Matthew Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum and Other Poems

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Ti­tle: Matthew Arnold's Sohrab and Rus­tum and Oth­er Po­ems

Au­thor: Matthew Arnold

Re­lease Date: Septem­ber 3, 2004 [EBook #13364]

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MATTHEW ARNOLD'S

SOHRAB AND RUS­TUM

AND OTH­ER PO­EMS

EDIT­ED, WITH IN­TRO­DUC­TION AND NOTES

BY

JUS­TUS COLLINS CASTLE­MAN

HEAD OF EN­GLISH DE­PART­MENT, SOUTH DI­VI­SION HIGH SCHOOL, MIL­WAU­KEE

1905

CON­TENTS

PREF­ACE

IN­TRO­DUC­TION A Short Life of Arnold Arnold the Po­et Arnold the Crit­ic Chrono­log­ical List of Arnold's Works Con­tem­po­rary Au­thors Bib­li­og­ra­phy

SE­LEC­TIONS FROM ARNOLD'S PO­ET­ICAL WORKS

NAR­RA­TIVE PO­EMS

Sohrab and Rus­tum Saint Bran­dan The For­sak­en Mer­man Tris­tram and Iseult

LYRI­CAL PO­EMS

The Church of Brou Re­qui­escat Con­so­la­tion A Dream Lines writ­ten in Kens­ing­ton Gar­dens The Strayed Rev­eller Moral­ity Dover Beach Philomela Hu­man Life Iso­la­tion--To Mar­guerite Kaiser Dead The Last Word Pal­la­di­um Rev­olu­tions Self-​De­pen­dence A Sum­mer Night Geist's Grave Epi­logue--To Less­ing's Lao­cooen

SON­NETS

Qui­et Work Shake­speare Youth's Ag­ita­tions Aus­ter­ity of Po­et­ry World­ly Place East Lon­don West Lon­don

ELE­GIAC PO­EMS

Memo­ri­al Vers­es The Schol­ar-​Gip­sy Thyr­sis Rug­by Chapel

NOTES

IN­DEX

* * * * *

IN­TRO­DUC­TION

A SHORT LIFE OF ARNOLD

Matthew Arnold, po­et and crit­ic, was born in the vil­lage of Lale­ham, Mid­dle­sex Coun­ty, Eng­land, De­cem­ber 24, 1822. He was the son of Dr. Thomas Arnold, best re­mem­bered as the great Head Mas­ter at Rug­by and in lat­er years dis­tin­guished al­so as a his­to­ri­an of Rome, and of Mary Pen­rose Arnold, a wom­an of re­mark­able char­ac­ter and in­tel­lect.

De­void of stir­ring in­ci­dent, and, on the whole, free from the ec­cen­tric­ities so com­mon to men of ge­nius, the sto­ry of Arnold's life is soon told. As a boy he lived the life of the nor­mal En­glish lad, with its healthy rou­tine of task and play. He was at school at both Lale­ham and Winch­ester, then at Rug­by, where he at­tract­ed at­ten­tion as a stu­dent and won a prize for po­et­ry. In 1840 he was elect­ed to an open schol­ar­ship at Bal­li­ol Col­lege, Ox­ford, and the next year ma­tric­ulat­ed for his uni­ver­si­ty work. Arnold's ca­reer at Ox­ford was a mem­orable one. While here he was as­so­ci­at­ed with such men as John Duke Co­leridge, John Shairp, Dean Fras­er, Dean Church, John Hen­ry New­man, Thomas Hugh­es, the Froudes, and, clos­est of all, with Arthur Hugh Clough, whose ear­ly death he lament­ed in his exquisite ele­giac po­em--_Thyr­sis_. Among this bril­liant com­pa­ny Arnold moved with ease, the rec­og­nized fa­vorite. Hav­ing tak­en the Newdi­gate prize for En­glish verse, and al­so hav­ing won a schol­ar­ship, he was grad­uat­ed with hon­ors in 1844, and in March of the fol­low­ing year had the ad­di­tion­al dis­tinc­tion of be­ing elect­ed a Fel­low of Oriel, the crown­ing glo­ry of an Ox­ford grad­uate. He af­ter­ward taught clas­sics for a short time at Rug­by, then in 1847 ac­cept­ed the post of pri­vate sec­re­tary to the Mar­quis of Lans­downe, Lord Pres­ident of the Coun­cil, which po­si­tion he oc­cu­pied un­til 1851, when he was ap­point­ed Lay In­spec­tor of Schools by the Com­mit­tee on Ed­uca­tion. The same year he mar­ried Frances Lucy Wight­man, daugh­ter of Sir William Wight­man, judge of the Court of the Queen's Bench.

Arnold's record as an ed­uca­tor is un­par­al­leled in the his­to­ry of Eng­land's pub­lic schools. For more than thir­ty-​five years he served as in­spec­tor and com­mis­sion­er, which of­fices he filled with ef­fi­cien­cy. As in­spec­tor he was earnest, con­sci­en­tious, ver­sa­tile; beloved alike by teach­ers and pupils. The Dean of Sal­is­bury likened his ap­pear­ance to in­spect the school at Kid­der­mas­ter, to the ad­mis­sion of a ray of light when a shut­ter is sud­den­ly opened in a dark­ened room. All-​in-​all, he val­ued hap­py-​ap­pear­ing chil­dren, and kind­ly sym­pa­thet­ic teach­ers, more than ex­cel­lence in grade re­ports. In con­nec­tion with the du­ties of his of­fice as com­mis­sion­er, he trav­elled fre­quent­ly on the Con­ti­nent to in­quire in­to for­eign meth­ods of pri­ma­ry and sec­ondary ed­uca­tion. Here he found much that was worth while, and of­ten car­ried back to Lon­don larg­er sug­ges­tions and ideas than the na­tion­al mind was ready to ac­cept. Un­der his su­per­vi­sion, how­ev­er, the school sys­tem of Eng­land was ex­ten­sive­ly re­vised and im­proved. He re­signed his po­si­tion un­der the Com­mit­tee of Coun­cil on Ed­uca­tion, in 1886, two years be­fore his death.

In the mean­time Arnold's pen had not been idle. His first vol­ume of verse, _The Strayed Rev­eller and Oth­er Po­ems_, ap­peared (1848), and al­though qui­et­ly re­ceived, slow­ly won its way in­to pub­lic fa­vor. The next year the nar­ra­tive po­em, _The Sick King in Bokhara_, came out, and was fol­lowed in turn by a third vol­ume in 1853, un­der the ti­tle of _Empe­do­cles on Et­na and Oth­er Po­ems_. By this time Arnold's rep­uta­tion as a po­et was es­tab­lished, and in 1857 he was elect­ed Pro­fes­sor of Po­et­ry at Ox­ford, where he be­gan his ca­reer as a lec­tur­er, in which ca­pac­ity he twice vis­it­ed Amer­ica. _Merope, a Tragedy_ (1856) and a vol­ume un­der the ti­tle of _New Po­ems_ (1869) fin­ish the list of his po­et­ical works, with the ex­cep­tion of oc­ca­sion­al vers­es.

Arnold's prose works, aside from his let­ters, con­sist whol­ly of crit­ical es­says, in which he has dealt fear­less­ly with the greater is­sues of his day. As will be seen by their ti­tles (see page xxxvi­ii of this vol­ume), the sub­ject-​mat­ter of these es­says is of very great scope, em­brac­ing in theme lit­er­ature, pol­itics, so­cial con­duct, and pop­ular re­li­gion. By them Arnold has ex­ert­ed a re­mark­able in­flu­ence on pub­lic thought and stamped him­self as one of the ablest crit­ics and re­form­ers of the last cen­tu­ry. Arnold's life was thus one of many wide­ly di­verse ac­tiv­ities and was at all times deeply con­cerned with prac­ti­cal as well as with lit­er­ary af­fairs; and on no side was it de­fi­cient in hu­man sym­pa­thies and re­la­tions. He won re­spect and rep­uta­tion while he lived, and his works con­tin­ue to at­tract men's minds, al­though with much un­even­ness. It has been said of him that, of all the mod­ern po­ets, ex­cept Goethe, he was the best crit­ic, and of all the mod­ern crit­ics, with the same ex­cep­tion, he was the best po­et. He died at Liv­er­pool, where he had gone to meet his daugh­ter re­turn­ing from Amer­ica, April 15, 1888. By his death the world lost an acute and cul­tured crit­ic, a re­fined writ­er, an earnest ed­uca­tion­al re­former, and a no­ble man. He was buried in his na­tive town, Lale­ham.

Agree­ably to his own re­quest, Arnold has nev­er been made the sub­ject for a bi­og­ra­phy. By means of his let­ters, his of­fi­cial re­ports, and state­ments of his friends, how­ev­er, one is able to trace the suc­ces­sive stages of his ca­reer, as he steadi­ly grew in hon­or and pub­lic use­ful­ness. Though some­what in­ad­equate, the pic­ture thus pre­sent­ed is sin­gu­lar­ly pleas­ing and at­trac­tive. The sub­joined ap­pre­ci­ations have been se­lect­ed with a view of giv­ing the stu­dent a glimpse of Arnold as he ap­peared to un­prej­udiced minds.

One who knew him at Ox­ford wrote of him as fol­lows: “His per­fect self-​pos­ses­sion, the sal­lies of his ready wit, the hu­mor­ous turn which he could give to any sub­ject that he han­dled, his gai­ety, au­dac­ity, and un­fail­ing com­mand of words, made him one of the most pop­ular and suc­cess­ful un­der­grad­uates that Ox­ford has ev­er known.”

“He was beau­ti­ful as a young man, strong and man­ly, yet full of dreams and schemes. His Olympian man­ners be­gan even at Ox­ford: there was no harm in them: they were nat­ural, not put on. The very sound of his voice and wave of his arm were Jove-​like.”--PRO­FES­SOR MAX MUeLLER.

"He was most dis­tinct­ly on the side of hu­man en­joy­ment. He con­spired and con­trived to make things pleas­ant. Pedantry he ab­horred. He was a man of this life and this world. A se­vere crit­ic of this world he in­deed was; but, find­ing him­self in it, and not pre­cise­ly know­ing what is be­yond it, like a brave and true-​heart­ed man, he set him­self to make the best of it. Its sights and sounds were dear to him. The 'un­crum­pling fern, the eter­nal moon­lit snow,' the red grouse spring­ing at our sound, the tin­kling bells of the 'high-​pas­tur­ing kine,' the va­garies of men, of wom­en, and dogs, their odd ways and tricks, whether of mind or man­ner, all de­light­ed, amused, tick­led him.

* * * * *

“In a sense of the word which is no­ble and blessed, he was of the earth earthy.... His mind was based on the plainest pos­si­ble things. What he hat­ed most was the fan­tas­tic--the far-​fetched, all-​elab­orat­ed fan­cies and strained in­ter­pre­ta­tions. He stuck to the beat­en track of hu­man ex­pe­ri­ence, and the broad­er the bet­ter. He was a plain-​sail­ing man. This is his true note.”--MR. AU­GUS­TINE BIR­RELL.

“He was in­ca­pable of sac­ri­fic­ing the small­est in­ter­est of any­body to his own; he had not a spark of en­vy or jeal­ousy; he stood well aloof from all the bustlings and jostlings by which self­ish men push on; he bore life's dis­ap­point­ments--and he was dis­ap­point­ed in some rea­son­able hopes--with good na­ture and for­ti­tude; he cast no bur­den up­on oth­ers, and nev­er shrank from bear­ing his own share of the dai­ly load to the last ounce of it; he took the deep­est, sin­cer­est, and most ac­tive in­ter­est in the well-​be­ing of his coun­try and his coun­try­men.”--MR. JOHN MOR­LEY.

In his es­say on Arnold, George E. Wood­ber­ry speaks of the po­et's per­son­al­ity as re­vealed by his let­ters in the fol­low­ing beau­ti­ful man­ner: "Few who did not know Arnold could have been pre­pared for the rev­ela­tion of a na­ture so true, so ami­able, so du­ti­ful. In ev­ery re­la­tion of pri­vate life he is shown to have been a man of ex­cep­tion­al con­stan­cy and plain­ness.... Ev­ery one must take de­light in the men­tal as­so­ci­ation with Arnold in the scenes of his ex­is­tence ... and in his fam­ily af­fec­tions. A na­ture warm to its own, kind­ly to all, cheer­ful, fond of sport and fun, and al­ways fed from pure foun­tains, and with it a char­ac­ter so found­ed up­on the rock, so humbly ser­vice­able, so con­tin­uing in pow­er and grace, must wake in all the re­spons­es of hap­py ap­pre­ci­ation and leave the charm of mem­ory.

“He did his du­ty as nat­ural­ly as if it re­quired nei­ther re­solve nor ef­fort, nor thought of any kind for the mor­row, and he nev­er failed, seem­ing­ly, in act or word of sym­pa­thy, in lit­tle or great things; and when to this one adds the clear ether of the in­tel­lec­tu­al life where he ha­bit­ual­ly moved in his own life apart, and the hu­man­ity of his home, the gift that these let­ters bring may be ap­pre­ci­at­ed. That gift is the man him­self, but set in the at­mo­sphere of home, with son­ship and fa­ther­hood, sis­ters and broth­ers, with the be­reave­ments of years ful­ly ac­com­plished, and those of baby­hood and boy­hood--a sweet and whole­some En­glish home, with all the cloud and sun­shine of the En­glish world drift­ing over its roof-​trees, and the soil of Eng­land be­neath its stones, and En­glish du­ties for the breath of its be­ing. To add such a home to the house­hold rights of En­glish Lit­er­ature is per­haps some­thing from which Arnold would have shrunk, but it en­dears his mem­ory.”

“It may be over­much He shunned the com­mon stain and smutch, From soil­ure of ig­no­ble touch Too grand­ly free, Too lofti­ly se­cure in such Cold pu­ri­ty; But he pre­served from chance con­trol The fortress of his es­tab­lished soul, In all things sought to see the whole; Brooked no dis­guise, And set his heart up­on the goal, Not on the prize.”

--MR. WILLIAM WAT­SON, _In Lale­ham Church­yard_.

ARNOLD THE PO­ET

Matthew Arnold was es­sen­tial­ly a man of the in­tel­lect. No oth­er au­thor of mod­ern times, per­haps no oth­er En­glish au­thor of any time, ap­peals so di­rect­ly as he to the ed­ucat­ed class­es. Even a cur­so­ry read­ing of his pages, prose or verse, re­veals the schol­ar and the crit­ic. He is al­ways think­ing, al­ways bril­liant, nev­er lacks for a word or phrase; and on the whole, his judg­ments are good. Be­tween his prose and verse, how­ev­er, there is a marked dif­fer­ence, both in tone and spir­itu­al qual­ity. True, each pos­sess­es the note of a lofty, though sto­ical courage; re­veals the same grace of fin­ish and ex­act­ness of phrase and man­ner; and is, in equal de­gree, the out­put of a sin­gu­lar­ly sane and no­ble na­ture; but here the com­par­ison ends; for, while his prose is of­ten stormy and con­tentious, his po­et­ry has al­ways about it an at­mo­sphere of en­tire re­pose. The cause of this dif­fer­ence is not far to seek. His po­et­ry, writ­ten in ear­ly man­hood, re­flects his in­ner self, the more lov­able side of his na­ture; while his prose presents the crit­ic and the re­former, point­ing out the good and bad, and per­mit­ting at times a spir­it of bit­ter­ness to creep in, as he en­deav­ors to arouse men out of their easy con­tent­ment with them­selves and their sur­round­ings.

With the ex­cep­tion of oc­ca­sion­al vers­es, Arnold's po­et­ical ca­reer be­gan and end­ed in­side of twen­ty years. The rea­son for this can on­ly be con­jec­tured, and need not be dwelt up­on here. But al­though his po­et­ic life was brief, it was of a very high or­der, his po­ems rank­ing well up among the lit­er­ary pro­duc­tions of the last cen­tu­ry. As a pop­ular po­et, how­ev­er, he will prob­ably nev­er class with Ten­nyson or Longfel­low. His po­ems are too cold­ly clas­si­cal and too unattrac­tive in sub­ject to ap­peal to the ca­su­al read­er, who is, gen­er­al­ly speak­ing, in­clined to­ward po­et­ry of the emo­tions rather than of the in­tel­lect--Arnold's usu­al kind. That he rec­og­nized this him­self, wit­ness the fol­low­ing qui­et state­ments made in let­ters to his friends: “My po­ems are mak­ing their way, I think, though slow­ly, and are per­haps nev­er to make way very far. There must al­ways be some peo­ple, how­ev­er, to whom the lit­er­al­ness and sin­cer­ity of them has a charm.... They rep­re­sent, on the whole, the main move­ment of mind of the last quar­ter of a cen­tu­ry, and thus they will prob­ably have their day, as peo­ple be­come con­scious to them­selves of what that move­ment of mind is, and in­ter­est­ed in the lit­er­ary pro­duc­tions which re­flect it.” Time has ver­ified the ac­cu­ra­cy of this judg­ment. In short, Arnold has made a pro­found rather than a wide im­pres­sion. To a few, how­ev­er, of each gen­er­ation, he will con­tin­ue to be a “voice orac­ular,”--a po­et with a pur­pose and a mes­sage.

=Arnold's Po­et­ic Cul­ture=.--Ob­vi­ous­ly, the sources of Arnold's cul­ture were clas­si­cal. As one crit­ic has terse­ly said, “He turned over his Greek mod­els by day and by night.” Here he found his ide­al stan­dards, and here he brought for com­par­ison all ques­tions that en­grossed his thoughts. Homer (he replied to an in­quir­er) and Epicte­tus (of mood con­ge­nial with his own) were props of his mind, as were Sopho­cles, “who saw life steadi­ly and saw it whole,” and Mar­cus Au­re­lius, whom he called the purest of men. These like na­tures af­ford­ed him re­pose and con­so­la­tion. Greek epic and dra­mat­ic po­et­ry and Greek phi­los­ophy ap­pealed pro­found­ly to him. Of the Greek po­ets he wrote: “No oth­er po­ets have lived so much by the imag­ina­tive rea­son; no oth­er po­ets have made their works so well bal­anced; no oth­er po­ets have so well sat­is­fied the think­ing pow­er; have so well sat­is­fied the re­li­gious sense.” More than any oth­er En­glish po­et he prized the qual­ities of mea­sure, pro­por­tion, and re­straint; and to him lu­cid­ity, aus­ter­ity, and high se­ri­ous­ness, con­spic­uous el­ements of clas­sic verse, were the sub­stance of true po­et­ry. In ex­plain­ing his own po­si­tion as to his art, he says: “In the sin­cere en­deav­or to learn and prac­tise, amid the be­wil­der­ing con­fu­sion of our times, what is sound and true in po­et­ic art, I seem, to my­self to find the on­ly sure guid­ance, the on­ly sol­id foot­ing, among the an­cients. They, at any rate, knew what they want­ed in Art, and we do not. It is this un­cer­tain­ty which is dis­heart­en­ing, and not hos­tile crit­icism.” And again: “The rad­ical dif­fer­ence be­tween the po­et­ic the­ory of the Greeks and our own is this: that with them, the po­et­ical char­ac­ter of the ac­tion in it­self, and the con­duct of it, was the first con­sid­er­ation; with us, at­ten­tion is fixed main­ly on the val­ue of sep­arate thoughts and im­ages which oc­cur in the treat­ment of an ac­tion. They re­gard the whole; we re­gard the parts. We have po­ems which seem to ex­ist mere­ly for the sake of sin­gle lines and pas­sages, and not for the sake of pro­duc­ing any to­tal im­pres­sion. We have crit­ics who seem to di­rect their at­ten­tion mere­ly to de­tached ex­pres­sions, to the lan­guage about the ac­tion, not the ac­tion it­self. I ver­ily be­lieve that the ma­jor­ity of them do not be­lieve that there is such a thing as a to­tal im­pres­sion to be de­rived from a po­em at all, or to be de­mand­ed from a po­et. They will per­mit the po­et to se­lect any ac­tion he pleas­es, and to suf­fer that ac­tion to go as it will, pro­vid­ed he grat­ifies them with oc­ca­sion­al bursts of fine writ­ing, and with a show of iso­lat­ed thoughts and im­ages; that is, they per­mit him to leave their po­et­ic sense un­grat­ified, pro­vid­ed that he grat­ifies their rhetor­ical sense and their cu­rios­ity.”

