Chapter III: Part 3

Dungeoned in poverty, he saw afar
The shining peaks of fame that wore the sun,
Most heavenly bright, they mocked him through his bars,
A lost man wildered on the dreary sea,
When loneliness hath somewhat touched his brain,
Doth shrink and shrink beneath the watching sky,
Which hour by hour more plainly doth express
The features of a deadly enemy,
Drinking his woes with a most hungry eye.
Ev'n so, by constant staring on his ills,
They grew worse-featured; till, in his great rage,
His spirit, like a roused sea, white with wrath,
Struck at the stars. "Hold fast! Hold fast! my brain!
Had I a curse to kill with, by yon Heaven!
I'd feast the worms to-night." Dreadfuller words,
Whose very terror blanched his conscious lips,
He uttered in his hour of agony.
With quick and subtle poison in his veins,
With madness burning in his heart and brain,
With words, like lightnings, round his pallid lips,
He rushed to die in the very eyes of God.
'Twas late, for as he reached the open roads,
Where night was reddened by the drudging fires,
The drowsy steeples tolled the hour of One.
The city now was left long miles behind,
A large black hill was looming 'gainst the stars,
He reached its summit. Far above his head,
Up there upon the still and mighty night,
God's name was writ in worlds. Awhile he stood,
Silent and throbbing like a midnight star,
He raised his hands, alas! 'twas not in prayer--
He long had ceased to pray. "Father," he said,
"I wished to loose some music o'er Thy world,
To strike from its firm seat some hoary wrong,
And then to die in autumn with the flowers,
And leaves, and sunshine I have loved so well.
Thou might'st have smoothed my way to some great end--
But wherefore speak? Thou art the mighty God.
This gleaming wilderness of suns and worlds
Is an eternal and triumphant hymn,
Chanted by Thee unto Thine own great self!
Wrapt in Thy skies, what were my prayers to Thee?
My pangs? My tears of blood? They could not move
Thee from the depths of Thine immortal dream.
Thou hast forgotten me, God! Here, therefore, here,
To-night upon this bleak and cold hill-side,
Like a forsaken watch-fire will I die,
And as my pale corse fronts the glittering night,
It shall reproach Thee before all Thy worlds."
His death did not disturb that ancient Night.
Scornfullest Night! Over the dead there hung
Greats gulfs of silence, blue, and strewn with stars--
No sound--no motion--in the eternal depths.

EDWARD.

Now, what a sullen-blooded fool was this,
At sulks with earth and Heaven! Could he not
Out-weep his passion like a blustering day,
And be clear-skied thereafter? He, poor wretch,
Must needs be famous! Lord! how Poets geck
At Fame, their idol. Call 't a worthless thing,
Colder than lunar rainbows, changefuller
Than sleeked purples on a pigeon's neck,
More transitory than a woman's loves,
The bubbles of her heart--and yet each mocker
Would gladly sell his soul for one sweet crumb
To roll beneath his tongue.

WALTER.

Alas! the youth
Earnest as flame, could not so tame his heart
As to live quiet days. When the heart-sick Earth
Turns her broad back upon the gaudy sun,
And stoops her weary forehead to the night,
To struggle with her sorrow all alone,
The moon, that patient sufferer, pale with pain,
Presses her cold lips on her sister's brow,
Till she is calm. But in _his_ sorrow's night
He found no comforter. A man can bear
A world's contempt when he has that within
Which says he's worthy--when he contemns himself,
There burns the hell. So this wild youth was foiled
In a great purpose--in an agony,
In which he learned to hate and scorn himself,
He foamed at God, and died.

MR. WILMOTT.

Rain similes upon his corse like tears--
The youth you spoke of was a glowing moth,
Born in the eve and crushed before the dawn.

VIOLET.

He was, methinks, like that frail flower that comes
Amid the nips and gusts of churlish March,
Drinking pale beauty from sweet April's tears,
Dead on the hem of May.

EDWARD.

A Lapland fool,
Who, staring upward as the Northern lights
Banner the skies with glory, breaks his heart,
Because his smoky hut and greasy furs
Are not so rich as they.

ARTHUR.

Mine is pathetic--
A ginger-beer bottle burst.

WALTER (_aside_).

And mine would be
The pale child, Eve, leading her mother, Night.
[MR. WILMOTT, ARTHUR, _and_ EDWARD, _converse_--VIOLET
_approaches_ WALTER.

VIOLET.

Did you know well that youth of whom you spake?

WALTER.

Know him! Oh, yes, I knew him as myself--
Two passions dwelt at once within his soul,
Like eve and sunset dwelling in one sky.
And as the sunset dies along the west,
Eve higher lifts her front of trembling stars,
Till she is seated in the middle sky,
So gradual, one passion slowly died,
And from its death the other drew fresh life,
Until 't was seated in his soul alone--
The dead was Love--the living, Poetry.

VIOLET.

Alas! if Love rose never from the dead.

WALTER.

Between him and the Lady of his Love
There stood a wrinkled worldling ripe for hell.
When with his golden hand he plucked that flower,
And would have smelt it, lo! it paled and shrank,
And withered in his grasp. And when she died,
The rivers of his heart ran all to waste;
They found no ocean, dry sands sucked them up.

Lady! he was a fool--a pitiful fool.
She said she loved him, would be dead in spring--
She asked him but to stand beside her grave--
She said she would be daisies--and she thought
'Twould give her joy to feel that he was near.
She died like music; and, would you believe 't?
He kept her foolish words within his heart
As ceremonious as a chapel keeps
A relic of a saint. And in the spring
The doting idiot went!

VIOLET.

What found he there?

WALTER.

Laugh till your sides ache! Oh, he went, poor fool!
But he found nothing save red-trampled clay,
And a dull sobbing rain. Do you not laugh?
Amid the comfortless rain he stood and wept,
Bare-headed, in the mocking, pelting rain.
He might have known 'twas ever so on earth.

