Chapter II: Preface (2)

In faces sweet seek all men consolation;
Our “fair”
Laugh, lisp, and lighten life, and find flirtation
A snare.
But wit and soul are mightier things than Time
Can wrong,
Linked with a silv’ry voice that is sublime
In song.
Dreams of fair girls illume, like stars on pall,
Life’s story;
Give rapture rare, and our soft slumbers all
Their glory.

F. B. DOVETON.

Truths take live forms that make a hope for labour,
Though rare,
When life seems sweeter with each bright hope’s neighbour――
Dreams fair.
Progress had not been crushed nor lost its spell
For men,
Had Rousseau never found the tyrant’s knell,
His pen.
Had Gladstone’s self ne’er poured the words that burn
For token,
The voice of Right for myriads who earn
Had spoken.

And yet these truths which show to us immortal
To-day,
When swart Injustice sees through its last portal
Decay;
The joy these truths can give to heart and soul,
And pour
Glory on prophets gone who filled the roll
Of yore;
Truths, gifts, and hopes that make our life’s hard track
Worth living――
What were they did no voices thunder back
Thanksgiving?

Mere thoughts, mere hopes, mere dreams, mere visions showing
No form;
The statesman gives their shape in language glowing
Heart-warm.
In deathless speech their life is found, their power
Is seen,
Else were their names the shadows of an hour
That’s been.
Mere theories rise, fall, and fade, though all
May cherish.
The fact endures, free speech forbids its fall
To perish.

In champions’ tongues has truth its full progression:
Bare thought
Dawns, shines, and fades, through finding no expression,
Though sought.
But speech and Press are mightier than all sway
Can bind,
Made potent by wide utterance their way
To find.
Progress and Freedom, though Time’s tide that rolls
Wax hoary,
Give to a nation’s life, both mind’s and soul’s,
Its glory.

A. PRATT.

――――:o:――――

LOFTY LINES.
(_By a Swinburnean Lofty Liner._)

Imparadised by my environment,
In rhymes impeccably good,
Let me scribble, as poor proud Byron meant
To have scribbled, if he could!
I’ll strain, as the sinuous cameleopard
Strains after the blossomy bough,
And with faculties that develop hard
Let me write――I can’t say how.

Impish idiom’s idiosyncrasy
Shall my verse festoon with flowers;
In a kingdom of pen-and-inkrasy
I shall wield prosodian powers.
Through innumerous apotheoses
The future my name shall learn,
And like passionate plethoric peonies
My perpetual poems burn.

Let my glory grow as the icicle
Accrues between night and morn;
As the bicyclist rides his bicycle
Let me on my metre be borne.
Flashing thus on verses vehicular,
With Pegasus ’neath my touch,
My method can’t be too particular,
Nor the public see too much.

The critics are all anthropophagous,
And feed on poetic flesh;
My heart nestles in my esophagous,
To think I’ve been in their mesh.
As vessels that sail on the Bosphorus
Catch Constantinople’s beams,
So my soul from prosody’s phosphorus
Still gathers Dædalian gleams.

_Funny Folks_, May 11, 1878.

――――

_The Family Herald_ (London) for July 28, 1888, contained an amusing article on _Parodies_, from which the following is an extract:

“But we wish to get away from well-trodden tracks, and we
will for once forsake our usual purely didactic groove in
order that we may give our readers an idea of what we regard
as artistic drollery, Take this dreadful imitation of Mr.
Swinburne’s manner. The parodist seems to have genuinely
enjoyed his work; and we have no doubt but that Mr.
Swinburne laughed as heartily as anybody. The poet is
supposed to be attending a wedding of distinguished persons
in Westminster Abbey, and the naughty scoffer represents him
as bursting forth with the following rather alarming clarion
call――

There is glee in the groves of the Galilean――
The groves that were wont to be gray and glum――
And a sound goes forth to the dim Ægean,
To Helen hopeless and Dido dumb――
The sound of a noise of cab or carriage,
A rhythm of rapture, a mode of marriage.
Sing “Hallelujah!” Shout “Io Pæan!”
Hymen――O Hymen, behold, they come!

What shall I sing to them? How shall I speak to them?
Whose is the speech that a groom thinks good?
Oh that a while I might gabble in Greek to them――
Gabble and gush and be understood,
Gush and glow and be understanded,
Apprehended and shaken-handed!
Yea, though a minute should seem a week to them,
I would utter such words as I might or could!

For winter’s coughs and cossets are over,
And all the season of sniffs and snows,
The rheums that ravish lover from lover,
The eyes that water, the nose that blows;
And time forgotten is not remembered,
And cards are wedded and cake dismembered,
And in the Abbey, closed, under cover,
Blooms and blossoms and breaks love’s rose.

A masterpiece! And there is not a touch of malignity in the
lines; the poet’s curious way of writing occasionally in the
Hebraic style, his vagueness, his peculiar mode of procuring
musical effects, are all picked out and shown with a smile.
No one has quite equalled Caldecott, but this anonymous wit
runs him hard.”

Unfortunately the author of the article omits to state the source from whence he derived the parody he praises so highly.

――――

HOME, SWEET HOME.

As Algernon Charles Swinburne might have wrapped
it up in Variations.

(’_Mid pleasures and palaces_――)

As sea-foam blown of the winds, as blossom of brine that is drifted
Hither and yon on the barren breast of the breeze,
Though we wander on gusts of a god’s breast shaken and shifted,
The salt of us stings, and is sore for the sobbing seas.
For home’s sake hungry at heart, we sicken in pillared porches
Of bliss made sick for a life that is barren of bliss,
For the place whereon is a light out of heaven that sears not nor
scorches,
Nor elsewhere than this.

(_An exile from home, splendour dazzles in vain_――)

For here we know shall no gold thing glisten
No bright thing burn, and no sweet thing shine;
Nor Love lower never an ear to listen
To words that work in the heart like wine.

What time we are set from our land apart,
For pain of passion and hunger of heart,
Though we walk with exiles fame faints to christen,
Or sing at the Cytherean’s shrine.

(VARIATION: _An exile from home_.)

Whether with him whose head of gods is honorèd
With song made splendent in the sight of men
Whose heart most sweetly stout,
From ravished France cast out,
Bring firstly hers, was hers most wholly then――
Or where on shining seas like wine
The dove’s wings draw the drooping Erycine.

