University of Virginia Library

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118

College Poems.

EXTRACT

From a Poem delivered at the Departure of the Senior Class of Yale College, in 1827.

We shall go forth together. There will come
Alike the day of trial unto all,
And the rude world will buffet us alike,
Temptation hath a music for all ears;
And mad ambition trumpeteth to all;
And the ungovernable thought within
Will be in every bosom eloquent;—
But when the silence and the calm come on,
And the high seal of character is set,
We shall not all be similar. The flow
Of life-time is a graduated scale;
And deeper than the vanities of power,
Or the vain pomp of glory, there is writ
A standard measuring its worth for Heaven.
The pathway to the grave may be the same,
And the proud man shall tread it, and the low,

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119

With his bow'd head, shall bear him company.
Decay will make no difference, and death,
With his cold hand, shall make no difference;
And there will be no precedence of power,
In waking at the coming trump of God;
But in the temper of the invisible mind,
The godlike and undying intellect,
There are distinctions that will live in heaven,
When time is a forgotten circumstance!
The elevated brow of kings will lose
The impress of regalia, and the slave
Will wear his immortality as free,
Beside the crystal waters; but the depth
Of glory in the attributes of God,
Will measure the capacities of mind;
And as the angels differ, will the ken
Of gifted spirits glorify him more.
It is life's mystery. The soul of man
Createth its own destiny of power;
And, as the trial is intenser here,
His being hath a nobler strength in heaven.

What is its earthly victory? Press on!
For it hath tempted angels. Yet press on!
For it shall make you mighty among men;
And from the eyrie of your eagle thought,
Ye shall look down on monarchs. O press on!
For the high ones and powerful shall come
To do you reverence: and the beautiful
Will know the purer language of your brow,

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120

And read it like a talisman of love!
Press on! for it is godlike to unloose
The spirit, and forget yourself in thought;
Bending a pinion for the deeper sky,
And, in the very fetters of your flesh,
Mating with the pure essences of heaven!
Press on!—“for in the grave there is no work,
And no device.”—Press on! while yet ye may!

So lives the soul of man. It is the thirst
Of his immortal nature; and he rends
The rock for secret fountains, and pursues
The path of the illimitable wind
For mysteries—and this is human pride!
There is a gentler element, and man
May breathe it with a calm, unruffled soul,
And drink its living waters till his heart
Is pure—and this is human happiness!
Its secret and its evidence are writ
In the broad book of nature. 'Tis to have
Attentive and believing faculties;
To go abroad rejoicing in the joy
Of beautiful and well-created things;
To love the voice of waters, and the sheen
Of silver fountains leaping to the sea;
To thrill with the rich melody of birds,
Living their life of music; to be glad
In the gay sunshine, reverent in the storm;
To see a beauty in the stirring leaf,
And find calm thoughts beneath the whispering tree;

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121

To see, and hear, and breathe the evidence
Of God's deep wisdom in the natural world!
It is to linger on “the magic face
Of human beauty,” and from light and shade
Alike to draw a lesson; 'tis to love
The cadences of voices that are tuned
By majesty and purity of thought;
To gaze on woman's beauty, as a star
Whose purity and distance make it fair;
And in the gush of music to be still,
And feel that it has purified the heart!
It is to love all virtue for itself,
All nature for its breathing evidence;
And, when the eye hath seen, and when the ear
Hath drunk the beautiful harmony of the world,
It is to humble the imperfect mind,
And lean the broken spirit upon God!

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127

THE ELMS OF NEW HAVEN.

The leaves we knew
Are gone, these many summers, and the winds
Have scatter'd them all roughly through the world
But still, in calm and venerable strength,
The old stems lift their burthens up to heaven,
And the young leaves, to the same pleasant tune,
Drink in the light, and strengthen, and grow fair.
The shadows have the same cool, emerald air;
And prodigal as ever is the breeze,
Distributing the verdure's temperate balm.
The trees are sweet to us. The outcry strong
Of the long-wandering and returning heart,
Is for the thing least changed. A stone unturn'd,
Is sweeter than a strange or alter'd face;
A tree, that flings its shadows as of yore,
Will make the blood stir, sometimes, when the words
Of a long-look'd-for lip fall icy cold.
Ye, who in this Academy of shade,
Dreamt out the scholar's dream, and then away
On troubled seas went voyaging with Care,

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128

But hail to-day the well-remember'd haven—
Ye, who at memory's trumpet-call, have stay'd
The struggling foot of life, the warring hand,
And, weary of the strife, come back to see
The green tent where your harness was put on—
Say—when you trod the shadowy street this morn,
Leapt not your heart up to the glorious trees?
Say—was it only to my sleep they came—
The angels, who to these remember'd trees
Brought me back, ever? I have come, in dream
From many a far land, many a brighter sky,
And trod these dappled shadows till the morn.
From every Gothic isle my heart fled home,
From every groinéd roof, and pointed arch,
To find its type in emerald beauty here.
The moon we worshipp'd thro' this trembling veil,
In other heavens seem'd garish and unclad.
The stars that burn'd to us thro' whispering leaves,
Stood cold and silently in other skies.
Stiller seem'd alway here the holy dawn
Hush'd by the breathless silence of the trees;
And who, that ever, on a Sabbath morn,
Sent thro' this leafy roof a prayer to Heaven,
And when the sweet bells burst upon the air,
Saw the leaves quiver, and the flecks of light
Leap like caressing angels to the feet
Of the church-going multitude, but felt
That here, God's day was holier—that the trees,
Pierced by these shining spires, and echoing ever
“To prayer!” “To prayer!” were but the lofty roof

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129

Of an unhewn cathedral, in whose choirs
Breezes and storm-winds, and the many birds
Join'd in the varied anthem; and that so,
Resting their breasts upon these bending limbs,
Closer, and readier to our need they lay—
The spirits who keep watch 'twixt us and Heaven

Alas! not spirits of bright wing alone
“Dwell by the oracle of God.” The tree
That with its bright spray fans the sacred spire,
And trembles like a seraph's lyre to prayer,
Is peopled with the lying ministers
To new-born passions, who, with couchant ear,
Follow the lone steps of the musing boy,
And ere the wild wish struggles to the light,
Mask its dark features, and with silvery voice
Promise it wings resistless. Back, to-day,
Comes many a foot, all wearily and slow,
That went into the world with winged heel;
And many a man, still young, though wisely sad,
Paces the sweet old shadows with a sigh,
The spirits are so mute to manhood's ear
That tranced the boy with music. On a night,
The fairest of a summer, years ago,
There walk'd a youth beneath these arching trees
The moon was in mid-heaven, an orb of gold.
The air was rock'd asleep, or, 'mid the leaves
Walked without whisper. On the pavement lay
The broken moonbeams, like a silver net,

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Massive and motionless, and, if a bird
Sang a half carol as the moon wore on
And look'd into his nest, or if the note
Of a monotonous insect caught the ear,
The silence was but challenged by the sound,
And night seem'd stiller after. With his heart
Robb'd of its sentinel, the youth paced on.
His truant soul lay breathless on his lips,
Drowsed with the spell of the voluptuous air;
And shut was memory's monitory book;
And mute, alas! as they will sometimes be,
Were Heaven's rebuking angels. Then uprose
In the unguarded chamber of his heart,
A murmur, inarticulate and wild;
And ere it had a semblance, or a name,
A soft voice from the trees said, “Wak'st thou there?
Wak'st thou, at last, O nature? Thou has slept,
Far through the morn, and glowing flowers of ear,
Many and bright ones, hast thou lost forever!
But life is full of roses—come away!
Shut up those dreary books, and come away!
Why is the night so passionately sweet,
If made for study and a brow of care?
Why are your lips pride, and your eyes soft fire?—
Why beautiful in youth,—if cold to joy?
List to the pleading senses, where they lie,
Numb and forgotten in the cell of thought;
Yet are they God's gift—precious as the rest.
Use what thou hast—turn to the soft path ever,—
And, in the garden of this pleasant world,

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Pluck what seems fairest to thee!” A light wind
Stole through the trees, and with its airy hand
Lifted the leafy veil from off the moon;
And steadfastly Night's solemn eye look'd in
Upon the flush'd face of the troubled boy—
And the mysterious voice was heard no more.

Again 'twas night. A storm was in the air;
And, by his pale and solitary lamp,
A youth of sterner temper than the last,
Kept the lone scholar's vigil. He had laid
His book upon its face, and with his head
Turn'd to the rattling casement, sat erect,
And listen'd to the shrill, tempestuous wind.
Gust after gust swept by, and as the scream
Of the careering tempest fiercer came,
The youth's dark brow crouch'd lowering to his eye,
And his thin lips press'd bloodlessly together;
And with some muttering words, as if replying
To voices that call'd to him from the storm,
He rose, and hurriedly strode forth. The air
Below the lashing tree-tops was all black.
The loftly trunks creak'd staggering in the wind,
But all invisibly; and in the sky
Was only so much light as must be there
While hope is in the world. Small need had then
The spirit who would wile that heart from Heaven
To lend it mask or utterance. With step
Reckless and fast the wanderer sped on,
And as the tempest smote upon his breast,

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132

And howlingly fled past, he clench'd his hands,
And struck his strong arms thro' the air, and rush'd
Headlong with flying fury thro' the dark.
Breathless and hoarse, at last, against the trunk
Of a vast tree he stood; and to an ear
Bending from out the branches as they swung,
Unconsciously he mutter'd:—“I am weak,
And this wild storm is mighty; but I feel
A joy in its career, as if my soul
Breathed only thus. I am aroused—unchain'd,
Something gives outcry in me that was dumb,
Something that pined for weapons is in arms,
And set on with a trumpet. Glorious blast!
What is my poor tranquility of life—
My abject study—to thy storming joy?
An intellect is mine—a passive soul
Antagonist to nothing—while for thee,
A senseless element, are wings and power—
Power to dash the stars out from the sky—
Wings to keep pace with midnight round the world.
The lightning's fiery traverse is no bar,
The thunder's hush no check, the howling trees
Only thy music. Demon, if thou art!
Prince of the powers of air, if such there be!
Darkness and conflict are my element,
As they are thine!” The storm lull'd suddenly,
The tortured trees stood silent in the gloom,
And all was still—save that amid the leaves
Stirr'd a low murmur, which, like airy lips,
Whispering close into the scholar's ear,

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Became articulate:—“Be calm! be calm!
Return to thy neglected books, and read!
Thou shalt have all thou wilt, but, in thy books,
Lie weapons keener than the lightning's edge
And in thy intellect a power of ill
To which the storm-wind is an infant's anger.
The blast blots out the stars that shine again.
The storm-wind and the darkness leave the trees
Brighter for morn to smile on; but the mind
Forges from knowledge an archangel's spear,
And, with the spirits that compel the world,
Conflicts for empire. Call thy hate of day,
Thy scorn of men, ambition!—and, if moved
By something in thy heart to wrong and slay—
Justice sits careless with a bloody sword;
Religion has remorseless whips; and gold
Brings to thy spurning foot the necks of men.
Be thou the sword—the whip—get thou the gold—
And borne triumphant upon human praise,
The lightning were too slow to do thy will—
The stormy night not black enough.” Again
Toward the window glimmering thro' the dark
The scholar turn'd, and with a pallid brow,
But lips of marble, fed his wasting lamp,
And patiently read down the morning star.
And he was changed thenceforward. [OMITTED]
[OMITTED]

[OMITTED] Wave once more
The wand athwart the mirror of the past.

