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diff --git a/77707-0.txt b/77707-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2966226 --- /dev/null +++ b/77707-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1151 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77707 *** + + + + + FLOWERS OF PARNASSUS—XXI + + + A LITTLE CHILD’S WREATH + + +[Illustration: “Content I leave with God what once I missed.”] + + + + + A LITTLE CHILD’S WREATH + BY ELIZABETH RACHEL CHAPMAN. WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY W. GRAHAM + ROBERTSON ❧ ☙︎ ❧ ☙︎ + + + JOHN LANE: PUBLISHER + LONDON AND NEW YORK + + MDCCCCIV + + + Wm. Clowes & Sons, Limited, Printers, London. + + + TO + THE HOLY MEMORY + OF + A LITTLE CHILD + AND + TO ALL WHO HAVE MOURNED ONE + + + + + Introductory Note + + +Elizabeth Rachel Chapman, whose sonnets are now republished as a +memorial volume, was born at Woodford, Essex, in February, 1850. She was +descended through her father from a Yorkshire family associated, in many +of its generations, with Whitby, and was connected through both father +and mother with the Gurneys of Earlham. She was a great-grand-daughter +of Elizabeth Fry, and was said to bear her a noticeable resemblance. +That this likeness was also in her mind is attested by the “genius for +benevolence” which she inherited from her ancestress, and by the +tenderness of her affection and pity for all sufferers. In her _Book of +Sibyls_ Mrs. Ritchie (Miss Thackeray) describes the Gurneys of Earlham +as ordained to “a sort of natural priesthood.” Elizabeth Chapman was of +that company of devoted spirits. Her love for children was boundless; +and the _Wreath_ was consecrated to the memory of a little nephew, +tenderly loved, in whose grave she now lies. + +Miss Chapman’s writings were published between the years 1881 and 1897; +at earlier date appeared her first work, _Master of All_, and at the +later her last, _Marriage Questions in Modern Fiction_. Meanwhile she +wrote what was perhaps her best-known work, _A Companion to “In +Memoriam,”_ which drew from Tennyson the letter published in the _Life_: +“I am grateful to you,” he says, “for your book ... excellent in taste +and judgment. I like, too, what you say about Comtism. I really could +almost fancy that page 95 was written by myself. I have been saying the +same thing for years in all but the same words.” The passage treats of +her perfect belief in immortality, and her sense of the mockery of life +without a future. Again, he said that her commentary on his poem was +“the best ever done.” _A Tourist Idyll and other Stories_, _The New +Godiva and other Studies_, and _A Comtist Lover and other Studies_ had +followed each other at intervals of a year or two, and in 1887 appeared +a volume of verse, _The New Purgatory and other Poems_. _A Little +Child’s Wreath_ was published in 1894 and reprinted in the year +following. + +There is a sense in which the simplest things of literature are the most +difficult. The primary and original griefs and felicities of the heart +need to-day something more than the original emotion, if poetry is to +re-tell them. We know too well the formula in literature, whereas in the +heart there is no formula; and thus the simple and primitive passion +inclines to be more silent now than at any earlier day. Women no longer +cry out at a funeral, and they say little when a child dies. The outcry +has ceased to reach the sensibility of the hearer, and the phrase of +grief has grown relaxed and dull by custom. Therefore it is with some of +the courage of unconsciousness, and of a grief secluded in its own +completeness, that a writer takes up the old history of the loss of a +beloved child. For this sorrow is so constantly with us—with mankind—as +to have become the ready subject of another kind of literature. The +sentimentalist has used it, and the sincere mourner, who had at hand +only a sentimentalist’s diction, has vainly essayed to convey the true +feeling in the strained and depreciated phrase. When Elizabeth Rachel +Chapman undertook her _Little Child’s Wreath_, she must have been well +aware that two kinds of insincerity—the insincerity of the +sentimentalist, which is insincerity of character, and that other sort +which is merely insincerity of literature, and may be the disabled +utterance of a true heart—had made much, especially in the course of the +nineteenth century, of the death of children. But she forgot or +disregarded all this unworthiness, for it can always be put aside; and +freshly and tenderly arranged her thoughts and rhymed her phrases, +writing out of a heart doubly sincere. + +Obviously her work must have been done in the after-time of grief. Her +sorrow for the little boy, which