Mrs. Egan was engaged in some needlework, and Fanny turning over the
leaves of a music-book, and occasionally humming some bars of her
favourite songs, as the gentlemen came into the drawing-room. Fanny rose
from the pianoforte as they entered.
“Oh, Miss Dawson,” exclaimed Moriarty, “why tantalise us so much as
to let us see you seated in that place where you can render so much
delight, only to leave it as we enter?”
Fanny turned off the captain's flourishing speech with a few lively
words and a smile, and took her seat at the tea-table to do the honours.
“The captain,” said Father Phil to the doctor, “is equally great in love
or war.”
“And knows about as little of one as the other,” said the doctor. “His
attacks are too open.”
“And therefore easily foiled,” said Father Phil; “How that pretty
creature, with the turn of a word and a curl of her lip, upset him that
time! Oh! what a powerful thing a woman's smile is, doctor? I often
congratulate myself that my calling puts all such mundane follies and
attractions out of my way, when I see and know what fools wise men are
sometimes made by silly girls. Oh, it is fearful, doctor; though, of
course, part of the mysterious dispensation of an all-wise Providence.”
“That fools should have the mastery, is it?” inquired the doctor, drily,
with a mischievous query in his eye as well. “Tut, tut, tut, doctor,”
replied Father Phil, impatiently; “you know well enough what I mean,
and I won't allow you to engage me in one of your ingenious battles of
words. I speak of that wonderful influence of the weaker sex over
the stronger, and how the word of a rosy lip outweighs sometimes the
resolves of a furrowed brow; and how the--pooh! pooh! I'm making a fool
of myself talking to you--but to make a long story short, I would rather
_wrastle_ out a logical dispute any day, or a tough argument of one of
the fathers, than refute some absurdity which fell from a pretty mouth
with a smile on it.”
“Oh, I quite agree with you,” said the doctor, grinning, “that the
fathers are not half such dangerous customers as the daughters.”
“Ah, go along with you, doctor!” said Father Phil, with a good-humoured
laugh. “I see you are in one of your mischievous moods, and so I'll have
nothing more to say to you.”
The Father turned away to join the Squire, while the doctor took a seat
near Fanny Dawson and enjoyed a quiet little bit of conversation with
her, while Moriarty was turning over the leaves of her album; but the
brow of the captain, who affected a taste in poetry, became knit, and
his lip assumed a contemptuous curl, as he perused some lines, and asked
Fanny whose was the composition.
“I forget,” was Fanny's answer.
“I don't wonder,” said Moriarty; “the author is not worth remembering,
for they are very rough.”
Fanny did not seem pleased with the criticism, and said that, when sung
to the measure of the air written down on the opposite page, they were
very flowing.
“But the principal phrase, the _'refrain'_ I may say, is so vulgar,”
added Moriarty, returning to the charge. “The gentleman says, 'What
would you do?' and the lady answers, 'That's what I'd do.' Do you call
that poetry?”
“I don't call _that_ poetry,” said Fanny, with some emphasis on the
word; “but if you connect those two phrases with what is intermediately
written, and read all in the spirit of the entire of the verses, I think
there is poetry in them--but if not poetry, certainly feeling.”
“Can you tolerate '_That's what I'd do'?_--the pert answer of a
housemaid.”
“A phrase in itself homely,” answered Fanny, “may become elevated by the
use to which it is applied.”
“Quite true, Miss Dawson,” said the doctor, joining in the discussion.
“But what are these lines which excite Randal's ire?”
“Here they are,” said Moriarty. “I will read them, if you allow me, and
then judge between Miss Dawson and me.
'What will you do, love, when I am going,
With white sail flowing,
The seas beyond?
What will you do, love, when--'”
“Stop thief!--stop thief!” cried the doctor. “Why, you are robbing
the poet of his reputation as fast as you can. You don't attend to the
rhythm of those lines--you don't give the ringing of the verse.”
“That's just what I have said in other words,” said Fanny. “When sung to
the melody, they are smooth.”
“But a good reader, Miss Dawson,” said the doctor, “will read verse with
the proper accent, just as a musician would divide it into bars; but my
friend Randal there, although he can tell a good story and hit off prose
very well, has no more notion of rhythm or poetry than new beer has of a
holiday.”
“And why, pray, has not new beer a notion of a holiday?”
“Because, sir, it works of a Sunday.”
“Your _beer_ may be new, doctor, but your _joke_ is not--I have seen it
before in some old form.”
“Well, sir, if I found it in its old form, like a hare, and started it
fresh, it may do for folks to run after as well as anything else. But
you shan't escape your misdemeanour in mauling those verses as you have
done, by finding fault with my joke _redevivus._ You read those lines,
sir, like a bellman, without any attention to metre.”
“To be sure,” said Father Phil, who had been listening for some time;
“they have a ring in them--”
“Like a pig's nose,” said the doctor.
“Ah, be aisy,” said Father Phil. “I say they have a ring in them like an
owld Latin canticle--
'What _will_ you _do,_ love, when I am _go_-ing,
With white sail _flow_-ing,
The says be_yond?_'
That's it!”
“To be sure,” said the doctor. “I vote for the Father's reading them out
on the spot.”
“Pray, do, Mister Blake,” said Fanny.
“Ah, Miss Dawson, what have I to do with reading love verses?”
“Take the book, sir,” said Growling, “and show me you have some faith in
your own sayings, by obeying a lady directly.”
“Pooh! pooh!” said the priest.
