Various
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 349, November, 1844
It is now our duty to revert to the principal poem in the collection, respecting which we have already ventured to pronounce rather an unfavourable opinion. The "Drama of Exile" is the most ambitious of Miss Barrett's compositions. It is intended to commemorate the sayings and doings of our First Parents, immediately subsequent to their expulsion from the garden of Eden. Its authoress, with sincere modesty, disclaims all intention of entering into competition with Milton; but the comparison must, of course, force itself upon the reader; and although it was not to be expected that she should rise so soaringly as Milton does above the level of her theme, it was at any rate to be expected that her dramatis personæ should not stand in absolute contrast to his. Yet Milton's Satan and Miss Barrett's Lucifer are the very antipodes of each other. Milton's Satan is a thoroughly practical character, and, if he had been human, he would have made a first-rate man of business in any department of life. Miss Barrett's Lucifer, on the contrary, is the poorest prater that ever made a point of saying nothing to the purpose, and we feel assured that he could have put his hand to nothing in heaven, on earth, or in hell. He has nothing to do, he does nothing, and he could do nothing. He seems incapable of excogitating a single plot of treachery, or of carrying into execution a single deed of violence. His thoughts are a great deal too much taken up about his own personal appearance. Gabriel is an equally irresolute character. The following is a portion of a dialogue which takes place between the two; and it is perhaps as fair a sample of the drama as any that we could select. Near the beginning of the poem Gabriel concludes a short address to Lucifer with these words —
"Go from us straightway.
Lucifer. Wherefore?
Gabriel. Lucifer,
Thy last step in this place, trod sorrow up.
Recoil before that sorrow, if not this sword.
Lucifer. Angels are in the world – wherefore not I?
Exiles are in the world – wherefore not I?
The cursed are in the world – wherefore not I?
Gabriel. Depart.
Lucifer. And where's the logic of 'depart?'
Our lady Eve had half been satisfied
To obey her Maker, if I had not learnt
To fix my postulate better. Dost thou dream
Of guarding some monopoly in heaven
Instead of earth? Why I can dream with thee
To the length of thy wings.
Gabriel. I do not dream.
This is not heaven, even in a dream; nor earth,
As earth was once, – first breathed among the stars, —
Articulate glory from the mouth divine, —
To which the myriad spheres thrill'd audibly,
Touch'd like a lute-string, – and the sons of God
Said amen, singing it. I know that this
Is earth, not new created, but new cursed —
This, Eden's gate, not open'd, but built up
With a final cloud of sunset. Do I dream?
Alas, not so! this is the Eden lost
By Lucifer the serpent! this the sword
(This sword, alive with justice and with fire,)
That smote upon the forehead, Lucifer
The angel! Wherefore, angel, go … depart —
Enough is sinn'd and suffer'd.
Lucifer. By no means."
It will be observed, that in this passage Gabriel thrice desires Lucifer to "move on;" it will also be observed that Gabriel has a sword – or perhaps it may be the revolving sword which guards Paradise that he speaks of; but be it so or not, he threatens Lucifer with the edge of the sword unless he decamps; and yet, although the warning is repeated, as we have said, three distinct times, and although Lucifer pertinaciously refuses to stir a step, still the weapon remains innocuous, and the arch-fiend remains intact. This is not the way in which Milton manages matters. Towards the conclusion of the fourth book of Paradise Lost, this same Gabriel orders Satan to leave his presence —
"Avant!
Fly thither whence thou fledd'st."
The rebel angel refuses to retire: – upon which, without more ado, both sides prepare themselves for battle. On the side of Gabriel
"Th'angelic squadron bright
Turned fiery red, sharpening in mooned horns
Their phalanx."
What an intense picture of ardour preparatory to action (it is night, remember) is presented to our imaginations by the words "turned fiery red!"
"On t'other side, Satan alarm'd,
Collecting all his might, dilated stood,
Like Teneriff, or Atlas, unremov'd:
His stature reach'd the sky."
