopeless girl! and the bright flush grew pale + Upon her cheek: she felt, as summer feels + The winds of autumn and the winter chills, + That darken his fair suns.--It was away, + Feeding on dreams, the heart of Agathe! + + The vesper prayers were said, and the last hymn + Sung to the Holy Virgin. In the dim, + Gray aisle was heard a solitary tread, + As of one musing sadly on the dead-- + 'Twas Julio; it was his wont to be + Often alone within the sanctuary; + But now, not so--another: it was she! + Kneeling in all her beauty, like a saint + Before a crucifix; but sad and faint + The tone of her devotion, as the trill + Of a moss-burden'd, melancholy rill. + + And Julio stood before her;--'twas as yet + The hour of the pale twilight--and they met + Each other's gaze, till either seem'd the hue + Of deepest crimson; but the ladye threw + Her veil above her features, and stole by + Like a bright cloud, with sadness and a sigh! + + Yet Julio still stood gazing and alone, + A dreamer!--"Is the sister ladye gone?" + He started at the silence of the air + That slumber'd over him--she is not there. + + And either slept not through the live-long night, + Or slept in fitful trances, with a bright, + Fair dream upon their eyelids: but they rose + In sorrow from the pallet of repose; + For the dark thought of their sad destiny + Came o'er them, like a chasm of the deep sea, + That was to rend their fortunes; and at eve + They met again, but, silent, took their leave, + As they did yesterday: another night, + And neither spake awhile--A pure delight + Had chasten'd love's first blushes: silently + Gazed Julio on the gentle Agathe-- + At length, "Fair Nun!"--She started, and held fast + Her bright hand on her lip--"the past, the past, + And the pale future! There be some that lie + Under those marble urns--I know not why, + But I were better in that only calm, + Than be as I have been, perhaps, and am. + The past!--ay! it hath perish'd; never, never, + Would I recall it to be blest for ever: + The future it must come--I have a vow"-- + And his cold hand rose trembling to his brow. + "True, true, I have a vow. Is not the moon + Abroad, fair Nun?"--"Indeed! so very soon?" + Said Agathe, and "I must then away."-- + "Stay, love! 'tis early yet; stay, angel, stay!" + But she was gone:--yet they met many a time + In the lone chapel, after vesper chime-- + They met in love and fear. + + One weary day, + And Julio saw not his loved Agathe; + She was not in the choir of sisterhood + That sang the evening anthem, and he stood + Like one that listen'd breathlessly awhile; + But stranger voices chanted through the aisle. + She was not there; and, after all were gone, + He linger'd: the stars came--he linger'd on, + Like a dark fun'ral image on the tomb + Of a lost hope. He felt a world of gloom + Upon his heart--a solitude--a chill. + The pale morn rose, and still, he linger'd still. + And the next vesper toll'd; nor yet, nor yet-- + "Can Agathe be faithless, and forget?" + + It was the third sad eve, he heard it said, + "Poor Julio! thy Agathe is dead," + And started. He had loiter'd in the train + That bore her to the grave: he saw her lain + In the cold earth, and heard a requiem + Sung over her--To him it was a dream! + A marble stone stood by the sepulchre; + He look'd, and saw, and started--she was there! + And Agathe had died; she that was bright-- + She that was in her beauty! a cold blight + Fell over the young blossom of her brow. + And the life-blood grew chill--She is not, now. + + She died, like zephyr falling amid flowers! + Like to a star within the twilight hours + Of morning--and she was not! Some have thought + The Lady Abbess gave her a mad draught, + That stole into her heart, and sadly rent + The fine chords of that holy instrument, + Until its music falter'd fast away, + And she--she died,--the lovely Agathe! + + Again, and through the arras of the gloom + Are the pale breezes moaning: by her tomb + Bends Julio, like a phantom, and his eye + Is fallen, as the moon-borne tides, that lie + At ebb within the sea. Oh! he is wan, + As winter skies are wan, like ages gone, + And stars unseen for paleness; it is cast, + As foliage in the raving of the blast, + All his fair bloom of thoughts! Is the moon chill, + That in the dark clouds she is mantled still? + And over its proud arch hath Heaven flung + A scarf of darkness? Agathe was young! + And there should be the virgin silver there, + The snow-white fringes delicately fair! + + He wields a heavy mattock in his hands, + And over him a lonely lanthorn stands + On a near niche, shedding a sickly fall + Of light upon a marble pedestal, + Whereon is chisel'd rudely, the essay + Of untaught tool, "Hic jacet Agathe!" + And Julio hath bent him down in speed, + Like one that doeth an unholy deed. + + There is a flagstone lieth heavily + Over the ladye's grave; I wist of three + That bore it, of a blessed verity! + But he hath lifted it in his pure madness, + As it were lightsome as a summer gladness, + And from the carved niche hath ta'en the lamp, + And hung it by the marble flagstone damp. + + And he is flinging the dark, chilly mould + Over the gorgeous pavement: 'tis a cold, + Sad grave, and there is many a relic there + Of chalky bones, which, in the wasting air, + Fell smouldering away; and he would dash + His mattock through them, with a cursed clash, + That made the lone aisle echo. But anon + He fell upon a skull,--a haggard one, + With its teeth set, and the great orbless eye + Revolving darkness, like eternity-- + And in his hand he held it, till it grew + To have the fleshy features and the hue + Of life. He gazed, and gazed, and it became + Like to his Agathe--all, all the same! + He drew it nearer,--the cold, bony thing!-- + To kiss the worm-wet lips. "Ay! let me cling-- + Cling to thee now, for ever!" but a breath + Of rank corruption from its jaws of death + Went to his nostrils, and he madly laugh'd, + And dash'd it over on the altar shaft, + Which the new risen moon, in her gray light, + Had fondly flooded, beautifully bright! + + Again he went + To his wild work, beside the monument. + "Ha! leave, thou moon! where thy footfall hath been + In sorrow amid heaven! there is sin + Under thy shadow, lying like a dew; + So come thou, from thy awful arch of blue, + Where thou art even as a silver throne + For some pale spectre-king; come thou alone, + Or bring a solitary orphan star + Under thy wings! afar, afar, afar, + To gaze upon this girl of radiancy, + In her deep slumbers--Wake thee, Agathe!" + + And Julio hath stolen the dark chest + Where the fair nun lay coffin'd, in the rest + That wakes not up at morning: she is there, + An image of cold calm! One tress of hair + Lingereth lonely on her snowy brow; + But the bright eyes are closed in darkness now; + And their long lashes delicately rest + On the pale cheek, like sun-rays in the west, + That fall upon a colourless, sad cloud. + Humility lies rudely on the proud, + But she was never proud; and there she is, + A yet unwither'd flower the autumn breeze + Hath blown from its green stem! 'T is pale, 't is pale, + But still unfaded, like the twilight veil + That falleth after sunset; like a stream + That bears the burden of a silver gleam + Upon its waters; and is even so,-- + Chill, melancholy, lustreless, and low! + + Beauty in death! a tenderness upon + The rude and silent relics, where alone + Sat the destroyer! Beauty on the dead! + The look of being where the breath is fled! + The unwarming sun still joyous in its light! + A time--a time without a day or night! + Death cradled upon Beauty, like a bee + Upon a flower, that looketh lovingly!-- + Like a wild serpent, coiling in its madness, + Under a wreath of blossom and of gladness! + + And there she is; and Julio bends o'er + The sleeping girl,--a willow on the shore + Of a Dead Sea! that steepeth its far bough + Into the bitter waters,--even now + Taking a foretaste of the awful trance + That was to pass on his own countenance! + + Yes! yes! and he is holding his pale lips + Over her brow; the shade of an eclipse + Is passing to his heart, and to his eye, + That is not tearful; but the light will die, + Leaving it like a moon within a mist,-- + The vision of a spell-bound visionist! + + He breathed a cold kiss on her ashy cheek, + That left no trace--no flush--no crimson streak, + But was as bloodless as a marble stone, + Susceptible of silent waste alone. + And on her brow a crucifix he laid-- + A jewel'd crucifix, the virgin maid + Had given him before she died. The moon + Shed light upon her visage--clouded soon, + Then briefly breaking from its airy veil, + Like warrior lifting up his aventayle. + + But Julio gazed on, and never lifted + Himself to see the broken clouds, that drifted + One after one, like infant elves at play + Amid the night-winds, in their lonely way-- + Some whistling and some moaning, some asleep, + And dreaming dismal dreams, and sighing deep + Over their couches of green moss and flowers, + And solitary fern, and heather bowers. + + The heavy bell toll'd two, and, as it toll'd, + Julio started, and the fresh-turn'd mould + He flung into the empty chasm with speed, + And o'er it dropt the flagstone. One could read + That Agathe lay there; but still the girl + Lay by him, like a precious and pale pearl, + That from the deep sea-waters had been rent-- + Like a star fallen from the firmament! + He hides the grave-tools in an aged porch, + To westward of the solitary church; + And he hath clasp'd around the melting waist + The beautiful, dead girl: his cheek is press'd + To hers--Life warming the cold chill of Death! + And over his pale palsy breathing breath + His eye is sunk upon her--"Thou must leave + The worm to waste for love of thee, and grieve + Without thee, as I may not. Thou must go, + My sweet betrothed, with me--but not below, + Where there is darkness, dream, and solitude, + But where is light, and life, and one to brood + Above thee till thou wakest--Ha! I fear + Thou wilt not wake for ever, sleeping here, + Where there are none but winds to visit thee, + And convent fathers, and a choristry + Of sisters, saying, 'Hush!'