The Complete Poetic and Dramatic Works of Robert Browning / Cambridge Edition

DRAMATIC ROMANCES

The seventh number of Bells and Pomegranates was entitled Dramatic Romances and Lyrics. In the redistribution of his shorter poems when he collected his writings, Browning having already a group of Dramatic Lyrics made a second of Dramatic Romances, taking the occasion to make a little nicer discrimination. Thus some of the poems originally included under the combined title were distributed among the Lyrics, and some at first grouped under Lyrics were transferred to this division of Romances. The first poem in the group was originally contained in Dramatic Lyrics along with Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister under the general title of Camp and Cloister, this poem representing the camp.

INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH CAMP

You know, we French stormed Ratisbon:

A mile or so away,

On a little mound, Napoleon

Stood on our storming-day;

With neck out-thrust, you fancy how,

Legs wide, arms locked behind,

As if to balance the prone brow

Oppressive with its mind.

Just as perhaps he mused "My plans

That soar, to earth may fall,

Let once my army-leader Lannes

Waver at yonder wall,"—

Out 'twixt the battery-smokes there flew

A rider, bound on bound

Full-galloping; nor bridle drew

Until he reached the mound.

Then off there flung in smiling joy,

And held himself erect

By just his horse's mane, a boy:

You hardly could suspect—

(So tight he kept his lips compressed,

Scarce any blood came through)

You looked twice ere you saw his breast

Was all but shot in two.

"Well," cried he, "Emperor, by God's grace

We've got you Ratisbon!

The Marshal's in the market-place,

And you'll be there anon

To see your flag-bird flap his vans

Where I, to heart's desire,

Perched him!" The chief's eye flashed; his plans

Soared up again like fire.

The chief's eye flashed; but presently

Softened itself, as sheathes

A film the mother-eagle's eye

When her bruised eaglet breathes;

"You're wounded!" "Nay," the soldier's pride

Touched to the quick, he said:

"I'm killed, Sire!" And his chief beside,

Smiling the boy fell dead.

THE PATRIOT

AN OLD STORY

Mr. Browning has denied that this poem refers to Arnold of Brescia. It is imaginative, not historical in its dramatic action. It was possibly to relieve the poem of its apparent distinct reference to history that he removed the name of Brescia, which was used in the poem in its first form.

It was roses, roses, all the way,

With myrtle mixed in my path like mad:

The house-roofs seemed to heave and sway,

The church-spires flamed, such flags they had,

A year ago on this very day.

The air broke into a mist with bells,

The old walls rocked with the crowd and cries.

Had I said, "Good folk, mere noise repels—

But give me your sun from yonder skies!"

They had answered, "And afterward, what else?"

Alack, it was I who leaped at the sun

To give it my loving friends to keep!

Naught man could do, have I left undone:

And you see my harvest, what I reap

This very day, now a year is run.

There's nobody on the house-tops now—

Just a palsied few at the windows set;

For the best of the sight is, all allow,

At the Shambles' Gate—or, better yet,

By the very scaffold's foot, I trow.

I go in the rain, and, more than needs,

A rope cuts both my wrists behind;

And I think, by the feel, my forehead bleeds,

For they fling, whoever has a mind,

Stones at me for my year's misdeeds.

Thus I entered, and thus I go!

In triumphs, people have dropped down dead.

"Paid by the world, what dost thou owe

Me?"—God might question; now instead,

'Tis God shall repay: I am safer so.

MY LAST DUCHESS

FERRARA

In Dramatic Lyrics this was entitled Italy, and grouped with Count Gismond under the head Italy and France.

That's my last Duchess painted on the wall,

Looking as if she were alive. I call

That piece a wonder, now: FrÀ Pandolf's hands

Worked busily a day, and there she stands.

Will't please you sit and look at her? I said

"FrÀ Pandolf" by design, for never read

Strangers like you that pictured countenance,

The depth and passion of its earnest glance,

But to myself they turned (since none puts by

The curtain I have drawn for you, but I)

And seemed as they would ask me, if they durst,

How such a glance came there; so, not the first

Are you to turn and ask thus. Sir, 't was not

Her husband's presence only, called that spot

Of joy into the Duchess' cheek: perhaps

FrÀ Pandolf chanced to say, "Her mantle laps

Over my lady's wrist too much," or "Paint

Must never hope to reproduce the faint

Half-flush that dies along her throat:" such stuff

Was courtesy, she thought, and cause enough

For calling up that spot of joy. She had

A heart—how shall I say?—too soon made glad,

Too easily impressed: she liked whate'er

She looked on, and her looks went everywhere.

Sir, 't was all one! My favor at her breast,

The dropping of the daylight in the West,

The bough of cherries some officious fool

Broke in the orchard for her, the white mule

She rode with round the terrace—all and each

Would draw from her alike the approving speech,

Or blush, at least. She thanked men,—good! but thanked

Somehow—I know not how—as if she ranked

My gift of a nine-hundred-years-old name

With anybody's gift. Who'd stoop to blame

This sort of trifling? Even had you skill

In speech—(which I have not)—to make your will

Quite clear to such an one, and say, "Just this

Or that in you disgusts me; here you miss,

Or there exceed the mark"—and if she let

Herself be lessoned so, nor plainly set

Her wits to yours, forsooth, and made excuse,

—E'en then would be some stooping; and I choose

Never to stoop. Oh sir, she smiled, no doubt,

Whene'er I passed her; but who passed without

Much the same smile? This grew; I gave commands;

Then all smiles stopped together. There she stands

As if alive. Will't please you rise? We'll meet

The company below, then. I repeat,

The Count your master's known munificence

Is ample warrant that no just pretence

Of mine for dowry will be disallowed;

Though his fair daughter's self, as I avowed

At starting, is my object. Nay, we'll go

Together down, sir. Notice Neptune, though,

Taming a sea-horse, thought a rarity,

Which Claus of Innsbruck cast in bronze for me!

COUNT GISMOND

AIX IN PROVENCE

Christ God who savest man, save most

Of men Count Gismond who saved me!

Count Gauthier, when he chose his post,

Chose time and place and company

To suit it; when he struck at length

My honor, 't was with all his strength.

And doubtlessly ere he could draw

All points to one, he must have schemed!

That miserable morning saw

Few half so happy as I seemed,

While being dressed in queen's array

To give our tourney prize away.

I thought they loved me, did me grace

To please themselves; 't was all their deed,

God makes, or fair or foul, our face;

If showing mine so caused to bleed

My cousins' hearts, they should have dropped

A word, and straight the play had stopped.

They, too, so beauteous! Each a queen

By virtue of her brow and breast;

Not needing to be crowned, I mean,

As I do. E'en when I was dressed,

Had either of them spoke, instead

Of glancing sideways with still head!

But no: they let me laugh, and sing

My birthday song quite through, adjust

The last rose in my garland, fling

A last look on the mirror, trust

My arms to each an arm of theirs,

And so descend the castle-stairs—

And come out on the morning-troop

Of merry friends who kissed my cheek,

And called me queen, and made me stoop

Under the canopy—(a streak

That pierced it, of the outside sun,

Powdered with gold its gloom's soft dun)—

And they could let me take my state

And foolish throne amid applause

Of all come there to celebrate

My queen's-day—Oh I think the cause

Of much was, they forgot no crowd

Makes up for parents in their shroud!

Howe'er that be, all eyes were bent

Upon me, when my cousins cast

Theirs down; 't was time I should present

The victor's crown, but ... there, 't will last

No long time ... the old mist again

Blinds me as then it did. How vain!

See! Gismond 's at the gate, in talk

With his two boys: I can proceed.

Well, at that moment, who should stalk

Forth boldly—to my face, indeed—

But Gauthier, and he thundered, "Stay!"

And all stayed. "Bring no crowns, I say!

"Bring torches! Wind the penance-sheet

About her! Let her shun the chaste,

Or lay herself before their feet!

Shall she whose body I embraced

A night long, queen it in the day?

For honor's sake no crowns, I say!"

I? What I answered? As I live,

I never fancied such a thing

As answer possible to give.

What says the body when they spring

Some monstrous torture-engine's whole

Strength on it? No more says the soul.

Till out strode Gismond; then I knew

That I was saved. I never met

His face before, but, at first view,

I felt quite sure that God had set

Himself to Satan; who would spend

A minute's mistrust on the end?

He strode to Gauthier, in his throat

Gave him the lie, then struck his mouth

With one back-handed blow that wrote

In blood men's verdict there. North, South,

East, West, I looked. The lie was dead,

And damned, and truth stood up instead.

This glads me most, that I enjoyed

The heart of the joy, with my content

In watching Gismond unalloyed

By any doubt of the event:

God took that on him—I was bid

Watch Gismond for my part: I did.

Did I not watch him while he let

His armorer just brace his greaves,

Rivet his hauberk, on the fret

The while! His foot ... my memory leaves

No least stamp out, nor how anon

He pulled his ringing gauntlets on.

And e'en before the trumpet's sound

Was finished, prone lay the false knight,

Prone as his lie, upon the ground:

Gismond flew at him, used no sleight

O' the sword, but open-breasted drove,

Cleaving till out the truth he clove.

Which done, he dragged him to my feet

And said, "Here die, but end thy breath

In full confession, lest thou fleet

From my first, to God's second death!

Say, hast thou lied?" And, "I have lied

To God and her," he said, and died.

Then Gismond, kneeling to me, asked

—What safe my heart holds, though no word

Could I repeat now, if I tasked

My powers forever, to a third

Dear even as you are. Pass the rest

Until I sank upon his breast.

Over my head his arm he flung

Against the world; and scarce I felt

His sword (that dripped by me and swung)

A little shifted in its belt:

For he began to say the while

How South our home lay many a mile.

So 'mid the shouting multitude

We two walked forth to never more

Return. My cousins have pursued

Their life, untroubled as before

I vexed them. Gauthier's dwelling-place

God lighten! May his soul find grace!

Our elder boy has got the clear

Great brow; though when his brother's black

Full eye shows scorn, it ... Gismond here?

And have you brought my tercel back?

I just was telling Adela

How many birds it struck since May.

THE BOY AND THE ANGEL

First published in Hood's Magazine, August, 1844. It was rewritten, with five new couplets, and was published in 1845, in Dramatic Romances and Lyrics, or No. VII. of Bells and Pomegranates. When it appeared in the Poetical Works of 1868, a fresh verse was added. In 1844 the poem ended as follows:—

"Go back and praise again

The early way, while I remain.

"Be again the boy all curl'd;

I will finish with the world."

Theocrite grew old at home,

Gabriel dwelt in Peter's dome.

Morning, evening, noon and night,

"Praise God!" sang Theocrite.

Then to his poor trade he turned,

Whereby the daily meal was earned.

Hard he labored, long and well;

O'er his work the boy's curls fell.

But ever, at each period.

He stopped and sang, "Praise God!"

Then back again his curls he threw,

And cheerful turned to work anew.

Said Blaise, the listening monk, "Well done;

I doubt not thou art heard, my son:

"As well as if thy voice to-day

Were praising God, the Pope's great way.

"This Easter Day, the Pope at Rome

Praises God from Peter's dome."

Said Theocrite, "Would God that I

Might praise him that great way, and die!"

Night passed, day shone,

And Theocrite was gone.

With God a day endures alway,

A thousand years are but a day.

God said in heaven, "Nor day nor night

Now brings the voice of my delight."

Then Gabriel, like a rainbow's birth,

Spread his wings and sank to earth;

Entered, in flesh, the empty cell,

Lived there, and played the craftsman well;

And morning, evening, noon and night,

Praised God in place of Theocrite.

And from a boy, to youth he grew:

The man put off the stripling's hue:

The man matured and fell away

Into the season of decay:

And ever o'er the trade he bent,

And ever lived on earth content,

(He did God's will; to him, all one

If on the earth or in the sun.)

God said, "A praise is in mine ear;

There is no doubt in it, no fear:

"So sing old worlds, and so

New worlds that from my footstool go.

"Clearer loves sound other ways:

I miss my little human praise."

Then forth sprang Gabriel's wings, off fell

The flesh disguise, remained the cell.

'T was Easter Day: he flew to Rome,

And paused above Saint Peter's dome.

In the tiring-room close by

The great outer gallery,

With his holy vestments dight,

Stood the new Pope, Theocrite:

And all his past career

Came back upon him clear,

Since when, a boy, he plied his trade,

Till on his life the sickness weighed;

And in his cell, when death drew near,

An angel in a dream brought cheer:

And rising from the sickness drear,

He grew a priest, and now stood here.

To the East with praise he turned,

And on his sight the angel burned.

"I bore thee from thy craftsman's cell,

And set thee here; I did not well.

"Vainly I left my angel-sphere,

Vain was thy dream of many a year.

"Thy voice's praise seemed weak; it dropped—

Creation's chorus stopped!

"Go back and praise again

The early way, while I remain.

"With that weak voice of our disdain,

Take up creation's pausing strain.

"Back to the cell and poor employ:

Resume the craftsman and the boy!"

Theocrite grew old at home;

A new Pope dwelt in Peter's dome.

One vanished as the other died:

They sought God side by side.

INSTANS TYRANNUS

Of the million or two, more or less,

I rule and possess,

One man, for some cause undefined,

Was least to my mind.

I struck him, he grovelled of course—

For, what was his force?

I pinned him to earth with my weight

And persistence of hate:

And he lay, would not moan, would not curse,

As his lot might be worse.

III

"Were the object less mean, would he stand

At the swing of my hand!

For obscurity helps him and blots

The hole where he squats."

So, I set my five wits on the stretch

To inveigle the wretch.

All in vain! Gold and jewels I threw,

Still he couched there perdue;

I tempted his blood and his flesh,

Hid in roses my mesh,

Choicest cates and the flagon's best spilth:

Still he kept to his filth.

Had he kith now or kin, were access

To his heart, did I press:

Just a son or a mother to seize!

