Lo, when the Lord made North and South And sun and moon ordained, He, Forthbringing each by word of mouth In order of its dignity, Did man from the crude clay express By sequence, and, all else decreed, He form’d the woman; nor might less Than Sabbath such a work succeed. And still with favour singled out, Marr’d less than man by mortal fall, Her disposition is devout, Her countenance angelical; The best things that the best believe Are in her face so kindly writ The faithless, seeing her, conceive Not only heaven, but hope of it; No idle thought her instinct shrouds, But fancy chequers settled sense, Like alteration of the clouds On noonday’s azure permanence; Pure dignity, composure, ease Declare affections nobly fix’d, And impulse sprung from due degrees Of sense and spirit sweetly mix’d. Her modesty, her chiefest grace, The cestus clasping Venus’ side, How potent to deject the face Of him who would affront its pride! Wrong dares not in her presence speak, Nor spotted thought its taint disclose Under the protest of a cheek Outbragging Nature’s boast the rose. In mind and manners how discreet; How artless in her very art; How candid in discourse; how sweet The concord of her lips and heart; How simple and how circumspect; How subtle and how fancy-free; Though sacred to her love, how deck’d With unexclusive courtesy; How quick in talk to see from far The way to vanquish or evade; How able her persuasions are To prove, her reasons to persuade; How (not to call true instinct’s bent And woman’s very nature, harm), How amiable and innocent Her pleasure in her power to charm; How humbly careful to attract, Though crown’d with all the soul desires, Connubial aptitude exact, Diversity that never tires.
II
The Tribute
Boon Nature to the woman bows; She walks in earth’s whole glory clad, And, chiefest far herself of shows, All others help her, and are glad: No splendour ’neath the sky’s proud dome But serves for her familiar wear; The far-fetch’d diamond finds its home Flashing and smouldering in her hair; For her the seas their pearls reveal; Art and strange lands her pomp supply With purple, chrome, and cochineal, Ochre, and lapis lazuli; The worm its golden woof presents; Whatever runs, flies, dives, or delves, All doff for her their ornaments, Which suit her better than themselves; And all, by this their power to give, Proving her right to take, proclaim Her beauty’s clear prerogative To profit so by Eden’s blame.
III
Compensation
That nothing here may want its praise, Know, she who in her dress reveals A fine and modest taste, displays More loveliness than she conceals.
THE MORNING CALL
1
‘By meekness charm’d, or proud to allow A queenly claim to live admired, Full many a lady has ere now My apprehensive fancy fired, And woven many a transient chain; But never lady like to this, Who holds me as the weather-vane Is held by yonder clematis. She seems the life of nature’s powers; Her beauty is the genial thought Which makes the sunshine bright; the flowers, But for their hint of her, were nought.’
2
A voice, the sweeter for the grace Of suddenness, while thus I dream’d, ‘Good morning!’ said or sang. Her face The mirror of the morning seem’d. Her sisters in the garden walk’d, And would I come? Across the Hall She led me; and we laugh’d and talk’d, And praised the Flower-show and the Ball; And Mildred’s pinks had gain’d the Prize; And, stepping like the light-foot fawn, She brought me ‘Wiltshire Butterflies,’ The Prize-book; then we paced the lawn, Close-cut, and with geranium-plots, A rival glow of green and red; Than counted sixty apricots On one small tree; the gold-fish fed; And watch’d where, black with scarlet tans, Proud Psyche stood and flash’d like flame, Showing and shutting splendid fans; And in the prize we found its name.
3
The sweet hour lapsed, and left my breast A load of joy and tender care; And this delight, which life oppress’d, To fix’d aims grew, that ask’d for pray’r. I rode home slowly; whip-in-hand And soil’d bank-notes all ready, stood The Farmer who farm’d all my land, Except the little Park and Wood; And with the accustom’d compliment Of talk, and beef, and frothing beer, I, my own steward, took my rent, Three hundred pounds for half the year; Our witnesses the Cook and Groom, We sign’d the lease for seven years more, And bade Good-day; then to my room I went, and closed and lock’d the door, And cast myself down on my bed, And there, with many a blissful tear, I vow’d to love and pray’d to wed The maiden who had grown so dear; Thank’d God who had set her in my path; And promised, as I hoped to win, That I would never dim my faith By the least selfishness or sin; Whatever in her sight I’d seem I’d truly be; I’d never blend With my delight in her a dream ’Twould change her cheek to comprehend; And, if she wish’d it, I’d prefer Another’s to my own success; And always seek the best for her With unofficious tenderness.
