Chapter XLII: Act 2

SCENE 1.2: THE PUBLIC STY. THE B0ARS IN FULL ASSEMBLY. ENTER PUEGANAX.

PURGANAX: Grant me your patience, Gentlemen and Boars, Ye, by whose patience under public burthens The glorious constitution of these sties Subsists, and shall subsist. The Lean-Pig rates Grow with the growing populace of Swine, _5 The taxes, that true source of Piggishness (How can I find a more appropriate term To include religion, morals, peace, and plenty, And all that fit Boeotia as a nation To teach the other nations how to live?), _10 Increase with Piggishness itself; and still Does the revenue, that great spring of all The patronage, and pensions, and by-payments, Which free-born Pigs regard with jealous eyes, Diminish, till at length, by glorious steps, _15 All the land's produce will be merged in taxes, And the revenue will amount to--nothing! The failure of a foreign market for Sausages, bristles, and blood-puddings, And such home manufactures, is but partial; _20 And, that the population of the Pigs, Instead of hog-wash, has been fed on straw And water, is a fact which is--you know-- That is--it is a state-necessity-- Temporary, of course. Those impious Pigs, _25 Who, by frequent squeaks, have dared impugn The settled Swellfoot system, or to make Irreverent mockery of the genuflexions Inculcated by the arch-priest, have been whipped Into a loyal and an orthodox whine. _30 Things being in this happy state, the Queen Iona--

NOTE: _16 land's]lands edition 1820.

A LOUD CRY FROM THE PIGS: She is innocent! most innocent!

PURGANAX: That is the very thing that I was saying, Gentlemen Swine; the Queen Iona being Most innocent, no doubt, returns to Thebes, _35 And the lean Sows and Bears collect about her, Wishing to make her think that WE believe (I mean those more substantial Pigs, who swill Rich hog-wash, while the others mouth damp straw) That she is guilty; thus, the Lean-Pig faction _40 Seeks to obtain that hog-wash, which has been Your immemorial right, and which I will Maintain you in to the last drop of--

A BOAR (INTERRUPTING HIM): What Does any one accuse her of?

PURGANAX: Why, no one Makes ANY positive accusation;--but _45 There were hints dropped, and so the privy wizards Conceived that it became them to advise His Majesty to investigate their truth;-- Not for his own sake; he could be content To let his wife play any pranks she pleased, _50 If, by that sufferance, HE could please the Pigs; But then he fears the morals of the Swine, The Sows especially, and what effect It might produce upon the purity and Religion of the rising generation _55 Of Sucking-Pigs, if it could be suspected That Queen Iona--

[A PAUSE.]

FIRST BOAR: Well, go on; we long To hear what she can possibly have done.

PURGANAX: Why, it is hinted, that a certain Bull-- Thus much is KNOWN:--the milk-white Bulls that feed _60 Beside Clitumnus and the crystal lakes Of the Cisalpine mountains, in fresh dews Of lotus-grass and blossoming asphodel Sleeking their silken hair, and with sweet breath Loading the morning winds until they faint _65 With living fragrance, are so beautiful!-- Well, _I_ say nothing;--but Europa rode On such a one from Asia into Crete, And the enamoured sea grew calm beneath His gliding beauty. And Pasiphae, _70 Iona's grandmother,--but SHE is innocent! And that both you and I, and all assert.

FIRST BOAR: Most innocent!

PURGANAX: Behold this BAG; a bag--

SECOND BOAR: Oh! no GREEN BAGS!! Jealousy's eyes are green, Scorpions are green, and water-snakes, and efts, _75 And verdigris, and--

PURGANAX: Honourable Swine, In Piggish souls can prepossessions reign? Allow me to remind you, grass is green-- All flesh is grass;--no bacon but is flesh-- Ye are but bacon. This divining BAG _80 (Which is not green, but only bacon colour) Is filled with liquor, which if sprinkled o'er A woman guilty of--we all know what-- Makes her so hideous, till she finds one blind She never can commit the like again. _85 If innocent, she will turn into an angel, And rain down blessings in the shape of comfits As she flies up to heaven. Now, my proposal Is to convert her sacred Majesty Into an angel (as I am sure we shall do), _90 By pouring on her head this mystic water. [SHOWING THE BAG.] I know that she is innocent; I wish Only to prove her so to all the world.

FIRST BOAR: Excellent, just, and noble Purganax.

SECOND BOAR: How glorious it will be to see her Majesty _95 Flying above our heads, her petticoats Streaming like--like--like--

THIRD BOAR: Anything.

PURGANAX: Oh no! But like a standard of an admiral's ship, Or like the banner of a conquering host, Or like a cloud dyed in the dying day, _100 Unravelled on the blast from a white mountain; Or like a meteor, or a war-steed's mane, Or waterfall from a dizzy precipice Scattered upon the wind.

FIRST BOAR: Or a cow's tail.

SECOND BOAR: Or ANYTHING, as the learned Boar observed. _105

PURGANAX: Gentlemen Boars, I move a resolution, That her most sacred Majesty should be Invited to attend the feast of Famine, And to receive upon her chaste white body Dews of Apotheosis from this BAG. _110

[A GREAT CONFUSION IS HEARD OF THE PIGS OUT OF DOORS, WHICH COMMUNICATES ITSELF TO THOSE WITHIN. DURING THE FIRST STROPHE, THE DOORS OF THE STY ARE STAVED IN, AND A NUMBER OF EXCEEDINGLY LEAN PIGS AND SOWS AND BOARS RUSH IN.]

SEMICHORUS 1: No! Yes!

SEMICHORUS 2: Yes! No!

SEMICHORUS 1: A law!

SEMICHORUS 2: A flaw!

SEMICHORUS 1: Porkers, we shall lose our wash, _115 Or must share it with the Lean-Pigs!

FIRST BOAR: Order! order! be not rash! Was there ever such a scene, Pigs!

AN OLD SOW (RUSHING IN): I never saw so fine a dash Since I first began to wean Pigs. _120

SECOND BOAR (SOLEMNLY): The Queen will be an angel time enough. I vote, in form of an amendment, that Purganax rub a little of that stuff Upon his face.

PURGANAX [HIS HEART IS SEEN TO BEAT THROUGH HIS WAISTCOAT]: Gods! What would ye be at?

