_Rabbi._ I am the Rabbi Ben Israel,

Throughout this village known full well,

And, as my scholars all will tell,

Learned in things divine;

The Cabala and Talmud hoar

Than all the prophets prize I more,

For water is all Bible lore,

But Mishna is strong wine.

My fame extends from West to East,

And always, at the Purim feast,

I am as drunk as any beast

That wallows in his sty;

The wine it so elateth me,

That I no difference can see

Between “Accursed Haman be!”

And “Blessed be Mordecai!”

Come hither, Judas Iscariot.

Say, if thy lesson thou hast got

From the Rabbinical Book or not.

Why howl the dogs at night?

_Judas._ In the Rabbinical Book, it saith

The dogs howl, when, with icy breath,

Great Sammaël, the Angel of Death,

Takes through the town his flight!

_Rabbi._ Well, boy! now say, if thou art wise,

When the Angel of Death, who is full of eyes,

Comes where a sick man dying lies,

What doth he to the wight?

_Judas._ He stands beside him, dark and tall,

Holding a sword from which doth fall

Into his mouth a drop of gall,

And so he turneth white.

_Rabbi._ And now, my Judas, say to me,

What the great Voices Four may be,

That quite across the world do flee,

And are not heard by men?

_Judas._ The Voice of the Sun in heaven’s dome,

The Voice of the Murmuring of Rome,

The Voice of a Soul that goeth home,

And the Angel of the Rain!

_Rabbi._ Right are thine answers every one!

Now, little Jesus, the carpenter’s son,

Let us see how thy task is done.

Canst thou thy letters say?

_Jesus._ Aleph.

_Rabbi._ What next! Do not stop yet!

Go on with all the alphabet.

Come, Aleph, Beth; dost thou forget?

Cock’s soul! thou’dst rather play!

_Jesus._ What Aleph means I fain would know,

Before I any farther go!

_Rabbi._ O, by St. Peter! wouldst thou so?

Come hither, boy, to me.

As surely as the letter Jod

Once cried aloud, and spake to God,

So surely shalt thou feel this rod,

And punished shalt thou be!

[_Here_ RABBI BEN ISRAEL _shall lift up his rod to strike_ JESUS, _and

his right arm shall be paralysed_.]

IX. CROWNED WITH FLOWERS.

JESUS _sitting among his playmates, crowned with flowers as their King_.

_Boys._ We spread our garments on the ground!

With fragrant flowers thy head is crowned,

While like a guard we stand around,

And hail thee as our King!

Thou art the new King of the Jews!

Nor let the passers-by refuse

To bring that homage which men use

To majesty to bring.

[_Here a traveller shall go by, and the boys shall lay hold

of his garments, and say._]

_Boys._ Come hither! and all reverence pay

Unto our monarch crowned to-day!

Then go rejoicing on your way,

In all prosperity!

_Traveller._ Hail to the King of Bethlehem,

Who weareth in his diadem

The yellow crocus for the gem

Of his authority!

[_He passes by; and others come in, bearing on a litter

a sick child._]

_Boys._ Set down the litter and draw near!

The King of Bethlehem is here!

What ails the child, who seems to fear

That we shall do him harm?

_The Bearers._ He climbed up to the Robin’s nest,

And out there darted, from his rest,

A serpent with a crimson crest,

And stung him in the arm.

_Jesus._ Bring him to me, and let me feel

The wounded place; my touch can heal

The sting of serpents, and can steal

The poison from the bite!

[_He touches the wound, and the boy begins to cry._]

Cease to lament! I can foresee

That thou hereafter known shall be,

Among the men who follow me,

As Simon the Canaanite!

EPILOGUE.

In the after part of the day

Will be represented another play,

Of the passion of our Blessed Lord,

Beginning directly after Nones!

At the close of which we shall accord,

By way of benison and reward,

The sight of a holy Martyr’s bones!

IV.

_The road to Hirschau._ PRINCE HENRY _and_ ELSIE, _with their

attendants, on horseback_.

_Elsie._ Onward and onward the highway runs to the distant

city, impatiently bearing

Tidings of human joy and disaster, of love and of hate, of

doing and daring!

_Prince Henry._ This life of ours is a wild Æolian harp of

many a joyous strain,

But under them all there runs a loud perpetual wail, as of

souls in pain.

_Elsie._ Faith alone can interpret life, and the heart that

aches and bleeds with the stigma

Of pain, alone bears the likeness of Christ, and can comprehend

its dark enigma.

_Prince Henry._ Man is selfish, and seeketh pleasure with

little care of what may betide;

Else why am I travelling here beside thee, a demon that rides by

an angel’s side?

_Elsie._ All the hedges are white with dust, and the great

dog under the creaking wain

Hangs his head in the lazy heat, while onward the horses toil

and strain.

_Prince Henry._ New they stop at the wayside inn, and the

waggoner laughs with the landlord’s daughter,

While out of the dripping trough the horses distend their

leathern sides with water.

_Elsie._ All through life there are wayside inns, where man

may refresh his soul with love;

Even the lowest may quench his thirst at rivulets fed by springs

from above.

_Prince Henry._ Yonder, where rises the cross of stone, our

journey along the highway ends,

And over the fields, by a bridle path, down into the broad green

valley descends.

_Elsie._ I am not sorry to leave behind the beaten road

with its dust and heat;

The air will be sweeter far, and the turf will be softer under

our horses’ feet.

[_They turn down a green lane._]

_Elsie._ Sweet is the air with the budding haws, and the

valley, stretching for miles below,

Is white with blossoming cherry-trees, as if just covered with

lightest snow.

_Prince Henry._ Over our heads a white cascade is gleaming

against the distant hill;

We cannot hear it, nor see it move, but it hangs like a banner

when winds are still.

_Elsie._ Damp and cool is this deep ravine, and cool the

sound of the brook by our side!

What is this castle that rises above us, and lords it over a

land so wide?

_Prince Henry._ It is the home of the Counts of Calva; well

have I known these scenes of old,

Well I remember each tower and turret, remember the brooklet,

the wood, and the wold.

_Elsie._ Hark! from the little village below us the bells

of the church are ringing for rain!

Priests and peasants in long procession come forth and kneel on

the arid plain.

_Prince Henry._ They have not long to wait, for I see in

the south uprising a little cloud,

That before the sun shall be set will cover the sky above us as

with a shroud.

[_They pass on._]

_The Convent of Hirschau in the Black Forest. The Convent cellar._

FRIAR CLAUS _comes in with a light and a basket of empty flagons_.

_Friar Claus._ I always enter this sacred place

With a thoughtful, solemn, and reverent pace,

Pausing long enough on each stair

To breathe an ejaculatory prayer,

And a benediction of the vines

That produce these various sorts of wines!

For my part, I am well content

That we have got through with the tedious Lent!

Fasting is all very well for those

Who have to contend with invisible foes;

But I am quite sure it does not agree

With a quiet, peaceful man like me,

Who am not of that nervous and meagre kind

That are always distressed in body and mind!

And at times it really does me good

To come down among this brotherhood,

Dwelling for ever under ground,

Silent, contemplative, round and sound;

Each one old, and brown with mould,

But filled to the lips with the ardour of youth,

With the latent power and love of truth,

And with virtues fervent and manifold.

I have heard it said, that at Easter-tide,

When buds are swelling on every side,

And the sap begins to move in the vine,

Then in all cellars, far and wide,

The oldest, as well as the newest, wine

Begins to stir itself, and ferment,

With a kind of revolt and discontent

At being so long in darkness pent,

And fain would burst from its sombre tun

To bask on the hill-side in the sun;

As in the bosom of us poor friars,

The tumult of half-subdued desires

For the world that we have left behind

Disturbs at times all peace of mind!

And now that we have lived through Lent,

My duty it is, as often before,

To open awhile the prison-door,

And give these restless spirits vent.

Now here is a cask that stands alone,

And has stood a hundred years or more,

Its beard of cobwebs, long and hoar,

Trailing and sweeping along the floor,

Like Barbarossa, who sits in his cave,

Taciturn, sombre, sedate, and grave,

Till his beard has grown through the table of stone!

It is of the quick, and not of the dead!

In its veins the blood is hot and red,

And a heart still beats in those ribs of oak

That time may have tamed, but has not broke.

It comes from Bacharach on the Rhine,

Is one of the three best kinds of wine,

And costs some hundred florins the ohm;

But that I do not consider dear,

When I remember that every year

Four butts are sent to the Pope of Rome,

And whenever a goblet thereof I drain,

The old rhyme keeps running in my brain:

At Bacharach on the Rhine,

At Hochheim on the Main,

And at Würzburg on the Stein,

Grow the three best kinds of wine!

They are all good wines, and better far

Than those of the Neckar, or those of the Ahr.

In particular, Würzburg well may boast

Of its blessed wine of the Holy Ghost,

Which of all wines I like the most.

This I shall draw for the Abbot’s drinking,

Who seems to be much of my way of thinking.

[_Fills a flagon._]

Ah! how the streamlet laughs and sings!

What a delicious fragrance springs

From the deep flagon, while it fills,

As of hyacinths and daffodils!

Between this cask and the Abbot’s lips

Many have been the sips and slips;

Many have been the draughts of wine,

On their way to his, that have stopped at mine;

And many a time my soul has hankered

For a deep draught out of his silver tankard,

When it should have been busy with other affairs,

Less with its longings and more with its prayers.

But now there is no such awkward condition,

No danger of death and eternal perdition;

So here’s to the Abbot and Brothers all,

Who dwell in this convent of Peter and Paul!

[_He drinks._]

O cordial delicious! O soother of pain!

It flashes like sunshine into my brain!

A benison rest on the Bishop who sends

Such a fudder of wine as this to his friends.

And now a flagon for such as may ask

A draught from the noble Bacharach cask,

And I will be gone, though I know full well

The cellar’s a cheerfuller place than the cell.

Behold where he stands, all sound and good,

Brown and old in his oaken hood;

Silent he seems externally

As any Carthusian monk may be;

But within, what a spirit of deep unrest!

What a seething and simmering in his breast!

As if the heaving of his great heart

Would burst his belt of oak apart!

Let me unloose this button of wood,

And quiet a little his turbulent mood.

[_Sets it running._]

See! how its currents gleam and shine,

As if they had caught the purple hues

Of autumn sunsets on the Rhine,

Descending and mingling with the dews;

Or as if the grapes were stained with the blood

Of the innocent boy, who, some years back,

Was taken and crucified by the Jews,

In that ancient town of Bacharach;

Perdition upon those infidel Jews,

In that ancient town of Bacharach!

The beautiful town, that gives us wine

With the fragrant odour of Muscadine!

I should deem it wrong to let this pass

Without first touching my lips to the glass,

For here in the midst of the current I stand,

Like the stone Pfalz in the midst of the river,

Taking toll upon either hand,

And much more grateful to the giver.

[_He drinks._]

Here, now, is a very inferior kind,

Such as in any town you may find,

Such as one might imagine would suit

The rascal who drank wine out of a boot.

And, after all, it was not a crime,

For he won thereby Dorf Hüffelsheim.

A jolly old toper! who at a pull

Could drink a postilion’s jack-boot full,

And ask with a laugh, when that was done,

If the fellow had left the other one!

This wine is as good as we can afford

To the friars, who sit at the lower board,

And cannot distinguish bad from good,

And are far better off than if they could,

Being rather the rude disciples of beer,

Than of anything more refined and dear!

[_Fills the other flagon and departs._]

_The Scriptorium._[38] FRIAR PACIFICUS _transcribing and illuminating_.

[38] See Appendix.

_Friar Pacificus._ It is growing dark! Yet one line more,

And then my work for to-day is o’er.

I come again to the name of the Lord!

Ere I that awful name record,

That is spoken so lightly among men,

Let me pause awhile, and wash my pen;

Pure from blemish and blot must it be

When it writes that word of mystery!

Thus have I laboured on and on,

Nearly through the Gospel of John.

Can it be that from the lips

Of this same gentle Evangelist,

That Christ himself perhaps has kissed,

Came the dread Apocalypse!

It has a very awful look,

As it stands there at the end of the book,

Like the sun in an eclipse.

Ah me! when I think of that vision divine,

Think of writing it, line by line,

I stand in awe of the terrible curse,

Like the trump of doom, in the closing verse.

God forgive me! If ever I

Take aught from the book of that Prophecy,

Lest my part too should be taken away

From the Book of Life on the Judgment Day.

This is well written, though I say it!

I should not be afraid to display it,

In open day, on the selfsame shelf

With the writings of St. Thecla herself,

Or of Theodosius, who of old

Wrote the Gospels in letters of gold!

That goodly folio standing yonder,

Without a single blot or blunder,

Would not bear away the palm from mine,

If we should compare them line for line.

There, now, is an initial letter!

Saint Ulric himself never made a better;

Finished down to the leaf and the snail,

Down to the eyes on the peacock’s tail!

And now, as I turn the volume over,

And see what lies between cover and cover,

What treasures of art these pages hold,

All ablaze with crimson and gold,

God forgive me! I seem to feel

A certain satisfaction steal

Into my heart, and into my brain,

As if my talent had not lain

Wrapped in a napkin, and all in vain.

Yes, I might almost say to the Lord,

Here is a copy of thy Word,

Written out with much toil and pain;

Take it, O Lord, and let it be

As something I have done for thee!

