SCENE V.

What, art thou done already? Thy tale is likeA day unsealed with sunset. What though dusk?A dusky rod of iron hath power to drawThe lightnings from their heaven to itself.The richest wage you can pay love is—love.

WALTER.

Then close the tale thyself, I drop the mask;I am the sun-tanned Page; the Lady, thou!I take thy hand, it trembles in my grasp;I look in thy face and see no frown in it.O may my spirit on hope's ladder climbFrom hungry nothing up to star-packed space,Thence strain on tip-toe to thy love beyond—The only heaven I ask!

LADY.

My God! 'tis hard!When I was all in leaf the frost winds came,And now, when o'er me runs the summer's breath,It waves but iron boughs.

WALTER.

What dost thou murmur?Thy cheeks burn mad as mine. O untouched lips!I see them as a glorious rebel seesA crown within his reach. I'll taste their blissAlthough the price be death——

LADY (springing up).

Walter! beware!These tell-tale heavens are list'ning earnestly.O Sir! within a month my bridal bellsWill make a village glad. The fainting EarthIs bleeding at her million golden veins,And by her blood I'm bought. The sun shall seeA pale bride wedded to grey hair, and eyesOf cold and cruel blue; and in the springA grave with daisies on it.[A pause.O my friend!We twain have met like ships upon the sea,Who hold an hour's converse, so short, so sweet;One little hour! and then, away they speedOn lonely paths, through mist, and cloud, and foam,To meet no more. We have been foolish, Walter!I would to God that I had never knownThis secret of thy heart, or else had met theeYears before this. I bear a heavy doom.If thy rich heart is like a palace shattered,Stand up amid the ruins of thy heart,And with a calm brow front the solemn stars.[Ladypauses;Walterremains silent.'Tis four o'clock already. She, the moon,Has climbed the blue steep of the eastern sky,And sits and tarries for the coming night.So let thy soul be up and ready armed,In waiting till occasion comes like night;As night to moons to souls occasion comes.I am thine elder,Walter!in the heart,I read thy future like an open book:I see thou shalt have grief; I also seeThy grief's edge blunted on the iron world.Be brave and strong through all thy wrestling years,A brave soul is a thing which all things serve;When the great Corsican from Elba came,The soldiers sent to take him, bound or dead,Were struck to statues by his kingly eyes:He spoke—they broke their ranks, they clasped his knees,With tears along a cheering road of triumphThey bore him to a throne. Know when to die!Perform thy work and straight return to God.Oh! there are men who linger on the stageTo gather crumbs and fragments of applauseWhen they should sleep in earth—who, like the moon,Have brightened up some little night of time,And 'stead of setting when their light is worn,Still linger, like its blank and beamless orb,When daylight fills the sky. But I must go.Nay, nay, I go alone! Yet one word more,—Strive for the Poet's crown, but ne'er forgetHow poor are fancy's blooms to thoughtful fruits;That gold and crimson mornings, though more brightThan soft blue days, are scarcely half their worth.Walter, farewell! the world shall hear of thee.[Ladystill lingers.I have a strange sweet thought. I do believeI shall be dead in spring, and that the soulWhich animates and doth inform these limbsWill pass into the daisies of my grave:If memory shall ever lead thee there,Through daisies I'll look up into thy faceAnd feel a dim sweet joy; and if they move,As in a little wind, thou'lt know 't is I.[Ladygoes.

WALTER (after a long interval, looking up).

God! what a light has passed away from earthSince my last look! How hideous this night!How beautiful the yesterday that stoodOver me like a rainbow! I am alone.The past is past. I see the future stretchAll dark and barren as a rainy sea.

Walter,wandering down a rural lane. Evening of the same day as Scene IV.

WALTER.

