Sir Lancelot A Legend of The Middle Ages. By Frederick William Faber: Second edition |
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| I. | BOOK I.
THE ASH-TREE HERMITAGE. |
| II. |
| III. |
| IV. |
| V. |
| VI. |
| VII. |
| VIII. |
| IX. |
| X. |
 | Sir Lancelot |  |
1
BOOK I. THE ASH-TREE HERMITAGE.
3
There is a sound in England, from the shores
Unto the midland vales, from London streets
To the deep chase where yet a Saxon thane
In his rude homestead lingers, keeping court
Among his rustic serfs. The realm is stirred,
For the Crusaders have returned. No hour
Of day or night but at the various ports,
The island round, some straggling bark arrives.
The very hostelries are surfeited
With guests, and armèd men in wassail drowned,
And prattling squires, not seldom with a gift
Of no mean minstrelsy and racy verse;
Who sang adventures, thousandfold, by sea
Endured, or with a blither interest
Encountered often in the chance delays
At foreign harbours,—narratives that might
Outdo the Cycle of Returns from Troy
For various intermingling of fierce war,
And love as fierce, and passionate rivalries,
And manly warriors sickening for their homes,
And of that sickness miserably cured
When home was gained, and monasteries filled
With penitents and world-worn sinners, men
Whose hearts were aged with pleasure, and, mid these,
A gentler sort, whose souls uncommon grief
Had disenthralled from earth and love of life.
Unto the midland vales, from London streets
To the deep chase where yet a Saxon thane
In his rude homestead lingers, keeping court
Among his rustic serfs. The realm is stirred,
For the Crusaders have returned. No hour
Of day or night but at the various ports,
The island round, some straggling bark arrives.
The very hostelries are surfeited
With guests, and armèd men in wassail drowned,
And prattling squires, not seldom with a gift
Of no mean minstrelsy and racy verse;
Who sang adventures, thousandfold, by sea
Endured, or with a blither interest
Encountered often in the chance delays
At foreign harbours,—narratives that might
Outdo the Cycle of Returns from Troy
For various intermingling of fierce war,
And love as fierce, and passionate rivalries,
And manly warriors sickening for their homes,
And of that sickness miserably cured
When home was gained, and monasteries filled
With penitents and world-worn sinners, men
Whose hearts were aged with pleasure, and, mid these,
A gentler sort, whose souls uncommon grief
Had disenthralled from earth and love of life.
4
O could we waken in the woods or hills,
By city gate, or bare refectory,
Or green baronial tower, the voices old
Of ballad-singers, errant, or retained
Familiars of the banquet, not the cloud
Of beautiful, pathetic song that hangs
Upon Mycenæ's cheerless mountain-slope,
Or lone Itaki's sweetly foliaged cliffs
Which the cool sea-breeze fans incessantly,—
Not this could equal for true touching strain,
Breathed from the sanctuaries of private life,
That drama of a thousand ballads, once
Floating o'er England and rehearsing there
The feats and perils of the homeward-bound
Crusaders, daily listened to with tears,
And deeply lodged within the popular heart.
By city gate, or bare refectory,
Or green baronial tower, the voices old
Of ballad-singers, errant, or retained
Familiars of the banquet, not the cloud
Of beautiful, pathetic song that hangs
Upon Mycenæ's cheerless mountain-slope,
Or lone Itaki's sweetly foliaged cliffs
Which the cool sea-breeze fans incessantly,—
Not this could equal for true touching strain,
Breathed from the sanctuaries of private life,
That drama of a thousand ballads, once
Floating o'er England and rehearsing there
The feats and perils of the homeward-bound
Crusaders, daily listened to with tears,
And deeply lodged within the popular heart.
Behold! on hill and dale the autumnal sun,
Both when he rises up and when he sets,
Sheds a wan lustre o'er some cavalcade,
Threading the watery dells, or upland slopes
Ascending, through the labyrinthine woods
Gleaming with slow advance, or straggling now
On the green level of the chalky downs.
Some knight mayhap returns unto his tower,
Some baron to his castle, or a monk,
Wayworn and yet reluctant, seeks once more
His woodland abbey,—an uneasy man,
Who in the dangerous cheer of pilgrimage
Had satisfied an ardent temper, chafed
With ritual and those even sanctities
Of cloistral occupation. Often too
From out the litters, shivering in the breeze,
Some eastern beauty, dark-eyed foreigner,
Looked forth and chided in an uncouth tongue
The warrior who reined in his steed close by;
While hourly from the hall his anxious wife,
To whom the last few hours of widowhood
Less tolerable seemed than years had been
Before, watched for the spearmen on the hill,
And little dreamed how terrible would be
The disenchantment of their meeting.
Both when he rises up and when he sets,
Sheds a wan lustre o'er some cavalcade,
Threading the watery dells, or upland slopes
Ascending, through the labyrinthine woods
Gleaming with slow advance, or straggling now
On the green level of the chalky downs.
Some knight mayhap returns unto his tower,
Some baron to his castle, or a monk,
Wayworn and yet reluctant, seeks once more
His woodland abbey,—an uneasy man,
Who in the dangerous cheer of pilgrimage
Had satisfied an ardent temper, chafed
With ritual and those even sanctities
Of cloistral occupation. Often too
From out the litters, shivering in the breeze,
Some eastern beauty, dark-eyed foreigner,
Looked forth and chided in an uncouth tongue
5
While hourly from the hall his anxious wife,
To whom the last few hours of widowhood
Less tolerable seemed than years had been
Before, watched for the spearmen on the hill,
And little dreamed how terrible would be
The disenchantment of their meeting.
Yet
Not wanting in the breadth of this fair land
Approved fidelity, and vows renewed
In tenderest einbrace, surprises sweet
At the tall striplings, the domestic knights
Of their lone mother, whom the sire had left
Wanting and not conferring aid, and girls
Confused before the keen admiring gaze
Of the fond knight, unused to read therein
The affectionate rights of his paternal eye.
And not forgotten is the chaplain grey—
But that his voice was somewhat more unclear
Least altered of the household, save the hound,
The lazy sleuth-hound couched upon the hearth
By the warm faggots, yet unrecognized,
A second generation since the knight
Had sailed for Palestine. And, now and then,
With gay pretence of needless ministries,
Old servants in their love, the young no less
Through curiosity, intruded there
To see their master, and with bustling cheer
Pressed their obtrusive hospitality
Upon their new-come fellows. O there were
Evenings in England then of such a bliss
As might for unreproved intensity
Of native feeling elsewhere have no mates,—
Evenings whose innocent obscurity
Outweighed whole years of trial, there compressed
Into impassioned hours of transport.
Not wanting in the breadth of this fair land
Approved fidelity, and vows renewed
In tenderest einbrace, surprises sweet
At the tall striplings, the domestic knights
Of their lone mother, whom the sire had left
Wanting and not conferring aid, and girls
Confused before the keen admiring gaze
Of the fond knight, unused to read therein
The affectionate rights of his paternal eye.
And not forgotten is the chaplain grey—
But that his voice was somewhat more unclear
Least altered of the household, save the hound,
The lazy sleuth-hound couched upon the hearth
By the warm faggots, yet unrecognized,
A second generation since the knight
Had sailed for Palestine. And, now and then,
With gay pretence of needless ministries,
Old servants in their love, the young no less
Through curiosity, intruded there
To see their master, and with bustling cheer
Pressed their obtrusive hospitality
Upon their new-come fellows. O there were
Evenings in England then of such a bliss
As might for unreproved intensity
Of native feeling elsewhere have no mates,—
Evenings whose innocent obscurity
6
Into impassioned hours of transport.