Then would have come the tug of war – then and would have ensued —
"Dreadful deeds
Might have ensued;"
and would have ensued —
"Had not soon
The Eternal, to prevent such horrid fray,
Hung forth in heaven his golden scales." —
"The fiend look'd up and knew
His mounted scale aloft; nor more, but fled
Murmuring, and with him fled the shades of night."
But in the interview which Miss Barrett describes between Gabriel and Lucifer, no such headlong propensity to act is manifested by either party – no such crisis ensues to interrupt the fray. Gabriel is satisfied with giving utterance to a feeble threat, which, when he finds that Lucifer pays no attention to it, he never attempts to carry into execution. For no apparent cause, he suddenly changes his tone, and condescends to hold parley with his foe on a variety of not very interesting particulars, informing him, among other things, that he "does not dream!"
The following is Lucifer's description of our First Mother. It is impregnated with Miss Barrett's mannerisms, and strongly characterized by that fantastical and untrue mode of picturing sensible objects, which the example of Shelley and Keates tended especially to foster, if they were not the first to introduce it: —
"Lucifer. Curse freely! curses thicken. Why, this Eve
Who thought me once part worthy of her ear,
And somewhat wiser than the other beasts, —
Drawing together her large globes of eyes,
The light of which is throbbing in and out
Around their continuity of gaze, —
Knots her fair eyebrows in so hard a knot,
And, down from her white heights of womanhood,
Looks on me so amazed, – I scarce should fear
To wager such an apple as she pluck'd,
Against one riper from the tree of life,
That she could curse too – as a woman may —
Smooth in the vowels."
We do not very well understand why Eve's curses should have been smoother in the vowels than in the consonants. But as we are no great elocutionists, or at all well conversant with the mysteries of "labials," "dentals," and "gutterals," we shall not contest the point with Lucifer, lest we should only expose our own ignorance.
Respecting the leading conception of her drama, Miss Barrett writes thus: – "My subject was the new and strange experience of the fallen humanity as it went forth from Paradise into the wilderness; with a peculiar reference to Eve's allotted grief, which, considering that self-sacrifice belonging to her womanhood, and the consciousness of originating the Fall to her offence – appeared to me imperfectly apprehended hitherto, and more expressible by a woman than a man." No wonder that Miss Barrett failed in her undertaking. In the conception of Eve's grief as distinguished from Adam's, and as coloured by the circumstances of her situation – namely, by the consciousness that she had been the first to fall, and the proximate cause of Adam's transgression – there is certainly no sufficient foundation to sustain the weight of a dramatic poem. At the most, it might have furnished materials for a sonnet. It therefore detracts nothing from the genius of Miss Barrett to say, that her attempt has been unsuccessful. She has tried to make bricks not only without straw, but almost without clay; and that being the case, the marvel is that she should have succeeded so well.
"There was room at least," continues Miss Barrett, "for lyrical emotion in those first steps into the wilderness, in that first sense of desolation after wrath, in that first audible gathering of the recriminating 'groan of the whole creation,' in that first darkening of the hills from the recoiling feet of angels, and in that first silence of the voice of God." There certainly was room for lyrical emotion in these first steps into wilderness. All nature might most appropriately be supposed to break forth in melodious regrets around the footsteps of the wanderers: but we cannot think that Miss Barrett has done justice to nature's strains. Unless lyrical emotion be expressed in language as clear as a mountain rill, and as well defined as the rocks over which it runs, it is much better left unsung. The merit of all lyrical poetry consists in the clearness and cleanness with which it is cut; no tags or loose ends can any where be permitted. But Miss Barrett's lyrical compositions are frequently so inarticulate, so slovenly, and so defective, both in rhythm and rhyme, that we are really surprised how a person of her powers could have written them, and how a person of any judgment could have published them. Take a specimen, not by any means the worst, from the "Song of the morning star to Lucifer: " —
"Mine orbed image sinks
Back from thee, back from thee,
As thou art fallen, methinks,
Back from me, back from me.