(_Give me my lowly thatched cottage_――)

For Joy finds Love grow bitter,
And spreads his wings to quit her,
At thoughts of birds that twitter
Beneath the roof-tree’s straw――
Of birds that come for calling,
No fear or fright appalling,
When dews of dusk are falling,
Or day light’s draperies draw.

(_Give me them, and the peace of mind._)

Give me these things then back, though the giving
Be at cost of earth’s garner of gold;
There is no life without these worth living,
No treasure where these are not told.
For the heart give the hope that it knows not,
Give the balm for the burn of the breast――
For the soul and the mind that repose not,
O, give us a rest!

H. C. BUNNER.

This Parody originally appeared in _Scribner’s Monthly_, May, 1881, with imitations of Bret Harte, Austin Dobson, Oliver Goldsmith, and Walt Whitman. They were afterwards republished in a volume, entitled _Airs from Arcady_, by H. C. Bunner. London, Charles Hutt, 1885.

――――:o:――――

A SWINBURNIAN INTERLUDE.

Short space shall be hereafter
Ere April brings the hour
Of weeping and of laughter,
Of sunshine and of shower,
Of groaning and of gladness,
Of singing and of sadness,
Of melody and madness,
Of all sweet things and sour.

Sweet to the blithe bucolic
Who knows nor cribs nor crams,
Who sees the frisky frolic
Of lanky little lambs:
But sour beyond expression
To one in deep depression
Who sees the closing session,
And imminent exams.

He cannot hear the singing
Of birds upon the bents.
Nor watch the wild-flowers springing.
Nor smell the April scents.
He gathers grief with grinding,
Foul food of sorrow finding
In books of beastly binding
And beastlier contents.

Our hope alone sustains him,
And no more hopes beside,
One only trust restrains him
From shocking suicide:
He will not play nor palter
With hemlock or with halter,
He will not fear nor falter,
Whatever chance betide.

He knows examinations
Like all things else have ends,
And then come vast vacations
And visits to his friends:
And youth with pleasure yoking,
And joyfulness and joking,
And smilingness and smoking,
For grief to make amends.

_The University News Sheet._ St. Andrews, N. B. March 31, 1886.

――――:o:――――

VACCINE.
_Written after reading “Faustine.”_

Hail! sacred salutary nymph,
Fair freckless queen;
Pure and translucent flows thy lymph,
Potent Vaccine!

“Each shapely silver arm” receives
The lancet keen;
E’en warriors trembling raise their sleeves
For thee, Vaccine.

“Let me go over your good gifts,”
That plain are seen;
Thou sav’st the face from scars and rifts,
Clear-browed Vaccine.

Belovèd maid of many charms,
Calm and serene,
Fondly we take thee _in our arms_,
Lovely Vaccine!

Virtue of inoculation,
To try we mean;
We’re _now_ a humour-us nation,
You’ll own, Vaccine.

Doctors, like ancient knights again,
With lances keen,
Daily go “pricking o’er the plain,”
With thee, Vaccine.

It would have gladdened Jenner’s heart,
Could he have seen
Such thousands suffering from the smart
Of thee, Vaccine.

And _Jenner-ations_ yet to be
Seen on life’s scene,
Shall pæans sing in praise of thee,
Saving Vaccine!

_The Day’s Doings._ March 4, 1871.

――――:o:――――

LA BELLE DAME SANS MERCI
(A.D. 1875).

Oh, what can ail thee, seedy swell,
Alone, and idly loitering?
The season’s o’er――at operas
No “stars” now sing.

Oh, what can ail thee, seedy swell,
So moody! in the dumps so down?
Why linger here when all the world
Is “out of town?”

I see black care upon thy brow,
Tell me, are I.O.U.’s now due?
And in thy pouch, I fear thy purse
Is empty, too.

“I met a lady at a ball,
Full beautiful――a fairy bright;
Her hair was golden (dyed, I find!)
Struck by the sight――

“I gazed, and long’d to know her then:
So I entreated the M.C.
To introduce me――and he did!
Sad hour for me.

“We paced the mazy dance, and too,
We talked thro’ that sweet evening long,
And to her――it came to pass,
I breathed Love’s song.

“She promised me her lily hand,
She seemed particularly cool:
No warning voice then whispered low,
‘Thou art a fool!’

“Next day I found I lov’d her not,
And then she wept and sigh’d full sore,
Went to her lawyer, on the spot,
And talked it o’er

“She brought an action, too, for breach
Of promise――’tis the fashion――zounds!
The jury brought in damages
Five thousand pounds!

“And this is why I sojourn here
Alone, and idly loitering,
Tho’ all the season’s through and tho’
No ‘stars’ now sing!”

_The Figaro._ September 15, 1875.

――――:o:――――

A SONG AFTER SUNSET.

The breeze o’er the bridge was a-blowing,
O’er wicked and wan Waterloo,
The busses buzzed, coming and going,
As busses will do.

Amid the cold coigns of the causeway.
I secretly, silently sat,
Aloof, out of laughter’s and law’s way,
Hard-holding my hat.

In crowds that seemed never to cease, men
Heaved, hurtled, home-hurried and howled,
While pestilent prigs of policemen,
Persistently prowled.

From pockets that penniless sounded
Two tickets I’d drearily drawn,
They prated of pledges impounded
In pitiless pawn.

They seemed with a cynical sorrow,
To sing the same sedulous strain:
“Pay up, and redeem us to-morrow,
Your watch and your chain!

We know you of old, sworn tormentor!
You thriver on thriftless and thief!
Spout-spider!――on spoiling intent, or
Rapacious relief!

Avuncular author of anguish,
We damn you with deepest disdain!
We linger, we long, and we languish
For freedom again.”

I smiled on the speakers unheeding,
I grinned at their garrulous games――
When the breeze blew them, splendidly speeding,
Right into the Thames.

They scattered, as seed that is sown, or
The fringe of the fast flowing foam,
And their hungry, hysterical owner
Went hopelessly home.

_Judy._ June, 16, 1880.

――――:o:――――

THE MAD, MAD MUSE.

Out on the margin of moonshine land,
Tickle me, love, in these lonesome ribs,
Out where the whing-whang loves to stand,
Writing his name with his tail on the sand,
And wipes it out with his oogerish hand;
Tickle me, love, in these lonesome ribs.