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134

A summer's eve in June. The sun had shot
A golden arrow down yon leafy aisle,
And to his tent gone in. The dusty air
Paraded in his glory. The bright spires,
Like mourners who still see the lost in Heaven,
Shone in his smile as if he had not set;
And presently, amid his glowing track,
Like one who came reluctant to replace
The great light newly fled, the evening star
Stood forth with timid and diminish'd ray—
But brighten'd as the sun was longer gone.
Life was a feast at this delicious hour,
And all came forth to it. The bent old man
Paced musingly before his open door.
The tired child, with hands cross'd droopingly,
Sat at the threshold. Slowly pass'd the dame;
Slowly the listless scholar, sauntering back
To his shut books unwillingly; and low—
Soften'd and low—as if the chord of love
Were struck and harmonized throughout the world,
The hum of voices rose upon the air.
Hush'd were the trees the while; and voiceless lay
The wakeful spirits in the leaves, till, lo!
A pale youth, mingling in the throng! With light
And airy step, and mien of such a grace
As breathes thro' marble from the sculptor's dream,
He pass'd, and after him the stranger's eye
Turn'd with inquiring wonder. Dumb no more

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Were the invisible dwellers in the trees;
For, as he went, the feathery branches seem'd
To “syllable his name;” and to the ears
Of them who met him, whispering music flew,
Stealing their hearts away to link to his.
“Love him!” the old man heard as if the leaves
Of his own roof-tree murmur'd it; “Love well
The poet who may sow your grave with flowers,
The traveller to the far land of the Past,
Lost to your feet forever!” Sadly lean'd
The mourner at her window as he came,
And the far-drooping elm-leaf touch'd her brow
And whisper'd, “He has counted all thy tears!
The breaking chord was audible to him!
The agony for which thou, weeping, saidst
There was no pity, for its throbs were dumb—
He look'd but in thine eyes, and read it all!
Love him, for sorrowing with thee!”The sad child,
Sitting alone with his unheeded grief,
Look'd at him through his tears, and smiled to hear
The same strange voice that talk'd to him in dreams
Speak from the low tree softly; and it said—
“The stranger who looks on thee loves the child!
He has seen angels like thee; and thy sorrow
Touches his own, as he goes silent by.
Love him, fair child!” The poor man, from his door,
Look'd forth with cheerful face, and as the eye,
The soft eye of the poet, turn'd to his,
A whisper from the tree said, “This is he
Who knows thy heart is human as his own,

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Who, with inspired numbers, tells the world
That love dwells with the lowly. He has made
The humble roof a burthen in sweet song—
Interpreted thy heart to happier men!
Love him! oh, love him, therefore!” The stern man,
Who, with the tender spirit of a child,
Walks in some thorny path, unloved and lone;
The maiden with her secret; the sad mother,
Speaking no more of her dishonor'd boy,
But bound to him with all her heart-strings yet,—
Those heard the trees say, as the poet pass'd,
“Yours is the mournful poetry of life,
And in the sad lines of your silent lips,
Reads he with tenderest pity! Knit to him
The hearts he opens like a claspéd book,
And, in the honey'd music of his verse,
Hear your dumb griefs made eloquent!” With eye
Watchful and moist, the poet kept his way,
Unconscious of the love around him springing;
And when from its bent path the evening star
Stepp'd silently, and left the lesser fires
Lonely in heaven, the poet had gone in,
Mute with the many sorrows he had seen;
And, with the constancy of starry eyes,
The hearts he touch'd drew to him. [OMITTED]

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THE BURIAL OF THE CHAMPION OF HIS CLASS, AT YALE COLLEGE.

Whose was the sinewy arm, that flung
Defiance to the ring?
Whose laugh of victory loudest rung—
Yet not for glorying?

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Whose heart, in generous deed and thought,
No rivalry might brook,
And yet distinction claiming not?
There lies he—go and look!

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139

The Lady Jane:

A HUMOROUS NOVEL IN RHYME.

I.

There was a lady—fair, and forty too.
There was a youth of scarcely two and twenty.
The story of their loves is strange, yet true.
I'll tell it you! Romances are so plenty
In prose, that you'll be glad of something new.
And so (in rhyme) for “what the devil meant he!”
You think he was too young!—but tell me whether
The moth and humming-bird grow old together!

II.

Nature, that made the ivy-leaf and lily,
Not of one warp and woop hath made us all!
Bent goes the careful, and erect the silly,
And wear and tear makes difference—not small;
And he that hath no money—will-he, nill-he—
Is thrust like an old man against the wall!

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Grief out of some the very life-blood washes;
Some shed it like ducks' backs and “Mackintoshes.”

III.

The Lady Jane was daughter of an Earl—
Shut from approach like sea-nymph in her shell.
Never a rude breath stirr'd the floating curl
Upon her marble temple, and naught fell
Upon the ear of the patrician girl
But pride-check'd syllables, all measured well.
Her suitors were her father's and not hers—
So were her debts at “Storr-and-Mortimer's.”

IV.

Her health was lady-like. No blood, in riot,
Tangled the tracery of her veinéd cheek,
Nor seem'd her exquisite repose the quiet
Of one by suffering made sweet and meek.
She ate and drank, and probably lived by it,
And liked her cup of tea by no means weak!
Untroubled by debt, lovers, or affliction,
Her pulse beat with extremely little friction.

V.

Yet was there fire within her soft gray eye,
And room for pressure on her lip of rose;
And few who saw her gracefully move by,
Imagined that her feelings slept, or froze.
You may have seen the cunning florist tie
A thread about a bud, which never blows,

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But, with shut chalice from the sun and rain,
Hoards up the morn—and such the Lady Jane.

VI.

The old lord had had offers for her hand,
The which he answer'd—by his secretary.
And, doubtless, some were for the lady's land,
The men being old and valetudinary;
But there were others who were all unmann'd,
And fell into a life of wild vagary,
In their despair. To tell his daughter of it,
The cold Earl thought would be but little profit.

VII.

And so she bloom'd—all fenced around with care;
And none could find a way to win or woo her.
When visible at home—the Earl was there!
Abroad—her chaperon stack closely to her!
She was a sort of nun in open air,
Known to but few, and intimate to fewer:
And, always used to conversation guarded,
She thought all men talk'd just as her papa did.

VIII.

Pause while you read, oh, Broadway demoiselle!
And bless your stars that long before you marry,
You are a judge of passion pleaded well!
For you have listen'd to Tom, Dick, and Harry.
And, if kind Heaven endowed you for a beile,
At least your destiny did not miscarry!

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“You've had your fling”—and now, all wise and steady,
For matrimony's cares you're cool and ready!

IX.

And yet the bloom upon the fruit is fair?
And “ignorance is bliss” in teaching love!
And guarding lips, when others have been there,
Is apt uneasy reveries to move!
I really think mammas should have a care!
And though of nunneries I disapprove,
'Tis easier to make blushes hear to reason
Than to unteach a “Saratoga Season.”

X.

In France, where, it is said, they wiser are,
Miss may not walk out, even with her cousin;
And when she is abroad from bolt and bar,
A well-bred man should be to her quite frozen;
And so at last, like a high-priced attar
Hermetically seal'd in silk and resin,
She is delivered safe to him who loves her;
And then—with whom she will she's hand and glove, sir!

XI.

I know this does not work well, and that ours
Are the best wives on earth. They love their spouses
Who prize them—as you do centennial flowers,
For having bloom'd, though not in your green-houses.
'Tis a bold wooer that dare talk of dowers.
And where I live, the milking of the cows is

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Too rude a task for females! Well. 'Twould hurt you,
Where women are so prized, to sneer at virtue.

XII.

“Free-born Americans,” they must have freedom!
They'll stay—if they have leave to run away.
They're ministering angels when you need 'em,
But 'specially want credit in Broadway.
French wives are more particular how you feed 'em,
The English drag you oftener to the play.
But ours we quite enslave—(more true than funny)—
With “heaven-born liberty,” and trust—or money!

XIII.

Upon her thirtieth birth-day, Lady Jane
Thought sadly on the twenties! Even the 'teens,
That she had said farewell to, without pain—
Leaves falling from a flower that nothing means—
Seem'd worth regathering to live again;
But not like Ruth, fares Memory, who gleans
After the careful Harvester of years:—
The Lady Jane thought on't with bitter tears!

XIV.

She glided to her mirror. From the air
Glided to meet her, with its tearful eyes,
A semblance sad, but beautifully fair;
And gradually there stole a sweet surprise
Under her lids, and as she laid the hair
Back from her snowy brow, Madonna-wise,

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“Time, after all,” she said, “a harmless flirt is!”
And from that hour took kindly to her thirties.

XV.

And, with his honors not at all unsteady,
The Decimal elect stepp'd coolly in;
And having all his nights and mornings ready,
He'd very little trouble to begin.
And Twenty was quite popular,—they said he
Went out of office with so little din!
The old Earl did not celebrate (nor ought he)
Her birth-days more. And like a dream came Forty.

XVI.

And on the morn of it she stood to dress,
Mock'd by that flattering semblance, as before,
And lifted with a smile the raven tress,
That, darkening her white shoulder, swept the floor.
Time had not touch'd her dazzling loveliness!
“Yet is it time,” she said, “that I give o'er—
I'm an old maid!—and though I suffer by it, I
Must change my style and leave off gay society.”

XVII.

And so she did. Her maid by her desire
Comb'd her luxuriant locks behind her ears;
She had her dresses alter'd to come higher,
Though it dissolved the dress-maker in tears!
And flung a new French hat into the fire,
Which she had bought, “forgetful of her years.”

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145

This t' anticipate “the world's dread laugh!”
Most persons think too much of it, by half.

XVIII.

I do not mean to say that generally
The “virtuous single” take too soon to tea;
But now and then you find one who could rally
At forty, and go back to twenty-three—
A handsome, plump, affectionate “Aunt Sally,”
With no taste for cats, flannel, and Bohea!
And I would have her, spite of “he or she says,”
Up heart, and pin her kerchief as she pleases.

