Chapter CVII: Epilogue (7)

"'Well but,' you object, 'you have it, who by glamour
Dress up lies to look like truths, mask folly in the garb of reason:
Your soul acts on theirs, sure, when the people clamor,
Hold their peace, now fight now fondle,--earwigged through the
brains.'
Possibly! but still the operation 's mundane,
Grosser than a taste demands which--craving manna--kecks at peason--
Power o'er men by wants material: why should one deign
Rule by sordid hopes and fears--a grunt for all one's pains?

"No, if men must praise me, let them praise to purpose!
Would we move the world, not earth but heaven must be our
fulcrum--_pou sto!_
Thus I seek to move it: Master, why intérpose--
Balk my climbing close on what 's the ladder's topmost round?
Statecraft 't is I step from: when by priestcraft hoisted
Up to where my foot may touch the highest rung which fate allows
toe,
Then indeed ask favor. On you shall be foisted
No excuse: I 'll pay my debt, each penny of the pound!

"Ho, my knaves without there! Lead this worthy downstairs!
No farewell, good Paul--nay, Peter--what 's your name remembered
rightly?
Come, he 's humble: out another would have flounced--airs
Suitors often give themselves when our sort bow them forth.
Did I touch his rags? He surely kept his distance:
Yet, there somehow passed to me from him--where'er the virtue might
lie--
Something that inspires my soul--Oh, by assistance
Doubtlessly of Peter!--still, he 's worth just what he 's worth!

"'T is my own soul soars now: soaring--how? By crawling!
I 'll to Rome, before Rome's feet the temporal-supreme lay
prostrate!
'Hands' (I 'll say) 'proficient once in pulling, hauling
This and that way men as I was minded--feet now clasp!'
Ay, the Kaiser's self has wrung them in his fervor!
Now--they only sue to slave for Rome, nor at one doit the cost rate.
Rome's adopted child--no bone, no muscle, nerve or
Sinew of me but I 'll strain, though out my life I gasp!"

As he stood one evening proudly--(he had traversed
Rome on horseback--peerless pageant!--claimed the Lateran as new
Pope)--
Thinking "All 's attained now! Pontiff! Who could have erst
Dreamed of my advance so far when, some ten years ago,
I embraced devotion, grew from priest to bishop,
Gained the Purple, bribed the Conclave, got the Two-thirds, saw my
coop ope,
Came out--what Rome hails me! O were there a wish-shop,
Not one wish more would I purchase--lord of all below!

"Ha--who dares intrude now--puts aside the arras?
What, old Peter, here again, at such a time, in such a presence?
Satan sends this plague back merely to embarrass
Me who enter on my office--little needing you!
'Faith, I 'm touched myself by age, but you look Tithon!
Were it vain to seek of you the sole prize left--rejuvenescence?
Well, since flesh is grass which time must lay his scythe on,
Say your say and so depart and make no more ado!"

Peter faltered--coughing first by way of prologue--
"Holiness, your help comes late: a death at ninety little matters.
Padua, build poor Peter's pyre now, on log roll log,
Burn away--I 've lived my day! Yet here 's the sting in death--
I 've an author's pride: I want my Book's survival:
See, I 've hid it in my breast to warm me 'mid the rags and tatters!
Save it--tell next age your Master had no rival!
Scholar's debt discharged in full, be 'Thanks' my latest breath!"

"Faugh, the frowsy bundle--scribblings harum-scarum
Scattered o'er a dozen sheepskins! What 's the name of this farrago?
Ha--'_Conciliator Differentiarum_'--
Man and book may burn together, cause the world no loss!
Stop--what else? A tractate--eh, '_De Speciebus_
_Ceremonialis Ma-gi-æ?_' I dream sure! Hence, away, go,
Wizard,--quick avoid me! Vain you clasp my knee, buss
Hand that bears the Fisher's ring or foot that boasts the Cross!

"Help! The old magician clings like an octopus!
Ah, you rise now--fuming, fretting, frowning, if I read your
features!
Frown, who cares? We 're Pope--once Pope, you can't unpope us!
Good--you muster up a smile: that 's better! Still so brisk?
All at once grown youthful? But the case is plain! Ass--
Here I dally with the fiend, yet know the Word--compels all
creatures
Earthly, heavenly, hellish. _Apage, Sathanas_
_Dicam verbum Salomonis_--" "_dicite!_" When--whisk!--

What was changed? The stranger gave his eyes a rubbing:
There smiled Peter's face turned back a moment at him o'er the
shoulder,
As the black-door shut, bang! "So he 'scapes a drubbing!"
(Quoth a boy who, unespied, had stopped to hear the talk.)
"That 's the way to thank these wizards when they bid men
_Benedicite!_ What ails you? You, a man, and yet no bolder?
Foreign Sir, you look but foolish!" "_Idmen, idmen!_"
Groaned the Greek. "O Peter, cheese at last I know from chalk!"

Peter lived his life out, menaced yet no martyr,
Knew himself the mighty man he was--such knowledge all his guerdon,
Left the world a big book--people but in part err
When they style a true _Scientiæ Com-pen-di-um:_
"_Admirationem incutit_" they sourly
Smile, as fast they shut the folio which myself was somehow spurred
on
Once to ope: but love--life's milk which daily, hourly,
Blockheads lap--O Peter, still thy taste of love 's to come!

Greek, was your ambition likewise doomed to failure?
True, I find no record you wore purple, walked with axe and fasces,
Played some antipope's part: still, friend, don't turn tail, you 're
Certain, with but these two gifts, to gain earth's prize in time!
Cleverness uncurbed by conscience--if you ransacked
Peter's book you 'd find no potent spell like these to rule the
masses;
Nor should want example, had I not to transact
Other business. Go your ways, you 'll thrive! So ends my rhyme.