Is it the gibber of gungs and keeks?
Tickle me, love, in these lonesome ribs,
Or what is the sound the whing-whang seeks,
Crouching low by winding creeks,
And holding his breath for weeks and weeks?
Tickle me, love, in these lonesome ribs.

Anoint him the wealthiest of wealthy things!
Tickle me, love, in these lonesome ribs.
’Tis a fair whing-whangess with phosphor rings,
And bridal jewels of fangs and stings,
And she sits and as sadly and softly sings;
As the mildewed whir of her own dead wings;
Tickle me, dear; tickle me here;
Tickle me, love, in these lonesome ribs.

ROBERT J. BURDETTE.

From S. Thompson’s _Collection of Poems_. Chicago. 1886.

――――

STUDIES IN EXOTIC VERSE.
_A Ballade of the Nurserie._

(After Mr. Swinburne’s “Dreamland.”)

She hid herself in the _soirée_ kettle
Out of her Ma’s way, wise wee maid!
Wan was her lip as the lily’s petal,
Sad was the smile that over it played.
Why doth she warble not? Is she afraid
Of the hound that howls, or the moaning mole?
Can it be on an errand she hath delayed?
Hush thee, hush thee, dear little soul!

The nightingale sings to the nodding nettle
In the gloom o’ the gloaming athwart the glade:
The zephyr sighs soft on Popòcatapètl,
And Auster is taking it cool in the shade:
Sing, hey for a _gutta serenade_!
Not mine to stir up a storied pole,
No noses snip with a bluggy blade――
Hush thee, hush thee, dear little soul?

Shall I bribe with a store of minted metal?
With Everton toffee thee persuade?
That thou in a kettle thyself should’st settle,
When grandly and gaudily all arrayed!
Thy flounces ’ill foul and fangles fade.
Come out, and Algernon Charles ’ill roll
Thee safe and snug in Plutonian plaid――
Hush thee, hush thee, dear little soul.

ENVOI.

When nap is none and raiment frayed,
And winter crowns the puddered poll,
A kettle sings ane soote ballade――
Hush thee, hush thee, dear little soul.

JOHN TWIG.

――――:o:――――

ON MARRIAGE WITH A DECEASED WIFE’S SISTER.

O blood-bitten lip all aflame,
O Dolores and also Faustine,
O aunts of the world worried shame,
Lo your hair with its amorous sheen
Meshes man in its tangles of gold;
O aunts of the tremulous thrill,
We are pining――we long to enfold
The Deceased Wife’s Fair Relative Bill.

G. R. SIMS.

――――:o:――――

A PARODY.

If it be but a dream or a vision,
The life which is after the grave,
The moil of the metaphysician
Is vain,――but an answer I crave,
Amid bright intellectual flambeaux
I shall find no light clearer than thee,
O sable and sensual Sambo,
The servant of me!

I beheld thee beholding the ballet,
Dumps doleful display’d deep despair,
Thou didst think of thine own land, my valet,
The land in which nought thou didst wear.

* * * * *

O statue, us Philistines loathing,
Of Phœbus!――our tailors we fear,
Come down, and redeem us from clothing,
O nude Belvidere!
We are wise――and we make ourselves hazy,
We are foolish――and, so, go to church;
While Sambo but laughs, and is lazy,
(Vile Discipline! lend me thy birch);
He dreams of no life save the present,
His virtue is but when it suits;
Sometimes, which is not quite so pleasant,
I miss coat or boots.

ANONYMOUS.

_Once a Week._ January 16, 1869.

――――:o:――――

GILLIAN.

_Jacke and Jille_

I have made me an end of the moods of maidens,
I have loosed me, and leapt from the links of love;
From the kiss that cloys and desire that deadens,
The woes that madden, the words that move.
In the dim last days of a spent September,
When fruits are fallen, and flies are fain;
Before you forget, and while I remember,
I cry as I shall cry never again.

_Went up a hylle_

Where the strong fell faints in the lazy levels
Of misty meadows, and streams that stray;
We raised us at eve from our rosy revels,
With faces aflame for the death of the day;
With pale lips parted, and sighs that shiver,
Low lids that cling to the last of love:
We left the levels, we left the river,
And turned us and toiled to the air above.

_to fetch a paile of water_,

By the sad sweet springs that have salved our sorrow,
The fates that haunt us, the grief that grips――
Where we walk not to-day nor shall walk to-morrow――
The wells of lethe for wearied lips.
With souls nor shaken with tears nor laughter,
With limp knees loosed as of priests that pray,
We bowed us and bent to the white well-water,
We dipped and we drank it and bore away.

_Jacke felle downe_

The low light trembled on languid lashes,
The haze of your hair on my mouth was blown,
Our love flashed fierce from its fading ashes,
As night’s dim net on the day was thrown.
What was it meant for, or made for, that minute,
But that our lives in delight should be dipt?
Was it yours, or my fault, or fate’s, that in it
Our frail feet faltered, our steep steps slipt?

_And brake his crowne, and Jille came tumblynge after_.

Our linked hands loosened and lapsed in sunder,
Love from our limbs as a shift was shed,
But paused a moment, to watch with wonder
The pale pained body, the bursten head.
While our sad souls still with regrets are riven,
While the blood burns bright on our bruisèd brows,
I have set you free, and I stand forgiven――
And now I had better go and call my cows.

From a scarce little pamphlet entitled “_Poems and Parodies_, by Two Undergrads.” Oxford. B. H. Blackwell, 1880. Price one shilling.

HOW JACK HARRIS BECAME ÆSTHETIC.

Ye Muses nine that in Arcadia dwell,
Quit Pindus and the cold Castalian well,
And me your lowliest follower inspire
With such clear flame as long ago did fire
The mighty lips of Blackstone; so may I,
A feeble trump of truth that cannot die,
Clearly proclaim and on the roll of fame
Inscribe, however humbly, my poor name.

_Jack Harris before his Conversion._

Come down to me, cling to me, lay thy red lips on me, love,
Let me drown in thy bountiful beauty, O glorious consecrate dove,
Made fit for the vigil of Venus, made fair by the Cyprian dame,
Made fair in the form of a maiden, a medley of music and flame;
For the world grows giddy around us, and swoons, and the pale souls
preach
Poor fables of sorrow and virtue, and all that the grey gods teach,
But we clasp and we bite and we madden, and I worship your throat
and your hair.
We have strayed in the cold sea places, we have laughed on the altar
stair,
We have eaten and drunken of love, and the lesson of living is this,
That the high sky bends above us, and life is a curse and a kiss.
Make me glad, O thou rare hand-maiden, with the sound of thy
passionate sighs,
While I sing of thy body’s white beauty and live in the light of
thine eyes,
For save me there’s no man living made worthy to utter thy praise,
Who art come as new moon to our night-tide, new sun toour days.

