The Poetical Works of John Payne Definitive Edition in Two Volumes |
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 | I. |
| II. |
| LONDON CITY POEMS. |
| I. |
| II. |
| III. |
| IV. |
| V. |
| VI. |
| VII. |
| VIII. |
| IX. |
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 | The Poetical Works of John Payne |  |
1
LONDON CITY POEMS.
3
I.A CITY APOLOGUE.
I love the grey old City's storied walls.
Not all the glare and turmoil of the day,
The hum and whirl of commerce in the streets,
Can dim for me the light of old romance,
That gilds its hoary monuments and towers.
I love to see the quiet dignity
With which, when work is done and night draws on
And all the din of footsteps fades away,
It shakes from off its flanks the ebbing tide
Of busy life, slips off the glare of day,
Wraps round its walls the mantle of the past
And settles back to its historic calm,
As if no break divided its long rest.
And ever, in the golden calm of eve,
When the clear sky grows dim toward the dusk,
Its streets for me are thick with memories,
Stately and sweet and sorrowful. I hear
The feet of Sidney echo on the stones
And see, in silence, noble Raleigh's face,
Pale with long prison, peer from out the bars
Upon a shadowy crowd. But not alone
My fancy dwells upon the peopled past.
I have no taint of that unlovely scorn
Which sees no beauty save in things long dead,
No sweetness in the world we live amongst.
I feel that, in the new as in the old,
Great deeds are possible, heroic lives
Lived nobly and true deaths died faithfully,
And please myself to find out quiet flowers,
That have bloomed bravely in the City smoke,
And souls whose clear eternal Spring of love
Has made their thought immortal. Many such,
Unknown to fame, have blossomed, lived and died,
Quiet dull lives, whose course the peace of God
Has, as the sky on broad, unrippled streams,
Filled with reflected heaven. Such a life,
Uncelebrate and sweet, my memory holds
Within its holiest casket, as one lays
A graven gem in velvet. One, whose path
Of years I love to follow, all his life
Dwelt in the City's dim and sunless shade
And there, from early youth to quiet death,
Worked hardly at dull toil for daily bread.
One of those earnest, tender-hearted men
We find sometimes among hard-handed folk,
Whose souls' mute poetry, expressionless,
Is hidden by the sameness of their lives,
To him God's world was one great fairy tale,
As sad and sweet as such tales use to be.
With heart too large to hold aught else but love,
He had but few to love. The delicate
And shrinking clearness of his mental sense
Held him aloof from those who shared his task
And he was lonely in the world of men.
His soul was full of sweet and tender doubt.
Across the hum and whirl of toil he oft
Looked, with mute wistfulness, at that great world
Of fame and action which, thus seen afar,
Was lovely to him as the rainbow is,
That is our symbol of unreal hope;
And there were times when he would grieve to think
He could not serve God in some nobler way.
He felt a barrier lay 'twixt him and it,
A wall of crystal, that he might not pass;
And so he did but yearn and to his work
Turned dumbly. Yet the chrism of his love
Rounded his life-work to ideal shape,
Unknown to him, and all his heart was full
Of such a deep and sweet humanity,
His life grew fragrant with the inner soul;
And weary folk, who passed him in the streets,
Saw Christ's love beam from out the wistful eyes
And had new confidence in God and man.
And so he worked and longed and lived and loved,
Did noble deeds, unknowing what he did,
Thought noble thoughts, unconscious of their worth,
And lived that greatness he desired in vain.
One friend he had, as poor as he, perchance,
But rich in hope; one of those wide-souled men
Whose natural mission seems the cure of souls,
Lark-hearted, with a native trick of song,
He looked on all with clear and hopeful eyes
And with a thinker's austere tenderness,
Tried all things in the crucible of thought.
He loved the gentle humble-minded man
And had long drawn from him his secret soul
As tenderly as Spring draws primrose-blooms
From the young earth. And once, when they had talked
Awhile together and some chance had turned
The converse on the worker's long desire,
The other rose and pacing up and down,
Said to his friend, “Had you told Hafiz this,
The poet who brought down the golden sun
And with it made his verses glad and bright,
He might have answered somewhat on this wise,
Veiling, as was his wont, the barb of thought
Under the wreathing blooms of metaphor.”
Then he took up his parable and spoke.
Not all the glare and turmoil of the day,
The hum and whirl of commerce in the streets,
Can dim for me the light of old romance,
That gilds its hoary monuments and towers.
I love to see the quiet dignity
With which, when work is done and night draws on
And all the din of footsteps fades away,
It shakes from off its flanks the ebbing tide
Of busy life, slips off the glare of day,
Wraps round its walls the mantle of the past
And settles back to its historic calm,
As if no break divided its long rest.
And ever, in the golden calm of eve,
When the clear sky grows dim toward the dusk,
Its streets for me are thick with memories,
Stately and sweet and sorrowful. I hear
The feet of Sidney echo on the stones
And see, in silence, noble Raleigh's face,
Pale with long prison, peer from out the bars
Upon a shadowy crowd. But not alone
My fancy dwells upon the peopled past.
I have no taint of that unlovely scorn
Which sees no beauty save in things long dead,
No sweetness in the world we live amongst.
4
Great deeds are possible, heroic lives
Lived nobly and true deaths died faithfully,
And please myself to find out quiet flowers,
That have bloomed bravely in the City smoke,
And souls whose clear eternal Spring of love
Has made their thought immortal. Many such,
Unknown to fame, have blossomed, lived and died,
Quiet dull lives, whose course the peace of God
Has, as the sky on broad, unrippled streams,
Filled with reflected heaven. Such a life,
Uncelebrate and sweet, my memory holds
Within its holiest casket, as one lays
A graven gem in velvet. One, whose path
Of years I love to follow, all his life
Dwelt in the City's dim and sunless shade
And there, from early youth to quiet death,
Worked hardly at dull toil for daily bread.
One of those earnest, tender-hearted men
We find sometimes among hard-handed folk,
Whose souls' mute poetry, expressionless,
Is hidden by the sameness of their lives,
To him God's world was one great fairy tale,
As sad and sweet as such tales use to be.
With heart too large to hold aught else but love,
He had but few to love. The delicate
And shrinking clearness of his mental sense
Held him aloof from those who shared his task
And he was lonely in the world of men.
His soul was full of sweet and tender doubt.
Across the hum and whirl of toil he oft
Looked, with mute wistfulness, at that great world
Of fame and action which, thus seen afar,
Was lovely to him as the rainbow is,
That is our symbol of unreal hope;
And there were times when he would grieve to think
He could not serve God in some nobler way.
5
A wall of crystal, that he might not pass;
And so he did but yearn and to his work
Turned dumbly. Yet the chrism of his love
Rounded his life-work to ideal shape,
Unknown to him, and all his heart was full
Of such a deep and sweet humanity,
His life grew fragrant with the inner soul;
And weary folk, who passed him in the streets,
Saw Christ's love beam from out the wistful eyes
And had new confidence in God and man.
And so he worked and longed and lived and loved,
Did noble deeds, unknowing what he did,
Thought noble thoughts, unconscious of their worth,
And lived that greatness he desired in vain.
One friend he had, as poor as he, perchance,
But rich in hope; one of those wide-souled men
Whose natural mission seems the cure of souls,
Lark-hearted, with a native trick of song,
He looked on all with clear and hopeful eyes
And with a thinker's austere tenderness,
Tried all things in the crucible of thought.
He loved the gentle humble-minded man
And had long drawn from him his secret soul
As tenderly as Spring draws primrose-blooms
From the young earth. And once, when they had talked
Awhile together and some chance had turned
The converse on the worker's long desire,
The other rose and pacing up and down,
Said to his friend, “Had you told Hafiz this,
The poet who brought down the golden sun
And with it made his verses glad and bright,
He might have answered somewhat on this wise,
Veiling, as was his wont, the barb of thought
Under the wreathing blooms of metaphor.”
Then he took up his parable and spoke.
“A lily grew upon the plains of Fars
And drank the living radiance of the sun
And fed her fill upon those golden dews
That Persian poets call the tears of God.
About her lay a paradise of sweets.
Narcissus-cups and stately amaranths
And many another gorgeous Eastern flower
Hid the brown earth with rainbow-coloured blooms:
And now and then, when the light morning breeze
Inclined the lily's stalk toward the dim
Horizon's golden marge, the regal bloom
Of roses met her vision and she knew
Their scent upon the perfumed winds of heaven,
Wherewith the evening cooled the glowing plains.
But she herself stood on a little hill,
Unmated and alone, a stretch of sand
Parting her from the crowd of kindred blooms.
Great grief to her this was; it seemed as if
Her place had been forgotten in the plan
And she alone could have no part in God
Nor work for Nature, as her comrades did.
The distant hum of some small neighbouring towns,
Where afar off dwelt sparsely-scattered men,
Came to her, sweetened by the breath of flowers.
At times she heard the tinkling camel-bells,
Sparkles of sound upon a murmurous sea,
And her heart yearned to grow toward the world
And take her share of duty with the rest.
And with the yearning brighter grew her bloom
And richer waxed the fragrance of her breath,
Until the air was filled with that sweet scent,
The soul and essence of desireful love;
And from afar the perfume of the flower
Was wafted unto many a toiling man,
So that he felt refreshed and comforted
And said, “What angel hovers in the air?
I smell the almond-blooms of Paradise.”
So sweet it was that, over all the rest,
An angel, hovering o'er the neighbouring flowers,
Caught the unearthly fragrance, which recalled
To him the odorous balms of his own heaven;
Then, nestling in the lily's cup, he felt
The stir of yearning at its fragrant heart
And comprehending, with the skill of love,
All that lay hidden in its candid soul,
‘Take heart,’ said he, ‘white lily. God is sweet
And life that is not sweet has little God.
Who thinks a life, unstirred by sounding deeds
And void of settled aim save love and peace,
Is dutiless, knows little of the links
Of purpose that conjoin all natural things.
Life is lived less in action than in thought
And all its aims are summarised in love.
Thou givest all thyself. Can God give more?
Would'st thou give more than God, love more than Love?
Be comforted; thou hast the praise of God.’
And the white flower was sorrowful no more.”
6
And fed her fill upon those golden dews
That Persian poets call the tears of God.
About her lay a paradise of sweets.
Narcissus-cups and stately amaranths
And many another gorgeous Eastern flower
Hid the brown earth with rainbow-coloured blooms:
And now and then, when the light morning breeze
Inclined the lily's stalk toward the dim
Horizon's golden marge, the regal bloom
Of roses met her vision and she knew
Their scent upon the perfumed winds of heaven,
Wherewith the evening cooled the glowing plains.
But she herself stood on a little hill,
Unmated and alone, a stretch of sand
Parting her from the crowd of kindred blooms.
Great grief to her this was; it seemed as if
Her place had been forgotten in the plan
And she alone could have no part in God
Nor work for Nature, as her comrades did.
The distant hum of some small neighbouring towns,
Where afar off dwelt sparsely-scattered men,
Came to her, sweetened by the breath of flowers.
At times she heard the tinkling camel-bells,
Sparkles of sound upon a murmurous sea,
And her heart yearned to grow toward the world
And take her share of duty with the rest.
And with the yearning brighter grew her bloom
And richer waxed the fragrance of her breath,
Until the air was filled with that sweet scent,
The soul and essence of desireful love;
And from afar the perfume of the flower
Was wafted unto many a toiling man,
So that he felt refreshed and comforted
And said, “What angel hovers in the air?
I smell the almond-blooms of Paradise.”
