PART I.

Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Robert Prince, Leonard Johnson and

the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net.

THE POETICAL WORKS

OF

THOMAS HOOD

WITH BIOGRAPHICAL INTRODUCTION

BY

WILLIAM MICHAEL ROSSETTI

ENLARGED AND REVISED EDITION

A. L. BURT COMPANY, PUBLISHERS, 52-58 DUANE STREET, NEW YORK

[Illustration: THOMAS HOOD.]

BIOGRAPHICAL INTRODUCTION.

There were scarcely any events in the life of Thomas Hood. One

condition there was of too potent determining importance--life-long ill

health; and one circumstance of moment--a commercial failure, and

consequent expatriation. Beyond this, little presents itself for record

in the outward facts of this upright and beneficial career, bright with

genius and coruscating with wit, dark with the lengthening and deepening

shadow of death.

The father of Thomas Hood was engaged in business as a publisher and

bookseller in the Poultry, in the city of London,--a member of the firm

of Vernor, Hood, and Sharpe. He was a Scotchman, and had come up to the

capital early in life, to make his way. His interest in books was not

solely confined to their saleable quality. He reprinted various old

works with success; published Bloomfield's poems, and dealt handsomely

with him; and was himself the author of two novels, which are stated to

have had some success in their day. For the sake of the son rather than

the father, one would like to see some account, with adequate

specimens, of these long-forgotten tales; for the queries which Thomas

Hood asks concerning the piteous woman of his _Bridge of Sighs_

interest us all concerning a man of genius, and interest us moreover

with regard to the question of intellectual as well as natural

affinity:--

"Who was his father,

Who was his mother?

Had he a sister,

Had he a brother?"

Another line of work in which the elder Hood is recorded to have been

active was the opening of the English book-trade with America. He

married a sister of the engraver Mr. Sands, and had by her a large

family; two sons and four daughters survived the period of childhood.

The elder brother, James, who died early of consumption, drew well, as

did also one or two of the sisters. It would seem therefore, when we

recall Thomas Hood's aptitudes and frequent miscellaneous practice in

the same line, that a certain tendency towards fine art, as well as

towards literature, ran in the family. The consumption which killed

James appears to have been inherited from his mother; she, and two of

her daughters, died of the same disease; and a pulmonary affection of a

somewhat different kind became, as we shall see, one of the poet's most

inveterate persecutors. The death of the father, which was sudden and

unexpected, preceded that of the mother, but not of James, and left the

survivors in rather straitened circumstances.

Thomas, the second of the two sons, was born in the Poultry, on or

about the 23d of May, 1799. He is stated to have been a retired child,

with much quiet humor; chuckling, we may guess, over his own quaint

imaginings, which must have come in crowds, and of all conceivable or

inconceivable sorts, to judge from the products of his after years;

keeping most of these fancies and surprises to himself, but every now

and then letting some of them out, and giving homely or stolid

bystanders an inkling of insight into the many-peopled crannies of his

boyish brain. He received his education at Dr. Wanostrocht's school at

Clapham. It is not very clear how far this education extended:[1] I

should infer that it was just about enough, and not more than enough,

to enable Hood to shift for himself in the career of authorship,

without serious disadvantage from inadequate early training, and also

without much aid thence derived--without, at any rate, any such rousing

and refining of the literary sense as would warrant us in attributing

to educational influences either the inclination to become an author,

or the manipulative power over language and style which Hood displayed

in his serious poems, not to speak of those of a lighter kind. We seem

to see him sliding, as it were, into the profession of letters, simply

through capacity and liking, and the course of events--not because he

had resolutely made up his mind to be an author, nor because his

natural faculty had been steadily or studiously cultivated. As to

details, it may be remarked that his schooling included some

amount--perhaps a fair average amount--of Latin. We find it stated that

he had a Latin prize at school, but was not apt at the language in

later years. He had however one kind of aptitude at it--being addicted

to the use of familiar Latin quotations or phrases, cited with humorous

verbal perversions.

[Footnote 1: The authority--I might almost say, the _one_

authority--for the life of Hood, is the _Memorials_ published by his

son and daughter. Any point which is not clearly brought out in that

affectionate and interesting record will naturally be equally or more

indefinite in my brief summary, founded as it is on the _Memorials_.]

In all the relations of family life, and the forms of family affection,

Hood was simply exemplary. The deaths of his elder brother and of his

father left him the principal reliance of his mother, herself destined

soon to follow them to the tomb: he was an excellent and devoted son.

His affection for one of his sisters, Anne, who also died shortly

afterwards, is attested in the beautiful lines named _The Deathbed_,--

"We watched her breathing through the night."

At a later date, the loves of a husband and a father seem to have

absorbed by far the greater part of his nature and his thoughts: his

letters to friends are steeped and drenched In "Jane," "Fanny," and

"Tom junior." These letters are mostly divided between perpetual family

details and perennial jocularity: a succession of witticisms, or at

lowest of puns and whimsicalities, mounts up like so many squibs and

crackers, fizzing through, sparkling amid, or ultimately extinguished

by, the inevitable shower--the steady rush and downpour--of the

home-affections. It may easily be inferred from this account that there

are letters which one is inclined to read more thoroughly, and in

greater number consecutively, than Hood's.

The vocation first selected for Hood, towards the age of fifteen, was

one which he did not follow up for long--that of an engraver. He was

apprenticed to his uncle Mr. Sands, and afterwards to one of the Le

Keux family. The occupation was ill-suited to his constantly ailing

health, and this eventually conduced to his abandoning it. He then went

to Scotland to recruit, remaining there among his relatives about five

years.[2] According to a statement made by himself, he was in a

merchant's office within this interval; it is uncertain, however,

whether this assertion is to be accepted as genuine, or as made for

some purpose of fun. His first published writing appeared in the

_Dundee Advertiser_ in 1814--his age being then, at the utmost, fifteen

and a half; this was succeeded by some contribution to a local

magazine. But as yet he had no idea of authorship as a profession.

[Footnote 2: "Two years," according to the _Memorials_; but the dates

for this portion of Hood's life are not accurately given in that work.

Hood completed the fifteenth year of his age in May, 1814. It is

certain, from the dates of his letters, that his sojourn in Scotland

began not later than September, 1815; and the writer of the _Memorials_

himself affirms that Hood "returned to London about 1820," in or before

July. If so, he was in Scotland about _five_ years; and, from the fact

that he had written in a Dundee newspaper in 1814, one might even

surmise that the term of six years was nearer the mark. At any rate, as

he had reached Scotland by September, 1815, he was there soon after

completing his sixteenth year: yet Mr. Hessey (_Memorials_, p. 23) says

that he was articled to the engraving business "at the age of fifteen

or sixteen," and his apprenticeship, according to Mr. Hood, junior,

lasted "some years" even _before_ his transfer from Mr. Sands to Mr. Le

Keux. The apprenticeship did not begin until after the father's death;

but the year of that death is left unspecified, though the day and

month are given. These dates, as the reader will readily perceive, are

sometimes vague, and sometimes contradictory. In the text of my notice,

I have endeavored to pick my way through their discrepancies.]

Towards the middle of the year 1820, Hood was re-settled in London,

improved in health, and just come of age. At first he continued

practising as an engraver; but in 1821 he began to act as a sort of

sub-editor for the _London Magazine_ after the death of the editor,

Mr. Scott, in a duel. He concocted fictitious and humorous answers to

correspondents--a humble yet appropriate introduction to the insatiable

habit and faculty for out-of-the-way verbal jocosity which marked-off

his after career from that of all other excellent poets.

His first regular contribution to the magazine, in July, 1821, was a

little poem _To Hope_: even before this, as early at any rate as 1815,

he was in the frequent practice of writing correctly and at some length

in verse, as witnessed by selections, now in print, from what he had

composed for the amusement of his relatives. Soon afterwards, a private

literary society was the recipient of other verses of the same order.

The lines _To Hope_ were followed, in the _London Magazine_, by the

_Ode to Dr. Kitchener_ and some further poems, including the important

work, _Lycus the Centaur_--after the publication of which, there could

not be much doubt of the genuine and uncommon powers of the new writer.

The last contribution of Hood to this magazine was the _Lines to a Cold

Beauty_. Another early work of his, and one which, like the verses _To

the Moon_, affords marked evidence of the impression which he had

received from Keats's poetry, is the unfinished drama (or, as he termed

it, "romance") of _Lamia_: I do not find its precise date recorded. Its

verse is lax, and its tone somewhat immature; yet it shows a great deal

of sparkling and diversified talent. Hood certainly takes a rather more

rational view than Keats did of his subject as a moral invention, or a

myth having some sort of meaning at its root. A serpent transformed

into a woman, who beguiles a youth of the highest hopes into amorous

languid self-abandonment, is clearly not, in morals, the sort of person

that ought to be left uncontrolled to her own devices. Keats

ostentatiously resents the action of the unimpassioned philosopher

Appollonius in revealing the true nature of the woman-serpent, and

dissolving her spell. An elderly pedant to interfere with the pretty

whims of a viper when she wears the outer semblance of a fine woman!

Intolerable!

(Such is the sentiment of Keats; but such plainly is not altogether the

conviction of Hood, although his story remains but partially

developed.)

By this time it may have become pretty clear to himself and others that

his proper vocation and destined profession was literature. Through the

_London Magazine_, he got to know John Hamilton Reynolds (author of the

_Garden of Florence_ and other poems, and a contributor to this serial

under the pseudonym of Edward Herbert), Charles Lamb, Allan Cunningham,

De Quincey, and other writers of reputation. To Hood the most directly

important of all these acquaintances was Mr. Reynolds; this gentleman

having a sister, Jane, to whom Hood was introduced. An attachment

ensued, and shortly terminated in marriage, the wedding taking place on

the 5th of May, 1824. The father of Miss Reynolds was the head

writing-master at Christ Hospital. She is stated to have had good

manners, a cultivated mind, and literary tastes, though a high

educational standard is not always traceable in her letters. At any

rate the marriage was a happy one; Mrs. Hood being a tender and

attentive wife, unwearied in the cares which her husband's precarious

health demanded, and he being (as I have said) a mirror of marital

constancy and devotion, distinguishable from a lover rather by his

intense delight in all domestic relations and details than by any

cooling-down in his fondness. It would appear that, in the later years

of Hood's life, he was not on entirely good terms with some members of

his wife's family, including his old friend John Hamilton Reynolds.

What may have caused this I do not find specified: all that we know of

the character of Hood justifies us in thinking that he was little or

not at all to blame, for he appears throughout a man of just,

honorable, and loving nature, and free besides from that sort of

self-assertion which invites a collision. Every one, however, has his

blemishes; and we may perhaps discern in Hood a certain over-readiness

to think himself imposed upon, and the fellow-creatures with whom he

had immediately to do a generation of vipers--a state of feeling not

characteristic of a mind exalted and magnanimous by habit, or "gentle"

in the older and more significant meaning of the term.

The time was now come for Hood to venture a volume upon the world.

Conjointly with Reynolds, he wrote, and published in 1825, his _Odes

and Addresses to Great People_. The title-page bore no author's name;

but the extraordinary talent and point of the work could hardly fail to

be noticed, even apart from its appeal to immediate popularity, dealing

as it did so continually with the uppermost topics of the day. It had

what it deserved, a great success. This volume was followed, in 1826,

by the first series of _Whims and Oddities_, which also met with a good

sale; the second series appeared in 1827. Next came two volumes of

_National Tales_, somewhat after the manner of Boccaccio (but how far

different from his spirit may easily be surmised), which are now little

known. The volume containing the _Plea of the Midsummer Fairies, Hero

and Leander_, and some other of Hood's most finished and noticeable

poems, came out in 1827. _The Midsummer Fairies_ itself was one of the

authors own favorite works, and certainly deserved to be so, as far as

dainty elegance of motive and of execution is concerned: but the

conception was a little too ingeniously remote for the public to ratify

the author's predilection. The _Hero and Leander_ will be at once

recognized as modelled on the style of Elizabethan narrative poems:

indeed Marlow treated the very same subject, and his poem, left

uncompleted, was finished by Chapman. Hood's is a most astonishing

example of revivalist poetry: it is reproductive and spontaneous at the

same time. It resembles its models closely, not

servilely--significantly, not mechanically; and has the great merit of

resembling them with comparative moderation. Elizabethan here both in

spirit and in letter, Hood is nevertheless a little less extreme than

his prototypes. Where they loaded, he does not find it needful to

overload, which is the ready and almost the inevitable resource of

revivalists, all but the fewest: on the contrary, he alleviates a

little,--but only a little.

In 1829 appeared the most famous of all his poems of a narrative

character--_The Dream of Eugene Aram_; it was published in the _Gem_,

an annual which the poet was then editing. Besides this amount of

literary activity, Hood continued writing in periodicals, sometimes

under the signature of "Theodore M."

His excessive and immeasurable addiction to rollicking fun, to the

perpetual "cracking of jokes" (for it amounts to that more definitely

than to anything else in the domain of the Comic Muse), is a somewhat

curious problem, taken in connection with his remarkable genius and

accomplishment as a poet, and his personal character as a solid

housekeeping citizen, bent chiefly upon rearing his family in

respectability, and paying his way, or, as the Church Catechism has

neatly and unimprovably expressed it, upon "doing his duty in that

state of life to which it had pleased God to call him." His almost

constant ill-health, and, in a minor degree, the troubles which beset

him in money-matters, make the problem all the more noticeable. The

influence of Charles Lamb may have had something to do with

it,--probably not very much. Perhaps there was something in the

literary atmosphere or the national tone of the time which gave

comicality a turn of predominance after the subsiding of the great

poetic wave which filled the last years of the eighteenth and the first

quarter of the nineteenth century in our country, in Blake, Burns,

Wordsworth, Scott, Coleridge, Landor, Byron, Keats, and, supreme among

all, Shelley. Something of the same transition may be noticed in the

art of design; the multifarious illustrator in the prior generation is

Stothard,--in the later, Cruikshank. At any rate, in literature, Lamb,

Hood, and then Dickens in his earliest works, the _Sketches by Boz_ and

_Pickwick_, are uncommonly characteristic and leading minds, and bent,

with singular inveteracy, upon being "funny,"--though not funny and

nothing else at all. But we should not force this consideration too

far: Hood is a central figure in the group and the period, and the

tendency of the time may be almost as much due to him as he to the

tendency. Mainly, we have to fall back upon his own idiosyncrasy: he

was born with a boundlessly whimsical perception, which he trained into

an inimitable sleight-of-hand in the twisting of notions and of words;

circumstances favored his writing for fugitive publications and

skimming readers, rather than under conditions of greater permanency;

and the result is as we find it in his works. His son expresses the

opinion that part of Hood's success in comic writing arose from his

early reading of _Humphrey Clinker_, _Tristram Shandy_, _Tom Jones_,

and other works of that period, and imbuing himself with their style: a

remark, however, which applies to his prose rather than his poetical

works. Certain it is that the appetite for all kinds of fun, verbal and

other was a part of Hood's nature. We see it in the practical jokes he

was continually playing on his good-humored wife--such as altering into

grotesque absurdity many of the words contained in her letters to

friends: we see it--the mere animal love of jocularity, as it might be

termed--in such a small point as his frequently addressing his friend

Philip de Franck, in letters, by the words, "Tim, says he," instead of

any human appellative[3] Hood reminds us very much of one of

Shakespeare's Fools (to use the word in no invidious sense) transported

into the nineteenth century,--the Fool in _King Lear_, or Touchstone.

For the occasional sallies of coarseness or ribaldry, the spirit of the

time has substituted a _bourgeois_ good-humor which respects the family

circle, and haunts the kitchen-stairs; for the biting jeer, intended to

make some victim uncomfortable, it gives the sarcastic or sprightly

banter, not unconscious of an effort at moral amelioration; for the

sententious sagacity, and humorous enjoyment of the nature of man, it

gives bright thoughts and a humanitarian sympathy. But, on the whole,

the intellectual personality is nearly the same: seeking by natural

affinity, and enjoying to the uttermost, whatever tends to lightness of

heart and to ridicule--thus dwelling indeed in the region of the

commonplace and the gross, but constantly informing it with some

suggestion of poetry, somewise side-meaning, or some form of sweetness

and grace. These observations relate of course to Hood's humorous

poems: into his grave and pathetic poems he can import qualities still

loftier than these--though even here it is not often that he utterly

forswears quaintness and oddity. The risible, the fantastic, was his

beacon-light; sometimes as delicate as a dell of glow-worms; sometimes

as uproarious as a bonfire; sometimes, it must be said (for he had to

be perpetually writing whether the inspiration came or not, or his

inspiration was too liable to come from the very platitudes and

pettinesses of everyday life), not much more brilliant than a

rush-light, and hardly more aromatic than the snuff of a tallow candle.

[Footnote 3: This "Tim, says he," is a perfect _gag_ in many of Hood's

letters. It is curious to learn what was the kind of joke which could

assume so powerful an ascendant over the mind and associations of this

great humorist. Here it is, as given in the Hood _Memorials_ from _Sir

Jonah Barrington's Memoirs_:--

"'Tim,' says he--

'Sir,' says he--

'Fetch me my hat, says he;

'That I may go,' says he,

'To Timahoe,' says he,

'And go to the fair,' says he,

'And see all that's there,' says he.--

'First pay what you owe,' says he;

'And then you may go,' says he,

'To Timahoe,' says he,

'And go to the fair,' says he,

'And see all that's there,' says he.--

'Now by this and by that,' says he,

'Tim, hang up my hat,' says he."]

We must now glance again at Hood's domestic affairs. His first child

had no mundane existence worth calling such; but has nevertheless lived

longer than most human beings in the lines which Lamb wrote for the

occasion, _On an Infant dying as soon as born_. A daughter followed,

and in 1830 was born his son, the Tom Hood who became editor of the

comic journal _Fun_, and died in 1874. At the time of his birth, the

family was living at Winchmore Hill: thence they removed about 1832, to

the Lake House, Wanstead, a highly picturesque dwelling, but scanty in

domestic comforts. The first of the _Comic Annual_ series was brought

out at Christmas, 1830. In the following couple of years, Hood did some

theatrical work; writing the libretto for an English opera which (it is

believed) was performed at the Surrey Theatre. Its name is now unknown,

but it had a good run in its day; a similar fate has befallen an

entertainment which he wrote for Mathews. He also composed a pantomime

for the Adelphi; and, along with Reynolds, dramatized _Gil Blas_. This

play is understood to have been acted at Drury Lane. The novel of

_Tylney Hall_, and the poem of the _Epping Hunt_, were written at

Wanstead.

Born in comfortable mediocrity, and early inured to narrow fortunes,

Hood had no doubt entered upon the literary calling without expecting

or caring to become rich. Hitherto, however, he seems to have prospered

progressively, and to have had no reason to regret, even in a wordly

sense, his choice of a profession. But towards the end of 1834 a

disaster overtook him; and thenceforth, to the end of his days, he had

nothing but tedious struggling and uphill work. To a man of his buoyant

temperament, and happy in his home, this might have been of no extreme

consequence, if only sound health had blessed him: unfortunately, the

very reverse was the case. Sickly hitherto, he was soon to become

miserably and hopelessly diseased: he worked on through everything

bravely and uncomplainingly, but no doubt with keen throbs of

discomfort, and not without detriment at times to the quality of his

writings. The disaster adverted to was the failure of a firm with which

Hood was connected, entailing severe loss upon him. With his accustomed

probity, he refused to avail himself of any legal immunities, and

resolved to meet his engagements in full eventually; but it became

requisite that he should withdraw from England. He proposed to settle

down in some one of the towns on the Rhine, and circumstances fixed his

choice on Coblentz. A great storm which overtook him during the passage

to Rotterdam told damagingly on his already feeble health. Coblentz,

which he reached in March, 1835, pleased him at first; though it was

not long before he found himself a good deal of an Englishman, and his

surroundings vexatiously German. After a while he came to consider a

German Jew and a Jew German nearly convertible terms; and indulged at

times in considerable acrimony of comment, such as a reader of

cosmopolitan temper is not inclined to approve. He had, however, at

least one very agreeable acquaintance at Coblentz--Lieutenant Philip de

Franck, an officer in the Prussian service, of partly English

parentage: the good-fellowship which he kept up with this amiable

gentleman, both in personal intercourse and by letter, was (as we have

seen) even boyishly vivacious and exuberant. In the first instance Hood

lived at No. 372 Castor Hof, where his family joined him in the Spring

of 1835: about a year later, they removed to No. 752 Alten Graben.

Spasms in the chest now began to be a trying and alarming symptom of

his ill-health, which, towards the end of 1836, took a turn for the

worse; he never afterwards rallied very effectually, though the

fluctuations were numerous--(in November, 1838, for instance, he

fancied that a radical improvement had suddenly taken place)--and at

times the danger was imminent. The unfavorable change in question was

nearly simultaneous with a visit which he made to Berlin, accompanying

Lieutenant de Franck and his regiment, on their transfer to Bromberg:

the rate of travelling was from fifteen to twenty English miles per

diem, for three days consecutively, and then one day of rest. Hood

liked the simple unextortionate Saxon folk whom he encountered on the

route, and contrasted them with the Coblentzers, much to the

disadvantage of the latter. By the beginning of December he was back in

his Rhineland home; but finally quitted it towards May, 1837. Several

attacks of blood-spitting occurred in the interval; at one time Hood

proposed for himself the deadly-lively epitaph, "Here lies one who spat

more blood and made more puns than any other man."

About this time he was engaged in writing _Up the Rhine_; performing,

as was his wont, the greater part of the work during the night-hours.

The sojourn at Coblentz was succeeded by a sojourn at Ostend; in which

city--besides the sea, which Hood always supremely delighted in--he

found at first more comfort in the ordinary mode of living, including

the general readiness at speaking or understanding English. Gradually,

however, the climate, extremely damp and often cold, proved highly

unsuitable to him; and, when he quitted Ostend in the Spring of 1840,

at the close of nearly three years' residence there, it was apparent

that his stay had already lasted too long. Within this period the

publication of _Hood's Own_ had occurred, and put to a severe trial

even _his_ unrivalled fertility in jest: one of his letters speaks of

the difficulty of being perfectly original in the jocose vein, more

especially with reference to the concurrent demands of _Hood's Own_,

and of the _Comic Annual_ of the year. At the beginning of 1839 he paid

a visit of about three weeks to his often-regretted England, staying

with one of his oldest and most intimate friends, Mr. Dilke, then

editor of the _Athenæum_. Another of his best friends--one indeed who

continued to the end roost unwearied and affectionate in his

professional and other attentions, Dr. Elliot--now made a medical

examination of Hood's condition. He pronounced the lungs to be

organically sound; the chief seat of disease being the liver, and the

heart, which was placed lower down than usual. At a later stage of the

disease, enlargement of the heart is mentioned, along with hæmorrhage

from the lungs consequent on that malady, and recurring with terrible

frequency: to these dropsy, arising from extreme weakness, was

eventually superadded. Indeed, the catalogue of the illnesses of the

unconquerably hilarious Hood, and the details of his sufferings, are

painful to read. They have at least the merit of giving a touch of

adventitious but intimate pathos even to some of his wildest

extravagances of verbal fence,--and of enhancing our sympathy and

admiration for the force and beauty of his personal character, which

could produce work such as this out of a torture of body and spirit

such as that. During this visit to London, Hood scrutinized his

publishing and other accounts, and found them sufficiently encouraging.

The first edition of _Up the Rhine_, consisting of 1500 copies, sold

off In a fortnight. Soon, however, some vexations with publishers

ensued: Hood felt it requisite to take legal proceedings, and the

action lingered on throughout and beyond the brief remainder of his

life. Thus his prospects were again blighted, and his means crippled

when most they needed to be unembarrassed.

The poet was back in England from Ostend in April 1840; and, under

medical advice, he determined to prolong his visit into a permanent

re-settlement in his native London. Here therefore he remained and

returned, no more to the Continent. He took a house, with his family,

in Camberwell, not far from the Green; removing afterwards to St.

John's Wood, and finally to another house in the same district,

Devonshire Lodge, Finchley Road. He wrote in the _New Monthly

Magazine_, then edited by Theodore Hook: his _Rhymes for the Times_,

the celebrated _Miss Kilmansegg_, and other compositions, first

appeared here. Hook dying in August 1841, Hood was invited to succeed

him as editor, and closed with the offer: this gave him an annual

salary of £300, besides the separate payments for any articles that he

wrote. The _Song of the Shirt_, which it would be futile to praise or

even to characterize, came out, anonymously of course, in the Christmas

number of _Punch_ for 1843: it ran like wildfire, and rang like a

tocsin, through the land. Immediately afterwards, in January 1844,

Hood's connection with the _New Monthly_ closed, and he started a

publication of his own, _Hood's Magazine_, which was a considerable

success: more than half the first number was the actual handiwork of

the editor. Many troubles and cross-purposes, however, beset the new

periodical; difficulties with which Hood was ill fitted, by his now

rapidly and fatally worsening health, to cope. They pestered him when

he was most in need of rest; and he was in need of rest when most he

was wanted to control the enterprise. _The Haunted House_, and various

other excellent poems by Hood, were published in this magazine.

His last days and final agonies were a little cheered by the granting

of a Government pension of £100, dating from June 1844, which, with

kindly but ominous foresight, was conferred upon Mrs. Hood, as likely

to prove the survivor. This was during the ministry of Sir Robert Peel,

whose courteous communications to the poet, and expressions of direct

personal interest in his writings, made the boon all the more

acceptable. Hood, indeed, had not been directly concerned in soliciting

it. At a somewhat earlier date, January 1841, the Literary Society had,

similarly unasked, voted him a sum of £50; but this he returned,

although his circumstances were such as might have made it by no means

unwelcome. From Christmas 1844 he was compelled to take to his bed, and

was fated never to leave his room again. The ensuing Spring, throughout

which the poet lay seemingly almost at the last gasp day by day, was a

lovely one. At times he was delirious; but mostly quite clear in mind,

and full of gentleness and resignation. "Dying, dying," were his last

words; and shortly before, "Lord, say 'Arise, take up thy cross, and

follow me.'" On the 3d of May 1845 he lay dead.

Hood's funeral took place in Kensal Green Cemetery: it was a quiet one,

but many friends attended. His faithful and loving wife would not be

long divided from him. Eighteen months later she was laid beside him,

dying of an illness first contracted from her constant tendance on his

sick-bed. In the closing period of his life, Hood could hardly bear her

being out of his sight, or even write when she was away. Some years

afterwards, a public subscription was got up, and a monument erected to

mark the grave of the good man and true poet who "sang the Song of the

Shirt."

The face of Hood is best known by two busts and an oil-portrait which

have both been engraved from. It is a sort of face to which apparently

a bust does more than justice, yet less than right. The features, being

mostly by no means bad ones, look better, when thus reduced to the mere

simple and abstract contour, than they probably showed in reality, for

no one supposed Hood to be a fine-looking man; on the other hand, the

_value_ of the face must have been in its shifting expression--keen,

playful, or subtle--and this can be but barely suggested by the

sculptor. The poet's visage was pallid, his figure slight, his voice

feeble; he always dressed in black, and is spoken of as presenting a

generally clerical aspect. He was remarkably deficient in ear for

music--not certainly for the true chime and varied resources of verse.

His aptitude for the art of design was probably greater than might be

inferred from the many comic woodcut-drawings which he has left. These

are irresistibly ludicrous--(who would not laugh over "The Spoiled

Child"--"What next? as the Frog said when his tail fell off"--and a

host of others?)--and all the more ludicrous and effective for being

drawn more childishly and less artistically than was within Hood's

compass. One may occasionally see some water-color landscape-bit or the

like from his hands pleasantly done; and during his final residence in

England he acted upon an idea he had long entertained, and produced

some little in the way of oil-painting. He was also ingenious in any

sort of light fancy-work--such, for instance, as carving the scenery

for a child's theatre which formed the delight of his little son and

daughter. His religious faith was, according to the writers of the

_Memorials_, deep and sincere, though his opposition to sectarian

narrowness and spite of all sorts was vigorous, and caused him

sometimes to be regarded as anti-religious. A letter of his to a

tract-giving and piously censorious lady who had troubled him

(published in the same book) is absolutely fierce, and indeed hardly to

be reconciled with the courtesy due to a woman, as a mere question of

sex. It would be convenient, I may observe, to know more plainly what

the biographers mean by such expressions as "religious faith,"

"Christian gentleman," and the like. They are not explained, for

instance, by adding that Hood honored the Bible too much to make it a

task-book for his children. "Religious faith" covers many very serious

differences of sentiment and conviction, between natural theology and

historical Christianity; and, on hearing that a man possessed religious

faith, one would like to learn which of the two extremes this faith was

more nearly conversant with. In respect of political or social opinion,

Hood appears to have been rather humane and philanthropic than

democratic, or "liberal" in the distinct technical sense. His favorite

theory of government, as he said in a letter to Peel, was "an angel

from heaven, and a despotism." He loved neither whigs nor tories, but

was on the side of a national policy: war was his abhorrence, and so

were the wicked corn-laws--an oligarchical device which survived him,

but not for long. His private generosity, not the less true or hearty

for the limits which a precarious and very moderate income necessarily

imposed on it, was in accordance with the general sentiments of

kindness which he was wont to express both in public and private: if he

preached, he did not forget to practise.

It has been well said[4] that "the predominant characteristics of his

genius are humorous fancies grafted upon melancholy impressions." Yet

the term "grafted" seems hardly strong enough. Hood appears, by natural

bent and permanent habit of mind, to have seen and sought for

ludicrousness under all conditions--it was the first thing that struck

him as a matter of intellectual perception or choice. On the other

hand, his nature being poetic, his sympathies acute, and the condition

of his life morbid, he very frequently wrote in a tone of deep and

indeed melancholy feeling, and was a master both of his own art and of

the reader's emotion; but, even in work of this sort, the intellectual

execration, when it takes precedence of the general feeling, is

continually fantastic, grotesque, or positively mirthful. And so again

with those of his works--including rude designs along with finished or

off-hand writing--which are professedly comical: the funny twist of

thought is the essential thing, and the most gloomy or horrible

subject-matter is often selected as the occasion for the horse-laugh.

In some of his works indeed (we might cite the poems named _The Dead

Robbery_, _The Forge_, and _The Supper Superstition_) the horse-laugh

almost passes into a nightmare laugh. A ghoul might seem to have set it

going, and laughing hyenas to be chorusing it. A man of such a faculty

and such a habit of work could scarcely, in all instances, keep himself

within the bounds of good taste--a term which people are far too ready

to introduce into serious discussions, for the purpose of casting

disparagement upon some work which transcends the ordinary standards of

appreciation, but a term nevertheless which has its important meaning

and its true place. Hood is too often like a man grinning awry, or

interlarding serious and beautiful discourse with a nod, a wink, or a

leer, neither requisite nor convenient as auxiliaries to his speech:

and to do either of these things is to fail in perfect taste.

Sometimes, not very often, we are allowed to reach the close of a poem

of his without having our attention jogged and called off by a single

interpolation of this kind; and then we feel unalloyed--what we

constantly feel also even under the contrary conditions--how exquisite

a poetic sense and how choice a cunning of hand were his. On the whole,

we can pronounce Hood the finest English poet between the generation of

Shelley and the generation of Tennyson.

[Footnote 4: Horne's _New Spirit of the Age_.]

CONTENTS.

To Hope

The Departure of Summer

The Sea of Death

To an Absentee

Lycus the Centaur

The Two Peacocks of Bedfont

Hymn to the Sun

Midnight

To a Sleeping Child

To Fancy

Fair Ines

To a False Friend

Ode--Autumn

Sonnet--Silence

Sonnet

Sonnet--to an Enthusiast

To a Cold Beauty

Sonnet--Death

Serenade

Verses in an Album

The Forsaken

Song

Song

Birthday Verses

I Love Thee

Lines

False Poets and True

The Two Swans

Ode on a Distant Prospect of Clapham Academy

Song

The Water Lady

Autumn

I Remember, I Remember!

The Poet's Portion

Ode to the Moon

Sonnet

A Retrospective Review

Ballad

Time, Hope and Memory

Flowers

Ballad

Ruth

The Plea of the Midsummer Fairies

Hero and Leander

Ballad

Autumn

Ballad

The Exile

To ----

Ode to Melancholy

Sonnet--to my Wife

Sonnet on Receiving a Gift

Sonnet

The Dream of Eugene Aram

Sonnet--for the 14th of February

The Death-Bed

Anticipation

To a Child Embracing his Mother

Stanzas

Sonnet to Ocean

To ----

Lines

Stanzas

Ode to Rae Wilson, Esq.

To my Daughter

Miss Kelmansegg and her Precious Leg

The Lee Shore

Sonnet

The Elm Tree

Lear

Sonnet

The Song of the Shirt

The Pauper's Christmas Carol

The Haunted House

The Mary

The Lady's Dream

The Key

The Workhouse Clock

The Bridge of Sighs

The Lay of the Laborer

Stanzas

Ode to Mr. Graham

A _Friendly_ Address to Mrs. Fry _in_ Newgate

Ode to Richard Martin, Esq.

Ode to the Great Unknown

Ode to Joseph Grimaldi, Senior

An Address to the Steam Washing Company

Ode to Captain Parry

Ode to W. Kitchener, M. D.

The Last Man

Faithless Sally Brown

As it Fell Upon a Day

The Stag-eyed Lady

The Irish Schoolmaster

Faithless Nelly Gray

Bianca's Dream

The Demon-ship

Tim Turpin

Death's Ramble

A Sailor's Apology for Bow-Legs

The Volunteer

The Epping Hunt

The Drowning Ducks

A Storm at Hastings

Lines to a Lady

The Angler's Farewell

Ode--to the Advocates for the Removal of Smithfield Market

A Report from Below

"I'm not a Single Man"

The Supper Superstition

The Duel

A Singular Exhibition at Somerset House

Lines to Mary

The Compass with Variations

The Ghost

The Fall

Our Village

A Public Dinner

Sally Simpkin's Lament

Ode to Sir Andrew Agnew, Bart

The Lost Heir

The Fox and the Hen

The Poacher

A Waterloo Ballad

A Lay of Real Life

The Sweep's Complaint

The Desert-Born

Agricultural Distress

Domestic Poems

The Green Man

Hit or Miss

The Forlorn Shepherd's Complaint

Lieutenant Luff

Morning Meditations

A Plain Direction

The Assistant Drapers' Petition

The Bachelor's Dream

Rural Felicity

A Flying Visit

Queen Mab

To Henrietta

A Parthian Glance

A True Story

The Mermaid of Margate

A Fairy Tale

Craniology

The Wee Man

The Progress of Art

Those Evening Bells

The Carelesse Nurse Mayd

Domestic Asides

Shooting Pains

John Day

Huggins and Duggins

The China-Mender

Domestic Didactics

Lament for the Decline of Chivalry

Playing at Soldiers

Mary's Ghost

The Widow

An Open Question

A Black Job

Etching Moralised

A Tale of a Trumpet

The Forge

The University Feud

HOOD'S POETICAL WORKS.

TO HOPE.

Oh! take, young Seraph, take thy harp,

And play to me so cheerily;

For grief is dark, and care is sharp,

And life wears on so wearily.

Oh! take thy harp!

Oh! sing as thou wert wont to do,

When, all youth's sunny season long,

I sat and listened to thy song,

And yet 'twas ever, ever new,

With magic in its heaven-tuned string--

The future bliss thy constant theme.

Oh! then each little woe took wing

Away, like phantoms of a dream;

As if each sound

That flutter'd round,

Had floated over Lethe's stream!

By all those bright and happy hours

We spent in life's sweet eastern bow'rs,

Where thou wouldst sit and smile, and show,

Ere buds were come, where flowers would blow,

And oft anticipate the rise

Of life's warm sun that scaled the skies;

By many a story of love and glory,

And friendships promised oft to me;

By all the faith I lent to thee,--

Oh! take, young Seraph, take thy harp,

And play to me so cheerily;

For grief is dark, and care is sharp,

And life wears on so wearily.

Oh! take thy harp!

Perchance the strings will sound less clear,

That long have lain neglected by

In sorrow's misty atmosphere;

It ne'er may speak as it hath spoken

Such joyous notes so brisk and high;

But are its golden chords all broken?

Are there not some, though weak and low,

To play a lullaby to woe?

But thou canst sing of love no more,

For Celia show'd that dream was vain;

And many a fancied bliss is o'er,

That comes not e'en in dreams again.

Alas! alas!

How pleasures pass,

And leave thee now no subject, save

The peace and bliss beyond the grave!

Then be thy flight among the skies:

Take, then, oh! take the skylark's wing,

And leave dull earth, and heavenward rise

O'er all its tearful clouds, and sing

On skylark's wing!

Another life-spring there adorns

Another youth--without the dread

Of cruel care, whose crown of thorns

Is here for manhood's aching head.

Oh! there are realms of welcome day,

A world where tears are wiped away!

Then be thy flight among the skies:

Take, then, oh! take the skylark's wing,

And leave dull earth, and heavenward rise

O'er all its tearful clouds, and sing

On skylark's wing!

THE DEPARTURE OF SUMMER.

Summer is gone on swallows' wings,

And Earth has buried all her flowers:

No more the lark,--the linnet--sings,

But Silence sits in faded bowers.