_Jack Harris after his Conversion._

From an article by Mr. Justin H. McCarthy, which appeared in _Belgravia_ (London). March, 1880.

――――:o:――――

THE LAY OF MACARONI.

As a wave that steals when the winds are stormy
From creek to cove of the curving shore,
Buffeted, blown, and broken before me,
Scattered and spread to its sunlit core:
As a dove that dips in the dark of maples
To sip the sweetness of shelter and shade,
I kneel in thy nimbus, O noon of Naples,
I bathe in thine beauty, by thee embayed.

What is it ails me that I should sing of her?
The queen of the flashes and flames that were!
Yea, I have felt the shuddering sting of her,
The flower-sweet throat and the hands of her!
I have swayed and sung to the sound of her psalters,
I have danced her dances of dizzy delight,
I have hallowed mine hair to the horns of her altars,
Between the nightingale’s song and the night!

What is it, Queen, that now I should do for thee?
What is it now I should ask at thine hands?
Blow of the trumpets thine children once blew for thee?
Break from thine feet and thine bosom the bands?
Nay, as sweet as the songs of Leone Leoni,
And gay as her garments of gem-sprinkled gold,
She gives me mellifluous, mild macaroni,
The choice of her children when cheeses are old!

And over me hover, as if by the wings of it,
Frayed in the furnace by flame that is fleet,
The curious coils and the strenuous strings of it,
Dropping, diminishing down, as I eat:
Lo! and the beautiful Queen, as she brings of it,
Lifts me the links of the limitless chain,
Bidding mine mouth chant the splendidest things of it,
Out of the wealth of my wonderful brain!

Behold! I have done it: my stomach is smitten
With sweets of the surfeit her hands have unrolled.
Italia, mine cheeks with thine kisses are bitten:
I am broken with beauty, stabbed, slaughtered, and sold!
No man of thy millions is more macaronied,
Save mighty Mazzini, than musical Me:
The souls of the Ages shall stand as astonied,
And faint in the flame I am fanning for thee!

From _Diversions of the Echo Club_, by Bayard Taylor.

――――:o:――――

BALLAD OF DREAMLAND.

I.

I hid my heart in a nest of roses,
Out of the sun’s way, hidden apart;
In a softer bed than the soft white snow’s is,
Under the roses I hid my heart.
Why should it sleep not? why should it start,
When never a leaf of the rose tree stirred?
What made sleep flutter his wings and part?
Only the song of a secret bird.
* * * * *

III.

The green land’s name that a charm encloses,
It never was writ in the traveller’s chart,
And sweet as the fruit on its tree that grows is,
It never was sold in the merchants’ mart.
The swallows of dreams through its dim fields dart,
And sleep’s are the tunes in its tree tops heard;
No hound’s note wakens the wild wood hart,
Only the song of a secret bird.
* * * * *

A. C. SWINBURNE.

――――

A BALLAD OF AFTER DINNER.
_A Month after Swinburne._

I hid my head in a rug from Moses,
From the clatter of moving dishes apart,
And curled up my feet for forty dozes,
Just for to soothe my beating heart.
Why did it sleep not? Why did it start,
When never a dish remained to shock?
What made the fluttering doze depart?
Only the tick of an eight day clock.

Be still, I said, for hope pre-supposes
A still mild mood for the sleep-slain hart;
Be still, for the wind, with its curled-up toes, is
Silent and quieter yet than thou art.
Doth a wound in thee deep as a thorn’s wound smart?
Dost thou fretfully languish for Clicquot and hock?
What bids the lids of thy sleep dispart;
Only the tick of an eight-day clock.

I wait in vain for the charm that encloses
The green land of dreams in sleep’s mystical chart,
For the fruit of its trees and the breath of its roses,
More sweet than are sold in the merchants’ mart.
So close to its border, why fails my heart?
What holdeth it back, tho’ my dim brain rock?
Without, the noise of the nightman’s cart,
Within, the tick of an eight-day clock.

_Envoi._

Erewhile in hope I had chosen my part,
To sleep for a season as sound as a block,
With never a thought of a nightman’s cart,
Or the hateful tick of an eight-day clock.

――――

A BALLAD OF DREAMLAND.

The sorest stress of the Season’s over;
Out of it’s crush I am lying alone,
My face to the sky, and my back in the clover.
Hark to that lark! Its jubilant tone
Is a cheery change from St. Stephen’s drone;
And ah! that whift from the wind-swept brine!
With nought to do but absorb ozone――
Should there be ballad more blythe than mine?

Song of a haven-welcoming lover!
Rare rose-scents from our garden blown
Reach me here, and my eyes discover,
Shimmering there, in a tangle thrown,
Sunny locks. “She is coming, my own!”
The green bowers sever, her blue eyes shine.
Sweet love nearing, sore labour flown,――
Should there be ballad more blythe than mine?

What to me though weariness hover
Still o’er Town where the toilers groan?
Lazy lounger, leisurely lover,
What care I for the Members’ moan
At the Irish incubus, heavy as stone?
For Biggar’s bullying, Whalley’s whine?
Peace unchequered, and care unknown,
Should there be ballad more blithe than mine?

ENVOI.

Eh! What! Drowsing? A dream? Ochone!
St. Patrick’s curse on those Irish swine,
Who have burst the bubble by slumber blown,
And broken a ballad so blithe as mine!

_Punch._ August 11, 1877.

――――:o:――――

The following parody appeared in _The Tomahawk_ (London) on the occasion of a visit paid by Ada Isaacs Menken to M. Alexandre Dumas, in Paris. “Miss Menken,” who was really the wife of John C. Heenan the pugilist, will be best remembered for her appearance (in very scanty attire) as “Mazeppa,” at Astley’s Theatre. She had a fine stage appearance, but was a very indifferent actress. She published a small volume of poems, entitled _Infelicia_, which is now eagerly sought after by collectors, because it contains an introduction written by Charles Dickens.

TO ADA.