no mother could have excelled, had +grown, when she began to write, not gentler—for we can hardly imagine it +anything but gentle even in the first speechless hours—but more able to +endure. She had the literary sincerity which led her to this expression, +and made the craftsmanship of verse a natural exercise in the leisure of +her loss. There is no rhetoric, no mere borrowing of excessive language, +no violence of feeling or of diction. The laws of poetry, spiritual as +well as metrical, control, or rather direct, the writer’s statement of +love and loss, and she has given the right of this discipline to a form +of verse—the Shakespearian sonnet—long neglected, but better fitted than +the Petrarchan to the quantity and quality of English rhyme. The poems +do not profess despair or revolt; they have the dignity of another +spirit, older, newer, and doubtless more perdurable. Miss Chapman’s +studies of _In Memoriam_ had instructed her in the responsibilities of a +profound affliction. + +Slightly, with the slightness of tenderness, she reveals the portrait of +a wonderful child, one of whom the world was not worthy. His death at +seven years old silenced the doubts, not whether he would be good, but +whether he would be strong, whether he would have the force, the +enterprise to face the strife, to grapple with the ill. The imminence of +death was evidently visible in him as it has been in so many children +who have died, as it is visible even in an infant who is not to survive +infancy—a greater sweetness, a lovelier smile, not imagined by a +mother’s memory after the child’s death, but noted during his life and +during his health, and confessed then as the inevitable sign of near +mortality. The portrait in _A Little Child’s Wreath_ is an exquisite one +of an exquisite subject; and unconsciously the author—now that she too +has passed from this world we may say it—has shown her own beautiful and +noble soul to have been marked for a too early, though a later, passage. + + ALICE MEYNELL. + + + _Our darling loved the meadows and the trees; + Great London jarred him ; he was ill at ease + And alien in the stir, the noise, the press; + The city vexed his perfect gentleness._ + + _So, loving him, we sent him from the town + To where the autumn leaves were falling brown, + And the November primrose, pale and dim, + In his own garden-plot delighted him._ + + _There, like his flowers, he would thrive and grow, + We in our fondness thought. But God said: No, + Your way is loving, but not wholly wise; + My way is best—to give him Paradise._ + + + + + Illustrations + + + “Content I leave with God what once I missed” _Frontispiece_ + “Round me the city looms, void, waste and wild” _Page_ 23 + “The jocund dance of wind-swept daffodils” „ 29 + “From heaven to heaven, along an azure sea” „ 35 + “O’er hill and dale, through waste and wood” „ 47 + “Or heaven reflected in the serious face” „ 61 + + + + + A LITTLE CHILD’S WREATH + + + I. + + If, where thou walkest, dear, we too could walk, + Close in the footsteps of our little saint, + Now, on this earth ; and hear the angels talk, + Living this very life (without life’s taint); + + If, where thou goest, we could also go, + Calm in the heavenly places, waiting not + For death’s enfranchisement to overthrow + The world in us, with every flaw and blot; + + If thy small hands, that late were clasped in pain, + Could clasp us every day to God and thee, + Drawing us childwards, heavenwards again + By their mere whiteness, everlastingly— + + Then, humbled and consoled by so much grace, + We might less hungrily desire thy face. + + + II. + + Turn where I will, I miss, I miss my sweet; + By my lone fire, or in the crowded way + Once so familiar to his joyous feet, + I miss, I hunger for him all the day. + + This is the house wherefrom his welcome rang; + These are the wintry walks where he and I + Would pause to mark if a stray robin sang, + Or some new sunset-flame enriched the sky. + + Here, where we crossed the dangerous road, and where + Unutterably desolate I stand, + How often, peering through the sombre air, + I felt the sudden tightening of his hand! + + Round me the city looms, void, waste and wild, + Wanting the presence of one little child. + +[Illustration: “Round me the city looms, void, waste and wild.”] + + + III. + + They bid me go forget my grief in Art; + But, dear, what art is so aloof and so + Distinct from thee that it can bring my heart + The balm less all-embracing sorrows know? + + Most surely not the painter’s; he, alas! + With all the cunning of his craft divine, + But disappoints my sight with what might pass + For beauty—had I never looked on thine. + + And music, what can music do but fill + The trembling cup of longing to the