O my light-bearer,
Could another fairer
Lack to thee, lack to thee?
Ai, ai, Heosphoros!
I loved thee, with the fiery love of stars.
Who love by burning, and by loving move,
Too near the throned Jehovah, not to love.
Ai, ai, Heosphoros!
Their brows flash fast on me from gliding cars,
Pale-passion'd for my loss.
Ai, ai, Heosphoros!
"Mine orbed heats drop cold
Down from thee, down from thee,
As fell thy grace of old
Down from me, down from me.
O my light-bearer,
Is another fairer
Won to thee, won to thee?
Ai, ai, Heosphoros,
Great love preceded loss,
Known to thee, known to thee.
Ai, ai!
Thou, breathing they communicable grace
Of life into my light
Mine astral faces, from thine angel face,
Hast inly fed,
And flooded me with radiance overmuch
From thy pure height.
Ai, ai!
Thou, with calm, floating pinions both ways spread,
Erect, irradiated,
Didst sting my wheel of glory
On, on before thee,
Along the Godlight, by a quickening touch!
Ha, ha!
Around, around the firmamental ocean,
I swam expanding with delirious fire!
Around, around, around, in blind desire
To be drawn upward to the Infinite —
Ha, ha!"
But enough of Ai ai Heosphoros. It may be very right for ladies to learn Greek – not, however, if it is to lead them to introduce such expressions as this into the language of English poetry.
Nor do we think that Miss Barrett's lyrical style improves when she descends to themes of more human and proximate interest, and makes the "earth-spirits" and the "flower-spirits" pour their lamentations into the ears of the exiled pair. The following is the conclusion of the láyment (as Miss Barrett pronounces the word lament) of the "flower-spirits: " —
"We pluck at your raiment,
We stroke down your hair,
We faint in our láment,
And pine into air.
Fare-ye-well – farewell!
The Eden scents, no longer sensible,
Expire at Eden's door!
Each footstep of your treading
Treads out some fragrance which ye knew before:
Farewell! the flowers of Eden
Ye shall smell never more."
Would not Miss Barrett's hair have stood on end if Virgil had written "Arma virumque canto?" Yet surely that false quantity would have been not more repugnant to the genius of Latin verse than her transposition of accent in the word lamént is at variance with the plainest proprieties of the English tongue.
The "earth-spirits" deliver themselves thus: —
Earth Spirits.
"And we scorn you! there's no pardon
Which can lean to you aright!
When your bodies take the guerdon
Of the death-curse in our sight,
Then the bee that hummeth lowest shall transcend you.
Then ye shall not move an eyelid
Though the stars look down your eyes;
And the earth, which ye defiled,
She shall show you to the skies, —
Lo! these kings of ours – who sought to comprehend you.'
First Spirit.
And the elements shall boldly
All your dust to dust constrain;
Unresistedly and coldly,
I will smite you with my rain!
From the slowest of my frosts is no receding.
Second Spirit.
And my little worm, appointed
To assume a royal part,
He shall reign, crown'd and anointed,
O'er the noble human heart!
Give him counsel against losing of that Eden!"
In one of the lyrical effusions, man is informed that when he goes to heaven —
"Then a sough of glory
Shall your entrance greet,
Ruffling round the doorway
The smooth radiance it shall meet."
We wonder what meaning Miss Barrett attaches to the word sough! It is a term expressive of the dreary sighing of autumnal winds, or any sound still more disconsolate and dreary; and therefore, to talk of a "sough of glory," is to talk neither more nor less than absolute nonsense.
What can be more unlyrical than this verse?
"Live, work on, oh, Earthy!
By the Actual's tension
Sped the arrow worthy
Of a pure ascension."
