Chapter III: Part 3

Rising by night, to search for shell and flower,
To lay in places where she found them first;
Hoarding his cherished goat's milk for the hour
When those young lips might feel the summer's thirst;
Holding himself for all devotion paid
By that clear laughter of the little maid.

Dwelling, alas! in that fond Paradise
Where no to-morrow quivers in suspense,--
Where scarce the changes of the sky suffice
To break the soft forgetfulness of sense,--
Where dreams become realities; and where
I willingly would leave him--did I dare.

Yet for a little space it still endured,
Until, upon a day when least of all
The softened Cyclops, by his hopes assured,
Dreamed the inevitable blow could fall,
Came the stern moment that should all destroy,
Bringing a pert young cockerel of a Boy.

Middy, I think,--he'd "_Acis_" on his box:--
A black-eyed, sun-burnt, mischief-making imp,
Pet of the mess,--a Puck with curling locks,
Who straightway travestied the Cyclops' limp,
And marveled how his cousin so could care
For such a "one-eyed, melancholy Bear."

Thus there was war at once; not overt yet,
For still the Child, unwilling, would not break
The new acquaintanceship, nor quite forget
The pleasant past; while, for his treasure's sake,
The boding smith with clumsy efforts tried
To win the laughing scorner to his side.

There are some sights pathetic; none I know
More sad than this: to watch a slow-wrought mind
Humbling itself, for love, to come and go
Before some petty tyrant of its kind;
Saddest, ah!--saddest far,--when it can do
Naught to advance the end it has in view.

This was at least the Cyclops' case, until,
Whether the boy beguiled the Child away,
Or whether that limp Matron on the Hill
Woke from her novel-reading trance, one day
He waited long and wearily in vain,--
But, from that hour, they never came again.

Yet still he waited, hoping--wondering if
They still might come, or dreaming that he heard
The sound of far-off voices on the cliff,
Or starting strangely when the she-goat stirred;
But nothing broke the silence of the shore,
And, from that hour, the Child returned no more.

Therefore our Cyclops sorrowed,--not as one
Who can command the gamut of despair;
But as a man who feels his days are done,
So dead they seem,--so desolately bare;
For, though he'd lived a hermit, 'twas but only
Now he discovered that his life was lonely.

The very sea seemed altered, and the shore;
The very voices of the air were dumb;
Time was an emptiness that o'er and o'er
Ticked with the dull pulsation "Will she come?"
So that he sat "consuming in a dream,"
Much like his old forerunner, Polypheme.

Until there came the question, "Is she gone?"
With such sad sick persistence that at last,
Urged by the hungry thought which drove him on,
Along the steep declivity he passed,
And by the summit panting stood, and still,
Just as the horn was sounding on the hill.

Then, in a dream, beside the "Dragon" door,
The smith saw travellers standing in the sun;
Then came the horn again, and three or four
Looked idly at him from the roof, but One,--
A Child within,--suffused with sudden shame,
Thrust forth a hand, and called to him by name.

Thus the coach vanished from his sight, but he
Limped back with bitter pleasure in his pain;
He was not all forgotten--could it be?
And yet the knowledge made the memory vain;
And then--he felt a pressure in his throat,
So, for that night, forgot to milk his goat.

What then might come of silent misery,
What new resolvings then might intervene,
I know not. Only, with the morning sky,
The goat stood tethered on the "Dragon" green,
And those who, wondering, questioned thereupon,
Found the hut empty,--for the man was gone.

A STORY FROM A DICTIONARY.

"Sic visum Veneri: cui placet impares
Formas atque animos sub juga aënea
Saevo mittere cum joco."
--Hor. i. 33.

"Love mocks us all"--as Horace said of old:
From sheer perversity, that arch-offender
Still yokes unequally the hot and cold,
The short and tall, the hardened and the tender;
He bids a Socrates espouse a scold,
And makes a Hercules forget his gender:--
_Sic visum Veneri!_ Lest samples fail,
I add a fresh one from the page of BAYLE.

It was in Athens that the thing occurred,
In the last days of Alexander's rule,
While yet in Grove or Portico was heard
The studious murmur of its learned school;--
Nay, 'tis one favoured of Minerva's bird
Who plays therein the hero (or the fool)
With a Megarian, who must then have been
A maid, and beautiful, and just eighteen.

I shan't describe her. Beauty is the same
In Anno Domini as erst B.C.;
The type is still that witching One who came,
Between the furrows, from the bitter sea;
'Tis but to shift accessories and frame,
And this our heroine in a trice would be,
Save that she wore a _peplum_ and a _chiton_,
Like any modern on the beach at Brighton.

Stay, I forget! Of course the sequel shows
She had some qualities of disposition,
To which, in general, her sex are foes,--
As strange proclivities to erudition,
And lore unfeminine, reserved for those
Who now-a-days descant on "Woman's Mission,"
Or tread instead that "primrose path" to knowledge,
That milder Academe--the Girton College.

The truth is, she admired ... a learned man.
There were no curates in that sunny Greece,
For whom the mind emotional could plan
Fine-art habiliments in gold and fleece;
(This was ere chasuble or cope began
To shake the centres of domestic peace;)
So that "admiring," such as maids give way to,
Turned to the ranks of Zeno and of Plato.

The "object" here was mildly prepossessing,
At least, regarded in a woman's sense;
His _forte_, it seems, lay chiefly in expressing
Disputed fact in Attic eloquence;
His ways were primitive; and as to dressing,
His toilet was a negative pretence;
He kept, besides, the _régime_ of the Stoic;--
In short, was not, by any means, "heroic."

_Sic visum Veneri!_--The thing is clear.
Her friends were furious, her lovers nettled;
'Twas much as though the Lady Vere de Vere
On some hedge-schoolmaster her heart had settled.
Unheard! Intolerable!--a lumbering steer
To plod the upland with a mare high-mettled!--
They would, no doubt, with far more pleasure hand her
To curled Euphorion or Anaximander.

And so they used due discipline, of course,
To lead to reason this most erring daughter,
Proceeding even to extremes of force,--
Confinement (solitary), and bread and water;
Then, having lectured her till they were hoarse,
Finding that this to no submission brought her,
At last, (unwisely[1]) to the man they sent,
That he might combat her by argument.

Being, they fancied, but a bloodless thing;
Or else too well forewarned of that commotion
Which poets feign inseparable from Spring
To suffer danger from a school-girl notion;
Also they hoped that she might find her king,
On close inspection, clumsy and Boeotian:--
This was acute enough, and yet, between us,
I think they thought too little about Venus.