Arnold has il­lus­trat­ed, with re­mark­able suc­cess, his ideas of that uni­ty which grat­ifies the po­et­ical sense, and has ap­proached very close to his Greek mod­els in nu­mer­ous in­stances; most no­tably so in his great epic or nar­ra­tive po­em, _Sohrab and Rus­tum_, which is dealt with else­where in this in­tro­duc­tion. Per­haps we could not do bet­ter than to quote for our con­sid­er­ation at this time, a fine syn­the­sis of Mr. Arthur Gal­ton. He says: “In Matthew Arnold's style and in his man­ner, he seems to me to re­call the great mas­ters, and this in a strik­ing and in an abid­ing way.... To re­call them at all is a rare gift, but to re­call them nat­ural­ly, and with no strained sense nor jar­ring note of im­ita­tion, is a gift so ex­ceed­ing­ly rare that it is al­most enough in it­self to place a writ­er among the great mas­ters; to pro­claim that he is one of them. To re­call them at all is a rare gift, though not a unique gift; a few oth­er mod­ern po­ets re­call them too; but with these, with ev­ery one of them, it is the ex­cep­tion when they re­sem­ble the great mas­ters. They have their own styles, which abide with them; it is on­ly now and then, by a flash of ge­nius, that they break through their own styles, and at­tain the one im­mor­tal style. Just the con­trary of this is true of Matthew Arnold. It is his own, his usu­al, and his most nat­ural style which re­calls the great mas­ters; and on­ly when he does not write like him­self, does he cease to re­sem­ble them.... No man who at­tains to this great style can fail to have a dis­tin­guished func­tion; and Matthew Arnold, like Mil­ton, will be 'a leav­en and a pow­er,' be­cause he, too, has made the great style cur­rent in En­glish. With his de­sire for cul­ture and for per­fec­tion, there is no des­tiny he would pre­fer to this, for which his na­ture, his train­ing, and his sym­pa­thies, all pre­pared him. To con­vey the mes­sage of those an­cients whom he loved so well, in that En­glish tongue which he was taught by them to use so per­fect­ly;--to serve as an eter­nal protest against char­la­tanism and vul­gar­ity;--is ex­act­ly the mis­sion he would have cho­sen for him­self.... The few writ­ers of our lan­guage, there­fore, who give us 'an ide­al of ex­cel­lence, the most high and the most rare,' have an im­por­tant func­tion; we should study their works con­tin­ual­ly, and it should be a mat­ter of pas­sion­ate con­cern with us, that the 'ide­als,' that is, the def­inite and per­fect mod­els, should abide with us for­ev­er.” The Greeks rec­og­nized three kinds of po­et­ry,--Lyric, Dra­mat­ic, and Epic. Arnold tried all three. First, then, as a lyri­cist.

=Arnold as a Lyri­cist=.--Lyric po­et­ry is the artis­tic ex­pres­sion of the po­et's in­di­vid­ual sen­ti­ments and emo­tions, hence it is sub­jec­tive. The ac­tion is usu­al­ly va­pid, the verse mu­si­cal, the time quick. Un­like the Epic and Dra­ma, it has no pre­ferred verse or me­ter, but leaves the po­et free to choose or in­vent ap­pro­pri­ate forms. In this species of verse Arnold was not whol­ly at ease. As has been said, one search­es in vain through the whole course of his po­et­ry for a blithe, mu­si­cal, gay or se­ri­ous, off­hand po­em, the true lyric kind. The rea­son for this is soon dis­cov­ered. Ob­vi­ous­ly, it lies in the fun­da­men­tal qual­ities of the po­et's mind and tem­per­ament. Though by no means lack­ing in emo­tion­al sen­si­bil­ity, Arnold was too in­tel­lec­tu­al­ly self-​con­scious to be car­ried away by the im­pul­sive­ness com­mon to the lyri­cal moods. With him the in­tel­lect was al­ways mas­ter; the emo­tions, sub­or­di­nate. With the lyri­cist, the or­der is, in the main, at least, re­versed. The po­et throws off in­tel­lec­tu­al re­straint, and “lets his il­lu­mined be­ing o'er­run” with mu­sic and song. This Arnold could not or would not do. Then, too, Arnold's lyrics are of­ten at fault met­ri­cal­ly. This, com­bined with fre­quent ques­tion­able rhymes, ar­gues a not too dis­crim­inat­ing po­et­ical ear. He al­so lacked ge­nius in in­vent­ing verse forms, and hence found him­self un­der the ne­ces­si­ty of em­ploy­ing or adapt­ing those al­ready in use. In this re­spect he was no­tably in­fe­ri­or to Ten­nyson, many of whose mea­sures are whol­ly his own. Again, con­sid­er­able por­tions of his lyric verse con­sist mere­ly of prose, cut in­to lines of dif­fer­ent length, in im­ita­tion of the un­rhymed mea­sures of the Greek po­et, Pin­dar. The Bish­op of Der­ry, com­ment­ing on these rhyth­mic nov­el­ties, likens them to the sound of a stick drawn by a city gamin sharply across the area rail­ings,--a not in­apt com­par­ison. That they were not al­ways suc­cess­ful, wit­ness the fol­low­ing stan­za from _Merope_:--

“Thou con­fess­est the prize In the rush­ing, blun­der­ing, mad, Cloud-​en­veloped, ob­scure, Un­ap­plaud­ed, un­sung Race of Calami­ty, mine!”

Sure­ly this is but the baldest prose. At in­ter­vals, how­ev­er, Arnold was nobly lyri­cal, and strange­ly, too, at times, in those same un­even mea­sures in which are found his most sig­nal fail­ures--the un­rhymed Pin­dar­ic. _Philomela_ writ­ten in this style is one of the most exquisite bits of verse in the lan­guage. As one crit­ic has put it, “It ought to be writ­ten in sil­ver and bound in gold.” In ur­ban­ity of phrase and in depth of gen­uine pathos it is un­sur­passed and shows Arnold at his best. _Rug­by Chapel, The Youth of Na­ture, The Youth of Man_, and _A Dream_ are good ex­am­ples of his longer ef­forts in this verse form. In the more com­mon lyric mea­sures, Arnold was, at times, equal­ly suc­cess­ful. Saints­bury, com­ment­ing on _Re­qui­escat_, says that the po­et has “here achieved the triple union of sim­plic­ity, pathos, and (in the best sense) el­egance”; and adds that there is not a false note in the po­em. He al­so speaks en­thu­si­as­ti­cal­ly of the “hon­ey-​drop­ping trochees” of the _New Sirens_, and of the “chis­elled and clas­sic per­fec­tion” of the lines of _Res­ig­na­tion_. Her­bert W. Paul, writ­ing of _Myc­er­inus_, de­clares that no such verse has been writ­ten in Eng­land since Wordsworth's _Lao­damia_; and con­tin­ues, “The po­em abounds in sin­gle lines of haunt­ing charm.” Among his more suc­cess­ful longer lyrics are _The Sick King in Bokhara, Switzer­land, Fad­ed Leaves_, and _Tris­tram and Iseult_, and _Epi­logue to Less­ing's Lao­cooen_, in­clud­ed in this vol­ume.

=Arnold as a Drama­tist=.--The dra­ma is im­itat­ed hu­man ac­tion, and is in­tend­ed to ex­hib­it a pic­ture of hu­man life by means of di­alogue, act­ing, and stage ac­ces­sories. In na­ture, it par­takes of both lyric and epic, thus unit­ing sen­ti­ment and ac­tion with nar­ra­tion. Char­ac­ters live and act be­fore us, and speak in our pres­ence, the in­ter­est be­ing kept up by con­stant­ly shift­ing sit­ua­tions tend­ing to­ward some strik­ing re­sult. As a drama­tist, Arnold achieved no great suc­cess. Again the fun­da­men­tal qual­ities of his mind stood in the way. An au­thor so sub­jec­tive, so ab­sorbed in self-​scruti­ny and in­tro­spec­tion as he, is sel­dom able to project him­self in­to the minds of oth­ers to any con­sid­er­able ex­tent. His dra­mas are bril­liant with beau­ti­ful phras­es, his pic­tures of land­scapes and of na­ture in her var­ious as­pects ap­proach per­fec­tion; but in the main, he fails to han­dle his plots in a dra­mat­ic man­ner and, as a re­sult, does not se­cure the to­tal­ity of im­pres­sion so vi­tal to the dra­ma. Fre­quent­ly, too, his char­ac­ters are te­dious, and in their di­alogue man­age to be pro­vok­ing­ly un­nat­ural or in­sipid. They al­so lack in in­di­vid­ual­ity and in­de­pen­dence in speech and ac­tion. Many of his sit­ua­tions, like­wise, are at fault. For in­stance, one can scarce­ly con­ceive of such char­ac­ters as Ulysses and Circe play­ing the sub­or­di­nate roles as­signed to them in _The Strayed Rev­eller_. A true drama­tist would hard­ly have com­mit­ted so fla­grant a blun­der. _Merope_ is writ­ten in im­ita­tion of the Greek trage­di­ans. It has dig­ni­ty of sub­ject, no­bil­ity of sen­ti­ment, and a clas­sic brevi­ty of style; but it is frigid and ar­ti­fi­cial, and fails in the most es­sen­tial func­tion of dra­ma--to stir the read­er's emo­tions. _Empe­do­cles on Et­na_, a half-​au­to­bi­ograph­ical dra­ma, is in some re­spects a strik­ing po­em. It is re­plete with bril­liant pas­sages, and con­tains some of Arnold's best lyric vers­es and most beau­ti­ful na­ture pic­tures; but the di­alogue is col­or­less, the rhymes poor, the plot, such as it con­tains, but in­dif­fer­ent­ly han­dled, and even Empe­do­cles, the prin­ci­pal char­ac­ter, is fre­quent­ly te­dious and un­nat­ural. Arnold's dra­mas show that his forte was not in char­ac­ter-​draw­ing nor in di­alogue.

=Arnold as a Writ­er of Epic and El­egy=.--Epic po­et­ry nar­rates in grand style the achieve­ments of heroes--the po­et telling the sto­ry as if present. It is sim­ple in con­struc­tion and uni­form in me­ter, yet it ad­mits of the di­alogue and the episode, and though not en­forc­ing a moral it may hold one in so­lu­tion. Ele­giac po­et­ry is plain­tive in tone and ex­press­es sor­row or lamen­ta­tion. Both epic and el­egy are in­evitably se­ri­ous in mood, and slow and state­ly in ac­tion. In these two forms of verse Arnold was at his best. Stock­ton pro­nounced _Sohrab and Rus­tum_ the no­blest po­em in the En­glish lan­guage. An­oth­er crit­ic has said that “it is the near­est ana­logue in En­glish to the ra­pid­ity of ac­tion, plain­ness of thought, plain­ness of dic­tion, and no­ble­ness of Homer.” Com­bin­ing, as it does, clas­sic pu­ri­ty of style with ro­man­tic ar­dor of feel­ing, it stands a di­rect ex­em­pli­fi­ca­tion of Arnold's po­et­ic the­ories, as set forth in the pref­ace of his vol­ume of 1853. Es­pe­cial­ly is it suc­cess­ful in em­pha­siz­ing his idea of uni­ty of im­pres­sion; “while the truth of its ori­en­tal col­or, the deep pathos of the sit­ua­tion, the fire and in­ten­si­ty of the ac­tion, the strong con­cep­tion of char­ac­ter, and the full, solemn mu­sic of the verse, make it un­ques­tion­ably the mas­ter­piece of Arnold's longer po­ems, among which it is the largest in bulk and al­so the most am­bi­tious in scheme.” _Balder Dead_, a char­ac­ter­is­tic Arnoldian pro­duc­tion, found­ed up­on the Norse leg­end of Balder, Lok, and Had­er, though not so great as _Sohrab and Rus­tum_, has much po­et­ic worth and ranks high among its kind; and _Tris­tram and Iseult_, with its in­fi­nite tragedy, and _The Sick King in Bokhara_, gor­geous in ori­en­tal col­or, are rare ex­am­ples of the lyri­cal epic. _The For­sak­en Mer­man_ and _Saint Bran­dan_, which are dealt with else­where in this vol­ume, are good ex­am­ples of his short­er nar­ra­tive po­ems. In _Thyr­sis_, the beau­ti­ful thren­ody in which he cel­ebrat­ed his dead friend, Clough, Arnold gave to the world one of its great­est ele­gies. One finds in this po­em and its com­pan­ion piece, _The Schol­ar-​Gip­sy_, the same uni­ty of clas­sic form with ro­man­tic feel­ing present in _Sohrab and Rus­tum_. Both are crys­tal-​clear with­out cold­ness, and re­strained with­out loss of a full vol­ume of pow­er. Mr. Saints­bury, writ­ing of _The Schol­ar-​Gip­sy_, says: “It has ev­ery­thing--a suf­fi­cient scheme, a def­inite mean­ing and pur­pose, a sus­tained and ad­equate com­mand of po­et­ical pre­sen­ta­tion, and pas­sages and phras­es of the most exquisite beau­ty;” and no less praise is due _Thyr­sis_. Oth­er of his ele­giac po­ems are _Heine's Grave, Stan­zas from the Grande Chartreuse, Stan­zas in Mem­ory of the Au­thor of “Ober­mann,” Ober­mann Once More, Rug­by Chapel_, and _Memo­ri­al Vers­es_, the two last named be­ing in­clud­ed in this vol­ume. In such mea­sures as are used in these po­ems, in the long, state­ly, swelling mea­sures, whose graver move­ments ac­cord with a se­ri­ous and el­evat­ed pur­pose, Arnold was most at ease.

=Greek Spir­it in Arnold=.--But it is not alone in the fact that he se­lects clas­sic sub­jects, and writes af­ter the man­ner of the great mas­ters, that Arnold's affin­ity with the Greeks is man­ifest­ed. His po­ems in spir­it, as in form, re­flect the moods com­mon to the an­cient Hel­lenes, “One feels the (Greek) qual­ity,” writes George E. Wood­ber­ry, “not as a source, but as a pres­ence. In Ten­nyson, Keats, and Shel­ley there was Greek in­flu­ence, but in them the re­sult was mod­ern. In Arnold the an­tiq­ui­ty re­mains--re­mains in mood, just as in Lan­dor it re­mains in form. The Greek twi­light broods over all his po­et­ry. It is pa­gan in philo­soph­ic spir­it, not At­tic, but of lat­er and sto­ical time; with the pa­tience, en­durance, suf­fer­ing, not in the Chris­tian types, but as they now seem to a post-​Chris­tian imag­ina­tion, look­ing back to the past.” Even when his po­ems treat of mod­ern or ro­man­tic sub­jects, one is im­pressed with the feel­ing that he presents them with the same qual­ity of imag­ina­tion as would the Greek mas­ters them­selves: and in the same form.

=Arnold's At­ti­tude to­ward Na­ture=.--In his at­ti­tude to­ward Na­ture Arnold is of­ten com­pared to Wordsworth. A close study, how­ev­er, re­veals a wide dif­fer­ence, both in the way Na­ture ap­pealed to them and in their mood in her pres­ence. To Arnold she of­fered a tem­po­rary refuge from the doubts and dis­trac­tions of our mod­ern life,--a sooth­ing, con­sol­ing, up­lift­ing pow­er; to Wordsworth she was an in­spi­ra­tion,--a pres­ence that dis­turbed him “with the joy of el­evat­ed thoughts.” Con­scious of the help he found in her as­so­ci­ation, Arnold urged all men to fol­low Na­ture's ex­am­ple; to pos­sess their souls in qui­etude, de­spite the storm and tur­moil with­out. Pan­coast says: “He de­lights in lead­ing us to con­tem­plate the in­fi­nite calm of Na­ture, be­side which man's tran­si­to­ry woes are re­duced to a mere fret­ful in­signif­icance. All the beau­ti­ful po­em of _Tris­tram and Iseult_ is built up­on the skil­ful al­ter­na­tion of two themes. We pass from the fever­ish, wast­ing, and ephemer­al strug­gle of hu­man pas­sions and de­sire, in­to an at­mo­sphere that shames its heat and fume by an im­memo­ri­al cool­ness and re­pose;” and the same com­par­ison con­sti­tutes the theme for a con­sid­er­able por­tion of his po­et­ical work. In his method of ap­proach­ing Na­ture, Arnold al­so dif­fered wide­ly from Wordsworth, in that he saw with the out­ward eye, that is ob­jec­tive­ly; while Wordsworth saw rather with the in­ward eye, or sub­jec­tive­ly. In this Arnold is es­sen­tial­ly Greek and more Ten­nyso­ni­an than Wordswor­thi­an. Many of his po­ems, in full or in part, are mere na­ture pic­tures, and are artis­tic in the ex­treme. The pic­tures of the Oxus stream at the close of _Sohrab and Rus­tum_; the En­glish gar­den in _Thyr­sis_; and the hunter on the ar­ras, in _Tris­tram and Iseult_, are all no­table ex­am­ples. This pic­to­ri­al method Wordsworth sel­dom used. In spir­it, too, the po­ets dif­fered wide­ly. To Wordsworth, Na­ture was, first of all, the abid­ing place of God; but Arnold “finds in the wood and field no stream­ing forth of beau­ty and wis­dom from the foun­tain­head of beau­ty,” no habi­tan­cy of Na­ture's God.