“You _won't_ refuse me?” said Fanny, in a coaxing tone.
“My dear Miss Dawson,” said the _padre._
“_Father Phil!_” said Fanny, with one of her rosy smiles.
“Oh, wow! wow! wow!” ejaculated the priest, in an amusing embarrassment,
“I see you will make me do whatever you like.” So Father Phil gave the
rare example of a man acting up to his own theory, and could not resist
the demand that came from a pretty mouth. He took the book and read the
lines with much feeling, but, with an observance of rhythm so grotesque,
that it must be given in his own manner.
WHAT WILL YOU DO, LOVE?
I
“What _will_ you _do_, love, when I am _go_-ing,
With white sail _flow_-ing,
The seas be-_yond?_
What _will_ you _do_, love, when waves di-_vide_ us,
And friends may chide us,
For being _fond_?”
“Though waves di-_vide_ us, and friends be _chi_-ding,
In faith a-_bi_-ding,
I'll still be true;
And I'll pray for _thee_ on the stormy _o_-cean,
In deep de-_vo_-tion,--
That's _what_ I'll do!”
II
“What _would_ you _do_, love, if distant _ti_-dings
Thy fond con-_fi_-dings
Should under-_mine_
And I a-_bi_-ding 'neath sultry _skies_,
Should think other _eyes_
Were as bright as _thine_?”
“Oh, name it _not_; though guilt and _shame_
Were on thy _name_,
I'd still be _true_;
But that heart of _thine_, should another _share_ it,
I could not _bear it_;--
What _would_ I do?”
III
“What _would_ you do, when, home re-_turn_-ing,
With hopes high _burn_-ing,
With wealth for _you_,--
If my _bark_, that _bound_-ed o'er foreign _foam_,
Should be lost near _home_,--
Ah, what _would_ you do?”
“So them wert _spar_-d, I'd bless the _mor_-row,
In want and _sor_-row,
That left me _you_;
And I'd welcome _thee_ from the wasting _bil_-low,
My heart thy _pil_-low!--
THAT'S _what_ I'd do!”
[Footnote: NOTE TO THE THIRD EDITION.--The foregoing dialogue and
Moriarty's captious remarks were meant, when, they appeared in the first
edition, as a hit at a certain small critic--a would-be song-writer--who
does ill-natured articles for the Reviews, and expressed himself very
contemptuously of my songs because of their simplicity; or, as he was
pleased to phrase it, “I had a knack of putting common things together.”
The song was written to illustrate my belief that the most common-place
expression, _appropriately applied_, may successfully serve the purposes
of the lyric; and here experience has proved me right, for this
very song of “What will you do?” (containing within it the other
common-place, “That's what I'd do”) has been received with special
favour by the public, whose long-continued goodwill towards my
compositions generally I gratefully acknowledge.]
“Well done, _padre!_” said the doctor; “with good emphasis and
discretion.”
“And now, my dear Miss Dawson,” said Father Phil, “since I've read
the lines at your high bidding, will you sing them for me at my humble
asking?”
“Very antithetically put, indeed,” said Fanny; “but you must excuse me.”
“You said there was a tune to it?”
“Yes; but I promised Captain Moriarty to sing him _this_,” said Fanny,
going over to the pianoforte, and laying her hand on an open music-book.
“Thanks, Miss Dawson,” said Moriarty, following fast.
Now, it was not that Fanny Dawson liked the captain that she was going
to sing the song; but she thought he had been rather “_mobbed_” by the
doctor and the _padre_ about the reading of the verses, and it was her
good breeding which made her pay this little attention to the worsted
party. She poured forth her sweet voice in a simple melody to the
following words:--
SAY NOT MY HEART IS COLD
I
“Say not my heart is cold,
Because of a silent tongue!
The lute of faultless mould
In silence oft hath hung.
The fountain soonest spent
Doth babble down the steep;
But the stream that _ever_ went
Is silent, strong, and deep.
II
“The charm of a secret life
Is given to choicest things:--
Of flowers, the fragrance rife
Is wafted on viewless wings;
We see not the charmed air
Bearing some witching sound;
And ocean deep is where
The pearl of price is found.
III
“Where are the stars by day?
They burn, though all unseen!
And love of purest ray
Is like the stars, I ween:
Unmark'd is the gentle light
When the sunshine of joy appears,
But ever, in sorrow's night,
'T will glitter upon thy tears!”
“Well, Randal, does that poem satisfy your critical taste?--of the
singing there can be but one opinion.”
“Yes, I think it pretty,” said Moriarty; “but there is one word in the
last verse I object to.”
“Which is that?” inquired Growling.
“_Ween_” said the other, “'the stars, I ween,' I object to.”
“Don't you see the meaning of that?” inquired the doctor. “I think it is
a very happy allusion.”
“I don't see any allusion whatever,” said the critic.
“Don't you see the poet alluded to the stars in the _milky_ way, and
says, therefore, 'The stars I _wean_'?”
“Bah! bah! doctor,” exclaimed the critical captain; “you are in one
of your quizzing moods to-night, and it is in vain to expect a serious
answer from you.” He turned on his heel as he spoke, and went away.
“Moriarty, you know, Miss Dawson, is a man who affects a horror of
puns, and therefore I always punish him with as many as I can,” said the
doctor, who was left by Moriarty's sudden pique to the enjoyment of a
pleasant chat with Fanny, and he was sorry when the hour arrived which
disturbed it by the breaking up of the party and the departure of the
guests.