VIOLET.

You cannot laugh yourself, Sir, nor can I.
Her unpolluted corse doth sleep in earth,
Like a pure thought within a sinful soul.
Dearer is earth to God for her sweet sake.

WALTER.

'Tis said our nature is corrupt; but she
O'erlaid hers with all graces, ev'n as Night
Wears such a crowd of jewels on her face,
You cannot see 'tis black.

VIOLET.

How looked this youth?
Did he in voice or mien resemble you?
Was he about your age? Wore he such curls?
Such eyes of dark sea-blue?

WALTER.

Why do you ask?

VIOLET.

I thought just now you might resemble him.
Were you not brothers?--twins? Or was the one
A shadow of the other?

WALTER.

What mean you?

VIOLET.

That like the moon you need not wrap yourself
In any cloud; you shine through each disguise;
You are a masker in a mask of glass.
You've such transparent sides, each casual eye
May see the heaving heart.

WALTER.

Oh, misery!
Is 't visible to thee?

VIOLET.

'Tis clear as dew!
Mine eyes have been upon it all the night,
Unknown to you.

WALTER.

The sorrowful alone
Can know the sorrowful. What woe is thine,
That thou canst read me thus?

VIOLET.

A new-born power,
Whose unformed features cannot clearly show
Whether 'tis Joy or Sorrow. But the years
May nurture it to either.

WALTER.

To thee I'm bare.
My heart lies open to you, as the earth
To the omniscient sun. I have a work--
The finger of my soul doth point it out;
I trust God's finger points it also out.
I must attempt it; if my sinews fail,
On my unsheltered head men's scorns will fall,
Like a slow shower of fire. Yet if one tear
Were mingled with them, it were less to bear.

VIOLET.

I'll give thee tears.--

WALTER.

That were as queenly Night
Would loosen all the jewels from her hair,
And hail them on this sordid thing, the earth.
Thy tears keep for a worthier head than mine.

VIOLET.

I will not cope with you in compliment.
I'll give you tears, and pity, and true thoughts;
If you are desolate, my heart is open;
I know 'tis little worth, but any hut,
However poor, unto a homeless man,
Is welcomer than mists or nipping winds.
But if you conquer Fame----

WALTER.

With eager hands
I'll bend the awful thing into a crown,
And you shall wear it.

VIOLET.

Oh, no, no!
Lay it upon _her_ grave. [_Another silence._

ARTHUR.

Run out again!
We should he jovial as the feasting gods,
We're silent as a synod of the stars!
The night is out at elbows. Laughter's dead.
To the rescue, Violet! A song! a song!

VIOLET _sings._

Upon my knee a modern minstrel's tales,
Full as a choir with music, lies unread;
My impatient shallop flaps its silken sails
To rouse me, but I cannot lift my head.
I see a wretched isle, that ghost-like stands,
Wrapt in its mist-shroud in the wint'ry main;
And now a cheerless gleam of red-ploughed lands,
O'er which a crow flies heavy in the rain.

I've neither heart nor voice!
[_Rises and draws the curtain._
You've sat the night out, Masters! See, the moon
Lies stranded on the pallid coast of morn.

ARTHUR.

Methinks our merriment lies stranded, too.
Draw the long table for a game of bowls.
You will be captain, Edward,--Gods! he yawns.
[_To_ WALTER.
Your thunder, Jove, has soured these cream-pots all.

MR. WILMOTT.

To bed! To bed!

SCENE IX.

_A Lawn_--_Sunset_--WALTER _lying at_ VIOLET'S _feet._

VIOLET.

You loved, then, very much, this friend of thine?

WALTER.

The sound of his voice did warm my heart like wine.
He's long since dead; but if there is a heaven,
He's in its heart of bliss.

VIOLET.

How did you live?

WALTER.

We read and wrote together, slept together;
We dwelt on slopes against the morning sun,
We dwelt in crowded streets, and loved to walk
While Labour slept; for, in the ghastly dawn,
The wildered city seemed a demon's brain,
The children of the night its evil thoughts.
Sometimes we sat whole afternoons, and watched
The sunset build a city frail as dream,
With bridges, streets of splendour, towers; and saw
The fabrics crumble into rosy ruins,
And then grow grey as heath. But our chief joy
Was to draw images from everything;
And images lay thick upon our talk,
As shells on ocean sands.

VIOLET.

From everything!
Here is the sunset, yonder grows the moon,
What image would you draw from these?

WALTER.

Why, this.
The sun is dying like a cloven king
In his own blood; the while the distant moon,
Like a pale prophetess, whom he has wronged,
Leans eager forward, with most hungry eyes,
Watching him bleed to death, and, as he faints,
She brightens and dilates; revenge complete,
She walks in lonely triumph through the night.

VIOLET.

Give not such hateful passion to the orb
That cools the heated lands; that ripes the fields,
While sleep the husbandmen, then hastes away
Ere the first step of dawn, doing all good
In secret and the night. 'Tis very wrong.
Would I had known your friend!

WALTER.

Iconoclast!
'Tis better as it is.

VIOLET.

Why is it so?

WALTER.

Because you would have loved him, and then I
Would have to wander outside of all joy,
Like Neptune in the cold. [_A pause._

VIOLET.

Do you remember
You promised yesterday you'd paint for me
Three pictures from your life?

WALTER.

I'll do so now.
On this delicious eve, with words like colours,
I'll limn them on the canvass of your sense.

VIOLET.

Be quick! be quick! for see, the parting sun
But peers above yon range of crimson hills,
Taking his last look of this lovely scene.
Dusk will be here anon.

WALTER.

And all the stars!

VIOLET.

