And Pordenone was roused from these thoughts anon by the sudden
Hush that had fallen upon the garrulous group of his pupils;
And ere he turned half-way with instinctive looks of inquiry,
He was already warned, with a shock at the heart, of a presence
Long attended, not feared; and he laid one hand on his sword-hilt,
Seizing the sheath with the other hand, that the pallet had dropped
from.
Then he fronted Titian, who stood with his arms lightly folded,
And with a curious smile, half of sarcasm, half of compassion,
Bent on th' embattled painter, cried: "Your slave, Messere Antonio!
What good friend has played this bitter jest with your humor?
As I beheld you just now full-armed with your pencil and palette,
I was half awed by your might; but these sorry trappings of bravo
Make me believe you less fit to be the rival of Titian,
Here in the peaceful calm of our well-ordered city of Venice,
Than to take service under some Spanish lordling at Naples,
Needy in blades for work that can not wait for the poison."
Pordenone flushed with anger and shame to be taken
At an unguarded point; but he answered with scornful defiance:
"Oh, you are come, I see, with the favorite weapon of Titian,
And you would make a battle of words. If you care for my counsel,
Listen to me: I say you are skilfuller far in my absence,
And your tongue can inflict a keener and deadlier mischief
When it is dipped in poisonous lies, and wielded in secret."
"Nay, then," Titian responded, "methinks that our friend Aretino[6]
Makes a much better effect than either of us in that tongue-play.
But since Messer Robusti has measured our wit for his portrait,
Even _he_ has grown shyer of using his tongue than he once was.
Have you not heard the tale? Tintoretto was told Aretino
Meant to make him the subject of one of his merry effusions;
And with his naked dirk he went carefully over his person,
Promising, if the poet made free with him in his verses,
He would immortalize my satirical friend with that pencil.
Doubtless the tale is not true. Aretino says nothing about it;
Always speaks, in fact, with the highest respect of Robusti.
True or not, 'tis well found." Then looking around on the frescos:
"Good, very good indeed! Your breadth and richness and softness
No man living surpasses; those heads are truly majestic.
Yes, Buonarotti was right, when he said that to look at your
Curtius
Richly repaid him the trouble and cost of a journey from Florence.
Surely the world shall know you the first of painters in fresco!
Well? You will not strike me unarmed? This was hardly expected
By the good people that taught you to think our rivalry blood-red.
Let us be friends, Pordenone!"
"Be patron and patronized, rather;
Nay, if you spoke your whole mind out, be assassin and victim.
Could the life beat again in the broken heart of Giorgione,
He might tell us, I think, something pleasant of friendship with
Titian."
Suddenly over the shoulder of Titian peered an ironical visage,
Smiling, malignly intent--the leer of the scurrilous poet:
"You know--all the world knows--who dug the grave of Giorgione.[7]
Titian and he were no friends--our Lady of Sorrows forgive 'em!
But for all hurt that Titian did him he might have been living,
Greater than any living, and lord of renown and such glory
As would have left you both dull as yon withered moon in the
sunshine."
Loud laughed the listening group at the insolent gibe of the poet,
Stirring the gall to its depths in the bitter soul of their master,
Who with his tremulous fingers tapped the hilt of his poniard,
Answering naught as yet. Anon the glance of the ribald,
Carelessly ranging from Pordenone's face to the picture,
Dwelt with an absent light on its marvellous beauty, and kindled
Into a slow recognition, with "Ha! Violante!" Then, erring
Wilfully as to the subject, he cackled his filthy derision:
"What have we here! More Magdalens yet of the painter's acquaintance?
Ah--!"
The words had scarce left his lips, when the painter
Rushed upon him, and clutching his throat, thrust him backward and
held him
Over the scaffolding's edge in air, and straightway had flung him
Crashing down on the pave of the cloister below, but for Titian,
Who around painter and poet alike wound his strong arms and stayed
them
Solely, until the bewildered pupils could come to the rescue.
Then, as the foes relaxed that embrace of frenzy and murder--
White, one with rage and the other with terror, and either with
hatred--
Grimly the great master smiled: "You were much nearer paradise,
Piero,
Than you have been for some time. Be ruled now by me and get
homeward
Fast as you may, and be thankful." And then, as the poet,
Looking neither to right nor to left, amid the smiles of the pupils
Tottered along the platform, and trembling descended the ladder
Down to the cloister pave, and, still without upward or backward
Glance, disappeared beneath the outer door of the Convent,
Titian turned again to the painter: "Farewell, Pordenone!
Learn more fairly to know me. I envy you not; and no rival
Now, or at any time, have I held you, or ever shall hold you.
Prosper and triumph still, for all me: you shall but do me honor,
Seeing that I too serve the art that your triumphs illustrate.
I for my part find life too short for work and for pleasure;
If it should touch a century's bound, I should think it too
precious
Even to spare a moment for rage at another's good fortune.
Do not be fooled by the purblind flatterers who would persuade you
Either of us shall have greater fame through the fall of the other.