* * * * *

When these parts Tiberius--not yet Cæsar--travelled,
Passing Padua, he consulted Padua's Oracle of Geryon
(God three-headed, thrice wise) just to get unravelled
Certain tangles of his future. "Fling at Abano
Golden dice," it answered: "dropt within the fount there,
Note what sum the pips present!" And still we see each die, the very
one,
Turn up, through the crystal,--read the whole account there
Where 't is told by Suetonius,--each its highest throw.

Scarce the sportive fancy-dice I fling show "Venus:"
Still--for love of that dear land which I so oft in dreams revisit--
I have--oh, not sung! but lilted (as--between us--
Grows my lazy custom) this its legend. What the lilt?

[Music]

DOCTOR ----

A Rabbi told me: On the day allowed
Satan for carping at God's rule, he came,
Fresh from our earth, to brave the angel-crowd.

"What is the fault now?" "This I find to blame:
Many and various are the tongues below,
Yet all agree in one speech, all proclaim

"'Hell has no might to match what earth, can show:
Death is the strongest-born of Hell, and yet
Stronger than Death is a Bad Wife, we know.'

"Is it a wonder if I fume and fret--
Robbed of my rights, since Death am I, and mine
The style of Strongest? Men pay Nature's debt

"Because they must at my demand; decline
To pay it henceforth surely men will please,
Provided husbands with bad wives combine

"To baffle Death. Judge between me and these!"
"Thyself shalt judge. Descend to earth in shape
Of mortal, marry, drain from froth to lees

"The bitter draught, then see if thou escape
Concluding, with men sorrowful and sage,
A Bad Wife's strength Death's self in vain would ape!"

How Satan entered on his pilgrimage,
Conformed himself to earthly ordinance,
Wived and played husband well from youth to age

Intrepidly--I leave untold, advance
Through many a married year until I reach
A day when--of his father's countenance

The very image, like him too in speech
As well as thought and deed,--the union's fruit
Attained maturity. "I needs must teach

"My son a trade: but trade, such son to suit,
Needs seeking after. He a man of war?
Too cowardly! A lawyer wins repute--

"Having to toil and moil, though--both which are
Beyond this sluggard. There 's Divinity:
No, that 's my own bread-winner--that be far

"From my poor offspring! Physic? Ha, we 'll try
If this be practicable. Where 's my wit?
Asleep?--since, now I come to think ... Ay, ay!

"Hither, my son! Exactly have I hit
On a profession for thee. _Medicus_--
Behold, thou art appointed! Yea, I spit

"Upon thine eyes, bestow a virtue thus
That henceforth not this human form I wear
Shalt thou perceive alone, but--one of us

"By privilege--thy fleshly sight shall bear
Me in my spirit-person as I walk
The world and take my prey appointed there.

"Doctor once dubbed--what ignorance shall balk
Thy march triumphant? Diagnose the gout
As colic, and prescribe it cheese for chalk--

"No matter! All 's one: cure shall come about
And win thee wealth--fees paid with such a roar
Of thanks and praise alike from lord and lout

"As never stunned man's ears on earth before.
'How may this be?' Why, that 's my skeptic! Soon
Truth will corrupt thee, soon thou doubt'st no more!

"Why is it I bestow on thee the boon
Of recognizing me the while I go
Invisibly among men, morning, noon,

"And night, from house to house, and--quick or slow--
Take my appointed prey? They summon thee
For help, suppose: obey the summons! so!

"Enter, look round! Where 's Death? Know--I am he,
Satan who work all evil: I who bring
Pain to the patient in whate'er degree.

"I, then, am there: first glance thine eye shall fling
Will find me--whether distant or at hand,
As I am free to do my spiriting.

"At such mere first glance thou shalt understand
Wherefore I reach no higher up the room
Than door or window, when my form is scanned.

"Howe'er friends' faces please to gather gloom,
Bent o'er the sick,--howe'er himself desponds,--
In such case Death is not the sufferer's doom.

"Contrariwise, do friends rejoice my bonds
Are broken, does the captive in his turn
Crow 'Life shall conquer'? Nip these foolish fronds

"Of hope a-sprout, if haply thou discern
Me at the head--my victim's head, be sure!
Forth now! This taught thee, little else to learn!"

And forth he went. Folk heard him ask demure,
"How do you style this ailment? (There he peeps,
My father through the arras!) Sirs, the cure

"Is plain as A B C! Experience steeps
Blossoms of pennyroyal half an hour
In sherris. _Sumat!_--Lo, how sound he sleeps--

"The subject you presumed was past the power
Of Galen to relieve!" Or else, "How 's this?
Why call for help so tardily? Clouds lour

"Portentously indeed, Sirs! (Naught 's amiss:
He 's at the bed-foot merely.) Still, the storm
May pass averted--not by quacks, I wis,

"Like you, my masters! You, forsooth, perform
A miracle? Stand, sciolists, aside!
Blood, ne'er so cold, at ignorance grows warm!"

Which boasting by result was justified,
Big as might words be: whether drugged or left
Drugless, the patient always lived, not died.

Great the heir's gratitude, so nigh bereft
Of all he prized in this world: sweet the smile
Of disconcerted rivals: "Cure?--say, theft

"From Nature in despite of Art--so style
This off-hand kill-or-cure work! You did much,
I had done more: folk cannot wait awhile!"

But did the case change? was it--"Scarcely such
The symptoms as to warrant our recourse
To your skill, Doctor! Yet since just a touch

"Of pulse, a taste of breath, has all the force
With you of long investigation claimed
By others,--tracks an ailment to its source

"Intuitively,--may we ask unblamed
What from this pimple you prognosticate?"
"Death!" was the answer, as he saw and named

The coucher by the sick man's head. "Too late
You send for my assistance. I am bold
Only by Nature's leave, and bow to Fate!

