SHORTLY AFTER THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING IN EUROPELet us begin and carry up this corpse,Singing together.Leave we the common crofts, the vulgar thorpesEach in its tetherSleeping safe on the bosom of the plain,Cared-for till cock-crow:Look out if yonder be not day againRimming the rock-row!That's the appropriate country; there, man's thought,Rarer, intenser, 10Self-gathered for an outbreak, as it ought,Chafes in the censer.Leave we the unlettered plain its herd and crop;Seek we sepultureOn a tall mountain, citied to the top,Crowded with culture!All the peaks soar, but one the rest excels;Clouds overcome it;No! Yonder sparkle is the citadel'sCircling its summit. 20Thither our path lies; wind we up the heights:Wait ye the warning?Our low life was the level's and the night's;He's for the morning.Step to a tune, square chests, erect each head,'Ware the beholders!This is our master, famous calm and dead,Borne on our shoulders.Sleep, crop and herd! sleep, darkling thorpe and croft,Safe from the weather! 30He, whom we convoy to his grave aloft,Singing together,He was a man born with thy face and throat,Lyric Apollo!Long he lived nameless: how should spring take noteWinter would follow?Till lo, the little touch, and youth was gone!Cramped and diminished,Moaned he, "New measures, other feet anon!My dance is finished?" 40No, that's the world's way: (keep the mountain-side,Make for the city!)He knew the signal, and stepped on with prideOver men's pity;Left play for work, and grappled with the worldBent on escaping:"What's in the scroll," quoth he, "thou keepest furled?Show me their shapingTheirs who most studied man, the bard and sage,Give!"—So, he gowned him, 50Straight got by heart that book to its last page:Learned, we found him.Yea, but we found him bald too, eyes like lead,Accents uncertain:"Time to taste life," another would have said,"Up with the curtain!"This man said rather, "Actual life comes next?Patience a moment!Grant I have mastered learning's crabbed text,Still there's the comment. 60Let me know all! Prate not of most or least,Painful or easy!Even to the crumbs I'd fain eat up the feast,Ay, nor feel queasy."Oh, such a life as he resolved to live,When he had learned it,When he had gathered all books had to give!Sooner, he spurned it.Image the whole, then execute the parts—Fancy the fabric 70Quite, ere you build, ere steel strike fire from quartz,Ere mortar dab brick!(Here's the town-gate reached: there's the market-placeGaping before us.)Yea, this in him was the peculiar grace(Hearten our chorus!)That before living he'd learn how to live—No end to learning:Earn the means first-God surely will contriveUse for our earning. 80Others mistrust and say, "But time escapes:Live now or never!"He said, "What's time? Leave Now for dogs and apes!Man has Forever."Back to his book then: deeper drooped his head:Calculus racked him:Leaden before, his eyes grew dross of lead:Tussis attacked him."Now, master, take a little rest!"—not he!(Caution redoubled, 90Step two abreast, the way winds narrowly!)Not a whit troubledBack to his studies, fresher than at first,Fierce as a dragonHe (soul-hydroptic with a sacred thirst)Sucked at the flagon.Oh, if we draw a circle premature,Heedless of far gain,Greedy for quick returns of profit, sureBad is our bargain! 100Was it not great? did not he throw on God,(He loves the burthen)God's task to make the heavenly periodPerfect the earthen?Did not he magnify the mind, show clearJust what it all meant?He would not discount life, as fools do here,Paid by instalment.He ventured neck or nothing-heaven's successFound, or earth's failure: 110"Wilt thou trust death or not?" He answered "Yes:Hence with life's pale lure!"That low man seeks a little thing to do,Sees it and does it:This high man, with a great thing to pursue,Dies ere he knows it.That low man goes on adding one to one,His hundred's soon hit:This high man, aiming at a million,Misses an unit. 120That, has the world here-should he need the next,Let the world mind him!This, throws himself on God, and unperplexedSeeking shall find him.So, with the throttling hands of death at strife,Ground he at grammar;Still, thro' the rattle, parts of speech were rife:While he could stammerHe settled Hoti's business—let it be!