University of Virginia Library

Long, long ago,—let us not know how long,—
Are not all love-tales ever old and young?—
Long, long ago, two young folk's faces flamed
In flushes, when each other's name was named;
Two young lives were in music-step advancing,
Each cymbal-playing to the other's dancing;
Two young hearts beat in sympathetic beating;
Two hands oft parted that would still be meeting,
And meeting still for ever, and aye parted
As if hand-sunder'd meant being broken-hearted;
As it hath been, too, since the first day passed;
And as it will be, even unto the last.

Touch'd largely by the sun, the river roll'd;
The Midas-sun turn'd all he touch'd to gold.
Abroad were all the little winds, and free
Leapt they and flitted blithe from tree to tree,
Laving their streamy bodies in those lakes
Of rippled leaves, whence soon each wind-elf breaks
With strugglings, from the clutches of the boughs,
Then shakes herself, and from her sides allows
Some single leaves to fall,—drops of the green
Leaf-element she has been bathing in.
Manifold voices, too, in various sport,
The would-be silence must obstruct and thwart;
Perhaps the thrush, whose joy is getting free
In bounteous breaks of bubbling melody;
Or the glad lark, who will praise God, then rise
To carry his own praise up to the skies,—
Praise full of thanks melodious and strong,
Thanks, which their lives exultingly prolong
In shakes, and trills, and spirts, and dancing drops of song.
All these are only representative
Of what in Bateman's inner world doth live;
No voiceful joy there, but its counterpart
Finds in the singing of young Bateman's heart;
No little wind so gladly skips, but it
To Bateman's thoughts shall be a symbol fit;
And how can Trent in such a glory roll
As to excel the glory in his soul?

For love is with him. The grass feels his feet
Earnest with love. In love strive and compete
His manly curls, to twine around the breeze.
'Tis love that majesties those common trees
To an exalted grandeur; gives a dye
Of alien blue divine unto the sky;
Makes of winds, rushing odours; reveals flowers
As live joys, leaf-disguised; finds bridal bowers
In vaguest clouds; shows, all things all things kiss;
And makes the flowing Trent a flowing bliss:—
In love his pulses musically move;
Live joys within him clap their hands, for love.
Look how, as 'twere a spirit, o'er the meads
He walks, but wists not of it; and proceeds,
Nor thinks how feet have dealings with his pace:
Joy smiles, a shining cherub, from his face,
And sings, for the eye's hearing! Sure, not air
It is he breathes;—no, it must be the rare
Life-element for which we mortals pine;—
This Bateman hath been favour'd with the wine
The angels press from heaven-grapes!—Ah, who'd be
Other than Bateman, if they might be he?

Now is he by the boat,—the church,—the green,—
The shady broad embankment; now doth lean
His steps to pass the little wooden bridge;
Now uses he the lover's privilege
To spy his love farther than others can.
Lo! in him breathes all the immortal man,
And in his lordly joy he can behold
The fields, the trees, the stream, the clouds of gold,—
All that great Nature hath, around, above,
To pity them, because they may not love
His Margaret, nor kiss her queenly hand;—
Can look around him proudly, with a grand
Vouchsafing majesty,—to patronise,
In love's self-glorying, almost the skies;—
Can wonder other men should be so blind
As not love Margaret; and is inclined
All feeling to condemn as naught compared
With that which he and Margaret have shared;—
Thinks the wind breathes of Margaret, therefore brings
Such a sweet freshness in its welcomings:—
Hardly conceives the landscape used to know
The way in proper loveliness to glow,—
Or flow'rs to bloom well,—till they did espy
In her the occasion to be handsome by:—
Finds in his heart fresh praisings of her grace,
And blessings of her bright refreshful face:—
Loves the dear grass she treads on, with a gush
Of gratitude, that it hath served to hush,
Smoothen, and ease the motion of her feet:—
While in his heart joy crowds two beats in every beat!
Madness indeed! Yet ask again,—Who'd be
Unlike the lover, if they might be he?
Who, sane, would still be so, and not be glad
To be as finely and as nobly mad?

Nay, let us be no spies upon their meeting,
But softly step aside. The lovers' greeting
Befits not alien eyes. There were but birds
And beasts to hear young Adam's glowing words,
And Eve's, in happy Eden. So let these
Have their own Eden perfect. Let them seize
Kind comfort, hand from hand, even as they meet
Where, near the trees, the gate doth plant its feet
At foot of the smooth rising. Let them walk
Up through the Grove unwatch'd, and in their talk
Foredream a gorgeous future. Let them say
Their bliss o'er to each other,—while they may!