So must the sinewy Centaur snort and rear,
As some sweet maiden-mare trots wickedly
Across his pagan path, burning his very heart;
Flicking the flies from off her heaving flanks,
The amorous flies who fill their lips with blood;
And while his life-blood riots in his hocks,
She spreads her cunning heels and whisks her tail;
Then kicks the bitter sand into his eyes,
Still gazing smarting on the supple form――
For I have felt a joy new-born to pain!
For I have seen that silken syren glide
Across the desert, hight old Astley’s Fane.
My breast could hardly flutter as she came
Bare-backed before my timorous sight; my nails
Curved inward to my palms, and such a sweet
Soft tremor crept around my nervous knees.
I swooned but for the kindly guardian of the box,
Who brought me welcome water at my wish,
And damped my throbbing temples.
On my bed
I rolled and rioted in frenzied fret,
For turn howe’er I would, upon the walls,
Across the sheets, the beauteous Ada rode,
Scenting the air with black-head clustering hair,
Loading the senses with soft-thrilling sighs;
While through the rosy lips pale pearls of teeth
Flashed hungrily. Strapped to her showy steed,
She bites her charger in the side, till lips
Run red with the brave beast’s blood; and as the sting
Of her small fangs urges his wild career,
So this hot flame that chars me to the bones,
Spreads out the fire of jealousy, and cries,
Mazeppa flies across the sea to greet
Great Athos-Porthos-Aramis.

――――:o:――――

On page 9, an imitation of Mr. Swinburne’s style written by Mr. Walter Parke, was given; the following, which is a parody of _Dolores_, appears in “Lays of the Saintly,” (London, Vizetelly & Co.), a clever work written by the same gentleman:――

ST. SIMEON STYLITES.

* * * * *

Talking of bards, one day a pagan poet
Approach’d the pillar, and began to sing;
The blessed Simeon could not choose but know it,
So high the minstrel pitch’d his voice and string.
This bard was Greek in sentiment and style;
A Venus-worshipper――profuse of curses
On those who deem’d his ethics loose and vile:
I give you a translation of his verses:――

_Stylites._

“Closed eyelids that hide like a shutter,
Hard eyes that have visions apart,
The grisly gaunt limbs, and the utter
And deadly abstraction of heart;
Whence all that is joyous and bright is
Expell’d as both vicious and vain
O, stony and stolid Stylites,
Our Patron of Pain!”

“There can be but warfare between us,
For thine is a spiritual creed,
And mine is the worship of Venus,
On “raptures and roses” I feed;
Self-torture’s thine only employment,
We both feel the bliss and the bane,
For woe will oft spring from enjoyment,
Our Patron of Pain!”

“Can joys be of Martyrdom’s giving?
Men seek them, and change at a breath
The leisures and labours of living,
For the ravings and rackings of death:
To stand all alone on that height is
An action unsought and insane,
O, moveless and morbid Stylites,
Our Patron of Pain!”

“There are those who still offer to Bacchus,
There are men who Love’s goddess still own,
What right have new faiths to attack us?
And why are our shrines overthrown?
There are poets, inspired by Castalia,
Whose lyres have Anacreon’s strain,
Whose lives are one long saturnalia,
Our Patron of Pain!”

“We sing of voluptuous blisses,
Of all that thy rigour would spurn,
Of “biting” and “ravenous” kisses,
Of bosoms that beat and that burn;
To all that is earthy and carnal,
Our votaries’ souls we would chain,
We breathe of the chamber and charnel
Our Patron of Pain!”

“Oho! for the days of sweet vices,
The glory of goddess and Greek!
(For all that most naughty and nice is
Most purely and surely antique).
Oho! for the days when Endymion
Thro’ love o’er Diana did reign!
These, these were Elysian, St. Simeon,
Our Patron of Pain!”

“We’ll crown us with myrtle and laurel,
We’ll wreathe us in Paphian flowers,
To be and make others immoral,
We’ll ply our poetical powers;
Our worship shall be Aphrodite’s,
To woman the wine we will drain,
O, loveless and lonely Stylites,
Our Patron of Pain!”

“By the hunger thine abstinence causes,
By the thirst of unbearable heat,
By thy pray’rs which have very few pauses,
By thy lodging devoid of a seat,
By sleep that so meagre at night is,
’Twere better awake to remain,
Come down from thy pillar, Stylites,
Our Patron of Pain!”

The holy man, it need not be remark’d,
Turn’d as deaf ear to such lascivious singing
As when a serpent hiss’d or wild dog barked,
Or raven croak’d around his column winging;
Immovable in body as in mind,
He bore his life’s insufferable tedium,
It seems a pity that he could not find
’Twixt vice and virtue’s height some “happy medium.”

――――:o:――――

In 1872, the late Mr. Mortimer Collins published “_The British Birds_, a communication from the Ghost of Aristophanes.” Extracts from this very clever satire are still often quoted. The following passages contain parodies of A. C. Swinburne, Robert Browning, and Alfred Tennyson, whose identities are thinly veiled under the names of Brow, Beard, and Hair.

SCENE. _In the Clouds._

PEISTHETAIRUS, _discovered_.

(Enter three Poets, all handsome. One hath redundant hair, a second redundant beard, a third redundant brow. They present a letter of introduction from an eminent London publisher, stating that they are candidates for the important post of Poet Laureate to the New Municipality which the Birds are about to create.)

PEISTHETAIRUS. Gentlemen:
Happy to see you in the Realms of Air
As yet the worthy Mayor and Aldermen
And Councillors of the Town have not decided
Whether they want a Poet Laureate.
But, if ’twill ease your minds to sing a little,
I’ll try and listen. As my memory
Fails me entirely in regard to names,
Let me without the least discourtesy
Name you by your appearance. Amorous Naso
Was named from his chief feature. So I beg
To call you HAIR, and BEARD, and BROW.

THE THREE POETS. Agreed.

EUELPIDES.
For this delightful tourney of rhyme I hunger:
Who’s to begin, my master?

PEISTHETAIRUS. Why, the younger.
For the topic――as ’tis tropic
Heat at present――perhaps ’twere pleasant
If each Paladin
His ballad in
Put salad in.
But there must be no single metre, please
That’s not allowed by Dr. Guest, of Caius,

BROW. (_Swinburne._)

“O cool in the summer is salad,
And warm in the winter is love;
And a poet shall sing you a ballad
Delicious thereon and thereof.
A singer am I, if no sinner,
My Muse has a marvellous wing,
And I willingly worship at dinner
The Sirens of Spring.