—Properly based Oun— 130Gave us the doctrine of the enclitic De,Dead from the waist down.Well, here's the platform, here's the proper place:Hail to your purlieus,All ye highfliers of the feathered race,Swallows and curlews!Here's the top-peak; the multitude belowLive, for they can, there:This man decided not to Live but Know—Bury this man there? 140Here—here's his place, where meteors shoot, clouds form,Lightnings are loosened,Stars come and go! Let joy break with the storm,Peace let the dew send!Lofty designs must close in like effects:Loftily Iying,Leave him—still loftier than the world suspects,Living and dying.NOTES:"A Grammarian's Funeral" is an elegy of a typical pioneerscholar of the Renaissance period, sung by the leader ofthe chorus of disciples, and interspersed with parentheticaldirections to them, while they all bear the body oftheir master to its appropriate burial-place on the highestmountain-peak. A humorous sense of disproportion inthe labors of devoted scholarship to its results heightenstheir exaltation of the dead humanist's indomitable trustin the supremacy of the immaterial.86. Calculus: the stone.88. Tussis: a cough.95. Hydroptic: dropsical.129. Hoti: Greek particle, conjunction, that.130. Oun: Greek particle, then, now then.131. Enclitic De: Greek, concerning which Browningwrote to the Editor of The News, London, Nov. 21,1874: "In a clever article you speak of 'the doctrine ofthe enclitic De—which, with all deference to Mr.Browning, in point of fact, does not exist.' No, not toMr. Browning, but pray defer to Herr Buttmann, whosefifth list of 'enclitics' ends with the inseparable De,'—or to Curtius, whose fifth list ends also with De (meaning'towards' and as a demonstrative appendage).That this is not to be confounded with the accentuated'De, meaning but,' was the 'Doctrine' which the Grammarianbequeathed to those capable of receiving it."
A MIDDLE-AGE INTERLUDEROSA MUNDI; SEU, FULCITE ME FLORIBUS.A CONCEIT OF MASTER GYSBRECHT,CANON-REGULAR OF SAINT JODOCUS-BY-THE-BAR, YPRES CITY. CANTUQUE,Virgilius. AND HATH OFTEN BEEN SUNGAT HOCK-TIDE AND FESTIVALS. GAVISUSERAM, Jessides.(It would seem to be a glimpse from the burningof Jacques du Bourg-Molay, at Paris, A.D. 1314,as distorted by the refraction from Flemish brain to brain,during the course of a couple of centuries.)[Molay was Grand Master of the Templarswhen that order was suppressed in 1312.]IPREADMONISHETH THE ABBOT DEODAET.The Lord, we look to once for all,Is the Lord we should look at, all at once:He knows not to vary, saith Saint Paul,Nor the shadow of turning, for the nonce.See him no other than as he is!Give both the infinitudes their due—Infinite mercy, but, I wis,As infinite a justice too.[Organ: plagal-cadence.]As infinite a justice too.II[ONE SINGETH]John, Master of the Temple of God, 10Falling to sin the Unknown Sin,What he bought of Emperor Aldabrod,He sold it to Sultan Saladin:Till, caught by Pope Clement, a-buzzing there,Hornet-prince of the mad wasps' hive,And clipt of his wings in Paris square,They bring him now to be burned alive.[And wanteth there grace of lute orclavicithern, ye shall say toconfirm him who singeth—We bring John now to be burned alive.IIIIn the midst is a goodly gallows built;'Twixt fork and fork, a stake is stuck; 20But first they set divers tumbrils a-tilt,Make a trench all round with the city muck;Inside they pile log upon log, good store;Faggots no few, blocks great and small,Reach a man's mid-thigh, no less, no more,—For they mean he should roast in the sight of all.CHORUS.We mean he should roast in the sight of all.IVGood sappy bavins that kindle forthwith;Billets that blaze substantial and slow;Pine-stump split deftly, dry as pith; 30Larch-heart that chars to a chalk-white glow:They up they hoist me John in a chafe,Sling him fast like a hog to scorch,Spit in his face, then leap back safe,Sing "Laudes" and bid clap-to the torch.CHORUS.Laus deo—who bids clap-to the torch.VJohn of the Temple, whose fame so bragged,Is burning alive in Paris square!How can he curse, if his mouth is gagged?Or wriggle his neck, with a collar there? 