4
Rising, I breathed a brighter clime, And found myself all self above, And, with a charity sublime, Contemn’d not those who did not love: And I could not but feel that then I shone with something of her grace, And went forth to my fellow men My commendation in my face.
CANTO V The Violets
PRELUDES
I
The Comparison
Where she succeeds with cloudless brow, In common and in holy course, He fails, in spite of prayer and vow And agonies of faith and force; Or, if his suit with Heaven prevails To righteous life, his virtuous deeds Lack beauty, virtue’s badge; she fails More graciously than he succeeds. Her spirit, compact of gentleness, If Heaven postpones or grants her pray’r, Conceives no pride in its success, And in its failure no despair; But his, enamour’d of its hurt, Baffled, blasphemes, or, not denied, Crows from the dunghill of desert, And wags its ugly wings for pride. He’s never young nor ripe; she grows More infantine, auroral, mild, And still the more she lives and knows The lovelier she’s express’d a child. Say that she wants the will of man To conquer fame, not check’d by cross, Nor moved when others bless or ban; She wants but what to have were loss. Or say she wants the patient brain To track shy truth; her facile wit At that which he hunts down with pain Flies straight, and does exactly hit. Were she but half of what she is, He twice himself, mere love alone, Her special crown, as truth is his, Gives title to the worthier throne; For love is substance, truth the form; Truth without love were less than nought; But blindest love is sweet and warm, And full of truth not shaped by thought, And therefore in herself she stands Adorn’d with undeficient grace, Her happy virtues taking hands, Each smiling in another’s face. So, dancing round the Tree of Life, They make an Eden in her breast, While his, disjointed and at strife, Proud-thoughted, do not bring him rest.
II
Love in Tears
If fate Love’s dear ambition mar, And load his breast with hopeless pain, And seem to blot out sun and star, Love, won or lost, is countless gain; His sorrow boasts a secret bliss Which sorrow of itself beguiles, And Love in tears too noble is For pity, save of Love in smiles. But, looking backward through his tears, With vision of maturer scope, How often one dead joy appears The platform of some better hope! And, let us own, the sharpest smart Which human patience may endure Pays light for that which leaves the heart More generous, dignified, and pure.
III
Prospective Faith
They safely walk in darkest ways Whose youth is lighted from above, Where, through the senses’ silvery haze, Dawns the veil’d moon of nuptial love. Who is the happy husband? He Who, scanning his unwedded life, Thanks Heaven, with a conscience free, ’Twas faithful to his future wife.
IV
Venus Victrix
Fatal in force, yet gentle in will, Defeats, from her, are tender pacts, For, like the kindly lodestone, still She’s drawn herself by what she attracts.
THE VIOLETS
1
I went not to the Dean’s unbid: I would not have my mystery, From her so delicately hid, The guess of gossips at their tea. A long, long week, and not once there, Had made my spirit sick and faint, And lack-love, foul as love is fair, Perverted all things to complaint. How vain the world had grown to be! How mean all people and their ways, How ignorant their sympathy, And how impertinent their praise; What they for virtuousness esteem’d, How far removed from heavenly right; What pettiness their trouble seem’d, How undelightful their delight; To my necessity how strange The sunshine and the song of birds; How dull the clouds’ continual change, How foolishly content the herds; How unaccountable the law Which bade me sit in blindness here, While she, the sun by which I saw, Shed splendour in an idle sphere! And then I kiss’d her stolen glove, And sigh’d to reckon and define The modes of martyrdom in love, And how far each one might be mine. I thought how love, whose vast estate Is earth and air and sun and sea, Encounters oft the beggar’s fate, Despised on score of poverty; How Heaven, inscrutable in this, Lets the gross general make or mar The destiny of love, which is So tender and particular; How nature, as unnatural And contradicting nature’s source, Which is but love, seems most of all Well-pleased to harry true love’s course; How, many times, it comes to pass That trifling shades of temperament, Affecting only one, alas, Not love, but love’s success prevent; How manners often falsely paint The man; how passionate respect, Hid by itself, may bear the taint Of coldness and a dull neglect; And how a little outward dust Can a clear merit quite o’ercloud, And make her fatally unjust, And him desire a darker shroud; How senseless opportunity Gives baser men the better chance; How powers, adverse else, agree To cheat her in her ignorance; How Heaven its very self conspires With man and nature against love, As pleased to couple cross desires, And cross where they themselves approve. Wretched were life, if the end were now! But this gives tears to dry despair, Faith shall be blest, we know not how, And love fulfill’d, we know not where.