brim? + There is no music—save a child’s voice still + Soft singing in the dusk the evening hymn. + + My very art, my art of song—ah me! + What is it now but one long sob for thee? + + + IV. + + Move through the flames with us, transcendent form, + As of the Son of God, in splendour move! + Divide the anguish, breast with us the storm, + Companion perfect grief with perfect love. + + Shine through the burning, more refulgent thou + Than fire with will subdued and mastered pain; + Unharmed sustain us in the furnace now, + And unconsumèd lead us forth again. + + Word of the Highest! Mystic effluence + Of That which calms us most, which helps us best! + Compose our hearts, control our shattered sense, + And, in our tribulation, give us rest. + + Nerve us to watch the night of weeping through, + Wisely to bear and nobly still to do. + + + V. + + When spring comes and the long, unwonted snows + Fade from the shrouded parks, and little green + Adventurous points show where the crocus grows, + And soon the dazzling phalanx will be seen— + + Then, in your favourite “flower-walk,” my dear, + Will troops of happy, living children play; + But I the shouts, the laughter shall not hear, + For I, dear heart, I shall not pass that way. + + Was it not there that, bounding at my side, + Last year in glorious sympathy with spring, + You the first crocus suddenly espied + With musical sweet cries of welcoming? + + In less frequented spots, observed of none, + My steps will stray, bereaved, forlorn, alone. + + + VI. + + Our woodland poet who on Nature’s breast + Lay wisely passive through the tranquil years, + Wrote of the comrade whom he loved the best + This praise: She gave me eyes, she gave me ears. + + The jocund dance of wind-swept daffodils; + The marvel of the nest the sparrows made; + The secrets of the vales and of the hills + The child had slowlier learned without her aid. + + For me, my best instructor in the spells + And wiles of Nature was a seven-years’ boy, + To whom she had revealed the soul that dwells + Beneath her careless outward robe of joy. + + She knew him true; she made him one with her, + Her little prophet and interpreter. + +[Illustration: “The jocund dance of wind-swept daffodils.”] + + + VII. + + Deep-curving lashes, long and soft and dark; + Deep gentle eyes that late were lit in heaven + With God’s most sacred, most immaculate spark, + To His elect among the children given; + + Dark hair, where wistful hands laid on to bless + Might pause, blest rather, overshadowèd + By wings of angels and the blamelessness + That crowned the innocent brow, the gracious head; + + A cheek, where tremulous colour came and went, + Transparent, sensitive, and smooth and fine; + Well-chiselled features, mutely eloquent + Of the great Master-workman’s touch divine— + + These were the parts that made a perfect whole, + The faultless temple of a spotless soul. + + + VIII. + + More than the faith of childhood’s years he had; + He did not doubt the depth of our desire + That he should be perpetually glad, + Nor dream our joy in him could ever tire. + + He trusted all the world; the world was kind, + And men and women loving; so he went + To dwell with strangers undismayed in mind, + And smiled, and did not deem it banishment. + + In every heart he knew he found a home, + A sanctuary in every human face; + And when God, missing him in heaven, said: Come! + It did not seem a solitary place. + + I think he only flushed in sweet surprise + To see the golden floor beneath his eyes. + + + IX. + + So docile was my dear, so wise to know + And love the tender rule he should obey, + So childly tractable, withal so slow + To childish wrath, so clean from passion’s sway, + + The momentary doubt would sometimes rise + If in the patient child reposed the will + The man would need, the force, the enterprise + To face the strife, to grapple with the ill. + + I know not, but I know that manhood’s crown + Was ever meekness, since the children’s friend + Rode humbly royal through the palm-strewn town + Unto a stern retributory end. + + I see foreshadowed in that seven-years’ span + The fulness of the stature of a man. + + + X. + + From heaven to heaven[1], along an azure sea, + Fanned by light airs, his little sail was set; + Young angels went with him for company, + And smiles and sunshine all the way he met. + + His pretty mates and he had communings + So fair, he could possess his soul in peace, + And scorn to be disturbed by earthly things + And chafed by trivial jars that soon must cease. + + Why should he fret who was in sight of port + Before almost he left his native shore, + And did but change a well-beloved resort + For one that would content and charm him more? + + His great serenity to him was given + Because his conversation was in heaven. + +Footnote 1: + + “Heaven lies about us in our infancy.”