XIX.

Some men, 'tis said, prefer a woman fat
Lord Byron did. Some like her very spare.
Some like a lameness. (I have known one that
Would go quite far enough for your despair,
And halt in time.) Some like them delicate
As lilies, and with some “the only wear”
Is one whose sex has spoil'd a midshipman.
Some only like what pleased another man.

XX.

I like one that likes me. But there's a kind
Of women, very dangerous to poets,
Whose hearts beat with a truth that seems like mind—
A nature that, though passionate, will show its
Devotion by not being rash or blind;
But by sweet study grows to love. And so it's

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146

Not odd if they are counted cold, though handsome,
And never meet a man who understands 'em.

XXI.

By never, I mean late in life. But ah!
How exquisite their love and friendship then!
Perennial of soul such women are,
And readers of the hearts of gifted men;
And as the deep well mourns the hidden star,
And mirrors the first ray that beams again,
They—be the loved light lost or dimly burning,
Feel all its clouds, and trust its bright returning.

XXII.

In outward seeming tranquil and subdued,
Their hearts beneath beat youthfully and fast.
Time and imprison'd love make not a prude;
And warm the gift we know to be the last;
And pure is the devotion that must brood
Upon your hopes alone—for hers are past!
Trust me, “a rising man” rose seldom higher,
But some dear, sweet old maid has pull'd the wire.

XXIII.

The Lady Jane, (pray do not think that hers
Was quite the character I've drawn above.
Old maids, like young, have various calibres,
And hers was moderate, though she was “a love,”)
The Lady Jane call'd on the dowagers—
Mainly her slight acquaintance to improve,

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147

But partly with a docile wish to know
What solaces of age were comme il faut.

XXIV.

They stared at her plain hat and air demure,
But answer'd her with some particularity;
And she was edified you may be sure,
And added vastly to her popularity.
She found a dozen mad on furniture,
Five on embroidery, and none on charity;
But her last call—the others were but short ones—
Turn'd out to Lady Jane of some importance.

XXV.

The door was open'd by a Spanish page—
A handsome lad in green with bullet buttons,
Who look'd out like a trulian from a cage,
And deign'd to glance at the tall menial but once,
Then bent, with earnestness beyond his age,
His eyes, (you would have liked to see them shut once,
The fringes were so long)—on Lady Jane.
The varlet clearly thought her not so plain.

XXVI.

And bounding up the flower-laden stair,
He waited her ascent, then open flung
A mirror, clear as 'twere a door of air,
Which on its silver hinge with music swung—
Contrived that never foot should enter there
Unheralded by that melodious tongue.

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148

This delicate alarum is worth while
More 'specially with carpets of three-pile.

XXVII.

Beyond a gallery extended, cool,
And softly lighted, and, from dome to floor,
Hung pictures—mostly the Venetian school;
Each “worth a Jew's eye”—very likely more;
And drapery, gold-broider'd in Stamboul,
Closed the extremity in lieu of door:
This the page lifted, and disclosed to view
The boudoir of the Countess Pasibleu.

XXVIII.

It was a small pavilion lined with pink,—
Mirrors and silk all, save the door and sky-light,
The latter of stain'd glass. (You would not think
How juvenescent is a rosy high light!)
Upon the table were seen pen and ink,
(Two things I cannot say have stood in my light,)
Amid a host of trinkets, toys, and fans;
The table in the style of Louis Quinze.

XXIX.

A singular and fragile little creature
Upon the cushions indolently lay,
With waning life in each transparent feature,
But youth in her bright lips' ethereal play;
In short, the kind of creature that would meet your
Conception of a transmigrating fay—

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149

The dark eyes, not at all worn out or weary,
Kindling for transfer to some baby Peri!

XXX.

The rest used up, past mending. Yet her tones
Were wildly, deeply, exquisitely clear;
Though voice is not a thing of flesh and bones,
And probably goes up when they stay here.
(I do not know how much of Smith and Jones
Will bear translating to “the better sphere,”
But ladies, certainly, when they shall climb to't,
Will get their dimples back—tho' not the rhyme to't.

XXXI.

Her person was dress'd very like her soul—
In fine material most loosely worn.
A cobweb cashmere struggled to control
Ringlets that laugh'd the filmy folds to scorn,
And, from the shawls in which she nestled, stole
The smallest slipper ever soil'd or torn.
You would not guess her age by looking at her,
Nor, from my sketch, of course. We'll leave that matter.

XXXII.

“My dear!” the Countess said, (by this time she
Had ceased the Weather, poor old man, to hammer—
He gets it, in these morning calls, pardie!
And Lady Jane had hinted with a stammer
Her errand—somewhat delicate, you see,)
“My dear, how very odd! I fear I am a

---

150

Poor judge of age—(who made that funny bonnet?)
Indeed, I always turn'd my back upon it!

XXXIII.

“Time has no business in one's house, my dear!
I'm not at home to any of my creditors.
They send their nasty bills in, once a year,
And Time's are like Mortality's—mere ‘dead letters.
Besides, what comfort is there living here,
If every stupid hour's to throw Death's head at us?
(Lend me a pin, dear!) Time at last will stop us:
But, come to that—we're free by habeas corpus.

XXXIV.

(“Fie, what a naughty shawl! No exposé,
I trust, love, eh? Hold there, thou virtuous pin!)
And so you really have come out to-day
To look you up some suitable new sin!”
“Oh, Countess!” “Did you never write a play?
Nor novel? Well, you really should begin!
For, (hark, my dear!) the publishers are biters,
Not the book's fine title—but the writer's.

XXXV.

“You're half an authoress; for, as my maid says,
‘Begun's half done,’ and you've your title writ.
I quote from Colburn, and as what ‘the trade’ says
Is paid for, it is well-consider'd wit.
Genius, undoubtedly, of many grades is,
But as to us, we do not need a bit.

---

151

‘Three volumes,’ says the bargain, ‘not too thin.’
You don't suppose I'd throw him genius in!”

XXXVI.

“But fame, dear Countess!” At the word there flush'd
A color to her cheek like fever's glow,
And in her hand unconsciously she crush'd
The fringes of her shawl, and bending low
To hide the tears that suddenly had gush'd
Into her large, dark eyes, she murmur'd “No!
Th' inglorious agony of conquering pain
Has drunk that dream up. I have lived in vain!

XXXVII.

“Yet have I set my soul upon the string,
Tense with the energy of high desire,
And trembled with the arrow's quivering spring,
To launch upon ambition's flight of fire!
And never lark so hush'd his heart to sing,
Or, as he sang, nerved wing to bear it higher,
As I have striven my wild heart to tame
And melt its love, pride, passion—into fame!

XXXVIII.

“Oh, poor the flattery to call it mine
For trifles which beguiled an hour of pain,
Or, on the echoing heels of mirth and wine,
Crept through the chambers of a throbbing brain.
Worthily, have I never written line!
And when they talk to me of fame I gain,

---

152

In very bitterness of soul I mock it,—
And put the nett proceeds into my pocket!

XXXIX.

“And so, my dear,—let not the market vary,—
I bid the critics, pro and con, defiance;
And then I'm fond of being literary,
And have a tenderness for ‘sucking lions.’
My friend the Dutchess has a fancy dairy:—
Cheeses or poets, curds or men of science—
It comes to the same thing. But, truce to mocking—
Suppose you try my color in a stocking?”

XL.

I need not state the ratiocination
By which the Lady Jane had so decided—
Not quite upon the regular vocation—
Of course you know she was too rich (or I did)
To care with Costard for “remuneration;”
But feeling that her life like Lethe glided,
She thought 'twould be advisable to bag her a
Few brace of rapids from her friend's Niagara.

XLI.

“Well, Countess! what shall be my premier pas?
Must I propitiate the penny-a-liners?
Or would a ‘sucking lion’ stoop so far
As to be fed and petted by a dry nurse?
I cannot shine—but I can see a star—
Are there not worshippers as well as shiners?

---

153

I will be ruled implicitly by you:—
My stocking's innocent—how dye it blue?”

XLII.

The Countess number'd on her fingers, musing:—
“I've several that I might make you over,
And not be inconsolable at losing;
But, really, as you've neither spouse nor lover,
‘Most any of my pets would be amusing,
Particularly if you're not above a
Discreet flirtation. Are you? How's the Earl?
Does he still treat you like a little girl?

XLIII.

“How do you see your visitors? Alone?
Does the Earl sleep at table after dinner?
Have you had many lovers? Dear me! None?
Was not your father something of a sinner?
Who is the nicest man you've ever known?
Pray, does the butler bring your letters in, or
First take them to the Earl? Is he not rather
A surly dog?—the butler, not your father.”

XLIV.

To these inquiries the Lady Jane
Replied with nods, or something as laconic,
For on the Countess rattled, might and main,
With a rapidity Napoleonic;
Then mused and said, “'Twill never do, its plain—
The poet must be warranted Platonic!

---

154

But, query—how to find you such an oddity?
My dear, they all make love!—its their commodity!

XLV.

“The poet's on the look-out for a scene—
The painter for a ‘novel situation;’
And either does much business between
The little pauses of a declaration—
Noting the way in which you sob or lean,
Or use your handkerchief in agitation.
I've known one—making love like Roderick Random—
Get off his knees and make a memorandum!

XLVI.

“You see they're always ready for the trade,
And have a speech as pat as a town-crier;
And so, my dear, I'm naturally afraid
To trust you with these gentlemen-on-fire.
I knew a most respectable old maid
A dramatist made love to—just to try her!
She hung herself, of course—but in that way
He got some pretty touches for his play.

XLVII.

“How shall we manage it? I say, with tears,
I've only two that are not rogues at bottom;
And one of those would soon be ‘over ears’
In love with you,—but that he hasn't got 'em
They were cut off by the New Zealanders—
(As he invariably adds) ‘'od-rot-'em!’

---

155

(Meaning the savages.) He's quite a poet,
(He wears his hair so that you wouldn't know it,)

XLVIII.

“In his ideas, I mean. (I really am at a
Stand-still about you.) Well—this man, one day,
Took in his head to own the earth's diameter,
From zenith through to nadir! (They do say
He kill'd his wife—or threw a ham at her—
Or something—so he had to go away—
That's neither here nor there.) His name is Wieland,
And under him exactly lies New Zealand.

XLIX.

“I'm not certain if his ‘seat’ 's, or no,
In the Low Countries. But the sky above it
Of course is his; and for some way below
He has a right to dig and to improve it;
But under him, a million miles or so,
Lies land that's not his,—and the law can't move it.
It cut poor Wieland's nadir off, no doubt—
And so he sail'd to buy the owner out.

L.