No such booty as these.

Were it simply a friend to pursue

'Mid my million or two,

Who could pay me in person or pelf

What he owes me himself!

No: I could not but smile through my chafe:

For the fellow lay safe

As his mates do, the midge and the nit,

—Through minuteness, to wit.

Then a humor more great took its place

At the thought of his face,

The droop, the low cares of the mouth,

The trouble uncouth

'Twixt the brows, all that air one is fain

To put out of its pain.

And, "no!" I admonished myself,

"Is one mocked by an elf,

Is one baffled by toad or by rat?

The gravamen's in that!

How the lion, who crouches to suit

His back to my foot,

Would admire that I stand in debate!

But the small turns the great

If it vexes you,—that is the thing!

Toad or rat vex the king?

Though I waste half my realm to unearth

Toad or rat, 't is well worth!"

So, I soberly laid my last plan

To extinguish the man.

Round his creep-hole, with never a break,

Ran my fires for his sake;

Over-head, did my thunder combine

With my underground mine:

Till I looked from my labor content

To enjoy the event.

VII

When sudden ... how think ye, the end?

Did I say "without friend"?

Say rather, from marge to blue marge

The whole sky grew his targe

With the sun's self for visible boss,

While an Arm ran across

Which the earth heaved beneath like a breast

Where the wretch was safe prest!

Do you see? Just my vengeance complete,

The man sprang to his feet,

Stood erect, caught at God's skirts, and prayed!

—So, I was afraid!

MESMERISM

All I believed is true!

I am able yet

All I want, to get

By a method as strange as new:

Dare I trust the same to you?

If at night, when doors are shut,

And the wood-worm picks,

And the death-watch ticks,

And the bar has a flag of smut,

And a cat 's in the water-butt—

And the socket floats and flares,

And the house-beams groan,

And a foot unknown

Is surmised on the garret-stairs,

And the locks slip unawares—

And the spider, to serve his ends,

By a sudden thread,

Arms and legs outspread,

On the table's midst descends,

Comes to find, God knows what friends!—

If since eve drew in, I say,

I have sat and brought

(So to speak) my thought

To bear on the woman away,

Till I felt my hair turn gray—

Till I seemed to have and hold,

In the vacancy

'Twixt the wall and me,

From the hair-plait's chestnut-gold

To the foot in its muslin fold—

Have and hold, then and there,

Her, from head to foot,

Breathing and mute,

Passive and yet aware,

In the grasp of my steady stare—

Hold and have, there and then,

All her body and soul

That completes my whole,

All that women add to men,

In the clutch of my steady ken—

Having and holding, till

I imprint her fast

On the void at last

As the sun does whom he will

By the calotypist's skill—

Then,—if my heart's strength serve,

And through all and each

Of the veils I reach

To her soul and never swerve,

Knitting an iron nerve—

Command her soul to advance

And inform the shape

Which has made escape

And before my countenance

Answers me glance for glance—

I, still with a gesture fit

Of my hands that best

To my soul's behest,

Pointing the power from it,

While myself do steadfast sit—

Steadfast and still the same

On my object bent,

While the hands give vent

To my ardor and my aim

And break into very flame—

Then I reach, I must believe,

Not her soul in vain,

For to me again

It reaches, and past retrieve

Is wound in the toils I weave;

And must follow as I require,

As befits a thrall,

Bringing flesh and all,

Essence and earth-attire,

To the source of the tractile fire:

Till the house called hers, not mine,

With a growing weight

Seems to suffocate

If she break not its leaden line

And escape from its close confine.

Out of doors into the night!

On to the maze

Of the wild wood-ways,

Not turning to left nor right

From the pathway, blind with sight—

Making through rain and wind

O'er the broken shrubs,

'Twixt the stems and stubs,

With a still, composed, strong mind,

Nor a care for the world behind—

Swifter and still more swift,

As the crowding peace

Doth to joy increase

In the wide blind eyes uplift

Through the darkness and the drift!

While I—to the shape, I too

Feel my soul dilate

Nor a whit abate,

And relax not a gesture due,

As I see my belief come true.

For, there! have I drawn or no

Life to that lip?

Do my fingers dip

In a flame which again they throw

On the cheek that breaks aglow?

Ha! was the hair so first?

What, unfilleted,

Made alive, and spread

Through the void with a rich outburst,

Chestnut gold-interspersed?

Like the doors of a casket-shrine,

See, on either side,

Her two arms divide

Till the heart betwixt makes sign,

Take me, for I am thine!

"Now—now"—the door is heard!

Hark, the stairs! and near—

Nearer—and here—

"Now!" and at call the third

She enters without a word.

On doth she march and on

To the fancied shape;

It is, past escape,

Herself, now: the dream is done

And the shadow and she are one.

First I will pray. Do Thou

That ownest the soul,

Yet wilt grant control

To another, nor disallow

For a time, restrain me now!

I admonish me while I may,

Not to squander guilt,

Since require Thou wilt

At my hand its price one day!

What the price is, who can say?

THE GLOVE

(PETER RONSARD loquitur.)

"Heigho," yawned one day King Francis,

"Distance all value enhances!

When a man 's busy, why, leisure

Strikes him as wonderful pleasure:

'Faith, and at leisure once is he?

Straightway he wants to be busy.

Here we 've got peace; and aghast I 'm

Caught thinking war the true pastime.

Is there a reason in metre?

Give us your speech, master Peter!"

I who, if mortal dare say so,

Ne'er am at loss with my Naso,

"Sire," I replied, "joys prove cloudlets:

Men are the merest Ixions"—

Here the King whistled aloud, "Let 's

—Heigho—go look at our lions!"

Such are the sorrowful chances

If you talk fine to King Francis.

And so, to the courtyard proceeding

Our company, Francis was leading,

Increased by new followers tenfold

Before he arrived at the penfold;

Lords, ladies, like clouds which bedizen

At sunset the western horizon.

And Sir De Lorge pressed 'mid the foremost

With the dame he professed to adore most.

Oh, what a face! One by fits eyed

Her, and the horrible pitside;

For the penfold surrounded a hollow

Which led where the eye scarce dared follow.

And shelved to the chamber secluded

Where Bluebeard, the great lion, brooded.

The King hailed his keeper, an Arab

As glossy and black as a scarab,

And bade him make sport and at once stir

Up and out of his den the old monster.

They opened a hole in the wire-work

Across it, and dropped there a firework,

And fled: one's heart's beating redoubled;

A pause, while the pit's mouth was troubled,

The blackness and silence so utter,

By the firework's slow sparkling and sputter;

Then earth in a sudden contortion

Gave out to our gaze her abortion.

Such a brute! Were I friend Clement Marot

(Whose experience of nature's but narrow,

And whose faculties move in no small mist

When he versifies David the Psalmist)

I should study that brute to describe you

Ilium Juda Leonem de Tribu.

One's whole blood grew curdling and creepy

To see the black mane, vast and heapy,

The tail in the air stiff and straining,

The wide eyes, nor-waxing nor waning,

As over the barrier which bounded

His platform, and us who surrounded

The barrier, they reached and they rested

On space that might stand him in best stead:

For who knew, he thought, what the amazement,

The eruption of clatter and blaze meant,

And if, in this minute of wonder,

No outlet, 'mid lightning and thunder,

Lay broad, and, his shackles all shivered,

The lion at last was delivered?

Ay, that was the open sky o'erhead!

And you saw by the flash on his forehead,

By the hope in those eyes wide and steady,

He was leagues in the desert already,

Driving the flocks up the mountain,

Or catlike couched hard by the fountain

To waylay the date-gathering negress:

So guarded he entrance or egress.

"How he stands!" quoth the King: "we may well swear,

(No novice, we've won our spurs elsewhere

And so can afford the confession,)

We exercise wholesome discretion

In keeping aloof from his threshold,

Once hold you, those jaws want no fresh hold,

Their first would too pleasantly purloin

The visitor's brisket or surloin:

But who's he would prove so fool-hardy?

Not the best man of Marignan, pardie!"

The sentence no sooner was uttered,

Than over the rails a glove fluttered,

Fell close to the lion, and rested:

The dame 't was, who flung it and jested

With life so, De Lorge had been wooing

For months past; he sat there pursuing

His suit, weighing out with nonchalance

Fine speeches like gold from a balance.

Sound the trumpet, no true knight's a tarrier!

De Lorge made one leap at the barrier,

Walked straight to the glove,—while the lion

Ne'er moved, kept his far-reaching eye on

The palm-tree-edged desert-spring's sapphire,

And the musky oiled skin of the Kaffir,—

Picked it up, and as calmly retreated,

Leaped back where the lady was seated,

And full in the face of its owner

Flung the glove.

"Your heart's queen, you dethrone her?

So should I!"—cried the King—"'t was mere vanity,

Not love, set that task to humanity!"

Lords and ladies alike turned with loathing

From such a proved wolf in sheep's clothing.

Not so, I; for I caught an expression

In her brow's undisturbed self-possession

Amid the Court's scoffing and merriment,—

As if from no pleasing experiment

She rose, yet of pain not much heedful

So long as the process was needful,—

As if she had tried in a crucible,

To what "speeches like gold" were reducible,

And, finding the finest prove copper,

Felt the smoke in her face was but proper;

To know what she had not to trust to,

Was worth all the ashes and dust too.

She went out 'mid hooting and laughter;

Clement Marot stayed; I followed after,

And asked, as a grace, what it all meant?

If she wished not the rash deed's recallment?

"For I"—so I spoke—"am a poet:

Human nature,—behooves that I know it!"

She told me, "Too long had I heard

Of the deed proved alone by the word:

For my love—what De Lorge would not dare!

With my scorn—what De Lorge could compare!

And the endless descriptions of death

He would brave when my lip formed a breath,

I must reckon as braved, or, of course,

Doubt his word—and moreover, perforce,

For such gifts as no lady could spurn,

Must offer my love in return.

When I looked on your lion, it brought

All the dangers at once to my thought,

Encountered by all sorts of men,

Before he was lodged in his den,—

From the poor slave whose club or bare hands

Dug the trap, set the snare on the sands,

With no King and no Court to applaud,

By no shame, should he shrink, overawed,

Yet to capture the creature made shift,

That his rude boys might laugh at the gift,

—To the page who last leaped o'er the fence

Of the pit, on no greater pretence

Than to get back the bonnet he dropped,

Lest his pay for a week should be stopped.

So, wiser I judged it to make

One trial what 'death for my sake'

Really meant, while the power was yet mine,

Than to wait until time should define

Such a phrase not so simply as I,

Who took it to mean just 'to die.'

The blow a glove gives is but weak:

Does the mark yet discolor my cheek?

But when the heart suffers a blow,

Will the pain pass so soon, do you know?"

I looked, as away she was sweeping,

And saw a youth eagerly keeping

As close as he dared to the doorway.

No doubt that a noble should more weigh

His life than befits a plebeian;

And yet, had our brute been Nemean—

(I judge by a certain palm fervor

The youth stepped with, forward to serve her)

—He'd have scarce thought you did him the worst turn

If you whispered, "Friend, what you'd get, first earn!"

And when, shortly after, she carried

Her shame from the Court, and they married,

To that marriage some happiness, maugre

The voice of the Court, I dared augur.

For De Lorge, he made women with men vie,

Those in wonder and praise, these in envy;

And in short stood so plain a head taller

That he wooed and won ... how do you call her?

The beauty, that rose in the sequel

To the King's love, who loved her a week well.

And 't was noticed he never would honor

De Lorge (who looked daggers upon her)

With the easy commission of stretching

His legs in the service, and fetching

His wife, from her chamber, those straying

Sad gloves she was always mislaying,

While the King took the closet to chat in,—

But of course this adventure came pat in.

And never the King told the story,

How bringing a glove brought such glory,

But the wife smiled—"His nerves are grown firmer:

Mine he brings now and utters no murmur."

Venienti occurrite morbo!

With which moral I drop my theorbo.

TIME'S REVENGES

Both this poem and the following were written after Browning's visit to Italy in 1844. As originally published they were entitled Italy in England and England in Italy. The dramatic incident in the former poem was not a rescript of a particular historic incident.

That second time they hunted me

From hill to plain, from shore to sea,

And Austria, hounding far and wide

Her blood-hounds through the country-side,

Breathed hot and instant on my trace,—

I made six days a hiding-place

Of that dry green old aqueduct

Where I and Charles, when boys, have plucked

The fire-flies from the roof above,

Bright creeping through the moss they love:

—How long it seems since Charles was lost!

Six days the soldiers crossed and crossed

The country in my very sight;

And when that peril ceased at night,

The sky broke out in red dismay

With signal fires; well, there I lay

Close covered o'er in my recess,

Up to the neck in ferns and cress,

Thinking on Metternich our friend,

And Charles's miserable end,

And much beside, two days; the third,

Hunger o'ercame me when I heard

The peasants from the village go

To work among the maize; you know,

With us in Lombardy, they bring

Provisions packed on mules, a string

With little bells that cheer their task,

And casks, and boughs on every cask

To keep the sun's heat from the wine;

These I let pass in jingling line,

And, close on them, dear noisy crew,

The peasants from the village, too;

For at the very rear would troop

Their wives and sisters in a group

To help, I knew. When these had passed,

I threw my glove to strike the last,

Taking the chance: she did not start,

Much less cry out, but stooped apart,

One instant rapidly glanced round,

And saw me beckon from the ground;

A wild bush grows and hides my crypt;

She picked my glove up while she stripped

A branch off, then rejoined the rest

With that; my glove lay in her breast.

Then I drew breath: they disappeared:

It was for Italy I feared.

An hour, and she returned alone

Exactly where my glove was thrown.

Meanwhile came many thoughts; on me

Rested the hopes of Italy;

I had devised a certain tale

Which, when 't was told her, could not fail

Persuade a peasant of its truth;

I meant to call a freak of youth

This hiding, and give hopes of pay,

And no temptation to betray.