At length, their voices strengthening, we indeed
Cannot but hear their words. They do not heed.
He sees not, nothing knows, nor dreams, unless
Of Margaret, and how her hand to press
Kindly enough, and how contrive to gaze
Longest in her sweet eyes, and make dull air
Into such living words as should be there:—
‘I have been all the night long wandering
In dreams, o'er dreary ways, which would not bring
My aching heart to where it wish'd to go.’—
‘Ay, so you say,’ she says; ‘but do I know?
Sometimes I'm half disposed your love to doubt.’
‘Why, Margaret dear!’—‘Nay, nay, I'll have it out,’
The pretty Wilful said, and, all the while,
Began to steal a little truant smile
From school, about her mouth, and dare to sport
In its new liberty, her face athwart;
And now her voice is toned more tenderly:—
‘Let me complete my speech. Were I to be
A man, and loved, I'd get a ring, and take it,
As I take this, between my hands, and break it,
And give one half to her, as now I do
To you, and say, as now I say to you,
Dear Henry, keep this for my sake,—a token
That, though gold breaks, my love can ne'er be broken.
—He took the slender moiety; he raised
His gradual-understanding eyes, and gazed
On her deep blushes, like a thing amazed,
Till his joy shone out liquid in his eyes.
Had he been rapt then into paradise,
And heard the viols and the trumpet-start
Angelical, I know not that his heart
Could have sent brighter flushes to his face.

They stand together, in that lonely place,
Near to the eastmost cliff, just where a deep
And red ravine is plough'd adown the steep:
Together, taller for their joy, they stand;
Each throbs a new pulse in the other's hand,
A little delegated heart, there sent
By the great heart, its joy to represent
And beat for it, to own the endearëd touch.
They of glad loving-kindness hold as much,—
And do not perish by it,—as e'er held
The human earthen vessel.
But impell'd,
As it might be a wing'd and pointed pain,
At last was, from thought's bow in Margaret's brain,
Shot;—whereunto responding, ‘Why suspect,’
Said Bateman, ‘that your father may object?’
—‘He may not; and yet—Henry, won't you call
On him to-morrow,—and so tell him all?’
—‘To-morrow?—it is soon;—yet you are right;
His leave I'll have before to-morrow night!’

Hopeful he spake; and yet this doubting-stone
Turn'd sideways joy's full stream. There stray'd a tone
Of sadness through their talk. She whispers: ‘Fate
Has oft avail'd hearts even to separate
That loved, perhaps, almost as much as ours.’
—‘Ah! what if on us, too,’ he says, ‘their powers
The Furies try? Would then this pledge of gold
You gave, and that eternal promise, hold?
Perhaps your constancy might then be seen
To break, as this ring broke!’—With alter'd mien,
As hurt, she turns, the while a solemn thrill
Shakes in her voice; vowing, she never will
Forsake, or cease to love him; and she prays
All earnestly, that if her heart strange ways
Should take from Bateman wandering, Heav'n may frown,
And bid its awful servants drag her down
That red ravine, and drown her in those deeps!
—‘Margaret! you frighten me!’—She stands and weeps.

Woe's me, what interruption's this appears
And brings such new, strong reason for her tears,
And puts such fresh disorder in her mien?
—Not Margaret's father?—‘Nay, child, you are seen;
And you, sir,—who are you?’—Hard, haughty speech
Hurls he at Bateman. They stare, each on each.
Vain explanation is essay'd. At length,—
His daughter's trembling weakness on his strength
Of arm supporting,—the proud man retires,
And leaves young Bateman choking in his fires.