“I never quite made out the calculation—
But plump against his cellar floor, bin 2,
He found a tribe had built their habitation,
Whose food was foreigners and kangaroo.
They would sell out—but, to his consternation,
They charged him—all the fattest of his crew!

---

156

At last they caught and roasted every one—
But he escaped by being under-done!”

LI.

That such a lion was well worth his feed,
Confess'd with merry tears the Lady Jane;
But, that he answer'd to her present need,
(A literary pet,) was not so plain.
She thought she'd give the matter up, indeed,
Or turn it over and so call again.
However, as her friend had mention'd two,
Perhaps the other might be made to do.

LII.

“I'm looking,” said the Countess, “for a letter
From my old playmate, Isabella Gray.
'Tis Heaven knows how long since I have met her?
She ran away and married one find day—
Poor girl! She might have done a great deal better!
The boy that she has sent to me, they say,
Is handsome, and has talents very striking:
So young, too—you can spoil him to your liking.

LIII.

“Her letter will amuse you. You must know
That, from her marriage-day, her lord has shut her
Securely up in an old French chateau;
Where, with her children and no woman but her,
He plays the old school gentleman; and so
Her worldly knowledge stopp'd at bread and butter.

---

157

She thinks I may be changed by time—for, may be,
I've lost a tooth or got another baby.

LIV.

“Heigh-ho!—'tis evident we're made of clay,
And harden unless kept in tears and shade;
This fashionable sunshine dries away
Much that we err in losing, I'm afraid!
I wonder what my guardian angels say
About the sort of woman I have made!
I wish I could begin my life again!
What think you of Pythagoras, Lady Jane?”

LV.

The Countess, all this while was running over
The pages of a letter, closely cross'd:—
“I wish,” she said, “my most devoted lover
Took half the trouble that this scrawl has cost!
Though some of it is quite a flight above a
Sane woman's comprehension. Tut! Where was't!
There is a passage here—the name's Beaulevres—
His chateau's in the neighborhood of Sevres.

LVI.

“The boy's call'd Jules. Ah, hero it is! My child
Brings you this letter. I've not much to say
More than you know of him, if he has smiled
When you have seen him. In his features play
The light from which his soul has been beguiled—
The blessed Heaven I lose with him to-day.

---

158

I ask you not to love him—he is there!
And you have loved him—without wish or prayer!

LVII.

His father sends him forth for fame and gold—
An angel on this errand! I have striven
Against it—but he is not mine to hold.
They say 'tis wrong to wish to stay him, even,
And that my pride's poor—my ambition cold!
Alas! to get him only back to Heaven
Is my one passionate prayer! Think me not wild—
'Tis that I have an angel for my child!

LVIII.

They say that he has genius. I but see
That he gets wisdom as the flower gets hue,
While others hive it like the toiling bee;
That, with him, all things beautiful keep new,
And every morn the first morn seems to be—
So freshly look abroad his eyes of blue!
What he has written seems to me no more
Than I have thought a thousand times before!

LIX.

Yet not upon his gay career to Fame
Broods my foreboding tear. I wish it won—
My prayer speeds on his spirit to its aim—
But in his chamber wait I for my son!—
When darken'd is ambition's star of fame—
When the night's fever of unrest is on—

---

159

With the unbidden sadness, the sharp care,
I fly from his bright hours, to meet him there!

LX.

Forgive me if I prate! Is't much—is't wild—
To hope—to pray—that you will sometimes creep
To the dream-haunted pillow of my child,
Keeping sweet watch above his fitful sleep?
Blest like his mother, if in dream he smiled,
Or, if he wept, still blest with him to weep;
Rewarded—oh, for how much more than this!—
By his awaking smile—his morning kiss!

LXI.

I know not how to stop! He leaves me well;
Life, spirit, health, in all his features speak;
His foot bounds with the spring of a gazelle;
But watch him—stay! well thought on!—there's a streak
Which the first faltering of his tongue will tell,
Long ere the bright blood wavers on his cheek—
A little bursted vein, that, near his heart,
Looks like a crimson thread half torn apart.

LXII.

So, trusting not his cheek by morning light,
When hope sits mantling on it, seek his bed
In the more tranquil watches of the night,
And ask this tell-tale how his heart has sped.
If well—its branching tracery shows bright;
But if its sanguine hue look cold and dead,

---

160

Ah, Gertrude! let your ministering be
As you would answer it, in heaven, to me!”

LXIII.

Enter the page:—“Miladi's maid is waiting!”—
A hint, (that it was time to dress for dinner,)
Which puts a stop in London to all prating.
As far as goes the letter you're a winner,
The rest of it to flannel shirts relating—
When Jules should wear his thicker, when his thinner.
The Countess laugh'd at Lady Jane's adieu:
She thought the letter touching. Pray, don't you?

LXIV.

I have observed that Heaven, in answering prayer,
(This is not meant to be a pious stanza—
Only a fact that has a pious air.)
(We're very sure, I think, to have an answer;)
But I've observed, I would remark, that where
Our plans are ill-contrived, as oft our plans are,
Kind Providence goes quite another way
To bring about the end for which we pray.

LXV.

In this connection I would also add,
That a discreet young angel, (bona fide,)
Accompanied our amiable lad;
And that he walk'd not out, nor stepp'd aside he,
Nor met with an adventure, good or bad,
(Although he enter'd London on a Friday,)

---

161

Nor ate, nor drank, nor closed his eye a minute,
Without this angel's guiding finger in it.

LXVI.

His, mother, as her letter seems to show,
Expected him, without delay or bother,—
Portmanteau, carpet-bag, and all—to go
Straight to her old friend's house—(forsooth! what other!)
The angel, who would seem the world to know,
Advised the boy to drive to Mivart's rather
He did. The angel, (as I trust is plain,)
Lodged in the vacant heart of Lady Jane.

LXVII.

A month in town these gentlemen had been
At date of the commencement of my story.
The angel's occupations you have seen,
If you have read what I have laid before ye.
Jules had seen Dan O'Connell and the Queen,
And girded up his loins for fame and glory,
And changed his old integuments for better;
And then he call'd and left his mother's letter.

LXVIII.

That female hearts grow never old in towns—
That taste grows rather young with dissipation—
That dowagers dress not in high-neck'd gowns—
Nor are, at fifty, proof against flirtation—
That hospitality is left to clowns,
Or elbow'd from the world by ostentation—

---

162

That a “tried friend” should not be tried again—
That boys at seventeen are partly men—

LXIX.

Are truths, as pat as paving-stones, in cities.
The contrary is true of country air;
(Where the mind rusts, which is a thousand pities,
While still the cheek keeps fresh and debonnair.)
But what I'm trying in this verse to hit is,
That Heaven, in answering Jules's mother's prayer,
Began by thwarting all her plans and suavities;
As needs must—vide the just-named depravities.

LXX.

Some stanzas back, we left the ladies going,
At six, to dress for dinner. Time to dine
I always give in poetry, well knowing
That, to jump over it in half a line,
Looks, (let us be sincere, dear muse!) like showing
Contempt we do not feel, for meat and wine.
Dinner! Ye Gods! What is there more respectable!
For eating, who, save Byron, ever check'd a belle!

LXXI.

'Tis ten—say half-past. Lady Jane has dined,
And dress'd as simply as a lady may.
A card lies on her table “To Remind”—
'Tis odd she never thought of it to-day.
But she is pleasantly surprised to find
'Tis Friday night, the Countess's soirée.

---

163

Back rolls the chariot to Berkely Square.
If you have dined, dear reader, let's go there!

LXXII.

We're early. In the cloak-room smokes the urn,
The house-keeper behind it, fat and solemn:
Steady as stars the fresh-lit candles burn,
And on the stairs the new-blown what d'ye-call 'em
Their nodding cups of perfume overturn;
The page leans idly by a marble column,
And stiffly a tall footman stands above,
Looking between the fingers of his glove.

LXXIII.

All bright and silent, like a charméd palace—
The spells wound up, the fays to come at twelve;
The house-keeper a witch, (cum grano salis;)
The handsome page, perhaps, a royal elve
Condemn'd to servitude by fairy malice;
(I wish the varlet had these thymes to delve!)
Some magic hall, it seems, for revel bright,
And Lady Jane the spirit first alight.

LXXIV.

Alas! here vanishes the foot of Pleasure!
She—like an early guest—goes in before,
And comes, when all are gone, for Memory's treasure;
But is not found upon the crowded floor;
(Unless, indeed, some charming woman says you're
A love, which makes close quarters less a bore.)

---

164

I've seen her, down Anticipation's vista,
As large as life—and walk'd straight on, and miss'd her!

LXXV.

With a declining taste for making friends,
One's taste for the fatigue of pleasure's past;
And then, one sometimes wonders which transcends—
The first hour of a gay night, or the last.
(Beginners “burn the candle at both ends,”
And find the middle brightest—that is fast!)
But a good rule at parties, (to keep up a
Mercurial air,) is to come in at supper.

LXXVI.

I mean that you should go to bed at nine
And sleep till twelve—take coffee or green tea,
Dress and go out—(this was a way of mine
When looking up the world in '33)—
Sup at the ball—(it's not a place for wine)—
Sleep, or not, after, as the case may be.
You've the advantage, thus, when all are yawning,
Of growing rather fresher toward morning.

LXXVII.

But, after thirty, here's your best “Elixir:”
Breakfast betimes. Do something worth your while
By twelve or one (this makes the blood run quick, sir!)
Dine with some man or woman who will smile.
Have little cause to care how politics are,
“Let not the sun go down upon your” bile;

---

165

And, if well-married, rich, and not too clever,
I don't see why you shouldn't live forever.

LXXVIII.

Short-lived is your “sad dog”—and yet, we hear,
“Whom the gods love die young.” Of course the ladies
Are safe in loving what the gods hold dear;
And the result, I'm very much afraid, is,
That if he “has his day,” it's “neither here
Nor there!” But it is time our hero made his
Appearance on the carpet, Lady Jane—
(I'll mend this vile pen, and begin again.)

LXXIX.

The Lady Jane walk'd thro' the bright rooms, breaking
The glittering silence with her flowing dress,
Whose pure folds seem'd a coy resistance making
To the fond air; while, to her loveliness
The quick-eyed mirrors breathlessly awaking,
Acknowledged not one radiant line the less
That not on them she look'd before she faded!
Neglected gentlemen don't do as they did:—

LXXX.

No!—for, 'twixt our quicksilver and a woman,
Nature has put no glass, for non-conductor,
And, while she's imaged in their bosoms, few men
Can make a calm, cold mirror their instructor;
For, when beloved, we deify what's human—
When piqued, we mock like devils! But I pluck'd a

---

166

Digression here. It's no use, my contending—
Fancy will ramble while the pen is mending!

LXXXI.