But when I saw that woman's face,

Its calm simplicity of grace,

Our Italy's own attitude

In which she walked thus far, and stood,

Planting each naked foot so firm,

To crush the snake and spare the worm—

At first sight of her eyes, I said,

"I am that man upon whose head

They fix the price, because I hate

The Austrians over us: the State

Will give you gold—oh, gold so much!—

If you betray me to their clutch,

And be your death, for aught I know,

If once they find you saved their foe.

Now, you must bring me food and drink,

And also paper, pen and ink,

And carry safe what I shall write

To Padua, which you'll reach at night

Before the duomo shuts; go in,

And wait till TenebrÆ begin;

Walk to the third confessional,

Between the pillar and the wall,

And kneeling whisper, Whence comes peace?

Say it a second time, then cease;

And if the voice inside returns,

From Christ and Freedom; what concerns

The cause of Peace?—for answer, slip

My letter where you placed your lip;

Then come back happy we have done

Our mother service—I, the son,

As you the daughter of our land!"

Three mornings more, she took her stand

In the same place, with the same eyes:

I was no surer of sunrise

Than of her coming. We conferred

Of her own prospects, and I heard

She had a lover—stout and tall,

She said—then let her eyelids fall,

"He could do much"—as if some doubt

Entered her heart,—then, passing out,

"She could not speak for others, who

Had other thoughts; herself she knew:"

And so she brought me drink and food.

After four days, the scouts pursued

Another path; at last arrived

The help my Paduan friends contrived

To furnish me: she brought the news.

For the first time I could not choose

But kiss her hand, and lay my own

Upon her head—"This faith was shown

To Italy, our mother; she

Uses my hand and blesses thee."

She followed down to the sea-shore;

I left and never saw her more.

How very long since I have thought

Concerning—much less wished for—aught

Beside the good of Italy,

For which I live and mean to die!

I never was in love; and since

Charles proved false, what shall now convince

My inmost heart I have a friend?

However, if I pleased to spend

Real wishes on myself—say, three—

I know at least what one should be.

I would grasp Metternich until

I felt his red wet throat distil

In blood through these two hands. And next,

—Nor much for that am I perplexed—

Charles, perjured traitor, for his part,

Should die slow of a broken heart

Under his new employers. Last

—Ah, there, what should I wish? For fast

Do I grow old and out of strength.

If I resolved to seek at length

My father's house again, how scared

They all would look, and unprepared!

My brothers live in Austria's pay

—Disowned me long ago, men say;

And all my early mates who used

To praise me so—perhaps induced

More than one early step of mine—

Are turning wise: while some opine

"Freedom grows license," some suspect

"Haste breeds delay," and recollect

They always said, such premature

Beginnings never could endure!

So, with a sullen "All's for best,"

The land seems settling: to its rest.

I think then, I should wish to stand

This evening in that dear, lost land,

Over the sea the thousand miles,

And know if yet that woman smiles

With the calm smile; some little farm

She lives in there, no doubt: what harm

If I sat on the door-side bench,

And, while her spindle made a trench

Fantastically in the dust,

Inquired of all her fortunes—just

Her children's ages and their names,

And what may be the husband's aims

For each of them. I'd talk this out,

And sit there, for an hour about,

Then kiss her hand once more, and lay

Mine on her head, and go my way.

So much for idle wishing—how

It steals the time! To business now.

THE ENGLISHMAN IN ITALY

PIANO DI SORRENTO

FortÙ, FortÙ, my beloved one,

Sit here by my side,

On my knees put up both little feet!

I was sure, if I tried,

I could make you laugh spite of Scirocco.

Now, open your eyes,

Let me keep you amused till he vanish

In black from the skies,

With telling my memories over

As you tell your beads;

All the Plain saw me gather, I garland

—The flowers or the weeds.

Time for rain! for your long hot dry Autumn

Had net-worked with brown

The white skin of each grape on the bunches,

Marked like a quail's crown,

Those creatures you make such account of,

Whose heads,—speckled white

Over brown like a great spider's back,

As I told you last night,—

Your mother bites off for her supper.

Red-ripe as could be,

Pomegranates were chapping and splitting

In halves on the tree:

And betwixt the loose walls of great flintstone,

Or in the thick dust

On the path, or straight out of the rock-side,

Wherever could thrust

Some burnt sprig of bold hardy rock-flower

Its yellow face up,

For the prize were great butterflies fighting,

Some five for one cup.

So, I guessed, ere I got up this morning,

What change was in store,

By the quick rustle-down of the quail-nets

Which woke me before

I could open my shutter, made fast

With a bough and a stone,

And look through the twisted dead vine-twigs,

Sole lattice that's known.

Quick and sharp rang the rings down the net-poles,

While, busy beneath,

Your priest and his brother tugged at them,

The rain in their teeth.

And out upon all the flat house-roofs

Where split figs lay drying,

The girls took the frails under cover:

Nor use seemed in trying

To get out the boats and go fishing,

For, under the cliff,

Fierce the black water frothed o'er the blind-rock,

No seeing our skiff

Arrive about noon from Amalfi,

—Our fisher arrive,

And pitch down his basket before us,

All trembling alive

With pink and gray jellies, your sea-fruit;

You touch the strange lumps,

And mouths gape there, eyes open, all manner

Of horns and of humps,

Which only the fisher looks grave at,

While round him like imps

Cling screaming the children as naked

And brown as his shrimps;

Himself too as bare to the middle

—You see round his neck

The string and its brass coin suspended,

That saves him from wreck.

But to-day not a boat reached Salerno,

So back, to a roan.

Came our friends, with whose help in the vine-yards

Grape-harvest began.

In the vat, halfway up in our house-side,

Like blood the juice spins,

While your brother all bare-legged is dancing

Till breathless he grins

Dead-beaten in effort on effort

To keep the grapes under,

Since still when he seems all but master,

In pours the fresh plunder

From girls who keep coming and going

With basket on shoulder,

And eyes shut against the rain's driving;

Your girls that are older,—

For under the hedges of aloe,

And where, on its bed

Of the orchard's black mould, the love-apple

Lies pulpy and red,

All the young ones are kneeling and filling

Their laps with the snails

Tempted out by this first rainy weather,—

Your best of regales,

As to-night will be proved to my sorrow,

When, supping in state,

We shall feast our grape-gleaners (two dozen,

Three over one plate)

With lasagne so tempting to swallow

In slippery ropes,

And gourds fried in great purple slices,

That color of popes.

Meantime, see the grape bunch they've brought you:

The rain-water slips

O'er the heavy blue bloom on each globe

Which the wasp to your lips

Still follows with fretful persistence:

Nay, taste, while awake,

This half of a curd-white smooth cheese-ball

That peels, flake by flake,

Like an onion, each smoother and whiter;

Next, sip this weak wine

From the thin green glass flask, with its stopper,

A leaf of the vine;

And end with the prickly-pear's red flesh

That leaves through its juice

The stony black seeds on your pearl-teeth.

Scirocco is loose!

Hark, the quick, whistling pelt of the olives

Which, thick in one's track,

Tempt the stranger to pick up and bite them,

Though not yet half black!

How the old twisted olive trunks shudder,

The medlars let fall

Their hard fruit, and the brittle great fig-trees

Snap off, figs and all,

For here comes the whole of the tempest!

No refuge, but creep

Back again to my side and my shoulder,

And listen or sleep.

Oh, how will your country show next week,

When all the vine-boughs

Have been stripped of their foliage to pasture

The mules and the cows?

Last eve, I rode over the mountains;

Your brother, my guide,

Soon left me, to feast on the myrtles

That offered, each side,

Their fruit-balls, black, glossy and luscious,—

Or strip from the sorbs

A treasure, or, rosy and wondrous,

Those hairy gold orbs!

But my mule picked his sure sober path out,

Just stopping to neigh

When he recognized down in the valley

His mates on their way

With the faggots and barrels of water;

And soon we emerged

From the plain, where the woods could scarce follow;

And still as we urged

Our way, the woods wondered, and left us,

As up still we trudged,

Though the wild path grew wilder each instant,

And place was e'en grudged

'Mid the rock-chasms and piles of loose stones

Like the loose broken teeth

Of some monster which climbed there to die

From the ocean beneath—

Place was grudged to the silver-gray fume-weed

That clung to the path,

And dark rosemary ever a-dying

That, 'spite the wind's wrath,

So loves the salt rock's face to seaward,

And lentisks as stanch

To the stone where they root and bear berries,

And ... what shows a branch

Coral-colored, transparent, with circlets

Of pale seagreen leaves;

Over all trod my mule with the caution

Of gleaners o'er sheaves,

Still, foot after foot like a lady,

Till, round after round,

He climbed to the top of Calvano,

And God's own profound

Was above me, and round me the mountains,

And under, the sea,

And within me my heart to bear witness

What was and shall be.

Oh, heaven and the terrible crystal!

No rampart excludes

Your eye from the life to be lived

In the blue solitudes.

Oh, those mountains, their infinite movement!

Still moving with you;

For, ever some new head and breast of them

Thrusts into view

To observe the intruder; you see it

If quickly you turn

And, before they escape you, surprise them.

They grudge you should learn

How the soft plains they look on, lean over

And love (they pretend)

—Cower beneath them, the flat sea-pine crouches,

The wild fruit-trees bend,

E'en the myrtle-leaves curl, shrink and shut:

All is silent and grave:

'Tis a sensual and timorous beauty,

How fair! but a slave.

So, I turned to the sea; and there slumbered

As greenly as ever

Those isles of the siren, your Galli;

No ages can sever

The Three, nor enable their sister

To join them,—halfway

On the voyage, she looked at Ulysses—

No farther to-day,

Though the small one, just launched in the wave

Watches breast-high and steady

From under the rock, her bold sister

Swum halfway already.

FortÙ, shall we sail there together

And see from the sides

Quite new rocks show their faces, new haunts

Where the siren abides?

Shall we sail round and round them, close over

The rocks, though unseen,

That ruffle the gray glassy water

To glorious green?

Then scramble from splinter to splinter,

Reach land and explore,

On the largest, the strange square black turret

With never a door,

Just a loop to admit the quick lizards;

Then, stand there and hear

The birds' quiet singing, that tells us

What life is, so clear?

—The secret they sang to Ulysses

When, ages ago,

He heard and he knew this life's secret

I hear and I know.

Ah, see! The sun breaks o'er Calvano;

He strikes the great gloom

And flutters it o'er the mount's summit

In airy gold fume.

All is over. Look out, see the gypsy,

Our tinker and smith,

Has arrived, set up bellows and forge,

And down-squatted forthwith

To his hammering, under the wall there;

One eye keeps aloof

The urchins that itch to be putting

His jews'-harps to proof,

While the other, through locks of curled wire,

Is watching how sleek

Shines the hog, come to share in the windfall

—Chew abbot's own cheek!

All is over. Wake up and come out now,

And down let us go,

And see the fine things got in order

At church for the show.

Of the Sacrament, set forth this evening;

To-morrow's the Feast

Of the Rosary's Virgin, by no means

Of Virgins the least,

As you'll hear in the off-hand discourse

Which (all nature, no art)

The Dominican brother, these three weeks,

Was getting by heart.

Not a pillar nor post but is dizened

With red and blue papers;

All the roof waves with ribbons, each altar

Ablaze with long tapers;

But the great masterpiece is the scaffold

Rigged glorious to hold

All the fiddlers and fifers and drummers

And trumpeters bold,

Not afraid of Bellini nor Auber,

Who, when the priest's hoarse,

Will strike us up something that's brisk

For the feast's second course.

And then will the flaxen-wigged Image

Be carried in pomp

Through the plain, while in gallant procession

The priests mean to stomp.

All round the glad church lie old bottles

With gunpowder stopped,

Which will be, when the Image re-enters,

Religiously popped;

And at night from the crest of Calvano

Great bonfires will hang,

On the plain will the trumpets join chorus,

And more poppers bang.

At all events, come—to the garden

As far as the wall;

See me tap with a hoe on the plaster

Till out there shall fall

A scorpion with wide angry nippers!

—"Such trifles!" you say?

FortÙ, in my England at home,

Men meet gravely to-day

And debate, if abolishing Corn-laws

Be righteous and wise

—If 'twere proper, Scirocco should vanish

In black from the skies.'

IN A GONDOLA

In a letter to Miss Haworth, Browning writes, "I am getting to love painting as I did once.... I chanced to call on Forster the other day, and he pressed me into committing verse on the instant, not the minute, in Maclise's behalf, who has wrought a divine Venetian work, it seems, for the British Institution. Forster described it well—but I could do nothing better than this wooden ware—(all the 'properties,' as we say, were given and the problem was how to catalogue them in rhyme and unreason.)" Thereupon followed the first stanza of the following poem; but after seeing the picture he was moved to go on and carry the poem through to a real end.

He sings.

I send my heart up to thee, all my heart

In this my singing.

For the stars help me, and the sea bears part;

The very night is clinging

Closer to Venice' streets to leave one space

Above me, whence thy face

May light my joyous heart to thee its dwelling place.

She speaks.

Say after me, and try to say

My very words, as if each word

Came from you of your own accord,

In your own voice, in your own way:

"This woman's heart and soul and brain

Are mine as much as this gold chain

She bids me wear; which" (say again)

"I choose to make by cherishing

A precious thing, or choose to fling

Over the boat-side, ring by ring."

And yet once more say ... no word more!

Since words are only words. Give o'er!

Unless you call me, all the same,

Familiarly by my pet name,

Which if the Three should hear you call.

And me reply to, would proclaim

At once our secret to them all.

Ask of me, too, command me, blame—

Do, break down the partition-wall

'Twixt us, the daylight world beholds

Curtained in dusk and splendid folds!

What's left but—all of me to take?