40Or heave his chest, which a band goes round?Or threat with his fist, since his arms are spliced?Or kick with his feet, now his legs are bound?—Thinks John, I will call upon Jesus Christ.[Here one crosseth himself.]VIJesus Christ—John had bought and sold,Jesus Christ—John had eaten and drunk;To him, the Flesh meant silver and gold.(Salva reverentia.)Now it was, "Saviour, bountiful lamb,"I have roasted thee Turks, though men roast me! 50"See thy servant, the plight wherein I am!"Art thou a saviour? Save thou me!"CHORUS.'Tis John the mocker cries, "Save thou me!"VIIWho maketh God's menace an idle word?—Saith, it no more means what it proclaims,Than a damsel's threat to her wanton bird?For she too prattles of ugly names.—Saith, he knoweth but one thing—what he knows?That God is good and the rest is breath;Why else is the same styled Sharon's rose? 60Once a rose, ever a rose, he saith.CHORUS.O, John shall yet find a rose, he saith!VIIIAlack, there be roses and roses, John!Some, honied of taste like your leman's tongue:Some, bitter; for why? (roast gaily on!)Their tree struck root in devil's-dung.When Paul once reasoned of righteousnessAnd of temperance and of judgment to come,Good Felix trembled, he could no less:John, snickering, crook'd his wicked thumb. 70CHORUS.What cometh to John of the wicked thumb?IXHa ha, John plucketh now at his roseTo rid himself of a sorrow at heart!Lo,—petal on petal, fierce rays unclose;Anther on anther, sharp spikes outstart;And with blood for dew, the bosom boils;And a gust of sulphur is all its smell;And lo, he is horribly in the toilsOf a coal-black giant flower of hell!CHORUS.What maketh heaven, That maketh hell. 80XSo, as John called now, through the fire amain,On the Name, he had cursed with, all his life—To the Person, he bought and sold again—For the Face, with his daily buffets rife—Feature by feature It took its place:And his voice, like a mad dog's choking bark,At the steady whole of the Judge's face—Died. Forth John's soul flared into the dark.SUBJOINETH THE ABBOT DEODAET.God help all poor souls lost in the dark!NOTES:"The Heretic's Tragedy" is an Interlude imagined in themanner of the Middle Ages, and typically representingthis period of human development in its quaint piety andprejudice, its childish delight in cruelty, and its cumulativelegend-making during the course of two centuries as reflectedthrough the Flemish nature. It is supposed to besung by an abbot, a choir-singer, and a chorus, in celebrationof the burning of Jacques du Bourg-Molay, lastGrand Master of the wealthy and powerful secular orderof Knights Templar, which came into rivalry with theChurch after the Crusades and was finally suppressed byPhilip IV of France and Pope Clement V, Molay'sburning at Paris in 1314 being a final scene in theirdiscomfiture and the Church's triumph.8. Plagal-cadence: a closing progression of chords inwhich the sub-dominant or chord on the fourth degree ofthe scale precedes the tonic or chord on the first degreeof the scale. The name arises from the modes used inearly church music called Plagal Modes, which were atransposition of the authentic modes beginning on thefourth degree of the authentic modes.12. Bought of... Aldabrod, etc.: Clement's arraignmentof Jacques or John being that the riches won piouslyby the order during the Crusades, he had not scrupled tosell again to Saladin, the Sultan, who is portrayed byScott in "The Talisman.''14. Pope Clement: the fifth Clement (1305-1314).18. Clavicithern: a cithern with keys like a harpsichord.25. Sing "Laudes": Sing the seven Psalms of praisemaking up the service of the Church called Lauds.48. Salvâ, etc. the bidding to greet here with a reverence,according to custom, the Host, or Christ's flesh,which had been mentioned.60. Sharon's rose: Solomon's Song 2.1.