Great friends of yours; you love them overmuch.

WALTER.

I love the stars too much! The tameless sea
Spreads itself out beneath them, smooth as glass.
You cannot love them, lady, till you dwell
In mighty towns; immured in their black hearts,
The stars are nearer to you than the fields.
I'd grow an Atheist in these towns of trade,
Were 't not for stars. The smoke puts heaven out;
I meet sin-bloated faces in the streets,
And shrink as from a blow. I hear wild oaths,
And curses spilt from lips that once were sweet,
And sealed for Heaven by a mother's kiss.
I mix with men whose hearts of human flesh,
Beneath the petrifying touch of gold,
Have grown as stony as the trodden ways.
I see no trace of God, till in the night,
While the vast city lies in dreams of gain,
He doth reveal himself to me in heaven.
My heart swells to Him as the sea to the moon;
Therefore it is I love the midnight stars.

VIOLET.

I would I had a lover who could give
Such ample reasons for his loving me,
As you for loving stars! But to your task.

WALTER.

Wilt listen to the pictures of my life?

VIOLET.

Patient as evening to the nightingale!

WALTER.

'Mong the green lanes of Kent--green sunny lanes--
Where troops of children shout, and laugh, and play,
And gather daisies, stood an antique home,
Within its orchard, rich with ruddy fruits,
For the full year was laughing in his prime.
Wealth of all flowers grew in that garden green,
And the old porch with its great oaken door
Was smothered in rose-blooms, while o'er the walls
The honeysuckle clung deliriously.
Before the door there lay a plot of grass,
Snowed o'er with daisies,--flower by all beloved,
And famousest in song--and in the midst,
A carvèd fountain stood, dried up and broken,
On which a peacock perched and sunned itself;
Beneath, two petted rabbits, snowy white,
Squatted upon the sward.
A row of poplars darkly rose behind,
Around whose tops, and the old-fashioned vanes,
White pigeons fluttered, and o'er all was bent
The mighty sky, with sailing sunny clouds.
One casement was thrown open, and within,
A boy hung o'er a book of poesy,
Silent as planet hanging o'er the sea.
In at the casement open to the noon
Came sweetest garden-odours, and the hum--
The drowsy hum--of the rejoicing bees,
Heavened in blooms that overclad the walls;
And the cool wind waved in upon his brow,
And stirred his curls. Soft fell the summer night.
Then he arose, and with inspired lips said,--
"Stars! ye are golden-voicèd clarions
To high-aspiring and heroic dooms.
To-night, as I look up unto ye, Stars!
I feel my soul rise to its destiny,
Like a strong eagle to its eyrie soaring.
Who thinks of weakness underneath ye, Stars?
A hum shall be on earth, a name be heard,
An epitaph shall look up proud to God.
Stars! read and listen, it may not be long."

VIOLET (_leaning over him_).

I'll see that grand desire within your eyes--
Oh, I only see myself!

WALTER.

Violet!
Could you look through my heart as through mine eyes,
You'd find yourself there, too.

VIOLET.

Hush, flatterer!
Yet go on with your tale.

WALTER.

Three blue days passed,
Full of the sun, loud with a thousand larks;
An evening like a grey child walked 'tween each.
'Twas in the quiet of the fourth day's noon,
The boy I speak of slumbered in the wood.
Like a dropt rose at an oak-root he lay,
A lady bent above him. He awoke;
She blushed like sunset, 'mid embarrassed speech;
A shock of laughter made them friends at once,
And laughter fluttered through their after-talk,
As darts a bright bird in and out the leaves.
All day he drank her splendid light of eyes;
Nor did they part until the deepening east
Gan to be sprinkled with the lights of eve.

VIOLET.

Go on! go on!

WALTER.

June sang herself to death.
They parted in the wood, she very pale,
And he walked home the weariest thing on earth.
That night he sat in his unlighted room,
Pale, sad, and solitary, sick at heart,
For he had parted with his dearest friends,
High aspirations, bright dreams golden-winged,
Troops of fine fancies that like lambs did play
Amid the sunshine and the virgin dews,
Thick-lying in the green fields of his heart.
Calm thoughts that dwelt like hermits in his soul,
Fair shapes that slept in fancifullest bowers,
Hopes and delights,--He parted with them all.
Linked hand in hand they went, tears in their eyes,
As faint and beautiful as eyes of flowers,
And now he sat alone with empty soul.
Last night his soul was like a forest, haunted
With pagan shapes; when one nymph slumbering lay,
A sweet dream 'neath her eyelids, her white limbs
Sinking full softly in the violets dim;
When timbrelled troops rushed past with branches green.
One in each fountain, riched with golden sands,
With her delicious face a moment seen,
And limbs faint-gleaming through their watery veil.
To-night his soul was like that forest old,
When these were reft away, and the wild wind
Running like one distract 'mong their old haunts,
Gold-sanded fountains, and the bladed flags.
[_A pause._
It is enough to shake one into tears.
A palace full of music was his heart,
An earthquake rent it open to the rain;
The lovely music died--the bright throngs fled--
Despair came like a foul and grizzly beast,
And littered in its consecrated rooms.

Nature was leaping like a Bacchanal
On the next morn, beneath its sky-wide sheen
The boy stood pallid in the rosy porch.
The mad larks bathing in the golden light,
The flowers close-fondled by the impassioned winds,
The smells that came and went upon the sense,
Like faint waves on a shore, he heeded not;
He could not look the morning in the eyes.
That singing morn he went forth like a ship;
Long years have passed, and he has not returned,
Beggared or laden, home.

VIOLET.

Ah, me, 'tis sad!
And sorrow's hand as well as mine has been
Among these golden curls. 'Tis past, 'tis past;
It has dissolved, as did the bank of cloud
That lay in the west last night.

WALTER.