I am the Three's: prevent them, slake

Your thirst! 'Tis said, the Arab sage,

In practising with gems, can loose

Their subtle spirit in his cruce

And leave but ashes: so, sweet mage,

Leave them my ashes when thy use

Sucks out my soul, thy heritage!

He sings.

Past we glide, and past, and past!

What's that poor Agnese doing

Where they make the shutters fast?

Gray Zanobi's just a-wooing

To his couch the purchased bride:

Past we glide!

Past we glide, and past, and past!

Why's the Pucci Palace flaring

Like a beacon to the blast?

Guests by hundreds, not one caring

If the dear host's neck were wried:

Past we glide!

She sings.

The moth's kiss, first!

Kiss me as if you made believe

You were not sure, this eve,

How my face, your flower, had pursed

Its petals up; so, here and there

You brush it, till I grow aware

Who wants me, and wide ope I burst.

The bee's kiss, now!

Kiss me as if you entered gay

My heart at some noonday,

A bud that dares not disallow

The claim, so all is rendered up,

And passively its shattered cup

Over your head to sleep I bow.

He sings.

What are we two?

I am a Jew,

And carry thee, farther than friends can pursue,

To a feast of our tribe;

Where they need thee to bribe

The devil that blasts them unless he imbibe

Thy ... Scatter the vision forever! And now,

As of old, I am I, thou art thou!

Say again, what we are?

The sprite of a star,

I lure thee above where the destinies bar

My plumes their full play

Till a ruddier ray

Than my pale one announce there is withering away

Some ... Scatter the vision forever! And now,

As of old, I am I, thou art thou!

He muses.

Oh, which were best, to roam or rest?

The land's lap or the water's breast?

To sleep on yellow millet-sheaves,

Or swim in lucid shallows just

Eluding water-lily leaves,

An inch from Death's black fingers, thrust

To lock you, whom release he must;

Which life were best on Summer eves?

He speaks, musing.

Lie back; could thought of mine improve you?

From this shoulder let there spring

A wing; from this, another wing;

Wings, not legs and feet, shall move you!

Snow-white must they spring, to blend

With your flesh, but I intend

They shall deepen to the end,

Broader, into burning gold,

Till both wings crescent-wise enfold

Your perfect self, from 'neath your feet

To o'er your head, where, lo, they meet

As if a million sword-blades hurled

Defiance from you to the world!

Rescue me thou, the only real!

And scare away this mad ideal

That came, nor motions to depart!

Thanks! Now, stay ever as thou art!

Still he muses.

What if the Three should catch at last

Thy serenader? While there's cast

Paul's cloak about my head, and fast

Gian pinions me, Himself has past

His stylet through my back; I reel;

And ... is it thou I feel?

They trail me, these three godless knaves,

Past every church that saints and saves,

Nor stop till, where the cold sea raves

By Lido's wet accursed graves,

They scoop mine, roll me to its brink,

And ... on thy breast I sink!

She replies, musing.

Dip your arm o'er the boat-side, elbow-deep,

As I do: thus: were death so unlike sleep,

Caught this way? Death's to fear from flame or steel,

Or poison doubtless; but from water—feel!

Go find the bottom! Would you stay me? There!

Now pluck a great blade of that ribbon-grass

To plait in where the foolish jewel was,

I flung away: since you have praised my hair,

'T is proper to be choice in what I wear.

He speaks.

Row home? must we row home? Too surely

Know I where its front's demurely

Over the Giudecca piled;

Window just with window mating,

Door on door exactly waiting,

All's the set face of a child:

But behind it, where's a trace

Of the staidness and reserve,

And formal lines without a curve,

In the same child's playing-face?

No two windows look one way

O'er the small sea-water thread

Below them. Ah, the autumn day

I, passing, saw you overhead!

First, out a cloud of curtain blew,

Then a sweet cry, and last came you—

To catch your lory that must needs

Escape just then, of all times then,

To peck a tall plant's fleecy seeds,

And make me happiest of men.

I scarce could breathe to see you reach

So far back o'er the balcony

To catch him ere he climbed too high

Above you in the Smyrna peach,

That quick the round smooth cord of gold,

This coiled hair on your head, unrolled,

Fell down you like a gorgeous snake

The Roman girls were wont, of old,

When Rome there was, for coolness' sake

To let lie curling o'er their bosoms.

Dear lory, may his beak retain

Ever its delicate rose stain

As if the wounded lotus-blossoms

Had marked their thief to know again!

Stay longer yet, for others' sake

Than mine! What should your chamber do?

—With all its rarities that ache

In silence while day lasts, but wake

At night-time and their life renew,

Suspended just to pleasure you

Who brought against their will together

These objects, and, while day lasts, weave

Around them such a magic tether

That dumb they look: your harp, believe,

With all the sensitive tight strings

Which dare not speak, now to itself

Breathes slumberously, as if some elf

Went in and out the chords, his wings

Make murmur wheresoe'er they graze,

As an angel may, between the maze

Of midnight palace-pillars, on

And on, to sow God's plagues, have gone

Through guilty glorious Babylon.

And while such murmurs flow, the nymph

Bends o'er the harp-top from her shell

As the dry limpet for the lymph

Come with a tune he knows so well.

And how your statues' hearts must swell!

And how your pictures must descend

To see each other, friend with friend!

Oh, could you take them by surprise,

You 'd find Schidone's eager Duke

Doing the quaintest courtesies

To that prim saint by Haste-thee-Luke!

And, deeper into her rock den,

Bold Castelfranco's Magdalen

You 'd find retreated from the ken

Of that robed counsel-keeping Ser—

As if the Tizian thinks of her,

And is not, rather, gravely bent

On seeing for himself what toys

Are these, his progeny invent,

What litter now the board employs

Whereon he signed a document

That got him murdered! Each enjoys

Its night so well, you cannot break

The sport up, so, indeed must make

More stay with me, for others' sake.

She speaks.

To-morrow, if a harp-string, say,

Is used to tie the jasmine back

That overfloods my room with sweets,

Contrive your Zorzi somehow meets

My Zanze! If the ribbon's black,

The Three are watching: keep away!

Your gondola—let Zorzi wreathe

A mesh of water-weeds about

Its prow, as if he unaware

Had struck some quay or bridge-foot stair!

That I may throw a paper out

As you and he go underneath.

There 's Zanze 's vigilant taper; safe are we.

Only one minute more to-night with me?

Resume your past self of a month ago!

Be you the bashful gallant, I will be

The lady with the colder breast than snow.

Now bow you, as becomes, nor touch my hand

More than I touch yours when I step to land,

And say, "All thanks, Siora!"—

Heart to heart

And lips to lips! Yet once more, ere we part,

Clasp me and make me thine, as mine thou art!

He is surprised, and stabbed.

It was ordained to be so, sweet!—and best

Comes now, beneath thine eyes, upon thy breast.

Still kiss me! Care not for the cowards! Care

Only to put aside thy beauteous hair

My blood will hurt! The Three, I do not scorn

To death, because they never lived: but I

Have lived indeed, and so—(yet one more kiss)—can die!

WARING

An account of Alfred Domett, Browning's early friend, who was the occasion of this poem, will be found in the notes.

What 's become of Waring

Since he gave us all the slip,

Chose land-travel or seafaring,

Boots and chest or staff and scrip,

Rather than pace up and down

Any longer London town?

Who'd have guessed it from his lip

Or his brow's accustomed bearing,

On the night he thus took ship

Or started landward?—little caring

For us, it seems, who supped together

(Friends of his too, I remember)

And walked home through the merry weather,

The snowiest in all December.

I left his arm that night myself

For what 's-his-name's, the new prose-poet

Who wrote the book there, on the shelf—

How, forsooth, was I to know it

If Waring meant to glide away

Like a ghost at break of day?

Never looked he half so gay!

III

He was prouder than the devil:

How he must have cursed our revel!

Ay and many other meetings,

Indoor visits, outdoor greetings,

As up and down he paced this London,

With no work done, but great works undone,

Where scarce twenty knew his name.

Why not, then, have earlier spoken,

Written, bustled? Who 's to blame

If your silence kept unbroken?

"True, but there were sundry jottings,

Stray-leaves, fragments, blurs and blottings,

Certain first steps were achieved

Already which"—(is that your meaning?)

"Had well borne out whoe'er believed

In more to come!" But who goes gleaning

Hedgeside chance-blades, while full-sheaved

Stand cornfields by him? Pride, o'erweening

Pride alone, puts forth such claims

O'er the day's distinguished names.

Meantime, how much I loved him,

I find out now I 've lost him.

I who cared not if I moved him,

Who could so carelessly accost him,

Henceforth never shall get free

Of his ghostly company.

His eyes that just a little wink

As deep I go into the merit

Of this and that distinguished spirit—

His cheeks' raised color, soon to sink,

As long I dwell on some stupendous

And tremendous (Heaven defend us!)

Monstr'-inform'-ingens-horrend-ous

Demoniaco-seraphic

Penman's latest piece of graphic.

Nay, my very wrist grows warm

With his dragging weight of arm.

E'en so, swimmingly appears,

Through one's after-supper musings,

Some lost lady of old years

With her beauteous vain endeavor

And goodness unrepaid as ever;

The face, accustomed to refusings,

We, puppies that we were ... Oh never

Surely, nice of conscience, scrupled

Being aught like false, forsooth, to?

Telling aught but honest truth to?

What a sin, had we centupled

Its possessor's grace and sweetness!

No! she heard in its completeness

Truth, for truth 's a weighty matter,

And truth, at issue, we can't flatter!

Well, 't is done with; she 's exempt

From damning us through such a sally;

And so she glides, as down a valley,

Taking up with her contempt,

Past our reach; and in, the flowers

Shut her unregarded hours.

Oh, could I have him back once more,

This Waring, but one half-day more!

Back, with the quiet face of yore,

So hungry for acknowledgment

Like mine! I'd fool him to his bent.

Feed, should not he, to heart's content?

I 'd say, "to only have conceived,

Planned your great works, apart from progress,

Surpasses little works achieved!"

I 'd lie so, I should be believed.

I 'd make such havoc of the claims

Of the day's distinguished names

To feast him with, as feasts an ogress

Her feverish sharp-toothed gold-crowned child!

Or as one feasts a creature rarely

Captured here, unreconciled

To capture; and completely gives

Its pettish humors license, barely

Requiring that it lives.

Ichabod, Ichabod,

The glory is departed!

Travels Waring East away?

Who, of knowledge, by hearsay,

Reports a man upstarted

Somewhere as a god,

Hordes grown European-hearted,

Millions of the wild made tame

On a sudden at his fame?

In Vishnu-land what Avatar?

Or who in Moscow, toward the Czar,

With the demurest of footfalls

Over the Kremlin's pavement bright

With serpentine and syenite,

Steps, with five other Generals

That simultaneously take snuff,

For each to have pretext enough

And kerchiefwise unfold his sash

Which, softness' self, is yet the stuff

To hold fast where a steel chain snaps,

And leave the grand white neck no gash?

Waring in Moscow, to those rough

Cold northern natures born perhaps,

Like the lambwhite maiden dear

From the circle of mute kings

Unable to repress the tear,

Each as his sceptre down he flings,

To Dian's fane at Taurica,

Where now a captive priestess, she alway

Mingles her tender grave Hellenic speech

With theirs, tuned to the hailstone-beaten beach

As pours some pigeon, from the myrrhy lands

Rapt by the whirlblast to fierce Scythian strands

Where breed the swallows, her melodious cry

Amid their barbarous twitter!

In Russia? Never! Spain were fitter!

Ay, most likely 't is in Spain

That we and Waring meet again

Now, while he turns down that cool narrow lane

Into the blackness, out of grave Madrid

All fire and shine, abrupt as when there 's slid

Its stiff gold blazing pall

From some black coffin-lid.

Or, best of all,

I love to think

The leaving us was just a feint;

Back here to London did he slink,

And now works on without a wink

Of sleep, and we are on the brink

Of something great in fresco-paint:

Some garret's ceiling, walls and floor,

Up and down and o'er and o'er

He splashes, as none splashed before

Since great Caldara Polidore.

Or Music means this land of ours

Some favor yet, to pity won

By Purcell from his Rosy Bowers,—

"Give me my so-long promised son,

Let Waring end what I begun!"

Then down he creeps and out he steals

Only when the night conceals

His face; in Kent 't is cherry-time,

Or hops are picking: or at prime

Of March he wanders as, too happy,

Years ago when he was young,

Some mild eve when woods grew sappy

And the early moths had sprung

To life from many a trembling sheath

Woven the warm boughs beneath;

While small birds said to themselves

What should soon be actual song,

And young gnats, by tens and twelves,

Made as if they were the throng

That crowd around and carry aloft

The sound they have nursed, so sweet and pure.

Out of a myriad noises soft,

Into a tone that can endure

Amid the noise of a July noon

When all God's creatures crave their boon,

All at once and all in tune,

And get it, happy as Waring then,

Having first within his ken

What a man might do with men:

And far too glad, in the even-glow.

To mix with the world he meant to take

Into his hand, he told you, so—

And out of it his world to make,

To contract and to expand

As he shut or oped his hand.

O Waring, what 's to really be?

A clear stage and a crowd to see!

Some Garrick, say, out shall not he

The heart of Hamlet's mystery pluck?

Or, where most unclean beasts are rife,

Some Junius—am I right?—shall tuck

His sleeve, and forth with flaying-knife!

Some Chatterton shall have the luck

Of calling Rowley into life!

Some one shall somehow run a-muck

With this old world for want of strife

Sound asleep. Contrive, contrive

To rouse us, Waring! Who 's alive?

Our men scarce seem in earnest now.

Distinguished names!—but 't is, somehow,

As if they played at being names

Still more distinguished, like the games

Of children. Turn our sport to earnest

With a visage of the sternest!

Bring the real times back, confessed

Still better than our very best!