So sweet it was that, over all the rest,
7
Caught the unearthly fragrance, which recalled
To him the odorous balms of his own heaven;
Then, nestling in the lily's cup, he felt
The stir of yearning at its fragrant heart
And comprehending, with the skill of love,
All that lay hidden in its candid soul,
‘Take heart,’ said he, ‘white lily. God is sweet
And life that is not sweet has little God.
Who thinks a life, unstirred by sounding deeds
And void of settled aim save love and peace,
Is dutiless, knows little of the links
Of purpose that conjoin all natural things.
Life is lived less in action than in thought
And all its aims are summarised in love.
Thou givest all thyself. Can God give more?
Would'st thou give more than God, love more than Love?
Be comforted; thou hast the praise of God.’
And the white flower was sorrowful no more.”
II.AN IDYLL OF THE PLAGUE.
(A. D. 1866.)
A stretch of river broadening to the sea;
Long tracts of marsh and sandy-bottomed shore,
Through which the full tide, in the evening light,
Glistens, broad-mirrored, and with liberal flow,
Laps o'er the marge its lavish liquid gold:
Sunset-enlightened sky, clear with the fires
Of dying day and in the faint far blue,
Gold-glinting spires and rosy-tinted white
Of roofs, where sleeps the little seaside town:
Upon the eager, seaward running flood,
A stately vessel, gay with glistering flags
And brilliant with the snow of stainless sails,
That blossom out along their pine-stem spires,
Rocks in the light breath of the coming wind:
And on the shore three figures, in whose eyes
The grief of parting dims the golden blink
Of sunset and the rosy-purple glow
Of clouds that float upon the western haze.
A woman, clad as women use to be
Who, poor, are yet not needy, to whose lot
Some share of ease has fallen, and two girls,
Her daughters, one fifteen, the other twelve;
All with sad faces turned toward the ship
And eyes that strive to hold her back with looks.
Awhile the wistful sorrow of their gaze
Seems gifted with some strange magnetic force;
For still the light breeze puffs and dies away
And the loose sails flap idly 'gainst the masts.
At last, the faint breaths freshen into wind
And the smooth current ripples to its kiss.
Some white thing flutters from the deck; the sails
Bend slowly to the breezes and the ship
Glides, with the tide-flow, past the line of foam,
That marks the river's boundary, and so
Into the rougher waters of the main.
A little while, their eyes, who watch from shore,
Strained to the utmost, follow, in her course,
The hastening ship, that bears their dearest one
Into the western distance; then the glow
Fades from the track of the departed sun;
The glints of light upon the distant crests
Die slowly and the sunned snow of the sails
Sinks, with the dying day, into the dusk.
Long tracts of marsh and sandy-bottomed shore,
Through which the full tide, in the evening light,
Glistens, broad-mirrored, and with liberal flow,
Laps o'er the marge its lavish liquid gold:
Sunset-enlightened sky, clear with the fires
Of dying day and in the faint far blue,
Gold-glinting spires and rosy-tinted white
Of roofs, where sleeps the little seaside town:
Upon the eager, seaward running flood,
8
And brilliant with the snow of stainless sails,
That blossom out along their pine-stem spires,
Rocks in the light breath of the coming wind:
And on the shore three figures, in whose eyes
The grief of parting dims the golden blink
Of sunset and the rosy-purple glow
Of clouds that float upon the western haze.
A woman, clad as women use to be
Who, poor, are yet not needy, to whose lot
Some share of ease has fallen, and two girls,
Her daughters, one fifteen, the other twelve;
All with sad faces turned toward the ship
And eyes that strive to hold her back with looks.
Awhile the wistful sorrow of their gaze
Seems gifted with some strange magnetic force;
For still the light breeze puffs and dies away
And the loose sails flap idly 'gainst the masts.
At last, the faint breaths freshen into wind
And the smooth current ripples to its kiss.
Some white thing flutters from the deck; the sails
Bend slowly to the breezes and the ship
Glides, with the tide-flow, past the line of foam,
That marks the river's boundary, and so
Into the rougher waters of the main.
A little while, their eyes, who watch from shore,
Strained to the utmost, follow, in her course,
The hastening ship, that bears their dearest one
Into the western distance; then the glow
Fades from the track of the departed sun;
The glints of light upon the distant crests
Die slowly and the sunned snow of the sails
Sinks, with the dying day, into the dusk.
Then, back again, with aching hearts, they turned
To where, within the smoke-enshrouded heart
Of the great town they lived, amidst a maze
Of narrow tortuous streets, that wound about
The region of the docks and ran along
The river ramparted with many a wharf.
All day the hum and roar of traffic whirled
About the place and even in the night
The air was full of noise: across the streets
Huge waggons toiled and patient labouring hacks
Tugged mighty burdens up the long steep lanes.
Three rooms they had, poor, but yet not without
Some touch of grace and comfort to conceal
Their poverty. The place was bright and warm
With gorgeous shells and corals, red and gold,
Rose-pink and pearly, that the husband's care
And father's thought had brought as memories
Of cruises in the wondrous southern seas;
And spangled foreign birds, that once had hopped
And chirrupped 'mid the palm and banian boughs,
In the clear air of golden-stranded isles,
Under the blue of rainbow-flowered skies,
With their emblazoned plumage, emerald
And gold and purple, lighted up the place
With an unreal unfamiliar air
Of foreign splendour. Very dear to them,
For whom long use had sanctified its walls
And love had lent its very poverty
A beauty of its own, the dwelling was,—
To them, who never in their lives, perhaps,
Had seen a field of cowslips all in bloom
Nor gathered violets in the early spring;
For love did hallow for them all mean things
And gilded City smoke with hope and peace.
Long had they dwelt there, many quiet years,
The oft-recurring pangs of waiting fear
And doubt as oft forgotten in the bright
Alternate joy of meeting and the rare
Short sudden sweetness of the dear one's stay,
Year after year, with these that were his all.
This time a longer voyage had he gone,
Into the gold of Polynesian seas;
And grave forebodings had made sad the hearts
Of wife and children: for their fearful love,
True-womanly, saw nought but certain ill
In the unknown. They shuddered at the tales
Of fierce sea-monsters, that old sailors told,
And all their yarns of horror and affright
About that false Pacific, whose clear blue
Seethes at the heart with unsuspected storms,
And pictured to themselves their sailor tossed,
Helpless, upon the hungry pitiless waves
Or struggling in the jaws of some foul shark,
Whilst the clear deep ran crimson with his blood.
In vain had he, who had small thought of fear,
Save for his dear ones, striven to divert
Their fears to quiet hope's expectancy,
With tales of all the wonders and delights,
That lay within that coral-hearted main,
And all the golden-fronded palms, that spread
Their waving fans toward the roseate heaven,
And promises of strange and lovely things,
The magic spoils of Nature's fairyland,
From that rich treasury of emerald isles,
He meant to bring with him on his return.
'Twas all in vain, he could not ease their hearts
Of that deep-seated longing, which foretold
Some vague calamity, as summer air
Is big with thunder, though the sky seem clear.
And so, a little while, when he was gone,
They went about their work all listlessly;
But soon the ancient wont came to their aid
And they fell back into the olden groove
Of quiet expectation and resigned.
They did not let confessed inquietude
Disturb the eventless current of their lives,
Spent in hard work, with little time for doubt:
But yet the seedlets of that brooding fear,
Whose vague unrest they even to themselves
Acknowledged not, lay latent in their hearts,
Ready to burst into a deadly flower,
When hap should will it. Onward went the days
And now the time began to draw toward
The ending of their fears. Two years, not more,
(Had he assured them) would have filled their span,
Before the “Kelpie” should again ascend
The river and cast anchor in the docks
And he again should press them to his heart.
The expected day passed by, and then a week,
A month and many weary, weary months;
And still they had no tidings of the ship.
As yet they had no thought of wreck or death;
The thought was far too awful to be thought,
—God could not be so cruel,—till, at last,
Well nigh a year beyond the rightful time,
When he, according to his word, again
Should have set foot within their ready doors,
They read a brief note in some journal's coign,
Which said, the ship, now twelve months overdue,
Had not for long been heard of (Oh, how cold
And bloodless seemed the formal printed words,
That were so fateful to them!) and 'twas feared
She had, with all her crew, gone down at sea;
And this seemed the more probable (it said)
That some, who held like course, had, far from land,
Picked up a board from off a vessel's stern,
That bore, in half-obliterated words,
The name of “Kelpie”. Yet 'twas possible
She had been stranded on some distant isle
Of many, that were known to stud those seas,
Innumerous, and many of the crew,
If not the whole, might still be living there,
Mayhap detained by savages or else
Devoid of means to leave the island shore,
Their boats all shattered by the self-same storm
That might have wrecked the ship. A straw of hope,
To which they clung, as only women cling,
When those they love are hoped for. So they lived,
Still thinking he could not be lost to them
And looking ever for his near return.
The months went by and still no tidings came
And still they watched and longed for him and hoped
A hopeless hope, more anguishful than fear.
Meantime, the money he had left with them,
To fend them from privation and avert
The grim necessity of ceaseless toil
For scanty bread, though hoarded with close care,
Was all expended and the stern, hard times
Exacted labour far beyond their wont.
One after one the little luxuries
And fanciful adornments, that the lost
Had gathered with such loving care for them,
Were bartered for bare food, and naked walls
Joined with wan looks to make the place look drear,
That erst had worn so homely bright an air.
Stern want began to pinch their toiling souls
And harder and yet harder grew the times,
Until unceasing labour scarce could earn
Sufficient food to hold the weary souls
Within the spare starved bodies. Hollow-eyed
And gaunt, mere spectres of their former selves,
They could have been contented, whilst the hope,
That had so long sustained them, stayed with them.
But now four years had passed and every chance
Seemed gone for them; and slowly hope died out
And one great gloom of unillumined pain
Shrouded the bitter struggle of their lives.
To where, within the smoke-enshrouded heart
Of the great town they lived, amidst a maze
Of narrow tortuous streets, that wound about
9
The river ramparted with many a wharf.
All day the hum and roar of traffic whirled
About the place and even in the night
The air was full of noise: across the streets
Huge waggons toiled and patient labouring hacks
Tugged mighty burdens up the long steep lanes.
Three rooms they had, poor, but yet not without
Some touch of grace and comfort to conceal
Their poverty. The place was bright and warm
With gorgeous shells and corals, red and gold,
Rose-pink and pearly, that the husband's care
And father's thought had brought as memories
Of cruises in the wondrous southern seas;
And spangled foreign birds, that once had hopped
And chirrupped 'mid the palm and banian boughs,
In the clear air of golden-stranded isles,
Under the blue of rainbow-flowered skies,
With their emblazoned plumage, emerald
And gold and purple, lighted up the place
With an unreal unfamiliar air
Of foreign splendour. Very dear to them,
For whom long use had sanctified its walls
And love had lent its very poverty
A beauty of its own, the dwelling was,—
To them, who never in their lives, perhaps,
Had seen a field of cowslips all in bloom
Nor gathered violets in the early spring;
For love did hallow for them all mean things
And gilded City smoke with hope and peace.
Long had they dwelt there, many quiet years,
The oft-recurring pangs of waiting fear
And doubt as oft forgotten in the bright
Alternate joy of meeting and the rare
Short sudden sweetness of the dear one's stay,
Year after year, with these that were his all.
This time a longer voyage had he gone,
10
And grave forebodings had made sad the hearts
Of wife and children: for their fearful love,
True-womanly, saw nought but certain ill
In the unknown. They shuddered at the tales
Of fierce sea-monsters, that old sailors told,
And all their yarns of horror and affright
About that false Pacific, whose clear blue
Seethes at the heart with unsuspected storms,
And pictured to themselves their sailor tossed,
Helpless, upon the hungry pitiless waves
Or struggling in the jaws of some foul shark,
Whilst the clear deep ran crimson with his blood.