[_He looks from the window._]

How sweet the air is! How fair the scene!

I wish I had as lovely a green

To paint my landscapes and my leaves!

How the swallows twitter under the eaves!

There, now, there is one in her nest;

I can just catch a glimpse of her head and breast,

And will sketch her thus in her quiet nook,

For the margin of my Gospel book.

[_He makes a sketch._]

I can see no more. Through the valley yonder

A shower is passing; I hear the thunder

Mutter its curses in the air,

The Devil’s own and only prayer!

The dusty road is brown with rain,

And, speeding on with might and main,

Hitherward rides a gallant train.

They do not parley, they cannot wait,

But hurry in at the convent-gate.

What a fair lady! and beside her

What a handsome, graceful, noble rider!

Now she gives him her hand to alight;

They will beg shelter for the night.

I will go down to the corridor,

And try to see that face once more;

It will do for the face of some beautiful Saint,

Or for one of the Maries I shall paint.

[_Goes out._]

_The Cloisters. The_ ABBOT ERNESTUS _pacing to and fro_.

_Abbot._ Slowly, slowly up the wall

Steals the sunshine, steals the shade;

Evening damps begin to fall,

Evening shadows are displayed.

Round me, o’er me, everywhere,

All the sky is grand with clouds,

And athwart the evening air

Wheel the swallows home in crowds.

Shafts of sunshine from the west

Paint the dusky windows red;

Darker shadows, deeper rest,

Underneath and overhead.

Darker, darker, and more wan,

In my breast the shadows fall;

Upward steals the life of man,

As the sunshine from the wall.

From the wall into the sky,

From the roof along the spire;

Ah, the souls of those that die

Are but sunbeams lifted higher.

_Enter_ PRINCE HENRY.

_Prince Henry._ Christ is arisen!

_Abbot._ Amen! he is arisen!

His peace be with you!

_Prince Henry._ Here it reigns for ever.

The peace of God, that passeth understanding,

Reigns in these cloisters and these corridors.

Are you Ernestus, Abbot of the convent?

_Abbot._ I am.

_Prince Henry._ And I Prince Henry of Hoheneck,

Who crave your hospitality to-night.

_Abbot._ You are thrice welcome to our humble walls.

You do us honour; and we shall requite it,

I fear, but poorly, entertaining you

With Paschal eggs, and our poor convent wine,

The remnants of our Easter holidays.

_Prince Henry._ How fares it with the holy monks of Hirschau?

Are all things well with them?

_Abbot._ All things are well.

_Prince Henry._ A noble convent! I have known it long

By the report of travellers. I now see

Their commendations lag behind the truth.

You lie here in the valley of the Nagold

As in a nest: and the still river, gliding

Along its bed, is like an admonition

How all things pass. Your lands are rich and ample,

And your revenues large. God’s benediction

Rests on your convent.

_Abbot._ By our charities

We strive to merit it. Our Lord and Master,

When he departed, left us, in his will,

As our best legacy on earth, the poor!

These we have always with us; had we not,

Our hearts would grow as hard as are these stones.

_Prince Henry._ If I remember right, the Counts of Calva

Founded your convent.

_Abbot._ Even as you say.

_Prince Henry._ And, if I err not, it is very old.

_Abbot._ Within these cloisters lie already buried

Twelve holy Abbots. Underneath the flags

On which we stand, the Abbot William lies,

Of blessed memory.

_Prince Henry._ And whose tomb is that

Which bears the brass escutcheon?

_Abbot._ A benefactor’s,

Conrad, a Count of Calva, he who stood

Godfather to our bells.

_Prince Henry._ Your monks are learned

And holy men, I trust.

_Abbot._ There are among them

Learned and holy men. Yet in this age

We need another Hildebrand, to shake

And purify us like a mighty wind.

The world is wicked, and sometimes I wonder

God does not lose his patience with it wholly,

And shatter it like glass! Even here, at times,

Within these walls, where all should be at peace,

I have my trials. Time has laid his hand

Upon my heart, gently, not smiting it,

But as a harper lays his open palm

Upon his harp, to deaden its vibrations.

Ashes are on my head, and on my lips

Sackcloth, and in my breast a heaviness

And weariness of life, that makes me ready

To say to the dead Abbots under us,

“Make room for me!” Only I see the dusk

Of evening twilight coming, and have not

Completed half my task; and so at times

The thought of my shortcomings in this life

Falls like a shadow on the life to come.

_Prince Henry._ We must all die, and not the old alone;

The young have no exemption from that doom.

_Abbot._ Ah, yes! the young may die, but the old must!

That is the difference.

_Prince Henry._ I have heard much laud

Of your transcribers. Your Scriptorium

Is famous among all, your manuscripts

Praised for their beauty and their excellence.

_Abbot._ That is indeed our boast. If you desire it,

You shall behold these treasures. And meanwhile

Shall the Refectorarius bestow

Your horses and attendants for the night.

(_They go in. The Vesper-bell rings._)

_The Chapel. Vespers; after which the monks retire, a chorister leading

an old monk who is blind._

_Prince Henry._ They are all gone, save one who lingers,

Absorbed in deep and silent prayer.

As if his heart could find no rest,

At times he beats his heaving breast

With clenchèd and convulsive fingers,

Then lifts them trembling in the air.

A chorister, with golden hair,

Guides hitherward his heavy pace.

Can it be so? Or does my sight

Deceive me in the uncertain light?

Ah no! I recognise that face,

Though time has touched it in his flight,

And changed the auburn hair to white.

It is Count Hugo of the Rhine,

The deadliest foe of all our race,

And hateful unto me and mine!

_The Blind Monk._ Who is it that doth stand so near,

His whispered words I almost hear?

_Prince Henry._ I am Prince Henry of Hoheneck,

And you, Count Hugo of the Rhine!

I know you, and I see the scar,

The brand upon your forehead, shine

And redden like a baleful star!

_The Blind Monk._ Count Hugo once, but now the wreck

Of what I was. O Hoheneck!

The passionate will, the pride, the wrath

That bore me headlong on my path,

Stumbled and staggered into fear,

And failed me in my mad career,

As a tired steed some evil-doer,

Alone upon a desolate moor,

Bewildered, lost, deserted, blind,

And hearing loud and close behind

The o’ertaking steps of his pursuer.

Then suddenly from the dark there came

A voice that called me by my name,

And said to me, “Kneel down and pray!”

And so my terror passed away,

Passed utterly away for ever.

Contrition, penitence, remorse,

Came on me with o’erwhelming force,

A hope, a longing, an endeavour,

By days of penance and nights of prayer,

To frustrate and defeat despair!

Calm, deep, and still is now my heart,

With tranquil waters overflowed;

A lake whose unseen fountains start,

Where once the hot volcano glowed.

And you, O Prince of Hoheneck!

Have known me in that earlier time,

A man of violence and crime,

Whose passions brooked no curb nor check.

Behold me now, in gentler mood,

One of this holy brotherhood.

Give me your hand; here let me kneel;

Make your reproaches sharp as steel;

Spurn me, and smite me on each cheek;

No violence can harm the meek,

There is no wound Christ cannot heal!

Yes; lift your princely hand, and take

Revenge, if ’tis revenge you seek;

Then pardon me, for Jesus’ sake!

_Prince Henry._ Arise, Count Hugo! let there be

No farther strife nor enmity

Between us twain; we both have erred!

Too rash in act, too wroth in word,

From the beginning have we stood

In fierce, defiant attitude,

Each thoughtless of the other’s right,

And each reliant on his might.

But now our souls are more subdued;

The hand of God, and not in vain,

Has touched us with the fire of pain.

Let us kneel down, and side by side

Pray, till our souls are purified,

And pardon will not be denied!

[_They kneel._]

_The Refectory. Gaudiolum of Monks at midnight._ LUCIFER _disguised as

a Friar_

_Friar Paul_ (_sings_).

Ave! color vini clari,

Dulcis potus, non amari,

Tua nos inebriari

Digneris potentia!

_Friar Cuthbert._ Not so much noise, my worthy freres,

You’ll disturb the Abbot at his prayers.

_Friar Paul_ (_sings_).

O! quam placens in colore!

O! quam fragrans in odore!

O! quam sapidum in ore!

Dulce linguæ vinculum!

_Friar Cuthbert._ I should think your tongue had broken its chain!

_Friar Paul_ (_sings_).

Felix venter quern intrabis!

Felix guttur quod rigabis!

Felix os quod tu lavabis!

Et beata labia!

_Friar Cuthbert._ Peace! I say, peace!

Will you never cease?

You will rouse up the Abbot, I tell you again!

_Friar John._ No danger! to-night he will let us alone,

As I happen to know he has guests of his own.

_Friar Cuthbert._ Who are they?

_Friar John._ A German Prince and his train,

Who arrived here just before the rain.

There is with him a damsel fair to see,

As slender and graceful as a reed!

When she alighted from her steed,

It seemed like a blossom blown from a tree.

_Friar Cuthbert._ None of your pale-faced girls for me!

None of your damsels of high degree!

_Friar John._ Come, old fellow, drink down to your peg!

But do not drink any farther, I beg!

_Friar Paul_ (_sings_).

In the days of gold,

The days of old,

Crozier of wood

And bishop of gold!

_Friar Cuthbert._ What an infernal racket and riot!

Can you not drink your wine in quiet?

Why fill the convent with such scandals,

As if we were so many drunken Vandals?

_Friar Paul_ (_continues_).

Now we have changed

That law so good,

To crozier of gold

And bishop of wood!

_Friar Cuthbert._ Well, then, since you are in the mood

To give your noisy humours vent,

Sing and howl to your heart’s content!

_Chorus of Monks._

Funde vinum, funde!

Tanquam sint fluminis undæ

Nec quæras unde,

Sed fundas semper abunde!

_Friar John._ What is the name of yonder friar,

With an eye that glows like a coal of fire,

And such a black mass of tangled hair?

_Friar Paul._ He who is sitting there,

With a rollicking,

Devil may care,

Free and easy look and air,

As if he were used to such feasting and frolicking?

_Friar John._ The same.

_Friar Paul._ He’s a stranger. You had better ask his name,

And where he is going, and whence he came.

_Friar John._ Hallo! Sir Friar!

_Friar Paul._ You must raise your voice a little higher;

He does not seem to hear what you say.

Now, try again! He is looking this way.

_Friar John._ Hallo! Sir Friar,

We wish to inquire

Whence you came, and where you are going,

And anything else that is worth the knowing.

So be so good as to open your head.

_Lucifer._ I am a Frenchman born and bred,

Going on a pilgrimage to Rome.

My home

Is the convent of St. Gildas de Rhuys,

Of which, very like, you never have heard.

_Monks._ Never a word!

_Lucifer._ You must know, then, it is in the diocese

Called the Diocese of Vannes,

In the province of Brittany.

From the grey rocks of Morbihan

It overlooks the angry sea;

The very sea-shore where,

In his great despair,

Abbot Abelard walked to and fro,

Filling the night with woe,

And wailing aloud to the merciless seas

The name of his sweet Heloise!

Whilst overhead

The convent windows gleamed as red

As the fiery eyes of the monks within,

Who with jovial din

Gave themselves up to all kinds of sin!

Ha! that is a convent! that is an abbey!

Over the doors

None of your death-heads carved in wood,

None of your Saints looking pious and good,

None of your Patriarchs old and shabby!

But the heads and tusks of boars,

And the cells

Hung all round with the fells

Of the fallow-deer.

And then what cheer!

What jolly, fat friars,

Sitting round the great, roaring fires,

Roaring louder than they,

With their strong wines,

And their concubines;

And never a bell,

With its swagger and swell,

Calling you up with a start of affright

In the dead of night,

To send you grumbling down dark stairs,

To mumble your prayers.

But the cheery crow

Of cocks in the yard below,

After daybreak, an hour or so,

And the barking of deep-mouthed hounds,

These are the sounds

That, instead of bells, salute the ear.

And then all day

Up and away

Through the forest, hunting the deer!

Ah, my friends! I’m afraid that here

You are a little too pious, a little too tame,

And the more is the shame.

’Tis the greatest folly

Not to be jolly;

That’s what I think!

Come, drink, drink,

Drink, and die game!

_Monks._ And your Abbot What’s-his-name?

_Lucifer._ Abelard!

_Monks._ Did he drink hard?

_Lucifer._ O, no! Not he!

He was a dry old fellow,

Without juice enough to get thoroughly mellow.

There he stood,

Lowering at us in sullen mood,

As if he had come into Brittany

Just to reform our brotherhood!

[_A roar of laughter._]

But you see

It would never do!

For some of us knew a thing or two,

In the Abbey of St. Gildas de Rhuys!

For instance the great ado

With old Fulbert’s niece,

The young and lovely Heloise!

_Friar John._ Stop there, if you please,

Till we drink to the fair Heloise.

_All_ (_drinking and shouting_). Heloise! Heloise!

[_The Chapel-bell tolls._]

_Lucifer_ (_starting_). What is that bell for? Are you such asses

As to keep up the fashion of midnight masses?

_Friar Cuthbert._ It is only a poor, unfortunate brother,

Who is gifted with most miraculous powers

Of getting up all sorts of hours,

And, by way of penance and Christian meekness,

Of creeping silently out of his cell,

To take a pull at that hideous bell;

So that all the monks who are lying awake

May murmur some kind of prayer for his sake,

And adapted to his peculiar weakness!