SEMICHORUS 1: Purganax has plainly shown a _125 Cloven foot and jackdaw feather.

SEMICHORUS 2: I vote Swellfoot and Iona Try the magic test together; Whenever royal spouses bicker, Both should try the magic liquor. _130

AN OLD BOAR [ASIDE]: A miserable state is that of Pigs, For if their drivers would tear caps and wigs, The Swine must bite each other's ear therefore.

AN OLD SOW [ASIDE]: A wretched lot Jove has assigned to Swine, Squabbling makes Pig-herds hungry, and they dine _135 On bacon, and whip Sucking-Pigs the more.

CHORUS: Hog-wash has been ta'en away: If the Bull-Queen is divested, We shall be in every way Hunted, stripped, exposed, molested; _140 Let us do whate'er we may, That she shall not be arrested. QUEEN, we entrench you with walls of brawn, And palisades of tusks, sharp as a bayonet: Place your most sacred person here. We pawn _145 Our lives that none a finger dare to lay on it. Those who wrong you, wrong us; Those who hate you, hate us; Those who sting you, sting us; Those who bait you, bait us; _150 The ORACLE is now about to be Fulfilled by circumvolving destiny; Which says: 'Thebes, choose REFORM or CIVIL WAR, When through your streets, instead of hare with dogs, A CONSORT QUEEN shall hunt a KING with Hogs, _155 Riding upon the IONIAN MINOTAUR.'

NOTE: _154 streets instead edition 1820.

[ENTER IONA TAURINA.]

IONA TAURINA (COMING FORWARD): Gentlemen Swine, and gentle Lady-Pigs, The tender heart of every Boar acquits Their QUEEN, of any act incongruous With native Piggishness, and she, reposing _160 With confidence upon the grunting nation, Has thrown herself, her cause, her life, her all, Her innocence, into their Hoggish arms; Nor has the expectation been deceived Of finding shelter there. Yet know, great Boars, _165 (For such whoever lives among you finds you, And so do I), the innocent are proud! I have accepted your protection only In compliment of your kind love and care, Not for necessity. The innocent _170 Are safest there where trials and dangers wait; Innocent Queens o'er white-hot ploughshares tread Unsinged, and ladies, Erin's laureate sings it, Decked with rare gems, and beauty rarer still, Walked from Killarney to the Giant's Causeway, _175 Through rebels, smugglers, troops of yeomanry, White-boys and Orange-boys, and constables, Tithe-proctors, and excise people, uninjured! Thus I!-- Lord Purganax, I do commit myself _180 Into your custody, and am prepared To stand the test, whatever it may be!

NOTE: (_173 'Rich and rare were the gems she wore.' See Moore's "Irish Melodies".-- [SHELLEY'S NOTE.])

PURGANAX: This magnanimity in your sacred Majesty Must please the Pigs. You cannot fail of being A heavenly angel. Smoke your bits of glass, _185 Ye loyal Swine, or her transfiguration Will blind your wondering eyes.

AN OLD BOAR [ASIDE]: Take care, my Lord, They do not smoke you first.

PURGANAX: At the approaching feast Of Famine, let the expiation be.

SWINE: Content! content!

IONA TAURINA [ASIDE]: I, most content of all, _190 Know that my foes even thus prepare their fall!

[EXEUNT OMNES.]

SCENE 2.2: THE INTERIOR OF THE TEMPLE OF FAMINE. THE STATUE OF THE GODDESS, A SKELETON CLOTHED IN PARTI-COLOURED RAGS, SEATED UPON A HEAP OF SKULLS AND LOAVES INTERMINGLED. A NUMBER OF EXCEEDINGLY FAT PRIESTS IN BLACK GARMENTS ARRAYED ON EACH SIDE, WITH MARROW-BONES AND CLEAVERS IN THEIR HANDS. [SOLOMON, THE COURT PORKMAN.] A FLOURISH OF TRUMPETS.

ENTER MAMMON AS ARCH-PRIEST, SWELLFOOT, DAKRY, PURGANAX, LAOCTONOS, FOLLOWED BY IONA TAURINA GUARDED. ON THE OTHER SIDE ENTER THE SWINE.

CHORUS OF PRIESTS, ACCOMPANIED BY THE COURT PORKMAN ON MARROW-BONES AND CLEAVERS: GODDESS bare, and gaunt, and pale, Empress of the world, all hail! What though Cretans old called thee City-crested Cybele? We call thee FAMINE! _5 Goddess of fasts and feasts, starving and cramming! Through thee, for emperors, kings, and priests and lords, Who rule by viziers, sceptres, bank-notes, words, The earth pours forth its plenteous fruits, Corn, wool, linen, flesh, and roots-- _10 Those who consume these fruits through thee grow fat, Those who produce these fruits through thee grow lean, Whatever change takes place, oh, stick to that! And let things be as they have ever been; At least while we remain thy priests, _15 And proclaim thy fasts and feasts. Through thee the sacred SWELLF00T dynasty Is based upon a rock amid that sea Whose waves are Swine--so let it ever be!

[SWELLFOOT, ETC., SEAT THEMSELVES AT A TABLE MAGNIFICENTLY COVERED AT THE UPPER END OF THE TEMPLE. ATTENDANTS PASS OVER THE STAGE WITH HOG-WASH IN PAILS. A NUMBER OF PIGS, EXCEEDINGLY LEAN, FOLLOW THEM LICKING UP THE WASH.]

MAMMON: I fear your sacred Majesty has lost _20 The appetite which you were used to have. Allow me now to recommend this dish-- A simple kickshaw by your Persian cook, Such as is served at the great King's second table. The price and pains which its ingredients cost _25 Might have maintained some dozen families A winter or two--not more--so plain a dish Could scarcely disagree.--

SWELLFOOT: After the trial, And these fastidious Pigs are gone, perhaps I may recover my lost appetite,-- _30 I feel the gout flying about my stomach-- Give me a glass of Maraschino punch.

PURGANAX (FILLING HIS GLASS, AND STANDING UP): The glorious Constitution of the Pigs!

ALL: A toast! a toast! stand up, and three times three!

DAKRY: No heel-taps--darken daylights! --

LAOCTONOS: Claret, somehow, _35 Puts me in mind of blood, and blood of claret!