Something, I know, of this sort is related
In Garrick's life. However, the man came,
And taking first his mission's end as stated,
Began at once her sentiments to tame,
Working discreetly to the point debated
By steps rhetorical I spare to name;
In other words,--he broke the matter gently.
Meanwhile, the lady looked at him intently,

Wistfully, sadly,--and it put him out,
Although he went on steadily, but faster.
There were some maladies he'd read about
Which seemed, at first, most difficult to master;
They looked intractable at times, no doubt,
But all they needed was a little plaster;
This was a thing physicians long had pondered,
Considered, weighed ... and then ... and then he wandered.

('Tis so embarrassing to have before you
A silent auditor, with candid eyes;
With lips that speak no sentence to restore you,
And aspect, generally, of pained surprise;
Then, if we add that all these things adore you,
'Tis really difficult to syllogise:--
Of course it mattered not to him a feather,
But still he wished ... they'd not been left together.)

"Of one," he said, continuing, "of these
The young especially should be suspicious;
Seeing no ailment in Hippocrates
Could be at once so tedious and capricious;
No seeming apple of Hesperides
More fatal, deadlier, and more delicious--
Pernicious,--he should say,--for all its seeming...."
It seemed to him he simply was blaspheming.

If she had only turned askance, or uttered
Word in reply, or trifled with her brooch,
Or sighed, or cried, grown petulant, or fluttered,
He might (in metaphor) have "called his coach";
Yet still, while patiently he hemmed and stuttered,
She wore her look of wondering reproach;
(And those who read the "Shakespeare of Romances"
Know of what stuff a girl's "dynamic glance" is.)

"But there was still a cure, the wise insisted,
In Love,--or rather, in Philosophy.
Philosophy--no, Love--at best existed
But as an ill for that to remedy:
There was no knot so intricately twisted,
There was no riddle but at last should be
By Love--he meant Philosophy--resolved...."
The truth is, he was getting quite involved.

O sovran Love! how far thy power surpasses
Aught that is taught of Logic or the Schools!
Here was a man, "far seen" in all the classes,
Strengthened of precept, fortified of rules,
Mute as the least articulate of asses;
Nay, at an age when every passion cools,
Conscious of nothing but a sudden yearning
Stronger by far than any force of learning!

Therefore he changed his tone, flung down his wallet,
Described his lot, how pitiable and poor;
The hut of mud,--the miserable pallet,--
The alms solicited from door to door;
The scanty fare of bitter bread and sallet,--
Could she this shame,--this poverty endure?
I scarcely think he knew what he was doing,
But that last line had quite a touch of wooing.

And so she answered him,--those early Greeks
Took little care to keep concealment preying
At any length upon their damask cheeks,--
She answered him by very simply saying,
She could and would:--and said it as one speaks
Who takes no course without much careful weighing....
Was this, perchance, the answer that he hoped?
It might, or might not be. But they eloped.

Sought the free pine-wood and the larger air,--
The leafy sanctuaries, remote and inner,
Where the great heart of nature, beating bare,
Receives benignantly both saint and sinner;--
Leaving propriety to gasp and stare,
And shake its head, like Burleigh, after dinner,
From pure incompetence to mar or mend them:
They fled and wed;--though, mind, I don't defend them.

I don't defend them. 'Twas a serious act,
No doubt too much determined by the senses;
(Alas! when these affinities attract,
We lose the future in the present tenses!)
Besides, the least establishment's a fact
Involving nice adjustment of expenses;
Moreover, too, reflection should reveal
That not remote contingent--_la famille_.

Yet these, maybe, were happy in their lot.
Milton has said (and surely Milton knows)
That after all, philosophy is "not,--
_Not_ harsh and crabbed, as dull fools suppose;"
And some, no doubt, for Love's sake have forgot
Much that is needful in this world of prose:--
Perchance 'twas so with these. But who shall say?
Time has long since swept them and theirs away.

[1] "Unwisely," surely. But 'tis well to mention
That this particular is _not_ invention.

THE WATER-CURE.

A TALE: IN THE MANNER OF PRIOR.

"--_portentaque Thessala rides?_"
--Hor.
"--_Thessalian portents do you flout?_"
* *

CARDENIO'S fortunes ne'er miscarried
Until the day CARDENIO married.
What then? the Nymph no doubt was young?
She was: but yet--she had a tongue!
Most women have, you seem to say.
I grant it--in a different way.

'Twas not that organ half-divine,
With which, Dear Friend, your spouse or mine,
What time we seek our nightly pillows,
Rebukes our easy peccadilloes:
'Twas not so tuneful, so composing;
'Twas louder and less often dozing;
At _Ombre_, _Basset_, _Loo_, _Quadrille_,
You heard it resonant and shrill;
You heard it rising, rising yet
Beyond SELINDA'S parroquet;
You heard it rival and outdo
The chair-men and the link-boy too;
In short, wherever lungs perform,
Like MARLBOROUGH, it rode the storm.

So uncontrolled it came to be,
CARDENIO feared his _chère amie_
(Like ECHO by _Cephissus_ shore)
Would turn to voice and nothing more.

That ('tis conceded) must be cured
Which can't by practice be endured.
CARDENIO, though he loved the maid,
Grew daily more and more afraid;
And since advice could not prevail
(Reproof but seemed to fan the gale),
A prudent man, he cast about
To find some fitting nostrum out.
What need to say that priceless drug
Had not in any mine been dug?
What need to say no skilful leech
Could check that plethora of speech?
Suffice it, that one lucky day
CARDENIO tried--another way.

A Hermit (there were hermits then;
The most accessible of men!)
Near _Vauxhall's_ sacred shade resided;
In him, at length, our friend confided.
(Simples, for show, he used to sell;
But cast _Nativities_ as well.)
Consulted, he looked wondrous wise;
Then undertook the enterprise.

What that might be, the Muse must spare:
To tell the truth, she was not there.
She scorns to patch what she ignores
With _Similes_ and _Metaphors_;
And so, in short, to change the scene,
She slips a fortnight in between.

Behold our pair then (quite by chance!)
In _Vauxhall's_ garden of romance,--
That paradise of nymphs and grottoes,
Of fans, and fiddles, and ridottoes!
What wonder if, the lamps reviewed,
The song encored, the maze pursued,
No further feat could seem more pat
Than seek the Hermit after that?
Who then more keen her fate to see
Than this, the new LEUCONOË,
On fire to learn the lore forbidden
In Babylonian numbers hidden?
Forthwith they took the darkling road
To ALBUMAZAR his abode.

