H a Cornell University 
 
 W) Librar y 
 
 The original of this book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013516095 
 
Le Marquis de Leuville. 
 PCJRS 
 
 AND 
 
 AELIA. 
 
 Illustrated. 
 
 FROM 
 
 "Entre-Nous" 
 
 TENTH THOUSAND. 
 
 (PUBLISHED BY CHAPMAN & HALL, LONDON.) 
 
 AMERICAN NEWS COMPANY, NEW YORK. 
 
Copyright 1884. 
 
TO FLORENCE. 
 
 Like the cushat to his nest, 
 Like the bee to honey-cell, 
 And the fisherman across the sands into the bonnie lee, 
 I have made you of my best 
 Just a, rosary to tell, 
 If you will raise my rustic beads to such a dignity. 
 
 Because some came from the air, 
 And some from lips of flowers, 
 Ap,d many from the bosom of the wild majestic sea, 
 And more came fleet and fair, 
 From a Summer that was ours, 
 And I bring them, as in olden time, to you on bended knee. 
 
 Out of sorrow some have come, 
 From the griefs of human lives; 
 And some from aching hours they tried in vain to render 
 
 Take these as tears, — and some 
 Like a swirl of Autumn leaves, 
 To write your beauty down the grove beneath your little 
 feet. 
 
ENTRE-NOUS. 
 
 Books not in a language 
 entirely your own in youth 
 should have some prefatory 
 account of themselves. 
 
 Vossius. 
 
 I HAD therefore better make some apologies for my 
 "French-English." 
 
 Poetry is an inconvenient thing. Yet poets will dream 
 in spite of stern reality perpetually staring them in the 
 face ; and painters still rise in the morn from their 
 rich visions of the night, without a beam of hope for 
 daily bread. 
 
 "Mais Us sont a nous ces beaux palais .'" said either 
 Alfred de Vigny, or Sarasin or Montreuil — or some of 
 those pelits-maitres of the Port Eoyal or otherwhere. 
 (The truth is, I am possessed by a nomad Asmodeus, 
 who is continually transgressing my geography and pro- 
 truding his two sticks where I get a little confused in 
 following him.} 
 
 " lis sont d nous ces beiux palais ! '!" . . . How well it 
 rings ! But these war-cries, born of a passant feeling that 
 
". ENTRE-NOVS. 
 
 God creates for the poet and the poet for man, are most 
 transient. The true poet's calling is a hard crusada. He 
 sheds the tears that others dream of : — out of his sorrow 
 comes his song, and even with this urgent inward 
 drouth he forgets his own grief, and when the sounds of 
 the street come louder through the windows newly- 
 opened to let in the first of Spring, he vows his soul to 
 the lay of the poor, — the unprofitable psalm of the right 
 against the wrong. His spiritual being is the scene of 
 some invisible tragedy when we see him, far away : when 
 the streams are strewed with leaves, and the innocent 
 lights and shadows lie peaceful aero s the road, looking 
 wistful as an Autumn afternoon, with '■'Fall" weather 
 in his heart, seeking in heaven some dead spirit, while 
 his own seems like a moth in the dew ; growing 
 white with one sweet souvenir safe beneath tbe 
 snow upon his brow, and needing indeed to feel that 
 love is older than death, and mercy the song of the 
 spheres. 
 
 Or farther still, in the mute desert, exiled ; gazing 
 from his little tent, with a door whence the swallows 
 come ; floating over taintless tides skyward through the 
 beautiful marvellous space, to the blue meadows among 
 the clouds nntravelled by the sun, earnestly, blindly 
 searching amid the voiceless music of our inward sight 
 for the one great chord — human and divine. 
 
 Or in "Venice, on the Giudecca, where the muffled 
 melody of a hundred loving hearts half hid in lamplit 
 
ENT RE-NO US. vii 
 
 gondolas, has sent bis soul on sapphire wings 
 athwart the night - clad Adriatic, where the moon 
 gathers half the sea into her smile, and makes each 
 foam-flecked wavelet fair ; — soaring higher yet, to seek 
 the one note of music that shall make all heaven 
 friends. Or else even plunging from his gondola to 
 taste the very sea itself : swimming by its side without 
 knowing or caring whether he went to perdition or not ; 
 and thence maybe to beautiful Verona, — beautiful Ve- 
 rona ! — in memory of Romeo and Juliet : — swerving from 
 his love's balcony in the strange light, half from the 
 fading window, half from the kindling dawn, banging 
 between heaven and the Adige, and ready to take a 
 hand at haphaizard for his life, or a two-handed sword 
 for bis love. Salvator Rosa is much my ideal, and I 
 do not see why a poet should not be a mighty hunter, 
 and hold his own with a sword or a sonnet ; the soul 
 of honour, et tout pour son altesse la femme. 
 
 Naturally, here I am only speaking of the true 
 poet, par la grace de Dieu — le geniilhomme passionne — 
 not the fanfaron of a kind of artistic carnality, nor 
 the poele d 'occasion ; the charlatan of verse, who lights 
 his equivocal incense on the dowdy shrine of human 
 vanity, and is about as full of poetry as a Kidder- 
 minster carpet, and as much at home in the beautiful 
 country lands as a tin rat-trap in a bank of flowers, 
 and who becomes poussif with piling up his ethereal 
 gewgaw confectionery. Glorying — grotesquely jubilating, 
 
viii ENTRE-NOUR 
 
 in fact, in a blinkard peacockism to advertise his 
 own tail. 
 
 By-the-way, let me say that I am not levelling a 
 covert stigmata at any personal friends here, and I 
 mention it because I onee inadvertently incurred a 
 virulent hatred (which I still recognize by an occasional 
 squib against me) for having created, in a little come- 
 dietta for amateurs, the character of a — Plagiarist — who 
 led a blighted existence from having had one original 
 thought ; which he never dared to use because he could 
 not for the life of him remember where he got it from. 
 But it is this kind of chiffonier musque who has caused 
 us to feel so utterly sick of "Spring," and the present 
 generation to be born tired of "Autumn," and such 
 things as "Lines on Receiving a Green Pen-wiper,'' etc. 
 Though these little pipers who sing their little loves 
 gently and equally in their own verses and other 
 people's, are nothing to that dynamitic pocket giant 
 of song who knows he can fluster the stars with his 
 candlestick, and frighten the sea with his walking- 
 stick ; a kind of Gargantuan Orpheus, in fact, who, 
 when he passes over the earth, the mountains double 
 up without thinking of the marmalade they make of 
 the poor travellers in the tunnels. 
 
 Let us dismiss these negres blancs with even the 
 heartrending dying words of poor Alfred de Musset, 
 " Dormir ! enfin je vais dormir." 
 
 For my part, inasmuch as I have to speak of my own 
 
ENTRENOUS. ix 
 
 work in this prefatory salmagundi, I may truly say 
 that though I write prose to raise some principle 
 of right against wrong, or to help the oppressed, 
 I never commit a line of poetry if I can help it ; but I 
 suppose my sensuous delight in form and colour does 
 not enable me entirely, in painting, to give forth some 
 idyllic accretions which, if I do not get them , out of 
 the sentient precincts of my temperament, turn their 
 points inward and give me pain. These are hidden 
 tithes of the soul, and, while I try hard to pay them 
 in full, I fear they make me often in need of the 
 charities of the imagination, I write my unkempt verse 
 almost in the exact form in which it fiist comes to me, 
 with little after-finish, preferring to brave a scant 
 countenance of hypercriticisrn, rather than lose any 
 possible relationship with high attributes it may have 
 had, when its imperial prevalence compelled me to set 
 it in its first raiment. 
 
 Moreover, I believe if you frankly write down some 
 simple thought that is moving your heart, not more 
 ungrammatically than is the wont of poets in general, 
 you will surely find some other heart to understand 
 it, and sympathize, if you have but patience to wait. 
 
 Yet in all picturing of thought, we should remember 
 we are expressing what we see in our heart's sight ; and 
 that which looks very different to the outward sight of 
 those we wish to -jjn-press, and goes through an exactly 
 opposite process with them. 
 
x ENTRE-NOU S. 
 
 Poetry is not intended to run a subject to earth, but 
 rather to elevate it and make poets of those to whom 
 the writer appeals. 
 
 To take an earthly metaphor : All that is required of 
 Poetry in her interpocular moods is to be contagious ; 
 therefore, though I may have only joue du malheur en 
 choisissant a idkms, yet if I could now and again touch 
 some keynote that might solace one bereaved heart, — 
 dispel some silvery web of a secret sorrow, or lead my 
 reader into kindly dreams of his own, far sweeter pro- 
 bably than any I can weave for him, I am content to 
 vanish, without button-holing him, as it were, with my 
 priciosite. 
 
 Also, I have a painful consciousness of two things : 
 first, my temperament is probably for the most part 
 that of a painter, and secondly (as my critics have 
 noted), having been reared principally among the tradi- 
 tions of France, I think mostly in French and conceive 
 with the brush. I therefore ask for la grande cour- 
 toisie of forbearance for my prudent non-elaboration. 
 
 Undoubtedly, with labour the most wayward measures 
 may be made polished metres ; but (unless the piece is 
 for music) I hope to be forgiven if they are dear to me 
 in their first poor array, when they eame to me ; 
 and I see them still in that sweet twilight, which 
 we say in France is " entre chien et loup." They are 
 Bashi-bazouks rather than a martinet's regulars, and 
 poems en peignoir. My muse seems always to have her 
 
\ ENTBE-NOUS. xi 
 
 hair astrew. Nobody is en toilette, and we are strictly 
 enlre-nous de bon. maiin. 
 
 The Press critics have been the cause of my not 
 changing this form in poetry. . They are the only sure 
 and penetrating judges. I should feel very crestfallen 
 if my work were full enough of mediocrities to "just 
 hit" the "general public," and the Press having solidly 
 approved, I feel my feeling strengthened. 
 
 I know that if they tried they could never find more 
 faults in my verse than I do myself ; and they always 
 leave the correcting to me. 
 
 Nevertheless, a literary friend has collected their favor- 
 able verdicts on my work into a volume of two parts, 
 forming about five hundred pages in octavo together, 
 the second portion of which has been reprinted. I can 
 only say I am proud of them. — I am most thankful to 
 have them ; and to the Press for those urging words, 
 and I hold these judgments as a talisman against all the 
 little aboiements lucratifs at one's heels from the lesser 
 critics. I can hardly, perhaps, render my feeling in 
 the matter more intelligibly than by saying over again 
 that I value the opinion of the great Press more than 
 all. That I like it as a body ; feel proud when any- 
 thing I write allows me to be "one among them," and 
 having been with these hard-worked pioneers of the 
 world's thought all over the earth, I know their ukase 
 to be fearless, and themselves good men and true. 
 
xm 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Aelia (Ittwt'd) - 1 
 
 At the Kmbasst {lllusfd) ... 43 
 
 A Warm November Day {lllusfd) - - 48 
 
 Fair Amstel {lllusfd) - - 51 
 
 A Lost Soul {lllusfd) - - 52 
 
 Andrevuola ... 60 
 
 Une Fete Sans Elle - - 65 
 
 The Choice or Arms ... - 67 
 
 Durante la Valsa - - - 73 
 
 Three Marble Steps ... 75 
 
 Daily Bread 80 
 
 A Dream Picture - 84 
 
 aspettando ... 85 
 
 Drifting - 86 
 
 A Dream is Passing ... 92 
 
 The Lily of Amstel-Land 94 
 
 Violets in London Streets - - 96 
 
 An Impromptu {IUust'd") • - 98 
 
 Elle Dit "Non" - 102 
 
 A Cry of Love {lllusfd) - - 104 
 
 The Song They Left on the Terrace - 108 
 
 Aly 110 
 
 Two Fates - - - 112 
 
 A Word of Troth {lllusfd) - 116 
 
 Press Notices 119 
 
XLV 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 PAOE 
 
 Aelia, (4 Illustrations) . 3 28, 32, 38 
 
 At the Embassy . . 45 
 
 A Warm November Day . 49 
 
 Fair Amstel 53 
 
 A Lost Soul . 57 
 
 An Impromptu . 99 
 
 A Cry op Love ... 105 
 
 A Word of Troth ..... 117 
 
pots 
 
 AND 
 
 A ELI A. 
 
 Illustrated. 
 
asc 
 
 'bA- I\,o AANCEQP*MEDl>gVAL ^VgNjCgj^ 
 
 'Ca^u piEuji^Mj'BBVRiT Awe CVMs t* riStfR;,-^ 
 
 IE? ^«i PftiT £ MlBD B6 362 KEJ-SJ CMLS»U| 
 
 «@1WS|!5T E&6KUS BUS PSStS 19MMBg! w 
 
 KHeW| Bbf MKUff IT 
 
 
 the fi$&$pa ftor "f 1 lift 
 
 TMI SiWM* PofiT, ^liars' LEM9EI APART 
 
 n^JLirf vlTHIff 
 
2 AELIA. 
 
 Moved fluctuant past their temples, and the air 
 
 All filled with these, and overladen, drooped 
 
 E'en like some unseen angel's azure wing, 
 
 And ruffled in one long vibration low 
 
 The lamp-lit waters, where the moonlight curled 
 
 Close round the imaged moon. 
 
 0, happy tones i 
 Some swerved and sank in eddies down blue depths, 
 And some went tangled in the silver beams, 
 And wended homeward ways on paths to heaven. 
 And with voluptuous odours some were caught 
 And taken up and smoothly borne away 
 About fair ladies' ears in gondolas : 
 For it waa Venice. 
 
 The Venice of wit and idlesse ; intrigue, 
 
 And sumptuous raiment, elegance and love : 
 
 The old sweet Venezia del cinque. 
 
 Bright Summer blushed brimful of brave romance 
 
 On the sea-city, in those knightly times, 
 
 And Moorish art lit up the Greek, and warmed 
 
 Quaiat quatro-cento with its Eastern smile. 
 
 Already grief for glory gone shed round 
 
AELIA. 5 
 
 A softening shade. There — night reigned infinite 
 
 Yet was not night. But some Circassian 
 
 Veiled maiden, come with violet eyes to hush 
 
 The trance'd spheres ; — with outheld hands to close 
 
 The wavelet's eyelid, lull the deep canals 
 
 And tell her love while sleep looked down on yoa 
 
 And smiled, through low Venetian floating chimes. 
 
 Aelia, the spoiled and loveliest of Venice, 
 
 Del Veneto la bianoa perla, 
 
 The lady of the radiance, iris-veiled, 
 
 Opal-like Aelia, fairest of the time 
 
 And wilfullest coquette, would play with love. 
 
 As with a treasure given her to play with ; 
 
 It came so gayly decked, so knightly knelt -. 
 
 So many flattered, likening her beauty 
 
 To the hanging gardens of the Lombard sky, 
 
 That landward called the clouds that looked on her. 
 
 And thus her pride and queenlier caprice 
 Grew up. All the nobles were but subjects ; 
 And the women in their tongue had named her 
 Heartless : and anon a courtly noble too 
 Would think full courteously — they read aright : 
 And yet at times, at times within her eyes 
 
6 AELIA. 
 
 Were holy lures to dream in hazel depths^. 
 And swimming shadows, endless and divine. 
 Two lovers, variously cast, diverse 
 In all things, stood the foremost in the crowd,, 
 Artim and Dardagil. Great Artim won 
 The smile of Aelia's kin, and deigned to sue 
 For Aelia's. 
 