A small room on the left, (I'll get on faster
If you're impatient,) very softly lit
By lamps conceal'd in the bells of alabaster,
Lipp'd like a lily, and “as white as it,”
With a sweet statue by a famous master,
Just in the centre, (but not dress'd a bit!)
This dim room drew aside our early-comer,
Who thought it like a moonlight night in summer.

LXXXII.

And so it was. For, through an opening door,
Came the soft breath of a conservatory,
And, bending its tall stem the threshold o'er,
Swung in a crimson flower, the tropics' glory;
And, as you gazed, the vista lengthen'd more,
And statues, lamps, and flowers—but, to my story!
The room was cushion'd like a Bey's divan;
And in it—(Heaven preserve us!)—sat a man!

LXXXIII.

At least, as far as boots and pantaloons
Are symptoms of a man, there seem'd one there—
Whatever was the number of his Junes.
She look'd again, and started! In a chair,
Sleeping as if his eyelids had been moons,
Reclined, with flakes of sunshine in his hair,

---

167

Or, what look'd like it,) a fair youth, quite real,
But of a beauty like the Greek ideal.

LXXXIV.

He slept, like Love by slumber overtaken,
His bow unbent, his quiver thrown aside;
The lip might to a manlier arch awaken—
The nostril, so serene, dilate with pride:
But now he lay, of all his masks forsaken,
And childhood's sleep was there, and naught beside;
And his bright lips lay smilingly apart,
Like a torn crimson leaf with pearly heart.

LXXXV.

Now Jules Beaulevres, Esq.—(this was he)—
Had never been “put up” to London hours;
And thinking he was simply ask'd to tea,
Had been, since seven, looking at the flowers—
No doubt extremely pleasant,—but, you see,
A great deal of it rather overpowers;
And possibly, that very fine exotic
He sat just under, was a slight narcotic.

LXXXVI.

At any rate, when it was all admired,—
As quite his notion of a heaven polite,
(Minus the angels,) he felt very tired—
As one, who'd been all day sight-seeing, might!
And having by the Countess been desired
To make himself at home, he did so, quite.

---

168

He begg'd his early coming might not fetter her,
And she went out to dine, the old—etcetera.

LXXXVII.

And thinking of his mother—and his bill
At Mivart's—and of all the sights amazing
Of which, the last few days, he had his fill—
And choking when he thought of fame—and gazing
Upon his varnish'd boots, (as young men will,)
And wond'ring how the shops could pay for glazing
And also, (here his thoughts were getting dim,)
Whether a certain smile was meant for him—

LXXXVIII.

And murm'ring over, with a drowsy bow,
The speech he made the Countess, when he met her,
And smiling, with closed eyelids, (thinking how
He should describe her in the morrow's letter)—
And sighing “Good-night!” (he was dreaming now)
Jules dropp'd into a world he liked much better;
But left his earthly mansion unprotected:
Well, sir! 'twas robb'd—as might have been expected!

LXXXIX.

The Lady Jane gazed on the fair boy sleeping,
And in his lips' rare beauty read his name;
And to his side with breathless wonder creeping,
Resistless to her heart the feeling came,
That, to her yearning love's devoted keeping,
Was given the gem within that fragile frame.

---

169

And bending, with almost a mother's bliss,
To his bright lips, she seal'd it with a kiss!

XC.

Oh, in that kiss how much of heaven united!
What haste to pity—eagerness to bless!
What thirsting of a heart, long pent and slighted,
For something fair, yet human, to caress!
How fathomless the love so briefly plighted!
What kiss thrill'd ever more—sinn'd ever less!
So love the angels, sent with holy mercies!
And so love poets—in their early verses!

XCI.

If, in well-bred society, (“hear! hear!”)
If, in this “wrong and pleasant” world of ours
There beats a pulse that seraphs may revere—
If Eden's birds, when frighted from its flowers,
Clung to one deathless seed, still blooming here—
If Time cut ever down, 'mid blighted hours,
A bliss that will spring up in bliss again—
'Tis woman's love. This I believe. Amen.

XCII.

To guard from ill, to help, watch over, warn—
To learn, for his sake, sadness, patience, pain—
To seek him with most love when most forlorn—
Promised the mute kiss of the Lady Jane.
And thus, in sinless purity is born,
“Alway, the love of woman. So, again,

---

170

I say, that up to kissing—later even—
A woman's love may have its feet in heaven.

XCIII.

Jules open'd (at the kiss) his large blue eyes,
And calmly gazed upon the face above him,
But never stirr'd, and utter'd no surprise—
Although his situation well might move him.
He seem'd so cool, (my lyre shall tell no lies,)
That Lady Jane half thought she shouldn't love him;
When suddenly the Countess Pasibleu
Enter'd the room with “Dear me! how d'ye do?”

XCIV.

Up sprang the boy—amazement on his brow!
But the next instant, through his lips there crept
A just awakening smile, and, with a bow,
Calmly he said: “'Twas only while I slept
The angels did not vanish—until now.”
A speech, I think, quite worthy an adept.
The Countess stared, and Lady Jane began
To fear that she had kiss'd a nice young man.

XCV.

Jules had that precious quality call'd tact;
And having made a very warm beginning,
He suddenly grew grave, and rather back'd;
As if incapable of further sinning.
'Twas well he did so, for, it is a fact,
The ladies like, themselves, to do the winning.

---

171

In female Shakspeares, Desdemonas shine;
And the Othellos “seriously incline.”

XCVI.

So, with a manner quite reserved and plain,
Jules ask'd to be presented, and then made
Many apologies to Lady Jane
For the eccentric part that he had play'd.
Regretted he had slept—confess'd with pain
He took her for an angel—was afraid
He had been rude—abrupt—did he alarm
Her much?—and might he offer her his arm?

XCVII.

And as they ranged that sweet conservatory,
He heeded not the flowers he walk'd among:
But such an air of earnest listening wore he,
That a dumb statue must have found a tongue;
And like a child that hears a fairy story,
His parted lips upon her utterance hung.
He seem'd to know by instinct, (else how was it?)
That people love the bank where they deposit.

XCVIII.

And closer, as the moments faster wore,
The slender arm within her own she press'd;
And yielding to the magic spell he bore—
The earnest truth upon his lips impress'd—
She lavishly told out the golden ore
Hoarded a life-time in her guarded breast.

---

172

And Jules, throughout, was beautifully tender—
Although, he did not always comprehend her.

XCIX.

And this in him was no deep calculation,
But in good truth, as well as graceful seeming,
Abandonment complete to admiration—
His soul gone from him as it goes in dreaming.
I wish'd to make this little explanation,
Misgiving that his tact might go for scheming;
I can assure you it was never plann'd;
I have it from his angel, (second hand.)

C.

And from the same authentic source I know,
That Lady Jane still thought him but a lad;
Though why the deuse she didn't treat him so,
Is quite enough to drive conjecture mad!
Perhaps she thought that it would make him grow
To take more beard for granted than he had.
A funny friend to lend a nice young man to!
I'm glad I've got him safely through one Canto.

---

173

CANTO II.

I.

The Countess Pasibleu's gay rooms were full,
Not crowded. It was neither rout nor ball—
Only “her Friday night.” The air was cool;
And there were people in the house of all
Varieties, except the pure John Bull.
The number of young ladies, too, was small—
You seldem find old John, or his young daughters,
Swimming in very literary waters.

II.

Indeed, with rare exceptions, women given
To the society of famous men,
Are those who will confess to twenty-seven;
But add to this the next reluctant ten,
And still they're fit to make a poet's heaven,
For sumptuously beautiful is then
The woman of proud mien and thoughtful brow;
And one (still bright in her meridian now.)

III.

Bent upon Jules, that night, her lustrous eye.
A creature of a loftier mould was she
Than in his dreams had ever glided by;

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174

And through his veins the blood flew startlingly,
And he felt sick at heart—he knew not why—
For 'tis the sadness of the lost to see
Angels look on us with a cold regard,
(Not knowing those who never left their card.)

IV.

She had a low, sweet brow, with fringéd lakes
Of an unfathom'd darkness couch'd below;
And parted on that brow in jetty flakes
The raven hair swept back with wavy flow,
Rounding a head of such a shape as makes
The old Greek marble with the goddess glow.
Her nostril's breaching arch might threaten storm—
But love lay in her lips, all hush'd and warm.

V.

And small teeth, glittering white, and cheek whose red
Seem'd Passion, there asleep, in rosy nest:
And neck set on as if to bear a head—
May be a lily, may be Juno's crest,—
So slightly sprang it from its snow-white bed!
So proudly rode above the swelling breast!
And motion, effortless as stars awaking
And melting out, at eve, and morning's breaking;

VI.

And voice delicious quite, and smile that came
Slow to the lips, as 'twere the heart smiled thro:—
These charms I've been particular to name,

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175

For they are, like an inventory, true,
And of themselves were stuff enough for fame;
But she, so wondrous fair, has genius too,
And brilliantly her thread of life is spun—
In verse and beauty both, the “Undying One!”

VII.

And song—for in those kindling lips there lay
Music to wing all utterance outward breaking,
As if upon the ivory teeth did play
Angels, who caught the words at their awaking,
And sped them with sweet melodies away—
The hearts of those who listen'd with them taking.
Of proof to this last fact there's little lack;
And Jules, poor lad! ne'er got his truant back!

VIII.

That heart stays with her still. 'Tis one of two,
(I should premise)—all poets being double,
Living in two worlds as of course they do,
Fancy and fact, and rarely taking trouble
T' explain in which they're living, as to you!
And this it is makes all the hubble-bubble,
For who can fairly write a bard's biography,
When, of his fancy-world, there's no geography!

IX.

Jules was at perfect liberty in fact
To love again, and still be true in fancy;
Else were this story at its closing act,

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176

Nay, he in fact might wed, and in romance he
Might find the qualities his sposa lack'd—
(A truth that I could easier make a man see,)
And woman's great mistake, if I may tell it, is
The calling such stray fancies “infidelities.”

X.

Byron was man and bard, and Lady B.,
In wishing to monopolize him wholly,
Committed bigamy, you plainly see.
She, being very single, Guiccioli
Took off the odd one of the wedded three—
A change, 'twould seem, quite natural and holy.
The after sin, which still his fame environs,
Was giving Guiccioli both the Byrons.

XI.

The stern wife drove him from her. Had she loved
With all the woman's tenderness the while,
He had not been the wanderer he proved.
Like bird to sunshine fled he to a smile;
And, lightly though the changeful fancy roved,
The heart speeds home with far more light a wile.
The world well tried—the sweetest thing in life
Is the unclouded welcome of a wife.

XII.

To poets more than all—for truthful love
Has, to their finer sense, a deeper sweetness;
Yet she who has the venturous wish to prove

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177

The poet's love when nearest to completeness,
Must wed the man and let the fancy rove—
Loose to the air that wing of eager fleetness,
And smile it home when wearied out—with air,
But if you scold him, Madam! have a care!