Thus
Through the fair counties of the busy land,
All thoughts were drawn and gathered into one,—
The travel-worn Crusaders had returned,—
Unwelcome, shall I say, or welcome? Ne'er
Did motives blend with such strong interchange
As then, such mingling of an affable joy
With fears unspoken, and affrighted thought
Lest for the past there should a reckoning come.
And sometimes loud repining, unashamed,
In graceless speech broke forth. Elsewhere perchance
Might feeling fluctuate in some unpoised,
And natural piety not seldom hang
Too nicely on the balance. In that day
Might Angels' eye have seen in human hearts
How passion intersected passion; and truth
Being with untruth at war, how each was then
Involved with each, while falsehood truth might seem,
Truth falsehood, mutually confused. Perchance
Long centuries of feud might roll away
Before the national manners should run clear
Of this unholy trouble at men's hearths,
Disturbance of the genial charities
And moral instincts of our social life,
Recovering, if recovered it might be,
The dignity of simple-hearted ways.
Through the fair counties of the busy land,
All thoughts were drawn and gathered into one,—
The travel-worn Crusaders had returned,—
Unwelcome, shall I say, or welcome? Ne'er
Did motives blend with such strong interchange
As then, such mingling of an affable joy
With fears unspoken, and affrighted thought
Lest for the past there should a reckoning come.
And sometimes loud repining, unashamed,
In graceless speech broke forth. Elsewhere perchance
Might feeling fluctuate in some unpoised,
And natural piety not seldom hang
Too nicely on the balance. In that day
Might Angels' eye have seen in human hearts
How passion intersected passion; and truth
Being with untruth at war, how each was then
Involved with each, while falsehood truth might seem,
Truth falsehood, mutually confused. Perchance
Long centuries of feud might roll away
Before the national manners should run clear
Of this unholy trouble at men's hearths,
Disturbance of the genial charities
And moral instincts of our social life,
Recovering, if recovered it might be,
The dignity of simple-hearted ways.
Why cometh not Sir Lancelot De Wace?
His hall stands empty where the silver Kent
Turns seaward, sweetly murmuring as he pours
Prone o'er the pebbly bed his frugal stream.
The woodlands echo not the horn; the sea
Hard by shines idly in the summer sun,
Or, when the tide is out, the fearless gulls
Pace leisurely upon the glossy sands.
The heron by the brook scarce lifts his head
To scan the passenger: upon the hearths
No hospitable faggots burn, or lights
From the long front of windows nightly glance
Through the low woods, like rising stars that mount
Above the horizon; and the village poor,
That sought the hall for their accustomed dole,
Straggling among the beech-trees gleam no more
With their red hoods in winter's wan sunshine.
His hall stands empty where the silver Kent
Turns seaward, sweetly murmuring as he pours
Prone o'er the pebbly bed his frugal stream.
The woodlands echo not the horn; the sea
7
Or, when the tide is out, the fearless gulls
Pace leisurely upon the glossy sands.
The heron by the brook scarce lifts his head
To scan the passenger: upon the hearths
No hospitable faggots burn, or lights
From the long front of windows nightly glance
Through the low woods, like rising stars that mount
Above the horizon; and the village poor,
That sought the hall for their accustomed dole,
Straggling among the beech-trees gleam no more
With their red hoods in winter's wan sunshine.
Why cometh not Sir Lancelot De Wace?
Why cometh not that Knight? Full many a heart
Among his vassal poor and menials grey
With querulous expectation waits their lord.
For the third Henry hath been crowned, and still
Sir Lancelot De Wace is in the East.
Why tarries that brave man so long from home?
Why cometh not that Knight? Full many a heart
Among his vassal poor and menials grey
With querulous expectation waits their lord.
For the third Henry hath been crowned, and still
Sir Lancelot De Wace is in the East.
Why tarries that brave man so long from home?
Now through the tenantry dismayed there goes
A rumour that the good Sir Lancelot
By Antioch in a lonely grove hath slain,
And that not in the fair and equal lists,
His youthful rival, who had wooed and won
In fair betrothal that false-hearted maid,
Ethilda, daughter of the old Sir Guy
Of Heversham. It was a woful day
When those ill tidings spread across the land,
All up the wooded valley of the Kent,
From the fair estuary with its cliffs
Of natural causeway to the shallow mere
Within the pastoral solitudes embraced,—
With yellow flag-flowers and red willow-herb
And dimpling globes of nuphar netted o'er,
So that the splashing of the frighted coot,
Or awkward-rising heron alone betrays
The water underneath. There was one heart
Throughout the length of his ancestral lands,
A heart doubt-laden and yet sorrowful.
That Athelstan in lawful duel slain
Might be, they doubted not, nor blamed the deed;
Only that aught unchivalrous was done
By a De Wace's hand might not be thought.
Sir Lancelot a murderer! Nay, the old,
So credulous of ill, forthwith repelled
The foul surmise. The headstrong faith of youth
Would have done battle gladly for their lord
In vindication of his honor. Ah!
Both were by harsh and cruel proof convinced
Of the dark tidings, when a retinue
Of armèd men by royal warrant took
In the king's name possession of the hall
And the wide fief of Lancelot De Wace.
A rumour that the good Sir Lancelot
By Antioch in a lonely grove hath slain,
And that not in the fair and equal lists,
His youthful rival, who had wooed and won
In fair betrothal that false-hearted maid,
Ethilda, daughter of the old Sir Guy
Of Heversham. It was a woful day
When those ill tidings spread across the land,
All up the wooded valley of the Kent,
From the fair estuary with its cliffs
Of natural causeway to the shallow mere
Within the pastoral solitudes embraced,—
With yellow flag-flowers and red willow-herb
And dimpling globes of nuphar netted o'er,
8
Or awkward-rising heron alone betrays
The water underneath. There was one heart
Throughout the length of his ancestral lands,
A heart doubt-laden and yet sorrowful.
That Athelstan in lawful duel slain
Might be, they doubted not, nor blamed the deed;
Only that aught unchivalrous was done
By a De Wace's hand might not be thought.
Sir Lancelot a murderer! Nay, the old,
So credulous of ill, forthwith repelled
The foul surmise. The headstrong faith of youth
Would have done battle gladly for their lord
In vindication of his honor. Ah!
Both were by harsh and cruel proof convinced
Of the dark tidings, when a retinue
Of armèd men by royal warrant took
In the king's name possession of the hall
And the wide fief of Lancelot De Wace.
Yet no one of injustice dreamed; no tongue
Among the poor had ever word of ill
To say of Hubert, the good minister,—
Hubert de Burgh, who in disastrous times
And the loose government of Henry's youth,
The prey of worthless favorites, then controlled
The rude, rough-handed baronage, by skill
Of temperate policy, no less than arms,
And a rare abstinence in victory.
A man he was who in the general good
Discerned still clearly, and with pious care
Preserved inviolate, the silent rights
Of individual happiness. Through him
The weight wherewith an absent lord lies hard,—
And specially that absent lord a king,—
Upon his vassals, mitigation found
In the green vale of Kent. Still it was hard
For that ancestral peasantry to pay
Unto a lord, to them unknown no less
Than they, their sires, or local wants to him,
The tribute of a base, reluctant toil
In lieu of what they had been wont to bear,—
The burden of affectionate service, paid
With manly will, with manly thanks received,
A mutual obligation more than right,
By nine Sir Lancelots from sire to son.
Among the poor had ever word of ill
To say of Hubert, the good minister,—
Hubert de Burgh, who in disastrous times
And the loose government of Henry's youth,
The prey of worthless favorites, then controlled
The rude, rough-handed baronage, by skill
Of temperate policy, no less than arms,
And a rare abstinence in victory.