 Little staid him where he loved. 
 
 Now he, men saw, was not of Latin race, 
 
 Thickset and strong, with hair upon his wrists • 
 
 Kefined in vice, and with an understream 
 
 Of wile that marked him of his line. Ranked high 
 
 I' the State for many powers, and riches first. 
 
 His palace too, a paradise of wealth. 
 
 The flatteries of Artim were supreme, 
 
 And weighed his words. It cost him little toil 
 
 To weave his web for women, whom he stalked 
 
 As doth the many-wintered spider, grown 
 
 Fastidious with spoil. Meditating 
 
 He overcast her with a silent oath, 
 
 She should be his ; and he no man for jest. 
 
 The passion these men know hath oft been named 
 By love's own name, and such mere bounden slave- 
 
AELIA. 1 
 
 To some such gnawing thirst will fiercely swear, , 
 
 He loves a maid whose soul hangs like a lark's 
 
 Fresh song in upper air, though he but craves 
 
 The sweet bird's blood to gorge him with and spoil. 
 
 All otherwise the loyal Dardagil, 
 
 Strange with the wayward passion of the Muse, 
 
 And his fantastic beauty, and soft tint 
 
 Of olive. Idle, tall ; as those that leaned 
 
 In Moorish Lion-courts, when Latin blood 
 
 Was swift. Most courtly and full warm ; yet 'neath 
 
 His dreamy indolence a panther lurked. 
 
 And Artim almost wondered at his look 
 
 Of merry, dauntless truth that upward glanced 
 
 From eyes that dimmed with others' woe alone — 
 
 Nor every man could read him right. His friend 
 
 He well could love, as women love, from out 
 
 The heart, by inspiration, giving all 
 
 And asking naught. Of grand old martial race 
 
 He came. Unlike them, save when stung with heat 
 
 Of conflict he would wake and rouse his sires 
 
 That slumbered to his harping. Proud of birth 
 
 Let them be ; — he to rank among the bards 
 
 In high noblesse and heraldry of God. 
 
8 AELIA. 
 
 Are poets loved of women ? So desired, 
 Caressed, yet are they loved before the realm 
 Within them is revealed — the scorn, the strength, 
 The charity, the majesty ? This one 
 Sweet Aelia mocked, tho' mockery of him 
 She could not snffer : him she threw her chains 
 Around, divining well this captive knight 
 The truest there, though scarce divining why ; 
 And hardly knowing yet the pain she gave, 
 The bliss, the fire, the torture of our love 
 That youth nor reason e'er shall comprehend. 
 The splendor of the vacillating Spring 
 Through orange bloom and pergola was hers, 
 And hers' Venetian April's bright caprice 
 Of frowns and smiles. Child and woman, fair 
 Above them all, and ever taught to feel 
 The vision bright and dream of love she was ; 
 The gentle monotone of Pulci now — 
 Anon Boiardo's brighter dream, the thought 
 Of Cimabue or strong pale Zeuxis 
 In the past. 
 
 Standing by the lighted shrine 
 To-night upon the terrace, with the stars, 
 Herself the star of half the nobles' eyes, 
 
AELIA. 9 
 
 She leaned with all her swerving light of gems 
 Above the wavy palace with its lamps, 
 And softly-ruffled globe of moon, that glowed 
 Below the star-shot tide. 
 
 And musing thus : 
 Save just where once or twice, as if by chance, 
 There lay a smooth-cut emerald, as 'twere 
 Asleep in veiled glow, her robe was white ; 
 Up-fastened here and there with bars of gold, 
 Dead gold, and fell in myriad idle folds, 
 And went away in waves. The dead gold looped 
 Her living hair up, and became a part 
 Of secret Summer scent and balmy sheen 
 Of amber. Soft-hued, smooth-cut emeralds 
 Upon, her neck and breast, she looked a dream ; 
 And there was not a glitter or an edge 
 In all that presence ; but a charm asleep, 
 A love-lit low glow, ruby-like, that rose 
 And passed when she passed, sailing through the sight 
 In only white and green, and gold, dead gold. 
 
 She stole from Artira through bright groups, wherein 
 liefiaement like a perfume filled the air, 
 And raising here her eyes to Dardagil, 
 
10 AELIA. 
 
 "Thou lovest me," she said; "tell me thereof. 
 
 Or is it much, or little, say, Sir Knight ; 
 
 For are there not varieties in lore ? 
 
 I long; — well — fear to know, yet tell me truth f 
 
 I'd have a true love-tale to-night ; this night 
 
 As Eastern as the fashion of thy brow. 
 
 Ha ! would I trust thee wert thou not a poet? 
 
 Poets, they say, will only wed with truth. 
 
 If they are false, then who is true, alack ! 
 
 I am spoilt, they say, so tell me truly alL" — 
 
 Ever in woman's heart are two refrains 
 With echoes full. Their songs are : Vanity, 
 And Love. Artim woke the first : Dardagil 
 Roused love ; and Aelia listened unto both. 
 
 Her lover answered her. All clouded each 
 
 Sweet sign upon his ever-speaking face. 
 
 " You would have truth ?" Then for the thousandth time, 
 
 Remembrance of her tortures struck the wave 
 
 Of passion for her in his heart, they met 
 
 And crashed like maddened waters. "Love is truth. 
 
 I love I And surely truth is mine — a trifle ? 
 
 A decoration for my lady's hair ? 
 
 Yea ! if thou wilt. I love thee, Aelia, love thee, 
 
AELIA. 11 
 
 1 as this music loves the air it leans on 1 
 
 1 love thee as low music loves the touch 
 That's mother to it. As that far-off wave, 
 With naught but other striving waves around, 
 Must love the shore. Aye ! or the mariner 
 That faints on it and floats with that last thought 
 That life could hold of love. Shall I tell truth ? 
 All truth, and wilt thou hear it ?" " Yea/' she said. 
 " Then, Aelia, I do love thee with a sense 
 
 So much above mere life, beyond mere death, 
 
 That when thou leav'st me in thy changeful moods, 
 
 Like swallows turning dappled breasts to go, 
 
 My brain becomes a maze of folly, — mad ! 
 
 And drunken shades of my distorted thought, 
 
 Seem leading through my soul some reckless slow 
 
 Weird minuet of inebriated night ! 
 
 My brows should burn the world up with their fire, 
 
 And fold so soft to serve and tend thee. Yet 
 
 How dare I give myself to thee and doubt 
 
 Thy choice were wealthier ? Queen sunflower of love, 
 
 1 know that thou conldst lull me when thou wouldst 
 
 To deep divine entrancement ; and that thou 
 
 Couldst bid me live the life of spirits ; drown 
 
 Or dance me on the ripple of the hour. 
 
12 AELIA. 
 
 O ! at the thought, I seem like yon sea-sands, 
 Part, part left dry of ocean, part still washed 
 With dying thunders of the ebb. I know thee. 
 And he that gives himself to thee, must watch 
 His image in the variable cloud 
 Tom by the winds. I know it. But the name, 
 That is thy title, shall not come from me !" 
 
 Aelia was silent long ; amazed to hear 
 
 This truth she asked for come from him who loved. 
 
 She would have spoken then, maybe to plead, 
 
 Or maybe to disdain him ; with the wrath 
 
 Of angry beauty crush him. He was gone ! — 
 
 All through the night she lay awake, until 
 
 The dusk -tipped wings of dawn bad brought her 
 
 sleep ; 
 And then she dreamed by chance her face was changed. 
 She went unrecognized of kith and kin, 
 And when she cried that she was Aelia, 
 "The little Aelia, that untamed coquette," 
 They scoffed, and frowned, and turned her from the 
 
 door. 
 Then sobbed she, " Bring me Dardugil ! he, 
 
AELIA. 13 
 
 He knows me well." And a strange woman said, 
 " He cannot know thee, Dardagil is mine." 
 Then fell she from the threshold screaming loud, — 
 And found her maidens round her, and her pillow 
 Wet with tears. 
 
 She rose, and all the day, 
 And alway after, robed herself in sable. 
 And then though Artim woo'd and chafed, and chafed 
 And woo'd ; her heart was fain and fortressed. 
 
 Strange, 
 Full strange to change for one hard word, but now 
 She only lived on hope and Dardagil. 
 With heart and lips whose words were worth their 
 
 kisses 
 Adoring the banished idol that she made. 
 That stalwart form, those large fatigued eyes. 
 And in her breast anon took sanctuary, 
 And raised high convent walls of purity 
 Around. Then, labour in despair, in vain 
 The goodliest gifts were sent by Artim ; gems 
 Hid deep in utmost eastward ocean 
 Such as Venice even, she the jewelled queen 
 Of all the seas, scarce knew, and courtly maid 
 Had coveted. Bat Aelia put them back, 
 
14 AELIA. 
 
 These that once had been the beauty's armour, 
 
 As valueless : — that made her mother's eyes 
 
 Who brought these gifts, to shine so tenderly 
 
 On her (and them). For that Aelia of old, 
 
 Whom they were seeking, the proud coquette, 
 
 Lay at the bottom of her jewel-case 
 
 Like a dead turquoise. Dardagil meanwhile 
 
 Bled unseen, like the root whose one sweet flower 
 
 la plucked. And paced the hidden side of all 
 
 That Eastern splendour littered in the bright 
 
 Venetian, ways abruptly edged with shade 
 
 To hear each day from kith and kin (so kind). 
 
 Aye, even from the very gondoliers, 
 
 The clank that linked her name with Artim's. 
 
 Praying 
 With riven heart that he, this Artim, might 
 But love her well ; and had he even known 
 She loved him (pondering on that truth he said), 
 His higher knighthood held him mute : for self 
 Had passed away, and chivalry or fear 
 To hinder her from higher choice, held bound 
 His heart in realms beyond the easy ways 
 Of love with love returned, for he had cast 
 
AELIA. 15 
 
 His bosom -on the waters, or to love 
 And float, or love and die. 
 
 And all this while 
 Bright Tintoretto, with his god-like hand 
 Enriched these days, and all along the shade 
 The soft-eyed maids with hair oar Titian loved 
 Bore wavering vases laughing to the wells. 
 And so the empty-handed Spring sailed by. 
 In sable gondolas and crescent moons. 
 
 But thick-browed Artim, brooding on nis schemes 
 
 To satiate a passion foiled, let not 
 
 The hours go unsown. He had a creature 
 
 Here, of one same mother born, who served him 
 
 Abjectly ; with whom in hours of play, 
 
 The eves of daily labour, for the State's 
 
 Behoof, the dark forethoughtful man would fence, 
 
 To keep his hand in for a sudden call, 
 
 And 'tween the passes would he rallyingly, 
 
 And with an indication of the steel, . 
 
 Hint at grave deeds that might be done and should— 
 
 And then again on guard. 
 
 The high lamp's light 
 la Artim's palace, shown abroad o'er Venice, 
 
16 AELIA. 
 
 Would often check the laughing gondoliers. 
 
 Returning from a festa it would make 
 
 The holy hush of still canal and square 
 
 Significant of evil. Heavenly night 
 
 In Venice shared the gaze of eager dame 
 
 And cavalier on that inscrutable 
 
 High lamp and lone. " What plots he now ?" they 
 
 hint. 
 "And whom against?" 
 
 A gondola was framed 
 Even like a sister unto Aelia's own. 
 "And thou," said Artim to his brother, " Seek 
 This canzonetting boy on whom her soul 
 Is fixed. Say we brothers hate as brothers : 
 And you would be revenged through him on me ; 
 This well implied : then bring him where this boat, 
 Mysteriously closed, divides the ripples 
 As though from off Murano. Then, me he sees 
 Reclining in it like the lord of it, 
 My lady hidden. Dost thou mark me well?'' 
 
 'Twas done : and soon the softly swerving lie, 
 
 As if from off Murano, in the crowd 
 
 Of muffled boats or gaily decked appeared 
 
AELIA. vt 
 
 Athwart the golden waves by Dardagil, 
 And as he looked his heart leaped, for Artini 
 Sat therein ! — 
 
 But Dardagil went on with talk 
 To Artim's brother carelessly, and said : 
 " How change sails on in Venice ! Here have I 
 But little time been absent, and 'tis robed 
 Anew." But quick his trembling arm betrayed 
 The poison of the plot that worked in him 
 From head to heel ; each fibre of his heart 
 Grew marble, so that violence of will ; 
 His own true stern nobility alone — - 
 Just held him on the crash of rage, that 'whelmed 
 Despair, and swayed him almost e'en to curse 
 At Aelia's name. " And yet, not this !" he said, 
 " I could have worn the crown of thorns, to know 
 This Artim loved — an' he but loved her well." — 
 And then, with outstretched hands, as though to stem 
 Hot tears from teeth of fire, " His love is vile — 
 Would kill her." Then suddenly — "Your brother 
 Has hurt you, cavalier- We follow him ; 
 The sore may spread too far." 
 
 The brother fain 
 Had made him turn ; remembering how he once 
 
18 AELIA. 
 
 For bat a tiny woid against her fame 
 
 Hurled huge Miguel, the very Doge's son, 
 
 There headlong in the Grand Canal. " But now," 
 
 Low down within himself, unheard he said, 
 
 " Unnerved, he'll fall upon a practiced sword, 
 
 If haply sword-play issue of it.'' Grim 
 
 He eyed the chase, and on the marble steps 
 
 Of Artim's palace Dardagil sprung forth 
 
 To summon Artim. Courteously the two 
 
 Sainted, Artim smiling hard. 
 
 " Returned 
 To life ?" he said. And Dardagil : " Or else 
 Embarked for death, or you !" — 
 
 "Is that a Doem 
 In birth ?" sneered Artim. 
 
 " My good sword may write 
 It on thy breast !" hurled fiercer Dardagil. 
 " Thy Muse a boy's untempered jealousy 1" 
 Cried Artim. 
 
 Then Dardagil, nis head erect 
 Once more: " I hardly heed your empty seats 
 Your gondola shows ill your craft ! Not I, 
 'Tis thou art jealous here. I had thought more 
 
AELIA. 19 
 
 Of Artim's jealousy. Swift jealousy ! 
 Whose harsh hawk's eye is blind to all but blood, 
 And speaks not till 'tis done. Had I a right 
 To jealousy, I'd break thee as the wave 
 This brittle bark, and leave thee littered there 
 On Lido's shore till wind and wave had washed 
 The ugly stain away." Artim just held 
 His rage enough to say, "My lady bird 
 ' To the palace comes not yet ; I have dropped 
 Her dainty feet at home ; the world's tongue wags, 
 You kuow." 
 