Arriving, they beheld the sage
Intent on hieroglyphic page,
In high _Armenian_ cap arrayed
And girt with engines of his trade;
(As _Skeletons_, and _Spheres_, and _Cubes_;
As _Amulets_ and _Optic Tubes_;)
With dusky depths behind revealing
Strange shapes that dangled from the ceiling,
While more to palsy the beholder
A Black Cat sat upon his shoulder.

The Hermit eyed the Lady o'er
As one whose face he'd seen before;
And then, with agitated looks,
He fell to fumbling at his books.

CARDENIO felt his spouse was frightened,
Her grasp upon his arm had tightened;
Judge then her horror and her dread
When "Vox Stellarum" shook his head;
Then darkly spake in phrase forlorn
Of _Taurus_ and of _Capricorn_;
Of stars averse, and stars ascendant,
And stars entirely independent;
In fact, it seemed that all the Heavens
Were set at sixes and at sevens,
Portending, in her case, some fate
Too fearful to prognosticate.

Meanwhile the Dame was well-nigh dead.
"But is there naught," CARDENIO said,
"No sign or token, Sage, to show
From whence, or what, this dismal woe?"

The Sage, with circle and with plane,
Betook him to his charts again.
"It vaguely seems to threaten Speech:
No more (he said) the signs can teach."

But still CARDENIO tried once more:
"Is there no potion in your store,
No charm by _Chaldee_ mage concerted
By which this doom can be averted?"

The Sage, with motion doubly mystic,
Resumed his juggling cabalistic.
The aspects here again were various;
But seemed to indicate _Aquarius_.
Thereat portentously he frowned;
Then frowned again, then smiled:--'twas found!
But 'twas too simple to be tried.
"What is it, then?" at once they cried.

"Whene'er by chance you feel incited
To speak at length, or uninvited;
Whene'er you feel your tones grow shrill
(At times, we know, the softest will!),
This word oracular, my daughter,
Bids you to fill your mouth with water:
Further, to hold it firm and fast,
Until the danger be o'erpast."

The Dame, by this in part relieved
The prospect of escape perceived,
Rebelled a little at the diet.
CARDENIO said discreetly, "Try it,
Try it, my Own. You have no choice,
What if you lose your charming voice!"
She tried, it seems. And whether then
Some god stepped in, benign to men;
Or Modesty, too long outlawed,
Contrived to aid the pious fraud,
I know not:--but from that same day
She talked in quite a different way.

THE NOBLE PATRON.

"_Ce sont les amours
Qui font les beaux jours._"

What is a _Patron_? JOHNSON knew,
And well that lifelike portrait drew.
_He is a Patron who looks down
With careless eye on men who drown;
But if they chance to reach the land,
Encumbers them with helping hand._
Ah! happy we whose artless rhyme
No longer now must creep to climb!
Ah! happy we of later days,
Who 'scape those _Caudine Forks_ of praise!
Whose votive page may dare commend
A Brother, or a private Friend!
Not so it fared with scribbling man,
As POPE says, "under my Queen ANNE."

DICK DOVECOT (this was long, be sure,
Ere he attained his _Wiltshire_ cure,
And settled down, like humbler folks,
To cowslip wine and country jokes)
Once hoped--as who will not?--for fame,
And dreamed of honours and a Name.

A fresh-cheek'd lad, he came to Town
In homespun hose and russet brown,
But armed at point with every view
Enforced in RAPIN and BOSSU.
Besides a stout portfolio ripe
For LINTOT'S or for TONSON'S type.
He went the rounds, saw all the sights,
Dropped in at _Wills_ and _Tom's_ o' nights;
Heard BURNET preach, saw BICKNELL dance,
E'en gained from ADDISON a glance;
Nay, once, to make his bliss complete,
He supp'd with STEELE in _Bury Street_.
('Tis true the feast was half by stealth:
PRUE was in bed: they drank her health.)

By this his purse was running low,
And he must either print or go.
He went to TONSON. TONSON said--
Well! TONSON hummed and shook his head;
Deplor'd the times; abus'd the Town;
But thought--at length--it might go down;
With aid, of course, of _Elzevir_,
And _Prologue_ to a Prince, or Peer.
Dick winced at this, for adulation
Was scarce that candid youth's vocation:
Nor did he deem his rustic lays
Required a _Coronet_ for _Bays_.

But there--the choice was that, or none.
The Lord was found; the thing was done.
With HORACE and with TOOKE'S _Pantheon_,
He penn'd his tributary pæan;
Despatched his gift, nor waited long
The meed of his ingenuous song.

Ere two days pass'd, a hackney chair
Brought a pert spark with languid air,
A lace cravat about his throat,--
Brocaded gown,--en _papillotes_.
("My Lord himself," quoth DICK, "at least!"
But no, 'twas that "inferior priest,"
His Lordship's man.) He held a card:
My Lord (it said) would see the Bard.

The day arrived; DICK went, was shown
Into an anteroom, alone--
A great gilt room with mirrored door,
Festoons of flowers and marble floor,
Whose lavish splendours made him look
More shabby than a sheepskin book.
(His own book--by the way--he spied
On a far table, toss'd aside.)

DICK waited, as they only wait
Who haunt the chambers of the Great.
He heard the chairmen come and go;
He heard the Porter yawn below;
Beyond him, in the Grand Saloon,
He heard the silver stroke of noon,
And thought how at this very time
The old church clock at home would chime.
Dear heart, how plain he saw it all!
The lich-gate and the crumbling wall,
The stream, the pathway to the wood,
The bridge where they so oft had stood.
Then, in a trice, both church and clock
Vanish'd before ... a shuttlecock.

A shuttlecock! And following slow
The zigzag of its to-and-fro,
And so intent upon its flight
She neither look'd to left nor right,
Came a tall girl with floating hair,
Light as a wood-nymph, and as fair.

_O Dea certé!_--thought poor Dick,
And thereupon his memories quick
Ran back to her who flung the ball
In HOMER'S page, and next to all
The dancing maids that bards have sung;
Lastly to One at home, as young,
As fresh, as light of foot, and glad,
Who, when he went, had seem'd so sad.
_O Dea certé!_ (Still, he stirred
Nor hand nor foot, nor uttered word.)

Meanwhile the shuttlecock in air
Went darting gaily here and there;
Now crossed a mirror's face, and next
Shot up amidst the sprawl'd, perplex'd
Olympus overhead. At last,
Jerk'd sidelong by a random cast,
The striker miss'd it, and it fell
Full on the book DICK knew so well.

(If he had thought to speak or bow,
Judge if he moved a muscle now!)