_Friar John._ From frailty and fall——

_All._ Good Lord, deliver us all!

_Friar Cuthbert._ And before the bell for matins sounds,

He takes lantern, and goes the rounds,

Flashing it into our sleepy eyes,

Merely to say it is time to arise.

But enough of that. Go on, if you please,

With your story about St. Gildas de Rhuys.

_Lucifer._ Well, it finally came to pass

That, half in fun and half in malice,

One Sunday at Mass

We put some poison into the chalice.

But, either by accident or design,

Peter Abelard kept away

From the chapel that day,

And a poor, young friar, who in his stead

Drank the sacramental wine,

Fell on the steps of the altar, dead!

But look! do you see at the window there

That face, with a look of grief and despair,

That ghastly face, as of one in pain?

_Monks._ Who? where?

_Lucifer._ As I spoke, it vanished away again.

_Friar Cuthbert._ It is that nefarious

Siebald the Refectorarius.

That fellow is always playing the scout,

Creeping and peeping and prowling about;

And then he regales

The Abbot with scandalous tales.

_Lucifer._ A spy in the convent? One of the brothers

Telling scandalous tales of the others?

Out upon him, the lazy loon!

I would put a stop to that pretty soon,

In a way he should rue it.

_Monks._ How shall we do it?

_Lucifer._ Do you, Brother Paul,

Creep under the window close to the wall,

And open it suddenly when I call.

Then seize the villain by the hair,

And hold him there,

And punish him soundly, once for all.

_Friar Cuthbert._ As St. Dunstan of old,

We are told,

Once caught the Devil by the nose!

_Lucifer._ Ha! ha! that story is very clever,

But has no foundation whatsoever.

Quick! for I see his face again

Glaring in at the window-pane;

Now! now! and do not spare your blows.

[FRIAR PAUL _opens the window suddenly, and seizes_ SIEBALD. _They beat

him._]

_Friar Siebald._ Help! help! are you going to slay me?

_Friar Paul._ That will teach you again to betray me!

_Friar Siebald._ Mercy! mercy!

_Friar Paul_ (_shouting and beating_).

Rumpas bellorum lorum,

Vin confer amorum

Morum verorum rorum

Tu plena polorum!

_Lucifer._ Who stands in the doorway yonder,

Stretching out his trembling hand,

Just as Abelard used to stand,

The flash of his keen, black eyes

Forerunning the thunder?

_The Monks_ (_in confusion_). The Abbot! the Abbot!

_Friar Cuthbert._ And what is the wonder!

He seems to have taken you by surprise.

_Friar Francis._ Hide the great flagon

From the eyes of the dragon!

_Friar Cuthbert._ Pull the brown hood over your face!

This will bring us into disgrace!

_Abbot._ What means this revel and carouse?

Is this a tavern and drinking house?

Are you Christian monks, or heathen devils,

To pollute this convent with your revels?

Were Peter Damian still upon earth,

To be shocked by such ungodly mirth,

He would write your names, with pen of gall,

In his Book of Gomorrah, one and all!

Away, you drunkards! to your cells,

And pray till you hear the matin-bells;

You, Brother Francis, and you, Brother Paul!

And as a penance mark each prayer

With the scourge upon your shoulders bare;

Nothing atones for such a sin

But the blood that follows the discipline.

And you, Brother Cuthbert, come with me

Alone into the sacristy;

You, who should be a guide to your brothers,

And are ten times worse than all the others,

For you I’ve a draught that has long been brewing,

You shall do a penance worth the doing!

Away to your prayers, then, one and all!

I wonder the very convent wall

Does not crumble and crush you in its fall!

_The neighbouring Nunnery. The_ ABBESS IRMINGARD _sitting with_ ELSIE

_in the moonlight_.

_Irmingard._ The night is silent, the wind is still,

The moon is looking from yonder hill

Down upon convent, and grove, and garden;

The clouds have passed away from her face,

Leaving behind them no sorrowful trace,

Only the tender and quiet grace

Of one whose heart has been healed with pardon!

And such am I. My soul within

Was dark with passion and soiled with sin.

But now its wounds are healed again;

Gone are the anguish, the terror, and pain;

For across the desolate land of woe,

O’er whose burning sands I was forced to go,

A wind from heaven began to blow;

And all my being trembled and shook,

As the leaves of the tree, or the grass of the field,

And I was healed, as the sick are healed,

When fanned by the leaves of the Holy Book!

As thou sittest in the moonlight there,

Its glory flooding thy folden hair,

And the only darkness that which lies

In the haunted chambers of thine eyes,

I feel my soul drawn unto thee,

Strangely, and strongly, and more and more,

As to one I have known and loved before;

For every soul is akin to me

That dwells in the land of mystery!

I am the Lady Irmingard,

Born of a noble race and name!

Many a wandering Suabian bard,

Whose life was dreary, and bleak, and hard,

Has found through me the way to fame.

Brief and bright were those days, and the night

Which followed was full of a lurid light.

Love, that of every woman’s heart

Will have the whole, and not a part,

That is to her, in Nature’s plan,

More than ambition is to man,

Her light, her life, her very breath,

With no alternative but death,

Found me a maiden soft and young,

Just from the convent’s cloistered school,

And seated on my lowly stool,

Attentive while the minstrels sung,

Gallant, graceful, gentle, tall,

Fairest, noblest, best of all,

Was Walter of the Vogelweid;

And, whatsoever may betide,

Still I think of him with pride!

His song was of the summer-time,

The very birds sang in his rhyme;

The sunshine, the delicious air,

The fragrance of the flowers were there;

And I grew restless as I heard,

Restless and buoyant as a bird,

Down soft, aërial currents sailing,

O’er blossomed orchards, and fields in bloom,

And through the momentary gloom

Of shadows o’er the landscape trailing,

Yielding and borne I knew not where,

But feeling resistance unavailing.

And thus, unnoticed and apart,

And more by accident than choice,

I listened to that single voice

Until the chambers of my heart

Were filled with it by night and day.

One night,—it was a night in May,—

Within the garden, unawares,

Under the blossoms in the gloom,

I heard it utter my own name

With protestations and wild prayers;

And it rang through me and became

Like the archangel’s trump of doom,

Which the soul hears, and must obey;

And mine arose as from a tomb.

My former life now seemed to me

Such as hereafter death may be,

When in the great Eternity

We shall awake and find it day.

It was a dream and would not stay;

A dream, that in a single night

Faded and vanished out of sight.

My father’s anger followed fast

This passion, as a freshening blast

Seeks out and fans the fire, whose rage

It may increase, but not assuage.

And he exclaimed: “No wandering bard

Shall win thy hand, O Irmingard!

For which Prince Henry of Hoheneck

By messenger and letter sues.”

Gently, but firmly, I replied:

“Henry of Hoheneck I discard!

Never the hand of Irmingard

Shall lie in his as the hand of a bride!”

This said I, Walter, for thy sake;

This said I, for I could not choose.

After a pause, my father spake

In that cold and deliberate tone

Which turns the hearer into stone,

And seems itself the act to be

That follows with such dread certainty:

“This, or the cloister and the veil!”

No other words than these he said.

But they were like a funeral wail;

My life was ended, my heart was dead.

That night from the castle-gate went down,

With silent, slow, and stealthy pace,

Two shadows, mounted on shadowy steeds,

Taking the narrow path that leads

Into the forest dense and brown.

In the leafy darkness of the place,

One could not distinguish form nor face,

Only a bulk without a shape,

A darker shadow in the shade;

One scarce could say it moved or stayed.

Thus it was we made our escape!

A foaming brook, with many a bound,

Followed us like a playful hound;

Then leaped before us, and in the hollow,

Paused, and waited for us to follow,

And seemed impatient, and afraid,

That our tardy flight should be betrayed

By the sound our horses’ hoof-beats made.

And when we reached the plain below,

We paused a moment and drew rein

To look back at the castle again;

And we saw the windows all aglow

With lights, that were passing to and fro;

Our hearts with terror ceased to beat;

The brook crept silent to our feet;

We knew what most we feared to know.

Then suddenly horns began to blow;

And we heard a shout, and a heavy tramp,

And our horses snorted in the damp

Night air of the meadows green and wide,

And in a moment, side by side,

So close, they must have seemed but one,

The shadows across the moonlight run,

And another came, and swept behind,

Like the shadow of clouds before the wind!

How I remember that breathless flight

Across the moors, in the summer night!

How under our feet the long, white road

Backward like a river flowed,

Sweeping with it fences and hedges;

Whilst farther away, and overhead,

Paler than I, with fear and dread,

The moon fled with us, as we fled

Along the forest’s jagged edges!

All this I can remember well;

But of what afterwards befell

I nothing farther can recall

Than a blind, desperate, headlong fall;

The rest is a blank and darkness all.

When I awoke out of this swoon,

The sun was shining, not the moon,

Making a cross upon the wall

With the bars of my windows narrow and tall;

And I prayed to it as I had been wont to pray,

From early childhood, day by day,

Each morning, as in bed I lay!

I was lying again in my own room!

And I thanked God, in my fever and pain,

That those shadows on the midnight plain

Were gone, and could not come again!

I struggled no longer with my doom!

This happened many years ago.

I left my father’s home to come

Like Catherine to her martyrdom,

For blindly I esteemed it so.

And when I heard the convent-door

Behind me close, to ope no more,

I felt it smite me like a blow.

Through all my limbs a shudder ran,

And on my bruisèd spirit fell

The dampness of my narrow cell,

As night air on a wounded man,

Giving intolerable pain.

But now a better life began.

I felt the agony decrease

By slow degrees, then wholly cease,

Ending in perfect rest and peace!

It was not apathy, nor dulness,

That weighed and pressed upon my brain,

But the same passion I had given

To earth before, now turned to heaven

With all its overflowing fulness.

Alas! the world is full of peril!

The path that runs through the fairest meads,

On the sunniest side of the valley, leads

Into a region bleak and sterile!

Alike in the high-born and the lowly,

The will is feeble, and passion strong.

We cannot sever right from wrong;

Some falsehood mingles with all truth;

Nor is it strange the heart of youth

Should waver and comprehend but slowly

The things that are holy and unholy.

But in this sacred and calm retreat,

We are all well and safely shielded

From winds that blow, and waves that beat,

From the cold, and rain, and blighting heat,

To which the strongest hearts have yielded.

Here we stand as the Virgins Seven,

For our celestial bridegroom yearning;

Our hearts are lamps for ever burning,

With a steady and unwavering flame,

Pointing upward, for ever the same,

Steadily upward, toward the Heaven!

The moon is hidden behind a cloud;

A sudden darkness fills the room,

And thy deep eyes, amid the gloom,

Shine like jewels in a shroud.

On the leaves is a sound of falling rain;

A bird, awakened in its nest,

Gives a faint twitter of unrest,

Then smooths its plumes and sleeps again.

No other sounds than these I hear;

The hour of midnight must be near.

Thou art o’erspent with the day’s fatigue

Of riding many a dusty league;

Sink, then, gently, to thy slumber;

Me so many cares encumber,

So many ghosts, and forms of fright,

Have started from their graves to-night,

They have driven sleep from mine eyes away:

I will go down to the chapel and pray.

V.

[_A covered bridge at Lucerne._]

_Prince Henry._ God’s blessing on the architects who build

The bridges o’er swift rivers and abysses

Before impassable to human feet,

No less than on the builders of cathedrals,

Whose massive walls are bridges thrown across

The dark and terrible abyss of Death.

Well has the name of Pontifex been given

Unto the Church’s head, as the chief builder

And architect of the invisible bridge

That leads from earth to heaven.

_Elsie._ How dark it grows!

What are these paintings on the walls around us?

_Prince Henry._ The Dance Macaber!

_Elsie._ What?

_Prince Henry._ The Dance of Death.

All that go to and fro must look upon it,

Mindful of what they shall be, while beneath,

Among the wooden piles, the turbulent river

Rushes impetuous as the river of life,

With dimpling eddies, ever green and bright,

Save where the shadow of this bridge falls on it.

_Elsie._ O, yes! I see it now!

_Prince Henry._ The grim musician

Leads all men through the mazes of that dance,

To different sounds in different measures moving;

Sometimes he plays a lute, sometimes a drum,

To tempt or terrify.

_Elsie._ What is this picture?

_Prince Henry._ It is a young man singing to a nun,

Who kneels at her devotions, but in kneeling

Turns round to look at him; and Death, meanwhile,

Is putting out the candles on the altar!

_Elsie._ Ah, what a pity ’tis that she should listen

Unto such songs, when in her orisons

She might have heard in heaven the angels singing!

_Prince Henry._ Here he has stolen a jester’s cap and bells,

And dances with the Queen.

_Elsie._ A foolish jest!

_Prince Henry._ And here the heart of the new-wedded wife,

Coming from church with her beloved lord,

He startles with the rattle of his drum.

_Elsie._ Ah, that is sad! And yet perhaps ’tis best

That she should die, with all the sunshine on her,

And all the benedictions of the morning,

Before this affluence of golden light

Shall fade into a cold and clouded grey,

Then into darkness!

_Prince Henry._ Under it is written,

“Nothing but death shall separate thee and me!”

_Elsie._ And what is this that follows close upon it?

_Prince Henry._ Death, playing on a dulcimer. Behind him,

A poor old woman, with a rosary,

Follows the sound, and seems to wish her feet

Were swifter to o’ertake him. Underneath,

The inscription reads, “Better is Death than Life.”