—_Wordsworth._ + +[Illustration: “From heaven to heaven, along an azure sea.”] + + + XI. + + “Flowers in my garden! Flowers!” Love’s willing thrall, + Responsive ever to her tyrant’s will, + Sped through the house, nor heeded other call, + To where, without, he stood and claimed her still. + + “My garden” in the town required the grace + He had to call it such—a dust-grimed square— + But his content emparadised the place, + And made it bud and blossom everywhere. + + “Where are your flowers?” I mocked, for all around, + Under the dismal walls, smoke-tainted green, + Dim laurel, sad spent crocus on the ground, + Sad ivy-tendrils, could alone be seen. + + But while I mocked, laughing and kissing too— + Lo! three small stems of scylla frail and blue. + + + XII. + + Under the flowers he loved my flower lies, + Pansy, and primrose pale, and violet, + And in my heart the season’s sweetness dies, + And all my joy is faded to regret. + + My garden, mine, is his new-planted grave, + Beneath the elm where birds, new-mated, sing, + Whose green-tipped branches in the west-wind wave, + And make their glad obeisance to the spring. + + Tell me not spring is fair and fraught with hope, + Bid me not go seek solace at her hands! + Spring is my autumn, my year’s downward slope, + And he is lying where the tall elm stands. + + My only spring, my only hope is this— + Soon, soon to follow where my treasure is. + + + XIII. + + I know not by what sorcery of sleep + Last night I held him radiant in my arms, + Yet knew him soon to die, but did not weep, + That he might think death blesses us, not harms. + + In health, in love, in life, it seemed my lot + To tell my lovely dear that he must go + Where we who were so one with him could not, + But needs must linger, if we would or no. + + And musing how I best could keep him brave, + And knowing well the hopes and fears of seven, + And well the liveliest joy his heart could have, + I smiled and told him flowers grew in heaven. + + But while to his, athirst, my lips I pressed, + The bright face fell; he thought to stay was best. + + + XIV. + + “Ill-placed my heart; I love another’s child,”[2] + Sings wistfully, and sighs, a bard of France; + And ah! the hunger in the accents mild, + The pain behind the smiling countenance! + + Vexed with the ache of uncompanioned souls, + His playmate at his mother’s side he sees, + And scarce his tender jealousy controls + When swift he springs upon his father’s knees. + + Nay, poet, sing for joy, exult and sing! + Thy dear one lives, though not for thee his heart; + He lives, he breathes, he ails not anything; + Watch him and love, and, praising God, depart. + + ’Tis but his father sweetly rivals thee, + While death, alas! requires my love of me. + +Footnote 2: + + “J’ai mal placé mon cœur—j’aime l’enfant d’un autre.”—_Sully + Prudhomme._ + + + XV. + + When in the twilight, round my lonely room, + Leaving the pictured features that I love, + My sad eyes, aching in the childless gloom, + From one mute image to the other rove, + + They dwell with most repose, most solacement + On the fair stripling, strong, erect and calm, + Of Andrea’s dream, from whose sweet lips “Repent!” + Fell soft, I think, like odoriferous balm. + + Deep, gentle eyes; pure, finely-moulded mouth, + Like his but now I looked my last upon; + He seems my angel grown to god-like youth, + And my belovèd seems the young St. John. + + With even such loveliness of soul and limb + Time and God’s grace would have anointed him. + + + XVI. + + Within a petal of the blessed Rose, + Of Dante’s blessed Rose of Paradise, + Sits my belovèd, radiant in repose, + Love on his lips, and laughter in his eyes. + + There, with the tender jocund company + Of little hurrying folk[3] that haste to heaven, + To him the sunshine of the life to be, + To him the perfectness of joy is given. + + Above the Flower’s mystic heart of light + His rose-leaf curls, a perfumed, delicate nest, + And whitely folds around his raiment white, + Encircling him in beauty and in rest. + + And in and out, like bees, the angels flit, + With stores of bliss that he may feed on it. + +Footnote 3: + + “Questa festinata gente a vera vita.”—_Dante._ + + + XVII. + + If haply, dear, I may to thee attain, + And be, I too, a child in heaven with thee,[4] + Let me for evermore a child remain, + And where thou dwellest, let my dwelling be. + + A childish-lowly seat, but next thine own; + If this, through perfect grace, should be my lot, + I would not climb to any loftier throne, + And loftier hopes I would remember not. + + The elder life brought strife, not peace, on earth, + The growing years dismay and hate and feud; + To share for ever thy unconscious mirth— + This were my heaven and my beatitude; + + And all the lore that saints and sages teach + Were foolishness beside thy prattling speech. + +Footnote 4: + + “I think we shall all be children to begin with, when we get to + heaven.”