"Besides, you have my rivals: lavish gold!
How comfortably quick shall life depart
Cosseted by attentions manifold!

"One day, one hour ago, perchance my art
Had done some service. Since you have yourselves
Chosen--before the horse--to put the cart,

"Why, Sirs, the sooner that the sexton delves
Your patient's grave the better! How you stare
--Shallow, for all the deep books on your shelves!

"Fare you well, fumblers!" Do I need declare
What name and fame, what riches recompensed
The Doctor's practice? Never anywhere

Such an adept as daily evidenced
Each new vaticination! Oh, not he
Like dolts who dallied with their scruples, fenced

With subterfuge, nor gave out frank and free
Something decisive! If he said "I save
The patient," saved he was: if "Death will be

"His portion," you might count him dead. Thus brave,
Behold our worthy, sans competitor
Throughout the country, on the architrave

Of Glory's temple golden-lettered for
Machaon _redivivus!_ So, it fell
That, of a sudden, when the Emperor

Was smit by sore disease, I need not tell
If any other Doctor's aid was sought
To come and forthwith make the sick Prince well.

"He will reward thee as a monarch ought.
Not much imports the malady; but then,
He clings to life and cries like one distraught

"For thee--who, from a simple citizen,
Mayst look to rise in rank,--nay, haply wear
A medal with his portrait,--always when

"Recovery is quite accomplished. There!
Pass to the presence!" Hardly has he crossed
The chamber's threshold when he halts, aware

Of who stands sentry by the head. All 's lost.
"Sire, naught avails my art: you near the goal,
And end the race by giving up the ghost."

"How?" cried the monarch: "Names upon your roll
Of half my subjects rescued by your skill--
Old and young, rich and poor--crowd cheek by jowl

"And yet no room for mine? Be saved I will!
Why else am I earth's foremost potentate?
Add me to these and take as fee your fill

"Of gold--that point admits of no debate
Between us: save me, as you can and must,--
Gold, till your gown's pouch cracks beneath the weight!"

This touched the Doctor. "Truly a home-thrust,
Parent, you will not parry! Have I dared
Entreat that you forego the meal of dust

"--Man that is snake's meat--when I saw prepared
Your daily portion? Never! Just this once,
Go from his head, then,--let his life be spared!"

Whisper met whisper in the gruff response;
"Fool, I must have my prey: no inch I budge
From where thou see'st me thus myself ensconce."

"Ah," moaned the sufferer, "by thy look I judge
Wealth fails to tempt thee: what if honors prove
More efficacious? Naught to him I grudge

"Who saves me. Only keep my head above
The cloud that 's creeping round it--I 'll divide
My empire with thee! No? What 's left but--love?

"Does love allure thee? Well then, take as bride
My only daughter, fair beyond belief!
Save me--to-morrow shall the knot be tied!"

"Father, you hear him! Respite ne'er so brief
Is all I beg: go now and come again
Next day, for aught I care: respect the grief

"Mine will be if thy first-born sues in vain!"
"Fool, I must have my prey!" was all he got
In answer. But a fancy crossed his brain.

"I have it! Sire, methinks a meteor shot
Just now across the heavens and neutralized
Jove's salutary influence: 'neath the blot

"Plumb are you placed now: well that I surmised
The cause of failure! Knaves, reverse the bed!"
"Stay!" groaned the monarch, "I shall be capsized--

"Jolt--jolt--my heels uplift where late my head
Was lying--sure I 'm turned right round at last!
What do you say now, Doctor?" Naught he said,

For why? With one brisk leap the Antic passed
From couch-foot back to pillow,--as before,
Lord of the situation. Long aghast

The Doctor gazed, then "Yet one trial more
Is left me" inwardly he uttered. "Shame
Upon thy flinty heart! Do I implore

"This trifling favor in the idle name
Of mercy to the moribund? I plead
The cause of all thou dost affect: my aim

"Befits my author! Why would I succeed?
Simply that by success I may promote
The growth of thy pet virtues--pride and greed.

"But keep thy favors!--curse thee! I devote
Henceforth my service to the other side.
No time to lose: the rattle 's in his throat.

"So,--not to leave one last resource untried,--
Run to my house with all haste, somebody!
Bring me that knobstick thence, so often plied

"With profit by the astrologer--shall I
Disdain its help, the mystic Jacob's-Staff?
Sire, do but have the courage not to die

"Till this arrive! Let none of you dare laugh!
Though rugged its exterior, I have seen
That implement work wonders, send the chaff

"Quick and thick flying from the wheat--I mean,
By metaphor, a human sheaf it threshed
Flail-like. Go fetch it! Or--a word between

Just you and me, friend!--go bid, unabashed,
My mother, whom you 'll find there, bring the stick
Herself--herself, mind!" Out the lackey dashed

Zealous upon the errand. Craft and trick
Are meat and drink to Satan: and he grinned
--How else?--at an excuse so politic

For failure: scarce would Jacob's-Staff rescind
Fate's firm decree! And ever as he neared
The agonizing one, his breath like wind

Froze to the marrow, while his eye-flash seared
Sense in the brain up: closelier and more close
Pressing his prey, when at the door appeared

--Who but his Wife the Bad? Whereof one dose,
One grain, one mite of the medicament,
Sufficed him. Up he sprang. One word, too gross

To soil my lips with,--and through ceiling went
Somehow the Husband. "That a storm 's dispersed
We know for certain by the sulphury scent!

"Hail to the Doctor! Who but one so versed
In all Dame Nature's secrets had prescribed
The staff thus opportunely? Style him first

"And foremost of physicians!" "I've imbibed
Elixir surely," smiled the prince,--"have gained
New lease of life. Dear Doctor, how you bribed

"Death to forego me, boots not: you 've obtained
My daughter and her dowry. Death, I 've heard,
Was still on earth the strongest power that reigned,

"Except a Bad Wife!" Whereunto demurred
Nowise the Doctor, so refused the fee
--No dowry, no bad wife!