_Elsie._ Better is Death than Life! Ah, yes! To thousands

Death plays upon a dulcimer, and sings

That song of consolation, till the air

Rings with it, and they cannot choose but follow

Whither he leads. And not the old alone,

But the young also hear it, and are still.

_Prince Henry._ Yes, in their sadder moments. ’Tis the sound

Of their own hearts they hear, half full of tears,

Which are like crystal cups, half filled with water,

Responding to the pressure of a finger

With music sweet and low and melancholy.

Let us go forward, and no longer stay

In this great picture-gallery of Death.

I hate it! ay, the very thought of it!

_Elsie._ Why is it hateful to you?

_Prince Henry._ For the reason

That life, and all that speaks of life, is lovely,

And death, and all that speaks of death, is hateful.

_Elsie._ The grave itself is but a covered bridge,

Leading from light to light, through a brief darkness!

_Prince Henry_ (_emerging from the bridge_).

I breathe again more freely! Ah, how pleasant

To come once more into the light of day,

Out of that shadow of death! To hear again

The hoof-beats of our horses on firm ground,

And not upon those hollow planks, resounding

With a sepulchral echo, like the clods

On coffins in a churchyard! Yonder lies

The Lake of the Four Forest-Towns, apparelled

In light, and lingering, like a village maiden,

Hid in the bosom of her native mountains,

Then pouring all her life into another’s,

Changing her name and being! Overhead,

Shaking his cloudy tresses loose in air,

Rises Pilatus, with his windy pines.

[_They pass on._]

_The Devil’s Bridge._ PRINCE HENRY _and_ ELSIE _crossing, with

attendants_.

_Guide._ This bridge is called the Devil’s Bridge.

With a single arch, from ridge to ridge,

It leaps across the terrible chasm

Yawning beneath us, black and deep,

As if, in some convulsive spasm,

The summits of the hills had cracked,

And made a road for the cataract,

That raves and rages down the steep!

_Lucifer_ (_under the bridge_). Ha! ha!

_Guide._ Never any bridge but this

Could stand across the wild abyss;

All the rest, of wood or stone,

By the Devil’s hand were overthrown.

He toppled crags from the precipice,

And whatsoe’er was built by day

In the night was swept away;

None could stand but this alone.

_Lucifer_ (_under the bridge_). Ha! ha!

_Guide._ I showed you in the valley a boulder

Marked with the imprint of his shoulder;

As he was bearing it up this way,

A peasant, passing, cried, “Herr Jé!”

And the Devil dropped it in his fright,

And vanished suddenly out of sight!

_Lucifer_ (_under the bridge_). Ha! ha!

_Guide._ Abbot Giraldus of Einsiedel,

For pilgrims on their way to Rome,

Built this at last, with a single arch,

Under which, on its endless march,

Runs the river, white with foam,

Like a thread through the eye of a needle.

And the Devil promised to let it stand,

Under compact and condition

That the first living thing which crossed

Should be surrendered into his hand,

And be beyond redemption lost.

_Lucifer_ (_under the bridge_). Ha! ha! perdition!

_Guide._ At length, the bridge being all completed,

The Abbot, standing at its head,

Threw across it a loaf of bread,

Which a hungry dog sprang after,

And the rocks re-echoed with peals of laughter

To see the Devil thus defeated!

[_They pass on._]

_Lucifer_ (_under the bridge_). Ha! ha! defeated!

For journeys and for crimes like this

I let the bridge stand o’er the abyss!

_The St. Gothard Pass._

_Prince Henry._ This is the highest point. Two ways the rivers

Leap down to different seas, and as they roll

Grow deep and still, and their majestic presence

Becomes a benefaction to the towns

They visit, wandering silently among them,

Like patriarchs old among their shining tents.

_Elsie._ How bleak and bare it is! Nothing but mosses

Grow on these rocks.

_Prince Henry._ Yet are they not forgotten;

Beneficent Nature sends the mists to feed them.

_Elsie._ See yonder little cloud, that, borne aloft

So tenderly by the wind, floats fast away

Over the snowy peaks! It seems to me

The body of St. Catherine, borne by angels!

_Prince Henry._ Thou art St. Catherine, and invisible angels

Bear thee across these chasms and precipices,

Lest thou shouldst dash thy feet against a stone!

_Elsie._ Would I were borne unto my grave, as she was,

Upon angelic shoulders! Even now

I seem uplifted by them, light as air!

What sound is that?

_Prince Henry._ The tumbling avalanches!

_Elsie._ How awful, yet how beautiful!

_Prince Henry._ These are

The voices of the mountain! Thus they ope

Their snowy lips, and speak unto each other,

In the primeval language, lost to man.

_Elsie._ What land is this that spreads itself beneath us?

_Prince Henry._ Italy! Italy!

_Elsie._ Land of the Madonna!

How beautiful it is! It seems a garden

Of Paradise!

_Prince Henry._ Nay, of Gethsemane

To thee and me, of passion and of prayer!

Yet once of Paradise. Long years ago

I wandered as a youth among its bowers,

And never from my heart has faded quite

Its memory, that, like a summer sunset,

Encircles with a ring of purple light

All the horizon of my youth!

_Guide._ O friends!

The days are short, the way before us long;

We must not linger, if we think to reach

The inn at Belinzona before vespers!

[_They pass on._]

_At the foot of the Alps. A halt under the trees at noon._

_Prince Henry._ Here let us pause a moment in the trembling

Shadow and sunshine of the road-side trees,

And, our tired horses in a group assembling,

Inhale long draughts of this delicious breeze.

Our fleeter steeds have distanced our attendants;

They lag behind us with a slower pace;

We will await them under the green pendants

Of the great willows in this shady place.

Ho, Barbarossa! how thy mottled haunches

Sweat with this canter over hill and glade!

Stand still, and let these overhanging branches

Fan thy hot sides and comfort thee with shade!

_Elsie._ What a delightful landscape spreads before us,

Marked with a whitewashed cottage here and there!

And, in luxuriant garlands drooping o’er us,

Blossoms of grape-vines scent the sunny air.

_Prince Henry._ Hark! what sweet sounds are those, whose accents holy

Fill the warm noon with music sad and sweet?

_Elsie._ It is a band of pilgrims moving slowly

On their long journey, with uncovered feet.

_Pilgrims_ (_chanting the Hymn of St. Hildebert_).

Me receptet Sion illa,

Sion David, urbs tranquilla,

Cujus faber auctor lucis,

Cujus portæ lignum crucis,

Cujus claves lingua Petri,

Cujus cives semper læti,

Cujus muri lapis vivus,

Cujus custos Rex festivus!

_Lucifer_ (_as a Friar in the procession_). Here am I, too,

in the pious band,

In the garb of a barefooted Carmelite dressed!

The soles of my feet are as hard and tanned

As the conscience of old Pope Hildebrand,

The Holy Satan, who made the wives

Of the bishops lead such shameful lives,

All day long I beat my breast,

And chant with a most particular zest

The Latin hymns, which I understand

Quite as well, I think, as the rest.

And at night such lodging in barns and sheds,

Such a hurly-burly in country inns,

Such a clatter of tongues in empty heads,

Such a helter-skelter of prayers and sins!

Of all the contrivances of the time

For sowing broad-cast the seeds of crime,

There is none so pleasing to me and mine

As a pilgrimage to some far-off shrine!

_Prince Henry._ If from the outward man we judge the inner,

And cleanliness is godliness, I fear

A hopeless reprobate, a hardened sinner,

Must be that Carmelite now passing near.

_Lucifer._ There is my German Prince again,

Thus far on his journey to Salern,

And the love-sick girl, whose heated brain

Is sowing the cloud to reap the rain;

But it’s a long road that has no turn!

Let them quietly hold their way,

I have also a part in the play.

But first I must act to my heart’s content

This mummery and this merriment,

And drive this motley flock of sheep

Into the fold, where drink and sleep

The jolly old friars of Benevent.

Of a truth, it often provokes me to laugh

To see these beggars hobble along,

Lamed and maimed, and fed upon chaff,

Chanting their wonderful piff and paff,

And, to make up for not understanding the song,

Singing it fiercely, and wild, and strong!

Were it not for my magic garters and staff,

And the goblets of goodly wine I quaff,

And the mischief I make in the idle throng,

I should not continue the business long.

_Pilgrims (chanting)._

In hâc urbe, lux solennis,

Ver æternum, pax perennis;

In hâc odor implens cælos,

In hâc semper festum melos!

_Prince Henry._ Do you observe that monk among the train,

Who pours from his great throat the roaring bass,

As a cathedral spout pours out the rain,

And this way turns his rubicund, round face?

_Elsie._ It is the same who, on the Strasburg square,

Preached to the people in the open air.

_Prince Henry._ And he has crossed o’er mountain, field, and fell

On that good steed, that seems to bear him well,

The hackney of the Friars of Orders Grey,

His own stout legs! He, too, was in the play,

Both as King Herod and Ben Israel.

Good morrow, Friar!

_Friar Cuthbert._ Good morrow, noble Sir!

_Prince Henry._ I speak in German, for, unless I err,

You are a German.

_Friar Cuthbert._ I cannot gainsay you.

But by what instinct, or what secret sign,

Meeting me here, do you straightway divine

That northward of the Alps my country lies?

_Prince Henry._ Your accent, like St. Peter’s, would betray you,

Did not your yellow beard and your blue eyes.

Moreover, we have seen your face before,

And heard you preach at the Cathedral door

On Easter Sunday, in the Strasburg square.

We were among the crowd that gathered there,

And saw you play the Rabbi with great skill,

As if, by leaning o’er so many years

To walk with little children, your own will

Had caught a childish attitude from theirs,

A kind of stooping in its form and gait,

And could no longer stand erect and straight.

Whence come you now?

_Friar Cuthbert._ From the old monastery

Of Hirschau, in the forest; being sent

Upon a pilgrimage to Benevent,

To see the image of the Virgin Mary,

That moves its holy eyes, and sometimes speaks,

And lets the piteous tears run down its cheeks,

To touch the hearts of the impenitent.

_Prince Henry._ O, had I faith, as in the days gone by,

That knew no doubt, and feared no mystery!

_Lucifer_ (_at a distance_). Ho, Cuthbert! Friar Cuthbert!

_Friar Cuthbert._ Farewell, Prince!

I cannot stay to argue and convince.

_Prince Henry._ This is indeed the blessed Mary’s land,

Virgin and Mother of our dear Redeemer!

All hearts are touched and softened at her name;

Alike the bandit, with the bloody hand,

The priest, the prince, the scholar, and the peasant,

The man of deeds, the visionary dreamer,

Pay homage to her as one ever present!

And even as children, who have much offended

A too indulgent father, in great shame,

Penitent, and yet not daring unattended

To go into his presence, at the gate

Speak with their sister, and confiding wait

Till she goes in before and intercedes;

So men, repenting of their evil deeds,

And yet not venturing rashly to draw near

With their requests an angry Father’s ear,

Offer to her their prayers and their confession,

And she for them in heaven makes intercession.

And if our Faith had given us nothing more

Than this example of all womanhood,

So mild, so merciful, so strong, so good,

So patient, peaceful, loyal, loving, pure,

This were enough to prove it higher and truer

Than all the creeds the world had known before.

_Pilgrims_ (_chanting afar off_).

Urbs cœlestis, urbs beata,

Supra petram collocata,

Urbs in portu satis tuto

De longinquo te saluto,

Te saluto te suspiro,

Te affecto, te requiro!

_The Inn at Genoa. A terrace overlooking the sea. Night._

_Prince Henry._ It is the sea, it is the sea,

In all its vague immensity,

Fading and darkening in the distance!

Silent, majestical, and slow,

The white ships haunt it to and fro,

With all their ghostly sails unfurled,

As phantoms from another world

Haunt the dim confines of existence!

But ah! how few can comprehend

Their signals, or to what good end

From land to land they come and go!

Upon a sea more vast and dark

The spirits of the dead embark,

All voyaging to unknown coasts.

We wave our farewells from the shore,

And they depart, and come no more,

Or come as phantoms and as ghosts.

Above the darksome sea of death

Looms the great life that is to be,

A land of cloud and mystery,

A dim mirage, with shapes of men

Long dead, and passed beyond our ken,

Awe-struck, we gaze, and hold our breath

Till the fair pageant vanisheth,

Leaving us in perplexity,

And doubtful whether it has been

A vision of the world unseen,

Or a bright image of our own

Against the sky in vapours thrown.

_Lucifer_ (_singing from the sea_).

Thou didst not make it, thou canst not mend it,

But thou hast the power to end it!

The sea is silent, the sea is discreet,

Deep it lies at thy very feet;

There is no confessor like unto Death!

Thou canst not see him, but he is near;

Thou needest not whisper above thy breath,

And he will hear;

He will answer the questions,

The vague surmises and suggestions,

That fill thy soul with doubt and fear!

_Prince Henry._ The fisherman, who lies afloat,

With shadowy sail, in yonder boat,

Is singing softly to the Night!

But do I comprehend aright

The meaning of the words he sung

So sweetly in his native tongue?

Ah, yes! the sea is still and deep,

All things within its bosom sleep!

A single step and all is o’er;

A plunge, a bubble, and no more;

And thou, dear Elsie, wilt be free

From martyrdom and agony.