There is a shadow on the plain

Of Winter ere he comes again,--

There is in woods a solemn sound

Of hollow warnings whisper'd round,

As Echo in her deep recess

For once had turn'd a prophetess.

Shuddering Autumn stops to list,

And breathes his fear in sudden sighs,

With clouded face, and hazel eyes

That quench themselves, and hide in mist.

Yes, Summer's gone like pageant bright;

Its glorious days of golden light

Are gone--the mimic suns that quiver,

Then melt in Time's dark-flowing river.

Gone the sweetly-scented breeze

That spoke in music to the trees;

Gone--for damp and chilly breath,

As if fresh blown o'er marble seas,

Or newly from the lungs of Death.

Gone its virgin roses' blushes,

Warm as when Aurora rushes

Freshly from the God's embrace,

With all her shame upon her face.

Old Time hath laid them in the mould;

Sure he is blind as well as old,

Whose hand relentless never spares

Young cheeks so beauty-bright as theirs!

Gone are the flame-eyed lovers now

From where so blushing-blest they tarried

Under the hawthorn's blossom-bough,

Gone; for Day and Night are married.

All the light of love is fled:--

Alas! that negro breasts should hide

The lips that were so rosy red,

At morning and at even-tide!

Delightful Summer! then adieu

Till thou shalt visit us anew:

But who without regretful sigh

Can say, adieu, and see thee fly?

Not he that e'er hath felt thy pow'r.

His joy expanding like a flow'r,

That cometh after rain and snow,

Looks up at heaven, and learns to glow:--

Not he that fled from Babel-strife

To the green sabbath-land of life,

To dodge dull Care 'mid clustered trees,

And cool his forehead in the breeze,--

Whose spirit, weary-worn perchance,

Shook from its wings a weight of grief,

And perch'd upon an aspen leaf,

For every breath to make it dance.

Farewell!--on wings of sombre stain,

That blacken in the last blue skies,

Thou fly'st; but thou wilt come again

On the gay wings of butterflies.

Spring at thy approach will sprout

Her new Corinthian beauties out,

Leaf-woven homes, where twitter-words

Will grow to songs, and eggs to birds;

Ambitious buds shall swell to flowers,

And April smiles to sunny hours,

Bright days shall be, and gentle nights

Full of soft breath and echo-lights,

As if the god of sun-time kept

His eyes half-open while he slept.

Roses shall be where roses were,

Not shadows, but reality;

As if they never perished there,

But slept in immortality:

Nature shall thrill with new delight,

And Time's relumined river run

Warm as young blood, and dazzling bright,

As if its source were in the sun!

But say, hath Winter then no charms?

Is there no joy, no gladness warms

His aged heart? no happy wiles

To cheat the hoary one to smiles?

Onward he comes--the cruel North

Pours his furious whirlwind forth

Before him--and we breathe the breath

Of famish'd bears that howl to death.

Onward he comes from the rocks that blanch

O'er solid streams that never flow:

His tears all ice, his locks all snow,

Just crept from some huge avalanche--

A thing half-breathing and half-warm,

As if one spark began to glow

Within some statue's marble form,

Or pilgrim stiffened in the storm.

Oh! will not Mirth's light arrows fail

To pierce that frozen coat of mail?

Oh! will not joy but strive in vain

To light up those glazed eyes again?

No! take him in, and blaze the oak,

And pour the wine, and warm the ale;

His sides shall shake to many a joke,

His tongue shall thaw in many a tale,

His eyes grow bright, his heart be gay,

And even his palsy charm'd away.

What heeds he then the boisterous shout

Of angry winds that scowl without,

Like shrewish wives at tavern door?

What heeds he then the wild uproar

Of billows bursting on the shore?

In dashing waves, in howling breeze,

There is a music that can charm him;

When safe, and sheltered, and at ease,

He hears the storm that cannot harm him.

But hark! those shouts! that sudden din

Of little hearts that laugh within.

Oh! take him where the youngsters play,

And he will grow as young as they!

They come! they come! each blue-eyed Sport,

The Twelfth-Night King and all his court--

'Tis Mirth fresh crown'd with misletoe!

Music with her merry fiddles,

Joy "on light fantastic toe,"

Wit with all his jests and riddles,

Singing and dancing as they go.

And Love, young Love, among the rest,

A welcome--nor unbidden guest.

But still for Summer dost thou grieve?

Then read our Poets--they shall weave

A garden of green fancies still,

Where thy wish may rove at will.

They have kept for after-treats

The essences of summer sweets,

And echoes of its songs that wind

In endless music through the mind:

They have stamp'd in visible traces

The "thoughts that breathe," in words that shine--

The flights of soul in sunny places--

To greet and company with thine.

These shall wing thee on to flow'rs--

The past or future, that shall seem

All the brighter in thy dream

For blowing in such desert hours.

The summer never shines so bright

As thought-of in a winter's night;

And the sweetest loveliest rose

Is in the bud before it blows;

The dear one of the lover's heart

Is painted to his longing eyes,

In charms she ne'er can realize--

But when she turns again to part.

Dream thou then, and bind thy brow

With wreath of fancy roses now,

And drink of Summer in the cup

Where the Muse hath mix'd it up;

The "dance, and song, and sun-burnt mirth,"

With the warm nectar of the earth:

Drink! 'twill glow in every vein,

And thou shalt dream the winter through:

Then waken to the sun again,

And find thy Summer Vision true!

THE SEA OF DEATH.

A FRAGMENT.

----Methought I saw

Life swiftly treading over endless space;

And, at her foot-print, but a bygone pace,

The ocean-past, which, with increasing wave,

Swallow'd her steps like a pursuing grave.

Sad were my thoughts that anchor'd silently

On the dead waters of that passionless sea,

Unstirr'd by any touch of living breath:

Silence hung over it, and drowsy Death,

Like a gorged sea-bird, slept with folded wings

On crowded carcases--sad passive things

That wore the thin gray surface, like a veil

Over the calmness of their features pale.

And there were spring-faced cherubs that did sleep

Like water-lilies on that motionless deep,

How beautiful! with bright unruffled hair

On sleek unfretted brows, and eyes that were

Buried in marble tombs, a pale eclipse!

And smile-bedimpled cheeks, and pleasant lips,

Meekly apart, as if the soul intense

Spake out in dreams of its own innocence:

And so they lay in loveliness, and kept

The birth-night of their peace, that Life e'en wept

With very envy of their happy fronts;

For there were neighbor brows scarr'd by the brunts

Of strife and sorrowing--where Care had set

His crooked autograph, and marr'd the jet

Of glassy locks, with hollow eyes forlorn,

And lips that curl'd in bitterness and scorn--

Wretched,--as they had breathed of this world's pain,

And so bequeathed it to the world again,

Through the beholder's heart in heavy sighs.

So lay they garmented in torpid light,

Under the pall of a transparent night,

Like solemn apparitions lull'd sublime

To everlasting rest,--and with them Time

Slept, as he sleeps upon the silent face

Of a dark dial in a sunless place.

TO AN ABSENTEE.

O'er hill, and dale, and distant sea,

Through all the miles that stretch between,

My thought must fly to rest on thee,

And would, though worlds should intervene.

Nay, thou art now so dear, methinks

The farther we are forced apart,

Affection's firm elastic links

But bind the closer round the heart.

For now we sever each from each,

I learned what I have lost in thee;

Alas, that nothing else could teach

How great indeed my love should be!

Farewell! I did not know thy worth;

But thou art gone, and now 'tis prized:

So angels walk'd unknown on earth,

But when they flew were recognized!

LYCUS THE CENTAUR.

FROM AN UNROLLED MANUSCRIPT OF APOLLONIUS CURIUS.

THE ARGUMENT.

Lycus, detained by Circe in her magical dominion, is beloved by a

Water Nymph, who, desiring to render him immortal, has recourse to

the Sorceress. Circe gives her an incantation to pronounce, which

should turn Lycus into a horse; but the horrible effect of the

charm causing her to break off in the midst, he becomes a Centaur.

Who hath ever been lured and bound by a spell

To wander, fore-doomed, in that circle of hell

Where Witchery works with her will like a god,

Works more than the wonders of time at a nod,--

At a word,--at a touch,--at a flash of the eye,

But each form is a cheat, and each sound is a lie,

Things born of a wish--to endure for a thought,

Or last for long ages--to vanish to nought,

Or put on new semblance? O Jove, I had given

The throne of a kingdom to know if that heaven,

And the earth and its streams were of Circe, or whether

They kept the world's birthday and brighten'd together!

For I loved them in terror, and constantly dreaded

That the earth where I trod, and the cave where I bedded,

The face I might dote on, should live out the lease

Of the charm that created, and suddenly cease:

And I gave me to slumber, as if from one dream

To another--each horrid,--and drank of the stream

Like a first taste of blood, lest as water I quaff'd

Swift poison, and never should breathe from the draught,--

Such drink as her own monarch husband drain'd up

When he pledged her, and Fate closed his eyes in the cup.

And I pluck'd of the fruit with held breath, and a fear

That the branch would start back and scream out in my ear;

For once, at my suppering, I plucked in the dusk

An apple, juice-gushing and fragrant of musk;

But by daylight my fingers were crimson'd with gore,

And the half-eaten fragment was flesh at the core;

And once--only once--for the love of its blush,

I broke a bloom bough, but there came such a gush

On my hand, that it fainted away in weak fright,

While the leaf-hidden woodpecker shriek'd at the sight;

And oh! such an agony thrill'd in that note,

That my soul, startling up, beat its wings in my throat,

As it long'd to be free of a body whose hand

Was doom'd to work torments a Fury had plann'd!

There I stood without stir, yet how willing to flee,

As if rooted and horror-turn'd into a tree,--

Oh! for innocent death,--and to suddenly win it,

I drank of the stream, but no poison was in it;

I plunged in its waters, but ere I could sink,

Some invisible fate pull'd me back to the brink;

I sprang from the rock, from its pinnacle height,

But fell on the grass with a grasshopper's flight;

I ran at my fears--they were fears and no more,

For the bear would not mangle my limbs, nor the boar,

But moan'd--all their brutalized flesh could not smother

The horrible truth,--we were kin to each other!

They were mournfully gentle, and group'd for relief,

All foes in their skin, but all friends in their grief:

The leopard was there,--baby-mild in its feature;

And the tiger, black-barr'd, with the gaze of a creature

That knew gentle pity; the bristle-back'd boar,

His innocent tusks stain'd with mulberry gore;

And the laughing hyena--but laughing no more;

And the snake, not with magical orbs to devise

Strange death, but with woman's attraction of eyes;

The tall ugly ape, that still bore a dim shine

Through his hairy eclipse of a manhood divine;

And the elephant stately, with more than its reason,

How thoughtful in sadness! but this is no season

To reckon them up from the lag-bellied toad

To the mammoth, whose sobs shook his ponderous load.

There were woes of all shapes, wretched forms, when I came,

That hung down their heads with a human-like shame;

The elephant hid in the boughs, and the bear

Shed over his eyes the dark veil of his hair;

And the womanly soul turning sick with disgust,

Tried to vomit herself from her serpentine crust;

While all groan'd their groans into one at their lot,

As I brought them the image of what they were not.

Then rose a wild sound of the human voice choking

Through vile brutal organs--low tremulous croaking:

Cries swallow'd abruptly--deep animal tones

Attuned to strange passion, and full-utter'd groans;

All shuddering weaken, till hush'd in a pause

Of tongues in mute motion and wide-yawning jaws;

And I guessed that those horrors were meant to tell o'er

The tale of their woes; but the silence told more,

That writhed on their tongues; and I knelt on the sod,

And pray'd with my voice to the cloud-stirring god,

For the sad congregation of supplicants there,

That upturn'd to his heaven brute faces of prayer;

And I ceased, and they utter'd a moaning so deep,

That I wept for my heart-ease,--but they could not weep,

And gazed with red eyeballs, all wistfully dry,

At the comfort of tears in a stag's human eye.

Then I motion'd them round, and, to soothe their distress,

I caress'd, and they bent them to meet my caress,

Their necks to my arm, and their heads to my palm,

And with poor grateful eyes suffer'd meekly and calm

Those tokens of kindness, withheld by hard fate

From returns that might chill the warm pity to hate;

So they passively bow'd--save the serpent, that leapt

To my breast like a sister, and pressingly crept

In embrace of my neck, and with close kisses blister'd

My lips in rash love,--then drew backward, and glister'd

Her eyes in my face, and loud hissing affright,

Dropt down, but swift started away from my sight!

This sorrow was theirs, but thrice wretched my lot,

Turn'd brute in my soul, though my body was not,

When I fled from the sorrow of womanly faces,

That shrouded their woe in the shade of lone places,

And dash'd off bright tears, till their fingers were wet,

And then wiped their lids with long tresses of jet:

But I fled--though they stretch'd out their hands, all entangled

With hair, and blood-stain'd of the breasts they had mangled,--

Though they call'd--and perchance but to ask, had I seen

Their loves, or to tell the vile wrongs that had been:

But I stayed not to hear, lest the story should hold

Some hell-form of words, some enchantment, once told,

Might translate me in flesh to a brute; and I dreaded

To gaze on their charms, lest my faith should be wedded

With some pity,--and love in that pity perchance--

To a thing not all lovely; for once at glance,

Methought, where one sat, I descried a bright wonder

That flow'd like a long silver rivulet under

The long fenny grass,--with so lovely a breast,

Could it be a snake-tail made the charm of the rest?

So I roamed in that circle of horrors, and Fear

Walk'd with me, by hills, and in valleys, and near

Cluster'd trees for their gloom--not to shelter from heat--

But lest a brute-shadow should grow at my feet;

And besides that full oft in the sunshiny place

Dark shadows would gather like clouds on its face,

In the horrible likeness of demons (that none

Could see, like invisible flames in the sun);

But grew to one monster that seized on the light,

Like the dragon that strangles the moon in the night;

Fierce sphinxes, long serpents, and asps of the south;

Wild birds of huge beak, and all horrors that drouth

Engenders of slime in the land of the pest,

Vile shapes without shape, and foul bats of the West,

Bringing Night on their wings; and the bodies wherein

Great Brahma imprisons the spirits of sin,

Many-handed, that blent in one phantom of fight

Like a Titan, and threatfully warr'd with the light;

I have heard the wild shriek that gave signal to close,

When they rushed on that shadowy Python of foes,

That met with sharp beaks and wide gaping of jaws,

With flappings of wings, and fierce grasping of claws,

And whirls of long tails:--I have seen the quick flutter

Of fragments dissevered,--and necks stretch'd to utter

Long screamings of pain,--the swift motion of blows,

And wrestling of arms--to the flight at the close,

When the dust of the earth startled upward in rings,

And flew on the whirlwind that follow'd their wings.

Thus they fled--not forgotten--but often to grow

Like fears in my eyes, when I walk'd to and fro

In the shadows, and felt from some beings unseen

The warm touch of kisses, but clean or unclean

I knew not, nor whether the love I had won

Was of heaven or hell--till one day in the sun,

In its very noon-blaze, I could fancy a thing

Of beauty, but faint as the cloud-mirrors fling

On the gaze of the shepherd that watches the sky,

Half-seen and half-dream'd in the soul of his eye.

And when in my musings I gazed on the stream,

In motionless trances of thought, there would seem

A face like that face, looking upward through mine:

With his eyes full of love, and the dim-drownd shine

Of limbs and fair garments, like clouds in that blue

Serene:--there I stood for long hours but to view

Those fond earnest eyes that were ever uplifted

Towards me, and wink'd as the water-weed drifted

Between; but the fish knew that presence, and plied

Their long curvy tails, and swift darted aside.

There I gazed for lost time, and forgot all the things

That once had been wonders--the fishes with wings,

And the glimmer of magnified eyes that look'd up

From the glooms of the bottom like pearls in a cup,

And the huge endless serpent of silvery gleam,

Slow winding along like a tide in the stream.

Some maid of the waters, some Naiad, methought

Held me dear in the pearl of her eye--and I brought

My wish to that fancy; and often I dash'd

My limbs in the water, and suddenly splash'd

The cool drops around me, yet clung to the brink,

Chill'd by watery fears, how that beauty might sink

With my life in her arms to her garden, and bind me

With its long tangled grasses, or cruelly wind me

In some eddy to hum out my life in her ear,

Like a spider-caught bee,--and in aid of that fear

Came the tardy remembrance--Oh falsest of men!

Why was not that beauty remember'd till then?

My love, my safe love, whose glad life would have run

Into mine--like a drop--that our fate might be one,

That now, even now,--may-be,--clasp'd in a dream,

That form which I gave to some jilt of the stream,

And gazed with fond eyes that her tears tried to smother

On a mock of those eyes that I gave to another!

Then I rose from the stream, but the eyes of my mind,

Still full of the tempter, kept gazing behind

On her crystalline face, while I painfully leapt

To the bank, and shook off the curst waters, and wept

With my brow in the reeds; and the reeds to my ear

Bow'd, bent by no wind, and in whispers of fear,

Growing small with large secrets, foretold me of one

That loved me,--but oh to fly from her, and shun

Her love like a pest--though her love was as true

To mine as her stream to the heavenly blue;

For why should I love her with love that would bring

All misfortune, like hate, on so joyous a thing?

Because of her rival,--even Her whose witch-face

I had slighted, and therefore was doom'd in that place

To roam, and had roam'd, where all horrors grew rank,

Nine days ere I wept with my brow on that bank;

Her name be not named, but her spite would not fail

To our love like a blight; and they told me the tale

Of Scylla,--and Picus, imprison'd to speak

His shrill-screaming woe through a woodpecker's beak.

Then they ceased--I had heard as the voice of my star

That told me the truth of my fortunes--thus far

I had read of my sorrow, and lay in the hush

Of deep meditation,--when lo! a light crush

Of the reeds, and I turn'd and look'd round in the night

Of new sunshine, and saw, as I sipp'd of the light

Narrow-winking, the realized nymph of the stream,

Rising up from the wave with the bend and the gleam

Of a fountain, and o'er her white arms she kept throwing

Bright torrents of hair, that went flowing and flowing

In falls to her feet, and the blue waters roll'd

Down her limbs like a garment, in many a fold,

Sun-spangled, gold-broider'd, and fled far behind,

Like an infinite train. So she came and reclined

In the reeds, and I hunger'd to see her unseal

The buds of her eyes that would ope and reveal

The blue that was in them;--they oped and she raised

Two orbs of pure crystal, and timidly gazed

With her eyes on my eyes; but their color and shine

Was of that which they look'd on, and mostly of mine--

For she loved me,--except when she blush'd, and they sank,

Shame-humbled, to number the stones on the bank,

Or her play-idle fingers, while lisping she told me

How she put on her veil, and in love to behold me

Would wing through the sun till she fainted away

Like a mist, and then flew to her waters and lay

In love-patience long hours, and sore dazzled her eyes

In watching for mine 'gainst the midsummer skies.

But now they were heal'd,--O my heart, it still dances

When I think of the charm of her changeable glances,

And my image how small when it sank in the deep

Of her eyes where her soul was,--Alas! now they weep,

And none knoweth where. In what stream do her eyes

Shed invisible tears? Who beholds where her sighs

Flow in eddies, or sees the ascent of the leaf

She has pluck'd with her tresses? Who listens her grief

Like a far fall of waters, or hears where her feet

Grow emphatic among the loose pebbles, and beat

Them together? Ah! surely her flowers float adown

To the sea unaccepted, and little ones drown

For need of her mercy,--even he whose twin-brother

Will miss him forever; and the sorrowful mother

Imploreth in vain for his body to kiss

And cling to, all dripping and cold as it is,

Because that soft pity is lost in hard pain

We loved,--how we loved!--for I thought not again

Of the woes that were whisper'd like fears in that place

If I gave me to beauty. Her face was the face,

Far away, and her eyes were the eyes that were drown'd

For my absence,--her arms were the arms that sought round

And claspt me to nought; for I gazed and became

Only true to my falsehood, and had but one name

For two loves, and call'd ever on Ægle, sweet maid

Of the sky-loving waters,--and was not afraid

Of the sight of her skin;--for it never could be;

Her beauty and love were misfortunes to me!

Thus our bliss had endured for a time-shorten'd space,

Like a day made of three, and the smile of her face

Had been with me for joy,--when she told me indeed

Her love was self-task'd with a work that would need

Some short hours, for in truth 'twas the veriest pity

Our love should not last, and then sang me a ditty,

Of one with warm lips that should love her, and love her

When suns were burnt dim and long ages past over.

So she fled with her voice, and I patiently nested

My limbs in the reeds, in still quiet, and rested

Till my thoughts grew extinct, and I sank in a sleep

Of dreams,--but their meaning was hidden too deep

To be read what their woe was;--but still it was woe

That was writ on all faces that swam to and fro

In that river of night;--and the gaze of their eyes

Was sad,--and the bend of their brows,--and their cries

Were seen, but I heard not. The warm touch of tears

Travell'd down my cold cheeks, and I shook till my fears

Awaked me, and lo! I was couch'd in a bower,

The growth of long summers rear'd up in an hour!

Then I said, in the fear of my dream, I will fly

From this magic, but could not, because that my eye

Grew love-idle among the rich blooms; and the earth

Held me down with its coolness of touch, and the mirth

Of some bird was above me,--who, even in fear,

Would startle the thrush? and methought there drew near

A form as of Ægle,--but it was not the face

Hope made, and I knew the witch-Queen of that place,

Even Circe the Cruel, that came like a Death,

Which I fear'd, and yet fled not, for want of my breath.

There was thought in her face, and her eyes were not raised

From the grass at her foot, but I saw, as I gazed,

Her spite--and her countenance changed with her mind

As she plann'd how to thrall me with beauty, and bind

My soul to her charms,--and her long tresses play'd

From shade into shine and from shine into shade,

Like a day in mid-autumn,--first fair, O how fair!

With long snaky locks of the adder-black hair

That clung round her neck,--those dark locks that I prize,

For the sake of a maid that once loved me with eyes

Of that fathomless hue,--but they changed as they roll'd,

And brighten'd, and suddenly blazed into gold

That she comb'd into flames, and the locks that fell down

Turn'd dark as they fell, but I slighted their brown,

Nor loved, till I saw the light ringlets shed wild,

That innocence wears when she is but a child;

And her eyes,--Oh I ne'er had been witched with their shine,

Had they been any other, my Ægle, than thine!

Then I gave me to magic, and gazed till I madden'd

In the full of their light,--but I sadden'd and sadden'd

The deeper I look'd,--till I sank on the snow

Of her bosom, a thing made of terror and woe,

And answer'd its throb with the shudder of fears,

And hid my cold eyes from her eyes with my tears,

And strain'd her white arms with the still languid weight

Of a fainting distress. There she sat like the Fate

That is nurse unto Death, and bent over in shame

To hide me from her the true Ægle--that came

With the words on her lips the false witch had fore-given

To make me immortal--for now I was even

At the portals of Death, who but waited the hush

Of world-sounds in my ears to cry welcome, and rush

With my soul to the banks of his black-flowing river.

Oh, would it had flown from my body forever,

Ere I listen'd those words, when I felt with a start,

The life-blood rush back in one throb to my heart,

And saw the pale lips where the rest of that spell

Had perished in horror--and heard the farewell

Of that voice that was drown'd in the dash of the stream!

How fain had I follow'd, and plunged with that scream

Into death, but my being indignantly lagg'd

Through the brutalized flesh that I painfully dragg'd

Behind me:--O Circe! O mother of spite!

Speak the last of that curse! and imprison me quite

In the husk of a brute,--that no pity may name

The man that I was,--that no kindred may claim--

"The monster I am! Let me utterly be

Brute-buried, and Nature's dishonor with me

Uninscribed!"--But she listen'd my prayer, that was praise

To her malice, with smiles, and advised me to gaze

On the river for love,--and perchance she would make

In pity a maid without eyes for my sake,

And she left me like Scorn. Then I ask'd of the wave,

What monster I was, and it trembled and gave

The true shape of my grief, and I turn'd with my face

From all waters forever, and fled through that place,

Till with horror more strong than all magic I pass'd

Its bounds, and the world was before me at last.

There I wander'd in sorrow, and shunned the abodes

Of men, that stood up in the likeness of Gods,

But I saw from afar the warm shine of the sun

On the cities, where man was a million, not one;

And I saw the white smoke of their altars ascending,

That show'd where the hearts of many were blending,

And the wind in my face brought shrill voices that came

From the trumpets that gather'd whole bands in one fame

As a chorus of man,--and they stream'd from the gates

Like a dusky libation poured out to the Fates.

But at times there were gentler processions of peace

That I watch'd with my soul in my eyes till their cease,

There were women! there men! but to me a third sex

I saw them all dots--yet I loved them as specks:

And oft to assuage a sad yearning of eyes

I stole near the city, but stole covert-wise

Like a wild beast of love, and perchance to be smitten

By some hand that I rather had wept on than bitten!

Oh, I once had a haunt near a cot where a mother

Daily sat in the shade with her child, and would smother

Its eyelids in kisses, and then in its sleep

Sang dreams in its ear of its manhood, while deep

In a thicket of willows I gazed o'er the brooks

That murmur'd between us and kiss'd them with looks;

But the willows unbosom'd their secret, and never

I return'd to a spot I had startled forever,

Though I oft long'd to know, but could ask it of none,

Was the mother still fair, and how big was her son?

For the haunters of fields they all shunn'd me by flight;

The men in their horror, the women in fright;

None ever remain'd save a child once that sported

Among the wild bluebells, and playfully courted

The breeze; and beside him a speckled snake lay

Tight strangled, because it had hiss'd him away

From the flower at his finger; he rose and drew near

Like a Son of Immortals, one born to no fear,

But with strength of black locks and with eyes azure bright

To grow to large manhood of merciful might.

He came, with his face of bold wonder, to feel,

The hair of my side, and to lift up my heel,

And question'd my face with wide eyes; but when under

My lids he saw tears,--for I wept at his wonder,

He stroked me, and utter'd such kindliness then,

That the once love of women, the friendship of men

In past sorrow, no kindness e'er came like a kiss

On my heart in its desolate day such as this!

And I yearn'd at his cheeks in my love, and down bent,

And lifted him up in my arms with intent

To kiss him,--but he cruel-kindly, alas!

Held out to my lips a pluck'd handful of grass!

Then I dropt him in horror, but felt as I fled

The stone he indignantly hurl'd at my head,

That dissever'd my ear,--but I felt not, whose fate

Was to meet more distress in his love that his hate!

Thus I wander'd, companion'd of grief and forlorn

Till I wish'd for that land where my being was born

But what was that land with its love, where my home

Was self-shut against me; for why should I come

Like an after-distress to my gray-bearded father,

With a blight to the last of his sight?--let him rather

Lament for me dead, and shed tears in the urn

Where I was not, and still in fond memory turn

To his son even such as he left him. Oh, how

Could I walk with the youth once my fellows, but now

Like Gods to my humbled estate?--or how bear

The steeds once the pride of my eyes and the care

Of my hands? Then I turn'd me self-banish'd, and came

Into Thessaly here, where I met with the same

As myself. I have heard how they met by a stream

In games, and were suddenly changed by a scream

That made wretches of many, as she roll'd her wild eyes

Against heaven, and so vanish'd.--The gentle and wise

Lose their thoughts in deep studies, and others their ill

In the mirth of mankind where they mingle them still.

THE TWO PEACOCKS OF BEDFONT.

I.

Alas! That breathing Vanity should go

Where Pride is buried,--like its very ghost,

Uprisen from the naked bones below,

In novel flesh, clad in the silent boast

Of gaudy silk that flutters to and fro,

Shedding its chilling superstition most

On young and ignorant natures--as it wont

To haunt the peaceful churchyard of Bedfont!

II.

Each Sabbath morning, at the hour of prayer,

Behold two maidens, up the quiet green

Shining, far distant, in the summer air

That flaunts their dewy robes and breathes between

Their downy plumes,--sailing as if they were

Two far-off ships,--until they brush between

The churchyard's humble walls, and watch and wait

On either side of the wide open'd gate,

III.

And there they stand--with haughty necks before

God's holy house, that points towards the skies--

Frowning reluctant duty from the poor,

And tempting homage from unthoughtful eyes:

And Youth looks lingering from the temple door,

Breathing its wishes in unfruitful sighs,

With pouting lips,--forgetful of the grace,

Of health, and smiles, on the heart-conscious face;--

IV.

Because that Wealth, which has no bliss beside,

May wear the happiness of rich attire;

And those two sisters, in their silly pride,

May change the soul's warm glances for the fire

Of lifeless diamonds;--and for health denied,--

With art, that blushes at itself, inspire

Their languid cheeks--and flourish in a glory

That has no life in life, nor after-story.

V.

The aged priest goes shaking his gray hair

In meekest censuring, and turns his eye

Earthward in grief, and heavenward in pray'r,

And sighs, and clasps his hands, and passes by,

Good-hearted man! what sullen soul would wear

Thy sorrow for a garb, and constantly

Put on thy censure, that might win the praise

Of one so gray in goodness and in days?

VI.

Also the solemn clerk partakes the shame

Of this ungodly shine of human pride,

And sadly blends his reverence and blame

In one grave bow, and passes with a stride

Impatient:--many a red-hooded dame

Turns her pain'd head, but not her glance, aside

From wanton dress, and marvels o'er again,

That heaven hath no wet judgments for the vain.

VII.

"I have a lily in the bloom at home,"

Quoth one, "and by the blessed Sabbath day

I'll pluck my lily in its pride, and come

And read a lesson upon vain array;--

And when stiff silks are rustling up, and some

Give place, I'll shake it in proud eyes and say--

Making my reverence,--'Ladies, an you please,

King Solomon's not half so fine as these,'"

VIII.

Then her meek partner, who has nearly run

His earthly course,--"Nay, Goody, let your text

Grow in the garden.--We have only one--

Who knows that these dim eyes may see the next?

Summer will come again, and summer sun,

And lilies too,--but I were sorely vext

To mar my garden, and cut short the blow

Of the last lily I may live to grow,"

IX.

"The last!" quoth she, "and though the last it were--

Lo! those two wantons, where they stand so proud

With waving plumes, and jewels in their hair,

And painted cheeks, like Dagons to be bow'd

And curtsey'd to!--last Sabbath after pray'r,

I heard the little Tomkins ask aloud

If they were angels--but I made him know

God's bright ones better, with a bitter blow!"

X.

So speaking, they pursue the pebbly walk

That leads to the white porch the Sunday throng,

Hand-coupled urchins in restrainëd talk,

And anxious pedagogue that chastens wrong,

And posied churchwarden with solemn stalk,

And gold-bedizen'd beadle flames along,

And gentle peasant clad in buff and green,

Like a meek cowslip in the spring serene;

XI.

And blushing maiden--modestly array'd

In spotless white,--still conscious of the glass;

And she, the lonely widow, that hath made

A sable covenant with grief,--alas!

She veils her tears under the deep, deep shade,

While the poor kindly-hearted, as they pass,

Bend to unclouded childhood, and caress

Her boy,--so rosy!--and so fatherless!

XII.

Thus, as good Christians ought, they all draw near

The fair white temple, to the timely call

Of pleasant bells that tremble in the ear.--

Now the last frock, and scarlet hood, and shawl

Fade into dusk, in the dim atmosphere

Of the low porch, and heav'n has won them all,

--Saying those two, that turn aside and pass,

In velvet blossom, where all flesh is grass.

XIII.

Ah me! to see their silken manors trail'd

In purple luxuries--with restless gold,--

Flaunting the grass where widowhood has wail'd

In blotted black,--over the heapy mould

Panting wave-wantonly! They never quail'd

How the warm vanity abused the cold;

Nor saw the solemn faces of the gone

Sadly uplooking through transparent stone:

XIV.

But swept their dwellings with unquiet light,

Shocking the awful presence of the dead;

Where gracious natures would their eyes benight,

Nor wear their being with a lip too red,

Nor move too rudely in the summer bright

Of sun, but put staid sorrow in their tread,

Meting it into steps, with inward breath,

In very pity to bereaved death.

XV.

Now in the church, time-sober'd minds resign

To solemn pray'r, and the loud chaunted hymn,--

With glowing picturings of joys divine

Painting the mist-light where the roof is dim;

But youth looks upward to the window shine,

Warming with rose and purple and the swim

Of gold, as if thought-tinted by the stains

Of gorgeous light through many-color'd panes;

XVI.

Soiling the virgin snow wherein God hath

Enrobed his angels,--and with absent eyes

Hearing of Heav'n, and its directed path,

Thoughtful of slippers--and the glorious skies

Clouding with satin,--till the preacher's wrath

Consumes his pity, and he glows and cries

With a deep voice that trembles in its might,

And earnest eyes grow eloquent in light:

XVII.

"Oh, that the vacant eye would learn to look

On very beauty, and the heart embrace

True loveliness, and from this holy book

Drink the warm-breathing tenderness and grace

Of love indeed! Oh, that the young soul took

Its virgin passion from the glorious face

Of fair religion, and address'd its strife,

To win the riches of eternal life!"

XVIII.

"Doth the vain heart love glory that is none,

And the poor excellence of vain attire?

Oh go, and drown your eyes against the sun,

The visible ruler of the starry quire,

Till boiling gold in giddy eddies run,

Dazzling the brain with orbs of living fire;

And the faint soul down-darkens into night,

And dies a burning martyrdom to light."

XIX.

Oh go, and gaze,--when the low winds of ev'n

Breathe hymns, and Nature's many forests nod

Their gold-crown'd heads; and the rich blooms of heav'n

Sun-ripen'd give their blushes up to God;

And mountain-rocks and cloudy steeps are riv'n

By founts of fire, as smitten by the rod

Of heavenly Moses,--that your thirsty sense

May quench its longings of magnificence!

XX.

"Yet suns shall perish--stars shall fade away--

Day into darkness--darkness into death--

Death into silence; the warm light of day,

The blooms of summer, the rich glowing breath

Of even--all shall wither and decay,

Like the frail furniture of dreams beneath

The touch of morn--or bubbles of rich dyes

That break and vanish in the aching eyes."

XXI.

They hear, soul-blushing, and repentant shed

Unwholesome thoughts in wholesome tears, and pour

Their sin to earth,--and with low drooping head

Receive the solemn blessing, and implore

Its grace--then soberly with chasten'd tread,

They meekly press towards the gusty door

With humbled eyes that go to graze upon

The lowly grass--like him of Babylon.

XXII.

The lowly grass!--O water-constant mind!

Fast-ebbing holiness!--soon-fading grace

Of serious thought, as if the gushing wind

Through the low porch had wash'd it from the face

For ever!--How they lift their eyes to find

Old vanities!--Pride wins the very place

Of meekness, like a bird, and flutters now

With idle wings on the curl-conscious brow!

XXIII.

And lo! with eager looks they seek the way

Of old temptation at the lowly gate;

To feast on feathers, and on vain array,

And painted cheeks, and the rich glistering state

Of jewel-sprinkled locks,--But where are they,

The graceless haughty ones that used to wait

With lofty neck, and nods, and stiffen'd eye?--

None challenge the old homage bending by.

XXIV.

In vain they look for the ungracious bloom

Of rich apparel where it glow'd before,--

For Vanity has faded all to gloom,

And lofty Pride has stiffen'd to the core,

For impious Life to tremble at its doom,--

Set for a warning token evermore,

Whereon, as now, the giddy and the wise

Shall gaze with lifted hands and wond'ring eyes.

XXV.

The aged priest goes on each Sabbath morn,

But shakes not sorrow under his gray hair;

The solemn clerk goes lavender'd and shorn

Nor stoops his back to the ungodly pair;--

And ancient lips that pucker'd up in scorn,

Go smoothly breathing to the house of pray'r;

And in the garden-plot, from day to day,

The lily blooms its long white life away.

XXVI.

And where two haughty maidens used to be,

In pride of plume, where plumy Death had trod,

Trailing their gorgeous velvets wantonly,

Most unmeet pall, over the holy sod;

There, gentle stranger, thou may'st only see

Two sombre Peacocks.

Age, with sapient nod

Marking the spot, still tarries to declare

How they once lived, and wherefore they are there.

HYMN TO THE SUN.

Giver of glowing light!

Though but a god of other days,

The kings and sages

Of wiser ages

Still live and gladden in thy genial rays!

King of the tuneful lyre,

Still poets' hymns to thee belong;

Though lips are cold

Whereon of old

Thy beams all turn'd to worshipping and song!

Lord of the dreadful bow,

None triumph now for Python's death;

But thou dost save

From hungry grave

The life that hangs upon a summer breath.

Father of rosy day,

No more thy clouds of incense rise;

But waking flow'rs

At morning hours,

Give out their sweets to meet thee in the skies.

God of the Delphic fame,

No more thou listenest to hymns sublime;

But they will leave

On winds at eve,

A solemn echo to the end of time.

MIDNIGHT.

Unfathomable Night! how dost thou sweep

Over the flooded earth, and darkly hide

The mighty city under thy full tide;

Making a silent palace for old Sleep,

Like his own temple under the hush'd deep,

Where all the busy day he doth abide,

And forth at the late dark, outspreadeth wide

His dusky wings, whence the cold waters sweep!

How peacefully the living millions lie!