"Give" and "It-shall-be-given-unto-you"

Originally published in 1854, in connection with a poem by Mrs. Browning, A Plea for the Ragged Schools of London, in a volume issued for a bazaar to benefit the "Refuge for Young Destitute Girls."

Grand rough old Martin Luther

Bloomed fables—flowers on furze,

The better the uncouther:

Do roses stick like burrs?

A beggar asked an alms

One day at an abbey-door,

Said Luther; but, seized with qualms,

The Abbot replied, "We 're poor!

"Poor, who had plenty once,

When gifts fell thick as rain:

But they give us naught, for the nonce,

And how should we give again?"

Then the beggar, "See your sins!

Of old, unless I err,

Ye had brothers for inmates, twins,

Date and Dabitur.

"While Date was in good case

Dabitur flourished too:

For Dabitur's lenten face

No wonder if Date rue.

"Would ye retrieve the one?

Try and make plump the other!

When Date's penance is done,

Dabitur helps his brother.

"Only, beware relapse!"

The Abbot hung his head.

This beggar might be perhaps

An angel, Luther said.

A LIGHT WOMAN

So far as our story approaches the end,

Which do you pity the most of us three?—

My friend, or the mistress of my friend

With her wanton eyes, or me?

My friend was already too good to lose,

And seemed in the way of improvement yet,

When she crossed his path with her hunting-noose,

And over him drew her net.

When I saw him tangled in her toils,

A shame, said I, if she adds just him

To her nine-and-ninety other spoils,

The hundredth for a whim!

And before my friend be wholly hers,

How easy to prove to him, I said,

An eagle 's the game her pride prefers,

Though she snaps at a wren instead!

So, I gave her eyes my own eyes to take,

My hand sought hers as in earnest need,

And round she turned for my noble sake,

And gave me herself indeed.

The eagle am I, with my fame in the world,

The wren is he, with his maiden face.

—You look away and your lip is curled?

Patience, a moment's space!

For see, my friend goes shaking and white;

He eyes me as the basilisk:

I have turned, it appears, his day to night,

Eclipsing his sun's disk.

And I did it, he thinks, as a very thief:

"Though I love her—that, he comprehends—

One should master one's passions, (love, in chief)

And be loyal to one's friends!"

And she,—she lies in my hand as tame

As a pear late basking over a wall;

Just a touch to try and off it came;

'T is mine,—can I let it fall?

With no mind to eat it, that 's the worst!

Were it thrown in the road, would the case assist?

'T was quenching a dozen blue-flies' thirst

When I gave its stalk a twist.

And I,—what I seem to my friend, you see:

What I soon shall seem to his love, you guess:

What I seem to myself, do you ask of me?

No hero, I confess.

'T is an awkward thing to play with souls,

And matter enough to save one's own:

Yet think of my friend, and the burning coals

He played with for bits of stone!

One likes to show the truth for the truth;

That the woman was light is very true:

But suppose she says,—Never mind that youth!

What wrong have I done to you?

Well, anyhow, here the story stays,

So far at least as I understand;

And, Robert Browning, you writer of plays,

Here 's a subject made to your hand!

THE LAST RIDE TOGETHER

I said—Then, dearest, since 't is so,

Since now at length my fate I know,

Since nothing all my love avails,

Since all, my life seemed meant for, fails,

Since this was written and needs must be—

My whole heart rises up to bless

Your name in pride and thankfulness!

Take back the hope you gave,—I claim

Only a memory of the same,

—And this beside, if you will not blame,

Your leave for one more last ride with me.

My mistress bent that brow of hers;

Those deep dark eyes where pride demurs

When pity would be softening through,

Fixed me a breathing-while or two

With life or death in the balance: right!

The blood replenished me again;

My last thought was at least not vain:

I and my mistress, side by side

Shall be together, breathe and ride,

So, one day more am I deified.

Who knows but the world may end to-night?

Hush! if you saw some western cloud

All billowy-bosomed, over-bowed

By many benedictions—sun's

And moon's and evening-star's at once—

And so, you, looking and loving best,

Conscious grew, your passion drew

Cloud, sunset, moonrise, star-shine too,

Down on you, near and yet more near,

Till flesh must fade for heaven was here!—

Thus leant she and lingered—joy and fear!

Thus lay she a moment on my breast.

Then we began to ride. My soul

Smoothed itself out, a long-cramped scroll

Freshening and fluttering in the wind.

Past hopes already lay behind.

What need to strive with a life awry?

Had I said that, had I done this,

So might I gain, so might I miss.

Might she have loved me? just as well

She might have hated, who can tell!

Where had I been now if the worst befell?

And here we are riding, she and I.

Fail I alone, in words and deeds?

Why, all men strive, and who succeeds?

We rode; it seemed my spirit flew,

Saw other regions, cities new,

As the world rushed by on either side.

I thought,—All labor, yet no less

Bear up beneath their unsuccess.

Look at the end of work, contrast

The petty done, the undone vast,

This present of theirs with the hopeful past!

I hoped she would love me; here we ride.

What hand and brain went ever paired?

What heart alike conceived and dared?

What act proved all its thought had been?

What will but felt the fleshly screen?

We ride and I see her bosom heave.

There's many a crown for who can reach.

Ten lines, a statesman's life in each!

The flag stuck on a heap of bones,

A soldier's doing! what atones?

They scratch his name on the Abbey-stones.

My riding is better, by their leave.

What does it all mean, poet? Well,

Your brains beat into rhythm, you tell

What we felt only; you expressed

You hold things beautiful the best,

And place them in rhyme so, side by side.

'Tis something, nay 'tis much: but then,

Have you yourself what's best for men?

Are you—poor, sick, old ere your time—

Nearer one whit your own sublime

Than we who never have turned a rhyme?

Sing, riding's a joy! For me, I ride.

And you, great sculptor—so, you gave

A score of years to Art, her slave,

And that's your Venus, whence we turn

To yonder girl that fords the burn!

You acquiesce, and shall I repine?

What, man of music, you grown gray

With notes and nothing else to say,

Is this your sole praise from a friend,

"Greatly his opera's strains intend,

But in music we know how fashions end!"

I gave my youth; but we ride, in fine.

Who knows what's fit for us? Had fate

Proposed bliss here should sublimate

My being—had I signed the bond—

Still one must lead some life beyond,

Have a bliss to die with, dim-descried.

This foot once planted on the goal,

This glory-garland round my soul,

Could I descry such? Try and test!

I sink back shuddering from the quest.

Earth being so good, would heaven seem best?

Now, heaven and she are beyond this ride.

And yet—she has not spoke so long!

What if heaven be that, fair and strong

At life's best, with our eyes upturned

Whither life's flower is first discerned,

We, fixed so, ever should so abide?

What if we still ride on, we two,

With life forever old yet new,

Changed not in kind but in degree,

The instant made eternity,—

And heaven just prove that I and she

Ride, ride together, forever ride?

THE PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN

A CHILD'S STORY

(Written for, and inscribed to, W. M. the Younger)

Macready's eldest son when a child was confined to the house by illness, and Browning wrote this jeu d'esprit to amuse the child and give him a subject for illustrative drawings.

Hamelin Town's in Brunswick,

By famous Hanover city;

The river Weser, deep and wide,

Washes its wall on the southern side;

A pleasanter spot you never spied;

But, when begins my ditty,

Almost five hundred years ago,

To see the townsfolk suffer so

From vermin, was a pity.

Rats!

They fought the dogs and killed the cats,

And bit the babies in the cradles,

And ate the cheeses out of the vats,

And licked the soup from the cooks' own ladles,

Split open the kegs of salted sprats,

Made nests inside men's Sunday hats,

And even spoiled the women's chats

By drowning their speaking

With shrieking and squeaking

In fifty different sharps and flats.

III

At last the people in a body

To the Town Hall came flocking:

"'T is clear," cried they, "our Mayor's a noddy;

And as for our Corporation—shocking

To think we buy gowns lined with ermine

For dolts that can't or won't determine

What's best to rid us of our vermin!

You hope, because you're old and obese,

To find in the furry civic robe ease?

Rouse up, sirs! Give your brains a racking

To find the remedy we're lacking,

Or, sure as fate, we'll send you packing!"

At this the Mayor and Corporation

Quaked with a mighty consternation.

An hour they sat in council;

At length the Mayor broke silence:

"For a guilder I'd my ermine gown sell,

I wish I were a mile hence!

It's easy to bid one rack one's brain—

I'm sure my poor head aches again,

I've scratched it so, and all in vain.

Oh for a trap, a trap, a trap!"

Just as he said this, what should hap

At the chamber-door but a gentle tap?

"Bless us," cried the Mayor, "what's that?

(With the Corporation as he sat,

Looking little though wondrous fat;

Nor brighter was his eye, nor moister

Than a too-long-opened oyster,

Save when at noon his paunch grew mutinous

For a plate of turtle green and glutinous)

"Only a scraping of shoes on the mat?

Anything like the sound of a rat

Makes my heart go pit-a-pat!"

"Come in!"—the Mayor cried, looking bigger:

And in did come the strangest figure!

His queer long coat from heel to head

Was half of yellow and half of red,

And he himself was tall and thin,

With sharp blue eyes, each like a pin,

And light loose hair, yet swarthy skin,

No tuft on cheek nor beard on chin,

But lips where smiles went out and in;

There was no guessing his kith and kin:

And nobody could enough admire

The tall man and his quaint attire.

Quoth one: "It 's as my great-grandsire,

Starting up at the Trump of Doom's tone,

Had walked this way from his painted tombstone!"

He advanced to the council-table:

And, "Please your honors," said he, "I 'm able,

By means of a secret charm, to draw

All creatures living beneath the sun,

That creep or swim or fly or run,

After me so as you never saw!

And I chiefly use my charm

On creatures that do people harm,

The mole and toad and newt and viper;

And people call me the Pied Piper."

(And here they noticed round his neck

A scarf of red and yellow stripe,

To match with his coat of the self-same cheque;

And at the scarf's end hung a pipe;

And his fingers, they noticed, were ever straying

As if impatient to be playing

Upon this pipe, as low it dangled

Over his vesture so old-fangled.)

"Yet," said he, "poor piper as I am,

In Tartary I freed the Cham,

Last June, from his huge swarms of gnats;

I eased in Asia the Nizam

Of a monstrous brood of vampire-bats:

And as for what your brain bewilders,

If I can rid your town of rats

Will you give me a thousand guilders?"

"One? fifty thousand!"—was the exclamation

Of the astonished Mayor and Corporation.

VII

Into the street the Piper stept,

Smiling first a little smile,

As if he knew what magic slept

In his quiet pipe the while;

Then, like a musical adept,

To blow the pipe his lips he wrinkled,

And green and blue his sharp eyes twinkled,

Like a candle-flame where salt is sprinkled;

And ere three shrill notes the pipe uttered,

You heard as if an army muttered;

And the muttering grew to a grumbling;

And the grumbling grew to a mighty rumbling;

And out of the houses the rats came tumbling.

Great rats, small rats, lean rats, brawny rats,

Brown rats, black rats, gray rats, tawny rats,

Grave old plodders, gay young friskers,

Fathers, mothers, uncles, cousins,

Cocking tails and pricking whiskers,

Families by tens and dozens,

Brothers, sisters, husbands, wives—

Followed the Piper for their lives.

From street to street he piped advancing,

And step for step they followed dancing,

Until they came to the river Weser,

Wherein all plunged and perished!

—Save one who, stout as Julius CÆsar,

Swam across and lived to carry

(As he, the manuscript he cherished)

To Rat-land home his commentary:

Which was, "At the first shrill notes of the pipe,

I heard a sound as of scraping tripe,

And putting apples, wondrous ripe,

Into a cider-press's gripe:

And a moving away of pickle-tub-boards,

And a leaving ajar of conserve-cupboards,

And a drawing the corks of train oil-flasks,

And a breaking the hoops of butter-casks:

And it seemed as if a voice

(Sweeter far than by harp or by psaltery

Is breathed) called out, 'Oh rats, rejoice!

The world is grown to one vast drysaltery!

So munch on, crunch on, take your nuncheon,

Breakfast, supper, dinner, luncheon!'

And just as a bulky sugar-puncheon,

All ready staved, like a great sun shone

Glorious scarce an inch before me,

Just as methought it said, 'Come, bore me!'

—I found the Weser rolling o'er me."

VIII

You should have heard the Hamelin people

Ringing the bells till they rocked the steeple.

"Go," cried the Mayor, "and get long poles,

Poke out the nests and block up the holes!

Consult with carpenters and builders,

And leave in our town not even a trace

Of the rats!"—when suddenly, up the face

Of the Piper perked in the market-place,

With a, "First, if you please, my thousand guilders!"

A thousand guilders! The Mayor looked blue;

So did the Corporation too.

For council dinners made rare havoc

With Claret, Moselle, Vin-de-Grave, Hock;

And half the money would replenish

Their cellar's biggest butt with Rhenish.

To pay this sum to a wandering fellow

With a gypsy coat of red and yellow!

"Beside," quoth the Mayor with a knowing wink,

"Our business was done at the river's brink;

We saw with our eyes the vermin sink,

And what 's dead can't come to life, I think.

So, friend, we 're not the folks to shrink

From the duty of giving you something for drink,

And a matter of money to put in your poke;

But as for the guilders, what we spoke

Of them, as you very well know, was in joke.

Beside, our losses have made us thrifty.

A thousand guilders! Come, take fifty!"

The Piper's face fell, and he cried,

"No trifling! I can't wait, beside!

I 've promised to visit by dinner time

Bagdat, and accept the prime

Of the Head-Cook's pottage, all he 's rich in,

For having left, in the Caliph's kitchen,

Of a nest of scorpions no survivor:

With him I proved no bargain-driver,

With you, don't think I 'll bate a stiver!

And folks who put me in a passion

May find me pipe after another fashion."

