University of Virginia Library

NARCISSUS.

Once when the golden day had dawned and died,
Narcissus, lily-cradled by the side
Of silver-waved Cephissus, whose soft sheen
Day-long divides his meadow-margins green,
Was found by woodland nymphs. Him, for the sake
Of his famed river-father—wont to slake
Their thirst beside his fountains—and his own
Exceeding beauty thus ere boyhood shown,
Unto their forest haunts they nimbly took,
And nurtured in a leaf-entangled nook.
And day by day the boy in form and face
Grew fairer, by the myriad waving grace
Of slender arms encircled—grew to be
More comely than the gods did e'er decree
To mortal man before. His beauty was
The beauty of a tall flower in the grass
Where-o'er the golden hours glide one by one,
Steeped in sweet slumbers of the golden sun,
A dream-fed beauty: in those night-black eyes
Lay undiscovered realms of rich surprise,
Whereto the broad and overarching brows
Were like the entrance of a stately house.
And round about the lips a light smile ran
That lingered there and would be gone a span,
But never far. So fair Endymion showed
To lonely-souled Selene when she glowed
All night above him in his land of rest,
Latmos below the sun-illumined West,
And all her thin and silver beauty turned
To burnished gold as o'er his cloud-hung bed she yearned.
Among the mountain gorges far withdrawn,
Unvisited save by the feet of Dawn,
Where lofty lone Parnassus lifts his peak
Supreme in snow, speckless of stain or streak,—
A white and dazzling wonder, to defy
The midnoon splendour of the deep blue sky—
There spreads a shelving lake. The valley there
Lays out its sunny slopes to light and air
Crowned with eternal forest: fir and pine
With silver birch and maple intertwine
Dense-clustered boughs, and companies of beech
Their suppliant red-tipped fingers heavenward reach.
But all about, as if the earth in sport
Ran riot of her riches, every sort
Of flowering shrub and dainty flower is seen
To deck those lawny dells and coverts green.
There crimson-tipped anemone, and white
Lily and asphodel glitter in the light;
Blue fields of hyacinth, spread lower down,
The languid sense in luscious odours drown;
Rose, mountain-rowan and acacia vie
Each with the other to enchant the eye
Of way-worn shepherds; thick-sown are the meads
With purple-petalled saffron; and the reeds
With spears of yellow iris-bloom are set
And modest flowers of blue marsh violet.
This at the lower margin; but the lake
Where swift Cephissus enters it doth take
More gloomy featuring; its flood is pent
Within a black precipitous rock-rent
Of bleak Parnassus. There the livelong day
Behind an angle, weather-scarped and grey,
Secluded in its blue mist-circled halls
A high foam-laden cataract falls and falls;
And from the sunny margin far remote,
Sometimes at eventide when every note
Of strenuous cicala chirping shrill
Is hushed, and loud melodious birds are still,
Across the calm lake-surface wind-unstirred
A low continuous sweet sound is heard—
The music of the silver cataract
In rhythmic pulse and soft repeated tact
Sleepladen; for whoever listens long
To that delicious far undying song
Treads a dream-haunted labyrinthine ground
And swiftly falls into forgetfulness profound.
Thither one noon Narcissus, dream-content,
His wayward slowly wandering footsteps bent.
Of love for him lone nymphs ere this had died:
Their beauty and their breath—together sighed
Upon the breeze for him—ere this had shed
A distant cloud-like lustre round his head;
Who all the while with half-averted look
The pleasant laughter and the dance forsook,
Cared not for winning smile, or wistful eye,
Or swift encounter of fair looks whereby
A wavering heart is won; for him no charm
Had rosy limb, or slender arching arm,
Or passionate device of perplext love,
Of any nymph in woodland, lawn, or grove,
This side of Mount Parnassus. But it seemed
As though some fair forgotten image gleamed,
Haunting the crystal caverns of his mind
In beauty undiminished, undivined.
Then to himself he sang: ‘O pleasant hours
Arching the earth like rainbow after showers
In sweet perpetual round, roam lightly on,
Bring vernal songs, bring summer, bring the sun,
Bring fresh and rosy flowers, all that is fair,
To fill the fragrant kingdoms of the air:
But when with sandals loosed and feet unshod
Ye pace the darkened chambers of your God,
Bring me—delay not—down the heavenly steep
Not troublous Love but sweet and dreamless sleep.’
And through the still hot air his music rang
In bell-like tones, high, plaintive, as he sang,
Which on the waveless lake from shore to shore
Fell like foam-bubbles on a damask floor,
Floating and bounding onward till they died
Upon the distant crag-encircled tide:
Where they awoke an answering echo sweet
Which fluttered back and perished at Narcissus' feet.
For all amid the crags remote from view,
Enfolded in a fairy curtain blue,
Just where the rock 'neath overhanging boughs
Steepfalling to the water's edge allows
No footspace for a goat or fallow deer,
But all its grooves and angles and its sheer
Black shining faces are with dew besprent
Of falling waters in loud tournament,
There is a niche. Hart's-tongue and maidenhair
There hide their frondage from the troubled air;
The slender harebell rimed with dewy flakes
Nods to and fro; and evermore there breaks
Upon its rocky sides a sea of sound
That roars with loud reverberation round.
For like a pearly ocean-moulded shell
Deepwinding inwards is that rockhewn cell,
Wherein all day the listener may hear
The murmurs of the outer world made clear
In ceaseless iteration. Here her home
The maiden Echo made. Her bath the foam
Of unseen waters, and her bed the rock
Raincurtained and fernbraided; for her frock
She wove the changeful iris hues, and set
A silver girdle with an amber fret.
Pale was she: by the dewy mist and air
Made like a water-spirit light and rare;
Pale blue her eyes; her features laughter-lined,
Yet white like one who of the lonely wind
Had made a playmate; very cold her mien
Yet by a sad and distant smile, star-keen,
At times transpierced; her step assured and swift,
As on her task through windswept chasm and rift
She plied white feet; and over all her hair
Hung back in cloud-bejewelled tresses fair.
Unseen of man she dwelt. No mortal eye
Had looked upon her life; yet to descry
Her strange and tameless beauty many a one
Had left the high warm uplands of the Sun,
And passed into those caverns cold as grave,
And perished in the fathomless dark wave.
For all day long with high and mocking note