ON WHICH THE JEWS WERE FORCED TO ATTEND AN ANNUAL CHRISTIAN SERMON IN ROME[" Now was come about Holy-Cross Day, and now must my lordpreach his first sermon to the Jews: as it was of old cared for in themerciful bowels of the Church, that, so to speak, a crumb at leastfrom her conspicuous table here in Rome should be, though but onceyearly, cast to the famishing dogs, under-trampled and bespitten-uponbeneath the feet of the guests. And a moving sight in truth, this, ofso many of the besotted blind restif and ready-to-perish Hebrews! nowmaternally brought-nay (for He saith, 'Compel them to come in') haled,as it were, by the head and hair, and against their obstinate hearts,to partake of the heavenly grace. What awakening, what striving withtears, what working of a yeasty conscience! Nor was my lord wantingto himself on so apt an occasion; witness the abundance of conversionswhich did incontinently reward him: though not to my lord bealtogether the glory."-Diary by the Bishop's Secretary, 1600.]What the Jews really said, on thus being driven to church, was ratherto this effect:—IFee, faw, fum! bubble and squeak!Blessedest Thursday's the fat of the week.Rumble and tumble, sleek and rough,Stinking and savoury, smug and gruff,Take the church-road, for the bell's due chimeGives us the summons—'tis sermon-time!IIBoh, here's Barnabas! Job, that's you?Up stumps Solomon—bustling too?Shame, man! greedy beyond your yearsTo handsel the bishop's shaving-shears?Fair play's a jewel! Leave friends in the lurch? 10Stand on a line ere you start for the church!IIIHiggledy piggledy, packed we lie,Rats in a hamper, swine in a stye,Wasps in a bottle, frogs in a sieve,Worms in a carcase, fleas in a sleeve.Hist! square shoulders, settle your thumbsAnd buzz for the bishop—here he comes.IVBow, wow, wow—a bone for the dog!I liken his Grace to an acorned hog. 20What, a boy at his side, with the bloom of a lass,To help and handle my lord's hour-glass!Didst ever behold so lithe a chine?His cheek hath laps like a fresh-singed swine.
VAaron's asleep—shove hip to haunch,Or somebody deal him a dig in the paunch!Look at the purse with the tassel and knobAnd the gown with the angel and thingumbob!What's he at, quotha? reading his text!Now you've his curtsey—and what comes next? 30VISee to our converts—you doomed black dozen—No stealing away—nor cog nor cozen!You five, that were thieves, deserve it fairly;You seven, that were beggars, will live less sparely;You took your turn and dipped in the hat,Got fortune—and fortune gets you; mind that!VIIGive your first groan—compunction's at workAnd soft! from a Jew you mount to a Turk.Lo, Micah,—the selfsame beard on chinHe was four times already converted in! 40Here's a knife, clip quick—it's a sign of grace—Or he ruins us all with his hanging-face.VIIIWhom now is the bishop a-leering at?I know a point where his text falls pat.I'll tell him to-morrow, a word just nowWent to my heart and made me vowI meddle no more with the worst of trades—Let somebody else pay his serenades.IXGroan all together now, whee-hee-hee!It's a-work, it's a-work, ah, woe is me! 50It began, when a herd of us, picked and placed,Were spurred through the Corso, stripped to the waist;Jew brutes, with sweat and blood well spentTo usher in worthily Christian Lent.XIt grew, when the hangman entered our bounds,Yelled, pricked us out to his church like hounds:It got to a pitch, when the hand indeedWhich gutted my purse would throttle my creed:And it overflows when, to even the odd,Men I helped to their sins help me to their God. 60XIBut now, while the scapegoats leave our flock,And the rest sit silent and count the clock,Since forced to muse the appointed timeOn these precious facts and truths sublime,Let us fitly employ it, under our breath,In saying Ben Ezra's Song of Death.XIIFor Rabbi Ben Ezra, the night he died,Called sons and sons' sons to his side,And spoke, "This world has been harsh and strange;Something is wrong: there needeth change. 