 "Breathe not her name aloud, Seigneur," 
 Said Dardagil. " We slash no lady's name, 
 We that are noble, with our meeting swords. 
 And pray you do not vex the truth with lies 
 And plots so low that serving fiends of hell 
 Would loathe them. See, the very gondola 
 Swings backward from your feet as though it 
 
 scorned 
 Incarnate liars ! Yet do I acknowledge 
 That you outstripped me in our race to-night, 
 And reached the palace first, as being your own 
 You well might do. Still I am discontent, 
 And smite ,you. Surely this is cause enough 
 
20 AELIA. 
 
 For crossing swords, and who needs more — needs none.."* 
 
 Then Artim's fury blazed ! * * * 
 
 a ***** * 
 
 Night, with the star 
 Of unvanquished will, frets the smooth-blown sands 
 Of Lido's shore. Full soon 'twill flash the swords 
 Of foes ; sparkling off their steel and the wave's 
 Phosphoric lunging foam at intervals 
 Against their footing. 
 
 Artim's mind was cool, 
 For ne had seen his fever'd foe stoop down 
 To cool his forehead in the sea : he kuew 
 Kind Fortune doth prefer the stronger hand,. 
 And felt it was his own. 
 
 Pale but elate, 
 Dauntless stood Dardagil, his doublet off, 
 The weird white moonlight on his open front, 
 And on his well-squared breast and shoulders broad, 
 His long bright rapier drawn, the point upon 
 The ground, the cold light just warmed iu his eyesj 
 Just falling through his graceful lifted hair, 
 His shadow at his feet. A long trailed star 
 Fell swiftly then, and to his confidant 
 
AELIA. 21 
 
 Said Dardagil, " I know the sign. I fight 
 
 For her, and fall for her, not me, God wot. — 
 
 By moonlit seas, and where she often comes, 
 
 With lights of Venice my beloved in sight, 
 
 That Aelia smiles upon. What more need I ? 
 
 " Out upon her," cried his friend, " and wilt thou 
 
 So tamely die for her who used thee so ? 
 
 I would that she were dead.'' Then Dardagil 
 
 "Was wroth indeed. "Aye, though I died for her 
 
 An hundred times, an hundredfold am I 
 
 Her knight and slave right thankfully. Doth ev'n 
 
 The lion turn upon the lioness, 
 
 « 
 And shall man be less ? I charge thee, see 
 
 Thou tell her not my end. Though Aelia's tears 
 
 Were Heaven to me, 'twere hell to have them fall, 
 
 ■Or know her bosom rose unevenly, 
 
 Even in Heaven. Do this, and only take 
 
 Her silent homage and my mute devoir ; 
 
 Then make obeisance low as to the queen, 
 
 And let my love, not grievings and regrets, 
 
 Breathe out itself (if she should ask thee aught) 
 
 In this last dying sign." 
 
 He raised his rapier 
 
 from the pricked sand, and waited for his foe. 
 
22 AELIA. 
 
 Then bright the four long sword-points glanced, and 
 
 left 
 The work of death with two. 
 
 There's something rare 
 In that first courtly altercation. Pew 
 The thrusts at first, till Dardagil dropped blood. 
 This roused him, though at each new touch he 
 
 smiled, 
 
 And smiled more sharply. Artim pressed him hard, 
 
 Half in disdain ; and but for deadly ire 
 
 Had cast the now unskilled opponent off, 
 
 That could but break and foil, to bleed and live. 
 
 But deadly ire and thirst for triumph strung 
 
 His arm ; he pressed to seize the victory. 
 
 i 
 Gasping he stopped. Dardagil lowered his sword. 
 
 The guard was quick renewed in silence. — Thanks 
 
 For generous forbearance there were none. ■ 
 
 More now in frantic malice Artim fought, 
 
 Until at last in miserable spite, 
 
 His rival to unnerve, he cried the name 
 
 Of Aelia. , 
 
 " Aelia ! Let her not be named !" 
 
 Cried Dardagil, and swift with flashing fbint 
 
 Pierced Artim through the breast. 
 
AELIA. 23 
 
 The moon glanced pale 
 Upon an upturned face, then hid her eyes, 
 While Dardagil was hurried to the boats, 
 With hollow sound of feet without the voices, 
 And silence sailed with them across the sea. 
 The wailing night-birds circled over it, 
 Strange fogs rose foul and fell from out of it. 
 Adrift on ghostly and forlorn lagoons 
 The lonely heron watched them, and the birds 
 Of reeds and rankest grasses' rose in flocks 
 Along that shore of idle ebb and, ooze; 
 Until they reached the long gray line of land. 
 
 Ere in the east the night bad bled, the news 
 
 Had gathered tenfold bloodliness, and spread 
 
 To Venice, of its statesman Artim slain, 
 
 And his successor would not dry his tears 
 
 (Poor man) until a price on Dardagil 
 
 Was laid. And all the mainland round was searched. 
 
 But if his enemy were dead indeed, 
 Or if the gentle lady of his love, 
 The once capricious Aelia, thought of him 
 Still tenderly, he knew not— an exile ; 
 Doomed by the rigid finger of the state. 
 
24 AELIA. 
 
 No ! no ; — no balm now soothed Aelia's despair 
 Save healing others' woe. Her golden hair 
 She strewed along her shoulders heedlessly, 
 Moving through the palace pale and proud. 
 Ever with daily tears she spoke his name. 
 His name 1 Maybe the melancholy air 
 Might echo where he was, and bid her fly 
 To him, to be but near him, and be his. 
 
 One moment, O pause there, and stay, 
 Dark clouds girt about the sweet sun, 
 You so crowd on him one by one ; 
 O! my love is craving, and none 
 
 Seem to heed me, mourning away ! 
 
 Stay, stay, weeping wave* of the main ! 
 
 Sobbing sounds of lover t that mourn! 
 
 T*,e wave that came up with the dauin, 
 
 And broke into smiles, is it gone? 
 Is there no n turning again ? 
 
 O Summer-day, why with eyes wet 
 
 Wilt close all (he sweet lovers' hours? 
 
 ' Tis but the month of the shadows and showers, 
 
 Of sweet crescent moons increasing the flowers, 
 
 Cans't be fur leaving us yet f 
 
AELIA. 27 
 
 With, a darkness where stars never come 
 The sun is eclipsed and accursed, 
 And the water that slakelh no thirst 
 From Hell's writhing ocean hath burst 
 
 With a, fierce fringe of flame in the foam! 
 
 Artim wounded, on Lido shore that night 
 
 Bled bitterly ; but even in his trance 
 
 Of faintness, with a gleam of ruling craft, 
 
 Gasped, "Not Venice !'' and while his brother's ear 
 
 Was bowed to him, commanded they should bear 
 
 By stealth his body to Murano's isle, 
 
 While solemn obsequies and published death 
 
 Of this Venetian crafty councillor 
 
 Brought execration on his rival's head, 
 
 And swift decrees of exile. All was done, 
 
 And hour by hour did Artim in his room 
 
 Of refuge in Murano fight with death. 
 
 Death wavered as to which one of the three 
 His hand should touch — or Artim on his bed, 
 Or Aelia bereft, or Dardagil 
 Condemned in exile. Death just poised his shaft 
 Between them, swerving heedlessly as though 
 
28 AELIA. 
 
 'Twas hung aloft on the crook'd weathercock 
 Of the little Lombard tower of silent old 
 Murano's fisher charch, while mass was said. ' 
 And hiding, Artitn fought the slayer well — 
 Fought hand to hand in that small stealthy house, 
 And turned him to his purpose. Death drove ont 
 His foe ; and when nigh spent he'd find a help 
 In thoughts of Aelia and her utter woe. 
 
 Eeraote in homeless lands the banished friend 
 
 Of Venice, Aelia's lover, lived within 
 
 Himself ; his body there, his soul across the earth. 
 
 A grief in sleep and waking ! — Saw 
 
 The chill gray twilight of that morn he fled 
 
 Across the ghostly and forlorn lagoon 
 
 Where lone the heron watched hiin, and the birds 
 
 Of reeds and rankest grasses rose in flocks 
 
 Along the shore of idle ebb and ooze ; 
 
 Saw Venice dimly through his tears, as though 
 
 It loomed in rain and fog. And silent oft 
 
 As list'ning unto slips of angels' songs 
 
 That dropped about the earth unheard of men 
 
 Would look as wistful as an afternoon ; 
 
 And seem to strive to catch some spent refrain 
 
AELIA. 29 
 
 Of bygone time, as village children do 
 
 At the dragged wheat-ears in the Autumn lanes 
 
 Where -rains have passed. 
 
 A sorrow's song he made, 
 A song of gleaning when the fields are bare. 
 
 TherJs the sunlight and the shadows and the changes 
 
 of the day, 
 And my love, my sunlight, now so changed, as sad as 
 
 it wis gay ; 
 And my life — 'lis but the gleaning of a life that's 
 
 burnt away. 
 
 Waiting, waiting with the clouds, in all the drowsy 
 
 amber sky, 
 The sun comes down to kiss them, in golden-veined 
 
 eternily ; 
 1 alone am left, with ships and heavy hours sailing 
 
 by- 
 Gleaning, gleaning, could thy dream but glean one 
 
 thought of mine to-day, 
 One li'.lh ivord, you'd know it, and an angel as they 
 
 say 
 Might leave a chink above the clouds, I'd see through 
 
 far away. 
 
30 AELIA. 
 
 So I wait through all the May-lime, with its frail air 
 
 full of thee : 
 And flitting hopes like gorsamers that seem to float 
 
 to me. 
 And now we glean thefadea flowers or fainted ecstasy. 
 
 Yet 'tis sweet in happy hay-time wi'h the buds all 
 waiting near, 
 
 To wait beneath the willows while the lily cups ap- 
 pear ; 
 
 But 'tis hard to wait in Winter time, when a'l is dead 
 and drear. 
 
 When the Autumn dies of weeping, and the gleaning 
 
 tempests blow, 
 Gleaning hopes and latest leaves that fly, and fade 
 
 away and go ! 
 Then I look for thee in Heaven ; and it sends me 
 
 down the snow ! 
 
 We live but where the heart is ; following fast 
 His songs in fancy, Dardagil no more 
 Could hold himself from Aelia ; — gave she bliss, 
 The block, or oubliettes. . . . 
 
 In monkish garb, 
 Of dark Dominican, and cowled, he stole 
 
AELIA. 33 
 
 Through Venice : and like steps upon his way, 
 The old' familiar churches one by one 
 He entered, thinking " Here she is, and here — 
 Perhaps another's 1 and in penitence ; 
 Perhaps beneath the stones dead, dead 1" 
 
 He passed 
 The steps of shrines groove-worn by kneeling knees, 
 Quaint Lombard carvings loved of lovers too 
 (For there's a twilight haunts them), till he reached 
 A chapel bearing Artim's name. The walls, 
 The altar-table, were behung with wreaths, 
 Flowers, and ex-votos ; one — the centre one — 
 From Artim ! this was Artim's chapel ! — this 
 Artim's thank-offering for life restored ! — 
 That blazed the exile as a coward's ruse. 
 
 "While Dardagil stood there in whirling doubt, 
 Half fathoming the cunning of the man 
 Of craft most fathomless, he heard a voice ; 
 Whose rich contralto tones struck him to stone. 
 Low wailed the voice, " Sweet Maddalena loved ; 
 Dear mother of repenting ! Madeleine ! 
 Too much, maybe, to see him and be loved ; 
 But thou couldst love as none have loved on earth* 
 
34 AELIA. 
 
 And look for love, but love, to ransom thee. 
 
 I too have Tintoretto-hair like thee, 
 
 And surely thou wilt hear my wail, when I 
 
 Renounce myself to live in him I love, 
 
 If yet he lives I — if yet he lives 1 But once 
 
 To lift my lips to his ; say, ' I repent,' 
 
 Say, 'I am changed- — changed wholly by that love 
 
 So high and passing sweet he gave me once': 
 
 And then, Maddalena 1 up to thine, 
 
 With thee and thine to look on him from heaven I 
 
 For I must die. I cannot yield my hand 
 
 To Artim, he that hounds me ; and my kin 
 
 Help him, Maddalena, and he strives, 
 
 And living I am weak, and dying strong, 
 
 And so, sweet Maddalena, let me come 1" 
 
 Her lover now had sunk upon his knees, 
 Thrilled by the voice to ecstasy, and by all 
 That bitter wail whose lifted tones unveiled 
 Her love ; unmanned a space. 'Twas, so sweet 
 To hear ; so strange, unhoped ; her presence seemed 
 A spirit in the gloom, that spoke with Heaven ; 
 And awed, he wrapped his head till she might fade 
 Like some mute after-rapture of a prayer. — 
 
AELIA. 35 
 
 She rose, and saw the well-knit monk that knelt. 
 
 And lest she should disturb him ; softly left 
 
 Her wonted altar. Then recovering, he 
 
 Iiooked up, as from a trance, and there was heard 
 
 Low talk — in which a man's harsh tongue pronounced 
 
 Her lover's name. Great God ! 'twas Artitn's voice. 
 
 Near stunned, " Aelia !" he cried ; flung off his cowl, 
 
 And called her to him, challenged Artim turn ; 
 
 On his life to turn ! Flew the dim aisle's lcngthj 
 
 Where Artim dragged faint Aelia to the porch. 
 
 'Twas but a flash, before a devil's laugh, 
 
 One shriek, one flicker of a flying veil, 
 
 And then the door with crashing thunder closed. 
 
 When Dardagil was master of himself, 
 
 From all the maddening of that moment past, 
 
 The echoes of the roar that rolled all round 
 
 And round this prison-house were settling high 
 
 In carven roof. 
 
 An oriel window shone, 
 And set a laughing light upon a tomb. 
 He gazed at it right steadfastly. " For there 
 The way must be 1" 
 
 As swift he climbed, he caught 
 Now demon's head and ears, now angel's wing, 
 
36 AELIA. 
 
 Now bat-like battling on the wall a space, 
 Now swinging pendent ; daringly at last 
 Scaling the aperture, and straining through, 
 He drew his girdle tight ; and heeding not 
 Or height or depth, he stood erect, and sprang. 
 
 Below him flowed the dark canal. 
 
 "A sword!'" 
 He shouted, as from out the heedless tide 
 He lay upon a barcarolo's breast. 
 And picked in haste some men of these and cried,. 
 " A sword, and to Lord Artim's house, and quick 1" 
 These sons of Venice- knew in that monk's garb 
 A gallant of the city. One even sang 
 A song of Dardagil's : "Sword, swzrd." It ran, 
 " sword!, be true, and' bright and true and swift 
 For ladies sweet, and hearts, be true as steel.'' 
 And then the end, all writ that time 
 When he but hoped to> meet his love on high. 
 
 Yet our hearts in the land beyond parting 
 Shall meet in the closes of rest, 
 
 And be laid in the wings of an angel, 
 And beat in the selfsame breas'. 
 
AELIA. 39 
 
 Beneath their oars the barca plunged and flew, 
 
 And on the wave they gave to him the steel 
 
 For prompt affairs. Now nearing, he beheld 
 
 A boat already crouching 'neath an arch 
 
 Of Artim's palace. Then he cried : "Good friends, 
 
 1 am that Dardagil, and come to save 
 
 A noble maiden ; see me not outmatched." 
 
 The secret archway's bolts borne down with blows, 
 
 And fighting every inch, and Dardagil 
 
 "With reddening sword to lead and cheer them on, 
 
 At last to Artim's chamber burst the men. 
 