"How?" cried the Mayor, "d' ye think I brook

Being worse treated than a Cook?

Insulted by a lazy ribald

With idle pipe and vesture piebald?

You threaten us, fellow? Do your worst,

Blow your pipe there till you burst!"

XII

Once more he stept into the street,

And to his lips again

Laid his long pipe of smooth straight cane;

And ere he blew three notes (such sweet

Soft notes as yet musician's cunning

Never gave the enraptured air)

There was a rustling that seemed like a bustling

Of merry crowds justling at pitching and hustling;

Small feet were pattering, wooden shoes clattering,

Little hands clapping and little tongues chattering,

And, like fowls in a farm-yard when barley is scattering,

Out came the children running.

All the little boys and girls,

With rosy cheeks and flaxen curls,

And sparkling eyes and teeth like pearls,

Tripping and skipping, ran merrily after

The wonderful music with shouting and laughter.

XIII

The Mayor was dumb, and the Council stood

As if they were changed into blocks of wood,

Unable to move a step, or cry

To the children merrily skipping by,

—Could only follow with the eye

That joyous crowd at the Piper's back.

But how the Mayor was on the rack,

And the wretched Council's bosoms beat,

As the Piper turned from the High Street

To where the Weser rolled its waters

Right in the way of their sons and daughters!

However, he turned from South to West,

And to Koppelberg Hill his steps addressed,

And after him the children pressed;

Great was the joy in every breast.

"He never can cross that mighty top!

He 's forced to let the piping drop,

And we shall see our children stop!"

When, lo, as they reached the mountain-side,

A wondrous portal opened wide,

As if a cavern was suddenly hollowed;

And the Piper advanced and the children followed,

And when all were in to the very last,

The door in the mountain-side shut fast.

Did I say, all? No! One was lame,

And could not dance the whole of the way;

And in after years, if you would blame

His sadness, he was used to say,—

"It 's dull in our town since my playmates left!

I can't forget that I 'm bereft

Of all the pleasant sights they see,

Which the Piper also promised me.

For he led us, he said, to a joyous land,

Joining the town and just at hand,

Where waters gushed and fruit-trees grew

And flowers put forth a fairer hue,

And everything was strange and new;

The sparrows were brighter than peacocks here,

And their dogs outran our fallow deer,

And honey-bees had lost their stings,

And horses were born with eagles' wings:

And just as I became assured

My lame foot would be speedily cured,

The music stopped and I stood still,

And found myself outside the hill,

Left alone against my will,

To go now limping as before,

And never hear of that country more!"

XIV

Alas, alas for Hamelin!

There came into many a burgher's pate

A text which says that heaven's gate

Opes to the rich at as easy rate

As the needle's eye takes a camel in!

The Mayor sent East, West, North and South,

To offer the Piper, by word of mouth,

Wherever it was men's lot to find him,

Silver and gold to his heart's content,

If he 'd only return the way he went,

And bring the children behind him.

But when they saw 't was a lost endeavor,

And Piper and dancers were gone forever,

They made a decree that lawyers never

Should think their records dated duly

If, after the day of the month and year,

These words did not as well appear,

"And so long after what happened here

On the Twenty-second of July,

Thirteen hundred and seventy-six:"

And the better in memory to fix

The place of the children's last retreat,

They called it, the Pied Piper's Street—

Where any one playing on pipe or tabor

Was sure for the future to lose his labor,

Nor suffered they hostelry or tavern

To shock with mirth a street so solemn;

But opposite the place of the cavern

They wrote the story on a column.

And on the great church-window painted

The same, to make the world acquainted

How their children were stolen away,

And there it stands to this very day.

And I must not omit to say

That in Transylvania there 's a tribe

Of alien people who ascribe

The outlandish ways and dress

On which their neighbors lay such stress,

To their fathers and mothers having risen

Out of some subterraneous prison

Into which they were trepanned

Long time ago in a mighty band

Out of Hamelin town in Brunswick land,

But how or why, they don't understand.

So, Willy, let me and you be wipers

Of scores out with all men—especially pipers!

And, whether they pipe us free frÓm rats or frÓm mice,

If we 've promised them aught, let us keep our promise!

THE FLIGHT OF THE DUCHESS

The first nine sections of this poem were printed in Hood's Magazine for April, 1845.

The poem took its rise from a line—"Following the Queen of the Gypsies, O!" the burden of a song which the poet, when a boy, heard a woman singing on a Guy Fawkes' Day. As Browning was writing it, he was interrupted by the arrival of a friend on some important business, which drove all thoughts of the Duchess, and the scheme of her story, out of the poet's head. But some months after the publication of the first part, when he was staying at Bettisfield Park, in Shropshire, a guest, speaking of early winter, said, "The deer had already to break the ice in the pond." On this a fancy struck the poet, and, returning home, he worked it up into the conclusion of the poem as it now stands.

aged with hearty goodwill

Whatever he now might enjoin to fulfil.

And promised the lady a thorough frightening.

And so, just giving her a glimpse

Of a purse, with the air of a man who imps

The wing of the hawk that shall fetch the hern-shaw,

He bade me take the Gypsy mother

And set her telling some story or other

Of hill or dale, oak-wood or fernshaw,

To while away a weary hour

For the lady left alone in her bower,

Whose mind and body craved exertion

And yet shrank from all better diversion.

XIV

Then clapping heel to his horse, the mere curveter,

Out rode the Duke, and after his hollo

Horses and hounds swept, huntsman and servitor,

And back I turned and bade the crone follow.

And what makes me confident what's to be told you

Had all along been of this crone's devising,

Is, that, on looking round sharply, behold you,

There was a novelty quick as surprising:

For first, she had shot up a full head in stature,

And her step kept pace with mine nor faltered,

As if age had foregone its usurpature,

And the ignoble mien was wholly altered,

And the face looked quite of another nature,

And the change reached too, whatever the change meant,

Her shaggy wolf-skin cloak's arrangement:

For where its tatters hung loose like sedges,

Gold coins were glittering on the edges,

Like the band-roll strung with tomans

Which proves the veil a Persian woman's:

And under her brow, like a snail's horns newly

Come out as after the rain he paces,

Two unmistakable eye-points duly

Live and aware looked out of their places.

So, we went and found Jacynth at the entry

Of the lady's chamber standing sentry;

I told the command and produced my companion,

And Jacynth rejoiced to admit any one,

For since last night, by the same token,

Not a single word had the lady spoken:

They went in both to the presence together,

While I in the balcony watched the weather.

And now, what took place at the very first of all,

I cannot tell, as I never could learn it:

Jacynth constantly wished a curse to fall

On that little head of hers and burn it,

If she knew how she came to drop so soundly

Asleep of a sudden and there continue

The whole time sleeping as profoundly

As one of the boars my father would pin you

'Twixt the eyes where life holds garrison,

—Jacynth forgive me the comparison!

But where I begin my own narration

Is a little after I took my station

To breathe the fresh air from the balcony,

And, having in those days a falcon eye,

To follow the hunt through the open country,

From where the bushes thinlier crested

The hillocks, to a plain where's not one tree.

When, in a moment, my ear was arrested

By—was it singing, or was it saying,

Or a strange musical instrument playing

In the chamber?—and to be certain

I pushed the lattice, pulled the curtain,

And there lay Jacynth asleep,

Yet as if a watch she tried to keep,

In a rosy sleep along the floor

With her head against the door;

While in the midst, on the seat of state,

Was a queen—the Gypsy woman late,

With head and face downbent

On the lady's head and face intent:

For, coiled at her feet like a child at ease,

The lady sat between her knees,

And o'er them the lady's clasped hands met,

And on those hands her chin was set,

And her upturned face met the face of the crone

Wherein the eyes had grown and grown

As if she could double and quadruple

At pleasure the play of either pupil

—Very like, by her hands' slow fanning,

As up and down like a gor-crow's flappers

They moved to measure, or bell clappers.

I said, "Is it blessing, is it banning,

Do they applaud you or burlesque you—

Those hands and fingers with no flesh on?"

But, just as I thought to spring in to the rescue,

At once I was stopped by the lady's expression:

For it was life her eyes were drinking

From the crone's wide pair above unwinking,

—Life's pure fire received without shrinking,

Into the heart and breast whose heaving

Told you no single drop they were leaving,

—Life, that filling her, passed redundant

Into her very hair, back swerving

Over each shoulder, loose and abundant,

As her head thrown back showed the white throat curving;

And the very tresses shared in the pleasure,

Moving to the mystic measure,

Bounding as the bosom bounded.

I stopped short, more and more confounded,

As still her cheeks burned and eyes glistened,

As she listened and she listened:

When all at once a hand detained me,

The selfsame contagion gained me,

And I kept time to the wondrous chime,

Making out words and prose and rhyme,

Till it seemed that the music furled

Its wings like a task fulfilled, and dropped

From under the words it first had propped,

And left them midway in the world:

Word took word as hand takes hand,

I could hear at last, and understand,

And when I held the unbroken thread,

The Gypsy said:—

"And so at last we find my tribe.

And so I set thee in the midst,

And to one and all of them describe

What thou saidst and what thou didst,

Our long and terrible journey through,

And all thou art ready to say and do

In the trials that remain:

I trace them the vein and the other vein

That meet on thy brow and part again,

Making our rapid mystic mark;

And I bid my people prove and probe

Each eye's profound and glorious globe

Till they detect the kindred spark

In those depths so dear and dark,

Like the spots that snap and burst and flee,

Circling over the midnight sea.

And on that round young cheek of thine

SHORTLY AFTER THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING IN EUROPE

A MIDDLE-AGE INTERLUDE

Rosa Mundi; seu, fulcite me Floribus. A Conceit of Master Gysbrecht, Canon-Regular of Saint Jodocus-by-the-Bar, Ypres City. Cantuque, Virgilius. And hath often been sung at Hock-tide and Festivals. Gavisus eram, Jessides.

(It would seem to be a glimpse from the burning of Jacques du Bourg-Molay, at Paris, A. D. 1314; as distorted by the refraction from Flemish brain to brain, during the course of a couple of centuries. R. B.)

PREADMONISHETH THE ABBOT DEODAET

The Lord, we look to once for all,

Is the Lord we should look at, all at once:

He knows not to vary, saith Saint Paul,

Nor the shadow of turning, for the nonce.

See him no other than as he is!

Give both the infinitudes their due—

Infinite mercy, but, I wis,

As infinite a justice too.

[Organ: plagal-cadence.

As infinite a justice too.

ONE SINGETH

John, Master of the Temple of God,

Falling to sin the Unknown Sin,

What he bought of Emperor Aldabrod,

He sold it to Sultan Saladin:

Till, caught by Pope Clement, a-buzzing there,

Hornet-prince of the mad wasps' hive,

And clipt of his wings in Paris square,

They bring him now to be burned alive.

[And wanteth there grace of lute or clavicithern, ye shall say to confirm him who singeth—

We bring John now to be burned alive.

In the midst is a goodly gallows built;

'Twixt fork and fork, a stake is stuck;

But first they set divers tumbrils a-tilt,

Make a trench all round with the city muck;

Inside they pile log upon log, good store;

Fagots not few, blocks great and small,

Reach a man's mid-thigh, no less, no more,—

For they mean he should roast in the sight of all.

Cho.—We mean he should roast in the sight of all.

Good sappy bavins that kindle forthwith;

Billets that blaze substantial and slow;

Pine-stump split deftly, dry as pith;

Larch-heart that chars to a chalk-white glow:

Then up they hoist me John in a chafe,

Sling him fast like a hog to scorch,

Spit in his face, then leap back safe,

Sing "Laudes" and bid clap-to the torch.

Cho.—Laus Deo—who bids clap-to the torch.

John of the Temple, whose fame so bragged,

Is burning alive in Paris square!

How can he curse, if his mouth is gagged?

Or wriggle his neck, with a collar there?

Or heave his chest, which a band goes round?

Or threat with his fist, since his arms are spliced?

Or kick with his feet, now his legs are bound?

—Thinks John, I will call upon Jesus Christ.

[Here one crosseth himself.

Jesus Christ—John had bought and sold,

Jesus Christ—John had eaten and drunk;

To him, the Flesh meant silver and gold.

(Salva reverentia.)

Now it was, "Saviour, bountiful lamb,

I have roasted thee Turks, though men roast me!

See thy servant, the plight wherein I am!

Art thou a saviour? Save thou me!"

Cho.—'T is John the mocker cries, "Save thou me!"

Who maketh God's menace an idle word?

—Saith, it no more means what it proclaims,

Than a damsel's threat to her wanton bird?—

For she too prattles of ugly names.

—Saith, he knoweth but one thing,—what he knows?

That God is good and the rest is breath;

Why else is the same styled Sharon's rose?

Once a rose, ever a rose, he saith.

Cho.—Oh, John shall yet find a rose, he saith!

Alack, there be roses and roses, John!

Some, honeyed of taste like your leman's tongue:

Some, bitter; for why? (roast gayly on!)

Their tree struck root in devil's dung.

When Paul once reasoned of righteousness

And of temperance and of judgment to come,

Good Felix trembled, he could no less:

John, snickering, crook'd his wicked thumb.

Cho.—What cometh to John of the wicked thumb?

Ha ha, John plucketh now at his rose

To rid himself of a sorrow at heart!

Lo,—petal on petal, fierce rays unclose;

Anther on anther, sharp spikes outstart;

And with blood for dew, the bosom boils;

And a gust of sulphur is all its smell;

And lo, he is horribly in the toils

Of a coal-black giant flower of hell!

Cho.—What maketh heaven, That maketh hell.

So, as John called now, through the fire amain,

On the Name, he had cursed with, all his life—

To the Person, he bought and sold again—

For the Face, with his daily buffets rife—

Feature by feature It took its place:

And his voice, like a mad dog's choking bark,

At the steady whole of the Judge's face—

Died. Forth John's soul flared into the dark.