70But what, or where? at the last or first?In one point only we sinned, at worst.XIII"The Lord will have mercy on Jacob yet,And again in his border see Israel set.When Judah beholds Jerusalem,The stranger-seed shall be joined to them:To Jacob's House shall the Gentiles cleave.So the Prophet saith and his sons believe.XIV"Ay, the children of the chosen raceShall carry and bring them to their place: 80In the land of the Lord shall lead the sameBondsmen and handmaids. Who shall blame,When the slaves enslave, the oppressed ones o'erThe oppressor triumph for evermore?XV"God spoke, and gave us the word to keep,Bade never fold the hands nor sleep'Mid a faithless world, at watch and ward,Till Christ at the end relieve our guard.By His servant Moses the watch was set:Though near upon cock-crow, we keep it yet. 90XVI"Thou! if thou wast He, who at mid-watch came,By the starlight, naming a dubious name!And if, too heavy with sleep—too rashWith fear—O Thou, if that martyr-gashFell on Thee coming to take thine own,And we gave the Cross, when we owed the Throne—XVII"Thou art the Judge. We are bruised thus.But, the Judgment over, join sides with us!Thine too is the cause! and not more thineThan ours, is the work of these dogs and swine, 100Whose life laughs through and spits at their creed!Who maintain Thee in word, and defy Thee in deed!XVIII"We withstood Christ then? Be mindful howAt least we withstand Barabbas now!Was our outrage sore? But the worst we spared,To have called these—Christians, had we dared!Let defiance to them pay mistrust of Thee,And Rome make amends for Calvary!XIX"By the torture, prolonged from age to age,By the infamy, Israel's heritage, 110By the Ghetto's plague, by the garb's disgrace,By the badge of shame, by the felon's place,By the branding-tool, the bloody whip,And the summons to Christian fellowship,—
XX"We boast our proof that at least the JewWould wrest Christ's name from the Devil's crew.Thy face took never so deep a shadeBut we fought them in it, God our aid!A trophy to bear, as we march, thy band,South, East, and on to the Pleasant Land!" 120[Pope Gregory XVI abolished this bad business of the Sermon.—R. B.]
NOTES:"Holy-Cross Day" reflects the attitude of the corrupt mediaevalChristians and Jews toward each other. The prosepreceding the poem gives the point of view of an imaginaryBishop's Secretary, who congratulates himself uponthe good work the Church is doing in forcing its doctrineon the Jews in the Holy-Cross Day sermon, and effectingmany conversions. The poem shows that the Jews regardthis solicitude on the part of the Christians with hatredand scorn, and that their conversions are in derision oftheir would-be converters. The sarcasm of the speakerreaches a pinnacle of bitterness when he accuses theChristian bishops of being men he had helped to their sinsand who now help him to their God. From scorn towardsuch followers of Christ, he passes, in the contemplationof Rabbi Ben Ezra's death song, to a defence of Christagainst these followers who profess but do not act hisprecepts, and a hope that if the Jews were mistaken innot accepting Christ, the tortures they now suffer will bereceived as expiation for their sin.Holy-Cross Day is September 14. The discovery of thetrue cross by Saint Helen inaugurated the festival, celebratedboth by Latins and Greeks as early as the fifth orsixth century, under the title of the Exaltation of theCross and later in commemoration of the alleged miraculousappearance of the Cross to Constantine in the skyat midday. Though the particular incidents of the poemare not historical, it is a fact (see Milman's "History of theJews'') that, by a Papal Bull issued by Gregory XIII in1584, all Jews above the age of twelve years were compelledto listen every week to a sermon from a Christianpriest.52. Corso: a street in Rome67. Rabbi Ben Ezra: or Ibn Ezra, a mediaeval Jewishwriter and thinker, born in Toledo, near the end of theeleventh century.III. Ghetto: the Jew's quarter. Pope Paul IV firstshut the Jews up in the Ghetto, and prohibited them fromleaving it after sunset.