Lull'd unto death beneath his poppy spells;

There is no breath--no living stir--no cry

No tread of foot--no song--no music-call--

Only the sound of melancholy bells--

The voice of Time--survivor of them all!

TO A SLEEPING CHILD.

I.

Oh, 'tis a touching thing, to make one weep,--

A tender infant with its curtain'd eye,

Breathing as it would neither live nor die

With that unchanging countenance of sleep!

As if its silent dream, serene and deep,

Had lined its slumber with a still blue sky

So that the passive cheeks unconscious lie

With no more life than roses--just to keep

The blushes warm, and the mild, odorous breath.

O blossom boy! so calm is thy repose.

So sweet a compromise of life and death,

'Tis pity those fair buds should e'er unclose

For memory to stain their inward leaf,

Tinging thy dreams with unacquainted grief.

TO A SLEEPING CHILD.

II.

Thine eyelids slept so beauteously, I deem'd

No eyes could wake so beautiful as they:

Thy rosy cheeks in such still slumbers lay,

I loved their peacefulness, nor ever dream'd

Of dimples:--for those parted lips so seem'd,

I never thought a smile could sweetlier play,

Nor that so graceful life could chase away

Thy graceful death,--till those blue eyes upbeam'd.

Now slumber lies in dimpled eddies drown'd

And roses bloom more rosily for joy,

And odorous silence ripens into sound,

And fingers move to sound.--All-beauteous boy!

How thou dost waken into smiles, and prove,

If not more lovely thou art more like Love!

TO FANCY.

Most delicate Ariel! submissive thing,

Won by the mind's high magic to its hest--

Invisible embassy, or secret guest,--

Weighing the light air on a lighter wing;--

Whether into the midnight moon, to bring

Illuminate visions to the eye of rest,--

Or rich romances from the florid West,--

Or to the sea, for mystic whispering,--

Still by thy charm'd allegiance to the will,

The fruitful wishes prosper in the brain,

As by the fingering of fairy skill,--

Moonlight, and waters, and soft music's strain,

Odors, and blooms, and _my_ Miranda's smile,

Making this dull world an enchanted isle.

FAIR INES.

O Saw ye not fair Ines?

She's gone into the West,

To dazzle when the sun is down,

And rob the world of rest:

She took our daylight with her,

The smiles that we love best,

With morning blushes on her cheek,

And pearls upon her breast.

O turn again, fair Ines,

Before the fall of night,

For fear the moon should shine alone,

And stars unrivall'd bright;

And blessed will the lover be

That walks beneath their light,

And breathes the love against thy cheek

I dare not even write!

Would I had been, fair Ines,

That gallant cavalier,

Who rode so gaily by thy side,

And whisper'd thee so near!

Were there no bonny dames at home,

Or no true lovers here,

That he should cross the seas to win

The dearest of the dear?

I saw thee, lovely Ines,

Descend along the shore,

With bands of noble gentlemen,

And banners waved before;

And gentle youth and maidens gay,

And snowy plumes they wore;

It would have been a beauteous dream,

--If it had been no more!

Alas, alas, fair Ines,

She went away with song,

With Music waiting on her steps,

And shoutings of the throng;

But some were sad, and felt no mirth,

But only Musics wrong,

In sounds that sang Farewell, Farewell,

To her you've loved so long.

Farewell, farewell, fair Ines,

That vessel never bore

So fair a lady on its deck,

Nor danced so light before,--

Alas, for pleasure on the sea,

And sorrow on the shore!

The smile that blest one lover's heart

Has broken many more!

TO A FALSE FRIEND.

Our hands have met, but not our hearts;

Our hands will never meet again.

Friends, if we have ever been,

Friends we cannot now remain:

I only know I loved you once,

I only know I loved in vain;

Our hands have met, but not our hearts;

Our hands will never meet again!

Then farewell to heart and hand!

I would our hands had never met:

Even the outward form of love

Must be resign'd with some regret.

Friends, we still might seem to be,

If I my wrong could e'er forget;

Our hands have join'd but not our hearts:

I would our hands had never met!

ODE.

AUTUMN.

I saw old Autumn in the misty morn

Stand shadowless like Silence, listening

To silence, for no lonely bird would sing

Into his hollow ear from woods forlorn,

Nor lowly hedge nor solitary thorn;

Shaking his languid locks all dewy bright

With tangled gossamer that fell by night,

Pearling his coronet of golden corn.

Where are the songs of Summer?--With the sun,

Opening the dusky eyelids of the south,

Till shade and silence waken up as one,

And Morning sings with a warm odorous mouth.

Where are the merry birds?--Away, away,

On panting wings through the inclement skies,

Lest owls should prey

Undazzled at noon-day,

And tear with horny beak their lustrous eyes.

Where are the blooms of Summer?--In the west,

Blushing their last to the last sunny hours.

When the mild Eve by sudden Night is prest

Like tearful Proserpine, snatch'd from her flow'rs

To a most gloomy breast.

Where is the pride of Summer,--the green prime,--

The many, many leaves all twinkling?--Three

On the moss'd elm; three on the naked lime

Trembling,--and one upon the old oak tree!

Where is the Dryad's immortality?--

Gone into mournful cypress and dark yew,

Or wearing the long gloomy Winter through

In the smooth holly's green eternity.

The squirrel gloats on his accomplish'd hoard,

The ants have brimm'd their garners with ripe grain,

And honey been save stored

The sweets of summer in their luscious cells;

The swallows all have wing'd across the main;

But here the Autumn melancholy dwells,

And sighs her tearful spells

Amongst the sunless shadows of the plain.

Alone, alone,

Upon a mossy stone,

She sits and reckons up the dead and gone,

With the last leaves for a love-rosary;

Whilst all the wither'd world looks drearily,

Like a dim picture of the drownëd past

In the hush'd mind's mysterious far-away,

Doubtful what ghostly thing will steal the last

Into that distance, gray upon the gray.

O go and sit with her, and be o'ershaded

Under the languid downfall of her hair;

She wears a coronal of flowers faded

Upon her forehead, and a face of care;--

There is enough of wither'd everywhere

To make her bower,--and enough of gloom;

There is enough of sadness to invite,

If only for the rose that died, whose doom

Is Beauty's,--she that with the living bloom

Of conscious cheeks most beautifies the light:

There is enough of sorrowing, and quite

Enough of bitter fruits the earth doth bear,--

Enough of chilly droppings from her bowl;

Enough of fear and shadowy despair,

To frame her cloudy prison for the soul!

SONNET.

SILENCE.

There is a silence where hath been no sound,

There is a silence where no sound may be,

In the cold grave--under the deep deep sea,

Or in wide desert where no life is found,

Which hath been mute, and still must sleep profound;

No voice is hush'd--no life treads silently,

But clouds and cloudy shadows wander free.

That never spoke, over the idle ground:

But in green ruins, in the desolate walls

Of antique palaces, where Man hath been,

Though the dun fox, or wild hyæna, calls,

And owls, that flit continually between,

Shriek to the echo, and the low winds moan,--

There the true Silence is, self-conscious and alone.

SONNET.

WRITTEN IN KEATS' "ENDYMION."

I saw pale Dian, sitting by the brink

Of silver falls, the overflow of fountains

From cloudy steeps; and I grew sad to think

Endymion's foot was silent on those mountains.

And he but a hush'd name, that Silence keeps

In dear remembrance,--lonely, and forlorn,

Singing it to herself until she weeps

Tears, that perchance still glisten in the morn:--

And as I mused, in dull imaginings,

There came a flash of garments, and I knew

The awful Muse by her harmonious wings

Charming the air to music as she flew--

Anon there rose an echo through the vale

Gave back Enydmion in a dreamlike tale.

SONNET.

TO AN ENTHUSIAST.

Young ardent soul, graced with fair Nature's truth,

Spring warmth of heart, and fervency of mind,

And still a large late love of all thy kind.

Spite of the world's cold practice and Time's tooth,--

For all these gifts, I know not, in fair sooth,

Whether to give thee joy, or bid thee blind

Thine eyes with tears,--that thou hast not resign'd

The passionate fire and freshness of thy youth:

For as the current of thy life shall flow,

Gilded by shine of sun or shadow-stain'd,

Through flow'ry valley or unwholesome fen,

Thrice blessed in thy joy, or in thy woe

Thrice cursed of thy race,--thou art ordain'd

To share beyond the lot of common men.

TO A COLD BEAUTY.

Lady, wouldst thou heiress be

To Winters cold and cruel part?

When he sets the rivers free,

Thou dost still lock up thy heart;--

Thou that shouldst outlast the snow,

But in the whiteness of thy brow?

Scorn and cold neglect are made

For winter gloom and winter wind,

But thou wilt wrong the summer air,

Breathing it to words unkind,--

Breath which only should belong

To love, to sunlight, and to song!

When the little buds unclose.

Red, and white, and pied, and blue,

And that virgin flow'r, the rose,

Opes her heart to hold the dew,

Wilt thou lock thy bosom up

With no jewel in its cup?

Let not cold December sit

Thus in Love's peculiar throne:

Brooklets are not prison'd now,

But crystal frosts are all agone,

And that which hangs upon the spray,

It is no snow, but flow'r of May!

SONNET.

DEATH.

It is not death, that sometime in a sigh

This eloquent breath shall take its speechless flight;

That sometime these bright stars, that now reply

In sunlight to the sun, shall set in night;

That warm conscious flesh shall perish quite,

And all life's ruddy springs forget to flow;

That thoughts shall cease, and the immortal sprite

Be lapp'd in alien clay and laid below;

It is not death to know this,--but to know

That pious thoughts, which visit at new graves

In tender pilgrimage, will cease to go

So duly and so oft,--and when grass waves

Over the past-away, there may be then

No resurrection in the minds of men.

SERENADE.

Ah, sweet, thou little knowest how

I wake and passionate watches keep;

And yet while I address thee now,

Methinks thou smilest in thy sleep.

'Tis sweet enough to make me weep,

That tender thought of love and thee,

That while the world is hush'd so deep,

Thy soul's perhaps awake to me!

Sleep on, sleep on, sweet bride of sleep!

With golden visions of thy dower,

While I this midnight vigil keep,

And bless thee in thy silent bower;

To me 'tis sweeter than the power

Of sleep, and fairy dreams unfurl'd,

That I alone, at this still hour,

In patient love outwatch the world.

VERSES IN AN ALBUM.

Far above the hollow

Tempest, and its moan,

Singeth bright Apollo

In his golden zone,--

Cloud doth never shade him,

Nor a storm invade him,

On his joyous throne.

So when I behold me

In an orb as bright,

How thy soul doth fold me

In its throne of light!

Sorrow never paineth,

Nor a care attaineth

To that blessed height.

THE FORSAKEN.

The dead are in their silent graves,

And the dew is cold above,

And the living weep and sigh,

Over dust that once was love.

Once I only wept the dead,

But now the living cause my pain:

How couldst thou steal me from my tears,

To leave me to my tears again?

My Mother rests beneath the sod,--

Her rest is calm and very deep:

I wish'd that she could see our loves,--

But now I gladden in her sleep.

Last night unbound my raven locks,

The morning saw them turned to gray,

Once they were black and well beloved,

But thou art changed,--and so are they!

The useless lock I gave thee once,

To gaze upon and think of me,

Was ta'en with smiles,--but this was torn

In sorrow that I send to thee!

SONG.

The stars are with the voyager

Wherever he may sail;

The moon is constant to her time;

The sun will never fail;

But follow, follow round the world,

The green earth and the sea,

So love is with the lover's heart,

Wherever he may be.

Wherever he may be, the stars

Must daily lose their light;

The moon will veil her in the shade;

The sun will set at night.

The sun may set, but constant love

Will shine when he's away;

So that dull night is never night,

And day is brighter day.

SONG.

O Lady, leave thy silken thread

And flowery tapestrie:

There's living roses on the bush,

And blossoms on the tree;

Stoop where thou wilt, thy careless hand

Some random bud will meet;

Thou canst not tread, but thou wilt find

The daisy at thy feet.

'Tis like the birthday of the world,

When earth was born in bloom;

The light is made of many dyes,

The air is all perfume;

There's crimson buds, and white and blue--

The very rainbow showers

Have turn'd to blossoms where they fell,

And sown the earth with flowers.

There's fairy tulips in the east,

The garden of the sun;

The very streams reflect the hues,

And blossom as they run:

While Morn opes like a crimson rose,

Still wet with pearly showers;

Then, lady, leave the silken thread

Thou twinest into flowers!

BIRTHDAY VERSES.

Good morrow to the golden morning,

Good morrow to the world's delight--

I've come to bless thy life's beginning,

Since it makes my own so bright!

I have brought no roses, sweetest,

I could find no flowers, dear,--

It was when all sweets were over

Thou wert born to bless the year.

But I've brought thee jewels, dearest,

In thy bonny locks to shine,--

And if love shows in their glances,

They have learn'd that look of mine!

I LOVE THEE.

I love thee--I love thee!

'Tis all that I can say;--

It is my vision in the night,

My dreaming in the day;

The very echo of my heart,

The blessing when I pray:

I love thee--I love thee!

Is all that I can say.

I love thee--I love thee!

Is ever on my tongue;

In all my proudest poesy

That chorus still is sung;

It is the verdict of my eyes,

Amidst the gay and young:

I love thee--I love thee!

A thousand maids among.

I love thee--I love thee!

Thy bright hazel glance,

The mellow lute upon those lips,

Whose tender tones entrance;

But most, dear heart of hearts, thy proofs

That still these words enhance,

I love thee--I love thee!

Whatever be thy chance.

LINES.

Let us make a leap, my dear,

In our love, of many a year,

And date it very far away,

On a bright clear summer day,

When the heart was like a sun

To itself, and falsehood none;

And the rosy lips a part

Of the very loving heart,

And the shining of the eye

But a sign to know it by;--

When my faults were all forgiven,

And my life deserved of Heaven.

Dearest, let us reckon so,

And love for all that long ago;

Each absence count a year complete,

And keep a birthday when we meet.

FALSE POETS AND TRUE.

TO WORDSWORTH.

Look how the lark soars upward and is gone,

Turning a spirit as he nears the sky!

His voice is heard, but body there is none

To fix the vague excursions of the eye.

So, poets' songs are with us, tho' they die

Obscured, and hid by death's oblivious shroud,

And Earth inherits the rich melody

Like raining music from the morning cloud.

Yet, few there be who pipe so sweet and loud

Their voices reach us through the lapse of space:

The noisy day is deafen'd by a crowd

Of undistinguished birds, a twittering race;

But only lark and nightingale forlorn

Fill up the silences of night and morn.

THE TWO SWANS.

A FAIRY TALE.

I.

Immortal Imogen, crown'd queen above

The lilies of thy sex, vouchsafe to hear

A fairy dream in honor of true love--

True above ills, and frailty, and all fear,--

Perchance a shadow of his own career

Whose youth was darkly prison'd and long-twined

By serpent-sorrow, till white Love drew near,

And sweetly sang him free, and round his mind

A bright horizon threw, wherein no grief may wind.

II.

I saw a tower builded on a lake,

Mock'd by its inverse shadow, dark and deep--

That seem'd a still intenser night to make,

Wherein the quiet waters sank to sleep,--

And, whatso'er was prison'd in that keep,

A monstrous Snake was warden:--round and round

In sable ringlets I beheld him creep

Blackest amid black shadows to the ground,

Whilst his enormous head, the topmost turret crown'd.

III.

From whence he shot fierce light against the stars,

Making the pale moon paler with affright;

And with his ruby eye out-threaten'd Mars--

That blaz'd in the mid-heavens, hot and bright--

Nor slept, nor wink'd, but with a steadfast spite

Watch'd their wan looks and tremblings in the skies;

And that he might not slumber in the night,

The curtain-lids were pluck'd from his large eyes,

So he might never drowse, but watch his secret prize.

IV.

Prince or princess in dismal durance pent,

Victims of old Enchantment's love or hate,

Their lives must all in painful sighs be spent,

Watching the lonely waters soon and late,

And clouds that pass and leave them to their fate,

Or company their grief with heavy tears:--

Meanwhile that Hope can spy no golden gate

For sweet escapement, but in darksome fears

They weep and pine away as if immortal years.

V.

No gentle bird with gold upon its wing

Will perch upon the grate--the gentle bird

Is safe in leafy dell, and will not bring

Freedom's sweet key-note and commission-word

Learn'd of a fairy's lips, for pity stirr'd--

Lest while he trembling sings, untimely guest!

Watch'd by that cruel Snake and darkly heard,

He leave a widow on her lonely nest,

To press in silent grief the darlings of her breast.

VI.

No gallant knight, adventurous, in his bark,

Will seek the fruitful perils of the place,

To rouse with dipping oar the waters dark

That bear that serpent image on their face.

And Love, brave Love! though he attempt the base,

Nerved to his loyal death, he may not win

His captive lady from the strict embrace

Of that foul Serpent, clasping her within

His sable folds--like Eve enthrall'd by the old Sin.

VII.

But there is none--no knight in panoply,

Nor Love, intrench'd in his strong steely coat:

No little speck--no sail--no helper nigh,

No sign--no whispering--no plash of boat:--

The distant shores show dimly and remote,

Made of a deeper mist,--serene and gray,--

And slow and mute the cloudy shadows float

Over the gloomy wave, and pass away,

Chased by the silver beams that on their marges play.

VIII.

And bright and silvery the willows sleep

Over the shady verge--no mad winds tease

Their hoary heads; but quietly they weep

Their sprinkling leaves--half fountains and half trees:

Their lilies be--and fairer than all these,

A solitary Swan her breast of snow

Launches against the wave that seems to freeze

Into a chaste reflection, still below

Twin shadow of herself wherever she may go.

IX.

And forth she paddles in the very noon

Of solemn midnight like an elfin thing,

Charm'd into being by the argent moon--

Whose silver light for love of her fair wing

Goes with her in the shade, still worshipping

Her dainty plumage:--all around her grew

A radiant circlet, like a fairy ring;

And all behind, a tiny little clue

Of light, to guide her back across the waters blue.

X.

And sure she is no meaner than a fay,

Redeem'd from sleepy death, for beauty's sake,

By old ordainment:--silent as she lay,

Touched by a moonlight wand I saw her wake,

And cut her leafy slough, and so forsake

The verdant prison of her lily peers,

That slept amidst the stars upon the lake--

A breathing shape--restored to human fears,

And new-born love and grief--self-conscious of her tears.

XI.

And now she clasps her wings around her heart,

And near that lonely isle begins to glide,

Pale as her fears, and oft-times with a start

Turns her impatient head from side to side

In universal terrors--all too wide

To watch; and often to that marble keep

Upturns her pearly eyes, as if she spied

Some foe, and crouches in the shadows steep

That in the gloomy wave go diving fathoms deep.

XII.

And well she may, to spy that fearful thing

All down the dusky walls in circlets wound;

Alas! for what rare prize, with many a ring

Girding the marble casket round and round?

His folded tail, lost in the gloom profound,

Terribly darkeneth the rocky base;

But on the top his monstrous head is crown'd

With prickly spears, and on his doubtful face

Gleam his unwearied eyes, red watchers of the place.

XIII.

Alas! of the hot fires that nightly fall,

No one will scorch him in those orbs of spite,

So he may never see beneath the wall

That timid little creature, all too bright,

That stretches her fair neck, slender and white,

Invoking the pale moon, and vainly tries

Her throbbing throat, as if to charm the night

With song--but, hush--it perishes in sighs,

And there will be no dirge sad-swelling, though she dies!

XIV.

She droops--she sinks--she leans upon the lake,

Fainting again into a lifeless flower;

But soon the chilly springs anoint and wake

Her spirit from its death, and with new power

She sheds her stifled sorrows in a shower

Of tender song, timed to her falling tears--

That wins the shady summit of that tower,

And, trembling all the sweeter for its fears,

Fills with imploring moan that cruel monster's ears.

XV.

And, lo! the scaly beast is all deprest,

Subdued like Argus by the might of sound--

What time Apollo his sweet lute addrest

To magic converse with the air, and bound

The many monster eyes, all slumber-drown'd:--

So on the turret-top that watchful Snake

Pillows his giant head, and lists profound,

As if his wrathful spite would never wake,

Charm'd into sudden sleep for Love and Beauty's sake!

XVI.

His prickly crest lies prone upon his crown,

And thirsty lip from lip disparted flies,

To drink that dainty flood of music down--

His scaly throat is big with pent-up sighs--

And whilst his hollow ear entranced lies,

His looks for envy of the charmed sense

Are fain to listen, till his steadfast eyes,

Stung into pain by their own impotence,

Distil enormous tears into the lake immense.

XVII.

Oh, tuneful Swan! oh, melancholy bird!

Sweet was that midnight miracle of song,

Rich with ripe sorrow, needful of no word

To tell of pain, and love, and love's deep wrong--

Hinting a piteous tale--perchance how long

Thy unknown tears were mingled with the lake,

What time disguised thy leafy mates among--

And no eye knew what human love and ache

Dwelt in those dewy leaves, and heart so nigh to break.

XVIII.

Therefore no poet will ungently touch

The water-lily, on whose eyelids dew

Trembles like tears; but ever hold it such

As human pain may wander through and through,

Turning the pale leaf paler in its hue--

Wherein life dwells, transfigured, not entomb'd,

By magic spells. Alas! who ever knew

Sorrow in all its shapes, leafy and plumed,

Or in gross husks of brutes eternally inhumed?

XIX.

And now the winged song has scaled the height

Of that dark dwelling, builded for despair,

And soon a little casement flashing bright

Widens self-open'd into the cool air--

That music like a bird may enter there

And soothe the captive in his stony cage;

For there is nought of grief, or painful care,

But plaintive song may happily engage

From sense of its own ill, and tenderly assuage.

XX.

And forth into the light, small and remote,

A creature, like the fair son of a king,

Draws to the lattice in his jewell'd coat

Against the silver moonlight glistening,

And leans upon his white hand listening

To that sweet music that with tenderer tone

Salutes him, wondering what kindly thing

Is come to soothe him with so tuneful moan,

Singing beneath the walls as if for him alone!

XXI.

And while he listens, the mysterious song,

Woven with timid particles of speech.

Twines into passionate words that grieve along

The melancholy notes, and softly teach

The secrets of true love,--that trembling reach

His earnest ear, and through the shadows dun

He missions like replies, and each to each

Their silver voices mingle into one,

Like blended streams that make one music as they run.

XXII.

"Ah! Love, my hope is swooning in my heart,--"

"Ay, sweet, my cage is strong and hung full high--"

"Alas! our lips are held so far apart,

Thy words come faint,--they have so far to fly!--"

"If I may only shun that serpent-eye,--"

"Ah me! that serpent-eye doth never sleep;--"

"Then, nearer thee, Love's martyr, I will die!--"

"Alas, alas! that word has made me weep!

For pity's sake remain safe in thy marble keep!"

XXIII.

"My marble keep! it is my marble tomb--"

"Nay, sweet! but thou hast there thy living breath--"

"Aye to expend in sighs for this hard doom;--"

"But I will come to thee and sing beneath,"

"And nightly so beguile this serpent wreath;--"

"Nay, I will find a path from these despairs."

"Ah, needs then thou must tread the back of death,

Making his stony ribs thy stony stairs.--

Behold his ruby eye, how fearfully it glares!"

XXIV.

Full sudden at these words, the princely youth

Leaps on the scaly back that slumbers, still

Unconscious of his foot, yet not for ruth,

But numb'd to dulness by the fairy skill

Of that sweet music (all more wild and shrill

For intense fear) that charm'd him as he lay--

Meanwhile the lover nerves his desperate will,

Held some short throbs by natural dismay,

Then down the serpent-track begins his darksome way.

XXV.

Now dimly seen--now toiling out of sight,

Eclipsed and cover'd by the envious wall;

Now fair and spangled in the sudden light,

And clinging with wide arms for fear of fall;

Now dark and shelter'd by a kindly pall

Of dusky shadow from his wakeful foe;

Slowly he winds adown--dimly and small,

Watch'd by the gentle Swan that sings below,

Her hope increasing, still, the larger he doth grow.

XXVI.

But nine times nine the serpent folds embrace

The marble walls about--which he must tread

Before his anxious foot may touch the base:

Long in the dreary path, and must be sped!

But Love, that holds the mastery of dread,

Braces his spirit, and with constant toil

He wins his way, and now, with arms outspread,

Impatient plunges from the last long coil;

So may all gentle Love ungentle Malice foil!

XXVII.

The song is hush'd, the charm is all complete,

And two fair Swans are swimming on the lake:

But scarce their tender bills have time to meet,

When fiercely drops adown that cruel Snake--

His steely scales a fearful rustling make,

Like autumn leaves that tremble and foretell

The sable storm;--the plumy lovers quake--

And feel the troubled waters pant and swell,

Heaved by the giant bulk of their pursuer fell.

XXVIII.

His jaws, wide yawning like the gates of Death,

Hiss horrible pursuit--his red eyes glare

The waters into blood--his eager breath

Grows hot upon their plumes:--now, minstrel fair!

She drops her ring into the waves, and there

It widens all around, a fairy ring

Wrought of the silver light--the fearful pair

Swim in the very midst, and pant and cling

The closer for their fears, and tremble wing to wing.

XXIX.

Bending their course over the pale gray lake,

Against the pallid East, wherein light play'd

In tender flushes, still the baffled Snake

Circled them round continually, and bay'd

Hoarsely and loud, forbidden to invade

The sanctuary ring--his sable mail

Roll'd darkly through the flood, and writhed and made

A shining track over the waters pale,

Lash'd into boiling foam by his enormous tail.

XXX.

And so they sail'd into the distance dim,

Into the very distance--small and white,

Like snowy blossoms of the spring that swim

Over the brooklets--follow'd by the spite

Of that huge Serpent, that with wild affright

Worried them on their course, and sore annoy,

Till on the grassy marge I saw them 'light,

And change, anon, a gentle girl and boy,

Lock'd in embrace of sweet unutterable joy!

XXXI.

Then came the Morn, and with her pearly showers

Wept on them, like a mother, in whose eyes

Tears are no grief; and from his rosy bowers

The Oriental sun began to rise,

Chasing the darksome shadows from the skies;

Wherewith that sable Serpent far away

Fled, like a part of night--delicious sighs

From waking blossoms purified the day,

And little birds were singing sweetly from each spray.

ODE ON A DISTANT PROSPECT OF CLAPHAM ACADEMY.[5]

[Footnote 5: No connection with any other Ode.]

I.

Ah me! those old familiar bounds!

That classic house, those classic grounds

My pensive thought recalls!

What tender urchins now confine,

What little captives now repine,

Within yon irksome walls?

II.

Ay, that's the very house! I know

Its ugly windows, ten a-row!

Its chimneys in the rear!

And there's the iron rod so high,

That drew the thunder from the sky

And turn'd our table-beer!

III.

There I was birch'd! there I was bred!

There like a little Adam fed

From Learning's woeful tree!

The weary tasks I used to con!--

The hopeless leaves I wept upon!--

Most fruitless leaves to me!--

IV.

The summon'd class!--the awful bow!--

I wonder who is master now

And wholesome anguish sheds!

How many ushers now employs,

How many maids to see the boys

Have nothing in their heads!

V.

And Mrs. S----?--Doth she abet

(Like Pallas in the parlor) yet

Some favor'd two or three,--

The little Crichtons of the hour,

Her muffin-medals that devour,

And swill her prize--bohea?

VI.

Ay, there's the playground! there's the lime,

Beneath whose shade in summer's prime

So wildly I have read!--

Who sits there _now_, and skims the cream

Of young Romance, and weaves a dream

Of Love and Cottage-bread?

VII.

Who struts the Randall of the walk?

Who models tiny heads in chalk?

Who scoops the light canoe?

What early genius buds apace?

Where's Poynter? Harris? Bowers? Chase?

Hal Baylis? blithe Carew?

VIII.

Alack! they're gone--a thousand ways!

And some are serving in "the Greys,"

And some have perish'd young!--

Jack Harris weds his second wife;

Hal Baylis drives the _wane_ of life;

And blithe Carew--is hung!

IX.

Grave Bowers teaches A B C

To savages at Owhyee;

Poor Chase is with the worms!--

All, all are gone--the olden breed!--

New crops of mushroon boys succeed,

"And push us from our _forms_!"

X.

Lo! where they scramble forth, and shout,

And leap, and skip, and mob about,

At play where we have play'd!

Some hop, some run, (some fall,) some twine

Their crony arms; some in the shine,--

And some are in the shade!

XI.

Lo there what mix'd conditions run!

The orphan lad; the widow's son;

And Fortune's favor'd care--

The wealthy-born, for whom she hath

Mac-Adamised the future path--

The Nabob's pamper'd heir!

XII.

Some brightly starr'd--some evil born,--

For honor some, and some for scorn,--

For fair or foul renown!

Good, bad, indiff'rent--none may lack!

Look, here's a White, and there's a Black

And there's a Creole brown!

XIII.

Some laugh and sing, some mope and weep,

And wish _their_ frugal sires would keep

Their only sons at home;--

Some tease their future tense, and plan

The full-grown doings of the man,

And plant for years to come!

XIV.

A foolish wish! There's one at hoop;

And four at _fives_! and five who stoop

The marble taw to speed!

And one that curvets in and out,

Reining his fellow Cob about,--

Would I were in his _steed_!

XV.

Yet he would glady halt and drop

That boyish harness off, to swop

With this world's heavy van--

To toil, to tug. O little fool!

While thou canst be a horse at school,

To wish to be a man!

XVI.

Perchance thou deem'st it were a thing

To wear a crown,--to be a king!

And sleep on regal down!

Alas! thou know'st not kingly cares;

For happier is thy head that wears

That hat without a crown!

XVII.

And dost thou think that years acquire

New added joys? Dost think thy sire

More happy than his son?

That manhood's mirth?--Oh, go thy ways

To Drury-lane when--_plays_,

And see _how forced_ our fun!

XVIII.

Thy taws are brave!--thy tops are rare!--

_Our_ tops are spun with coils of care,

Our _dumps_ are no delight!--

The Elgin marbles are but tame,

And 'tis at best a sorry game

To fly the Muse's kite!

XIX.

Our hearts are dough, our heels are lead,

Our topmost joys fall dull and dead

Like balls with no rebound!

And often with a faded eye

We look behind, and send a sigh

Towards that merry ground!

XX.

Then be contented. Thou hast got

The most of heaven in thy young lot;

There's sky-blue in thy cup!

Thou'lt find thy Manhood all too fast--

Soon come, soon gone! and Age at last

A sorry _breaking-up_!

SONG.

There is dew for the flow'ret[6]

And honey for the bee,

And bowers for the wild bird,

And love for you and me.

There are tears for the many

And pleasures for the few;

But let the world pass on, dear,

There's love for me and you.

There is care that will not leave us,

And pain that will not flee;

But on our hearth unalter'd

Sits Love--'tween you and me.

_Our_ love it ne'er was reckon'd,

Yet good it is and true,

It's _half_ the world to me, dear,

It's _all_ the world to you.

[Footnote 6: The first two stanzas by Hood, the other two contributed

by Barry Cornwall at the request of Mrs. Hood, with a view to the poem

being set to music.]

THE WATER LADY.[7]

[Footnote 7: Suggested, according to Hood's son, by a water-color

drawing by Keats's friend Severn.]

Alas, the moon should ever beam

To show what man should never see!--

I saw a maiden on a stream,

And fair was she!

I staid awhile, to see her throw

Her tresses black, that all beset

The fair horizon of her brow

With clouds of jet.

I staid a little while to view

Her cheek, that wore in place of red

The bloom of water, tender blue,

Daintily spread.

I staid to watch, a little space,

Her parted lips if she would sing;

The waters closed above her face

With many a ring.

And still I staid a little more,

Alas! she never comes again!

I throw my flowers from the shore,

And watch in vain.

I know my life will fade away,

I know that I must vainly pine,

For I am made of mortal clay,

But she's divine!

AUTUMN.

The Autumn is old,

The sere leaves are flying;--

He hath gather'd up gold,

And now he is dying;--

Old Age, begin sighing!

The vintage is ripe,

The harvest is heaping;--

But some that have sow'd

Have no riches for reaping;--

Poor wretch, fall a-weeping!

The year's in the wane,

There is nothing adorning,

The night has no eve,

And the day has no morning;--

Cold winter gives warning.

The rivers run chill,

The red sun is sinking,

And I am grown old,

And life is fast shrinking;

Here's enow for sad thinking!

I REMEMBER, I REMEMBER.

I remember, I remember,

The house where I was born,

The little window where the sun

Came peeping in at morn;

He never came a wink too soon,

Nor brought too long a day,

But now, I often wish the night

Had borne my breath away!

I remember, I remember,

The roses, red and white,

The violets, and the lily-cups,

Those flowers made of light!

The lilacs where the robin built,

And where my brother set

The laburnum on his birthday,--

The tree is living yet!

I remember, I remember,

Where I was used to swing,

And thought the air must rush as fresh

To swallows on the wing;

My spirit flew in feathers then,

That is so heavy now,

And summer pools could hardly cool

The fever on my brow!

I remember, I remember,

The fir trees dark and high;

I used to think their slender tops

Were close against the sky:

It was a childish ignorance,

But now 'tis little joy

To know I'm farther off from Heav'n

Than when I was a boy.

THE POET'S PORTION.

What is a mine--a treasury--a dower--

A magic talisman of mighty power?

A poet's wide possession of the earth.

He has th' enjoyment of a flower's birth

Before its budding--ere the first red streaks,--

And Winter cannot rob him of their cheeks.

Look--if his dawn be not as other men's!

Twenty bright flushes--ere another kens

The first of sunlight is abroad--he sees

Its golden 'lection of the topmost trees,

And opes the splendid fissures of the morn.

When do his fruits delay, when doth his corn

Linger for harvesting? Before the leaf

Is commonly abroad, in his piled sheaf

The flagging poppies lose their ancient flame.

No sweet there is, no pleasure I can name,

But he will sip it first--before the lees.

'Tis his to taste rich honey,--ere the bees

Are busy with the brooms. He may forestall

June's rosy advent for his coronal;

Before th' expectant buds upon the bough,

Twining his thoughts to bloom upon his brow.

Oh! blest to see the flower in its seed,

Before its leafy presence; for indeed

Leaves are but wings on which the summer flies,

And each thing perishable fades and dies,

Escap'd in thought; but his rich thinkings be

Like overflows of immortality:

So that what there is steep'd shall perish never,

But live and bloom, and be a joy forever.

ODE TO THE MOON.

I.

Mother of light! how fairly dost thou go

Over those hoary crests, divinely led!--

Art thou that huntress of the silver bow,

Fabled of old? Or rather dost thou tread

Those cloudy summits thence to gaze below,

Like the wild Chamois from her Alpine snow,

Where hunter never climb'd,--secure from dread?

How many antique fancies have I read

Of that mild presence! and how many wrought!

Wondrous and bright,

Upon the silver light,

Chasing fair figures with the artist, Thought!

II.

What art thou like?--Sometimes I see thee ride

A far-bound galley on its perilous way,

Whilst breezy waves toss up their silvery spray;--

Sometimes behold thee glide,

Cluster'd by all thy family of stars,

Like a lone widow, through the welkin wide,

Whose pallid cheek the midnight sorrow mars;--

Sometimes I watch thee on from steep to steep,

Timidly lighted by thy vestal torch,

Till in some Latmian cave I see thee creep,

To catch the young Endymion asleep,--

Leaving thy splendor at the jagged porch!--

III.

Oh, thou art beautiful, howe'er it be!

Huntress, or Dian, or whatever named;

And he, the veriest Pagan, that first framed

A silver idol, and ne'er worshipp'd thee!--

It is too late--or thou should'st have my knee--

Too late now for the old Ephesian vows,

And not divine the crescent on thy brows!--

Yet, call thee nothing but the mere mild Moon,

Behind those chestnut boughs,

Casting their dappled shadows at my feet;

I will be grateful for that simple boon,

In many a thoughtful verse and anthem sweet,

And bless thy dainty face when'er we meet.

IV.

In nights far gone,--ay, far away and dead,--

Before Care-fretted, with a lidless eye,--

I was thy wooer on my little bed,

Letting the early hours of rest go by,

To see thee flood the heaven with milky light,

And feed thy snow-white swans, before I slept;

For thou wert then purveyor of my dreams,--

Thou wert the fairies' armourer, that kept

Their burnish'd helms, and crowns, and corslets bright,

Their spears, and glittering mails;

And ever thou didst spill in winding streams

Sparkles and midnight gleams,

For fishes to new gloss their ardent scales!--

V.

Why sighs?--why creeping tears?--why clasped hands?--

Is it to count the boy's expended dow'r?

That fairies since have broke their gifted wands?

That young Delight, like any o'erblown flower,

Gave, one by one, its sweet leaves to the ground?--

Why then, fair Moon, for all thou mark'st no hour,

Thou art a sadder dial to old Time

Than ever I have found

On sunny garden-plot, or moss-grown tow'r,

Motto'd with stern and melancholy rhyme.

VI.