--But I will sing + Rare songs to thy pure spirit, wandering + Down on the dews to hear me; I will tune + The instrument of the ethereal moon, + And all the choir of stars, to rise and fall + In harmony and beauty musical." + + He is away--and still the sickly lamp + Is burning next the altar; there's a damp, + Thin mould upon the pavement; and, at morn, + The monks do cross them in their blessed scorn + And mutter deep anathemas, because + Of the unholy sacrilege, that was + Within the sainted chapel,--for they guess'd, + By many a vestige sad, how the dark rest + Of Agathe was broken,--and anon + They sought for Julio. The summer sun + Arose and and set, with his imperial disc + Toward the ocean-waters, heaving brisk + Before the winds,--but Julio came never: + He that was frantic as a foaming river-- + Mad as the fall of leaves upon the tide + Of a great tempest, that have fought and died + Along the forest ramparts, and doth still + In its death-struggle desperately reel + Round with the fallen foliage--he was gone, + And none knew whither. Still were chanted on + Sad masses, by pale sisters, many a day, + And holy requiems sung for Agathe! + + + + +CHIMERA II + + + A curse! a curse! the beautiful pale wing + Of a sea-bird was worn with wandering, + And, on a sunny rock beside the shore, + It stood, the golden waters gazing o'er; + And they were heaving a brown amber flow + Of weeds, that glitter'd gloriously below. + + It was the sunset, and the gorgeous hall + Of heaven rose up on pillars magical + Of living silver, shafting the fair sky + Between dark time and great eternity. + They rose upon their pedestal of sun, + A line of snowy columns! and anon + Were lost in the rich tracery of cloud + That hung along, magnificently proud, + Predicting the pure star-light, that beyond + The east was armouring in diamond + About the camp of twilight, and was soon + To marshal under the fair champion moon, + That call'd her chariot of unearthly mist, + Toward her citadel of amethyst. + + A curse! a curse! a lonely man is there + By the deep waters, with a burden fair + Clasp'd in his wearied arms--'Tis he; 'tis he + The brain-struck Julio, and Agathe! + His cowl is back--flung back upon the breeze, + His lofty brow is haggard with disease, + As if a wild libation had been pour'd + Of lightning on those temples, and they shower'd + A dismal perspiration, like a rain, + Shook by the thunder and the hurricane! + + He dropt upon a rock, and by him placed, + Over a bed of sea-pinks growing waste, + The silent ladye, and he mutter'd wild, + Strange words, about a mother, and no child. + "And I shall wed thee, Agathe! although + Ours be no God-blest bridal--even so!" + And from the sand he took a silver shell, + That had been wasted by the fall and swell + Of many a moon-borne tide into a ring-- + A rude, rude ring; it was a snow-white thing, + Where a lone hermit limpet slept and died, + In ages far away. "Thou art a bride, + Sweet Agathe! Wake up; we must not linger." + He press'd the ring upon her chilly finger, + And to the sea-bird, on its sunny stone, + Shouted, "Pale priest! thou liest all alone + Upon thy ocean altar, rise away + To our glad bridal!" and its wings of gray + All lazily it spread, and hover'd by + With a wild shriek--a melancholy cry! + Then swooping slowly o'er the heaving breast + Of the blue ocean, vanish'd in the west. + + And Julio is chanting to his bride, + A merry song of his wild heart, that died + On the soft breeze through pinks beside the sea, + All rustling in their beauty gladsomely. + + +SONG + + A rosary of stars, love! we'll count them as we go + Upon the laughing waters, that are wandering below, + And we'll o'er the pearly moon-beam, as it lieth in the sea, + In beauty and in glory, like a shadowing of thee! + + A rosary of stars, love! a prayer as we glide, + And a whisper in the wind, and a murmur on the tide! + And we'll say a fair adieu to the flowers that are seen, + With shells of silver sown in radiancy between. + + A rosary of stars, love! the purest they shall be, + Like spirits of pale pearls, in the bosom of the sea; + Now help thee, virgin mother! with a blessing as we go, + Upon the laughing waters, that are wandering below! + + He lifted the dead girl, and is away + To where a light boat, in its moorings lay, + Like a sea-cradle, rocking to the hush + Of the nurse waters. With a frantic rush + O'er the wild field of tangles he hath sped, + And through the shoaling waves that fell and fled + Upon the furrow'd beach. + + The snowy sail + Is hoisted to the gladly gushing gale, + That bosom'd its fair canvass with a breast + Of silver, looking lovely to the west; + And at the helm there sits the wither'd one, + Gazing and gazing on the sister nun, + With her fair tresses floating on his knee-- + The beautiful, death-stricken Agathe! + + Fast, fast, and far away, the bark hath stood + Out toward the great heaving solitude, + That gurgled in its deeps, as if the breath + Went through its lungs, of agony and death! + + The sun is lost within the labyrinth + Of clouds of purple and pale hyacinth, + That are the frontlet of the sister Sky + Kissing her brother Ocean; and they lie + Bathing in blushes, till the rival queen + Night, with her starry tiar, floateth in-- + A dark and dazzling beauty! that doth draw + Over the light of love a shade of awe + Most strange, that parts our wonder not the less + Between her mystery and loveliness! + + And she is there, that is a pyramid + Whereon the stars, the statues of the dead, + Are imaged over the eternal hall, + A group of radiances majestical! + And Julio looks up, and there they be, + And Agathe, and all the waste of Sea, + That slept in wizard slumber, with a shroud + Of night flung o'er his bosom, throbbing proud + Amid its azure pulses; and again + He dropt his blighted eye-orbs, with a strain + Of mirth upon the ladye:--Agathe! + Sweet bride! be thou a queen, and I will lay + A crown of sea-weed on thy royal brow; + And I will twine these tresses, that are now + Floating beside me, to a diadem; + And the sea foam will sprinkle gem on gem, + And so will the soft dews. Be thou the queen + Of the unpeopled waters, sadly seen + By star-light, till the yet unrisen moon + Issue, unveiled, from her anderoon, + To bathe in the sea fountains: let me say, + "Hail--hail to thee! thrice hail, my Agathe!" + + The warrior world was lifting to the bent + Of his eternal brow magnificent, + The fiery moon, that in her blazonry + Shone eastward, like a shield. The throbbing sea + Felt fever on his azure arteries, + That shadow'd them with crimson, while the breeze + Fell faster on the solitary sail. + But the red moon grew loftier and pale, + And the great ocean, like the holy hall, + Where slept a seraph host maritimal, + Was gorgeous, with wings of diamond + Fann'd over it, and millions beyond + Of tiny waves were playing to and fro, + All musical, with an incessant flow + Of cadences, innumerably heard + Between the shrill notes of a hermit bird, + That held a solemn paean to the moon. + + A few devotional fair clouds were soon + Breathed o'er the living countenance of Heaven, + And under the great galaxies were driven + Of stars that group'd together, and they went + Like voyagers along the firmament, + And grew to silver in the blessed light + Of the moon alchymist. It was not night, + Not the dark deathly shadow, that falls o'er + The eye-lid like a curse, but far before + In splendour, struggling through a fall of gloom, + In many a myriad gushes, that do come + Direct from the eternal stars beyond, + Like holy fountains pouring diamond! + + A sail! awake thee, Julio! a sail! + And be not bending to thy trances pale. + But he is gazing on the moonlit brow + Of his dead Agathe, and fondly now, + The light is silvering her bloodless face + And the cold grave-clothes. There is loveliness + As in a marble image, very bright! + But stricken with a phantasy of light + That is not given to the mortal hue, + To life and breathing beauty: and she too + Is more of the expressless lineament, + Than of the golden thoughts that came and went + Over her features like a living tide + No while before. + + A sail is on the wide + And moving waters, and it draweth nigh + Like a sea-cloud. The elfin billows fly + Before it, in their armories enthrall'd + Of radiant and moon-breasted emerald; + And many is the mariner that sees + The lone boat in the melancholy breeze, + Waving her snowy canvass, and anon + Their stately vessel with a gallant run + Crowds by in all her glory; but the cheer + Of men is pass'd into a sudden fear, + And whisperings, and shakings of the head-- + The moon was streaming on a virgin dead, + And Julio sat over her insane, + Like a sea demon! O'er and o'er again, + Each cross'd him, as the stately vessel stood + Far out into the murmuring solitude! + + But Julio saw not; he only heard + A rushing, like the passing of a bird, + And felt him heaving on the foam, that flew + Along the startled billows; and he knew + Of a strange sail, by broken oaths that fell + Beside him, on the coming of the swell. + + They knew thou wert a queen, my royal bride! + And made obeisance at thy holy side. + They saw thee, Agathe! and go to bring + Fair worshippers, and many a poet-king, + To utter music at thy pearly feet.