Among these latter busts we count by scores,Half-emperors and quarter-emperors,Each with his bay-leaf fillet, loose-thonged vest,Loric and low-browed Gorgon on the breast,One loves a baby face, with violets there,Violets instead of laurel in the hair,As those were all the little locks could bear.Now, read here. "Protus ends a periodOf empery beginning with a god;Born in the porphyry chamber at Byzant, 10Queens by his cradle, proud and ministrant:And if he quickened breath there, 'twould like firePantingly through the dim vast realm transpire.A fame that he was missing spread afar:The world from its four corners, rose in war,Till he was borne out on a balconyTo pacify the world when it should see.The captains ranged before him, one, his handMade baby points at, gained the chief command.And day by day more beautiful he grew 20In shape, all said, in feature and in hue,While young Greek sculptors, gazing on the child,Became with old Greek sculpture reconciled.Already sages laboured to condenseIn easy tomes a life's experience:And artists took grave counsel to impartIn one breath and one hand-sweep, all their art,To make his graces prompt as blossomingOf plentifully-watered palms in spring:Since well beseems it, whoso mounts the throne, 30For beauty, knowledge, strength, should stand alone,And mortals love the letters of his name."—Stop! Have you turned two pages? Still the same.New reign, same date. The scribe goes on to sayHow that same year, on such a month and day,"John the Pannonian, groundedly believedA blacksmith's bastard, whose hard hand reprievedThe Empire from its fate the year before,Came, had a mind to take the crown, and woreThe same for six years (during which the Huns 40Kept off their fingers from us), till his sonsPut something in his liquor"—and so forth.Then a new reign. Stay—"Take at its just worth"(Subjoins an annotator) "what I giveAs hearsay. Some think, John let Protus liveAnd slip away. 'Tis said, he reached man's ageAt some blind northern court; made, first a page,Then tutor to the children; last, of useAbout the hunting-stables. I deduceHe wrote the little tract 'On worming dogs,' 50Whereof the name in sundry cataloguesIs extant yet. A Protus of the raceIs rumoured to have died a monk in Thrace,And if the same, he reached senility."Here's John the Smith's rough-hammered head. Great eye,Gross jaw and griped lips do what granite canTo give you the crown-grasper. What a man!NOTES:"Protus" sets in contrast the representations by artist andannalist of the two busts and the two lives of Protus, thebaby emperor of Byzantium, born in the purple, gentlynurtured and cherished, yet fated to obscurity, and of John,the blacksmith's bastard, predestined to usurp his throneand save the empire with his harder hand.
There's a palace in Florence, the world knows well,And a statue watches it from the square,And this story of both do our townsmen tell.Ages ago, a lady there,At the farthest window facing the EastAsked, "Who rides by with the royal air?"The bridesmaids' prattle around her ceased;She leaned forth, one on either hand;They saw how the blush of the bride increased—They felt by its beats her heart expand— 10As one at each ear and both in a breathWhispered, "The Great-Duke Ferdinand."That self-same instant, underneath,The Duke rode past in his idle way,Empty and fine like a swordless sheath.Gay he rode, with a friend as gay,Till he threw his head back—"Who is she?""A bride the Riccardi brings home to-day."Hair in heaps lay heavilyOver a pale brow spirit-pure— 20Carved like the heart of a coal-black tree,Crisped like a war-steed's encolure—And vainly sought to dissemble her eyesOf the blackest black our eyes endure.And lo, a blade for a knight's empriseFilled the fine empty sheath of a man—The Duke grew straightway brave and wise.He looked at her, as a lover can;She looked at him, as one who awakes:The past was a sleep, and her life began. 30Now, love so ordered for both their sakes,A feast was held that selfsame nightIn the pile which the mighty shadow makes.(For Via Larga is three-parts light,But the palace overshadows one,Because of a crime which may God requite!To Florence and God the wrong was done,Through the first republic's murder thereBy Cosimo and his cursed son.)The Duke (with the statue's face in the square) 40Turned in the midst of his multitudeAt the bright approach of the bridal pair.Face to face the lovers stoodA single minute and no more,While the bridegroom bent as a man subdued—Bowed till his bonnet brushed the floor—For the Duke on the lady a kiss conferred,As the courtly custom was of yore.In a minute can lovers exchange a word?If a word did pass, which I do not think, 50Only one out of the thousand heard.That was the bridegroom. At day's brinkHe and his bride were alone at lastIn a bedchamber by a taper's blink.Calmly he said that her lot was cast,That the door she had passed was shut on herTill the final catafalk repassed.The world meanwhile, its noise and stir,Through a certain window facing the East,She could watch like a convent's chronicler. 