I yearned for love,
As earnestly as sun-cracked summer earth
Yearns to the heavens for rain--none ever came.

VIOLET.

Oh, say not so! I love thee very much;
Let me but grow up like a sweet-breathed flower
Within this ghastly fissure of thy heart!
Do you not love me, Walter?

WALTER.

By thy tears
I love thee as my own immortal soul.
Weep, weep, my Beautiful! Upon thy face
There is no cloud of sorrow or distress.
It is as moonlight, pale, serene, and clear.
Thy tears are spilt of joy, they fall like rain
From heaven's stainless blue.
Bend over me, my Beautiful, my Own.
Oh, I could lie with face upturned for ever,
And on thy beauty feed as on a star!
[_Another pause._
Thy face doth come between me and the heaven--
Start not, my dearest! for I would not give
Thee in thy tears for all yon sky lit up
For a god's feast to-night. And I am loved!
Why did you love me, Violet?

VIOLET.

The sun
Smiles on the earth, and the exuberant earth
Returns the smile in flowers--'twas so with me.
I love thee as a fountain leaps to light--
I can do nothing else.

WALTER.

Say these words again,
And yet again; never fell on my ear
Such drops of music.

VIOLET.

Alas! poor words are weak,
So are the daily ills of common life,
To draw the ingots and the hoarded pearls
From out the treasure-caverns of my heart.
Suffering, despair, and death alone can do it:
Poor Walter! [_Kisses him._

WALTER.

Gods! I could out-Anthony
Anthony! This moment I could scatter
Kingdoms life halfpence. I am drunk with joy.
This is a royal hour--the top of life.
Henceforth my path slopes downward to the grave--
All's dross but love. That largest Son of Time,
Who wandered singing through the listening world,
Will be as much forgot as the canoe
That crossed the bosom of a lonely lake
A thousand years ago. My Beautiful!
I would not give thy cheek for all his songs--
Thy kiss for all his fame. Why do you weep?

VIOLET.

To think that we, so happy now, must die.

WALTER.

That thought hangs like a cold and slimy snail
On the rich rose of love--shake it away--
Give me another kiss, and I will take
Death at a flying leap. The night is fair,
But thou art fairer, Violet! Unloose
The midnight of thy tresses, let them float
Around us both. How the freed ringlets reel
Down to the dewy grass! Here lean thy head,
Now you will feel my heart leap 'gainst thy cheek;
Imprison me with those white arms of thine.
So, so. O sweet upturnèd face! (_Kisses her._) If God
Told you to-night He'd grant your dearest wish,
What would it be?

VIOLET.

That He would let you grow
To your ambition's height. What would be yours?

WALTER.

A greater boon than Satan's forfeit throne!
That He would keep us beautiful and young
For ever, as to-night. Oh, I could live
Unwearied on thy beauty, till the sun
Grows dim and wrinkled as an old man's face.
Our cheeks are close, our breaths mix like our souls.
We have been starved hereto; Love's banquet's spread,
Now let us feast our fills.

VIOLET.

Walter!

SCENE X.

_A Bridge in a City_--_Midnight_--WALTER _alone._

WALTER.

Adam lost Paradise--eternal tale
Repeated in the lives of all his sons.
I had a shining orb of happiness,
God gave it me; but sin passed over it
As small-pox passes o'er a lovely face,
Leaving it hideous. I have lost for ever
The Paradise of young and happy thoughts,
And now stand in the middle of my life
Looking back through my tears--ne'er to return.
I've a stern tryst with Death, and must go on,
Though with slow steps and oft-reverted eyes.

'Tis a thick, rich-hazed, sumptuous autumn night;
The moon grows like a white flower in the sky;
The stars are dim. The tired year rests content
Among her sheaves, as a fond mother rests
Among her children; all her work is done.
There is a weight of peace upon the world;
It sleeps: God's blessing on it. Not on _me_!
Oh, as a lewd dream stains the holy sleep,
I stain the holy night, yet dare not die!
I knew this river's childhood, from the lake
That gave it birth, till, as if spilt from heaven,
It floated o'er the face of jet-black rocks,
Graceful and gauzy as a snowy veil.
Then we were pure as the blue sky above us,
Now we are black alike. This stream has turned
The wheels of commerce, and come forth distained;
And now trails slowly through a city's heart,
Drawing its filth as doth an evil soul
Attract all evil things; putrid and black
It mingles with the clear and stainless sea.
So into pure eternity my soul
Will disembogue itself.
Good men have said
That sometimes God leaves sinners to their sin,--
He has left me to mine, and I am changed;
My worst part is insurgent, and my will
Is weak and powerless as a trembling king
When millions rise up hungry. Woe is me!
My soul breeds sins as a dead body worms!
They swarm and feed upon me. Hear me, God!
Sin met me and embraced me on my way;
Methought her cheeks were red, her lips had bloom;
I kissed her bold lips, dallied with her hair:
She sang me into slumber. I awoke--
It was a putrid corse that clung to me,
That _clings_ to me like memory to the damned,
That rots into my being. Father! God!
I cannot shake it off, it clings, it clings;--
I soon will grow as corrupt as itself. [_A pause._
God sends me back my prayers, as a father
Returns unoped the letters of a son
Who has dishonoured him.
Have mercy, Fiend!
Thou Devil, thou wilt drag me down to hell.
Oh, if she had proclivity to sin
Who did appear so beauteous and so pure,
Nature may leer behind a gracious mask.
And God himself may be----I'm giddy, blind,
The world reels from beneath me.
[_Catches hold of the parapet._
(_An outcast approaches._) Wilt pray for me?

GIRL (_shuddering_).

'Tis a dreadful thing to pray.

WALTER.

Why is it so?
Hast thou, like me, a spot upon thy soul
That neither tears can cleanse nor fires eterne?