SWELLFOOT: Laoctonos is fishing for a compliment, But 'tis his due. Yes, you have drunk more wine, And shed more blood, than any man in Thebes. [TO PURGANAX.] For God's sake stop the grunting of those Pigs! _40

PURGANAX: We dare not, Sire, 'tis Famine's privilege.

CHORUS OF SWINE: Hail to thee, hail to thee, Famine! Thy throne is on blood, and thy robe is of rags; Thou devil which livest on damning; Saint of new churches, and cant, and GREEN BAGS, _45 Till in pity and terror thou risest, Confounding the schemes of the wisest; When thou liftest thy skeleton form, When the loaves and the skulls roll about, We will greet thee-the voice of a storm _50 Would be lost in our terrible shout!

Then hail to thee, hail to thee, Famine! Hail to thee, Empress of Earth! When thou risest, dividing possessions; When thou risest, uprooting oppressions, _55 In the pride of thy ghastly mirth; Over palaces, temples, and graves, We will rush as thy minister-slaves, Trampling behind in thy train, Till all be made level again! _60

MAMMON: I hear a crackling of the giant bones Of the dread image, and in the black pits Which once were eyes, I see two livid flames. These prodigies are oracular, and show The presence of the unseen Deity. _65 Mighty events are hastening to their doom!

SWELLFOOT: I only hear the lean and mutinous Swine Grunting about the temple.

DAKRY: In a crisis Of such exceeding delicacy, I think We ought to put her Majesty, the QUEEN, _70 Upon her trial without delay.

MAMMON: THE BAG Is here.

PURGANAX: I have rehearsed the entire scene With an ox-bladder and some ditchwater, On Lady P--; it cannot fail. [TAKING UP THE BAG.] Your Majesty [TO SWELLFOOT.] In such a filthy business had better _75 Stand on one side, lest it should sprinkle you. A spot or two on me would do no harm, Nay, it might hide the blood, which the sad Genius Of the Green Isle has fixed, as by a spell, Upon my brow--which would stain all its seas, _80 But which those seas could never wash away!

IONA TAURINA: My Lord, I am ready--nay, I am impatient To undergo the test. [A GRACEFUL FIGURE IN A SEMI-TRANSPARENT VEIL PASSES UNNOTICED THROUGH THE TEMPLE; THE WORD "LIBERTY" IS SEEN THROUGH THE VEIL, AS IF IT WERE WRITTEN IN FIRE UPON ITS FOREHEAD. ITS WORDS ARE ALMOST DROWNED IN THE FURIOUS GRUNTING OF THE PIGS, AND THE BUSINESS OF THE TRIAL. SHE KNEELS ON THE STEPS OF THE ALTAR, AND SPEAKS IN TONES AT FIRST FAINT AND LOW, BUT WHICH EVER BECOME LOUDER AND LOUDER.] Mighty Empress! Death's white wife! Ghastly mother-in-law of Life! _85 By the God who made thee such, By the magic of thy touch, By the starving and the cramming Of fasts and feasts! by thy dread self, O Famine! I charge thee! when thou wake the multitude, _90 Thou lead them not upon the paths of blood. The earth did never mean her foison For those who crown life's cup with poison Of fanatic rage and meaningless revenge-- But for those radiant spirits, who are still _95 The standard-bearers in the van of Change. Be they th' appointed stewards, to fill The lap of Pain, and Toil, and Age!-- Remit, O Queen! thy accustomed rage! Be what thou art not! In voice faint and low _100 FREEDOM calls "Famine",--her eternal foe, To brief alliance, hollow truce.--Rise now!

[WHILST THE VEILED FIGURE HAS BEEN CHANTING THIS STROPHE, MAMMON, DAKRY, LAOCTONOS, AND SWELLFOOT, HAVE SURROUNDED IONA TAURINA, WHO, WITH HER HANDS FOLDED ON HER BREAST, AND HER EYES LIFTED TO HEAVEN, STANDS, AS WITH SAINT-LIKE RESIGNATION, TO WAIT THE ISSUE OF THE BUSINESS, IN PERFECT CONFIDENCE OF HER INNOCENCE.]

[PURGANAX, AFTER UNSEALING THE GREEN BAG, IS GRAVELY ABOUT TO POUR THE LIQUOR UPON HER HEAD, WHEN SUDDENLY THE WHOLE EXPRESSION OF HER FIGURE AND COUNTENANCE CHANGES; SHE SNATCHES IT FROM HIS HAND WITH A LOUD LAUGH OF TRIUMPH, AND EMPTIES IT OVER SWELLFOOT AND HIS WHOLE COURT, WHO ARE INSTANTLY CHANGED INTO A NUMBER OF FILTHY AND UGLY ANIMALS, AND RUSH OUT OF THE TEMPLE. THE IMAGE OF FAMINE THEN ARISES WITH A TREMENDOUS SOUND, THE PIGS BEGIN SCRAMBLING FOR THE LOAVES, AND ARE TRJPPED UP BY THE SKULLS; ALL THOSE WHO EAT THE LOAVES ARE TURNED INTO BULLS, AND ARRANGE THEMSELVES QUIETLY BEHIND THE ALTAR. THE IMAGE OF FAMINE SINKS THROUGH A CHASM IN THE EARTH, AND A MINOTAUR RISES.]

MINOTAUR: I am the Ionian Minotaur, the mightiest Of all Europa's taurine progeny-- I am the old traditional Man-Bull; _105 And from my ancestors having been Ionian, I am called Ion, which, by interpretation, Is JOHN; in plain Theban, that is to say, My name's JOHN BULL; I am a famous hunter, And can leaf any gate in all Boeotia, _110 Even the palings of the royal park, Or double ditch about the new enclosures; And if your Majesty will deign to mount me, At least till you have hunted down your game, I will not throw you. _115

IONA TAURINA [DURING THIS SPEECH SHE HAS BEEN PUTTING ON BOOTS AND SPURS, AND A HUNTING-CAP, BUCKISHLY COCKED ON ONE SIDE, AND TUCKING UP HER HAIR, SHE LEAPS NIMBLY ON HIS BACK]: Hoa! hoa! tallyho! tallyho! ho! ho! Come, let us hunt these ugly badgers down, These stinking foxes, these devouring otters, These hares, these wolves, these anything but men. Hey, for a whipper-in! my loyal Pigs Now let your noses be as keen as beagles', _120 Your steps as swift as greyhounds', and your cries More dulcet and symphonious than the bells Of village-towers, on sunshine holiday; Wake all the dewy woods with jangling music. Give them no law (are they not beasts of blood?) _125 But such as they gave you. Tallyho! ho! Through forest, furze, and bog, and den, and desert, Pursue the ugly beasts! tallyho! ho!