 But Aelia had been hidden in the midst 
 
 Of this his palace, vast as ancient fort, 
 
 Immured in some high lodgement that a spring 
 
 Touched light would whirl to unknown depths with all 
 
 Therein. Such outrage to the maiden's kin 
 
 Were naught to one so high in Venice then, 
 
 And he could hold her, while his foe, and dupe, 
 
 Remained outwitted and condemned beneath 
 
 The sentence of the State. But seeing now 
 
 The hated face between him and his prize — 
 
 The face he thought all barred by iron laws — 
 
 Fierce Artim stood aghast. Then they seized him 
 
 In a flash : ana Aelia found at last, she flung 
 
40 AELIA. 
 
 Herself on Dardagil's good arm and cried : 
 "'The traitor is betrayed. Death he may deal. 
 But never can he claim me of my friends, 
 Who thus dishonours them. We're free to-day, 
 O Dardagil, my love ! My saviour now ; 
 These palace walls shall hold me not alive." 
 
 Artim made one rnsh — 
 His last I — held tightly as he was ; his men 
 Had fallen, and the barcarolo bent 
 To whisper then to Dardagil : " Escape , 
 If but he stamp his foot, more minions mount 
 Prom under. Most we've spitted ; let them writhe." 
 
 Then Dardagil took Aelia 'neath his sword 
 And led her toward the gondolas. "Long life,'' 
 He laughed. " Long life to you, my brave Seigneur." 
 His long bright rapier swinging on his hip, 
 *' The lady Aelia's palace, an she will, 
 Shall be our meeting-place. 
 
 The past is writ 
 In water, but the present writ in blood. 
 Tour life is much to me, for I love home, 
 And you alive, I have a home in Venice." 
 
AELIA. 41 
 
 There's oft one ray that dances on a wall, 
 
 Of sunny wavelets born upon the deep 
 
 Canal where'er 'tis kissed by vagrant airs 
 
 Or gondola or barca swaying on. 
 
 And idle boatmen watch it, maidens too, 
 
 And children laugh at it, and mothers oft 
 
 Will show it to their sucklings till they crow. 
 
 It quivers up bright Aelia's balcony, 
 
 Fantastic as a spirit, aye, the sprite 
 
 Of human joy that makes the favouring sky 
 
 To beam on circumstance : waters sweet 
 
 Of lovers' dreams 1 And still the heart of love 
 
 Than sea-wave deeper is, and than sunlight 
 
 Even brighter is, nor has its ecstasy 
 
 One word of speech. Bat every sunlit wave 
 
 In Venice seems to send a leaping beam 
 
 To quiver up the balcony to them 
 
 And bliss sailed in with it upon the wind 
 
 Without one cloud to carry all across 
 
 The Lombard sky, and both were mute, too blest 
 
 For words to whisper e'en each other's names. 
 
 A.elia and Dardagil and western sky 
 
 Sinking like the very raptured silent sun 
 
 Itself in closing Heavens, heart in heart, 
 
 Rapt hand in hand, eyes trembling up to eyes. 
 
42 
 
 AT" THE EMBASSY. 
 
 Paris. 
 
 Of all the Paris season's gayest balls, the- Embassy was the 
 most superbly brilliant last night. Below, the waltzes, youth, age, 
 dullness, wit, love, bliss and anguish, seemed speaking all their 
 different languages, in every tongue. Near a tottering diplomat 
 and an intriguing ancient Duchess, stood a lovely young girl 
 with a distinguished-looking man, somewhat her elder, evidently 
 of a different nationality. They were beneath the tall domes of 
 the conservatory, just where the sumptuous glow and music came 
 faintly 'neath the still stately tropic leaves. She seemed rooted 
 there, with all her love in her half-closed lips, like some twining- 
 plant with a thousand sweet buds waiting but one warm May 
 morning to burst into bloom and turn that longed-for dawn into 
 a. thousand petaled rays and hues. — He had come there at last 
 with strength enough to tell her they never more must meet. 
 Kinder for these two were the chilliest northern blast than this 
 Boft searching music, for they had each in different directions 
 glided on the fatal highroad of love, whence is no return : that 
 long pathway that crumbles away behind the steps of all who 
 travel it. — It was coming, that fearful farewell to lips which never 
 should have met, and shall meet no more save on the trackway 
 to Heaven that is beat by the feet of the dead. 
 
 It was the last ball there — 
 
 Au Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres ! 
 
 They were near to a serre, 
 
 Ou sait si bien les faire, 
 
 II faisait boa in the laden air. 
 
 Auburn — more than auburn was her hair. 
 
AT THE EMBASSY. 43 
 
 Nothing is more loving than the entreaty of her gaze, 
 No lily on a tendril more tender than her grace, 
 Than he, no one more stricken, such a sadness on his 
 face. 
 
 They silently lingered together 
 
 Until the waltz began, 
 Then won by the ways of the measure 
 
 Thus a whisper ran. 
 
 You know not what you're asking, saintly little 
 
 maid, 
 Innocent and beautiful indeed I ' 
 
 They know not what they're asking, those longing 
 
 hazel eyes ; 
 All that a glance in a glance can read — ■ 
 The Idyll of a soul in a sweet parenthesis. 
 
 I envy the confusion of yonr heart's convulsive thrill, 
 
 Sa tendresse qui tresaille — its deep, its mute reproach. 
 
 I'd gladly weep with tears like yours because I can't 
 reveal 
 
 A secret like your secret, that so throb3 at my ap- 
 proach, 
 
 And covet even more than you the love I cannot feel. 
 
44 AT THE EMBASSY. 
 
 You say you'd pardon all my faults, your love would 
 
 never swerve. 
 O white soul swimming swan-like on the stream of 
 
 destiny, 
 That sings so sweet, yet only feels its voice that it 
 
 may die, 
 "Vous prechez un converti. — Yesl a life without a love 
 Is like a magic lantern without a light to me. 
 But the curse my kiss would give you would be worse 
 
 than you can think. 
 Thrilled like water in a vase wherein we drop a drop 
 
 of ink. 
 Aye, your love breathes like Springtide on the full 
 
 redundant lands, 
 And when we watch the wild flowers in little chil- 
 dren's hands. 
 Mine but shames the shabby Winter ; with each new 
 
 life it gives, 
 Like a land of little Summer in the sun without the 
 
 leaves. 
 There waits a cruel woman near to whom my being 
 
 clings, 
 "With a gorgeous Eastern beauty : with armR that 
 
 spread like wings, 
 
AT TEE EMBASSY. 47 
 
 la which I fly to endless realms that live bat in ray 
 
 brain — 
 To heavens full of emptiness I search and searcn 
 
 again 1 
 You — you long to give me life, and yet, I breatne 
 
 but in her gaze, 
 And she battens my ambition on the leaven of her 
 
 praise ; 
 I clamber at a will-o'-the-wisp like squirrels in a cage. 
 I've a habit now of loving her — un fatal sortile'ge. 
 Ses moindres petits riens si beaux ; my own eyes 
 
 plead for her, 
 And make me think her charming ruse, la haute 6cob 
 
 du coeur. 
 I've sold her all my footsteps, and the secret of her 
 
 spell 
 She closes with her eyelids, and surrounds it with 
 
 her smile. 
 Me'me mon salut eternel at her proud feet is lain, 
 I know 'tis but Eternity can give it back again. 
 Sweet poisons scent her ambient tress, her sighs, her 
 
 witching web, 
 And the flood whirls on the flow'rs till they're stranded 
 
 at the ebb — . 
 
48 A WARM NOVEMBER DAY. 
 
 No ! lift no eyes that speak so much 1 asking up to 
 
 me, 
 Who would not dare to kiss your hand e'en on bended 
 
 knee ; 
 But I wring my hands and look to you, like sinners 
 
 out of Hell, 
 For you've raised my soul sufficiently to say to you — 
 
 farewell 1 
 
 A WARM NOVEMBER DAT. 
 
 Tuilleries Gardens. 
 Aye ! when it is fine in November, 
 
 AH Summer seems coming again, 
 And the lips that we love and remember 
 
 Seem to kiss us for joy — and for pain. 
 
 But pain, 0, sweet with emotion, 
 
 And sunshine so brimful of words, 
 
 It could give the wild waves of mid-ocean, 
 The voice in the breasts of the birds 
 
 Aye I when it is bright in November, 
 I see thee, adore thee, — with pain ; 
 
 Like the sun that alights on an ember, 
 And burns it to glory again. 
 
FAIR AMSTEL. 51 
 
 For thine will be first of all faces, 
 To come in the manifold years, 
 
 Like the flowers that bloom in the places 
 That angels have watered with tears. 
 
 FAIR AMSTEL. 
 
 TTue River of Amsterdam. 
 Sweet Amstel though I sing, the song is thine, 
 For I but give thee back thine own words hid 
 Within thy bosom, while with queenly pace 
 And pause, like some fair vestal's footstep slow, 
 Thou near'st the sea thy sons have swayed so long. 
 A babbling brooklet on the lee makes more 
 Ado than thou on whose broad breast, as kind 
 As sleep in gentle Summer air, have passed 
 The riches of the Bast, and sea-gnlls rest 
 Their weary wings with me, a wanderer too. 
 Thy lands taught Peter to be Great, and all 
 Thy people courtesy. In sooth thy tongue 
 Seems tuned alone to tell the idyll fair 
 That surely sits on every maiden's brow, 
 As on thy fields the raiment of content. 
 
52 A LOST SOUL. 
 
 Aye i let none other call the cattle home, 
 But make " Je maintiendrai," " J'ai maintenu 1" 
 And that shall tell the Teuton and the Gaul 
 In aecents bold well earned in wars. That e'en 
 In peace you still invade the very sea, 
 And bid the Ocean pause I . . And yet although 
 In Chatham with your sword you thrust us far 
 More deep than all ; now, that regained, I swear 
 Within our hearts yon pieree us deeper still 
 With all your winning ways. 
 
 A LOST SOUL. 
 
 So long ago we do not know, 
 
 But either he or she died unshriverh. 
 
 What matters it that one life be lost? 
 That overcast with tears* 
 
 And tempest-tost 
 It fall, through endless years, 
 
 And flicker out and die, 
 
 Like one more day from out the sky.. 
 
A LOST SOUL. 55 
 
 What matters it? 
 
 If one great grief 
 
 Or sweet belief, 
 Kemorseless shatters it, 
 Relentless scatters it 
 
 Vertiginous through space. 
 
 And there, with its wrecked sweet face 
 Cast down, like some drooped rose, 
 Fleeter than April rain it goes, 
 Painfully its dead blush veiling, 
 
 Through the endless spheres 'tis sailing, 
 
 Down from its high, bright pedestal in air 
 To unvoiced depths of great despair. 
 What matters it? 
 
 Tet doth it fade without one word 
 Said aloud, like some pink cloud 
 
 From out the fair 
 Unfurrowed face of Heaven 
 Some still even, — 
 
 And leaving there, 
 No ! naught recorded ? — 
 Naught save the unclouded, 
 
 Unfurrowed face of Heaven, 
 
 Just as even 
 And as fair. 
 
56 A LOST SOUL. 
 
 No spell broken, 
 No weird token, 
 Strange and mute and faint and undefined, 
 To the wordless reapers of the wind, 
 
 Speaking o'er earth of her. Forgot. 
 In some strange tongue earth knoweth not 
 None here praying 
 
 Or interceding : 
 On earth . to others pleading, 
 By just saying : 
 
 " You never knew, 
 The devil tempt you : 
 Placing eternity 
 Slyly and furtively, 
 
 Like a watching cheat, 
 Against some sweet infirmity, 
 
 Twixt pace and pause of your unwayward 
 feet." 
 
 Naught on the fair unlurrowed face of Heaven, 
 Or dome on dome encircling into space, that even. — 
 Deep in the eternal mystery 
 Of the endless air. 
 Far and farther, filmier and more fair ; 
 
A LOST SOUL. 59 
 
 Nothing written there, 
 Not even one lightning thrill or momentary 
 
 spot ; 
 While the Past saith to the 7s to be: 
 " It matters not ! ... It matters not i" 
 
tiO 
 
 ANDREVUOLA. 
 
 .... "And thus, Alastair, severed from Andrevuola, his love, 
 wandered westward, grieving ever, and crossed the ocean, and one 
 calm Autumn morning reached Niagara. Through the wistful 
 stillness now all the past came back." .... 
 
 Part of a tale improvised by the author for 
 Lord Beaconsfield. 
 
 I know ; — thou'rt Autumn ; silent, — still, 
 
 But O too full of songs that fill 
 
 My soul with sighs, and make me hear 
 
 Sweet words said earlier in the year. 
 
 I thrill with pain, yet seek one dear 
 
 Lost loved low voice. And gone hands near 
 
 My yearning hands, with one more tear 
 
 Our Summer knew not, ling'ring here, 
 
 One foot on earth and one on High, 
 
 To kiss a long, long, last good-by, 
 And smile across the hemisphere. 
 
 I kept thee from me till to-day ; 
 
 And hid my love and pain 1 — But each ray 
 To-day hath such a wistful glow, 
 The half-dead flowers do not know 
 
ANDREVUOLA. 61 
 
 If they're to fade, or once more blow. 
 
 And my heart will overflow, 
 
 And beats the cruel bars 1 Although 
 
 Sometimes, — I thought thou wert — who knows? — 
 
 As hollow-bosomed as a rose, 
 But what of that ? I l6ved thee so ! 
 
 And I do hope that where thou art, 
 No day like this will rouse thy heart, — 
 
 Because to-day on land and lee, 
 
 The cricket trilleth, and the bee 
 
 Goes once more forth ; and leaf and tree 
 
 ■Wave once again, and they and we 
 
 Hold out our arms, and long to -see 
 
 Some far-off land that is to be. 
 
 And all whose sorrows sleep will wake 
 And feel their hearts must speak or break. 
 
 And this will make thee think of me. 
 
 I kept thee from me till to-day, 
 But now 'tis bright as 'twas in May * 
 
 And surely once my heart and I 
 
 May speak out once 5 with one wild cry. 
 
 Of all its tears, ere the day go by, 
 
 Just cherish one, till we know why 
 
62 ANDREVUOLA. 
 
 The earth hath speech, and stars on high 
 
 Look down on us so mournfully. 
 
 The whole wide world would love to-day 1 
 We think the thoughts no words can say, 
 No wind in Heaven drive away, 
 
 And think how far from thee am I. 
 
 I kept thee from me ! — and to-day 
 Just one sweet morn will come and say : 
 "Not all Niagara with its roar 
 Can still my heart. My love 1 no more 
 Than seas can part us, though they tore 
 The earth in twain." Though I implore 
 My soul to stay, 'tween shore and shore 
 'Twill waver till it wanders o'er. 
 
 For my love's secret hymn lies furled 
 In each dead leaf o'er all the world I — 
 And I shall see thee never more 1 
 
 What dost thou mean, thou " Never more "? 
 
 Dost mean, that we from shore to shore 
 In myriad worlds we see in dreams 
 Shall float, and seek, and find no gleams 
 Of hope ? No sight of her who seems 
 On earth onr only life ? That streams 
 
ANDREVUOLA. 63 
 
 Shall pass to rivers in the beams 
 Of future suns in wild extremes, 
 
 Of utmost azure, there to greet 
 
 An endless sea ? — TCut to thy feet 
 That I shall come, no nevermore ? 
 