A man he was who in the general good
Discerned still clearly, and with pious care
Preserved inviolate, the silent rights
Of individual happiness. Through him
The weight wherewith an absent lord lies hard,—
And specially that absent lord a king,—
9
In the green vale of Kent. Still it was hard
For that ancestral peasantry to pay
Unto a lord, to them unknown no less
Than they, their sires, or local wants to him,
The tribute of a base, reluctant toil
In lieu of what they had been wont to bear,—
The burden of affectionate service, paid
With manly will, with manly thanks received,
A mutual obligation more than right,
By nine Sir Lancelots from sire to son.
O'er the long glen of Sleddale evening hung
With clouds of dreary grey; the heights were lost
In the dull canopy, whose stooping folds
Cast o'er the rock-strewn valley, uniform,
A cold and purple shadow, while the sun
To his invisible setting hasted down
Without one thread of crimson to disclose
How far the day was spent. With downcast eye,
And scarcely noticing the gloomy scene,
A wanderer, with a wayworn gait and air
Of deep abstraction, climbed the mountain-side
To Kentmere: it was Lancelot de Wace,
Who sought, an Excommunicated Man,
Among his native solitudes some lone
And joyless hermitage, where he might bear
Through what should yet remain to him of life,
The weight of that dread censure, and the load,
As burdensome, of drear, foreboding thought.
With clouds of dreary grey; the heights were lost
In the dull canopy, whose stooping folds
Cast o'er the rock-strewn valley, uniform,
A cold and purple shadow, while the sun
To his invisible setting hasted down
Without one thread of crimson to disclose
How far the day was spent. With downcast eye,
And scarcely noticing the gloomy scene,
A wanderer, with a wayworn gait and air
Of deep abstraction, climbed the mountain-side
To Kentmere: it was Lancelot de Wace,
Who sought, an Excommunicated Man,
Among his native solitudes some lone
And joyless hermitage, where he might bear
Through what should yet remain to him of life,
The weight of that dread censure, and the load,
As burdensome, of drear, foreboding thought.
A humbled and heart-stricken man he was,
Who asked no mitigation of his lot,
Nor would have welcomed it, if it had come
Unsought; for, self-betrayed, before the throne
Of Henry he had claimed his punishment,
When he had been for seven whole years concealed
A hermit or a wanderer in the east,
In safety unendurable through sense
Of guilt and gnawing of unquietness.
For noble feats in Palestine achieved
From capital penalties he was released,
Only the forfeiture of his broad lands
Was then confirmed; and the unbending Church
With merciful severity had laid
Her censures on him; lest his soul, through sin
Too soon effaced, should perish in the end.
Who asked no mitigation of his lot,
Nor would have welcomed it, if it had come
Unsought; for, self-betrayed, before the throne
Of Henry he had claimed his punishment,
10
A hermit or a wanderer in the east,
In safety unendurable through sense
Of guilt and gnawing of unquietness.
For noble feats in Palestine achieved
From capital penalties he was released,
Only the forfeiture of his broad lands
Was then confirmed; and the unbending Church
With merciful severity had laid
Her censures on him; lest his soul, through sin
Too soon effaced, should perish in the end.
Now from the ridge Sir Lancelot's stony way
Dropped to the margin of the slimy mere,
Fringed verdantly with dark and speckled weeds
And water-plants profuse, whose shining leaves
With bloody spots of brown were all bedropped;
And tangled roots, like knotted snakes asleep,
Half under water lay, and half above:
And brittle stalks with veins of poisonous sap
Exuded strongest odors; while the nights
Of the beginning autumn inter-streaked
The fenny herbage with its golden lines
And pale, discolored red: the crisp white canes
Of reedy sedge with plaint unmusical
Grated against each other, as the wind
Rung with shrill breathing o'er the waving swamp.
The heron with discordant notice rose,
And flapping wings, upon the cloudy air;
Then, poised awhile, its plumaged rudder set
This way or that, unto Winander's isles,
Or woody pass below Glenridding Screes,
Or promontory, seaward looking, far
Towards Lune's or Leven's mouths. A single ring,
Not native, of old willow trees there stood
Round a deserted hut where dwelt erewhile
A falconer, who in Sir Lancelot's youth
Had hawked with him for many a happy hour
By this same lake.
Dropped to the margin of the slimy mere,
Fringed verdantly with dark and speckled weeds
And water-plants profuse, whose shining leaves
With bloody spots of brown were all bedropped;
And tangled roots, like knotted snakes asleep,
Half under water lay, and half above:
And brittle stalks with veins of poisonous sap
Exuded strongest odors; while the nights
Of the beginning autumn inter-streaked
The fenny herbage with its golden lines
And pale, discolored red: the crisp white canes
Of reedy sedge with plaint unmusical
Grated against each other, as the wind
Rung with shrill breathing o'er the waving swamp.
The heron with discordant notice rose,
And flapping wings, upon the cloudy air;
Then, poised awhile, its plumaged rudder set
This way or that, unto Winander's isles,
Or woody pass below Glenridding Screes,
Or promontory, seaward looking, far
Towards Lune's or Leven's mouths. A single ring,
Not native, of old willow trees there stood
11
A falconer, who in Sir Lancelot's youth
Had hawked with him for many a happy hour
By this same lake.
The weary knight looked up
Into the melancholy evening, spread
O'er scenes once known so well, once loved so much;
And for the first time with diverted thoughts
Felt that there was additional bitterness,
Even to a lot unbearable as his,
In the localities around. O days
Of our past boyhood, pregnant though ye were
With giddy humours and debasing joys,
What innocent appearance have ye, seen
Through the long gloom of penitential thought
In after years, by contrast falsified
With guilt unequal made by age alone!
Into the melancholy evening, spread
O'er scenes once known so well, once loved so much;
And for the first time with diverted thoughts
Felt that there was additional bitterness,
Even to a lot unbearable as his,
In the localities around. O days
Of our past boyhood, pregnant though ye were
With giddy humours and debasing joys,
What innocent appearance have ye, seen
Through the long gloom of penitential thought
In after years, by contrast falsified
With guilt unequal made by age alone!
O better far it were would memory
O'erleap the pleasant worldliness of youth
Which so entraps our thoughts, and rather muse
On the few wrecks by radiant childhood left
Upon the misty confines of our sense!
O purest Time, from out the recent Font
Still dewy, still with spiritual flowers
Of musky scent and snowy tint adorned,
How art thou to the hopeful, striving soul
A bath of strength and innocent delights,
With unfatigued recurrence visited!
While to the pleasure-loving soul thou seem'st
A tantalizing Eden, dimly seen
To be delectable, yet not unbarred,
But in mysterious thoughts absconded deep
From restless wish, the memory of wild acts,
Or sin-bleared eye. O there is gracious hope
Of true amendment in the heart that seeks
With sacred habit to revive the days
Of its lost childhood, from its fragrant flowers
To suck the honey of sad thought, or feed
The wells of tears with dew-drops lurking still
In earliest reminiscence unexhaled!
O'erleap the pleasant worldliness of youth
Which so entraps our thoughts, and rather muse
On the few wrecks by radiant childhood left
Upon the misty confines of our sense!
O purest Time, from out the recent Font
Still dewy, still with spiritual flowers
Of musky scent and snowy tint adorned,
How art thou to the hopeful, striving soul
A bath of strength and innocent delights,
With unfatigued recurrence visited!
While to the pleasure-loving soul thou seem'st
A tantalizing Eden, dimly seen
To be delectable, yet not unbarred,
But in mysterious thoughts absconded deep
From restless wish, the memory of wild acts,
Or sin-bleared eye. O there is gracious hope
12
With sacred habit to revive the days
Of its lost childhood, from its fragrant flowers
To suck the honey of sad thought, or feed
The wells of tears with dew-drops lurking still
In earliest reminiscence unexhaled!
Like silvery breakers on the lone sea-shore,
The hoary foliage of the willows rose
And fell in regular descents, and gleamed
With dusky light upon the moorland dim.
