_Shepherd._ Thus found he his loved Galatea fled
With Acis! What rage ensued thou knowest.
Deceived, dejected, foiled, and overthrown
In hoarse distraction a full sev’n days’ term
He ranged, but on the eighth no more was glimpsed
Striding from vale to vale nor, raging, heard
Splintering the pine-slope nigh the precipice
With fist far flung nor with a desolate
Thunder of voice, volleyed from scarp to jag,
Dislodging from steep snowfields friths compact
In downward avalanche: less loud than he.
And no tide had we of him, save by chance
The while I wandered seeking a strayed goat
Through seaward vales, I happen’d on him.
_Girl._ Ah!
Lubberly still poor wretch? or quiet grown?
_Shepherd._ He on an ocean pinnacle of rock
Sat, scowling, motionless. In truth he seemed
Rather a further buttress of the crag
Than a giant, helpless and unhappy being.
About his brooding bulk all day the birds,
The slippery swallow, the pois’d martin,
Lifted or swept a-scatter ev’n as when,
Chatting, such gad around the ravaged mien
Of the colossal Pharaoh or twin gods
Hawk-headed and immense of ancient Egypt.
Thus grieved he. And the huge begnarlèd hands
Pillared his jaw. A chillness gloomed his face
As on bare hills shadow of moveless cloud.
Nor spake he aught. But when the sun raged high
Grappling a rock he dashed it ’gainst his breast
And roared till the golden-green sea blackened
And spouting drove, loud with careering gulls,
Before his gusty breath; but passion spent
Dropping then pined, while from the single eye
One tear, as huge and hot as Phlegethon,
Fell in a hissing flood.
_Girl._ Alas, poor brute!
And yet I laugh.
_Shepherd._ Longtime in sufferance
Bowed he his massy head, quite dumb with grief.
But, at the last, confusedly arousing
His sluggish hands, groped for and found his pipes
Twin, dry, boughless trunks of beech fire-hollowed
And with huge cinder bored. This pair he set
To cave-like mouth, then, pursing hairy lips,
Vented, with monster fingers laid on stops,
His heart’s deep sorrow: ’twas a wounding sound.
_Girl._ And was it angry, then, the giant’s plaint?
_Shepherd._ Angry ’twas not: though anger in it spake
As of a rebel turning eye to heav’n
With moody imprecation natural
To one so crossed from birth. Melancholy
Lent majesty to strains uncouth. He mourned
The gift of might which is his mightiest foe.
Mourned! though the dire pipes themselves rebelling
Came apt not to his hand. With rage he shook
Yet, obstinate, subdued them to his mood
So that they brimmed the dusky lower air,
The fire-strewn skies, flushed cliffs and tawny sea
With the beauty borne of desolation.
Thus lingered he.
_Girl._ And of the tune itself,
Ugly, was it?
_Shepherd._ Listen: when twilight fell,
While the near wave lapsed with but seldom foam,
Darkling against the light foretells the moon,
He still played on. “Strange end,” thought I, “thou hast,
Poor fool whose all of life is ended now,
Saving the music thou canst make of it.”
Since, as I think, his heart is shipwrecked now:
Heart, but not song! For as the night waxed late
Somewhat of beauty found he and with beauty
Somewhat of solace. To the last I listened
The while th’ unbroken moon rocked in the tide
And multitudes of sea-sprites, glistering,
Rose up in choir, but, sudden, hushed to hear
Such grief pine on. Thus somewhat was the sound--
Like to the muffled wind among the crags
When night is clear, without or stars or moon,
And lightless clouds drift on a lightless sky;
Or as the mournful blowing of the waves,
Which in the pyloned gloom of northern cave
Nightly with flood soon-swallowed and discharge
Of pouring foam, deep tide and troubled ebb,
Makes profound plaint and dreary melody
To lightless waste, huge night and solemn stars.
Such was the Cyclops’ music.
_Girl._ Ah, poor soul!
_Shepherd._ Dost weep?
_Girl._ Yes, shepherd.
_Shepherd._ Fie, now; comfort thee!
The gods wax angry at a lass’s tears
Who has no whit to cry for. Thus say I,
Those there are who ev’n by living darken
The lives of such as are less passionate
Yet in their fall, by ev’n the full measure
That they o’ertopped us, must we mourn for them,
Such wonder has Life bared.
_Girl._ Maybe ’tis so;
Still I am sorry.
_Shepherd._ Yield thee now thine arm.
So: round my neck as mine sinks now round thine....
Evening falls. Hear the brook in the spinney:
Thy very voice.
_Girl._ And ... is yon star Venus?
_Shepherd._ Aye: Venus ’tis. Thou hast eyes like heaven.
_Girl._ Love is a pretty thing. Kiss me, sweet shepherd.
_L. RICE-OXLEY_
(_KEBLE_)