WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY HOWARD CHANDLER HRISTY 32 Class ^K±-Ud.^ Book XS_ Copyright l^°_ 1Q_1 COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 2 '^W0 J^OWSlsf ^iJiwflilOf/^WIjrCiiriifcV /»*'» O budding time! O love's blest prime! my Cfeoz^e QDLiotD ^V^ltk q) lludttatlond in (EoLot 'y cjijowazd (oliandiez (olitidty KON-IN FEKIOR. A^Eoy cJTooffat, Ijaid and Gompany Copyright, 1909, by MOFFAT, YARD AND COMPANY NEW YORK Published. October, 1909 \ The Plimpton Press Norwood Mass. U.S.A. 248930 Co NATALIE INTRODUCTORY NOTE So vast looms George Eliot's fame as a novelist that it will surprise most readers of this exquisite Poem of Life and Love to find her its author. The surprise is natural and justified. "As if a strong, delightful water that we only knew as a river," writes Matthew Browne in the Contemporary Review, " appeared in the character of a fountain; as if one whom we had wondered at as a good walker or inexhaustible pedestrian began to dance; as if Mr. Bright, in the middle of a public meeting, were to oblige the company with a song, — no, no, not like that exactly, but like something quite new, — is the appearance of George Eliot in the charac- ter of a poet." That she herself appreciated this is INTRODUCTORY NOTE shown abundantly in her correspondence. In one of her innumerable letters to Mrs. Bray she wrote, referring to her poetry : — " I expect a good deal of disgust to be felt toward me in many quarters in doing what was not looked for from me." But it was a feeling far different from disgust that this beautiful poem inspired on its appearance in 1866. It was written in the early prime of her life and her career. She had produced "Adam Bede," "The Mill on the Floss," "Silas Marner," "Romola" and "Felix Holt," and had yet to write "Middlemarch" and "Deronda." She was forty-seven years old and had well tasted of the great success of which she was soon to drink so deeply. She had attained some fame and financial inde- INTRODUCTORY NOTE pendence. She was glorying in the posses- sion of one of the profoundest loves in literature. At this time, this pause, as it were, before her entry into her greater celebrity, she wrote the few poems she has left us. Of these, "Two Lovers" makes the surest appeal to the universal human heart. The year 1866 was one of great spiritual stress with George Eliot. Its early months were occupied with the completion of "Felix Holt," which she finished on May 31st "in a fever of excitement after days and nights of trembling and palpita- tion," only to fall into a complete reaction from which she did not strongly recover until the year neared its close. Mr. Lewes's health meantime was precarious. INTRODUCTORY NOTE and they were compelled to seek change on the Continent. "As soon as one has found the key of Hfe," she wrote Madame Bodichon, "'it opes the gates of death.' Youth has not learned the art of living and we go on bungling till our experience can only serve us for a very brief space." It was during this year that she wrote the poem that Mr. Christy has here illus- trated so beautifully and appreciatively. ' Even to those that know George Eliot as a poet the "Two Lovers" is not famil- iar; and the publishers, therefore, beheve that the author's many readers will wel- come this new and attractive presentation of the charming poem. m 10 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS O buddincr time! ^^^'^^ O _ _ PAGE O love's blest prime ! . Frontispiece "Mingled the dark and sunny hair, And heard the wooing thrushes sing" i6 "Two wedded from the portal stept: The bells made happy caroUings" 20 "Two faces o'er a cradle bent: Two hands above the head were locked" 24 "Two parents by the evening fire: The red light fell about their knees" 28 "But all the heads by slow degrees Had gone and left that lonely pair" 32 "They drew their chairs up side by side, Their pale cheeks joined and said 'once more!'" 3^ S^,^* II "^wo Mdvsgi<^ TWO LOVERS Two lovers by a moss-grown spring: They leaned soft cheeks to- gether there, Mingled the dark and sunny hair, And heard the wooing thrushes sing. O budding time! O love's blest prime! 15 " Mingled the dark and sunny hair, And heard the wooing thrushes sing.' .i/CWfnC^Wt^^V; !