XIII.

All this time the “Undying One” was singing.
She ceased, and Jules felt every sound a pain
While that sweet cadence in his ear was ringing;
So gliding from the arm of Lady Jane,
Which rather seem'd to have the whim of clinging,
He made himself a literary lane—
Punching and shoving every kind of writer
Till he got out. (He might have been politer.)

XIV.

Free of “the press,” he wander'd through the rooms,
Longing for solitude, but studying faces;
And, smitten with the ugliness of Brougham's,
He mused upon the cross with monkey races—
(Hieroglyphick'd on th' Egyptian tombs
And shown in France with very striking traces.)
“Rejected” Smith's he thought a head quite glorious;
And Hook, all button'd up, he took for “Boreas.”

XV.

He noted Lady Stepney's pretty hand,
And Barry Cornwall's sweet and serious eye;
And saw Moore get down from his chair to stand,

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178

While a most royal duke went bowing by—
Saw Savage Landor, wanting soap and sand—
Saw Lady Chatterton take snuff and sigh—
Saw graceful Bulwer say “good-night,” and vanish—
Heard Crofton Croker's brogue, and thought it Spanish.

XVI.

He saw Smith whispering something very queer,
And Hayward creep behind to overhear him;
Saw Lockhart whistling in a lady's ear,
(Jules thought so, till, on getting very near him,
The error—not the mouth—became quite clear;)
He saw “the Duke” and had a mind to cheer him,
And fine Jane Porter with her cross and feather,
And clever Babbage, with his face of leather.

XVII.

And there was plump and saucy Mrs. Gore,
And calm, old, lily-white Joanna Baillie,
And frisky Bowring, London's wisest bore;
And there was “devilish handsome” D'Israeli;
And not a lion of all these did roar;
But laughing, flirting, gossiping so gaily,—
Poor Jules began to think 'twas only mockery
To talk of “porcelain”—'twas a world of crockery.

XVIII.

'Tis half a pity authors should be seen!
Jules thought so, and I think so, too, with Jules.
They'd better do the immortal with a screen,

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179

And show but mortal in a world of fools;
Men talk of “taste” for thunder—but they mean
Old Vulcan's apron and his dirty tools;
They flock all wonder to the Delphic shade,
To know—just how the oracle is made!

XIX.

What we should think of Bulwer's works—without him,
His wife, his coat, his curls or other handle;
What of our Cooper, knowing naught about him,
Save his enchanted quill and pilgrim's sandal;
What of old Lardner, (gracious! how they flout him!)
Without this broad—(and Heavy-)side of scandal;
What of Will Shakspeare had he kept a “Boz”
Like Johnson—would be curious questions, coz!

XX.

Jove is, no doubt, a gainer by his cloud,
(Which ta'en away, might cause irreverent laughter,)
But, out of sight, he thunders ne'er so loud,
And no one asks the god to dinner after;
And “Fame's proud temple,” build it ne'er so proud,
Finds notoriety a useful rafter.
And when you've been abused awhile, you learn,
All blasts blow fair for you—that blow astern!

XXI.

No “pro” without its “con;”—the pro is fame,
Pure, cold, unslander'd, like a virgin's frill;
The con is beef and mutton, sometimes game,

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180

Madeira, sherry, claret, what you will;
The ladies' (albums) striving for your name;
All, (save the woodcock,) yours without a bill;
And “in the gate,” an unbelieving Jew,
Your “Mordecai!”—Why, clearly con's your cue!

XXII.

I've “reason'd” myself neatly “round the ring,”
While Jules came round to Lady Jane once more,
And supper being but a heavy thing,
(To lookers-on,) I'll show him to the door,
And his first night to a conclusion bring;
Not (with your kind permission, sir) before
I tell you what her Ladyship said to him
As home to Brook-street her swift horses drew him.

XXIII.

“You're comfortably lodged, I trust,” she said:
“And Mrs. Mivart—is she like a mother?
Have you musquito curtains to your bed?
Do you sleep well without your little brother?
What do you eat for breakfast—baker's bread?
I'll send you some home-made, if you would rather
What do you do to-morrow?—say at five,
Or four—say four—I call for you to drive?

XXIV.

“There's the New Garden, and the Coliseum—
Perhaps you don't care much for Panoramas?
But there's an armadillo—you must see him!

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181

And those big-eyed giraffes and heavenly lamas!
And—are you fond of music?—the Te Deum
Is beautifully play'd by Lascaramhas,
At the new Spanish chapel. This damp air!
And you've no hat on!—let me feel your hair!

XXV.

“Poor boy?”—but Jule's head was on her breast,
Rock'd like a nautilus in calm mid-ocean;
And while its curls within her hands she press'd,
The Lady Jane experienced some emotion:
For, did he sleep? or wish to be caress'd?
What meant the child?—she'd not the slightest notion!
Arrived at home, he rose, without a shake—
Trembling and slightly flush'd—but wide awake.

XXVI.

Loose rein! put spur! and follow, gentle reader!
For I must take a flying leap in rhyme;
And be to you both Jupiter and leader,
Annihilating space, (we all kill time,)
And overtaking Jules in Rome, where he'd a
Delight or two, besides the pleasant clime.
The Lady Jane and he, (I scorn your cavils—
The Earl was with them, sir!) were on their travels.

XXVII.

You know, perhaps, the winds are no narcotic,
As swallow'd 'twixt the Thames and Firth-of-Forth;
And Jules had proved a rather frail exotic—

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182

Too delicate to winter so far north,
The Earl was breaking, and half idiotic,
And Lady Jane's condition little worth;
So, through celestial Paris, (speaking victual-ly,)
They sought the sunnier clime of ill-fed Italy.

XXVIII.

Oh Italy!—but no!—I'll tell its faults
It has them, though the blood so “nimbly capers”
Beneath those morning heavens and starry vaults,
That we forget big rooms and little tapers;
Forget how drowsily the Romans waltz;
Forget they've neither shops nor morning papers;
Forget how dully sits, 'mid ancient glory,
This rich man's heaven—this poor man's purgatory!

XXIX.

Fashion the world as one bad man would have it, he
Would silence Harry's tongue, and Tom's and Dick's;
And doubtless it is pleasing to depravity
To know a land where people are but sticks—
Where you've no need of fair words, flattery, suavity,
But spend your money, if you like, with kicks—
Where they pass by their own proud, poor nobility,
To welcome golden “Snooks” with base servility.

XXX.

Jules was not in the poor man's category—
So Rome's condition never spoilt his supper.
The deuse (for him) might take the Curtian glory

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183

Of riding with a nation on his crupper.
He lived upon a Marquis's first story—
The venerable Marquis in the upper—
And found it pass'd the time, (and so would you,)
To do some things at Rome that Romans do.

XXXI.

The Marquis upon whom he chanced to quarter,
(He took his lodgings separate from the Earl,)
The Marquis had a friend, who had a daughter—
The friend a noble like himself, the girl
A diamond of the very purest water;
(Or purest milk, if you prefer a pearl;)
And these two friends, tho' poor, were hand and glove,
And of a pride their fortunes much above.

XXXII.

The Marquis had not much besides his palace,
The Count, beyond his daughter, simply naught;
And, one day, died this very Count Pascalis,
Leaving his friend his daughter, as he ought;
And, though the Fates had done the thing in malice,
The old man took her, without second thought,
And married her. “She's freer thus,” he said,
“And will be young to marry when I'm dead.”

XXXIII.

Meantime, she had a title, house, and carriage,
And far from wearing chains, had newly burst 'em—
For, as of course you know, before their marriage

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184

Girls are sad prisoners by Italian custom—
Not meaning their discretion to disparage,
But just because they're sure they couldn't trust 'em.
When wedded, they are free enough—moreover
The marriage contract specifies one lover.

XXXIV.

Not that the Marchioness had one—no, no!
Nor wanted one. It is not my intention
To hint it in this tale. Jules lodged below—
But his vicinity's not my invention;
And, if it seems to you more apropos
Than I have thought it worth my while to mention,
Why, you think as the world did—verbum sat—
But still it needn't be so—for all that.

XXXV.

'Most any female neighbor, up a stair,
Occasions thought in him who lodges under;
And Jules, by accident, had walk'd in where
(A “flight too high” 's a very common blunder.)
He saw a lady whom he thought as fair
As “from her shell rose” Mrs. Smith of Thunder.
Though Venus, I would say were Vulcan by,
Was no more like the Marchioness than I.

XXXVI.

For this grave sin there needed much remission;
And t' assure it, oft the offender went.
The Marquis had a very famous Titian,

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185

And Jules so often came to pay his rent,
The old man recommended a physician,
Thinking his intellect a little bent;
And, pitying, he thought and talk'd about him,
Till, finally, he couldn't live without him,

XXXVII.

And, much to the neglect of Lady Jane,
Jules paid him back his love; and there, all day,
The fair young Marchioness, with fickle brain,
Tried him with changeful mood, now coy, now gay:
And the old man lived o'er his youth again,
Seeing those grown-up children at their play,
His wife sixteen, Jules looking scarcely more,
'Twas frolic infancy to eighty-four.

XXXVIII.

There seems less mystery in matrimony,
With people living nearer the equator;
And early, like the most familiar crony,
Unheralded by butler, groom, or waiter,
Jules join'd the Marquis at his macaroni,—
The Marchioness at toast and coffee later;
And if his heart throbb'd wild sometimes, he hid it;
And if her dress required “doing”—did it.

XXXIX.

Now, though the Marchioness in church did faint once,
And, as Jules bore her out, they didn't group ill;
And though the spouses (as a pair) were quaint ones—

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186

She scarce a woman, and his age octuple—
'Twas odd, extremely odd, of their acquaintance,
To call Jules lover with so little scruple!
He'd a caressing way—but la! you know it's
A sort of manner natural to poets!

XL.

God made them prodigal in their bestowing:
And, if their smiles were riches, few were poor!
They turn to all the sunshine that is going—
Swoop merrily at all that shows a lure—
Their love at heart and lips is overflowing—
Their motto, “Trust the future—now is sure!”
Their natural pulse is high intoxication—
(Sober'd by debt and mortal botheration.)

XLI.

Of such men's pain and pleasure, hope and passion,
The symptoms are not read by “those who run;”
And 'tis a pity it were not the fashion
To count them but as children of the sun—
Not to be baited like the “bulls of Bashan,”
Nor liable, like clods, for “one pound one”—
But reverenced—as Indians rev'rence fools—
Inspired, tho' God knows how. Well—such was Jules.

XLII.