-- + Now, wake thee! for the moonlight cometh sweet, + To visit in thy temple of the sea; + Thy sister moon is watching over thee! + And she is spreading a fair mantle of + Pure silver, in thy lonely palace, love!-- + Now, wake thee! for the sea-bird is aloof, + In solitude, below the starry roof; + And on its dewy plume there is a light + Of palest splendour, o'er the blessed night. + Thy spirit, Agathe!--and yet, thou art + Beside me, and my solitary heart + Is throbbing near to thee: I must not feel + The sweet notes of thy holy music steal + Into my feverous and burning brain,-- + So wake not! and I'll hush thee with a strain + Of my wild fancy, till thou dream of me, + And I be loved as I have loved thee:-- + + +SONG + + 'Tis light to love thee living, girl, when hope is full and fair, + In the springtide of thy beauty, when there is no sorrow there-- + No sorrow on thy brow, and no shadow on thy heart! + When, like a floating sea-bird, bright and beautiful thou art! + + 'Tis light to love thee living, girl--to see thee ever so, + With health, that, like a crimson flower, lies blushing in the snow; + And thy tresses falling over, like the amber on the pearl-- + Oh! true it is a lightsome thing, to love thee living, girl! + + But when the brow is blighted, like a star of morning tide, + And faded is the crimson blush upon the cheek beside; + It is to love, as seldom love, the brightest and the best, + When our love lies like a dew upon the one that is at rest. + + Because of hopes, that, fallen, are changing to despair, + And the heart is always dreaming on the ruin that is there, + Oh, true! 'tis weary, weary, to be gazing over thee, + And the light of thy pure vision breaketh never upon me! + + He lifts her in his arms, and o'er and o'er, + Upon the brow of chilliness and hoar, + Repeats a silent kiss;--along the side + Of the lone bark, he leans that pallid bride, + Until the waves do image her within + Their bosom, like a spectre--'Tis a sin + Too deadly to be shadow'd or forgiven, + To do such mockery in the sight of Heaven! + And bid her gaze into the startled sea, + And say, "Thy image, from eternity, + Hath come to meet thee, ladye!" and anon, + He bade the cold corse kiss the shadowy one, + That shook amid the waters, like the light + Of borealis in a winter night! + + And after, he did strain her sea-wet hair + Between his chilly fingers, with a stare + Of mystery, that marvell'd how that she + Had drench'd it so amid the moonlit sea. + The morning rose, with breast of living gold, + Like eastern phoenix, and his plumage roll'd + In clouds of molted brilliance, very bright! + And on the waste of waters floated light.-- + + In truth, 'twas strange to see that merry bark + Skimming the silver ocean, like a shark + At play amid the beautiful sea-green, + And all so sadly desolate within. + + And hours flew after hours, a weary length, + Until the sunlight, in meridian strength, + Threw burning floods upon the wasted brow + Of that sea-hermit mariner; and now + He felt the fire-light feed upon his brain, + And started with intensity of pain, + And wash'd him in the sea; it only brought + Wild reason, like a demon, and he thought + Strange thoughts, like dreaming men--he thought how those + Were round him he had seen, and many rose + His heart had hated; every billow threw + Features before him, and pale faces grew + Out of the sea by myriads:--the self-same + Was moulded from its image, and they came + In groups together, and all said, like one, + "Be cursed!" and vanish'd in the deep anon. + Then thirst, intolerable as the breath + Of Upas, fanning the wild wings of death, + Crept up his very gorge,--like to a snake, + That stifled him, and bade the pulses ache + Through all the boiling current of his blood. + It was a thirst, that let the fever flood + Fall over him, and gave a ghastly hue + To his cramp'd lips, until their breathing grew + White as a mist, and short, and like a sigh, + Heaved with a struggle, till it falter'd by. + + And ever he did look upon the corse + With idiot visage, like the hag Remorse + That gloateth over on a nameless deed + Of darkness and of dole unhistoried. + And were there that might hear him, they would hear + The murmur of a prayer in deep fear, + Through unbarr'd lips, escaping by the half, + And all but smother'd by a maniac laugh, + That follow'd it, so sudden and so shrill, + That swarms of sea-birds, wandering at will + Upon the wave, rose startled, and away + Went flocking, like a silver shower of spray! + And aye he called for water, and the sea + Mock'd him with his brine surges tauntingly, + And lash'd them over on his fev'rous brow, + Volleying roars of curses:--"Stay thee, now, + Avenger! lest I die; for I am worn + Fainter than star-light at the birth of morn; + Stay thee, great angel! for I am not shriven, + But frantic as thyself: Oh Heaven! Heaven! + But thou hast made me brother of the sea, + That I may tremble at his tyranny; + Or am I slave? a very, very jest + To the sarcastic waters? let me breast + The base insulters, and defy them so, + In this lone little skiff--I am your foe! + Ye raving, lion-like, and ramping seas, + That open up your nostrils to the breeze, + And fain would swallow me! Do ye not fly, + Pale, sick, and gurgling, as I pass you by?" + + "Lift up! and let me see, that I may tell + Ye can be mad, and strange, and terrible; + That ye have power, and passion, and a sound + As of the flying of an angel round + The mighty world; that ye are one with time, + And in the great primordium sublime + Were nursed together, as an infant-twain,-- + A glory and a wonder! I would fain + Hold truce, thou elder brother! for we are, + In feature, as the sun is to a star, + So are we like, and we are touch'd in tune + With lunacy as music; and the moon, + That setteth the tides sentinel before + Thy camp of waters, on the pebbled shore, + And measures their great footsteps to and fro, + Hath lifted up into my brain the flow + Of this mad tide of blood.--Ay! we are like + In foam and frenzy; the same winds do strike, + The same fierce sun-rays, from their battlement + Of fire! so, when I perish impotent + Before the night of death, they'll say of me, + He died as mad and frantic, as the sea!" + + A cloud stood for the east, a cloud like night, + Like a huge vulture, and the blessed light + Of the great sun grew shadow'd awfully: + It seem'd to mount up from the mighty sea, + Shaking the showers from its solemn wings, + And grew, and grew, and many a myriad springs, + Were on its bosom, teeming full of rain. + There fell a terrible and wizard chain + Of lightning, from its black and heated forge, + And the dark waters took it to their gorge, + And lifted up their shaggy flanks in wonder + With rival chorus to the peal of thunder, + That wheel'd in many a squadron terrible + The stern black clouds, and as they rose and fell + They oozed great showers; and Julio held up + His wasted hands, in likeness of a cup, + And drank the blessed waters, and they roll'd + Upon his cheeks like tears, but sadly cold!-- + 'Twas very strange to look on Agathe! + How the quick lightnings, in their elfin play, + Stream'd pale upon her features, and they were + Sickly, like tapers in a sepulchre! + + The ship! that self same ship, that Julio knew + Had pass'd him, with her panic-stricken crew, + She gleams amid the storm, a shatter'd thing + Of pride and lordly beauty: her fair wing + Of sail is wounded--the proud pennon gone: + Dark, dark she sweepeth like an eagle, on + Through waters that are battling to and fro, + And tossing their great giant shrouds of snow + Over her deck. Ahead, and there is seen + A black, strange line of breakers, down between + The awful surges, lifting up their manes, + Like great sea lions. Quick and high she strains + Her foaming keel--that solitary ship! + As if, in all her frenzy, she would leap + The cursed barrier; forward, fast and fast-- + Back, back she reels; her timbers and her mast + Split in a thousand shivers! A white spring + Of the exulted sea rose bantering + Over her ruin; and the mighty crew, + That mann'd her decks, were seen, a straggling few, + Far scatter'd on the surges. Julio felt + The impulse of that hour, and low he knelt, + Within his own light bark--a prayful man! + And clasp'd his lifeless bride; and to her wan, + Cold cheek did lay his melancholy brow.