Why should I grieve for this?--Oh I must yearn

Whilst Time, conspirator with Memory,

Keeps his cold ashes in an ancient urn,

Richly emboss'd with childhood's revelry,

With leaves and cluster'd fruits, and flow'rs eterne,--

(Eternal to the world, though not to me),

Aye there will those brave sports and blossoms be,

The deathless wreath, and undecay'd festoon,

When I am hearsed within,--

Less than the pallid primrose to the Moon,

That now she watches through a vapor thin.

VII.

So let it be:--Before I lived to sigh,

Thou wert in Avon, and a thousand rills,

Beautiful Orb! and so, whene'er I lie

Trodden, thou wilt be gazing from thy hills.

Blest be thy loving light, where'er it spills,

And blessëd thy fair face, O Mother mild!

Still shine, the soul of rivers as they run,

Still lend thy lonely lamp to lovers fond,

And blend their plighted shadows into one:--

Still smile at even on the bedded child,

And close his eyelids with thy silver wand!

SONNET.

WRITTEN IN A VOLUME OF SHAKSPEARE.

How bravely Autumn paints upon the sky

The gorgeous fame of Summer which is fled!

Hues of all flow'rs, that in their ashes lie,

Trophied in that fair light whereon they fed,--

Tulip, and hyacinth, and sweet rose red,--

Like exhalations from the leafy mould,

Look here how honor glorifies the dead,

And warms their scutcheons with a glance of gold!--

Such is the memory of poets old,

Who on Parnassus' hill have bloom'd elate;

Now they are laid under their marbles cold,

And turned to clay, whereof they were create;

But god Apollo hath them all enroll'd,

And blazon'd on the very clouds of Fate!

A RETROSPECTIVE REVIEW.

I.

Oh, when I was a tiny boy,

My days and nights were full of joy,

My mates were blithe and kind!--

No wonder that I sometimes sigh,

And dash the tear-drop from my eye,

To cast a look behind!

II.

A hoop was an eternal round

Of pleasure. In those days I found

A top a joyous thing;--

But now those past delights I drop,

My head, alas! is all my top,

And careful thoughts the string!

III.

My marbles--once my bag was stored,--

Now I must play with Elgin's lord,

With Theseus for a taw!

My playful horse has slipt his string,

Forgotten all his capering,

And harness'd to the law!

IV.

My kite--how fast and far it flew!

Whilst I, a sort of Franklin, drew

My pleasure from the sky!

'Twas paper'd o'er with studious themes,

The tasks I wrote--my present dreams

Will never soar so high!

V.

My joys are wingless all and dead;

My dumps are made of more than lead;--

My flights soon find a fall;

My fears prevail, my fancies droop,

Joy never cometh with a hoop,

And seldom with a call!

VI.

My football's laid upon the shelf;

I am a shuttlecock myself

The world knocks to and fro;--

My archery is all unlearn'd,

And grief against myself has turn'd

My arrows and my bow!

VII.

No more in noontide sun I bask;

My authorship's an endless task,

My head's ne'er out of school:

My heart is pain'd with scorn and slight,

I have too many foes to fight,

And friends grown strangely cool!

VIII.

The very chum that shared my cake

Holds out so cold a hand to shake,

It makes me shrink and sigh:--

On this I will not dwell and hang,--

The changeling would not feel a pang

Though these should meet his eye!

IX.

No skies so blue or so serene

As then;--no leaves look half so green

As clothed the playground tree!

All things I loved are altered so,

Nor does it ease my heart to know

That change resides in me!

X.

Oh for the garb that marked the boy,

The trousers made of corduroy,

Well ink'd with black and red;

The crownless hat, ne'er deem'd an ill--

It only let the sunshine still

Repose upon my head!

XI.

Oh for the riband round the neck!

The careless dogs-ears apt to deck

My book and collar both!

How can this formal man be styled

Merely an Alexandrine child,

A boy of larger growth?

XII.

Oh for that small, small beer anew!

And (heaven's own type) that mild sky-blue

That wash'd my sweet meals down;

The master even!--and that small Turk

That fagg'd me!--worse is now my work--

A fag for all the town!

XIII.

Oh for the lessons learned by heart!

Ay, though the very birch's smart

Should mark those hours again;

I'd "kiss the rod," and be resign'd

Beneath the stroke, and even find

Some sugar in the cane!

XIV.

The Arabian Nights rehearsed in bed!

The Fairy Tales in school-time read,

By stealth, 'twixt verb and noun!

The angel form that always walk'd

In all my dreams, and look'd and talk'd

Exactly like Miss Brown!

XV.

The _omne bene_--Christmas come!

The prize of merit, won for home--

Merit had prizes then!

But now I write for days and days,

For fame--a deal of empty praise,

Without the silver pen!

XVI.

Then "home, sweet home!" the crowded coach--

The joyous shout--the loud approach--

The winding horns like rams'!

The meeting sweet that made me thrill,

The sweetmeats, almost sweeter still,

No 'satis' to the 'jams'!--

XVII.

When that I was a tiny boy

My days and nights were full of joy,

My mates were blithe and kind!

No wonder that I sometimes sigh,

And dash the tear-drop from my eye,

To cast a look behind!

BALLAD.

It was not in the Winter

Our loving lot was cast;

It was the Time of Roses,--

We plucked them as we passed!

That churlish season never frown'd

On early lovers yet:--

Oh, no--the world was newly crown'd

With flowers when first we met!

'Twas twilight, and I bade you go,

But still you held me fast;

It was the Time of Roses,--

We pluck'd them as we pass'd.--

What else could peer thy glowing cheek,

That tears began to stud?

And when I ask'd the like of Love,

You snatched a damask bud;

And oped it to the dainty core,

Still glowing to the last.--

It was the Time of Roses,--

We plucked them as we pass'd!

TIME, HOPE, AND MEMORY.

I heard a gentle maiden, in the spring,

Set her sweet sighs to music, and thus sing:

"Fly through the world, and I will follow thee,

Only for looks that may turn back on me;

"Only for roses that your chance may throw--

Though withered--Twill wear them on my brow,

To be a thoughtful fragrance to my brain,--

Warm'd with such love, that they will bloom again."

"Thy love before thee, I must tread behind,

Kissing thy foot-prints, though to me unkind;

But trust not all her fondness, though it seem,

Lest thy true love should rest on a false dream."

"Her face is smiling, and her voice is sweet;

But smiles betray, and music sings deceit;

And words speak false;--yet, if they welcome prove,

I'll be their echo, and repeat their love."

"Only if waken'd to sad truth, at last,

The bitterness to come, and sweetness past;

When thou art vext, then turn again, and see

Thou hast loved Hope, but Memory loved thee."

FLOWERS.

I will not have the mad Clytie,

Whose head is turned by the sun;

The tulip is a courtly queen,

Whom, therefore, I will shun;

The cowslip is a country wench,

The violet is a nun;--

But I will woo the dainty rose,

The queen of every one.

The pea is but a wanton witch,

In too much haste to wed,

And clasps her rings on every hand;

The wolfsbane I should dread;

Nor will I dreary rosemarye,

That always mourns the dead;--

But I will woo the dainty rose,

With her cheeks of tender red.

The lily is all in white, like a saint,

And so is no mate for me--

And the daisy's cheek is tipped with a blush,

She is of such low degree;

Jasmine is sweet, and has many loves,

And the broom's betroth'd to the bee;--

But I will plight with the dainty rose,

For fairest of all is she.

BALLAD.

She's up and gone, the graceless girl,

And robb'd my failing years!

My blood before was thin and cold

But now 'tis turn'd to tears;--

My shadow falls upon my grave,

So near the brink I stand,

She might have stay'd a little yet,

And led me by the hand!

Aye, call her on the barren moor,

And call her on the hill:

'Tis nothing but the heron's cry,

And plover's answer shrill;

My child is flown on wilder wings

Than they have ever spread,

And I may even walk a waste

That widen'd when she fled.

Full many a thankless child has been,

But never one like mine;

Her meat was served on plates of gold,

Her drink was rosy wine;

But now she'll share the robin's food,

And sup the common rill,

Before her feet will turn again

To meet her father's will!

RUTH.

She stood breast high amid the corn

Clasp'd by the golden light of morn,

Like the sweetheart of the sun,

Who many a glowing kiss had won.

On her cheek an autumn flush,

Deeply ripen'd;--such a blush

In the midst of brown was born,

Like red poppies grown with corn.

Round her eyes her tresses fell,

Which were blackest none could tell,

But long lashes veil'd a light,

That had else been all too bright.

And her hat, with shady brim,

Made her tressy forehead dim;--

Thus she stood amid the stooks,

Praising God with sweetest looks:--

Sure, I said, Heav'n did not mean,

Where I reap thou shouldst but glean,

Lay thy sheaf adown and come,

Share my harvest and my home.

THE PLEA OF THE MIDSUMMER FAIRIES.[8]

[Footnote 8: The opening Poem in the volume published by Hood in 1827,

under the same title. The Poem was prefaced by the following letter to

Charles Lamb:--

"My dear Friend, I thank my literary fortune that I am not reduced

like many better wits to barter dedications, for the hope or

promise of patronage, with some nominally great man; but that where

true affection points, and honest respect, I am free to gratify my

head and heart by a sincere inscription. An intimacy and dearness,

worthy of a much earlier date than our acquaintance can refer to,

direct me at once to your name; and with this acknowledgment of

your ever kind feeling towards me, I desire to record a respect and

admiration for you as a writer, which no one acquainted with our

literature, save Elia himself, will think disproportionate or

misplaced. If I had not these better reasons to govern me, I should

be guided to the same selection by your intense yet critical relish

for the works of the great Dramatist, and for that favorite play in

particular which has furnished the subject of my verses.

It is my design in the following poem to celebrate by an allegory

that immortality which Shakspeare has conferred on the fairy

mythology by his Midsummer Night's Dream. But for him, those pretty

children of our childhood would leave barely their names to our

maturer years; they belong, as the mites upon the plumb, to the

bloom of fancy, a thing generally too frail and beautiful to

withstand the rude handling of time: but the Poet has made this

most perishable part of the mind's creation equal to the most

enduring; he has so intertwined the Elfins with human sympathies,

and linked them by so many delightful associations with the

productions of nature, that they are as real to the mind's eye, as

their green magical circles to the outer sense. It would have been

a pity for such a race to go extinct, even though they were but as

the butterflies that hover about the leaves and blossoms of the

visible world. I am, my dear friend, yours most truly, T. HOOD."]

I.

'Twas in that mellow season of the year

When the hot sun singes the yellow leaves

Till they be gold,--and with a broader sphere

The Moon looks down on Ceres and her sheaves;

When more abundantly the spider weaves,

And the cold wind breathes from a chillier clime;--

That forth I fared, on one of those still eves,

Touch'd with the dewy sadness of the time,

To think how the bright months had spent their prime,

II.

So that, wherever I address'd my way,

I seem'd to track the melancholy feet

Of him that is the Father of Decay,

And spoils at once the sour weed and the sweet;--

Wherefore regretfully I made retreat

To some unwasted regions of my brain,

Charm'd with the light of summer and the heat,

And bade that bounteous season bloom again,

And sprout fresh flowers in mine own domain.

III.

It was a shady and sequester'd scene,

Like those famed gardens of Boccaccio,

Planted with his own laurels evergreen,

And roses that for endless summer blow;

And there were fountain springs to overflow

Their marble basins,--and cool green arcades

Of tall o'erarching sycamores, to throw

Athwart the dappled path their dancing shades,--

With timid coneys cropping the green blades.

IV.

And there were crystal pools, peopled with fish,

Argent and gold; and some of Tyrian skin,

Some crimson-barr'd;--and ever at a wish

They rose obsequious till the wave grew thin

As glass upon their backs, and then dived in,

Quenching their ardent scales in watery gloom;

Whilst others with fresh hues row'd forth to win

My changeable regard,--for so we doom

Things born of thought to vanish or to bloom.

V.

And there were many birds of many dyes,

From tree to tree still faring to and fro,

And stately peacocks with their splendid eyes,

And gorgeous pheasants with their golden glow,

Like Iris just bedabbled in her bow,

Beside some vocalists, without a name,

That oft on fairy errands come and go,

With accents magical;--and all were tame,

And peckled at my hand where'er I came.

VI.

And for my sylvan company, in lieu

Of Pampinea with her lively peers,

Sate Queen Titania with her pretty crew,

All in their liveries quaint, with elfin gears,

For she was gracious to my childish years,

And made me free of her enchanted round;

Wherefore this dreamy scene she still endears,

And plants her court upon a verdant mound,

Fenced with umbrageous woods and groves profound.

VII.

"Ah me," she cries, "was ever moonlight seen

So clear and tender for our midnight trips?

Go some one forth, and with a trump convene

My lieges all!"--Away the goblin skips

A pace or two apart, and deftly strips

The ruddy skin from a sweet rose's cheek,

Then blows the shuddering leaf between his lips,

Making it utter forth a shrill small shriek,

Like a fray'd bird in the gray owlet's beak.

VIII.

And lo! upon my fix'd delighted ken

Appear'd the loyal Fays.--Some by degrees

Crept from the primrose buds that open'd then,

Ana some from bell-shaped blossoms like the bees,

Some from the dewy meads, and rushy leas,

Flew up like chafers when the rustics pass;

Some from the rivers, others from tall trees

Dropp'd, like shed blossoms, silent to the grass,

Spirits and elfins small, of every class.

IX.

Peri and Pixy, and quaint Puck the Antic,

Brought Robin Goodfellow, that merry swain;

And stealthy Mab, queen of old realms romantic,

Came too, from distance, in her tiny wain,

Fresh dripping from a cloud--some bloomy rain,

Then circling the bright Moon, had wash'd her car,

And still bedew'd it with a various stain:

Lastly came Ariel, shooting from a star,

Who bears all fairy embassies afar.

X.

But Oberon, that night elsewhere exiled,

Was absent, whether some distemper'd spleen

Kept him and his fair mate unreconciled,

Or warfare with the Gnome (whose race had been

Sometime obnoxious), kept him from his queen,

And made her now peruse the starry skies

Prophetical, with such an absent mien;

Howbeit, the tears stole often to her eyes,

And oft the Moon was incensed with her sighs--

XI.

Which made the elves sport drearily, and soon

Their hushing dances languish'd to a stand,

Like midnight leaves, when, as the Zephyrs swoon,

All on their drooping stems they sink unfann'd,--

So into silence droop'd the fairy band,

To see their empress dear so pale and still,

Crowding her softly round on either hand,

As pale as frosty snowdrops, and as chill,

To whom the sceptred dame reveals her ill.

XII.

"Alas," quoth she, "ye know our fairy lives

Are leased upon the fickle faith of men;

Not measured out against Fate's mortal knives,

Like human gosamers,--we perish when

We fade and are forgot in worldly kens--

Though poesy has thus prolong'd our date,

Thanks be to the sweet Bard's auspicious pen

That rescued us so long!--howbeit of late

I feel some dark misgivings of our fate."

XIII.

"And this dull day my melancholy sleep

Hath been so thronged with images of woe,

That even now I cannot choose but weep

To think this was some sad prophetic show

Of future horror to befall us so,

Of mortal wreck and uttermost distress,

Yea, our poor empire's fall and overthrow,

For this was my long vision's dreadful stress,

And when I waked my trouble was not less."

XIV.

"Whenever to the clouds I tried to seek,

Such leaden weight dragg'd these Icarian wings,

My faithless wand was wavering and weak,

And slimy toads had trespass'd in our rings--

The birds refused to sing for me--all things

Disown'd their old allegiance to our spells;

The rude bees prick'd me with their rebel stings;

And, when I pass'd, the valley-lily's bells

Rang out, methought, most melancholy knells."

XV.

"And ever on the faint and flagging air

A doleful spirit with a dreary note

Cried in my fearful ear, 'Prepare! prepare!'

Which soon I knew came from a raven's throat,

Perch'd on a cypress-bough not far remote,--

A cursed bird, too crafty to be shot,

That alway cometh with his soot-black coat

To make hearts dreary:--for he is a blot

Upon the book of life, as well ye wot!--"

XVI.

"Wherefore some while I bribed him to be mute,

With bitter acorns stuffing his foul maw,

Which barely I appeased, when some fresh bruit

Startled me all aheap!--and soon I saw

The horridest shape that ever raised my awe,--

A monstrous giant, very huge and tall,

Such as in elder times, devoid of law,

With wicked might grieved the primeval ball,

And this was sure the deadliest of them all!"

XVII.

"Gaunt was he as a wolf of Languedoc,

With bloody jaws, and frost upon his crown

So from his barren poll one hoary lock

Over his wrinkled front fell far adown,

Well nigh to where his frosty brows did frown

Like jagged icicles at cottage eaves;

And for his coronal he wore some brown

And bristled ears gather'd from Ceres' sheaves,

Entwined with certain sere and russet leaves."

XVIII.

"And lo! upon a mast rear'd far aloft,

He bore a very bright and crescent blade,

The which he waved so dreadfully, and oft,

In meditative spite, that, sore dismay'd,

I crept into an acorn-cup for shade;

Meanwhile the horrid effigy went by:

I trow his look was dreadful, for it made

The trembling birds betake them to the sky,

For every leaf was lifted by his sigh."

XIX.

"And ever, as he sigh'd, his foggy breath

Blurr'd out the landscape like a flight of smoke:

Thence knew I this was either dreary Death

Or Time, who leads all creatures to his stroke.

Ah wretched me!"--Here, even as she spoke,

The melancholy Shape came gliding in,

And lean'd his back against an antique oak,

Folding his wings, that were so fine and thin,

They scarce were seen against the Dryad's skin.

XX.

Then what a fear seized all the little rout!

Look how a flock of panick'd sheep will stare--

And huddle close--and start--and wheel about,

Watching the roaming mongrel here and there,--

So did that sudden Apparition scare

All close aheap those small affrighted things;

Nor sought they now the safety of the air,

As if some leaden spell withheld their wings;

But who can fly that ancientest of Kings?

XXI.

Whom now the Queen, with a forestalling tear

And previous sigh, beginneth to entreat,

Bidding him spare, for love, her lieges dear:

"Alas!" quoth she, "is there no nodding wheat

Ripe for thy crooked weapon, and more meet,--

Or wither'd leaves to ravish from the tree,--

Or crumbling battlements for thy defeat?

Think but what vaunting monuments there be

Builded in spite and mockery of thee."

XXII.

"O fret away the fabric walls of Fame,

And grind down marble Cæsars with the dust:

Make tombs inscriptionless--raze each high name,

And waste old armors of renown with rust:

Do all of this, and thy revenge is just:

Make such decays the trophies of thy prime,

And check Ambition's overweening lust,

That dares exterminating war with Time,--

But we are guiltless of that lofty crime."

XXIII.

"Frail feeble spirits!--the children of a dream!

Leased on the sufferance of fickle men,

Like motes dependent on the sunny beam,

Living but in the sun's indulgent ken,

And when that light withdraws, withdrawing then;--

So do we flutter in the glance of youth

And fervid fancy,--and so perish when

The eye of faith grows aged;--in sad truth,

Feeling thy sway, O Time! though not thy tooth!"

XXIV.

"Where be those old divinities forlorn,

That dwelt in trees, or haunted in a stream?

Alas! their memories are dimm'd and torn,

Like the remainder tatters of a dream:

So will it fare with our poor thrones, I deem;--

For us the same dark trench Oblivion delves,

That holds the wastes of every human scheme.

O spare us then,--and these our pretty elves,--

We soon, alas! shall perish of ourselves!"

XXV.

Now as she ended, with a sigh, to name

Those old Olympians, scatter'd by the whirl

Of Fortune's giddy wheel and brought to shame,

Methought a scornful and malignant curl

Show'd on the lips of that malicious churl,

To think what noble havocs he had made;

So that I fear'd he all at once would hurl

The harmless fairies into endless shade,--

Howbeit he stopp'd awhile to whet his blade.

XXVI.

Pity it was to hear the elfins' wail

Rise up in concert from their mingled dread,

Pity it was to see them, all so pale,

Gaze on the grass as for a dying bed;--

But Puck was seated on a spider's thread,

That hung between two branches of a briar,

And 'gan to swing and gambol, heels o'er head,

Like any Southwark tumbler on a wire,

For him no present grief could long inspire.

XXVII.

Meanwhile the Queen with many piteous drops,

Falling like tiny sparks full fast and free,

Bedews a pathway from her throne;--and stops

Before the foot of her arch enemy,

And with her little arms enfolds his knee,

That shows more grisly from that fair embrace;

But she will ne'er depart. "Alas!" quoth she,

"My painful fingers I will here enlace

Till I have gain'd your pity for our race."

XXVIII.

"What have we ever done to earn this grudge,

And hate--(if not too humble for thy hating?)--

Look o'er our labors and our lives, and judge

If there be any ills of our creating;

For we are very kindly creatures, dating

With nature's charities still sweet and bland:--

O think this murder worthy of debating!"

Herewith she makes a signal with her hand,

To beckon some one from the Fairy band.

XXIX.

Anon I saw one of those elfin things,

Clad all in white like any chorister,

Come fluttering forth on his melodious wings,

That made soft music at each little stir,

But something louder than a bee's demur

Before he lights upon a bunch of broom,

And thus 'gan he with Saturn to confer,--

And O his voice was sweet, touch'd with the gloom

Of that sad theme that argued of his doom!

XXX.

Quoth he, "We make all melodies our care,

That no false discords may offend the Sun,

Music's great master--tuning everywhere

All pastoral sounds and melodies, each one

Duly to place and season, so that none

May harshly interfere. We rouse at morn

The shrill sweet lark; and when the day is done,

Hush silent pauses for the bird forlorn,

That singeth with her breast against a thorn."

XXXI.

"We gather in loud choirs the twittering race,

That make a chorus with their single note;

And tend on new-fledged birds in every place,

That duly they may get their tunes by rote;

And oft, like echoes, answering remote,

We hide in thickets from the feather'd throng,

And strain in rivalship each throbbing throat,

Singing in shrill responses all day long,

Whilst the glad truant listens to our song."

XXXII.

"Wherefore, great King of Years, as thou dost love

The raining music from a morning cloud,

When vanish'd larks are carolling above,

To wake Apollo with their pipings loud;--

If ever thou hast heard in leafy shroud

The sweet and plaintive Sappho of the dell,

Show thy sweet mercy on this little crowd,

And we will muffle up the sheepfold bell

Whene'er thou listenest to Philomel."

XXXIII.

Then Saturn thus;--"Sweet is the merry lark,

That carols in man's ear so clear and strong;

And youth must love to listen in the dark

That tuneful elegy of Tereus' wrong;

But I have heard that ancient strain too long,

For sweet is sweet but when a little strange,

And I grow weary for some newer song;

For wherefore had I wings, unless to range

Through all things mutable, from change to change?"

XXXIV.

"But would'st thou hear the melodies of Time,

Listen when sleep and drowsy darkness roll

Over hush'd cities, and the midnight chime

Sounds from their hundred clocks, and deep bells toll

Like a last knell over the dead world's soul,

Saying, 'Time shall be final of all things,

Whose late, last voice must elegize the whole,'--

O then I clap aloft my brave broad wings,

And make the wide air tremble while it rings!"

XXXV.

Then next a fair Eve-Fay made meek address,

Saying, "We be the handmaids of the Spring;

In sign whereof, May, the quaint broideress,

Hath wrought her samplers on our gauzy wing.

We tend upon buds birth and blossoming,

And count the leafy tributes that they owe--

As, so much to the earth--so much to fling

In showers to the brook--so much to go

In whirlwinds to the clouds that made them grow."

XXXVI.

"The pastoral cowslips are our little pets,

And daisy stars, whose firmament is green;

Pansies, and those veil'd nuns, meek violets,

Sighing to that warm world from which they screen;

And golden daffodils, pluck'd for May's Queen;

And lonely harebells, quaking on the heath;

And Hyacinth, long since a fair youth seen,

Whose tuneful voice, turn'd fragrance in his breath,

Kiss'd by sad Zephyr, guilty of his death."

XXXVII.

"The widow'd primrose weeping to the moon

And saffron crocus in whose chalice bright

A cool libation hoarded for the noon

Is kept--and she that purifies the light,

The virgin lily, faithful to her white,

Whereon Eve wept in Eden for her shame;

And the most dainty rose, Aurora's spright,

Our every godchild, by whatever name--

Spares us our lives, for we did nurse the same!"

XXXVIII.

Then that old Mower stamp'd his heel, and struck

His hurtful scythe against the harmless ground,

Saying, "Ye foolish imps, when am I stuck

With gaudy buds, or like a wooer crown'd

With flow'ry chaplets, save when they are found

Withered?--Whenever have I pluck'd a rose,

Except to scatter its vain leaves around?

For so all gloss of beauty I oppose,

And bring decay on every flow'r that blows."

XXXIX.

"Or when am I so wroth as when I view

The wanton pride of Summer;--how she decks

The birthday world with blossoms ever-new,

As if Time had not lived, and heap'd great wrecks

Of years on years?--O then I bravely vex

And catch the gay Months in their gaudy plight,

And slay them with the wreaths about their necks,

Like foolish heifers in the holy rite,

And raise great trophies to my ancient might."

XL.

Then saith another, "We are kindly things,

And like her offspring nestle with the dove,--

Witness these hearts embroidered on our wings,

To show our constant patronage of love:--

We sit at even, in sweet bow'rs above

Lovers, and shake rich odors on the air,

To mingle with their sighs; and still remove

The startling owl, and bid the bat forbear

Their privacy, and haunt some other where."

XLI.

"And we are near the mother when she sits

Beside her infant in its wicker bed;

And we are in the fairy scene that flits

Across its tender brain: sweet dreams we shed,

And whilst the tender little soul is fled,

Away, to sport with our young elves, the while

We touch the dimpled cheek with roses red,

And tickle the soft lips until they smile,

So that their careful parents they beguile."

XLII.

"O then, if ever thou hast breathed a vow

At Love's dear portal, or at pale moon-rise

Crush'd the dear curl on a regardful brow,

That did not frown thee from thy honey prize--

If ever thy sweet son sat on thy thighs,

And wooed thee from thy careful thoughts within

To watch the harmless beauty of his eyes,

Or glad thy fingers on his smooth soft skin,

For Love's dear sake, let us thy pity win!"

XLIII.

Then Saturn fiercely thus:--"What joy have I

In tender babes, that have devour'd mine own,

Whenever to the light I heard them cry,

Till foolish Rhea cheated me with stone?

Whereon, till now, is my great hunger shown,

In monstrous dint of my enormous tooth;

And--but the peopled world is too full grown

For hunger's edge--I would consume all youth

At one great meal, without delay or ruth!"

XLIV.

"For I am well nigh crazed and wild to hear

How boastful fathers taunt me with their breed,

Saying, 'We shall not die nor disappear,

But, in these other selves, ourselves succeed

Ev'n as ripe flowers pass into their seed

Only to be renew'd from prime to prime,'

All of which boastings I am forced to read,

Besides a thousand challenges to Time,

Which bragging lovers have compiled in rhyme."

XLV.

"Wherefore, when they are sweetly met o' nights,

There will I steal and with my hurried hand

Startle them suddenly from their delights

Before the next encounter hath been plann'd,

Ravishing hours in little minutes spann'd;

But when they say farewell, and grieve apart,

Then like a leaden statue I will stand,

Meanwhile their many tears encrust my dart,

And with a ragged edge cut heart from heart."

XLVI.

Then next a merry Woodsman, clad in green,

Step vanward from his mates, that idly stood

Each at his proper ease, as they had been

Nursed in the liberty of old Shérwood,

And wore the livery of Robin Hood,

Who wont in forest shades to dine and sup,--

So came this chief right frankly, and made good

His haunch against his axe, and thus spoke up,

Doffing his cap, which was an acorn's cup:--

XLVII.

"We be small foresters and gay, who tend

On trees, and all their furniture of green,

Training the young boughs airily to bend,

And show blue snatches of the sky between;--

Or knit more close intricacies, to screen

Birds' crafty dwellings, as may hide them best,

But most the timid blackbird's--she that, seen,

Will bear black poisonous berries to her nest,

Lest man should cage the darlings of her breast."

XLVIII.

"We bend each tree in proper attitude,

And founting willows train in silvery falls;

We frame all shady roofs and arches rude,

And verdant aisles leading to Dryads' halls,

Or deep recesses where the Echo calls;--

We shape all plumy trees against the sky,

And carve tall elms' Corinthian capitals,--

When sometimes, as our tiny hatchets ply,

Men say, the tapping woodpecker is nigh."

XLIX.

"Sometimes we scoop the squirrel's hollow cell,

And sometimes carve quaint letters on trees' rind,

That haply some lone musing wight may spell

Dainty Aminta,--Gentle Rosalind,--

Or chastest Laura,--sweetly call'd to mind

In sylvan solitudes, ere he lies down;--

And sometimes we enrich gray stems with twined

And vagrant ivy,--or rich moss, whose brown

Burns into gold as the warm sun goes down."

L.

"And, lastly, for mirth's sake and Christmas cheer,

We bear the seedling berries, for increase,

To graft the Druid oaks, from year to year,

Careful that mistletoe may never cease;--

Wherefore, if thou dost prize the shady peace

Of sombre forests, or to see light break

Through sylvan cloisters, and in spring release

Thy spirit amongst leaves from careful ake,

Spare us our lives for the Green Dryad's sake."

LI.

Then Saturn, with a frown:--"Go forth, and fell

Oak for your coffins, and thenceforth lay by

Your axes for the rust, and bid farewell

To all sweet birds, and the blue peeps of sky

Through tangled branches, for ye shall not spy

The next green generation of the tree;

But hence with the dead leaves, whene'e they fly,--

Which in the bleak air I would rather see,

Than flights of the most tuneful birds that be."

LII.

"For I dislike all prime, and verdant pets,

Ivy except, that on the aged wall

Prays with its worm-like roots, and daily frets

The crumbled tower it seems to league withal,

King-like, worn down by its own coronal:--

Neither in forest haunts love I to won,

Before the golden plumage 'gins to fall,

And leaves the brown bleak limbs with few leaves on,

Or bare--like Nature in her skeleton."

LIII.

"For then sit I amongst the crooked boughs,

Wooing dull Memory with kindred sighs;

And there in rustling nuptials we espouse,

Smit by the sadness in each other's eyes;--

But Hope must have green bowers and blue skies,

And must be courted with the gauds of Spring;

Whilst Youth leans god-like on her lap, and cries,

'What shall we always do, but love and sing?'--

And Time is reckon'd a discarded thing."

LIV.

Here in my dream it made me fret to see

How Puck, the antic, all this dreary while

Had blithely jested with calamity,

With mis-timed mirth mocking the doleful style

Of his sad comrades, till it raised my bile

To see him so reflect their grief aside,

Turning their solemn looks to have a smile--

Like a straight stick shown crooked in the tide;--

But soon a novel advocate I spied.

LV.

Quoth he--"We teach all natures to fulfil

Their fore-appointed crafts, and instincts meet,--

The bee's sweet alchemy,--the spider's skill,--

The pismire's care to garner up his wheat,--

And rustic masonry to swallows fleet,--

The lapwing's cunning to preserve her nest,--

But most, that lesser pelican, the sweet

And shrilly ruddock, with its bleeding breast,

Its tender pity of poor babes distrest."

LVI.

"Sometimes we cast our shapes, and in sleek skins

Delve with the timid mole, that aptly delves

From our example; so the spider spins,

And eke the silk-worm, pattern'd by ourselves:

Sometimes we travail on the summer shelves

Of early bees, and busy toils commence,

Watch'd of wise men, that know not we are elves,

But gaze and marvel at our stretch of sense,

And praise our human-like intelligence."

LVII.

"Wherefore, by thy delight in that old tale,

And plaintive dirges the late robins sing,

What time the leaves are scatter'd by the gale,

Mindful of that old forest burying;--

As thou dost love to watch each tiny thing,

For whom our craft most curiously contrives,

If thou hast caught a bee upon the wing,

To take his honey-bag,--spare us our lives,

And we will pay the ransom in full hives."

LVIII.

"Now by my glass," quoth Time, "ye do offend

In teaching the brown bees that careful lore,

And frugal ants, whose millions would have end,

But they lay up for need a timely store,

And travail with the seasons evermore;

Whereas Great Mammoth long hath pass'd away,

And none but I can tell what hide he wore;

Whilst purblind men, the creatures of a day,

In riddling wonder his great bones survey."

LIX.

Then came an elf, right beauteous to behold,

Whose coat was like a brooklet that the sun

Hath all embroider'd with its crooked gold,

It was so quaintly wrought and overrun

With spangled traceries,--most meet for one

That was a warden of the pearly streams;--

And as he stept out of the shadows dun,

His jewels sparkled in the pale moon's gleams,

And shot into the air their pointed beams.

LX.

Quoth he,--"We bear the gold and silver keys

Of bubbling springs and fountains, that below

Course thro' the veiny earth,--which when they freeze

Into hard crysolites, we bid to flow,

Creeping like subtle snakes, when, as they go,

We guide their windings to melodious falls,

At whose soft murmurings, so sweet and low,

Poets have tuned their smoothest madrigals,

To sing to ladies in their banquet-halls."

LXI.

"And when the hot sun with his steadfast heat

Parches the river god,--whose dusty urn

Drips miserly, till soon his crystal feet

Against his pebbly floor wax faint and burn

And languid fish, unpoised, grow sick and yearn,--

Then scoop we hollows in some sandy nook,

And little channels dig, wherein we turn

The thread-worn rivulet, that all forsook

The Naiad-lily, pining for her brook."

LXII.

"Wherefore, by thy delight in cool green meads,

With living sapphires daintily inlaid,--

In all soft songs of waters and their reeds,--

And all reflections in a streamlet made,

Haply of thy own love, that, disarray'd,

Kills the fair lily with a livelier white,--

By silver trouts upspringing from green shade,

And winking stars reduplicate at night,

Spare us, poor ministers to such delight."

LXIII.

Howbeit his pleading and his gentle looks

Moved not the spiteful Shade:--Quoth he, "Your taste

Shoots wide of mine, for I despise the brooks

And slavish rivulets that run to waste

In noontide sweats, or, like poor vassals, haste

To swell the vast dominion of the sea,

In whose great presence I am held disgraced,

And neighbor'd with a king that rivals me

In ancient might and hoary majesty."

LXIV.

"Whereas I ruled in Chaos, and still keep

The awful secrets of that ancient dearth,

Before the briny fountains of the deep

Brimm'd up the hollow cavities of earth;--

I saw each trickling Sea-God at his birth,

Each pearly Naiad with her oozy locks,

And infant Titans of enormous girth,

Whose huge young feet yet stumbled on the rocks,

Stunning the early world with frequent shocks."

LXV.

"Where now is Titan, with his cumbrous brood,

That scared the world?--By this sharp scythe they fell,

And half the sky was curdled with their blood:

So have all primal giants sigh'd farewell.

No wardens now by sedgy fountains dwell,

Nor pearly Naiads. All their days are done

That strove with Time, untimely, to excel;

Wherefore I razed their progenies, and none

But my great shadow intercepts the sun!"

LXVI.

Then saith the timid Fay--"Oh, mighty Time!

Well hast thou wrought the cruel Titans' fall,

For they were stain'd with many a bloody crime:

Great giants work great wrongs,--but we are small,

For love goes lowly;--but Oppression's tall,

And with surpassing strides goes foremost still

Where love indeed can hardly reach at all;

Like a poor dwarf o'erburthen'd with good will,

That labors to efface the tracks of ill.--"

LXVII.

"Man even strives with Man, but we eschew

The guilty feud, and all fierce strifes abhor;

Nay, we are gentle as the sweet heaven's dew,

Beside the red and horrid drops of war,

Weeping the cruel hates men battle for,

Which worldly bosoms nourish in our spite:

For in the gentle breast we ne'er withdraw,

But only when all love hath taken flight,

And youth's warm gracious heart is hardened quite."

LXVIII.

"So are our gentle natures intertwined

With sweet humanities, and closely knit

In kindly sympathy with human kind.

Witness how we befriend, with elfin wit,

All hopeless maids and lovers,--nor omit

Magical succors unto hearts forlorn:--

We charm man's life, and do not perish it;--

So judge us by the helps we showed this morn,

To one who held his wretched days in scorn."

LXIX.

"'Twas nigh sweet Amwell;--for the Queen had task'd

Our skill to-day amidst the silver Lea,

Whereon the noontide sun had not yet bask'd,

Wherefore some patient man we thought to see,

Planted in moss-grown rushes to the knee,

Beside the cloudy margin cold and dim;--

Howbeit no patient fisherman was he

That cast his sudden shadow from the brim,

Making us leave our toils to gaze on him."

LXX.

"His face was ashy pale, and leaden care

Had sunk the levell'd arches of his brow,

Once bridges for his joyous thoughts to fare

Over those melancholy springs and slow,

That from his piteous eyes began to flow,

And fell anon into the chilly stream;

Which, as his mimick'd image show'd below,

Wrinkled his face with many a needless seam,

Making grief sadder in its own esteem."

LXXI.

"And lo! upon the air we saw him stretch

His passionate arms; and, in a wayward strain,

He 'gan to elegize that fellow wretch

That with mute gestures answer'd him again,

Saying, 'Poor slave, how long wilt thou remain

Life's sad weak captive in a prison strong,

Hoping with tears to rust away thy chain,

In bitter servitude to worldly wrong?--

Thou wear'st that mortal livery too long!'"