We have said that the lyrical effusions interspersed throughout the "Drama of Exile," are very slovenly and defective in point of rhyme. What can be worse than "Godhead" and "wooded," "treading" and "Eden," "glories" and "floorwise," "calmly" and "palm-tree," "atoms" and "fathoms," "accompted" and "trumpet," and a hundred others? What can be worse, do we ask? We answer that there is one species of rhyme which Miss Barrett is sometimes, though, we are happy to say, very rarely, guilty of, which is infinitely more reprehensible than any of these inaccuracies. We allude to the practice of affixing an r to the end of certain words, in order to make them rhyme with other words which terminate in that letter. Writers who are guilty of this atrocity are not merely to be condemned as bad rhymesters: they are to be blamed on the far more serious ground that they give the sanction and authority of print to one of the vilest vulgarisms which pollutes the oral language of certain provincial societies. What makes the practice so offensive in literary composition is the fact, that the barbarism is one which may sometimes be actually heard falling from living lips. But for this, it would be pardonable. We verily believe that Miss Barrett herself does not talk of "Laurar" and "Matildar;" we verily believe that she would consider any one who does so no fit associate for herself in point of manners or education: – yet she scruples not to make "Aceldama"(r) rhyme to "tamer," and "Onora"(r) rhyme to "o'er her." When we think of these things, we turn to the following "stage-direction" with which her "Drama of Exile" concludes – "There is a sound through the silence as of the falling tears of an angel." That angel must have been a distressed critic like ourselves.
Next to the "Drama of Exile," the longest poem in the collection is the composition entitled "A Vision of Poets." This poem is designed, says our authoress, "to indicate the necessary relations of genius to suffering and self-sacrifice." It is stamped throughout with the thoughtful earnestness of Miss Barrett's character, and is, on the whole, a very impressive performance. But it would have been more impressive still if it had been composed after less vicious models, or if Miss Barrett had trusted more to a style prompted by her own native powers, and less to the fantastical modes of phraseology which have been introduced into literature by certain inferior artists of this and the preceding generation. We cannot read it, however, without appreciating the fervour which stirs the soul of the authoress through all its depths, when she declares and upholds the sacred mission of the poet, and teaches him that he must embrace his destiny with gratitude and pride, even though the crown which encircles his living brows be one in which the thorns far out-number the laurel leaves. We shall grace our pages with a series of portraits, in which Miss Barrett sketches off first the true poets and then the pretenders. They certainly contain some good points, although many of her touches must be pronounced unsuccessful. Let Homer lead the van: —
"Here, Homer, with the broad suspense
Of thunderous brows, and lips intense
Of garrulous god-innocence.
"There, Shakspeare! on whose forehead climb
The crowns o' the world! Oh, eyes sublime —
With tears and laughters for all time!
"Here, Æschylus – the women swoon'd
To see so awful when he frown'd
As the gods did – he standeth crown'd.
"Euripides, with close and mild
Scholastic lips – that could be wild,
And laugh or sob out like a child
"Right in the classes. Sophocles,
With that king's look which down the trees,
Follow'd the dark effigies
"Of the lost Theban! Hesiod old,
Who somewhat blind, and deaf, and cold,
Cared most for gods and bulls! and bold
"Electric Pindar, quick as fear,
With race-dust on his checks, and clear,
Slant startled eyes that seem to hear
"The chariot rounding the last goal,
To hurtle past it in his soul!
And Sappho crown'd with aureole
"Of ebon curls on calmed brows —
O poet-woman! none forgoes
The leap, attaining the repose!
"Theocritus, with glittering locks,
Dropt sideway, as betwixt the rocks
He watch'd the visionary flocks!
"And Aristophanes! who took
The world with mirth, and laughter-struck
The hollow caves of Thought, and woke
"The infinite echoes hid in each.
And Virgil! shade of Mantuan beech
Did help the shade of bay to reach
"And knit around his forehead high! —
For his gods wore less majesty
Than his brown bees humm'd deathlessly.
"Lucretius – nobler than his mood!
Who dropp'd his plummet down the broad
Deep universe, and said 'No God,'
"Finding no bottom. He denied
Divinely the divine, and died
Chief poet on the Tiber-side,
"By grace of God. His face is stern,
As one compell'd, in spite of scorn,
To teach a truth he could not learn.