She teased the merry shepherds when they smote
Their palms together, through them hooting shrill
In jubilant reply from hill to hill.
And when they sang, it was her wanton joy
Unto their words to render answer coy;
Till one at last, from ruddy mien and rude,
Would grow lovesick, and leave his wonted food
Untouched, and plain upon the passing wind,
And pray a shepherd mate his flocks to mind.
Then would the nymph his steps astray beguile,
And hide his eyes from day's returning smile.
This cold fantastic fickle maid that day
Dreambound in unaccustomed slumbers lay
Upon her ferny couch. Her breathing came
And went, quick, fitful, like a flickering flame.
Her face was changed—it seemed her latest freak:
A rose had broke the spell upon her cheek.
And o'er her limbs a wave-like languor swelled
And on her bosom brake, for she beheld
In visionary fancy one unmoved
By all her lures and antics—and she loved.
Beside the far remote lake-marge he stood
And sang; and o'er the level waterflood
His words seemed floating to her single ear—
Through obscure shades and sunlit spaces clear,
And down the dark rocklimits lone and steep—
‘Not troublous love, but sweet and dreamless sleep.’
And from her slumbers swiftly she uprose,
But, ere her waking powers she could dispose,
Old fatal use upon her lips did leap,
In loud and mocking accents she made answer ‘Sleep.’
Then from the cold clear gloom she turned her face
Upward, between those walls—a moment's space—
And saw o'erhead the hot and dazzling sky
Sharp-sundered by the forest-fringes high,
And for that bright unblemished upper land
Longing, and bold because the breezes fanned
Her forehead, from her lonely home she crept,
And out into the sunlight lightly stept;
Where, from a heathery bee-haunted slope,
The valley of her vision and her hope
She viewed with actual eye. Yet stayed not here,
But downwards to the meadows by the mere
Went through the dry sweet grass. But now the Sun
His toilsome heavenward ascent had done,
And pausing for a while upon the height
Flung wide o'er all the earth his arrowy light;
Then westward went, another golden hour
Shining with intense undiminished power.
Hot was the air; no sound the sultry time
Gave but the silvery insistent chime
Of shoreward ripples, though the white lake-face
Showed not of wandering wind or wave a trace.
Betwixt the green and glassy worlds she went—
The rock nymph Echo—on her love intent;
Her feet within the wave-washed fringes wet,
Her face against the sun's full splendour set,
Nor careful, till most suddenly the heat
Shot needles from her shoulders to her feet,
And on her head the sunbeams seemed to beat
Intolerable rhythm. And as from trance
Awaking, to her half-confounded glance
The world appeared to reel in senseless swound,
While o'er her path the awful Sungod frowned
Absolute prohibition. Yet she took
No heeding of his fierce forbidding look,
But disobedient to the high behest
On to her own destruction proudly pressed.
For this fair sprite, whose fit and only home
Had been shade-curtained crags and cooling foam,
In the intense glare wasted all her strength
And thinned into a shadow, till at length
Her form grew bodiless, and she became
White and translucent like a taper flame
Set in the sunlight. So the dew is seen
On summer morns to vanish from the green;
So written characters cast on the fire
Lose substance but not form; so when the lyre
Is softly struck, and all the strings are still,
The sound moves on. So moved her stedfast will.
And by the marshes where the moorhen breeds
Among bulrushes and red-flowering reeds,
And by the sunny overhanging banks
Where all day long fieldmice are full of pranks
And swift kingfishers dart below and pass
Into their tunnelled homes beneath the grass,
She fled swiftfooted; and you might have said
A moonlike glamour on the ground was shed,
Or that a shimmering light breeze, half spent,
The verdure's myriad slender spires had bent:
Till through a belt of lilacs she did peep
And saw Narcissus on a mossy bank asleep.
Then Echo turned away, and in her grief,
Seeing the end too surely, sought relief
In darkness and the shadow of a grove,
Whereto she told her first last only love,
And all night long beneath the flying Moon
Made melancholy plaining. But so soon
As morning came—and with it dawn of hope—
With her distressful fancies did she cope,
And went to seek Narcissus. So six days
She teased him in and out the woodland ways,
And now would scatter roses for his bed,
Relenting, now would mimic all he said,
Saying Echo, Echo, in her lightest tone;
And oft at midnoon, in a hollow stone,
Brought icy water from a crystal well,
Or lilies from some moist and shady dell.
For all he knew her not, but turned aside,
And evermore regarded but the glassy tide.
Then on the seventh day she saw the Fate
Throw wide for her its final gloomy gate;
And turning on itself her life down went
Through all the sharp degrees of pain's descent
To Death: for Anger and great grief had sped
The end of passion, and her heart was dead.
So throwing out her arms upon the gale
She cried unto the Gods with grievous wail,
And cursed the careless lord of her desire,
And said: ‘Let the same unremitting fire
Devour thy heart and mine: for I must die.’
And with a sharp and ominous loud sigh
Backward upon the breezes from the bank
She fled, and into the blue distance sank.
And on Narcissus fell the fair nymph's ban;
For while within the waters he did scan
Some dreamworld wonder, in that lake-born land
Dimly discerning his own image stand,
He knew it not; but deemed that some fair maid
Upon the nether meadow-marge delayed,
And in love-cravings for that unattained
Fanciful beauty, his own beauty waned
And wasted with desire unsatisfied;
Whereof at length himself had surely died,
But that the Gods took pity in that hour
And so transformed him to the fashion of a flower.
And now each vernal season, when the Sun
His vertical high course begins to run,
When midday Zephyrs dream beside the rill,
And the lake from an overhanging hill
Looks like the entrance of another land,
Upon its sunny bank is seen to stand
A fragrant flower whose white and golden eye
Peers at its own pale image mournfully,
And, long ere Philomel forsakes her sighs,
Pines on its slender stem and falls and dies.
And, as the changes of the world go by,
About that land ofttimes is heard a cry
Like thin and bitter laughter, wheresoe'er
Among her lonely crags and caverns bare,
Now bodiless and dwindled to a sound,
Heart-broken Echo mocks the starry night profound.