 That not in all the countless years, 
 
 In the fastnesses of future spheres 
 Our souls shall touch ? Like some great bell 
 Whose sound is tolled, — 'tis done I Not hell 
 Nor Heaven shall hear again. None tell 
 The words that far too sweetly fell 
 Upon our ears, and said too well 
 The love they sealed in one farewell. 
 
 And not in all the endless space, 
 
 My face shall ever meet thy face, 
 Nor pass the place where it shall dwell. 
 
 That all our love shall be as naught .... 
 
 My brain goes reeling with the thought 1 — 
 In mighty, far-off, filmy skies, 
 Fair clouds will roll ; — and red suns rise 
 To glow new morns, whose radiant eyes 
 Will melt at eve. Sweet majesties 
 And angels in grand galaxys 
 
64 ANDREVUOLA. 
 
 Will crowd the seventh Paradise. 
 
 And no great tide, no heavenly sea, 
 Will ever float thee near to me, 
 
 Through all the vast eternities ! ! 
 
65 
 
 UNE FETE SANS ELLE. 
 A la Duchess de V . 
 
 Hier aoir chez nn seigneur tout Paris en nombre 
 Put reuni par lui pour un joyeux repas ; 
 
 Mais moi je vous chercbais, me refoulant daus l'onibre. 
 Car je sentais bientot que vous n'en etiez pas. 
 
 Oai. d'autres ont aussi les couleurs de l'aurore, 
 
 Un sourire enchanteur, un rayon triste et doux : 
 
 Tous avez tout cela ; mais vous avez encore 
 
 TJn charme plus puissant qui n'appartient qu'a 
 vous. 
 
 Tons avez cette grace, d'un naif ineffable, 
 
 Et que possede seul le parfum d'une fleur. 
 
 Votre regard est doux, et sa puissance aimable 
 Devoile les tresors que cache votre cceur. 
 
66 UNE FETE SANS ELLK 
 
 Ah ! que n'etiez-vous la, quand j'errais en delire, 
 
 Et que mon ame, helas 1 epuisait sa douleur ! 
 Mais vous ne savez pas jusqu'ou va votre empire : 
 
 J'ai peur de mon amour, j'ai peur de yous- 
 J'ai peur ! 
 
 * * * « • 
 
 Car il suffit pour me desarmer 
 
 D'un senl baiser de tes levres en flamme, 
 
 Ton ame a pris toute mon ame 
 Je t'aime et ne veux que t' aimer. 
 
67 
 
 THE CHOICE OF ARMS. 
 
 BlAEHITZ. 
 
 The choice of arms is given to the one insulted or injured. 
 
 COLONNA. 
 
 A Paraphrased Sketch of a Poem, originally written in French by 
 the Author for Recitation. 
 
 I stand before the judgment throne of Heaven, 
 'Mid rays of angels glowed in strange white light 
 Beyond. Erect,, and fearing les-; O God, 
 Thy wra'h than Thy great love ! I tell the tale 
 Beneath its record held 'tween Heavenly wings. 
 
 They told me Maud, my Love, my Maud, was false. 
 I thought it once ; since Love and Pear are twins : 
 And yet one word from her, one soft pained look 
 On my transcendent agony healed all. 
 It is so sweet to trust the lips we love. 
 
 But I met him who wrought the ill. His eyes 
 Met mine. He knew their tiger's turn ; 
 Saw me impelled towards him sideways like a cat, 
 And squared his well-knit frame right skillfully 
 
68 'THE CHOICE OF ARMS'. 
 
 To stop my hand. It would have bitten tight, 
 
 And held like leopard's teeth. — I stopped my rush !: 
 
 Near fell in staying it I held by the thought 
 
 That Maud's- fair name and fame must not flash oat. 
 
 Between our meeting swords.. He also saw 
 
 I would have hurled him from the jetty there, 
 
 And gone with him straight down and through the- 
 
 sea 
 That raved like burning fringe of hell. Aye 1 on 
 To hell itself, till there my claw burned off 
 His throat. But then he knew, before the world, 
 I must find pretext foreign to her name. 
 This saved him. Then he planned it quick. . . We botb 
 Were skilled in arms, but he, renowned for fence, 
 Well knew, I'arme blanche was rarely to my hand 
 Of late. So when the pretext came, too soon 
 For thought, and stung my strained and pregnant. 
 
 skin ;. 
 Out flew ray "blow and down he went, and thus 
 Made me aggressor, leaving him to choose 
 For swords, and though he knew me wounded twice 
 With these, and knew my prior cause to make 
 Demur, he felt that I would fight this night 
 With earthquakes like the gods, or throw the dice; 
 
THE CHOICE OF ARMS. 69 
 
 For my own mother's soul. And so he gained 
 And chose, though he first having wrought the ill 
 About her name, the choice of arms by right 
 Was mine. 
 
 Well ! He was first upon the ground. 
 :Stalwart, fierce, and pale, in the uncanny light 
 Of dawn. No sweet and heavy southern sun 
 Peeped slily t'ward the glamoured crescent faint 
 In Eastern spheres ; but he stood like some great ghost, 
 The youth all faded from his face as hath 
 The green from Autumn leaves. 
 
 The night below 
 Boiled sulkily away, ashamed to shew 
 Such sodden sky with one red stain across 
 For morning. 
 
 Ominously I felt the knife, 
 With which my second clipped my shirt-sleeve round, 
 Had slipped and cut my arm. And so I held 
 My rapier crosswise just a moment up 
 Against the storm cloud couchant in the wind 
 Before we made salute. I knew full well 
 His steel's strong clink meant more than skill, but 
 
 dared 
 The death. 1 liked the weighting of my blade. 
 
70 THE CHOICE OF ARMS. 
 
 And taste the breath of the affected calm 
 
 Of that first courtly altercation. 
 
 When each man measures each, and but an inch 
 
 Would end the pointed courtesy. His choice 
 
 "Was right, and nerved his arm. A good square foot 
 
 Must measure all my fleury's deviation 
 
 For my guard ; till "feinte en tierce degagement teste 
 
 En quarte " might give me one small chance for life. 
 
 Straight for my heart he went. At each risposte 
 He pressed me harder still. I still fought on, 
 Although he saw how spent I grew. So faint 
 Each fresh assault her face came in a dream. — 
 Crash burst the thunder and the flash. And rain 
 And tears almost seemed mixed with drops which. 
 
 streamed 
 From both our brows. Straining, though all but killed, 
 . And harder pressed : I seemed to draw in dreams 
 Her features fair with each cramped guard against 
 The insolence of that white tongue of fire, 
 That ever darted at my face and breast 
 As though the devil laughed above the storm. 
 
 At last a pause. — 'Twas well : for my breath passed 
 At most my throat. " On guard !" Again. This time 
 
THE CHOICE OF ARMS. 71 
 
 On guard for death. In the storm's dim wicked light 
 
 I swear his sword dipt mine before the word. 
 
 'Twas worse than foul, his " coup de temps " 
 
 Too swift I So faint was I that in a flash 
 
 They saw his point appear right through my shirt. 
 
 '* He's killed 1" they cried. " Aye I killed be damned !" 
 
 cried I : 
 And quick ; — full four feet back ; before my foe 
 Recovered half a span (for he had missed) : 
 With "feinte en tierce degagement vite en quarte," 
 With crash and flash as though all Heaven fell, 
 I felt my rapier pierce that traitor wrist 
 And iron arm, and shoulder-blade. And flung 
 It to the earth. " Saved, saved 1" my second cried, 
 "En quarte basse!"* 
 
 Yes, saved I And now they say, 
 He's dying, may be dead. — More blest than I 
 He lies all shriven in his chambers grand, 
 Alight with mystic flames of gentle rite 
 About his head. The anthem for his soul 
 
 * The words "En quarte basse," which are, perhaps, too tech- 
 nical for recitation, may be changed to the words " And crossed 
 the ground " for those amongst an audience who are not adepts 
 in fencing. 
 
72 THE CHOICE OF ARMS. 
 
 All faintly floating round. And she who loves 
 The well-knit Count forgives him all his faults, 
 I too ; except his rest, and that he fenced 
 So ill — he missed my heart : For I am sick 
 Of all the gaping world's afflictive crew, 
 And sooner far were on that road to rest 
 With her I love to smooth my closing eyes. 
 
73 
 
 DURANTE LA VALSA. 
 
 (Andante.) 
 
 stkive to keep silent, my breaking heart, 
 
 And keep back your tears if you can ; 
 She will see, as we dance and we laugh, that thou art 
 
 But the pulse of a dying man. 
 My spirit, my soul, let her not see, 
 
 Are hung in a look, in a sound — 
 That her silvery smiles are passing through rae 
 
 Near by as she gives them around. 
 
 ¥et maybe she knows 
 
 My heart was the rose 
 That now in her bosom is lain : 
 
 Each scent that it gives 
 Is a life in its leaves, 
 
 That never will open again. 
 
U DURANTE LA VALSA. 
 
 (Ptoio.) 
 
 She'll hear all my words you murmur so low 
 
 O monodies maddening sweet ; 
 I shall faint with her form in my arms as ye flow, 
 
 And die of my love at her feet. 
 Yes, die with my love untold on my lips, 
 
 Yet press her but once to my breast, 
 In the light and perfume, till the melody steeps 
 
 My life in its languorous rest. 
 
 For she knows, she knows 
 
 My heart was the rose 
 She chose from the tree to be slain. 
 
 Each breath it receives 
 Is a death in its leaves, 
 
 That never will blossom again. 
 
 ***** 
 
 (Diminuendo.') 
 She knows that my heart's last fibres 
 
 In her gaze are giving way, 
 Like the pent-up soul of Winter 
 
 At the trembling breath of May ; 
 Like the sicklied hue of heaven 
 
 At the kindling kiss of day, 
 
75 
 
 THREE MARBLE STEPS. 
 
 Come d'autunno si levari le 
 foglie, 
 L'una appresso dell 'attra, infln 
 
 che Vramo, 
 Sende alia terra tulte sue 
 
 Dante. 
 If they should come to thee, those gentler tears 
 
 Our memory holds to keep the old days green, 
 And our first kisses, through the empty years, — 
 Remember when these lips are dead, 
 Full tenfold more than the love they said, 
 Burned in the heart that fed and died 
 
 On the gentle sweet curse they placed therein. 
 There's one wish left of the threnody 
 And tender dream-like devilry. 
 A wish — a weird travail of bitterest woe. 
 That near one door of the palace, where thou 
 
 And the courtiers' ladies often would come, 
 Should be three marble steps. And that I, 
 All shriven for rest, aye rest 1 as I lie, 
 
 With my songs for pillow, might know my form 
 
76 THREE MARBLE STEPS. 
 
 By that Eastern avatar after death, 
 
 Would change into them, as I sleep beneath. — 
 
 Sweet death can much that life cannot, 
 
 And thou would'st be often there near the spot • 
 
 And I would be, 
 Three marble steps, just made for thee. 
 
 Three marble steps in the morning light : 
 The first the pale rose of pink roses • 
 
 And one as pale as the flight 
 Of the rose from the brow of a maiden 
 
 At touch of love, and as white. 
 And one as pure as the passionate 
 Azure and pearl of the night. 
 
 Three marble steps, there in my own France, 
 
 In that mignon palace where that shattered lance 
 
 Which you and I remember is ranged among the 
 rest, 
 
 His who rode so proudly for that favour in his 
 crest. 
 
 Three marble steps for love ; 
 Like love, too sweet and smooth above 
 For the bitter hid below ; 
 
THREE MARBLE STEPS. 77 
 
 Just placed where you, half dreaming still 
 
 From having slept, 
 Might stray toward the terrace at your will : 
 
 And though you stept 
 As light as leaves in Valombrosa, I should know 
 
 Whene'er the little feet would come and go, 
 
 Or pause id flitting to and fro. 
 
 Three marble steps. And I would be 
 
 Between the north towers' majesty 
 
 And the grand terrace, placed just where 
 
 The peacocks come above the lawn, 
 
 Where the knights come courting the ladies there, 
 
 And the black thrush trims his wing at dawn. 
 I too would wake beneath the sweet 
 
 Soft sound of a rondel of Vaucluse, 
 
 And gentle press of the dainty feet, 
 
 That fretfully patter their dainty shoes. 
 
 Three marble steps : where the noon all gay, 
 With the butterfly's phantom shadow would play. 
 On the broad warm beam of a midsummer's day. 
 And where, perchance, if a flower should grow, 
 They might heed it not, but leave it to blow 
 
78 THREE MARBLE STEPS. 
 
 Just for a season, until in the snow 
 
 The three marble steps in the drift and sleet 
 Are chilled in the chime of a New Year's eve • 
 With the lovers so long in taking their leave, 
 
 That they cover my heart with the prints of their 
 feet. 
 
 Three marble steps. With the golden day 
 
 Faint in the breath of the vespers ; floating away, 
 
 'Mid avds and hymns and the blest 
 
 Hid bells of anthems : filling the air 
 With a fugitive music, the songs that give rest : 
 
 With the pulse of life lulling its throb with prayer. 
 
 Three marble steps later, with night in the spell, 
 Lagging in cloudland, pausing in air, 
 
 Weaving white webs in her chariot wheel, 
 And telling her stories to listeners there. 
 Thou, too, at thy threshold might enter not 
 
 But linger there likewise — hallow the spot 
 
 Where the moonlight could trace thee my form 
 as I lie 
 
 At thy feet : with my soul drawn down from the skv, 
 Or in dew across fairy lawns tree unto tree 
 Could weave my dead spirit in silver for thee. 
 
THREE MARBLE STEPS. 79 
 
 Aye, then I could feel — I know I could feel — 
 Tour white fingers coming ; should they once steal 
 
 Toward my dead heart that would quicken and 
 glow, 
 Should you bend down to the three marble steps, 
 And take your dear name from off my white lips, 
 
 And write it for once on my brow. 
 
80 
 
 DAILY BREAD. 
 
 Partem nostrum superstantialem da nobis hodie. 
 
 St. Jerome. 
 
 And thus do many to lire and eat, 
 
 Men garnering crime, as we gather in wheat. 
 
 They clamour to kiss the fonlest of feet, 
 
 They have made their shirts of a dead man's sheet, 
 
 And slandered the corpse as they fled. 
 Flourished their pharisee's canting and cry, 
 Fattened with priests on the God they belie, 
 Fawned to the vice of the rich or the high, 
 Foisted their daughters on whoso will buy, 
 
 And gained but a bare daily bread. 
 
 A woman dead ? ? — With the law for the poor ? 
 What, stiffened and propped up against the door? 
 Her eyes on the infant her head hangs o'er? 
 The stain of her tears on its pinafore ? 
 
 Her arms still clinging, — dead ? 
 Has fervid mauve and rich crisp lawn 
 Passed and passed, and not heard her moan 
 
DAILY BBEAD. 81 
 
 For grief's bare durance, food alone ? 
 O, food to give her little one ! 
 
 A mother's cry for bread I 
 
 Mines of misery lie untold 
 
 Of withered souls whose sighs were gold, 
 
 Who sang of love and died of cold 
 
 With rich-clothed thoughts ; whose clothing told 
 
 The dirge of hunger's dread : 
 Whose inspiration's brightest heat, 
 And soaring dreams that sang so sweet, 
 Like wounded birds dropped down to greet 
 Grim fears of having bread to eat — 
 
 O ! horrid daily bread ! 
 