=Arnold's At­ti­tude to­ward Life=.--Arnold's at­ti­tude to­ward life has been dwelt up­on in the ap­pre­ci­ations un­der the bi­ograph­ical sketch in this vol­ume and need on­ly briefly be summed up here. To him, hu­man life in its high­er de­vel­op­ments pre­sent­ed it­self as a stern and stren­uous af­fair; but he nev­er fal­tered nor sought to es­cape from his share of the bur­den. "On the con­trary, the pre­vail­ing note of his po­et­ry is self-​re­liance; help must come from the soul it­self, for

“The foun­tains of life are all with­in.”

He preach­es for­ti­tude and courage in the face of the mys­te­ri­ous and the in­evitable--a courage, in­deed, for­lorn and pa­thet­ic in the eyes of many--and he con­stant­ly takes refuge from the chok­ing cares of life, in a kind of sto­ical res­ig­na­tion." As a re­former, his func­tion was es­pe­cial­ly to stir peo­ple up, to make them dis­sat­is­fied with them­selves and their in­sti­tu­tions, and to force them to think, to be­come in­di­vid­ual. Ev­ery­where in his works one is con­front­ed by his un­vary­ing in­sis­tence up­on the suprema­cy of con­duct and du­ty. The mod­ern ten­den­cy to drift away from the old, es­tab­lished re­li­gious faith was a mat­ter of se­ri­ous thought to him and led him to give to the world a ra­tio­nal creed that would sat­is­fy the scep­tics and at­tract the in­dif­fer­ent. We can­not do bet­ter than quote for our clos­ing thought the fol­low­ing preg­nant lines from the au­thor's son­net en­ti­tled _The Bet­ter Part_:--

“Hath man no sec­ond life? _Pitch this one high!_ Sits there no judge in Heav­en, our sin to see? _More strict­ly, then, the in­ward judge obey_! Was Christ a man like us? _Ah! let us try If we then, too, can be such men as he!_”

* * * * *

ARNOLD THE CRIT­IC

The fol­low­ing ex­tracts on Arnold as a crit­ic are quot­ed from well-​known au­thor­ities.

"Arnold's prose has lit­tle trace of the wist­ful melan­choly of his verse. It is al­most al­ways ur­bane, vi­va­cious, light-​heart­ed. The clas­si­cal bent of his mind shows it­self here, un­mixed with the in­her­itance of ro­man­tic feel­ing which col­ors his po­et­ry. Not on­ly is his prose clas­si­cal in qual­ity, by virtue of its re­straint, of its def­inite aim, and of the dry white light of in­tel­lect which suf­fus­es it; but the doc­trine which he spent his life in preach­ing is based up­on a clas­si­cal ide­al, the ide­al of sym­me­try, whole­ness, or, as he dar­ing­ly called it, _per­fec­tion_.... Wher­ev­er, in re­li­gion, pol­itics, ed­uca­tion, or lit­er­ature, he saw his coun­try­men un­der the dom­ina­tion of nar­row ide­als, he came speak­ing the mys­tic word of de­liv­er­ance, 'Cul­ture.' Cul­ture, ac­quain­tance with the best which has been thought and done in the world, is his panacea for all ills.... In al­most all of his prose writ­ing he at­tacks some form of 'Philis­tin­ism,' by which word he char­ac­ter­ized the nar­row-​mind­ed­ness and self-​sat­is­fac­tion of the British mid­dle class.

"Arnold's tone is ad­mirably fit­ted to the pe­cu­liar task he had to per­form.... In _Cul­ture and An­ar­chy_ and many suc­ces­sive works, he made his plea for the gospel of ideas with ur­ban­ity and play­ful grace, as be­fit­ted the Hel­lenic spir­it, bring­ing 'sweet­ness and light' in­to the dark places of British prej­udice. Some­times, as in _Lit­er­ature and Dog­ma_, where he pleads for a more lib­er­al and lit­er­ary read­ing of the Bible, his man­ner is qui­et, suave, and gen­tly per­sua­sive. At oth­er times, as in _Friend­ship's Gar­land_, he shoots the ar­rows of his sar­casm in­to the ranks of the Philistines with a del­icate raillery and scorn, all the more ex­as­per­at­ing to his foes, be­cause it is veiled by a mock hu­mil­ity, and is scrupu­lous­ly po­lite.

"Of Arnold's lit­er­ary crit­icism, the most no­table sin­gle piece is the fa­mous es­say _On Trans­lat­ing Homer_, which de­serves care­ful study for the en­light­en­ment it of­fers con­cern­ing many of the fun­da­men­tal ques­tions of style. The es­says on Wordsworth and on By­ron from _Es­says in Crit­icism_, and that on Emer­son, from _Dis­cours­es in Amer­ica_, fur­nish good ex­am­ples of Arnold's charm of man­ner and weight of mat­ter in this province.

“The to­tal im­pres­sion which Arnold makes in his prose may be de­scribed as that of a spir­itu­al man-​of-​the-​world. In com­par­ison with Car­lyle, Buskin, and New­man, he is world­ly. For the ro­man­tic pas­sion and mys­tic vi­sion of these men he sub­sti­tutes an ide­al of bal­anced cul­ti­va­tion, the ide­al of the trained, sym­pa­thet­ic, cos­mopoli­tan gen­tle­man. He marks a re­turn to the con­ven­tions of life af­ter the storm and stress of the ro­man­tic age. Yet in his own way he al­so was a prophet and a preach­er, striv­ing whole-​heart­ed­ly to re­lease his coun­try­men from bondage to mean things, and point­ing their gaze to that sym­me­try and bal­ance of char­ac­ter which has seemed to many no­ble minds the true goal of hu­man en­deav­or.”--MOODY AND LOVETT, _A His­to­ry of En­glish Lit­er­ature_.

“As a lit­er­ary crit­ic, his taste, his tem­per, his judg­ment were pret­ty near­ly in­fal­li­ble. He com­bined a loy­al and rea­son­able sub­mis­sion to lit­er­ary au­thor­ity, with a free and even dar­ing use of pri­vate judg­ment. His ad­mi­ra­tion for the ac­knowl­edged mas­ters of hu­man ut­ter­ance--Homer, Sopho­cles, Shake­speare, Mil­ton, Goethe--was gen­uine and en­thu­si­as­tic, and in­com­pa­ra­bly bet­ter in­formed than that of some more con­ven­tion­al crit­ics. Yet this cor­dial sub­mis­sion to rec­og­nized au­thor­ity, this hon­est loy­al­ty to es­tab­lished rep­uta­tion, did not blind him to de­fects; did not se­duce him in­to in­dis­crim­inat­ing praise; did not de­ter him from ex­pos­ing the ten­den­cy to ver­biage in Burke and Jere­my Tay­lor, the ex­cess blank­ness of much of Wordsworth's blank verse, the un­der­cur­rent of medi­ocrity in Macaulay, the ab­sur­di­ties of Mr. Ruskin's et­ymol­ogy. And as in great mat­ters, so in small. What­ev­er lit­er­ary pro­duc­tion was brought un­der Matthew Arnold's no­tice, his judg­ment was clear, sym­pa­thet­ic, and in­de­pen­dent. He had the read­iest ap­pre­ci­ation of true ex­cel­lence, a quick in­tol­er­ance of turgid­ity and in­fla­tion--of what he called en­deav­ors to ren­der plat­itude en­durable by mak­ing it pompous, and live­ly hor­ror of af­fec­ta­tion and un­re­al­ity.”--Mr. GEORGE RUS­SELL.

“In his work as lit­er­ary crit­ic Arnold has oc­cu­pied a high place among the fore­most prose writ­ers of the time. His style is in marked con­trast to the dithyra­mbic elo­quence of Car­lyle, or to Ruskin's pure and ra­di­ant col­or­ing. It is a qui­et style, re­strained, clear, dis­crim­inat­ing, in­ci­sive, with lit­tle glow of ar­dor or pas­sion. Notwith­stand­ing its scrupu­lous as­sump­tion of ur­ban­ity, it is of­ten a mer­ci­less style, in­de­scrib­ably ir­ri­tat­ing to an op­po­nent by its un­der­cur­rent of sar­cas­tic hu­mor, and its calm air of as­sured su­pe­ri­or­ity. By his in­sis­tence on a high stan­dard of tech­ni­cal ex­cel­lence, and by his ad­mirable pre­sen­ta­tion of cer­tain prin­ci­ples of lit­er­ary judg­ment, Arnold per­formed a great work for lit­er­ature. On the oth­er hand, we miss here, as in his po­et­ry, the hu­man el­ement, the com­pre­hen­sive sym­pa­thy that we rec­og­nize in the crit­icism of Car­lyle. Yet Car­lyle could not have writ­ten the es­say _On Trans­lat­ing Homer_, with all its schol­ar­ly dis­crim­ina­tion in style and tech­nique, any more than Arnold could have pro­duced Car­lyle's large-​heart­ed es­say on _Burns_. Arnold's var­ied en­er­gy and high­ly trained in­tel­li­gence have been felt in many dif­fer­ent fields. He has won a pe­cu­liar and hon­or­able place in the po­et­ry of the cen­tu­ry; he has ex­celled as lit­er­ary crit­ic, he has la­bored in the cause of ed­uca­tion, and fi­nal­ly, in his _Cul­ture and An­ar­chy_, he has set forth his scheme of so­cial re­form, and in cer­tain lat­er books has made His con­tri­bu­tion to con­tem­po­rary thought.”--PAN­COAST, _In­tro­duc­tion to En­glish Lit­er­ature_.

* * * * *

CHRONO­LOG­ICAL LIST OF ARNOLD'S WORKS

1840. Alar­ic at Rome. (Prize po­em at Rug­by.) 1843. Cromwell. (Prize po­em at Ox­ford.) 1849. The Strayed Rev­eller and Oth­er Po­ems. Myc­er­inus. The Strayed Rev­eller. Frag­ment of an Antigone. The Sick King in Bokhara. Re­li­gious Iso­la­tion. To my Friends. A Mod­ern Sap­pho. The New Sirens. The Voice. To Faus­ta. Stagyrus. To a Gip­sy Child. The Hayswa­ter Boat. The For­sak­en Mer­man. The World and the Qui­etist. In Utrumque Para­tus. Res­ig­na­tion. Son­nets. Qui­et Work. To a Friend. Shake­speare. To the Duke of Welling­ton. Writ­ten in But­ler's Ser­mons. Writ­ten in Emer­son's Es­says. To an In­de­pen­dent Preach­er. To George Cruik­shank. To a Re­pub­li­can Friend.

1852. Empe­do­cles on Et­na and Oth­er Po­ems. Empe­do­cles on Et­na. The Riv­er. Ex­cuse. In­dif­fer­ence. Too Late. On the Rhine. Long­ing. The Lake. Part­ing. Ab­sence. Des­tiny. (Not reprint­ed.) To Mar­guerite. Hu­man Life. De­spon­den­cy. Youth's Ag­ita­tions--A Son­net. Self-​De­cep­tion. Lines writ­ten by a Death-​bed. (Af­ter­ward, Youth and Calm.) Tris­tram and Iseult. Memo­ri­al Vers­es. (Pre­vi­ous­ly pub­lished in _Fras­er's Mag­azine_.) Courage. (Not reprint­ed.) Self-​De­pen­dence. A Sum­mer Night. The Buried Life. A Farewell. Stan­zas in Mem­ory of the Au­thor of _Ober­mann_. Con­so­la­tion. Lines writ­ten in Kens­ing­ton Gar­dens. The World's Tri­umphs--A Son­net. The Sec­ond Best. Rev­olu­tions. The Youth of Na­ture. The Youth of Man. Moral­ity. Progress. The Fu­ture. 1853. Po­ems. Sohrab and Rus­tum. Cad­mus and Har­mo­nia. (A frag­ment of Empe­do­cles on Et­na.) Philomela. Thekla's An­swer. The Church of Brou. The Neck­an. Switzer­land. Rich­mond Hill. (A frag­ment of The Youth of Man.) Re­qui­escat. The Schol­ar-​Gip­sy. Stan­zas in Mem­ory of the Late Ed­ward Quill­man. Pow­er of Youth. (A frag­ment of The Youth of Man.) 1854. A Farewell. 1855. Po­ems. Balder Dead Sep­ara­tion. 1858. Merope: A Tragedy. 1867. New Po­ems. Per­sis­ten­cy of Po­et­ry. Saint Bran­dan. _(Fras­er's Mag­azine_, Ju­ly, 1860.) Son­nets. A Pic­ture of New­stead. Rachel. (Three Son­nets.) East Lon­don. West Lon­don. An­ti-​Des­per­ation. Im­moral­ity. World­ly Place. The Di­vin­ity. The Good Shep­herd with the Kid. Aus­ter­ity of Po­et­ry. East and West. Mon­ica's Last Prayer. Calais Sands. Dover Beach. The Ter­race at Berne. Stan­zas com­posed at Car­nae. A South­ern Night. (Pre­vi­ous­ly pub­lished in the _Vic­to­ria Re­gia_, 1861.) Frag­ment of Cho­rus of a “De­janeira.” Pal­la­di­um. Ear­ly Death and Fame. Grow­ing Old. The Progress of Poesy. A Name­less Epi­taph. The Last Word. A Wish. A Cau­tion to Po­ets. Pis-​Aller. Epi­logue to Less­ing's Lao­cooen. Bac­cha­na­lia. Rug­by Chapel. Heine's Grave. Stan­zas from the Grande Chartreuse. 1860. The Lord's Mes­sen­gers. (_Corn­hill Mag­azine_, Ju­ly.) 1866. Thyr­sis. (_Macmil­lan's Mag­azine_, April.) 1868. Ober­mann Once More. 1873. New Rome. (_Corn­hill Mag­azine_, June.) 1877. Ha­worth Church­yard with Epi­logue. (_Fras­er's Mag­azine_, May.) 1881. Geist's Grave. (_Fort­night­ly Re­view_, Jan­uary.) 1882. West­min­ster Abbey. (_Nine­teenth Cen­tu­ry Mag­azine_, Jan­uary.) Poor Matthais. (_Macmil­lan's Mag­azine_, De­cem­ber.) 1887. Ho­ra­tian Echo. (_The Cen­tu­ry Guild Hob­by Horse_, Ju­ly.) Kaiser Dead. (_Fort­night­ly Re­view_, Ju­ly.)

PROSE WORKS

1859. Eng­land and the Ital­ian Ques­tion. 1861. Pop­ular Ed­uca­tion in France. On Trans­lat­ing Homer. 1864. A French Eton. 1865. Es­says in Crit­icism. 1867. On Study of Celtic Lit­er­ature. 1868. Schools and Uni­ver­si­ties on the Con­ti­nent. 1869. Cul­ture and An­ar­chy. 1870. St. Paul and Protes­tantism. 1871. Friend­ship's Gar­land. 1873. Lit­er­ature and Dog­ma. 1874. High­er Schools and Uni­ver­si­ties in Ger­many. 1875. God and the Bible. 1877. Last Es­says on Church and Re­li­gion. 1879. Mixed Es­says. 1882. Irish Es­says. 1885. Dis­cours­es in Amer­ica. 1888. Es­says in Crit­icism, Sec­ond Se­ries. Spe­cial Re­port on El­emen­tary Ed­uca­tion Abroad. Civ­iliza­tion in the Unit­ed States.

CON­TEM­PO­RARY AU­THORS

Thomas Car­lyle (1795-1881). Thomas B. Macaulay (1800-1859). Eliz­abeth Bar­rett Brown­ing (1806-1861). Al­fred Ten­nyson (1809-1892). Charles R. Dar­win (1809-1882). William M. Thack­er­ay (1811-1863). Robert Brown­ing (1812-1889). Charles Dick­ens (1812-1870). George Eliot (1819-1880). John Ruskin (1819-1900). Her­bert Spencer (1820-1903).

William Cullen Bryant (1794-1878). Ralph Wal­do Emer­son (1803-1882). Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864). John G. Whit­ti­er (1807-1892). Hen­ry W. Longfel­low (1807-1882). Oliv­er Wen­dell Holmes (1809-1894). James Rus­sell Low­ell (1819-1891).

BIB­LI­OG­RA­PHY

_The Po­et­ical Works of Matthew Arnold_ (The Macmil­lan Com­pa­ny, one vol­ume). _The En­glish Po­ets_, Vol. I, by T.H. Ward. _Matthew Arnold and the Spir­it of the Age_, edit­ed by the En­glish Club of Se­wa­nee, Ten­nessee. _Matthew Arnold_, by Sir J.G. Fitch. _Ten­nyson, Ruskin, and Oth­er Lit­er­ary Es­ti­mates_, by Fred­er­ic Har­ri­son. _Stud­ies in In­ter­pre­ta­tion_, by W.H. Hud­son. _Cor­rect­ed Im­pres­sions on Matthew Arnold_, by G.E.B. Saints­bury. _Matthew Arnold_, by Her­bert W. Paul. _Matthew Arnold_, by G.E.B. Saints­bury. _Arnold's Let­ters_, col­lect­ed and ar­ranged by G.W.E. Rus­sell. _The Bib­li­og­ra­phy of Matthew Arnold_, edit­ed by T.B. Smart. _Matthew Arnold_, by An­drew Lang, in _Cen­tu­ry Mag­azine_, 1881-1882, p. 849.

_The Po­et­ry of Matthew Arnold_, by R.H. Hut­ton, in _Es­says The­olog­ical and Lit­er­ary_, Vol. II. _Re­li­gion and Cul­ture_, by John Shairp. _Arnold_, in _Vic­to­ri­an Po­ets_, by Sted­man. _Matthew Arnold, New Po­ems_, in _Es­says and Stud­ies_, by A.C. Swin­burne. _Arnold_, in _Our Liv­ing Po­ets_, by For­man.

* * * * *

SOHRAB AND RUS­TUM

AND OTH­ER PO­EMS

* * * * *

NAR­RA­TIVE PO­EMS

SOHRAB AND RUS­TUM deg.

AN EPISODE

And the first grey of morn­ing fill'd the east, deg. deg.1 And the fog rose out of the Oxus deg. stream. deg.2 But all the Tar­tar camp deg. along the stream deg.3 Was hush'd, and still the men were plunged in sleep; Sohrab alone, he slept not; all night long 5 He had lain wake­ful, toss­ing on his bed; But when the grey dawn stole in­to his tent, He rose, and clad him­self, and girt his sword, And took his horse­man's cloak, and left his tent, And went abroad in­to the cold wet fog, 10 Through the dim camp to Per­an-​Wisa's deg. tent. deg.11

Through the black Tar­tar tents he pass'd, which stood Clus­ter­ing like bee-​hives on the low flat strand Of Oxus, where the sum­mer-​floods o'er­flow When the sun melts the snows in high Pamere deg. deg.15 Through the black tents he pass'd, o'er that low strand, And to a hillock came, a lit­tle back From the stream's brink--the spot where first a boat, Cross­ing the stream in sum­mer, scrapes the land. The men of for­mer times had crown'd the top 20 With a clay fort; but that was fall'n, and now The Tar­tars built there Per­an-​Wisa's tent, A dome of laths, and o'er it felts were spread. And Sohrab came there, and went in, and stood Up­on the thick piled car­pets in the tent, 25 And found the old man sleep­ing on his bed Of rugs and felts, and near him lay his arms. And Per­an-​Wisa heard him, though the step Was dull'd; for he slept light, an old man's sleep; And he rose quick­ly on one arm, and said:-- 30

“Who art thou? for it is not yet clear dawn. Speak! is there news, or any night alarm?”