LXXII.

"This, with more spleenful speeches and some tears,

When he had spent upon the imaged wave,

Speedily I convened my elfin peers

Under the lily-cups, that we might save

This woeful mortal from a wilful grave

By shrewd diversions of his mind's regret,

Seeing he was mere Melancholy's slave,

That sank wherever a dark cloud he met,

And straight was tangled in her secret net."

LXXIII.

"Therefore, as still he watch'd the water's flow,

Daintily we transform'd, and with bright fins

Came glancing through the gloom; some from below

Rose like dim fancies when a dream begins,

Snatching the light upon their purple skins;

Then under the broad leaves made slow retire:

One like a golden galley bravely wins

Its radiant course,--another glows like fire,--

Making that wayward man our pranks admire."

LXXIV.

"And so he banish'd thought, and quite forgot

All contemplation of that wretched face;

And so we wiled him from that lonely spot

Along the river's brink; till, by heaven's grace,

He met a gentle haunter of the place,

Full of sweet wisdom gather'd from the brooks,

Who there discuss'd his melancholy case

With wholesome texts learned from kind nature's books,

Meanwhile he newly trimm'd his lines and hooks."

LXXV.

Herewith the Fairy ceased. Quoth Ariel now--

"Let me remember how I saved a man,

Whose fatal noose was fastened on a bough,

Intended to abridge his sad life's span;

For haply I was by when he began

His stern soliloquy in life dispraise,

And overheard his melancholy plan,

How he had made a vow to end his days,

And therefore follow'd him in all his ways."

LXXVI.

"Through brake and tangled copse, for much he loathed

All populous haunts, and roam'd in forests rude,

To hide himself from man. But I had clothed

My delicate limbs with plumes, and still pursued,

Where only foxes and wild cats intrude,

Till we were come beside an ancient tree

Late blasted by a storm. Here he renew'd

His loud complaints,--choosing that spot to be

The scene of his last horrid tragedy."

LXXVII.

"It was a wild and melancholy glen,

Made gloomy by tall firs and cypress dark,

Whose roots, like any bones of buried men,

Push'd through the rotten sod for fear's remark;

A hundred horrid stems, jagged and stark,

Wrestled with crooked arms in hideous fray,

Besides sleek ashes with their dappled bark,

Like crafty serpents climbing for a prey,

With many blasted oaks moss-grown and gray."

LXXVIII.

"But here upon his final desperate clause

Suddenly I pronounced so sweet a strain,

Like a pang'd nightingale, it made him pause,

Till half the frenzy of his grief was slain,

The sad remainder oozing from his brain

In timely ecstasies of healing tears,

Which through his ardent eyes began to drain;--

Meanwhile the deadly Fates unclosed their shears:--

So pity me and all my fated peers!"

LXXIX.

Thus Ariel ended, and was some time hush'd:

When with the hoary shape a fresh tongue pleads,

And red as rose the gentle Fairy blush'd

To read the records of her own good deeds:--

"It chanced," quoth she, "in seeking through the meads

For honied cowslips, sweetest in the morn,

Whilst yet the buds were hung with dewy beads."

And Echo answered to the huntsman's horn,

We found a babe left in the swaths forlorn.

LXXX.

"A little, sorrowful, deserted thing,

Begot of love, and yet no love begetting;

Guiltless of shame, and yet for shame to wring;

And too soon banish'd from a mother's petting,

To churlish nurture and the wide world's fretting,

For alien pity and unnatural care;--

Alas! to see how the cold dew kept wetting

His childish coats, and dabbled all his hair,

Like gossamers across his forehead fair."

LXXXI.

"His pretty pouting mouth, witless of speech,

Lay half-way open like a rose-lipp'd shell;

And his young cheek was softer than a peach,

Whereon his tears, for roundness, could not dwell,

But quickly roll'd themselves to pearls, and fell,

Some on the grass, and some against his hand,

Or haply wander'd to the dimpled well,

Which love beside his mouth had sweetly plann'd,

Yet not for tears, but mirth and smilings bland."

LXXXII.

"Pity it was to see those frequent tears

Falling regardless from his friendless eyes;

There was such beauty in those twin blue spheres,

As any mother's heart might leap to prize;

Blue were they, like the zenith of the skies

Softened betwixt two clouds, both clear and mild;--

Just touched with thought, and yet not over wise,

They show'd the gentle spirit of a child,

Not yet by care or any craft defiled."

LXXXIII.

"Pity it was to see the ardent sun

Scorching his helpless limbs--it shone so warm;

For kindly shade or shelter he had none,

Nor mother's gentle breast, come fair or storm.

Meanwhile I bade my pitying mates transform

Like grasshoppers, and then, with shrilly cries,

All round the infant noisily we swarm,

Haply some passing rustic to advise--

Whilst providential Heaven our care espies."

LXXXIV.

"And sends full soon a tender-hearted hind,

Who, wond'ring at our loud unusual note,

Strays curiously aside, and so doth find

The orphan child laid in the grass remote,

And laps the foundling in his russet coat,

Who thence was nurtured in his kindly cot:--

But how he prosper'd let proud London quote,

How wise, how rich, and how renown'd he got,

And chief of all her citizens, I wot."

LXXXV.

"Witness his goodly vessels on the Thames,

Whose holds were fraught with costly merchandise,--

Jewels from Ind, and pearls for courtly dames,

And gorgeous silks that Samarcand supplies:

Witness that Royal Bourse he bade arise,

The mart of merchants from the East and West:

Whose slender summit, pointing to the skies,

Still bears, in token of his grateful breast,

The tender grasshopper, his chosen crest--"

LXXXVI.

"The tender grasshopper, his chosen crest,

That all the summer, with a tuneful wing,

Makes merry chirpings in its grassy nest,

Inspirited with dew to leap and sing:--

So let us also live, eternal King!

Partakers of the green and pleasant earth:--

Pity it is to slay the meanest thing,

That, like a mote, shines in the smile of mirth:--

Enough there is of joy's decrease and dearth!"

LXXXVII.

"Enough of pleasure, and delight, and beauty,

Perish'd and gone, and hasting to decay;--

Enough to sadden even thee, whose duty

Or spite it is to havoc and to slay:

Too many a lovely race razed quite away,

Hath left large gaps in life and human loving;--

Here then begin thy cruel war to stay,

And spare fresh sighs, and tears, and groans, reproving

Thy desolating hand for our removing."

LXXXVIII.

Now here I heard a shrill and sudden cry,

And, looking up, I saw the antic Puck

Grappling with Time, who clutch'd him like a fly,

Victim of his own sport,--the jester's luck!

He, whilst his fellows grieved, poor wight, had stuck

His freakish gauds upon the Ancient's brow,

And now his ear, and now his beard, would pluck;

Whereas the angry churl had snatched him now,

Crying, "Thou impish mischief, who art thou?"

LXXXIX.

"Alas!" quoth Puck, "a little random elf,

Born in the sport of nature, like a weed,

For simple sweet enjoyment of myself,

But for no other purpose, worth, or need;

And yet withal of a most happy breed;

And there is Robin Goodfellow besides,

My partner dear in many a prankish deed

To make dame Laughter hold her jolly sides,

Like merry mummers twain on holy tides."

XC.

"'Tis we that bob the angler's idle cork,

Till e'en the patient man breathes half a curse;

We steal the morsel from the gossip's fork,

And curdling looks with secret straws disperse,

Or stop the sneezing chanter at mid verse:

And when an infant's beauty prospers ill,

We change, some mothers say, the child at nurse:

But any graver purpose to fulfil,

We have not wit enough, and scarce the will."

XCI.

"We never let the canker melancholy

To gather on our faces like a rust,

But glass our features with some change of folly,

Taking life's fabled miseries on trust,

But only sorrowing when sorrow must:

We ruminate no sage's solemn cud,

But own ourselves a pinch of lively dust

To frisk upon a wind,--whereas the flood

Of tears would turn us into heavy mud."

XCII.

"Beshrew those sad interpreters of nature,

Who gloze her lively universal law,

As if she had not form'd our cheerful feature

To be so tickled with the slightest straw!

So let them vex their mumbling mouths, and draw

The corners downward, like a wat'ry moon,

And deal in gusty sighs and rainy flaw--

We will not woo foul weather all too soon,

Or nurse November on the lap of June."

XCIII.

"For ours are winging sprites, like any bird,

That shun all stagnant settlements of grief;

And even in our rest our hearts are stirr'd,

Like insects settled on a dancing leaf:--

This is our small philosophy in brief,

Which thus to teach hath set me all agape:

But dost thou relish it? O hoary chief!

Unclasp thy crooked fingers from my nape,

And I will show thee many a pleasant scrape."

XCIV.

Then Saturn thus:--shaking his crooked blade

O'erhead, which made aloft a lightning flash

In all the fairies' eyes, dismally fray'd!

His ensuing voice came like the thunder crash--

Meanwhile the bolt shatters some pine or ash--

"Thou feeble, wanton, foolish, fickle thing!

Whom nought can frighten, sadden, or abash,--

To hope my solemn countenance to wring

To idiot smiles!--but I will prune thy wing!"

XCV.

"Lo! this most awful handle of my scythe

Stood once a May-pole, with a flowery crown,

Which rustics danced around, and maidens blithe,

To wanton pipings;--but I pluck'd it down,

And robed the May Queen in a churchyard gown,

Turning her buds to rosemary and rue;

And all their merry minstrelsy did drown,

And laid each lusty leaper in the dew;--

So thou shalt fare--and every jovial crew!"

XCVI.

Here he lets go the struggling imp, to clutch.

His mortal engine with each grisly hand,

Which frights the elfin progeny so much,

They huddle in a heap, and trembling stand

All round Titania, like the queen bee's band,

With sighs and tears and very shrieks of woe!--

Meanwhile, some moving argument I plann'd,

To make the stern Shade merciful,--when lo!

He drops his fatal scythe without a blow!

XCVII.

For, just at need, a timely Apparition

Steps in between, to bear the awful brunt;

Making him change his horrible position,

To marvel at this comer, brave and blunt,

That dares Time's irresistible affront,

Whose strokes have scarr'd even the gods of old;--

Whereas this seem'd a mortal, at mere hunt

For coneys, lighted by the moonshine cold,

Or stalker of stray deer, stealthy and bold.

XCVIII.

Who, turning to the small assembled fays,

Doffs to the lily queen his courteous cap,

And holds her beauty for a while in gaze,

With bright eyes kindling at this pleasant hap;

And thence upon the fair moon's silver map,

As if in question of this magic chance,

Laid like a dream upon the green earth's lap;

And then upon old Saturn turns askance,

Exclaiming, with a glad and kindly glance:--

XCIX.

"Oh, these be Fancy's revelers by night!

Stealthy companions of the downy moth--

Diana's motes, that flit in her pale light,

Shunners of sunbeams in diurnal sloth;--

These be the feasters on night's silver cloth;--

The gnat with shrilly trump is their convener,

Forth from their flowery chambers, nothing loth,

With lulling tunes to charm the air serener,

Or dance upon the grass to make it greener."

C.

"These be the pretty genii of the flow'rs,

Daintily fed with honey and pure dew--

Midsummer's phantoms in her dreaming hours,

King Oberon, and all his merry crew,

The darling puppets of romance's view;

Fairies, and sprites, and goblin elves we call them,

Famous for patronage of lovers true;--

No harm they act, neither shall harm befall them,

So do not thus with crabbed frowns appal them."

CI.

O what a cry was Saturn's then!--it made

The fairies quake. "What care I for their pranks,

However they may lovers choose to aid,

Or dance their roundelays on flow'ry banks?--

Long must they dance before they earn my thanks,--

So step aside, to some far safer spot,

Whilst with my hungry scythe I mow their ranks,

And leave them in the sun, like weeds, to rot,

And with the next day's sun to be forgot."

CII.

Anon, he raised afresh his weapon keen;

But still the gracious Shade disarm'd his aim,

Stepping with brave alacrity between,

And made his sore arm powerless and tame.

His be perpetual glory, for the shame

Of hoary Saturn in that grand defeat!--

But I must tell how here Titania, came

With all her kneeling lieges, to entreat

His kindly succor, in sad tones, but sweet.

CIII.

Saying, "Thou seest a wretched queen before thee,

The fading power of a failing land,

Who for a kingdom kneeleth to implore thee,

Now menaced by this tyrant's spoiling hand;

No one but thee can hopefully withstand

That crooked blade, he longeth so to lift.

I pray thee blind him with his own vile sand,

Which only times all ruins by its drift,

Or prune his eagle wings that are so swift."

CIV.

"Or take him by that sole and grizzled tuft,

That hangs upon his bald and barren crown;

And we will sing to see him so rebuff'd,

And lend our little mights to pull him down,

And make brave sport of his malicious frown,

For all his boastful mockery o'er men.

For thou wast born, I know, for this renown,

By my most magical and inward ken,

That readeth ev'n at Fate's forestalling pen."

CV.

"Nay, by the golden lustre of thine eye,

And by thy brow's most fair and ample span,

Thought's glorious palace, framed for fancies high,

And by thy cheek thus passionately wan,

I know the signs of an immortal man,--

Nature's chief darling, and illustrious mate,

Destined to foil old Death's oblivious plan,

And shine untarnish'd by the fogs of Fate,

Time's famous rival till the final date!"

CVI.

"O shield us then from this usurping Time,

And we will visit thee in moonlight dreams;

And teach thee tunes, to wed unto thy rhyme,

And dance about thee in all midnight gleams,

Giving thee glimpses of our magic schemes,

Such as no mortal's eye hath ever seen;

And, for thy love to us in our extremes,

Will ever keep thy chaplet fresh and green,

Such as no poet's wreath hath ever been!"

CVII.

"And we'll distil thee aromatic dews,

To charm thy sense, when there shall be no flow'rs;

And flavor'd syrups in thy drinks infuse,

And teach the nightingale to haunt thy bow'rs,

And with our games divert thy weariest hours,

With all that elfin wits can e'er devise.

And, this churl dead, there'll be no hasting hours

To rob thee of thy joys, as now joy flies":--

Here she was stopp'd by Saturn's furious cries.

CVIII.

Whom, therefore, the kind Shade rebukes anew,

Saying, "Thou haggard Sin, go forth, and scoop

Thy hollow coffin in some churchyard yew,

Or make th' autumnal flow'rs turn pale, and droop;

Or fell the bearded corn, till gleaners stoop

Under fat sheaves,--or blast the piny grove;--

But here thou shall not harm this pretty group,

Whose lives are not so frail and feebly wove,

But leased on Nature's loveliness and love."

CIX.

"'Tis these that free the small entangled fly,

Caught in the venom'd spider's crafty snare;--

These be the petty surgeons that apply

The healing balsams to the wounded hare,

Bedded in bloody fern, no creature's care!--

These be providers for the orphan brood,

Whose tender mother hath been slain in air,

Quitting with gaping bill her darling's food,

Hard by the verge of her domestic wood."

CX.

"'Tis these befriend the timid trembling stag,

When, with a bursting heart beset with fears,

He feels his saving speed begin to flag;

For then they quench the fatal taint with tears,

And prompt fresh shifts in his alarum'd ears,

So piteously they view all bloody morts;

Or if the gunner, with his arms, appears,

Like noisy pyes and jays, with harsh reports,

They warn the wild fowl of his deadly sports."

CXI.

"For these are kindly ministers of nature,

To soothe all covert hurts and dumb distress;

Pretty they be, and very small of stature,--

For mercy still consorts with littleness;--

Wherefore the sum of good is still the less,

And mischief grossest in this world of wrong;--

So do these charitable dwarfs redress

The tenfold ravages of giants strong,

To whom great malice and great might belong."

CXII.

"Likewise to them are Poets much beholden

For secret favors in the midnight glooms;

Brave Spenser quaff'd out of their goblets golden,

And saw their tables spread of prompt mushrooms,

And heard their horns of honeysuckle blooms

Sounding upon the air most soothing soft,

Like humming bees busy about the brooms,--

And glanced this fair queen's witchery full oft,

And in her magic wain soar'd far aloft."

CXIII.

"Nay I myself, though mortal, once was nursed

By fairy gossips, friendly at my birth,

And in my childish ear glib Mab rehearsed

Her breezy travels round our planet's girth,

Telling me wonders of the moon and earth;

My gramarye at her grave lap I conn'd,

Where Puck hath been convened to make me mirth;

I have had from Queen Titania tokens fond,

And toy'd with Oberon's permitted wand."

CXIV.

"With figs and plums and Persian dates they fed me,

And delicate cates after my sunset meal,

And took me by my childish hand, and led me

By craggy rocks crested with keeps of steel,

Whose awful bases deep dark woods conceal,

Staining some dead lake with their verdant dyes.

And when the West sparkled at Phoebus' wheel,

With fairy euphrasy they purged mine eyes,

To let me see their cities in the skies."

CXV.

"'Twas they first school'd my young imagination

To take its flights like any new-fledged bird,

And show'd the span of winged meditation

Stretch'd wider than things grossly seen or heard.

With sweet swift Ariel how I soar'd and stirr'd

The fragrant blooms of spiritual bow'rs!

'Twas they endear'd what I have still preferr'd,

Nature's blest attributes and balmy pow'rs,

Her hills and vales and brooks, sweet birds and flow'rs."

CXVI.

"Wherefore with all true loyalty and duty

Will I regard them in my honoring rhyme,

With love for love, and homages to beauty,

And magic thoughts gather'd in night's cool clime,

With studious verse trancing the dragon Time,

Strong as old Merlin's necromantic spells;

So these dear monarchs of the summer's prime

Shall live unstartled by his dreadful yells,

Till shrill larks warn them to their flowery cells."

CXVII.

Look how a poison'd man turns livid black,

Drugg'd with a cup of deadly hellebore,

That sets his horrid features all at rack,--

So seem'd these words into the ear to pour

Of ghastly Saturn, answering with a roar

Of mortal pain and spite and utmost rage,

Wherewith his grisly arm he raised once more,

And bade the cluster'd sinews all engage,

As if at one fell stroke to wreck an age.

CXVIII.

Whereas the blade flash'd on the dinted ground,

Down through his steadfast foe, yet made no scar

On that immortal Shade, or death-like wound;

But Time was long benumb'd, and stood ajar,

And then with baffled rage took flight afar,

To weep his hurt in some Cimmerian gloom,

Or meaner fames (like mine) to mock and mar,

Or sharp his scythe for royal strokes of doom,

Whetting its edge on some old Cæsar's tomb.

CXIX.

Howbeit he vanish'd in the forest shade,

Distantly heard as if some grumbling pard,

And, like Nymph Echo, to a sound decay'd;--

Meanwhile the fays cluster'd the gracious Bard,

The darling centre of their dear regard:

Besides of sundry dances on the green,

Never was mortal man so brightly starr'd,

Or won such pretty homages, I ween.

"Nod to him, Elves!" cries the melodious queen.

CXX.

"Nod to him, Elves, and flutter round about him,

And quite enclose him with your pretty crowd,

And touch him lovingly, for that, without him,

The silkworm now had spun our dreary shroud;--

But he hath all dispersed Death's tearful cloud,

And Time's dread effigy scared quite away:

Bow to him then, as though to me ye bow'd,

And his dear wishes prosper and obey

Wherever love and wit can find a way!"

CXXI.

"'Noint him with fairy dews of magic savors,

Shaken from orient buds still pearly wet,

Roses and spicy pinks,--and, of all favors,

Plant in his walks the purple violet,

And meadow-sweet under the hedges set,

To mingle breaths with dainty eglantine

And honeysuckles sweet,--nor yet forget

Some pastoral flowery chaplets to entwine,

To vie the thoughts about his brow benign!"

CXXII.

"Let no wild things astonish him or fear him,

But tell them all how mild he is of heart,

Till e'en the timid hares go frankly near him,

And eke the dappled does, yet never start;

Nor shall their fawns into the thickets dart,

Nor wrens forsake their nests among the leaves,

Nor speckled thrushes flutter far apart;--

But bid the sacred swallow haunt his eaves,

To guard his roof from lightning and from thieves."

CXXIII.

"Or when he goes the nimble squirrel's visitor,

Let the brown hermit bring his hoarded nuts,

For, tell him, this is Nature's kind Inquisitor,--

Though man keeps cautious doors that conscience shuts,

For conscious wrong all curious quest rebuts,--

Nor yet shall bees uncase their jealous stings,

However he may watch their straw-built huts;--

So let him learn the crafts of all small things,

Which he will hint most aptly when he sings."

CXXIV.

Here she leaves off, and with a graceful hand

Waves thrice three splendid circles round his head;

Which, though deserted by the radiant wand,

Wears still the glory which her waving shed,

Such as erst crown'd the old Apostle's head,

To show the thoughts there harbor'd were divine,

And on immortal contemplations fed:--

Goodly it was to see that glory shine

Around a brow so lofty and benign!--

CXXV.

Goodly it was to see the elfin brood

Contend for kisses of his gentle hand,

That had their mortal enemy withstood,

And stay'd their lives, fast ebbing with the sand.

Long while this strife engaged the pretty band;

But now bold Chanticleer, from farm to farm,

Challenged the dawn creeping o'er eastern land,

And well the fairies knew that shrill alarm,

Which sounds the knell of every elfish charm.

CXXVI.

And soon the rolling mist, that 'gan arise

From plashy mead and undiscover'd stream,

Earth's morning incense to the early skies,

Crept o'er the failing landscape of my dream.

Soon faded then the Phantom of my theme--

A shapeless shade, that fancy disavowed,

And shrank to nothing in the mist extreme,

Then flew Titania,--and her little crowd,

Like flocking linnets, vanished in a cloud.

HERO AND LEANDER.

TO S. T. COLERIDGE.

It is not with a hope my feeble praise

Can add one moment's honor to thy own,

That with thy mighty name I grace these lays;

I seek to glorify myself alone:

For that some precious favor thou hast shown

To my endeavor in a bygone time,

And by this token I would have it known

Thou art my friend, and friendly to my rhyme!

It is my dear ambition now to climb

Still higher in thy thought,--if my bold pen

May thrust on contemplations more sublime.--

But I am thirsty for thy praise, for when

We gain applauses from the great in name,

We seem to be partakers of _their_ fame.

I.

Oh Bards of old! What sorrows have ye sung,

And tragic stories, chronicled in stone,--

Sad Philomel restored her ravish'd tongue,

And transform'd Niobe in dumbness shown;

Sweet Sappho on her love forever calls,

And Hero on the drown'd Leander falls!

II.

Was it that spectacles of sadder plights

Should make our blisses relish the more high?

Then all fair dames, and maidens, and true knights,

Whose flourish'd fortunes prosper in Love's eye,

Weep here, unto a tale of ancient grief,

Traced from the course of an old bas-relief.

III.

There stands Abydos!--here is Sestos' steep,

Hard by the gusty margin of the sea,

Where sprinkling waves continually do leap;

And that is where those famous lovers be,

A builded gloom shot up into the gray,

As if the first tall watch-tow'r of the day.

IV.

Lo! how the lark soars upward and is gone;

Turning a spirit as he nears the sky,

His voice is heard, though body there is none,

And rain-like music scatters from on high;

But Love would follow with a falcon spite,

To pluck the minstrel from his dewy height.

V.

For Love hath framed a ditty of regrets,

Tuned to the hollow sobbings on the shore,

A vexing sense, that with like music frets,

And chimes this dismal burthen o'er and o'er,

Saying, Leander's joys are past and spent,

Like stars extinguish'd in the firmament.

VI.

For ere the golden crevices of morn

Let in those regal luxuries of light,

Which all the variable east adorn,

And hang rich fringes on the skirts of night,

Leander, weaning from sweet Hero's side,

Must leave a widow where he found a bride.

VII.

Hark! how the billows beat upon the sand!

Like pawing steeds impatient of delay;

Meanwhile their rider, ling'ring on the land,

Dallies with love, and holds farewell at bay

A too short span.--How tedious slow is grief!

But parting renders time both sad and brief.

VIII.

"Alas!" (he sigh'd), "that this first glimpsing light,

Which makes the wide world tenderly appear,

Should be the burning signal for my flight

From all the world's best image, which is here;

Whose very shadow, in my fond compare,

Shines far more bright than Beauty's self elsewhere."

IX.

Their cheeks are white as blossoms of the dark,

Whose leaves close up and show the outward pale,

And those fair mirrors where their joys did spark,

All dim and tarnish'd with a dreary veil,

No more to kindle till the night's return,

Like stars replenish'd at Joy's golden urn.

X.

Ev'n thus they creep into the spectral gray,

That cramps the landscape in its narrow brim,

As when two shadows by old Lethe stray,

He clasping her, and she entwining him;

Like trees, wind-parted, that embrace anon,--

True love so often goes before 'tis gone.

XI.

For what rich merchant but will pause in fear,

To trust his wealth to the unsafe abyss?

So Hero dotes upon her treasure here,

And sums the loss with many an anxious kiss,

Whilst her fond eyes grow dizzy in her head,

Fear aggravating fear with shows of dread.

XII.

She thinks how many have been sunk and drown'd,

And spies their snow-white bones below the deep,

Then calls huge congregated monsters round,

And plants a rock wherever he would leap;

Anon she dwells on a fantastic dream,

Which she interprets of that fatal stream.

XIII.

Saying, "That honied fly I saw was thee,

Which lighted on a water-lily's cup,

When, lo! the flower, enamor'd of my bee,

Closed on him suddenly and lock'd him up,

And he was smother'd in her drenching dew;

Therefore this day thy drowning I shall rue."

XIV.

But next, remembering her virgin fame,

She clips him in her arms and bids him go,

But seeing him break loose, repents her shame,

And plucks him back upon her bosom's snow;

And tears unfix her iced resolve again,

As steadfast frosts are thaw'd by show'rs of rain.

XV.

O for a type of parting!--Love to love

Is like the fond attraction of two spheres,

Which needs a godlike effort to remove,

And then sink down their sunny atmospheres,

In rain and darkness on each ruin'd heart,

Nor yet their melodies will sound apart.

XVI.

So brave Leander sunders from his bride;

The wrenching pang disparts his soul in twain;

Half stays with her, half goes towards the tide,--

And life must ache, until they join again.

Now wouldst thou know the wideness of the wound?--

Mete every step he takes upon the ground.

XVII.

And for the agony and bosom-throe,

Let it be measured by the wide vast air,

For that is infinite, and so is woe,

Since parted lovers breathe it everywhere.

Look how it heaves Leander's laboring chest,

Panting, at poise, upon a rocky crest!

XVIII.

From which he leaps into the scooping brine,

That shocks his bosom with a double chill;

Because, all hours, till the slow sun's decline,

That cold divorcer will be 'twixt them still;

Wherefore he likens it to Styx' foul tide,

Where life grows death upon the other side.

XIX.

Then sadly he confronts his twofold toil

Against rude waves and an unwilling mind,

Wishing, alas! with the stout rower's toil,

That like a rower he might gaze behind,

And watch that lonely statue he hath left,

On her bleak summit, weeping and bereft!

XX.

Yet turning oft, he sees her troubled locks

Pursue him still the furthest that they may;

Her marble arms that overstretch the rocks,

And her pale passion'd hands that seem to pray

In dumb petition to the gods above:

Love prays devoutly when it prays for love!

XXI.

Then with deep sighs he blows away the wave,

That hangs superfluous tears upon his cheek,

And bans his labor like a hopeless slave,

That, chain'd in hostile galley, faint and weak,

Plies on despairing through the restless foam,

Thoughtful of his lost love, and far-off home.

XXII.

The drowsy mist before him chill and dank,

Like a dull lethargy o'erleans the sea,

When he rows on against the utter blank,

Steering as if to dim eternity,--

Like Love's frail ghost departing with the dawn;

A failing shadow in the twilight drawn.

XXIII.

And soon is gone,--or nothing but a faint

And failing image in the eye of thought,

That mocks his model with an after-paint,

And stains an atom like the shape she sought;

Then with her earnest vows she hopes to fee

The old and hoary majesty of sea.

XXIV.

"O King of waves, and brother of high Jove,

Preserve my sumless venture there afloat;

A woman's heart, and its whole wealth of love,

Are all embark'd upon that little boat;

Nay!--but two loves, two lives, a double fate,--

A perilous voyage for so dear a freight."

XXV.

"If impious mariners be stain'd with crime,

Shake not in awful rage thy hoary locks;

Lay by thy storms until another time,

Lest my frail bark be dash'd against the rocks:

O rather smooth thy deeps, that he may fly

Like Love himself, upon a seeming sky!"

XXVI.

"Let all thy herded monsters sleep beneath,

Nor gore him with crook'd tusks, or wreathëd horns;

Let no fierce sharks destroy him with their teeth,

Nor spine-fish wound him with their venom'd thorns;

But if he faint, and timely succor lack,

Let ruthful dolphins rest him on their back."

XXVII.

"Let no false dimpling whirlpools suck him in,

Nor slimy quicksands smother his sweet breath;

Let no jagg'd corals tear his tender skin,

Nor mountain billows bury him in death";--

And with that thought forestalling her own fears,

She drowned his painted image in her tears.

XXVIII.

By this, the climbing Sun, with rest repair'd,

Look'd through the gold embrasures of the sky,

And ask'd the drowsy world how she had fared;--

The drowsy world shone brighten'd in reply;

And smiling off her fogs, his slanting beam

Spied young Leander in the middle stream.

XXXI.

His face was pallid, but the hectic morn

Had hung a lying crimson on his cheeks,

And slanderous sparkles in his eyes forlorn;

So death lies ambush'd in consumptive streaks;

But inward grief was writhing o'er its task,

As heart-sick jesters weep behind the mask.

XXX.

He thought of Hero and the lost delight,

Her last embracings, and the space between;

He thought of Hero and the future night,

Her speechless rapture and enamor'd mien,

When, lo! before him, scarce two galleys' space,

His thoughts confronted with another face!

XXXI.

Her aspect's like a moon, divinely fair,

But makes the midnight darker that it lies on;

'Tis so beclouded with her coal-black hair

That densely skirts her luminous horizon,

Making her doubly fair, thus darkly set,

As marble lies advantaged upon jet.

XXXII.

She's all too bright, too argent, and too pale,

To be a woman;--but a woman's double,

Reflected, on the wave so faint and frail,

She tops the billows like an air-blown bubble;

Or dim creation of a morning dream,

Fair as the wave-bleached lily of the stream.

XXXIII.

The very rumor strikes his seeing dead:

Great beauty like great fear first stuns the sense:

He knows not if her lips be blue or red,

Nor of her eyes can give true evidence:

Like murder's witness swooning in the court,

His sight falls senseless by its own report.

XXXIV.

Anon resuming, it declares her eyes

Are tint with azure, like two crystal wells

That drink the blue complexion of the skies,

Or pearls outpeeping from their silvery shells:

Her polish'd brow, it is an ample plain,

To lodge vast contemplations of the main.

XXXV.

Her lips might corals seem, but corals near

Stray through her hair like blossoms on a bower;

And o'er the weaker red still domineer,

And make it pale by tribute to more power;

Her rounded cheeks are of still paler hue,

Touch'd by the bloom of water, tender blue.

XXXVI.

Thus he beholds her rocking on the water,

Under the glossy umbrage of her hair,

Like pearly Amphitrite's fairest daughter,

Naiad, or Nereid,--or Syren fair,

Mislodging music in her pitiless breast,

A nightingale within a falcon's nest.

XXXVII.

They say there be such maidens in the deep,

Charming poor mariners, that all too near

By mortal lullabies fall dead asleep,

As drowsy men are poison'd through the ear;

Therefore Leander's fears begin to urge,

This snowy swan is come to sing his dirge.

XXXVIII.

At which he falls into a deadly chill,

And strains his eyes upon her lips apart;

Fearing each breath to feel that prelude shrill,

Pierce through his marrow, like a breath-blown dart

Shot sudden from an Indian's hollow cane,

With mortal venom fraught, and fiery pain.

XXXIX.

Here then, poor wretch, how he begins to crowd

A thousand thoughts within a pulse's space;

There seem'd so brief a pause of life allow'd,

His mind stretch'd universal, to embrace

The whole wide world, in an extreme farewell,--

A moment's musing--but an age to tell.

XL.

For there stood Hero, widow'd at a glance,

The foreseen sum of many a tedious fact,

Pale cheeks, dim eyes, and wither'd countenance,

A wasted ruin that no wasting lack'd;

Time's tragic consequents ere time began,

A world of sorrow in a tear-drop's span.

XLI.

A moment's thinking is an hour in words,--

An hour of words is little for some woes;

Too little breathing a long life affords

For love to paint itself by perfect shows;

Then let his love and grief unwrong'd lie dumb,

Whilst Fear, and that it fears, together come.

XLII.

As when the crew, hard by some jutty cape,

Struck pale and panick'd by the billow's roar,

Lay by all timely measures of escape,

And let their bark go driving on the shore;

So fray'd Leander, drifting to his wreck,

Gazing on Scylla, falls upon her neck.

XLIII.

For he hath all forgot the swimmer's art,

The rower's cunning, and the pilot's skill,

Letting his arms fall down in languid part,

Sway'd by the waves, and nothing by his will,

Till soon he jars against that glossy skin,

Solid like glass, though seemingly as thin.

XLIV.

Lo! how she startles at the warning shock,

And straightway girds him to her radiant breast,

More like his safe smooth harbor than his rock;

Poor wretch, he is so faint and toil-opprest,

He cannot loose him from his grappling foe,

Whether for love or hate, she lets not go.

XLV.

His eyes are blinded with the sleety brine,

His ears are deafen'd with the wildering noise;

He asks the purpose of her fell design,

But foamy waves choke up his struggling voice;

Under the ponderous sea his body dips,

And Hero's name dies bubbling on his lips.

XLVI.

Look how a man is lower'd to his grave,--

A yearning hollow in the green earth's lap;

So he is sunk into the yawning wave,--

The plunging sea fills up the watery gap;

Anon he is all gone, and nothing seen

But likeness of green turf and hillocks green.

XLVII.

And where he swam, the constant sun lies sleeping,

Over the verdant plain that makes his bed;

And all the noisy waves go freshly leaping.

Like gamesome boys over the churchyard dead;

The light in vain keeps looking for his face:--

Now screaming sea-fowl settle in his place.

XLVIII.

Yet weep and watch for him, though all in vain!

Ye moaning billows, seek him as ye wander!

Ye gazing sunbeams, look for him again!

Ye winds, grow hoarse with asking for Leander!

Ye did but spare him for more cruel rape,

Sea-storm and ruin in a female shape!

XLIX.

She says 'tis love hath bribed her to this deed,

The glancing of his eyes did so bewitch her.

O bootless theft! unprofitable meed!

Love's treasury is sack'd, but she no richer;

The sparkles of his eyes are cold and dead,

And all his golden looks are turn'd to lead!

L.

She holds the casket, but her simple hand

Hath spill'd its dearest jewel by the way;

She hath life's empty garment at command,

But her own death lies covert in the prey;

As if a thief should steal a tainted vest,

Some dead man's spoil, and sicken of his pest.

LI.

Now she compels him to her deeps below,

Hiding his face beneath her plenteous hair,

Which jealously she shakes all round her brow,

For dread of envy, though no eyes are there

But seals', and all brute tenants of the deep,

Which heedless through the wave their journeys keep.

LII.

Down and still downward through the dusky green

She bore him, murmuring with joyous haste

In too rash ignorance, as he had been

Born to the texture of that watery waste;

That which she breathed and sigh'd, the emerald wave,

How could her pleasant home become his grave!

LIII.

Down and still downward through the dusky green

She bore her treasure, with a face too nigh

To mark how life was alter'd in its mien,

Or how the light grew torpid in his eye,

Or how his pearly breath, unprison'd there,

Flew up to join the universal air.

LIV.

She could not miss the throbbings of his heart,

Whilst her own pulse so wanton'd in its joy;

She could not guess he struggled to depart,

And when he strove no more, the hapless boy!

She read his mortal stillness for content,

Feeling no fear where only love was meant.

LV.

Soon she alights upon her ocean-floor,

And straight unyokes her arms from her fair prize;

Then on his lovely face begins to pore,

As if to glut her soul;--her hungry eyes

Have grown so jealous of her arms' delight;

It seems she hath no other sense but sight.

LVI.

But O sad marvel! O most bitter strange!

What dismal magic makes his cheek so pale?

Why will he not embrace,--why not exchange

Her kindly kisses;--wherefore not exhale

Some odorous message from life's ruby gates,

Where she his first sweet embassy awaits?

LVII.

Her eyes, poor watchers, fix'd upon his looks,

Are grappled with a wonder near to grief,

As one, who pores on undecipher'd books,

Strains vain surmise, and dodges with belief;

So she keeps gazing with a mazy thought,

Framing a thousand doubts that end in nought.

LVIII.

Too stern inscription for a page so young,

The dark translation of his look was death!

But death was written in an alien tongue,

And learning was not by to give it breath;

So one deep woe sleeps buried in its seal,

Which Time, untimely, hasteth to reveal.

LIX.

Meanwhile she sits unconscious of her hap,

Nursing Death's marble effigy, which there

With heavy head lies pillow'd in her lap,

And elbows all unhinged;--his sleeking hair

Creeps o'er her knees, and settles where his hand

Leans with lax fingers crook'd against the sand;

LX.