The hoary foliage of the willows rose
And fell in regular descents, and gleamed
With dusky light upon the moorland dim.
This then, so thought the weary fugitive,
This is my welcome to my native home,
The busy greeting of my vassals, this
That arch of proud triumphal thought through which
Hope and ambition entered once so oft
In visionary pomp!
This is my welcome to my native home,
The busy greeting of my vassals, this
That arch of proud triumphal thought through which
Hope and ambition entered once so oft
In visionary pomp!
This self-same day
And self-same month, when to the hallowed East,
With dreams untarnished yet, I journeyed first,
I stood with Sigismund, the noble Pole,
On our rude galley's deck. With silent speed
Along the Servian shore we glided down
The kingly Danube, where past Drenkova
It bursts the green Carpathians through, and flows
Betwixt impending cliffs and woods o'erarched
Through sylvan horrors beautiful. The stream
In eddies deep with glossy surface wheeled
In calm solemnity. The leafy tops
Of walnut woods, for centuries unfelled,
With clematis and lithe wild vine were bound
In their own thickets prisoners, while the crags
Were hung with bells of white convolvulus,
As though a bridal were to pass that way,
A region of festoons, enwreathed for leagues
One with another, while above the trees,
Half masked, the cliffs of rich and mottled red
In heavy brows or airy minarets
Sprung emulous to catch the setting sun.
Vale after vale with tributary stream
We passed, and through their dusky wooded gates
We caught sweet momentary views beyond.
And one most touching spectacle there was,
Still unforgotten; through an opening wide
In the rough rampart of Danubian rocks,
Far in the heart of Servia we beheld
A mountain, like a couchant lion shaped,
In softest purple clad, which for awhile
Against the saffron sky stood boldly forth,
But, as the furnace of the kindled west
Glowed more intensely, was absorbed apace,
Absorbed until incorporated wholly
With shooting gold, which, crimson grown at length,
Yielded once more from out its gorgeous womb
The outline of the hill, distinct and keen.
Oh in that hour what sunny thoughts were mine,
What happiness, what hope exuberant!
Ah! Sigismund, how enviable seems
Thy fate, although no warrior's grave was thine;
But by the sunbeams withered like a flower,
Salem unreached, thy warfare was fulfilled,
And in full armor, most ungentle shroud!
Where paynim watch-fires nightly gleam, thou sleep'st;
In the cold moonlight by these hands entombed
Beneath a myrtle and an arbutus,
By slow Orontes laved with stately lapse
Near old Seleucia.
And self-same month, when to the hallowed East,
With dreams untarnished yet, I journeyed first,
I stood with Sigismund, the noble Pole,
On our rude galley's deck. With silent speed
Along the Servian shore we glided down
The kingly Danube, where past Drenkova
It bursts the green Carpathians through, and flows
Betwixt impending cliffs and woods o'erarched
Through sylvan horrors beautiful. The stream
In eddies deep with glossy surface wheeled
In calm solemnity. The leafy tops
Of walnut woods, for centuries unfelled,
With clematis and lithe wild vine were bound
In their own thickets prisoners, while the crags
Were hung with bells of white convolvulus,
As though a bridal were to pass that way,
A region of festoons, enwreathed for leagues
13
Half masked, the cliffs of rich and mottled red
In heavy brows or airy minarets
Sprung emulous to catch the setting sun.
Vale after vale with tributary stream
We passed, and through their dusky wooded gates
We caught sweet momentary views beyond.
And one most touching spectacle there was,
Still unforgotten; through an opening wide
In the rough rampart of Danubian rocks,
Far in the heart of Servia we beheld
A mountain, like a couchant lion shaped,
In softest purple clad, which for awhile
Against the saffron sky stood boldly forth,
But, as the furnace of the kindled west
Glowed more intensely, was absorbed apace,
Absorbed until incorporated wholly
With shooting gold, which, crimson grown at length,
Yielded once more from out its gorgeous womb
The outline of the hill, distinct and keen.
Oh in that hour what sunny thoughts were mine,
What happiness, what hope exuberant!
Ah! Sigismund, how enviable seems
Thy fate, although no warrior's grave was thine;
But by the sunbeams withered like a flower,
Salem unreached, thy warfare was fulfilled,
And in full armor, most ungentle shroud!
Where paynim watch-fires nightly gleam, thou sleep'st;
In the cold moonlight by these hands entombed
Beneath a myrtle and an arbutus,
By slow Orontes laved with stately lapse
Near old Seleucia.
O most dreary change!
Most desolate! most dark! with hungry soul,
Hungry of bitterness and penal woe,
With honest acceptation do I bid
Thee welcome! you, harsh wailing Winds, and Moors,
And sobbing Mosses, and cold splashing Meres,
And bleakest Mountains, by the noisy flail
Of the rude tempest beaten, and white shares
Of foamy torrents ploughed,—you too I bid
Welcome sincere, nay, grateful I may say,
In hope the mercy of my God may work
My punishment through you;—through, you perchance,
Time, Solitude, long Fast, and Living rude,
And Silence drear, may in His love exact
Enough to satisfy His wrath: the rest,
A greater heap, beyond all measure great,
The Cross might pay, pay utterly, nor be
Impoverished; so unsearchable its wealth.
14
Hungry of bitterness and penal woe,
With honest acceptation do I bid
Thee welcome! you, harsh wailing Winds, and Moors,
And sobbing Mosses, and cold splashing Meres,
And bleakest Mountains, by the noisy flail
Of the rude tempest beaten, and white shares
Of foamy torrents ploughed,—you too I bid
Welcome sincere, nay, grateful I may say,
In hope the mercy of my God may work
My punishment through you;—through, you perchance,
Time, Solitude, long Fast, and Living rude,
And Silence drear, may in His love exact
Enough to satisfy His wrath: the rest,
A greater heap, beyond all measure great,
The Cross might pay, pay utterly, nor be
Impoverished; so unsearchable its wealth.
And from thy wealth, O Nature, gathering wealth,
Wherewith perchance despondency may be
Enriched to meekest hope; and venturous faith,
By fear chastised, ennobled into love,
I, a base sinner, shall not poorer be
Than her who whilome in Sarepta dwelt
A widow lone, and from thine outward forms
A symbol, guided, chose. In her two sticks,
To dress the unfailing sacrifice of meal
And oil, a real sacrifice of faith
No less than sustenance by God supplied,
She chanced upon the saving Cross to light
In type unlooked for; so mayhap can I,
By lore my spirit hath already learned
In distant Asia, find in natural forms
Suggestive virtue which through grace may be
In truth a poor auxiliary, yet still
An aiding supplement to one who lies
Beneath the ban of Holy Mother Church.
Wherewith perchance despondency may be
Enriched to meekest hope; and venturous faith,
By fear chastised, ennobled into love,
I, a base sinner, shall not poorer be
Than her who whilome in Sarepta dwelt
A widow lone, and from thine outward forms
A symbol, guided, chose. In her two sticks,
To dress the unfailing sacrifice of meal
And oil, a real sacrifice of faith
No less than sustenance by God supplied,
She chanced upon the saving Cross to light
In type unlooked for; so mayhap can I,
By lore my spirit hath already learned
In distant Asia, find in natural forms
Suggestive virtue which through grace may be
15
An aiding supplement to one who lies
Beneath the ban of Holy Mother Church.
Next into Troutbeck Vale, a savage scene
Of matted coppice then, Sir Lancelot climbed.
And lo! a welcome of white sunshine burst
All on a sudden through the parting clouds.
The mists cleared off from Kirkstone's rocky pass,
And radiance, mounting from the glorious west
In upward sloping beams, possessed the gorge
With burning brightness, till it overflowed
That ample pass into the lower vales.