In vain had he, who had small thought of fear,
Save for his dear ones, striven to divert
Their fears to quiet hope's expectancy,
With tales of all the wonders and delights,
That lay within that coral-hearted main,
And all the golden-fronded palms, that spread
Their waving fans toward the roseate heaven,
And promises of strange and lovely things,
The magic spoils of Nature's fairyland,
From that rich treasury of emerald isles,
He meant to bring with him on his return.
'Twas all in vain, he could not ease their hearts
Of that deep-seated longing, which foretold
Some vague calamity, as summer air
Is big with thunder, though the sky seem clear.
And so, a little while, when he was gone,
They went about their work all listlessly;
But soon the ancient wont came to their aid
And they fell back into the olden groove
Of quiet expectation and resigned.
They did not let confessed inquietude
Disturb the eventless current of their lives,
Spent in hard work, with little time for doubt:
But yet the seedlets of that brooding fear,
11
Acknowledged not, lay latent in their hearts,
Ready to burst into a deadly flower,
When hap should will it. Onward went the days
And now the time began to draw toward
The ending of their fears. Two years, not more,
(Had he assured them) would have filled their span,
Before the “Kelpie” should again ascend
The river and cast anchor in the docks
And he again should press them to his heart.
The expected day passed by, and then a week,
A month and many weary, weary months;
And still they had no tidings of the ship.
As yet they had no thought of wreck or death;
The thought was far too awful to be thought,
—God could not be so cruel,—till, at last,
Well nigh a year beyond the rightful time,
When he, according to his word, again
Should have set foot within their ready doors,
They read a brief note in some journal's coign,
Which said, the ship, now twelve months overdue,
Had not for long been heard of (Oh, how cold
And bloodless seemed the formal printed words,
That were so fateful to them!) and 'twas feared
She had, with all her crew, gone down at sea;
And this seemed the more probable (it said)
That some, who held like course, had, far from land,
Picked up a board from off a vessel's stern,
That bore, in half-obliterated words,
The name of “Kelpie”. Yet 'twas possible
She had been stranded on some distant isle
Of many, that were known to stud those seas,
Innumerous, and many of the crew,
If not the whole, might still be living there,
Mayhap detained by savages or else
Devoid of means to leave the island shore,
Their boats all shattered by the self-same storm
12
To which they clung, as only women cling,
When those they love are hoped for. So they lived,
Still thinking he could not be lost to them
And looking ever for his near return.
The months went by and still no tidings came
And still they watched and longed for him and hoped
A hopeless hope, more anguishful than fear.
Meantime, the money he had left with them,
To fend them from privation and avert
The grim necessity of ceaseless toil
For scanty bread, though hoarded with close care,
Was all expended and the stern, hard times
Exacted labour far beyond their wont.
One after one the little luxuries
And fanciful adornments, that the lost
Had gathered with such loving care for them,
Were bartered for bare food, and naked walls
Joined with wan looks to make the place look drear,
That erst had worn so homely bright an air.
Stern want began to pinch their toiling souls
And harder and yet harder grew the times,
Until unceasing labour scarce could earn
Sufficient food to hold the weary souls
Within the spare starved bodies. Hollow-eyed
And gaunt, mere spectres of their former selves,
They could have been contented, whilst the hope,
That had so long sustained them, stayed with them.
But now four years had passed and every chance
Seemed gone for them; and slowly hope died out
And one great gloom of unillumined pain
Shrouded the bitter struggle of their lives.
One night, as, cowered o'er the scanty fire,
With weary eyes bent on the pitiless work,
They toiled, with hearts from which hard use had chased
All feeling save a horrible dull pain
And (God be thanked) all-blest undying love,
The youngest girl let fall her half-done work
And laying down her yet all-childish head
Upon her mother's bosom, faintly said,
“Mother, forgive me; I can work no more;
My heart is sick with pain.” And so was dead.
With weary eyes bent on the pitiless work,
They toiled, with hearts from which hard use had chased
All feeling save a horrible dull pain
And (God be thanked) all-blest undying love,
13
And laying down her yet all-childish head
Upon her mother's bosom, faintly said,
“Mother, forgive me; I can work no more;
My heart is sick with pain.” And so was dead.
Thus had death blotted from their book of life
Its Alpha and Omega, first and last,
Father and youngest child, and there were left
But two poor women, sorrow-struck and wan,
All lonely with each other in the world.
Left by themselves to breast the pitiless world,
Nearer and nearer drew their faithful hearts
And brighter burned their mutual love (half pain),
As harder grew the misery and the toil.
And now the June of the fifth year was come
And vague forebodings hovered in the air
Of coming horrors. From the distant East,
Each mail bore tidings how the Indian shores
Lay prostrate in the grasp of that fell plague,
That had some dozen years before laid waste
All Europe with the hell-wind of its breath:
And as the summer waned, the time grew fierce
With heat scarce known in England and the pest
Flew nearer through the neighbouring continents.
Foul mists began to hover o'er the town,
Significant of coming pestilence,
And weird miasmas in the dead of night
Rose from the river's rank and sweltering flood
And wrapped the sleepers in their fell embrace.
And gradually folk heard of awful deaths,
Unknown to ordinary summer-time;
And men said “Cholera”, with bated breath,
And laid their hands upon each other's lips,
As if they feared the pest would hear its name
And come as if invoked to come. At length,
September came, and with it came the plague.
Into fell life the hidden germs of death
Leapt with an awful swiftness and the air
Was deadly with the poison of their breath.
Folk died like sheep and every workhouse hole
Was crammed to overflowing with the dead.
The sextons could not do their dismal work
Swiftly enough: the dead outstripped the live
And arms that plied the spade grew numb with toil.
Day after day up rose the pitiless sun
And rained down flame on the deserted streets:
Strong men dropped smitten in the open ways
And funerals choked the city's avenues.
All round them died, in hundreds, of the plague,
The gaunt, half-starved poor folk; women and men
And children fell to death the easier prey,
That they could scarce be said to live; and soon
The wave of pestilence swept over them.
Its Alpha and Omega, first and last,
Father and youngest child, and there were left
But two poor women, sorrow-struck and wan,
All lonely with each other in the world.
Left by themselves to breast the pitiless world,
Nearer and nearer drew their faithful hearts
And brighter burned their mutual love (half pain),
As harder grew the misery and the toil.
And now the June of the fifth year was come
And vague forebodings hovered in the air
Of coming horrors. From the distant East,
Each mail bore tidings how the Indian shores
Lay prostrate in the grasp of that fell plague,
That had some dozen years before laid waste
All Europe with the hell-wind of its breath:
And as the summer waned, the time grew fierce
With heat scarce known in England and the pest
Flew nearer through the neighbouring continents.
Foul mists began to hover o'er the town,
Significant of coming pestilence,
And weird miasmas in the dead of night
Rose from the river's rank and sweltering flood
And wrapped the sleepers in their fell embrace.
And gradually folk heard of awful deaths,
Unknown to ordinary summer-time;
And men said “Cholera”, with bated breath,
And laid their hands upon each other's lips,
As if they feared the pest would hear its name
And come as if invoked to come. At length,
September came, and with it came the plague.
Into fell life the hidden germs of death
14
Was deadly with the poison of their breath.
Folk died like sheep and every workhouse hole
Was crammed to overflowing with the dead.
The sextons could not do their dismal work
Swiftly enough: the dead outstripped the live
And arms that plied the spade grew numb with toil.
Day after day up rose the pitiless sun
And rained down flame on the deserted streets:
Strong men dropped smitten in the open ways
And funerals choked the city's avenues.
All round them died, in hundreds, of the plague,
The gaunt, half-starved poor folk; women and men
And children fell to death the easier prey,
That they could scarce be said to live; and soon
The wave of pestilence swept over them.
One evening, from her work the mother came
Back to the one poor room still left to them,
Where sat the daughter and her scanty meal
Awaited her return, and staggering in,
Fell down upon the bed, with trembling hands
And nerveless limbs. Her eyes were wild and glazed
And all her aspect to her child too well
Revealed the fatal symptons of the plague.
But, when her daughter strove to raise her up
And tend her with the fearlessness of love,
She started up with a despairing strength
And with death written in her flaming eyes,
Conjured the girl to “let her die alone
And save herself. She must not touch her now;
She had the pest;” and strove to fend her off
From nearing her. But she (so strong is love)
Said, “Mother, you are all I have on earth:
For me life is not glad, and without you,
'Twere worthless. Please God, if He bid you die,
I will die with you. Nay, you could not have
The heart to die without me and to leave
Me quite deserted in this dreary world!
We have too long been one in misery
And love, for God to part our love in death.”
So saying, round her mother's thin worn neck
Her arms she threw and drew her burning head
To its old refuge on her faithful breast.
The morning came and found them still so clasped,
Sleeping the fitful sleep of feveredness.
All day they lay, in helpless agony,
Unnoticed and alone; for they who lived
Around them had no aid to waste on them,
Being well nigh as stricken as themselves;
And darkness came and found them sick to death.
The weary hours went by and still they lay
In death-like silence, till the gloom of night
Began to blend into the gray of morn;
And then the daughter turned and feebly cried,
With failing voice, “Mother!” And she who, dumb
With agony, grew stiff in the death-trance,
(O mighty effort of immortal love!)
Lifted her arms, already stark with death,
And strained her daughter closer to her heart.
A little while they lay and then again
The daughter spoke; “Mother, are you asleep?
I feel so weary, yet not now in pain:
I think this must be death; I seem to see
Father at last again. Kiss me once more,
For the last time;” and feebly strove to press
Her pallid lips to those belovéd ones,
Where all her love was centred, and to rouse
The torpid senses to some feeble spark
Of animation. But the mother lay
Moveless and stiff in death and she herself
Already felt the angel of the plague
Draw with chill finger-tips the film of death
Over her eyes. The dawn came creeping up
The eastern sky and gradually the hand
Of friendly death relaxed the pain-strung mouth
Into a smile of peace; the lids dropped down
And the wan features settled into rest.
Back to the one poor room still left to them,
Where sat the daughter and her scanty meal
Awaited her return, and staggering in,
Fell down upon the bed, with trembling hands
And nerveless limbs. Her eyes were wild and glazed
And all her aspect to her child too well
Revealed the fatal symptons of the plague.
But, when her daughter strove to raise her up
And tend her with the fearlessness of love,
She started up with a despairing strength
And with death written in her flaming eyes,
Conjured the girl to “let her die alone
And save herself. She must not touch her now;
She had the pest;” and strove to fend her off
From nearing her. But she (so strong is love)
Said, “Mother, you are all I have on earth:
For me life is not glad, and without you,
'Twere worthless. Please God, if He bid you die,
I will die with you. Nay, you could not have
The heart to die without me and to leave
15
We have too long been one in misery
And love, for God to part our love in death.”
So saying, round her mother's thin worn neck
Her arms she threw and drew her burning head
To its old refuge on her faithful breast.
The morning came and found them still so clasped,
Sleeping the fitful sleep of feveredness.
All day they lay, in helpless agony,
Unnoticed and alone; for they who lived
Around them had no aid to waste on them,
Being well nigh as stricken as themselves;
And darkness came and found them sick to death.
The weary hours went by and still they lay
In death-like silence, till the gloom of night
Began to blend into the gray of morn;
And then the daughter turned and feebly cried,
With failing voice, “Mother!” And she who, dumb
With agony, grew stiff in the death-trance,
(O mighty effort of immortal love!)
Lifted her arms, already stark with death,
And strained her daughter closer to her heart.
A little while they lay and then again
The daughter spoke; “Mother, are you asleep?