PERSEPHONE.

On high Olympus, where the great Gods hold
Council and converse all the days of gold,
The air, inviolate of mortal breath,
Is very still, more still than aught but death,
Save life—such radiant life as Gods enjoy.
For all delights that mortals dream of cloy
The feeble human sense to weariness,
Which faints, like some frail insect in a mess
Compact of honey and all luscious things;
But from the God ethereal there springs
A power so keen, so vivid, and so bright,
That like the Sun's intense pervading light
It searches the inert from end to end,
And nothing leaves with which it does not blend
Into a garment of enjoyment. So
They, the Gods, noting all the ebb and flow
Of this fair world, feeling with implicate
Fingers of sense outstretched the delicate
Delight of every light-thrill on the breeze,
Or hearing shocks of nations and of seas,
As heavenward for help they heave and cry,
Know, understand, but are not moved thereby:
For passion is part-knowledge, but they know
Past all misprision. Therefore doth there go
About Olympus' top such balm of air
As mortals, comprehending not, compare
To summer mornings of the later June;
Yet is it brighter, warmer, as a tune
Played on Apollo's god-lyre might surpass
The same flute-laboured of faun Marsyas.
All day in showers the golden-flaked sunshine
Floats downward through a liquid crystalline
Ocean of air, which, scarcely heaving, breaks
In balmy kisses where each forehead shakes
To right and left from white ambrosial brows
Its waving fringe. No rude intrusions rouse
This quiet that the Gods hold for their own,
But they can hear like a far distant tone
The murmurs and the music of the Earth—
Its lamentations and high tones of mirth,
Loud sylvan choruses and lonely song,
Lowings and bleatings of the herded throng,
Faint cockcrow and impatient fitful bark
Of shepherd hound wherever he may mark
A sheep astray, the shoreward sound of seas
And shout of broken battle—all of these
Half lost in air, save when a lark sometimes,
With beating heart and pinions heavenward climbs,
And holds immortals from their proper bliss
To listen to that earthborn song of his.
But when they would be free of Earth and men,
Pursuing their own paths past mortal ken,
They spread the soft white carpet of the clouds
About their feet, which underneath enshrouds
Earth's darkened races from the risen day;
Who deem the sun spoiled of his proper sway,
Nor know nor guess he holds his dazzling court
High overhead with Gods in god-like sport.
For there, sunsmitten, the white spotless plain
Spreads far and wide, smooth-billowed like the main,
When, minding stormy weather in the still,
It breaks, and fringes with a white foam-frill
Each island rock. So here the white mist breaks
Upwards on purple pinnacles and peaks,
Marking the limits of the land and sea;
And overhead the azure canopy
Is limitless pure light. The happy hours,
Each garlanded with crown of stars and flowers,
Here tarry from their swift earth-circling flight;
Venus unyokes her doves, and out of sight
Zeus puts his bolted fire; proud Hera yields
Her haughty seat, and o'er the silver fields
In equal converse all the Gods do go
With Loves and Zephyrs and the nectar flow
Of God-created laughter, more divine
Than nectar and more sweet than Cyprus wine.
Yet since all things, each by its opposite,
Are known, and light without dark is not light,
Nor day without night day, nor things divine
Divine, until experience refine
Good out of ill endured and life from death—
Since this at least our mortal wisdom saith
(For what and how the Gods themselves discern
We know not)—therefore whosoever turn
His footing from the sunlight, close at hand
Shall have quick entrance to the sunless land,
And tread the realms of darkness, absolute,
Dread, limitless, deep, undisturbed and mute;
Whose king is Hades. For when first the plains
Of sun and shadow into separate reigns
Were broken, he, being born of equal birth
With Zeus his brother, took the hollow Earth
And caves of Night and Silence for his own,
Leaving the light and land of all things shown
Unto the other; while between the twain
The neutral twilight-circled dusky plain
Was left for men. And each man whosoe'er
Moves bordering both worlds and can declare
Some part in each: for 'twixt them like a gate
His eyelids stand, which, soon as they dilate,
Suffer himself to pass their crystal doors
Into the upper land wherein he soars
Light-charioted like a God—God Zeus to wit:
But when those lids are closed, his soul doth sit
Contemplative and calm within its own
Infinite realm of thought upon the throne
Of night—and Hades; therefore, when men die,
Their friends make fast those jewelled doors whereby
The soul may never more return, and say
That to the realms of Hades it takes way.
Such is that land, serene-lit like a gem
Of purest night set in the diadem
Of its own monarch—a black diamond,—
In silence beautiful, and sense of fond
Large melancholy, restful in its gloom
And quiet liberty of spacious room,
Yet rousing fancy with its forms foreseen,
Forethought, foreboded down each deep ravine
And unexplored broad valley: who may know
What shapes about that wilderness do go?
Since Hades here doth hold all essences
And seeds of things, for Zeus at length to bless
To manifest fruition;—folded here
Lie slender-branching fern and wheaten ear,
All acts of men and famous enterprise—
As new lands lie in voyager's surmise—
Waiting the light to shape them. And rich store
He has in keeping: gold and silver ore,
And jewels Earth-embowelled in deep mines,
Which are not jewels, for no sparkle shines
Or has shone in them since the primal night,
Mountains of porphyry and malachite,
Opal and alabaster, and a hoard
Of turquoise, jade and cat's-eye cavern-stored.
Such is the wealth of Hades—and the mind,
Which yet is formless, valueless, till signed
And shapen by the sunlight into sight;
Just so within a marble block the might
Of fine prophetic fancy doth foreshow
The emprisoned form, which no one yet may know
Until the sculptor, taking tool in hand,
Sets free the statue from its stony band.
Now how from these two worlds, like friendly foes,
The yearly seasonable change arose
Of summer into winter, and why Earth
In Spring and Autumn signifies the birth
And death of all her children—or their sleep—
Was on this wise. For from Olympus' steep,
When parts their cloudy floor, the Gods can see
Laid out beneath them in fair spaces free
Mountain and valley and far meadowland,
Of sunny beauty, like a garden planned
In miniature: the forest foliage seems
Rich moss, no more, where, following the streams,
It dimples down each hillside; and the fields,
With many-coloured crops of various yields,
Lie like a robe which Ceres, passing by,
Had flung aside because the sun was high;
And then they trace the girdle of her land,
Broad ocean blue with silver-braided strand,
That flows about the world and makes it one,—
And listen for its song. And when the sun
Is near its watery edge, early or late,
And rude winds have forgot the day's debate,
They see a thousand incense-columns tall
Rise through the sultry air and range and fall
In wreaths of incense round Olympus' head;
And all are gladdened since the Gods are glad.
In those days girlish summer, rosy-crowned,
Circled her flowery sparkling wine-cup round
The whole bright year—nor was Demeter sad;
But now, with tears as well as laughter clad,
Whole months the mother of our corn and wine
Bewails her lost delight, fair Proserpine.
'Twas on a day when all the woods were green
And shady in the sun's meridian sheen—
A fitful light breeze swept the cool hillside,
And in the nearest valley dropt and died—
That rich Demeter from her gracious toil,
Whereby for man she fills the stubborn soil
With energy divine and fruitful grace,
Rested awhile. Upon her blooming face,
Prodigal of love in smiling motherhood,
And on her flaxen hair the arching wood
Threw grateful twilight, while with happy gaze
She viewed her work—rich fields of golden maize,
White wheat and waving oats, meads stocked with kine,
Olive and orange groves, and slopes of vine.
And at her side her gentle lovely child
Caught up the smile of earth and gazed and smiled
With rarer grace, more like the wreathen flowers
That, twined among her tresses, in sweet showers
Fell all about her as she moved her feet.
White robes she wore, blue-girdled, as to greet
Companionship of sunbeams and the sun,
Which round about her form did float and run,
As round a ripe peach on a southern wall;