The Marquis thought him sunshine at the window—
The window of his heart—and let him in!
The Marchioness loved sunshine like a Hindoo,

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187

And she thought loving him could be no sin;
And as she loved not yet as those who sin do,
'Twas very well—was't not? Stick there a pin!
It strikes me that so far—to this last stanza—
The hero seems a well-disposed young man, sir!

XLIII.

I have not bored you much with his “abilities,”
Though I set out to treat you to a poet,
The first course commonly is “puerilities”—
(A soup well pepper'd—all the critics know it!)
Brought in quite hot. (The simple way to chill it is,
For “spoons” to stir, and puffy lips to blow it.)
Then, poet stuff'd, and by his kidney roasted,
And last (with “lagrima,”) “the devil” toasted.

XLIV.

High-scream between the devil and the roast,
But no Sham-pain!—Hold there! the fit is o'er.
Obsta principiis—one pun breeds a host—
(Alarmingly prolific for a bore!)
But he who never sins can little boast
Compared to him who goes and sins no more!
The “sinful Mary” walks more white in heaven
Than some who never “sinn'd and were forgiven!”

XLV.

Jules had objections very strong to playing
His character of poet—therefore I
Have rather dropp'd that thread, as I was saying.

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188

But though he'd neither phrensy in his eye,
Nor much of outer mark the bard betraying—
(A thing he piqued himself on, by the by—)
His conversation frequently arose
To what was thought a goodly flight for prose.

XLVI.

His beau ideal was to sink the attic,
(Though not by birth, nor taste, “the salt above”)
To pitilessly cut the air erratic
Which ladies, fond of authors, so much love,
And be, in style, calm, cold, aristocratic—
Serene in faultless boots and primrose glove.
But th' exclusive's made of starch, not honey!
And Jules was cordial, joyous, frank, and funny.

XLVII.

This was one secret of his popularity,
Men hate a manner colder than their own,
And ladies—bless their hearts! love chaste hilarity
Better than sentiment—if truth were known!
And Jules had one more slight peculiarity—
He'd little “approbativeness”—or none—
And what the critics said concern'd him little—
Provided it touch'd not his drink and victual.

XLVIII.

Critics, I say—of course he was in print—
“Poems,” of course—of course “anonymous”—
Of course he found a publisher by dint

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189

Of search most diligent, and far more fuss
Than chemists make in melting you a flint.
Since that experiment he reckons plus
Better manure than minus for his bays—
In short, seeks immortality—“that pays.”

XLIX.

He writes in prose—the public like it better.
Well—let the public! You may take a poet,
And he shall write his grandmother a letter,
And, if he's any thing but rhyme—he'll show it.
Prose may be poetry without its fetter,
And be it pun or pathos, high or low wit,
The thread will show its gold, however twisted—
(I wish the public flatter'd me that this did!)

L.

No doubt there's pleasant stuff that ill unravels.
I fancy most of Moore's would read so-so,
Done into prose of pious Mr. Flavel's—
(That is my Sunday reading—so I know,)
Yet there's Childe Harold—excellent good travels—
And what could spoil sweet Robinson Crusoe!
But though a clever verse-r makes a prose-r,
About the vice-versa, I don't know, sir!

LI.

Verser's a better word than versifier,
(Unless 'tis verse on fire, you mean to say,)
And I've long thought there's something to desire

---

190

In poet's nomenclature, by the way.
It sounds but queer to laud “the well-known lyre”—
Call a dog “poet!” he will run away—
And “songster,” “rhymester,” “bard,” and “poetaster,”
Are customers they're shy of at the Astor.

LII.

A “scribbler's” is a skittish reputation,
And weighs a man down like a hod of mortar.
Commend a suitor's wit, imagination—
The merchant may think of him for his daughter;
But say that “he writes poetry”—---n!
Her “Pa” would rather throw her in the water!
And yet when poets wed, as facts will prove,
Their bills stand all at pa, they much above!

LIII.

Jules had a hundred minds to cut the muses;
And sometimes did, “forever!”—(for a week!)
He found for time so many other uses.
His superfluity was his physique;
And exercise, if violent, induces
Blood to the head and flush upon the cheek;
And, (though details are neither here nor there,)
Makes a man sit uneasy on his chair;

LIV.

Particularly that of breaking horses.
The rate of circulation in the blood,
Best suited to the meditative forces,

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191

Is quite as far from mercury as mud—
That of the starry, not the racing-courses.
No man can trim his style 'mid fire and flood,
Nor in a passion, nor just after marriage;
And, as to Cæsar's writing in his carriage,

LV.

Credat Judæus! Thought is free and easy;
But language, unless wrought with labor limæ,
Is not the kind of thing, sir, that would please ye!
The bee makes honey, but his toil is thymy,
And nothing is well done until it tease ye;
(Tho' if there's one who would 'twere not so, I'm he!)
Now Jules, I say, found out that filly-breaking,
Though monstrous fun, was not a poet's making.

LVI.

True—some drink up to composition's glow;
Some talk up to it—vide Neckar's daughter!
But when the temp'rature's a fourth too low,
Of course you make up the deficient quarter!
Like Byron's atmosphere, which, chemists know,
Required hydrogen—(more gin and water.)
And Jules's sanguine humor was too high,
So, of the bottle he had need be shy!

LVII.

And of society, which makes him thin
With fret and fever, and of sunny sky—
Father of idleness, the poet's sin!

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192

(John Bull should be industrious, by the by,
If clouds without concentrate thought within,)
In short, the lad could fag—(I mean soar high)—
Only by habits, which (if Heaven let her choose)
His mother would bequeath as Christian virtues!

LVIII.

Now men have oft been liken'd unto streams.
(And, truly, both are prone to run down hill,
And seldom brawl when dry, or so it seems!)
And Jules, when he had brooded, long and still,
At the dim fountain of the poet's dreams,
Felt suddenly his veins with phrensy fill;
And, urged, as by the torrent's headlong force,
Ruthlessy rode—if he could find a horse.

LIX.

Yes, sir—he had his freshets like a river,
And horses were his passion—so he rode,
When he his prison'd spirits would deliver,
As if he fled from—some man whom he owed—
And glorious, to him, the bounding quiver
Of the young steed in terror first bestrode!
Thrilling as inspiration the delay—
The arrowy spring—the fiery flight away

LX.

Such riding galls the Muses, (though we know
Old Pegasus's build is short and stocky,)
But I'd a mind by these details to show

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193

What Jules might turn out, were the Muses baulky.
This hint to his biographer I throw—
In Jules, the bard, was spoil'd a famous jockey!
Though not at all to imitate Apollo!
Horse him as well, he'd beat that dabster hollow!

LXI.

'Tis one of the proprieties of story
To mark the change in heroes, stage by stage;
And therefore I have tried to lay before ye
The qualities of Jule's second age.
It should wind up with some memento mori—
But we'll defer that till we draw the sage.
The moral's the last thing, (I say with pain,)
And now let's turn awhile to Lady Jane.

LXII.

The Earl, I've said, was in his idiocy,
And Lady Jane not well. They therefore hired
The summer palace of Rospigliosi,
To get the sun as well as be retired.
You shouldn't fail, I think, this spot to go see—
That's if you care to have your fancy fired—
It's out of Rome—it strikes me on a steep hill—
A sort of place to go with nice people.

LXIII.

It looks affectionate, with all its splendor—
As loveable as ever look'd a nest;
A palace, I protest, that makes you tender,

---

194

And long for—fol de rol, and all the rest.
Guido's Aurora's there—you couldn't mend her;
And Samson, by Caracci—not his best;
But pictures, I can talk of to the million—
To you, I'll just describe one small pavilion.

LXIV.

It's in the garden just below the palace;
I think upon the second terrace—no—
The first—yes, 'tis the first—the orange alleys
Lead from the first flight down—precisely so!
Well—half-way is a fountain, where, with malice
In all his looks, a Cupid—'hem! you know
You needn't notice that—you hurry by,
And lo! a fairy structure fills your eye.

LXV.

A crescent colonnade folds in the sun,
To keep it for the wooing South wind only—
A thing I wonder is not oftener done,
(The crescent, not the wooing—that's my own lie,)
For there are months, and January's one,
When winds are chill, and life in-doors gets lonely,
And one quite longs, if wind would keep away,
To sing i' the sunshine, like old King René.

LXVI.

The columns are of marble, white as light:
The structure low, yet airy, and the floor
A tesselated pavement, curious quite,—

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195

Of the same fashion in and out of door.
The Lady Jane, who kept not warm by sight,
Had carpeted this pavement snugly o'er,
And introduced a stove, (an open Rumford)—
So the pavilion had an air of comfort.

LXVII.

“The frescoes on the ceiling really breathe,”
The guide-books say. Of course they really see:
And, as I tell you what went on beneath,
Of course those naked goddesses told me.
They saw two rows of dazzling English teeth,
Employ'd, each morn, on “English toast and tea;”
And once, when Jules came in, they strain'd their eyes,
But didn't see the teeth, to their surprise.

LXVIII.

The Lady Jane smiled not. Her lashes hung
Low to the soft eye, and so still they lay,
Jules knew a tear was hid their threads among,
And that she fear'd 'twould gush and steal away.
The kindly greeting trembled on her tongue,
The hand's faint pressure chill'd his touch like clay,
And Jules with wonder felt the world all changing,
With but the cloud of one fond heart's estranging.

LXIX.

Oh it is darkness to lose love!—howe'er
We little prize the fond heart—fond no more!
The bird, dark-wing'd on earth, looks white in air!

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196

Unrecognized are angels, till they soar!
And few so rich they may not well beware
Of lightly losing the heart's golden ore!
Yet—hast thou love too poor for thy possessing?—
Loose it, like friends to death, with kiss and blessing!

LXX.

You're naturally surprised, that Lady Jane
Loved Mr. Jules. (He's Mr. now—not Master!)
The fact's abruptly introduced, it's plain;
And possibly I should have made it last a
Whole Canto, more or less—but I'll explain.
Lumping the sentiment one gets on faster!
Though it's in narrative an art quite subtle,
To work all even, like a weaver's shuttle.

LXXI.

Good “characters” in tales are “well brought up”—
(Though, by this rule, my Countess Pasibleu
Is a bad character—yet, just to sup,
I much prefer her house to a church pew—)
But, pouring verse for readers, cup by cup,—
So much a week,—what is a man to do?
“'Tis wish'd that if a story you begin, you'd
Make separate scenes of each ‘to be continued.’”

LXXII.

So writes plain “Jonathan,” who tills my brains
With view to crop—(the seed being ready money—)
And if the “small-lot system” bring him gains,

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197

He has a right to fence off grave from funny—
Working me up, as 'twere, in window-panes,
And, I must own, where one has room to run, he
Is apt, as Cooper does, to spread it thin,
So now I'll go to lumping it again!