The player paused, bent down to look,
Lifted a cover of the book;
Pished at the Prologue, passed it o'er,
Went forward for a page or more
(_Asem and Asa_: DICK could trace
Almost the passage and the place);
Then for a moment with bent head
Rested upon her hand and read.

(DICK thought once more how cousin CIS
Used when she read to lean like this;--
"Used when she _read_,"--why, CIS could _say_
All he had written,--any day!)

Sudden was heard a hurrying tread;
The great doors creaked. The reader fled.
Forth came a crowd with muffled laughter,
A waft of Bergamot, and after,
His Chaplain smirking at his side,
My Lord himself in all his pride--
A portly shape in stars and lace,
With wine-bag cheeks and vacant face.

DICK bowed and smiled. The Great Man stared,
With look half puzzled and half scared;
Then seemed to recollect, turned round,
And mumbled some imperfect sound:
A moment more, his coach of state
Dipped on its springs beneath his weight;
And DICK, who followed at his heels,
Heard but the din of rolling wheels.

Away, too, all his dreams had rolled;
And yet they left him half consoled:
Fame, after all, he thought might wait.
Would CIS? Suppose he were too late!
Ten months he'd lost in Town--an age!

Next day he took the _Wiltshire_ Stage.

VERS DE SOCIETE.

INCOGNITA.

Just for a space that I met her--
Just for a day in the train!
It began when she feared it would wet her,
That tiniest spurtle of rain:
So we tucked a great rug in the sashes,
And carefully padded the pane;
And I sorrow in sackcloth and ashes,
Longing to do it again!

Then it grew when she begged me to reach her
A dressing-case under the seat;
She was "really so tiny a creature,
That she needed a stool for her feet!"
Which was promptly arranged to her order
With a care that was even minute,
And a glimpse--of an open-work border,
And a glance--of the fairyest boot.

Then it drooped, and revived at some hovels--
"Were they houses for men or for pigs?"
Then it shifted to muscular novels,
With a little digression on prigs:
She thought "Wives and Daughters" "so jolly;"
"Had I read it?" She knew when I had,
Like the rest, I should dote upon "Molly;"
And "poor Mrs. Gaskell--how sad!"

"Like Browning?" "But so-so." His proof lay
Too deep for her frivolous mood.
That preferred your mere metrical _soufflé_
To the stronger poetical food;
Yet at times he was good--"as a tonic:"
Was Tennyson writing just now?
And was this new poet Byronic,
And clever, and naughty, or how?

Then we trifled with concerts and croquêt,
Then she daintily dusted her face;
Then she sprinkled herself with "Ess Bouquet,"
Fished out from the foregoing case;
And we chattered of Gassier and Grisi,
And voted Aunt Sally a bore;
Discussed if the tight rope were easy,
Or Chopin much harder than Spohr.

And oh! the odd things that she quoted,
With the prettiest possible look,
And the price of two buns that she noted
In the prettiest possible book;
While her talk like a musical rillet
Flashed on with the hours that flew,
And the carriage, her smile seemed to fill it
With just enough summer--for Two.

Till at last in her corner, peeping
From a nest of rugs and of furs,
With the white shut eyelids sleeping
On those dangerous looks of hers,
She seemed like a snow-drop breaking,
Not wholly alive nor dead,
But with one blind impulse making
To the sounds of the spring overhead;

And I watched in the lamplight's swerving
The shade of the down-dropt lid,
And the lip-line's delicate curving,
Where a slumbering smile lay hid,
Till I longed that, rather than sever,
The train should shriek into space,
And carry us onward--for ever,--
Me and that beautiful face.

But she suddenly woke in a fidget,
With fears she was "nearly at home,"
And talk of a certain Aunt Bridget,
Whom I mentally wished--well, at Rome;
Got out at the very next station,
Looking back with a merry _Bon Soir_,
Adding, too, to my utter vexation,
A surplus, unkind _Au Revoir_.

So left me to muse on her graces,
To dose and to muse, till I dreamed
That we sailed through the sunniest places
In a glorified galley, it seemed;
But the cabin was made of a carriage,
And the ocean was Eau-de-Cologne,
And we split on a rock labelled MARRIAGE,
And I woke,--as cold as a stone.

And that's how I lost her--a jewel,
_Incognita_--one in a crowd,
Nor prudent enough to be cruel,
Nor worldly enough to be proud.
It was just a shut lid and its lashes,
Just a few hours in a train,
And I sorrow in sackcloth and ashes
Longing to see her again.

DORA VERSUS ROSE.

"_The Case is proceeding._"

From the tragic-est novels at Mudie's--
At least, on a practical plan--
To the tales of mere Hodges and Judys,
One love is enough for a man.
But no case that I ever yet met is
Like mine: I am equally fond
Of Rose, who a charming brunette is,
And Dora, a blonde.

Each rivals the other in powers--
Each waltzes, each warbles, each paints--
Miss Rose, chiefly tumble-down towers;
Miss Do., perpendicular saints.
In short, to distinguish is folly;
'Twixt the pair I am come to the pass
Of Macheath, between Lucy and Polly,--
Or Buridan's ass.

If it happens that Rosa I've singled
For a soft celebration in rhyme,
Then the ringlets of Dora get mingled
Somehow with the tune and the time;
Or I painfully pen me a sonnet
To an eyebrow intended for Do.'s,
And behold I am writing upon it
The legend "To Rose."

Or I try to draw Dora (my blotter
Is all overscrawled with her head),
If I fancy at last that I've got her,
It turns to her rival instead;
Or I find myself placidly adding
To the rapturous tresses of Rose
Miss Dora's bud-mouth, and her madding,
Ineffable nose.

Was there ever so sad a dilemma?
For Rose I would perish (_pro tem._);
For Dora I'd willingly stem a--
(Whatever might offer to stem);
But to make the invidious election,--
To declare that on either one's side
I've a scruple,--a grain, more affection,
I _cannot_ decide.

And, as either so hopelessly nice is,
My sole and my final resource
Is to wait some indefinite crisis,--
Some feat of molecular force,
To solve me this riddle conducive
By no means to peace or repose,
Since the issue can scarce be inclusive
Of Dora _and_ Rose.

(_Afterthought._)

But, perhaps, if a third (say a Norah),
Not quite so delightful as Rose,--
Not wholly so charming as Dora,--
Should appear, is it wrong to suppose,--
As the claims of the others are equal,--
And flight--in the main--is the best,--
That I might ... But no matter,--the sequel
Is easily guessed.

AD ROSAM.

"_Mitte sectari ROSA quo locorum
Sera moretur._"
--Hor. i. 38.