_Elsie_ (_coming from her chamber upon the terrace_).

The night is calm and cloudless,

And still as still can be,

And the stars come forth to listen

To the music of the sea.

They gather, and gather, and gather,

Until they crowd the sky,

And listen in breathless silence

To the solemn litany.

It begins in rocky caverns,

As a voice that chants alone

To the pedals of the organ

In monotonous undertone;

And anon from shelving beaches,

And shallow sands beyond,

In snow-white robes uprising

The ghostly choirs respond.

And sadly and unceasing

The mournful voice sings on,

And the snow-white choirs still answer,

Christe eleison!

_Prince Henry._ Angel of God! thy finer sense perceives

Celestial and perpetual harmonies!

Thy purer soul, that trembles and believes,

Hears the archangel’s trumpet in the breeze,

And where the forest rolls, or ocean heaves,

Cecilia’s organ sounding in the seas,

And tongues of prophets speaking in the leaves.

But I hear discord only and despair,

And whispers as of demons in the air!

_At Sea._

_Il Padrone._ The wind upon our quarter lies,

And on before the freshening gale,

That fills the snow-white lateen sail,

Swiftly our light felucca flies.

Around, the billows burst and foam;

They lift her o’er the sunken rock,

They beat her sides with many a shock,

And then upon their flowing dome

They poise her, like a weathercock!

Between us and the western skies

The hills of Corsica arise;

Eastward, in yonder long, blue line,

The summits of the Apennine,

And southward, and still far away,

Salerno, on its sunny bay.

You cannot see it, where it lies.

_Prince Henry._ Ah, would that never more mine eyes

Might see its towers by night or day!

_Elsie._ Behind us, dark and awfully,

There comes a cloud out of the sea,

That bears the form of a hunted deer,

With hide of brown, and hoofs of black,

And antlers laid upon its back,

And fleeing fast and wild with fear,

As if the hounds were on its track!

_Prince Henry._ Lo! while we gaze, it breaks and falls

In shapeless masses, like the walls

Of a burnt city. Broad and red

The fires of the descending sun

Glare through the windows, and o’erhead,

Athwart the vapours, dense and dun,

Long shafts of silvery light arise,

Like rafters that support the skies!

_Elsie._ See! from its summit the lurid levin

Flashes downward without warning,

As Lucifer, son of the morning,

Fell from the battlements of heaven!

_Il Padrone._ I must entreat you, friends, below!

The angry storm begins to blow,

For the weather changes with the moon.

All this morning, until noon,

We had baffling winds, and sudden flaws

Struck the sea with their cat’s-paws.

Only a little hour ago

I was whistling to Saint Antonio

For a capful of wind to fill our sail,

And instead of a breeze he has sent a gale.

Last night I saw Saint Elmo’s stars,[39]

With their glimmering lanterns, all at play

On the tops of the masts and the tips of the spars,

And I knew we should have foul weather to-day.

Cheerly, my hearties! yo heave ho!

Brail up the mainsail, and let her go

As the winds will and Saint Antonio!

Do you see that Livornese felucca,

That vessel to the windward yonder,

Running with her gunwale under?

I was looking when the wind o’ertook her.

She had all sail set, and the only wonder

Is, that at once the strength of the blast

Did not carry away her mast.

She is a galley of the Grand Duca,

That, through the fear of the Algerines,

Convoys those lazy brigantines,

Laden with wine and oil from Lucca.

Now all is ready high and low;

Blow, blow, good Saint Antonio!

Ha! that is the first dash of the rain,

With a sprinkle of spray above the rails,

Just enough to moisten our sails,

And make them ready for the strain.

See how she leaps, as the blasts o’ertake her,

And speeds away with a bone in her mouth!

Now keep her head toward the south,

And there is no danger of bank or breaker.

With the breeze behind us, on we go;

Not too much, good Saint Antonio!

[39] See Appendix.

VI.

_The School of Salerno. A travelling Scholastic affixing his Theses to

the gate of the College._

_Scholastic._ There, that is my gauntlet, my banner, my shield,

Hung up as a challenge to all the field!

One hundred and twenty-five propositions,

Which I will maintain with the sword of the tongue

Against all disputants, old and young.

Let us see if doctors or dialecticians

Will dare to dispute my definitions,

Or attack any one of my learned theses.

Here stand I; the end shall be as God pleases.

I think I have proved, by profound researches,

The error of all those doctrines so vicious

Of the old Areopagite Dionysius,

That are making such terrible work in the churches,

By Michael the Stammerer sent from the East,

And done into Latin by that Scottish beast,

Johannes Duns Scotus, who dares to maintain,

In the face of the truth, the error infernal,

That the universe is and must be eternal;

At first laying down, as a fact fundamental,

That nothing with God can be accidental;

Then asserting that God before the creation

Could not have existed, because it is plain

That, had he existed, he would have created;

Which is begging the question that should be debated,

And moveth me less to anger than laughter.

All nature, he holds, is a respiration

Of the Spirit of God, who, in breathing, hereafter

Will inhale it into his bosom again,

So that nothing but God alone will remain.

And therein he contradicteth himself;

For he opens the whole discussion by stating,

That God can only exist in creating.

That question I think I have laid on the shelf!

[_He goes out. Two Doctors come in disputing, and followed by Pupils._]

_Doctor Serafino._ I, with the Doctor Seraphic, maintain,

That a word which is only conceived in the brain

Is a type of eternal Generation;

The spoken word is the Incarnation.

_Doctor Cherubino._ What do I care for the Doctor Seraphic,

With all his wordy chaffer and traffic?

_Doctor Serafino._ You make but a paltry show of resistance;

Universals have no real existence!

_Doctor Cherubino._ Your words are but idle and empty chatter;

Ideas are eternally joined to matter!

_Doctor Serafino._ May the Lord have mercy on your position,

You wretched, wrangling culler of herbs!

_Doctor Cherubino._ May he send your soul to eternal perdition,

For your Treatise on the Irregular Verbs!

[_They rush out fighting. Two Scholars come in._]

_First Scholar._ Monte Cassino, then, is your College.

What think you of ours here at Salern?

_Second Scholar._ To tell the truth, I arrived so lately,

I hardly yet have had time to discern.

So much, at least, I am bound to acknowledge:

The air seems healthy, the buildings stately,

And on the whole I like it greatly.

_First Scholar._ Yes, the air is sweet; the Calabrian hills

Send us down puffs of mountain air;

And in summer-time the sea-breeze fills

With its coolness cloister, and court, and square.

Then at every season of the year

There are crowds of guests and travellers here;

Pilgrims, and mendicant friars, and traders

From the Levant, with figs and wine,

And bands of wounded and sick Crusaders,

Coming back from Palestine.

_Second Scholar._ And what are the studies you pursue?

What is the course you here go through?

_First Scholar._ The first three years of the college course

Are given to Logic alone, as the source

Of all that is noble, and wise, and true.

_Second Scholar._ That seems rather strange, I must confess,

In a Medical School; yet, nevertheless,

You doubtless have reasons for that.

_First Scholar._ O, yes!

For none but a clever dialectician

Can hope to become a great physician;

That has been settled long ago.

Logic makes an important part

Of the mystery of the healing art;

For without it how could you hope to show

That nobody knows so much as you know?

After this there are five years more

Devoted wholly to medicine,

With lectures on chirurgical lore,

And dissections of the bodies of swine,

As likest the human form divine.

_Second Scholar._ What are the books now most in vogue?

_First Scholar._ Quite an extensive catalogue;

Mostly, however, books of our own;

As Garriopontus’ Passionarius,

And the writings of Matthew Platearius;

And a volume universally known

As the Regimen of the School of Salern,

For Robert of Normandy written in terse

And very elegant Latin verse.

Each of these writings has its turn.

And when at length we have finished these,

Then comes the struggle for degrees,

With all the oldest and ablest critics;

The public thesis and disputation,

Question, and answer, and explanation

Of a passage out of Hippocrates,

Or Aristotle’s Analytics.

There the triumphant Magister stands!

A book is solemnly placed in his hands,

On which he swears to follow the rule

And ancient forms of the good old School;

To report if any confectionarius

Mingles his drugs with matters various,

And to visit his patients twice a day,

And once in the night, if they live in town,

And if they are poor, to take no pay.

Having faithfully promised these,

His head is crowned with a laurel crown;

A kiss on his cheek, a ring on his hand,

The Magister Artium et Physices

Goes forth from the school like a lord of the land.

And now, as we have the whole morning before us,

Let us go in, if you make no objection,

And listen awhile to a learned prelection

On Marcus Aurelius Cassiodorus.

[_They go in. Enter_ LUCIFER _as a Doctor_.]

LUCIFER. This is the great School of Salern!

A land of wrangling and of quarrels,

Of brains that seethe and hearts that burn,

Where every emulous scholar hears,

In every breath that comes to his ears,

The rustling of another’s laurels!

The air of the place is called salubrious;

The neighbourhood of Vesuvius lends it

An odour volcanic, that rather mends it,

And the buildings have an aspect lugubrious,

That inspires a feeling of awe and terror

Into the heart of the beholder,

And befits such an ancient homestead of error,

Where the old falsehoods moulder and smoulder,

And yearly by many hundred hands

Are carried away, in the zeal of youth,

And sown like tares in the field of truth,

To blossom and ripen in other lands.

What have we here, affixed to the gate?

The challenge of some scholastic wight,

Who wishes to hold a public debate

On sundry questions wrong or right!

Ah, now this is my great delight!

For I have often observed of late

That such discussions end in a fight.

Let us see what the learned wag maintains

With such a prodigal waste of brains.

[_Reads_]

“Whether angels in moving from place to place

Pass through the intermediate space.

Whether God himself is the author of evil,

Or whether that is the work of the Devil.

When, where, and wherefore Lucifer fell,

And whether he now is chained in hell.”

I think I can answer that question well!

So long as the boastful human mind

Consents in such mills as this to grind,

I sit very firmly upon my throne!

Of a truth it almost makes me laugh,

To see men leaving the golden grain

To gather in piles the pitiful chaff

That old Peter Lombard thrashed with his brain,

To have it caught up and tossed again

On the horns of the Dumb Ox of Cologne!

But my guests approach! there is in the air

A fragrance like that of the Beautiful Garden

Of Paradise in the days that were!

An odour of innocence and of prayer,

And of love, and faith that never fails,

Such as the fresh young heart exhales

Before it begins to wither and harden!

I cannot breathe such an atmosphere!

My soul is filled with a nameless fear,

That, after all my trouble and pain,

After all my restless endeavour,

The youngest, fairest soul of the twain,

The most ethereal, most divine,

Will escape from my hands for ever and ever;

But the other is already mine!

Let him live to corrupt his race,

Breathing among them, with every breath,

Weakness, selfishness, and the base

And pusillanimous fear of death.

I know his nature, and I know

That of all who in my ministry

Wander the great earth to and fro,

And on my errands come and go,

The safest and subtlest are such as he.

_Enter_ PRINCE HENRY _and_ ELSIE, _with attendants_.

_Prince Henry._ Can you direct us to Friar Angelo?

_Lucifer._ He stands before you.

_Prince Henry._ Then you know our purpose.

I am Prince Henry of Hoheneck, and this

The maiden that I spake of in my letters.

_Lucifer._ It is a very grave and solemn business!

We must not be precipitate. Does she

Without compulsion, of her own free will,

Consent to this?

_Prince Henry._ Against all opposition,

Against all prayers, entreaties, protestations.

She will not be persuaded.

_Lucifer._ That is strange!

Have you thought well of it?

_Elsie._ I come not here

To argue, but to die. Your business is not

To question, but to kill me. I am ready.

I am impatient to be gone from here

Ere any thoughts of earth disturb again

The spirit of tranquillity within me.

_Prince Henry._ Would I had not come here! Would I were dead,

And thou wert in thy cottage in the forest,

And hadst not known me! Why have I done this?

Let me go back and die.

_Elsie._ It cannot be;

Not if these cold flat stones on which we tread

Were coulters heated white, and yonder gateway

Flamed like a furnace with a sevenfold heat.

I must fulfil my purpose.

_Prince Henry._ I forbid it!

Not one step farther. For I only meant

To put thus far thy courage to the proof.

It is enough. I, too, have courage to die,

For thou hast taught me!

_Elsie._ O my Prince! remember

Your promises. Let me fulfil my errand.

You do not look on life and death as I do.

There are two angels, that attend unseen

Each one of us, and in great books record

Our good and evil deeds. He who writes down

The good ones, after every action closes

His volume, and ascends with it to God.

The other keeps his dreadful day-book open

Till sunset, that we may repent; which doing,

The record of the action fades away,

And leaves a line of white across the page.

Now if my act be good, as I believe,

It cannot be recalled. It is already

Sealed up in heaven, as a good deed accomplished.

The rest is yours. Why wait you? I am ready.

[_To her attendants._]

Weep not, my friends! rather rejoice with me.

I shall not feel the pain, but shall be gone,

And you will have another friend in heaven.

Then start not at the creaking of the door

Through which I pass. I see what lies beyond it.

[_To_ PRINCE HENRY.]

And you, O Prince, bear back my benison

Unto my father’s house, and all within it.

This morning in the church I prayed for them,

After confession, after absolution,

When my whole soul was white, I prayed for them.

God will take care of them, they need me not.

And in your life let my remembrance linger,

As something not to trouble and disturb it,

But to complete it, adding life to life.