"You think absurd
This tale?"--the Rabbi added: "True, our Talmud
Boasts sundry such: yet--have our elders erred
In thinking there 's some water there, not all mud?"
I tell it, as the Rabbi told it me.

PAN AND LUNA

Si credere dignum est.--_Georgic_, III. 390.

Oh, worthy of belief I hold it was,
Virgil, your legend in those strange three lines!
No question, that adventure came to pass
One black night in Arcadia: yes, the pines,
Mountains and valleys mingling made one mass
Of black with void black heaven: the earth's confines,
The sky's embrace,--below, above, around,
All hardened into black without a bound.

Fill up a swart stone chalice to the brim
With fresh-squeezed yet fast-thickening poppy-juice:
See how the sluggish jelly, late a-swim,
Turns marble to the touch of who would loose
The solid smooth, grown jet from rim to rim,
By turning round the bowl! So night can fuse
Earth with her all-comprising sky. No less.
Light, the least spark, shows air and emptiness.

And thus it proved when--diving into space,
Stript of all vapor, from each web of mist
Utterly film-free--entered on her race
The naked Moon, full-orbed antagonist
Of night and dark, night's dowry: peak to base,
Upstarted mountains, and each valley, kissed
To sudden life, lay silver-bright: in air
Flew she revealed, Maid-Moon with limbs all bare.

Still as she fled, each depth--where refuge seemed--
Opening a lone pale chamber, left distinct
Those limbs: 'mid still-retreating blue, she teemed
Herself with whiteness,--virginal, uncinct
By any halo save what finely gleamed
To outline not disguise her: heaven was linked
In one accord with earth to quaff the joy,
Drain beauty to the dregs without alloy.

Whereof she grew aware. What help? When, lo,
A succorable cloud with sleep lay dense:
Some pinetree-top had caught it sailing slow,
And tethered for a prize: in evidence
Captive lay fleece on fleece of piled-up snow
Drowsily patient: flake-heaped how or whence,
The structure of that succorable cloud,
What matter? Shamed she plunged into its shroud.

Orbed--so the woman-figure poets call
Because of rounds on rounds--that apple-shaped
Head which its hair binds close into a ball
Each side the curving ears--that pure undraped
Pout of the sister paps--that ... Once for all,
Say--her consummate circle thus escaped
With its innumerous circlets, sank absorbed,
Safe in the cloud--O naked Moon full-orbed!

But what means this? The downy swathes combine,
Conglobe, the smothery coy-caressing stuff
Curdles about her! Vain each twist and twine
Those lithe limbs try, encroached on by a fluff
Fitting as close as fits the dented spine
Its flexible ivory outside-flesh: enough!
The plumy drifts contract, condense, constringe,
Till she is swallowed by the feathery springe.

As when a pearl slips lost in the thin foam
Churned on a sea-shore, and, o'er-frothed, conceits
Herself safe-housed in Amphitrite's dome,--
If, through the bladdery wave-worked yeast, she meets
What most she loathes and leaps from,--elf from gnome
No gladlier,--finds that safest of retreats
Bubble about a treacherous hand wide ope
To grasp her--(divers who pick pearls so grope)--

So lay this Maid-Moon clasped around and caught
By rough red Pan, the god of all that tract:
He it was schemed the snare thus subtly wrought
With simulated earth-breath,--wool-tufts packed
Into a billowy wrappage. Sheep far-sought
For spotless shearings yield such: take the fact
As learned Virgil gives it,--how the breed
Whitens itself forever: yes, indeed!

If one forefather ram, though pure as chalk
From tinge on fleece, should still display a tongue
Black 'neath the beast's moist palate, prompt men balk
The propagating plague: he gets no young:
They rather slay him,--sell his hide to calk
Ships with, first steeped in pitch,--nor hands are wrung
In sorrow for his fate: protected thus,
The purity we love is gained for us.

So did Girl-Moon, by just her attribute
Of unmatched modesty betrayed, lie trapped,
Bruised to the breast of Pan, half god half brute,
Raked by his bristly boar-sward while he lapped
--Never say, kissed her! that were to pollute
Love's language--which moreover proves unapt
To tell now she recoiled--as who finds thorns
Where she sought flowers--when, feeling, she touched--horns!

Then--does the legend say?--first moon-eclipse
Happened, first swooning-fit which puzzled sore
The early sages? Is that why she dips
Into the dark, a minute and no more,
Only so long as serves her while she rips
The cloud's womb through and, faultless as before,
Pursues her way? No lesson for a maid
Left she, a maid herself thus trapped, betrayed?

Ha, Virgil? Tell the rest, you! "To the deep
Of his domain the wildwood, Pan forthwith
Called her, and so she followed"--in her sleep,
Surely?--"by no means spurning him." The myth
Explain who may! Let all else go, I keep
--As of a ruin just a monolith--
Thus much, one verse of five words, each a boon:
Arcadia, night, a cloud, Pan, and the moon.

* * * * *

The first ten lines that follow were printed as epilogue to the second series of _Dramatic Idyls;_ the second ten were added to them by Browning in the album of a young American girl in Venice, October, 1880. See _The Century_ for November, 1882.

"Touch him ne'er so lightly, into song he broke:
Soil so quick-receptive,--not one feather-seed,
Not one flower-dust fell but straight its fall awoke
Vitalizing virtue: song would song succeed
Sudden as spontaneous--prove a poet-soul!"
Indeed?
Rock's the song-soil rather, surface hard and bare:
Sun and dew their mildness, storm and frost their rage
Vainly both expend,--few flowers awaken there:
Quiet in its cleft broods--what the after-age
Knows and names a pine, a nation's heritage.