And there lies spread in many an oozy trail,

Like glossy weeds hung from a chalky base,

That shows no whiter than his brow is pale;

So soon the wintry death had bleach'd his face

Into cold marble,--with blue chilly shades,

Showing wherein the freezy blood pervades.

LXI.

And o'er his steadfast cheek a furrow'd pain

Hath set, and stiffened like a storm in ice,

Showing by drooping lines the deadly strain

Of mortal anguish;--yet you might gaze twice

Ere Death it seem'd, and not his cousin, Sleep,

That through those creviced lids did underpeep.

LXII.

But all that tender bloom about his eyes,

Is Death's own violets, which his utmost rite

It is to scatter when the red rose dies;

For blue is chilly, and akin to white:

Also he leaves some tinges on his lips,

Which he hath kiss'd with such cold frosty nips.

LXIII.

"Surely," quoth she, "he sleeps, the senseless thing,

Oppress'd and faint with toiling in the stream!"

Therefore she will not mar his rest, but sing

So low, her tune shall mingle with his dream;

Meanwhile, her lily fingers task to twine

His uncrispt locks uncurling in the brine.

LXIV.

"O lovely boy!"--thus she attuned her voice,--

"Welcome, thrice welcome, to a sea-maid's home,

My love-mate thou shalt be, and true heart's choice;

How have I long'd such a twin-self should come,--

A lonely thing, till this sweet chance befell,

My heart kept sighing like a hollow shell."

LXV.

"Here thou shalt live, beneath this secret dome,

An ocean-bow'r, defended by the shade

Of quiet waters, a cool emerald gloom

To lap thee all about. Nay, be not fray'd,

Those are but shady fishes that sail by

Like antic clouds across my liquid sky!"

LXVI.

"Look how the sunbeam burns upon their scales,

And shows rich glimpses of their Tyrian skins;

They flash small lightnings from their vigorous tails,

And winking stars are kindled at their fins;

These shall divert thee in thy weariest mood,

And seek thy hand for gamesomeness and food."

LXVII.

"Lo! those green pretty leaves with tassel bells,

My flow'rets those, that never pine for drouth;

Myself did plant them in the dappled shells,

That drink the wave with such a rosy mouth,--

Pearls wouldst thou have beside? crystals to shine?

I had such treasures once,--now they are thine."

LXVIII.

"Now, lay thine ear against this golden sand,

And thou shalt hear the music of the sea,

Those hollow tunes it plays against the land,--

Is't not a rich and wondrous melody?

I have lain hours, and fancied in its tone

I heard the languages of ages gone!"

LXIX.

"I too can sing when it shall please thy choice,

And breathe soft tunes through a melodious shell,

Though heretofore I have but set my voice

To some long sighs, grief-harmonized, to tell

How desolate I fared;--but this sweet change

Will add new notes of gladness to my range!"

LXX.

"Or bid me speak, and I will tell thee tales,

Which I have framed out of the noise of waves;

Ere now I have communed with senseless gales,

And held vain colloquies with barren caves;

But I could talk to thee whole days and days,

Only to word my love a thousand ways."

LXXI.

"But if thy lips will bless me with their speech,

Then ope, sweet oracles! and I'll be mute;

I was born ignorant for thee to teach,

Nay all love's lore to thy dear looks impute;

Then ope thine eyes, fair teachers, by whose light

I saw to give away my heart aright!"

LXXII.

But cold and deaf the sullen creature lies

Over her knees, and with concealing clay,

Like hoarding Avarice, locks up his eyes,

And leaves her world impoverish'd of day;

Then at his cruel lips she bends to plead,

But there the door is closed against her need.

LXXIII.

Surely he sleeps,--so her false wits infer!

Alas! poor sluggard, ne'er to wake again!

Surely he sleeps, yet without any stir

That might denote a vision in his brain;

Or if he does not sleep, he feigns too long,

Twice she hath reach'd the ending of her song.

LXXIV.

Therefore 'tis time she tells him to uncover

Those radiant jesters, and disperse her fears,

Whereby her April face is shaded over,

Like rainy clouds just ripe for showering tears;

Nay, if he will not wake, so poor she gets,

Herself must open those lock'd-up cabinets.

LXXV.

With that she stoops above his brow, and bids

Her busy hands forsake his tangled hair,

And tenderly lift up those coffer-lids,

That she may gaze upon the jewels there,

Like babes that pluck an early bud apart,

To know the dainty color of its heart.

LXXVI.

Now, picture one, soft creeping to a bed,

Who slowly parts the fringe-hung canopies,

And then starts back to find the sleeper dead;

So she looks in on his uncover'd eyes,

And seeing all within so drear and dark,

Her own bright soul dies in her like a spark.

LXXVII.

Backward she falls, like a pale prophetess,

Under the swoon of holy divination:

And what had all surpass'd her simple guess,

She now resolves in this dark revelation;

Death's very mystery,--oblivious death;--

Long sleep,--deep night, and an entranced breath.

LXXVIII.

Yet life, though wounded sore, not wholly slain,

Merely obscured, and not extinguish'd, lies;

Her breath that stood at ebb, soon flows again,

Heaving her hollow breast with heavy sighs,

And light comes in and kindles up the gloom,

To light her spirit from its transient tomb.

LXXIX.

Then like the sun, awaken'd at new dawn,

With pale bewilder'd face she peers about,

And spies blurr'd images obscurely drawn,

Uncertain shadows in a haze of doubt;

But her true grief grows shapely by degrees,--

A perish'd creature lying on her knees.

LXXX.

And now she knows how that old Murther preys,

Whose quarry on her lap lies newly slain:

How he roams all abroad and grimly slays,

Like a lean tiger in Love's own domain;

Parting fond mates,--and oft in flowery lawns

Bereaves mild mothers of their milky fawns.

LXXXI.

O too dear knowledge! O pernicious earning!

Foul curse engraven upon beauty's page!

Ev'n now the sorrow of that deadly learning

Ploughs up her brow, like an untimely age,

And on her cheek stamps verdict of death's truth

By canker blights upon the bud of youth!

LXXXII.

For as unwholesome winds decay the leaf,

So her cheeks' rose is perish'd by her sighs,

And withers in the sickly breath of grief;

Whilst unacquainted rheum bedims her eyes,

Tears, virgin tears, the first that ever leapt

From those young lids, now plentifully wept.

LXXXIII.

Whence being shed, the liquid crystalline

Drops straightway down, refusing to partake

In gross admixture with the baser brine,

But shrinks and hardens into pearls opaque,

Hereafter to be worn on arms and ears;

So one maid's trophy is another's tears!

LXXXIV.

"O foul Arch-Shadow, thou old cloud of Night,"

(Thus in her frenzy she began to wail,)

"Thou blank Oblivion--blotter-out of light,

Life's ruthless murderer, and dear love's bale!

Why hast thou left thy havoc incomplete,

Leaving me here, and slaying the more sweet?"

LXXXV.

"Lo! what a lovely ruin thou hast made!

Alas! alas! thou hast no eye to see,

And blindly slew'st him in misguided shade.

Would I had lent my doting sense to thee!

But now I turn to thee, a willing mark,

Thine arrows miss me in the aimless dark!"

LXXXVI.

"O doubly cruel!--twice misdoing spite,

But I will guide thee with my helping eyes,

Or--walk the wide world through, devoid of sight,--

Yet thou shalt know me by my many sighs.

Nay, then thou should'st have spared my roses, false Death,

And known Love's flow'r by smelling his sweet breath;"

LXXXVII.

"Or, when thy furious rage was round him dealing,

Love should have grown from touching of his skin;

But like cold marble thou art all unfeeling.

And hast no ruddy springs of warmth within,

And being but a shape of freezing bone,

Thy touching only turn'd my love to stone!"

LXXXVIII.

"And here, alas! he lies across my knees,

With cheeks still colder than the stilly wave.

The light beneath his eyelids seems to freeze;

Here then, since Love is dead and lacks a grave,

O come and dig it in my sad heart's core--

That wound will bring a balsam for its sore!"

LXXXIX.

"For art thou not a sleep where sense of ill

Lies stingless, like a sense benumb'd with cold,

Healing all hurts only with sleep's good-will?

So shall I slumber, and perchance behold

My living love in dreams,--O happy night,

That lets me company his banish'd spright!"

XC.

"O poppy Death!--sweet poisoner of sleep;

Where shall I seek for thee, oblivious drug,

That I may steep thee in my drink, and creep

Out of life's coil? Look, Idol! how I hug

Thy dainty image in this strict embrace,

And kiss this clay-cold model of thy face!"

XCI.

"Put out, put out these sun-consuming lamps,

I do but read my sorrows by their shine;

O come and quench them with thy oozy damps,

And let my darkness intermix with thine;

Since love is blinded, wherefore should I see?

Now love is death,--death will be love to me!"

XCII.

"Away, away, this vain complaining breath,

It does but stir the troubles that I weep;

Let it be hush'd and quieted, sweet Death;

The wind must settle ere the wave can sleep,--

Since love is silent, I would fain be mute;

O death, be gracious to my dying suit!"

XCIII.

Thus far she pleads, but pleading nought avails her,

For Death, her sullen burthen, deigns no heed;

Then with dumb craving arms, since darkness fails her,

She prays to heaven's fair light, as if her need

Inspired her there were Gods to pity pain,

Or end it,--but she lifts her arms in vain!

XCIV.

Poor gilded Grief! the subtle light by this

With mazy gold creeps through her watery mine,

And, diving downward through the green abyss,

Lights up her palace with an amber shine;

There, falling on her arms,--the crystal skin

Reveals the ruby tide that fares within.

XCV.

Look how the fulsome beam would hang a glory

On her dark hair, but the dark hairs repel it;

Look how the perjured glow suborns a story

On her pale lips, but lips refuse to tell it;

Grief will not swerve from grief, however told

On coral lips, or character'd in gold;

XCVI.

Or else, thou maid! safe anchor'd on Love's neck,

Listing the hapless doom of young Leander,

Thou would'st not shed a tear for that old wreck,

Sitting secure where no wild surges wander;

Whereas the woe moves on with tragic pace,

And shows its sad reflection in thy face.

XCVII.

Thus having travell'd on, and track'd the tale,

Like the due course of an old bas-relief,

Where Tragedy pursues her progress pale,

Brood here awhile upon that sea-maid's grief,

And take a deeper imprint from the frieze

Of that young Fate, with Death upon her knees.

XCVIII.

Then whilst the melancholy Muse withal

Resumes her music in a sadder tone,

Meanwhile the sunbeam strikes upon the wall,

Conceive that lovely siren to live on,

Ev'n as Hope whisper'd, the Promethean light

Would kindle up the dead Leander's spright.

XCIX.

"'Tis light," she says, "that feeds the glittering stars,

And those were stars set in his heavenly brow;

But this salt cloud, this cold sea-vapor, mars

Their radiant breathing, and obscures them now;

Therefore I'll lay him in the clear blue air,

And see how these dull orbs will kindle there."

C.

Swiftly as dolphins glide, or swifter yet,

With dead Leander in her fond arms' fold,

She cleaves the meshes of that radiant net

The sun hath twined above of liquid gold,

Nor slacks till on the margin of the land

She lays his body on the glowing sand.

CI.

There, like a pearly waif, just past the reach

Of foamy billows he lies cast. Just then,

Some listless fishers, straying down the beach,

Spy out this wonder. Thence the curious men,

Low crouching, creep into a thicket brake,

And watch her doings till their rude hearts ache.

CII.

First she begins to chafe him till she faints,

Then falls upon his mouth with kisses many,

And sometimes pauses in her own complaints

To list his breathing, but there is not any,--

Then looks into his eyes where no light dwells;

Light makes no pictures in such muddy wells.

CIII.

The hot sun parches his discover'd eyes,

The hot sun beats on his discolor'd limbs,

The sand is oozy whereupon he lies,

Soiling his fairness;--then away she swims,

Meaning to gather him a daintier bed,

Plucking the cool fresh weeds, brown, green, and red.

CIV.

But, simple-witted thief, while she dives under,

Another robs her of her amorous theft;

The ambush'd fishermen creep forth to plunder,

And steal the unwatch'd treasure she has left;

Only his void impression dints the sands;

Leander is purloin'd by stealthy hands!

CV.

Lo! how she shudders off the beaded wave,

Like Grief all over tears, and senseless falls,--

His void imprint seems hollow'd for her grave;

Then, rising on her knees, looks round and calls

On "Hero! Hero!" having learn'd this name

Of his last breath, she calls him by the same.

CVI.

Then with her frantic hands she rends her hairs,

And casts them forth, sad keepsakes to the wind,

As if in plucking those she plucked her cares;

But grief lies deeper, and remains behind

Like a barb'd arrow, rankling in her brain,

Turning her very thoughts to throbs of pain.

CVII.

Anon her tangled locks are left alone,

And down upon the sand she meekly sits,

Hard by the foam, as humble as a stone,

Like an enchanted maid beside her wits,

That ponders with a look serene and tragic,

Stunn'd by the mighty mystery of magic.

CVIII.

Or think of Ariadne's utter trance,

Crazed by the flight of that disloyal traitor,

Who left her gazing on the green expanse

That swallowed up his track,--yet this would mate her,

Ev'n in the cloudy summit of her woe,

When o'er the far sea-brim she saw him go.

CIX.

For even so she bows, and bends her gaze

O'er the eternal waste, as if to sum

Its waves by weary thousands all her days,

Dismally doom'd! meanwhile the billows come,

And coldly dabble with her quiet feet,

Like any bleaching stones they wont to greet.

CX.

And thence into her lap have boldly sprung,

Washing her weedy tresses to and fro,

That round her crouching knees have darkly hung;

But she sits careless of waves' ebb and flow,

Like a lone beacon on a desert coast,

Showing where all her hope was wreck'd and lost.

CXI.

Yet whether in the sea or vaulted sky,

She knoweth not her lover's abrupt resort,

So like a shape of dreams he left her eye,

Winking with doubt. Meanwhile, the churls' report

Has throng'd the beach with many a curious face,

That peeps upon her from its hiding place.

CXII.

And here a head, and there a brow half seen,

Dodges behind a rock. Here on his hands

A mariner his crumpled cheeks doth lean

Over a rugged crest. Another stands,

Holding his harmful arrow at the head,

Still check'd by human caution and strange dread.

CXIII.

One stops his ears,--another close beholder

Whispers unto the next his grave surmise;

This crouches down,--and just above his shoulder,

A woman's pity saddens in her eyes,

And prompts her to befriend that lonely grief,

With all sweet helps of sisterly relief.

CXIV.

And down the sunny beach she paces slowly,

With many doubtful pauses by the way;

Grief hath an influence so hush'd and holy,--

Making her twice attempt, ere she can lay

Her hand upon that sea-maid's shoulder white,

Which makes her startle up in wild affright.

CXV.

And, like a seal, she leaps into the wave

That drowns the shrill remainder of her scream;

Anon the sea fills up the watery cave,

And seals her exit with a foamy seam,--

Leaving those baffled gazers on the beach,

Turning in uncouth wonder each to each.

CXVI.

Some watch, some call, some see her head emerge,

Wherever a brown weed falls through the foam;

Some point to white eruptions of the surge:--

But she is vanish'd to her shady home,

Under the deep, inscrutable,--and there

Weeps in a midnight made of her own hair.

CXVII.

Now here, the sighing winds, before unheard,

Forth from their cloudy caves begin to blow,

Till all the surface of the deep is stirr'd,

Like to the panting grief it hides below;

And heaven is cover'd with a stormy rack,

Soiling the waters with its inky black.

CXVIII.

The screaming fowl resigns her finny prey,

And labors shoreward with a bending wing,

Rowing against the wind her toilsome way;

Meanwhile, the curling billows chafe, and fling

Their dewy frost still further on the stones,

That answer to the wind with hollow groans.

CXIX.

And here and there a fisher's far-off bark

Flies with the sun's last glimpse upon its sail,

Like a bright flame amid the waters dark,

Watch'd with the hope and fear of maidens pale;

And anxious mothers that upturn their brows,

Freighting the gusty wind with frequent vows,

CXX.

For that the horrid deep has no sure path

To guide Love safe into his homely haven.

And lo! the storm grows blacker in its wrath,

O'er the dark billow brooding like a raven,

That bodes of death and widow's sorrowing,

Under the dusky covert of his wing.

CXXI.

And so day ended. But no vesper spark

Hung forth its heavenly sign; but sheets of flame

Play'd round the savage features of the dark,

Making night horrible. That night, there came

A weeping maiden to high Sestos' steep,

And tore her hair and gazed upon the deep.

CXXII.

And waved aloft her bright and ruddy torch,

Whose flame the boastful wind so rudely fann'd,

That oft it would recoil, and basely scorch

The tender covert of her sheltering hand;

Which yet, for Love's dear sake, disdain'd retire,

And, like a glorying martyr, braved the fire.

CXXIII.

For that was love's own sign and beacon guide

Across the Hellespont's wide weary space,

Wherein he nightly struggled with the tide:--

Look what a red it forges on her face,

As if she blush'd at holding sucha light,

Ev'n in the unseen presence of the night!

CXXIV.

Whereas her tragic cheek is truly pale,

And colder than the rude and ruffian air

That howls into her ear a horrid tale

Of storm and wreck, and uttermost despair,

Saying, "Leander floats amid the surge,

And those are dismal waves that sing his dirge."

CXXV.

And hark!--a grieving voice, trembling and faint,

Blends with the hollow sobbings of the sea;

Like the sad music of a siren's plaint,

But shriller than Leander's voice should be,

Unless the wintry death had changed its tone,--

Wherefore she thinks she hears his spirit moan.

CXXVI.

For now, upon each brief and breathless pause,

Made by the raging winds, it plainly calls

On "Hero! Hero!"--whereupon she draws

Close to the dizzy brink, that ne'er appals

Her brave and constant spirit to recoil,

However the wild billows toss and toil.

CXXVII.

"Oh! dost thou live under the deep deep sea?

I thought such love as thine could never die;

If thou hast gain'd an immortality

From the kind pitying sea-god, so will I;

And this false cruel tide that used to sever

Our hearts, shall be our common home forever!"

CXXVIII.

"There we will sit and sport upon one billow,

And sing our ocean ditties all the day,

And lie together on the same green pillow,

That curls above us with its dewy spray;

And ever in one presence live and dwell,

Like two twin pearls within the selfsame shell!"

CXXIX.

One moment then, upon the dizzy verge

She stands;--with face upturn'd against the sky;

A moment more, upon the foamy surge

She gazes, with a calm despairing eye;

Feeling that awful pause of blood and breath,

Which life endures when it confronts with death;--

CXXX.

Then from the giddy steep she madly springs,

Grasping her maiden robes, that vainly kept

Panting abroad, like unavailing wings,

To save her from her death.--The sea-maid wept

And in a crystal cave her corse enshrined;

No meaner sepulchre should Hero find!

BALLAD.

Spring it is cheery,

Winter is dreary,

Green leaves hang, but the brown must fly;

When he's forsaken,

Wither'd and shaken,

What can an old man do but die?

Love will not clip him,

Maids will not lip him,

Maud and Marian pass him by;

Youth it is sunny,

Age has no honey,--

What can an old man do but die?

June it was jolly,

Oh for its folly!

A dancing leg and a laughing eye;

Youth may be silly,

Wisdom is chilly,--

What can an old man do but die?

Friends, they are scanty,

Beggars are plenty,

If he has followers, I know why;

Gold's in his clutches,

(Buying him crutches!)

What can an old man do but die?

AUTUMN

The Autumn skies are flush'd with gold,

And fair and bright the rivers run;

These are but streams of winter cold,

And painted mists that quench the sun.

In secret boughs no sweet birds sing,

In secret boughs no bird can shroud;

These are but leaves that take to wing,

And wintry winds that pipe so loud.

'Tis not trees' shade, but cloudy glooms

That on the cheerless valleys fall,

The flowers are in their grassy tombs,

And tears of dew are on them all.

BALLAD.

Sigh on, sad heart, for Love's eclipse

And Beauty's fairest queen,

Though 'tis not for my peasant lips

To soil her name between:

A king might lay his sceptre down,

But I am poor and nought,

The brow should wear a golden crown

That wears her in its thought.

The diamonds glancing in her hair,

Whose sudden beams surprise,

Might bid such humble hopes beware

The glancing of her eyes;

Yet looking once, I look'd too long,

And if my love is sin,

Death follows on the heels of wrong,

And kills the crime within.

Her dress seem'd wove of lily leaves,

It was so pure and fine,

O lofty wears, and lowly weaves,--

But hodden-gray is mine;

And homely hose must step apart,

Where garter'd princes stand,

But may he wear my love at heart

That wins her lily hand!

Alas! there's far from russet frieze

To silks and satin gowns,

But I doubt if God made like degrees

In courtly hearts and clowns.

My father wrong'd a maiden's mirth,

And brought her cheeks to blame,

And all that's lordly of my birth

Is my reproach and shame!

'Tis vain to weep,--'tis vain to sigh,

'Tis vain, this idle speech,

For where her happy pearls do lie,

My tears may never reach;

Yet when I'm gone, e'en lofty pride

May say, of what has been,

His love was nobly born and died,

Though all the rest was mean!

My speech is rude,--but speech is weak

Such love as mine to tell,

Yet had I words, I dare not speak,

So, Lady, fare thee well;

I will not wish thy better state

Was one of low degree,

But I must weep that partial fate

Made such a churl of me.

THE EXILE.

The swallow with summer

Will wing o'er the seas,

The wind that I sigh to

Will visit thy trees.

The ship that it hastens

Thy ports will contain,

But me!--I must never

See England again!

There's many that weep there,

But one weeps alone,

For the tears that are falling

So far from her own;

So far from thy own, love,

We know not our pain;

If death is between us,

Or only the main.

When the white cloud reclines

On the verge of the sea,

I fancy the white cliffs,

And dream upon thee;

But the cloud spreads its wings

To the blue heav'n and flies.

We never shall meet, love,

Except in the skies!

TO ----

Welcome, dear Heart, and a most kind good-morrow;

The day is gloomy, but our looks shall shine:--

Flowers I have none to give thee, but I borrow

Their sweetness in a verse to speak for thine.

Here are red roses, gather'd at thy cheeks,--

The white were all too happy to look white:

For love the rose, for faith the lily speaks;

It withers in false hands, but here 'tis bright!

Dost love sweet Hyacinth? Its scented leaf

Curls manifold,--all love's delights blow double:

'Tis said this flow'ret is inscribed with grief,--

But let that hint of a forgotten trouble.

I pluck'd the Primrose at night's dewy noon;

Like Hope, it show'd its blossoms in the night;--

'Twas, like Endymion, watching for the Moon!

And here are Sun-flowers, amorous of light!

These golden Buttercups are April's seal,--

The Daisy-stars her constellations be:

These grew so lowly, I was forced to kneel,

Therefore I pluck no Daisies but for thee!

Here's Daisies for the morn, Primrose for gloom

Pansies and Roses for the noontide hours:--

A wight once made a dial of their bloom,--

So may thy life be measured out by flowers!

ODE TO MELANCHOLY.

Come, let us set our careful breasts,

Like Philomel, against the thorn,

To aggravate the inward grief,

That makes her accents so forlorn;

The world has many cruel points,

Whereby our bosoms have been torn,

And there are dainty themes of grief,

In sadness to outlast the morn,--

True honor's dearth, affection's death,

Neglectful pride, and cankering scorn,

With all the piteous tales that tears

Have water'd since the world was born.

The world!--it is a wilderness,

Where tears are hung on every tree;

For thus my gloomy phantasy

Makes all things weep with me!

Come let us sit and watch the sky,

And fancy clouds, where no clouds be;

Grief is enough to blot the eye,

And make heaven black with misery.

Why should birds sing such merry notes,

Unless they were more blest than we?

No sorrow ever chokes their throats,

Except sweet nightingale; for she

Was born to pain our hearts the more

With her sad melody.

Why shines the Sun, except that he

Makes gloomy nooks for Grief to hide,

And pensive shades for Melancholy,

When all the earth is bright beside?

Let clay wear smiles, and green grass wave,

Mirth shall not win us back again,

Whilst man is made of his own grave,

And fairest clouds but gilded rain!

I saw my mother in her shroud,

Her cheek was cold and very pale;

And ever since I've look'd on all

As creatures doom'd to fail!

Why do buds ope except to die?

Ay, let us watch the roses wither,

And think of our loves' cheeks;

And oh! how quickly time doth fly

To bring death's winter hither!

Minutes, hours, days, and weeks,

Months, years, and ages, shrink to nought;

An age past is but a thought!

Ay, let us think of Him awhile

That, with a coffin for a boat,

Rows daily o'er the Stygian moat,

And for our table choose a tomb:

There's dark enough in any skull

To charge with black a raven plume;

And for the saddest funeral thoughts

A winding-sheet hath ample room,

Where Death, with his keen-pointed style,

Hath writ the common doom.

How wide the yew-tree spreads its gloom,

And o'er the dead lets fall its dew,

As if in tears it wept for them,

The many human families

That sleep around its stem!

How cold the dead have made these stones,

With natural drops kept ever wet!

Lo! here the best--the worst--the world

Doth now remember or forget,

Are in one common ruin hurl'd,

And love and hate are calmly met;

The loveliest eyes that ever shone,

The fairest hands, and locks of jet.

Is't not enough to vex our souls,

And fill our eyes, that we have set

Our love upon a rose's leaf,

Our hearts upon a violet?

Blue eyes, red cheeks, are frailer yet;

And sometimes at their swift decay

Beforehand we must fret.

The roses bud and bloom, again;

But Love may haunt the grave of Love,

And watch the mould in vain.

O clasp me, sweet, whilst thou art mine,

And do not take my tears amiss;

For tears must flow to wash away

A thought that shows so stern as this:

Forgive, if somewhile I forget,

In woe to come, the present bliss;

As frighted Proserpine let fall

Her flowers at the sight of Dis,

Ev'n so the dark and bright will kiss.

The sunniest things throw sternest shade,

And there is ev'n a happiness

That makes the heart afraid!

Now let us with a spell invoke

The full-orb'd moon to grieve our eyes;

Not bright, not bright, but, with a cloud

Lapp'd all about her, let her rise

All pale and dim, as if from rest

The ghost of the late-buried sun

Had crept into the skies.

The Moon! she is the source of sighs,

The very face to make us sad;

If but to think in other times

The same calm quiet look she had,

As if the world held nothing base,

Of vile and mean, of fierce and bad;

The same fair light that shone in streams,

The fairy lamp that charmed the lad;

For so it is, with spent delights

She taunts men's brains, and makes them mad.

All things are touch'd with Melancholy,

Born of the secret soul's mistrust,

To feel her fair ethereal wings

Weigh'd down with vile degraded dust;

Even the bright extremes of joy

Bring on conclusions of disgust,

Like the sweet blossoms of the May,

Whose fragrance ends in must.

O give her, then, her tribute just,

Her sighs and tears, and musings holy;

There is no music in the life

That sounds with idiot laughter solely;

There's not a string attuned to mirth,

But has its chord in Melancholy.

SONNET.

By ev'ry sweet tradition of true hearts,

Graven by Time, in love with his own lore;

By all old martyrdoms and antique smarts,

Wherein Love died to be alive the more;

Yea, by the sad impression on the shore,

Left by the drown'd Leander, to endear

That coast for ever, where the billow's roar

Moaneth for pity in the Poet's ear;

By Hero's faith, and the foreboding tear

That quench'd her brand's last twinkle in its fall;

By Sappho's leap, and the low rustling fear

That sigh'd around her flight; I swear by all,

The world shall find such pattern in my act,

As if Love's great examples still were lack'd.

SONNET.

TO MY WIFE.

The curse of Adam, the old curse of all,

Though I inherit in this feverish life

Of worldly toil, vain wishes, and hard strife,

And fruitless thought, in Care's eternal thrall,

Yet more sweet honey than of bitter gall

I taste, through thee, my Eve, my sweet wife.

Then what was Man's lost Paradise!--how rife

Of bliss, since love is with him in his fall!

Such as our own pure passion still might frame,

Of this fair earth, and its delightful bow'rs,

If no fell sorrow, like the serpent, came

To trail its venom o'er the sweetest flow'rs;--

But oh! as many and such tears are ours,

As only should be shed for guilt and shame!

SONNET.

ON RECEIVING A GIFT.

Look how the golden ocean shines above

Its pebbly stones, and magnifies their girth;

So does the bright and blessed light of Love

Its own things glorify, and raise their worth.

As weeds seem flowers beneath the flattering brine,

And stones like gems, and gems as gems indeed,

Ev'n so our tokens shine; nay, they outshine

Pebbles and pearls, and gems and coral weed;

For where be ocean waves but half so clear,

So calmly constant, and so kindly warm,

As Love's most mild and glowing atmosphere,

That hath no dregs to be upturn'd by storm?

Thus, sweet, thy gracious gifts are gifts of price,

And more than gold to doting Avarice.

SONNET.

Love, dearest Lady, such as I would speak,

Lives not within the humor of the eye;--

Not being but an outward phantasy,

That skims the surface of a tinted cheek,--

Else it would wane with beauty, and grow weak,

As if the rose made summer,--and so lie

Amongst the perishable things that die,

Unlike the love which I would give and seek:

Whose health is of no hue--to feel decay

With cheeks' decay, that have a rosy prime.

Love is its own great loveliness alway,

And takes new lustre from the touch of time;

Its bough owns no December and no May,

But bears its blossom into Winter's clime.

THE DREAM OF EUGENE ARAM.[9]

[Footnote 9: Hood edited _The Gem_, one of the many annuals of

that day, for the year 1829. The volume is memorable for having

contained his fine poem.

"The remarkable name of Eugene Aram, belonging to a man of unusual

talents and acquirements, is unhappily associated with a deed of

blood as extraordinary in its details as any recorded in our

calendar of crime. In the year 1745, being then an usher and deeply

engaged in the study of Chaldee, Hebrew, Arabic, and the Celtic

dialects, for the formation of a lexicon, he abruptly turned over a

still darker page in human knowledge, and the brow that learning

might have made illustrious was stamped ignominious forever with

the brand of Cain. To obtain a trifling property he concerted with

an accomplice, and with his own hand effected the violent death of

one Daniel Clarke, a shoe-maker, of Knaresborough, in Yorkshire.

For fourteen years nearly the secret slept with the victim in the

earth of St. Robert's Cave, and the manner of its discovery would

appear a striking example of the divine justice even amongst those

marvels narrated in that curious old volume alluded to in the

_Fortunes of Nigel_, under its quaint title of 'God's Revenge

against Murther.'

"The accidental digging up of a skeleton, and the unwary and

emphatic declaration of Aram's accomplice that it could not be that

of Clarke, betraying a guilty knowledge of the true bones, he was

wrought to a confession of their deposit. The learned homicide was

seized and arraigned, and a trial of uncommon interest was wound up

by a defence as memorable as the tragedy itself for eloquence and

ingenuity--too ingenious for innocence, and eloquent enough to do

credit even to that long premeditation which the interval between

the deed and its discovery had afforded. That this dreary period

had not passed without paroxysms of remorse may be inferred from a

fact of affecting interest. The late Admiral Burney was a scholar

at the school at Lynn in Norfolk when Aram was an usher, subsequent

to his crime. The Admiral stated that Aram was beloved by the boys,

and that he used to discourse to them of murder, not occasionally,

as I have written elsewhere, but constantly, and in somewhat of the

spirit ascribed to him in the poem.

"For the more imaginative part of the version I must refer back to

one of those unaccountable visions which come upon us like

frightful monsters thrown up by storms from the great black deeps

of slumber. A lifeless body, in love and relationship the nearest

and dearest, was imposed upon my back, with an overwhelming sense

of obligation--not of filial piety merely, but some awful

responsibility, equally vague and intense, and involving, as it

seemed, inexpiable sin, horrors unutterable, torments

intolerable--to bury my dead, like Abraham, out of my sight. In

vain I attempted, again and again, to obey the mysterious

mandate--by some dreadful process the burthen was replaced with a

more stupendous weight of injunction, and an apalling conviction of

the impossibility of its fulfilment. My mental anguish was

indescribable;--the mighty agonies of souls tortured on the

supernatural racks of sleep are not to be penned--and if in

sketching those that belong to blood-guiltiness I have been at all

successful, I owe it mainly to the uninvoked inspiration of that

terrible dream."

The introduction of Admiral Burney's name makes it likely that Hood

may have owed his first interest in the story to Charles Lamb. The

circumstance that the book over which the gentle boy was poring when

questioned by the usher was called the _Death of Abel_, is by no

means forced or unnatural. Salomon Gessner's prose poem, _Der Tod

Abels_, published in 1758, attained an astonishing popularity

throughout Europe, and appeared in an English version somewhere

about the time of the discovery of Aram's crime.]

I.

'Twas in the prime of summer time,

An evening calm and cool,

And four-and-twenty happy boys

Came bounding out of school:

There were some that ran and some that leapt,

Like troutlets in a pool.

II.

Away they sped with gamesome minds,

And souls untouch'd by sin;

To a level mead they came, and there

They drave the wickets in:

Pleasantly shone the setting sun

Over the town of Lynn.

III.

Like sportive deer they coursed about,

And shouted as they ran,--

Turning to mirth all things of earth,

As only boyhood can;

But the Usher sat remote from all,

A melancholy man!

IV.

His hat was off, his vest apart,

To catch heaven's blessed breeze;

For a burning thought was in his brow,

And his bosom ill at ease:

So he lean'd his head on his hands, and read

The book between his knees!

V.

Leaf after leaf he turn'd it o'er,

Nor ever glanced aside,

For the peace of his soul he read that book

In the golden eventide:

Much study had made him very lean,

And pale, and leaden-eyed.

VI.

At last he shut the ponderous tome,

With a fast and fervent grasp

He strain'd the dusky covers close,

And fix'd the brazen hasp:

"Oh, God! could I so close my mind,

And clasp it with a clasp!"

VII.

Then leaping on his feet upright,

Some moody turns he took,--

Now up the mead, then down the mead,

And past a shady nook,--

And, lo! he saw a little boy

That pored upon a book!

VIII.

"My gentle lad, what is't you read--

Romance or fairy fable?

Of is it some historic page,

Or kings and crowns unstable?"

The young boy gave an upward glance,--

"It is 'The Death of Abel.'"

IX.

The Usher took six hasty strides,

As smit with sudden pain,--

Six hasty strides beyond the place,

Then slowly back again;

And down he sat beside the lad,

And talk'd with him of Cain;

X.

And, long since then, of bloody men,

Whose deeds tradition saves;

Of lonely folk cut off unseen,

And hid in sudden graves;

Of horrid stabs, in groves forlorn,

And murders done in caves;

XI.

And how the sprites of injured men

Shriek upward from the sod,--

Ay, how the ghostly hand will point

To show the burial clod;

And unknown facts of guilty acts

Are seen in dreams from God!

XII.

He told how murderers walk the earth

Beneath the curse of Cain,--

With crimson clouds before their eyes,

And flames about their brain:

For blood has left upon their souls

Its everlasting stain!

XIII.

"And well," quoth he, "I know, for truth,

Their pangs must be extreme,--

Woe, woe, unutterable woe,--

Who spill life's sacred stream!

For why? Methought, last night, I wrought

A murder, in a dream!"

XIV.

"One that had never done me wrong--

A feeble man, and old;

I led him to a lonely field,--

The moon shone clear and cold:

Now here, said I, this man shall die,

And I will have his gold!"

XV.

"Two sudden blows with a ragged stick,

And one with a heavy stone,

One hurried gash with a hasty knife,--

And then the deed was done:

There was nothing lying at my foot

But lifeless flesh and bone!"

XVI.

"Nothing but lifeless flesh and bone,

That could not do me ill;

And yet I feared him all the more,

For lying there so still:

There was a manhood in his look,

That murder could not kill!"

XVII.

"And, lo! the universal air

Seemed lit with ghastly flame;--

Ten thousand thousand dreadful eyes

Were looking down in blame:

I took the dead man by his hand,

And called upon his name!"

XVIII.

"Oh, God! it made me quake to see

Such sense within the slain!

But when I touched the lifeless clay,

The blood gush'd out amain!

For every clot, a burning spot

Was scorching in my brain!"

XIX.

"My head was like an ardent coal,

My heart as solid ice:

My wretched, wretched soul, I knew,

Was at the Devil's price:

A dozen times I groan'd the dead

Had never groan'd but twice!"

XX.

And now, from forth the frowning sky,

From the Heaven's topmost height,

I heard a voice--the awful voice

Of the blood-avenging Sprite:--

"Thou guilty man! take up thy dead

And hide it from my sight!"

XXI.

"I took the dreary body up,

And cast it in a stream,--

A sluggish water, black as ink,

The depth was so extreme:--

My gentle Boy, remember this

Is nothing but a dream!"

XXII.

"Down went the corse with a hollow plunge,

And vanish'd in the pool;

Anon I cleansed my bloody hands,

And wash'd my forehead cool,

And sat among the urchins young,

That evening in the school."

XXIII.

"Oh, Heaven! to think of their white souls,

And mine so black and grim!

I could not share in childish prayer,

Nor join in Evening Hymn:

Like a Devil of the Pit I seem'd,

'Mid holy Cherubim!"