At first they had flared forth past all control.—
Like gleaming sword from sheath, he from his soul
Had drawn wrath sharp and forceful on his foe;—
His foe?—What! Margaret's father?—No, ah no!
That must not be. He let the weapon go.
There stood he like a man who inly burns,
But all his flame to smoke and stifling turns.
Then slowly fell to naught the enragëd start
And thumping of the hammer of his heart;
And all the sorrow of the thing came o'er him,
And the drear desolation spread before him
Through the waste, pining years. And if he wept
Let us be glad he did so. Some have kept
From weeping, till the tears within supprest
Have put a ranker sap in growths unblest,
And forced up deadly nightshades of the heart,
Or soak'd and rotted all the better part
To pestilent corruption. 'Tis a sign,
If Bateman weeps, some hidden hope must shine
A sun above him, to draw up his tears
From the deep heart-well. Soon, more bravely bears
The boy his grief. Less absolute, he thinks,
The bitterness of the sad cup he drinks.
Love lies a-bleeding, but the injured flower
May yet its healing find in sun and shower.
Shatter'd, no doubt, much tempested and tost
His love's barque may be, but it is not lost.
He'll go, he says, and toil for Margaret's sake;
He is but young yet, and can wait, and make
Wealth o'er that sea which soon must be between
Hearts which asunder'd never should have been.

But he must see her first. Therefore he hies
Next day, soon as the sun doth in the skies
Lift up the frontal of his golden head.
Like any houseless ghost poor Bateman sped,—
An anguish at his heart, and stinging goads;
And so he nears the house of Gerard Rhodes,
Where Margaret is, but where he may not be,—
Alas! alas!— He lean'd against a tree,
The sunlight round him by the night within
Balancing:—and as if peace he might win
By counting up the past, over he goes
The whole sum from its origin to close:—
How they first met,—first spoke;—how he essay'd
To think of winning such a peerless maid;—
All her sweet looks, words, motions, innocent;—
What made him first think her heart tow'rd him bent;—
How ominously once with him it went
When, having made a carven H and M
In loving nearness, and there married them
With blessings, and a ring cut in the rind
Of a smooth tree,—thenceforth he ne'er could find
Those young initials, though he sought and sought
With careful diligence. Thus back is brought
Each least event, down to the recent blast
That tore love's joyous banner from its mast;—
Not one heart-breaking detail is he spared;
But with a dismal bias all the bared
And blighted rows and borders of the whole
Late garden, but now desert of his soul,
He traverses, and mourns his wither'd flowers,
And, weary, lengthens out th' enormous hours.
Over and o'er again the account he sums
Of his great grief:—and yet no Margaret comes.
She frets within close guard. At last, away
He breaks himself from the intent to say
Farewell, as loth as, by a hand forlorn,
The shrieking mandrake hardly might be torn
Up by its roots, in any ancient tale.

That day goes Bateman, eager, pining, pale,
To a sure friend, whom he entreats to bear
A message to poor Margaret; tells him where;
Shows him the kernel of the story sad;
Conjures him, by the friendship which he had,
To help their correspondence to and fro,
And never let her cruel father know:—
All which is promised. A most speedy breeze
Bears Bateman far off o'er the sundering seas.

Why should I be at needless grief to tell
The moaning mischief which on Margaret fell,
And brought her death a-knocking at her door?—
Or what a tedious watching 'twas before
Her friends might comfort to each other give,
And, smiling, in low whispers say ‘She'll live’?
For thus at last they did. Thenceforth, what bliss,
Of all the sweet sad past, was left, but this,—
Still the old walks to go, and, at each spot,
Say,—‘Here he gave me the forget-me-not,—
As if 'twas possible I could forget!’—
Or,—‘Here he first dared say “My Margaret!”’
Or,—‘This is where he oftenest loved to go;’—
And each old joy's grave make new tears to flow?
—Thus, slowly, went the weeping-time forlorn,
Till from their myriad husky cradles torn
Fell the grandchildren of that season's corn.