* * * * *

Thus I wrote in London, musing on my betters,
Poets dead and gone; and lo, the critics cried,
"Out on such a boast!" as if I dreamed that fetters
Binding Dante bind up--me! as if true pride
Were not also humble!
So I smiled and sighed
As I oped your book in Venice this bright morning,
Sweet new friend of mine! and felt the clay or sand,
Whatsoe'er my soil be, break--for praise or scorning--
Out in grateful fancies--weeds; but weeds expand
Almost into flowers, held by such a kindly hand.

THE BLIND MAN TO THE MAIDEN

Browning translated the following from a German poem in Wilhelmine von Hillern's novel _The Hour Will Come_ at the request of Mrs. Clara Bell, the translator of the novel. It there appeared as the work of an anonymous friend, but was reprinted as Browning's in _The Whitehall Review_ for March 1, 1883.

The blind man to the maiden said,
"O thou of hearts the truest,
Thy countenance is hid from me;
Let not my question anger thee!
Speak, though in words the fewest.

"Tell me, what kind of eyes are thine?
Dark eyes, or light ones rather?"
"My eyes are a decided brown--
So much, at least, by looking down,
From the brook's glass I gather."

"And is it red--thy little month?
That too the blind must care for."
"Ah! I would tell it soon to thee,
Only--none yet has told it me.
I cannot answer, therefore.

"But dost thou ask what heart I have--
There hesitate I never.
In thine own breast 't is borne, and so
'T is thine in weal, and thine in woe,
For life, for death--thine ever!"

GOLDONI

The following sonnet was written by Browning for the album of the Committee of the Goldoni monument, erected in Venice in 1883.

Goldoni--good, gay, sunniest of souls,--
Glassing half Venice in that verse of thine,--
What though it just reflect the shade and shine
Of common life, nor render, as it rolls,
Grandeur and gloom? Sufficient for thy shoals
Was Carnival; Parini's depths enshrine
Secrets unsuited to that opaline
Surface of things which laughs along thy scrolls.
There throng the people: how they come and go,
Lisp the soft language, flaunt the bright garb,--see,--
On Piazza, Calle, under Portico
And over Bridge! Dear king of Comedy,
Be honored! thou that didst love Venice so,
Venice, and we who love her, all love thee!

VENICE, _November 27, 1883._

JOCOSERIA

This collection of poems was published in 1883. The title of the volume is mentioned in a foot-note to the _Note_ at the end of _Paracelsus_, where the poet speaks of "such rubbish as Melander's _Jocoseria_." In a letter, accompanying a copy of the volume, sent to a friend, Browning wrote: "The title is taken from the work of Melander (Schwartzmann), reviewed, by a curious coincidence, in the _Blackwood_ of this month [February, 1883]. I referred to it in a note to _Paracelsus_. The two Hebrew quotations [in the note to Jochanan Hakkadosh] (put in to give a grave look to what is mere fun and invention) being translated amount to (1) 'A Collection of Lies'; and (2), an old saying, 'From Moses to Moses arose none like Moses.'"

WANTING IS--WHAT?

This is in the nature of a prelude to the entire group of poems.

Wanting is--what?
Summer redundant,
Blueness abundant,
--Where is the blot?
Beamy the world, yet a blank all the same,
--Framework which waits for a picture to frame:
What of the leafage, what of the flower?
Roses embowering with naught they embower!
Come then, complete incompletion, O comer,
Pant through the blueness, perfect the summer!
Breathe but one breath
Rose-beauty above,
And all that was death
Grows life, grows love,
Grows love!

DONALD

This story which Browning had from the lips of the hero has also been told in prose by Sir Walter Scott.

"Will you hear my story also,
--Huge Sport, brave adventure in plenty?"
The boys were a band from Oxford,
The oldest of whom was twenty.

The bothy we held carouse in
Was bright with fire and candle;
Tale followed tale like a merry-go-round
Whereof Sport turned the handle.

In our eyes and noses--turf-smoke:
In our ears a tune from the trivet,
Whence "Boiling, boiling," the kettle sang,
"And ready for fresh Glenlivet."

So, feat capped feat, with a vengeance:
Truths, though,--the lads were loyal:
Grouse, five-score brace to the bag!
Deer, ten hours' stalk of the Royal!"

Of boasting, not one bit, boys!
Only there seemed to settle
Somehow above your curly heads,
--Plain through the singing kettle,

Palpable through the cloud,
As each new-puffed Havana
Rewarded the teller's well-told tale,--
This vaunt "To Sport--Hosanna!

"Hunt, fish, shoot,
Would a man fulfil life's duty!
Not to the bodily frame alone
Does Sport give strength and beauty,

"But character gains in--courage?
Ay, Sir, and much beside it!
You don't sport, _more 's the pity;_
You soon would find, if you tried it,

"Good sportsman means good fellow,
Sound-hearted he, to the centre;
Your mealy-mouthed mild milksops
--There 's where the rot can enter!

"There 's where the dirt will breed,
The shabbiness Sport would banish!
Oh no, Sir, no! In your honored case
All such objections vanish.

"'T is known how hard you studied:
A Double-First--what, the jigger!
Give me but half your Latin and Greek,
I 'll never again touch trigger!

"Still, tastes are tastes, allow me!
Allow, too, where there 's keenness
For Sport, there 's little likelihood
Of a man's displaying meanness!"

So, put on my mettle, I interposed.
"Will you hear my story?" quoth I.
Never mind how long since it happed,
I sat, as we sit, in a bothy;

"With as merry a band of mates, too,
Undergrads all on a level:
(One 's a Bishop, one 's gone to the Bench,
And one's gone--well, to the Devil.)

"When, lo, a scratching and tapping!
In hobbled a ghastly visitor.
Listen to just what he told us himself
--No need of our playing inquisitor!"