FULL CHORUS OF I0NA AND THE SWINE: Tallyho! tallyho! Through rain, hail, and snow, _130 Through brake, gorse, and briar, Through fen, flood, and mire, We go! we go!

Tallyho! tallyho! Through pond, ditch, and slough, _135 Wind them, and find them, Like the Devil behind them, Tallyho! tallyho!

[EXEUNT, IN FULL CRY; IONA DRIVING ON THE SWINE, WITH THE EMPTY GEEEN BAG.]

THE END.

NOTE ON OEDIPUS TYRANNUS, BY MRS. SHELLEY.

In the brief journal I kept in those days, I find recorded, in August, 1820, Shelley 'begins "Swellfoot the Tyrant", suggested by the pigs at the fair of San Giuliano.' This was the period of Queen Caroline's landing in England, and the struggles made by George IV to get rid of her claims; which failing, Lord Castlereagh placed the "Green Bag" on the table of the House of Commons, demanding in the King's name that an enquiry should be instituted into his wife's conduct. These circumstances were the theme of all conversation among the English. We were then at the Baths of San Giuliano. A friend came to visit us on the day when a fair was held in the square, beneath our windows: Shelley read to us his "Ode to Liberty"; and was riotously accompanied by the grunting of a quantity of pigs brought for sale to the fair. He compared it to the 'chorus of frogs' in the satiric drama of Aristophanes; and, it being an hour of merriment, and one ludicrous association suggesting another, he imagined a political-satirical drama on the circumstances of the day, to which the pigs would serve as chorus--and "Swellfoot" was begun. When finished, it was transmitted to England, printed, and published anonymously; but stifled at the very dawn of its existence by the Society for the Suppression of Vice, who threatened to prosecute it, if not immediately withdrawn. The friend who had taken the trouble of bringing it out, of course did not think it worth the annoyance and expense of a contest, and it was laid aside.

Hesitation of whether it would do honour to Shelley prevented my publishing it at first. But I cannot bring myself to keep back anything he ever wrote; for each word is fraught with the peculiar views and sentiments which he believed to be beneficial to the human race, and the bright light of poetry irradiates every thought. The world has a right to the entire compositions of such a man; for it does not live and thrive by the outworn lesson of the dullard or the hypocrite, but by the original free thoughts of men of genius, who aspire to pluck bright truth

'from the pale-faced moon; Or dive into the bottom of the deep Where fathom-line would never touch the ground, And pluck up drowned'

truth. Even those who may dissent from his opinions will consider that he was a man of genius, and that the world will take more interest in his slightest word than in the waters of Lethe which are so eagerly prescribed as medicinal for all its wrongs and woe. This drama, however, must not be judged for more than was meant. It is a mere plaything of the imagination; which even may not excite smiles among many, who will not see wit in those combinations of thought which were full of the ridiculous to the author. But, like everything he wrote, it breathes that deep sympathy for the sorrows of humanity, and indignation against its oppressors, which make it worthy of his name.

***

EPIPSYCHIDION.

VERSES ADDRESSED TO THE NOBLE AND UNFORTUNATE LADY, EMILIA V--,

NOW IMPRISONED IN THE CONVENT OF --.

L'anima amante si slancia fuori del creato, e si crea nell' infinito un Mondo tutto per essa, diverso assai da questo oscuro e pauroso baratro. HER OWN WORDS.

["Epipsychidion" was composed at Pisa, January, February, 1821, and published without the author's name, in the following summer, by C. & J. Ollier, London. The poem was included by Mrs. Shelley in the "Poetical Works", 1839, both editions. Amongst the Shelley manuscripts in the Bodleian is a first draft of "Epipsychidion", 'consisting of three versions, more or less complete, of the "Preface [Advertisement]", a version in ink and pencil, much cancelled, of the last eighty lines of the poem, and some additional lines which did not appear in print' ("Examination of the Shelley manuscripts in the Bodleian Library, by C.D. Locock". Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1903, page 3). This draft, the writing of which is 'extraordinarily confused and illegible,' has been carefully deciphered and printed by Mr. Locock in the volume named above. Our text follows that of the editio princeps, 1821.]

ADVERTISEMENT.

The Writer of the following lines died at Florence, as he was preparing for a voyage to one of the wildest of the Sporades, which he had bought, and where he had fitted up the ruins of an old building, and where it was his hope to have realised a scheme of life, suited perhaps to that happier and better world of which he is now an inhabitant, but hardly practicable in this. His life was singular; less on account of the romantic vicissitudes which diversified it, than the ideal tinge which it received from his own character and feelings. The present Poem, like the "Vita Nuova" of Dante, is sufficiently intelligible to a certain class of readers without a matter-of-fact history of the circumstances to which it relates and to a certain other class it must ever remain incomprehensible, from a defect of a common organ of perception for the ideas of which it treats. Not but that gran vergogna sarebbe a colui, che rimasse cosa sotto veste di figura, o di colore rettorico: e domandato non sapesse denudare le sue parole da cotal veste, in guisa che avessero verace intendimento.

The present poem appears to have been intended by the Writer as the dedication to some longer one. The stanza on the opposite page [1] is almost a literal translation from Dante's famous Canzone

Voi, ch' intendendo, il terzo ciel movete, etc.

The presumptuous application of the concluding lines to his own composition will raise a smile at the expense of my unfortunate friend: be it a smile not of contempt, but pity. S.

[1] i.e. the nine lines which follow, beginning, 'My Song, I fear,' etc.--ED.

My Song, I fear that thou wilt find but few Who fitly shalt conceive thy reasoning, Of such hard matter dost thou entertain; Whence, if by misadventure, chance should bring Thee to base company (as chance may do), _5 Quite unaware of what thou dost contain, I prithee, comfort thy sweet self again, My last delight! tell them that they are dull, And bid them own that thou art beautiful.