Yet maidenly and slender, and in all
Her movements swift and modest, with the free
Magic of unexpected fire, was she,
Persephone, whom some call Proserpine.
Then, sudden gazing in the face benign
Of fond Demeter, as if some quick stroke
Of fancy so enforced it, thus she spoke:—
‘O mother dear, goddess of earthward care,
I know a meadow where the flowers are fair
With morning and the light upon their leaves;
Why linger 'mid the wine-vats and fat sheaves?
Come downward where the flowers are free of care.’
‘They know my voice, and hear me when I call,
And, as in some melodious madrigal,
Make answer down their choral lines of beauty,
Welcome on welcome waved in loyal duty:
Come hearken to that flowery madrigal.’
Then spake the mother of the fruitful earth:
‘O child, beloved and beautiful from birth,
I cannot leave these nurslings of my care:
The wells would choke, the plodding slow ploughshare
Would stumble in the furrow, the ripe seed
Forget with tiny outstretched arms to plead
For sunshine and enrichment of its dye,
And all that mortals seek and I supply
Fail in the general famine. But do thou,
If thou wilt, go, and, if thou wilt, go now,
Alone; for though I would not thou shouldst leave
The circle of my love, I will not grieve
Thy heart by prohibition. And the height
Commands the valley, and will grant me sight
Of all thy flowery gladness.’ So she went,
Persephone, and passed the woodland pent
And overhanging vines and orchard closes
And waving cornlands hedged about with roses,
Until a flowery mead received her feet
With soft close kiss and answering fragrance sweet.
These are the plains of Enna. Summer here
Holds her chief court, and dwells without a peer
In pensive beauty. Quiet is the land,
And sacred to her presence, unprofaned
By mortal tread; and whether days are clear
Or cloudy, on the limit doth appear
A moonlike light, where the far sea unseen
Fringes the sun-crowned sky with reflex sheen.
But now the sultry mead from midnoon blaze
Was curtained by a cloud, round which the rays
Rained in a silver shower: their circling made
A shining-columned temple of pure shade,
Wherein Persephone, in single grace,
Stood like a flowery genius of the place,
And sang:
And as she sang, about her feet the mead
Of gold and purple made a flowery brede;
The air, impassioned with a myriad hues,
O'er all her snow-white raiment did diffuse
Love-tinted splendours; to attain her head
A cloudy fragrance climbed, and thence was shed
Wave-like at every lightest motion; where
Clusters of hyacinth clung to her hair,
Over and past her like a flying veil
A rose shed all its petals on the gale,
And rustling with delight her footsteps fell
Upon the happy fields of asphodel.
But not alone Demeter on the height
Beheld that day's rejoicing; for delight
Had seized King Hades in his lonely home,
What time his vacant eyes, long used to roam
About the void with introvertive air,
Were dazzled to a keen and pointed stare
By that sweet revelation—summer-clad
Persephone. The magic vision had
One meaning only for him—love: the doubt,
The vague mist-phantoms of his mind went out
Utterly in that light: he waited not
An instant, e'en for casting of a lot,
But calling to his aid all earth and air,
Wind, fire, and thunder, from their cloudy lair,
Darkness and rain, and lurid red eclipse,
With signifying eyes and silent lips
He leapt into his chariot, black as night,
With nightblack horses harnessed, bade a sprite
Fling wide the doors of Hell, and sprang amain
To meet Persephone upon the plain.
Who, at that sight, fulfilled with sudden dread,
Swooned out of all sensation as one dead,
And earthward fell, while o'er her flowery crew
A grey cold shiver in wide circles flew,
As o'er the clouds of sunset, when the sun
Faints in eclipse before its course is run.
And in that moment with rapacious hand
He, Hades, swept her from the trembling land,
And for his paramour and consort bore
Her to the realms of gloom and silence sore.
Oft thus grey Winter in the waning year
With roaring winds and retinue of fear
Sweeps o'er the world; and ere its icy blast,
Black-ominous of death, be overpast,
Some child of sunlight, a blue smiling flower,
Lies lifeless where the lurid storm-clouds lower;
And, frozen earthwards, finds the days no more
That happy Summer in her sandals bore,
But lingers ice-bound in rude Winter's prison
Till life-redeeming Spring be rearisen.
So now Demeter's mother-heart with fear
Beat loudly high; for from her mountain sheer
She saw a dismal cloud close densely down
Upon Persephone; then rain did drown
All sight and sunlight, till a sudden crash
Rang, as of thunder, with a lurid flash;
Whereafter silence, till a friendless wind
Broke from the mountain-summits far behind,
And swept the plain, now desolate in dearth
Of flower or maid, or any mark of mirth.
In that day all the land seemed desolate.
Demeter rose; the smile that sat in state
Upon her face, like light upon the sun,
Had faded, and instead her eyes had won
A wondering far look of lonely grief,
Not without scorn, because e'en Zeus, the chief
Of Gods, seemed blemished in authority
By this bereavement. For both earth and sky
Grew gloomier; and where the Goddess stood
Dead leaves hissed by her from the withered wood,
The shrivelled grass showed brown beneath her feet,
And died, the rainy air was mixed with sleet,
And from each tree sweet fruit fell with a thud,
While every blossom perished ere the bud.
So, like the moon, when on a rainy night
It hastens through the clouds with ragged light,
Revealing half an outline and no more,
She lit a torch and, of despair pressed sore,
By once flower-garlanded familiar ways
Hastened along the land; and for amaze
Knew nought of what this strange mishap might be,
But only that she sought Persephone.
Meanwhile the cloudy caverns of the Earth
Re-echoed to unwonted tones of mirth
Down all their hollow arches: gnome and sprite
Crept from their crannies to behold the light
Where, in his palace court, dusk heralds cried
The joy of Hades with his shining bride.
For all about her, like a dazzling mist,
The breath of summer closely clung, and kissed
Her tender limbs with tints that shot and crossed
From shadowy aisle to aisle, until they lost
Themselves among those labyrinthine ways.
And darkness first in summer's tempered rays
Discerned itself: the pale and formless shades
That glide unconscious through those vacant glades
Gazed on each other, and were made aware
Of unexpressed desires; the stagnant air
Felt for its limits through the vaulted gloom
And trembled like a spirit freed from doom;
The Furies and the Harpy-birds that haunt
The caves of Death, whom no foul sight can daunt,
Shrank when they mirrored in each other's mien
Their own distortion; the great deep unseen
Fell open inwards: and Hades himself,
With the same wonder as his meanest elf,
Beheld the hidden glories of his land
And gauged his empire. Whereupon he planned
To make Persephone his queen, and set
Her place beside him on a throne of jet
Before his palace portal, for the eye
And centre of his conscious sovereignty.
For like a court before that palace spreads
An open space, where evermore there treads
With silent tremor o'er the sightless fields
Hell's myriad populace: all that earth yields
Of man, or beast, or creature whatsoe'er,
All that hath been or will be, boded there
In bodiless dense movement, speeds its way
To find its own ends and the light of day.
And, all around, the visionary rocks
Break backward in deep lanes whose darkness mocks
The baffled eye, whence evermore appear
Fresh phantoms, undefined, or vague, or clear,
Who join the throng before their monarch's throne
And wait his will or wilful work their own.
And whosoe'er through Hades' palace-gate
Will gaze sees only night; for all its state
Turns outward, but within is absolute
Bewilderment of vacant space and mute.
And if there be, behind the formal front,
Chambers and halls, or but their semblance on't—
Something or nothing—no man knows aright,
Save that the cloudborn legions of the night
Throng thickest here, and in a livid stream
Pass outwards like the pageant of a dream.
So, when their bridal hour was overpast,
He, Hades, from that palace-portal vast
Led forth Persephone, and in throned state
Set her beside him for his sceptre's mate.
Her chair was carven of a block of jet
Twisted to tangled snakes; for back was set
The semblance of a monstrous bat, whose wings
Folded and fanned her like half-living things;
And his was shapen a Medusa's head,