GIRL.

But few request _my_ prayers.

WALTER.

I request them.
For ne'er did a dishevelled woman cling
So earnest-pale to a stern conqueror's knees,
Pleading for a dear life, as did my prayer
Cling to the knees of God. He shook it off,
And went upon His way. Wilt pray for me?

GIRL.

Sin crusts me o'er as limpets crust the rocks.
I would be thrust from ev'ry human door;
I dare not knock at heaven's.

WALTER.

Poor homeless one!
There is a door stands wide for thee and me--
The door of hell. Methinks we are well met.
I saw a little girl three years ago,
With eyes of azure and with cheeks of red,
A crowd of sunbeams hanging down her face;
Sweet laughter round her; dancing like a breeze.
I'd rather lair me with a fiend in fire
Than look on such a face as hers to-night.
But I can look on thee, and such as thee;
I'll call thee "Sister;" do thou call me "Brother."
A thousand years hence, when we both are damned,
We'll sit like ghosts upon the wailing shore,
And read our lives by the red light of hell.
Shall we not, Sister?

GIRL.

O thou strange, wild man!
Let me alone: what would you seek with me?

WALTER.

Your ear, my Sister. I have that within
Which urges me to utterance. I could accost
A pensive angel, singing to himself
Upon a hill in heaven, and leave his mind
As dark and turbid as a trampled pool,
To purify at leisure.--I have none
To listen to me, save a sinful woman
Upon a midnight bridge.--She was so fair,
God's eye could rest with pleasure on her face.
Oh, God, she was so happy! Her short life,
As full of music as the crowded June
Of an unfallen orb. What is it now?
She gave me her young heart, full, full of love:
My return--was to break it. Worse, far worse;
I crept into the chambers of her soul,
Like a foul toad, polluting as I went.

GIRL.

I pity her--not you. Man trusts in God;
He is eternal. Woman trusts in man,
And he is shifting sand.

WALTER.

Poor child, poor child!
We sat in dreadful silence with our sin,
Looking each other wildly in the eyes:
Methought I heard the gates of heaven close,
She flung herself against me, burst in tears,
As a wave bursts in spray. She covered me
With her wild sorrow, as an April cloud
With dim dishevelled tresses hides the hill
On which its heart is breaking. She clung to me
With piteous arms, and shook me with her sobs,
For she had lost her world, her heaven, her God,
And now had nought but me and her great wrong.
She did not kill me with a single word,
But once she lifted her tear-dabbled face--
Had hell gaped at my feet I would have leapt
Into its burning throat, from that pale look.
Still it pursues me like a haunting fiend:
It drives me out to the black moors at night,
Where I am smitten by the hissing rain,
And ruffian winds, dislodging from their troops,
Hustle me shrieking, then with sudden turn
Go laughing to their fellows. Merciful God!
It comes--that face again, that white, white face,
Set in a night of hair; reproachful eyes,
That make me mad. Oh, save me from those eyes!
They will torment me even in the grave,
And burn on me in Tophet.

GIRL.

Where are you going?

WALTER.

My heart's on fire by hell, and on I drive
To outer blackness, like a blazing ship.
[_He rushes away._

SCENE XI.

_Night._--WALTER, _standing alone in his garden._

WALTER.

Summer hath murmured with her leafy lips
Around my home, and I have heard her not;
I've missed the process of three several years,
From shaking wind-flowers to the tarnished gold
That rustles sere on Autumn's aged boughs.
I went three years ago, and now return,
As stag sore-hunted a long summer day
Creeps in the eve to its deep forest-home. [_A pause._
This is my home again! Once more I hail
The dear old gables and the creaking vanes.
It stands all flecked with shadows in the moon,
Patient, and white, and woeful. 'Tis so still,
It seems to brood upon its youthful years,
When children sported on its ringing floors,
And music trembled through its happy rooms.
'Twas here I spent my youth, as far removed
From the great heavings, hopes, and fears of man,
As unknown isle asleep in unknown seas.
Gone my pure heart, and with it happy days;
No manna falls around me from on high,
Barely from off the desert of my life
I gather patience and severe content.
God is a worker. He has thickly strewn
Infinity with grandeur. God is Love;
He yet will wipe away Creation's tears,
And all the worlds shall summer in His smile.
Why work I not? The veriest mote that sports
Its one-day life within the sunny beam
Has its stern duties. Wherefore have I none?
I will throw off this dead and useless past,
As a strong runner, straining for his life,
Unclasps a mantle to the hungry winds.
A mighty purpose rises large and slow
From out the fluctuations of my soul,
As, ghost-like, from the dim and tumbling sea
Starts the completed moon. [_Another pause._
I have a heart to dare,
And spirit-thews to work my daring out;
I'll cleave the world as a swimmer cleaves the sea,
Breaking the sleek green billows into froth,
With tilting full-blown chest, and scattering
With scornful breath the kissing, flattering foam,
That leaps and dallies with his dipping lip.
Thou'rt distant, now, O World! I hear thee not;
No pallid fringes of thy fires to-night
Droop round the large horizon. Yet, O World!
I have thee in my power, and as a man
By some mysterious influence can sway
Another's mind, making him laugh and weep,
Shudder or thrill, such power have I on thee.
Much have I suffered, both from thee and thine;
Thou shalt not 'scape me, World! I'll make thee weep;
I'll make my lone thought cross thee like a spirit,
And blanch thy braggart cheeks, lift up thy hair,
And make thy great knees tremble; I will send
Across thy soul dark herds of demon dreams,
And make thee toss and moan in troubled sleep;
And, waking, I will fill thy forlorn heart
With pure and happy thoughts, as summer woods
Are full of singing-birds. I come from far,
I'll rest myself, O World! awhile on thee,
And half in earnest, half in jest, I'll cut
My name upon thee, pass the arch of Death,
Then on a stair of stars go up to God.