 Yet Bongs in proud enchanting strain 
 Still upward rise from beds of pain, 
 And cruel jests, against the grain, 
 Like drunken grief that reels again. 
 
 Can grim grotesque exceed 
 The painter rising from his dream 
 Of fruitful vale, and laughing stream, 
 Whose brush would now revive some gleam 
 Of boyhood's dawn— without a beam 
 
 Of hope for daily bread ? 
 
82 DAILY BREAD. 
 
 A blackness shrouds the flood, the bark, 
 And all the frozen city stark, 
 While voiceless steps infest the dark, 
 Hail ! now start up in bed, and hark 
 
 That angry stealthy tread 1 
 The phantom "Want,"' whose touch is blight, 
 She stalks the curse'd streets to-night, 
 And claps her wings in haggard fright, 
 And shrieks, with all her hoarded might, 
 
 A haunting cry for bread I 
 
 Who passes on the midnight tide ? * 
 That seems with gloaming ghosts allied, 
 And peers through fog, as though he spied 
 For one that doth too deeply hide? 
 
 The fisher of the dead 1 
 Too often is his labour crowned : 
 All night for bread they're found and drowned 
 With bread, and Death his boat swings round, 
 His children yearn for corpses owned : 
 
 For they are " daily bread." 
 
 * Charles Sickens frequently refers to this ghastly calling of 
 seeking by night on the Thames for the i-iver's dead. 
 
DAILY BREAD. 83 
 
 Near 1 in the gas, lost women crowd, 
 With reeking jokes and laughter loud. 
 Leaping and dancing on the shroud 
 That Death is spreading sly and proud, 
 Beneath the loathsome bed. 
 
 Aye I drug the cup that else would craze, 
 The fulsome breath, the poisoned praise, 
 The sickening kiss of him who pays 
 Then Hell itself unveils and says, 
 
 Ha ! ha ! I'm daily bread ! t 
 
84' 
 
 A BREAM-PICTURE: 
 
 I lived with ray love in the cities that lie- 
 in a cloud above all these clouds iu the sky. 
 In a dream above all our dreams. Melody 
 And God's unseen banners, with their Eastern dye-, 
 Sank round great hanging domes ; till veined porphyry 
 Was opal with dawn in these fields on high, 
 Where the flowers were souls of old songs gone by. 
 And hung like the lilies in lakes, just below, 
 The crescent moon passed, and the stars seemed to flow 
 To a music of kisses — kisses whose power 
 Shall make all Eternity in love with an hour. 
 And we sat with the white palace portals ajar, 
 And as thence I looked forth I could see so far — 
 For ever and for ever L 
 
65 
 
 ASPETTANDO* 
 
 Sospirando ; chieggo invano 
 
 Fra i mortali il bene amato : 
 
 Mel rapiva ingiusto fato 
 Ai trasporti dell' amor. 
 
 Ed alnme, son sempre solo, 
 
 Langue 1'alma, e piange il cor ! 
 
 Aspettando vien l'Autunno 
 
 Ed il crudo verno appresso : 
 
 Ahi ! dal duol trafitto, oppresso, 
 Eesto al pianto in'abbandon — 
 
 E piangeudo il tempo vola, 
 
 Non ritorua ; e mesta io son! 
 
 "No. 6 of the Series for Music. 
 
86 
 
 DRIFTING. 
 
 "Les souvenirs sont ecrits dans les mers, et 
 la marte basse les emporte au (liable. 
 
 I head once some song, writ in a boat, in marvellous 
 Soft air of Naples. Sweet from some heart, right 
 
 glorious, 
 Tuned by the gentle grape-flower time, when in loving: 
 
 Spring 
 E'en heaven and earth touch lips for very joy, and sing. 
 I am nearly sure they naively called their sweet strain, 
 
 "Drifting." 
 They were four, I think, for some half-day their eyes 
 
 uplifting 
 T'ward too sweet Naples' skies, with Ischia and the 
 
 bay 
 And Capri : — capable to hold them half a day. 
 They were sweet singers who had left their wonted 
 
 thrift, 
 And for one noon maybe they thought they were 
 
 adrift, 
 
DRIFTING. 87 
 
 Aye, one would think — to hear them apostroohize their 
 
 jaunt, 
 They drifted ever, from Hades to the Hellespont ; 
 Although they know the waves that rock them, gently 
 
 flowing, 
 Will take them quite exactly where they know they're 
 
 going. 
 And they have also learnt the sea's depth under them 
 
 as well, 
 While wantonly they " Dip their reckless hands within 
 
 the swell." 
 Aye ; even better than Yesuvian boatmen they know 
 The specific gravity of that near-by volcano ; 
 Until, with mellowing shadows, these gentle dilettanti 
 Grow quite anticii with lagrima and chianti. 
 
 Yes I Sail on ; your hands within the swell, one day, 
 And call it "Drifting." Ah 1 you know not what you 
 say. 
 
 You take the first, first fragile boat, 
 
 And drift : drift rudderless ; afloat 
 
 On life's mad boiling river, 
 
 Be it Styx or Guadalquivir. 
 
 Drift first wildly, in the fashion 
 
S8 DRIFTING. 
 
 Of youth's imperious passion. 
 
 Heedless, as the fairies of the golden bough. 
 
 Blind ; with unsung songs fretting heart and 
 
 brow, 
 Now coursing careless and intrepid 
 Some chaotic, whirling rapid, — 
 And floating now through blossomed intimate sweet 
 
 closes, 
 With the spikenard, sendaline, terebinth, and roses, 
 All catching perfumes to-and-fro beneath the trailing 
 
 trees, 
 Frail and fragrant on the fluctuant fluting of the 
 
 breeze ; 
 With that sweet queen of the silver bow. — Drifting 
 
 through the place, 
 While the blooms are falling gently on your lips and 
 
 face : 
 Until some tide hath caught you, and an Ocean 
 Spreads before you. Then, heedless if the motion 
 Tie held by hands of Heaven or Hell, 
 You dip your passioned lips into the swell. 
 Dead, from having lived a lifetime in an hour. 
 The palace of some glorious error. 
 Drinking the waves with their hard bitter Dower, 
 
DRIFTING. 89 
 
 Till seas well up whose nectar is of tears ; 
 
 Evil and of unquenched thirst, through endless years. 
 
 Then still drift — knowing you are lost from having 
 
 drifted. 
 Lost maybe the easier from being over gifted. 
 Drowning and drifting because heaven's blue 
 Hath over much inebriated you. 
 Living and loving while all through the soul of France 
 Christ and Sappho and Polichinelle wildly lead the 
 
 dance. 
 And even there, — true to some Quixotic unsaid vow 
 
 grown old 
 And useless as the poppies in the field, that hold 
 Their heads up by the will of God and light of 
 
 - heaven alone, 
 You feel your soul filled with the daring that would 
 
 bid the sun 
 To pause, and grasp the vast charged pendulum of 
 
 the universe 
 And bid it stay. — Then having drank all, — all the per- 
 fumed curse, 
 You drift alone, with troughs of sea high round your 
 
 little boat, 
 And claws of twenty winds all catching at your throat. 
 
90 DRIFTING. 
 
 Only your own strong arm against the storm-built 
 
 cloud, 
 Yet sending up a glance as lurid and as proud 
 
 As Heaven to Earth. Enchanted wilh the thrall, 
 As dark as Hecate's bosom, and o'er it all 
 E'en Lesbos' air grown salt and angry, as 'twould 
 
 divide 
 Thetis again, and whirl her God once more beyond the 
 tide. 
 Saying of prudence, We forget it, 
 If it lead us to perdition, let it. 
 Drift 1 And whate'er there be to win, disdain it, 
 And all of safe and sleek reward ; disclaim it. 
 Drawn past Charybdis — on to Naxos where Ariadne 
 
 wailing, 
 Should have wrecked the heart of earth. There hail- 
 ing 
 The soul of Musset or Theocritus, and all the lost. 
 And even then! nigh drowned, and tempest tost, 
 And wrecked and wracked, and having learnt no tamer 
 
 thought, 
 Nor worldly lesson it should have taught. 
 
 You have kept your unchained spirit all this while 
 So gentle that — Stay ! One woman's smile 
 
DRIFTING. 91 
 
 Would send you seeking once again the pure no- 
 blesse 
 That crowns at last the too great flow of wild ivresse. 
 Seeking like heedless knights the grief that kills some 
 
 other, 
 The childless father of the orphan, sorrow's brother, 
 And with some long sacrifice uncomplaining, 
 Gently, proudly, mutely training 
 Your heart t'ward homelier tides, and by this 'haviour, 
 Striving to near the best of all the lost — the Saviour ; 
 
 Knowing having dipped your hands into the swell, 
 
 That though the whole great sea rushed up and fell 
 In one great wave upon you from above, 
 It could not wreck you half so deep as love ; 
 That path all paved with cruel crimson prints of 
 
 piteous feet, 
 Which fire burns behind you, hissing with the gall of 
 things too sweet. 
 
 And so drift on, my soul, and quaff 
 
 Whate'er shall fill thy chalice, as a sacrament, 
 Till planets crash, and earth, and half 
 
 The stars, shall drift beyond the firmament. 
 
92 
 
 A DREAM IS PASSING. 
 
 For Music. 
 
 A dream is passing, 
 Passing, passing — 
 Whither away ? 
 
 bend your head, and veil the sigh 
 
 That floatB in your breath as it passeth by. 
 Passing, passing — 
 Whither away ? 
 
 My love lies still in a morning beam, 
 That passes the garden shade auu her dream. 
 Passing, passing — 
 Whither away? 
 
 1 hid me near in the trailing trees, 
 
 For wooing her dream from. the wayward breeze. 
 Passing, passing — 
 Whither away? 
 
A BREAM IS PASSING. 93 
 
 It came to me once in an undcr-breath ; 
 But left me, and laid me alone with death. 
 Passing, passing — 
 Whither away? 
 
 The angels slept in the purple clouds, 
 That go on their journeys in joyful crowds 
 Passing, passing — 
 Whither away ? 
 
 They hailed it nearing them there above, 
 And they took it to heart, for' its name is Love. 
 Passing, passing — 
 Whither away? 
 
94 
 
 THE LILY OF AMSTEL-LANB. 
 
 Amsterdam. 
 
 "Stray little waifs of darkness lingered yet 
 Across the widening dawn, and, Wee (he song 
 That goes with golden feet to Heaven, 
 And listening angels, lean among the clouds 
 To learn, she came. Dainty as morn's first rose, 
 Sipping the dew with maiden lips. Ber breath, 
 The breath of morn between its leaves. And pure 
 Aye as the lily there all pale with love* " L. 
 
 Pale sits the lily. Pale she sits and white, 
 
 And far upon the ocean the blue waves rave, 
 Silent as the white ship's footstep on the wave ; 
 Pale sits the lily, and on her brow the light 
 The queen wears 'neath the silver bow of night. 
 
THE LILY OF AMSTEL-LAND. 95 
 
 Pale sits the lily, and reads in dreams maybe, 
 The holy page the night hides of her lore 
 Among her robes, and lives on earth no more, 
 Than doth the light of some soft melody, 
 Or star that seeketh foothold in the sea. 
 
 Like a bride that peereth through the light of earth, 
 To find some gentle dwelling-place of love, 
 She seems ever passing white realms far above 
 This dim light of the lily-bud at birth, 
 Burning high and burning low upon the earth. 
 
96 
 
 VIOLETS IN LONDON STREETS. 
 
 Quid non cernit amor! 
 Quid rum vestigai amator ! 
 Beboald. 
 
 Nestling in the hedges shade 
 
 They grew, 
 Just where on the green 'tis laid, 
 
 A few, 
 They'd fill the air about the stile, 
 
 And hide, 
 
 And wanderers lingered there awhile 
 
 And sighed. 
 ***** 
 
 All hustled in the market-place, 
 
 Bleak the morn 
 The widow brought them, with a lace 
 
 Wan and woi 
 The passers crowd the homeless town 
 
 Indifferent. 
 She never smelt them ; up and down 
 
 The widow went. 
 
VIOLETS IN LONDON STREETS. 9? 
 
 Round lover's heart all flowers steal, 
 
 Aye ! they know how, 
 So often they are sent to tell 
 
 Their tales of woe. 
 A lover blind as lovers are 
 
 In shadow-lands, 
 Had eyes to see the flowers there. — 
 
 With tiny hands 
 Her child held up the widow's ware. 
 
 The lover paid her well, 
 And struggling through her face of care 
 
 Came such a wistful smile. 
 
 # * * * • 
 
 Some angel in a wandering mood 
 
 Had dropped the seed that grew, 
 
 To bring the little children food, 
 
 And your love's thoughts to you. 
 
98 
 
 AN impromptu: 
 
 After the BaB. 
 She gave me a piece of her mignonette, 
 
 The mignonette, 
 
 Her mignonette. 
 Perhaps 'twas to tell me I mnst forget — 
 Perhaps that although we had hardly - met, 
 
 Yes, hardly met, 
 
 Aye, hardly met, ; 
 That slie knew how sorrow and grief and care 
 Lay deep underneath my worldly air. 
 
 That she knew, 
 Aye, she knew 
 My heart was as gentle and tender and true 
 As her glance that had looked it through and through. 
 But whatever it was, my eyes are wet 
 
AN IMPROMPTU. 101 
 
 As I sit alone ; and the mignonette 
 I« here in my Land, and it seems as though 
 Some angel had held in her hand just now 
 The only one flower I'd like to wave 
 Among the long grasses over my grave, 
 For the lovers to pluck as a talisman sure, 
 Since once it had lain in her hand as pure 
 
 As the fatally sweet mignonette. 
 
 There's a " Language of Flowers " surely true as it 
 
 flows 
 With its burden of love. For 'twere sin, God knows, 
 To be placing a lie in the lips of a rose. 
 
 But there's never a seer who could understand 
 The rapt world of meanings or sweet command 
 In a flower hid in a maiden's hand, 
 That you take when you clasp it to say good-night, 
 With the smallest press, and a searching light 
 Hung in her eyes like the silver flight 
 Of a falling star in an azure sky, 
 And with nothing said, not even a sigh, 
 And only the faintest, faintest good-by — 
 
 And the silently sweet mignonette. 
 
102 
 
 ELLE BIT "NON." 
 
 Audaces fortuna jwoai, timidosque repeRak. 
 
 1l faut pourtant qu'un jonr 
 
 Mes bras ton ccetir enlacent, 
 Ec que de mon amour 
 
 Lea doux transports t'embrassent. 
 
 Mon etre entier fre'mit 
 
 Pres de la bien-airaee. 
 Et tout en raoi gemit 
 
 Quand elle est eloignee. 
 
 J'ai faim d'un seal baiser, 
 
 Bien que mes yeux devorenfr. 
 Sans jamais se lasser, 
 
 Tes levres qu'ils adoreut 
 
ELLE BIT "NON." 103 
 
 Mais j'attends que tes yeux en flaramo 
 
 Parlent a mon coeur dbloui 
 De l'amonr qui brule en ton ftme. 
 