SUBJOINETH THE ABBOT DEODAET

God help all poor souls lost in the dark!

HOLY-CROSS DAY

ON WHICH THE JEWS WERE FORCED TO ATTEND AN ANNUAL CHRISTIAN SERMON IN ROME

The passage from a mock-historic Diary which follows is by Browning himself.

"Now was come about Holy-Cross Day, and now must my lord preach his first sermon to the Jews: as it was of old cared for in the merciful bowels of the Church, that, so to speak, a crumb at least from her conspicuous table here in Rome should be, though but once yearly, cast to the famishing dogs, under-trampled and bespitten-upon beneath the feet of the guests. And a moving sight in truth, this, of so many of the besotted blind restif and ready-to-perish Hebrews! now maternally brought—nay, (for He saith, 'Compel them to come in') haled, as it were, by the head and hair, and against their obstinate hearts, to partake of the heavenly grace. What awakening, what striving with tears, what working of a yeasty conscience! Nor was my lord wanting to himself on so apt an occasion; witness the abundance of conversions which did incontinently reward him: though not to my lord be altogether the glory."—Diary by the Bishop's Secretary, 1600.

What the Jews really said, on thus being driven to church, was rather to this effect:—

Fee, faw, fum! bubble and squeak!

Blessedest Thursday 's the fat of the week.

Rumble and tumble, sleek and rough,

Stinking and savory, smug and gruff,

Take the church-road, for the bell's due chime

Gives us the summons—'t is sermon-time!

Boh, here 's Barnabas! Job, that 's you?

Up stumps Solomon—bustling too?

Shame, man! greedy beyond your years

To handsel the bishop's shaving-shears?

Fair play 's a jewel! Leave friends in the lurch?

Stand on a line ere you start for the church!

Higgledy piggledy, packed we lie,

Rats in a hamper, swine in a sty,

Wasps in a bottle, frogs in a sieve,

Worms in a carcass, fleas in a sleeve.

Hist! square shoulders, settle your thumbs

And buzz for the bishop—here he comes.

Bow, wow, wow—a bone for the dog!

I liken his Grace to an acorned hog.

What, a boy at his side, with the bloom of a lass,

To help and handle my lord's hour-glass!

Didst ever behold so lithe a chine?

His cheek hath laps like a fresh-singed swine.

Aaron's asleep—shove hip to haunch,

Or somebody deal him a dig in the paunch!

Look at the purse with the tassel and knob,

And the gown with the angel and thingumbob!

What's he at, quotha? reading his text!

Now you've his curtsey—and what comes next?

See to our converts—you doomed black dozen—

No stealing away—nor cog nor cozen!

You five, that were thieves, deserve it fairly;

You seven, that were beggars, will live less sparely;

You took your turn and dipped in the hat,

Got fortune—and fortune gets you; mind that!

Give your first groan—compunction's at work;

And soft! from a Jew you mount to a Turk.

Lo, Micah,—the selfsame beard on chin

He was four times already converted in!

Here's a knife, clip quick—it's a sign of grace—

Or he ruins us all with his hanging-face.

Whom now is the bishop a-leering at?

I know a point where his text falls pat.

I'll tell him to-morrow, a word just now

Went to my heart and made me vow

I meddle no more with the worst of trades—

Let somebody else pay his serenades.

Groan all together now, whee—hee—hee!

It's a-work, it's a-work, ah, woe is me!

It began, when a herd of us, picked and placed,

Were spurred through the Corso, stripped to the waist;

Jew brutes, with sweat and blood well spent

To usher in worthily Christian Lent.

It grew, when the hangman entered our bounds,

Yelled, pricked us out to his church like hounds:

It got to a pitch, when the hand indeed

Which gutted my purse would throttle my creed:

And it overflows, when, to even the odd,

Men I helped to their sins help me to their God.

But now, while the scapegoats leave our flock,

And the rest sit silent and count the clock,

Since forced to muse the appointed time

On these precious facts and truths sublime,—

Let us fitly employ it, under our breath,

In saying Ben Ezra's Song of Death.

For Rabbi Ben Ezra, the night he died,

Called sons and sons' sons to his side,

And spoke, "This world has been harsh and strange;

Something is wrong: there needeth a change.

But what, or where? at the last or first?

In one point only we sinned, at worst.

"The Lord will have mercy on Jacob yet.

And again in his border see Israel set.

When Judah beholds Jerusalem,

The stranger-seed shall be joined to them:

To Jacob's House shall the Gentiles cleave.

So the Prophet saith and his sons believe.

"Ay, the children of the chosen race

Shall carry and bring them to their place:

In the land of the Lord shall lead the same,

Bondsmen and handmaids. Who shall blame.

When the slaves enslave, the oppressed ones o'er

The oppressor triumph forevermore?

"God spoke, and gave us the word to keep:

Bade never fold the hands nor sleep

'Mid a faithless world,—at watch and ward,

Till Christ at the end relieve our guard.

By his servant Moses the watch was set:

Though near upon cock-crow, we keep it yet.

"Thou! if thou wast he, who at mid-watch came,

By the starlight, naming a dubious name!

And if, too heavy with sleep—too rash

With fear—O thou, if that martyr-gash

Fell on thee coming to take thine own,

And we gave the Cross, when we owed the Throne—

"Thou art the Judge. We are bruisÈd thus.

But, the Judgment over, join sides with us!

Thine too is the cause! and not more thine

Than ours, is the work of these dogs and swine,

Whose life laughs through and spits at their creed,

Who maintain thee in word, and defy thee in deed!

"We withstood Christ then? Be mindful how

At least we withstand Barabbas now!

Was our outrage sore? But the worst we spared,

To have called these—Christians, had we dared!

Let defiance to them pay mistrust of thee,

And Rome make amends for Calvary!

"By the torture, prolonged from age to age.

By the infamy, Israel's heritage,

By the Ghetto's plague, by the garb's disgrace,

By the badge of shame, by the felon's place,

By the branding-tool, the bloody whip,

And the summons to Christian fellowship,—

"We boast our proof that at least the Jew

Would wrest Christ's name from the Devil's crew.

Thy face took never so deep a shade

But we fought them in it, God our aid!

A trophy to bear, as we march, thy band,

South, East, and on to the Pleasant Land!"[4]

PROTUS

Among these latter busts we count by scores,

Half-emperors and quarter-emperors.

Bach with his bay-leaf fillet, loose-thonged vest,

Lorie and low-browed Gorgon on the breast,—

One loves a baby face, with violets there,

Violets instead of laurel in the hair,

As those were all the little locks could bear.

Now read here. "Protus ends a period

Of empery beginning with a god;

Born in the porphyry chamber at Byzant,

Queens by his cradle, proud and ministrant:

And if he quickened breath there, 't would like fire

Pantingly through the dim vast realm transpire.

A fame that he was missing spread afar:

The world, from its four corners, rose in war,

Till he was borne out on a balcony

To pacify the world when it should see.

The captains ranged before him, one, his hand

Made baby points at, gained the chief command.

And day by day more beautiful he grew

In shape, all said, in feature and in hue,

While young Greek sculptors, gazing on the child

Became with old Greek sculpture reconciled.

Already sages labored to condense

In easy tomes a life's experience:

And artists took grave counsel to impart

In one breath and one hand-sweep, all their art—

To make his graces prompt as blossoming

Of plentifully-watered palms in spring:

Since well beseems it, whoso mounts the throne,

For beauty, knowledge, strength, should stand alone,

And mortals love the letters of his name."

—Stop! Have you turned two pages? Still the same

New reign, same date. The scribe goes on to say

How that same year, on such a month and day,

"John the Pannonian, groundedly believed

A blacksmith's bastard, whose hard hand reprieved

The Empire from its fate the year before,—

Came, had a mind to take the crown, and wore

The same for six years (during which the Huns

Kept off their fingers from us), till his sons

Put something in his liquor"—and so forth.

Then a new reign. Stay—"Take at its just worth"

(Subjoins an annotator) "what I give

As hearsay. Some think, John let Protus live

And slip away. 'T is said, he reached man's age

At some blind northern court; made, first a page,

Then tutor to the children; last, of use

About the hunting-stables. I deduce

He wrote the little tract 'On worming dogs,'

Whereof the name in sundry catalogues

Is extant yet. A Protus of the race

Is rumored to have died a monk in Thrace,—

And if the same, he reached senility."

Here's John the Smith's rough-hammered head. Great eye,

Gross jaw and griped lips do what granite can

To give you the crown-grasper. What a man!

THE STATUE AND THE BUST

This poem was published first in 1855 as an independent issue. A correspondent of an American paper once asked the following questions respecting this poem:—

"1. When, how, and where did it happen? Browning's divine vagueness lets one gather only that the lady's husband was a Riccardi. 2. Who was the lady? who the duke? 3. The magnificent house wherein Florence lodges her prÉfet is known to all Florentine ball-goers as the Palazzo Riccardi. It was bought by the Riccardi from the Medici in 1659. From none of its windows did the lady gaze at her more than royal lover. From what window, then, if from any? Are the statue and the bust still in their original positions?"

The letter fell into the hands of Mr. Thomas J. Wise, who sent it to Mr. Browning, and received the following answer.

Jan. 8, 1887.

Dear Mr. Wise,—I have seldom met with, such a strange inability to understand what seems the plainest matter possible: 'ball-goers' are probably not history-readers, but any guide-book would confirm what is sufficiently stated in the poem. I will append a note or two, however. 1. 'This story the townsmen tell;' 'when, how, and where,' constitutes the subject of the poem. 2. The lady was the wife of Riccardi; and the duke, Ferdinand, just as the poem says. 3. As it was built by, and inhabited by, the Medici till sold, long after, to the Riccardi, it was not from the duke's palace, but a window in that of the Riccardi, that the lady gazed at her lover riding by. The statue is still in its place, looking at the window under which 'now is the empty shrine.' Can anything be clearer? My 'vagueness' leaves what to be 'gathered' when all these things are put down in black and white? Oh, 'ball-goers'!"

There's a palace in Florence, the world knows well,

And a statue watches it from the square,

And this story of both do our townsmen tell.

Ages ago, a lady there,

At the farthest window facing the East

Asked, "Who rides by with the royal air?"

The bridesmaids' prattle around her ceased;

She leaned forth, one on either hand;

They saw how the blush of the bride increased—

They felt by its beats her heart expand—

As one at each ear and both in a breath

"Whispered, "The Great-Duke Ferdinand."

That selfsame instant, underneath,

The Duke rode past in his idle way,

Empty and fine like a swordless sheath.

Gay he rode, with a friend as gay,

Till he threw his head back—"Who is she?"

—"A bride the Riccardi brings home to-day."

Hair in heaps lay heavily

Over a pale brow spirit-pure—

Carved like the heart of the coal-black tree,

Crisped like a war-steed's encolure—

And vainly sought to dissemble her eyes

Of the blackest black our eyes endure,

And lo, a blade for a knight's emprise

Filled the fine empty sheath of a man,—

The Duke grew straightway brave and wise.

He looked at her, as a lover can;

She looked at him, as one who awakes:

The past was a sleep, and her life began.

Now, love so ordered for both their sakes,

A feast was held that selfsame night

In the pile which the mighty shadow makes.

(For Via Larga is three-parts light,

But the palace overshadows one,

Because of a crime, which may God requite!

To Florence and God the wrong was done,

Through the first republic's murder there

By Cosimo and his cursed son.)

The Duke (with the statue's face in the square)

Turned in the midst of his multitude

At the bright approach of the bridal pair.

Face to face the lovers stood

A single minute and no more,

While the bridegroom bent as a man subdued;—

Bowed till his bonnet brushed the floor—

For the Duke on the lady a kiss conferred,

As the courtly custom was of yore.

In a minute can lovers exchange a word?

If a word did pass, which I do not think,

Only one out of a thousand heard.

That was the bridegroom. At day's brink

He and his bride were alone at last

In a bed chamber by a taper's blink.

Calmly he said that her lot was cast,

That the door she had passed was shut on her

Till the final catafalk repassed.

The world meanwhile, its noise and stir,

Through a certain window facing the East

She could watch like a convent's chronicler.

Since passing the door might lead to a feast,

And a feast might lead to so much beside,

He, of many evils, chose the least.

"Freely I choose too," said the bride—

"Your window and its world suffice,"

Replied the tongue, while the heart replied—

"If I spend the night with that devil twice,

May his window serve as my loop of hell

Whence a damned soul looks on paradise!

"I fly to the Duke who loves me well,

Sit by his side and laugh at sorrow

Ere I count another ave-bell.

"'T is only the coat of a page to borrow,

And tie my hair in a horse-boy's trim.

And I save my soul—but not to-morrow"—

(She checked herself and her eye grew dim)

"My father tarries to bless my state:

I must keep it one day more for him.

"Is one day more so long to wait?

Moreover the Duke rides past, I know;

We shall see each other, sure as fate."

She turned on her side and slept. Just so!

So we resolve on a thing and sleep:

So did the lady, ages ago.

That night the Duke said, "Dear or cheap

As the cost of this cup of bliss may prove

To body or soul, I will drain it deep."

And on the morrow, bold with love,

He beckoned the bridegroom (close on call,

As his duty bade, by the Duke's alcove)

And smiled "'T was a very funeral,

Your lady will think, this feast of ours,—

A shame to efface, whate'er befall!

"What if we break from the Arno bowers,

And try if Petraja, cool and green,

Cure last night's fault with this morning's flowers?"

The bridegroom, not a thought to be seen

On his steady brow and quiet mouth,

Said, "Too much favor for me so mean!

"But, alas! my lady leaves the South;

Each wind that comes from the Apennine

Is a menace to her tender youth:

"Nor a way exists, the wise opine,

If she quits her palace twice this year,

To avert the flower of life's decline."

Quoth the Duke, "A sage and a kindly fear.

Moreover Petraja is cold this spring:

Be our feast to-night as usual here!"