EPIPSYCHIDION.

Sweet Spirit! Sister of that orphan one, Whose empire is the name thou weepest on, In my heart's temple I suspend to thee These votive wreaths of withered memory.

Poor captive bird! who, from thy narrow cage, _5 Pourest such music, that it might assuage The rugged hearts of those who prisoned thee, Were they not deaf to all sweet melody; This song shall be thy rose: its petals pale Are dead, indeed, my adored Nightingale! _10 But soft and fragrant is the faded blossom, And it has no thorn left to wound thy bosom.

High, spirit-winged Heart! who dost for ever Beat thine unfeeling bars with vain endeavour, Till those bright plumes of thought, in which arrayed _15 It over-soared this low and worldly shade, Lie shattered; and thy panting, wounded breast Stains with dear blood its unmaternal nest! I weep vain tears: blood would less bitter be, Yet poured forth gladlier, could it profit thee. _20

Seraph of Heaven! too gentle to be human, Veiling beneath that radiant form of Woman All that is insupportable in thee Of light, and love, and immortality! Sweet Benediction in the eternal Curse! _25 Veiled Glory of this lampless Universe! Thou Moon beyond the clouds! Thou living Form Among the Dead! Thou Star above the Storm! Thou Wonder, and thou Beauty, and thou Terror! Thou Harmony of Nature's art! Thou Mirror _30 In whom, as in the splendour of the Sun, All shapes look glorious which thou gazest on! Ay, even the dim words which obscure thee now Flash, lightning-like, with unaccustomed glow; I pray thee that thou blot from this sad song _35 All of its much mortality and wrong, With those clear drops, which start like sacred dew From the twin lights thy sweet soul darkens through, Weeping, till sorrow becomes ecstasy: Then smile on it, so that it may not die. _40

I never thought before my death to see Youth's vision thus made perfect. Emily, I love thee; though the world by no thin name Will hide that love from its unvalued shame. Would we two had been twins of the same mother! _45 Or, that the name my heart lent to another Could be a sister's bond for her and thee, Blending two beams of one eternity! Yet were one lawful and the other true, These names, though dear, could paint not, as is due. _50 How beyond refuge I am thine. Ah me! I am not thine: I am a part of THEE.

Sweet Lamp! my moth-like Muse has burned its wings Or, like a dying swan who soars and sings, Young Love should teach Time, in his own gray style, _55 All that thou art. Art thou not void of guile, A lovely soul formed to be blessed and bless? A well of sealed and secret happiness, Whose waters like blithe light and music are, Vanquishing dissonance and gloom? A Star _60 Which moves not in the moving heavens, alone? A Smile amid dark frowns? a gentle tone Amid rude voices? a beloved light? A Solitude, a Refuge, a Delight? A Lute, which those whom Love has taught to play _65 Make music on, to soothe the roughest day And lull fond Grief asleep? a buried treasure? A cradle of young thoughts of wingless pleasure? A violet-shrouded grave of Woe?--I measure The world of fancies, seeking one like thee, _70 And find--alas! mine own infirmity.

She met me, Stranger, upon life's rough way, And lured me towards sweet Death; as Night by Day, Winter by Spring, or Sorrow by swift Hope, Led into light, life, peace. An antelope, _75 In the suspended impulse of its lightness, Were less aethereally light: the brightness Of her divinest presence trembles through Her limbs, as underneath a cloud of dew Embodied in the windless heaven of June _80 Amid the splendour-winged stars, the Moon Burns, inextinguishably beautiful: And from her lips, as from a hyacinth full Of honey-dew, a liquid murmur drops, Killing the sense with passion; sweet as stops _85 Of planetary music heard in trance. In her mild lights the starry spirits dance, The sunbeams of those wells which ever leap Under the lightnings of the soul--too deep For the brief fathom-line of thought or sense. _90 The glory of her being, issuing thence, Stains the dead, blank, cold air with a warm shade Of unentangled intermixture, made By Love, of light and motion: one intense Diffusion, one serene Omnipresence, _95 Whose flowing outlines mingle in their flowing, Around her cheeks and utmost fingers glowing With the unintermitted blood, which there Quivers, (as in a fleece of snow-like air The crimson pulse of living morning quiver,) _100 Continuously prolonged, and ending never, Till they are lost, and in that Beauty furled Which penetrates and clasps and fills the world; Scarce visible from extreme loveliness. Warm fragrance seems to fall from her light dress _105 And her loose hair; and where some heavy tress The air of her own speed has disentwined, The sweetness seems to satiate the faint wind; And in the soul a wild odour is felt Beyond the sense, like fiery dews that melt _110 Into the bosom of a frozen bud.-- See where she stands! a mortal shape indued With love and life and light and deity, And motion which may change but cannot die; An image of some bright Eternity; _115 A shadow of some golden dream; a Splendour Leaving the third sphere pilotless; a tender Reflection of the eternal Moon of Love Under whose motions life's dull billows move; A Metaphor of Spring and Youth and Morning; _120 A Vision like incarnate April, warning, With smiles and tears, Frost the Anatomy Into his summer grave. Ah, woe is me! What have I dared? where am I lifted? how Shall I descend, and perish not? I know _125 That Love makes all things equal: I have heard By mine own heart this joyous truth averred: The spirit of the worm beneath the sod In love and worship, blends itself with God.

Spouse! Sister! Angel! Pilot of the Fate _130 Whose course has been so starless! O too late Beloved! O too soon adored, by me! For in the fields of Immortality My spirit should at first have worshipped thine, A divine presence in a place divine; _135 Or should have moved beside it on this earth, A shadow of that substance, from its birth; But not as now:--I love thee; yes, I feel That on the fountain of my heart a seal Is set, to keep its waters pure and bright _140 For thee, since in those TEARS thou hast delight. We--are we not formed, as notes of music are, For one another, though dissimilar; Such difference without discord, as can make Those sweetest sounds, in which all spirits shake _145 As trembling leaves in a continuous air?