But Sohrab came to the bed­side, and said:-- “Thou know'st me, Per­an-​Wisa! it is I. The sun is not yet risen, and the foe 35 Sleep; but I sleep not; all night long I lie Toss­ing and wake­ful, and I come to thee. For so did King Afrasiab deg. bid me seek deg.38 Thy coun­sel, and to heed thee as thy son, In Samar­cand, deg. be­fore the army march'd; deg.40 And I will tell thee what my heart de­sires. Thou know'st if, since from Ad­er-​bai­jan deg. first deg.42 I came among the Tar­tars and bore arms, I have still served Afrasiab well, and shown, At my boy's years, deg. the courage of a man. deg.45 This too thou know'st, that while I still bear on The con­quer­ing Tar­tar en­signs through the world, And beat the Per­sians back on ev­ery field, I seek one man, one man, and one alone-- Rus­tum, my fa­ther; who I hoped should greet, 50 Should one day greet, up­on some well-​fought field, His not un­wor­thy, not in­glo­ri­ous son. So I long hoped, but him I nev­er find. Come then, hear now, and grant me what I ask. Let the two armies rest to-​day; but I 55 Will chal­lenge forth the bravest Per­sian lords To meet me, man to man; if I pre­vail, Rus­tum will sure­ly hear it; if I fall-- Old man, the dead need no one, claim no kin. Dim is the ru­mour of a com­mon fight, deg. deg.60 Where host meets host, and many names are sunk deg.; deg.61 But of a sin­gle com­bat fame speaks clear.”

He spoke; and Per­an-​Wisa took the hand Of the young man in his, and sigh'd, and said:--

“O Sohrab, an un­qui­et heart is thine! 65 Canst thou not rest among the Tar­tar chiefs, And share the bat­tle's com­mon chance deg. with us deg.67 Who love thee, but must press for ev­er first, In sin­gle fight in­cur­ring sin­gle risk, To find a fa­ther thou hast nev­er seen deg.? deg.70 That were far best, my son, to stay with us Un­mur­mur­ing; in our tents, while it is war, And when 'tis truce, then in Afrasiab's towns. But, if this one de­sire in­deed rules all, To seek out Rus­tum--seek him not through fight! 75 Seek him in peace, and car­ry to his arms, O Sohrab, car­ry an un­wound­ed son! But far hence seek him, for he is not here. For now it is not as when I was young, When Rus­tum was in front of ev­ery fray; 80 But now he keeps apart, and sits at home, In Seis­tan, deg. with Zal, his fa­ther old. deg.82 Whether that his own mighty strength at last Peels the ab­horr'd ap­proach­es of old age, Or in some quar­rel deg. with the Per­sian King. deg. deg.85 There go deg.!--Thou wilt not? Yet my heart fore­bodes deg.86 Dan­ger or death awaits thee on this field. Fain would I know thee safe and well, though lost To us; fain there­fore send thee hence, in peace To seek thy fa­ther, not seek sin­gle fights 90 In vain;--but who can keep the li­on's cub From raven­ing, and who gov­ern Rus­tum's son? Go, I will grant thee what thy heart de­sires.”

So said he, and dropp'd Sohrab's hand, and left His bed, and the warm rugs where­on he lay; 95 And o'er his chilly limbs his woollen coat He pass'd, and tied his san­dals on his feet, And threw a white cloak round him, and he took In his right hand a ruler's staff, no sword deg.; deg.99 And on his head he set his sheep-​skin cap, 100 Black, glossy, curl'd, the fleece of Kara-​Kul deg.; deg.101 And raised the cur­tain of his tent, and call'd His her­ald to his side, and went abroad.

The sun by this had risen, and clear'd the fog From the broad Oxus and the glit­ter­ing sands. 105 And from their tents the Tar­tar horse­men filed In­to the open plain; so Haman deg. bade-- deg.107 Haman, who next to Per­an-​Wisa ruled The host, and still was in his lusty prime. From their black tents, long files of horse, they stream'd; As when some grey Novem­ber morn the files, 111 In march­ing or­der spread, of long-​neck'd cranes Stream over Cas­bin deg. and the south­ern slopes deg.113 Of El­burz, deg. from the Ar­alian es­tu­ar­ies, deg.114 Or some frore deg. Caspi­an reed-​bed, south­ward bound deg.115 For the warm Per­sian sea-​board--so they stream'd. The Tar­tars of the Oxus, the King's guard, First, with black sheep-​skin caps and with long spears; Large men, large steeds; who from Bokhara deg. come deg.119 And Khi­va, deg. and fer­ment the milk of mares. deg. deg.120 Next, the more tem­per­ate Toork­muns deg. of the south, deg.121 The Tukas, deg. and the lances of Sa­lore, deg.122 And those from At­truck deg. and the Caspi­an sands; deg.123 Light men and on light steeds, who on­ly drink The acrid milk of camels, and their wells. 125 And then a swarm of wan­der­ing horse, who came From far, and a more doubt­ful ser­vice own'd; The Tar­tars of Fer­ghana, deg. from the banks deg.128 Of the Jaxartes, deg. men with scanty beards deg.129 And close-​set skull-​caps; and those wilder hordes 130 Who roam o'er Kipchak deg. and the north­ern waste, deg.131 Kalmucks deg. and un­kempt Kuz­zaks, deg. tribes who stray deg.132 Near­est the Pole, and wan­der­ing Kirghizzes, deg. deg.133 Who come on shag­gy ponies from Pamere; These all filed out from camp in­to the plain. 135 And on the oth­er side the Per­sians form'd;-- First a light cloud of horse, Tar­tars they seem'd. The Ily­ats of Kho­ras­san deg.; and be­hind, deg.138 The roy­al troops of Per­sia, horse and foot, Mar­shall'd bat­tal­ions bright in bur­nish'd steel. 140 But Per­an-​Wisa with his her­ald came, Thread­ing the Tar­tar squadrons to the front, And with his staff kept back the fore­most ranks. And when Fer­ood, who led the Per­sians, saw That Per­an-​Wisa kept the Tar­tars back, 145 He took his spear, and to the front he came, And check'd his ranks, and fix'd deg. them where they stood. deg.147 And the old Tar­tar came up­on the sand Be­twixt the silent hosts, and spake, and said:--

“Fer­ood, and ye, Per­sians and Tar­tars, hear! 150 Let there be truce be­tween the hosts to-​day. But choose a cham­pi­on from the Per­sian lords To fight our cham­pi­on Sohrab, man to man.”

As, in the coun­try, on a morn in June, When the dew glis­tens on the pearled ears, 155 A shiv­er runs through the deep corn deg. for joy-- deg.156 So, when they heard what Per­an-​Wisa said, A thrill through all the Tar­tar squadrons ran Of pride and hope for Sohrab, whom they loved.

But as a troop of ped­lars, from Ca­bool, deg. deg.160 Cross un­der­neath the In­di­an Cau­ca­sus, deg. deg.161 That vast sky-​neigh­bour­ing moun­tain of milk snow; Cross­ing so high, that, as they mount, they pass Long flocks of trav­el­ling birds dead on the snow, Choked by the air, and scarce can they them­selves 165 Slake their parch'd throats with sug­ar'd mul­ber­ries-- In sin­gle file they move, and stop their breath, For fear they should dis­lodge the o'er­hang­ing snows-- So the pale Per­sians held their breath with fear.

And to Fer­ood his broth­er chiefs came up 170 To coun­sel; Gudurz and Zoar­rah came, And Fer­aburz, who ruled the Per­sian host Sec­ond, and was the un­cle of the King deg.; deg.173 These came and coun­sell'd, and then Gudurz said:--

“Fer­ood, shame bids us take their chal­lenge up, 175 Yet cham­pi­on have we none to match this youth. He has the wild stag's foot, the li­on's heart. deg. deg.177 But Rus­tum came last night; aloof he sits deg. deg.178 And sullen, and has pitch'd his tents apart. Him will I seek, and car­ry to his ear 180 The Tar­tar chal­lenge, and this young man's name. Hap­ly he will for­get his wrath, and fight. Stand forth the while, and take their chal­lenge up.”

So spake he; and Fer­ood stood forth and cried:-- “Old man, be it agreed as thou hast said! 185 Let Sohrab arm, and we will find a man.” He spake: and Per­an-​Wisa turn'd, and strode Back through the open­ing squadrons to his tent. But through the anx­ious Per­sians Gudurz ran, And cross'd the camp which lay be­hind, and reach'd, 190 Out on the sands be­yond it, Rus­tum's tents. Of scar­let cloth they were, and glit­ter­ing gay, Just pitch'd; the high pavil­ion in the midst Was Rus­tum's, and his men lay camp'd around. And Gudurz en­ter'd Rus­tum's tent, and found 195 Rus­tum; his morn­ing meal was done, but still The ta­ble stood be­fore him, charged with food-- A side of roast­ed sheep, and cakes of bread; And dark green mel­ons; and there Rus­tum sate deg. deg.199 List­less, and held a fal­con deg. on his wrist, deg.200 And play'd with it; but Gudurz came and stood Be­fore him; and he look'd, and saw him stand, And with a cry sprang up and dropp'd the bird, And greet­ed Gudurz with both hands, and said:--

“Wel­come! these eyes could see no bet­ter sight. 205 What news? but sit down first, and eat and drink.”

But Gudurz stood in the tent-​door, and said:-- “Not now! a time will come to eat and drink, But not to-​day; to-​day has oth­er needs. The armies are drawn out, and stand at gaze; 210 For from the Tar­tars is a chal­lenge brought To pick a cham­pi­on from the Per­sian lords To fight their cham­pi­on--and thou know'st his name-- Sohrab men call him, but his birth is hid. O Rus­tum, like thy might is this young man's! 215 He has the wild stag's foot, the li­on's heart; And he is young, and Iran's deg. chiefs are old, deg.217 Or else too weak; and all eyes turn to thee. Come down and help us, Rus­tum, or we lose!”

He spoke; but Rus­tum an­swer'd with, a smile:-- 220 “Go to deg.! if Iran's chiefs are old, then I deg.221 Am old­er; if the young are weak, the King Errs strange­ly; for the King, for Kai Khos­roo, deg. deg.223 Him­self is young, and hon­ours younger men, And lets the aged moul­der to their graves. 225 Rus­tum he loves no more, but loves the young-- The young may rise at Sohrab's vaunts, not I. For what care I, though all speak Sohrab's fame? For would that I my­self had such a son, And not that one slight help­less girl deg. I have-- deg.230 A son so famed, so brave, to send to war, And I to tar­ry with the snow-​hair'd Zal, deg. deg.232 My fa­ther, whom the rob­ber Afghans vex, And clip his bor­ders short, and drive his herds, And he has none to guard his weak old age. 235 There would I go, and hang my ar­mour up, And with my great name fence that weak old man, And spend the good­ly trea­sures I have got, And rest my age, and hear of Sohrab's fame, And leave to death the hosts of thank­less kings, 240 And with these slaugh­ter­ous hands draw sword no more.”

He spoke, and smiled; and Gudurz made re­ply:-- “What then, O Rus­tum, will men say to this, When Sohrab dares our bravest forth, and seeks Thee most of all, and thou, whom most he seeks, 245 Hidest thy face? Take heed lest men should say: _Like some old miser, Rus­tum hoards his fame, And shuns to per­il it with younger men.”_ deg. deg.248

And, great­ly moved, then Rus­tum made re­ply:-- “O Gudurz, where­fore dost thou say such words? 250 Thou know­est bet­ter words than this to say. What is one more, one less, ob­scure or famed, Valiant or craven, young or old, to me? Are not they mor­tal, am not I my­self? But who for men of nought would do great deeds? 255 Come, thou shalt see how Rus­tum hoards his fame! But I will fight un­known, and in plain arms deg.; deg.257 Let not men say of Rus­tum, he was match'd In sin­gle fight with any mor­tal man.”

He spoke, and frown'd; and Gudurz turn'd, and ran 260 Back quick­ly through the camp in fear and joy-- Fear at his wrath, but joy that Rus­tum came. But Rus­tum strode to his tent-​door, and call'd His fol­low­ers in, and bade them bring his arms, And clad him­self in steel; the arms he chose 265 Were plain, and on his shield was no de­vice, deg. deg.266 On­ly his helm was rich, in­laid with gold, And, from the flut­ed spine atop, a plume Of horse­hair waved, a scar­let horse­hair plume. So arm'd, he is­sued forth; and Ruksh, his horse, 270 Fol­low'd him like a faith­ful hound at heel-- Ruksh, whose renown was noised through all the earth, The horse, whom Rus­tum on a for­ay once Did in Bokhara by the riv­er find A colt be­neath its dam, and drove him home, 275 And rear'd him; a bright bay, with lofty crest, Dight deg. with a sad­dle-​cloth of broi­der'd green deg.277 Crust­ed with gold, and on the ground were work'd All beasts of chase, all beasts which hunters know. So fol­low'd, Rus­tum left his tents, and cross'd 280 The camp, and to the Per­sian host ap­pear'd. And all the Per­sians knew him, and with shouts Hail'd; but the Tar­tars knew not who he was. And dear as the wet div­er to the eyes Of his pale wife who waits and weeps on shore, 285 By sandy Bahrein, deg. in the Per­sian Gulf, deg.286 Plung­ing all day in the blue waves, at night, Hav­ing made up his tale deg. of pre­cious pearls, deg.288 Re­joins her in their hut up­on the sands-- So dear to the pale Per­sians Rus­tum came. 290

And Rus­tum to the Per­sian front ad­vanced, And Sohrab arm'd in Haman's tent, and came. And as afield the reapers cut a swath Down through the mid­dle of a rich man's corn, And on each side are squares of stand­ing corn, 295 And in the midst a stub­ble, short and bare-- So on each side were squares of men, with spears Bristling, and in the midst, the open sand. And Rus­tum came up­on the sand, and cast His eyes to­ward the Tar­tar tents, and saw 300 Sohrab come forth, and eyed him as he came.

As some rich wom­an, on a win­ter's morn, Eyes through her silken cur­tains the poor drudge Who with numb black­en'd fin­gers makes her fire-- At cock-​crow, on a star­lit win­ter's morn, 305 When the frost flow­ers deg. the whiten'd win­dow-​panes-- And won­ders how she lives, and what the thoughts Of that poor drudge may be; so Rus­tum eyed The un­known ad­ven­tur­ous youth, who from afar Came seek­ing Rus­tum, and de­fy­ing forth 310 All the most valiant chiefs; long he pe­rused deg. deg.311 His spir­it­ed air, and won­der'd who he was. For very young he seem'd, ten­der­ly rear'd; Like some young cy­press, tall, and dark, and straight, Which in a queen's se­clud­ed gar­den throws 315 Its slight dark shad­ow on the moon­lit turf, By mid­night, to a bub­bling foun­tain's sound-- So slen­der Sohrab seem'd, deg. so soft­ly rear'd. deg.318 And a deep pity en­ter'd Rus­tum's soul As he be­held him com­ing; and he stood, 320 And beck­on'd to him with his hand, and said:--

“O thou young man, the air of Heav­en is soft, And warm, and pleas­ant; but the grave is cold! Heav­en's air is bet­ter than the cold dead grave. Be­hold me! I am vast, deg. and clad in iron, deg.325 And tried deg.; and I have stood on many a field Of blood, and I have fought with many a foe-- Nev­er was that field lost, or that foe saved. deg. deg.327 O Sohrab, where­fore wilt thou rush on death? Be gov­ern'd deg.! quit the Tar­tar host, and come deg.330 To Iran, and be as my son to me, And fight be­neath my ban­ner till I die! There are no youths in Iran brave as thou.”

So he spake, mild­ly; Sohrab heard his voice, The mighty voice of Rus­tum, and he saw 335 His gi­ant fig­ure plant­ed on the sand, Sole, like some sin­gle tow­er, which a chief Hath build­ed on the waste in for­mer years Against the rob­bers; and he saw that head, Streak'd with its first grey hairs;--hope filled his soul, 340 And he ran for­ward and em­braced his knees, And clasp'd his hand with­in his own, and said:--

“O, by thy fa­ther's head deg.! by thine own soul! deg.343 Art thou not Rus­tum deg.? speak! art thou not he?” deg.344

But Rus­tum eyed askance the kneel­ing youth, 345 And turn'd away, and spake to his own soul:--

“Ah me, I muse what this young fox may mean! False, wily, boast­ful, are these Tar­tar boys. For if I now con­fess this thing he asks, And hide it not, but say: _Rus­tum is here_! 350 He will not yield in­deed, nor quit our foes, But he will find some pre­text not to fight, And praise my fame, and prof­fer cour­te­ous gifts A belt or sword per­haps, and go his way. And on a feast-​tide, in Afrasiab's hall, 355 In Samar­cand, he will arise and cry: 'I chal­lenged once, when the two armies camp'd Be­side the Oxus, all the Per­sian lords To cope with me in sin­gle fight; but they Shrank, on­ly Rus­tum dared; then he and I 360 Changed gifts, and went on equal terms away.' So will he speak, per­haps, while men ap­plaud; Then were the chiefs of Iran shamed through me.”

And then he turn'd, and stern­ly spake aloud:-- “Rise! where­fore dost thou vain­ly ques­tion thus 365 Of Rus­tum? I am here, whom thou hast call'd By chal­lenge forth; make good thy vaunt, deg. or yield! deg.367 Is it with Rus­tum on­ly thou wouldst fight? Rash boy, men look on Rus­tum's face and flee! For well I know, that did great Rus­tum stand 370 Be­fore thy face this day, and were re­veal'd, There would be then no talk of fight­ing more. But be­ing what I am, I tell thee this-- Do thou record it in thine in­most soul: Ei­ther thou shalt re­nounce thy vaunt and yield, 375 Or else thy bones shall strew this sand, till winds Bleach them, or Oxus with his sum­mer-​floods, Oxus in sum­mer wash them all away.”