Sunset is burning like the seal of GodUpon the close of day.—This very hourNight mounts her chariot in the eastern gloomsTo chase the flying Sun, whose flight has leftFootprints of glory in the clouded west:Swift is she haled by wingèd swimming steeds,Whose cloudy manes are wet with heavy dews,And dews are drizzling from her chariot wheels.Soft in her lap lies drowsy-lidded Sleep,Brainful of dreams, as summer hive with bees;And round her in the pale and spectral lightFlock bats and grisly owls on noiseless wings.The flying sun goes down the burning west,Vast night comes noiseless up the eastern slope,And so the eternal chase goes round the world.Unrest! unrest! The passion-panting seaWatches the unveiled beauty of the starsLike a great hungry soul. The unquiet cloudsBreak and dissolve, then gather in a mass,And float like mighty icebergs through the blue.Summers, like blushes, sweep the face of earth;Heaven yearns in stars. Down comes the frantic rain;We hear the wail of the remorseful windsIn their strange penance. And this wretched orbKnows not the taste of rest; a maniac world,Homeless and sobbing through the deep she goes.[A Child runs past;Walterlooks after her.O thou bright thing, fresh from the hand of God,The motions of thy dancing limbs are swayedBy the unceasing music of thy being!Nearer I seem to God when looking on thee.'Tis ages since he made his younger star.His hand was on thee as 'twere yesterday,Thou later Revelation! Silver Stream,Breaking with laughter from the lake divineWhence all things flow! O bright and singing babe!What wilt thou be hereafter?—Why should manPerpetuate this round of miseryWhen he has in his hand the power to close it?Let there be no warm hearts, no love on earth.No Love! No Love! Love bringeth wretchedness.No holy marriage. No sweet infant smiles.No mother's bending o'er the innocent sleepWith unvoiced prayers and with happy tears.Let the whole race die out, and with a stroke,A master-stroke, at once cheat Death and HellOf half of their enormous revenues.[Walterapproaches a cottage; a peasant sitting at the door.One of my peasants. 'Tis a fair eve.

Unrest! unrest! The passion-panting seaWatches the unveiled beauty of the starsLike a great hungry soul. The unquiet cloudsBreak and dissolve, then gather in a mass,And float like mighty icebergs through the blue.Summers, like blushes, sweep the face of earth;Heaven yearns in stars. Down comes the frantic rain;We hear the wail of the remorseful windsIn their strange penance. And this wretched orbKnows not the taste of rest; a maniac world,Homeless and sobbing through the deep she goes.[A Child runs past;Walterlooks after her.O thou bright thing, fresh from the hand of God,The motions of thy dancing limbs are swayedBy the unceasing music of thy being!Nearer I seem to God when looking on thee.'Tis ages since he made his younger star.His hand was on thee as 'twere yesterday,Thou later Revelation! Silver Stream,Breaking with laughter from the lake divineWhence all things flow! O bright and singing babe!What wilt thou be hereafter?—Why should manPerpetuate this round of miseryWhen he has in his hand the power to close it?Let there be no warm hearts, no love on earth.No Love! No Love! Love bringeth wretchedness.No holy marriage. No sweet infant smiles.No mother's bending o'er the innocent sleepWith unvoiced prayers and with happy tears.Let the whole race die out, and with a stroke,A master-stroke, at once cheat Death and HellOf half of their enormous revenues.

[Walterapproaches a cottage; a peasant sitting at the door.One of my peasants. 'Tis a fair eve.

PEASANT.

Ay, Master!How sweet the smell of beans upon the air;The wheat is earing fairly. We have reasonFor thankfulness to God.

WALTER (looking upward).

Wehavegreat reason;For He provides a balm for all our woes.He has made Death. Thrice blessed be His name!

PEASANT.

He has made Heaven——

WALTER.

To yawn eternities.Did I say death? O God! there is no death.When our eyes close, we only pass one stageOf our long being.—Dost thou wish to die?

PEASANT.

I trust in God to live for many years,Although with a worn frame and with a heartSomewhat the worse for wear.

WALTER.