I had a vacant dwelling--
Where situated, I,
As naught can serve the telling,
Decline to specify;--
Enough 'twas neither haunted,
Entailed, nor out of date;
I put up "Tenant Wanted,"
And left the rest to Fate.

Then, Rose, you passed the window,--
I see you passing yet,--
Ah, what could I within do,
When, Rose, our glances met!
You snared me, Rose, with ribbons,
Your rose-mouth made me thrall,
Brief--briefer far than Gibbon's,
Was my "Decline and Fall."

I heard the summons spoken
That all hear--king and clown:
You smiled--the ice was broken;
You stopped--the bill was down.
How blind we are! It never
Occurred to me to seek
If you had come for ever,
Or only for a week.

The words your voice neglected,
Seemed written in your eyes;
The thought your heart protected,
Your cheek told, missal-wise;--
I read the rubric plainly
As any Expert could;
In short, we dreamed,--insanely,
As only lovers should.

I broke the tall Oenone,
That then my chambers graced,
Because she seemed "too bony,"
To suit your purist taste;
And you, without vexation,
May certainly confess
Some graceful approbation,
Designed _à mon adresse_.

You liked me then, carina,--
You liked me then, I think;
For your sake gall had been a
Mere tonic-cup to drink;
For your sake, bonds were trivial,
The rack, a _tour-de-force_;
And banishment, convivial,--
You coming too, of course.

Then, Rose, a word in jest meant
Would throw you in a state
That no well-timed investment
Could quite alleviate;
Beyond a Paris trousseau
You prized my smile, I know,
I, yours--ah, more than Rousseau
The lip of d'Houdetot.

Then, Rose,--But why pursue it?
When Fate begins to frown
Best write the final "_fuit_,"
And gulp the physic down.
And yet,--and yet, that only,
The song should end with this:--
You left me,--left me lonely,
_Rosa mutabilis_!

Left me, with Time for Mentor,
(A dreary _tête-à-tête_!)
To pen my "Last Lament," or
Extemporize to Fate,
In blankest verse disclosing
My bitterness of mind,--
Which is, I learn, composing
In cases of the kind.

No, Rose. Though you refuse me,
Culture the pang prevents;
"I am not made"--excuse me--
"Of so slight elements;"
I leave to common lovers
The hemlock or the hood;
My rarer soul recovers
In dreams of public good.

The Roses of this nation--
Or so I understand
From careful computation--
Exceed the gross demand;
And, therefore, in civility
To maids that can't be matched,
No man of sensibility
Should linger unattached.

So, without further fashion--
A modern Curtius,
Plunging, from pure compassion,
To aid the overplus,--
I sit down, sad--not daunted,
And, in my weeds, begin
A new card--"Tenant Wanted;
Particulars within."

OUTWARD BOUND.

(HORACE, III. 7.)

"_Quid fles, Asterie, quem tibi candidi
Primo restituent vere Favonii--
Gygen?_"

Come, Laura, patience. Time and Spring
Your absent Arthur back shall bring,
Enriched with many an Indian thing
Once more to woo you;
Him neither wind nor wave can check,
Who, cramped beneath the "Simla's" deck,
Still constant, though with stiffened neck,
Makes verses to you.

Would it were wave and wind alone!
The terrors of the torrid zone,
The indiscriminate cyclone,
A man might parry;
But only faith, or "triple brass,"
Can help the "outward-bound" to pass
Safe through that eastward-faring class
Who sail to marry.

For him fond mothers, stout and fair,
Ascend the tortuous cabin stair
Only to hold around his chair
Insidious sessions;
For him the eyes of daughters droop
Across the plate of handed soup,
Suggesting seats upon the poop,
And soft confessions.

Nor are these all his pains, nor most.
Romancing captains cease to boast--
Loud majors leave their whist--to roast
The youthful griffin;
All, all with pleased persistence show
His fate,--"remote, unfriended, slow,"--
His "melancholy" bungalow,--
His lonely tiffin.

In vain. Let doubts assail the weak;
Unmoved and calm as "Adam's Peak,"
Your "blameless Arthur" hears them speak
Of woes that wait him;
Naught can subdue his soul secure;
"Arthur will come again," be sure,
Though matron shrewd and maid mature
Conspire to mate him.

But, Laura, on your side, forbear
To greet with too impressed an air
A certain youth with chestnut hair,--
A youth unstable;
Albeit none more skilled can guide
The frail canoe on Thamis tide,
Or, trimmer-footed, lighter glide
Through "Guards" or "Mabel."

Be warned in time. Without a trace
Of acquiescence on your face,
Hear, in the waltz's breathing-space,
His airy patter;
Avoid the confidential nook;
If, when you sing, you find his look
Grow tender, close your music-book,
And end the matter.

IN THE ROYAL ACADEMY.

HUGH (_on furlough_).
HELEN (_his cousin_).

HELEN.

They have not come! And ten is past,--
Unless, by chance, my watch is fast;
--Aunt Mabel surely told us "ten."

HUGH.

I doubt if she can do it, then.
In fact, their train....

HELEN.

That is,--you knew.
How could you be so treacherous, Hugh?

HUGH.

Nay;--it is scarcely mine, the crime,
One can't account for railway-time!
Where shall we sit? Not here, I vote;--
At least, there's nothing here of note.

HELEN.

Then _here_ we'll stay, please. Once for all,
I bar all artists,--great and small!
From now until we go in June
I shall hear nothing but this tune:--
Whether I like Long's "Vashti," or
Like Leslie's "Naughty Kitty" more;
With all that critics, right or wrong,
Have said of Leslie and of Long....
No. If you value my esteem,
I beg you'll take another theme;
Paint me some pictures, if you will,
But spare me these, for good and ill....

HUGH.

"Paint you some pictures!" Come, that's kind!
You know I'm nearly colour-blind.

HELEN.

Paint then, in words. You did before;
Scenes at--where was it? Dustypoor?
You know....

HUGH (_with an inspiration_).

I'll try.

HELEN.

But mind they're pretty
Not "hog hunts." ...

HUGH.

You shall be Committee,
And say if they are "out" or "in."

HELEN.

I shall reject them all. Begin.

HUGH.

Here is the first. An antique Hall
(Like Chanticlere) with panelled wall.
A boy, or rather lad. A girl,
Laughing with all her rows of pearl
Before a portrait in a ruff.
He meanwhile watches....

HELEN.

That's enough,
It wants "_verve_," "_brio_," "breadth," "design," ...
Besides, it's English. I decline.

HUGH.