He spoke; and Sohrab an­swer'd, on his feet:-- “Art thou so fierce? Thou wilt not fright me so deg.! deg.380 I am no girl to be made pale by words. Yet this thou hast said well, did Rus­tum stand Here on this field, there were no fight­ing then. But Rus­tum is far hence, and we stand here. Be­gin! thou art more vast, more dread than I, 385 And thou art proved, I know, and I am young-- But yet suc­cess sways with the breath of Heav­en. And though thou think­est that thou know­est sure Thy vic­to­ry, yet thou canst not sure­ly know. For we are all, like swim­mers in the sea, 390 Poised on the top of a huge wave of fate, Which hangs un­cer­tain to which side to fall. And whether it will heave us up to land, Or whether it will roll us out to sea, Back out to sea, to the deep waves of death, 395 We know not, and no search will make us know; On­ly the event will teach us in its hour.”

He spoke, and Rus­tum an­swer'd not, but hurl'd His spear; down from the shoul­der, down it came, As on some par­tridge, in the corn a hawk, 400 That long has tow­er'd deg. in the airy clouds, deg.401 Drops like a plum­met; Sohrab saw it come, And sprang aside, quick as a flash; the spear Hiss'd, and went quiv­er­ing down in­to the sand, Which it sent fly­ing wide;--then Sohrab threw 405 In turn, and full struck deg. Rus­tum's shield; sharp rang, deg.406 The iron plates rang sharp, but turn'd the spear. And Rus­tum seized his club, which none but he Could wield; an un­lopp'd trunk it was, and huge, Still rough--like those which men in tree­less plains 410 To build them boats fish from the flood­ed rivers, Hy­pha­sis deg. or Hy­daspes, deg. when, high up deg.412 By their dark springs, the wind in win­ter-​time Hath made in Hi­malayan forests wrack, deg. deg.414 And strewn the chan­nels with torn boughs--so huge 415 The club which Rus­tum lift­ed now, and struck One stroke; but again Sohrab sprang aside, Lithe as the glanc­ing deg. snake, and the club came deg.418 Thun­der­ing to earth, and leapt from Rus­tum's hand. And Rus­tum fol­low'd his own blow, and fell 420 To his knees, and with his fin­gers clutch'd the sand; And now might Sohrab have un­sheathed his sword, And pierced the mighty Rus­tum while he lay Dizzy, and on his knees, and choked with sand; But he look'd on, and smiled, nor bared his sword, 425 But cour­te­ous­ly drew back, and spoke, and said:--

“Thou strik'st too hard! that club of thine will float Up­on the sum­mer-​floods, and not my bones. But rise, and be not wroth! not wroth am I; No, when I see thee, wrath for­sakes my soul. 430 Thou say'st, thou art not Rus­tum; be it so! Who art thou then, that canst so touch my soul? Boy as I am, I have seen bat­tles too-- Have wad­ed fore­most in their bloody waves, And heard their hol­low deg. roar of dy­ing men; deg.435 But nev­er was my heart thus touch'd be­fore. Are they from Heav­en, these soft­en­ings of the heart? O thou old war­rior, let us yield to Heav­en! Come, plant we here in earth our an­gry spears, And make a truce, and sit up­on this sand, 440 And pledge each oth­er in red wine, like friends, And thou shalt talk to me of Rus­tum's deeds. There are enough foes in the Per­sian host, Whom I may meet, and strike, and feel no pang; Cham­pi­ons enough Afrasiab has, whom thou 445 Mayst fight; fight _them_, when they con­front thy spear! But oh, let there be peace 'twixt thee and me!”

He ceased, but while he spake, Rus­tum had risen, And stood erect, trem­bling with rage; his club He left to lie, but had re­gain'd his spear, 450 Whose fiery point now in his mail'd right-​hand Blazed bright and bale­ful, like that au­tumn-​star, deg. deg.452 The bale­ful sign of fevers; dust had soil'd His state­ly crest, deg. and dimm'd his glit­ter­ing arms. deg.454 His breast heaved, his lips foam'd, and twice his voice 455 Was choked with rage; at last these words broke way:--

“Girl! nim­ble with thy feet, not with thy hands! Curl'd min­ion, dancer, coin­er of sweet words! Fight, let me hear thy hate­ful voice no more! Thou art not in Afrasiab's gar­dens now 460 With Tar­tar girls, with whom thou art wont to dance; But on the Oxus-​sands, and in the dance Of bat­tle, and with me, who make no play Of war; I fight it out, and hand to hand. Speak not to me of truce, and pledge, and wine! 465 Re­mem­ber all thy val­our deg.; try thy feints deg.466 And cun­ning! all the pity I had is gone; Be­cause thou hast shamed me be­fore both the hosts With thy light skip­ping tricks, and thy girl's wiles. deg.” deg.468

He spoke, and Sohrab kin­dled deg. at his taunts, deg.470 And he too drew his sword; at once they rush'd To­geth­er, as two ea­gles on one prey Come rush­ing down to­geth­er from the clouds, One from the east, one from the west; their shields Bash'd with a clang to­geth­er, and a din. 475 Rose, such as that the sinewy wood­cut­ters Make of­ten in the for­est's heart at morn, Of hew­ing ax­es, crash­ing trees--such blows Rus­tum and Sohrab on each oth­er hail'd. And you would say that sun and stars took part 480 In that un­nat­ural deg. con­flict; for a cloud deg. deg.481 Grew sud­den­ly in Heav­en, and dark'd the sun Over the fight­ers' heads; and a wind rose Un­der their feet, and moan­ing swept the plain, And in a sandy whirl­wind wrapp'd the pair. 485 In gloom they twain were wrapp'd, and they alone; For both the on-​look­ing hosts on ei­ther hand Stood in broad day­light, and the sky was pure, And the sun sparkled deg. on the Oxus stream. deg.489 But in the gloom they fought, with blood­shot eyes 490 And labour­ing breath; first Rus­tum struck the shield Which Sohrab held stiff out; the steel-​spiked spear Rent the tough plates, but fail'd to reach the skin, And Rus­tum pluck'd it back with an­gry groan. Then Sohrab with his sword smote Rus­tum's helm, deg. deg.495 Nor clove its steel quite through; but all the crest He shore deg. away, and that proud horse­hair plume, deg.497 Nev­er till now de­filed, sank to the dust; And Rus­tum bow'd his head deg.; but then the gloom deg.499 Grew black­er, thun­der rum­bled in the air, 500 And light­nings rent the cloud; and Ruksh, the horse, Who stood at hand, ut­ter'd a dread­ful cry;-- No horse's cry was that, most like the roar Of some pain'd desert-​li­on, who all day Hath trail'd the hunter's javelin in his side, 505 And comes at night to die up­on the sand. The two hosts heard that cry, and quaked for fear, And Oxus cur­dled deg. as it cross'd his stream. deg.508 But Sohrab heard, and quail'd not, but rush'd on, And struck again; and again Rus­tum bow'd 510 His head; but this time all the blade, like glass, Sprang in a thou­sand shiv­ers on the helm, And in the hand the hilt re­main'd alone. Then Rus­tum raised his head; his dread­ful eyes Glared, and he shook on high his men­ac­ing spear, 515 And shout­ed: _Rus­tum_ deg.!--Sohrab heard that shout, deg.516 And shrank amazed; back he re­coil'd one step, And scann'd with blink­ing eyes the ad­vanc­ing form; And then he stood be­wil­der'd; and he dropp'd His cov­er­ing shield, and the spear pierced his side. 520 He reel'd, and stag­ger­ing back, sank to the ground; And then the gloom dis­persed, and the wind fell, And the bright sun broke forth, and melt­ed all The cloud; and the two armies saw the pair-- Saw Rus­tum stand­ing, safe up­on his feet, 525 And Sohrab, wound­ed, on the bloody sand.

Then, with a bit­ter smile, deg. Rus­tum be­gan:-- deg.527 “Sohrab, thou thought­est in thy mind to kill A Per­sian lord this day, and strip his corpse, And bear thy tro­phies to Afrasiab's tent. 530 Or else that the great Rus­tum would come down Him­self to fight, and that thy wiles would move His heart to take a gift, and let thee go. And then all the Tar­tar host would praise Thy courage or thy craft, and spread thy fame, 535 To glad deg. thy fa­ther in his weak old age. deg.536 Fool, thou art slain, and by an un­known man! Dear­er to the red jack­als deg. shalt thou be deg.538 Than to thy friends, and to thy fa­ther old.”

And, with a fear­less mien, Sohrab replied:-- 540 “Un­known thou art; yet thy fierce vaunt is vain Thou dost not slay me, proud and boast­ful man! No! Rus­tum slays me, and this fil­ial heart. For were I match'd with ten such men as thee, And I were that which till to-​day I was, 545 They should be ly­ing here, I stand­ing there But that beloved name un­nerved my arm-- That name, and some­thing, I con­fess, in thee, Which trou­bles all my heart, and made my shield Fall; and thy spear trans­fix'd an un­arm'd foe. 550 And now thou boast­est, and in­sult'st my fate. But hear thou this, fierce man, trem­ble to hear The mighty Rus­tum shall avenge my death! My fa­ther, whom I seek through all the world, He shall avenge my death, and pun­ish thee!” 555

As when some hunter deg. in the spring hath found deg.556 A breed­ing ea­gle sit­ting on her nest, Up­on the crag­gy isle of a hill-​lake, And pierced her with an ar­row as she rose, And fol­low'd her to find her where she fell 560 Far off;--anon her mate comes wing­ing back From hunt­ing, and a great way off de­scries His hud­dling young left sole deg.; at that, he checks deg.563 His pin­ion, and with short un­easy sweeps Cir­cles above his eyry, with loud screams 565 Chid­ing his mate back to her nest; but she Lies dy­ing, with the ar­row in her side, In some far stony gorge out of his ken, A heap of flut­ter­ing feath­ers--nev­er more Shall the lake glass deg. her, fly­ing over it; deg.570 Nev­er the black and drip­ping precipices Echo her stormy scream as she sails by-- As that poor bird flies home, nor knows his loss, So Rus­tum knew not his own loss, but stood Over his dy­ing son, and knew him not. 575

But, with a cold in­cred­ulous voice, he said:-- “What prate is this of fa­thers and re­venge? The mighty Rus­tum nev­er had a son.”

And, with a fail­ing voice, Sohrab replied:-- “Ah yes, he had! and that lost son am I. 580 Sure­ly the news will one day reach his ear, Reach Rus­tum, where he sits, and tar­ries long, Some­where, I know not where, but far from here; And pierce him like a stab, and make him leap To arms, and cry for vengeance up­on thee. 585 Fierce man, be­think thee, for an on­ly son! What will that grief, what will that vengeance be? Oh, could I live, till I that grief had seen! Yet him I pity not so much, but her, My moth­er, who in Ad­er-​bai­jan dwells 590 With that old king, her fa­ther, who grows grey With age, and rules over the valiant Ko­ords. Her most I pity, who no more will see Sohrab re­turn­ing from the Tar­tar camp, With spoils and hon­our, when the war is done. 595 But a dark ru­mour will be bruit­ed up, deg. deg.596 From tribe to tribe, un­til it reach her ear; And then will that de­fence­less wom­an learn That Sohrab will re­joice her sight no more, But that in bat­tle with a name­less foe, 600 By the far-​dis­tant Oxus, he is slain.”

He spoke; and as he ceased, he wept aloud, Think­ing of her he left, and his own death. He spoke; but Rus­tum lis­ten'd, plunged in thought. Nor did he yet be­lieve it was his son 605 Who spoke, al­though he call'd back names he knew; For he had had sure tid­ings that the babe, Which was in Ad­er-​bai­jan born to him, Had been a puny girl, no boy at all-- So that sad moth­er sent him word, for fear 610 Rus­tum should seek the boy, to train in arms-- And so he deem'd that ei­ther Sohrab took, By a false boast, the style deg. of Rus­tum's son; deg.613 Or that men gave it him, to swell his fame. So deem'd he; yet he lis­ten'd, plunged in thought 615 And his soul set to grief, as the vast tide Of the bright rock­ing Ocean sets to shore At the full moon; tears gath­er'd in his eyes; For he re­mem­ber'd his own ear­ly youth, And all its bound­ing rap­ture; as, at dawn, 620 The shep­herd from his moun­tain-​lodge de­scries A far, bright city, smit­ten by the sun, Through many rolling clouds--so Rus­tum saw His youth; saw Sohrab's moth­er, in her bloom; And that old king, deg. her fa­ther, who loved well deg.625 His wan­der­ing guest, and gave him his fair child With joy; and all the pleas­ant life they led, They three, in that long-​dis­tant sum­mer-​time-- The cas­tle, and the dewy woods, and hunt And hound, and morn on those de­light­ful hills 630 In Ad­er-​bai­jan. And he saw that Youth, Of age and looks deg. to be his own dear son, deg.632 Piteous and love­ly, ly­ing on the sand; Like some rich hy­acinth which by the scythe Of an un­skil­ful gar­den­er has been cut, 635 Mow­ing the gar­den grass-​plots near its bed, And lies, a fra­grant tow­er of pur­ple bloom, On the mown, dy­ing grass--so Sohrab lay, Love­ly in death, up­on the com­mon sand. And Rus­tum gazed on him with grief, and said:-- 640

“O Sohrab, thou in­deed art such a son Whom Rus­tum, wert thou his, might well have loved. Yet here thou er­rest, Sohrab, or else men Have told thee false--thou art not Rus­tum's son. For Rus­tum had no son; one child he had-- 645 But one--a girl; who with her moth­er now Plies some light fe­male task, nor dreams of us-- Of us she dreams not, nor of wounds, nor war.”

But Sohrab an­swer'd him in wrath; for now The an­guish of the deep-​fix'd spear grew fierce, 650 And he de­sired to draw forth the steel, And let the blood flow free, and so to die-- But first he would con­vince his stub­born foe; And, ris­ing stern­ly on one arm, he said:--

“Man, who art thou who dost de­ny my words? 655 Truth sits up­on the lips of dy­ing men, And false­hood, while I lived, was far from mine. I tell thee, prick'd up­on this arm deg. I bear deg.658 That seal which Rus­tum to my moth­er gave, That she might prick it on the babe she bore.” 660

He spoke; and all the blood left Rus­tum's cheeks, And his knees tot­ter'd, and he smote his hand Against his breast, his heavy mailed hand, That the hard iron corslet deg. clank'd aloud; deg.663 And to his heart he press'd the oth­er hand, 665 And in a hol­low voice he spake, and said:--

“Sohrab, that were a proof which could not lie! If thou show this, then art thou Rus­tum's son.”

Then, with weak hasty fin­gers, Sohrab loosed His belt, and near the shoul­der bared his arm, 670 And show'd a sign in faint ver­mil­ion points Prick'd; as a cun­ning deg. work­man, in Pekin, deg.672 Pricks with ver­mil­ion some clear porce­lain vase, An em­per­or's gift--at ear­ly morn he paints, And all day long, and, when night comes, the lamp 675 Lights up his stu­dious fore­head and thin hands-- So del­icate­ly prick'd the sign ap­pear'd On Sohrab's arm, the sign of Rus­tum's seal. It was that grif­fin, deg. which of old rear'd Zal, deg.679 Rus­tum's great fa­ther, whom they left to die, 680 A help­less babe, among the moun­tain-​rocks; Him that kind crea­ture found, and rear'd, and loved-- Then Rus­tum took it for his glo­ri­ous sign. And Sohrab bared that im­age on his arm, And him­self scann'd it long with mourn­ful eyes, 685 And then he touch'd it with his hand and said:--

“How say'st thou? Is that sign the prop­er sign Of Rus­tum's son, or of some oth­er man's?”

He spoke; but Rus­tum gazed, and gazed, and stood Speech­less; and then he ut­ter'd one sharp cry: 690 _O boy_--_thy fa­ther!_--and his voice choked there. And then a dark cloud pass'd be­fore his eyes, And his head swam, and he sank down to earth. But Sohrab crawl'd to where he lay, and cast His arms about his neck, and kiss'd his lips, 695 And with fond fal­ter­ing fin­gers stroked his cheeks, Try­ing to call him back to life; and life Came back to Rus­tum, and he oped his eyes, And they stood wide with hor­ror; and he seized In both his hands the dust which lay around, 700 And threw it on his head, and smirch'd his hair,-- His hair, and face, and beard, and glit­ter­ing arms; And strong con­vul­sive groan­ings shook his breast, And his sobs choked him; and he clutch'd his sword, To draw it, and for ev­er let life out. 705 But Sohrab saw his thought, and held his hands, And with a sooth­ing voice he spake, and said:--

“Fa­ther, for­bear! for I but meet to-​day The doom which at my birth was writ­ten down In Heav­en, and thou art Heav­en's un­con­scious hand. deg. deg.710 Sure­ly my heart cried out that it was thou, When first I saw thee; and thy heart spoke too, I know it! but fate trod those prompt­ings down Un­der its iron heel; fate, fate en­gaged The strife, and hurl'd me on my fa­ther's spear. 715 But let us speak no more of this! I find My fa­ther; let me feel that I have found! deg. deg.717 Come, sit be­side me on this sand, and take My head be­twixt thy hands, and kiss my cheeks, And wash them with thy tears, and say: _My son!_ 720 Quick! quick! for num­ber'd are my sands of life, And swift; for like the light­ning to this field I came, and like the wind I go away-- Sud­den, and swift, and like a pass­ing wind. deg. deg.724 But it was writ in Heav­en that this should be.” 725

So said he, and his voice re­leased the heart Of Rus­tum, and his tears brake forth; he cast His arms round his son's neck, and wept aloud, And kiss'd him. And awe fell on both the hosts, When they saw Rus­tum's grief; and Ruksh, the horse, 730 With his head bow­ing to the ground and mane Sweep­ing the dust, came near, and in mute woe First to the one then to the oth­er moved His head, as if in­quir­ing what their grief Might mean; and from his dark, com­pas­sion­ate eyes, 735 The big warm tears roll'd down, and caked deg. the sand. deg.736 But Rus­tum chid him with stern voice, and said:--

“Ruksh, now thou grievest; but, O Ruksh, thy feet Should first have rot­ted on their nim­ble joints, Or ere they brought thy mas­ter to this field!” 740

But Sohrab look'd up­on the horse and said:-- “Is this, then, Ruksh? How of­ten, in past days, My moth­er told me of thee, thou brave steed, My ter­ri­ble fa­ther's ter­ri­ble horse! and said, That I should one day find thy lord and thee. 745 Come, let me lay my hand up­on thy mane! O Ruksh, thou art more for­tu­nate than I; For thou hast gone where I shall nev­er go, And snuff'd the breezes of my fa­ther's home. And thou hast trod the sands of Seis­tan, 750 And seen the Riv­er of Hel­mund, deg. and the Lake deg.751 Of Zir­rah deg.; and the aged Zal him­self deg.752 Has of­ten stroked thy neck, and giv­en thee food, Corn in a gold­en plat­ter soak'd with wine, And said: _O Ruksh! bear Rus­tum well!_--but I 755 Have nev­er known my grand­sire's fur­row'd face, Nor seen his lofty house in Seis­tan, Nor slaked my thirst at the clear Hel­mund stream; But lodged among my fa­ther's foes, and seen Afrasiab's cities on­ly, Samar­cand, 760 Bokhara, and lone Khi­va in the waste, And the black Toork­mun tents; and on­ly drunk The desert rivers, Moorghab deg. and Tejend, deg. deg.763 Ko­hik, deg. and where the Kalmuks feed their sheep, The north­ern Sir deg.; and this great Oxus stream, deg.765 The yel­low Oxus, by whose brink I die.”