I feel so weary, yet not now in pain:
I think this must be death; I seem to see
Father at last again. Kiss me once more,
For the last time;” and feebly strove to press
Her pallid lips to those belovéd ones,
Where all her love was centred, and to rouse
The torpid senses to some feeble spark
Of animation. But the mother lay
Moveless and stiff in death and she herself
Already felt the angel of the plague
Draw with chill finger-tips the film of death
Over her eyes. The dawn came creeping up
The eastern sky and gradually the hand
16
Into a smile of peace; the lids dropped down
And the wan features settled into rest.
Suddenly footsteps sounded on the stair;
The door flew open and a sun-bronzed man,
Haggard and toil-worn, burst into the room,
With mingled hope and fear inscribed upon
His eager face. The naked walls first caught
His gaze: where erst he had been wont to see
Comfort and plenty, all too plainly showed
Despair and want. And then his haggard eyes
Fell on the two dead women on the bed,
That lay, yet warm, clasped in each other's arms,
Unseparate in death as in their lives;
And with an awful cry of agony,
He fell upon his knees and hid his face
Against the coverlet. A moment passed,
Dumb with undying pain; and then a sob,
Big with the dead hope of five weary years,
Broke up out of his breast, too fiercely strained
With agony to yield its woe in tears;
And with that one sob burst in twain his heart.
The dawn crept on; and when the neighbours came,
Hearing no stir, as there was wont to be
For early morning toil, to know the cause
(Too well suspecting, in that awful time,
What was the cause) of the unwonted calm,
They found him dead by his belovéd dead,
Whilst blue broke day across the Eastern hills
And the glad sun rained gold upon the earth.
The door flew open and a sun-bronzed man,
Haggard and toil-worn, burst into the room,
With mingled hope and fear inscribed upon
His eager face. The naked walls first caught
His gaze: where erst he had been wont to see
Comfort and plenty, all too plainly showed
Despair and want. And then his haggard eyes
Fell on the two dead women on the bed,
That lay, yet warm, clasped in each other's arms,
Unseparate in death as in their lives;
And with an awful cry of agony,
He fell upon his knees and hid his face
Against the coverlet. A moment passed,
Dumb with undying pain; and then a sob,
Big with the dead hope of five weary years,
Broke up out of his breast, too fiercely strained
With agony to yield its woe in tears;
And with that one sob burst in twain his heart.
The dawn crept on; and when the neighbours came,
Hearing no stir, as there was wont to be
For early morning toil, to know the cause
(Too well suspecting, in that awful time,
What was the cause) of the unwonted calm,
They found him dead by his belovéd dead,
Whilst blue broke day across the Eastern hills
And the glad sun rained gold upon the earth.
17
III.QUIA MULTUM AMAVIT. )
JUST a drowned woman, with death-draggled hair
And wan eyes, all a-stare;
The weary limbs composed in ghastly rest,
The hands together prest,
Tight holding something that the flood has spared
Nor even the rough workhouse folk have dared
To separate from her wholly, but untied
Gently the knotted hands and laid it by her side.
And wan eyes, all a-stare;
The weary limbs composed in ghastly rest,
The hands together prest,
Tight holding something that the flood has spared
Nor even the rough workhouse folk have dared
To separate from her wholly, but untied
Gently the knotted hands and laid it by her side.
18
A piteous sight,—yet not without some sign
Of handiwork divine;
Some faint, mysterious traces of content
About the brows, unbent
At last from toil and misery,— some mark
Of child-like, tired composure in the stark,
Wan features, on whose calm there is imprest
At last the seal of rest.
Of handiwork divine;
Some faint, mysterious traces of content
About the brows, unbent
At last from toil and misery,— some mark
Of child-like, tired composure in the stark,
Wan features, on whose calm there is imprest
At last the seal of rest.
See, she was fair,—and now she's rid of strife,
She's comelier than in life;
For death has smoothed the tresses of her hair
And stroked the lines of care,
With no ungentle hand, from off her brow.
She seems at peace at last,—no matter how.
Death has been angel-sweet to her tired soul;
She has no need of dole.
She's comelier than in life;
For death has smoothed the tresses of her hair
And stroked the lines of care,
With no ungentle hand, from off her brow.
She seems at peace at last,—no matter how.
Death has been angel-sweet to her tired soul;
She has no need of dole.
You know her story? Just the sad, old tale,
Whose victims never fail!
Common enough and mean, but yet not quite
Without its gleam of light;
Not all devoid of some redeeming spark
Of nobleness to lighten its grim dark.
You turn away. You've heard of many such?
“She was so wicked!” But she loved so much.
Whose victims never fail!
Common enough and mean, but yet not quite
Without its gleam of light;
Not all devoid of some redeeming spark
Of nobleness to lighten its grim dark.
You turn away. You've heard of many such?
“She was so wicked!” But she loved so much.
I tell you, this poor woman you despise,
From whom you turn your eyes,
Loved with an ardour, side by side with which
Our lives, so seeming rich
In virtues and in grandeurs, fade away
Into the dusk, as night before the day.
Yet of her life you fear to hear me tell.
“She was so wicked!” But she loved so well.
From whom you turn your eyes,
Loved with an ardour, side by side with which
Our lives, so seeming rich
In virtues and in grandeurs, fade away
Into the dusk, as night before the day.
Yet of her life you fear to hear me tell.
“She was so wicked!” But she loved so well.
19
You saw the portrait taken from her grasp,
Stiffened in Death's cold clasp?
Two little children, poorly clad and plain,
Sun-scorched and worn with pain,
Wan with mean cares, too early for their years,
Their child-eyes eager with unchildish fears
And sordid, bitter yearnings. “But a smutch!”
You say. “And after all it's nought to me
What was her life and what her hopes might be.
She was so wicked!” Oh, she loved so much!
Stiffened in Death's cold clasp?
Two little children, poorly clad and plain,
Sun-scorched and worn with pain,
Wan with mean cares, too early for their years,
Their child-eyes eager with unchildish fears
And sordid, bitter yearnings. “But a smutch!”
You say. “And after all it's nought to me
What was her life and what her hopes might be.
She was so wicked!” Oh, she loved so much!
True, a mere daub, whereon the beneficent sun
Has written, in faint, dun,
Unbeauteous lines, a hard and narrow life,
Wherein dull care was rife
And little thought of beauty or delight
Relieved the level blackness of the night:
And yet I would not change those pictured two
For all the cherubs Raphael ever drew.
Has written, in faint, dun,
Unbeauteous lines, a hard and narrow life,
Wherein dull care was rife
And little thought of beauty or delight
Relieved the level blackness of the night:
And yet I would not change those pictured two
For all the cherubs Raphael ever drew.
Two little faces, plain enough to you,
Nothing of bright or new;
Such faces as one meets amongst each crowd,
Sharp-visaged and low-browed;
And yet to her, her picture-books of heaven,
The treasuries from which the scanty leaven,
Wherewith she stirred her poor mean life to joy,
Was drawn,—pure gold for her without alloy.
Nothing of bright or new;
Such faces as one meets amongst each crowd,
Sharp-visaged and low-browed;
And yet to her, her picture-books of heaven,
The treasuries from which the scanty leaven,
Wherewith she stirred her poor mean life to joy,
Was drawn,—pure gold for her without alloy.
They were her all, and by no sacred tie,
No pure maternity.
To her the name of wife had been denied;
In sin she lived and died.
She was an outlaw from the pale of right
And yet there was that in her had such might,
That she would not have shamed our dear Lord Christ.
She loved and that sufficed.
No pure maternity.
To her the name of wife had been denied;
In sin she lived and died.
She was an outlaw from the pale of right
And yet there was that in her had such might,
That she would not have shamed our dear Lord Christ.
She loved and that sufficed.
20
They were her shame and pride, her hope and fear,
To her how dreadly dear
We scarce can feel. You happy, virtuous wives,
Whose quiet, peaceful lives
Flow on, unstirred by misery or crime,
Can have no thought how high these souls can climb
For love; with what a weird, unearthly flame
These wretched mothers love their babes of shame;
How they can suffer for them, dull and mean
As they may seem, and sell their souls to screen
Their darlings, dealing out their hearts' best blood,
Drop after drop, to buy them daily food.
To her how dreadly dear
We scarce can feel. You happy, virtuous wives,
Whose quiet, peaceful lives
Flow on, unstirred by misery or crime,
Can have no thought how high these souls can climb
For love; with what a weird, unearthly flame
These wretched mothers love their babes of shame;
How they can suffer for them, dull and mean
As they may seem, and sell their souls to screen
Their darlings, dealing out their hearts' best blood,
Drop after drop, to buy them daily food.
And so for years she toiled for them, as none
Could ever toil, save one
Who had nought else to care for, night and day,
Until her hair grew gray
With labour such as souls in Dante's hell
Might have been bound to, and with fiends as fell
To act as her taskmasters and compel
The poor, thin fingers;—yet was honest still
For many a weary day and night, until
She found, with aching heart and pain-crazed head,
Her toil could not suffice to earn her children bread.
Could ever toil, save one
Who had nought else to care for, night and day,
Until her hair grew gray
With labour such as souls in Dante's hell
Might have been bound to, and with fiends as fell
To act as her taskmasters and compel
The poor, thin fingers;—yet was honest still
For many a weary day and night, until
She found, with aching heart and pain-crazed head,
Her toil could not suffice to earn her children bread.
They were her all; and she, ground down by want,
With hollow eyes and gaunt,
Saw but their misery, small beside her own,
Heard but their hungry moan,
Could not endure their piteous looks and sold
Herself to infamy, to warm their cold,
To feed their hunger and assuage their thirst,
Not hers. And yet, folk say, she is accurst!
With hollow eyes and gaunt,
Saw but their misery, small beside her own,
Heard but their hungry moan,
Could not endure their piteous looks and sold
Herself to infamy, to warm their cold,
To feed their hunger and assuage their thirst,
Not hers. And yet, folk say, she is accurst!
Cruel as fate was, there was yet in store
More pain for her and more
Fierce anguish. Famine and the plague combined,
In league with her own kind,
To steal from her her one source of content,
The one faint gleam of higher things, that blent
Its glimmer with her life's unbroken grey;
The one pale star, that turned her night to day,
Sank in the chill of death's delivering wave,
Extinguished in the grave.
More pain for her and more
Fierce anguish. Famine and the plague combined,
21
To steal from her her one source of content,
The one faint gleam of higher things, that blent
Its glimmer with her life's unbroken grey;
The one pale star, that turned her night to day,
Sank in the chill of death's delivering wave,
Extinguished in the grave.
Not even the omnipotence of Love
Had power to rise above
The sullen stern unpitying sweep of Fate,
That left her desolate.
O wretched mother! Wretched time of ours!
When all enlightenment's much-vaunted powers
To save this Magdalen's all could only fail,
When Love has no avail!
Had power to rise above
The sullen stern unpitying sweep of Fate,
That left her desolate.
O wretched mother! Wretched time of ours!
When all enlightenment's much-vaunted powers
To save this Magdalen's all could only fail,
When Love has no avail!
Starved even to death! For this she'd sold her soul;
This was her striving's goal!
Life had no longer aught that might suffice
To hallow all its dreary want and vice.
Nothing but death remained to her, the crown
Of all whose lives are hopeless. So fell down
Her star of life into the dusk of night
And she gave up the fight.
This was her striving's goal!
Life had no longer aught that might suffice
To hallow all its dreary want and vice.
Nothing but death remained to her, the crown
Of all whose lives are hopeless. So fell down
Her star of life into the dusk of night
And she gave up the fight.
So calm and peaceful seemed the dark grey flood,
Foul with much human blood.
God help her! Death was kinder than the world.