In falls of golden light it came, and rose
Till the whole glen, with splendor flooded, seemed
Full of ethereal beauty from the roots
Of the wild mountains to their rugged heights.
Sir Lancelot, whose pace uneasy thoughts
Had lately quickened, now stood still and gazed,
Then journeyed forward, weeping as he went
In silence, inexpressibly relieved.
Of matted coppice then, Sir Lancelot climbed.
And lo! a welcome of white sunshine burst
All on a sudden through the parting clouds.
The mists cleared off from Kirkstone's rocky pass,
And radiance, mounting from the glorious west
In upward sloping beams, possessed the gorge
With burning brightness, till it overflowed
That ample pass into the lower vales.
In falls of golden light it came, and rose
Till the whole glen, with splendor flooded, seemed
Full of ethereal beauty from the roots
Of the wild mountains to their rugged heights.
Sir Lancelot, whose pace uneasy thoughts
Had lately quickened, now stood still and gazed,
Then journeyed forward, weeping as he went
In silence, inexpressibly relieved.
Within the Vale of Troutbeck towards the head
There is a single woody hill, enclosed
Within the mountains, yet apart and low.
Amid the underwood around, it seems
Like a huge animal recumbent there,
Not without grace; and sweetly apt it is
To catch all wandering sunbeams as they pass,
Or volatile lights in transit o'er the vale.
And oft the travellers of this day may see
The sunny hill within a flying shower
Of greenest hue in that romantic glen.
Upon the west there is a shaggy dell
Marked with a dusky vein of alders grey,
Beneath whose shade is heard a noisy brook
Racing amid the stones; and eastward hangs
A bell-shaped mountain which the wild winds ring
Full mournfully, and by a verdant trench
And stream that glimmers in a sunken fosse,
Divided from the isolated hill.
Both steep and smooth that grassy mountain is,
Green as the noted turf upon Scale How,
With junipers unspeckled, nor adorned
With a loose surface of unquiet fern
Which finds a wandering air upon the breast
Of earth when pensive tree-tops sleep aloft,
And with continual waving gives a light
To the still prospects. But upon the brow
Two regions of red heather are outspread
In formal shapes, like plots of garden ground,
Ending in lines so trim and straight no spade
More straightly could have delved them, through dislike
Of other soil, or the more rapid fall,
Of the descent, or some more latent cause.
That single hill it is, with hawthorn trees
In parklike order scattered on the lawn,
Which in the month of May, with muffled boughs
Depressed by snow-drifts of chaste flower, might well
Provoke the lambs to jealousy that flit
In aimless frolic on the turf below,
Like scudding foam across the dark green sea.
And at the junction of the forkèd streams
Where two wych-elms for ever dip their oars,
And rise with starry drippings to the air,
How wildly is the full moon's orbèd face
Amid the shaken circles multiplied,
And her attendant stars rebuffed from wave
To wave, as though there had been war in heaven.
There is a single woody hill, enclosed
Within the mountains, yet apart and low.
Amid the underwood around, it seems
Like a huge animal recumbent there,
Not without grace; and sweetly apt it is
To catch all wandering sunbeams as they pass,
Or volatile lights in transit o'er the vale.
And oft the travellers of this day may see
The sunny hill within a flying shower
Of greenest hue in that romantic glen.
Upon the west there is a shaggy dell
Marked with a dusky vein of alders grey,
Beneath whose shade is heard a noisy brook
16
A bell-shaped mountain which the wild winds ring
Full mournfully, and by a verdant trench
And stream that glimmers in a sunken fosse,
Divided from the isolated hill.
Both steep and smooth that grassy mountain is,
Green as the noted turf upon Scale How,
With junipers unspeckled, nor adorned
With a loose surface of unquiet fern
Which finds a wandering air upon the breast
Of earth when pensive tree-tops sleep aloft,
And with continual waving gives a light
To the still prospects. But upon the brow
Two regions of red heather are outspread
In formal shapes, like plots of garden ground,
Ending in lines so trim and straight no spade
More straightly could have delved them, through dislike
Of other soil, or the more rapid fall,
Of the descent, or some more latent cause.
That single hill it is, with hawthorn trees
In parklike order scattered on the lawn,
Which in the month of May, with muffled boughs
Depressed by snow-drifts of chaste flower, might well
Provoke the lambs to jealousy that flit
In aimless frolic on the turf below,
Like scudding foam across the dark green sea.
And at the junction of the forkèd streams
Where two wych-elms for ever dip their oars,
And rise with starry drippings to the air,
How wildly is the full moon's orbèd face
Amid the shaken circles multiplied,
And her attendant stars rebuffed from wave
To wave, as though there had been war in heaven.
17
The self-same hill it is, whereon the Knight
Now sought an ancient hermitage, for years
Vacant and ruinous, which in his youth
In some long rambles he had visited.
Beneath a grassy knoll, with coronal
Of ragged ash surmounted, was the cell
Between two leaning rocks, a desolate
And uncouth residence, yet weather-proof,
And from the running brook not far removed.
Now sought an ancient hermitage, for years
Vacant and ruinous, which in his youth
In some long rambles he had visited.
Beneath a grassy knoll, with coronal
Of ragged ash surmounted, was the cell
Between two leaning rocks, a desolate
And uncouth residence, yet weather-proof,
And from the running brook not far removed.
Not for ablution only at the dawn,
Or rite prelusive to more solemn prayer,
Or with ingenious craft full often used
At midnight to put back the approach of sleep,
Aiding the spirit to subdue the flesh,
Impatient of the vigil,—not alone
For all the baser ends of common life
Was the propinquity of that clear stream
A blessing: for a privilege it is
To be a dweller in a sounding vale
Of limpid waters from the mountainous rocks
Descending, sweetly chanting as they come
The praise of Baptism; so that when we walk
Abroad, in each translucent deep we see
The Font, and in the prattling shallows hear
The missionary waters going forth
From the pierced sides of those eternal heights
To fill the cleansing vessels of the Church.
Or rite prelusive to more solemn prayer,
Or with ingenious craft full often used
At midnight to put back the approach of sleep,
Aiding the spirit to subdue the flesh,
Impatient of the vigil,—not alone
For all the baser ends of common life
Was the propinquity of that clear stream
A blessing: for a privilege it is
To be a dweller in a sounding vale
Of limpid waters from the mountainous rocks
Descending, sweetly chanting as they come
The praise of Baptism; so that when we walk
Abroad, in each translucent deep we see
The Font, and in the prattling shallows hear
The missionary waters going forth
From the pierced sides of those eternal heights
To fill the cleansing vessels of the Church.
O blessèd Element! how dread would seem
The exulting rivers, and the buoyant plunge
Of stony cataracts, unto the sons
Of Sem, as witnessing the abiding power
Of the destructive waters, yea, how dread
The aspect of that fatal element,
Even through the rainbow thoughts the Oath Divine
Might haply furnish to their timorous hearts!
But, O what ready consolation leaps,
Like a reflected sunbeam, from the rills
Into the Christian heart, while yet the drops
Of our New Birth, not wholly dried within,
Stir with a sweet response of hidden joy.
So that when long upon a barren moor,
Or breadth of arid pinewood, we have roamed,
How cheerfully our weary footsteps make
A needless circuit to attain a pool
Discerned amid the heather or the stems,
That we may look therein, and weep or smile
As best befits the temper of the hour!
And to my well-pleased ear each mountain brook
With various plea, the chime of tumbling falls
Or murmuring lapse, seems audibly to claim
Kindred with Jordan, in whose typical wave
All waters from the Body Virginal
Of God's dear Son received the cleansing Gift,
The Mystical Ablution of our sins
Drawn from the contact of that Sacred Flesh.