O fool! fool! fool!These hands are brown with toil; that brow is seamed,Still must you sweat and swelter in the sun,And trudge, with feet benumbed, the winter's snow,Nor intermission have until the end.Thou canst not draw down fame upon thy head,And yet would cling to life! I'll not believe it;The faces of all things belie their hearts,Each man's as weary of his life as I.This anguish'd earth shines on the moon—a moon.The moon hides with a cloak of tender lightA scarr'd heart fed upon by hungry fires.Black is this world, but blacker is the next;There is no rest for any living soul:We are immortals—and must bear with usThrough all eternity this hateful being;Restlessly flitting from pure star to star,The memory of our sins, deceits, and crimes,Eating into us like a poisoned robe.Yet thou canst wear content upon thy faceAnd talk of thankfulness! O die, man, die!Get underneath the earth for very shame.[During this speech the Child draws near; at its close her Father presents her toWalter.Is this thy answer?[Looks at her earnestly.O my worthy friend,I lost a world to-day and shed no tear;Now I could weep forthee. Sweet sinless one!My heart is weak as a great globe, all sea.It finds no shore to break on but thyself:So let it break.[He hides his face in his hands, the Child looking fearfully up at him.

A Room in London.Walterreading from a manuscript.

My head is grey, my blood is young,Red-leaping in my veins,The spring doth stir my spirit yetTo seek the cloistered violet,The primrose in the lanes.In heart I am a very boy,Haunting the woods, the waterfalls,The ivies on grey castle-walls;Weeping in silent joyWhen the broad sun goes down the west,Or trembling o'er a sparrow's nest.The world might laugh were I to tellWhat most my old age cheers,—Mem'ries of stars and crescent moons,Of nutting strolls through autumn noons,Rainbows 'mong April's tears.But chief, to live that hour again,When first I stood on sea-beach old,First heard the voice, first saw out-rolledThe glory of the main.Many rich draughts hath Memory,The Soul's cup-bearer, brought to me.I saw a garden in my strolls,A lovely place, I ween,With rows of vermeil-blossomed trees,With flowers, with slumb'rous haunts of bees,With summer-house of green.A peacock perched upon a dial,In the sun's face he did uncloseHis train superb with eyes and glows,To dare the sun to trial.A child sat in a shady place,A shower of ringlets round her face.She sat on shaven plot of grass,With earnest face, and weavingLilies white and freakèd pansiesInto quaint delicious fancies,Then, on a sudden leavingHer floral wreath, she would upspringWith silver shouts and ardent eyes,To chase the yellow butterflies,Making the garden ring;Then gravely pace the scented walk,Soothing her doll with childish talk.And being, as I said before,An old man who could findA boundless joy beneath the skies,And in the light of human eyes,And in the blowing wind,There, daily were my footsteps turned,Through the long spring, until the peachWas drooping full-juiced in my reach.—Each day my old heart yearnedTo look upon that child so fair,That infant in her golden hair.In this green lovely world of oursI have had many pets,Two are still leaping in the sun,Three are married;thatdearest oneIs 'neath the violets.I gazèd till my heart grew wild,To fold her in my warm caresses,Clasp her showers of golden tresses,—Oh, dreamy-eyèd child!O Child of Beauty! still thou artA sunbeam in this lonely heart.When autumn eves grew chill and rainy,England left I for the Ganges;I couched 'mong groves of cedar-trees,Blue lakes, and slumb'rous palaces,Crossed the snows of mountain-ranges,Watched the set of old Orion,Saw wild flocks and wild-eyed shepherds,Princes charioted by leopards,In the desert met the lion,The mad sun above us glaring,—Child! for thee I still was caring.Home returned from realms barbaric,By the shores of Loch Lubnaig,A dear friend and I were walking('Twas the Sabbath), we were talkingOf dreams and feelings vague;We pausèd by a place of graves,Scarcely a word was 'twixt us given,Silent the earth, silent the heaven,No murmur of the waves,The awèd Loch lay black and stillIn the black shadow of the hill.We loosed the gate and wandered in,When the sun eternalWas sudden blanched with amethyst,As if a thick and purple mistDusked his brows supernal.Soon like a god in mortal throes,City, hill, and sea, he dipsIn the death-hues of eclipse;Mightier his anguish grows,Till he hung black, with ring intense,The wreck of his magnificence.Above the earth's cold face he hungWith a pale ring of glory,Like that which cunning limners paintAround the forehead of a saint,Or brow of martyr hoary.And sitting there I could but choose,—That blind and stricken sun aboon,Stars shuddering through the ghostly noon,'Mong the thick-falling dews,—To tell, with features pale and wild,About that Garden and that Child.When moons had waxed and waned, I stoodBeside the garden gate,The Peacock's dial was overthrown,The walks with moss were overgrown,Herbower was desolate.Gazing in utter miseryUpon that sad and silent place,A woman came with mournful face,And thus she said to me,—"Those trees, as they were human souls,All withered at the death-bell knolls."I turned and asked her of the child."She is gone hence," quoth she,"To be with Christ in Paradise.Oh, sir! I stilled her infant cries,I nursed her on my knee.Though we were ever at her side,And saw life fading in her cheek,She knew us not, nor did she speak,Till just before she died;In the wild heart of that eclipse,These words came through her wasted lips:—'The callow young were huddling in the nests,The marigold was burning in the marsh,Like a thing dipt in sunset, when He came.My blood went up to meet Him on my face,Glad as a child that hears its father's step,And runs to meet him at the open porch.I gave Him all my being, like a flowerThat flings its perfume on a vagrant breeze;A breeze that wanders on and heeds it not.His scorn is lying on my heart like snow,My eyes are weary, and I fain would sleep;The quietest sleep is underneath the ground.Are ye around me, friends? I cannot see,I cannot hear the voices that I love,I lift my hands to you from out the night!Methought I felt a tear upon my cheek;Weep not, my mother! It is time to rest,And I am very weary; so, good night!'"My heart is in the grave with her,The family went abroad;Last autumn you might see the fruits,Neglected, rot round the tree-roots;This spring no leaves they shewed.I sometimes fear my brain is crost:Around this place, the churchyard yonder,All day, all night, I silent wander,As woeful as a ghost——God take me to His gracious keeping,But this old man is wildly weeping!"That night the sky was heaped with clouds;Through one blue gulf profound,Begirt with many a cloudy crag,The moon came rushing like a stag,And one star like a hound.Wearily the chase I eyed,Wearily I saw the Dawn'sFeet sheening o'er the dewy lawns.O God! that I had died.My heart's red tendrils were all tornAnd bleeding on that summer morn.