And if at times beside the evening fire

You see my face among the other faces,

Let it not be regarded as a ghost

That haunts your house, but as a guest that loves you.

Nay, even as one of your own family,

Without whose presence there were something wanting.

I have no more to say. Let us go in.

_Prince Henry._ Friar Angelo! I charge you on your life,

Believe not what she says, for she is mad,

And comes here not to die, but to be healed!

_Elsie._ Alas! Prince Henry!

_Lucifer._ Come with me; this way.

[ELSIE _goes in with_ LUCIFER, _who thrusts_ PRINCE HENRY _back and

closes the door_.]

_Prince Henry._ Gone! and the light of all my life

gone with her!

A sudden darkness falls upon the world!

O, what a vile and abject thing am I,

That purchase length of days at such a cost!

Not by her death alone, but by the death

Of all that’s good and true and noble in me!

All manhood, excellence, and self-respect,

All love, and faith, and hope, and heart are dead!

All my divine nobility of nature

By this one act is forfeited for ever.

I am a Prince in nothing but in name!

[_To the attendants._]

Why did you let this horrible deed be done?

Why did you not lay hold on her, and keep her

From self-destruction? Angelo! murderer!

[_Struggles at the door, but cannot open it._]

_Elsie_ (_within_). Farewell, dear Prince! farewell!

_Prince Henry._ Unbar the door!

_Lucifer._ It is too late!

_Prince Henry._ It shall not be too late!

[_They burst the door open and rush in._]

_The cottage in the Odenwald._ URSULA, _spinning. Summer afternoon.

A table spread._

_Ursula._ I have marked it well—it must be true,—

Death never takes one alone, but two!

Whenever he enters in at a door,

Under roof of gold or roof of thatch,

He always leaves it upon the latch,

And comes again ere the year is o’er.

Never one of a household only!

Perhaps it is a mercy of God,

Lest the dead there under the sod,

In the land of strangers, should be lonely!

Ah me! I think I am lonelier here!

It is hard to go,—but harder to stay!

Were it not for the children, I should pray

That Death would take me within the year!

And Gottlieb!—he is at work all day

In the sunny field, or the forest murk,

But I know that his thoughts are far away,

I know that his heart is not in his work!

And when he comes home to me at night

He is not cheery, but sits and sighs,

And I see the great tears in his eyes,

And try to be cheerful for his sake.

Only the children’s hearts are light.

Mine is weary, and ready to break.

God help us! I hope we have done right;

We thought we were acting for the best!

[_Looking through the open door._]

Who is it coming under the trees?

A man, in the Prince’s livery dressed!

He looks about him with doubtful face,

As if uncertain of the place.

He stops at the beehives;—now he sees

The garden gate; he is going past!

Can he be afraid of the bees?

No; he is coming in at last!

He fills my heart with strange alarm!

_Enter a Forester._

_Forester._ Is this the tenant Gottlieb’s farm?

_Ursula._ This is his farm, and I his wife.

Pray sit. What may your business be?

_Forester._ News from the Prince!

_Ursula._ Of death or life?

_Forester._ You put your questions eagerly!

_Ursula._ Answer me, then. How is the Prince?

_Forester._ I left him only two hours since

Homeward returning down the river,

As strong and well as if God, the Giver,

Had given him back his youth again.

_Ursula_ (_despairing_). Then Elsie, my poor child, is dead!

_Forester._ That, my good woman, I have not said.

Don’t cross the bridge till you come to it,

Is a proverb old, and of excellent wit.

_Ursula._ Keep me no longer in this pain!

_Forester._ It is true your daughter is no more;—

That is, the peasant she was before.

_Ursula._ Alas! I am simple and lowly bred,

I am poor, distracted, and forlorn.

And it is not well that you of the court

Should mock me thus, and make a sport

Of a joyless mother whose child is dead,

For you, too, were of mother born!

_Forester._ Your daughter lives, and the Prince is well!

You will learn ere long how it all befell.

Her heart for a moment never failed;

But when they reached Salerno’s gate,

The Prince’s nobler self prevailed,

And saved her for a nobler fate.

And he was healed, in his despair,

By the touch of St. Matthew’s sacred bones;

Though I think the long ride in the open air,

That pilgrimage over stocks and stones,

In the miracle must come in for a share!

_Ursula._ Virgin! who lovest the poor and lowly,

If the loud cry of a mother’s heart

Can ever ascend to where thou art,

Into thy blessed hands and holy

Receive my prayer of praise and thanksgiving!

Let the hands that bore our Saviour bear it

Into the awful presence of God;

For thy feet with holiness are shod,

And if thou bearest it he will hear it.

Our child who was dead, again is living!

_Forester._ I did not tell you she was dead;

If you thought so ’twas no fault of mine;

At this very moment, while I speak,

They are sailing homeward down the Rhine,

In a splendid barge, with golden prow,

And decked with banners white and red

As the colours on your daughter’s cheek.

They call her the Lady Alicia now;

For the Prince in Salerno made a vow

That Elsie only would he wed.

_Ursula._ Jesu Maria! what a change!

All seems to me so weird and strange!

_Forester._ I saw her standing on the deck,

Beneath an awning cool and shady;

Her cap of velvet could not hold

The tresses of her hair of gold,

That flowed and floated like the stream

And fell in masses down her neck.

As fair and lovely did she seem

As in a story or a dream

Some beautiful and foreign lady.

And the Prince looked so grand and proud

And waved his hand thus to the crowd

That gazed and shouted from the shore,

All down the river, long and loud.

_Ursula._ We shall behold our child once more;

She is not dead! She is not dead!

God, listening, must have overheard

The prayers, that, without sound or word,

Our hearts in secrecy have said!

O, bring me to her; for mine eyes

Are hungry to behold her face;

My very soul within me cries;

My very hands seem to caress her,

To see her, gaze at her, and bless her;

Dear Elsie, child of God and grace!

[_Goes out towards the garden._]

_Forester._ There goes the good woman out of her head:

And Gottlieb’s supper is waiting here;

A very capacious flagon of beer,

And a very portentous loaf of bread.

One would say his grief did not much oppress him.

Here’s to the health of the Prince, God bless him.

[_He drinks._]

Ha! it buzzes and stings like a hornet!

And what a scene there, through the door!

The forest behind and the garden before,

And midway an old man of threescore,

With a wife and children that caress him.

Let me try still further to cheer and adorn it

With a merry, echoing blast of my cornet!

[_Goes out blowing his horn._]

_The Castle of Vautsberg on the Rhine._ PRINCE HENRY _and_ ELSIE

_standing on the terrace at evening. The sound of bells heard from a

distance._

_Prince Henry._ We are alone. The wedding guests

Ride down the hill with plumes and cloaks,

And the descending dark invests

The Niederwald, and all the nests

Among its hoar and haunted oaks.

_Elsie._ What bells are those, that ring so slow,

So mellow, musical, and low?

_Prince Henry._ They are the bells of Geisenheim,

That with their melancholy chime

Ring out the curfew of the sun.

_Elsie._ Listen, beloved.

_Prince Henry._ They are done!

Dear Elsie! many years ago

Those same soft bells at eventide

Rang in the ears of Charlemagne,

As, seated by Fastrada’s side

At Ingelheim, in all his pride,

He heard their sound with secret pain.

_Elsie._ Their voices only speak to me

Of peace and deep tranquillity,

And endless confidence in thee!

_Prince Henry._ Thou knowest the story of her ring,

How, when the court went back to Aix,

Fastrada died; and how the king

Sat watching by her night and day,

Till into one of the blue lakes,

Which water that delicious land,

They cast the ring, drawn from her hand;

And the great monarch sat serene

And sad beside the fated shore,

Nor left the land for evermore.

_Elsie._ That was true love.

_Prince Henry._ For him the queen

Ne’er did what thou hast done for me.

_Elsie._ Wilt thou as fond and faithful be?

Wilt thou so love me after death?

_Prince Henry._ In life’s delight, in death’s dismay,

In storm and sunshine, night and day,

In health, in sickness, in decay,

Here and hereafter, I am thine!

Thou hast Fastrada’s ring. Beneath

The calm, blue waters of thine eyes,

Deep in thy steadfast soul it lies,

And, undisturbed by this world’s breath,

With magic light its jewels shine!

This golden ring, which thou hast worn

Upon thy finger since the morn,

Is but a symbol and a semblance,

An outward fashion, a remembrance,

Of what thou wearest within unseen,

O my Fastrada, O my queen!

Behold! the hill-tops all aglow

With purple and with amethyst;

While the whole valley deep below

Is filled, and seems to overflow,

With a fast-rising tide of mist.

The evening air grows damp and chill;

Let us go in.

_Elsie._ Ah, not so soon.

See yonder fire! It is the moon

Slow rising o’er the eastern hill.

It glimmers on the forest tips,

And through the dewy foliage drips

In little rivulets of light,

And makes the heart in love with night.

_Prince Henry._ Oft on this terrace, when the day

Was closing, have I stood and gazed,

And seen the landscape fade away,

And the white vapours rise and drown

Hamlet and vineyard, tower and town,

While far above the hill-tops blazed.

But then another hand than thine

Was gently held and clasped in mine;

Another head upon my breast

Was laid, as thine is now, at rest.

Why dost thou lift those tender eyes

With so much sorrow and surprise?

A minstrel’s, not a maiden’s hand,

Was that in which my own was pressed

A manly form usurped thy place,

A beautiful, but bearded face,

[Illustration:

“_Oft on this terrace, when the day

Was closing, have I stood and gazed,

And seen the landscape fade away._”

]

That now is in the Holy Land,

Yet in my memory from afar

Is shining on us like a star.

But linger not. For, while I speak,

A sheeted spectre white and tall,

The cold mist climbs the castle wall,

And lays his hand upon thy cheek.

[_They go in._]

EPILOGUE.

THE TWO RECORDING ANGELS ASCENDING.

_The Angel of Good Deeds_ (_with closed book_).

God sent his messenger the rain,

And said unto the mountain brook,

“Rise up, and from thy caverns look

And leap, with naked, snow-white feet,

From the cool hills into the heat

Of the broad, arid plain.”

God sent his messenger of faith,

And whispered in the maiden’s heart,

“Rise up, and look from where thou art,

And scatter with unselfish hands

Thy freshness on the barren sands

And solitudes of Death.”

O beauty of holiness,

Of self-forgetfulness, of lowliness!

O power of meekness,

Whose very gentleness and weakness

Are like the yielding, but irresistible air!

Upon the pages

Of the sealed volume that I bear,

The deed divine

Is written in characters of gold,

That never shall grow old,

But through all ages

Burn and shine

With soft effulgence!

O God! it is thy indulgence

That fills the world with the bliss

Of a good deed like this!

_The Angel of Evil Deeds_ (_with open book_).

Not yet, not yet

Is the red sun wholly set,

But evermore recedes,

While open still I bear

The Book of Evil Deeds,

To let the breathings of the upper air

Visit its pages, and erase

The records from its face!

Fainter and fainter as I gaze

In the broad blaze

The glimmering landscape shines,

And below me the black river

Is hidden by wreaths of vapour!

Fainter and fainter the black lines

Begin to quiver

Along the whitening surface of the paper;

Shade after shade

The terrible words grow faint and fade,

And in their place

Runs a white space!

Down goes the sun!

But the soul of one,

Who by repentance

Has escaped the dreadful sentence,

Shines bright below me as I look.

It is the end!

With closèd Book

To God do I ascend.

Lo! over the mountain steeps

A dark, gigantic shadow sweeps

Beneath my feet;

A blackness inwardly brightening

With sudden heat,

As a storm-cloud lurid with lightning.

And a cry of lamentation,

Repeated and again repeated,

Deep and loud

As the reverberation

Of cloud answering unto cloud,

Swells and rolls away in the distance,

As if the sheeted

Lightning retreated,

Baffled and thwarted by the wind’s resistance.

It is Lucifer,

The son of mystery;

And since God suffers him to be,

He, too, is God’s minister,

And labours for some good

By us not understood!

MARTIN LUTHER.

_A Chamber in the Wartburg. Morning._ MARTIN LUTHER _writing_.

_Martin Luther._ Our God a tower of strength is he,

A goodly wall and weapon;

From all our need he helps us free,

That now to us doth happen.

The old evil foe

Doth in earnest grow,

In grim armour dight,

Much guile and great might;

On earth there is none like him.

O yes; a tower of strength indeed,

A present help in all our need,

A sword and buckler is our God.

Innocent men have walked unshod

O’er burning ploughshares, and have trod

Unharmed on serpents in their path,

And laughed to scorn the Devil’s wrath!

Safe in this Wartburg tower I stand

Where God hath led me by the hand,

And look down, with a heart at ease,

Over the pleasant neighbourhoods,

Over the vast Thuringian Woods,

With flash of river, and gloom of trees,

With castles crowning the dizzy heights,

And farms and pastoral delights,

And the morning pouring everywhere

Its golden glory on the air.

Safe, yes, safe am I here at last,

Safe from the overwhelming blast

Of the mouths of Hell, that followed me fast,

And the howling demons of despair

That hunted me like a beast to his lair.

Of our own might we nothing can;

We soon are unprotected;

There fighteth for us the right Man,

Whom God himself elected.

Who is he? ye exclaim;

Christus is his name,

Lord of Sabaoth,

Very God in troth;

The field he holds for ever.