-- + "Save thou a mariner!" He starteth now + To hear that dying cry; and there is one, + All worn and wave-wet, by his bark anon, + Clinging, in terror of the ireful sea, + A fair hair'd mariner! But suddenly + He saw the pale dead ladye, by a flame + Of blue and livid lightning, and there came + Over his features blindness, and the power + Of his strong hands grew weak,--a giant shower + Of foam rose up, and swept him far along; + And Julio saw him buffeting the throng + Of the great eddying waters, till they went + Over him--a wind-shaken cerement! + + Then terribly he laugh'd, and rose above + His soul-less bride--the ladye of his love + Lifting him up, in all his wizard glee; + And he did wave, before the frantic sea, + His wasted arm. "Adieu! adieu! adieu! + Thou sawest how we were; thou sawest, too, + Thou wert not so; for in the inmost shrine + Of my deep heart are thoughts that are not thine. + And thou art gone, fair mariner! in foam + And music-murmurs, to thy blessed home-- + Adieu! adieu! Thou sawest how that she + Sleeps in her holy beauty, tranquilly; + And when the fair and floating vision breaks + From her pure brow, and Agathe awakes-- + Till then, we meet not; so adieu, adieu!" + Still on before the sullen tempest flew, + Fast as a meteor star, the lonely bark: + And Julio bent over to the dark, + The solitary sea, for close beside + Floated the stringed harp of one that died + In that wild shipwreck, and he drew it home, + With madness, to his bosom: the white foam + Was o'er its strings; and on the streaming sail + He wiped them, running, with his fingers pale, + Along the tuneless notes, that only gave + Seldom responses to his wandering stave! + + + + + TO THE HARP + + + I + + Jewel! that lay before the heart + Of some romantic boy, + And startled music in her home, + Of mystery and joy! + + + II + + The image of his love was there; + And, with her golden wings, + She swept her tone of sorrow from + Thy melancholy strings! + + + III + + We drew thee, as an orphan one, + From waters that had cast + No music round thee, as they went + In their pale beauty past. + + + IV + + No music but the changeless sigh-- + That murmur of their own, + That loves not blending in the thrill + Of thine aerial tone. + + + V + + The girl that slumbers at our side + Will dream how they are bent, + That love her even as they love + Thy blessed instrument. + + + VI + + And music, like a flood, will break + Upon the fairy throne + Of her pure heart, all glowing, like + A morning star, alone! + + + VII + + Alone, but for the song of him + That waketh by her side, + And strikes thy chords of silver to + His fair and sea-borne bride. + + + VIII + + Jewel! that hung before the heart + Of some romantic boy; + Like him, I sweep thee with a storm + Of music and of joy! + + And Julio placed the trembling harp before + The ladye, till the minstrel winds came o'er + Its moisten'd strings, and tuned them with a sigh. + "I hear thee, how thy spirit goeth by, + In music and in love. Oh Agathe! + Thou sleepest long, long, long; and they will say + That seek thee,--'She is dead--she is no more!' + But thou art cold, and I will throw before + Thy chilly brow the pale and snowy sheet." + And he did lift it from her marble feet, + The sea-wet shroud! and flung it silently + Over her brow--the brow of Agathe! + + But, as a passion from the mooded mind, + The storm had died, and wearily the wind + Fell fast asleep at evening, like one + That hath been toiling in the fiery sun. + And the white sail dropt downward, as the wing + Of wounded sea-bird, feebly murmuring + Unto the mast. It was a deathly calm, + And holy stillness, like a shadow, swam + All over the wide sea, and the boat stood. + Like her of Sodom, in the solitude, + A snowy pillar, looking on the waste. + And there was nothing but the azure breast + Of ocean and the sky--the sea and sky, + And the lone bark; no clouds were floating by + Where the sun set, but his great seraph light, + Went down alone, in majesty and might; + And the stars came again, a silver troop, + Until, in shame, the coward shadows droop + Before the radiance of these holy gems, + That bear the images of diadems! + + And Julio fancied of a form that rose + Before him from the desolate repose + Of the deep waters--a huge ghastly form, + As of one lightning-stricken in a storm; + And leprosy cadaverous was hung + Before his brow, and awful terror flung + Around him like a pall--a solemn shroud!-- + A drapery of darkness and of cloud! + And agony was writhing on his lip, + Heart-rooted, awful agony and deep, + Of fevers, and of plagues, and burning blain, + And ague, and the palsy of the brain-- + A wierd and yellow spectre! And his eyes + Were orbless and unpupil'd, as the skies + Without the sun, or moon, or any star: + And he was like the wreck of what men are,-- + A wasted skeleton, that held the crest + Of Time, and bore his motto on his breast! + + There came a group before of maladies, + And griefs, and Famine empty as a breeze,-- + A double monster, with a gloating leer + Fix'd on his other half. They drew them near, + One after one, led onward by Despair, + That like the last of winter glimmer'd there,-- + A dismal prologue to his brother Death, + Which was behind, and, with the horrid breath + Of his wide baneful nostrils, plied them on. + And often as they saw the skeleton + Grisly beside them, the wild phantasies + Grew mad and howl'd; the fever of disease + Became wild frenzy--very terrible! + And, for a hell of agony--a hell + Of rage, was there, that fed on misty things, + On dreams, ideas, and imaginings. + + And some were raving on philosophy, + And some on love, and some on jealousy, + And some upon the moon; and these were they + That were the wildest; and anon alway + Julio knew them by a something dim + About their wasted features like to him! + + But Death was by, like shell of pyramid + Among old obelisks, and his eyeless head + Shook o'er the wiery ribs, where darkness lay + The image of a heart--He is away! + And Julio is watching, like Remorse, + Over the pale and solitary corse! + + Shower soft light, ye stars, that shake the dew + From your eternal blossoms! and thou, too, + Moon! minded of thy power, tide-bearing queen! + That hast a slave and votary within + The great rock-fetter'd deeps, and hearest cry + To thee the hungry surges, rushing by + Like a vast herd of wolves,--fall full and fair + On Julio as he sleepeth, even there, + Amid the suppliant bosom of the sea!-- + Sleep! dost thou come, and on thy blessed knee + With hush and whisper lull the troubled brain + Of this death-lover?--Still the eyes do strain + Their orbs on Agathe--those raven eyes! + All earnest on the ladye as she lies + In her white shroud. They see not, though they are + As if they saw; no splendour like a star + Is under their dark lashes: they are full + Of dream and slumber--melancholy, dull! + + * * * * * + + A wide, wide sea! and on its rear and van + Amid the stars, the silent meteors ran + All that still night, and Julio with a cry + Woke up, and saw them flashing fiercely by. + + * * * * * + + Full three times three, its awful veil of night + Hath Heaven hung before the blessed light; + And a fair breeze falls o'er the sleeping sea, + Where Julio is watching Agathe! + By sun and darkness hath he bent him over-- + A mad, moon-stricken, melancholy lover! + + And hardly hath he tasted, night or day, + Of drink or food, because of Agathe! + He sitteth in a dull and dreary mood, + Like statue in a ruin'd solitude, + Bearing the brent of sunlight and of shade + Over the marble of some colonnade. + + The ladye, she hath lost the pearly hue + Upon her gorgeous brow, where tresses grew + Luxuriantly as thoughts of tenderness, + That once were floating in the pure recess + Of her bright soul. These are not as they were, + But are as weeds above a sepulchre, + Wild waving in the breeze: her eyes are now + Sunk deeply under the discolour'd brow, + That is of sickly yellow, and pale blue, + Unnaturally blending. The same hue + Is on her cheek: it is the early breath + Of cold Corruption, the ban dog of Death, + Falling upon her features.--Let it be, + And gaze awhile on Julio, as he + Is gazing on the corse of Agathe! + + In truth, he seemeth like no living one, + But is the image of a skeleton: + A fearful portrait from the artist tool + Of Madness--terrible and wonderful! + + There was no passion there--no feeling traced + Under those eyelids, where had run to waste, + All that was wild, or beautiful, or bright; + A very cloud was cast upon their light, + That gave to them the heavy hue of lead; + And they were lorn, and lustreless, and dead! + He sate like vulture from the mountains gray, + Unsated, that had flown full many a day + O'er distant land and sea, and was in pride + Alighted by the lonely ladye's side. + + He sate like winter o'er the wasted year-- + Like melancholy winter, drawing near + To its own death.--"Oh me! the worm, at last, + Will gorge upon me, and the autumn blast + Howl by!--Where?--where?--there is no worm to creep + Amid the waters of the lonely deep; + But I will take me Agathe upon + This sorrowful, sore bosom, and anon, + Down, down, through azure silence, we shall go, + Unepitaph'd, to cities far below; + Where the sea triton, with his winding shell, + Shall sound our blessed welcome. We shall dwell + With many a mariner in his pearly home, + In bowers of amber weed and silver foam, + Amid the crimson corals; we shall be + Together, Agathe! fair Agathe!-- + But thou art sickly, ladye--thou art sad; + And I am weary, ladye--I am mad! + They bring no food to feed us, and I feel + A frost upon my vitals, very chill, + Like winter breaking on the golden year + Of life. This bark shall be our floating bier, + And the dark waves our mourners; and the white, + Pure swarm of sunny sea birds, basking bright + On some far isle, shall sorrowfully pour + Their wail of melancholy o'er and o'er, + At evening, on the waters of the sea,-- + While, with its solemn burden, silently, + Floats forward our lone bark.