The world might laugh were I to tellWhat most my old age cheers,—Mem'ries of stars and crescent moons,Of nutting strolls through autumn noons,Rainbows 'mong April's tears.But chief, to live that hour again,When first I stood on sea-beach old,First heard the voice, first saw out-rolledThe glory of the main.Many rich draughts hath Memory,The Soul's cup-bearer, brought to me.

I saw a garden in my strolls,A lovely place, I ween,With rows of vermeil-blossomed trees,With flowers, with slumb'rous haunts of bees,With summer-house of green.A peacock perched upon a dial,In the sun's face he did uncloseHis train superb with eyes and glows,To dare the sun to trial.A child sat in a shady place,A shower of ringlets round her face.

She sat on shaven plot of grass,With earnest face, and weavingLilies white and freakèd pansiesInto quaint delicious fancies,Then, on a sudden leavingHer floral wreath, she would upspringWith silver shouts and ardent eyes,To chase the yellow butterflies,Making the garden ring;Then gravely pace the scented walk,Soothing her doll with childish talk.And being, as I said before,An old man who could findA boundless joy beneath the skies,And in the light of human eyes,And in the blowing wind,There, daily were my footsteps turned,Through the long spring, until the peachWas drooping full-juiced in my reach.—Each day my old heart yearnedTo look upon that child so fair,That infant in her golden hair.

In this green lovely world of oursI have had many pets,Two are still leaping in the sun,Three are married;thatdearest oneIs 'neath the violets.I gazèd till my heart grew wild,To fold her in my warm caresses,Clasp her showers of golden tresses,—Oh, dreamy-eyèd child!O Child of Beauty! still thou artA sunbeam in this lonely heart.