Then, with a heavy groan, Rus­tum be­wail'd:-- “Oh, that its waves were flow­ing over me! Oh, that I saw its grains of yel­low silt Roll tum­bling in the cur­rent o'er my head!” 770

But, with a grave mild voice, Sohrab replied:-- “De­sire not that, my fa­ther! thou must live. For some are born to do great deeds, and live, As some are born to be ob­scured, and die. Do thou the deeds I die too young to do, 775 And reap a sec­ond glo­ry in thine age; Thou art my fa­ther, and thy gain is mine. But come! thou seest this great host of men Which fol­low me; I pray thee, slay not these! Let me en­treat for them; what have they done? 780 They fol­low'd me, my hope, my fame, my star. Let them all cross the Oxus back in peace. But me thou must bear hence, not send with them, But car­ry me with thee to Seis­tan, And place me on a bed, and mourn for me, 785 Thou, and the snow-​hair'd Zal, and all thy friends. And thou must lay me in that love­ly earth, And heap a state­ly mound deg. above my bones, deg.788 And plant a far-​seen pil­lar over all. That so the pass­ing horse­man on the waste 790 May see my tomb a great way off, and cry: _Sohrab, the mighty Rus­tum's son, lies there, Whom his great fa­ther did in ig­no­rance kill!_ And I be not for­got­ten in my grave.”

And, with a mourn­ful voice, Rus­tum replied:-- 795 “Fear not! as thou hast said, Sohrab, my son, So shall it be; for I will burn my tents, And quit the host, and bear thee hence with me, And car­ry thee away to Seis­tan, And place thee on a bed, and mourn for thee, 800 With the snow-​head­ed Zal, and all my friends. And I will lay thee in that love­ly earth, And heap a state­ly mound above thy bones, And plant a far-​seen pil­lar over all, And men shall not for­get thee in thy grave. 805 And I will spare thy host; yea, let them go! Let them all cross the Oxus back in peace! What should I do with slay­ing any more? For would that all that I have ev­er slain Might be once more alive; my bit­ter­est foes, 810 And they who were call'd cham­pi­ons in their time, And through whose death I won that fame I have-- And I were noth­ing but a com­mon man, A poor, mean sol­dier, and with­out renown, So thou might­est live too, my son, my son! 815 Or rather would that I, even I my­self, Might now be ly­ing on this bloody sand, Near death, and by an ig­no­rant stroke of thine, Not thou of mine! and I might die, not thou; And I, not thou, be borne to Seis­tan; 820 And Zal might weep above my grave, not thine; And say: _O son, I weep thee not too sore, For will­ing­ly, I know, thou met'st thine end!_ But now in blood and bat­tles was my youth, And full of blood and bat­tles is my age, 825 And I shall nev­er end this life of blood.”

Then, at the point of death, Sohrab replied:-- “A life of blood in­deed, thou dread­ful man! But thou shalt yet have peace; on­ly not now, Not yet! but thou shalt have it on that day, deg. deg.830 When thou shalt sail in a high-​mast­ed ship, Thou and the oth­er peers of Kai Khos­roo, Re­turn­ing home over the salt blue sea, From lay­ing thy dear mas­ter in his grave.”

And Rus­tum gazed in Sohrab's face, and said:-- 835 “Soon be that day, my son, and deep that sea! Till then, if fate so wills, let me en­dure.”

He spoke; and Sohrab smiled on him, and took The spear, and drew it from his side, and eased His wound's im­pe­ri­ous an­guish; but the blood 840 Came welling from the open gash, and life Flow'd with the stream;--all down his cold white side The crim­son tor­rent ran, dim now and soil'd, Like the soil'd tis­sue of white vi­olets Left, fresh­ly gath­er'd, on their na­tive bank, 845 By chil­dren whom their nurs­es call with haste. In­doors from the sun's eye; his head droop'd low, His limbs grew slack; mo­tion­less, white, he lay-- White, with eyes closed; on­ly when heavy gasps, Deep heavy gasps quiv­er­ing through all his frame, 850 Con­vulsed him back to life, he open'd them, And fix'd them fee­bly on his fa­ther's face; Till now all strength was ebb'd, and from his limbs Un­will­ing­ly the spir­it fled away, Re­gret­ting the warm man­sion which it left, 855 And youth, and bloom, and this de­light­ful world.

So, on the bloody sand, Sohrab lay dead; And the great Rus­tum drew his horse­man's cloak Down o'er his face, and sate by his dead son. As those black gran­ite pil­lars, once high-​rear'd 860 By Jemshid in Perse­po­lis, deg. to bear deg.861 His house, now 'mid their bro­ken flights of steps Lie prone, enor­mous, down the moun­tain side-- So in the sand lay Rus­tum by his son.

And night came down over the solemn waste, 865 And the two gaz­ing hosts, and that sole pair, And dark­en'd all; and a cold fog, with night, Crept from the Oxus. Soon a hum arose, As of a great as­sem­bly loosed, and fires Be­gan to twin­kle through the fog; for now 870 Both armies moved to camp, and took their meal; The Per­sians took it on the open sands South­ward, the Tar­tars by the riv­er marge; And Rus­tum and his son were left alone.

But the ma­jes­tic riv­er float­ed on, 875 Out of the mist and hum of that low land, In­to the frosty starlight, and there moved, Re­joic­ing, through the hush'd Choras­mi­an deg. waste, deg.878 Un­der the soli­tary moon;--he flow'd Right for the po­lar star, deg. past Orgun­je, deg. deg.880 Brim­ming, and bright, and large; then sands be­gin To hem his wa­tery march, and dam his streams, And split his cur­rents; that for many a league The shorn and par­cell'd Oxus strains along Through beds of sand and mat­ted rushy isles-- 885 Oxus, for­get­ting the bright speed he had In his high moun­tain-​cra­dle in Pamere, A foil'd cir­cuitous wan­der­er--till at last The long'd-​for dash of waves is heard, and wide His lu­mi­nous home deg. of wa­ters opens, bright deg.890 And tran­quil, from whose floor the new-​bathed stars deg. deg.891 Emerge, and shine up­on the Ar­al Sea.

SAINT BRAN­DAN deg.

Saint Bran­dan sails the north­ern main; The broth­er­hood of saints are glad. He greets them once, he sails again; So late!--such storms!--The Saint is mad!

He heard, across the howl­ing seas, 5 Chime con­vent-​bells on win­try nights; He saw, on spray-​swept He­brides, deg. deg.7 Twin­kle the monastery-​lights;

But north, still north, Saint Bran­dan steer'd-- And now no bells, no con­vents more! 10 The hurtling Po­lar lights deg. are near'd, deg.11 The sea with­out a hu­man shore.

At last--(it was the Christ­mas night; Stars shone af­ter a day of storm)-- He sees float past an ice­berg white, 15 And on it--Christ!--a liv­ing form.

That furtive mien, that scowl­ing eye, Of hair that red deg. and tuft­ed fell-- deg.18 It is--Oh, where shall Bran­dan fly?-- The traitor Ju­das, out of hell! 20

Palsied with ter­ror, Bran­dan sate deg.; deg.21 The moon was bright, the ice­berg near. He hears a voice sigh humbly: "Wait! By high per­mis­sion I am here.

"One mo­ment wait, thou holy man 25 On earth my crime, my death, they knew; My name is un­der all men's ban-- Ah, tell them of my respite too!

"Tell them, one blessed Christ­mas-​night-- (It was the first af­ter I came, 30 Breath­ing self-​mur­der, deg. fren­zy, spite, deg.31 To rue my guilt in end­less flame)--

"I felt, as I in tor­ment lay 'Mid the souls plagued by heav­en­ly pow­er, An an­gel touch my arm, and say: 35 _Go hence, and cool thy­self an hour!_

"'Ah, whence this mer­cy, Lord?' I said. _The Lep­er rec­ol­lect,_ deg. said he, deg.38 _Who ask'd the passers-​by for aid, In Jop­pa, deg. and thy char­ity._ deg.40

"Then I re­mem­ber'd how I went, In Jop­pa, through the pub­lic street, One morn when the siroc­co spent Its storms of dust with burn­ing heat;

"And in the street a lep­er sate, 45 Shiv­er­ing with fever, naked, old; Sand raked his sores from heel to pate, The hot wind fever'd him five-​fold.

"He gazed up­on me as I pass'd And mur­mur'd: _Help me, or I die!_-- 50 To the poor wretch my cloak I cast, Saw him look eased, and hur­ried by.

"Oh, Bran­dan, think what grace di­vine, What bless­ing must full good­ness show­er, When frag­ment of it small, like mine, 55 Hath such in­es­timable pow­er!

"Well-​fed, well-​clothed, well-​friend­ed, I Did that chance act of good, that one! Then went my way to kill and lie-- For­got my good as soon as done. 60

"That germ of kind­ness, in the womb Of mer­cy caught, did not ex­pire; Out­lives my guilt, out­lives my doom, And friends me in the pit of fire.

"Once ev­ery year, when car­ols wake, 65 On earth, the Christ­mas-​night's re­pose, Aris­ing from the sin­ner's lake, I jour­ney to these heal­ing snows.

“I stanch with ice my burn­ing breast, With si­lence balm my whirling brain. 70 Oh, Bran­dan! to this hour of rest That Jop­pan lep­er's ease was pain.”--

Tears start­ed to Saint Bran­dan's eyes; He bow'd his head, he breathed a prayer-- Then look'd, and lo, the frosty skies! 75 The ice­berg, and no Ju­das there!

THE FOR­SAK­EN MER­MAN deg.

Come, dear chil­dren, let us away; Down and away be­low! Now my broth­ers call from the bay, Now the great winds shore­ward blow, Now the salt tides sea­ward flow; 5 Now the wild white hors­es deg. play, deg.6 Champ and chafe and toss in the spray. Chil­dren dear, let us away! This way, this way!

Call her once be­fore you go-- 10 Call once yet! In a voice that she will know: “Mar­garet deg.! Mar­garet!” deg.13 Chil­dren's voic­es should be dear (Call once more) to a moth­er's ear; 15 Chil­dren's voic­es, wild with pain-- Sure­ly she will come again! Call her once and come away; This way, this way! “Moth­er dear, we can­not stay! 20 The wild white hors­es foam and fret.” Mar­garet! Mar­garet!

Come, dear chil­dren, come away down; Call no more! One last look at the white-​wall'd town, 25 And the lit­tle grey church on the windy shore; Then come down! She will not come though you call all day; Come away, come away!

Chil­dren dear, was it yes­ter­day 30 We heard the sweet bells over the bay? In the cav­erns where we lay, Through the surf and through the swell, The far-​off sound of a sil­ver bell? Sand-​strewn cav­erns, cool and deep, 35 Where the winds are all asleep; Where the spent lights quiver and gleam, Where the salt weed sways in the stream, Where the sea-​beasts, ranged deg. all round, deg.39 Feed in the ooze of their pas­ture-​ground; 40 Where the sea-​snakes coil and twine, Dry their mail deg. and bask in the brine; deg.42 Where great whales come sail­ing by, Sail and sail, with un­shut eye, Round the world for ev­er and aye? 45 When did mu­sic come this way? Chil­dren dear, was it yes­ter­day?

Chil­dren dear, was it yes­ter­day (Call yet once) that she went away? Once she sate with you and me, 50 On a red gold throne in the heart of the sea, And the youngest sate on her knee. She comb'd its bright hair, and she tend­ed it well, When down swung the sound of a far-​off bell. deg. deg.54 She sigh'd, she look'd up through the clear green sea; 55 She said: “I must go, for my kins­folk pray In the lit­tle grey church on the shore to-​day. 'Twill be East­er-​time in the world--ah me! And I lose my poor soul, Mer­man! here with thee.” I said: “Go up, dear heart, through the waves; 60 Say thy prayer, and come back to the kind sea-​caves!” She smiled, she went up through the surf in the bay. Chil­dren dear, was it yes­ter­day?

Chil­dren dear, were we long alone? “The sea grows stormy, the lit­tle ones moan; 65 Long prayers,” I said, “in the world they say; Come!” I said; and we rose through the surf in the bay. We went up the beach, by the sandy down Where the sea-​stocks bloom, to the white-​wall'd town; Through the nar­row paved streets, where all was still, 70 To the lit­tle grey church on the windy hill. From the church came a mur­mur of folk at their prayers, But we stood with­out in the cold blow­ing airs. We climb'd on the graves, on the stones worn with rains, And we gazed up the aisle through the small lead­ed panes. 75 She sate by the pil­lar; we saw her clear: “Mar­garet, hist! come quick, we are here! Dear heart,” I said, “we are long alone; The sea grows stormy, the lit­tle ones moan.” But, ah, she gave me nev­er a look, 80 For her eyes were seal'd deg. to the holy book! deg.81 Loud prays the priest; shut stands the door. Come away, chil­dren, call no more! Come away, come down, call no more!

Down, down, down! 85 Down to the depths of the sea! She sits at her wheel in the hum­ming town, Singing most joy­ful­ly. Hark what she sings: “O joy, O joy, For the hum­ming street, and the child with its toy! 90 For the priest, and the bell, and the holy well; For the wheel where I spun, And the blessed light of the sun deg.!” deg.93 And so she sings her fill, Singing most joy­ful­ly, 95 Till the spin­dle drops from her hand, And the whizzing wheel stands still. She steals to the win­dow, and looks at the sand, And over the sand at the sea; And her eyes are set in a stare; 100 And anon there breaks a sigh, And anon there drops a tear, From a sor­row-​cloud­ed eye, And a heart sor­row-​laden, A long, long sigh; 105 For the cold strange eyes of a lit­tle Mer­maid­en And the gleam of her gold­en hair.

Come away, away, chil­dren; Come chil­dren, come down! The hoarse wind blows cold­ly; 110 Lights shine in the town. She will start from her slum­ber When gusts shake the door; She will hear the winds howl­ing, Will hear the waves roar. 115 We shall see, while above us The waves roar and whirl, A ceil­ing of am­ber, A pave­ment of pearl. Singing: “Here came a mor­tal, 120 But faith­less was she! And alone dwell for ev­er The kings of the sea.”

But, chil­dren, at mid­night, When soft the winds blow, 125 When clear falls the moon­light, When spring-​tides are low; When sweet airs come sea­ward From heaths starr'd with broom, deg. deg.129 And high rocks throw mild­ly 130 On the blanch'd sands a gloom; Up the still, glis­ten­ing beach­es, Up the creeks we will hie, Over banks of bright sea­weed The ebb-​tide leaves dry. 135 We will gaze, from the sand-​hills, At the white, sleep­ing town; At the church on the hill-​side-- And then come back down. Singing: “There dwells a loved one, 140 But cru­el is she! She left lone­ly for ev­er The kings of the sea.”

TRIS­TRAM AND ISEULT deg.

I

TRIS­TRAM

_Tris­tram_. Is she not come deg.? The mes­sen­ger was sure-- Prop me up­on the pil­lows once again-- Raise me, my page! this can­not long en­dure. --Christ, what a night! how the sleet whips the pane! What lights will those out to the north­ward be deg.? deg.5

_The Page_. The lanterns of the fish­ing-​boats at sea.

_Tris­tram_. Soft--who is that, stands by the dy­ing fire?

_The Page_. Iseult. deg. deg.8

_Tris­tram_. Ah! not the Iseult I de­sire.

* * * * *

What Knight is this so weak and pale, Though the locks are yet brown on his no­ble head, 10 Propt on pil­lows in his bed, Gaz­ing sea­ward for the light Of some ship that fights the gale On this wild De­cem­ber night? Over the sick man's feet is spread 15 A dark green for­est-​dress; A gold harp leans against the bed, Rud­dy in the fire's light. I know him by his harp of gold, Fa­mous in Arthur's court deg. of old; deg.20 I know him by his for­est-​dress-- The peer­less hunter, harp­er, knight, Tris­tram of Ly­oness. deg. deg.23 What La­dy is this, whose silk at­tire Gleams so rich in the light of the fire? 25 The ringlets on her shoul­ders ly­ing In their flit­ting lus­tre vy­ing With the clasp of bur­nish'd gold Which her heavy robe doth hold. Her looks are mild, her fin­gers slight 30 As the driv­en snow are white deg.; deg.31 But her cheeks are sunk and pale. Is it that the bleak sea-​gale Beat­ing from the At­lantic sea On this coast of Brit­tany, 35 Nips too keen­ly the sweet flow­er? Is it that a deep fa­tigue Hath come on her, a chilly fear, Pass­ing all her youth­ful hour Spin­ning with her maid­ens here, 40 List­less­ly through the win­dow-​bars Gaz­ing sea­wards many a league, From her lone­ly shore-​built tow­er, While the knights are at the wars? Or, per­haps, has her young heart 45 Felt al­ready some deep­er smart, Of those that in se­cret the heart-​strings rive, Leav­ing her sunk and pale, though fair? Who is this snow­drop by the sea?-- I know her by her mild­ness rare, 50 Her snow-​white hands, her gold­en hair; I know her by her rich silk dress, And her frag­ile love­li­ness-- The sweet­est Chris­tian soul alive, Iseult of Brit­tany. 55

Iseult of Brit­tany?--but where Is that oth­er Iseult fair, That proud, first Iseult, Corn­wall's queen? She, whom Tris­tram's ship of yore From Ire­land to Corn­wall bore, 60 To Tyn­tagel, deg. to the side deg.61 Of King Marc, deg. to be his bride? deg.62 She who, as they voy­aged, quaff'd With Tris­tram that spiced mag­ic draught, Which since then for ev­er rolls 65 Through their blood, and binds their souls, Work­ing love, but work­ing teen deg.?--. deg.67 There were two Iseults who did sway Each her hour of Tris­tram's day; But one pos­sess'd his wan­ing time, 70 The oth­er his re­splen­dent prime. Be­hold her here, the pa­tient flow­er, Who pos­sess'd his dark­er hour! Iseult of the Snow-​White Hand Watch­es pale by Tris­tram's bed. 75 She is here who had his gloom, Where art thou who hadst his bloom? One such kiss as those of yore Might thy dy­ing knight re­store! Does the love-​draught work no more? 80 Art thou cold, or false, or dead, Iseult of Ire­land?