Thy wisdom speaks in me, and bids me dare Beacon the rocks on which high hearts are wrecked. I never was attached to that great sect, Whose doctrine is, that each one should select _150 Out of the crowd a mistress or a friend, And all the rest, though fair and wise, commend To cold oblivion, though it is in the code Of modern morals, and the beaten road Which those poor slaves with weary footsteps tread, _155 Who travel to their home among the dead By the broad highway of the world, and so With one chained friend, perhaps a jealous foe, The dreariest and the longest journey go.

True Love in this differs from gold and clay, _160 That to divide is not to take away. Love is like understanding, that grows bright, Gazing on many truths; 'tis like thy light, Imagination! which from earth and sky, And from the depths of human fantasy, _165 As from a thousand prisms and mirrors, fills The Universe with glorious beams, and kills Error, the worm, with many a sun-like arrow Of its reverberated lightning. Narrow The heart that loves, the brain that contemplates, _170 The life that wears, the spirit that creates One object, and one form, and builds thereby A sepulchre for its eternity.

Mind from its object differs most in this: Evil from good; misery from happiness; _175 The baser from the nobler; the impure And frail, from what is clear and must endure. If you divide suffering and dross, you may Diminish till it is consumed away; If you divide pleasure and love and thought, _180 Each part exceeds the whole; and we know not How much, while any yet remains unshared, Of pleasure may be gained, of sorrow spared: This truth is that deep well, whence sages draw The unenvied light of hope; the eternal law _185 By which those live, to whom this world of life Is as a garden ravaged, and whose strife Tills for the promise of a later birth The wilderness of this Elysian earth.

There was a Being whom my spirit oft _190 Met on its visioned wanderings, far aloft, In the clear golden prime of my youth's dawn, Upon the fairy isles of sunny lawn, Amid the enchanted mountains, and the caves Of divine sleep, and on the air-like waves _195 Of wonder-level dream, whose tremulous floor Paved her light steps;--on an imagined shore, Under the gray beak of some promontory She met me, robed in such exceeding glory, That I beheld her not. In solitudes _200 Her voice came to me through the whispering woods, And from the fountains, and the odours deep Of flowers, which, like lips murmuring in their sleep Of the sweet kisses which had lulled them there, Breathed but of HER to the enamoured air; _205 And from the breezes whether low or loud, And from the rain of every passing cloud, And from the singing of the summer-birds, And from all sounds, all silence. In the words Of antique verse and high romance,--in form, _210 Sound, colour--in whatever checks that Storm Which with the shattered present chokes the past; And in that best philosophy, whose taste Makes this cold common hell, our life, a doom As glorious as a fiery martyrdom; _215 Her Spirit was the harmony of truth.--

Then, from the caverns of my dreamy youth I sprang, as one sandalled with plumes of fire, And towards the lodestar of my one desire, I flitted, like a dizzy moth, whose flight _220 Is as a dead leaf's in the owlet light, When it would seek in Hesper's setting sphere A radiant death, a fiery sepulchre, As if it were a lamp of earthly flame.-- But She, whom prayers or tears then could not tame, _225 Passed, like a God throned on a winged planet, Whose burning plumes to tenfold swiftness fan it, Into the dreary cone of our life's shade; And as a man with mighty loss dismayed, I would have followed, though the grave between _230 Yawned like a gulf whose spectres are unseen: When a voice said:--'O thou of hearts the weakest, The phantom is beside thee whom thou seekest.' Then I--'Where?'--the world's echo answered 'where?' And in that silence, and in my despair, _235 I questioned every tongueless wind that flew Over my tower of mourning, if it knew Whither 'twas fled, this soul out of my soul; And murmured names and spells which have control Over the sightless tyrants of our fate; _240 But neither prayer nor verse could dissipate The night which closed on her; nor uncreate That world within this Chaos, mine and me, Of which she was the veiled Divinity, The world I say of thoughts that worshipped her: _245 And therefore I went forth, with hope and fear And every gentle passion sick to death, Feeding my course with expectation's breath, Into the wintry forest of our life; And struggling through its error with vain strife, _250 And stumbling in my weakness and my haste, And half bewildered by new forms, I passed, Seeking among those untaught foresters If I could find one form resembling hers, In which she might have masked herself from me. _255 There,--One, whose voice was venomed melody Sate by a well, under blue nightshade bowers: The breath of her false mouth was like faint flowers, Her touch was as electric poison,--flame Out of her looks into my vitals came, _260 And from her living cheeks and bosom flew A killing air, which pierced like honey-dew Into the core of my green heart, and lay Upon its leaves; until, as hair grown gray O'er a young brow, they hid its unblown prime _265 With ruins of unseasonable time.

In many mortal forms I rashly sought The shadow of that idol of my thought. And some were fair--but beauty dies away: Others were wise--but honeyed words betray: _270 And One was true--oh! why not true to me? Then, as a hunted deer that could not flee, I turned upon my thoughts, and stood at bay, Wounded and weak and panting; the cold day Trembled, for pity of my strife and pain. _275 When, like a noonday dawn, there shone again Deliverance. One stood on my path who seemed As like the glorious shape which I had d reamed As is the Moon, whose changes ever run Into themselves, to the eternal Sun; _280 The cold chaste Moon, the Queen of Heaven's bright isles, Who makes all beautiful on which she smiles, That wandering shrine of soft yet icy flame Which ever is transformed, yet still the same, And warms not but illumines. Young and fair _285 As the descended Spirit of that sphere, She hid me, as the Moon may hide the night From its own darkness, until all was bright Between the Heaven and Earth of my calm mind, And, as a cloud charioted by the wind, _290 She led me to a cave in that wild place, And sate beside me, with her downward face Illumining my slumbers, like the Moon Waxing and waning o'er Endymion. And I was laid asleep, spirit and limb, _295 And all my being became bright or dim As the Moon's image in a summer sea, According as she smiled or frowned on me; And there I lay, within a chaste cold bed: Alas, I then was nor alive nor dead:-- _300 For at her silver voice came Death and Life, Unmindful each of their accustomed strife, Masked like twin babes, a sister and a brother, The wandering hopes of one abandoned mother, And through the cavern without wings they flew, _305 And cried 'Away, he is not of our crew.' I wept, and though it be a dream, I weep.