--Oh, Agathe! + Methinks that I shall meet thee far away, + Within the awful centre of the earth, + Where, earliest, we had our holy birth-- + In some huge cavern, arching wide below, + Upon whose airy pivot, years ago, + The world went round: 'tis infinitely deep, + But never dismal; for above it sleep, + And under it, blue waters, hung aloof, + And held below,--an amethystine roof, + A sapphire pavement; and the golden sun, + Afar, looks through alternately, like one + That watches round some treasure: often, too, + Through many a mile of ocean, sparkling through, + Are seen the stars and moon, all gloriously, + Bathing their angel brilliance in the sea!" + + "And there are shafted pillars, that beyond, + Are ranged before a rock of diamond, + Awfully heaving its eternal heights, + From base of silver strewn with chrysolites; + And over it are chasms of glory seen, + With crimson rubies clustering between, + On sward of emerald, with leaves of pearl, + And topazes hung brilliantly on beryl. + So Agathe!--but thou art sickly sad, + And tellest me, poor Julio is mad-- + Ay, mad!--was he not madder when he sware + A vow to Heaven? was there no madness there, + That he should do--for why?--a holy string + Of penances? No penances will bring + The stricken conscience to the blessed light + Of peace,--Oh! I am lost, and there is night, + Despair and darkness, darkness and despair, + And want, that hunts me to the lion-lair + Of wild perdition: and I hear them all-- + All cursing me! The very sun-rays fall + In curses, and the shadow of the moon, + And the pale star light, and the winds that tune + Their voices to the music of the sea,-- + And thou,--yes, thou! my gentle Agathe!-- + All curse me!--Oh! that I were never, never!-- + Or but a breathless fancy, that was ever + Adrift upon the wilderness of Time, + That knew no impulse, but was left sublime + To play at its own will!--that I were hush'd + At night by silver cataracts, that gush'd + Through flowers of fairy hue, and then to die + Away, with all before me passing by, + Like a fair vision I had lived to see, + And died to see no more!--It cannot be! + By this right hand! I feel it is not so, + And by the beating of a heart below, + That strangely feareth for eternity!" + + He said, and gazing on the lonely sea, + Far off he saw, like an ascending cloud, + To westward, a bright island, lifted proud + Amid the struggling waters, and the light + Of the great sun was on its clifted height, + Scattering golden shadow, like a mirror; + But the gigantic billows sprung in terror + Upon its rock-built and eternal shore, + With silver foams that fell in fury o'er + A thousand sunny breakers. Far above, + There stood a wild and solitary grove + Of aged pines, all leafless but their brows, + Where a green group of tempest-stricken boughs + Was waving now and then, and to and fro, + And the pale moss was clustering below. + + Then Julio saw, and bent his head away + To the cold wasted corse of Agathe, + And sigh'd; but ever he would turn again + A gaze to that green island on the main. + + The bark is drifting through the surf, beside + Its rocks of gray upon the coming tide; + And lightly is it stranded on the shore + Of pure and silver shells, that lie before, + Glittering in the glory of the sun; + And Julio hath landed him, like one + That aileth of some wild and weary pest; + And Agathe is folded on his breast,-- + A faded flower! with all the vernal dews + From its bright blossom shaken, and the hues + Become as colourless as twilight air-- + I marvel much, that she was ever fair! + + + + + CHIMERA III + + + Another moon! and over the blue night + She bendeth, like a holy spirit bright, + Through stars that veil them in their wings of gold; + As on she floateth with her image cold + Enamell'd on the deep. A sail of cloud + Is to her left, majestically proud! + Trailing its silver drapery away + In thin and fairy webs, that are at play + Like stormless waves upon a summer sea + Dragging their length of waters lazily. + + Ay! to the rocks! and thou wilt see, I wist, + A lonely one, that bendeth in the mist + Of moonlight, with a wild and raven pall + Flung round him. Is he mortal man at all? + For, by the meagre fire-light that is under + Those eyelids, and the vizor shade of wonder + Falling upon his features, I would guess, + Of one that wanders out of blessedness! + Julio! raise thee!--By the holy mass! + I wot not of the fearless one would pass + Thy wizard shadow. Where the raven hair + Was shorn before, in many a matted layer + It lieth now; and on a rock beside + The sea, like merman at the ebb of tide, + Feasting his wondrous vision on Decay, + So art thou gazing over Agathe! + + Ah me! but this is never the fair girl, + With brow of light, as lovely as a pearl, + That was as beautiful as is the form + Of sea-bird at the breaking of a storm. + The eye is open, with convulsive strain-- + A most unfleshly orb! the stars that wane + Have nothing of its hue; for it is cast + With sickly blood, and terribly aghast! + And sunken in its socket, like the light + Of a red taper in the lonely night! + And there is not a braid of her bright hair + But lieth floating in the moonlight air, + Like the long moss, beside a silver spring, + In elfin tresses, sadly murmuring. + The worm hath 'gan to crawl upon her brow-- + The living worm! and with a ripple now, + Like that upon the sea, are heard below, + The slimy swarms all ravening as they go, + Amid the stagnate vitals, with a rush; + And one might hear them echoing the hush + Of Julio, as he watches by the side + Of the dead ladye, his betrothed bride! + + And, ever and anon, a yellow group + Was creeping on her bosom, like a troop + Of stars, far up amid the galaxy, + Pale, pale, as snowy showers; and two or three + Were mocking the cold finger, round and round, + With likeness of a ring; and, as they wound + About its bony girth, they had the hue + Of pearly jewels glistering in dew. + That deathly stare! it is an awful thing + To gaze upon; and sickly thoughts will spring + Before it to the heart: it telleth how + There must be waste where there is beauty now. + The chalk! the chalk! where was the virgin snow + Of that once heaving bosom!--even so,-- + The cold pale dewy chalk, with yellow shade + Amid the leprous hues; and o'er it played + The straggling moonlight, and the merry breeze, + Like two fair elves, that, by the murmuring seas, + Woo'd smilingly together; but there fell + No life-gleam on the brow, all terrible + Becoming, through its beauty, like a cloud + That waneth paler even than a shroud, + All gorgeous and all glorious before; + For waste, like to the wanton night, was o'er + Her virgin features, stealing them away-- + Ah me! ah me! and this is Agathe? + + "Enough! enough! Oh God! but I have pray'd + To thee, in early daylight and in shade, + And the mad curse is on me still--and still! + I cannot alter the Eternal will-- + But--but--I hate thee, Agathe! I hate + What lunacy hath bade me consecrate: + I am _not_ mad!--_not now!_--I do not feel + That slumberous and blessed opiate steal + Up to my brain--Oh! that it only would, + To people this eternal solitude + With fancies, and fair dreams, and summer mirth, + Which is not now--And yet, my mother earth, + I would not love to lie above thee so, + As Agathe lies there--oh! no! no! no! + To have these clay-worms feast upon my heart! + And all the light of being, to depart + Into a dismal shadow! I could die + As the red lightnings, quenching amid sky + Their wild and wizard breath; I could away, + Like a blue billow, bursting into spray; + But, never--never have corruption here, + To feed her worms, and let the sunlight jeer + Above me so.--'Tis thou!--I owe thee, Moon, + To-night's fair worship; so be lifting soon + Thy veil of clouds, that I may kneel, as one + That seeketh for thy virgin benison!" + + He gathers the cold limpets, as they creep + On the grey rocks beside the lonely deep; + And with a flint breaks through into the shell, + And feeds him--by the mass! he feasteth well. + And he hath lifted water in a clam, + And tasted sweetly, from a stream that swam + Down to the sea; and now is turn'd away, + Again, again, to gaze on Agathe! + + There is a cave upon that isle--a cave + Where dwelt a hermit man; the winter wave + Roll'd to its entrance, casting a bright mound + Of snowy shells and fairy pebbles round; + And over were the solemn ridges strewn + Of a dark rock, that, like the wizard throne + Of some sea-monarch, stood, and from it hung + Wild thorn and bramble, in confusion flung + Amid the startling crevices--like sky, + Through gloom of clouds, that sweep in thunder by. + A cataract fell over, in a streak + Of silver, playing many a wanton freak; + Midway, and musical, with elfin glee + It bounded in its beauty to the sea, + Like dazzling angel vanishing away. + In sooth, 'twas pleasant in the moonlight gray + To see that fairy fountain leaping so, + Like one that knew not wickedness nor woe! + + The hermit had his cross and rosary; + I ween like other hermits, so was he; + A holy man, and frugal, and at night + He prayed, or slept, or, sometimes, by the light + Of the fair moon, went wandering beside + The lonely sea, to hear the silver tide + Rolling in gleesome music to the shore: + The more he heard, he loved to hear the more. + And there he is, his hoary beard adrift + To the night winds, that sportingly do lift + Its snow-white tresses; and he leaneth on + A rugged staff, all weakly and alone, + A childless, friendless man! + + He is beside + The ghastly Julio, and his ghastlier bride. + 'Twas wondrous strange to gaze upon the two! + And the old hermit felt a throbbing through + His pulses:--"Holy virgin! save me, save!" + He deem'd of spectre from the midnight wave, + And cross'd him thrice, and pray'd, and pray'd again:-- + "Hence! hence!" and Julio started, as the strain + Of exorcisms fell faintly on his ear:-- + "I knew thee, father, that thou beest here, + To gaze upon this girl, as I have been. + By yonder moon! it was a frantic sin + To worship so an image of the clay; + It was like beauty--but is now away-- + What lived upon her features, like the light + On yonder cloud, all tender and all bright; + But it is faded as the other must, + And she that was all beauty, is all dust." + + "Father! thy hand upon this brow of mine, + And tell me, is it cold?