Whereon himself durst ne'er look, but the dread
Visage stared terror on each trembling one
Who craved for mercy at that dismal throne.
Now when she saw this horror, in her fear
She fell force-emptied; for the wicked leer
Of stark Medusa slew her; and the doom
Of Death and Night was hers which of her bloom
Made melancholy ending. Then the love
That Hades bore her in the realms above
Broke his fierce moody nature; at her feet
He fell and sued forgiveness from the sweet
Closed eyes and parted lips, and cried aloud,
Snatched at his hair, beat breast, and lowly bowed
His head to dust. For all, his rugged hand
Held, like a seashell on some rocky strand,
Her hand yet lifeless. Then with solemn care
He placed her palms in one, and ranged her hair
Each way upon her forehead, whence there slipt
Full many a flower that once her fingers clipt
On Enna's fields—and from her garment's fold,—
All which he gathered, like unvalued gold,
And shed upon her lap. Which duly done,
He let his dusky fingers, one by one,
Dwell on her taintless brow, as if to trace
The pure immortal beauty of her face;
Whence, passing downwards o'er her slender form,
His huge arms circling clasped her heart, yet warm,
Close to his own, while with deep pleading eyes,
Eager in grief, he gazed on his lost prize.—
And as a child, to soundest slumber charmed,
Sleeps moveless till the mother-soul, alarmed
With vague presentiment of ill, stoops o'er
His tiny couch, watching the blue veins score
The fair white forehead, and the little lips
Breathing? or breathless? till at length she slips
A finger through his light curls, and so breaks
The spell, and chides her false fears as he wakes:
So she awoke from death—or from a trance—
As though called lifeward by love's quickening glance;
And saw those night-deep orbs, which in their fire
Outshone his diamond-claspt kingly tiar,
Grown starlike in their depths with steadfast love:
A sight which so her troubled mind did move,
That with new courage she renewed her might,
And filled the heart of Hades with delight;
Who on his secret palace-threshold swore
Allegiance to her beauty evermore.
And so the gates of night and death were glad
For many a day, and sober joyance had;
And in Persephone's pale smile the shades
Revived, as flowers do when the sunlight braids
Their rainfaint petals with its vigorous beams.
And Hades at her side poured all his dreams
Into her ear: strange lore he only knew
Of light and darkness, and the livid hue
Which is not either; of the death and birth
Of all created things; and how huge Earth,
With all its furniture, hath yet no frame
Of solid bulk, but is at most a name
For that which marks the margin of two lands—
The lands of sun and shadow,—how it stands
Subject to their alliance, yet of old
How fierce antagonism availed to hold
These realms apart—his from his brother Zeus'.
And then he spake of love, and how its use
'Twixt him and her, once being gained and given
(She being daughter of the king of Heaven),
Might have rare answer in an order new
Of actual things; but chiefly did he sue
Without device of reason, with the skill
Of one who sees and hath no other will
Than what he sees. And she, Persephone,
Hearing her uncouth suitor urge his plea,
Forsook her fears, and, gazing on him long,
For the great love remembered not the wrong;
But suffered his insistance, and in time
Dwelt with him in his melancholy clime,
Not discontented, and was made the queen
Of all the underworld which is not seen.
Nevertheless, her child-heart inly yearned
After Demeter's lonely state, and turned
Backward upon the past days till she pined
And ever grew of more unquiet mind
And paler countenance; whereat at last
Hades took fear, foreboding she might cast
Aside allegiance and depart her way.
Therefore he brought her in a dish one day
Pomegranate seeds, that she might eat thereof
And know renewal and return of Love.
Now in this space Demeter, wandering o'er
The desert lands, and daily growing more
Wasted with grief and angered with the Gods,
Came to Olympus, where its grey head nods
Peace on the clustered fields about its feet.
Her cheeks were furrowed, and her hair with sleet
Was knotted, while her garments, loosely hung,
In draggled folds about her figure clung:
Whereat in heaven some flakes of laughter fell.
But she, beholding Zeus, said: ‘Is it well,
O Father of the Gods, that ye, who have
The earth in keeping, should create a grave?
For such the world is now. The King of death
Holds cavern-bound my child, and with her breath
All beauty is departed from the land;
Whereat, while tempests score and scorch and brand
The blackened world, ye in your high-built towers
Laugh at your ease, and lead the careless hours
In rounds of revel and dishonest mirth.
Give ear, O mighty Zeus, and, for this dearth
Dulls your high glory, grant Earth's fruit again,
Lest ye be nameless in the homes of men.’
Whose angry suit he heeded not at first,
But, later, when the wretched land was curst
With ruin of high rivers, rot, and blight,
For shame and pity of its mournful plight
He heard, and rendered answer to her prayer.
For Zeus had promised, in the days that were,
The child to Hades, by a secret pact
Hid from the mother, lest she should distract
His politic design thereby to bind
His brother subject by the tie of kind;
Which purpose now in part frustrated was;
For when the land fell desolate, because
This was a scandal and a crying shame
To all Olympus, and pretext of blame
To discontented mortals who forsook
Their punctual sacrifices and betook
Themselves to other gods, he broke his word,
And on quick Hermes his commands conferred.
So while, enduring still her rayless doom
Amid the mute assemblies of the gloom,
Persephone was made night's consort, there
Fell sudden on the cavern-vaulted air
A chill of fear, one moment, then the next,
As when a veil of strongly woven text
Is torn asunder, with a sequent roar
Of myriad sharp severance Night shore
Her pitchy roof, and in a ragged crack
Burst open to the light, whose shimmering track
Shot o'er a gloom of faces far and wide.
And in the sunbeams' centre there did ride
Heaven's winged messenger, who seemed to bear
Magic of colour to the sunless air;
For wheresoe'er he looked there leapt a hue,
Crimson and gold, and emerald and blue;
And hell itself was glorious; but he
Stretched hand to hand and held Persephone,
And ere astounded Hades could deny
Swept with her to the land below the sky.
And with her came the children of the Earth:
All faded shapes of beauty had new birth;
Sweet winds before her went, about her flew
Spring's flowers and, where they fell, took root and grew;
And with a clap the earth closed, and King Night
Was left a prisoner in lonely plight.
'Twas on the plain Eleusis where they met,
Mother and child; and all tearful regret
Was wiped away between them, as they sang
And held each other, and the high world rang
With happy notes; for far and wide was heard
The song of nearing Spring: each wondering bird
Whistled, and gazed up sunward, and would cease,
And still essayed to sing his heart's increase.
Through sunlit field and orchard, like clear fire,
Gay blossoms brake upon each spray and spire,
And tipped the wizened boughs, which shone like lamps
Sacred to Summer when dark Winter's damps
Are stricken by the sungod's burning bow.
In emerald and white and ruby glow
They heralded abroad high festival,
And filled the land with incense; at their call
The furrows stood arrayed in ranks of green,
The fields grew bright with poppy, flax, and bean,
Hedgerows and trees with wild and trailing vine
Were gaily garlanded, and for a sign
The lizard sat upon a sunny stone
And watched the hours fall earthward one by one.
So the Earth-mother lost and found again
Her lovely child; and all the former pain
Came back pure joy. The ways of mortals too
Were blessed because of her: a gracious dew
Fell in rich nights of increase and of calm,
Long mellow days loaded the crops with balm
And healed the wounds of Winter, and the fruit
Broke earthward from each overladen shoot
With noisy promise. Thus the summer passed.
At last came Autumn, and with high hand cast
Earth's harvest o'er its floor. Whereafter, change;
For, having in the cavern-kingdoms strange
Eaten the seeds of life, Persephone,
Obedient to love's unexpressed decree,
Each year went earthward to renew her might
And bless returning summer with the sight
Of Night's conception. So while winds blew chill,
She dwelt with Hades and the land was still.