The exulting rivers, and the buoyant plunge
Of stony cataracts, unto the sons
Of Sem, as witnessing the abiding power
Of the destructive waters, yea, how dread
The aspect of that fatal element,
Even through the rainbow thoughts the Oath Divine
18
But, O what ready consolation leaps,
Like a reflected sunbeam, from the rills
Into the Christian heart, while yet the drops
Of our New Birth, not wholly dried within,
Stir with a sweet response of hidden joy.
So that when long upon a barren moor,
Or breadth of arid pinewood, we have roamed,
How cheerfully our weary footsteps make
A needless circuit to attain a pool
Discerned amid the heather or the stems,
That we may look therein, and weep or smile
As best befits the temper of the hour!
And to my well-pleased ear each mountain brook
With various plea, the chime of tumbling falls
Or murmuring lapse, seems audibly to claim
Kindred with Jordan, in whose typical wave
All waters from the Body Virginal
Of God's dear Son received the cleansing Gift,
The Mystical Ablution of our sins
Drawn from the contact of that Sacred Flesh.
Stay, stay, poor worldly Hearts! and rest awhile
From gainful traffic, and the frivolous war
Of wordy senates, and the vulgar place
In slanderous courts, all, talents in the earth
Unprofitably hidden,—rest awhile,
And with the poet o'er this woodland bridge
Descend, or rather raise yourselves, to lean,
And watch the fish in unpolluted depths
Tarrying unmoved against the stream, old types,
Haply by apostolic teaching first divulged,
Of Him the Fish Divine through love submerged
Within the depths of poor Humanity!
Or with St. Leo, by some Latian stream
In spirit walking, let us ponder well
In every curve those still pellucid wombs
Of crystal undefiled, where now converge
The under-water beams which enter there,
Piercing the fluent brook without a wound,
And playing on the quiet stones beneath.
Within such wombs are Christian babes conceived
With an immaculate conception, pierced
By the Invisible Spirit; for the power
He gave to Mary hath He likewise shed
Into these watery depths; what Jesus took
From her, so speaks that ancient Saint, He laid
Once more within the Sacramental Font.
These are the wombs of Mary, these the depths
Immaculate wherein the Fish resides.
But see! the golden fisher from the bridge
Shoots on his glancing wings; shall nature still
Preach on? Lo! then, ye children of the world,
That bird is crowned a king, and ever makes
The streams the limits of his realm, the rills
His pathway o'er the world, baptismal roads
Which he deserteth never, and for food
The venturous creature preys upon the fish,
Like faith upon the Flesh of Him submerged
For our behoof within those watery depths.
Ah! had we kept that same baptismal path,
The road of waters, we should not bewail
With tears—yet even those who weep are blest—
The ruffled splendor of our plumage now.
From gainful traffic, and the frivolous war
Of wordy senates, and the vulgar place
In slanderous courts, all, talents in the earth
Unprofitably hidden,—rest awhile,
And with the poet o'er this woodland bridge
Descend, or rather raise yourselves, to lean,
And watch the fish in unpolluted depths
Tarrying unmoved against the stream, old types,
Haply by apostolic teaching first divulged,
Of Him the Fish Divine through love submerged
Within the depths of poor Humanity!
Or with St. Leo, by some Latian stream
19
In every curve those still pellucid wombs
Of crystal undefiled, where now converge
The under-water beams which enter there,
Piercing the fluent brook without a wound,
And playing on the quiet stones beneath.
Within such wombs are Christian babes conceived
With an immaculate conception, pierced
By the Invisible Spirit; for the power
He gave to Mary hath He likewise shed
Into these watery depths; what Jesus took
From her, so speaks that ancient Saint, He laid
Once more within the Sacramental Font.
These are the wombs of Mary, these the depths
Immaculate wherein the Fish resides.
But see! the golden fisher from the bridge
Shoots on his glancing wings; shall nature still
Preach on? Lo! then, ye children of the world,
That bird is crowned a king, and ever makes
The streams the limits of his realm, the rills
His pathway o'er the world, baptismal roads
Which he deserteth never, and for food
The venturous creature preys upon the fish,
Like faith upon the Flesh of Him submerged
For our behoof within those watery depths.
Ah! had we kept that same baptismal path,
The road of waters, we should not bewail
With tears—yet even those who weep are blest—
The ruffled splendor of our plumage now.
Weep, weep, ye little mosses! ever weep
With sunny trickling o'er yon giant rock!
A power abides in your celestial tears
Shed from the Rock Divine, more precious far
Than that anointing which from Aron's beard
Went down into the outskirts of the Law!
Chime, all ye little Jordans! as I walk,
Warning the penitent to keep the Gift
Received; or, it were best to say, preserve
What yet remains of that baptismal power!
And while the mountains lift their mighty heads,
Companions of the sunrise, and proclaim
Christ, the true mountain, and the forests wave
Their beckoning boughs and lisp in gentle songs,
Heard by the meek in spirit, of Thy ways,
O Holy Ghost! let this sweet valley preach
Our Baptism, let the thunder of the floods
Cry Baptism loudly to forgetful hearts,
And let the summer-hidden brooks prolong
The lesson in their accents soft and low,
And murmur Baptism to the ear of love!
With sunny trickling o'er yon giant rock!
A power abides in your celestial tears
Shed from the Rock Divine, more precious far
Than that anointing which from Aron's beard
20
Chime, all ye little Jordans! as I walk,
Warning the penitent to keep the Gift
Received; or, it were best to say, preserve
What yet remains of that baptismal power!
And while the mountains lift their mighty heads,
Companions of the sunrise, and proclaim
Christ, the true mountain, and the forests wave
Their beckoning boughs and lisp in gentle songs,
Heard by the meek in spirit, of Thy ways,
O Holy Ghost! let this sweet valley preach
Our Baptism, let the thunder of the floods
Cry Baptism loudly to forgetful hearts,
And let the summer-hidden brooks prolong
The lesson in their accents soft and low,
And murmur Baptism to the ear of love!
O that the hermitage of all our lives,
Our hidden lives secreted with our Lord,
Might be, as was Sir Lancelot's rocky cell,
Never from running brooks too far removed!
Our hidden lives secreted with our Lord,
Might be, as was Sir Lancelot's rocky cell,
Never from running brooks too far removed!
In solemn mood of mind and with his thoughts
Grave and collected, the lone Knight surveyed
The sanctuary of cloudy years to come,
The narrow vale and clasping bound of hills,
The silent school-house of his solitude,—
Where in the eye of nature he must learn
The austere wisdom of repentance. There
So long he stood, so ardently he gazed
Upon the cell and its rough neighbourhood,
Now in the twilight dusky and obscure,
It seemed as though he waited for some sign,
Or looked to find the features of the place
Significant and legible, where he
Some tokens of the future might detect:
Till by the beauty of the night o'ercome,
Looking upon the star-lit valley, thus,
But silently within himself, he mused.
Grave and collected, the lone Knight surveyed
The sanctuary of cloudy years to come,
The narrow vale and clasping bound of hills,
The silent school-house of his solitude,—
Where in the eye of nature he must learn
The austere wisdom of repentance. There
So long he stood, so ardently he gazed
Upon the cell and its rough neighbourhood,
Now in the twilight dusky and obscure,
It seemed as though he waited for some sign,
Or looked to find the features of the place
Significant and legible, where he
Some tokens of the future might detect:
21
Looking upon the star-lit valley, thus,
But silently within himself, he mused.
Evening hath gone, hath died upon the hills,
The vale, the river,—no one knoweth where;
But her last lustrous breath hath passed at once
From land and sky. The sombre earth is now
But the grey, twilight-curtained bed, whereon
That death is daily died. From every point
Huge palls of black, continuous cloud are drawn
Onward and upward till they meet above
And rest upon the heights, roofing the earth
With awful nearness,—like the closing round,
Audibly wafting, of seraphic wings
To guard the slumbering world. With what a weight
Night seems to lean incumbent on the earth,
The earth still beating with the sun's late warmth!