--But she will twine + No wreath upon these temples,--never, never! + For there she lieth, like a streamless river + That stagnates in its bed. Feel, feel me, here, + If I be madly throbbing in the fear + For that cold slimy worm. Ay! look and see + How dotingly it feeds, how pleasantly! + And where it is, have been the living hues + Of beauty, purer than the very dews. + So, father! seest thou that yonder moon + Will be on wane to-morrow, soon and soon? + And I, that feel my being wear away, + Shall droop beside to darkness; so, but say + A prayer for the dead, when I am gone, + And let the azure tide that floweth on + Cover us lightly with its murmuring surf + Like a green sward of melancholy turf. + Thou mayest, if thou wilt, thou mayest rear + A cenotaph on this lone island here, + Of some rude mossy stone, below a tree, + And carve an olden rhyme for her and me + Upon its brow." + + He bends, and gazes yet + Before his ghastly bride! the anchoret + Sate by him, and hath press'd a cross of wood + To his wan lips. + + * * * * * + + "My son! look up and tell thy dismal tale. + Thou seemest cold, and sorrowful, and pale. + Alas! I fear but thou hast strangely been + A child of curse, and misery, and sin. + And this--is she thy sister?"--"Nay! my bride." + "A nun! and thou:"--"True, true! but then she died, + And was a virgin, and is virgin still, + Chaste as the moon, that taketh her pure fill + Of light from the great sun. But now, go by, + And leave me to my madness, or to die! + This heart, this brain are sore.--Come, come, and fold + Me round, ye hydra billows! wrapt in gold, + That are so writhing your eternal gyres + Before the moon, which, with a myriad tiars + Is crowning you, as ye do fall and kiss + Her pearly feet, that glide in blessedness! + Let me be torture-eaten, ere I die! + Let me be mangled sore with agony! + And be so cursed, so stricken by the spell + Of my heart's frenzy, that a living hell + Be burning there!--Back! back! if thou art mad-- + Methought thou wast, but thou art only sad. + Is this thy child, old man? look, look, and see! + In truth it is a piteous thing for thee + To become childless--Well-a-well, go by! + Is there no grave? The quiet sea is nigh, + And I will bury her below the moon; + It may be but a trance or midnight swoon, + And she may wake. Wake, ladye! ha! methought + It was like _her_--Like her! and is it not? + My angel girl! my brain, my stricken brain!-- + I know thee now!--I know myself again." + + He flings him on the ladye, and anon, + With loathly shudder, from that wither'd one + Hath torn him back. "Oh me! no more--no more! + Thou virgin mother! Is the dream not o'er, + That I have dreamt, but I must dream again + For moons together, till this weary brain + Become distemper'd as the winter sea? + Good father! give me blessing; let it be + Upon me as the dew upon the moss. + Oh me! but I have made the holy cross + A curse, and not a blessing! let me kiss + The sacred symbol; for, by this--by this! + I sware, and sware again, as now I will-- + Thou Heaven! if there be bounty in thee still, + If thou wilt hear, and minister, and bring + The light of comfort on some angel wing + To one that lieth lone, do--do it now; + By all the stars that open on thy brow + Like silver flowers! and by the herald moon + That listeth to be forth at nightly noon, + Jousting the clouds, I swear! and be it true, + As I have perjured me, that I renew + Allegiance to thy God, and bind me o'er + To this same penance, I have done before! + That night and day I watch, as I have been + Long watching, o'er the partner of my sin! + That I taste never the delight of food, + But these wild shell-fish, that may make the mood + Of madness stronger, till it grapple Death-- + Despair--Eternity!" + + He saith, he saith, + And, on the jaundiced bosom of the corse, + Lieth all frenzied; one would see Remorse, + And hopeless Love, and Hatred, struggling there, + And Lunacy, that lightens up Despair, + And makes a gladness out of agony. + Pale phantom! I would fear and worship thee, + That hast the soul at will, and gives it play, + Amid the wildest fancies far away; + That thronest Reason, on some wizard throne + Of fairy land, within the milky zone,-- + Some spectre star, that glittereth beyond + The glorious galaxies of diamond. + + Beautiful Lunacy! that shapest flight + For love to blessed bowers of delight, + And buildest holy monarchies within + The fancy, till the very heart is queen + Of all her golden wishes. Lunacy! + Thou empress of the passions! though they be + A sister group of wild, unearthly forms, + Like lightnings playing in their home of storms! + I see thee, striking at the silver strings + Of the pure heart, and holy music springs + Before thy touch, in many a solemn strain, + Like that of sea-waves rolling from the main! + + But say, is Melancholy by thy side, + With tresses in a raven shower, that hide + Her pale and weeping features? Is she never + Flowing before thee, like a gloomy river, + The sister of thyself? but cold and chill, + And winter-born, and sorrowfully still, + And not like thee, that art in merry mood, + And frolicksome amid thy solitude! + + Fair Lunacy! I see thee, with a crown + Of hawthorn and sweet daisies, bending down + To mirror thy young image in a spring; + And thou wilt kiss that shadow of a thing + As soul-less as thyself. 'Tis tender, too, + The smile that meeteth thine! the holy hue + Of health! the pearly radiance of the brow! + All, all as tender--beautiful as thou! + + And wilt thou say, my sister, there is none + Will answer thee? Thou art--thou art alone, + A pure, pure being! but the God on high + Is with thee ever, as thou goest by. + + Thou poetess! that harpest to the moon, + And, in soft concert to the silver tune + Of waters, play'd on by the magic wind, + As he comes streaming, with his hair untwined, + Dost sing light strains of melody and mirth,-- + I hear thee, hymning on thy holy birth, + How thou wert moulded of thy mother Love, + That came, like seraph, from the stars above, + And was so sadly wedded unto Sin, + That thou wert born, and Sorrow was thy twin. + Sorrow and mirthful Lunacy! that be + Together link'd for time, I deem of ye + That ye are worshipp'd as none others are,-- + One as a lonely shadow, one a star! + + Is Julio glad, that bendeth, even now, + To his wild purpose, to his holy vow? + He seeth only in his ladye-bride + The image of the laughing girl, that died + A moon before--The same, the very same-- + The Agathe that lisp'd her lover's name, + To him and to her heart: that azure eye, + That shone through sunny tresses, waving by; + The brow, the cheek, that blush'd of fire and snow, + Both blending into one ethereal glow; + And that same breathing radiancy, that swam + Around her, like a pure and blessed calm + Around some halcyon bird. And, as he kiss'd + Her wormy lips, he felt that he was blest! + He felt her holy being stealing through + His own, like fountains of the azure dew, + That summer mingles with his golden light; + And he would clasp her, till the weary night + Was worn away. + + * * * * * + + And morning rose in form + Of heavy clouds, that knitted into storm + The brow of Heaven, and through her lips the wind + Came rolling westward, with a track behind + Of gloomy billows, bursting on the sea, + All rampant, like great lions terribly, + And gnashing on each other: and anon, + Julio heard them, rushing one by one, + And laugh'd and turn'd.--The hermit was away, + For he was old and weary, and he lay + Within his cave, and thought it was a dream, + A summer's dream? and so the quiet stream + Of sleep came o'er his eyelids, and in truth + He dreamt of that strange ladye, and the youth + That held a death-wake on her wasting form; + And so he slept and woke not, till the storm + Was over. + + But they came,--the wind and sea, + And rain and thunder, that in giant glee, + Sang o'er the lightnings pale, as to and fro + They writhed, like stricken angels!