This is the next. 'Tis finer far:
A foaming torrent (say Braemar).
A pony, grazing by a boulder,
Then the same pair, a little older,
Left by some lucky chance together.
He begs her for a sprig of heather....

HELEN.

--"Which she accords with smile seraphic."
I know it,--it was in the "Graphic."
Declined.

HUGH.

Once more, and I forego
All hopes of hanging, high or low:
Behold the hero of the scene,
In bungalow and palankeen....

HELEN.

What!--all at once! But that's absurd;--
Unless he's Sir Boyle Roche's bird!

HUGH.

Permit me--'Tis a Panorama,
In which the person of the drama,
Mid orientals dusk and tawny,
Mid warriors drinking brandy pawnee,
Mid scorpions, dowagers, and griffins,
In morning rides, at noon-day tiffins,
In every kind of place and weather,
Is solaced ... by a sprig of heather.

(_More seriously._)

He puts that faded scrap before
The "Rajah," or the "Koh-i-noor"....
He would not barter it for all
Benares, or the Taj-Mahal....
It guides,--directs his every act,
And word, and thought--In short--in fact--
I mean ...

(_Opening his locket._)

Look, Helen, that's the heather!
(Too late! Here come both Aunts together.)

HELEN.

What heather, Sir?

(_After a pause._)

And why ... "too late?"
--Aunt Dora, how you've made us wait!
Don't you agree that it's a pity
Portraits are hung by the Committee?

THE LAST DESPATCH.

Hurrah! the Season's past at last;
At length we've "done" our pleasure.
Dear "Pater," if you _only_ knew
How much I've _longed_ for home and you,--
Our own green lawn and leisure!

And then the pets! One half forgets
The dear dumb friends--in Babel.
I hope my special fish is fed;--
I long to see poor Nigra's head
Pushed at me from the stable!

I long to see the cob and "Rob,"--
Old Bevis and the Collie;
And _won't_ we read in "Traveller's Rest"!
Home readings after all are best;--
None else seem half so "jolly!"

One misses your dear kindly store
Of fancies quaint and funny;
One misses, too, your kind _bon-mot_;--
The Mayfair wit I mostly know
Has more of gall than honey!

How tired one grows of "calls and balls!"
This "_toujours perdrix_" wearies;
I'm longing, quite, for "Notes on Knox";
(_Apropos_, I've the loveliest box
For holding _Notes and Queries_!)

A change of place would suit my case.
You'll take me?--on probation?
As "Lady-help," then, let it be;
I feel (as Lavender shall see),
That Jams are _my_ vocation!

How's Lavender? My love to her.
Does Briggs still flirt with Flowers?--
Has Hawthorn stubbed the common clear?--
You'll let me give _some_ picnics, Dear,
And ask the Vanes and Towers?

I met Belle Vane. "HE'S" still in Spain!
Sir John won't let them marry.
Aunt drove the boys to Brompton Rink;
And Charley,--changing Charley,--think,
Is now _au mieux_ with Carry!

And NO. You know what "_No_" I mean--
There's no one yet at present:
The Benedick I have in view
Must be a something wholly new,--
One's father's _far_ too pleasant.

So hey, I say, for home and you!
Good-by to Piccadilly;
Balls, beaux, and Bolton-row, adieu!
Expect me, Dear, at half-past two;
Till then,--your Own Fond--MILLY.

"PREMIERS AMOURS."

_Old Loves and old dreams,--_
_"Requiescant in pace."_
_How strange now it seems,--_
_"Old" Loves and "old" dreams!_
_Yet we once wrote you reams
_Maude, Alice, and Gracie!_
_Old Loves and old dreams,--_
_"Requiescant in pace."_

When I called at the "Hollies" to-day,
In the room with the cedar-wood presses,
Aunt Deb. was just folding away
What she calls her "memorial dresses."

She'd the frock that she wore at fifteen,--
Short-waisted, of course--my abhorrence;
She'd "the loveliest"--something in "een"
That she wears in her portrait by Lawrence;

She'd the "jelick" she used--"as a Greek," (!)
She'd the habit she got her bad fall in;
She had e'en the blue _moiré antique_
That she opened Squire Grasshopper's ball in:--

New and old they were all of them there:--
Sleek velvet and bombazine stately,--
She had hung them each over a chair
To the "_paniers_" she's taken to lately

(Which she showed me, I think, by mistake).
And I conned o'er the forms and the fashions,
Till the faded old shapes seemed to wake
All the ghosts of my passed-away "passions;"--

From the days of love's youthfullest dream,
When the height of my shooting idea
Was to burn, like a young Polypheme,
For a somewhat mature Galatea.

There was Lucy, who "tiffed" with her first,
And who threw me as soon as her third came;
There was Norah, whose cut was the worst,
For she told me to wait till my "berd" came;

Pale Blanche, who subsisted on salts;
Blonde Bertha, who doted on Schiller;
Poor Amy, who taught me to waltz;
Plain Ann, that I wooed for the "siller;"--

All danced round my head in a ring,
Like "The Zephyrs" that somebody painted,
All shapes of the feminine thing--
Shy, scornful, seductive, and sainted,--

To my Wife, in the days she was young....
"How, Sir," says that lady, disgusted,
"Do you dare to include ME among
Your loves that have faded and rusted?"

"Not at all!"--I benignly retort.
(I was just the least bit in a temper!)
"Those, alas! were the fugitive sort,
But you are my--_eadem semper_!"

Full stop,--and a Sermon. Yet think,--
There was surely good ground for a quarrel,--
She had checked me when just on the brink
Of--I feel--a remarkable MORAL.

THE SCREEN IN THE LUMBER ROOM.

Yes, here it is, behind the box,
That puzzle wrought so neatly--
That paradise of paradox--
We once knew so completely;
You see it? 'Tis the same, I swear,
Which stood, that chill September,
Beside your aunt Lavinia's chair
The year when ... You remember?

Look, Laura, look! You must recall
This florid "Fairy's Bower,"
This wonderful Swiss waterfall,
And this old "Leaning Tower;"
And here's the "Maiden of Cashmere,"
And here is Bewick's "Starling,"
And here the dandy cuirassier
You thought was "such a Darling!"

Your poor dear Aunt! you know her way,
She used to say this figure
Reminded her of Count D'Orsay
"In all his youthful vigour;"
And here's the "cot beside the hill"
We chose for habitation,
The day that ... But I doubt if still
You'd like the situation!

Too damp--by far! She little knew,
Your guileless Aunt Lavinia,
Those evenings when she slumbered through
"The Prince of Abyssinia,"
That there were two beside her chair
Who both had quite decided
To see things in a rosier air
Than Rasselas provided!