LXXIII.

“Love grows, by what” it gives to feed another,
And not by what “it feeds on.” 'Tis divine,
If any thing's divine besides the mother
Whose breast, self-blessing, is its holy sign.
Much better than a sister loves a brother
The Lady Jane loved Jules, and “line by line,
Precept by precept,” furnish'd him advice;
Also much other stuff he thought more nice.

LXXIV.

She got him into sundry pleasant clubs,
By pains that women can take, though but few will!
She made most of him when he got most rubs;
And once, in an inevitable duel,
She follow'd him alone to Wormwood Scrubs—
But not to hinder! Faith! she was a jewel!
I wish the star all manner of festivity
That shone upon her Ladyship's nativity!

LXXV.

All sorts of enviable invitations,
Tickets, and privileges, got she him;
Gave him much satin waistcoat, work'd with patience,

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(Becoming to a youth so jimp and slim)—
Cut for his sake some prejudiced relations,
And found for him in church the psalm and hymn;
Sent to his “den” some things not found in Daniel's,
And kept him in kid gloves, cologne, and flannels.

LXXVI.

To set him down upon her way chez elle,
She stay'd unreasonably late at parties;
To introduce him to a waltzing belle
She sometimes made a cessio dignitatis;
And one kind office more that I must tell—
She sent her maid, (and very stern your heart is
If charity like this you find a sin in,)
In church-time, privately, to air his linen.

LXXVII.

Was Jules ungrateful? No! Was he obtuse?
Did he believe that women's hearts were flowing
With tenderness, like water in a sluice,—
Like the sun's shining,—like the breeze's blowing,—
And fancy thanking them was not much use?
Had he the luck of intimately knowing
Another woman, quite as kind, and nicer?
Had he a “friend” sub rosa? No, sir! Fie, sir!

LXXVIII.

Then why neglect her? Having said he did,
I will explain, as Brutus did his stab,—
(Though by my neighbors I'm already chid

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199

For getting on so very like a crab)—
Jules didn't call, as oft as he was bid,
Because in Rome he didn't keep a cab—
A fact that quite explains why friendships, marriages,
And other ties depend on keeping carriages.

LXXIX.

Without a carriage men should have no card,
Nor “owe a call” at all—except for love.
And friends who need that you the “lean earth lard”
To give their memories a pasteboard shove,
On gentlemen a-foot bear rather hard!
It's paying high for Broadway balls, by Jove!
To walk next day half way to Massachusett
And leave your name—on ladies that won't use it.

LXXX.

It really should be taught in infant schools
That the majority means men, not dollars;
And, therefore, that, to let the rich make rules,
Is silly in “poor pretty little scholars.”
And this you see is apropos of Jules,
Who call'd as frequently as richer callers
While he'd a cab;—but courtesy's half horse—
A secret those who ride keep snug, of course.

LXXXI.

I say while he was Centaur, (horse and man,)
Jules never did neglect the Lady Jane;
And, at the start it was my settled plan,

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200

(Though I've lost sight of it, I see with pain,)
To show how moderate attentions can,
If once she love, a woman's heart retain.
True love is weak and humble, though so brittle;
And asks, 'tis wonderful how very little!

LXXXII.

For instance—Jules's every day routine
Was, breakfast at his lodgings, rather early;
A short walk in the nearest Park, the Green;
(Where, if address'd he was extremely surly;)
Five minutes at the Club, perhaps fifteen;
Then giving his fine silk moustache a curl, he
Stepp'd in his cab and drove to Belgrave Square,
Where he walk'd in with quite a household air.

LXXXIII.

And here he pass'd an hour—or two, or three—
Just as it served his purpose, or his whim;
And sweeter haunt on earth could scarcely be
Than that still boudoir, rose-lit, scented, dim—
Its mistress, elsewhere all simplicity,
Dress'd ever sumptuously there—for him!
With all that taste could mould, or gold could buy,
Pampering fondly his reluctant eye.

LXXXIV.

And on the silken cushions at her feet
He daily dream'd these morning hours away,
Troubling himself but little to be sweet.

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201

Poets are fond of revery, they say,
But not with ladies whom they rarely meet.
And if you love one, madam, (as you may!)
And wish his wings to pin as with a skewer,
Be careful of all manner of toujours!

LXXXV.

“Toujours perdrix,” snipe, woodcock, trout, or rabbit
Offends the simplest palate, it appears,
And, (if a secret, I'm disposed to blab it,)
It's much the same with smiles, sighs, quarrels, tears.
The fancy mortally abhors a habit!
(Not that which Seraphina's bust inspheres!)
E'en one-tuned music-boxes breed satiety,
Unless you keep of them a great variety.

LXXXVI.

Daily to Jules the sun rose in the East,
And brought new milk and morning paper daily:
The “yield” of both the Editor and beast,
Great mysteries, unsolved by Brown or Paley;
But Jules—not plagued about it in the least—
Read his gazette, and drank his tea quite gaily;
And Lady Jane's fond love and cloudless brow
Grew to be like the Editor and cow.

LXXXVII.

I see you understand it. One may dash on
A color here—stroke there—and lo! the story!
And, speaking morally, this outline fashion

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202

Befits a world so cramm'd yet transitory.
I've sketch'd for you a deep and tranquil passion
Kindled while nursing up a bard for glory;
And, having whisk'd you for that end to London,
Let's back to Italy, and see it undone.

LXXXVIII.

Fair were the frescoes of Rospigliosi—
Bright the Italian sunshine on the wall—
The day delicious and the room quite cozy—
And yet there were two bosoms full of gall!
So lurks the thorn in paths long soft and rosy!
Jules was not one whom trifles could appal,
But few things will make creep the lion's mane
Like ladies in a miff who wont explain!

LXXXIX.

Now I have seen a hadji and a cadi—
Have sojourn'd among strangers, oft and long—
Have known most sorts of women, fair and shady,
And mingled in most kinds of mortal throng—
But, in my life, I never saw a lady
Who had, the least, the air of being wrong!
The fact is, there's a nameless grace in evil
We never caught—'twas she who saw the devil!

XC.

In pedigree of sin we're mere beginners—
For what was Adam to the “morning star?”
She would take precedence—if sins were dinners,

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And hence that self-assured “de haut en bas”
So unattainable by men, as sinners.
Of course, she plays the devil in a fracas—
Frowns better, looks more innocent, talks faster,
And argues like her grandmother's old master!

XCI.

And in proportion as the angel fades—
As love departs—the crest of woman rises—
Even in passion's softer, lighter shades,
With aristocracy's well-bred disguises;
For, with no tragic fury, no tirades,
A lady looks a man into a crisis!
And, to 'most any animal carnivorous
Before a belle aggrieved, the Lord deliver us!

XCII.

Jules had one thing particular to say,
The morn I speak of, but, in fact, was there,
With twenty times the mind to be away.
Uncomfortable seem'd the stuff'd arm-chair
In which the Earl would sometimes pass the day;
And there was something Roman in the air;
For every effort to express his errand
Ended in “um!”—as 'twere a Latin gerund.

XCIII.

He had received a little billet-doux
The night before—as plain as A B C—
(I mean, it would appear as plain to you,

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204

Though very full of meaning, you'll agree)—
Informing him that by advice quite new
The Earl was going now to try the sea;
And begging him to have his passport vised
For Venice, by Bologna—if he pleased!

XCIV.

Smooth as a melody of Mother Goose's
The gentle missive elegantly ran—
A sort of note the writer don't care who sees,
For you may pick a flaw in't if you can—
But yet a stern experimentum crucis,
Quite in the style of Metternich, or Van,—
And meant—without more flummery or fuss—
Stay with your Marchioness—or come with us!

XCV.

Here was to be “a parting such as wrings
The blood from out young hearts”—for Jules would stay!
The bird she took unfledged had got its wings,
And, though its cage be gold, it must away!
But this, and similar high-color'd things,
Refinement makes it difficult to say;
For, higher “high life” is, (this side an attic,)
The more it shrinks from all that looks dramatic.

XCVI.

Hence, words grow cold as agony grows hot,
'Twixt those who see in ridicule a Hades;
And though the truth but coldly end the plot,

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205

(There really is no pathos for you, ladies!)
Jules cast the die with simple “I think not!”
And her few words were guarded as he made his;
For rank has one cold law of Moloch's making—
Death, before outcry, while the heart is breaking!

XCVII.

She could not tell that boy how hot the tear
That seem'd within her eyeball to have died—
She could not tell him her exalted sphere
Had not a hope his boyish love beside:
The grave of anguish is a human ear—
Hers lay unburied in a pall of pride!
And life, for her, thenceforth, was cold and lonely,
With her heart lock'd on that dumb sorrow only!

XCVIII.

Calm, in her “pride of place,” moves Lady Jane—
Paler, but beautifully pale, and cold—
So cold, the gazer believes joy nor pain
Has o'er that pulse of marble ever roll'd.
She loved too late to dream of love again,
And rich, fair, noble, and alone, grows old!
A star, on which a spirit had alighted
Once, in all time, were like a life so blighted!

XCIX.

So, from the poet's woof was broke a thread
Which we have follow'd in its rosy weaving!
Yet merrily, still on, the shuttle sped.

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Jules was not made of stuff to die of grieving;
But, that an angel from his path had fled,
He was not long in mournfully believing.
And “angel watch and ward” had fled with her—
For, virtuously loved, 'tis hard to err!

C.

Poets are moths, (or so some poet sings,
Or so some pleasant allegory goes,)
And Jules at many a bright light burnt his wings.
His first chaste scorching the foregoing shows;
But, while one passion best in metre rings,
Another is best told in lucid prose.
As to the Marchioness, I've half a plan, sir!
To limn her in the quaint Spenserian stanza.

END.

TO THE READER.

And now, dear reader! as a brick may be
A sample of a house—a bit of glass
Of a broad mirror—it has seem'd to me
These fragments for a tale may shift to pass.
(I am a poet much cut up, pardie!)
But “shorts” is poor “to running loose to grass.”
Where there's a meadow to range freely over,
You pick to please you—timothy or clover.

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207

Without the slightest hint at transmigration,
I wish hereafter we may meet in calf!
That you may read me with some variation—
This when you're moody—that when you would laugh.
In that case, I may swell this true narration,
And blow off here and there a speech of chaff.
I trust you think, that, were there more 'twere better, or
If cetera desunt, decent were the cetera!

P. S.—I really had forgotten quite
To say to you, from Countess Pasibleu—
(Dying, 'tis thought, but quite too ill to write)—
Her Ladyship's best compliments to you,
And she's toujours chez elle on Friday night,
(Buckingham Crescent, May Fair, No. 2.)
This, (as her written missive would have said,)
Always in case her Ladyship's not dead.