--White as snow + Roll'd billow after billow, and the tide + Came forward as an army deep and wide, + To charge with all its waters. There was heard + A murmur far and far, of those that stirr'd + Within the great encampment of the sea, + And dark they were, and lifted terribly + Their water-spouts like banners. It was grand + To see the black battalions, hand in hand + Striding to conflict, and their helmets bent + Below their foamy plumes magnificent! + + And Julio heard and laugh'd, "Shall I be king + To your great hosts, that ye are murmuring + For one to bear you to your holy war? + There is no sun, or moon, or any star, + To guide your iron footsteps as ye go; + But I, your king, will marshal you to flow + From shore to shore. Then bring my car of shell, + That I may ride before you terrible; + And bring my sceptre of the amber weed, + And Agathe, my virgin bride, shall lead + Your summer hosts, when these are ambling low, + In azure and in ermine, to and fro." + He said, and madly, with his wasted hand, + Swept o'er the tuneless harp, and fast he spann'd + The silver chords, until a rush of sound + Came from them, solemn--terrible--profound; + And then he dash'd the instrument away + Into the waters, and the giant play + Of billows threw it back unto the shore, + A shiver'd, stringless frame--its day of music o'er! + The tide, the rolling tide! the multitude + Of the sea surges, terrible and rude, + Tossing their chalky foam along the bed + Of thundering pebbles, that are shoring dread, + And fast retreating to the gloomy gorge + Of waters, sounding like a Titan forge! + + It comes! it comes! the tide, the rolling tide! + But Julio is bending to his bride, + And making mirthful whispers to her ear. + A cataract! a cataract is near, + Of one stupendous billow, and it breaks + Terribly furious, with a myriad flakes + Of foam, that fly about the haggard twain; + And Julio started, with a sudden pain, + That shot into his heart; his reason flew + Back to its throne; he rose, and wildly threw + His matted tresses over on his brow. + Another billow came, and even now + Was dashing at his feet. There was no shade + Of terror, as the serpent waters play'd + Before him, but his eye was calm as death. + Another, yet another! and the breath + Of the weird wind was with it; like a rock + Unriveted it fell--a shroud of smoke + Pass'd over--there was heard, and died away, + The voice of one, shrill shrieking, "Agathe!" + + The sea-bird sitteth lonely by the side + Of the far waste of waters, flapping wide + His wet and weary wings; but _he_ is gone, + The stricken Julio!--a wave-swept stone + Stands there, on which he sat, and nakedly + It rises looking to the lonely sea; + But Julio is gone, and Agathe! + The waters swept them madly to their core,-- + The dead and living with a frantic roar! + And so he died, his bosom fondly set + On her's; and round her clay-cold waist were met + His bare and wither'd arms, and to her brow + His lips were press'd. Both, both are perish'd now! + + He died upon her bosom in a swoon; + And fancied of the pale and silver moon, + That went before him in her hall of blue: + He died like golden insect in the dew, + Calm, calm, and pure; and not a chord was rung + In his deep heart, but love. He perish'd young, + But perish'd, wasted by some fatal flame + That fed upon his vitals; and there came + Lunacy sweeping lightly, like a stream, + Along his brain--He perish'd in a dream! + + In sooth, I marvel not, + If death be only a mysterious thought, + That cometh on the heart, and turns the brow + Brightless and chill, as Julio's is now; + For only had the wasting struggle been + Of one wild feeling, till it rose within + Into the form of death, and nature felt + The light of the immortal being melt + Into its happier home, beyond the sea, + And moon, and stars, into eternity! + + The sun broke through his dungeon long enthrall'd + By dismal cloud, and on the emerald + Of the great living sea was blazing down, + To gift the lordly billows with a crown + Of diamond and silver. From his cave + The hermit came, and by the dying wave + Lone wander'd, and he found upon the sand, + Below a truss of sea-weed, with his hand + Around the silent waist of Agathe, + The corse of Julio! Pale, pale, it lay + Beside the wasted girl. The fireless eye + Was open, and a jewell'd rosary + Hung round the neck; but it was gone,--the cross + That Agathe had given. + + Amid the moss, + The hermit scoop'd a solitary grave + Below the pine-trees, and he sang a stave, + Or two, or three, of some old requiem + As in their narrow home he buried them. + And many a day, before that blessed spot + He sate, in lone and melancholy thought, + Gazing upon the grave; and one had guess'd + Of some dark secret shadowing his breast. + And yet, to see him, with his silver hair + Adrift and floating in the sea-borne air, + And features chasten'd in the tears of woe, + In sooth 'twas merely sad to see him so! + A wreck of nature, floating far and fast, + Upon the stream of Time--to sink at last! + + And he is wandering by the shore again, + Hard leaning on his staff; the azure main + Lies sleeping far before him, with his seas + Fast folded in the bosom of the breeze, + That like the angel Peace hath dropt his wings + Around the warring waters. Sadly sings + To his own heart that lonely hermit man, + A tale of other days, when passion ran + Along his pulses, like a troubled stream, + And glory was a splendour, and a dream! + He stoop'd to gather up a shining gem, + That lay amid the shells, as bright as them,-- + It was a cross, the cross that Agathe + Had given to her Julio: the play + Of the fierce sunbeams fell upon its face, + And on the glistering jewels--But the trace + Of some old thought came burning to the brain + Of the pale hermit, and he shrunk in pain + Before the holy symbol. It was not + Because of the eternal ransom wrought + In ages far away, or he had bent + In pure devotion sad and reverent; + But now, he started, as he look'd upon + That jewell'd thing, and wildly he is gone + Back to the mossy grave, away, away:-- + "My child! my child! my own, own Agathe!" + + It is her father,--he,--an alter'd man! + His quiet had been wounded, and the ban + Of misery came over him, and froze + The bright and holy tides, that fell and rose + In joy amid his heart. To think of her, + That he had injured so, and all so fair, + So fond, so like the chosen of his youth,-- + It was a very dismal thought, in truth, + That he had left her hopelessly, for aye, + Within the cloister-wall to droop, and die! + And so he could not bear to have it be; + But sought for some lone island in the sea, + Where he might dwell in doleful solitude, + And do strange penance in his mirthless mood, + For this same crime, unnaturally wild, + That he had done unto his saintly child. + And ever he did think, when he had laid + These lovers in the grave, that, through the shade + Of ghastly features melting to decay, + He saw the image of his Agathe. + + And now the truth had flash'd into his brain: + And he is fallen, with a shriek of pain, + Upon the lap of pale and yellow moss; + For long ago he gave that blessed cross + To his fair girl, and knew the relic still, + By many a thousand thoughts, that rose at will + Before it, of the one that was not now, + But, like a dream, had floated from the brow + Of Time, that seeth many a lovely thing + Fade by him, like a sea-wave murmuring. + + The heart is burst!--the heart that stood in steel + To woman's earnest tears, and bade her feel + The curse of virgin solitude,--a veil; + And saw the gladsome features growing pale + Unmoved: 'tis rent, like some eternal tower + The sea hath shaken, and its stately power + Lies lonely, fallen, scatter'd on the shore: + 'Tis rent, like some great mountain, that, before + The Deluge, stood in glory and in might, + But now is lightning-riven, and the night + Is clambering up its sides, and chasms lie strewn, + Like coffins, here and there: 'tis rent! the throne + Where passions, in their awful anarchy, + Stood sceptred! There was heard an inward sigh, + That took the being, on its troubled wings, + Far to the land of dim imaginings! + + All three are dead; that desolate green isle + Is only peopled by the passing smile + Of sun and moon, that surely have a sense, + They look so radiant with intelligence,-- + So like the soul's own element,--so fair! + The features of a God lie veiled there! + + And mariners that have been toiling far + Upon the deep, and lost the polar star, + Have visited that island, and have seen + That lover's grave: and many there have been + That sat upon the gray and crumbling stone, + And started, as they saw a skeleton + Amid the long sad moss, that fondly grew + Through the white wasted ribs; but never knew + Of those who slept below, or of the tale + Of that brain-stricken man, that felt the pale + And wandering moonlight steal his soul away,-- + Poor Julio, and the ladye Agathe! + + * * * * * + + We found them,--children of toil and tears, + Their birth of beauty shaded; + We left them in their early years + Fallen and faded. + + We found them, flowers of summer hue: + Their golden cups were lighted + With sparkles of the pearly dew-- + We left them blighted! + + We found them,--like those fairy flowers; + And the light of morn lay holy + Over their sad and sainted bowers-- + We left them, lowly. + + We found them,--like twin stars, alone, + In brightness and in feeling; + We left them,--and the curse was on + Their beauty stealing. + + They rest in quiet, where they are: + Their lifetime is the story + Of some fair flower--some silver star, + Faded in glory! + + + + +POEMS + + + + +THE IRIS + + A pale and broken Iris in the mirror + Of a gray cloud,--as gray as death, + Slow sailing in the breath + Of thunder! Like a child, that lies in terror + Through the dark night, an Iris fair + Trembled midway in air. + The blending of its elfin hues + Was as the pure enamel on + The early morning dews; + And gloriously they shone, + Waving everyone his wing, + Like a young aerial thing! + That Iris