 Ou ce " Non !" est un " Non " qui dit : 
 "Oui!" 
 
104 
 
 A CRY OF LOVE* 
 
 "Et la jeune Princesse, pour register a son 
 amour fatal, s'enfuu se caehant au Cou- 
 vent de Sorrento." 
 
 — Gr ancles Ghroniques de France. 
 I cried to Love, " O go away !'' 
 And then one little sunny ray 
 Set all my dreams to joy again ; 
 I love the more the more the pain, 
 And when it seems 'twould go away, 
 I strain it nearer still to stay. 
 
 A hundred times, " O go," I say, 
 And in the cloister fall and pray ; 
 But in my sleep some old refrain 
 Gets tangled in my life again, 
 That when I wake with tears I know 
 I cannot, cannot let thee go ! 
 
 *Set to music by the Author. Published by Brentano, NewTork, 
 
A CRY OF LOVE. 107 
 
 Love seems too great for earth ; the strife 
 Is worse than death, and more than life. 
 Arise I for Love comes by, and pain. 
 Is spangled on his wings and train. 
 He touches earth, to live on high ; 
 " kiss me once and let me die 1" 
 
108 
 
 THE SONG THEY LEFT ON THE TERRACE. 
 
 She is more loved than my heart's first love, 
 
 For there never was one as this is ; 
 Her breath is the swerve of a long lemon grove, 
 
 And her mouth is the gateway of kisses : 
 Cold lips are mute and pulses flush, 
 
 When my arm round her loveliness closes ; 
 The scent of her hair is the soft-spoken air 
 
 That has opened the lingering roses. 
 
 The night moved with us as the crescent above 
 
 In the midst of the stars ; and caresses 
 Out-numbered the stars that it passed in the spheres 
 
 To the innermost Heaven's recesses. 
 And the words that we wove in the night-diadem 
 
 "Were so strange in their accents and stresses, 
 Till the violets fell in the roses below, 
 
 Swooned in worlds, of bashful excesses. 
 
THE SONG THEY LEFT. 109 
 
 Then we dived, in the morn, 
 
 In the stream that is born 
 In the mountain of sweet water-courses ; 
 
 And through the low land 
 
 We rode hand in hand, 
 Straining kisses to each from our horses ! 
 
 And then noon glowed away 
 
 In a trance as we lay 
 In the glade that the shade intersperses. 
 
 Under flowers we crept, 
 
 And in odours we slept, 
 Hidden up in the laurels and furzes. 
 
 But I died in this love, 
 
 As the stars fall above, 
 To light dead lakes of the spirit ; 
 
 And our souls floating even, 
 
 Shall repeat it in heaven, 
 Where cherubims cluster to hear it. 
 
110 
 
 ALY. 
 
 For Music. 
 
 Gawlerulum cum gaudentzbug 
 Tacitus. 
 
 " If the key is in the door " : She said, 
 
 Come in, 
 Come in. 
 She blushed as she whispered it low, and laid 
 Her white little hand in mine, as though 
 "Twere some precious thing all flower-like made. 
 To set the wide world's heart aglow. 
 
 For she does not know that my soul lies still 
 As a child in her presence sweet. 
 
 With a mystic censer to guard her from ill, 
 My spirit lives there at her feet. 
 
 If the key is in the door : she said, 
 
 Come in, 
 Come in. 
 
ALY. Ill 
 
 Bat I brought her the scents from the cool moonlight, 
 And the sighs she hears round are from me. 
 
 I passed the chinks of the portals of night, 
 And came in on the wind from the sea. 
 
 I'm the moth that flies painfully too near her light, 
 
 And burn all to hear when she sings ; 
 And I catch all the notes from her lips in their flight, 
 And bear them away on my wings. 
 
 Come Id, 
 Come in, 
 If the key is in the door : she said, 
 
 Come in, 
 Come in. 
 
112 
 
 TWO FATES. 
 
 For Recitation. 
 
 We only ask for love to give it bach. 
 
 This is a story of strange f rue love ; 
 
 The gentle sway whose pleasure is to yield. 
 
 How tell the .tale ? — how fair she was aud fal=e. 
 
 3R ifS ifl ift -ft Ofl 
 
 Her lover then, when I was brought to her, 
 Loved her as the hour loves some melody, 
 On which it slips away and dies. He felt 
 A strange dark instinct — realized. She left him • 
 Loved me ; until I too in time was left. 
 She hoped then I would turn on her in wrath. 
 Alas, I had but words to say how fair 
 Her faults were. Bend me low, and pass to grief, 
 ****** 
 
 With power to make men felons, gods or mad, 
 She held all things but happiness. There hung 
 An evil number somewhere in the stars 
 About her. 
 
 Haply there had been sword play 
 
TWO FA1ES. 113 
 
 At first between her former love and me : 
 
 And better I had fallen. Bat he passed 
 
 From sight mysteriously, weirdly ; none 
 
 Knew whither. I writhed here in pain, and, quick 
 
 With life to feel the deathly souvenir, 
 
 Hating and loving aught that brought her back, 
 
 Lived on, and smiled, and laughed — upon my sleeve, 
 
 Above the parched shades and ashes cursed 
 
 Of half-spent hells of ruined passion. 
 
 We have all some phrase in life we cannot read 
 Without a thrill ; and so, once passing, late 
 For some May fair repast, and driving through 
 The bye-streets of the shorter way, wherein 
 The sounding hoofs of high-bred steeds awoke 
 Unwonted clatter, I approached a knot 
 Of homely folk about a lonely man. 
 
 I stopped — I know not why — and mixed among 
 The loiterers there. " He's always so," they said, 
 All laughing. 'Twas he. Mad 1 That former love 
 Of hers. A wise no-meaning look, and then 
 A second heaven lit his face, a weird 
 Beatitude ; his dress unchosen and awry ; 
 
114 TWO FATES. 
 
 His hand to his head, as though to clutch and keep 
 His thoughts, all strewn among its silken snow. 
 His eye, fixed far above the weary brows 
 Of these unkempt waifs of the outer world, 
 Shone with the light ' that never was on earth 
 Or sea.' His lips moving, seemed singing things 
 Unheard of. Calm, peaceable, heedless and mad. 
 
 Singling me — he knew not why — " There — !'' he said, 
 " There ; — there ! See her ! She bids me come. Her 
 
 hands 
 Are held to me ; tier wnite enticing hands. 
 Her eyes rain azure love through each dark lash 
 And drop their kiss on me. 'Tis too much bliss : 
 O ! God— I'll hold my spirit still lest I 
 Go mad ; mad ; mad ! — She calms me now, and kneels 
 By me — a queen 1 — an angel ! Hear her words 1 — 
 No 1 not words — music ! — for her voice is song, 
 Fear not, Marion — my love will last until 
 The end !" 
 
 The night grew woven fire. 1 fled, 
 And left the chafing steeds and gaping man 
 To drive to — Paradise, or where he would. 
 Home, I locked me in the inmost chamber 
 
TWO FATES. 115 
 
 Of my house. ! then to have wept. But no, 
 
 My homeless eyes were hard and hollow — hot 
 
 As a crater ; — without one human tear. Dry 
 
 As a Tuscan river-bed in Summer. 
 
 It all came back, my hate of him ; my love 
 
 Of her ; and spilled my inmost blood again. 
 
 At last, there from the lowlit niche I tore 
 
 The cross that bore the Saviour down, and cursed 
 
 My brain. And would have beat it from my brow 
 
 To walk with him there hand-in-hand all night 
 
 In sorrow's squalid streets. Had he not all 
 
 That drink can give ? that life can give ? and love ? 
 
 Madness. . . Then I prayed ; prayed like the damued 
 
 man, 
 For whom all night they build a gallows tree. 
 Prayed that God would crush my haunting cry 
 From out my prisoned mind, "It cannot be.'' 
 Until these mocking skies are broken through 
 And show that this life is the dream, and his, 
 The madman's rave, all that is reality : — 
 And that which is to be! 
 
n& 
 
 "A WORD OF TROTSr 
 
 For Musis-, 
 
 "Amor ei mel et felle est f/scundissimus." 
 
 Would, you go, without one little vow, 
 
 Would you leave without one little worc£ 
 
 That would make Heaven's- altars to glow, 
 And an angel to write what he heard ? 
 
 Not a word I could whisper through nights 
 
 Full of tears that will come when we part, 
 in the, sweet Summer shadows and lights 
 
 While the Summer is breaking my heart- 
 Not a word 1 ean answer the breeze 
 
 Wh^u it thrills- me to death with thy name p 
 And can tell to the leaves on the trees 
 
 How it trembled like them when it came. 
 
 Not a word I could beg them to write 
 On the stone they will lay over me,. 
 
 Just to tell how a wee little while 
 
 It had- linked me- to- Heaven and theet. 
 
119 
 
 PUBLISHER'S NOTE. 
 Ref.: Page VI., Preface of Illustrated Edifn. 
 
 Reference having been made in the present edition to the 
 pamphlet of *' Press Opinions," a portion of a collection of 
 abridged paragraphs — compiled for L' Association Litteraire 
 Internationale, of Paris, by the British Delegate, for literary- 
 controversy — showing the similarity of the international 
 opinion in Europe and America on certain characteristics of 
 the poems, is subjoined to the present volume, with their 
 dates. — Ed. 
 
 " Court Journal," London, August 4th, 1877. 
 
 He either treats strong passions and strong situations 
 grandly and powerfully, or glides softly through a tender 
 love tale, and touches our inmost hearts. 
 
 "Morning Post," London, August 27th, 1877. 
 Elegance, tenderness, pathos and power. 
 
 " The Mail," Weekly Edition of " The Times," London, 
 September 25th, 1877. 
 
 Perfect in form and charming in tone. 
 
 "Boston Evening Transcript," 1884. 
 A European reputation as a poet and painter. 
 
 "Examiner," September 1st, 1877. 
 A mastery of English measure. 
 
 " The Graphic," London, December 22d, 1879. 
 
 Pathos and passion permeate these songs of love an& 
 chivalry ... Tragically passionate, his pictures of love 
 and life are painted in with powerful strokes, but their 
 almost painful beauty is never marred by a coarse touch. 
 
 His verse is alight with love, but it is clean fire. 
 
 Essentially human, they are so full of music and manly 
 sentiment that only a prurient mind could disapprove of 
 them. 
 
120 PRESS OPINIONS. 
 
 "The Court Circular," London, December 1st, 1877. 
 
 Highest elegance of versification and tenderness of senti- 
 ment. 
 
 "Revue Britannique," Paris, 
 
 The poems have a character perfectly Dantesque. 
 
 Lord Beaconsfield, 1878. 
 
 One of the most charming collection of poems I have ever 
 read. " La Legende de Leuville," translated into French, 
 •would make a most picturesque and dramatic recitation. 
 
 %ro," Paris. 
 We (France) should he proud of them. 
 
 " Whitehall Review," London, 1879. 
 
 One can imagine some bibliophile of the future thumbing 
 his graceful books and re-editing them as the most apt ex- 
 pression of the poetry of these days. We have no sympathy 
 with those sciolists who have innocently, if not ignorantly, 
 aimed their shafts at him, and he has suffered a perfect mar- 
 tyrdom of petitesses at their hands. . . . Especially a brim- 
 ming over of a certain deep melancholy and flashing memories 
 of a dare-devil but craving life, while he bears the stigmata 
 of more than one great grief. . . . Let this ripen in his 
 powerful mind, and the men and women of to-morrow will 
 tear upon them the impress of his startling yet scholarly 
 rhythm, and his refined talent as a painter. 
 
 Charles Leland (Hans Brietmann), 1879. 
 Poetical ideas in it enough for twenty books. 
 
 Charles Reade, 1881. 
 
 Fearless original and eccentric. Hans Brietmann is right. 
 His work contains a California of poetical ideas . . . He 
 seems to taste the Oxford " cynico-epicurean " sense of every 
 word, though he is more a painter than a poet. 
 
 " Manchester Courier," December 27th, 1880. 
 
 The best living specimen of a combination of Count 
 d'Orsay, Alfred de Musset and Swinburne. 
 
 "The Aberdeen Journal," September 1st, 1877. 
 
 Sweet poetic thoughts to secure a place far up the British 
 Parnassus. Not in Browning is there verse finer than 
 "Fallen," nor in Hood than "Daily Bread." 
 
PRESS OPINIONS. 121 
 
 Arsine Houssaye, late Ministre des Arts, Paris. 
 A poet equal to Byron, and a painter like Turner. 
 
 "Le Pays," Paris, May 25th, 1883. 
 
 He could be a Francis I., a Buckingham, Lord Byron, 
 Kichelieu, Athos, or even d'Artagnan. 
 
 "La Patrie," Paris, May 13th, 1883. 
 
 An apostle of the truly beautiful. A chief of the true 
 aesthetic school . . . Has fallen into the error of not wishing 
 to pander to the exigencies of the "Pschutt," the fashionable 
 tyrant of to-day, and is immediately bombarded for ever 
 ■with this irksome cognizance of " eccentric " and " original." 
 In fact a man more calumniated hardly exists. 
 
 "May Fair," London, July 24th, 1877. 
 
 He makes us look to our national laurels and bays . . Has 
 approved himself worthy of a place in our English Pantheon. 
 Poems flushed with the sunshine of the South : but that 
 he can appreciate the colouring and melody of an English 
 Summer day is well shown by his water-colour drawings 
 and verses. 
 
 " Chicago Times," 1884. 
 
 A man of broad and liberal culture and wide travel, having 
 crossed the desert, North Africa, Spain, and part of the 
 American Continent, and enjoys high rank as a poet and 
 painter. . . . Good Greek and Latin scholar. "Entre-nous" 
 has in it poetical ideas enough for twenty books. 
 
 " Albany Journal," U. S. A., March 17th, 1884. 
 
 Eare literary ability and considerable reputation as poet 
 and painter. 
 
 "The. Morning Post," London, December 18th, 1877. 
 
 Neither studied nor conventional. . . . Thorough capacity 
 to think and write in French and English. 
 
 "The Italie," Rome. 
 
 A contradistinction of all those books that only appear 
 to die . . . " The Bay of Villafranca " will clothe the 
 thought of the fisherman of that enchanted sea many 
 a night . . . The outpouring of a heart that has suffered, 
 
 consoling itself by helping others "Aelia" is a 
 
 romance, a gem ; a perfect fifteenth century scene. 
 
 "L'Opinione," Rome. 
 
 Spontaneous, flowing, and harmonious, and many flowers 
 gathered from our Italian soil. 
 
122 PRESS OPINIONS. 
 
 " Oil Bias," Paris, April 16th, 1883. 
 
 Chivalrous ; and neither maudlin nor feeble. He loves 
 the strong, clear, frank laugh that is manly and Cheer- 
 ing, and a love-song sung by a bold cavalier and a fear- 
 less gentleman. ... A litterateur of the greatest talent, a 
 painter of considerable power, and a son of France by reason 
 of his heart and his wit. 
 
 " Saunders's News- Letter," Dublin, September 6th, 1877. 
 
 A vigorous, healthy tone, not much in vogue in these days 
 of the "fleshly school." . . . Original and never obscure. 
 . . . No mean contribution to the poetic literature of the 
 day. 
 