SCENE XII.

_An Apartment_--CHARLES _and_ EDWARD _seated._

EDWARD.

Have you seen Walter lately?

CHARLES.

Very much;
I wintered with him.

EDWARD.

What was he about?

CHARLES.

He wrote his Poem then.

EDWARD.

That was a hit!
The world is murmuring like a hive of bees:
He is its theme--to-morrow it may change.
Was it done at a dash?

CHARLES.

It was; each word sincere,
As blood-drops from the heart. The full-faced moon,
Set round with stars, in at his casement looked,
And saw him write and write: and when the moon
Was waning dim upon the edge of morn,
Still sat he writing, thoughtful-eyed and pale;
And, as of yore, round his white temples reeled
His golden hair, in ringlets beautiful.
Great joy he had, for thought came glad and thick
As leaves upon a tree in primrose-time;
And as he wrote, his task the lovelier grew,
Like April unto May, or as a child,
A-smile in the lap of life, by fine degrees
Orbs to a maiden, walking with meek eyes
In atmosphere of beauty round her breathed.
He wrote all winter in an olden room,
Hallowed with glooms and books. Priests who have wed
Their makers unto Fame, Moons that have shed
Eternal halos around England's head;
Books dusky and thumbed without, _within_, a sphere
Smelling of Spring, as genial, fresh, and clear,
And beautiful, as is the rainbowed air
After May showers. Within this pleasant lair
He passed in writing all the winter moons;
But when May came, with train of sunny noons,
He chose a leafy summer-house within
The greenest nook in all his garden green;
Oft a fine thought would flush his face divine,
As he had quaffed a cup of olden wine,
Which deifies the drinker: oft his face
Gleamed like a spirit's in that shady place,
While he saw, smiling upward from the scroll,
The image of the thought within his soul;
There, 'mid the waving shadows of the trees,
'Mong garden-odours and the hum of bees,
He wrote the last and closing passages.
He is not happy.

EDWARD.

Has he told you so?

CHARLES.

Not in plain terms. Oft an unhappy thought,
Telling all is not well, falls from his soul
Like a diseasèd feather from the wing
Of a sick eagle; a scorched meteor-stone
Dropt from the ruined moon.

EDWARD.

What are these thoughts?

CHARLES.

I walked with him upon a windy night;
We saw the streaming moon flee through the sky,
Pursued by all the dark and hungry clouds.
He stopped and said: "Weariness feeds on all.
God wearies, and so makes a universe,
And gathers angels round him.--He is weak;
I weary, and so wreak myself in verse,----
Away with scrannel-pipes. Oh, for mad War!
I'd give my next twelve years to head but once
Ten thousand horse in a victorious charge.
Give me some one to hate, and let me chase
Him through the zones, and finding him at last,
Make his accursed eyes leap on his cheeks,
And his face blacken, with one choking gripe."

EDWARD.

Savage enough, i' faith!

CHARLES.

He often said,
His strivings after Poesy and Fame
Were vain as turning blind eyes on the sun.
His Book came out; I told him that the world
Hailed him a Poet. He said, with feeble smile,
"I have arisen like a dawn--the world,
Like the touched Memnon, murmurs--that is all."
He said, as we were lying on the moss,
(A forest sounding o'er us, like a sea
Above two mermen seated on the sands,)
"Our human hearts are deeper than our souls,
And Love than Knowledge is diviner food--
Oh, Charles! if God will ever send to thee
A heart that loves thee, reverence that heart.
We think that Death is hard, when he can kill
An infant smiling in his very face:
Harder was I than Death.--In cup of sin
I did dissolve thee, thou most precious pearl,
Then drank thee up." We sat one eve,
Gazing in silence on the falling sun:
We saw him sink. Upon the silent world,
Like a fine veil, came down the tender gloom;
A dove came fluttering round the window, flew
Away, and then came fluttering back. He said,
"As that dove flutters round the casement, comes
A pale shape round my soul; I've done it wrong,
I never will be happy till I ope
My heart and take it in."--'Twas ever so;
To some strange sorrow all his thoughts did tend,
Like waves unto a shore. Dost know his grief?

EDWARD.

I dimly guess it; a rich cheek grew pale,
A happy spirit singing on her way
Grew mute as winter. Walter, mad and blind,
Threw off the world, God, unclasped loving arms,
Rushed wild through Pleasure and through Devil-world,
Till he fell down exhausted.--Do you know
If he believes in God?

CHARLES.

He told me once,
The saddest thing that can befall a soul
Is when it loses faith in God and Woman;
For he had lost them both. Lost I those gems--
Though the world's throne stood empty in my path,
I would go wandering back into my childhood,
Searching for them with tears.

EDWARD.

Let him go
Alone upon his waste and dreary road,
He will return to the old faith he learned
Beside his mother's knee. That memory
That haunts him, as the sweet and gracious moon
Haunts the poor outcast Earth, will lead him back
To happiness and God.

CHARLES.

May it be so!

SCENE XIII.

_Afternoon._--WALTER _and_ VIOLET _entering the garden from the house._

VIOLET.

This is the dwelling you have told me of,--
Summer again hath dressed its bloomy walls,
Its fragrant front is populous with bees;
This is the garden--all is very like,
And yet unlike the picture in my heart;
I know not which is loveliest. I see
Afar the wandering beauty of the stream,
And nearer I can trace it as it shows
Its broad and gleaming back among the woods.
Is that the wood you slept in?

WALTER.