"And Ossian, dimly seen or guess'd!
Once counted greater than the rest,
When mountain-winds blew out his vest.
"And Spenser droop'd his dreaming head
(With languid sleep-smile you had said
From his own verse engendered)
"On Ariosto's, till they ran
Their locks in one! – The Italian
Shot nimbler heat of bolder man
"From his fine lids. And Dante stern
And sweet, whose spirit was an urn
For wine and milk pour'd out in turn.
"And Goethe – with that reaching eye
His soul reach'd out from far and high,
And fell from inner entity.
"And Schiller, with heroic front
Worthy of Plutarch's kiss upon't —
Too large for wreath of modern wont.
"Here Milton's eyes strike piercing-dim!
The shapes of suns and stars did swim
Like clouds on them, and granted him
"God for sole vision! Cowley, there,
Whose active fancy debonaire
Drew straws like amber – foul to fair.
"And Burns, with pungent passionings
Set in his eyes. Deep lyric springs
Are of the fire-mount's issuings.
"And poor, proud Byron – sad as grave
And salt as life! forlornly brave,
And quivering with the dart he drave.
"And visionary Coleridge, who
Did sweep his thoughts as angels do
Their wings, with cadence up the Blue."
"Homer" we are not sure about; we can only hope that there may be people whom the picture will please. "Shakspeare" is good. "Æschylus" (Miss Barrett's favourite, too,) is treated very scurvily and very ungrammatically. What on earth are we to make of the words "the women swooned to see so awful" &c.? It is well known that no pregnant woman could look Æschylus in the face when the fit of inspiration was on him, without having cause to regret her indiscretion. But though delicacy might have dictated that this fact should be only barely hinted at, surely grammar need not have miscarried in the statement. The syntax of the passage will puzzle future commentators as much as some of his own corrupt choruses. "Euripides" promises well; but the expression, "Right in the classes," throws our intellect completely on its beam-ends; and as we cannot right it again, in order to take a second glance at the poet of Medea, we must pass on to the next. "Sophocles" will be acceptable to scholars. "Hesiod" is excellent. "Cared most for gods and bulls" is worth any money. "Pindar" and "Sappho" are but so so. The picture of "Theocritus" is very beautiful. There is nothing particularly felicitous in the sketch of "Aristophanes." How much more graphic is what Milton, in one of his prose works, says with respect to the "holy Chrysostom's" study of the same. Chrysostom, it seems, was a great student of Aristophanes. Some people might have been, and no doubt were, scandalized to think that so pious a father of the church should have made a bosom companion of so profane and virulent a wit: but says Milton, the holy father was quite right in poring over Aristophanes, for "he had the art to cleanse a scurrilous vehemence into the style of a rousing sermon." Put that into verse and it would ring well. We thank Miss Barrett for the graphic touch of Virgil's "brown bees," which certainly are better than his gods. "Lucretius" is very finely painted. "Ossian" looms large through the mist, but walk up to him, and the pyramid is but a cairn. "Spenser" and "Ariosto," with their locks blended in one, compose a very sweet picture. "Dante" we will not answer for. "Goethe" is a perfect enigma. What does the word "fell" mean? δεινος, we suppose – that is, "not to be trifled with." But surely it sounds very strange, although it may be true enough, to say that this "fellness" is occasioned by "inner entity." But perhaps the line has some deeper meaning, which we are unable to fathom. We have seen a better picture than that of Goethe in the hour of inspiration, when his forehead was like a precipice dim with drifting sleet. "Schiller" is well drawn; evidently from Thorwaldsen's gigantic statue of the poet. Miss Barrett paints "Milton" in his blindness as seeing all things in God. But Mallebranche had already taught that God is the "sole vision" of all of us; and therefore, if that theory be correct, she has failed to assign to the poet of the Fall any distinctive attribute which distinguishes him from other men. "Cowley" is well characterized. "Burns" ought to have been better. "Byron" pleases us. "Coleridge" has very considerable merit.