* * * * *

Do you happen to know in Ross-shire
Mount Ben ... but the name scarce matters:
Of the naked fact I am sure enough,
Though I clothe it in rags and tatters.

You may recognize Ben by description;
Behind him--a moor's immenseness:
Up goes the middle mount of a range,
Fringed with its firs in denseness.

Rimming the edge, its fir-fringe, mind!
For an edge there is, though narrow;
From end to end of the range, a strip
Of path runs straight as an arrow.

And the mountaineer who takes that path
Saves himself miles of journey
He has to plod if he crosses the moor
Through heather, peat, and burnie.

But a mountaineer he needs must be,
For, look you, right in the middle
Projects bluff Ben--with an end in _ich_--
Why planted there, is a riddle:

Since all Ben's brothers little and big
Keep rank, set shoulder to shoulder,
And only this burliest out must bulge
Till it seems--to the beholder

From down in the gully,--as if Ben's breast,
To a sudden spike diminished,
Would signify to the boldest foot
"All further passage finished!"

Yet the mountaineer who sidles on
And on to the very bending,
Discovers, if heart and brain be proof,
No necessary ending.

Foot up, foot down, to the turn abrupt
Having trod, he, there arriving,
Finds--what he took for a point was breadth,
A mercy of Nature's contriving.

So, he rounds what, when 't is reached, proves straight,
From one side gains the other:
The wee path widens--resume the march,
And he foils you, Ben my brother!

But Donald--(that name, I hope, will do)--
I wrong him if I call "foiling"
The tramp of the callant, whistling the while
As blithe as our kettle's boiling.

He had dared the danger from boyhood up,
And now,--when perchance was waiting
A lass at the brig below,--'twixt mount
And moor would he stand debating?

Moreover this Donald was twenty-five,
A glory of bone and muscle:
Did a fiend dispute the right of way,
Donald would try a tussle.

Lightsomely marched he out of the broad
On to the narrow and narrow;
A step more, rounding the angular rock,
Reached the front straight as an arrow.

He stepped it, safe on the ledge he stood,
When--whom found he full-facing?
What fellow in courage and wariness too,
Had scouted ignoble pacing,

And left low safety to timid mates,
And made for the dread dear danger,
And gained the height where--who could guess
He would meet with a rival ranger?

'T was a gold-red stag that stood and stared,
Gigantic and magnific,
By the wonder--ay, and the peril--struck
Intelligent and pacific:

For a red deer is no fallow deer
Grown cowardly through park-feeding;
He batters you like a thunderbolt
If you brave his haunts unheeding.

I doubt he could hardly perform _volte-face_
Had valor advised discretion:
You may walk on a rope, but to turn on a rope
No Blondin makes profession.

Yet Donald must turn, would pride permit,
Though pride ill brooks retiring:
Each eyed each--mute man, motionless beast--
Less fearing than admiring.

These are the moments when quite new sense,
To meet some need as novel,
Springs up in the brain: it inspired resource:
--"Nor advance nor retreat but--grovel!"

And slowly, surely, never a whit
Relaxing the steady tension
Of eye-stare which binds man to beast,--
By an inch and inch declension,

Sank Donald sidewise down and down:
Till flat, breast upwards, lying
At his six-foot length, no corpse more still,
--"If he cross me! The trick 's worth trying."

Minutes were an eternity;
But a new sense was created
In the stag's brain too; he resolves! Slow, sure,
With eye-stare unabated,

Feelingly he extends a foot
Which tastes the way ere it touches
Earth's solid and just escapes man's soft,
Nor hold of the same unclutches

Till its fellow foot, light as a feather whisk,
Lands itself no less finely:
So a mother removes a fly from the face
Of her babe asleep supinely.

And now 't is the haunch and hind-foot's turn
--That 's hard: can the beast quite raise it?
Yes, traversing half the prostrate length,
His hoof-tip does not graze it.

Just one more lift! But Donald, you see,
Was sportsman first, man after:
A fancy lightened his caution through,
--He wellnigh broke into laughter:

"It were nothing short of a miracle!
Unrivalled, unexampled--
All sporting feats with this feat matched
Were down and dead and trampled!"

The last of the legs as tenderly
Follows the rest: or never
Or now is the time! His knife in reach,
And his right-hand loose--how clever!

For this can stab up the stomach's soft,
While the left-hand grasps the pastern.
A rise on the elbow, and--now 's the time
Or never: this turn 's the last turn!

I shall dare to place myself by God
Who scanned--for he does--each feature
Of the face thrown up in appeal to him
By the agonizing creature.

Nay, I hear plain words: "Thy gift brings this!"
Up he sprang, back he staggered,
Over he fell, and with him our friend
--At following game no laggard.

Yet he was not dead when they picked next day
From the gully's depth the wreck of him;
His fall had been stayed by the stag beneath
Who cushioned and saved the neck of him.

But the rest of his body--why, doctors said,
Whatever could break was broken;
Legs, arms, ribs, all of him looked like a toast
In a tumbler of port-wine soaken.

"That your life is left you, thank the stag!"
Said they when--the slow cure ended--
They opened the hospital-door, and thence
--Strapped, spliced, main fractures mended,

And minor damage left wisely alone,--
Like an old shoe clouted and cobbled,
Out--what went in a Goliath wellnigh,--
Some half of a David hobbled.

"You must ask an alms from house to house:
Sell the stag's head for a bracket,
With its grand twelve tines--I 'd buy it myself--
And use the skin for a jacket!"

He was wiser, made both head and hide
His win-penny: hands and knees on,
Would manage to crawl--poor crab--by the roads
In the misty stalking-season.

And if he discovered a bothy like this,
Why, harvest was sure: folk listened.
He told his tale to the lovers of Sport:
Lips twitched, cheeks glowed, eyes glistened.