The sullen waters whirled
A moment o'er a circling plash, and then
She was forgotten from the world of men
And it was nought to her what folk might say.
Quiet at last she lay.
Foul with much human blood.
God help her! Death was kinder than the world.
The sullen waters whirled
A moment o'er a circling plash, and then
She was forgotten from the world of men
And it was nought to her what folk might say.
Quiet at last she lay.
I know not if this poor soul's martyrdom
For you be wholly dumb.
To me, I own, her sin seems holier far
Than half our virtues are;
For hers was of that ore which, purged of dross,
Yields gold that might have gilded Christ's own cross
And He have smiled. And yet you fear her touch?
“She was so wicked!” But she loved so much.
For you be wholly dumb.
22
Than half our virtues are;
For hers was of that ore which, purged of dross,
Yields gold that might have gilded Christ's own cross
And He have smiled. And yet you fear her touch?
“She was so wicked!” But she loved so much.
And of her common, mean and awful fate
Our righteous ones will prate,—
A fruitful text for homily!—until
Another come to fill
Her vacant place. And yet none sees the bloom
Of love, that opened in her life's blank gloom
And made it angel-bright. Folk turn aside
And know not how a martyr lived and died.
Our righteous ones will prate,—
A fruitful text for homily!—until
Another come to fill
Her vacant place. And yet none sees the bloom
Of love, that opened in her life's blank gloom
And made it angel-bright. Folk turn aside
And know not how a martyr lived and died.
“Accurséd,” say they, “is the suicide.
In sin she lived and died.
We have in her, and she in us, no part.
Our lives, thank heaven! dispart.
At least we're holier than she.” Alas!
My brethren, when reflected in God's glass,
I doubt me much if many of our lives
Will, when the day of reckoning arrives,
Or all our virtues, with her sin compare
Or as her life be fair.
In sin she lived and died.
We have in her, and she in us, no part.
Our lives, thank heaven! dispart.
At least we're holier than she.” Alas!
My brethren, when reflected in God's glass,
I doubt me much if many of our lives
Will, when the day of reckoning arrives,
Or all our virtues, with her sin compare
Or as her life be fair.
Even grim Death was pitiful to her;
Her rest he did not stir.
Shall we be, who with her drew common breath,
Less pitiful than Death?
We, who have heard how Christ once lived and died,
With whom His love is fabled to abide,
Shall we avoid a poor dead sinner's touch?
So wicked, say we? Oh, she loved so much!
Her rest he did not stir.
Shall we be, who with her drew common breath,
Less pitiful than Death?
We, who have heard how Christ once lived and died,
With whom His love is fabled to abide,
Shall we avoid a poor dead sinner's touch?
So wicked, say we? Oh, she loved so much!
23
For me, I cannot hold her life's long pain
To have been all in vain.
I cannot think that God will let her go,
After this life of woe;
Cannot believe that He, whose deathless love
She aped so well, will look on from above
With careless righteousness, while she sinks down
Into hell's depths, and with a pious frown,
Leave her to struggle in the devil's clutch.
True, she was wicked;—but she loved so much.
To have been all in vain.
I cannot think that God will let her go,
After this life of woe;
Cannot believe that He, whose deathless love
She aped so well, will look on from above
With careless righteousness, while she sinks down
Into hell's depths, and with a pious frown,
Leave her to struggle in the devil's clutch.
True, she was wicked;—but she loved so much.
At an inquest held at the Whitehorse Tavern, before Mr. Cooper, Coroner for the Western district, on the body of Eliza Farrell, unfortunate female, found drowned below Waterloo Bridge on Monday last, Rosse Farrell said, “Deceased was my sister. She was an unfortunate. She was unmarried. She had worked as a seamstress till trade was so bad last year that she could not earn a living at the prices paid by the sweaters and she then went upon the streets.” Witness believed she would never have done so but for her two illegitimate children, of whom she was passionately fond. Witness had no doubt that deceased's mind had been affected by their death. They died of neglect and starvation, owing to a woman, whom deceased paid to take care of them, having spent the money in drink. She paid the woman every penny she could scrape together and witness had known her sell the dress off her back to make up the weekly money. Deceased came to her on Saturday night, after having been to see the children, and told her she had found they were dead and had been already buried by the parish. She seemed quite distracted and rushed out of the house like a mad thing and witness had never seen her again. The photograph produced (found on deceased) was that of the children. After a few remarks from the coroner, the jury returned a verdict of “Suicide in a state of temporary insanity.” —Extract from daily paper.
IV.A CHRISTMAS VIGIL.
“LET me but see the light of heaven again!”And with chill fingers, from the window pane
I drew the curtain. All the glass was starred
With quaint frost-tracery, intercrossed and barred
With the cold mimic blossoms of the time,
The death in life of flowerage of the rime.
The day grew dark toward the Christmas Eve:
Without, each hanging gable-edge and eave
Was looped and curtained with the trellised snow
And all the sky was drear for winter woe.
The streets were still for weariness and all
The fields lay dead beneath a death-white pall;
Whilst o'er the fretted silver such as went
About the ways, in that drear wonderment,
Broke not the deathly silence with their tread.
It seemed a city of the risen dead,
Awsome with living ghosts, that stalked along
The pallid highways in a ghastly throng,
Flitting as noiselessly as shades. Within,
My grief seemed with the grief of Nature twin:
24
Than bound the fields and meadows. There, no part
Of that bright ecstasy—wherewith the voice
Of angels bade the shrouded earth rejoice
For that upon the keen-aired Christmas morn
There was in Bethlehem of Juda born
One who should bring to bloom the bud of peace
And be Himself the blossom,—brought decrease
Of sadness; nor,—O sweet Lord Christ! Alas!
Has not thy memory withered like dry grass,
When summer-winds are pitiless!—the chime
(A hollow mockery of the loveless time)
Of bells, whose song was tuneless with the sense
Of its unmeaning, cheered the sad suspense
That weighed upon me. Long past every fear,
Because past hope for ever, one all-dear,
All precious to me, lay at odds with Death
And I already felt the icy breath
Of the dread angel stir the frost-stilled air,
As I did watch. The battle and the care
Were over and the dim cold hour was come,
When my sad heart, like the sad streets, was dumb
With its dead hopes, unknowing if the gloom
Were big with ecstasy or if some doom
Of unexperienced horror lay concealed
Within its awful bosom, where ensealed
Slept the mysterious Future. Very dear
To my most God-like sympathies, no mere
Convenient friend, with whom the only tie
Is mutual ease and use of amity,
Was he who lay a-dying. He had been
My comrade, when the hopes of Spring were green,
My help in autumn's dreary blank of gray,
In winter's night of doubt my cheer and stay.
Together we had trod the path of years,
Hoped hopes together, feared each other's fears,
Seen morning lighten in each other's eyes
25
Of perfect vision, that should help us read
In Nature's tangles the eternal creed.
We had so long been habited to share
Each other's pain and pleasure, joy and care,
To live and breathe each other's life and breath,
To think I could not share with him his death
Seemed cruel wonder; and to me, his soul
Felt the least portion of the common dole,
For that but death in life was left to me,
Condemned thenceforth in life alone to be,
Whilst to his lot fell life in death. And so
I sat and watched him, as the fire burnt low,
And wondered, in my numbing trance of pain,
How long before the morn should come again
And puzzled over trifles, whilst there lay
Within my heart one gloom of winter's gray
And paralysed all thought. My mind went back
Along the dim years' memory-misted track
And lost itself in woodbine-tangled lanes
And saw the silken poppies' crimson stains
Sprinkle the russet moorland. Or I stood
Within a maze of hawthorn-blossomed wood
And knew the bedded violets by their scent
And primroses, wide-eyed for wonderment,
That glittered in the tender tree-foot green,
Under the golden shadow of the treen.
And he, who lay a-dying, held once more
My hand and walked with me that flowered floor,
Filled the sweet air with wise and lovely words
Or songs as Spring-like as the pipe of birds;
Reasoned of fair and wondrous things and turned
All thoughts to beauty, as within him burned
The Spring's full glory; took the things of Earth
And made them bright with an immortal mirth.
So sat I, dreaming o'er dead youth again,
Half-conscious, half-forgetful of my pain,
26
Fell through the Christmas twilight soft and low.
And as the evening darkened into night,
Toning to grey the snow's relentless white,
I heard his voice, that called me to his side,
So faint, another would have thought he sighed.
I leant me o'er the bed and took his hand,
Seeing by his face how very fast life's sand
Ran from the hour-glass. And he, as it were,
Renewing life awhile, to hold me there,
Raised himself up and lay upon my breast,
Silent awhile, whilst day died in the west;
And then, “The gates of death do gape for me,”
He said. “My feet from life are slipping free.
Dear friend, I linger but a second, then
Launch out upon the sea unplumbed of men.
I go into the darkness; yet you stay
And I go lonely on my lightless way.
I look into the mystery. Is it rest,
Long-yearned-for rest, tow'rd which the chill swift tide
Of ebbing life so ceaselessly doth glide?
O God, to whom I come, a bidden guest,
Let it be peace, I pray! No heaven of psalms,
No charm of bended heads and folded palms!
My life too long has been a psalm of woes;
I crave that Rest to which all Being flows.
O Buddha, sweet thy faith was aye to me,
That holds us loosed from life in death to be,
Absolved and safe from love and pain and dole,
Lost in the calm sea of the one great Soul.
O God, how fair this lovely Eastern dream,
Haply the truth, to my tired soul doth seem,—
To lose one's weary personality
In the unconsciousness of Deity!
I cannot think but Jesus meant the same,
Despite the sophisms that debase his name
And turn his sweet humanity to gall
27
Great souls and pure, who read the signs of God
And leave their dreams to coarser minds, that plod
Over their bright imaginings and tread
Into the dust each flower that shows its head.
Dear Christ! How men have blackened thy white faith
And blurred thy heaven with the shadow of death!
I enter on the path thy tender feet
Trod once,—not bitter to me nor yet sweet;
For I am weary and desire to rest,
And I am sorely with vague doubt opprest,
Lest other toils await me. Yet I hope
And fear not, though my feet in darkness grope;
For, whilst I hold thy hand, dear friend, I know
Christ's love can still in human bosoms glow
And love will round all troubles into peace,
Although the springs of light and being cease
To cheer us. I may say, with Rabelais,
As farewell word to living, ‘Je m'en vais
Querir le grand Peut-être.’ It is the end.
I carry into night thy love, O friend,
'Spite death, 'spite doubt and cold.” And spake no more.
And I, down looking if his soul still wore
That web of flesh it long had found so sore,
Saw that the appointed peace had made him dumb
And knew that the deliverer Death was come.
V.A DREAM OF FAITHS.
WITHIN a maze of narrow, tortuous streets,
Whose convolutions deaden the day's din
And roar of City turmoil to that hum
Of softly murmuring sound one hears within
The pearly chambers of a twisted shell,
A gray old church stands in a little space
Of swarded churchyard, green and variegate
With plaited flower beds; in the City's heart,
A flowered nest of peace and restfulness.
But one of many other quiet nooks
That nestle in the mirky City's midst,
To me long use and knowledge made it dear
Beyond its fellows, for it seemed to me,
The ancient fane, all lonely as it was
And resonant to but few human steps,
Wore an especial air of friendly peace
And seemed to tender comfort to my soul.
Ay, and the very flowers had in their eyes,
Upturned to seek the friendly heaven's blink
Between the long lines of encroaching walls,
A deeper meaning than flowers use to show
To general sight, as who should say, “We long
After the open freedom of the plains
And breezy freshness of the blossomed fields
With an incessant longing; yet, resigned
To do God's service where He bids it us,
We are content to live beneath the smoke
And give our scent and comfort of our bloom
As freely as our brethren of the meads,
Feeding our yearning on the infrequent sun
And the rare love of some few weary souls,
That gather consolation from our life.”