2
While thus I grieved, and kiss’d her glove, My man brought in her note to say, Papa had hid her send his love, And would I dine with them next day? They had learn’d and practised Purcell’s glee, To sing it by to-morrow night. The Postscript was: Her sisters and she Inclosed some violets, blue and white; She and her sisters found them where I wager’d once no violets grew; So they had won the gloves. And there The violets lay, two white, one blue.
CANTO VI The Dean
PRELUDES
I
Perfect Love rare
Most rare is still most noble found, Most noble still most incomplete; Sad law, which leaves King Love uncrown’d In this obscure, terrestrial seat! With bale more sweet than others’ bliss, And bliss more wise than others’ bale, The secrets of the world are his. And freedom without let or pale. O, zealous good, O, virtuous glee, Religious, and without alloy, O, privilege high, which none but he Who highly merits can enjoy; O, Love, who art that fabled sun Which all the world with bounty loads, Without respect of realms, save one, And gilds with double lustre Rhodes; A day of whose delicious life, Though full of terrors, full of tears, Is better than of other life A hundred thousand million years; Thy heavenly splendour magnifies The least commixture of earth’s mould, Cheapens thyself in thine own eyes, And makes the foolish mocker bold.
II
Love Justified
What if my pole-star of respect Be dim to others? Shall their ‘Nay,’ Presumably their own defect, Invalidate my heart’s strong ‘Yea’? And can they rightly me condemn, If I, with partial love, prefer? I am not more unjust to them, But only not unjust to her. Leave us alone! After awhile, This pool of private charity Shall make its continent an isle, And roll, a world-embracing sea; This foolish zeal of lip for lip, This fond, self-sanction’d, wilful zest, Is that elect relationship Which forms and sanctions all the rest; This little germ of nuptial love, Which springs so simply from the sod, The root is, as my song shall prove, Of all our love to man and God.
III
Love Serviceable
What measure Fate to him shall mete Is not the noble Lover’s care; He’s heart-sick with a longing sweet To make her happy as she’s fair. Oh, misery, should she him refuse, And so her dearest good mistake! His own success he thus pursues With frantic zeal for her sole sake. To lose her were his life to blight, Being loss to hers; to make her his, Except as helping her delight, He calls but incidental bliss; And holding life as so much pelf To buy her posies, learns this lore: He does not rightly love himself Who does not love another more.
IV
A Riddle Solved
Kind souls, you wonder why, love you, When you, you wonder why, love none. We love, Fool, for the good we do, Not that which unto us is done!
THE DEAN
1
The Ladies rose. I held the door, And sigh’d, as her departing grace Assured me that she always wore A heart as happy as her face; And, jealous of the winds that blew, I dreaded, o’er the tasteless wine, What fortune momently might do To hurt the hope that she’d be mine.
2
Towards my mark the Dean’s talk set: He praised my ‘Notes on Abury,’ Read when the Association met At Sarum; he was pleased to see I had not stopp’d, as some men had, At Wrangler and Prize Poet; last, He hoped the business was not bad I came about: then the wine pass’d.
3
A full glass prefaced my reply: I loved his daughter, Honor; I told My estate and prospects; might I try To win her? At my words so bold My sick heart sank. Then he: He gave His glad consent, if I could get Her love. A dear, good Girl! she’d have Only three thousand pounds as yet; More bye and bye. Yes, his good will Should go with me; he would not stir; He and my father in old time still Wish’d I should one day marry her; But God so seldom lets us take Our chosen pathway, when it lies In steps that either mar or make Or alter others’ destinies, That, though his blessing and his pray’r Had help’d, should help, my suit, yet he Left all to me, his passive share Consent and opportunity. My chance, he hoped, was good: I’d won Some name already; friends and place Appear’d within my reach, but none Her mind and manners would not grace. Girls love to see the men in whom They invest their vanities admired; Besides, where goodness is, there room For good to work will be desired. ’Twas so with one now pass’d away; And what she was at twenty-two, Honor was now; and he might say Mine was a choice I could not rue.