Ah! men wore stocks in Britain's land,
And maids short waists and tippets,
When this old-fashioned screen was planned
From hoarded scraps and snippets;
But more--far more, I think--to me
Than those who first designed it,
Is this--in Eighteen Seventy-Three
I kissed you first behind it.

DAISY'S VALENTINES.

All night through Daisy's sleep, it seems,
Have ceaseless "rat-tats" thundered;
All night through Daisy's rosy dreams
Have devious Postmen blundered,
Delivering letters round her bed,--
Mysterious missives, sealed with red,
And franked of course with due Queen's-head,--
While Daisy lay and wondered.

But now, when chirping birds begin,
And Day puts off the Quaker,--
When Cook renews her morning din,
And rates the cheerful baker,--
She dreams her dream no dream at all,
For, just as pigeons come at call,
Winged letters flutter down, and fall
Around her head, and wake her.

Yes, there they are! With quirk and twist,
And fraudful arts directed;
(Save Grandpapa's dear stiff old "fist,"
Through all disguise detected;)
But which is his,--her young Lothair's,--
Who wooed her on the school-room stairs
With three sweet cakes, and two ripe pears,
In one neat pile collected?

'Tis there, be sure. Though truth to speak,
(If truth may be permitted),
I doubt that young "gift-bearing Greek"
Is scarce for fealty fitted;
For has he not (I grieve to say),
To two loves more, on this same day,
In just this same emblazoned way,
His transient vows transmitted?

He _may_ be true. Yet, Daisy dear,
That even youth grows colder
You'll find is no new thing, I fear;
And when you're somewhat older,
You'll read of one Dardanian boy
Who "wooed with gifts" a maiden coy,--
Then took the morning train to Troy,
In spite of all he'd told her.

But wait. Your time will come. And then,
Obliging Fates, please send her
The bravest thing you have in men,
Sound-hearted, strong, and tender;--
The kind of man, dear Fates, you know,
That feels how shyly Daisies grow,
And what soft things they are, and so
Will spare to spoil or mend her.

IN TOWN.

"_The blue fly sung in the pane._"--Tennyson.

Toiling in Town now is "horrid,"
(There is that woman again!)--
June in the zenith is torrid,
Thought gets dry in the brain.

There is that woman again:
"Strawberries! fourpence a pottle!"
Thought gets dry in the brain;
Ink gets dry in the bottle.

"Strawberries! fourpence a pottle!"
Oh for the green of a lane!--
Ink gets dry in the bottle;
"Buzz" goes a fly in the pane!

Oh for the green of a lane,
Where one might lie and be lazy!
"Buzz" goes a fly in the pane;
Bluebottles drive me crazy!

Where one might lie and be lazy,
Careless of Town and all in it!--
Bluebottles drive me crazy:
I shall go mad in a minute!

Careless of Town and all in it,
With some one to soothe and to still you;--
I shall go mad in a minute;
Bluebottle, then I shall kill you!

With some one to soothe and to still you,
As only one's feminine kin do,--
Bluebottle, then I shall kill you:
There now! I've broken the window!

As only one's feminine kin do,--
Some muslin-clad Mabel or May!--
There now! I've broken the window!
Bluebottle's off and away!

Some muslin-clad Mabel or May,
To dash one with eau de Cologne;--
Bluebottle's off and away;
And why should I stay here alone!

To dash one with eau de Cologne,
All over one's eminent forehead;--
And why should I stay here alone!
Toiling in Town now is "horrid."

A SONNET IN DIALOGUE.

FRANK (_on the Lawn_).
Come to the Terrace, May,--the sun is low.

MAY (_in the House_).
Thanks, I prefer my Browning here instead.

FRANK.
There are two peaches by the strawberry bed.

MAY.
They will be riper if we let them grow.

FRANK.
Then the Park-aloe is in bloom, you know.

MAY.
Also, her Majesty Queen Anne is dead.

FRANK.
But surely, May, your pony must be fed.

MAY.
And was, and is. I fed him hours ago.
'Tis useless, Frank, you see I shall not stir.

FRANK.
Still, I had something you would like to hear.

MAY.
No doubt some new frivolity of men.

FRANK.
Nay,--'tis a thing the gentler sex deplores
Chiefly, I think....

MAY (_coming to the window_).
What is this secret, then?

FRANK (_mysteriously_).
There are no eyes more beautiful than yours!

GROWING GRAY.

"_On a l'âge de son coeur._"--A. d'Houdetot.

A little more toward the light;--
Me miserable! Here's one that's white;
And one that's turning;
Adieu to song and "salad days;"
My Muse, let's go at once to Jay's,
And order mourning.

We must reform our rhymes, my Dear,--
Renounce the gay for the severe,--
Be grave, not witty;
We have, no more, the right to find
That Pyrrha's hair is neatly twined,--
That Chloe's pretty.

Young Love's for us a farce that's played;
Light canzonet and serenade
No more may tempt us;
Gray hairs but ill accord with dreams;
From aught but sour didactic themes
Our years exempt us.

Indeed! you really fancy so?
You think for one white streak we grow
At once satiric?
A fiddlestick! Each hair's a string
To which our ancient Muse shall sing
A younger lyric.

The heart's still sound. Shall "cakes and ale"
Grow rare to youth because _we_ rail
At schoolboy dishes?
Perish the thought! 'Tis ours to chant
When neither Time nor Tide can grant
Belief with wishes.

VARIA.

THE MALTWORM'S MADRIGAL.

I drink of the Ale of Southwark, I drink of the Ale of Chepe;
At noon I dream on the settle; at night I cannot sleep;
For my love, my love it groweth; I waste me all the day;
And when I see sweet Alison, I know not what to say.

The sparrow when he spieth his Dear upon the tree,
He beateth-to his little wing; he chirketh lustily;
But when I see sweet Alison, the words begin to fail;
I wot that I shall die of Love--an I die not of Ale.

Her lips are like the muscadel; her brows are black as ink;
Her eyes are bright as beryl stones that in the tankard wink;
But when she sees me coming, she shrilleth out--"Te-Hee!
Fye on thy ruddy nose, Cousin, what lackest thou of me?"

"Fye on thy ruddy nose, Cousin! Why be thine eyes so small?
Why go thy legs tap-lappetty like men that fear to fall?
Why is thy leathern doublet besmeared with stain and spot?
Go to. Thou art no man (she saith)--thou art a Pottle-pot!"