Take endive――like love it is bitter;
Take beet――for like love it is red;
Crisp leaf of the lettuce shall glitter,
And cress from the rivulet’s bed:
Anchovies foam-born, like the lady
Whose beauty has maddened this bard,
And olives, from groves that are shady;
And eggs――boil ’em hard.”

BEARD. (_Browning._)

Waitress, with eyes so marvellous black,
And the blackest possible lustrous gay tress,
This is the month of the Zodiac
When I want a pretty deft-handed waitress.
Bring a china-bowl, you merry young soul;
Bring anything green, from worsted to celery;
Bring pure olive-oil from Italy’s soil――
Then your china-bowl we’ll well array.
When the time arrives chip choicest chives,
And administer quietly chili and capsicum――
Young girls do not quite know what’s what
’Till as a Poet into their laps I come).
Then a lobster fresh as fresh can be
(When it screams in the pot I feel a murderer);
After which I fancy we
Shall want a few bottles of Heidsieck or Roederer.

HAIR. (_Tennyson._)

King Arthur, growing very tired indeed
Of wild Tintagel, now that Launcelot
Had gone to Jersey or to Jericho,
And there was nobody to make a rhyme,
And Cornish girls were christened Jennifer,
And the Round Table had grown rickety,
Said unto Merlin (who had been asleep
For a few centuries in Broceliande,
But woke, and had a bath, and felt refreshed):
“What shall I do to pull myself together?”
Quoth Merlin, “Salad is the very thing,
And you can get it at the _Cheshire Cheese_”
King Arthur went there; _verily_, I believe
That he has dined there every day since then.
Have you not marked the portly gentleman
In his cool corner, with his plate of greens?
The great knight Launcelot prefers the _Cock_,
Where port is excellent (in pints), and waiters
Are portlier than kings, and steaks are tender,
And poets have been known to meditate――
Ox-fed orating ominous ostasticks.

* * * * *

The first edition of _The British Birds_ soon went out of print, and became very scarce. But in December, 1885, Mrs. Mortimer Collins wrote a letter to the editor of Parodies, which has now a melancholy interest:――“I believe copies of British Birds can still be had at Mr. Bentley’s, as I brought out a second edition there some eight years ago. Yes, there are some parodies of Swinburne, Tennyson and Browning. But the best known bits of the book are not parodies, unless you call the whole book a parody of Aristophanes.

“The ‘Positivists’ is the most famous piece in the book, containing the lines:――

“There was an APE in the days that were earlier;
Centuries passed, and his hair became curlier;
Centuries more gave a thumb to his wrist――
Then he was MAN, and a Positivist.”

“and ‘Skymaking’ is another oft quoted bit. I thought, perhaps, that you had written parodies on these; though it seemed unlikely, because satiric verse does not lend itself to parody. I am always interested in anything connected with my husband’s works, because I truly believe in his genius. I may perhaps be somewhat partial in my judgment, for Mortimer was a more brilliant talker than writer. Day after day I enjoyed his wit, and I used to be so sorry there were not more to hear it: but he was quite content with his audience of one.

“My husband has written many parodies. If you would like to quote them I can refer you to them.”

But this kind offer of assistance was not to be fulfilled, for Mrs. Collins complained at the end of the letter of her failing strength, and in less than three months she passed away.

――――:o:――――

A MATCH.

(_Matched._)

If I were Anglo-Saxon,
And you were Japanese,
We’d study storks together,
Pluck out the peacock’s feather
And lean our languid backs on
The stiffest of settees;
If I were Anglo-Saxon,
And you were Japanese.

If you were Della-Cruscan,
And I were A.-Mooresque,
We’d make our limbs look less in
Artistic folds, and dress in
What once were tunics Tuscan
In DANTE’S days grotesque;
If you were Della-Cruscan,
And I were A.-Mooresque.

If I were mock Pompeian,
And you Belgravian Greek,
We’d glide ’mid gaping Vandals
In shapeless sheets and sandals,
Like shades in Tartarean
Dim ways remote and bleak;
If I were mock Pompeian,
And you Belgravian Greek.

If you were Culture’s scarecrow,
And I the guy of Art
I’d learn in latest phrases
Of either’s quaintest crazes
To lisp, and let my hair grow,
While yours you’d cease to part;
If you were Culture’s scarecrow,
And I the guy of Art.

If I’d a Botticelli,
And you’d a new Burne-Jones,
We’d doat for days and days on
Their mystic hues, and gaze on
With lowering looks that felly
We’d fix upon their tones;
If I’d a Botticelli,
And you’d a new Burne-Jones.

If you were skilled at crewels,
And I, a dab at rhymes,
I’d write delirious “ballads,”
While you your bilious salads
Where stitching upon two ells
Of coarsest crass, at times;
If you were skilled at crewels,
And I, a dab at rhymes.

If I were what’s “consummate,”
And you were quite “too too,”
’Twould be our Eldorado
To have a yellow dado,
Our happiness to hum at
A teapot tinted blue;
If I were what’s “consummate,”
And you were quite “too too.”

If you were what “intense” is,
And I were like “decay,”
We’d mutely muse or mutter
In terms distinctly utter,
And find out what the sense is
Of this Æsthetic lay;
If you were what “intense” is,
And I were like “decay.”

If you were wan, my lady,
And I, your lover, weird,
We’d sit and wink for hours
At languid lily-flowers,
Till, fain of all things fady,
We faintly――disappeared!
If you were wan, my lady,
And I, your lover, weird.

This Parody appeared in _Punch_, (June 18, 1881), at the time when the Æsthetic revival in art and literature was the subject of much undeserved ridicule, because of the absurd extent to which it was carried by a few senseless fanatics.

――――:o:――――

BETWEEN THE SUNSET AND THE SEA.
_An American Imitation._

Between the gate post and the gate
I lingered with my love till late;
And what cared I for time of night
Till wakened by the watch dogs bite,
And thud of leathering boxtoed fate
Between the gate post and the gate.

Between the seaside and the sea
I kissed my love and she kissed me;
But rapturous day was grewsome night
And what is love but bloom and blight?
And what is kiss of mine to thee
Between the seaside and the sea.