came + Over the shells of gold, beside + The blue and waveless tide; + Its girdle, of resplendent flame, + Met shore and sea, afar, + Like angel that shall stand + On flood and land, + Crown'd with a meteor star. + + The sea-bird, from her snowy stone, + Beheld it floating on, + Like a bride that bent her way + To the altar, standing lone, + In some cathedral gray. + The melancholy wave + Started at the cry she gave, + Hailing the lovely child + Of the immortal sun,-- + A tender and a tearful one, + Bounding away, with footsteps wild! + + Old Neptune on his silver bed + The dazzling image threw; + It laid like sunbeam on the dew, + Its young tress-waving head. + The god upon the shadow gazed, + And silently upraised + A gentle wave, that came and kiss'd + Fair Iris in her holy rest. + Her pearly brow grew pale: + It felt the sinful fire, + And from her queenly tiar + She drew the veil. + The sun-wing'd steeds her sacred car + Wheel'd to her throne of star. + + + + +TO A SPIRIT + + + Spirit! in deathless halo zoned, + A chain of stars with wings of diamond,-- + Is music blended into thee + With holy light and immortality? + For, as thy shape of glory swept + Through seas of darkness, magic breathings fell + Around it, like the notes that slept + In the wild caverns of a silver shell. + + Thou camest, as a lightning spring + Through chasms of horrid cloud, on scathless wing; + Old Chaos round him, like a tiar, + Swathed the long rush of immaterial fire; + As thou, descending from afar, + Wast canopied with living arch of light, + Pale pillars of immortal star, + Burst through the curtains of the moonless night. + + Phantom of wonder! over thee, + Trembles the shadow of the Deity; + For face to face, on lifted throne, + Thou gazest to the glory-shrouded One, + Where highest in the azure height + Of universe, eternally he turns + Myriads of worlds; with blaze of light + Filling the hollow of their golden urns. + + Why comest thou, with feelings bound + On thy birth-shore, the long unenter'd ground? + To visit where thy being first, + Through the pale shell of embryo nothing, burst? + Or, on celestial errand bent, + To win to faith a sin enraptured son, + And point the angel lineament + Of mercy on a cross,--the Bleeding One? + + Spirit! I breathe no sad adieu: + The altars where thou bendest never knew + Sigh, tear, or sorrow, and the night + No chariot drives behind the wheel of light; + Where every seraph is a sun, + And every soul an everlasting star.-- + Go to thy home, thou peerless one! + Where glory and the Great Immortal are! + + + + +HER, A STATUE + + + Her life is in the marble! yet a fall + Of sleep lies on the heart's fair arsenal, + Like new shower'd snow. You hear no whisper through + Those love-divided lips; no pearly dew + Trembles on her pale orbs, that seem to be + Bent on a dream of immortality! + + She sleeps: her life is sleep,--a holy rest! + Like that of wing-borne cloud, that, in the west + Laves his aerial image, till afar + The sunlight leaves him, melting into star. + Did Phidias from her brow the veil remove, + Uncurtaining the peerless queen of love? + The fluent stone in marble waves recoil'd, + Touch'd by his hand, and left the wondrous child, + A Venus of the foam! How softly fair + The dove-like passion on the sacred air + Floats round her, nesting in her wreathed hair, + That tells, though shadeless, of its auburn hue, + Bathed in a hoar of diamond-dropping dew! + + How beautiful!--Was this not one of eld, + That Chaos on his boundless bosom held, + Till Earth came forward in a rush of storm, + Closing his ribs upon her wingless form? + How beautiful!--The very lips do speak + Of love, and bid us worship: the pale cheek + Seems blushing through the marble--through the snow! + And the undrap'ried bosom feels a flow + Of fever on its brightness; every vein + At the blue pulse swells softly, like a chain + Of gentle hills. I would not fling a wreath + Of jewels on that brow, to flash beneath + Those queenly tresses; for itself is more + Than sea-born pearl of some Elysian shore! + + Such, with a heart like woman! I would cast + Life at her foot, and, as she glided past, + Would bid her trample on the slavish thing-- + Tell her, I'd rather feel me withering + Under her step, than be unknown for aye: + And, when her pride had crush'd me, she might see + A love-wing'd spirit glide in glory by + Striking the tent of its mortality! + + + + +TO A STORM-STAID BIRD + + + Trembler! a month is past, and thou + Wert singing on the thorn, + And shaking dew-drops from the bough + In the golden haze of morn! + + My heart was just as thou, as light-- + As loving of the breeze, + That kiss'd thee in its elfin flight, + Through the green acacia trees. + + And now the winter snow-flakes lie + All on thy widow'd wing; + Trembler! methinks I hear thee sigh + For the silver days of spring. + + But shake thy plume--the world is free + Before thee--warbler, fly! + Blest by a sunbeam and by me, + Bird of my heart! good-bye! + + + + +THE WOLF-DROVE + + + No night-star in the welkin blue! no moonshade round the trees + That grew down to the sea-swept foot of the ancient Pyrenees! + The cold gray mantle of the mist, along the shoulders cast + Of those wild mountains, to and fro, hung waving in the blast. + + A snow-crown rising on their brows, in royalty they stood, + As if they vice-reign'd on a throne of winter solitude; + Those hills that rose far upward, till in majesty they bent + Their world's great eye-orb on her own immortal lineament! + + The howl, the long deep howl was heard, the rushing like a wave + Of the wolf train from their forest haunt, in some old mountain cave; + Like a sea-wave, when the wind is horsed behind its foamy crest, + And it lifts upon the shell-built shore, its azure-spotted breast. + + They came with war-whoop, following each other, like a thread, + Through the long labyrinth of trees, in sunless archway spread; + Their gnarled trunks in shadowy lines rose dimly, few by few, + Mail'd in their mossy armouring,--a pathless avenue! + + In sooth, there was a shepherd girl by her aged father's side; + He gazed upon her deep dark eyes, in glory and in pride; + The mother's soul was living there,--the image full and wild, + Of one he loved--of one no more, was beaming in her child. + + And she was at her father's side, her raven tresses felt + Upon his care-worn cheek, as gay and joyfully she knelt, + Kissing the old man's tears away, by the embers burning faint, + While she sung the holy aves, and a vesper to her saint. + + "Now bar the breezy lattice, love!--but hist! how fares the night? + Methought I heard the wolf abroad. Heaven help! I heard aright-- + My mantle!--By the Mother Saint! our flock is in the fold? + How think you, love? wake up the hound, I ween the wolf is bold." + + "Stay, stay; 'tis past!" "I hear it still; to rest, I pray, to rest." + "Nay, father! hold; thou must not go;" and silently she press'd + The old man's arm, and bade him stay, for love of Heaven and her: + His danger was too wild a thought, for so fond a girl to bear. + + He kiss'd her, and they parted then; but, through the lattice low, + She gazed amid the vine-twigs pale, all cradled to and fro; + The holy whisper of the wind stole lightly by the eaves,-- + A sad dirge, sighing to the fall of the winter-blighted leaves. + + He comes not! 'Tis a dreadful thing to hear them as they rave, + The savage wolf-train howling, like the near burst of a wave. + She thought it was a father's cry she heard--a father's cry! + And she flung her from the cottage door, in startled agony. + + Good Virgin save thee, gentle girl! they are no knightly train + That mark thee for their sinless prey--thou wilt not smile again; + The blood is streaming on thy cheek; the heart it ceases slow; + A father gazes on his child--God help a father's woe! + + + + +HYMN TO ORION + + + Orion! old Orion! who dost wait + Warder at heaven's star-studded gate, + On a throne where worlds might meet + At thy silver sandal'd feet, + All invisible to thee, + Gazing through immensity; + For thy crowned head is higher + Than the ramparts of earth-searching fire, + And the comet his blooded banner, there + Flings back upon the waveless air. + + Old Orion! holy hands + Have knit thy everlasting bands, + Belted by the King of kings, + Under thy azure-sheathed wings, + With a zone of living light, + Such as bound the Apostate might, + When from highest tower of heaven, + His vaunting shape was wrathly driven + To its wane, woe-wall'd abode, + Rended from the eye of God! + + Dost thou, in thy vigils, hail + Arcturus on his chariot pale, + Leading his sons--a fiery flight-- + Over the hollow hill of night? + Or tellest of their watches long, + To the sleepless, nameless throng, + Shoaling in a wond'rous gleam, + Like channel through the azure stream + Of life reflected, as it flows, + In one broad ocean of repose, + Gushing from thy lips, Orion! + To the holy walls of Zion? + + + + _Printed by_ BALLANTYNE, HANSON & CO. + _London & Edinburgh_ + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Death-Wake, by Thomas T Stoddart + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DEATH-WAKE *** + +***** This file should be named 16601.txt or 16601.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/6/6/0/16601/ + +Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Sankar Viswanathan 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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