ELFLAND:

A FAIRY INTERMEZZO.

• Peter . . . . . . A mortal.
• Queen Mab. . .A fairy
• Puck . . . .A fairy
• Candy . . . .A fairy
• Zephyr . . . .A fairy
• Thistledown . . .A fairy
• Echo . . . . . .A maiden.

Scene I.

A woodland dell.
Enter Peter meditatively.
Peter
A stoup of wine is good for many things:
It ravishes the heart of ruined kings
From dumb despair, redeems the yokel wretch
From dreams of scarlet bean and purple vetch,
Frees each man from his own fore-destined star,
Excites to love—and sleep, if love be far.
What matters love? To wile a tedious day
'Tis well devised, but if a man should say
'Tis more than that, why he and I must part.
They rave who rage of death and broken heart;
To no inclemencies doth Love incline,
And if he did—Heigh ho! a stoup of wine!...
How dizzily in dots the sunlight dances!
It fills the mazy brain with sleepy fancies.
And Philomel is not herself: her song
Is routed by its own rebellious throng.
Heavens! what a clamour. Peace! the bird is mad;
Such rupture of one's reasoning's too bad.
But here's a space, a bank not over steep,
I'll rest a moment, muse, it may be, sleep. (Reclines and presently sleeps.)
(Bugle within, and sound of the evening breeze. Down a blue forest glade, and swiftly borne in mid-air like a many-coloured cloud, comes a train of woodland elves. Queen Mab alights in the centre of the mossy hollow.)


Q. Mab.
In this moss-bespangled place
Let us rest a moment's space.

All.
Let us rest!

Mab.
For the sun, descending slow,
Now in calm and crimson glow
Brightens o'er the boundless west;
And closing eyes of weary devils
Wakes us unto moonlight revels.

All.
Moonlight revels, revels!

Echo.
Revels!

Mab.
But ere we begin the sport
Must we call our elfin court;
For the world would finely go
Did we e'er forget to deal
Fairy justice on the slow
Sense of mortals, and by playing
Pranks upon them make them feel
That the world is past their weighing:
That the meadow's not all mowing,
Nor the harvest as the hoeing;
That the sheep is more than shearing,
And the salmon than the spearing;
That the beast's not made for basting,
Nor the tongue for nought but tasting;
That the hive's not only honey,
Nor the only magic money;
That man's trade means not mistrusting;
That fair love lies not in lusting;
And, though grievous 'tis agreeing,
Sometimes truth transcendeth seeing;
That there's something in the air
Subtler than they e'er suspect,
Which, e'en where they were aware,
Were too dainty to detect.
Business first, then, and thereafter
Jolly leisure and loud laughter.

All.
And loud laughter, laughter!

Echo.
After!

Mab.
Hail, then! from your airy nooks
Underneath this leafy dome,
Elfin fairies, lightly come.
Leave your laughter-loving looks
For a moment, and endue
Graver bearing, as it brooks
Loyal-earnest fays to do.
Come! from overhead and under-
Foot, come swiftly footing it:
From the caverns of the thunder,
And the lean ant-lion's pit:
Come from where ye lazily
With grotesque grimacery
Swing in angles of the beech-boughs,
Or, like rare and dainty lord
Lady-friended on the sward,
Each politely unto each bows.
Come from every chink and cranny
Of grey bark and mossy cover,
Where ye teaze the long uncanny
Centipedes, and o'er them hover,
Filling them with dreadful anguish,
And foreboding of a beak!
Or from where ye lie and languish
Love beneath a leafy tent
Of white cyclamen, and seek
To commingle in mute glances
Fairy founts of wonderment.
Or with little limber lances,
Each the bristle of a boar,
And shrill horns of trumpet-moss,
Through the ancient woodlands hoar
Hunt the terrible and cross-
Grained stag-beetle till he roar
‘Mercy,’ for his antlers bright
Trophies are of valiant fight.
Come, then, over fern and bracken,
With swift pace: slow not nor slacken:
Down the sunbeam's line of splendour
Let your airy figures slender
Quickly slide. Let gentle Zephyr
Bear you as the winged heifer
Bore Europa....

Zephyr
(hiding himself).
Never! never!

Mab.
Come, our court waits; half a minute,
Sees our subjects subject in it.

(Elves come trooping in from all sides, and form a fairy ring round their queen.)
Mab
(seating herself).
This toadstool shall the seat of justice be;
And, first, if any of our subjects see
Cause of complaint against another ....