 "The Berlin Oegenwort," Berlin, November 14th, 1877. 
 
 In one hand he holds a mastery of light causerie, in the 
 other noble pictures with a charm of language so sweet 
 that all seems wrapped in some soft Oriental robe. . . . 
 Possesses the cruel reality, the enchanting ideal, in the high- 
 est degree. A fearless individuality, a freedom, a capricious 
 originality which, compared with ordinary English poetry, 
 is as the fleet free flight of an Arab barb in the wide desert 
 to the monotonous amble of a park hack. 
 
 "The Boston Globe," Boston, October 18th, 1877. 
 
 There is something more in these verses than a mere repro- 
 duction of the obvious aspects of the world within and with 
 out us ; there is insight into their underlying significance. 
 
 "The Art Journal," London, March 2d, 1877. 
 
 The very highest order of power as well as grace. He has 
 established his claim to prominent rank as one of the poets 
 of the period. 
 
 "Some Journal," Boston, March 22d, 1884. 
 A European reputation as painter and poet. 
 Lord Beaconsfield, 1879. 
 
 Has created more envy than a First 'Groom of the Bed- 
 chamber. 
 
 " Home Journal," New York, December 21st, 1881. 
 
 A remarkable man in many ways, with a head resembling 
 the pictures of Lord Byron, and a manner almost child-like in 
 its naif, frank simplicity and boyishness. . . . His beau- 
 tiful paintings are greatly admired. 
 
 "Het ffieuws Van Ben Bag," Amsterdam, Sept. 26th, 1883. 
 Bekenden tegenstander. ^Esthetisch streven. 
 
'PBESS OPINIONS. 123 
 
 "National Tribune," Washington, April 3d, 1884. 
 
 The poems became the rage at once. A veritable Admi- 
 rable Crichton. ... A fine artist, and writing in five 
 languages. Strongly tinged with the realism of literature 
 founded by Balzac and disgraced by Zola ; but he never ap- 
 proaches even the uncleanness of the latter. 
 
 "Buffalo Courier," March 18th, 1884. 
 
 A man of broad culture, a thorough linguist ; one of 
 nature's born poets. 
 
 "Manchester Courier," Manchester, April 11th, 1883. 
 
 An advocate of the dare-devil chivalry of the Middle Ages. 
 
 "Milwaukee Sentinel," (Ella Wheeler), May 18th, 1884. 
 
 A knight of the Middle Ages ; a true poet. 
 
 "High Life," Paris, 1880. 
 
 Grand seigneur, homme de lettres, artiste amateur, sem- 
 blable a ces nobles de la Eenaissance italienne, dont le blason 
 Stait dessine par les Muses. Leur genie rayonne comme leur 
 personne. Ses vers sont flls de son coeur ; ce sont les pages, 
 emues ou gaies, de son carnet de voyages . . . Bizarre et ex- 
 centrique. . . Ses lauriers font un bel eff et sur son blason. 
 
 "The Boulevard," Paris, July 10th, 1880. 
 
 We are irresistibly carried away far over the mountains 
 into some half -known land, wildly beautiful and untrodden 
 by the foot of man, whereof his poems sing the strange and 
 grand music. Has the power to illustrate his books in 
 black and white, besides being one of the strongest colourists 
 in water-colour we have seen of late. A finished elocution- 
 ist, though generally modest enough to recite any one else's 
 verses rather than his own. 
 
 "Indianapolis Journal," March, 1882. 
 
 Grand poetry indeed. Stands in the first rank of artists 
 . . . Drawings far better worthy of study than the water- 
 colours at the Academy of New York . . . Often paints on 
 an ordinary paper pistol-target of his own, riddled in the 
 centre by bullets. 
 
 "The Gazzetta d' Italia," Naples, August 11th, 1879. 
 
 The enthusiasm which immediately burst forth on his 
 work was simply nothing beyond his great merits. 
 
 "Ill'd Sporting & Dramatic News," London, Aug. 2d, 1879. 
 Heartfelt earnestness. 
 
134 PBESS OPINIONS. 
 
 "Lowell Morning Mail," November 14th, 1881. 
 
 "Writes in French, English and Italian with ease. Con- 
 tributed to the Whitehall Review and periodicals of note, and 
 Trench journals. Can illustrate his works and recite his 
 verse in a thoroughly artistic manner. 
 
 "The Enquirer," Philadelphia, December 13th; 1881. 
 
 He will divide popularity now with Tennyson Has 
 
 oftener the hearty, manly ring of Longfellow. Has the 
 power to recite his verse and illustrate his books with his 
 own pencil — no mean one. 
 
 "Home Journal," November 9th, 1881. 
 
 The beau ideal of an artist, nor does this belie him in 
 his pen-and-ink sketches. Not content with the laurels of 
 Art and Poesy, he plucks a leaf from the brow of the sister 
 muse. 
 
 'JO 'Artiste,'' of Arsene Houssaye, Paris, February, 1881. 
 
 A je ne sais quoi of freshness and spontaneity, a man 
 full of feeling, bright, frank, and free. In some pages, 
 though, the poet's sadness bursts forth in touching accents 
 that have a fullness of beauty — a richness of metaphor that 
 is simply magnificent ... A strain of imposing and austere 
 beauty. 
 
 " Boston Beacon" March 29th, 1884.' 
 
 A man of culture and a thorough linguist. 
 
 "Oalignani's Messenger," Paris, November 5th and 6th, 1883. 
 
 Is what Germans call melsietig, a many-sided man . . . 
 Capital verses with as much poetry as fine specimens of 
 manly English. 
 
 "Le Triboulet," Paris, April 21st, 1881. 
 
 One of the most distinguished poets, and painter of great 
 talent. 
 
 "Le Soir," Paris, June, 1883. 
 
 The chief of a new aesthetic school. The author of 
 •' Entre-Nous" is still a furore. 
 
 Carlyle. 
 
 Too much above people's heads to have a great success . . . 
 An entire want of floor to all he writes and paints . . . The 
 vulgar will probably hate him. 
 
 "The Brighton Standard," Brighton, Dec. 4th, 1879. 
 
 All breathe deep feeling, and are conceived under great 
 and sad emotion such as stolid Saxons very rarely possess. 
 
PBES8 OPINIONS. 125 
 
 "Le Globe," Paris, October 12th, 1880. 
 A renowned Anglo-French poet. 
 
 " The Daily Chronicle." , 
 Has made verse a method of giving to the world the 
 fantastic but ennobling memories of days spent in travel so 
 wild that it borders on the work of the explorer, and in 
 keen observation of life in its most pathetic and graceful 
 aspects .... The mediaeval romance of " Aelia" has a 
 courage and unconventional freshness that show forth genius, 
 that makes the light of the poetic sacred fire shine upon the 
 faces of the readers. ... A rich broidery of modern aesthe- 
 ticism in its highest sense. ... He promises to give us an 
 English form of the odes and poems of the classic poets in 
 the Sapphic metre. . . . With him the race of true poets 
 will not die out . . . His other varied talents have often 
 had the usual faculty of raising in vulgar minds an utter 
 chaos of envy and calumny, both of which have been used 
 to their utmost against him. 
 
 " World," New York, March 16th, 1884. 
 
 A man of broad culture, a thorough linguist, and one of 
 nature's born poets. 
 
 "Detroit Post and Tribune," May 18th, 1884. 
 
 Arsene Houssaye calls him a luminaire (a seeker after 
 light) in his paintings . . . Leans to the Salvator Rosa 
 style, but toned by conscientious study of the Italian mas- 
 ters . . . Poetry in his painting, and painting in his poetry. , 
 
 "L' Illustration, " Paris, November, 1883. 
 
 Un des ecrivains les plus distingues. . . . Revelant un 
 sentiment profond de l'sesthetique . . . Une organization 
 d'elite. 
 
 " La Paw," Paris, 1880. 
 Translation. 
 
 Fresh as an April morning with the tender richness of 
 the spring. The thoughts in their soaring height, have 
 the broad, strong wings of the eagle, held bravely upward 
 and at ease ; a ring of such a heart-rending sorrow here 
 and there, that we know this poet has suffered, and out of 
 his sorrow has come his song, with a sad sad note that must 
 break forth despite all effort to keep it back. Imbued with 
 a longing to heal all human woe, when he sings of it his 
 heart thrills with a charity, a majesty, that is the true 
 poet's cry of sisterhood to sorrow. . . . Knowledge of re- 
 fined life, and the absolute aristocratic instinct in "Chez 
 1' Ambassadeur. " 
 
 "World," August 16th, 1884. 
 
 Possesses talent uncommon to rank. . . . 
 
126 PEES8 OPINIONS. 
 
 is," Paris, November 19th, 1883. 
 
 Tin Antinoils Hercule : tire 1'epSe.et le pistolet comme Saint- 
 Georges, monte & cheval comme Fordham, cuisine comme 
 Brillat-Savarin, parle presque autant de langues que le comte 
 d'Irisson, et rime comme Musset. Sa devise est-: Faites ! — 
 courte et fiere. 
 
 Voioi 
 
 Le personnage en raccourci. 
 
 . . . Vers pleins d'emotion et de tendresse, ou le francais 
 et l'anglais se partagent parf ois la rime. Fait songer 8, Victor 
 Hugo et Euckert ; c'est un Byron francais ou un Musset 
 anglais ; comme eux, il a chante la f emme et l'amour. II 
 a horreur des boudines modernes, qui sont la negation de 
 l'elegance et de la force. Aussi nardi voyageur que M. de 
 Brazza. 
 
 " Home Journal," Boston, March 22d, 1884. 
 
 ... A European reputation as a poet and painter. 
 
 " Galignani," Paris, November 14th, 1883. 
 . . . The ion vivant of taste and talent. 
 
 " Boston Saturday Gazette," May 17th, 1884. 
 Admired and enjoyed. Does all with grace, and drama- 
 tically. . . . 
 
 " Northern Times," England, 1882. 
 
 . Not of the fleshly school, unless inasmuch as flesh means 
 hard fibres and stern passion. Imagery often above the 
 heads of untravelled men. . . . When Nimrod is a born 
 poet he brings back from prairie and jungle the beauties 
 of a fresh, unhackneyed mind. The works of the Anglo- 
 French Nobleman are magnificent' in this. A strange mix- 
 ture of genius carelessness and erudition. Some very re- 
 markable transcripts of the Sapphic metre, and some Greek 
 iambics, also charming original poems in French and Italian. 
 His general construction of phrase, however, is French. 
 
 "Saturday Times," Boston, April 5th, 1884. 
 . . . An elocutionist of no mean parts. 
 
 " Le Soir," Paris, July 13th, 1883 
 . . . Le poete sesthetique. 
 
 "Daily Chronicle," December 27th, 1882. 
 . . . An sssthetic nobleman. . . . 
 
 " Chicago IHbune," February 18th, 1883,' 
 . . . Even calumny has not embittered him. 
 
PBUSS OPINIONS. 127 
 
 "L'ltalie," Rome. 
 . . . TTn artiste grand seigneur. 
 
 '•Boston Courier," March 23d, 1884. 
 
 . . . Has distinguished himself both as poet and painter 
 
 "The Roma," Naples, October 2d, 1879. 
 
 . . . There is also all the fire of Byron's JDon Juan in this 
 fresh bright poet. 
 
 " Times," Chicago, May, 1884. 
 . . . An artist, a poet, a musician, and a fine painter. 
 "Roman Times," Rome, July 18th, 1883. 
 
 ... He feels intensely, and feels like a grand, poetical 
 knight of old. . . . 
 
 " Express," Buffalo, March 18th, 1884. 
 . . . All that a maiden's fancy ever dreamed.' 
 
 " Le Voltaire," Paris, November 6th, 1882. 
 Un des plus extraordinaires champions que l'on connaisse. 
 " Saturday Times," Boston, March 22d, 1884. 
 
 A broad scholar, very superior linguist. Poems enjoyed 
 the popularity of eight editions. . . . Highly praised on this 
 side also. 
 
 " Albany Evening Journal," July 10th, 1884. 
 
 Rare mental endowments : manly, frank and intellectual. 
 
 "■Globe," Boston, May 19th, 1884. 
 
 . . . With his deft brush he can paint the most charming 
 water-colours, or with his facile pen write the most fascinating 
 of verses. An extraordinary linguist, an adept in all the 
 manly sports. Has received the highest encomiums from 
 the press of this country. 
 
 " Le PapiUon," Paris, May 6th, 1883. 
 
 Possedant le sentiment du beau a dose enorme d'un colo- 
 riste et d'un poete enamoure comme Musset, vivant comme lui 
 la poesie et des rSves chivalresques. Quelques uns l'ont mal 
 compris, mais il est simplement un homme d'infiniment d'es- 
 prit, ayant pour ideal tout ce qui est beau, noble, et bon 
 dans son imagination puissante. 
 
 " Le Soir," Paris, November 5th, 1883. 
 . , . poesies des plus attrayantes. . . . 
 
 "La Liberie" Paris, November 14th, 1883. 
 Polyglotte et voyageur intrepide : a fonde une ecole esthe- 
 tique. ... 
 
128 PBESS OPINIONS. 
 
 "Post," Boston, March 21st, 1884. 
 A European reputation as a poet and a painter. 
 
 " Weekly Argus," May 3d, 1884. 
 ... A famed writer and painter. . . . 
 Henri Ketten, 1879. 
 
 . . . Plus harmonieuses et plus adaptees d'etre mises en 
 musique que toutes autres poesies que ie connais. Elles por- 
 tent chaqune une riche et douce melodic toute faite entre 
 leurs ailles. Mais le poete lui meme a du avoir souvent 
 senti les larmes aux yeux. Juste l'Sme d'elite comme disait 
 Litzt que les vulgaires tachent & detruire par la calomnie ner- 
 sonelle. 
 
 " Oil Bias," Paris, Nov. 2d, 1883. 
 
 Une personality Parisienne, mais connaissant 9. fond 
 L'ltalien, Espagnol, Allemand, Anglais, Francais, Grec, et 
 le Latin. . . . Charmant et original. Des vers pleins d'emo- 
 tion et de tendresse. . . . 
 
 " Detroit Free Press," May, 1884. 
 
 An elocutionist. . . . His special gift is poetry ; foreign 
 critics have pronounced it worthy of the highest genius. 
 
 M. Molinari, of the Journal des Debats, Paris, 1877. 
 . . . Poesie bien charmante. 
 
 " Le BeveU," Paris, November 21st, 1884. 
 
 . . . Une personality comme il en existe peu ; comme il 
 n'en existe pas. 
 
 " Transcript," Boston, March 20th, 1884. 
 
 Bare attainments and rare literary ability. The only dan- 
 ger will be his giving too free a rein to his political fancy. 
 
 " Morning Post," London, August 7th, 1877. 
 
 .... Each poem has a soul and body. He writes as 
 though a thought had, as it were, become entangled in a 
 mesh of sweet strong words, — words that have long been in 
 love with each other but have only now got wedded. 
 
 "Lutheran Observer," Philadelphia, April 4th, 1884. 
 
 Broad culture, rare literary ability, and considerable repu- 
 tation as a poet and painter. ... 
 
 &c. &c. &c. &c.