Chapter C: S. Calverley

NUREMBERG

In the valley of the Pegnitz, where across broad meadow-lands Rise the blue Franconian mountains, Nuremberg, the ancient, stands.

Quaint old town of toil and traffic, quaint old town of art and song, Memories haunt thy pointed gables, like the rooks that round them throng:

Memories of the Middle Ages, when the emperors, rough and bold, 5 Had their dwelling in thy castle, time-defying, centuries old;

And thy brave and thrifty burghers boasted, in their uncouth rhyme, That their great imperial city stretched its hand through every clime.

In the court-yard of the castle, bound with many an iron band, Stands the mighty linden planted by Queen Cunigunde's hand; 10

On the square the oriel window, where in old heroic days Sat the poet Melchior singing Kaiser Maximilian's praise.

Everywhere I see around me rise the wondrous world of Art: Fountains wrought with richest sculpture standing in the common mart;

And above cathedral doorways saints and bishops carved in stone, 15 By a former age commissioned as apostles to our own.

In the church of sainted Sebald sleeps enshrined his holy dust, And in bronze the Twelve Apostles guard from age to age their trust;

In the church of sainted Lawrence stands a pix of sculpture rare, Like the foamy sheaf of fountains, rising through the painted air. 20

Here, when Art was still religion, with a simple, reverent heart, Lived and laboured Albrecht Duerer, the Evangelist of Art;

Hence in silence and in sorrow, toiling still with busy hand, Like an emigrant he wandered, seeking for the Better Land.

_Emigravit_ is the inscription on the tombstone where he lies; 25 Dead he is not, but departed,--for the artist never dies.

Fairer seems the ancient city, and the sunshine seems more fair, That he once has trod its pavement, that he once has breathed its air!

Through these streets so broad and stately, these obscure and dismal lanes, Walked of yore the Master-singers, chanting rude poetic strains. 30

From remote and sunless suburbs came they to the friendly guild, Building nests in Fame's great temple, as in spouts the swallows build.

As the weaver plied the shuttle, wove he too the mystic rhyme, And the smith his iron measures hammered to the anvil's chime;

Thanking God, whose boundless wisdom makes the flowers of poesy bloom In the forge's dust and cinders, in the tissues of the loom. 36

Here Hans Sachs, the cobbler-poet, laureate of the gentle craft, Wisest of the Twelve Wise Masters, in huge folios sang and laughed.

But his house is now an ale-house, with a nicely sanded floor, And a garland in the window, and his face above the door; 40

Painted by some humble artist, as in Adam Puschman's song, As the old man grey and dove-like, with his great beard white and long.

And at night the swart mechanic comes to drown his cark and care, Quaffing ale from pewter tankards, in the master's antique chair.

Vanished is the ancient splendour, and before my dreamy eye 45 Wave these mingled shapes and figures, like a faded tapestry.

Not thy Councils, not thy Kaisers, win for thee the world's regard; But thy painter, Albrecht Duerer, and Hans Sachs thy cobbler-bard.

Thus, O Nuremberg, a wanderer from a region far away, As he paced thy streets and court-yards, sang in thought his careless lay:

Gathering from the pavement's crevice, as a floweret of the soil, 51 The nobility of labour,--the long pedigree of toil.

H. W. LONGFELLOW.

AGED CITIES

I have known cities with the strong-armed Rhine Clasping their mouldered quays in lordly sweep; And lingered where the Maine's low waters shine Through Tyrian Frankfort; and been fain to weep 'Mid the green cliffs where pale Mosella laves 5 That Roman sepulchre, imperial Treves. Ghent boasts her street, and Bruges her moonlight square; And holy Mechlin, Rome of Flanders, stands, Like a queen-mother, on her spacious lands; And Antwerp shoots her glowing spire in air. 10 Yet have I seen no place, by inland brook, Hill-top, or plain, or trim arcaded bowers, That carries age so nobly in its look, As Oxford with the sun upon her towers.