Whose convolutions deaden the day's din
And roar of City turmoil to that hum
Of softly murmuring sound one hears within
28
A gray old church stands in a little space
Of swarded churchyard, green and variegate
With plaited flower beds; in the City's heart,
A flowered nest of peace and restfulness.
But one of many other quiet nooks
That nestle in the mirky City's midst,
To me long use and knowledge made it dear
Beyond its fellows, for it seemed to me,
The ancient fane, all lonely as it was
And resonant to but few human steps,
Wore an especial air of friendly peace
And seemed to tender comfort to my soul.
Ay, and the very flowers had in their eyes,
Upturned to seek the friendly heaven's blink
Between the long lines of encroaching walls,
A deeper meaning than flowers use to show
To general sight, as who should say, “We long
After the open freedom of the plains
And breezy freshness of the blossomed fields
With an incessant longing; yet, resigned
To do God's service where He bids it us,
We are content to live beneath the smoke
And give our scent and comfort of our bloom
As freely as our brethren of the meads,
Feeding our yearning on the infrequent sun
And the rare love of some few weary souls,
That gather consolation from our life.”
Hard by the church, a little parsonage,
Gray as itself, but green with clustering wealth
Of ivy tendrils, nestled to its side,
As if for shelter from the encroaching world:
And therein dwelt an old and reverend man,
Who was the priest of that neglected fane,
Uncomraded, except by memories
And the vague creatures of his own sweet thoughts.
A man who, working God's work in the world,
Had little commerce with world's use, but dwelt
Within the heaven of his own clear faith,
'Spite age's frosts, he was a child at heart
And had still childhood's generous confidence,
Its pure delight in bright and innocent things.
For him, the dreams, that had made sweet his youth
And glorified his manhood, still relieved
The sunset-shadow of his waning life
And lighted up the gloom of those stern hours,
When, in the gray of the descending years,
The sea of memory gives up its dead.
He had not lost his early purity
Of joy in all the sweet and rare delights,
The delicate and shrinking mysteries,
That swarm, for those who love, in this our world:
He had yet faith in all the lovely myths
And fables, that do symblize God's love
In picture-speech of bird-song and of bloom;
Relived dead youth in every violet's scent,
Saw Ophir in each lily's golden dust,
Golconda in each flower-cup's crystal dew.
Gray as itself, but green with clustering wealth
Of ivy tendrils, nestled to its side,
As if for shelter from the encroaching world:
And therein dwelt an old and reverend man,
Who was the priest of that neglected fane,
Uncomraded, except by memories
And the vague creatures of his own sweet thoughts.
A man who, working God's work in the world,
29
Within the heaven of his own clear faith,
'Spite age's frosts, he was a child at heart
And had still childhood's generous confidence,
Its pure delight in bright and innocent things.
For him, the dreams, that had made sweet his youth
And glorified his manhood, still relieved
The sunset-shadow of his waning life
And lighted up the gloom of those stern hours,
When, in the gray of the descending years,
The sea of memory gives up its dead.
He had not lost his early purity
Of joy in all the sweet and rare delights,
The delicate and shrinking mysteries,
That swarm, for those who love, in this our world:
He had yet faith in all the lovely myths
And fables, that do symblize God's love
In picture-speech of bird-song and of bloom;
Relived dead youth in every violet's scent,
Saw Ophir in each lily's golden dust,
Golconda in each flower-cup's crystal dew.
The sceptic murmur of the unquiet age,
Eager for light, no matter though it lose,
In the cold gleam, some glow of ancient warmth,
Had reached him in his peaceful solitude;
And to his mild but clear intelligence
It could not but be patent that the doom
Of death was passed for many a thing he loved,
Much good, that had for many weary years
Outlived its use, and many an old belief,
That, in its time, had been the breath of life
To millions, but was now long since worn out
And sunk to superstition. Much he grieved
A natural grief (as one who, in a dream,
Sees the phantasmata of his sweet thoughts
Fade from him and will not be comforted,
But mourns them waking, though he knew them not
For real or seeming) and his soul was full
Of troubling doubt. For him the coming years
Were big with fears; he could not shape his hope,
That had so long run all unquestioningly
In the worn channel of the ancient faith,
Into the stronger current of new thought,
That swept old landmarks from his way of life.
The clinging dogmas of time-honoured creeds
Fettered his spirit with the knitted webs
Of their exanimate subtleties, so that
He was not free to let his simple love
(That else might, with the magic of its own
All-powerful menstruum, have solved for him
The weary problem) work its natural work,
Clogged as it was by age-old fallacies.
And so his spirit in the tangling doubts
Strove, like a fly caught in a spider's web,
That twines itself more inextricably,
With every effort, in the unyielding toils.
Eager for light, no matter though it lose,
In the cold gleam, some glow of ancient warmth,
Had reached him in his peaceful solitude;
And to his mild but clear intelligence
It could not but be patent that the doom
Of death was passed for many a thing he loved,
Much good, that had for many weary years
Outlived its use, and many an old belief,
That, in its time, had been the breath of life
To millions, but was now long since worn out
And sunk to superstition. Much he grieved
A natural grief (as one who, in a dream,
Sees the phantasmata of his sweet thoughts
Fade from him and will not be comforted,
But mourns them waking, though he knew them not
30
Of troubling doubt. For him the coming years
Were big with fears; he could not shape his hope,
That had so long run all unquestioningly
In the worn channel of the ancient faith,
Into the stronger current of new thought,
That swept old landmarks from his way of life.
The clinging dogmas of time-honoured creeds
Fettered his spirit with the knitted webs
Of their exanimate subtleties, so that
He was not free to let his simple love
(That else might, with the magic of its own
All-powerful menstruum, have solved for him
The weary problem) work its natural work,
Clogged as it was by age-old fallacies.
And so his spirit in the tangling doubts
Strove, like a fly caught in a spider's web,
That twines itself more inextricably,
With every effort, in the unyielding toils.
One night, he dreamt, an angel came to him,
As Beatrice to Dante, in the shape,
Thrice sublimate, of one whom he had loved
In the clear Spring-time of his vanished youth,
And took him by the hand and led him up
To a high mountain's snow-incoronate top
And showed him all the kingdoms of the world.
Before him lay the glory and the power
Of all that has on earth been fair and bright,
Stately and wonderful, since being was;
All teachings that have swayed the souls of men,
All that has aye been powerful to save,
All faiths, were imaged for him in the dream,
Living a symbol-life in definite shapes;
And all high thoughts and solemn mysteries
Moved, radiant, o'er the surface of the world,
Clothed in their own fulfilment's acted shape,
Or stood in statue-majesty, enshrined
In snow of marble and gold-glitterance.
Beneath his feet the earth spread far and wide,
Veined with the tortuous silver of its streams,
And here and there majestic temples rose,
Graven to all cunning shapes of human art
And vivid at the heart with fire-cored gems.
Strange lustres flashed from the enchanted shapes
And met each other in the throbbing air,
Weaving a dazzling, iridescent haze
About the path of those weird phantasies.
The netted radiance hid the constant sky
And made, for those that dwelt beneath its spell,
A new and seeming heaven, bright and strange,
Here sweet with glancing lights, there stern with storms,
And holding, on its topmost pinnacle,
A painted dream of earthly luxury,
That men had wrought from their fantastic hopes
And set it in the sky and called it “heaven.”
As Beatrice to Dante, in the shape,
Thrice sublimate, of one whom he had loved
In the clear Spring-time of his vanished youth,
And took him by the hand and led him up
To a high mountain's snow-incoronate top
And showed him all the kingdoms of the world.
Before him lay the glory and the power
Of all that has on earth been fair and bright,
Stately and wonderful, since being was;
All teachings that have swayed the souls of men,
All that has aye been powerful to save,
All faiths, were imaged for him in the dream,
Living a symbol-life in definite shapes;
And all high thoughts and solemn mysteries
Moved, radiant, o'er the surface of the world,
Clothed in their own fulfilment's acted shape,
Or stood in statue-majesty, enshrined
31
Beneath his feet the earth spread far and wide,
Veined with the tortuous silver of its streams,
And here and there majestic temples rose,
Graven to all cunning shapes of human art
And vivid at the heart with fire-cored gems.
Strange lustres flashed from the enchanted shapes
And met each other in the throbbing air,
Weaving a dazzling, iridescent haze
About the path of those weird phantasies.
The netted radiance hid the constant sky
And made, for those that dwelt beneath its spell,
A new and seeming heaven, bright and strange,
Here sweet with glancing lights, there stern with storms,
And holding, on its topmost pinnacle,
A painted dream of earthly luxury,
That men had wrought from their fantastic hopes
And set it in the sky and called it “heaven.”
The priest gazed long upon the changing play
Of those phantasmal semblances, and soon
He saw the gradual light fade out from them;
The gem-fire died within its ancient haunts
And all the radiant shapes grew etiolate
And colourless as darkness-blanching flowers.
It seemed to him, the essence of their life
Had left them and their source of radiance,
Impermanent, had dried up at the spring.
And as he looked, a crash of thunderous song,
Wherein all awful sweetness was expressed,
Pealed out across the surface of the earth
And rent the charmed veil of that seeming heaven,
Letting in on it the eternal light.
The dream-forms shrank and shrivelled in the blaze
Of new irradiance, “alba sicut lux,”
And all the structures of that wondrous birth
Sank into ruin. All the earth was strewn
With one huge waste of gray and lifeless wrecks.
He looked and knew the symbolled destiny,
Pre-eminent among the other shapes,
Of that old faith, which was so dear to him;
And with a sudden dreary consciousness
And sense how blank was life thenceforth to him,
Shorn of its own particular star of hope,
Sank down upon his knees and bowed his head
Upon his hands. The angel looked at him
With eyes in which there shone compassionate love
And peace; and then to him, “Be not dismayed:
These are but earthly things thou seëst die,
But fabrics of a human phantasy,
That men have fashioned, after their own shape,
From their unreasoning fears and baseless hopes,
From their unreal pains and feverish joys,
And knelt and worshipped their own handiwork.
And so they are but mortal, do but live
So long as the quick, animating soul
Throbs in their confines. When it flees from them,
They crumble into vague and shapeless wreck.
The hearts of men do ofttimes cleave to them,
For that they feel in them their godlike part,
The sympathetic presence of the soul,
And worship, all unconscious, their own selves.
Many have drawn from them the breath of life,
Whilst that their living virtue yet had force;
And folk still cling to them with desperate faith,
Long after every spark of life has fled,
As one who seeks deliverance in the arms
Of his once powerful friend, now old and weak,
And will not lightly credit his decay.
But, ere they had their being, God was God
And will be yet, although the heavens pass.
Be not dismayed: there is no change in Him
Alone. Thy refuge is the Eternal God
And under thee the everlasting arms.”
Of those phantasmal semblances, and soon
He saw the gradual light fade out from them;
The gem-fire died within its ancient haunts
And all the radiant shapes grew etiolate
And colourless as darkness-blanching flowers.
It seemed to him, the essence of their life
Had left them and their source of radiance,
Impermanent, had dried up at the spring.
And as he looked, a crash of thunderous song,
Wherein all awful sweetness was expressed,
Pealed out across the surface of the earth
And rent the charmed veil of that seeming heaven,
Letting in on it the eternal light.
The dream-forms shrank and shrivelled in the blaze
Of new irradiance, “alba sicut lux,”
And all the structures of that wondrous birth
Sank into ruin. All the earth was strewn
With one huge waste of gray and lifeless wrecks.