All things are hushed except the waterfalls,
The inarticulate voices of the woods,
And scarcely-silent shining of the moon.
She how she hangs, the very soul of night,
And from the purple hollow showers on man
Her radiant pulses of unfruitful gold!
The vale, the river,—no one knoweth where;
But her last lustrous breath hath passed at once
From land and sky. The sombre earth is now
But the grey, twilight-curtained bed, whereon
That death is daily died. From every point
Huge palls of black, continuous cloud are drawn
Onward and upward till they meet above
And rest upon the heights, roofing the earth
With awful nearness,—like the closing round,
Audibly wafting, of seraphic wings
To guard the slumbering world. With what a weight
Night seems to lean incumbent on the earth,
The earth still beating with the sun's late warmth!
All things are hushed except the waterfalls,
The inarticulate voices of the woods,
And scarcely-silent shining of the moon.
She how she hangs, the very soul of night,
And from the purple hollow showers on man
Her radiant pulses of unfruitful gold!
O that I had the night-bird's wing to flee
To many a dreadful glen and fishy tarn,
Which I have seen and feared by day, (in youth
Chasing the deer or anxious to reclaim
A truant falcon) that at this still hour
When night is working her chief miracles,
And with grey shadowy lights is lying bare
The very nerves of darkness, I might drink
From the deep wells of terror one chaste draught
To chill the over-lightness of my heart!
To many a dreadful glen and fishy tarn,
Which I have seen and feared by day, (in youth
Chasing the deer or anxious to reclaim
A truant falcon) that at this still hour
When night is working her chief miracles,
And with grey shadowy lights is lying bare
The very nerves of darkness, I might drink
From the deep wells of terror one chaste draught
To chill the over-lightness of my heart!
Round me are hills whose summits seem to reel
Within the unsteady atmosphere of night,
Clothed in soft gloom, like raven's plumage: there
Mid the strong folds of ether, and the zones
Of mighty clasping winds that gird with chains
The naked precipice and leaning peak,
Great things and glorious pomps are going on
Up in the birth-place of the storms and calms,
Where light and darkness fetch their utmost powers
To meet and clash in war unspeakable.
And now and then throughout the quiet night
Fragments of breezes with a liquid fall
Drop to the lowlands, whisper in the reeds,
And are drawn in beneath the silver brook,
Bearing, it may be, messages and words
Of wondrous import from the lines arrayed
Upon the unseen steeps.
22
Clothed in soft gloom, like raven's plumage: there
Mid the strong folds of ether, and the zones
Of mighty clasping winds that gird with chains
The naked precipice and leaning peak,
Great things and glorious pomps are going on
Up in the birth-place of the storms and calms,
Where light and darkness fetch their utmost powers
To meet and clash in war unspeakable.
And now and then throughout the quiet night
Fragments of breezes with a liquid fall
Drop to the lowlands, whisper in the reeds,
And are drawn in beneath the silver brook,
Bearing, it may be, messages and words
Of wondrous import from the lines arrayed
Upon the unseen steeps.
But hark! the owls
Shout from the firs on Wansfell, and the eye
May trace those sailing pirates of the night,
Stooping with dusky prows to cleave the gloom,
Scattering a momentary wake behind,
A palpable and broken brightness shed
As with white wing they part the darksome air!
Shout from the firs on Wansfell, and the eye
May trace those sailing pirates of the night,
Stooping with dusky prows to cleave the gloom,
Scattering a momentary wake behind,
A palpable and broken brightness shed
As with white wing they part the darksome air!
Thus, inmate of the Ash-tree Hermitage—
Which they who seek will surely find, if so
Imagination help them to the spot—
The lone Sir Lancelot dwelt for seven whole years
And more. By his old vassals was he served
With common necessaries duly left
Twice in the week beneath a holly bush
On a smooth slab of stone, a ministry
Connived at by the merciful old man
Who ruled St. Catherine's cloister by the lake,
If not suggested by his thoughtful love.
Yet speech did no one hold with their poor lord;
On such condition was it understood
Connivance rested; yet from brake or hill
Full many an eye, both young and old, would watch
To see the last De Wace, as by his cell
He stood, or from the tangled copse emerged
High up to wander on the open moors.
Which they who seek will surely find, if so
Imagination help them to the spot—
The lone Sir Lancelot dwelt for seven whole years
And more. By his old vassals was he served
With common necessaries duly left
Twice in the week beneath a holly bush
On a smooth slab of stone, a ministry
Connived at by the merciful old man
Who ruled St. Catherine's cloister by the lake,
If not suggested by his thoughtful love.
23
On such condition was it understood
Connivance rested; yet from brake or hill
Full many an eye, both young and old, would watch
To see the last De Wace, as by his cell
He stood, or from the tangled copse emerged
High up to wander on the open moors.
It chanced that in the byegone years his lot
A strange, mysterious Providence had met
In Caucasus and by the savage steppes
Interminable, and the Asian lakes,
Whereby the powers of nature had been made
To him a language dimly understood,—
A punishment, yet not without relief
Commingled, science far above the pitch
Of those rough days, except unto the few
To whom the stars obediently would yield
Nightly interpretations, and the stones
Their latent mutabilities unfold,
And gums and fatal saps would minister
Their properties medicinal, for ends
Unhallowed, and a loathsome skill.
A strange, mysterious Providence had met
In Caucasus and by the savage steppes
Interminable, and the Asian lakes,
Whereby the powers of nature had been made
To him a language dimly understood,—
A punishment, yet not without relief
Commingled, science far above the pitch
Of those rough days, except unto the few
To whom the stars obediently would yield
Nightly interpretations, and the stones
Their latent mutabilities unfold,
And gums and fatal saps would minister
Their properties medicinal, for ends
Unhallowed, and a loathsome skill.
Even such,
Only more guilty, is the fearful use
Of nature made in these self-boasting days,
By science unabashed before the Eye
Of the Supreme, and not on bended knees
Its searches prosecuting day and night.
A base, idolatrous ritual it is,
Whence, in oblivion oft of the First Cause,
Self-swollen knowledge uncouth service yields
To second causes multitudinous;—
Not in the beautiful and bright array
Of mystic truths, impersonations fair
Of sight or sound, which in old Greece were wont
To minister unto the inward sense
Of what Eternal was and Infinite,
And ofttimes raised the soul above herself,—
Faith even in its short-comings beautiful;—
But with a barren worship of poor names,
Vacant, unhelpful, unimpassioned; loud
In novelty of dissonance,—oh! how
Unlike the symphony true science wakes,
In sympathy absorbing to itself
The skilful tones of sweet Theology,
Which Heaven hath crowned the queen of sciences,
Mother of truth and fountain of the arts,
Pure heavenly lore, within the humble soul,
In varying tune with every want and woe
And every homeless love of humankind,—
A deep accord of everlasting praise
Preluded now, with such rehearsal as
Might win the world unto the side of Heaven,
If to the charming she would lend an ear.
Only more guilty, is the fearful use
Of nature made in these self-boasting days,
By science unabashed before the Eye
Of the Supreme, and not on bended knees
Its searches prosecuting day and night.