And when he had come to the close, and spread
His spoils for the gazers' wonder,
With "Gentlemen, here 's the skull of the stag
I was over, thank God, not under!"--

The company broke out in applause;
"By Jingo, a lucky cripple!
Have a munch of grouse and a hunk of bread,
And a tug, besides, at our tipple!"

And "There 's my pay for your pluck!" cried This,
"And mine for your jolly story!"
Cried That, while T' other--but he was drunk--
Hiccupped "A trump, a Tory!"

I hope I gave twice as much as the rest;
For, as Homer would say, "within grate
Though teeth kept tongue," my whole soul growled,
"Rightly rewarded,--Ingrate!"

SOLOMON AND BALKIS

Solomon King of the Jews and the Queen of Sheba, Balkis,
Talk on the ivory throne, and we well may conjecture their talk is
Solely of things sublime: why else has she sought Mount Zion,
Climbed the six golden steps, and sat betwixt lion and lion?

She proves him with hard questions: before she has reached the
middle
He smiling supplies the end, straight solves them riddle by riddle;
Until, dead-beaten at last, there is left no spirit in her,
And thus would she close the game whereof she was first beginner:

"O wisest thou of the wise, world's marvel and wellnigh monster,
One crabbed question more to construe or _vulgo_ conster!
Who are those, of all mankind, a monarch of perfect wisdom
Should open to, when they knock at _spheteron do_--that 's, his
dome?"

The King makes tart reply: "Whom else but the wise his equals
Should he welcome with heart and voice?--since, king though he be,
such weak walls
Of circumstance--power and pomp--divide souls each from other
That whoso proves kingly in craft I needs must acknowledge my
brother.

"Come poet, come painter, come sculptor, come builder--whate'er his
condition,
Is he prime in his art? We are peers! My insight has pierced the
partition
And hails--for the poem, the picture, the statue, the building--my
fellow!
Gold 's gold though dim in the dust: court-polish soon turns it
yellow.

"But tell me in turn, O thou to thy weakling sex superior,
That for knowledge hast travelled so far yet seemest nowhit the
wearier,--
Who are those, of all mankind, a queen like thyself, consummate
In wisdom, should call to her side with an affable 'Up hither, come,
mate'?"

"The Good are my mates--how else? Why doubt it?" the Queen
upbridled:
"Sure even above the Wise,--or in travel my eyes have idled,--
I see the Good stand plain: be they rich, poor, shrewd, or simple,
If Good they only are.... Permit me to drop my wimple!"

And, in that bashful jerk of her body, she--peace, thou scoffer!--
Jostled the King's right-hand stretched courtously help to proffer,
And so disclosed a portent: all unaware the Prince eyed
The Ring which bore the Name--turned outside now from inside!

The truth-compelling Name!--and at once, "I greet the Wise--oh,
Certainly welcome such to my court--with this proviso:
The building must be my temple, my person stand forth the statue,
The picture my portrait prove, and the poem my praise--you cat,
you!"

But Solomon nonplussed? Nay! "Be truthful in turn!" so bade he:
"See the Name, obey its hest!" And at once subjoins the lady,
--"Provided the Good are the young, men strong and tall and proper,
Such servants I straightway enlist,--which means" ... But the
blushes stop her.

"Ah, Soul," the Monarch sighed, "that wouldst soar yet ever
crawlest,
How comes it thou canst discern the greatest yet choose the
smallest,
Unless because heaven is far, where wings find fit expansion,
While creeping on all-fours suits, suffices the earthly mansion?

"Aspire to the Best! But which? There are Bests and Bests so many,
With a _habitat_ each for each, earth's Best as much Best as any!
On Lebanon roots the cedar--soil lofty, yet stony and sandy--
While hyssop, of worth in its way, on the wall grows low but handy.

"Above may the Soul spread wing, spurn body and sense beneath her;
Below she must condescend, to plodding unbuoyed by ether.
In heaven I yearn for knowledge, account all else inanity;
On earth I confess an itch for the praise of fools--that 's Vanity.

"It is naught, it will go, it can never presume above to trouble me;
But here,--why, it toys and tickles and teases, howe'er I redouble
me
In a doggedest of endeavors to play the indifferent. Therefore,
Suppose we resume discourse? Thou hast travelled thus far: but
wherefore?

"Solely for Solomon's sake, to see whom earth styles Sagest?"
Through her blushes laughed the Queen. "For the sake of a Sage? The
gay jest!
On high, be communion with Mind--there, Body concerns not Balkis:
Down here,--do I make too bold? Sage Solomon,--one fool's small
kiss!"

CRISTINA AND MONALDESCHI

Ah, but how each loved each, Marquis!
Here 's the gallery they trod
Both together, he her god,
She his idol,--lend your rod,
Chamberlain!--ay, there they are--"_Quis_
_Separabit?_"--plain those two
Touching words come into view,
Apposite for me and you:

Since they witness to incessant
Love like ours: King Francis, he--
Diane the adored one, she--
Prototypes of you and me.
Everywhere is carved her Crescent
With his Salamander-sign--
Flame-fed creature: flame benign
To itself or, if malign,

Only to the meddling curious,
--So, be warned, Sir! Where 's my head?
How it wanders! What I said
Merely meant--the creature, fed
Thus on flame, was scarce injurious
Save to fools who woke its ire,
Thinking fit to play with fire.
'T is the Crescent you admire?

Then, be Diane! I 'll be Francis.
Crescents change,--true!--wax and wane,
Woman-like: male hearts retain
Heat nor, once warm, cool again.
So, we figure--such our chance is--
I as man and you as ... What?
Take offence? My Love forgot
He plays woman, I do not?