Nothing can vex the Devil more

Than the name of him whom we adore.

Therefore doth it delight me best

To stand in the choir among the rest,

With the great organ trumpeting

Through its metallic tubes, and sing:

_Et Verbum caro factum est_!

These words the Devil cannot endure,

For he knoweth their meaning well!

Him they trouble and repel,

Us they comfort and allure,

And happy it were, if our delight

Were as great as his affright!

Yea, music is the Prophet’s art;

Among the gifts that God hath sent,

One of the most magnificent!

It calms the agitated heart;

Temptations, evil thoughts, and all

The passions that disturb the soul,

Are quelled by its divine control,

As the Evil Spirit fled from Saul,

And his distemper was allayed,

When David took his harp and played.

This world may full of Devils be,

All ready to devour us;

Yet not so sore afraid are we,

They shall not overpower us.

This World’s Prince, howe’er

Fierce he may appear,

He can harm us not,

He is doomed, God wot!

One little word can slay him!

Incredible it seems to some,

And to myself a mystery,

That such weak flesh and blood as we,

Armed with no other shield or sword,

Or other weapon than the Word,

Should combat and should overcome

A spirit powerful as he!

He summons forth the Pope of Rome

With all his diabolic crew,

His shorn and shaven retinue

Of priests and children of the dark;

Kill! kill! they cry, the Heresiarch,

Who rouseth up all Christendom

Against us; and at one fell blow

Seeks the whole Church to overthrow!

Not yet; my hour is not yet come.

Yesterday in an idle mood,

Hunting with others in the wood,

I did not pass the hours in vain,

For in the very heart of all

The joyous tumult raised around,

Shouting of men, and baying of hound,

And the bugle’s blithe and cheery call,

And echoes answering back again,

From crags of the distant mountain chain,—

In the very heart of this, I found

A mystery of grief and pain.

It was an image of the power

Of Satan, hunting the world about,

With his nets and traps and well-trained dogs,

His bishops and priests and theologues,

And all the rest of the rabble rout,

Seeking whom he may devour!

Enough have I had of hunting hares,

Enough of these hours of idle mirth,

Enough of nets and traps and gins!

The only hunting of any worth

Is where I can pierce with javelins

The cunning foxes and wolves and bears,

The whole iniquitous troop of beasts,

The Roman Pope and the Roman priests

That sorely infest and afflict the earth!

Ye nuns, ye singing birds of the air!

The fowler hath caught you in his snare,

And keeps you safe in his gilded cage,

Singing the song that never tires,

To lure down others from their nests;

How ye flutter and beat your breasts,

Warm and soft with young desires,

Against the cruel pitiless wires,

Reclaiming your lost heritage!

Behold! a hand unbars the door,

Ye shall be captives held no more.

The Word they shall perforce let stand,

And little thanks they merit!

For he is with us in the land,

With gifts of his own Spirit!

Though they take our life,

Goods, honours, child, and wife,

Let these pass away,

Little gain have they;

The Kingdom still remaineth!

Yea, it remaineth for evermore,

However Satan may rage and roar,

Though often he whispers in my ears:

What if thy doctrines false should be?

And wrings from me a bitter sweat.

Then I put him to flight with jeers,

Saying: Saint Satan! pray for me;

If thou thinkest I am not saved yet!

And my mortal foes that lie in wait

In every avenue and gate!

As to that odious monk John Tetzel

Hawking about his hollow wares

Like a huckster at village fairs,

And those mischievous fellows, Wetzel,

Campanus, Carlstadt, Martin Cellarius,

And all the busy multifarious

Heretics, and disciples of Arius,

Half-learned, dunce-bold, dry and hard,

They are not worthy of my regard,

Poor and humble as I am.

But ah! Erasmus of Rotterdam,

He is the vilest miscreant

That ever walked this world below!

A Momus, making his mock and mow

At Papist and at Protestant,

Sneering at St. John and St. Paul,

At God and Man, at one and all;

And yet as hollow and false and drear,

As a cracked pitcher to the ear,

And ever growing worse and worse!

Whenever I pray, I pray for a curse

On Erasmus, the Insincere!

Philip Melancthon! thou alone

Faithful among the faithless known,

Thee I hail, and only thee!

Behold the record of us three!

_Res et verba Philippus,

Res sine verbis Lutherus;

Erasmus verba sine re_!

My Philip, prayest thou for me?

Lifted above all earthly care,

From these high regions of the air,

Among the birds that day and night

Upon the branches of tall trees

Sing their lauds and litanies,

Praising God with all their might,

My Philip, unto thee I write.

My Philip! thou who knowest best

All that is passing in this breast;

The spiritual agonies,

The inward deaths, the inward hell,

And the divine new births as well,

That surely follow after these,

As after winter follows spring;

My Philip, in the night-time sing

This song of the Lord I send to thee,

And I will sing it for thy sake,

Until our answering voices make

A glorious antiphony,

And choral chant of victory!

ST. JOHN.

SAINT JOHN _wandering over the face of the Earth_.

_St. John._ The Ages come and go,

The Centuries pass as Years;

My hair is white as the snow,

My feet are weary and slow,

The earth is wet with my tears!

The kingdoms crumble, and fall

Apart, like a ruined wall,

Or a bank that is undermined

By a river’s ceaseless flow,

And leave no trace behind!

The world itself is old;

The portals of Time unfold

On hinges of iron, that grate

And groan with the rust and the weight,

Like the hinges of a gate

That hath fallen to decay;

But the evil doth not cease;

There is war instead of peace,

Instead of love there is hate;

And still I must wander and wait,

Still I must watch and pray,

Not forgetting in whose sight,

A thousand years in their flight

Are as a single day.

The life of man is a gleam

Of light, that comes and goes

Like the course of the Holy Stream,

The cityless river, that flows

From fountains no one knows,

Through the Lake of Galilee,

Through forests and level lands,

Over rocks, and shallows, and sands

Of a wilderness wild and vast,

Till it findeth its rest at last

In the desolate Dead Sea!

But alas! alas for me,

Not yet this rest shall be!

What, then! doth Charity fail?

Is Faith of no avail?

Is Hope blown out like a light

By a gust of wind in the night?

The clashing of creeds, and the strife

Of the many beliefs, that in vain

Perplex man’s heart and brain,

Are nought but the rustle of leaves,

When the breath of God upheaves

The boughs of the Tree of Life,

And they subside again!

And I remember still

The words, and from whom they came,

Not he that repeateth the name,

But he that doeth the will!

And him evermore I behold

Walking in Galilee,

Through the corn-fields waving gold,

In hamlet, in wood, and in wold,

By the shores of the Beautiful Sea.

He toucheth the sightless eyes;

Before him the demons flee;

To the dead he sayeth: Arise!

To the living: Follow me!

And that voice still soundeth on

From the centuries that are gone,

To the centuries that shall be!

From all vain pomps and shows,

From the pride that overflows,

And the false conceits of men;

From all the narrow rules

And subtleties of Schools,

And the craft of tongue and pen;

Bewildered in its search,

Bewildered with the cry:

Lo, here! lo, there, the Church!

Poor, sad Humanity

Through all the dust and heat

Turns back with bleeding feet,

By the weary road it came,

Unto the simple thought

By the Great Master taught,

And that remaineth still:

Not he that repeateth the name

But he that doeth the will!

[Illustration]

_The Song of Hiawatha_

1855.

INTRODUCTION.

Should you ask me, whence these stories?

Whence these legends and traditions,

With the odours of the forest,

With the dew and damp of meadows,

With the curling smoke of wigwams,

With the rushing of great rivers,

With their frequent repetitions,

And their wild reverberations,

As of thunder in the mountains?

I should answer, I should tell you,

“From the forest and the prairies,

From the great lakes of the Northland,

From the land of the Ojibways,

From the land of the Dacotahs,

From the mountains, moors, and fenlands,

Where the heron, the Shuh-shuh-gah,

Feeds among the reeds and rushes,

I repeat them as I heard them

From the lips of Nawadaha,

The musician, the sweet singer.”

Should you ask where Nawadaha

Found these songs, so wild and wayward,

Found these legends and traditions,

I should answer, I should tell you,

“In the birds’-nests of the forest,

In the lodges of the beaver,

In the hoof-prints of the bison,

In the eyrie of the eagle!

“All the wild-fowl sang them to him,

In the moorlands and the fenlands,

In the melancholy marshes;

Chetowaik,[40] the plover, sang them,

Mahng, the loon, the wild goose, Wawa,

The blue heron, the Shuh-shuh-gah,

And the grouse, the Mushkodasa!”

If still further you should ask me,

Saying, “Who was Nawadaha?

Tell us of this Nawadaha,”

I should answer your inquiries

Straightway in such words as follow.

“In the vale of Tawasentha,

In the green and silent valley,

By the pleasant water-courses,

Dwelt the singer Nawadaha.

Round about the Indian village

Spread the meadows and the corn-fields,

And beyond them stood the forest,

Stood the groves of singing pine-trees,

Green in Summer, white in Winter,

Ever sighing, ever singing.

“And the pleasant water-courses,

You could trace them through the valley,

By the rushing in the Spring-time,

By the alders in the Summer,

By the white fog in the Autumn,

By the black line in the Winter;

And beside them dwelt the singer,

In the vale of Tawasentha,

In the green and silent valley.

“There he sang of Hiawatha,

Sang the song of Hiawatha,

Sang his wondrous birth and being,

How he prayed and how he fasted,

How he lived, and toiled, and suffered,

That the tribes of men might prosper,

That he might advance his people!”

Ye who love the haunts of Nature,

Love the sunshine of the meadow,

Love the shadow of the forest,

Love the wind among the branches,

And the rain-shower and the snow-storm,

And the rushing of great rivers

Through their palisades of pine-trees,

And the thunder in the mountains,

Whose innumerable echoes

Flap like eagles in their eyries;—

Listen to these wild traditions,

To this Song of Hiawatha!

Ye who love a nation’s legends,

Love the ballads of a people,

That like voices from afar off

Call to us to pause and listen,

Speak in tones so plain and childlike,

Scarcely can the ear distinguish

Whether they are sung or spoken;—

Listen to this Indian legend,

To this Song of Hiawatha!

Ye whose hearts are fresh and simple,

Who have faith in God and Nature,

Who believe, that in all ages

Every human heart is human,

That in even savage bosoms

There are longings, yearnings, strivings,

For the good they comprehend not,

That the feeble hands and helpless,

Groping blindly in the darkness,

Touch God’s right hand in that darkness,

And are lifted up and strengthened:—

Listen to this simple story,

To this Song of Hiawatha!

Ye, who sometimes, in your rambles

Through the green lanes of the country,

Where the tangled barberry-bushes

Hang their tufts of crimson berries

Over stone walls grey with mosses,

Pause by some neglected graveyard,

For a while to muse, and ponder

On a half-effaced inscription,

Written with little skill of song-craft.

Homely phrases, but each letter

Full of hope and yet of heart-break,

Full of all the tender pathos

Of the Here and the Hereafter;—

Stay and read this rude inscription!

Read this Song of Hiawatha!

[40] The vocabulary will be found in the Appendix with the notes, but

the English word is generally beside the Indian.

I.

THE PEACE-PIPE.

On the Mountains of the Prairie,

On the great Red Pipe-stone Quarry,

Gitche Manito, the mighty,

He the Master of Life descending,

On the red crags of the quarry,

Stood erect, and called the nations,

Called the tribes of men together.

From his footprints flowed a river,

Leaped into the light of morning,

O’er the precipice plunging downward

Gleamed like Ishkoodah, the comet.

And the Spirit, stooping earthward,

With his finger on the meadow

Traced a winding pathway for it,

Saying to it, “Run in this way!”

From the red stone of the quarry

With his hand he broke a fragment,

Moulded it into a pipe-head,

Shaped and fashioned it with figures;

From the margin of the river

Took a long reed for a pipe-stem,

With its dark-green leaves upon it;

Filled the pipe with bark of willow,

With the bark of the red willow;

Breathed upon the neighbouring forest,

Made its great boughs chafe together,

Till in flame they burst and kindled;

And erect upon the mountains,

Gitche Manito, the mighty,

Smoked the calumet, the Peace-Pipe,

As a signal to the nations.

And the smoke rose slowly, slowly,

Through the tranquil air of morning,

First a single line of darkness,

Then a denser, bluer vapour,

Then a snow-white cloud unfolding,

Like the tree-tops of the forest,

Ever rising, rising, rising,

Till it touched the top of heaven,

Till it broke against the heaven,

And rolled outward all around it.

From the Vale of Tawasentha,

From the Valley of Wyoming,

From the groves of Tuscaloosa,

From the far-off Rocky Mountains,

From the Northern lakes and rivers,

All the tribes beheld the signal,

Saw the distant smoke ascending,

The Pukwana of the Peace-Pipe.

And the Prophets of the nations

Said: “Behold it, the Pukwana!

By this signal from afar off,

Bending like a wand of willow,

Waving like a hand that beckons,

Gitche Manito, the mighty,

Calls the tribes of men together,

Calls the warriors to his council!”

Down the rivers, o’er the prairies,

Came the warriors of the nations,

Came the Delawares and Mohawks,

Came the Choctaws and Camanches,

Came the Shoshonies and Blackfeet,

Came the Pawnees and Omahas,

Came the Mandans and Dacotahs,

Came the Hurons and Ojibways,

All the warriors drawn together

By the signal of the Peace-Pipe,

To the Mountains of the Prairie,

To the great Red Pipe-stone Quarry.