XXIV.

"And peace went with them, one and all,

And each calm pillow spread:

But Guilt was my grim Chamberlain

That lighted me to bed;

And drew my midnight curtains round,

With fingers bloody red!"

XXV.

"All night I lay in agony,

In anguish dark and deep;

My fever'd eyes I dared not close,

But stared aghast at Sleep:

For Sin had render'd unto her

The keys of Hell to keep!"

XXVI.

"All night I lay in agony,

From weary chime to chime,

With one besetting horrid hint,

That rack'd me all the time;

A mighty yearning, like the first

Fierce impulse unto crime!"

XXVII.

"One stern tyrannic thought, that made

All other thoughts its slave;

Stronger and stronger every pulse

Did that temptation crave,--

Still urging me to go and see

The Dead Man in his grave!"

XXVIII.

"Heavily I rose up, as soon

As light was in the sky,

And sought the black accursed pool

With a wild misgiving eye;

And I saw the Dead in the river bed,

For the faithless stream was dry."

XXIX.

"Merrily rose the lark, and shook

The dew-drop from its wing;

But I never mark'd its morning flight,

I never heard it sing:

For I was stooping once again

Under the horrid thing."

XXX.

"With breathless speed, like a soul in chase,

I took him up and ran;--

There was no time to dig a grave

Before the day began:

In a lonesome wood, with heaps of leaves,

I hid the murder'd man!"

XXXI.

"And all that day I read in school,

But my thought was other where;

As soon as the mid-day task was done,

In secret I was there:

And a mighty wind had swept the leaves,

And still the corse was bare!"

XXXII.

"Then down I cast me on my face,

And first began to weep,

For I knew my secret then was one

That earth refused to keep:

Or land or sea, though he should be

Ten thousand fathoms deep."

XXXIII.

"So wills the fierce avenging Sprite,

Till blood for blood atones!

Ay, though he's buried in a cave,

And trodden down with stones,

And years have rotted off his flesh,--

The world shall see his bones!"

XXXIV.

"Oh, God! that horrid, horrid dream

Besets me now awake!

Again again, with dizzy brain,

The human life I take;

And my red right hand grows raging hot,

Like Cranmer's at the stake."

XXXV.

"And still no peace for the restless clay

Will wave or mould allow;

The horrid thing pursues my soul,--

It stands before me now!"

The fearful Boy look'd up, and saw

Huge drops upon his brow.

XXXVI.

That very night, while gentle sleep

The urchin eyelids kiss'd,

Two stern-faced men set out from Lynn,

Through the cold and heavy mist;

And Eugene Aram walk'd between.

With gyves upon his wrist.

SONNET.

FOR THE 14TH OF FEBRUARY.

No popular respect will I omit

To do thee honor on this happy day,

When every loyal lover tasks his wit

His simple truth in studious rhymes to pay,

And to his mistress dear his hopes convey.

Rather thou knowest I would still outrun

All calendars with Love's,--whose date alway

Thy bright eyes govern better than the Sun,--

For with thy favor was my life begun;

And still I reckon on from smiles to smiles,

And not by summers, for I thrive on none

But those thy cheerful countenance complies:

Oh! if it be to choose and call thee mine,

Love, thou art every day my Valentine.

THE DEATH-BED.[10]

[Footnote 10: _The Englishman's Magazine_, August 1831. This magazine

was a venture of Edward Moxon, the publisher, but had a career of only

seven months. It is memorable, however, for including, besides the

above and various papers by Charles Lamb, poetical contributions from

Tennyson and Arthur Hallam, and also for containing the review by the

latter of Tennyson's first volume of poems, published in 1830. The

beautiful stanzas of Hood's appear here, as far as I have discovered,

for the first time. The date of their composition remains unfixed.

Hood's son was under the impression that they were written on the death

of one of his father's sisters, but supplied no evidence bearing on the

question.]

We watch'd her breathing through the night.

Her breathing soft and low,

As in her breast the wave of life

Kept heaving to and fro.

So silently we seem'd to speak,

So slowly moved about,

As we had lent her half our powers

To eke her living out.

Our very hopes belied our fears,

Our fears our hopes belied--

We thought her dying when she slept,

And sleeping when she died.

For when the morn came dim and sad,

And chill with early showers,

Her quiet eyelids closed--she had

Another morn than ours.

ANTICIPATION.[11]

[Footnote 11: These impressive, if rather morbid, lines seem to have

been hitherto overlooked by Hood's editors, and are here collected for

the first time.]

"Coming events cast their shadow before."

I had a vision in the summer light--

Sorrow was in it, and my inward sight

Ached with sad images. The touch of tears

Gushed down my cheeks:--the figured woes of years

Casting their shadows across sunny hours.

Oh, there was nothing sorrowful in flowers

Wooing the glances of an April sun,

Or apple blossoms opening one by one

Their crimson bosoms--or the twittered words

And warbled sentences of merry birds;--

Or the small glitter and the humming wings

Of golden flies and many colored things--

Oh, these were nothing sad--nor to see _Her_,

Sitting beneath the comfortable stir

Of early leaves--casting the playful grace

Of moving shadows in so fair a face--

Nor in her brow serene--nor in the love

Of her mild eyes drinking the light above

With a long thirst--nor in her gentle smile--

Nor in her hand that shone blood-red the while

She raised it in the sun. All these were dear

To heart and eye--but an invisible fear

Shook in the trees and chilled upon the air,

And if one spot was laughing brightest--there

My soul most sank and darkened in despair!--

As if the shadows of a curtained room

Haunted me in the sun--as if the bloom

Of early flow'rets had no sweets for me,

Nor apple blossoms any blush to see--

As if the hour had brought too bright a day--

And little birds were all too gay!--too gay!--

As if the beauty of that Lovely One

Were all a fable.--Full before the sun

Stood Death and cast a shadow long before,

Like a dark pall enshrouding her all o'er,

Till eyes, and lips, and smiles, were all no more!

TO A CHILD EMBRACING HIS MOTHER.

Love thy mother, little one!

Kiss and clasp her neck again,--

Hereafter she may have a son

Will kiss and clasp her neck in vain.

Love thy mother, little one!

Gaze upon her living eyes,

And mirror back her love for thee,--

Hereafter thou mayst shudder sighs

To meet them when they cannot see.

Gaze upon her living eyes!

Press her lips the while they glow

With love that they have often told,--

Hereafter thou mayst press in woe,

And kiss them till thine own are cold.

Press her lips the while they glow!

Oh, revere her raven hair!

Although it be not silver-gray;

Too early Death, led on by Care,

May snatch save one dear lock away.

Oh, revere her raven hair!

Pray for her at eve and morn,

That Heaven may long the stroke defer,--

For thou mayst live the hour forlorn

When thou wilt ask to die with her.

Pray for her at eve and morn!

STANZAS[12]

[Footnote 12: From Hood's novel of _Tylney Hall_, published in 1834;

apparently one of the many tender tributes originally addressed by Hood

to his wife.]

(FROM _TYLNEY HALL_.)

Still glides the gentle streamlet on,

With shifting current new and strange;

The water that was here is gone,

But those green shadows do not change.

Serene, or ruffled by the storm,

On present waves as on the past,

The mirrored grave retains its form,

The self-same trees their semblance cast.

The hue each fleeting globule wears,

That drop bequeaths it to the next,

One picture still the surface bears,

To illustrate the murmured text.

So, love, however time may flow,

Fresh hours pursuing those that flee

One constant image still shall show

My tide of life is true to thee!

SONNET TO OCEAN.[13]

[Footnote 13: Written in 1835 after Hood's disastrous voyage to

Rotterdam, in which the ship was nearly lost, and Hood's health was

permanently affected.]

Shall I rebuke thee, Ocean, my old love,

That once, in rage, with the wild winds at strife,

Thou darest menace my unit of a life,

Sending my clay below, my soul above,

Whilst roar'd thy waves, like lions when they rove

By night, and bound upon their prey by stealth!

Yet didst thou n'er restore my fainting health?--

Didst thou ne'er murmur gently like the dove?

Nay, dost thou not against my own dear shore

Full break, last link between my land and me?--

My absent friends talk in thy very roar,

In thy waves' beat their kindly pulse I see,

And, if I must not see my England more,

Next to her soil, my grave be found in thee!

TO ----

COMPOSED AT ROTTERDAM.

I.

I gaze upon a city,--

A city new and strange,--

Down many a watery vista

My fancy takes a range;

From side to side I saunter,

And wonder where I am;

And can _you_ be in England,

And _I_ at Rotterdam!

II.

Before me lie dark waters

In broad canals and deep,

Whereon the silver moonbeams

Sleep, restless in their sleep;

A sort of vulgar Venice

Reminds me where I am;

Yes, yes, you are in England,

And I'm at Rotterdam.

III.

Tall houses with quaint gables,

Where frequent windows shine,

And quays that lead to bridges,

And trees in formal line,

And masts of spicy vessels

From western Surinam,

All tell me you're in England,

But I'm in Rotterdam.

IV.

Those sailors, how outlandish

The face and form of each!

They deal in foreign gestures,

And use a foreign speech;

A tongue not learn'd near Isis,

Or studied by the Cam,

Declares that you're in England,

And I'm at Rotterdam.

V.

And now across a market

My doubtful way I trace,

Where stands a solemn statue,

The Genius of the place;

And to the great Erasmus

I offer my salaam;

Who tells me you're in England,

But I'm at Rotterdam.

VI.

The coffee-room is open--

I mingle in its crowd,--

The dominos are noisy--

The hookahs raise a cloud;

The flavor, none of Fearon's,

That mingles with my dram,

Reminds me you're in England,

And I'm at Rotterdam.

VII.

Then here it goes, a bumper--

The toast it shall be mine,

In schiedam, or in sherry,

Tokay, or hock of Rhine;

It well deserves the brightest,

Where sunbeam ever swam--

"The Girl I love in England"

I drink at Rotterdam!

LINES

ON SEEING MY WIFE AND TWO CHILDREN SLEEPING

IN THE SAME CHAMBER.[14]

[Footnote 14: Written at Coblenz, where Hood and his family were then

settled, in November 1835.]

And has the earth lost its so spacious round,

The sky its blue circumference above,

That in this little chamber there is found

Both earth and heaven--my universe of love!

All that my God can give me, or remove,

Here sleeping, save myself, in mimic death.

Sweet that in this small compass I behove

To live their living and to breathe their breath!

Almost I wish that, with one common sigh,

We might resign all mundane care and strife,

And seek together that transcendent sky,

Where Father, Mother, Children, Husband, Wife,

Together pant in everlasting life!

STANZAS.[15]

[Footnote 15: Assigned by Hood's son to the year 1835, but apparently

only on conjecture.]

Is there a bitter pang for love removed,

O God! The dead love doth not cost more tears

Than the alive, the loving, the beloved--

Not yet, not yet beyond all hopes and fears!

Would I were laid

Under the shade

Of the calm grave, and the long grass of years,--

That love might die with sorrow:--I am sorrow;

And she, that loves me tenderest, doth press

Most poison from my cruel lips, and borrow

Only new anguish from the old caress;

Oh, this world's grief

Hath no relief

In being wrung from a great happiness.

Would I had never filled thine eyes with love,

For love is only tears: would I had never

Breathed such a curse-like blessing as we prove;

Now, if "Farewell" _could_ bless thee, I would sever!

Would I were laid

Under the shade

Of the cold tomb, and the long grass forever!

ODE TO RAE WILSON, ESQ.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE _ATHENÆUM_.

MY DEAR SIR--The following Ode was written anticipating the tone of

some strictures on my writings by the gentleman to whom it is

addressed. I have not seen his book; but I know by hearsay that some

of my verses are characterized as "profaneness and ribaldry"--citing,

in proof, the description of a certain sow, from whose jaw a cabbage

sprout

"Protruded, as the dove so staunch

For peace supports an olive branch."

If the printed works of my Censor had not prepared me for any

misapplication of _types_, I should have been surprised by this

misapprehension of one of the commonest emblems. In some cases the

dove unquestionably stands for the Divine Spirit; but the same bird

is also a lay representative of the peace of this world, and, as such,

has figured time out of mind in allegorical pictures. The sense in

which it was used by me is plain from the context; at least, it

would be plain to any one but a fisher for faults, predisposed to

carp at some things, to dab at others, and to flounder in all. But I

am possibly in error. It is the female swine, perhaps, that is

profaned in the eyes of the Oriental tourist. Men find strange ways

of marking their intolerance; and the spirit is certainly strong

enough, in Mr. W.'s works, to set up a creature as sacred, in sheer

opposition to the Mussulman, with whom she is a beast of abomination.

It would only be going the whole sow.--I am, dear Sir, yours very

truly, THOS. HOOD.

"Close, close your eyes with holy dread,

And weave a circle round him thrice,

For he on honey-dew hath fed

And drunk the milk of Paradise."--COLERIDGE.

"It's very hard them kind of men

Won't let a body be."--_Old Ballad_.

A wanderer, Wilson, from my native land,

Remote, O Rae, from godliness and thee,

Where rolls between us the eternal sea,

Besides some furlongs of a foreign sand,--

Beyond the broadest Scotch of London Wall;

Beyond the loudest Saint that has a call;

Across the wavy waste between us stretch'd,

A friendly missive warns me of a stricture,

Wherein my likeness you have darkly etch'd,

And though I have not seen the shadow sketch'd,

Thus I remark prophetic on the picture.

I guess the features:--in a line to paint

Their moral ugliness, I'm not a saint.

Not one of those self-constituted saints,

Quacks--not physicians--in the cure of souls,

Censors who sniff out mortal taints,

And call the devil over his own coals--

Those pseudo Privy Councillors of God,

Who write down judgments with a pen hard-nibb'd;

Ushers of Beelzebub's Black Rod,

Commending sinners, not to ice thick-ribb'd,

But endless flames, to scorch them up like flax--

Yet sure of heav'n themselves, as if they'd cribb'd

Th' impression of St. Peter's keys in wax!

Of such a character no single trace

Exists, I know, in my fictitious face;

There wants a certain cast about the eye;

A certain lifting of the nose's tip;

A certain curling of the nether lip,

In scorn of all that is, beneath the sky;

In brief it is an aspect deleterious,

A face decidedly not serious,

A face profane, that would not do at all

To make a face at Exeter Hall,--

That Hall where bigots rant, and cant, and pray,

And laud each other face to face,

Till ev'ry farthing-candle _ray_

Conceives itself a great gas-light of grace.

Well!--be the graceless lineaments confest!

I do enjoy this bounteous beauteous earth;

And dote upon a jest

"Within the limits of becoming mirth";--

No solemn sanctimonious face I pull,

Nor think I'm pious when I'm only bilious--

Nor study in my sanctum supercilious

To frame a Sabbath Bill or forge a Bull.

I pray for grace--repent each sinful act--

Peruse, but underneath the rose, my Bible;

And love my neighbor far too well, in fact,

To call and twit him with a godly tract

That's turn'd by application to a libel.

My heart ferments not with the bigot's leaven,

All creeds I view with toleration thorough,

And have a horror of regarding heaven

As anybody's rotten borough.

What else? no part I take in party fray,

With troops from Billingsgate's slang-whanging tartars,

I fear no Pope--and let great Ernest play

At Fox and Goose with Foxs' Martyrs!

I own I laugh at over-righteous men,

I own I shake my sides at ranters,

And treat sham-Abr'am saints with wicked banters,

I even own, that there are times--but then

It's when I've got my wine--I say d----canters!

I've no ambition to enact the spy

On fellow souls, a Spiritual Pry--

'Tis said that people ought to guard their noses,

Who thrust them into matters none of theirs;

And tho' no delicacy discomposes

Your Saint, yet I consider faith and pray'rs

Amongst the privatest of men's affairs.

I do not hash the Gospel in my books,

And thus upon the public mind intrude it,

As if I thought, like Otaheitan cooks,

No food was fit to eat till I had chewed it.

On Bible stilts I don't affect to stalk;

Nor lard with Scripture my familiar talk,--

For man may pious texts repeat,

And yet religion have no inward seat;

'Tis not so plain as the old Hill of Howth,

A man has got his belly full of meat

Because he talks with victuals in his mouth!

Mere verbiage,--it is not worth a carrot!

Why, Socrates--or Plato--where's the odds?--

Once taught a jay to supplicate the Gods,

And made a Polly-theist of a Parrot!

A mere professor, spite of all his cant, is

Not a whit better than a Mantis,--

An insect, of what clime I can't determine,

That lifts its paws most parson-like, and thence,

By simple savages--thro' sheer pretence--

Is reckon'd quite a saint amongst the vermin.

But where's the reverence, or where the _nous_,

To ride on one's religion thro' the lobby,

Whether a stalking-horse or hobby,

To show its pious paces to "the house"?

I honestly confess that I would hinder

The Scottish member's legislative rigs,

That spiritual Pinder,

Who looks on erring souls as straying pigs,

That must be lash'd by law, wherever found,

And driv'n to church, as to the parish pound.

I do confess, without reserve or wheedle,

I view that grovelling idea as one

Worthy some parish clerk's ambitious son,

A charity-boy, who longs to be a beadle.

On such a vital topic sure 'tis odd

How much a man can differ from his neighbor:

One wishes worship freely giv'n to God,

Another wants to make it statute-labor--

The broad distinction in a line to draw,

As means to lead us to the skies above,

You say--Sir Andrew and his love of law,

And I--the Saviour with his law of love.

Spontaneously to God should tend the soul,

Like the magnetic needle to the Pole;

But what were that intrinsic virtue worth,

Suppose some fellow, with more zeal than knowledge,

Fresh from St. Andrew's College,

Should nail the conscious needle to the north?

I do confess that I abhor and shrink

From schemes, with a religious willy-nilly,

That frown upon St. Giles's sins, but blink

The peccadilloes of all Piccadilly--

My soul revolts at such a bare hypocrisy,

And will not, dare not, fancy in accord

The Lord of Hosts with an Exclusive Lord

Of this world's aristocracy.

It will not own a notion so unholy,

As thinking that the rich by easy trips

May go to heav'n, whereas the poor and lowly

Must work their passage, as they do in ships.

One place there is--beneath the burial sod,

Where all mankind are equalized by death;

Another place there is--the Fane of God,

Where all are equal, who draw living breath;--

Juggle who will _elsewhere_ with his own soul,

Playing the Judas with a temporal dole--

He who can come beneath that awful cope,

In the dread presence of a Maker just,

Who metes to ev'ry pinch of human dust

One even measure of immortal hope--

He who can stand within that holy door,

With soul unbow'd by that pure spirit-level,

And frame unequal laws for rich and poor,--

Might sit for Hell and represent the Devil!

Such are the solemn sentiments, O Rae,

In your last Journey-Work, perchance you ravage,

Seeming, but in more courtly terms, to say

I'm but a heedless, creedless, godless savage;

A very Guy, deserving fire and faggots,--

A Scoffer, always on the grin,

And sadly given to the mortal sin

Of liking Maw-worms less than merry maggots!

The humble records of my life to search,

I have not herded with mere pagan beasts;

But sometimes I have "sat at good men's feasts,"

And I have been "where bells have knoll'd to church."

Dear bells! how sweet the sounds of village bells

When on the undulating air they swim!

Now loud as welcomes! faint, now, as farewells!

And trembling all about the breezy dells

As flutter'd by the wings of Cherubim.

Meanwhile the bees are chanting a low hymn;

And lost to sight th' ecstatic lark above

Sings, like a soul beatified, of love,--

With, now and then, the coo of the wild pigeon;--

O Pagans, Heathens, Infidels and Doubters!

If such sweet sounds can't woo you to religion,

Will the harsh voices of church cads and touters?

A man may cry "Church! Church!" at ev'ry word,

With no more piety than other people--

A daw's not reckon'd a religious bird

Because it keeps a-cawing from a steeple.

The Temple is a good, a holy place,

But quacking only gives it an ill savor;

While saintly mountebanks the porch disgrace,

And bring religion's self into disfavor!

Behold yon servitor of God and Mammon,

Who, binding up his Bible with his Ledger,

Blends Gospel texts with trading gammon,

A black-leg saint, a spiritual hedger,

Who backs his rigid Sabbath, so to speak,

Against the wicked remnant of the week,

A saving bet against his sinful bias--

"Rogue that I am," he whispers to himself,

"I lie--I cheat--do anything for pelf,

But who on earth can say I am not pious?"

In proof how over-righteousness re-acts,

Accept an anecdote well based on facts.

One Sunday morning--(at the day don't fret)--

In riding with a friend to Ponder's End

Outside the stage, we happened to commend

A certain mansion that we saw To Let.

"Ay," cried our coachman, with our talk to grapple

"You're right! no house along the road comes nigh it!

'Twas built by the same man as built yon chapel

And master wanted once to buy it,--

But t'other driv the bargain much too hard--

He ax'd sure-_ly_ a sum purdigious!

But being so particular religious,

Why, _that_, you see, put master on his guard!"

Church is "a little heav'n below,

I have been there and still would go,"--

Yet I am none of those, who think it odd

A man can pray unbidden from the cassock,

And, passing by the customary hassock,

Kneel down remote upon the simple sod,

And sue in formâ pauperis to God.

As for the rest,--intolerant to none,

Whatever shape the pious rite may bear,

Ev'n the poor Pagan's homage to the Sun

I would not harshly scorn, lest even there

I spurn'd some elements of Christian pray'r--

An aim, tho' erring, at a "world ayont,"

Acknowledgment of good--of man's futility,

A sense of need, and weakness, and indeed

That very thing so many Christians want--

Humility.

Such, unto Papists, Jews or turban'd Turks,

Such is my spirit--(I don't mean my wraith!)

Such, may it please you, is my humble faith;

I know, full well, you do not like my _works!_

I have not sought, 'tis true, the Holy Land,

As full of texts as Cuddie Headrigg's mother,

The Bible in one hand,

And my own commonplace-book in the other--

But you have been to Palestine--alas!

Some minds improve by travel, others, rather,

Resemble copper wire, or brass,

Which gets the narrower by going farther!

Worthless are all such Pilgrimages--very!

If Palmers at the Holy Tomb contrive

The human heats and rancor to revive

That at the Sepulchre they ought to bury.

A sorry sight it is to rest the eye on,

To see a Christian creature graze at Sion,

Then homeward, of the saintly pasture full,

Rush bellowing, and breathing fire and smoke,

At crippled Papistry to butt and poke,

Exactly as a skittish Scottish bull

Hunts an old woman in a scarlet cloak!

Why leave a serious, moral, pious home,

Scotland, renown'd for sanctity of old,

Far distant Catholics to rate and scold

For--doing as the Romans do at Rome?

With such a bristling spirit wherefore quit

The Land of Cakes for any land of wafers,

About the graceless images to flit,

And buzz and chafe importunate as chafers,

Longing to carve the carvers to Scotch collops?--

People who hold such absolute opinions

Should stay at home, in Protestant dominions,

Not travel like male Mrs. Trollopes.

Gifted with noble tendency to climb,

Yet weak at the same time,

Faith is a kind of parasitic plant,

That grasps the nearest stem with tendril-rings;

And as the climate and the soil may grant,

So is the sort of tree to which it clings.

Consider then, before, like Hurlothrumbo

You aim your club at any creed on earth,

That, by the simple accident of birth,

_You_ might have been High Priest to Mumbo Jumbo.

For me--thro' heathen ignorance perchance,

Not having knelt in Palestine,--I feel

None of that griffinish excess of zeal,

Some travellers would blaze with here in France.

Dolls I can see in virgin-like array,

Nor for a scuffle with the idols hanker

Like crazy Quixote at the puppet's play,

If their "offence be rank," should mine be _rancor_?

Mild light, and by degrees, should be the plan

To cure the dark and erring mind;

But who would rush at a benighted man,

And give him two black eyes for being blind?

Suppose the tender but luxuriant hop

Around a canker'd stem should twine,

What Kentish boor would tear away the prop

So roughly as to wound, nay, kill the bine?

The images, 'tis true, are strangely dress'd,

With gauds and toys extremely out of season;

The carving nothing of the very best,

The whole repugnant to the eye of reason,

Shocking to Taste, and to Fine Arts a treason--

Yet ne'er o'erlook in bigotry of sect

One truly _Catholic_, one common form,

At which uncheck'd

All Christian hearts may kindle or keep warm.

Say, was it to my spirit's gain or loss,

One bright and balmy morning, as I went

From Liege's lovely environs to Ghent,

If hard by the wayside I found a cross,

That made me breathe a pray'r upon the spot--

While Nature of herself, as if to trace

The emblem's use, had trail'd around its base

The blue significant Forget-me-not?

Methought, the claims of Charity to urge

More forcibly, along with Faith and Hope,

The pious choice had pitched upon the verge

Of a delicious slope

Giving the eye much variegated scope;--

"Look round," it whisper'd, "on that prospect rare,

Those vales so verdant, and those hills so blue;

Enjoy the sunny world, so fresh, and fair,

But"--(how the simple legend pierced me thro'!)

"PRIEZ POUR LES MALHEUREUX."

With sweet kind natures, as in honey'd cells,

Religion lives, and feels herself at home;

But only on a formal visit dwells

Where wasps instead of bees have formed the comb.

Shun pride, O Rae!--whatever sort beside

You take in lieu, shun spiritual pride!

A pride there is of rank--a pride of birth,

A pride of learning, and a pride of purse,

A London pride--in short, there be on earth

A host of prides, some better and some worse;

But of all prides, since Lucifer's attaint,

The proudest swells a self-elected Saint.

To picture that cold pride so harsh and hard,

Fancy a peacock in a poultry yard.

Behold him in conceited circles sail,

Strutting and dancing, and now planted stiff,

In all his pomp of pageantry, as if

He felt "the eyes of Europe" on his tail!

As for the humble breed retain'd by man,

He scorns the whole domestic clan--

He bows, he bridles,

He wheels, he sidles,

At last, with stately dodgings, in a corner

He pens a simple russet hen, to scorn her

Full in the blaze of his resplendent fan!

"Look here," he cries (to give him words),

"Thou feather'd clay--thou scum of birds!"

Flirting the rustling plumage in her eyes,--

"Look here, thou vile predestined sinner,

Doom'd to be roasted for a dinner,

Behold those lovely variegated dyes!

These are the rainbow colors of the skies,

That Heav'n has shed upon me _con amore_--

A Bird of Paradise?--a pretty story!

_I_ am that Saintly Fowl, thou paltry chick!

Look at my crown of glory!

Thou dingy, dirty, drabbled, draggled jill!"

And off goes Partlet, wriggling from a kick,

With bleeding scalp laid open by his bill!

That little simile exactly paints

How sinners are despised by saints.

By saints!--the Hypocrites that ope heav'n's door

Obsequious to the sinful man of riches--

But put the wicked, naked, barelegg'd poor

In parish stocks instead of breeches.

The Saints!--the Bigots that in public spout,

Spread phosphorus of zeal on scraps of fustian,

And go like walking "Lucifers" about

Mere living bundles of combustion.

The Saints!--the aping Fanatics that talk

All cant and rant, and rhapsodies high-flown--

That bid you baulk

A Sunday walk,

And shun God's work as you should shun your own.

The Saints!--the Formalists, the extra pious,

Who think the mortal husk can save the soul,

By trundling with a mere mechanic bias,

To church, just like a lignum-vitæ bowl!

The Saints!--the Pharisees, whose beadle stands

Beside a stern coercive kirk.

A piece of human mason-work,

Calling all sermons contrabands,

In that great Temple that's not made with hands!

Thrice blessed, rather, is the man, with whom

The gracious prodigality of nature,

The balm, the bliss, the beauty, and the bloom,

The bounteous providence in ev'ry feature,

Recall the good Creator to his creature,

Making all earth a fane, all heav'n its dome!

To _his_ tuned spirit the wild heather-bells

Ring Sabbath knells;

The jubilate of the soaring lark

Is chant of clerk;

For choir, the thrush and the gregarious linnet;

The sod's a cushion for his pious want;

And, consecrated by the heav'n within it,

The sky-blue pool, a font.

Each cloud-capped mountain is a holy altar;

An organ breathes in every grove;

And the full heart's a Psalter,

Rich in deep hymns of gratitude and love!

Sufficiently by stern necessitarians

Poor Nature, with her face begrimed by dust,

Is stoked, coked, smoked, and almost choked; but must

Religion have its own Utilitarians,

Labell'd with evangelical phylacteries,

To make the road to heav'n a railway trust,

And churches--that's the naked fact--mere factories?

Oh! simply open wide the Temple door,

And let the solemn, swelling, organ greet,

With _Voluntaries_ meet,

The willing advent of the rich and poor!

And while to God the loud Hosannas soar,

With rich vibrations from the vocal throng--

From quiet shades that to the woods belong,

And brooks with music of their own,

Voices may come to swell the choral song

With notes of praise they learned in musings lone.

How strange it is while on all vital questions,

That occupy the House and public mind,

We always meet with some humane suggestions

Of gentle measures of a healing kind,

Instead of harsh severity and vigor,

The Saint alone his preference retains

For bills of penalties and pains,

And marks his narrow code with legal rigor!

Why shun, as worthless of affiliation,

What men of all political persuasion

Extol--and even use upon occasion--

That Christian principle, Conciliation?

But possibly the men who make such fuss

With Sunday pippins and old Trots infirm,

Attach some other meaning to the term,

As thus:

One market morning, in my usual rambles,

Passing along Whitechapel's ancient shambles,

Where meat was hung in many a joint and quarter,

I had to halt awhile, like other folks,

To let a killing butcher coax

A score of lambs and fatted sheep to slaughter.

A sturdy man he looke'd to fell an ox,

Bull-fronted, ruddy, with a formal streak

Of well-greased hair down either cheek,

As if he dee-dash-dee'd some other flocks

Beside those woolly-headed stubborn blocks

That stood before him, in vexatious huddle--

Poor little lambs, with bleating wethers group'd,

While, now and then, a thirsty creature stoop'd

And meekly snuff'd, but did not taste the puddle.

Fierce bark'd the dog, and many a blow was dealt,

That loin, and chump, and scrag and saddle felt,

Yet still, that fatal step they all declined it,--

And shunn'd the tainted door as if they smelt

Onions, mint sauce, and lemon juice behind it.

At last there came a pause of brutal force,

The cur was silent, for his jaws were full

Of tangled locks of tarry wool,

The man had whoop'd and holloed till dead hoarse.

The time was ripe for mild expostulation,

And thus it stammer'd from a stander-by--

"Zounds!--my good fellow,--it quite makes me--why,

It really--my dear fellow--do just try Conciliation!"

Stringing his nerves like flint,

The sturdy butcher seized upon the hint,--

At least he seized upon the foremost wether,--

And hugg'd and lugg'd and tugg'd him neck and crop

Just _nolens volens_ thro' the open shop--

If tails come off he didn't care a feather,--

Then walking to the door and smiling grim,

He rubb'd his forehead and his sleeve together--

"There!--I have _con_ciliated him!"

Again--good-humoredly to end our quarrel--

(Good humor should prevail!)

I'll fit you with a tale,

Whereto is tied a moral.

Once on a time a certain English lass

Was seized with symptoms of such deep decline,

Cough, hectic flushes, ev'ry evil sign,

That, as their wont is at such desperate pass,

The Doctors gave her over--to an ass.

Accordingly, the grisly Shade to bilk,

Each morn the patient quaff'd a frothy bowl

Of asinine new milk,

Robbing a shaggy suckling of a foal

Which got proportionably spare and skinny--

Meanwhile the neighbors cried "Poor Mary Ann!

She can't get over it! she never can!"

When lo! to prove each prophet was a ninny

The one that died was the poor wet-nurse Jenny.

To aggravate the case,

There were but two grown donkeys in the place;

And most unluckily for Eve's sick daughter,

The other long ear'd creature was a male,

Who never in his life had given a pail

Of milk, or even chalk and water.

No matter: at the usual hour of eight

Down trots a donkey to the wicket-gate,

With Mister Simon Gubbins on his back,--

"Your sarvant, Miss",--a worry spring-like day,--

Bad time for hasses tho'! good lack! good lack!

Jenny be dead, Miss,--but I've brought ye Jack,

He doesn't give no milk--but he can bray.

So runs the story,

And, in vain self-glory,

Some Saints would sneer at Gubbins for his blindness--

But what the better are their pious saws

To ailing souls, than dry hee-haws,

Without the milk of human kindness?

TO MY DAUGHTER[16]

ON HER BIRTHDAY.

[Footnote 16: Written at Ostend in September 1839.]

Dear Fanny! nine long years ago,

While yet the morning sun was low,

And rosy with the Eastern glow

The landscape smiled--

Whilst lowed the newly-waken'd herds--

Sweet as the early song of birds,

I heard those first, delightful words,

"Thou hast a Child!"

Along with that uprising dew

Tears glisten'd in my eyes, though few,

To hail a dawning quite as new

To me, as Time:

It was not sorrow--not annoy--

But like a happy maid, though coy,

With grief-like welcome even Joy

Forestalls its prime.

So mayst thou live, dear! many years,

In all the bliss that life endears,

Not without smiles, nor yet from tears

Too strictly kept:

When first thy infant littleness

I folded in my fond caress,

The greatest proof of happiness

Was this--I wept.

MISS KILMANSEGG AND HER PRECIOUS LEG.[17]

[Footnote 17: Originally published by instalments in Colburn's _New

Monthly Magazine_ in 1840 and 1841, as one of a proposed series to be

entitled "Rhymes for the Times."]

A GOLDEN LEGEND.

"What is here?

Gold! yellow, glittering, precious gold?"

_Timon of Athens_.

HER PEDIGREE.

I.

To trace the Kilmansegg pedigree

To the very root of the family tree

Were a task as rash as ridiculous:

Through antediluvian mists as thick

As London fog such a line to pick

Were enough, in truth, to puzzle old Nick,

Not to name Sir Harris Nicolas.

II.

It wouldn't require much verbal strain

To trace the Kill-man, perchance, to Cain;

But, waiving all such digressions,

Suffice it, according to family lore,

A Patriarch Kilmansegg lived of yore,

Who was famed for his great possessions.

III.

Tradition said he feather'd his nest

Through an Agricultural Interest

In the Golden Age of Farming;

When golden eggs were laid by the geese,

And Colehian sheep wore a golden fleece,

And golden pippins--the sterling kind

Of Hesperus--now so hard to find--

Made Horticulture quite charming!

IV.

A Lord of Land, on his own estate,

He lived at a very lively rate,

But his income would bear carousing;

Such acres he had of pastures and heath,

With herbage so rich from the ore beneath,

The very ewe's and lambkin's teeth

Were turn'd into gold by browsing.

V.

He gave, without any extra thrift,

A flock of sheep for a birthday gift

To each son of his loins, or daughter:

And his debts--if debts he had--at will

He liquidated by giving each bill

A dip in Pactolian water.

VI.

'Twas said that even his pigs of lead,

By crossing with some by Midas bred,

Made a perfect mine of his piggery.

And as for cattle, one yearling bull

Was worth all Smithfield-market full

Of the Golden Bulls of Pope Gregory.

VII.

The high-bred horses within his stud,

Like human creatures of birth and blood,

Had their Golden Cups and flagons:

And as for the common husbandry nags,

Their noses were tied in money-bags,

When they stopp'd with the carts and wagons.

VIII.

Moreover, he had a Golden Ass,

Sometimes at stall, and sometimes at grass,

That was worth his own weight in money

And a golden hive, on a Golden Bank,

Where golden bees, by alchemical prank,

Gather'd gold instead of honey.

IX.

Gold! and gold! and gold without end!

He had gold to lay by, and gold to spend,

Gold to give, and gold to lend,

And reversions of gold _in futuro._

In wealth the family revell'd and roll'd,

Himself and wife and sons so bold;--

And his daughters sang to their harps of gold

"O bella eta del'oro!"

X.

Such was the tale of the Kilmansegg Kin,

In golden text on a vellum skin,

Though certain people would wink and grin,

And declare the whole story a parable--

That the Ancestor rich was one Jacob Ghrimes,

Who held a long lease, in prosperous times,

Of acres, pasture and arable.

XI.

That as money makes money, his golden bees

Were the Five per Cents, or which you please,

When his cash was more than plenty--

That the golden cups were racing affairs;

And his daughters, who sang Italian airs,

Had their golden harps of Clementi.

XII.

That the Golden Ass, or Golden Bull,

Was English John, with his pockets full,

Then at war by land and water:

While beef, and mutton, and other meat,

Were almost as dear as money to eat,

And farmers reaped Golden Harvests of wheat

At the Lord knows what per quarter!

XIII.

What different dooms our birthdays bring!

For instance, one little manikin thing

Survives to wear many a wrinkle;

While Death forbids another to wake,

And a son that it took nine moons to make

Expires without even a twinkle!

XIV.

Into this world we come like ships,

Launch'd from the docks, and stocks, and slips,

For fortune fair or fatal;

And one little craft is cast away

In its very first trip in Babbicome Bay,

While another rides safe at Port Natal.

XV.

What different lots our stars accord!

This babe to be hail'd and woo'd as a Lord!

And that to be shun'd like a leper!

One, to the world's wine, honey, and corn,

Another, like Colchester native, born

To its vinegar, only, and pepper.