* * * * *

Loud howls the wind, sharp pat­ters the rain, And the knight sinks back on his pil­lows again. He is weak with fever and pain; 85 And his spir­it is not clear. Hark! he mut­ters in his sleep, As he wan­ders deg. far from here, deg.88 Changes place and time of year, And his closed eye doth sweep 90 O'er some fair un­win­try sea, deg. deg.91 Not this fierce At­lantic deep, While he mut­ters bro­ken­ly:--

_Tris­tram_. The calm sea shines, loose hang the ves­sel's sails; Be­fore us are the sweet green fields of Wales, 95 And over­head the cloud­less sky of May.-- _“Ah, would I were in those green fields at play, Not pent on ship-​board this de­li­cious day! Tris­tram, I pray thee, of thy cour­tesy, Reach me my gold­en phial stands by thee, 100 But pledge me in it first for cour­tesy.”_-- Ha! dost thou start? are thy lips blanch'd like mine? Child, 'tis no true draught this, 'tis poi­son'd wine! Iseult!...

* * * * *

Ah, sweet an­gels, let him dream! 105 Keep his eye­lids! let him seem Not this fever-​wast­ed wight Thinn'd and paled be­fore his time, But the bril­liant youth­ful knight In the glo­ry of his prime, 110 Sit­ting in the gild­ed barge, At thy side, thou love­ly charge, Bend­ing gai­ly o'er thy hand, Iseult of Ire­land! And she too, that princess fair, 115 If her bloom be now less rare, Let her have her youth again-- Let her be as she was then! Let her have her proud dark eyes, And her petu­lant quick replies-- 120 Let her sweep her daz­zling hand With its ges­ture of com­mand, And shake back her raven hair With the old im­pe­ri­ous air! As of old, so let her be, 125 That first Iseult, princess bright, Chat­ting with her youth­ful knight As he steers her o'er the sea, Quit­ting at her fa­ther's will The green isle deg. where she was bred, deg.130 And her bow­er in Ire­land, For the surge-​beat Cor­nish strand Where the prince whom she must wed Dwells on loud Tyn­tagel's hill, deg. deg.134 High above the sound­ing sea. 135 And that po­tion rare her moth­er Gave her, that her fu­ture lord, Gave her, that King Marc and she, Might drink it on their mar­riage-​day, And for ev­er love each oth­er-- 140 Let her, as she sits on board, Ah, sweet saints, un­wit­ting­ly! See it shine, and take it up, And to Tris­tram laugh­ing say: “Sir Tris­tram, of thy cour­tesy, 145 Pledge me in my gold­en cup!” Let them drink it--let their hands Trem­ble, and their cheeks be flame, As they feel the fa­tal bands Of a love they dare not name, 150 With a wild de­li­cious pain, Twine about their hearts again! Let the ear­ly sum­mer be Once more round them, and the sea Blue, and o'er its mir­ror kind 155 Let the breath of the May-​wind, Wan­der­ing through their droop­ing sails, Die on the green fields of Wales! Let a dream like this re­store What his eye must see no more! deg. deg.160

_Tris­tram_. Chill blows the wind, the pleasaunce-​walks deg. are drear-- deg.161 Mad­cap, what jest was this, to meet me here? Were feet like those made for so wild a way? The south­ern win­ter-​par­lour, by my fay, deg. deg.164 Had been the like­li­est tryst­ing-​place to-​day! 165 _“Tris­tram!--nay, nay--thou must not take my hand!-- Tris­tram!--sweet love!--we are be­tray'd--out-​plann'd. Fly--save thy­self--save me!--I dare not stay.”_-- One last kiss first!--_“'Tis vain--to horse--away!”_

* * * * *

Ah! sweet saints, his dream doth move 170 Faster sure­ly than it should, From the fever in his blood! All the spring-​time of his love Is al­ready gone and past, And in­stead there­of is seen 175 Its win­ter, which en­dureth still-- Tyn­tagel on its surge-​beat hill, The pleasaunce-​walks, the weep­ing queen, The fly­ing leaves, the strain­ing blast, And that long, wild kiss--their last. deg. deg.180 And this rough De­cem­ber-​night, And his burn­ing fever-​pain, Min­gle with his hur­ry­ing dream, Till they rule it, till he seem The press'd fugi­tive again, 185 The love-​des­per­ate ban­ish'd knight With a fire in his brain Fly­ing o'er the stormy main. --Whith­er does he wan­der now? Hap­ly in his dreams the wind 190 Wafts him here, and lets him find The love­ly or­phan child deg. again deg. deg.192 In her cas­tle by the coast; The youngest, fairest chate­laine, deg. deg.194 Whom this realm of France can boast, 195 Our snow­drop by the At­lantic sea, Iseult of Brit­tany. And--for through the hag­gard air, The stain'd arms, the mat­ted hair Of that stranger-​knight ill-​starr'd, deg. deg.200 There gleam'd some­thing, which re­call'd The Tris­tram who in bet­ter days Was Launcelot's guest at Joy­ous Gard deg.-- deg.203 Wel­comed here, deg. and here in­stall'd, deg.204 Tend­ed of his fever here, 205 Hap­ly he seems again to move His young guardian's heart with love In his ex­iled lone­li­ness, In his state­ly, deep dis­tress, With­out a word, with­out a tear. 210 --Ah! 'tis well he should re­trace His tran­quil life in this lone place; His gen­tle bear­ing at the side Of his timid youth­ful bride; His long ram­bles by the shore 215 On win­ter-​evenings, when the roar Of the near waves came, sad­ly grand, Through the dark, up the drown'd sand, Or his end­less rever­ies In the woods, where the gleams play 220 On the grass un­der the trees, Pass­ing the long sum­mer's day Idle as a mossy stone In the for­est-​depths alone, The chase ne­glect­ed, and his hound 225 Couch'd be­side him on the ground. deg. deg.226 --Ah! what trou­ble's on his brow? Hith­er let him wan­der now; Hith­er, to the qui­et hours Pass'd among these heaths of ours. 230 By the grey At­lantic sea; Hours, if not of ec­sta­sy, From vi­olent an­guish sure­ly free!

_Tris­tram_. All red with blood the whirling riv­er flows, The wide plain rings, the dazed air throbs with blows. 235 Up­on us are the chival­ry of Rome-- Their spears are down, their steeds are bathed in foam. deg. deg.237 “Up, Tris­tram, up,” men cry, “thou moon­struck knight deg.! deg.238 What foul fiend rides thee deg.? On in­to the fight!” deg.239 --Above the din her deg. voice is in my ears; deg.240 I see her form glide through the cross­ing spears.-- Iseult!...

* * * * *

Ah! he wan­ders forth again deg.; deg.243 We can­not keep him; now, as then, There's a se­cret in his breast deg. deg.245 Which will nev­er let him rest. These mus­ing fits in the green wood They cloud the brain, they dull the blood! --His sword is sharp, his horse is good; Be­yond the moun­tains will he see 250 The fa­mous towns of Italy, And la­bel with the blessed sign deg. deg.252 The hea­then Sax­ons on the Rhine. At Arthur's side he fights once more With the Ro­man Em­per­or. deg. deg.255 There's many a gay knight where he goes Will help him to for­get his care; The march, the lea­guer, deg. Heav­en's blithe air, deg.258 The neigh­ing steeds, the ring­ing blows-- Sick pin­ing comes not where these are. 260 Ah! what boots it, deg. that the jest deg.261 Light­ens ev­ery oth­er brow, What, that ev­ery oth­er breast Dances as the trum­pets blow, If one's own heart beats not light 265 On the waves of the toss'd fight, If one­self can­not get free From the clog of mis­ery? Thy love­ly youth­ful wife grows pale Watch­ing by the salt sea-​tide 270 With her chil­dren at her side For the gleam of thy white sail. Home, Tris­tram, to thy halls again! To our lone­ly sea com­plain, To our forests tell thy pain! 275

_Tris­tram_. All round the for­est sweeps off, black in shade, But it is moon­light in the open glade; And in the bot­tom of the glade shine clear The for­est-​chapel and the foun­tain near. --I think, I have a fever in my blood; 280 Come, let me leave the shad­ow of this wood, Ride down, and bathe my hot brow in the flood. --Mild shines the cold spring in the moon's clear light; God! 'tis _her_ face plays in the wa­ters bright. “Fair love,” she says, “canst thou for­get so soon, 285 At this soft hour un­der this sweet moon?”-- Iseult!...

* * * * *

Ah, poor soul! if this be so, On­ly death can balm thy woe. The soli­tudes of the green wood 290 Had no medicine for thy mood; The rush­ing bat­tle clear'd thy blood As lit­tle as did soli­tude. --Ah! his eye­lids slow­ly break Their hot seals, and let him wake; 295 What new change shall we now see? A hap­pi­er? Worse it can­not be.

_Tris­tram_. Is my page here? Come, turn me to the fire! Up­on the win­dow-​panes the moon shines bright; The wind is down--but she'll not come to-​night. 300 Ah no! she is asleep in Corn­wall now, Far hence; her dreams are fair--smooth is her brow Of me she recks not, deg. nor my vain de­sire. deg.303

--I have had dreams, I have had dreams, my page, Would take a score years from a strong man's age; 305 And with a blood like mine, will leave, I fear, Scant leisure for a sec­ond mes­sen­ger.

--My princess, art thou there? Sweet, do not wait! To bed, and sleep! my fever is gone by; To-​night my page shall keep me com­pa­ny. 310 Where do the chil­dren sleep? kiss them for me! Poor child, thou art al­most as pale as I; This comes of nurs­ing long and watch­ing late. To bed--good night! deg. deg.314

* * * * *

She left the gleam-​lit fire­place, 315 She came to the bed-​side; She took his hands in hers--her tears Down on his wast­ed fin­gers rain'd. She raised her eyes up­on his face-- Not with a look of wound­ed pride, 320 A look as if the heart com­plained-- Her look was like a sad em­brace; The gaze of one who can di­vine A grief, and sym­pa­thise. Sweet flow­er! thy chil­dren's eyes 325 Are not more in­no­cent than thine. But they sleep in shel­ter'd rest, Like help­less birds in the warm nest, On the cas­tle's south­ern side; Where fee­bly comes the mourn­ful roar 330 Of buf­fet­ing wind and surg­ing tide Through many a room and cor­ri­dor. --Full on their win­dow the moon's ray Makes their cham­ber as bright as day. It shines up­on the blank white walls, 335 And on the snowy pil­low falls, And on two an­gel-​heads doth play Turn'd to each oth­er--the eyes closed, The lash­es on the cheeks re­posed. Round each sweet brow the cap close-​set 340 Hard­ly lets peep the gold­en hair; Through the soft-​open'd lips the air Scarce­ly moves the cov­er­let. One lit­tle wan­der­ing arm is thrown At ran­dom on the coun­ter­pane, 345 And of­ten the fin­gers close in haste As if their ba­by-​own­er chased The but­ter­flies again. This stir they have, and this alone; 350 But else they are so still! --Ah, tired mad­caps! you lie still; But were you at the win­dow now, To look forth on the fairy sight Of your il­lu­mined haunts by night, 355 To see the park-​glades where you play Far love­li­er than they are by day, To see the sparkle on the eaves, And up­on ev­ery gi­ant-​bough Of those old oaks, whose wet red leaves 360 Are jew­ell'd with bright drops of rain-- How would your voic­es run again! And far be­yond the sparkling trees Of the cas­tle-​park one sees The bare heaths spread­ing, clear as day, 365 Moor be­hind moor, far, far away, In­to the heart of Brit­tany. And here and there, lock'd by the land, Long in­lets of smooth glit­ter­ing sea, And many a stretch of wa­tery sand 370 All shin­ing in the white moon-​beams-- But you see fair­er in your dreams!

What voic­es are these on the clear night-​air? What lights in the court--what steps on the stair?

II

ISEULT OF IRE­LAND deg.

_Tris­tram_. Raise the light, my page! that I may see her.-- Thou art come at last, then, haughty Queen! Long I've wait­ed, long I've fought my fever; Late thou comest, cru­el thou hast been.

_Iseult_. Blame me not, poor suf­fer­er! that I tar­ried; 5 Bound I was, I could not break the band. Chide not with the past, but feel the present! I am here--we meet--I hold thy hand.

_Tris­tram_. Thou art come, in­deed--thou hast re­join'd me; Thou hast dared it--but too late to save. 10 Fear not now that men should tax thine hon­our! I am dy­ing: build--(thou may'st)--my grave!

_Iseult_. Tris­tram, ah, for love of Heav­en, speak kind­ly! What, I hear these bit­ter words from thee? Sick with grief I am, and faint with trav­el-- 15 Take my hand--dear Tris­tram, look on me!

_Tris­tram_. I for­got, thou comest from thy voy­age-- Yes, the spray is on thy cloak and hair. But thy dark eyes are not dimm'd, proud Iseult! And thy beau­ty nev­er was more fair. 20

_Iseult_. Ah, harsh flat­ter­er! let alone my beau­ty! I, like thee, have left my youth afar. Take my hand, and touch these wast­ed fin­gers-- See my cheek and lips, how white they are!

_Tris­tram_. Thou art paler--but thy sweet charm, Iseult! 25 Would not fade with the dull years away. Ah, how fair thou stand­est in the moon­light! I for­give thee, Iseult!--thou wilt stay?

_Iseult_. Fear me not, I will be al­ways with thee; I will watch thee, tend thee, soothe thy pain; 30 Sing thee tales of true, long-​part­ed lovers, Join'd at evening of their days again.

_Tris­tram_. No, thou shalt not speak! I should be find­ing Some­thing al­ter'd in thy court­ly tone. Sit--sit by me! I will think, we've lived so 35 In the green wood, all our lives, alone.

_Iseult_. Al­ter'd, Tris­tram? Not in courts, be­lieve me, Love like mine is al­ter'd in the breast; Court­ly life is light and can­not reach it-- Ah! it lives, be­cause so deep-​sup­press'd! 40

What, thou think'st men speak in court­ly cham­bers Words by which the wretched are con­soled? What, thou think'st this aching brow was cool­er, Cir­cled, Tris­tram, by a band of gold?

Roy­al state with Marc, my deep-​wrong'd hus­band-- 45 That was bliss to make my sor­rows flee! Silken courtiers whis­per­ing honied noth­ings deg.-- Those were friends to make me false to thee!

Ah, on which, if both our lots were bal­anced, Was in­deed the heav­iest bur­den thrown-- 50 Thee, a pin­ing ex­ile in thy for­est, Me, a smil­ing queen up­on my throne?

Vain and strange de­bate, where both have suf­fer'd, Both have pass'd a youth con­sumed and sad, Both have brought their anx­ious day to evening, 55 And have now short space for be­ing glad!

Join'd we are hence­forth; nor will thy peo­ple, Nor thy younger Iseult take it ill, That a for­mer ri­val shares her of­fice, When she sees her hum­bled, pale, and still. 60

I, a fad­ed watch­er by thy pil­low, I, a stat­ue on thy chapel-​floor, Pour'd in prayer be­fore the Vir­gin-​Moth­er, Rouse no anger, make no ri­vals more.

She will cry: “Is this the foe I dread­ed? 65 This his idol? this that roy­al bride? Ah, an hour of health would purge his eye­sight! Stay, pale queen! for ev­er by my side.”

Hush, no words! that smile, I see, for­gives me. I am now thy nurse, I bid thee sleep. 70 Close thine eyes--this flood­ing moon­light blinds them!-- Nay, all's well again! thou must not weep.

_Tris­tram_. I am hap­py! yet I feel, there's some­thing Swells my heart, and takes my breath away. Through a mist I see thee; near--come near­er! 75 Bend--bend down!--I yet have much to say.

_Iseult_. Heav­en! his head sinks back up­on the pil­low-- Tris­tram! Tris­tram! let thy heart not fail! Call on God and on the holy an­gels! What, love, courage!--Christ! he is so pale. 80

_Tris­tram_. Hush, 'tis vain, I feel my end ap­proach­ing! This is what my moth­er said should be, When the fierce pains took her in the for­est, The deep draughts of death, in bear­ing me.

“Son,” she said, “thy name shall be of sor­row; 85 Tris­tram art thou call'd for my death's sake.” So she said, and died in the drear for­est. Grief since then his home with me doth make. deg. deg.88

I am dy­ing.--Start not, nor look wild­ly! Me, thy liv­ing friend, thou canst not save. 90 But, since liv­ing we were un­unit­ed, Go not far, O Iseult! from my grave.

Close mine eyes, then seek the princess Iseult; Speak her fair, she is of roy­al blood! Say, I will'd so, that thou stay be­side me-- 95 She will grant it; she is kind and good.

Now to sail the seas of death I leave thee-- One last kiss up­on the liv­ing shore!

_Iseult_. Tris­tram!--Tris­tram!--stay--re­ceive me with thee! Iseult leaves thee, Tris­tram! nev­er more. deg. deg.100

* * * * *

You see them clear--the moon shines bright. Slow, slow and soft­ly, where she stood, She sinks up­on the ground;--her hood Has fall­en back; her arms out­spread Still hold her lover's hand; her head 105 Is bow'd, half-​buried, on the bed. O'er the blanch'd sheet her raven hair Lies in dis­or­der'd streams; and there, Strung like white stars, the pearls still are, And the gold­en bracelets, heavy and rare, 110 Flash on her white arms still. The very same which yestern­ight Flash'd in the sil­ver sconces' deg. light, deg.113 When the feast was gay and the laugh­ter loud In Tyn­tagel's palace proud. 115 But then they deck'd a rest­less ghost With hot-​flush'd cheeks and bril­liant eyes, And quiv­er­ing lips on which the tide Of court­ly speech abrupt­ly died, And a glance which over the crowd­ed floor, 120 The dancers, and the fes­tive host, Flew ev­er to the door. deg. deg.122 That the knights eyed her in sur­prise, And the dames whis­pered scoff­in­gly: “Her moods, good lack, they pass like show­ers! 125 But yestern­ight and she would be As pale and still as with­er'd flow­ers, And now to-​night she laughs and speaks And has a colour in her cheeks; Christ keep us from such fan­ta­sy!”-- 130 Yes, now the long­ing is o'er­past, Which, dogg'd deg. by fear and fought by shame, deg.132 Shook her weak bo­som day and night, Con­sumed her beau­ty like a flame, And dimm'd it like the desert-​blast. 135 And though the bed-​clothes hide her face, Yet were it lift­ed to the light, The sweet ex­pres­sion of her brow Would charm the gaz­er, till his thought Erased the rav­ages of time, 140 Fill'd up the hol­low cheek, and brought A fresh­ness back as of her prime-- So heal­ing is her qui­et now. So per­fect­ly the lines ex­press A tran­quil, set­tled love­li­ness, 145 Her younger ri­val's purest grace.