Candy.
Hear, Lady Queen, my huge half-brother,
Master Puck,'s been plaguing me,
And in the most outrageous fashion.

Puck.
Ho! little Candy's in a passion.

Mab.
Now, Puck, what's this, unruly man?

Puck.
Let him unfold it; he began.

Candy.
O mischief! Hear me, Lady Queen.
It was two minutes since, I think,
That I was wandering on the green,
When there a pretty maiden-pink
I did espy,
And clambering up right joyfully,
Upon its flat and level disk,
As fairies wont, began to frisk
And frolic; for, as mortals say,
The white dots on that dainty sweet
Carpet are prints of elfin feet.
Then Master Puck, passing that way,
Espied me, and—for, as you know,
Just in the midst of every flower
Of maiden-pink, where'er it blow,
There is a dark and narrow bower
Too deep for any sprite to view ....

Puck.
At least for one so small as you!

Candy.
He, Master Puck—of whom I talk—
Espying, shook the slender stalk,
That, in my horror and great fear,
My knees to tremble did begin ....

A voice.
And in he slipped!

All.
He sliddered in!

Echo.
In!

(General laughter and merriment.)
Mab.
Silence, I pray. Proceed, small elf.

Candy.
There's not much further to relate.
The pretty flower beneath my weight
Bent, and I boded in despair
That on my head I must be hurled;
But, sticking fast, in sheer mid-air,
Quite upside-down I saw the world.

All.
O ecstatic fancy!

Echo.
Fancy!

Mab.
Peace, profitless imps. This tale of his
Requires some proof. Call witnesses. (Witness appears.)

What is your name?—We know it well,
But for our courtly forms' sake tell
It us once more.

Thistledown.
'Tis Thistledown.

Mab.
What saw you, Master Thistledown?

This.
Now by the silver moon I swear,
That soon shall cleave the midnight air,
I saw a quaint and quirky scene.
As I was gliding o'er the green,
Driving in front a filmy sphere
Of that white down whose name I bear,
Lo! right afront, a flush of red
Upon the moss, and overhead
A cry of one in anguish pent.
Uplooking, in astonishment
I saw the sky one vast pink curtain,
And in the midst of it a certain
Not wholly unfamiliar feature,
Scarlet, the boss of that huge shield—
Tête sanguine on a purpure field.
'Twas Candy, said I, I'm your creature,
Slave, servant, minister, and man;
So helped him down, and hither ran.

Mab.
Puck, to this story what say you?

Puck.
In substance, I confess, 'tis true.

Mab
(solemnly).
Roundfaced scoundrel, with the sly
Smile and dark familiar eye,
Though I know thou'rt not in earnest,
Since all things to fun thou turnest,
Yet I warn thee such rude play
Ill besuits a loyal fay;
Therefore, lest condign displeasure
Visit thee with loss of leisure,
Leave these wayward habits scrapish,
End these wanton antics apish.

Echo.
Pish!

Mab.
What more awaits our royal grant?
In all the worlds that fairies haunt,
Not only on high moor or fen,
But in the stuffy brains of men,
Has aught been done amiss this day?
Has any housewife hoped to stay
Chimney soot from tumbling in
By counsel ta'en of kith or kin?
Has any farmer heaped his pride
On princely beast that has not died?
Has speculator made a hit,
Sleek-crediting his own sole wit?
Has any villain gone his way
Rejoicing that the night was dark,
And not learned ere the early lark
How much apiece stout handcuffs weigh?
Has any thought he understood
The world, and could do what he would,
And not been so fashed ere the morn
He wished himself had ne'er been born?
If any such mishap there be
Let it be signified to me.
(Enter 1st Wish.)
Who is this pallid eager elf?

1 Wish.
My name, great lady, is Love of Pelf.
I come of that exhaustless race
That in men's brains doth breed apace
More million-fold than ocean's fishes—
The countless tribe of mortal wishes.

Mab.
I know you well; what is your plaint?

1 Wish.
Ah, sovereign queen, from this restraint
Release me; for now ten long years
I suffer hateful prisonment
Within a miser's skull, fast pent
From all my fellow hopes and fears
In lonely greed of gain. Day-long
I chafe: no other fancies throng
That dismal vacant tenement,
But what from sheer ennui I paint
Upon its white unfurnished walls;
And brief the respite that befalls
When sleep nods from my master's nape
The signal of my glad escape.

Mab.
We know your tribe: 'tis yours to sting
Man from his brutish indolence
By fancied pleasures of the sense.
You teeming airy sprites, that wing
Your way about his dwelling house,
By cunning quaint devices rouse
Him ever from his former self,
And forward on the fancied pelf
With eager blind desire he rushes,
And finds it clay within his clutches.
So slowly learns the boorish clown,
By pointed sharp experience shown,
What is and is not; and may die
As wise, that is to say, well nigh,
As we are born. And each fond sprite
That's hatched as Wish in any wight
May never end his long career,
But like the bee that, flitting here
And there, makes trial of each flower,
Must flit from man to man till all
Have felt the magic of his power,
And yet have freed them from his thrall;
Then, having circled mortal toil,
He leaves the hated earthly coil
And enters into regions airy,
Becoming one of us—a fairy.
Say, elfin, has this miser then
Never yet come to wiser ken.

1 Wish.
He scrapes, scrapes, as the sinner sinned,
Aimlessly, endlessly, without tire.
I showed him wealth of either Ind,
He opened wider mouthed desire.
I am his thrice ill-fated slave—
Since he is mine—and till the grave
Holds him there is no hope for me.

Mab.
This case is past recovery.
I'll give you quittance, go and find
New lodging in another mind.

1 Wish.
The wretch will die without my help,
Like motherless unweaned whelp.

Mab.
Nought can make such an one live, so
'Tis fair farewell to let him go. (Enter 2nd Wish.)

Here comes a brother of your race.

2 Wish.
True, but the kinship's hard to trace.
I am an essence light as air,
Impalpable, men call me Prayer:
I dwell among them when the morn
Falls on each waking face forlorn,
At even, when the breeze is heard
In lofty trees, their hearts are stirred
By me to high imaginings
Of beautiful and holy things,
Which hold them as men in a dream,
Who, walking, to themselves scarce seem
To touch the ground whereon they tread.
That spirit whereto mine is wed
Is of a peaceful lonely nun.
Her hands are helpful on the ways,
Her heart, worldweary, ever prays
To pass and be a little one,
A star not far from God's high throne.
Grant, gracious lady, this may be.

Mab.
Such power I have not, yet I see
The end is not far distant. Stay
And watch with her another day.
Thy work builds up the world and gives
Substance and strength to mortal lives.
Who comes there now? Another one?

3 Wish.
I crave for justice to be done.

Mab.
What is your story.