And then to himself—"Which night shall bring

Thy bride to her lover's embraces, fool—

Or I am the fool, and thou art the king!

"Yet my passion must wait a night, nor cool—

For to-night the Envoy arrives from France

Whose heart I unlock with thyself, my tool.

"I need thee still and might miss perchance.

To-day is not wholly lost, beside,

With its hope of my lady's countenance:

"For I ride—what should I do but ride?

And passing her palace, if I list,

May glance at its window—well betide!"

So said, so done: nor the lady missed

One ray that broke from the ardent brow,

Nor a curl of the lips where the spirit kissed.

Be sure that each renewed the vow,

No morrow's sun should arise and set

And leave them then as it left them now.

But next day passed, and next day yet,

'With still fresh cause to wait one day more

Ere each leaped over the parapet.

And still, as love's brief morning wore,

With a gentle start, half smile, half sigh,

They found love not as it seemed before.

They thought it would work infallibly,

But not in despite of heaven and earth:

The rose would blow when the storm passed by.

Meantime they could profit in winter's dearth

By store of fruits that supplant the rose:

The world and its ways have a certain worth:

And to press a point while these oppose

Were simple policy; better wait:

We lose no friends and we gain no foes.

Meantime, worse fates than a lover's fate,

Who daily may ride and pass and look

Where his lady watches behind the grate!

And she—she watched the square like a book

Holding one picture and only one,

Which daily to find she undertook:

When the picture was reached the book was done,

And she turned from the picture at night to scheme

Of tearing it out for herself next sun.

So weeks grew months, years; gleam by gleam

The glory dropped from their youth and love,

And both perceived they had dreamed a dream;

Which hovered as dreams do, still above:

But who can take a dream for a truth?

Oh, hide our eyes from the next remove!

One day as the lady saw her youth

Depart, and the silver thread that streaked

Her hair, and, worn by the serpent's tooth,

The brow so puckered, the chin so peaked,—

And wondered who the woman was,

Hollow-eyed and haggard-cheeked,

Fronting her silent in the glass—

"Summon here," she suddenly said,

"Before the rest of my old self pass,

"Him, the Carver, a hand to aid,

Who fashions the clay no love will change,

And fixes a beauty never to fade.

"Let Robbia's craft so apt and strange

Arrest the remains of young and fair,

And rivet them while the seasons range.

"Make me a face on the window there,

Waiting as ever, mute the while,

My love to pass below in the square!

"And let me think that it may beguile

Dreary days which the dead must spend

Down in their darkness under the aisle,

"To say, 'What matters it at the end?

I did no more while my heart was warm

Than does that image, my pale-faced friend.'

"Where is the use of the lip's red charm,

The heaven of hair, the pride of the brow,

And the blood that blues the inside arm—

"Unless we turn, as the soul knows how,

The earthly gift to an end divine?

A lady of clay is as good, I trow."

But long ere Robbia's cornice, fine,

With flowers and fruits which leaves enlace,

Was set where now is the empty shrine—

(And, leaning out of a bright blue space,

As a ghost might lean from a chink of sky,

The passionate pale lady's face—

Eying ever, with earnest eye

And quick-turned neck at its breathless stretch,

Some one who ever is passing by—)

The Duke had sighed like the simplest wretch

In Florence, "Youth—my dream escapes!

Will its record stay?" And he bade them fetch

Some subtle moulder of brazen shapes—

"Can the soul, the will, die out of a man

Ere his body find the grave that gapes?

"John of Douay shall effect my plan,

Set me on horseback here aloft,

Alive, as the crafty sculptor can,

"In the very square I have crossed so oft:

That men may admire, when future suns

Shall touch the eyes to a purpose soft,

"While the mouth and the brow stay brave in bronze—

Admire and say, 'When he was alive

How he would take his pleasure once!'

"And it shall go hard but I contrive

To listen the while, and laugh in my tomb

At idleness which aspires to strive."

So! While these wait the trump of doom,

How do their spirits pass, I wonder,

Nights and days in the narrow room?

Still, I suppose, they sit and ponder

What a gift life was, ages ago,

Six steps out of the chapel yonder.

Only they see not God, I know,

Nor all that chivalry of his,

The soldier-saints who, row on row,

Burn upward each to his point of bliss—

Since, the end of life being manifest,

He had burned his way through the world to this.

I hear you reproach, "But delay was best,

For their end was a crime."—Oh, a crime will do

As well, I reply, to serve for a test,

As a virtue golden through and through,

Sufficient to vindicate itself

And prove its worth at a moment's view!

Must a game be played for the sake of pelf?

Where a button goes, 't were an epigram

To offer the stamp of the very Guelph.

The true has no value beyond the sham:

As well the counter as coin, I submit,

When your table's a hat, and your prize, a dram.

Stake your counter as boldly every whit,

Venture as warily, use the same skill,

Do your best, whether winning or losing it,

If you choose to play!—is my principle.

Let a man contend to the uttermost

For his life's set prize, be it what it will!

The counter our lovers staked was lost

As surely as if it were lawful coin:

And the sin I impute to each frustrate ghost

Is—the unlit lamp and the ungirt loin,

Though the end in sight was a vice, I say.

You of the virtue (we issue join)

How strive you? De te, fabula!

PORPHYRIA'S LOVER

First printed in Mr. Fox's Monthly Repository in 1836, under the signature Z. When issued in Bells and Pomegranates it was grouped with Johannes Agricola in Meditation as No. II. of Madhouse Cells. The poem has an interest as the earliest, apparently, of Browning's monologues.

"CHILDE ROLAND TO THE DARK TOWER CAME"

See Edgar's song in Lear.

My first thought was, he lied in every word,

That hoary cripple, with malicious eye

Askance to watch the working of his lie

On mine, and mouth scarce able to afford

Suppression of the glee, that pursed and scored

Its edge, at one more victim gained thereby.

What else should he be set for, with his staff?

What, save to waylay with his lies, ensnare

All travellers who might find him posted there,

And ask the road? I guessed what skull-like laugh

Would break, what crutch 'gin write my epitaph

For pastime in the dusty thoroughfare,

If at his counsel I should turn aside

Into that ominous tract which, all agree,

Hides the Dark Tower. Yet acquiescingly

I did turn as he pointed: neither pride

Nor hope rekindling at the end descried,

So much as gladness that some end might be.

For, what with my whole world-wide wandering.

What with my search drawn out through years, my hope

Dwindled into a ghost not fit to cope

With that obstreperous joy success would bring,—

I hardly tried now to rebuke the spring

My heart made, finding failure in its scope.

As when a sick man very near to death

Seems dead indeed, and feels begin and end

The tears, and takes the farewell of each friend,

And hears one bid the other go, draw breath

Freelier outside, ("since all is o'er," he saith,

"And the blow fallen no grieving can amend;")

While some discuss if near the other graves

Be room enough for this, and when a day

Suits best for carrying the corpse away,

With care about the banners, scarves and staves:

And still the man hears all, and only craves

He may not shame such tender love and stay.

Thus, I had so long suffered in this quest,

Heard failure prophesied so oft, been writ

So many times among "The Band"—to wit,

The knights who to the Dark Tower's search addressed

Their steps—that just to fail as they, seemed best,

And all the doubt was now—should I be fit?

So, quiet as despair, I turned from him,

That hateful cripple, out of his highway

Into the path he pointed. All the day

Had been a dreary one at best, and dim

Was settling to its close, yet shot one grim

Red leer to see the plain catch its estray.

For mark! no sooner was I fairly found

Pledged to the plain, after a pace or two,

Than, pausing to throw backward a last view

O'er the safe road, 'twas gone; gray plain all round:

Nothing but plain to the horizon's bound.

I might go on; naught else remained to do.

So, on I went. I think I never saw

Such starved ignoble nature; nothing throve:

For flowers—as well expect a cedar grove!

But cockle, spurge, according to their law

Might propagate their kind, with none to awe,

You'd think: a burr had been a treasure trove.

No! penury, inertness and grimace,

In some strange sort, were the land's portion. "See

Or shut your eyes," said Nature peevishly,

"It nothing skills: I cannot help my case:

'Tis the Last Judgment's fire must cure this place,

Calcine its clods and set my prisoners free."

If there pushed any ragged thistle-stalk

Above its mates, the head was chopped; the bents

Were jealous else. What made those holes and rents

In the dock's harsh swarth leaves, bruised as to balk

All hope of greenness? 'tis a brute must walk

Pashing their life out, with a brute's intents.

As for the grass, it grew as scant as hair

In leprosy; thin dry blades pricked the mud

Which underneath looked kneaded up with blood.

One stiff blind horse, his every bone a-stare,

Stood stupefied, however he came there:

Thrust out past service from the devil's stud!

Alive? he might be dead for aught I know,

With that red gaunt and colloped neck a-strain,

And shut eyes underneath the rusty mane;

Seldom went such grotesqueness with such woe;.

I never saw a brute I hated so;

He must be wicked to deserve such pain.

I shut my eyes and turned them on my heart.

As a man calls for wine before he fights,

I asked one draught of earlier, happier sights,

Ere fitly I could hope to play my part.

Think first, fight afterwards—the soldier's art:

One taste of the old time sets all to rights.

Not it! I fancied Cuthbert's reddening face

Beneath its garniture of curly gold,

Dear fellow, till I almost felt him fold

An arm in mine to fix me to the place,

That way he used. Alas, one night's disgrace!.

Out went my heart's new fire and left it cold.

Giles then, the soul of honor—there he stands

Frank as ten years ago when knighted first.

What honest man should dare (he said) lie durst.

Good—but the scene shifts—faugh! what hangman hands

Pin to his breast a parchment? His own bands

Read it. Poor traitor, spit upon and curst!

Better this present than a past like that;

Back therefore to my darkening path again!

No sound, no sight as far as eye could strain.

Will the night send a howlet or a bat?

I asked: when something on the dismal flat

Came to arrest my thoughts and change their train.

A sudden little river crossed my path

As unexpected as a serpent comes.

No sluggish tide congenial to the glooms;

This, as it frothed by, might have been a bath

For the fiend's glowing hoof—to see the wrath

Of its black eddy bespate with flakes and spumes.

So petty yet so spiteful! All along,

Low scrubby alders kneeled down over it;

Drenched willows flung them headlong in a fit

Of mute despair, a suicidal throng:

The river which had done them all the wrong,

Whate'er that was, rolled by, deterred no whit.

Which, while I forded,—good saints, how I feared

To set my foot upon a dead man's cheek,

Each step, or feel the spear I thrust to seek

For hollows, tangled in his hair or beard!

—It may have been a water-rat I speared,

But, ugh! it sounded like a baby's shriek.

Glad was I when I reached the other bank.

Now for a better country. Vain presage!

Who were the strugglers, what war did they wage,

Whose savage trample thus could pad the dank

Soil to a plash? Toads in a poisoned tank,

Or wild cats in a red-hot iron cage—

The fight must so have seemed in that fell cirque.

What penned them there, with all the plain to choose?

No footprint leading to that horrid mews,

None out of it. Mad brewage set to work

Their brains, no doubt, like galley-slaves the Turk

Pits for his pastime, Christians against Jews.

And more than that—a furlong on—why, there!

What bad use was that engine for, that wheel,

Or brake, not wheel—that harrow fit to reel

Men's bodies out like silk? with all the air

Of Tophet's tool, on earth left unaware,

Or brought to sharpen its rusty teeth of steel.

Then came a bit of stubbed ground, once a wood,

Next a marsh, it would seem, and now mere earth

Desperate and done with: (so a fool finds mirth,

Makes a thing and then mars it, till his mood

Changes and off he goes!) within a rood—

Bog, clay and rubble, sand and stark black dearth.

Now blotches rankling, colored gay and grim,

Now patches where some leanness of the soil's

Broke into moss or substances like boils;

Then came some palsied oak, a cleft in him

Like a distorted mouth that splits its rim

Gaping at death, and dies while it recoils.

And just as far as ever from the end!

Naught in the distance but the evening, naught

To point my footstep further! At the thought,

A great black bird, Apollyon's bosom-friend,

Sailed past, nor beat his wide wing dragon-penned

That brushed my cap—perchance the guide I sought.

For, looking up, aware I somehow grew,

'Spite of the dusk, the plain had given place

All round to mountains—with such name to grace

Mere ugly heights and heaps now stolen in view.

How thus they had surprised me,—solve it, you!

How to get from them was no clearer case.

Yet half I seemed to recognize some trick

Of mischief happened to me, God knows when—

In a bad dream perhaps. Here ended, then,

Progress this way. When, in the very nick

Of giving up, one time more, came a click

As when a trap shuts—you're inside the den!

Burningly it came on me all at once,

This was the place! those two hills on the right,

Crouched like two bulls locked horn in horn in fight;

While to the left, a tall scalped mountain ... Dunce,

Dotard, a-dozing at the very nonce,

After a life spent training for the sight!

What in the midst lay but the Tower itself?

The round squat turret, blind as the fool's heart,

Built of brown stone, without a counterpart

In the whole world. The tempest's mocking elf

Points to the shipman thus the unseen shelf

He strikes on, only when the timbers start.

Not see? because of night perhaps?—why, day

Came back again for that! before it left,

The dying sunset kindled through a cleft:

The hills, like giants at a hunting, lay,

Chin upon hand, to see the game at bay,—

"Now stab and end the creature—to the heft!"

Not hear? when noise was everywhere! it tolled

Increasing like a bell. Names in my ears,

Of all the lost adventurers my peers,—

How such a one was strong, and such was bold,

And such was fortunate, yet each of old

Lost, lost! one moment knelled the woe of years.

There they stood, ranged along the hillsides, met

To view the last of me, a living frame

For one more picture! in a sheet of flame

I saw them and I knew them all. And yet

Dauntless the slug-horn to my lips I set,

And blew. "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower came."

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