32
Pre-eminent among the other shapes,
Of that old faith, which was so dear to him;
And with a sudden dreary consciousness
And sense how blank was life thenceforth to him,
Shorn of its own particular star of hope,
Sank down upon his knees and bowed his head
Upon his hands. The angel looked at him
With eyes in which there shone compassionate love
And peace; and then to him, “Be not dismayed:
These are but earthly things thou seëst die,
But fabrics of a human phantasy,
That men have fashioned, after their own shape,
From their unreasoning fears and baseless hopes,
From their unreal pains and feverish joys,
And knelt and worshipped their own handiwork.
And so they are but mortal, do but live
So long as the quick, animating soul
Throbs in their confines. When it flees from them,
They crumble into vague and shapeless wreck.
The hearts of men do ofttimes cleave to them,
For that they feel in them their godlike part,
The sympathetic presence of the soul,
And worship, all unconscious, their own selves.
Many have drawn from them the breath of life,
Whilst that their living virtue yet had force;
And folk still cling to them with desperate faith,
Long after every spark of life has fled,
As one who seeks deliverance in the arms
Of his once powerful friend, now old and weak,
And will not lightly credit his decay.
But, ere they had their being, God was God
And will be yet, although the heavens pass.
Be not dismayed: there is no change in Him
Alone. Thy refuge is the Eternal God
And under thee the everlasting arms.”
The listener's heart drank comfort from the clear
Sustaining words, and from the shade of doubt
His soul leapt out into the day of hope,
As waters leap from out the dim rock-rifts
Into the morning splendour of the sun.
Before him still the waste of ruins lay,
But over all things, as within himself,
He felt some healing influence had passed
And softened their stern aspect of despair.
The garish sun died out and all the earth
Lay in the moonlit sanctity of death:
And as he stood, the air was all astir
With that blithe mystery, that ushers in
The Spring-time, and the summer-hearted world
Throbbed with the coming rapture of the May.
The buds burst out into a new flower-birth
And all the eager host of passionate blooms
Spread, rustling, o'er the surface of the earth.
Spring's fresh leaf-green and delicate-petalled blooms
Hid the gray ruins with a fragrant shroud;
All-mother Earth put forth her flowerful hand
And took the dead again to her embrace,
All things forgiven, all but love forgotten
In the new peace of that assoiling death.
The air was sweet with carol; all the woods
Were budded and the sudden flowering sky
Flamed with the tender promise of new dawn.
33
His soul leapt out into the day of hope,
As waters leap from out the dim rock-rifts
Into the morning splendour of the sun.
Before him still the waste of ruins lay,
But over all things, as within himself,
He felt some healing influence had passed
And softened their stern aspect of despair.
The garish sun died out and all the earth
Lay in the moonlit sanctity of death:
And as he stood, the air was all astir
With that blithe mystery, that ushers in
The Spring-time, and the summer-hearted world
Throbbed with the coming rapture of the May.
The buds burst out into a new flower-birth
And all the eager host of passionate blooms
Spread, rustling, o'er the surface of the earth.
Spring's fresh leaf-green and delicate-petalled blooms
Hid the gray ruins with a fragrant shroud;
All-mother Earth put forth her flowerful hand
And took the dead again to her embrace,
All things forgiven, all but love forgotten
In the new peace of that assoiling death.
The air was sweet with carol; all the woods
Were budded and the sudden flowering sky
Flamed with the tender promise of new dawn.
Then, “Lift thine eyes,” the angel said to him,
“Toward the golden region of the East.”
He raised his head and looked across the mists
To where the sun ran, reddening, through the brume,
And burning through the opal-hearted veil,
He saw the jasper hills of a new heaven.
“Toward the golden region of the East.”
He raised his head and looked across the mists
To where the sun ran, reddening, through the brume,
And burning through the opal-hearted veil,
He saw the jasper hills of a new heaven.
34
VI.A PORTRAIT.
I knew a poet once, a lonely man,
Whose soul dwelt in the dim wood-glooms of thought
And dreamt strange visions of enchanted Spring:
Whose song, in that bright bloom-tide when the May
Quickens life's pulses and the summer lies,
Sun-weary, on the painted meadow-grass,
Was solemn, strange and sorrowful: scant trace
Was there of Spring-tide glory or the craze
Of ecstasy, that turns the air to wine,
When in the rose-hearts burns the July splendour.
What little joy there was was weird and still,
Stately and serious, with an undersong
That sounded like the night-bird's wailing notes
Or the quaint ripple of some low-voiced rill,
That murmurs of earth's hidden soul of pain
Under her robe of blooms; one heard in it
The chariot-thunder of the shrouded hours,
That swept across the autumn-verging skies.
But, in the winter, when the sky was clear
With silver frost and crystal-feathered snow
Fell softly through the air, when streamlets lay
Fast-locked in dreamless sleep, his soul bloomed out
To a new flow'rage and his song grew bright
With exquisite strange splendour. In the lines,
The ringing sweetness of bird-haunted woods
Replaced the crash of snow-enladen boughs:
The blooms ran wreathing o'er the broidered page:
One smelt the summer in his scented verse
And one eternal rose of cloudless sky
Glittered, from opal dawn to golden eve,
In the clear setting of his pictured words.
For why? He saw the complements of things
And knew how Nature's ever-changing pulse
Throbbed with strange secrets, how the flower of death
Bore at its heart the ovary of life.
He felt that winter held the germs of Spring
And summer's roses slept beneath the snow.
And so no joy was sorrowless to him,
No sorrow joyless, and his spheral life
Lay in the equipoise of perfect peace.
Whose soul dwelt in the dim wood-glooms of thought
And dreamt strange visions of enchanted Spring:
Whose song, in that bright bloom-tide when the May
Quickens life's pulses and the summer lies,
Sun-weary, on the painted meadow-grass,
Was solemn, strange and sorrowful: scant trace
Was there of Spring-tide glory or the craze
Of ecstasy, that turns the air to wine,
When in the rose-hearts burns the July splendour.
What little joy there was was weird and still,
Stately and serious, with an undersong
That sounded like the night-bird's wailing notes
Or the quaint ripple of some low-voiced rill,
That murmurs of earth's hidden soul of pain
Under her robe of blooms; one heard in it
The chariot-thunder of the shrouded hours,
That swept across the autumn-verging skies.
But, in the winter, when the sky was clear
With silver frost and crystal-feathered snow
Fell softly through the air, when streamlets lay
Fast-locked in dreamless sleep, his soul bloomed out
To a new flow'rage and his song grew bright
With exquisite strange splendour. In the lines,
The ringing sweetness of bird-haunted woods
Replaced the crash of snow-enladen boughs:
The blooms ran wreathing o'er the broidered page:
One smelt the summer in his scented verse
And one eternal rose of cloudless sky
Glittered, from opal dawn to golden eve,
In the clear setting of his pictured words.
For why? He saw the complements of things
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Throbbed with strange secrets, how the flower of death
Bore at its heart the ovary of life.
He felt that winter held the germs of Spring
And summer's roses slept beneath the snow.
And so no joy was sorrowless to him,
No sorrow joyless, and his spheral life
Lay in the equipoise of perfect peace.
In the great city's crowded heart he dwelt
And all his life had passed there. Little he
Knew of the Spring-sweet glories of the May
Or of the rare deep magic of the time
When summer brims the jewel-chaliced flowers
With wine of wonder and the woods burst out
A-bloom with singing. Yet the flowers of May
Bloomed in the shaded woodlands of his soul
And in his heart a chastened glow of Spring
Lived ever. Life for him was sweet and calm,
The sweeter for a touch of pain in it,
As music saddens to its sweetest key;
And so he lived a kind of moonlight life,
Where all things remedied their opposites
And joy and pain were ever softened down
To the calm light of that Eternal Pearl
That Dante tells of in his “Paradise.”
And all his life had passed there. Little he
Knew of the Spring-sweet glories of the May
Or of the rare deep magic of the time
When summer brims the jewel-chaliced flowers
With wine of wonder and the woods burst out
A-bloom with singing. Yet the flowers of May
Bloomed in the shaded woodlands of his soul
And in his heart a chastened glow of Spring
Lived ever. Life for him was sweet and calm,
The sweeter for a touch of pain in it,
As music saddens to its sweetest key;
And so he lived a kind of moonlight life,
Where all things remedied their opposites
And joy and pain were ever softened down
To the calm light of that Eternal Pearl
That Dante tells of in his “Paradise.”
VII.A DREAM-LIFE.
A man lived once within the busy town
And filled his days with labour hard and sore:
From break of morn, until the night fell down,
He worked for bread amid the city's roar.
And filled his days with labour hard and sore:
From break of morn, until the night fell down,
He worked for bread amid the city's roar.
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His toil was with no love or friendship blest,
His path of life was blank and cold and sere;
The one faint hope that lingered in his breast
Served but to make his present lot more drear.
His path of life was blank and cold and sere;
The one faint hope that lingered in his breast
Served but to make his present lot more drear.
He had once loved and (dead to all but him)
Love's memory yet lingered in his heart;
Although his soul was sere and eyes grown dim,
That guest from him might nevermore depart.
Love's memory yet lingered in his heart;
Although his soul was sere and eyes grown dim,
That guest from him might nevermore depart.
A lonely man, throughout the weary day
His hands ceased not from dull and cheerless strife;
The outer world for him had long grown gray
And little beauty blossomed in his life.
His hands ceased not from dull and cheerless strife;
The outer world for him had long grown gray
And little beauty blossomed in his life.
But in his heart there was a quiet nook,
Where lay old memories, adust and dim;
He read on Sundays in the Hebrew book,
And dreams of his dead youth came back to him.
Where lay old memories, adust and dim;
He read on Sundays in the Hebrew book,
And dreams of his dead youth came back to him.
He read of king and warrior and priest,
Heard in his ears the battle's thunderous din,
And from his heart the pain of toiling ceased
And all his soul had peace from care and sin.
Heard in his ears the battle's thunderous din,
And from his heart the pain of toiling ceased
And all his soul had peace from care and sin.
He read; and Spring flowered round his weary life;
He smelt the sweet faint primroses again
And saw white wind-flowers in the woodglooms rife,
Heard on the grass the apple-blossoms rain:
He smelt the sweet faint primroses again
And saw white wind-flowers in the woodglooms rife,
Heard on the grass the apple-blossoms rain:
He saw the azure canopy of heaven,
With white-winged clouds that glittered in the sun;
He saw the wood-deeps by the sunbeams riven
And gold lights flower through the shadows dun.
With white-winged clouds that glittered in the sun;
He saw the wood-deeps by the sunbeams riven
And gold lights flower through the shadows dun.
He read; and he was ankle-deep in grass,
With cowslip-umbels nodding at his feet,
And saw the shadows of the sun-clouds pass,
Where with the brook the heavens seemed to meet.
With cowslip-umbels nodding at his feet,
And saw the shadows of the sun-clouds pass,
Where with the brook the heavens seemed to meet.
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He heard the songful babble of the stream,
That from its pebbles drew sweet undertones,
And watched the minnows, in the golden gleam,
Dart in and out the brown and dappled stones.
That from its pebbles drew sweet undertones,
And watched the minnows, in the golden gleam,
Dart in and out the brown and dappled stones.
He read; and fragrance of the scented pines
Rose round his spirit, like a mist of balm;
He saw red fruitage on the strawberry-bines
Glow in the hedges in the summer calm.
Rose round his spirit, like a mist of balm;
He saw red fruitage on the strawberry-bines
Glow in the hedges in the summer calm.
Nesh eyebright looked at him and meadow-sweet;
He smelt the scent of the crushed grass again
And wild-thyme sent up perfume from his feet,
The plant that yields us fragrance from its pain.