4
He ceased, and gave his hand. He had won (And all my heart was in my word), From me the affection of a son, Whichever fortune Heaven conferr’d! Well, well, would I take more wine? Then go To her; she makes tea on the lawn These fine warm afternoons. And so We went whither my soul was drawn; And her light-hearted ignorance Of interest in our discourse Fill’d me with love, and seem’d to enhance Her beauty with pathetic force, As, through the flowery mazes sweet, Fronting the wind that flutter’d blythe, And loved her shape, and kiss’d her feet, Shown to their insteps proud and lithe, She approach’d, all mildness and young trust, And ever her chaste and noble air Gave to love’s feast its choicest gust, A vague, faint augury of despair.
CANTO VII Ætna and the Moon
PRELUDES
I
Love’s Immortality
How vilely ’twere to misdeserve The poet’s gift of perfect speech, In song to try, with trembling nerve, The limit of its utmost reach, Only to sound the wretched praise Of what to-morrow shall not be; So mocking with immortal bays The cross-bones of mortality! I do not thus. My faith is fast That all the loveliness I sing Is made to bear the mortal blast, And blossom in a better Spring. Doubts of eternity ne’er cross The Lover’s mind, divinely clear; For ever is the gain or loss Which maddens him with hope or fear: So trifles serve for his relief, And trifles make him sick and pale; And yet his pleasure and his grief Are both on a majestic scale. The chance, indefinitely small, Of issue infinitely great, Eclipses finite interests all, And has the dignity of fate.
II
Heaven and Earth
How long shall men deny the flower Because its roots are in the earth, And crave with tears from God the dower They have, and have despised as dearth, And scorn as low their human lot, With frantic pride, too blind to see That standing on the head makes not Either for ease or dignity! But fools shall feel like fools to find (Too late inform’d) that angels’ mirth Is one in cause, and mode, and kind With that which they profaned on earth.
ÆTNA AND THE MOON
1
To soothe my heart I, feigning, seized A pen, and, showering tears, declared My unfeign’d passion; sadly pleased Only to dream that so I dared. Thus was the fervid truth confess’d, But wild with paradox ran the plea. As wilfully in hope depress’d, Yet bold beyond hope’s warranty:
2
‘O, more than dear, be more than just, And do not deafly shut the door! I claim no right to speak; I trust Mercy, not right; yet who has more? For, if more love makes not more fit, Of claimants here none’s more nor less, Since your great worth does not permit Degrees in our unworthiness. Yet, if there’s aught that can be done With arduous labour of long years, By which you’ll say that you’ll be won, O tell me, and I’ll dry my tears. Ah, no; if loving cannot move, How foolishly must labour fail! The use of deeds is to show love; If signs suffice let these avail: Your name pronounced brings to my heart A feeling like the violet’s breath, Which does so much of heaven impart It makes me amorous of death; The winds that in the garden toss The Guelder-roses give me pain, Alarm me with the dread of loss, Exhaust me with the dream of gain; I’m troubled by the clouds that move; Tired by the breath which I respire; And ever, like a torch, my love, Thus agitated, flames the higher; All’s hard that has not you for goal; I scarce can move my hand to write, For love engages all my soul, And leaves the body void of might; The wings of will spread idly, as do The bird’s that in a vacuum lies; My breast, asleep with dreams of you, Forgets to breathe, and bursts in sighs; I see no rest this side the grave, No rest nor hope, from you apart; Your life is in the rose you gave, Its perfume suffocates my heart; There’s no refreshment in the breeze; The heaven o’erwhelms me with its blue; I faint beside the dancing seas; Winds, skies, and waves are only you; The thought or act which not intends You service seems a sin and shame; In that one only object ends Conscience, religion, honour, fame. Ah, could I put off love! Could we Never have met! What calm, what ease! Nay, but, alas, this remedy Were ten times worse than the disease! For when, indifferent, I pursue The world’s best pleasures for relief, My heart, still sickening back to you, Finds none like memory of its grief; And, though ’twere very hell to hear You felt such misery as I, All good, save you, were far less dear! Than is that ill with which I die Where’er I go, wandering forlorn, You are the world’s love, life, and glee: Oh, wretchedness not to be borne If she that’s Love should not love me!’
3
I could not write another word, Through pity for my own distress; And forth I went, untimely stirr’d To make my misery more or less. I went, beneath the heated noon, To where, in her simplicity, She sate at work; and, as the Moon On Ætna smiles, she smiled on me. But, now and then, in cheek and eyes, I saw, or fancied, such a glow As when, in summer-evening skies, Some say, ‘It lightens,’ some say, ‘No.’ ‘Honoria,’ I began—No more. The Dean, by ill or happy hap, Came home; and Wolf burst in before, And put his nose upon her lap.