When autumn eves grew chill and rainy,England left I for the Ganges;I couched 'mong groves of cedar-trees,Blue lakes, and slumb'rous palaces,Crossed the snows of mountain-ranges,Watched the set of old Orion,Saw wild flocks and wild-eyed shepherds,Princes charioted by leopards,In the desert met the lion,The mad sun above us glaring,—Child! for thee I still was caring.

Home returned from realms barbaric,By the shores of Loch Lubnaig,A dear friend and I were walking('Twas the Sabbath), we were talkingOf dreams and feelings vague;We pausèd by a place of graves,Scarcely a word was 'twixt us given,Silent the earth, silent the heaven,No murmur of the waves,The awèd Loch lay black and stillIn the black shadow of the hill.

We loosed the gate and wandered in,When the sun eternalWas sudden blanched with amethyst,As if a thick and purple mistDusked his brows supernal.Soon like a god in mortal throes,City, hill, and sea, he dipsIn the death-hues of eclipse;Mightier his anguish grows,Till he hung black, with ring intense,The wreck of his magnificence.Above the earth's cold face he hungWith a pale ring of glory,Like that which cunning limners paintAround the forehead of a saint,Or brow of martyr hoary.And sitting there I could but choose,—That blind and stricken sun aboon,Stars shuddering through the ghostly noon,'Mong the thick-falling dews,—To tell, with features pale and wild,About that Garden and that Child.

When moons had waxed and waned, I stoodBeside the garden gate,The Peacock's dial was overthrown,The walks with moss were overgrown,Herbower was desolate.Gazing in utter miseryUpon that sad and silent place,A woman came with mournful face,And thus she said to me,—"Those trees, as they were human souls,All withered at the death-bell knolls."

I turned and asked her of the child."She is gone hence," quoth she,"To be with Christ in Paradise.Oh, sir! I stilled her infant cries,I nursed her on my knee.Though we were ever at her side,And saw life fading in her cheek,She knew us not, nor did she speak,Till just before she died;In the wild heart of that eclipse,These words came through her wasted lips:—

'The callow young were huddling in the nests,The marigold was burning in the marsh,Like a thing dipt in sunset, when He came.

My blood went up to meet Him on my face,Glad as a child that hears its father's step,And runs to meet him at the open porch.

I gave Him all my being, like a flowerThat flings its perfume on a vagrant breeze;A breeze that wanders on and heeds it not.

His scorn is lying on my heart like snow,My eyes are weary, and I fain would sleep;The quietest sleep is underneath the ground.

Are ye around me, friends? I cannot see,I cannot hear the voices that I love,I lift my hands to you from out the night!

Methought I felt a tear upon my cheek;Weep not, my mother! It is time to rest,And I am very weary; so, good night!'

"My heart is in the grave with her,The family went abroad;Last autumn you might see the fruits,Neglected, rot round the tree-roots;This spring no leaves they shewed.I sometimes fear my brain is crost:Around this place, the churchyard yonder,All day, all night, I silent wander,As woeful as a ghost——God take me to His gracious keeping,But this old man is wildly weeping!"

That night the sky was heaped with clouds;Through one blue gulf profound,Begirt with many a cloudy crag,The moon came rushing like a stag,And one star like a hound.Wearily the chase I eyed,Wearily I saw the Dawn'sFeet sheening o'er the dewy lawns.O God! that I had died.My heart's red tendrils were all tornAnd bleeding on that summer morn.

WALTER (after a long silence, speaking abstractedly, and with frequent pauses).

Twice hath the windy Summer made a noiseOf leaves o'er all the land from sea to sea,And still that Child's face sleeps within my heartLike a young sunbeam in a gloomy wood,Making the darkness smile—I almost smileAt the strange fancies I have girt her with;The garden, peacock, and the black eclipse,The still old graveyard 'mong the dreary hills,Grey mourners round it—I wonder if she's dead?She was too fair for earth. Ah! she would dieLike music, sunbeams, and the pallid flowersThat spring on Winter's corse—I saw those gravesWith Him who is no more. They are all dead,The beings whom I loved, and I am sad,But would not change my sadness for a lifeWithout a fissure running through its joy.This very hour a suite of sumptuous roomsO'erflows with music like a cup with wine;Outside, the night is weeping like a girlAt her seducer's door, and still the roomsRun o'er with music, careless of her woe.I would not have my heart thus. This poor rhymeIs but an adumbration of my life,My misery tricked out in a quaint disguise.Oh, it did happen on a summer dayWhen I was playing unawares with flowers,That happiness shot past me like a planet,And I was barren left!