He smelt the scent of the crushed grass again
And wild-thyme sent up perfume from his feet,
The plant that yields us fragrance from its pain.
Once more he passed through woods by autumn worn
And trod brown carpets of the rustling leaves;
He saw the gold sun glitter on the corn
And heard the sickle shear the russet sheaves.
And trod brown carpets of the rustling leaves;
He saw the gold sun glitter on the corn
And heard the sickle shear the russet sheaves.
He heard sweet voices through the mists of years
And quaint wild snatches of forgotten rhyme;
And many a love he had embalmed in tears
Re-lived for him its early blossom-time.
And quaint wild snatches of forgotten rhyme;
And many a love he had embalmed in tears
Re-lived for him its early blossom-time.
The week-day toil was but a dreary dream,
In which the voices of the birds were hushed;
It was the things of life that did but seem;
The true things on his Sabbath vision rushed.
In which the voices of the birds were hushed;
It was the things of life that did but seem;
The true things on his Sabbath vision rushed.
A dream of summer held his weary soul,
Although his life seemed echoless and dumb,
His spirit from the webs of working stole,
And when he died, he thought the Spring was come.
Although his life seemed echoless and dumb,
His spirit from the webs of working stole,
And when he died, he thought the Spring was come.
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VIII.THE RED ROSE.
ONE day, as from my bed I went,
I saw one stand before the door,
Whose hands a bough of blossom bore,
Snow-white and very sweet of scent.
I saw one stand before the door,
Whose hands a bough of blossom bore,
Snow-white and very sweet of scent.
His visage was full grave and sweet
And awful as the morning red,
When in the east the night is dead;
And lilies grew about his feet.
And awful as the morning red,
When in the east the night is dead;
And lilies grew about his feet.
His hair was of a tender gold,
As cowslips in the middle Spring,
And clad his shoulders, ring on ring;
It was full pleasant to behold.
As cowslips in the middle Spring,
And clad his shoulders, ring on ring;
It was full pleasant to behold.
White roses in his arms he held
And snow-white roses round his head;
But on his breast one rose was red,
As if his heart's blood there had welled;
And snow-white roses round his head;
But on his breast one rose was red,
As if his heart's blood there had welled;
And in one hand a lily-bell,
That garments of fair silver wore
And burnt red-golden at the core,
As 'twere the sun therein did dwell.
That garments of fair silver wore
And burnt red-golden at the core,
As 'twere the sun therein did dwell.
“Sir,” said I, “if I may be told,
What is the meaning of these flowers,
Whose like ne'er drank the Spring's soft showers
Nor ever grew on hill or wold?”
What is the meaning of these flowers,
Whose like ne'er drank the Spring's soft showers
Nor ever grew on hill or wold?”
“These are the roses of the city
Of God and eke of Christ,” he said,
“That erst in crimson were arrayed,
But now are turned all white for pity
Of God and eke of Christ,” he said,
“That erst in crimson were arrayed,
But now are turned all white for pity
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“Of human dolour and compassion
For blindness of mortality;
But in this other that ye see
The hue, in token of Christ's passion,
For blindness of mortality;
But in this other that ye see
The hue, in token of Christ's passion,
“Abides, that men may, in its sight,
The blood shed for them have in mind
And in its bloom fair hope may find
And in its smell may have delight.
The blood shed for them have in mind
And in its bloom fair hope may find
And in its smell may have delight.
“For this red rose I bear is Love,
That sweetens life and softens pain,
And thereto should all things be fain
And set its sweets all sweets above.”
That sweetens life and softens pain,
And thereto should all things be fain
And set its sweets all sweets above.”
“Sir,” said I, “if I may be told,
What is that lily that is dight
With leaves of such a lovely white
And at the heart is burning gold?”
What is that lily that is dight
With leaves of such a lovely white
And at the heart is burning gold?”
And he, “This is the sign of death,
That is without both white and cold,
But at the core is burning gold
And holdeth store of fragrant breath.
That is without both white and cold,
But at the core is burning gold
And holdeth store of fragrant breath.
“Choose which of these thou willest take,
For the dear God, in heaven that lives,
Such grace unto all mortals gives,
For Christ His Son's belovéd sake,
For the dear God, in heaven that lives,
Such grace unto all mortals gives,
For Christ His Son's belovéd sake,
“That each may once within his life
Make choice of roses red or white
Or lily with the heart of light,
To solace him in pain and strife.”
Make choice of roses red or white
Or lily with the heart of light,
To solace him in pain and strife.”
And I, “Sir, sorrow is enough
Within this life and world of ours
And death comes with the evening hours;
And so I choose the rose of Love.”
Within this life and world of ours
And death comes with the evening hours;
And so I choose the rose of Love.”
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Whereat my hand I stretchéd out,
That lovely crimson bloom to bear
From him and in my bosom wear;
But lo! my hand drew back in doubt
That lovely crimson bloom to bear
From him and in my bosom wear;
But lo! my hand drew back in doubt
Which it should take; for that one rose,
That in the wreath of white was red,
Had loren all its lustihead
And had put on the hue of those
That in the wreath of white was red,
Had loren all its lustihead
And had put on the hue of those
Which were upon the bough y-sprent;
And these, in stead, to crimson turned,
As 'twere new fire within them burned;
Nay, to the lily there was lent
And these, in stead, to crimson turned,
As 'twere new fire within them burned;
Nay, to the lily there was lent
A flush of colour; so I knew
Not which was lily nor which rose,
Which was the blossom that I chose,
So like a bloom on each one blew.
Not which was lily nor which rose,
Which was the blossom that I chose,
So like a bloom on each one blew.
Then to the bearer, “Sir,” said I,
“Who art thou that, as no man may,
Dost make these colours change and play,
So that their semblants mock the eye?”
“Who art thou that, as no man may,
Dost make these colours change and play,
So that their semblants mock the eye?”
And he, “I draw no mortal breath:
The Lord, in heaven that reigns above,
Did give to me the name of ‘Love’;
But oftentimes men call me ‘Death’.”
The Lord, in heaven that reigns above,
Did give to me the name of ‘Love’;
But oftentimes men call me ‘Death’.”
And as he spoke, his seeming fled
And melted into empty air,
And I into this world of care
Went with knit brows and drooping head.
And melted into empty air,
And I into this world of care
Went with knit brows and drooping head.
And as among the folk I walked,
Along wide place and sunny street,
Meseemed mine eyes bytimes did meet
His form with whom I late had talked,
Along wide place and sunny street,
Meseemed mine eyes bytimes did meet
His form with whom I late had talked,
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As in the ways he went and strewed
White flowers and red with viewless hands;
And often in my dreams he stands
Before me, as that morn he stood.
White flowers and red with viewless hands;
And often in my dreams he stands
Before me, as that morn he stood.
IX.CHRISTMAS BELLS.
O silver-chiming bells, in the misty Christmas morning,
Filling with glad ripples the frost-enlightened air,
What song is it you sing to us,
What tidings that you bring to us,
What burden that the clamours of your changeful cadence bear?
Do ye still recall the advent of the star-enkindled dawning,
When 'mid flower-calm the lily of old Christendom was born?
Still hail the domination,
In many a land and nation,
Of Him who opened baby eyes upon that thronéd morn?
Filling with glad ripples the frost-enlightened air,
What song is it you sing to us,
What tidings that you bring to us,
What burden that the clamours of your changeful cadence bear?
Do ye still recall the advent of the star-enkindled dawning,
When 'mid flower-calm the lily of old Christendom was born?
Still hail the domination,
In many a land and nation,
Of Him who opened baby eyes upon that thronéd morn?
Alas! sad bells, this many a day, your tune has lost its meaning;
The earth to your bright jubilance is echoless for woe:
A strange, prophetic sadness
Lies heart-deep in your gladness;
Ye can never stir the world again into the olden glow.
Ye should rather mourn for hope and faith, that in Christ's grave lie buried,
Never again, it seems to us, to see the daybreak beam.
The tender, sweet old story
Has lost its morning glory;
The trace of Christ has faded and His Gospel is a dream.
The earth to your bright jubilance is echoless for woe:
A strange, prophetic sadness
Lies heart-deep in your gladness;
Ye can never stir the world again into the olden glow.
Ye should rather mourn for hope and faith, that in Christ's grave lie buried,
Never again, it seems to us, to see the daybreak beam.
The tender, sweet old story
Has lost its morning glory;
The trace of Christ has faded and His Gospel is a dream.
Or is it for the year that's past your brazen throats are clanging,
To celebrate its harvesting of righteousness and peace?
And is your carol's burden
The happy golden guerdon,
That love and faith have garnered up to swell the years' increase?
Are hope and peace so rife, O bells, is Christ-like love so plentiful,
That ye must wake the world that sleeps, worn out with toil and care,
That ye must rend night's quiet
With your rejoiceful riot
And from tired eyes forgetfulness of blesséd sleep must scare?
To celebrate its harvesting of righteousness and peace?
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The happy golden guerdon,
That love and faith have garnered up to swell the years' increase?
Are hope and peace so rife, O bells, is Christ-like love so plentiful,
That ye must wake the world that sleeps, worn out with toil and care,
That ye must rend night's quiet
With your rejoiceful riot
And from tired eyes forgetfulness of blesséd sleep must scare?
Are this dead year's last moments, the coming one's dim prospect
So fair with happy memories, with Spring-sweet hope so bright?
Was that which fades so sweet for us
And were its steps so fleet for us
That ye must needs proclaim it to the startled ear of night?
Is it for our glad progress, in the year that lies a-dying,
Toward the dream prophetic of God's kingdom upon earth,
Ye break the Yule-night glamour
With your clarion-throated clamour,
Whilst men are mute for shame before the morning of Christ's birth?
So fair with happy memories, with Spring-sweet hope so bright?
Was that which fades so sweet for us
And were its steps so fleet for us
That ye must needs proclaim it to the startled ear of night?
Is it for our glad progress, in the year that lies a-dying,
Toward the dream prophetic of God's kingdom upon earth,
Ye break the Yule-night glamour
With your clarion-throated clamour,
Whilst men are mute for shame before the morning of Christ's birth?
Alas! there is no peace for us: the earth is full of misery;
The folk are crazed with lust of gain and mean unknightly strife:
The earth with blood is weary
And the world is bare and dreary,
For crime and greed have choked with thorns the amaranth of life.
In vain ye fill the air with notes, that tell of hope and gladness:
Your throats should ring with dirges for the year that's growing cold,
Should wake the folk from sleeping
To the coming time of reaping
For what they've sown in this dead year, whose days are almost told.
The folk are crazed with lust of gain and mean unknightly strife:
The earth with blood is weary
And the world is bare and dreary,
For crime and greed have choked with thorns the amaranth of life.
In vain ye fill the air with notes, that tell of hope and gladness:
Your throats should ring with dirges for the year that's growing cold,
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To the coming time of reaping
For what they've sown in this dead year, whose days are almost told.
Ring, weary bells, from out your spires, and wake the world to consciousness
Of all the weary work that lies before the failing feet.
Toll for the pest-scathed city,
In which there is no pity,
Where crime infests each alley and famine chokes each street.
Toll for the craze of sightless greed, that blinds the folk to righteousness
And bids them set no price on aught that is not bought or sold;
Toll for the past year's madness
And the coming one's vague sadness;
Toll, sad bells, for the new year and the old.
Of all the weary work that lies before the failing feet.
Toll for the pest-scathed city,
In which there is no pity,
Where crime infests each alley and famine chokes each street.
Toll for the craze of sightless greed, that blinds the folk to righteousness
And bids them set no price on aught that is not bought or sold;
Toll for the past year's madness
And the coming one's vague sadness;
Toll, sad bells, for the new year and the old.
| The Poetical Works of John Payne | |