Between the sunshine and the sun
I saw a face that hinted fun;
But what is fun and what is face
When driven at life’s killing pace?
I simply say that I have none
Between the sunshade and the sun.

Between the bumble and the bee
Full many a soul has had to flee;
And what is love may I inquire
When asked to build the kitchen fire?
Or who would not leap in the sea
Between the bumble and the bee.

Between the tea store and the tea
There is a wide immensity;
A dollar twenty five a pound
And not a nickel to be found;
Then what has fate in store for thee
Between the tea store and the tea.

R. W. ANSWELL.

――――:o:――――

A SONG AFTER SUNSET.

(_Being a Word from the Hanley Dog by the Cynic Poet Laureate_,
ALG-RN-N SW-NB-RNE.)

Lo, from my Black Country flung for thee,
Raving, red-eyed, scarred and seared;
To a bran-new sensation tune sung for thee,
With red lips, white teeth, underhung for thee,
Beauty begrimed and blood-smeared!
Vice-jawed, retractile, snub-snouted――
Tushes for fists swift to smite;
Round by round felled but not routed,
Rare of bark, bitter of bite!

If with grapplings and pluckings asunder――
If with throat-thirst for worry unslaked――
If with rush on growl, flash on low thunder――
Knocked over, but ne’er knocking under――
With cash on me lavishly staked――
If eye against eye glimly glaring,
Biped BRUMMY could quadruped scan,
Ring and chain with me, blood with me, sharing,――
Say which was brute, which was man?
* * * * *

_Punch._ August 1, 1874.

――――:o:――――

The following is a parody of another favourite metre of Mr. Swinburne, which has been sent in, unfortunately without any information as to when and where it originally appeared:――

APRIL SHOWERS.

Oh, April showers
Are good for flowers,
And fill the bowers
With perfumes rare;
But twinge erratic,
And pang rheumatic
And not ecstatic
Do they prepare!

And though the leanness
And arid meanness
Of lawns with greenness
They hide and clothe;
They, past disputing,
Set corns a-shooting,
Which makes your booting
A thing to loathe!

And of the Future
Although they suit your
Bright dreams, compute you’re
The Past’s sad prey;
The while you yell a
Vain ritornello
For that umbrella
That’s stolen away!

――――:o:――――

In 1880, Messrs. Chatto and Windus, of Piccadilly, published an anonymous volume of Poems, entitled “_The Heptalogia_, or the seven against sense, a cap with Seven Bells.” In this there are parodies of Robert Browning, Tennyson, Coventry Patmore, and others, but it is more than doubtful whether the general public appreciated the sarcasm of these clever skits. Amongst reading men much curiosity was felt as to the author, but in answer to enquiries on the subject, the publishers replied they were not at liberty to mention the author’s name. Eventually public opinion assigned the work to Mr. Swinburne, although it contains an exquisite parody on his own style, entitled _Nephelidia_. This is a charming specimen of rhythmical, musical nonsense. A few of the opening lines may be quoted, without injury to themselves, or to the rest of the poem, as the conclusion is perfectly irrelevant to the beginning, or to anything else:――

NEPHELIDIA.

From the depth of the dreamy decline of the dawn through a notable
nimbus of nebulous noonshine,
Pallid and pink as the palm of the flag-flower that flickers with
fear of the flies as they float,
Are they looks of our lovers that lustrously lean from a marvel of
mystic miraculous moonshine,
These that we feel in the blood of our blushes that thicken and
threaten with throbs through the throat?
Thicken and thrill as a theatre thronged at appeal of an actor’s
appalled agitation,
Fainter with fear of the fires of the future than pale with the
promise of pride in the past;
Flushed with the famishing fullness of fever that reddens with
radiance of rathe recreation,
Gaunt as the ghastliest of glimpses that gleam through the gloom
of the gloaming when ghosts go aghast?
Nay, for the nick of the tick of the time is a tremulous touch on
the temples of terror,
Strained as the sinews yet strenuous with strife of the dead who
is dumb as the dust-heaps of death:
Surely no soul is it, sweet as the spasm of erotic emotional
exquisite error,
Bathed in the balms of beatified bliss, beatific itself by
beatitude’s breath.
Surely no spirit or sense of a soul that was soft to the spirit
and soul of our senses
Sweetens the stress of suspiring suspicion that sobs in the
semblance and sound of a sigh;
Only this oracle opens Olympian, in mystical moods and triangular
tenses――
‘Life is the lust of a lamp for the light that is dark till the
dawn of the day when we die.’

Another parody, which was generally attributed to Mr. Swinburne, appeared in _The Fortnightly Review_ for December, 1881. It was entitled “_Disgust_; a Dramatic Monologue,” and was a parody of Tennyson’s “_Despair_, a Dramatic Monologue” published in _The Nineteenth Century_, November, 1881.

The original poem contained arguments of a most unpleasant and absurd description, these were ably ridiculed in the burlesque, which will be found on page 184, Volume 1, of this collection.

The following parody was also printed with the initials “A. C. S.,” but clever as it is, few would venture to assert that it was actually written by Mr. Swinburne.

THE TOPER’S LAMENT.

Oh, my memory lovingly lingers
Around the sweet sound of thy name,
And the spell of those magical fingers
That kindled my heart into flame;
But the joy that I think on no more is,
And my throat feels an ominous lump,
As I muse o’er the wreck of thy glories,
Thou Magpie and Stump!

For day after day have I sought thee,
As flowers are sought by the gale;
And night after night have I brought thee
A lip for thine exquisite ale.
Thy portals have welcomed me ever,
Mine hostess was pleasant and plump,
And her handmaids attentive and clever,
O Magpie and Stump!

Did I rage with the thirst of a Hector
(A thirst that she nimbly foresaw)
For a cup of thy ravishing nectar,
Who drew it as Nancy could draw?
While for grilling a steak that was juicy,
Or a chop that was chopped from the chump,
Had’st thou ever an equal to Lucy,
My Magpie and Stump?

Ah! thy votaries flocked beyond number,
And worshipped full oft at thy shrine;
And we poured forth libations to slumber,
And we censed with tobacco divine;
And then haply some bibulous fellow
Would fall to the floor with a bump――
For thy potions were potently mellow,
Our Magpie and Stump.

But I rave――for the past of my pleasure
Has left me a little intense,
And the lolloping lilt of my measure
Is stronger in sound than in sense.
Yet an ecstasy must have its morrow,
And an ace may succumb to a trump;
So my spirit is sunken in sorrow,
Dear Magpie and Stump.