What storms then shook the ocean of my sleep, Blotting that Moon, whose pale and waning lips Then shrank as in the sickness of eclipse;-- _310 And how my soul was as a lampless sea, And who was then its Tempest; and when She, The Planet of that hour, was quenched, what frost Crept o'er those waters, till from coast to coast The moving billows of my being fell _315 Into a death of ice, immovable;-- And then--what earthquakes made it gape and split, The white Moon smiling all the while on it, These words conceal:--If not, each word would be The key of staunchless tears. Weep not for me! _320

At length, into the obscure Forest came The Vision I had sought through grief and shame. Athwart that wintry wilderness of thorns Flashed from her motion splendour like the Morn's, And from her presence life was radiated _325 Through the gray earth and branches bare and dead; So that her way was paved, and roofed above With flowers as soft as thoughts of budding love; And music from her respiration spread Like light,--all other sounds were penetrated _330 By the small, still, sweet spirit of that sound, So that the savage winds hung mute around; And odours warm and fresh fell from her hair Dissolving the dull cold in the frore air: Soft as an Incarnation of the Sun, _335 When light is changed to love, this glorious One Floated into the cavern where I lay, And called my Spirit, and the dreaming clay Was lifted by the thing that dreamed below As smoke by fire, and in her beauty's glow _340 I stood, and felt the dawn of my long night Was penetrating me with living light: I knew it was the Vision veiled from me So many years--that it was Emily.

Twin Spheres of light who rule this passive Earth, _345 This world of loves, this ME; and into birth Awaken all its fruits and flowers, and dart Magnetic might into its central heart; And lift its billows and its mists, and guide By everlasting laws, each wind and tide _350 To its fit cloud, and its appointed cave; And lull its storms, each in the craggy grave Which was its cradle, luring to faint bowers The armies of the rainbow-winged showers; And, as those married lights, which from the towers _355 Of Heaven look forth and fold the wandering globe In liquid sleep and splendour, as a robe; And all their many-mingled influence blend, If equal, yet unlike, to one sweet end;-- So ye, bright regents, with alternate sway _360 Govern my sphere of being, night and day! Thou, not disdaining even a borrowed might; Thou, not eclipsing a remoter light; And, through the shadow of the seasons three, From Spring to Autumn's sere maturity, _365 Light it into the Winter of the tomb, Where it may ripen to a brighter bloom. Thou too, O Comet beautiful and fierce, Who drew the heart of this frail Universe Towards thine own; till, wrecked in that convulsion, _370 Alternating attraction and repulsion, Thine went astray and that was rent in twain; Oh, float into our azure heaven again! Be there Love's folding-star at thy return; The living Sun will feed thee from its urn _375 Of golden fire; the Moon will veil her horn In thy last smiles; adoring Even and Morn Will worship thee with incense of calm breath And lights and shadows; as the star of Death And Birth is worshipped by those sisters wild _380 Called Hope and Fear--upon the heart are piled Their offerings,--of this sacrifice divine A World shall be the altar. Lady mine, Scorn not these flowers of thought, the fading birth Which from its heart of hearts that plant puts forth _385 Whose fruit, made perfect by thy sunny eyes, Will be as of the trees of Paradise.

The day is come, and thou wilt fly with me. To whatsoe'er of dull mortality Is mine, remain a vestal sister still; _390 To the intense, the deep, the imperishable, Not mine but me, henceforth be thou united Even as a bride, delighting and delighted. The hour is come:--the destined Star has risen Which shall descend upon a vacant prison. _395 The walls are high, the gates are strong, thick set The sentinels--but true Love never yet Was thus constrained: it overleaps all fence: Like lightning, with invisible violence Piercing its continents; like Heaven's free breath, _400 Which he who grasps can hold not; liker Death, Who rides upon a thought, and makes his way Through temple, tower, and palace, and the array Of arms: more strength has Love than he or they; For it can burst his charnel, and make free _405 The limbs in chains, the heart in agony, The soul in dust and chaos. Emily, A ship is floating in the harbour now, A wind is hovering o'er the mountain's brow; There is a path on the sea's azure floor, _410 No keel has ever ploughed that path before; The halcyons brood around the foamless isles; The treacherous Ocean has forsworn its wiles; The merry mariners are bold and free: Say, my heart's sister, wilt thou sail with me? _415 Our bark is as an albatross, whose nest Is a far Eden of the purple East; And we between her wings will sit, while Night, And Day, and Storm, and Calm, pursue their flight, Our ministers, along the boundless Sea, _420 Treading each other's heels, unheededly. It is an isle under Ionian skies, Beautiful as a wreck of Paradise, And, for the harbours are not safe and good, This land would have remained a solitude _425 But for some pastoral people native there, Who from the Elysian, clear, and golden air Draw the last spirit of the age of gold, Simple and spirited; innocent and bold. The blue Aegean girds this chosen home, _430 With ever-changing sound and light and foam, Kissing the sifted sands, and caverns hoar; And all the winds wandering along the shore Undulate with the undulating tide: There are thick woods where sylvan forms abide; _435 And many a fountain, rivulet, and pond, As clear as elemental diamond, Or serene morning air; and far beyond, The mossy tracks made by the goats and deer (Which the rough shepherd treads but once a year) _440 Pierce into glades, caverns, and bowers, and halls Built round with ivy, which the waterfalls Illumining, with sound that never fails Accompany the noonday nightingales; And all the place is peopled with sweet airs; _445 The light clear element which the isle wears Is heavy with the scent of lemon-flowers, Which floats like mist laden with unseen showers. And falls upon the eyelids like faint sleep; And from the moss violets and jonquils peep, _450 And dart their arrowy odour through the brain Till you might faint with that delicious pain. And every motion, odour, beam and tone, With that deep music is in unison: Which is a soul within the soul--they seem _455 Like echoes of an antenatal dream.-- It is an isle 'twixt Heaven, Air, Earth, and Sea, Cradled, and hung in clear tranquillity; Bright as that wandering Eden Lucifer, Washed by the soft blue Oceans of young air. _460 It is a favoured place. Famine or Blight, Pestilence, War and Earthquake, never light Upon its mountain-peaks; blind vultures, they Sail onward far upon their fatal way: The winged storms, chanting their thunder-psalm _465 To other lands, leave azure chasms of calm Over this isle, or weep themselves in dew, From which its fields and woods ever renew Their green and golden immortality. And from the sea there rise, and from the sky _470 There fall, clear exhalations, soft and bright. Veil after veil, each hiding some delight, Which Sun or Moon or zephyr draw aside, Till the isle's beauty, like a naked bride Glowing at once with love and loveliness, _475 Blushes and trembles at its own excess: Yet, like a buried lamp, a Soul no less Burns in the heart of this delicious isle, An atom of th' Eternal, whose own smile Unfolds itself, and may be felt, not seen _480 O'er the gray rocks, blue waves, and forests green, Filling their bare and void interstices.-- But the chief marvel of the wilderness Is a lone dwelling, built by whom or how None of the rustic island-people know: _485 'Tis not a tower of strength, though with its height It overtops the woods; but, for delight, Some wise and tender Ocean-King, ere crime Had been invented, in the world's young prime, Reared it, a wonder of that simple time, _490 An envy of the isles, a pleasure-house Made sacred to his sister and his spouse. It scarce seems now a wreck of human art, But, as it were Titanic; in the heart Of Earth having assumed its form, then grown _495 Out of the mountains, from the living stone, Lifting itself in caverns light and high: For all the antique and learned imagery Has been erased, and in the place of it The ivy and the wild-vine interknit _500 The volumes of their many-twining stems; Parasite flowers illume with dewy gems The lampless halls, and when they fade, the sky Peeps through their winter-woof of tracery With moonlight patches, or star atoms keen, _505 Or fragments of the day's intense serene;-- Working mosaic on their Parian floors. And, day and night, aloof, from the high towers And terraces, the Earth and Ocean seem To sleep in one another's arms, and dream _510 Of waves, flowers, clouds, woods, rocks, and all that we Read in their smiles, and call reality.