As a contrast to the preceding sketches of the true poets, (many of which, however, we have omitted, and we may also remark, in parenthesis, that none of our living poets are meddled with,) we now pass before the eyes of the reader a panorama of pretenders. We shall make no remarks on the expression of their features, leaving Miss Barrett to brand them as they deserve with her just scorn and indignation —
"One dull'd his eyeballs as they ached,
With Homer's forehead – though he lack'd
An inch of any! And one rack'd
"His lower lip with restless tooth —
As Pindar's rushing words forsooth
Were pent behind it. One, his smooth
"Pink cheeks, did rumple passionate,
Like Æschylus – and tried to prate
On trolling tongue, of fate and fate!
"One set her eyes like Sappho's – or
Any light woman's! one forbore
Like Dante, or any man as poor
"In mirth, to let a smile undo
His hard shut lips. And one, that drew
Sour humours from his mother, blew
"His sunken cheeks out to the size
Of most unnatural jollities,
Because Anacreon looked jest-wise.
"So with the rest. – It was a sight
For great world-laughter, as it might
For great world-wrath, with equal right.
"Out came a speaker from that crowd,
To speak for all – in sleek and proud
Exordial periods, while he bow'd
"His knee before the angel. – 'Thus,
O angel! who hast call'd for us,
We bring thee service emulous, —
"'Fit service from sufficient soul —
Hand-service, to receive world's dole —
Lip-service, in world's ear to roll
"'Adjusted concords – soft enow
To hear the winecups passing through,
And not too grave to spoil the show.
"'Thou, certes, when thou askest more,
O sapient angel! leanest o'er
The window-sill of metaphor.
"'To give our hearts up! fie! – That rage
Barbaric, antedates the age!
It is not done on any stage.
"'Because your scald or gleeman went
With seven or nine-string'd instrument
Upon his back – must ours be bent?
"'We are not pilgrims, by your leave,
No, nor yet martyrs! if we grieve,
It is to rhyme to … summer eve.
"'And if we labour, it shall be
As suiteth best with our degree,
In after-dinner reverie.'
"More yet that speaker would have said —
Poising between his smiles fair-fed,
Each separate phrase till finished:
"But all the foreheads of those born
And dead true poets flash'd with scorn
Betwixt the bay leaves round them worn —
"Ay, jetted such brave fire, that they,
The new-come, shrank and paled away,
Like leaden ashes when the day
"Strikes on the hearth! A spirit-blast,
A presence known by power, at last
Took them up mutely – they had pass'd!"
"Lady Geraldine's Courtship" is a poem of the Tennysonian school. Some pith is put forth in the passionate parts of the poem; but it is deficient throughout in that finished elegance of style which distinguishes the works of the great artist from whom it is imitated. Bertram, a peasant-born poet falls in love with the Lady Geraldine, a woman of high rank and very extensive possessions. He happens to overhear the lady address the following words to a suitor of the same rank with herself, and whose overtures she is declining —
"Yes, your lordship judges rightly. Whom I marry, shall be noble,
Ay, and wealthy. I shall never blush to think how he was born."
Upon which, imagining that these words have some special and cutting reference to himself, he passes into the presence of the lady, and rates her in a strain of very fierce invective, which shows that his blood is really up, whatever may be thought of the taste which dictated his language, or of the title he had to take to task so severely a lady who had never given him any sort of encouragement. In a letter to a friend, he thus describes the way in which he went to work – the fourth line is a powerful one —
"Oh, she flutter'd like a tame bird, in among its forest-brothers,
Far too strong for it! then drooping, bow'd her face upon her hands —
And I spake out wildly, fiercely, brutal truths of her and others!
I, she planted the desert, swathed her, windlike, with my sands.
"I pluck'd up her social fictions, bloody-rooted, though leaf verdant, —
Trod them down with words of shaming, – all the purples and the gold,
And the 'landed stakes' and Lordships – all that spirits pure and ardent
Are cast out of love and reverence, because chancing not to hold.