EnterEdward,unobserved.

EDWARD.

Walter's love-sick for Fame:A haughty mistress! How this mad old worldReels to its burning grave, shouting forth names,Like a wild drunkard at his frenzy's height,And they who bear them deem such shoutingsFame,And, smiling, die content. What is thy thought?

WALTER.

'Tis this, a sad one:—Though our beings pointUpward, like prayers or quick spires of flame,We soon lose interest in this breathing world.Joy palls from taste to taste, until we yawnIn Pleasure's glowing face. When first we love,Our souls are clad with joy, as if a tree,All winter-bare, had on a sudden leaptTo a full load of blooms; next time 'tis nought.Great weariness doth feed upon the soul;I sometimes think the highest-blest in heavenWill weary 'mong its flowers. As for myself,There's nothing new between me and the graveBut the cold feel of Death.

EDWARD.

Watch well thy heart!It is, methinks, an eager shaking star,Not a calm steady planet.

WALTER.

I love thee much,But thou art all unlike the glorious guideOf my proud boyhood. Oh, he led me up,As Hesper, large and brilliant, leads the night!Our pulses beat together, and our beingsMixed like two voices in one perfect tune,And his the richest voice. He loved all things,From God to foam-bells dancing down a stream,With a most equal love. Thou mock'st at much;And he who sneers at any living hopeOr aspiration of a human heart,Is just so many stages less than God,That universal and all-sided Love.I'm wretched, Edward! to the very heart;I see an unreached heaven of young desireShine through my hopeless tears. My drooping sailsFlap idly 'gainst the mast of my intent.I rot upon the waters when my prowShould grate the golden isles.

EDWARD.

What wouldst thou do?Thy brain did teem with vapours wild and vast.

WALTER.

But since my younger and my hotter days(As nebula condenses to an orb),These vapours gathered to one shining hope,Sole-hanging in my sky.

EDWARD.

What hope is that?

WALTER.

To set this Age to music—The great workBefore the Poet now—I do believeWhen it is fully sung, its great complaint,Its hope, its yearning, told to earth and heaven,Our troubled age shall pass, as doth a dayThat leaves the west all crimson with the promiseOf the diviner morrow, which even thenIs hurrying up the world's great side with light.Father! if I should live to see that morn,Let me go upward, like a lark, to singOne song in the dawning!

EDWARD.

Ah, my ardent friend!You need not tinker at this leaking world,'Tis ruined past all cure.

WALTER.

Edward, for shame!Not on a path of reprobation runsThe trembling earth. God's eye doth follow herWith far more love than doth her maid, the moon.Speak no harsh words of Earth, she is our mother,And few of us, her sons, who have not addedA wrinkle to her brow. She gave us birth,We drew our nurture from her ample breast,And there is coming, for us both, an hourWhen we shall pray that she will ope her armsAnd take us back again. Oh, I would pledgeMy heart, my blood, my brain, to ease the earthOf but one single pang!

EDWARD.

So would not I.Because the pangs of earth shall ne'er be eased.We sleep on velvets now, instead of leaves;The land is covered with a net of iron,Upon whose spider-like, far-stretching lines,The trains are rushing, and the peevish seaFrets 'gainst the bulging bosoms of the ships,Whose keels have waked it from its hour's repose.Walter! this height of civilisation's tideMeasures our wrong. We've made the immortal SoulSlave to the Body. 'Tis the Soul has wroughtAnd laid the iron roads, evoked a powerNext mightiest to God, to drive the trainsThat bring the country butter up to town;Has drawn the terrible lightning from its cloud,And tamed it to an eager Mercury,Running with messages of news and gain;And still the Soul is tasked to harder work,For Paradise, according to the world,Is scarce a league a-head.