F. W. FABER.

BRUGES

The Spirit of Antiquity--enshrined In sumptuous buildings, vocal in sweet song, In picture, speaking with heroic tongue, And with devout solemnities entwined-- Mounts to the seat of grace within the mind: 5 Hence Forms that glide with swan-like ease along, Hence motions, even amid the vulgar throng, To an harmonious decency confined: As if the streets were consecrated ground, The city one vast temple, dedicate 10 To mutual respect in thought and deed; To leisure, to forbearances sedate; To social cares from jarring passions freed; A deeper peace than that in deserts found!

W. WORDSWORTH.

THE BELFRY OF BRUGES

In the market-place of Bruges stands the belfry old and brown; Thrice consumed and thrice rebuilded, still it watches o'er the town.

As the summer morn was breaking, on that lofty tower I stood, And the world threw off the darkness, like the weeds of widowhood. 4

Thick with towns and hamlets studded, and with streams and vapours gray, Like a shield embossed with silver, round and vast the landscape lay.

At my feet the city slumbered. From its chimneys, here and there, Wreaths of snow-white smoke ascending, vanished, ghost-like, into air.

Not a sound rose from the city at that early morning hour, But I heard a heart of iron beating in the ancient tower. 10

From their nests beneath the rafters sang the swallows wild and high; And the world, beneath me sleeping, seemed more distant than the sky.

Then most musical and solemn, bringing back the olden times, With their strange unearthly changes rang the melancholy chimes,

Like the psalms from some old cloister, when the nuns sing in the choir; And the great bell tolled among them, like the chanting of a friar. 16

Visions of the days departed, shadowy phantoms filled my brain; They who live in history only seemed to walk the earth again;

All the Foresters of Flanders,--mighty Baldwin Bras de Fer, Lyderick du Bucq and Cressy Philip, Guy de Dampierre. 20

I beheld the pageants splendid that adorned those days of old; Stately dames, like queens attended, knights who bore the Fleece of Gold.

Lombard and Venetian merchants with deep-laden argosies; Ministers from twenty nations; more than royal pomp and ease.

I beheld proud Maximilian, kneeling humbly on the ground; 25 I beheld the gentle Mary, hunting with her hawk and hound;

And her lighted bridal-chamber, where a duke slept with the queen, And the armed guard around them, and the sword unsheathed between.

I beheld the Flemish weavers, with Namur and Juliers bold, Marching homeward from the bloody battle of the Spurs of Gold; 30

Saw the fight at Minnewater, saw the White Hoods moving west, Saw great Artevelde victorious scale the Golden Dragon's nest.

And again the whiskered Spaniard all the land with terror smote; And again the wild alarum sounded from the tocsin's throat;

Till the bell of Ghent responded o'er lagoon and dike of sand, 35 'I am Roland! I am Roland! there is victory in the land!'

Then the sound of drums aroused me. The awakened city's roar Chased the phantoms I had summoned back into their graves once more.

Hours had passed away like minutes; and, before I was aware, Lo! the shadow of the belfry crossed the sun-illumined square. 40

H. W. LONGFELLOW.

THE CARILLON

ANTWERP AND BRUGES

At Antwerp, there is a low wall
Binding the city, and a moat
Beneath, that the wind keeps afloat.
You pass the gates in a slow drawl
Of wheels. If it is warm at all 5
The Carillon will give you thought.

I climbed the stair in Antwerp church,
What time the urgent weight of sound
At sunset seems to heave it round.
Far up, the Carillon did search 10
The wind; and the birds came to perch
Far under, where the gables wound.

In Antwerp harbour on the Scheldt
I stood along, a certain space
Of night. The mist was near my face: 15
Deep on, the flow was heard and felt.
The Carillon kept pause, and dwelt
In music through the silent place.

At Bruges, when you leave the train,
--A singing numbness in your ears,-- 20
The Carillon's first sound appears
Only the inner moil. Again
A little minute though--your brain
Takes quiet, and the whole sense hears.

John Memmeling and John Van Eyck 25
Hold state at Bruges. In sore shame
I scanned the works that keep their name.
The Carillon, which then did strike
Mine ears, was heard of theirs alike;
It set me closer unto them. 30

I climbed at Bruges all the flight
The Belfry has of ancient stone.
For leagues I saw the east wind blown:
The earth was grey, the sky was white.
I stood so near upon the height 35
That my flesh left the Carillon.