XVI.

One is litter'd under a roof

Neither wind nor water proof--

That's the prose of Love in a Cottage--

A puny, naked, shivering wretch,

The whole of whose birthright would not fetch,

Though Robins himself drew up the sketch,

The bid of "a mess of pottage."

XVII.

Born of Fortunatus's kin

Another comes tenderly ushered in

To a prospect all bright and burnish'd:

No tenant he for life's back slums--

He comes to the world, as a gentleman comes

To a lodging ready furnish'd.

XVIII.

And the other sex--the tender--the fair--

What wide reverses of fate are there!

Whilst Margaret, charm'd by the Bulbul rare,

In a garden of Gul reposes--

Poor Peggy hawks nosegays from street to street

Till--think of that, who find life so sweet!--

She hates the smell of roses!

XIX.

Not so with the infant Kilmansegg!

She was not born to steal or beg,

Or gather cresses in ditches;

To plait the straw, or bind the shoe,

Or sit all day to hem and sew,

As females must--and not a few--

To fill their insides with stitches!

XX.

She was not doom'd, for bread to eat,

To be put to her hands as well as her feet--

To carry home linen from mangles--

Or heavy-hearted, and weary-limb'd,

To dance on a rope in a jacket trimm'd

With as many blows as spangles.

XXI.

She was one of those who by Fortune's boon

Are born, as they say, with a silver spoon

In her mouth, not a wooden ladle:

To speak according to poet's wont,

Plutus as sponsor stood at her font,

And Midas rocked the cradle.

XXII.

At her first _début_ she found her head

On a pillow of down, in a downy bed,

With a damask canopy over.

For although, by the vulgar popular saw,

All mothers are said to be "in the straw,"

Some children are born in clover.

XXIII.

Her very first draught of vital air,

It was not the common chameleon fare

Of plebeian lungs and noses,--

No--her earliest sniff

Of this world was a whiff

Of the genuine Otto of Roses!

XXIV.

When she saw the light, it was no mere ray

Of that light so common--so everyday--

That the sun each morning launches--

But six wax tapers dazzled her eyes,

From a thing--a gooseberry bush for size--

With a golden stem and branches.

XXV.

She was born exactly at half-past two,

As witness'd a timepiece in ormolu

That stood on a marble table--

Showing at once the time of day,

And a team of _Gildings_ running away

As fast as they were able,

With a golden God, with a golden Star,

And a golden Spear, in a golden Car,

According to Grecian fable.

XXVI.

Like other babes, at her birth she cried;

Which made a sensation far and wide--

Ay, for twenty miles around her:

For though to the ear 'twas nothing more

Than an infant's squall, it was really the roar

Of a Fifty-thousand Pounder!

It shook the next heir

In his library chair,

And made him cry, "Confound her!"

XXVII.

Of signs and omens there was no dearth,

Any more than at Owen Glendower's birth,

Or the advent of other great people

Two bullocks dropp'd dead,

As if knock'd on the head,

And barrels of stout

And ale ran about,

And the village bells such a peal rang out,

That they crack'd the village steeple.

XXVIII.

In no time at all, like mushroom spawn,

Tables sprang up all over the lawn;

Not furnish'd scantly or shabbily,

But on scale as vast

As that huge repast,

With its loads and cargoes

Of drink and botargoes,

At the Birth of the Babe in Rabelais.

XXIX.

Hundreds of men were turn'd into beasts,

Like the guests at Circe's horrible feasts,

By the magic of ale and cider:

And each country lass, and each country lad

Began to caper and dance like mad,

And ev'n some old ones appear'd to have had

A bite from the Naples Spider.

XXX.

Then as night came on,

It had scared King John

Who considered such signs not risible,

To have seen the maroons,

And the whirling moons,

And the serpents of flame,

And wheels of the same,

That according to some were "whizzable."

XXXI.

Oh, happy Hope of the Kilmanseggs!

Thrice happy in head, and body, and legs,

That her parents had such full pockets!

For had she been born of Want and Thrift,

For care and nursing all adrift,

It's ten to one she had had to make shift

With rickets instead of rockets!

XXXII.

And how was the precious baby drest?

In a robe of the East, with lace of the West,

Like one of Croesus's issue--

Her best bibs were made

Of rich gold brocade,

And the others of silver tissue.

XXXIII.

And when the baby inclined to nap,

She was lull'd on a Gros de Naples lap,

By a nurse in a modish Paris cap,

Of notions so exalted,

She drank nothing lower than Curaçoa

Maraschino, or pink Noyau,

And on principle never malted.

XXXIV.

From a golden boat, with a golden spoon,

The babe was fed night, morning, and noon;

And altho' the tale seems fabulous,

'Tis said her tops and bottoms were gilt,

Like the oats in that Stable-yard Palace built

For the horse of Heliogabalus.

XXXV.

And when she took to squall and kick--

For pain will wring, and pins will prick,

E'en the wealthiest nabob's daughter--

They gave her no vulgar Dalby or gin,

But a liquor with leaf of gold therein,

Videlicet,--Dantzic Water.

XXXVI.

In short she was born, and bred, and nurst,

And drest in the best from the very first,

To please the genteelest censor--

And then, as soon as strength would allow,

Was vaccinated, as babes are now,

With virus ta'en from the best-bred cow

Of Lord Althorpe's--now Earl Spencer.

HER CHRISTENING.

XXXVII.

Though Shakspeare asks us, "What's in a name?"

(As if cognomens were much the same),

There's really a very great scope in it.

A name?--why, wasn't there Doctor Dodd,

That servant at once of Mammon and God,

Who found four thousand pounds and odd,

A prison--a cart--and a rope in it?

XXXVIII.

A name?--if the party had a voice,

What mortal would be a Bugg by choice?

As a Hogg, a Grubb, or a Chubb rejoice?

Or any such nauseous blazon?

Not to mention many a vulgar name,

That would make a door-plate blush for shame,

If door-plates were not so brazen!

XXXIX.

A name?--it has more than nominal worth,

And belongs to good or bad luck at birth--

As dames of a certain degree know.

In spite of his Page's hat and hose,

His Page's jacket, and buttons in rows,

Bob only sounds like a page in prose

Till turn'd into Rupertino.

XL.

Now to christen the infant Kilmansegg,

For days and days it was quite a plague,

To hunt the list in the Lexicon:

And scores were tried, like coin, by the ring,

Ere names were found just the proper thing

For a minor rich as a Mexican.

XLI.

Then cards were sent, the presence to beg

Of all the kin of Kilmansegg,

White, yellow, and brown relations:

Brothers, Wardens of City Halls,

And Uncles--rich as three Golden Balls

From taking pledges of nations.

XLII.

Nephews, whom Fortune seem'd to bewitch,

Rising in life like rockets--

Nieces, whose dowries knew no hitch--

Aunts, as certain of dying rich

As candles in golden sockets--

Cousins German and Cousins' sons,

All thriving and opulent--some had tons

Of Kentish hops in their pockets!

XLIII.

For money had stuck to the race through life

(As it did to the bushel when cash so rife

Posed Ali Baba's brother's wife)--

And down to the Cousins and Coz-lings,

The fortunate brood of the Kilmanseggs,

As if they had come out of golden eggs,

Were all as wealthy as "Goslings."

XLIV.

It would fill a Court Gazette to name

What East and West End people came

To the rite of Christianity:

The lofty Lord, and the titled Dame,

All di'monds, plumes, and urbanity:

His Lordship the May'r with his golden chain,

And two Gold Sticks, and the Sheriffs twain,

Nine foreign Counts, and other great men

With their orders and stars, to help "M. or N."

To renounce all pomp and vanity.

XLV.

To paint the maternal Kilmansegg

The pen of an Eastern Poet would beg,

And need an elaborate sonnet;

How she sparkled with gems whenever she stirr'd,

And her head niddle-noddled at every word,

And seem'd so happy, a Paradise Bird

Had nidificated upon it.

XLVI.

And Sir Jacob the Father strutted and bow'd,

And smiled to himself, and laugh'd aloud,

To think of his heiress and daughter--

And then in his pockets he made a grope,

And then, in the fulness of joy and hope,

Seem'd washing his hands with invisible soap

In imperceptible water.

XLVII.

He had roll'd in money like pigs in mud.

Till it scem'd to have entered into his blood

By some occult projection:

And his cheeks instead of a healthy hue,

As yellow as any guinea grew,

Making the common phrase seem true,

About a rich complexion.

XLVIII.

And now came the nurse, and during a pause,

Her dead-leaf satin would fitly cause

A very autumnal rustle--

So full of figure, so full of fuss,

As she carried about the babe to buss,

She seem'd to be nothing but bustle.

XLIX.

A wealthy Nabob was Godpapa,

And an Indian Begum was Godmamma,

Whose jewels a Queen might covet--

And the Priest was a Vicar, and Dean withal

Of that Temple we see with a Golden Ball,

And a Golden Cross above it.

L.

The Font was a bowl of American gold,

Won by Raleigh in days of old,

In spite of Spanish bravado;

And the Book of Pray'r was so overrun

With gilt devices, it shone in the sun

Like a copy--a presentation one--

Of Humboldt's "El Dorada."

LI.

Gold! and gold! and nothing but gold!

The same auriferous shine behold

Wherever the eye could settle!

On the walls--the sideboard--the ceiling-sky--

On the gorgeous footmen standing by,

In coats to delight a miner's eye

With seams of the precious metal.

LII.

Gold! and gold! and besides the gold,

The very robe of the infant told

A tale of wealth in every fold,

It lapp'd her like a vapor!

So fine! so thin! the mind at a loss

Could compare it to nothing except a cross

Of cobweb with bank-note paper.

LIII.

Then her pearls--'twas a perfect sight, forsooth,

To see them, like "the dew of her youth,"

In such a plentiful sprinkle.

Meanwhile, the Vicar read through the form,

And gave her another, not overwarm,

That made her little eyes twinkle.

LIV.

Then the babe was cross'd and bless'd amain!

But instead of the Kate, or Ann, or Jane,

Which the humbler female endorses--

Instead of one name, as some people prefix,

Kilmansegg went at the tails of six,

Like a carriage of state with its horses.

LV.

Oh, then the kisses she got and hugs!

The golden mugs and the golden jugs

That lent fresh rays to the midges!

The golden knives, and the golden spoons,

The gems that sparkled like fairy boons,

It was one of the Kilmansegg's own saloons,

But looked like Rundell and Bridge's!

LVI.

Gold! and gold! the new and the old!

The company ate and drank from gold,

They revell'd, they sang, and were merry;

And one of the Gold Sticks rose from his chair,

And toasted "the Lass with the golden hair"

In a bumper of Golden Sherry.

LVII.

Gold! still gold! it rained on the nurse,

Who--unlike Danäe--was none the worse!

There was nothing but guineas glistening!

Fifty were given to Doctor James,

For calling the little Baby names,

And for saying, Amen!

The Clerk had ten,

And that was the end of the Christening.

HER CHILDHOOD.

LVIII.

Our youth! our childhood! that spring of springs!

'Tis surely one of the blessedest things

That nature ever intended!

When the rich are wealthy beyond their wealth,

And the poor are rich in spirits and health,

And all with their lots contented!

LIX.

There's little Phelim, he sings like a thrush,

In the selfsame pair of patchwork plush,

With the selfsame empty pockets,

That tempted his daddy so often to cut

His throat, or jump in the water-butt--

But what cares Phelim? an empty nut

Would sooner bring tears to their sockets.

LX.

Give him a collar without a skirt,

(That's the Irish linen for shirt)

And a slice of bread with a taste of dirt,

(That's Poverty's Irish butter)

And what does he lack to make him blest?

Some oyster-shells, or a sparrow's nest,

A candle-end and a gutter.

LXI.

But to leave the happy Phelim alone,

Gnawing, perchance, a marrowless bone,

For which no dog would quarrel--

Turn we to little Miss Kilmansegg,

Cutting her first little toothy-peg

With a fifty-guinea coral--

A peg upon which

About poor and rich

Reflection might hang a moral.

LXII.

Born in wealth, and wealthily nursed,

Capp'd, papp'd, napp'd, and lapp'd from the first

On the knees of Prodigality,

Her childhood was one eternal round

Of the game of going on Tickler's ground

Picking up gold--in reality.

LXIII.

With extempore carts she never play'd,

Or the odds and ends of a Tinker's Trade,

Or little dirt pies and puddings made,

Like children happy and squalid;

The very puppet she had to pet,

Like a bait for the "Nix my Dolly" set,

Was a Dolly of gold--and solid!

LXIV.

Gold! and gold! 'twas the burden still!

To gain the Heiress's early good-will

There was much corruption and bribery--

The yearly cost of her golden toys

Would have given half London's Charity Boys

And Charity Girls the annual joys

Of a holiday dinner at Highbury.

LXV.

Bon-bons she ate from the gilt _cornet_;

And gilded queens on St. Bartlemy's day;

Till her fancy was tinged by her presents--

And first a Goldfinch excited her wish,

Then a spherical bowl with its Golden fish,

And then two Golden Pheasants.

LXVI.

Nay, once she squall'd and scream'd like wild--

And it shows how the bias we give to a child

Is a thing most weighty and solemn:--

But whence was wonder or blame to spring

If little Miss K.,--after such a swing--

Made a dust for the flaming gilded thing

On the top of the Fish Street column?

HER EDUCATION.

LXVII.

According to metaphysical creed,

To the earliest books that children read

For much good or much bad they are debtors--

But before with their A B C they start,

There are things in morals, as well as art,

That play a very important part--

"Impressions before the letters."

LXVIII.

Dame Education begins the pile,

Mayhap in the graceful Corinthian style,

But alas for the elevation!

If the Lady's maid or Gossip the Nurse

With a load of rubbish, or something worse,

Have made a rotten foundation.

LXIX.

Even thus with little Miss Kilmansegg,

Before she learnt her E for egg,

Ere her Governess came, or her Masters--

Teachers of quite a different kind

Had "cramm'd" her beforehand, and put her mind

In a go-cart on golden casters.

LXX.

Long before her A B and C,

They had taught her by heart her L. S. D.

And as how she was born a great Heiress;

And as sure as London is built of bricks,

My Lord would ask her the day to fix,

To ride in a fine gilt coach and six,

Like Her Worship the Lady May'ress.

LXXI.

Instead of stories from Edgeworth's page,

The true golden lore for our golden age,

Or lessons from Barbauld and Trimmer,

Teaching the worth of Virtue and Health,

All that she knew was the Virtue of Wealth,

Provided by vulgar nursery stealth

With a Book of Leaf Gold for a primer.

LXXII.

The very metal of merit they told,

And praised her for being as "good as gold"!

Till she grew as a peacock haughty;

Of money they talk'd the whole day round,

And weigh'd desert, like grapes, by the pound,

Till she had an idea from the very sound

That people with nought were naughty.

LXXIII.

They praised--poor children with nothing at all!

Lord! how you twaddle and waddle and squall

Like common-bred geese and ganders!

What sad little bad little figures you make

To the rich Miss K., whose plainest seed-cake

Was stuff'd with corianders!

LXXIV.

They praised her falls, as well as her walk,

Flatterers make cream cheese of chalk,

They praised--how they praised--her very small talk,

As if it fell from the Solon;

Or the girl who at each pretty phrase let drop

A ruby comma, or pearl full-stop,

Or an emerald semi-colon.

LXXV.

They praised her spirit, and now and then

The Nurse brought her own little "nevy" Ben,

To play with the future May'ress,

And when he got raps, and taps, and slaps,

Scratches, and pinches, snips, and snaps,

As if from a Tigress or Bearess,

They told him how Lords would court that hand,

And always gave him to understand,

While he rubb'd, poor soul,

His carroty poll,

That his hair has been pull'd by _a Hairess_.

LXXVI.

Such were the lessons from maid and nurse,

A Governess help'd to make still worse,

Giving an appetite so perverse

Fresh diet whereon to batten--

Beginning with A B C to hold

Like a royal playbill printed in gold

On a square of pearl-white satin

LXXVII.

The books to teach the verbs and nouns,

And those about countries, cities, and towns,

Instead of their sober drabs and browns,

Were in crimson silk, with gilt edges;--

Her Butler, and Enfield, and Entick--in short

Her "Early Lessons" of every sort,

Look'd like Souvenirs, Keepsakes, and Pledges.

LXXVIII.

Old Johnson shone out in as fine array

As he did one night when he went to the play;

Chambaud like a beau of King Charles's day--

Lindley Murray in like conditions--

Each weary, unwelcome, irksome task,

Appear'd in a fancy dress and a mask;--

If you wish for similar copies, ask

For Howell and James's Editions.

LXXIX.

Novels she read to amuse her mind,

But always the affluent match-making kind

That ends with Promessi Sposi,

And a father-in-law so wealthy and grand,

He could give cheque-mate to Coutts in the Strand;

So, along with a ring and posy,

He endows the Bride with Golconda off hand,

And gives the Groom Potosi.

LXXX.

Plays she perused--but she liked the best

Those comedy gentlefolks always possess'd

Of fortunes so truly romantic--

Of money so ready that right or wrong

It always is ready to go for a song,

Throwing it, going it, pitching it strong--

They ought to have purses as green and long

As the cucumber call'd the Gigantic.

LXXXI.

Then Eastern Tales she loved for the sake

Of the Purse of Oriental make,

And the thousand pieces they put in it--

But Pastoral scenes on her heart fell cold,

For Nature with her had lost its hold,

No field but the Field of the Cloth of Gold

Would ever have caught her foot in it.

LXXXII.

What more? She learnt to sing, and dance,

To sit on a horse, although he should prance,

And to speak a French not spoken in France

Any more than at Babel's building--

And she painted shells, and flowers, and Turks,

But her great delight was in Fancy Works

That are done with gold or gilding.

LXXXIII.

Gold! still gold!--the bright and the dead,

With golden beads, and gold lace, and gold thread

She work'd in gold, as if for her bread;

The metal had so undermined her,

Gold ran in her thoughts and fill'd her brain,

She was golden-headed as Peter's cane

With which he walked behind her.

HER ACCIDENT.

LXXXIV.

The horse that carried Miss Kilmansegg,

And a better nether lifted leg,

Was a very rich bay, call'd Banker--

A horse of a breed and a mettle so rare,--

By Bullion out of an Ingot mare,--

That for action, the best of figures, and air,

It made many good judges hanker.

LXXXV.

And when she took a ride in the Park,

Equestrian Lord, or pedestrian Clerk,

Was thrown in an amorous fever,

To see the Heiress how well she sat,

With her groom behind her, Bob or Nat,

In green, half smother'd with gold, and a hat

With more gold lace than beaver.

LXXXVI.

And then when Banker obtain'd a pat,

To see how he arch'd his neck at that!

He snorted with pride and pleasure!

Like the Steed in the fable so lofty and grand,

Who gave the poor Ass to understand

That _he_ didn't carry a bag of sand,

But a burden of golden treasure.

LXXXVII.

A load of treasure?--alas! alas!

Had her horse been fed upon English grass,

And shelter'd in Yorkshire spinneys,

Had he scour'd the sand with the Desert Ass,

Or where the American whinnies--

But a hunter from Erin's turf and gorse,

A regular thoroughbred Irish horse,

Why, he ran away, as a matter of course,

With a girl worth her weight in guineas!

LXXXVIII.

Mayhap 'tis the trick of such pamper'd nags

To shy at the sight of a beggar in rags,--

But away, like the bolt of a rabbit,--

Away went the horse in the madness of fright,

And away went the horsewoman mocking the sight--

Was yonder blue flash a flash of blue light,

Or only the skirt of her habit?

LXXXIX.

Away she flies, with the groom behind,--

It looks like a race of the Calmuck kind,

When Hymen himself is the starter,

And the Maid rides first in the fourfooted strife,

Riding, striding, as if for her life,

While the Lover rides after to catch him a wife,

Although it's catching a Tartar.

XC.

But the Groom has lost his glittering hat!

Though he does not sigh and pull up for that--

Alas! his horse is a tit for Tat

To sell to a very low bidder--

His wind is ruin'd, his shoulder is sprung,

Things, though a horse be handsome and young,

A purchaser _will_ consider.

XCI.

But still flies the Heiress through stones and dust,

Oh, for a fall, if she must,

On the gentle lap of Flora!

But still, thank Heaven! she clings to her seat--

Away! away! she could ride a dead heat

With the Dead who ride so fast and fleet,

In the Ballad of Leonora!

XCII.

Away she gallops!--it's awful work!

It's faster than Turpin's ride to York,

On Bess that notable clipper!

She has circled the Ring!--she crosses the Park!

Mazeppa, although he was stripp'd so stark,

Mazeppa couldn't outstrip her!

XCIII.

The fields seem running away with the folks!

The Elms are having a race for the Oaks

At a pace that all Jockeys disparages!

All, all is racing! the Serpentine

Seems rushing past like the "arrowy Rhine,"

The houses have got on a railway line,

And are off like the first-class carriages!

XCIV.

She'll lose her life! she is losing her breath!

A cruel chase, she is chasing Death,

As female shriekings forewarn her:

And now--as gratis as blood of Guelph--

She clears that gate, which has clear'd itself

Since then, at Hyde Park Corner!

XCV.

Alas! for the hope of the Kilmanseggs!

For her head, her brains, her body, and legs,

Her life's not worth a copper!

Willy-nilly,

In Piccadilly,

A hundred hearts turn sick and chilly,

A hundred voices cry, "Stop her!"

And one old gentleman stares and stands,

Shakes his head and lifts his hands,

And says, "How very improper!"

XCVI.

On and on!--what a perilous run!

The iron rails seem all mingling in one,

To shut out the Green Park scenery!

And now the Cellar its dangers reveals,

She shudders--she shrieks--she's doom'd, she feels,

To be torn by powers of horses and wheels,

Like a spinner by steam machinery!

XCVII.

Sick with horror she shuts her eyes,

But the very stones seem uttering cries,

As they did to that Persian daughter,

When she climb'd up the steep vociferous hill,

Her little silver flagon to fill

With the magical Golden Water!

XCVIII.

"Batter her! shatter her!

Throw and scatter her!"

Shouts each stony-hearted chatterer!

"Dash at the heavy Dover!

Spill her! kill her! tear and tatter her!

Smash her! crash her!" (the stones didn't flatter her!)

"Kick her brains out! let her blood spatter her!

Roll on her over and over!"

XCIX.

For so she gather'd the awful sense

Of the street in its past unmacadamized tense,

As the wild horse overran it,--

His four heels making the clatter of six,

Like a Devil's tattoo, play'd with iron sticks

On a kettle-drum of granite!

C.

On! still on! she's dazzled with hints

Of oranges, ribbons, and color'd prints,

A Kaleidoscope jumble of shapes and tints,

And human faces all flashing,

Bright and brief as the sparks from the flints,

That the desperate hoof keeps dashing!

CI.

On and on! still frightfully fast!

Dover Street, Bond Street, all are past!

But--yes--no--yes!--they're down at last!

The Furies and Fates have found them!

Down they go with sparkle and crash,

Like a Bark that's struck by the lightning flash--

There's a shriek--and a sob--

And the dense dark mob

Like a billow closes around them!

* * * * *

CII.

"She breathes!"

"She don't!"

"She'll recover!"

"She won't!"

"She's stirring! she's living, by Nemesis!"

Gold, still gold! on counter and shelf!

Golden dishes as plenty as delf;

Miss Kilmansegg's coming again to herself

On an opulent Goldsmith's premises!

CIII.

Gold! fine gold!--both yellow and red,

Beaten, and molten--polish'd, and dead--

To see the gold with profusion spread

In all forms of its manufacture!

But what avails gold to Miss Kilmansegg,

When the femoral bone of her dexter log

Has met with a compound fracture?

CIV.

Gold may soothe Adversity's smart;

Nay, help to bind up a broken heart;

But to try it on any other part

Were as certain a disappointment,

As if one should rub the dish and plate,

Taken out of a Staffordshire crate--

In the hope of a Golden Service of State--

With Singleton's "Golden Ointment."

CV.

"As the twig is bent, the tree's inclined,"

Is an adage often recall'd to mind,

Referring to juvenile bias:

And never so well is the verity seen,

As when to the weak, warp'd side we lean,

While Life's tempests and hurricanes try us.

CVI.

Even thus with Miss K. and her broken limb:

By a very, very remarkable whim,

She show'd her early tuition:

While the buds of character came into blow

With a certain tinge that served to show

The nursery culture long ago,

As the graft is known by fruition!

CVII.

For the King's Physician, who nursed the case,

His verdict gave with an awful face,

And three others concurr'd to egg it;

That the Patient to give old Death the slip,

Like the Pope, instead of a personal trip,

Must send her Leg as a Legate.

CVIII.

The limb was doom'd--it couldn't be saved!

And like other people the patient behaved,

Nay, bravely that cruel parting braved,

Which makes some persons so falter,

They rather would part, without a groan,

With the flesh of their flesh, and bone of their bone,

They obtain'd at St. George's altar.

CIX.

But when it came to fitting the stump

With a proxy limb--then flatly and plump

She spoke, in the spirit olden;

She couldn't--she shouldn't--she wouldn't have wood!

Nor a leg of cork, if she never stood,

And she swore an oath, or something as good,

The proxy limb should be golden!

CX.

A wooden leg! what, a sort of peg,

For your common Jockeys and Jennies!

No, no, her mother might worry and plague--

Weep, go down on her knees, and beg,

But nothing would move Miss Kilmansegg!

She could--she would have a Golden Leg,

If it cost ten thousand guineas!

CXI.

Wood indeed, in Forest or Park,

With its sylvan honors and feudal bark,

Is an aristocratic article:

But split and sawn, and hack'd about town,

Serving all needs of pauper or clown,

Trod on! stagger'd on! Wood cut down

Is vulgar--fibre and particle!

CXII.

And Cork!--when the noble Cork Tree shades

A lovely group of Castilian maids,

'Tis a thing for a song or sonnet!--

But cork, as it stops the bottle of gin,

Or bungs the beer--the _small_ beer--in,

It pierced her heart like a corking-pin,

To think of standing upon it!

CXIII.

A Leg of Gold--solid gold throughout,

Nothing else, whether slim or stout,

Should ever support her, God willing!

She must--she could--she would have her whim,

Her father, she turn'd a deaf ear to him--

He might kill her--she didn't mind killing!

He was welcome to cut off her other limb--

He might cut her all off with a shilling!

CXIV.

All other promised gifts were in vain.

Golden Girdle, or Golden Chain,

She writhed with impatience more than pain,

And utter'd "pshaws!" and "pishes!"

But a Leg of Gold as she lay in bed,

It danced before her--it ran in her head!

It jump'd with her dearest wishes!

CXV.

"Gold--gold--gold! Oh, let it be gold!"

Asleep or awake that tale she told,

And when she grew delirious:

Till her parents resolved to grant her wish,

If they melted down plate, and goblet, and dish,

The case was getting so serious.

CXVI.

So a Leg was made in a comely mould,

Of gold, fine virgin glittering gold,

As solid as man could make it--

Solid in foot, and calf, and shank,

A prodigious sum of money it sank;

In fact 'twas a Branch of the family Bank,

And no easy matter to break it.

CXVII.

All sterling metal--not half-and-half,

The Goldsmith's mark was stamp'd on the calf--

'Twas pure as from Mexican barter!

And to make it more costly, just over the knee,

Where another ligature used to be,

Was a circle of jewels, worth shillings to see,

A new-fangled Badge of the Garter!

CXVIII.

'Twas a splendid, brilliant, beautiful Leg,

Fit for the Court of Scander-Beg,

That Precious Leg of Miss Kilmansegg!

For, thanks to parental bounty,

Secure from Mortification's touch,

She stood on a Member that cost as much

As a Member for all the County!

HER FAME.

CXIX.

To gratify stern ambition's whims,

What hundreds and thousands of precious limbs

On a field of battle we scatter!

Sever'd by sword, or bullet, or saw,

Off they go, all bleeding and raw,--

But the public seems to get the lock-jaw,

So little is said on the matter!

CXX.

Legs, the tightest that ever were seen,

The tightest, the lightest, that danced on the green,

Cutting capers to sweet Kitty Clover;

Shatter'd, scatter'd, cut, and bowl'd down,

Off they go, worse off for renown,

A line in the _Times_, or a talk about town,

Than the leg that a fly runs over!

CXXI.

But the Precious Leg of Miss Kilmansegg,

That gowden, goolden, golden leg,

Was the theme of all conversation!

Had it been a Pillar of Church and State,

Or a prop to support the whole Dead Weight,

It could not have furnished more debate

To the heads and tails of the nation!

CXXII.

East and west, and north and south,

Though useless for either hunger or drouth,--

The Leg was in everybody's mouth,

To use a poetical figure,

Rumor, in taking her ravenous swim,

Saw, and seized on the tempting limb,

Like a shark on the leg of a nigger.

CXXIII.

Wilful murder fell very dead;

Debates in the House were hardly read;

In vain the Police Reports were fed

With Irish riots and _rumpuses_--

The Leg! the Leg! was the great event,

Through every circle in life it went,

Like the leg of a pair of compasses.

CXXIV.

The last new Novel seem'd tame and flat,

The Leg, a novelty newer than that,

Had tripp'd up the heels of Fiction!

It Burked the very essays of Burke,

And, alas! how Wealth over Wit plays the Turk!

As a regular piece of goldsmith's work,

Got the better of Goldsmith's diction.

CXXV.

"A leg of gold! what, of solid gold?"

Cried rich and poor, and young and old,--

And Master and Miss and Madam--

'Twas the talk of 'Change--the Alley--the Bank--

And with men of scientific rank,

It made as much stir as the fossil shank

Of a Lizard coeval with Adam!

CXXVI.

Of course with Greenwich and Chelsea elves,

Men who had lost a limb themselves,

Its interest did not dwindle--

But Bill, and Ben, and Jack, and Tom

Could hardly have spun more yarns therefrom,

If the leg had been a spindle.

CXXVII.

Meanwhile the story went to and fro,

Till, gathering like the ball of snow,

By the time it got to Stratford-le-Bow,

Through Exaggeration's touches,

The Heiress and hope of the Kilmanseggs

Was propp'd on _two_ fine Golden Legs,

And a pair of Golden Crutches!

CXXVIII.

Never had Leg so great a run!

'Twas the "go" and the "Kick" thrown into one!

The mode--the new thing under the sun,

The rage--the fancy--the passion!

Bonnets were named, and hats were worn,

_A la_ Golden Leg instead of Leghorn,

And stockings and shoes,

Of golden hues,

Took the lead in the walks of fashion!

CXXIX.

The Golden Leg had a vast career,

It was sung and danced--and to show how near

Low Folly to lofty approaches,

Down to society's very dregs,

The Belles of Wapping wore "Kilmanseggs,"

And St. Gile's Beaux sported Golden Legs

In their pinchbeck pins and brooches!

HER FIRST STEP.

CXXX.

Supposing the Trunk and Limbs of Man

Shared, on the allegorical plan,

By the Passions that mark Humanity,

Whichever might claim the head, or heart,

The stomach, or any other part,

The Legs would be seized by Vanity.

CXXXI.

There's Bardus, a six-foot column of fop,

A lighthouse without any light atop,

Whose height would attract beholders,

If he had not lost some inches clear

By looking down at his kerseymere,

Ogling the limbs he holds so dear,

Till he got a stoop in his shoulders.

CXXXII.

Talk of Art, of Science, or Books,

And down go the everlasting looks,

To his rural beauties so wedded!

Try him, wherever you will, you find

His mind in his legs, and his legs in his mind,

All prongs and folly--in short a kind

Of fork--that is Fiddle-headed.

CXXXIII.

What wonder, then, if Miss Kilmansegg,

With a splendid, brilliant, beautiful leg,

Fit for the court of Scander-Beg,

Disdain'd to hide it like Joan or Meg,

In petticoats stuff'd or quilted?

Not she! 'twas her convalescent whim

To dazzle the world with her precious limb,--

Nay, to go a little high-kilted.

CXXXIV.

So cards were sent for that sort of mob

Where Tartars and Africans hob-and-nob,

And the Cherokee talks of his cab and cob

To Polish or Lapland lovers--

Cards like that hieroglyphical call

To a geographical Fancy Ball

On the recent Post-Office covers.

CXXXV.

For if Lion-hunters--and great ones too--

Would mob a savage from Latakoo,

Or squeeze for a glimpse of Prince Le Boo,

That unfortunate Sandwich scion--

Hundreds of first-rate people, no doubt,

Would gladly, madly, rush to a rout

That promised a Golden Lion!

HER FANCY BALL.

CXXXVI.

Of all the spirits of evil fame,

That hurt the soul or injure the frame,

And poison what's honest and hearty,

There's none more needs a Mathew to preach

A cooling, antiphlogistic speech,

To praise and enforce

A temperate course,

Than the Evil Spirit of Party.

CXXXVII.

Go to the House of Commons, or Lords,

And they seem to be busy with simple words

In their popular sense or pedantic--

But, alas! with their cheers, and sneers, and jeers,

They're really busy, whatever appears,

Putting peas in each other's ears,

To drive their enemies frantic!

CXXXVII.

Thus Tories like to worry the Whigs,

Who treat them in turn like Schwalbach pigs,

Giving them lashes, thrashes, and digs,

With their writhing and pain delighted--

But after all that's said, and more,

The malice and spite of Party are poor

To the malice and spite of a party next door,

To a party not invited.

CXXXIX.

On with the cap and out with the light,

Weariness bids the world good night,

At least for the usual season;

But hark! a clatter of horses' heels;

And Sleep and Silence are broken on wheels,

Like Wilful Murder and Treason!

CXL.

Another crash--and the carriage goes--

Again poor Weariness seeks the repose

That Nature demands, imperious;

But Echo takes up the burden now,

With a rattling chorus of row-de-dow-dow,

Till Silence herself seems making a row,

Like a Quaker gone delirious!

CXLI.

'Tis night--a winter night--and the stars

Are shining like winkin'--Venus and Mars

Are rolling along in their golden cars

Through the sky's serene expansion--

But vainly the stars dispense their rays,

Venus and Mars are lost in the blaze

Of the Kilmanseggs' luminous mansion!

CXLII.

Up jumps Fear in a terrible fright!

His bedchamber windows look so bright,--

With light all the Square is glutted!

Up he jumps, like a sole from the pan,

And a tremor sickens his inward man,

For he feels as only a gentleman can,

Who thinks he's being "gutted."

CXLIII.

Again Fear settles, all snug and warm;

But only to dream of a dreadful storm

From Autumn's sulphurous locker;

But the only electrical body that falls

Wears a negative coat, and positive smalls,

And draws the peal that so appals

From the Kilmanseggs' brazen knocker!

CXLIV.

'Tis Curiosity's Benefit night--

And perchance 'tis the English Second-Sight,

But whatever it be, so be it--

As the friends and guests of Miss Kilmansegg

Crowd in to look at her Golden Leg,

As many more

Mob round the door,

To see them going to see it!

CXLV.

In they go--in jackets and cloaks,

Plumes and bonnets, turbans and toques,

As if to a Congress of Nations:

Greeks and Malays, with daggers and dirks,

Spaniards, Jews, Chinese, and Turks--

Some like original foreign works,

But mostly like bad translations.

CXLVI.

In they go, and to work like a pack,

Juan, Moses, and Shacabac,

Tom, and Jerry and Springheel'd Jack,--

For some of low Fancy are lovers--

Skirting, zigzagging, casting about,

Here and there, and in and out,

With a crush, and a rush, for a full-bodied rout

In one of the stiffest of covers.

CXLVII.

In they went, and hunted about,

Open-mouth'd like chub and trout,

And some with the upper lip thrust out,

Like that fish for routing, a barbel--

While Sir Jacob stood to welcome the crowd,

And rubb'd his hands, and smiled aloud,

And bow'd, and bow'd, and bow'd, and bow'd,

Like a man who is sawing marble.

CXLVIII.

For Princes were there, and Noble Peers;

Dukes descended from Norman spears;

Earls that dated from early years;

And lords in vast variety--

Besides the Gentry both new and old--

For people who stand on legs of gold

Are sure to stand well with society.

CXLIX.

"But where--where--where?" with one accord,

Cried Moses and Mufti, Jack and my Lord,

Wang-Fong and Il Bondocani--

When slow, and heavy, and dead as a dump,

They heard a foot begin to stump,

Thump! lump!

Lump! thump!

Like the Spectre in "Don Giovanni"!

CL.

And lo! the Heiress, Miss Kilmansegg,

With her splendid, brilliant, beautiful leg,

In the garb of a Goddess olden--

Like chaste Diana going to hunt,

With a golden spear--which of course was blunt,

And a tunic loop'd up to a gem in front,

To show the Leg that was Golden!

CLI.

Gold! still gold; her Crescent behold,

That should be silver, but would be gold;

And her robe's auriferous spangles!

Her golden stomacher--how she would melt!

Her golden quiver, and golden belt,

Where a golden bugle dangles!

CLII.

And her jewell'd Garter! Oh Sin, oh Shame!

Let Pride and Vanity bear the blame,

That bring such blots on female fame!

But to be a true recorder,

Besides its thin transparent stuff,

The tunic was loop'd quite high enough

To give a glimpse of the Order!

CLIII.

But what have sin or shame to do