—_Tennyson._ + + + XVIII. + + Like Mary’s mother, moving not her gaze, + For all her singing, from her daughter’s smile, + I would give endless thanks, give endless praise, + And look on thee, thee only, all the while. + + Close to thy side, my wound made whole again, + I would not raise my eyes to where, serene, + With Rachel, Ruth, and Beatrice, freed from pain, + Sits regal, crowned with angels, heaven’s queen. + + I would not even glance to where he stands, + Proud at her feet, while loud his _Aves_ swell, + With wings outspread, intent on her commands, + The mighty Love[5], God’s herald, Gabriel. + + How could I choose but ever feast on this, + To see my heart’s delight again in bliss? + +Footnote 5: + + “Quell’ amor che primo li discese.”—_Dante._ + + + XIX. + + Where jaded London pauses, climbing north, + For very weariness, and leaves large room + For May in magic vesture to come forth + And spread the hills with fern and yellow broom, + + I go to breathe; I go, without my dear, + And think how he, with ball or mimic bow, + Danced up and down the happy slopes last year, + His eye joy-kindled and his cheek aglow. + + I hear him call my name; I see the far + Blue distance shine beyond the hawthorn-flowers; + I cry to God to give me back my star, + My sweet, to give me back those golden hours. + + How cool upon the heights the breezes blew! + How swift into the air his arrow flew! + + + XX. + + At midnight, in my dream, a cry was heard, + As of the bridegroom’s coming. Through the black + And solitary void no echo stirred + Sounded this melody: He has come back! + + A little moment, and behold once more + I saw him, as he lived, before me stand, + But to a deeper hue than erst it wore + By largesse of the sun his cheek was tanned. + + They said that gipsies had decoyed my love, + And he, o’er hill and dale, through waste and wood, + Where’er such pensioners of nature rove, + Had shared their wandering life and found it good. + + In careless joy glad day had followed day; + And that was why he was so long away. + +[Illustration: “O’er hill and dale, through waste and wood.”] + + + XXI. + + And wilt thou never feel the hurrying tide + Of virile blood pulse quick along thy veins, + And stand magnificent in manly pride, + And know a man’s fierce joys and glorious pains? + + Strong vital thrills that lift the human up, + Transfigured, rapt, to mix with the divine; + Beats of the music, foamings of the cup, + Filled to the splendid brim with youth’s new wine— + + These wilt thou never taste—not taste the bliss + Of our mere being, mere recurrent breath, + Mere oneness with the life in all that is, + The cosmic energies that laugh at death— + + Not know the moments when some god in us + Seems to exalt and crown our manhood thus? + + + XXII. + + And when the god speaks, when potential force + Springs into actual, as the bud to flower, + And, like a storm-fed stream along its course, + Rush the first promptings of creative power; + + When from mere man we grow to maker, bard, + Sage, prophet, scholar, artist; scale the heights; + Assume the sceptre; drink the whole unmarred, + Completed draught of richest life’s delights; + + When we control and rule, inspire and lead, + Mould laws for men, bid empires feel our sway, + Probe nature’s secrets, wrest them to our need, + Live glorious years in one heroic day— + + This full fruition of our human lot + Wilt thou for evermore inherit not? + + + XXIII. + + Dying a child, thou wilt not see the birth + Of beauty from the blossom-foam of May + Again at all, or June enchant the earth + With scent of hedge-rose and of new-mown hay. + + No more the pageant of October woods + Wilt thou behold, nor feel the mystical + Hushed charm of Nature in her wintry moods + Of weird white silence any more at all. + + Unseen by thee to mingle with the skies + The alp shall rear his everlasting snow; + Unhallowed by the wonder in thine eyes + Through the clear heaven the harvest moon shall go; + + Unblest by gaze of thine, perennial rills + Breathe answering peace among the little hills. + + + XXIV. + + Nor, thus untimely dying, shall the throes + Of mightier births touch thee, afar, asleep, + As back to youth divine the old world grows, + And forward into light the lost truths leap. + + Not thine, upborne upon the gathering wave + Of spirit-forces, perfecting the man, + Thy joy to seek, thy crown of joy to have + In newly leading him to Canaan. + + The toiler, human-free, and strong in might + And