I--the woman? See my habit,
Ask my people! Anyhow,
Be we what we may, one vow
Binds us, male or female. Now,--
Stand, Sir! Read! "_Quis separabit?_"
Half a mile of pictured way
Past these palace-walls to-day
Traversed, this I came to say.

You must needs begin to love me;
First I hated, then, at best,
--Have it so!--I acquiesced;
Pure compassion did the rest.
From below thus raised above me,
Would you, step by step, descend,
Pity me, become my friend,
Like me, like less, loathe at end?

That 's the ladder's round you rose by!
That--my own foot kicked away,
Having raised you: let it stay,
Serve you for retreating? Nay.
Close to me you climbed: as close by,
Keep your station, though the peak
Reached proves somewhat bare and bleak!
Woman 's strong if man is weak.

Keep here, loving me forever!
Love's look, gesture, speech, I claim:
Act love, lie love, all the same--
Play as earnest were our game!
Lonely I stood long: 't was clever
When you climbed, before men's eyes,
Spurned the earth and scaled the skies,
Gained my peak and grasped your prize.

Here you stood, then, to men's wonder;
Here you tire of standing? Kneel!
Cure what giddiness you feel,
This way! Do your senses reel?
Not unlikely! What rolls under?
Yawning death in yon abyss
Where the waters whirl and hiss
Round more frightful peaks than this.

Should my buffet dash you thither ...
But be sage! No watery grave
Needs await you: seeming brave
Kneel on safe, dear timid slave!
You surmised, when you climbed hither,
Just as easy were retreat
Should you tire, conceive unmeet
Longer patience at my feet?

Me as standing, you as stooping,--
Who arranged for each the pose?
Lest men think us friends turned foes,
Keep the attitude you chose!
Men are used to this same grouping--
I and you like statues seen.
You and I, no third between,
Kneel and stand! That makes the scene.

Mar it--and one buffet ... Pardon!
Needless warmth--wise words in waste!
'T was prostration that replaced
Kneeling, then? A proof of taste.
Crouch, not kneel, while I mount guard on
Prostrate love--become no waif,
No estray to waves that chafe
Disappointed--love 's so safe!

Waves that chafe? The idlest fancy!
Peaks that scare? I think we know
Walls enclose our sculpture: so
Grouped, we pose in Fontainebleau.
Up now! Wherefore hesitancy?
Arm in arm and cheek by cheek,
Laugh with me at waves and peak!
Silent still? Why, pictures speak.

See, where Juno strikes Ixion,
Primatice speaks plainly! Pooh--
Rather, Florentine Le Roux!
I 've lost head for who is who--
So it swims and wanders! Fie on
What still proves me female! Here,
By the staircase!--for we near
That dark "Gallery of the Deer."

Look me in the eyes once! Steady!
Are you faithful now as erst
On that eve when we two first
Vowed at Avon, blessed and cursed
Faith and falsehood? Pale already?
Forward! Must my hand compel
Entrance--this way? Exit--well,
Somehow, somewhere. Who can tell?

What if to the selfsame place in
Rustic Avon, at the door
Of the village church once more,
Where a tombstone paves the floor
By that holy-water basin
You appealed to--"As, below.
This stone hides its corpse, e'en so
I your secrets hide"? What ho!

Friends, my four! You, Priest, confess him!
I have judged the culprit there:
Execute my sentence! Care
For no mail such cowards wear!
Done, Priest? Then, absolve and bless him!
Now--you three, stab thick and fast,
Deep and deeper! Dead at last?
Thanks, friends--Father, thanks! Aghast?

What one word of his confession
Would you tell me, though I lured
With that royal crown abjured
Just because its bars immured
Love too much? Love burst compression,
Fled free, finally confessed
All its secrets to that breast
Whence ... let Avon tell the rest!

MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT AND FUSELI

Oh, but is it not hard, Dear?
Mine are the nerves to quake at a mouse:
If a spider drops I shrink with fear:
I should die outright in a haunted house;
While for you--did the danger dared bring help--
From a lion's den I could steal his whelp,
With a serpent round me, stand stock-still,
Go sleep in a churchyard,--so would will
Give me the power to dare and do
Valiantly--just for you!

Much amiss in the head, Dear,
I toil at a language, tax my brain
Attempting to draw--the scratches here!
I play, play, practise, and all in vain:
But for you--if my triumph brought you pride,
I would grapple with Greek Plays till I died,
Paint a portrait of you--who can tell?
Work my fingers off for your "Pretty well:"
Language and painting and music too,
Easily done--for you!

Strong and fierce in the heart, Dear,
With--more than a will--what seems a power
To pounce on my prey, love outbroke here
In flame devouring and to devour.
Such love has labored its best and worst
To win me a lover; yet, last as first,
I have not quickened his pulse one beat,
Fixed a moment's fancy, bitter or sweet:
Yet the strong fierce heart's love's labor's due,
Utterly lost, was--you!

ADAM, LILITH, AND EVE

One day, it thundered and lightened.
Two women, fairly frightened,
Sank to their knees, transformed, transfixed,
At the feet of the man who sat betwixt;
And "Mercy!" cried each--"if I tell the truth
Of a passage in my youth!"

Said This: "Do you mind the morning
I met your love with scorning?
As the worst of the venom left my lips,
I thought, 'If, despite this lie, he strips
The mask from my soul with a kiss--I crawl
His slave,--soul, body, and all!'"

Said That: "We stood to be married;
The priest, or some one, tarried;
'If Paradise-door prove locked?' smiled you.
I thought, as I nodded, smiling too,
'Did one, that 's away, arrive--nor late
Nor soon should unlock Hell's gate!'"

It ceased to lighten and thunder.
Up started both in wonder,
Looked round and saw that the sky was clear,
Then laughed "Confess you believed us, Dear!"
"I saw through the joke!" the man replied
They re-seated themselves beside.

IXION