WALTER.

The man I lovedWrought this complaint of thine into a song,Which I sung long ago.

EDWARD.

We must reverseThe plans of ages. Let the Body sweat,So that the soul be calm, why shoulditwork?Say, had I spent the pith of half my life,And made me master of our English law,What gain had I on resurrection morn,But such as hath the body of a clown,That it could turn a summerset on earth?A single soul is richer than all worlds,Its acts are only shadows of itself,And oft its wondrous wealth is all unknown;'Tis like a mountain-range, whose rugged sidesFeed starveling flocks of sheep; pierce the bare sides,And they ooze plenteous gold. We must go downAnd work our souls like mines, make books our lamps,Not shrines to worship at, nor heed the world—Let it go roaring past. You sigh for Fame;Would serve as long as Jacob for his love,So you might win her. Spirits calm and stillAre high above your order, as the starsSit large and tranquil o'er the restless cloudsThat weep and lighten, pelt the earth with hail,And fret themselves away. The truly greatRest in the knowledge of their own deserts,Nor seek the confirmation of the world.Wouldst thou be calm and still?

WALTER.

I'd be as lieveA minnow to leviathan, that drawsA furrow like a ship. Away! away!You'd make the world a very oyster-bed.I'd rather be the glad, bright-leaping foam,Than the smooth sluggish sea. O let me liveTo love and flush and thrill—or let me die!

EDWARD.

And yet, what weariness was on your tongueAn hour ago!—you shall be wearier yet.

A Balcony overlooking the Sea—EdwardandWalterseated.

WALTER.

The lark is singing in the blinding sky,Hedges are white with May. The bridegroom seaIs toying with the shore, his wedded bride,And, in the fulness of his marriage joy,He decorates her tawny brow with shells,Retires a space, to see how fair she looks,Then proud, runs up to kiss her. All is fair—All glad, from grass to sun! Yet more I loveThan this, the shrinking day, that sometimes comesIn Winter's front, so fair 'mong its dark peers,It seems a straggler from the files of June,Which in its wanderings had lost its wits,And half its beauty; and, when it returned,Finding its old companions gone away,It joined November's troop, then marching past;And so the frail thing comes, and greets the worldWith a thin crazy smile, then bursts in tears,And all the while it holds within its handA few half-withered flowers. I love and pity it!

EDWARD.

Air is like Happiness or Poetry.We see it in the glorious roof of day,We feel it lift the down upon the cheek,We hear it when it sways the heavy woods,We close our hand on 't—and we have it not.

WALTER.

I'd be above all things the summer windBlowing across a kingdom, rich with almsFrom ev'ry flower and forest, ruffling oftThe sea to transient wrinkles in the sun,Where ev'ry wrinkle is a flash of light.

EDWARD.

Like God, I would pervade Humanity,From bridegroom dreaming on his marriage morn,To a wild wretch tied on the farthest boughOf oak that roars on edge of an abyss,The while the desperate wind with all its strengthStrains the whole night to drive it down the gulf,Which like a beast gapes wide for man and tree.I'd creep into the lost and ruined heartsOf sinful women dying in the streets,—Of pinioned men, their necks upon the block,Axe gleaming in the air.

WALTER.

Away, away!Break not, my Edward, this consummate hour;For very oft within the year that's pastI've fought against thy drifts of wintry thoughtTill they put out my fires, and I have lain,A volcano choked with snow. Now let me rest!If I should wear a rose but once in life,You surely would not tear it leaf from leaf,And trample all its sweetness in the dust!Thy dreary thoughts will make my festal heartAs empty and as desolate's a churchWhen worshippers are gone and night comes down.Spare me this happy hour, and let me rest!

EDWARD.

The banquet you do set before your joysIs surely but indifferently served,When they so readily vacate their seats.

WALTER (abstractedly).

Would I could raise the dead!I am as happy as the singing heavens—There was one very dear to me that died,With heart as vacant as a last-year's nest.Oh, could I bring her back, I'd empty mine,And brim hers with my joy!—enough for both.

EDWARD (after a pause).

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