meekness, shall not come within thy ken; + Nor woman rising to her pristine height + Sublime of patriot and of citizen; + + Nor that slow loosening of the secular chain + That binds the brutes in dumb, vicarious pain. + + + XXV. + + Shall Love not bless thee? Shalt thou ever miss + His mysteries of healing and content, + His balm of Gilead garnered in a kiss, + The bounteousness of his good government? + + Lo, where he walks in pureness beauty springs, + And flowers of gladness where his feet have trod, + And all the way from off his rainbow wings + Drop to the earth benignant dews of God. + + Who come within his gentle seigniory, + Whom his hand touches and his lips caress + Are straightway set from thrall of evil free, + And proudly tread the ways of righteousness. + + Alas! shall Love, the saviour, not draw nigh + At all to thee? Shall he too pass thee by? + + + XXVI. + + Again my dear was with me yesternight, + But now his brow was vexed, his eye was dim, + And he distressed and tired, and worn and white, + As when the pains of death gat hold on him. + + On the bare deck of some tall phantom ship, + Tossed by rude waves, unnursed and lone he lay, + No tender hand to cool his fevered lip, + No voice love’s little language soft to say. + + Amazed with grief to succour him I flew, + And made his hard bed smooth and warm and fair, + And one faint flickering smile of comfort drew, + Which pierced my heart, and still inhabits there. + + Yet, waking, grieve I less, dear love! I see + How far more softly Death hath pillowed thee. + + + XXVII. + + Fondly the wise man said that foolishness + In a child’s heart was bound, and said the rod + Could perfect that which surelier one caress + Lays, love-baptized, before the feet of God. + + And fondly he, the passionate saint who steeped + His virgin soul in Carthaginian mire, + Found in the weanling babe that laughed and leaped, + Glad from its mother’s arm, hate, spite and ire. + + They erred. The child is, was, and still shall be + The world’s deliverer; in his heart the springs + Of our salvation ever rise, and we + Mount on his innocency as on wings. + + I, at the least, who knew and ever grieve + One little lovely soul, must so believe. + + + XXVIII. + + More grateful to the human heart, and more + Wise with the wisdom human mothers earn + By pangs of birth and pains of loss, his lore + Who bade mankind of little children learn. + + Pure, he could feel their splendid guilelessness; + Kingly, he recognised their royalty; + Longsuffering, he was one with them, nor less + Grandly magnanimous than they was he. + + He dared to judge mankind best fed by truth, + Best led by love, desiring most of all— + Not lures of sin—but grace to walk like Ruth + Where natural ties and home affections call. + + And so he “took a child,” with father’s touch, + And therefore said God’s kingdom was of such. + + + XXIX. + + A quiet southern bay; a quiet sea + That scarcely breaks along the level sands; + An ecstasy of little children’s glee; + A weight of grief that no one understands. + + Slow-moving sails, with curves of grace complete + As ever beauty-loving pencil drew; + A ceaseless play of pretty hands and feet; + A want for ever deep, for ever new. + + Peace on the teeming earth, goodwill and peace + In the clear blue and floating cloudlets white; + Crownèd the land with joy of her increase; + Quenched my desire and vanished my delight. + + A sea-bird said: I know, I know the pain; + He will not see the summer-tide again. + + + XXX. + + Kind little lad, with dark, disordered hair, + Who, friendly-wise, forsake your half-built fort + To make me in the sand a high-backed chair, + So kind, so keen to join the livelier sport— + + Haste to your trenches! Fly! To arms! to arms! + The foe prepares to storm your citadel; + Your comrades sound excursions and alarms, + And those stout hands must fight that build so well. + + Laugh, happy soul!—nor dream you brought me tears. + His beauty had you not—for that the earth + Holds not his equal—but you had his years, + Almost his eyes, and something of his mirth; + + And one stray lock on your bare neck that curled + Made sudden twilight of the summer world. + + + XXXI. + + What draws us childwards? Cherub charm and grace, + The frolic kitten and the tricksy elf, + Or heaven reflected in the serious face, + And the divine unconscious of itself? + + What art makes magnets of the helpless hands + That fitfully caress and feebly touch, + What sorcery entwines the flowery bands + That chafe so sweetly and compel so much? + + For thee I know not, but for me I know; + I know the charm that everywhere, abroad, + At home, and wheresoever I may go, + Enthrones the child my sovereign and my lord. + + Not beauty, no, nor grace, nor