"'For myself I do not argue,' said I, 'though I love you, Madam,
But for better souls, that nearer to the height of yours have trod —
And this age shows, to my thinking, still more infidels to Adam,
Than directly, by profession, simple infidels to God.
"'Yet, O God' (I said,) 'O grave' (I said,) 'O mother's heart and bosom!
With whom first and last are equal, saint and corpse and little child!
We are fools to your deductions, in these figments of heart-closing!
We are traitors to your causes, in these sympathies defiled!
"'Learn more reverence, madam, not for rank or wealth —that needs no learning;
That comes quickly – quick as sin does! ay, and often works to sin;
But for Adam's seed, man! Trust me, 'tis a clay above your scorning,
With God's image stamp'd upon it, and God's kindling breath within.
"'What right have you, Madam, gazing in your shining mirror daily,
Getting, so, by heart, your beauty, which all others must adore, —
While you draw the golden ringlets down your fingers, to vow gaily…
You will wed no man that's only good to God, – and nothing more.'"
In the second stanza, we cannot make out the construction of the words, "all that spirits pure and ardent are cast out of love and reverence." This vigorous tirade is continued throughout several stanzas. The poor lady merely utters the word "Bertram," and the lover is carried to bed in a fainting fit when his passion is expended. When he recovers he indites the aforesaid letter. After he has dispatched it, the lady enters his apartment: oh, blessed and gracious apparition! We quote the dénouement, omitting one or two stanzas —
Soh! how still the lady standeth! 'tis a dream – a dream of mercies!
'Twixt the purple lattice-curtains, how she standeth still and pale!
'Tis a vision, sure, of mercies, sent to soften his self-curses —
Sent to sweep a patient quiet, o'er the tossing of his wail.
'Eyes,' he said, 'now throbbing through me! are ye eyes that did undo me?
Shining eyes, like antique jewels set in Parian statue-stone!
Underneath that calm white forehead, are ye ever burning torrid,
O'er the desolate sand-desert of my heart and life undone?'
"Ever, evermore the while in a slow silence she kept smiling, —
And approach'd him slowly, slowly, in a gliding measured pace;
With her two white hands extended, as if praying one offended,
And a look of supplication, gazing earnest in his face.
"Said he – 'Wake me by no gesture, – sound of breath, or stir of vesture;
Let the blessed apparition melt not yet to its divine!
No approaching – hush! no breathing! or my heart must swoon to death in
The too utter life thou bringest – O thou dream of Geraldine!'
"Ever, evermore the while in a slow silence she kept smiling —
But the tears ran over lightly from her eyes, and tenderly;
'Dost thou, Bertram, truly love me? Is no woman far above me,
Found more worthy of thy poet-heart, than such a one as I?'
"Said he – 'I would dream so ever, like the flowing of that river,
Flowing ever in a shadow, greenly onward to the sea;
So, thou vision of all sweetness – princely to a full completeness, —
Would my heart and life flow onward – deathward – through this dream of THEE!'
"Ever, evermore the while in a slow silence she kept smiling, —
While the shining tears ran faster down the blushing of her cheeks;
Then with both her hands enfolding both of his, she softly told him,
'Bertram, if I say I love thee… 'tis the vision only speaks.'
"Soften'd, quicken'd to adore her, on his knee he fell before her —
And she whisper'd low in triumph – 'It shall be as I have sworn!
Very rich he is in virtues, – very noble – noble certes;
And I shall not blush in knowing, that men call him lowly born!"
With the exception of the line, and the other expressions which we have printed in italics, we think that the whole tone of this finale is "beautiful exceedingly;" although, if we may express our private opinion, we should say that the lover, after his outrageous demeanour, was very unworthy of the good fortune that befell him. But, in spite of the propitious issue of the poem, we must be permitted (to quote one of Miss Barrett's lines in this very lay) to make our "critical deductions for the modern writers' fault." Will she, or any one else tell us the meaning of the second line in this stanza? Or, will she maintain that it has any meaning at all? Lady Geraldine's possessions are described —