3 Wish.
I'll relate.
'Tis of a simple maid, sedate,
From homely duties of the farm
And household round of quiet charm
Rudely decoyed, and sad her fate.
For often when the days were warm
He came, her lover, and at eve,
When quiet sheep their slumbers leave
And once again begin to browse,
Would find her at the milking pail
Among her dun and dappled cows;
And there upon the fragrant gale
Would breathe forth honey-sweetened vows.
And she was coy, yet simple too,
And loved him with a love so true
She could not love him falsely. So
No sooner saw he this intent
Than he deserted her to go
In search of other merriment;
And she, poor wight, left broken-hearted,
From all her happy life is parted;
Yet true in her true heart remains,
And when I whisper through her pains,
Revenge! bids me behind her back.

All.
Ah! might we stretch him on the rack!

Mab.
She who is wronged forgives, but we
Who are not wronged cannot forgive:
Such faithlessness while fairies live
Un-fairy-punished shall not be.
Whither away the wretch went he?

3 Wish.
Not far from here I saw him pass,
And fall asleep amid the grass.

All.
Asleep amid the grass!

Echo.
The ass!

Mab
(angrily).
What mocking Echo thus discerns
Sport in our solemn tones, and turns
Our every word to ridicule?
Have riddance of the brain-sick fool!
You, Puck, to gild your late disgrace,
Hie after her in earnest chase,
And bring her breathless to this place
To sit on penitential stool.

(Exit Puck, and re-enter after an interval, breathless, with a fair white nymph his prisoner.)
Mab.
Your punishment is quickly spoke (to Echo).
(To all.)

Within the hollow of an oak,
With age and winter gnarled and wizened,
This mocking maid shall be imprisoned.
Go, some of you, and with a chaunt
Disturb the white owl from his haunt;
Rake out the dead leaves of last year,
And line the den with lichens sere,
Then quickly put her in and close
The entrance with a wall of moss,
And braid it carefully across
With tough woodbine and briar rose.
There shall she stay befitting time,
Forgetful of her wanton chime.
(Exeunt Puck and others with reluctant Echo.
Now to behold this base-born wight,
Where is he? Hist! and bring a light.
A glowworm in a lucid bell
Of white bindweed will serve us well.
Hang it upon a hair, and swing
It as the priests the censer fling.
(They come upon a body in the grass.)
Lo!

All.
Oh, Oh!

Mab.
Hush! lest he hear. He moves. Away!

All.
Away!

(They vanish on the nightwind down a beechen alley. Peter sits up, rubs his eyes, and presently falls asleep again.)

Scene II.

The same. Midnight.
(The rising moon is seen through the trees.)
Queen Mab,
followed by the other Fairies, one after one, alights out of the night.
Hist! fairies all, the silver queen
Of our devotion now is seen
With tender glances on the green
Of maiden majesty.
Befits us then in choral ring
All wayward thoughts away to fling,
And loudly musically sing
Our heartfelt fealty.

Chorus.

Chorus.

Echo.
No!

(General laughter.)
Mab.
Once more this vagrant Echo mocks
Our voice, and shakes her laughter-locks
Contemptuous of the prison door;
Haste, Puck, and hale her here once more.

(Exit Puck. After an interval re-enters with Echo.)
Puck.
I found her mossy prison thrown
Upon the sward, and Echo flown.
Thrice loudly on her did I call,
And heard her by a ruined wall
Make faint reply; but when I came,
Our Lady Moon, in argent flame,
Passed by that way with all her suite;
I saw the fanciful white feet
Of all the maids that hold her train,
And lost my nymph. Like jewelled rain
A cloud of fireflies onward swept:
Upon the back of one I leapt
And bent its dance towards a dell
Among the woods which I know well;—
There in a huge and hollow stone
She oft will dwell whole days alone;—
And hardly had I found a place
Wherein to hide a moment's space,
When in, without doubt or demur,
She stept, and was my prisoner.

Mab.
My elves, what punishment condign
Shall we inflict?—a fairy fine
Of all her changeling properties,
Her mask and tricksy mimicries,
Her sandals swift and magic hood
Invisible? Think ye this would
Be too severe upon the sprite?

Puck.
Forget we not that other wight—
That mortal who of love makes sport,
And waits the sentence of our court.

Mab.
'Tis well. The maiden shall not lose
Her properties, provide she use
Them in our service for the just
Chastisement of that faithless dust.
He, jilting a true mortal maid,
Shall love a fickle mocking shade;
And jeering at heart-broken bliss
Shall break the little heart that's his.
(They move to the side of the sleeping man.)
Here, where he slumbers in the grass,
Beside his feet let stand the lass.
See how the dew has drenched his hair:
Doubtless his dreams are strange and rare.
See, on his forehead stand bright beads:
Doubtless the moon a fever breeds
Among his limbs. Soon will he wake:
Over his eyes love-cobwebs shake.
Stand all around, light elfin crew,
With censer lamps in order due,
And after me this song ensue,
Love-mystery to make.

Mab and Chorus.

Mab.
Haste now, the wight begins to wake;
Already doth the dim dawn break,
With fitful breathings of the breeze;
A glimmer strikes about the trees,
The beechen boles grow large and white;
Haste, while the morning yet is night;
Our work, all we can do, is done;
Haste, ere the rising of the sun;
Haste, ere the morning is full day;
Haste, fairies all, away, away!

(They vanish.)
Peter
(sitting up and stretching himself.)
O ay! 'tis cold. I dreamt.
(Sees Echo.)
But Gods above!
What's this? No dream: the dreamlass of my love! (To Echo.)

Look not so cold; see, I am wholly thine.
Look not so cold; I am not drunk with wine,
But love, true love. O how thou art so fair
As never mortal maid! The silver moon
Amid my dreams put off her starry shoon
To dwell amid thy hair, an aureole
Of unimagined brightness—like a bowl
Of sparkling wine when summer dries the soul.
O maiden, now the moonlight pales away
Thou art alone in beauty. Grant me, say,
Say thou wilt grant me but the single bliss
Of one complete explorative close kiss.
Yet 'twould not be enough, divinest elf,
But thou must render me thy whole sweet self.
(Echo moves backward.
Nay! be not angry. Let me touch thy hand —
How fickle is the light about the land.
She seems to fade. This doubtful morning haze
And glimmering white dawn begins to daze
My proper sight.
But I will follow thee,
And in my love-devotion shalt thou see
My joy to brave all danger. Dearest one,
Let us halt here a space. How now? she's gone.
And now? why now? But reason this outreaches:
A crowd of maids!—or are they only beeches?
No, here thou art: all danger is surpast.
My love, my lily-fair, ah, now at last
What longing arms I fling around thy neck —
(Embraces a beechen stem.)
Oh!

Echo
(out of the distance).
Echo.

EARTH'S VOICES.