gleams of heaven; + The passport to my heart is—being seven. + + + XXXII. + + I dreamed I did but dream my love was dead, + And all for nought had been my long complaint; + He had come back and stood beside my bed, + Grown tall and straight and fair as Andrea’s saint. + + He has come back! Again the tidings rang; + Again my pulses leaped with wild delight; + Again the choric stars together sang, + And joyous pæans sounded through the night. + + But with the calm of heaven on me he smiled, + There where in feverish ecstasy I lay, + As on a mother her home-coming child, + When childish things have long been put away. + + “’Tis thou art now my care,” looks such an one, + “And I thy stay, thy comforter, thy son.” + +[Illustration: “Or heaven reflected in the serious face.”] + + + XXXIII. + + Where loving Francis shed on Umbrian ways + And fruitful slopes of sun-kissed Apennine + The benediction of his cheerful praise, + The oil and spikenard of his speech benign, + + I wandered, musing how so dark an age + Had borne a heart so pitying and so sweet, + To whom all bruisèd things made pilgrimage— + All hunted things—to shelter at his feet. + + And fancy, wistful-fond, began to paint + A greeting yonder in the far-off land, + And how the merciful Assisian saint + Had taken mine, rejoicing, by the hand; + + Not so much glad that he was safe and whole, + As proud to welcome a companion soul. + + + XXXIV. + + The lowliest timid creature that had life, + Had from the prophet tenderest look and word; + He saved the lambs from torture and the knife, + And bare them in his bosom like his Lord. + + While furious men through blood to greatness won, + And women’s eyes with weeping still were wet, + He taught his “sister birds” their antiphon, + Or fondled “little brother leveret.” + + Now in his native heaven serene he moves, + With comrades wise, benignant, courteous, kind, + With whatsoever succours, yearns and loves, + With men of godlike and of childlike mind; + + And near him walks, familiar and at ease, + My angel-love, for he too was of these. + + + XXXV. + + With him too gracious Pity made her home, + And furled her sad soiled wings in sweet content, + Forgetful that it is her lot to roam + From age to age in woeful banishment. + + His small heart seemed to her no narrow space, + But, like God’s many mansions, wide and fair; + And so she chose it for a resting-place, + And hospitably she was harboured there. + + And grateful for the boon, she taught him lore + Of heaven, and how the tender angels know + The merciful are blest for evermore, + Although the wise and prudent say not so; + + And how God holds him least among the least + Who is not pitiful to bird and beast. + + + XXXVI. + + Superbly still they vaunt their ancient pride, + Those lofty eyries of old Italy + That ruled the land when Francis lived and died, + Glorious in might, erect, and fair to see. + + Perugia’s portals and Siena’s towers, + And dear Assisi’s walls that shine afar, + What seem they to this distant age of ours?— + Lairs of fierce men that took delight in war. + + Yet, while we deprecate, our Europe groans + Beneath her armaments the livelong day; + Her peoples cry for bread—we give them stones, + And crush and curse with mailèd peace alway; + + And still to Moloch babes are sacrificed + By men that call upon the name of Christ. + + + XXXVII. + + Yea, lonely still and evermore without, + Shamed and forgotten by the weed-grown door, + Standeth the Christ, while rings the battle-shout, + While statesmen wrangle and while madmen roar. + + Spurned is the lord of peace, his message spurned + As when his people thorns for solace gave; + As when Servetus or when Cranmer burned, + Or England dared to side against the slave. + + Hark! from the savage wilds they go to tame + Hark, what discordant sounds affront the ear! + His very priests, contending in his name, + Make it a thing of hate and scorn and fear. + + Only the child his loving liegeman is, + And lays a timid hand, consoled, in his. + + + XXXVIII. + + Blest are the trusting eyes that close in sleep + Or e’er the soilure of the world they see; + And blest art thou—I feel it while I weep— + Yea, well is thee and happy shalt thou be. + + Blest is the guileless heart that never guessed + How faith is tainted and how love defiled, + But only knew them fresh from God and dressed + In whiteness in the fancy of a child. + + Blest is the voice that never strove nor cried, + Nor swerved from truth, nor raged in vain desire; + Blest is the hour in which our darling died, + Saved from the evil, rescued from the fire. + + Bow we the head; cease we the piteous knell; + God is the judge, and doeth all things well. + + + XXXIX. + + I do thee wrong to mourn thee; I blaspheme + The Power