This isle and house are mine, and I have vowed Thee to be lady of the solitude.-- And I have fitted up some chambers there _515 Looking towards the golden Eastern air, And level with the living winds, which flow Like waves above the living waves below.-- I have sent books and music there, and all Those instruments with which high Spirits call _520 The future from its cradle, and the past Out of its grave, and make the present last In thoughts and joys which sleep, but cannot die, Folded within their own eternity. Our simple life wants little, and true taste _525 Hires not the pale drudge Luxury, to waste The scene it would adorn, and therefore still, Nature with all her children haunts the hill. The ring-dove, in the embowering ivy, yet Keeps up her love-lament, and the owls flit _530 Round the evening tower, and the young stars glance Between the quick bats in their twilight dance; The spotted deer bask in the fresh moonlight Before our gate, and the slow, silent night Is measured by the pants of their calm sleep. _535 Be this our home in life, and when years heap Their withered hours, like leaves, on our decay, Let us become the overhanging day, The living soul of this Elysian isle, Conscious, inseparable, one. Meanwhile _540 We two will rise, and sit, and walk together, Under the roof of blue Ionian weather, And wander in the meadows, or ascend The mossy mountains, where the blue heavens bend With lightest winds, to touch their paramour; _545 Or linger, where the pebble-paven shore, Under the quick, faint kisses of the sea Trembles and sparkles as with ecstasy,-- Possessing and possessed by all that is Within that calm circumference of bliss, _550 And by each other, till to love and live Be one:--or, at the noontide hour, arrive Where some old cavern hoar seems yet to keep The moonlight of the expired night asleep, Through which the awakened day can never peep; _555 A veil for our seclusion, close as night's, Where secure sleep may kill thine innocent lights: Sleep, the fresh dew of languid love, the rain Whose drops quench kisses till they burn again. And we will talk, until thought's melody _560 Become too sweet for utterance, and it die In words, to live again in looks, which dart With thrilling tone into the voiceless heart, Harmonizing silence without a sound. Our breath shall intermix, our bosoms bound, _565 And our veins beat together; and our lips With other eloquence than words, eclipse The soul that burns between them, and the wells Which boil under our being's inmost cells, The fountains of our deepest life, shall be _570 Confused in Passion's golden purity, As mountain-springs under the morning sun. We shall become the same, we shall be one Spirit within two frames, oh! wherefore two? One passion in twin-hearts, which grows and grew, _575 Till like two meteors of expanding flame, Those spheres instinct with it become the same, Touch, mingle, are transfigured; ever still Burning, yet ever inconsumable: In one another's substance finding food, _580 Like flames too pure and light and unimbued To nourish their bright lives with baser prey, Which point to Heaven and cannot pass away: One hope within two wills, one will beneath Two overshadowing minds, one life, one death, _585 One Heaven, one Hell, one immortality, And one annihilation. Woe is me! The winged words on which my soul would pierce Into the height of Love's rare Universe, Are chains of lead around its flight of fire-- _590 I pant, I sink, I tremble, I expire!

...

Weak Verses, go, kneel at your Sovereign's feet, And say:--'We are the masters of thy slave; What wouldest thou with us and ours and thine?' Then call your sisters from Oblivion's cave, _595 All singing loud: 'Love's very pain is sweet, But its reward is in the world divine Which, if not here, it builds beyond the grave.' So shall ye live when I am there. Then haste Over the hearts of men, until ye meet _600 Marina, Vanna, Primus, and the rest, And bid them love each other and be blessed: And leave the troop which errs, and which reproves, And come and be my guest,--for I am Love's.

NOTES: _100 morning]morn may Rossetti cj. _118 of]on edition 1839. _405 it]he edition 1839. _501 many-twining]many twining editio prin. 1821. _504 winter-woof]inter-woof Rossetti cj.

FRAGMENTS CONNECTED WITH EPIPSYCHIDION.

[Of the fragments of verse that follow, lines 1-37, 62-92 were printed by Mrs. Shelley in "Posthumous Works", 1839, 2nd edition; lines 1-174 were printed or reprinted by Dr. Garnett in "Relics of Shelley", 1862; and lines 175-186 were printed by Mr. C.D. Locock from the first draft of "Epipsychidion" amongst the Shelley manuscripts in the Bodleian Library. See "Examination, etc.", 1903, pages 12, 13. The three early drafts of the "Preface (Advertisement)" were printed by Mr. Locock in the same volume, pages 4, 5.]

THREE EARLY DRAFTS OF THE PREFACE.

(ADVERTISEMENT.)