60Since passing the door might lead to a feastAnd a feast might lead to so much beside,He, of many evils, chose the least."Freely I choose too," said the bride—"Your window and its world suffice,"Replied the tongue, while the heart replied—"If I spend the night with that devil twice,May his window serve as my loop of hellWhence a damned soul looks on paradise!"I fly to the Duke who loves me well, 70Sit by his side and laugh at sorrow!Ere I count another ave-bell,"'Tis only the coat of a page to borrow,And tie my hair in a horse-boy's trim,And I save my soul—but not to-morrow"—(She checked herself and her eye grew dim)"My father tarries to bless my state:I must keep it one day more for him."Is one day more so long to wait?Moreover the Duke rides past, I know; 80We shall see each other, sure as fate."She turned on her side and slept. Just so!So we resolve on a thing and sleep:So did the lady, ages ago.That night the Duke said, "Dear or cheapAs the cost of this cup of bliss may proveTo body or soul, I will drain it deep."And on the morrow, bold with love,He beckoned the bridegroom (close on call,As his duty bade, by the Duke's alcove) 90And smiled, "'Twas a very funeral,Your lady will think, this feast of ours,A shame to efface, whate'er befall!"What if we break from the Arno bowers,And try if Petraja, cool and green,Cure last night's fault with this morning's flowers?"The bridegroom, not a thought to be seenOn his steady brow and quiet mouth,Said, "Too much favour for me so mean!"But, alas! my lady leaves the South; 100Each wind that comes from the ApennineIs a menace to her tender youth:"Nor a way exists, the wise opine,If she quits her palace twice this year,To avert the flower of life's decline."Quoth the Duke, "A sage and a kindly fear.Moreover Petraja is cold this spring:Be our feast to-night as usual here!"And then to himself—"Which night shall bringThy bride to her lover's embraces, fool— 110Or I am the fool, and thou art the king!"Yet my passion must wait a night, nor cool—For to-night the Envoy arrives from FranceWhose heart I unlock with thyself my tool."I need thee still and might miss perchance.To-day is not wholly lost, beside,With its hope of my lady's countenance:"For I ride—what should I do but ride?And passing her palace, if I list,May glance at its window-well betide!" 120So said, so done: nor the lady missedOne ray that broke from the ardent brow,Nor a curl of the lips where the spirit kissed.Be sure that each renewed the vow,No morrow's sun should arise and setAnd leave them then as it left them now.But next day passed, and next day yet,With still fresh cause to wait one day moreEre each leaped over the parapet.And still, as love's brief morning wore, 130With a gentle start, half smile, half sigh,They found love not as it seemed before.They thought it would work infallibly,But not in despite of heaven and earth:The rose would blow when the storm passed by.Meantime they could profit in winter's dearthBy store of fruits that supplant the rose:The world and its ways have a certain worth:And to press a point while these opposeWere simple policy; better wait: 140We lose no friends and we gain no foes.Meantime, worse fates than a lover's fateWho daily may ride and pass and lookWhere his lady watches behind the grate!And she—she watched the square like a bookHolding one picture and only one,Which daily to find she undertook:When the picture was reached the book was done,And she turned from the picture at night to schemeOf tearing it out for herself next sun. 150So weeks grew months, years; gleam by gleamThe glory dropped from their youth and love,And both perceived they had dreamed a dream;Which hovered as dreams do, still above:But who can take a dream for a truth?Oh, hide our eyes from the next remove!One day as the lady saw her youthDepart, and the silver thread that streakedHer hair, and, worn by the serpent's tooth,The brow so puckered, the chin so peaked, 160And wondered who the woman was,Hollow-eyed and haggard-cheeked,Fronting her silent in the glass—"Summon here," she suddenly said,"Before the rest of my old self pass,"Him, the Carver, a hand to aid,Who fashions the clay no love will changeAnd fixes a beauty never to fade."Let Robbia's craft so apt and strangeArrest the remains of young and fair, 170And rivet them while the seasons range."Make me a face on the window there,Waiting as ever, mute the while,My love to pass below in the square!"And let me think that it may beguileDreary days which the dead must spendDown in their darkness under the aisle,"To say, 'What matters it at the end?'I did no more while my heart was warmThan does that image, my pale-faced friend.' 