Ah me!—What is there in the scope and range
Of this wide, wasted world, but change on change?
This Margaret, this ring-breaker, the unwed
But oath-bound bride of Bateman, shall be led
Into the church, and married by a man
In whose veins blood of Bateman never ran!
—Why should you start? this is no such strange thing
To need a special note of wondering.
—Why should you start? I tell you, deeds are done,
Ay, every hour, beneath this smiling sun,
Which neither tears, nor tearing of the hair,
Nor howling,—no, nor even sheer despair
Gnawing its own flesh,—can enough declare.
It is no new thing, love's flow'r should be found
Prone to be withering in a shallow ground;
What wonder, then, if Margaret should drink
Lethe from time's cup, and forget to think
Of him who ne'er forgot to think of her?
Ay, though she may have watch'd, and would not stir
For hours from the window, when she thought
A letter from poor Henry might be brought;
Then, when she saw it, snatch it, just as food
Would be snatch'd up by famine;—brood, and brood
O'er it, and every lonely moment seize
From each part its remotest sense to tease;
Seem almost to have read it when it came,
Through her long hope and yearning for the same;
Appoint it sanctuaries wherein to rest,—
Nightly, her pillow; or, by day, a nest
Near the heart beating in her breathing breast;
Still over to herself be whispering
Each phrase as a delicious thought and thing;
Wish each line double, and find every one
A thing to smile, tremble, or weep upon;
Know every crease and fold in every part,
And almost have each least stroke off by heart:
All this may be, and yet be overpast,
And Bateman's letters go unread at last.
Her sire neglected no device to catch
Her slow consent to the eligible match;
And, if her secret thought were known, 'twas part
Of the self-lauded motion of her heart
To deem it bounden duty to obey,
And let her heartless father have his way,
Though her best welfare he had thrust aside
Only to bloat his mean and vulgar pride,
And though it ne'er seem'd duty, till her mind
Its dial-hand from Bateman had declined,
And till she thought, perchance if she refuse
Germaine, she may the ease and pleasure lose
And pride of reigning as a household queen,
Above the level of those who had been
Her maiden equals.—Therefore doth she falter
A perjured ‘Yes’ to Germaine at the altar.

Who'd now be Bateman?—Ah, who would not be
Other than Bateman, if they now were he?
Her letters ceasing, the boy can control
His heart no more. He comes home,—learns the whole.
Then sits he down, and leans upon his hand
A head confused, and strives to understand
The whole tale; and thus reads its meaning o'er:—
It is, to stand by Margaret no more;
Nor feel the warmëd pressure and the pride
Of her confiding arm against his side;
Nor learn her looks by heart; nor watch arise
The pleasure of his presence in her eyes;
Never to sit with her in secret bower,
Or comfort her in any weeping hour;
Never to lean o'er her closed eyes, and make
A gentlest stirring lest from sleep she wake;
Never to be her champion in the strife,
To affray her griefs and smooth her path of life;
Never to serve, her faithful minister,
Or have a right even to be kind to her:—
All such hopes now for him are dead and gone,
Buried, and cover'd up, and stampt upon,
And have no rising. All that was amass'd
For his possession in the splendid past
Unto—a broken ring hath shrunk at last!

There be great spirits can consent and smile
At Fortune's grossest felonies, even while
Their treasures 'tis she steals,—with tearless eyes
Gaze in the face of the bereaving skies,—
And answer to misfortune's keenest smart
With the big beat of a majestic heart.
Alas! Not such was Bateman. The half-ring
By letter, and by chance the news, they bring
Of a young corpse whereon these lines are read:—
False woman, of thy vows and oaths have dread,
For thou art mine by them, alive or dead!

There faded Margaret from that fatal hour,
As from its sick roots a worm-haunted flower,
For she began to be all overrun
With creeping thoughts of what her fault had done.
Sit could not she, nor stand, nor rest for long
In any place; but memory of her wrong
Wrought as an evil fret upon her brain,
And gave her in fresh postures unto pain.
Ah, sure, had Bateman thought what might betide
Her by his dying, thus he had not died!
Poor girl, poor girl! She eats not, does not sleep,
And frets and burns with fever; cannot sleep,
But makes, with restlessness, in many a heap
Disorder rise and sit about her bed:
And ever to one same plaint is she wed,
Moaning,—‘Alive or dead! alive or dead!’

Two kind-soul'd neighbours near her bed forlorn
A-watching sit; for a child hath been born;
And see, the mother sleeps!—‘Oh, do not stir,
Now such a wholesome thing hath fallen on her!’—
So they sit quiet, till their drowsy eyes
Notice no more the shadows fall and rise
And dance round the night-taper. Morning breaks,
And leaps in at the window, off the flakes
Of its sun-lighted clouds.—One wakes, and wakes
Her co-nurse. Chilly is the morning air.
They look into the bed; they feel; they stare!
Still warm her place, yet Margaret is not there!
Calm, calm in Clifton deeps the Trent doth flow,
But down that red ravine, an hour ago,
Did Margaret run therein and sink below.
The nearest villagers awoke, 'tis said,
At hearing, as they shook upon their bed,
A piteous wailing of ‘Alive or dead!’—
Nor do they a false verdict give, who tell
That Margaret was borne off by fiends of hell;—
Remorse and madness serve the infernal crown,
And these the demons were that dragged her down.