That is it.
And every nook and glade and tangled dell,
From its wide circle to its leafy heart,
Is as familiar to me as my soul.
Memories dwell like doves among the trees,
Like nymphs in glooms, like naïads in the wells;
And some are sweet, and sadder some than death.
[_A pause._
I could have sworn the world did sing in air,
I was so happy once. The eagle drinks
The keen blue morning, and the morn was mine.
I bathed in sunset, and to me the night
Was a perpetual wonder and an awe.
Oft, as I lay on earth and gazed at her,
The gliding moon with influence divine
Would draw a most delicious tide of tears
And spill it o'er my eyes. Sadness was joy
Of but another sort. My happiness
Was flecked with vague and transitory griefs,
As sweetly as the shining length of June
With evanescent eves; and through my soul
At intervals a regal pageant passed,
As through the palpitating streets the corse
Of a great chieftain, rolled in music rich,
Moves slow towards its rest. In these young days
Existence was to me sufficient joy;
At once a throne and kingdom, crown and lyre.
Now it is but a strip of barren sand,
On which with earnest heart I strive to rear
A temple to the Gods. I will not sadden you.
[_They move on._
This is the fountain: once it flashed and sang
(Possessed of such exuberance of joy)
To golden sunrise, the blue day, and when
The night grew gradual o'er it, star by star,--
Now it is mute as Memnon.

VIOLET.

Sad again!
Its brim is written over--o'er and o'er;
'Tis mute; but have you made its marble lips
As sweet as Music's?

WALTER.

Miserable words!
The offspring of some most unhappy hours.
To me this fountain's brim is sad as though
'Twere splashed with my own blood.

VIOLET (_reads_).

"Nature cares not
Although her loveliness should ne'er be seen
By human eyes, nor praised by human tongues.
The cataract exults among the hills,
And wears its crown of rainbows all alone.
Libel the ocean on his tawny sands,
Write verses in his praise,--the unmoved sea
Erases both alike. Alas for man!
Unless his fellows can behold his deeds
He cares not to be great." 'Tis very true.
The next is written in a languid hand:
"Sin hath drunk up my pleasure, as eclipse
Drinks up the sunlight. On my spirit lies
A malison and ban. What though the Spring
Makes all the hills and valleys laugh in green,--
Is the sea healed, or is the plover's cry
Merry upon the moor? I now am kin
To these, and winds, and ever-suffering things."
Oh, I could blot these words out with my tears!

WALTER.

So could I when I wrote them.

VIOLET.

What is next?
"A sin lies dead and dreadful in my soul,
Why should I gaze upon it day by day?
Oh, rather, since it cannot be destroyed,
Let me as reverently cover it
As with a cloth we cover up the dead,
And place it in some chamber of my soul,
Where it may lie unseen as sound, yet _felt_,--
Making life hushed and awful."

WALTER.

No more. No more.
Let God wash out this record with His rain!
This is the summer-house. [_They enter._
It is as sweet
As if enamoured Summer did adorn
It for his Love to dwell in. I love to sit
And hear the pattering footsteps of the shower,
As he runs over it, or watch at noon
The curious sunbeams peeping through the leaves.

VIOLET.

I've always pictured you in such a place
Writing your Book, and hurrying on, as if
You had a long and wondrous tale to tell,
And felt Death's cold hand closing round your heart.

WALTER.

Have you read my Book?

VIOLET.

I have.

WALTER.

It is enough.
The Book was only written for two souls,
And they are thine and mine.

VIOLET.

For many weeks,
When I was dwelling by the moaning sea,
Your name was blown to me on ev'ry wind,
And I was glad; for by that sign I knew
You had fulfilled your heart, and hoped you would
Put off the robes of sorrow, and put on
The singing crown of Fame. One dreary morn
Your Book came to me, and I fondled it,
As though it were a pigeon sent from thee
With love beneath its wing. I read and read
Until the sun lifted his cloudy lids
And shot wild light along the leaping deep,
Then closed his eyes in death. I shed no tear,
I laid it down in silence, and went forth
Burdened with its sad thoughts: slowly I went;
And, as I wandered through the deepening gloom,
I saw the pale and penitential moon
Rise from dark waves that plucked at her, and go
Sorrowful up the sky. Then gushed my tears--
The tangled problem of my life was plain--
I cried aloud, "Oh, would he come to me!
I know he is unhappy; that he strives
As fiercely as that blind and desperate sea,
Clutching with all its waves--in vain, in vain.
He never will be happy till he comes."
As I went home the thought that you would come
Filled my lorn heart with gladness, as the moon
Filled the great vacant night with moonlight, till
Its silver bliss ran o'er--so after prayer
I slept in the lap of peace--next morn you came.

WALTER.

And then I found you beautiful and pale--
Pale as that moonlight night! O Violet,
I have been undeceived. In my hot youth
I kissed the painted bloom off Pleasure's lips
And found them pale as Pain's,--and wept aloud.
Never henceforward can I hope to drain
The rapture of a lifetime at a gulp.
My happiness is not a troubled joy;
'Tis deep, serene as death. The sweet contents,
The happy thoughts from which I've been estranged,
Again come round me, as the old known peers
Surround and welcome a repentant spirit,
Who by the steps of sorrow hath regained
His throne and golden prime. The eve draws nigh!
The prosperous sun is in the west, and sees
From the pale east to where he sets in bliss,
His long road glorious. Wilt thou sing, my love,
And sadden me into a deeper joy?

VIOLET _sings._

The wondrous ages pass like rushing waves,
Each crowned with its own foam. Bards die, and Fame
Hangs like a pallid meteor o'er their graves.
Religions change, and come and go like flame.

Nothing remains but Love, the world's round mass
It doth pervade, all forms of life it shares,
The institutions that like moments pass
Are but the shapes the masking spirit wears.

Love is a sanctifier; 'tis a moon,
Turning each dusk to silver. A pure light,
Redeemer of all errors----
[_Ceases, and bursts into tears._

WALTER.