A base, idolatrous ritual it is,
Whence, in oblivion oft of the First Cause,
Self-swollen knowledge uncouth service yields
To second causes multitudinous;—
Not in the beautiful and bright array
Of mystic truths, impersonations fair
24
To minister unto the inward sense
Of what Eternal was and Infinite,
And ofttimes raised the soul above herself,—
Faith even in its short-comings beautiful;—
But with a barren worship of poor names,
Vacant, unhelpful, unimpassioned; loud
In novelty of dissonance,—oh! how
Unlike the symphony true science wakes,
In sympathy absorbing to itself
The skilful tones of sweet Theology,
Which Heaven hath crowned the queen of sciences,
Mother of truth and fountain of the arts,
Pure heavenly lore, within the humble soul,
In varying tune with every want and woe
And every homeless love of humankind,—
A deep accord of everlasting praise
Preluded now, with such rehearsal as
Might win the world unto the side of Heaven,
If to the charming she would lend an ear.
Like some insidious creature, self-immured,
Which 'neath the glebe absconds, and hourly fights
Against the outward beauty of the earth
With dull corrosive diligence, so lurks
The curse of Babel at the secret root
Of popular language or the invented tongue
Of mundane science, and, each passing year,
Sunders with more effectual divorce
The mighty power of language from the Faith,
Which once with amity subserved the truth
In Creeds consigned, through spiritual power
At Pentecost infused into the Church,
From Tongues of Fire distilled, unquenchable
As is the beacon by the climbing surge.
Which 'neath the glebe absconds, and hourly fights
Against the outward beauty of the earth
With dull corrosive diligence, so lurks
The curse of Babel at the secret root
Of popular language or the invented tongue
Of mundane science, and, each passing year,
Sunders with more effectual divorce
The mighty power of language from the Faith,
Which once with amity subserved the truth
In Creeds consigned, through spiritual power
At Pentecost infused into the Church,
From Tongues of Fire distilled, unquenchable
As is the beacon by the climbing surge.
25
O I could weep for that most grievous wrong
Which we commit, the trespass of our lips,
Against the noble majesty of day,
And sacred beauty of nocturnal skies!
When o'er the weary realms of Europe, God,
Upon the purple walls of midnight, deigns
To write the sweet inscriptions of His love
In starry characters, lo! science lifts
Her forehead unabashed, and from her towers
Preaches the pagan worship, rites and spells,
Junctions and separations, there fulfilled
By red-haired Mars, or that divinest orb,
Beaming on children at their early prayers,
The lamp of evening now surnamed from her
The sea-born goddess. And upon the earth,
In patient loveliness outspread, no less
Prevails the tyranny of pagan names,
Bidding that eloquent preacher hold her peace;
Drawing across her blazonry of types
A veil of denser woof than that of old,
Broidered with form of every living thing,
In Egypt woven for the Isiac rites.
Flowers that for innate love of Jesus sign
Their little bosoms with a summer Cross,
Choice blooms through simple mention consecrate
By the dear Saviour's Lips, and modest herbs
Which in their form or habits could remind
Past ages of the Blissful Mother, torn
Each from its little pulpit, sing by force,
Hard by the waters of our Babylon,
Of Venus, or the self-admiring boy,
Or wounded gallant whom the goddess loved.
Which we commit, the trespass of our lips,
Against the noble majesty of day,
And sacred beauty of nocturnal skies!
When o'er the weary realms of Europe, God,
Upon the purple walls of midnight, deigns
To write the sweet inscriptions of His love
In starry characters, lo! science lifts
Her forehead unabashed, and from her towers
Preaches the pagan worship, rites and spells,
Junctions and separations, there fulfilled
By red-haired Mars, or that divinest orb,
Beaming on children at their early prayers,
The lamp of evening now surnamed from her
The sea-born goddess. And upon the earth,
In patient loveliness outspread, no less
Prevails the tyranny of pagan names,
Bidding that eloquent preacher hold her peace;
Drawing across her blazonry of types
A veil of denser woof than that of old,
Broidered with form of every living thing,
In Egypt woven for the Isiac rites.
Flowers that for innate love of Jesus sign
Their little bosoms with a summer Cross,
Choice blooms through simple mention consecrate
By the dear Saviour's Lips, and modest herbs
Which in their form or habits could remind
Past ages of the Blissful Mother, torn
Each from its little pulpit, sing by force,
Hard by the waters of our Babylon,
Of Venus, or the self-admiring boy,
Or wounded gallant whom the goddess loved.
Ah me! we need another Pentecost
Unto the stammering nations to restore
Their unity of ritual voice again!
That deed of ill by humble men deplored
Which boastfully deformed the catholic past,
And now hath shaped three centuries to bear
Its paltry and disfigured lineaments,
Hath more than half way travelled toward a change.
Therefore, as admonition to ourselves
And grave enticement to our friends, let us,
Each in his unobtrusive measure, turn
The helm of our swift-sailing words, and steer
Our common converse by more Christian stars;
Mindful that on the new-created earth
The first, sublimest litany that rose,
From man unto the Triune God above,
Was that miraculous Nomenclature given
With mystical intelligence to all
Created things by Adam, thus inspired
To worship God with that primeval song,—
A litany the sweetest which the earth
Had rendered, till the Church was taught to sing
The dear life-giving Dolours of her Lord!
Unto the stammering nations to restore
26
That deed of ill by humble men deplored
Which boastfully deformed the catholic past,
And now hath shaped three centuries to bear
Its paltry and disfigured lineaments,
Hath more than half way travelled toward a change.
Therefore, as admonition to ourselves
And grave enticement to our friends, let us,
Each in his unobtrusive measure, turn
The helm of our swift-sailing words, and steer
Our common converse by more Christian stars;
Mindful that on the new-created earth
The first, sublimest litany that rose,
From man unto the Triune God above,
Was that miraculous Nomenclature given
With mystical intelligence to all
Created things by Adam, thus inspired
To worship God with that primeval song,—
A litany the sweetest which the earth
Had rendered, till the Church was taught to sing
The dear life-giving Dolours of her Lord!
But, not like alchemist or vigil-worn
Astrologer, Sir Lancelot entertained
Communion far sublimer than was wont,
But of a moral sort, with natural things;
Striving in true submission to the Church
To bear her weight, yet not the less to seek
From earth consoling wisdom like her own,—
A rule whereby to mete his inward growth,
A melody to which he might attune
The variable temper of his soul:
As though some roots and remnants there might be,
Inverted strata of the treasure once
In earth laid up, when mystic tillage could
Suffice for discipline to sinless man,
By God ordained in Paradise of old,—
Through the fierce action of the ancient curse
Delved deep into the soil, but by the power
Of Christian meditation haply still
Recoverable, and which may yet escape
In obscure spots and by unthought-of ways
The jealous custody wherein it lies.
How much had been retrieved in elder times
And through the affectionate patience of the Church,
In Alexandria chiefly, had the Knight
Been duly taught when in Bologna once
He studied, and a far-famed doctor there,
While the vast hall was througed with auditors,
In studious exposition had unlocked
The cabinets of Christian allegory.
And such communion did he now attempt
To achieve in that his penal hermitage.
Astrologer, Sir Lancelot entertained
Communion far sublimer than was wont,
But of a moral sort, with natural things;
Striving in true submission to the Church
To bear her weight, yet not the less to seek
From earth consoling wisdom like her own,—
A rule whereby to mete his inward growth,
A melody to which he might attune
The variable temper of his soul:
As though some roots and remnants there might be,
Inverted strata of the treasure once
In earth laid up, when mystic tillage could
27
By God ordained in Paradise of old,—
Through the fierce action of the ancient curse
Delved deep into the soil, but by the power
Of Christian meditation haply still
Recoverable, and which may yet escape
In obscure spots and by unthought-of ways
The jealous custody wherein it lies.
How much had been retrieved in elder times
And through the affectionate patience of the Church,
In Alexandria chiefly, had the Knight
Been duly taught when in Bologna once
He studied, and a far-famed doctor there,
While the vast hall was througed with auditors,
In studious exposition had unlocked
The cabinets of Christian allegory.
And such communion did he now attempt
To achieve in that his penal hermitage.
| Sir Lancelot | |