Farewell! nevermore shall thy chalice
Of barleycorn bubble for me;
They have altered thee into a palace
Devoted to coffee and tea.
Thy courts are now trod by the teacher,
Thy fountains the cow and the pump,
And thy priest is a temperance preacher,
Poor Magpie and Stump!

Farewell! But if e’er in the distance
Of time that we cannot foresee,
Thou return to thy pristine existence――
For I cannot, alas! come to thee!
As the prodigal found from his father
Forgiveness, again shalt thou jump
To the height of my patronage――rather!
Rare Magpie and Stump!

A. C. S.

_St. James’s Gazette._ March 19, 1881.

――――:o:――――

SONG OF THE SPRINGTIDE.

O Season supposed of all free flowers,
Made lovely by light of the sun,
Of garden, of field, and of tree-flowers,
Thy singers are surely in fun!
Or what is it wholly unsettles
Thy sequence of shower and shine,
And maketh thy pushings and petals
To shrivel and pine?

Why is it that o’er the wild waters
That beastly North-Easter still blows,
Dust-dimming the eyes of our daughters,
Blue-nipping each nice little nose?
Why is it these sea-skirted islands
Are plagued with perpetual chills,
Driving men to Italian or Nile-lands
From Albion’s ills?

Happy he, O Springtide, who hath found thee,
All sunlit, in luckier lands,
With thy garment of greenery round thee,
And belted with blossomy bands.
From us by the blast thou art drifted.
All brag of thy beauties is bosh;
When the songs of thy singers are sifted,
They simply won’t wash.

* * * * *

What lunatic lune, what vain vision,
Thy laureate, Springtide, may move
To sing thee――oh, bitter derision!――
As season of laughter and love?
You make a man mad beyond measure,
O Spring, and thy lauders like thee:
Thy flowers, thy pastimes and pleasures,
Are fiddlededee!

_Punch._ May 22, 1880.

――――:o:――――

SWINBURNISM.

I trow, wild friends, God’s soul wots well by rote
My sweet soft strains and lovely lays of love,
And all the white ways of her sweet sharp throat,
Which, not right yet, I have waxed weary of.

* * * * *

I never left off kissing her, I well think,
But wrapped in rich red raiment of her hair,
Kissed her all day, till her lips parch’d for drink
As the parch’d often lips of a flute-player.

No maid of a king’s blood, but held right high
In God’s sharp sight, from whom no things are hid.
“You must not tell,” she sighed and turned to cry.
“That I should tell your mother, God forbid!”

Said so I kept my word, I never told her
You drink pure water? I, sir, I drink wine!
Your cool clear brain must needs yield verse-water,
But, sweet strong drunken maniac music, mine.

S. K. COWAN.

From _A Book of Jousts_. London, Field and Tuer.

――――

A VALENTINE.

Ah, Love! if love lie still betwixt us twain,
Through all these years――yea, love, before love wane
Lift up thine eyes and slay me; the desire
Of death consumes me, like the sun-god’s fire.
Slay me, and kill me, dearest, deal me death.
Lo! I will murmur with my latest breath,
Laying this lily at thy gracious feet,
How precious, nay, how _utter_ art thou, sweet.

J. M. LOWRY.

――――

SWINBURNESE.

Also thine eyes were mild as a lowlit flame of fire,
When thou wovest the web whereof wiles were the woof and the warp
was my heart.
Why left’st thou the fertile field whence thou reapedst the fruit of
desire?
For the change of the face of thy colour I know thee not whence
thou art!

Alas for the going of swiftness, for the feet of the running of thee,
When thou wentest among the swords, and the shoutings of Captain’s
made shrill!
Woe is me for the pleasant places! yea, one shall say of thy glee,
“It is not,” and as for delight the feet of thy dancing are still.

_Translation._

Where are those eyes that were so mild
When of my heart you me beguiled?
Why did you skedaddle from me and the child?
O, Johnnie, I hardly knew you.
Where are those legs with which you run
When first you went to shoulder the gun?
Indeed, your dancing days are done――
O, Johnnie, I hardly knew you.

R. Y. TYRRELL.

From _A Book of Jousts_. London, Field and Tuer.

――――

In _The World_ Christmas Number, 1879, there was an exquisite satire on Mr. Burne Jones’s art entitled “The God and the Damosel”; it was accompanied by the following verses, and a prose criticism (too long to quote in full) written in imitation of the intensely Æsthetic jargon familiar to the frequenters of the Grosvenor Gallery. To fully appreciate the poem and the criticism, the burlesque picture by Mr. E. B. T. Burnt Bones should be seen, once seen it could never be forgotten.

THE GOD AND THE DAMOSEL.
_By A. C. Sinburn._

THE GOD.

Look in my face, and know me who I am.
I smite and save; I bless, and, lo, I damn.
Incline thine head, thy browless brow incline;
I touch thee, and I tap thee, and proclaim,
For ever and for ever thou art mine!

O long as grief, and leaner than desire!
O sweet retreating breasts and amorous-kissing knees!
O grace and goodliness of strait attire!
A robe of them who sport in summer seas.

By these, and by the eyelids of thine eyes,
Ringed round with darkness, swollen weeper-wise,
By these I know thee; these are for a sign,
Surer, yea, even than thy most splendid size
Of spreaden hands: I know thee, thou art mine.

THE DAMOSEL.

Master and lord, I know thee who thou art;
Lo, and with homage of the stricken heart,
I hail thee, I adore thee, and obtest:
I am thine own, I know no better part;
Do with me, master, as thee seemeth best.

O loose as thought and bodiless as dream!
O globular grand eyes, a bane of maidenhood!
O miracle of tunic-folds, that seem
Self-balanced, firm, a glory of carven wood!

By these, and by the crown thy temples wear,
Holy, a cauline flower of wondrous hair;
By thy red mouth, a bow without a chord,
And shaftless, yea, but deadly, O most fair,
I knew thee, and I know thee for my lord!

THE GOD.

Ay, now the flicker of a nauseate smile
Bestirs thy cheek and wan lips imbecile;
Thy pale plucked blossom droops; its day is done.

THE DAMOSEL.

Nay, let me deck my bosom therewithal,
It were ill-ominous to let it fall,
The faithful mistress of Hyperion Sun.

THE GOD.