that gave thee joy, that gives thee rest, + And while I chafe and fret, and sigh and dream, + Lulls thee in slumber on its sheltering breast. + + This earth was not for thee, oh, not for thee + The turmoil and the wearying storm and stress, + The hungering hope deferred for good to be, + The mocking shows, the maddening lovelessness. + + Thou spirit-child, for soothing formed, not strife! + Thou gracious tender joy an instant given! + Thou didst but beautify and bless our life + A little while to perfect us for heaven; + + And see, for us hath life become a prayer + That we may merit grace to meet thee there. + + + XL. + + Rest, little love! rest well, my heart’s desire! + Sleep while the storm-winds blow, the furious rage; + Sleep till the foes of God and goodness tire; + Sleep till the earth fulfils her pilgrimage. + + Sleep where the slender snowdrop bells in peace + Kiss the small crystals off the hoary grass; + Sleep where all angry things and hurtful cease, + Where calms brood ever and where tempests pass. + + Hushed by the gracious hand of pitying death, + I hush thee too with my low song of praise; + Thou gentlest thing that ever yet drew breath, + My thanks for this thy rest to heaven I raise! + + Content I leave with God what once I missed, + And keep upon thy grave my Eucharist. + +------------------------------------------------------------------------ + + + + + Flowers of Parnassus + + _A Series of Famous Poems Illustrated_ + + Size 5½ × 4½ inches, gilt top + Price 1/- net Bound in Cloth Price 50 cents net + Price 1/6 net Bound in Leather Price 75 cents net + + + LIST OF VOLUMES + + Vol. I. GRAY’S ELEGY AND ODE ON DISTANT PROSPECT OF ETON COLLEGE. + With Twelve Illustrations by J. T. FRIEDENSON. + + Vol. II. THE STATUE AND THE BUST. By ROBERT BROWNING. With Nine + Illustrations by PHILIP CONNARD. + + Vol III. MARPESSA. By STEPHEN PHILLIPS. With Seven Illustrations by + PHILIP CONNARD. + + Vol. IV. THE BLESSED DAMOZEL. By D. G. ROSSETTI. With Eight + Illustrations by PERCY BULCOCK. + + Vol. V. THE NUT-BROWN MAID. A New Version by F. B. MONEY-COUTTS. + With Nine Illustrations by HERBERT COLE. + + Vol. VI. A DREAM OF FAIR WOMEN. By ALFRED TENNYSON. With Nine + Illustrations by PERCY BULCOCK. + + Vol. VII. A DAY DREAM. By ALFRED TENNYSON. With Eight Illustrations + by AMELIA BAUERLE. + + Vol. VIII. A BALLAD ON A WEDDING. By SIR JOHN SUCKLING. With Nine + Illustrations by HERBERT COLE. + + Vol. IX. RUBÁIYÁT OF OMAR KHAYYÁM. Rendered into English Verse by + EDWARD FITZGERALD. With Nine Illustrations by HERBERT + COLE. + + Vol. X. THE RAPE OF THE LOCK. By ALEXANDER POPE. With Nine + Illustrations by AUBREY BEARDSLEY. + + Vol. XI. CHRISTMAS AT THE MERMAID. By THEODORE WATTS-DUNTON. With + Nine Illustrations by HERBERT COLE. + + Vol. XII. SONGS OF INNOCENCE. By WILLIAM BLAKE. With Nine + Illustrations by GERALDINE MORRIS. + + Vol. XIII. THE SENSITIVE PLANT. By PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY. With Eight + Illustrations by F. L. GRIGGS. + + Vol. XIV. ISABELLA; or, THE POT OF BASIL. By JOHN KEATS. With + Illustrations. + + Vol. XV. WORDSWORTH’S GRAVE. By WILLIAM WATSON. With Illustrations + by DONALD MAXWELL. + + Vol. XVII. LYCIDAS. By JOHN MILTON. With Eight Illustrations by + GERTRUDE BRODIE. + + Vol. XVIII. LINES COMPOSED A FEW MILES ABOVE TINTERN ABBEY. By WILLIAM + WORDSWORTH. With Eight Illustrations by DONALD MAXWELL. + + Vol. XIX. THE BUILDING OF THE SHIP. By HENRY LONGFELLOW. With Eight + Illustrations by DONALD MAXWELL. + + Vol. XX. THE TOMB OF BURNS. By WILLIAM WATSON. With Nine + Illustrations by D. Y. CAMERON. + + Vol. XXI. A LITTLE CHILD’S WREATH. By ELIZABETH RACHEL CHAPMAN. With + an Introduction by Mrs. MEYNELL, and Illustrations by W. + GRAHAM ROBERTSON. + + Vol. XXII. THE DEFENCE OF GUENEVERE. By WILLIAM MORRIS. With Eight + Illustrations by JESSIE M. KING. + + Vol. XXIII. KILMENY. By JAMES HOGG. With Eight Illustrations by MARY + CORBETT. + + Vol. XXIV. ODE ON THE MORNING OF CHRIST’S NATIVITY. By JOHN MILTON. + With Eight Illustrations by J. COLLIER JAMES. + + Vol. XXV. THE BALLAD OF A NUN. By JOHN DAVIDSON. With Eight + Illustrations by PAUL HENRY. + + Vol. XXVI. RESOLUTION AND INDEPENDENCE. By WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. With + Eight Illustrations by DONALD MAXWELL. + + JOHN LANE, London & New York + +------------------------------------------------------------------------ + + + + + TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES + + + ● Typos fixed; non-standard spelling and dialect retained. + ● Used numbers for footnotes. + ● Enclosed italics font in _underscores_. + ● HTML alt text was added for images that didn’t have captions. + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77707 *** |