And they stood there on the meadow,

With their weapons and their war-gear,

Painted like the leaves of Autumn,

Painted like the sky of morning,

Wildly glaring at each other;

In their faces stern defiance,

In their hearts the feuds of ages,

The hereditary hatred,

The ancestral thirst of vengeance.

Gitche Marnito, the mighty,

The Creator of the nations,

Looked upon them with compassion,

With paternal love and pity;

Looked upon their wrath and wrangling

But as quarrels among children,

But as feuds and fights of children!

Over them he stretched his right hand,

To subdue their stubborn natures,

To allay their thirst and fever,

By the shadow of his right hand;

Spake to them with voice majestic

As the sound of far-off waters,

Falling into deep abysses,

Warning, chiding, spake in this wise: —

“O my children; my poor children!

Listen to the words of wisdom,

Listen to the words of warning,

From the lips of the Great Spirit,

From the Master of Life, who made you!

“I have given you lands to hunt in,

I have given you streams to fish in,

I have given you bear and bison,

I have given you roe and reindeer,

I have given you brant and beaver,

Filled the marshes full of wild-fowl,

Filled the rivers full of fishes;

Why then are you not contented?

Why then will you hunt each other?

“I am weary of your quarrels,

Weary of your wars and bloodshed,

Weary of your prayers for vengeance,

Of your wranglings and dissensions;

All your strength is in your union,

All your danger is in discord;

Therefore be at peace henceforward,

And as brothers live together.

“I will send a Prophet to you,

A Deliverer of the nations,

Who shall guide you and shall teach you,

Who shall toil and suffer with you.

If you listen to his counsels,

You will multiply and prosper;

If his warnings pass unheeded,

You will fade away and perish!

“Bathe now in the stream before you,

Wash the war-paint from your faces,

Wash the blood-stains from your fingers,

Bury your war-clubs and your weapons,

Break the red stone from this quarry,

Mould and make it into Peace-Pipes,

Take the reeds that grow beside you,

Deck them with your brightest feathers,

Smoke the calumet together,

And as brothers live henceforward!”

Then upon the ground the warriors

Threw their cloaks and shirts of deer-skin,

Threw their weapons and their war-gear,

Leaped into the rushing river,

Washed the war-paint from their faces.

Clear above them flowed the water,

Clear and limpid from the footprints

Of the Master of Life descending;

Dark below them flowed the water,

Soiled and stained with streaks of crimson,

As if blood were mingled with it!

From the river came the warriors,

Cleaned and washed from all their war-paint;

On the banks their clubs they buried,

Buried all their warlike weapons.

Gitche Manito, the mighty,

The Great Spirit, the Creator,

Smiled upon his helpless children!

And in silence all the warriors

Broke the red stone of the quarry,

Smoothed and formed it into Peace-Pipes,

Broke the long reeds by the river,

Decked them with their brightest feathers,

And departed each one homeward,

While the Master of Life, ascending,

Through the opening of cloud-curtains,

Through the doorways of the heaven,

Vanished from before their faces,

In the smoke that rolled around him,

The Pukwana of the Peace-Pipe!

II.

THE FOUR WINDS.

“Honour be to Mudjekeewis!”

Cried the warriors, cried the old men,

When he came in triumph homeward

With the sacred Belt of Wampum,

From the regions of the North-Wind,

From the kingdom of Wabasso,

From the land of the White Rabbit.

He had stolen the Belt of Wampum,

From the neck of Mishe-Mokwa,

From the Great Bear of the mountains,

From the terror of the nations,

As he lay asleep and cumbrous

On the summit of the mountains,

Like a rock with mosses on it,

Spotted brown and grey with mosses.

Silently he stole upon him,

Till the red nails of the monster

Almost touched him, almost scared him,

Till the hot breath of his nostrils

Warmed the hands of Mudjekeewis,

As he drew the Belt of Wampum

Over the round ears, that heard not,

Over the small eyes, that saw not,

Over the long nose and nostrils,

The black muffle of the nostrils,

Out of which the heavy breathing

Warmed the hands of Mudjekeewis.

Then he swung aloft his war-club,

Shouted loud and long his war-cry,

Smote the mighty Mishe-Mokwa

In the middle of the forehead,

Right between the eyes he smote him.

With the heavy blow bewildered,

Rose the Great Bear of the mountains;

But his knees beneath him trembled,

And he whimpered like a woman,

As he reeled and staggered forward,

As he sat upon his haunches;

And the mighty Mudjekeewis,

Standing fearlessly before him,

Taunted him in loud derision,

Spake disdainfully in this wise:—

“Hark you, Bear! you are a coward,

And no Brave, as you pretended;

Else you would not cry and whimper

Like a miserable woman!

Bear! you know our tribes are hostile,

Long have been at war together;

Now you find that we are strongest,

You go sneaking in the forest,

You go hiding in the mountains!

Had you conquered me in battle,

Not a groan would I have uttered;

But you, Bear! sit here and whimper,

And disgrace your tribe by crying,

Like a wretched Shaugodaya,

Like a cowardly old woman!”

Then again he raised his war-club,

Smote again the Mishe-Mokwa

In the middle of his forehead,

Broke his skull, as ice is broken

When one goes to fish in Winter.

Thus was slain the Mishe-Mokwa,

He the Great Bear of the mountains,

He the terror of the nations.

“Honour be to Mudjekeewis!”

With a shout exclaimed the people,

“Honour be to Mudjekeewis!

Henceforth he shall be the West-Wind,

And hereafter and for ever

Shall he hold supreme dominion

Over all the winds of heaven.

Call him no more Mudjekeewis,

Call him Kabeyun, the West-Wind!”

Thus was Mudjekeewis chosen

Father of the Winds of Heaven.

For himself he kept the West-Wind,

Gave the others to his children;

Unto Wabun gave the East-Wind,

Gave the South to Shawondasee,

And the North-Wind, wild and cruel,

To the fierce Kabibonokka.

Young and beautiful was Wabun;

He it was who brought the morning,

He it was whose silver arrows

Chased the dark o’er hill and valley;

He it was whose cheeks were painted

With the brightest streaks of crimson,

And whose voice awoke the village,

Called the deer and called the hunter.

Lonely in the sky was Wabun;

Though the birds sang gaily to him,

Though the wild-flowers of the meadow

Filled the air with odours for him,

Though the forests and the rivers

Sang and shouted at his coming,

Still his heart was sad within him,

For he was alone in heaven.

But one morning gazing earthward,

While the village still was sleeping,

And the fog lay on the river,

Like a ghost, that goes at sunrise,

He beheld a maiden walking

All alone upon a meadow,

Gathering water-flags and rushes

By a river in the meadow.

Every morning, gazing earthward,

Still the first thing he beheld there

Was her blue eyes looking at him,

Two blue lakes among the rushes.

And he loved the lonely maiden,

Who thus waited for his coming;

For they both were solitary,

She on earth and he in heaven.

And he wooed her with caresses,

Wooed her with his smile of sunshine,

With his flattering words he wooed her,

With his sighing and his singing,

Gentlest whispers in the branches,

Softest music, sweetest odours,

Till he drew her to his bosom,

Folded in his robes of crimson,

Till into a star he changed her,

Trembling still upon his bosom;

And for ever in the heavens

They are seen together walking,

Wabun and the Wabun-Annung,

Wabun and the Star of Morning.

But the fierce Kabibonokka

Had his dwelling among icebergs,

In the everlasting snow-drifts,

In the kingdom of Wabasso,

In the land of the White Rabbit.

He it was whose hand in Autumn

Painted all the trees with scarlet,

Stained the leaves with red and yellow;

He it was who sent the snow-flakes,

Sifting, hissing through the forest,

Froze the ponds, the lakes, the rivers,

Drove the loon and sea-gull southward,

Drove the cormorant and curlew

To their nests of sedge and sea-tang

In the realms of Shawondasee.

Once the fierce Kabibonokka

Issued from his lodge of snow-drifts,

From his home among the icebergs,

And his hair, with snow besprinkled,

Streamed behind him like a river,

Like a black and wintry river,

As he howled and hurried southward,

Over frozen lakes and moorlands.

There among the reeds and rushes

Found he Shingebis, the diver,

Trailing strings of fish behind him,

O’er the frozen fens and moorlands,

Lingering still among the moorlands,

Though his tribe had long departed

To the land of Shawondasee.

Cried the fierce Kabibonokka,

“Who is this that dares to brave me?

Dares to stay in my dominions,

When the Wawa has departed,

When the wild-goose has gone southward,

And the heron, the Shuh-shuh-gah,

Long ago departed southward?

I will go into his wigwam,

I will put his smouldering fire out!”

And at night Kabibonokka

To the lodge came wild and wailing,

Heaped the snow in drifts about it,

Shouted down into the smoke-flue,

Shook the lodge poles in his fury,

Flapped the curtain of the doorway.

Shingebis, the diver, feared not,

Shingebis, the diver, cared not;

Four great logs had he for fire-wood,

One for each moon of the winter,

And for food the fishes served him.

By his blazing fire he sat there,

Warm and merry, eating, laughing,

Singing, “O Kabibonokka,

You are but my fellow-mortal!”

Then Kabibonokka entered,

And though Shingebis, the diver,

Felt his presence by the coldness,

Felt his icy breath upon him,

Still he did not cease his singing,

Still he did not leave his laughing,

Only turned the log a little,

Only made the fire burn brighter,

Made the sparks fly up the smoke-flue.

From Kabibonokka’s forehead,

From his snow-besprinkled tresses,

Drops of sweat fell fast and heavy,

Making dints upon the ashes,

As along the eaves of lodges,

As from drooping boughs of hemlock,

Drips the melting snow in springtime,

Making hollows in the snow-drifts.

Till at last he rose defeated,

Could not bear the heat and laughter,

Could not bear the merry singing,

But rushed headlong through the doorway,

Stamped upon the crusted snow-drifts,

Stamped upon the lakes and rivers,

Made the snow upon them harder,

Made the ice upon them thicker,

Challenged Shingebis, the diver,

To come forth and wrestle with him,

To come forth and wrestle naked

On the frozen fens and moorlands.

Forth went Shingebis, the diver,

Wrestled all night with the North-Wind,

Wrestled naked on the moorlands

With the fierce Kabibonokka,

Till his panting breath grew fainter,

Till his frozen grasp grew feebler,

Till he reeled and staggered backward,

And retreated, baffled, beaten,

To the kingdom of Wabasso,

To the land of the White Rabbit,

Hearing still the gusty laughter,

Hearing Shingebis, the diver,

Singing, “O Kabibonokka,

You are but my fellow-mortal!”

Shawondasee, fat and lazy,

Had his dwelling far to southward,

In the drowsy, dreamy sunshine,

In the never-ending Summer.

He it was who sent the wood-birds,

Sent the robin, the Opechee,

Sent the blue-bird, the Owaissa,

Sent the Shaw-shaw, sent the swallow,

Sent the wild-goose, Wawa, northward,

Sent the melons and tobacco,

And the grapes in purple clusters.

From his pipe the smoke ascending

Filled the sky with haze and vapour,

Filled the air with dreamy softness,

Gave a twinkle to the water,

Touched the rugged hills with smoothness,

Brought the tender Indian Summer

To the melancholy Northland,

In the dreary Moon of Snow-shoes.

Listless, careless Shawondasee!

In his life he had one shadow,

In his heart one sorrow had he.

Once, as he was gazing northward,

Far away upon a prairie

He beheld a maiden standing,

Saw a tall and slender maiden

All alone upon a prairie;

Brightest green were all her garments,

And her hair was like the sunshine.

Day by day he gazed upon her,

Day by day he sighed with passion,

Day by day his heart within him

Grew more hot with love and longing

For the maid with yellow tresses.

But he was too fat and lazy

To bestir himself and woo her;

Yes, too indolent and easy

To pursue her and persuade her.

So he only gazed upon her,

Only sat and sighed with passion

For the maiden of the prairie.

Till one morning, looking northward,

He beheld her yellow tresses

Changed and covered o’er with whiteness;

Covered as with whitest snow-flakes.

“Ah! my brother from the Northland,

From the kingdom of Wabasso,

From the land of the White Rabbit!

You have stolen the maiden from me,

You have laid your hand upon her,

You have wooed and won my maiden,

With your stories of the Northland!”

Thus the wretched Shawondasee

Breathed into the air his sorrow;

And the South-Wind o’er the prairie

Wandered warm with sighs of passion,

With the sighs of Shawondasee,

Till the air seemed full of snow-flakes,

Full of thistle-down the prairie,

And the maid with hair like sunshine

Vanished from his sight for ever;

Never more did Shawondasee

See the maid with yellow tresses!

Poor, deluded Shawondasee!

’Twas no woman that you gazed at,

’Twas no maiden that you sighed for,

’Twas the prairie dandelion

That through all the dreamy Summer

You had gazed at with such longing,

You had sighed for with such passion,

And had puffed away for ever,

Blown into the air with sighing.

Ah! deluded Shawondasee!

Thus the Four Winds were divided,

Thus the sons of Mudjekeewis

Had their stations in the heavens;

At the corners of the heavens;

For himself the West-Wind only

Kept the mighty Mudjekeewis.

III.

HIAWATHA’S CHILDHOOD.