The air of the De­cem­ber-​night Steals cold­ly around the cham­ber bright, Where those life­less lovers be; Swing­ing with it, in the light 150 Flaps the ghost­like tapestry. And on the ar­ras wrought you see A state­ly Hunts­man, clad in green, And round him a fresh for­est-​scene. On that clear for­est-​knoll he stays, 155 With his pack round him, and de­lays. He stares and stares, with trou­bled face, At this huge, gleam-​lit fire­place, At that bright, iron-​fig­ured door, And those blown rush­es on the floor. 160 He gazes down in­to the room With heat­ed cheeks and flur­ried air, And to him­self he seems to say: _“What place is this, and who are they? Who is that kneel­ing La­dy fair? 165 And on his pil­lows that pale Knight Who seems of mar­ble on a tomb? How comes it here, this cham­ber bright, Through whose mul­lion'd win­dows clear The cas­tle-​court all wet with rain, 170 The draw­bridge and the moat ap­pear, And then the beach, and, mark'd with spray, The sunken reefs, and far away The un­qui­et bright At­lantic plain? --What, has some glam­our made me sleep, 175 And sent me with my dogs to sweep, By night, with bois­ter­ous bu­gle-​peal, Through some old, sea-​side, knight­ly hall, Not in the free green wood at all? That Knight's asleep, and at her prayer 180 That La­dy by the bed doth kneel-- Then hush, thou bois­ter­ous bu­gle-​peal!”_ --The wild boar rus­tles in his lair; The fierce hounds snuff the taint­ed air; But lord and hounds keep root­ed there. 185

Cheer, cheer thy dogs in­to the brake, O Hunter! and with­out a fear Thy gold­en-​tas­sell'd bu­gle blow, And through the glades thy pas­time take-- For thou wilt rouse no sleep­ers here! 190 For these thou seest are un­moved; Cold, cold as those who lived and loved A thou­sand years ago. deg. deg.193

III

ISEULT OF BRIT­TANY deg.

A year had flown, and o'er the sea away, In Corn­wall, Tris­tram and Queen Iseult lay; In King Marc's chapel, in Tyn­tagel old-- There in a ship they bore those lovers cold.

The young sur­viv­ing Iseult, one bright day, 5 Had wan­der'd forth. Her chil­dren were at play In a green cir­cu­lar hol­low in the heath Which bor­ders the sea-​shore--a coun­try path Creeps over it from the till'd fields be­hind. The hol­low's grassy banks are soft-​in­clined, 10 And to one stand­ing on them, far and near The lone un­bro­ken view spreads bright and clear Over the waste. This cirque deg. of open ground deg.13 Is light and green; the heather, which all round Creeps thick­ly, grows not here; but the pale grass 15 Is strewn with rocks, and many a shiv­er'd mass Of vein'd white-​gleam­ing quartz, and here and there Dot­ted with hol­ly-​trees and ju­niper. deg. deg.18 In the smooth cen­tre of the open­ing stood Three hol­lies side by side, and made a screen, 20 Warm with the win­ter-​sun, of bur­nish'd green With scar­let berries gemm'd, the fell-​fare's deg. food. deg.22 Un­der the glit­ter­ing hol­lies Iseult stands, Watch­ing her chil­dren play; their lit­tle hands Are busy gath­er­ing spars of quartz, and streams 25 Of stagshorn deg. for their hats; anon, with screams deg.26 Of mad de­light they drop their spoils, and bound Among the hol­ly-​clumps and bro­ken ground, Rac­ing full speed, and startling in their rush The fell-​fares and the speck­led mis­sel-​thrush 30 Out of their glossy coverts;--but when now Their cheeks were flush'd, and over each hot brow, Un­der the feath­er'd hats of the sweet pair, In blind­ing mass­es show­er'd the gold­en hair-- Then Iseult call'd them to her, and the three 35 Clus­ter'd un­der the hol­ly-​screen, and she Told them an old-​world Bre­ton his­to­ry. deg. deg.37

Warm in their man­tles wrapt the three stood there, Un­der the hol­lies, in the clear still air-- Man­tles with those rich furs deep glis­ter­ing 40 Which Venice ships do from swart Egypt bring. Long they stay'd still--then, pac­ing at their ease, Moved up and down un­der the glossy trees. But still, as they pur­sued their warm dry road, From Iseult's lips the un­bro­ken sto­ry flow'd, 45 And still the chil­dren lis­ten'd, their blue eyes Fix'd on their moth­er's face in wide sur­prise; Nor did their looks stray once to the sea-​side, Nor to the brown heaths round them, bright and wide, Nor to the snow, which, though 'twas all away 50 From the open heath, still by the hedgerows lay, Nor to the shin­ing sea-​fowl, that with screams Bore up from where the bright At­lantic gleams, Swoop­ing to land­ward; nor to where, quite clear, The fell-​fares set­tled on the thick­ets near. 55 And they would still have lis­ten'd, till dark night Came keen and chill down on the heather bright; But, when the red glow on the sea grew cold, And the grey tur­rets of the cas­tle old Look'd stern­ly through the frosty evening-​air, 60 Then Iseult took by the hand those chil­dren fair, And brought her tale to an end, and found the path, And led them home over the dark­en­ing heath.

And is she hap­py? Does she see un­moved The days in which she might have lived and loved 65 Slip with­out bring­ing bliss slow­ly away, One af­ter one, to-​mor­row like to-​day? Joy has not found her yet, nor ev­er will-- Is it this thought which, makes her mien so still, Her fea­tures so fa­tigued, her eyes, though sweet, 70 So sunk, so rarely lift­ed save to meet Her chil­dren's? She moves slow; her voice alone Hath yet an in­fan­tine and sil­ver tone, But even that comes lan­guid­ly; in truth, She seems one dy­ing in a mask of youth. 75 And now she will go home, and soft­ly lay Her laugh­ing chil­dren in their beds, and play Awhile with them be­fore they sleep; and then She'll light her sil­ver lamp, which fish­er­men Drag­ging their nets through the rough waves, afar, 80 Along this iron coast, deg. know like a star, deg. deg.81 And take her broi­dery-​frame, and there she'll sit Hour af­ter hour, her gold curls sweep­ing it; Lift­ing her soft-​bent head on­ly to mind Her chil­dren, or to lis­ten to the wind. 85 And when the clock peals mid­night, she will move Her work away, and let her fin­gers rove Across the shag­gy brows of Tris­tram's hound Who lies, guard­ing her feet, along the ground; Or else she will fall mus­ing, her blue eyes 90 Fixt, her slight hands clasp'd on her lap; then rise, And at her prie-​dieu deg. kneel, un­til she have told deg.92 Her rosary-​beads of ebony tipp'd with gold, Then to her soft sleep--and to-​mor­row'll be To-​day's ex­act re­peat­ed ef­fi­gy. 95

Yes, it is lone­ly for her in her hall. The chil­dren, and the grey-​hair'd seneschal, deg. deg.97 Her wom­en, and Sir Tris­tram's aged hound, Are there the sole com­pan­ions to be found. But these she loves; and nois­er life than this 100 She would find ill to bear, weak as she is. She has her chil­dren, too, and night and day Is with them; and the wide heaths where they play, The hol­lies, and the cliff, and the sea-​shore, The sand, the sea-​birds, and the dis­tant sails, 105 These are to her dear as to them; the tales With which this day the chil­dren she be­guiled She gleaned from Bre­ton grandames, when a child, In ev­ery hut along this sea-​coast wild. She her­self loves them still, and, when they are told, 110 Can for­get all to hear them, as of old.

Dear saints, it is not sor­row, as I hear, Not suf­fer­ing, which shuts up eye and ear To all that has de­light­ed them be­fore, And lets us be what we were once no more. 115 No, we may suf­fer deeply, yet re­tain Pow­er to be moved and soothed, for all our pain, By what of old pleased us, and will again. No, 'tis the grad­ual fur­nace of the world, In whose hot air our spir­its are up­curl'd 120 Un­til they crum­ble, or else grow like steel-- Which kills in us the bloom, the youth, the spring-- Which leaves the fierce ne­ces­si­ty to feel, But takes away the pow­er--this can avail, By dry­ing up our joy in ev­ery­thing, 125 To make our for­mer plea­sures all seem stale. This, or some tyran­nous sin­gle thought, some fit Of pas­sion, which sub­dues our souls to it, Till for its sake alone we live and move-- Call it am­bi­tion, or re­morse, or love-- 130 This too can change us whol­ly, and make seem All which we did be­fore, shad­ow and dream.

And yet, I swear, it angers me to see How this fool pas­sion gulls deg. men po­tent­ly; deg.134 Be­ing, in truth, but a dis­eased un­rest, 135 And an un­nat­ural over­heat at best. How they are full of lan­guor and dis­tress Not hav­ing it; which when they do pos­sess, They straight­way are burnt up with fume and care, And spend their lives in post­ing here and there deg. deg.140 Where this plague drives them; and have lit­tle ease, Are fu­ri­ous with them­selves, and hard to please. Like that bold Cae­sar, deg. the famed Ro­man wight, deg.143 Who wept at read­ing of a Gre­cian knight Who made a name at younger years than he; 145 Or that renown'd mir­ror of chival­ry, Prince Alexan­der, deg. Philip's peer­less son, deg.147 Who car­ried the great war from Mace­don In­to the Soudan's deg. realm, and thun­dered on deg.149 To die at thir­ty-​five in Baby­lon. 150

What tale did Iseult to the chil­dren say, Un­der the hol­lies, that bright-​win­ter's day? She told them of the fairy-​haunt­ed land Away the oth­er side of Brit­tany, Be­yond the heaths, edged by the lone­ly sea; 155 Of the deep for­est-​glades of Broce-​liande, deg. deg.156 Through whose green boughs the gold­en sun­shine creeps Where Mer­lin by the en­chant­ed thorn-​tree sleeps. For here he came with the fay deg. Vi­vian, deg.158 One April, when the warm days first be­gan. He was on foot, and that false fay, his friend, 160 On her white pal­frey; here he met his end, In these lone syl­van glades, that April-​day. This tale of Mer­lin and the love­ly fay deg. deg.163 Was the one Iseult chose, and she brought clear Be­fore the chil­dren's fan­cy him and her. 165

Blow­ing be­tween the stems, the for­est-​air Had loosen'd the brown locks of Vi­vian's hair, Which play'd on her flush'd cheek, and her blue eyes Sparkled with mock­ing glee and ex­er­cise. Her pal­frey's flanks were mired and bathed in sweat, 170 For they had trav­ell'd far and not stopp'd yet. A brier in that tan­gled wilder­ness Had scored her white right hand, which she al­lows To rest un­gloved on her green rid­ing-​dress; The oth­er ward­ed off the droop­ing boughs. 175 But still she chat­ted on, with her blue eyes Fix'd full on Mer­lin's face, her state­ly prize. Her 'haviour had the morn­ing's fresh clear grace, The spir­it of the woods was in her face. She look'd so witch­ing fair, that learned wight 180 For­got his craft, and his best wits took flight; And he grew fond, and ea­ger to obey His mis­tress, use her em­pire deg. as she may. deg.184 They came to where the brush­wood ceased, and day 185 Peer'd 'twixt the stems; and the ground broke away, In a sloped sward down to a brawl­ing brook; And up as high as where they stood to look On the brook's far­ther side was clear, but then The un­der­wood and trees be­gan again. 190 This open glen was stud­ded thick with thorns Then white with blos­som; and you saw the horns, Through last year's fern, of the shy fal­low-​deer Who come at noon down to the wa­ter here. You saw the bright-​eyed squir­rels dart along 195 Un­der the thorns on the green sward; and strong The black­bird whis­tled from the din­gles near, And the weird chip­ping of the wood­peck­er Rang lonelily and sharp; the sky was fair, And a fresh breath of spring stirr'd ev­ery­where. 200 Mer­lin and Vi­vian stopp'd on the slope's brow, To gaze on the light sea of leaf and bough Which glis­ter­ing plays all round them, lone and mild. As if to it­self the qui­et for­est smiled. Up­on the brow-​top grew a thorn, and here 205 The grass was dry and moss'd, and you saw clear Across the hol­low; white anemones Starr'd the cool turf, and clumps of prim­ros­es Ran out from the dark un­der­wood be­hind. No fair­er rest­ing-​place a man could find. 210 “Here let us halt,” said Mer­lin then; and she Nod­ded, and tied her pal­frey to a tree.

They sate them down to­geth­er, and a sleep Fell up­on Mer­lin, more like death, so deep. Her fin­ger on her lips, then Vi­vian rose 215 And from her brown-​lock'd head the wim­ple throws, And takes it in her hand, and waves it over The blos­som'd thorn-​tree and her sleep­ing lover. Nine times she waved the flut­ter­ing wim­ple deg. round, deg.219 And made a lit­tle plot of mag­ic ground. 220 And in that daised cir­cle, as men say, Is Mer­lin pris­on­er deg. till the judg­ment-​day; deg.222 But she her­self whith­er she will can rove-- For she was pass­ing weary of his love. deg. deg.224

LYRI­CAL PO­EMS

THE CHURCH OF BROU deg.

I

THE CAS­TLE

Down the Savoy deg. val­leys sound­ing, deg.1 Echo­ing round this cas­tle old, 'Mid the dis­tant moun­tain-​chalets deg. deg.3 Hark! what bell for church is toll'd?

In the bright Oc­to­ber morn­ing 5 Savoy's Duke had left his bride. From the cas­tle, past the draw­bridge, Flow'd the hunters' mer­ry tide.

Steeds are neigh­ing, gal­lants glit­ter­ing; Gay, her smil­ing lord to greet, 10 From her mul­lion'd cham­ber-​case­ment Smiles the Duchess Mar­guerite.

From Vi­en­na, by the Danube, Here she came, a bride, in spring. Now the au­tumn crisps the for­est; 15 Hunters gath­er, bu­gles ring.

Hounds are pulling, prick­ers deg. swear­ing, deg.17 Hors­es fret, and boar-​spears glance. Off!--They sweep the marshy forests. West­ward, on the side of France. 20

Hark! the game's on foot; they scat­ter!-- Down the for­est-​rid­ings lone, Fu­ri­ous, sin­gle horse­men gal­lop---- Hark! a shout--a crash--a groan!

Pale and breath­less, came the hunters; 25 On the turf dead lies the boar-- God! the Duke lies stretch'd be­side him, Sense­less, wel­ter­ing in his gore.

* * * * *

In the dull Oc­to­ber evening, Down the leaf-​strewn for­est-​road, 30 To the cas­tle, past the draw­bridge, Came the hunters with their load.

In the hall, with sconces blaz­ing, Ladies wait­ing round her seat, Clothed in smiles, be­neath the dais deg. deg.35 Sate the Duchess Mar­guerite.

Hark! be­low the gates un­bar­ring! Tramp of men and quick com­mands! “--'Tis my lord come back from hunt­ing--” And the Duchess claps her hands. 40

Slow and tired, came the hunters-- Stopp'd in dark­ness in the court. “--Ho, this way, ye lag­gard hunters! To the hall! What sport? What sport?”--

Slow they en­ter'd with their mas­ter; 45 In the hall they laid him down. On his coat were leaves and blood-​stains, On his brow an an­gry frown.

Dead her prince­ly youth­ful hus­band Lay be­fore his youth­ful wife, 50 Bloody, 'neath the flar­ing sconces-- And the sight froze all her life.

* * * * *

In Vi­en­na, by the Danube, Kings hold rev­el, gal­lants meet. Gay of old amid the gayest 55 Was the Duchess Mar­guerite.

In Vi­en­na, by the Danube, Feast and dance her youth be­guiled. Till that hour she nev­er sor­row'd; But from then she nev­er smiled. 60

'Mid the Savoy moun­tain val­leys Far from town or haunt of man, Stands a lone­ly church, un­fin­ish'd, Which the Duchess Maud be­gan;

Old, that Duchess stern be­gan it, 65 In grey age, with palsied hands; But she died while it was build­ing, And the Church un­fin­ish'd stands--

Stands as erst deg. the builders left it, deg.69 When she sank in­to her grave; 70 Moun­tain greensward paves the chan­cel, deg. deg.71 Hare­bells flow­er in the nave. deg. deg.72

“--In my cas­tle all is sor­row,” Said the Duchess Mar­guerite then; “Guide me, some one, to the moun­tain! 75 We will build the Church again.”--

San­dall'd palmers, deg. far­ing home­ward, deg.78 Aus­tri­an knights from Syr­ia came. “--Aus­tri­an wan­der­ers bring, O warders! Homage to your Aus­tri­an dame.”-- 80

From the gate the warders an­swer'd: “--Gone, O knights, is she you knew! Dead our Duke, and gone his Duchess; Seek her at the Church of Brou!”--

Aus­tri­an knights and march-​worn palmers 85 Climb the wind­ing moun­tain-​way.-- Reach the val­ley, where the Fab­ric Ris­es high­er day by day.

Stones are saw­ing, ham­mers ring­ing; On the work the bright sun shines, 90 In the Savoy moun­tain-​mead­ows, By the stream, be­low the pines.

On her pal­fry white the Duchess Sate and watch'd her work­ing train-- Flem­ish carvers, Lom­bard gilders, 95 Ger­man ma­sons, smiths from Spain.

Clad in black, on her white pal­frey, Her old ar­chi­tect be­side-- There they found her in the moun­tains, Morn and noon and even­tide. 100

There she sate, and watch'd the builders, Till the Church was roof'd and done. Last of all, the builders rear'd her In the nave a tomb of stone.

On the tomb two forms they sculp­tured, 105 Life­like in the mar­ble pale-- One, the Duke in helm and ar­mour; One, the Duchess in her veil.

Round the tomb the carved stone fret­work deg. deg.109 Was at East­er-​tide put on. 110 Then the Duchess closed her labours; And she died at the St. John.

II

THE CHURCH

Up­on the glis­ten­ing lead­en roof Of the new Pile, the sun­light shines; The stream goes leap­ing by. The hills are clothed with pines sun-​proof; 'Mid bright green fields, be­low the pines, 5 Stands the Church on high. What Church is this, from men aloof?-- 'Tis the Church of Brou.

At sun­rise, from their dewy lair Cross­ing the stream, the kine are seen 10 Round the wall to stray-- The church­yard wall that clips the square Of open hill-​sward fresh and green Where last year they lay. But all things now are or­der'd fair 15 Round the Church of Brou.

On Sun­days, at the matin-​chime, deg. deg.17 The Alpine peas­ants, two and three, Climb up here to pray; Burghers and dames, at sum­mer's prime, 20 Ride out to church from Cham­bery, deg. deg.21 Dight deg. with man­tles gay. deg.22 But else it is a lone­ly time Round the Church of Brou.

On Sun­days, too, a priest doth come 25 From the wall'd town be­yond the pass, Down the moun­tain-​way; And then you hear the or­gan's hum, You hear the white-​robed priest say mass, And the peo­ple pray. 30 But else the woods and fields are dumb Round the Church of Brou.

And af­ter church, when mass is done, The peo­ple to the nave re­pair Round the tomb to stray; 35 And mar­vel at the Forms of stone, And praise the chis­ell'd broi­deries deg. rare-- deg.37 Then they drop away. The prince­ly Pair are left alone In the Church of Brou. 40