What ails you, Violet?
Has music stung you like a very snake?
Why do you weep?

VIOLET.

Walter! dost thou believe
Love will redeem all errors? Oh, my friend,
This gospel saves you! doubt it, you are lost.
Deep in the mists of sorrow long I lay,
Hopeless and still, when suddenly _this_ truth
Like a slant sunbeam quivered through the mist,
And turned it into radiance. In the light
I wrote these words, while you were far away
Fighting with shadows. Oh! Walter, in one boat
We floated o'er the smooth, moon-silvered sea;
The sky was smiling with its orbs of bliss;
And while we lived within each other's eyes,
We struck and split, and all the world was lost
In one wild whirl of horror darkening down;
At last I gained a deep and silent isle,
Moaned on by a dim sea, and wandered round,
Week after week, the happy-mournful shore,
Wond'ring if you had 'scaped.

WALTER.

Thou noble soul,
Teach me, for thou art nearer God than I!
My life was a long dream; when I awoke,
Duty stood like an angel in my path,
And seemed so terrible, I could have turned
Into my yesterdays, and wandered back
To distant childhood, and gone out to God
By the gate of birth, not death. Lift, lift me up
By thy sweet inspiration, as the tide
Lifts up a stranded boat upon the beach.
I will go forth 'mong men, not mailed in scorn,
But in the armour of a pure intent.
Great duties are before me and great songs,
And whether crowned or crownless, when I fall
It matters not, so that God's work is done.
I've learned to prize the quiet lightning-deed,
Not the applauding thunder at its heels
Which men call Fame. Our night is past;
We stand in precious sunrise, and beyond
A long day stretches to the very end.
Look out, my beautiful, upon the sky!
Even puts on her jewels. Look! she sets,
Venus upon her brow. I never gaze
Upon the evening but a tide of awe,
And love, and wonder, from the Infinite,
Swells up within me, as the running brine
From the smooth-glistening, wide-heaving sea,
Grows in the creeks and channels of a stream
Until it threats its banks. It is not joy,
'Tis sadness more divine.

VIOLET.

How quick they come,--
World after world! See the great moon above
Yon undistinguishable clump of trees
Is slowly from the darkness gathering light!
You used to love the moon!

WALTER.

This mournful wind
Has surely been with Winter, 'tis so cold;
The dews are falling, Violet! Your cloak--
Draw it around you. Let the still night shine!
A star's a cold thing to a human heart,
And love is better than their radiance. Come!
Let us go in together.

AN EVENING AT HOME.

To-day a chief was buried--let him rest.
His country's bards are up like larks, and fill
With singing the wide heavens of his fame.
To-night I sit within my lonely room,
The atmosphere is full of misty rain,
Wretched the earth and heaven. Yesterday
The streets and squares were choked with yellow fogs,
To-morrow we may all be drenched in sleet!
Stretched like a homeless beggar on the ground,
The city sleeps amid the misty rain.
Though Rain hath pitched his tent above my head,
'Tis but a speck upon the happy world.
Since I've begun to trace these lines, Sunrise
Has struck a land and woke its bleating hills;
Afar upon some black and silent moor
The crystal stars are shaking in the wind;
An ocean gurgles, for the stooping moon
Hath kissed him into peace, and now she smooths
The well-pleased monster with her silver hand.
Come, naked, gleaming Spring! great crowds of larks
Fluttering above thy head, thy happy ears
Loud with their ringing songs, Bright Saviour, come!
And kill old Winter with thy glorious look,
And turn his corse to flowers!

I sit to-night
As dreary as the pale, deserted East,
That sees the Sun, the Sun that once was hers,
Forgetful of her, flattering his new love,
The happy-blushing West. In these long streets
Of traffic and of noise, the human hearts
Are hard and loveless as a wreck-strewn coast.
Eternity doth wear upon her face
The veil of Time. They only see the veil,
And thus they know not what they stand so near.
Oh, rich in gold! Beggars in heart and soul!
Poor as the empty void! Why, even I,
Sitting in this bare chamber with my thoughts,
Am richer than ye all, despite your bales,
Your streets of warehouses, your mighty mills,
Each booming like a world faint heard in space:
Your ships; unwilling fires, that day and night
Writhe in your service seven years, then die
Without one taste of peace. Do ye believe
A simple primrose on a grassy bank
Forth-peeping to the sun, a wild bird's nest,
The great orb dying in a ring of clouds,
Like hoary Jacob 'mong his waiting sons;
The rising moon, and the young stars of God,
Are things to love? With _these_ my soul is brimmed;
With a diviner and serener joy
Then all thy heaven of money-bags can bring
Thy dry heart, Worldling!

The terror-stricken rain
Flings itself wildly on the window-panes,
Imploring shelter from the chasing wind.
Alas! to-night in this wide waste of streets
It beats on human limbs as well as walls!
God led Eve forth into the empty world
From Paradise. Could our great Mother come
And see her children now, what sight were worst;
A worker woke by cruel Day, the while
A kind dream feeds with sweetest phantom-bread,
Him, and his famished ones; or when the Wind,
With shuddering fingers, draws the veil of smoke,
And scares her with a battle's bleeding face?

Most brilliant star upon the crest of Time
Is England. England! Oh, I know a tale
Of those far summers when she lay in the sun,
Listening to her own larks, with growing limbs,
And mighty hands, which since have tamed the world,
Dreaming about their tasks. This dreary night
I'll tell the story to my listening heart.
I sang 't to thee, O unforgotten Friend!
(Who dwellest now on breezy English downs,
While I am drowning in the hateful smoke)
Beside the river which I long have loved.
O happy Days! O happy, happy Past!
O Friend! I am a lone benighted ship;
Before me hangs the vast untravelled gloom,
Behind, a wake of splendour, fading fast
Into the hungry gloom from whence it came.