We can thrive only in common. The tardily blossoming cycles,
Flowering at last in this glorious age of our art, had not waited,
Folded calyxes still, for Pordenone or Titian.
Think you if we had not been, our pictures had never been painted?
Others had done them, or better, the same. We are only
Pencils God paints with. And think you that He had wanted for
pencils
But for our being at hand? And yet--for some virtue creative
Dwells and divinely exists in the being of every creature,
So that the thing done through him is dear as if he had done it--
If I should see your power, a tint of this great efflorescence,
Fading, methinks I should feel myself beginning to wither.
They have abused your hate who told you that Titian was jealous.
Once, in my youth that is passed, I too had my hates and my envies.
'Sdeath! how it used to gall me--that power and depth of Giorgione!
I could have turned my knife in his heart when I looked at his
portraits.
Ah! we learn somewhat still as the years go. Now, when I see you
Doing this good work here, I am glad in my soul of its beauty.
Art is not ours, O friend! but if we are not hers, we are nothing.
Look at the face you painted last year--or yesterday, even:
Far, so far, it seems from you, so utterly, finally, parted,
Nothing is stranger to you than this child of your soul; and you
wonder--
'Did I indeed then do it?' No thrill of the rapture of doing
Stirs in your breast at the sight. Nay, then, not even the beauty
Which we had seemed to create is our own: the frame universal
Is as much ours. And shall I hate you because you are doing
That which when done you cannot feel yours more than I mine can feel
it?
It shall belong hereafter to all who perceive and enjoy it,
Rather than him who made it; he, least of all, shall enjoy it.
They of the Church conjure us to look on death and be humble;
I say, look upon life and keep your pride if you can, then:
See how to-day's achievement is only to-morrow's confusion;
See how possession always cheapens the thing that was precious
To our endeavor; how losses and gains are equally losses;
How in ourselves we are nothing, and how we are anything only
As indifferent parts of the whole, that still, on our ceasing,
Whole remains as before, no less without us than with us.
Were it not for the delight of doing, the wonderful instant
Ere the thing done is done and dead, life scarce were worth living.
Ah, but that makes life divine! We are gods, for that instant
immortal,
Mortal for evermore, with a few days' rumor--or ages'--
What does it matter? We, too, have our share of eating and
drinking,
Love, and the liking of friends--mankind's common portion and
pleasure.
Come, Pordenone, with me; I would fain have you see my Assumption
While it is still unfinished, and stay with me for the evening:
You shall send home for your lute, and I'll ask Sansovino to
supper.[8]
After what happened just now I scarcely could ask Aretino;
Though, for the matter of that, the dog is not one to bear malice.
Will you not come?"
V.
I listen with Titian, and wait for the answer.
But, whatever the answer that comes to Titian, I hear none.
Nay, while I linger, all those presences fade into nothing,
In the dead air of the past; and the old Augustinian Convent
Lapses to picturesque profanation again as a barrack;
Lapses and changes once more, and this time vanishes wholly,
Leaving me at the end with the broken, shadowy legend,
Broken and shadowy still, as in the beginning. I linger,
Teased with its vague unfathomed suggestion, and wonder,
As at first I wondered, what happened about Violante,
And am but ill content with those metaphysical phrases
Touching the strictly impersonal nature of personal effort,
Wherewithal Titian had fain avoided the matter at issue.
FOOTNOTES:
[5] Giovanni Antonio Licinio, called _Pordenone_ from his birth-place
in the Friuli, was a contemporary of Titian's, whom he equalled
in many qualities, and was one of the most eminent Venetian
painters in fresco.
[6] Pietro Aretino, the satirical poet, was a friend of Titian, whose
house he frequented. The story of Tintoretto's measuring him for
a portrait with his dagger is well known.
[7] Giorgione (Giorgio Barbarelli) was Titian's fellow-pupil and rival
in the school of Bellini. He died at thirty-four, after a life
of great triumphs and excesses.
[8] Sansovino, the architect, was a familiar guest at Titian's table,
in his house near the Fondamenta Nuove.
THE LONG DAYS.
Yes! they are here again, the long, long days,
After the days of winter, pinched and white;
Soon, with a thousand minstrels comes the light,
Late, the sweet robin-haunted dusk delays.
But the long days that bring us back the flowers,
The sunshine, and the quiet-dripping rain,
And all the things we knew of spring again,
The long days bring not the long-lost long hours.
The hours that now seem to have been each one
A summer in itself, a whole life's bound,
Filled full of deathless joy--where in his round,
Have these forever faded from the sun?
The fret, the fever, the unrest endures,
But the time flies.... Oh, try, my little lad,
Coming so hot and play-worn, to be glad
And patient of the long hours that are yours!
* * * * *
Transcriber Notes
Archaic and variable spelling and hypenation preserved, including
words like chorussing and chipmonk.
Author's punctuation style is preserved, including some inconsistent
quotes in "Pordenone".
Passages in italics indicated by _underscores_.