"No man," i'faith. "No man!" she saith. And "Pottle-pot" thereto!
"Thou sleepest like our dog all day; thou drink'st as fishes do."
I would that I were Tibb the dog; he wags at her his tail;
Or would that I were fish, in truth, and all the sea were Ale!

So I drink of the Ale of Southwark, I drink of the Ale of Chepe;
All day I dream in the sunlight; I dream and eke I weep,
But little lore of loving can any flagon teach,
For when my tongue is looséd most, then most I lose my speech.

AN APRIL PASTORAL.

_He._ Whither away, fair Neat-herdess?
_She._ Shepherd, I go to tend my kine.
_He._ Stay thou, and watch this flock of mine.
_She._ With thee? Nay, that were idleness.
_He._ Thy kine will pasture none the less.
_She._ Not so: they wait me and my sign.
_He._ I'll pipe to thee beneath the pine.
_She._ Thy pipe will soothe not their distress.
_He._ Dost thou not hear beside the spring
How the gay birds are carolling?
_She._ I hear them. But it may not be.
_He._ Farewell then, Sweetheart! Farewell now.
_She._ Shepherd, farewell----Where goest thou?
_He._ I go ... to tend thy kine for thee!

A NEW SONG OF THE SPRING GARDENS.

_To the Burden of "Rogues All."_

Come hither ye gallants, come hither ye maids,
To the trim gravelled walks, to the shady arcades;
Come hither, come hither, the nightingales call;--
Sing _Tantarara_,--Vauxhall! Vauxhall!

Come hither, ye cits, from your Lothbury hives!
Come hither, ye husbands, and look to your wives!
For the sparks are as thick as the leaves in the Mall;--
Sing _Tantarara_,--Vauxhall! Vauxhall!

Here the 'prentice from Aldgate may ogle a Toast!
Here his Worship must elbow the Knight of the Post!
For the wicket is free to the great and the small;--
Sing _Tantarara_,--Vauxhall! Vauxhall!

Here Betty may flaunt in her mistress's sack!
Here Trip wear his master's brocade on his back!
Here a hussy may ride, and a rogue take the wall;--
Sing _Tantarara_,--Vauxhall! Vauxhall!

Here Beauty may grant, and here Valour may ask!
Here the plainest may pass for a Belle (in a mask)!
Here a domino covers the short and the tall;--
Sing _Tantarara_,--Vauxhall! Vauxhall!

'Tis a type of the world, with its drums and its din;
'Tis a type of the world, for when once you come in
You are loth to go out; like the world 'tis a ball;--
Sing _Tantarara_,--Vauxhall! Vauxhall!

A LOVE-SONG.

(XVIII. CENT.)

When first in CELIA'S ear I poured
A yet unpractised pray'r,
My trembling tongue sincere ignored
The aids of "sweet" and "fair."
I only said, as in me lay,
I'd strive her "worth" to reach;
She frowned, and turned her eyes away,--
So much for truth in speech.

Then DELIA came. I changed my plan;
I praised her to her face;
I praised her features,--praised her fan,
Her lap-dog and her lace;
I swore that not till Time were dead
My passion should decay;
She, smiling, gave her hand, and said
'Twill last then--for a DAY.

OF HIS MISTRESS.

(_After Anthony Hamilton._)

To G. S.

She that I love is neither brown nor fair,
And, in a word her worth to say,
There is no maid that with her may
Compare.

Yet of her charms the count is clear, I ween:
There are five hundred things we see,
And then five hundred too there be,
Not seen.

Her wit, her wisdom are direct from Heaven:
But the sweet Graces from their store
A thousand finer touches more
Have given.

Her cheek's warm dye what painter's brush could note?
Beside her Flora would be wan
And white as whiteness of the swan
Her throat.

Her supple waist, her arm from Venus came,
Hebe her nose and lip confess,
And, looking in her eyes, you guess
Her name.

THE NAMELESS CHARM.

(_Expanded from an Epigram of Piron._)

Stella, 'tis not your dainty head,
Your artless look, I own;
'Tis not your dear coquettish tread,
Or this, or that, alone;

Nor is it all your gifts combined;
'Tis something in your face,--
The untranslated, undefined,
Uncertainty of grace,

That taught the Boy on Ida's hill
To whom the meed was due;
_All three have equal charms--but still
This one I give it to!_

TO PHIDYLE.

(HOR. III., 23.)

Incense, and flesh of swine, and this year's grain,
At the new moon, with suppliant hands, bestow,
O rustic Phidyle! So naught shall know
Thy crops of blight, thy vine of Afric bane,
And hale the nurslings of thy flock remain
Through the sick apple-tide. Fit victims grow
'Twixt holm and oak upon the Algid snow,
Or Alban grass, that with their necks must stain
The Pontiff's axe: to thee can scarce avail
Thy modest gods with much slain to assail,
Whom myrtle crowns and rosemary can please.
Lay on the altar a hand pure of fault;
More than rich gifts the Powers it shall appease,
Though pious but with meal and crackling salt.

TO HIS BOOK.

(HOR. EP. I., 20.)

For mart and street you seem to pine
With restless glances, Book of mine!
Still craving on some stall to stand,
Fresh pumiced from the binder's hand.
You chafe at locks, and burn to quit
Your modest haunt and audience fit
For hearers less discriminate.
I reared you up for no such fate.
Still, if you _must_ be published, go;
But mind, you can't come back, you know!

"What have I done?" I hear you cry,
And writhe beneath some critic's eye;
"What did I want?"--when, scarce polite,
They do but yawn, and roll you tight.
And yet methinks, if I may guess
(Putting aside your heartlessness
In leaving me and this your home),
You should find favour, too, at Rome.
That is, they'll like you while you're young,
When you are old, you'll pass among
The Great Unwashed,--then thumbed and sped,
Be fretted of slow moths, unread,
Or to Ilerda you'll be sent,
Or Utica, for banishment!
And I, whose counsel you disdain,
At that your lot shall laugh amain,
Wryly, as he who, like a fool,
Thrust o'er the cliff his restive mule.
Nay! there is worse behind. In age
They e'en may take your babbling page
In some remotest "slum" to teach
Mere boys their rudiments of speech!

But go. When on warm days you see
A chance of listeners, speak of me.
Tell them I soared from low estate,
A freedman's son, to higher fate
(That is, make up to me in worth
What you must take in point of birth);
Then tell them that I won renown
In peace and war, and pleased the town;
Paint me as early gray, and one
Little of stature, fond of sun,
Quick-tempered, too,--but nothing more.
Add (if they ask) I'm forty-four,
Or was, the year that over us
Both Lollius ruled and Lepidus.

FOR A COPY OF HERRICK.