180"Where is the use of the lip's red charm,The heaven of hair, the pride of the brow,And the blood that blues the inside arm—"Unless we turn, as the soul knows how,The earthly gift to an end divine?A lady of clay is as good, I trow."But long ere Robbia's cornice, fine,With flowers and fruits which leaves enlace,Was set where now is the empty shrine—(And, leaning out of a bright blue space, 190As a ghost might lean from a chink of sky,The passionate pale lady's face—Eyeing ever, with earnest eyeAnd quick-turned neck at its breathless stretch,Some one who ever is passing by)The Duke had sighed like the simplest wretchIn Florence, "Youth—my dream escapes!Will its record stay?" And he bade them fetchSome subtle moulder of brazen shapes—"Can the soul, the will, die out of a man 200Ere his body find the grave that gapes?"John of Douay shall effect my plan,Set me on horseback here aloft,Alive, as the crafty sculptor can,"In the very square I have crossed so oft:That men may admire, when future sunsShall touch the eyes to a purpose soft,"While the mouth and the brow stay brave in bronze—Admire and say, 'When he was aliveHow he would take his pleasure once!' 210"And it shall go hard but I contriveTo listen the while, and laugh in my tombAt idleness which aspires to strive."————————————————So! While these wait the trump of doom,How do their spirits pass, I wonder,Nights and days in the narrow room?Still, I suppose, they sit and ponderWhat a gift life was, ages ago,Six steps out of the chapel yonder.Only they see not God, I know, 220Nor all that chivalry of his,The soldier-saints who, row on row,Burn upward each to his point of bliss—Since, the end of life being manifest,He had burned his way thro' the world to this.I hear you reproach, "But delay was best,For their end was a crime." Oh, a crime will doAs well, I reply, to serve for a test,As a virtue golden through and through,Sufficient to vindicate itself 230And prove its worth at a moment's view!Must a game be played for the sake of pelfWhere a button goes, 'twere an epigramTo offer the stamp of the very Guelph.The true has no value beyond the sham:As well the counter as coin, I submit,When your table's a hat, and your prize a dram.Stake your counter as boldly every whit,Venture as warily, use the same skill,Do your best, whether winning or losing it, 240If you choose to play!—is my principle.Let a man contend to the uttermostFor his life's set prize, be it what it will!The counter our lovers staked was lostAs surely as if it were lawful coin:And the sin I impute to each frustrate ghostIs—the unlit lamp and the ungirt loin,Though the end in sight was a vice, I say.You of the virtue (we issue join)How strive you? De te, fabula! 250NOTES:"The Statue and the Bust" creates the characters and thesituation, and dramatically represents a story which is basedon a Florentine tradition that Duke Ferdinand I placedhis equestrian statue in the Piazza dell' Annunziata so thathe might gaze forever towards the old Riccardi Palace,where a lady he loved was imprisoned by her jealous husband.The bride and her ducal lover are seen exchangingtheir first looks, through which they perceive the genuinenessof their love; and the temporizing of each is presented,through which, for the sake of petty conveniences,they submit to be thwarted by the wary husband, and tohave the end they count supreme delayed until love andyouth have gone, and the best left them is the artificialgaze interchanged by a bronze statue in the square and aclay face at the window. The closing stanzas point themoral against the palsy of the will, whose strenuous exerciseis life's main gift.I. There's a palace in Florence: refers to the oldRiccardi Palace, now the Palazzo Antinori, in the squareof the Annunziata, where the statue still stands.22. encolure: neck and shoulder of a horse33. The pile which the mighty shadow makes: refers toanother palace in the Via Larga where the duke (not thelady) lived, and which is to-day known as the RiccardiPalace. Cooke's "Browning Guide Book" and Berdoe's"Browning Cyclopaedia" both confuse the two, attributingerror to Browning in spite of his letter about it. Thisconfusion was cleared up by Harriet Ford (Poet-lore, Dec.1891, vol. iii. p. 648, "Browning right about the Riccardi Palace'').36. Because of a crime, etc.: refers to the destroying ofthe liberties of the Florentine republic by Cosimo deiMedici and his grandson, Lorenzo, who lived in the thenMedici (now Riccardi) Palace, whose darkening of thestreet with its bulk symbolizes the crime which took thelight from Florence.57. catafalk: the stage or scaffolding for a coffin whilst in the church94. Arno bowers: the palace by the Arno, the riverflowing through Florence.95. Petraja: a Florentine suburb.169. Robbia's craft: the Robbia family were skilled inshaping the bisque known as Della Robbia ware whichwas long one of the Florentine manufactures, and tracesof which, when Browning wrote, still adorned the outercornice of the palace.202. John of Douay [Giovanni of Bologna], sculptor (1524-1608).The statue is one of his finest works.250. De te, fabula! Concerning thee, this fable!