Mentana—Edwin Arnold, C.S.I.
LES CHANSONS DES RUES ET DES BOIS.
Love of the WoodlandShooting Stars
L'ANNÉE TERRIBLE.
To Little Jeanne—Marwaod TuckerTo a Sick Child during the Siege of Paris—Lucy H. HooperThe Carrier PigeonToys and TragedyMourning—Marwood TuckerThe Lesson of the Patriot Dead—H.L.W.The Boy on the Barricade—H.L.W.To His Orphan Grandchildren—Marwood TuckerTo the Cannon "Victor Hugo"
L'ART D'ÊTRE GRANDPÈRE.
The Children of the Poor—Dublin University MagazineThe Epic of the Lion—Edwin Arnold, C.S.I.
LES QUATRE VENTS DE L'ESPRIT.
On Hearing the Princess Royal Sing—Nelson R. TyermanMy Happiest DreamAn Old-Time LayJerseyThen, most, I SmileThe Exile's DesireThe Refugee's Haven
VARIOUS PIECES.
To the Napoleon Column—Author of "Critical Essays"Charity—Dublin University MagazineSweet Sister—Mrs. B. SomersThe Pity of the AngelsThe Sower—Toru DuttOh, Why not be Happy?—Leopold WrayFreedom and the WorldSerenade—Henry F. ChorleyAn Autumnal SimileTo Cruel OceanEsmeralda in PrisonLover's Song—Ernest Oswald CoeA Fleeting Glimpse of a Village—Fraser's MagazineLord Rochester's SongThe Beggar's Quatrain—H.L.C., London SocietyThe Quiet Rural ChurchA Storm Simile
DRAMATIC PIECES.
The Father's Curse—Fredk. L. SlousPaternal Love—Fanny Kemble-ButlerThe Degenerate Gallants—Lord F. Leveson GowerThe Old and the Young Bridegroom—Charles SherryThe Spanish Lady's Love—C. MoirThe Lover's Sacrifice—Lord F. Leveson GowerThe Old Man's Love—C. MoirThe Roll of the De Silva Race—Lord F. Leveson GowerThe Lover's Colloquy—Lord F. Leveson GowerCromwell and the Crown—Leitch RitchieMilton's Appeal to CromwellFirst Love—Fanny Kemble-ButlerThe First Black Flag—Democratic ReviewThe Son in Old Age—Foreign Quarterly ReviewThe Emperor's Return—Athenaum
Towards the close of the First French Revolution, Joseph Leopold Sigisbert Hugo, son of a joiner at Nancy, and an officer risen from the ranks in the Republican army, married Sophie Trébuchet, daughter of a Nantes fitter-out of privateers, a Vendean royalist and devotee.
Victor Marie Hugo, their second son, was born on the 26th of February, 1802, at Besançon, France. Though a weakling, he was carried, with his boy-brothers, in the train of their father through the south of France, in pursuit of Fra Diavolo, the Italian brigand, and finally into Spain.
Colonel Hugo had become General, and there, besides being governor over three provinces, was Lord High Steward at King Joseph's court, where his eldest son Abel was installed as page. The other two were educated for similar posts among hostile young Spaniards under stern priestly tutors in the Nobles' College at Madrid, a palace become a monastery. Upon the English advance to free Spain of the invaders, the general and Abel remained at bay, whilst the mother and children hastened to Paris.
Again, in a house once a convent, Victor and his brother Eugène were taught by priests until, by the accident of their roof sheltering a comrade of their father's, a change of tutor was afforded them. This was General Lahorie, a man of superior education, main supporter of Malet in his daring plot to take the government into the Republicans' hands during the absence of Napoleon I. in Russia. Lahorie read old French and Latin with Victor till the police scented him out and led him to execution, October, 1812.
School claimed the young Hugos after this tragical episode, where they were oddities among the humdrum tradesmen's sons. Victor, thoughtful and taciturn, rhymed profusely in tragedies, "printing" in his books, "Châteaubriand or nothing!" and engaging his more animated brother to flourish the Cid's sword and roar the tyrant's speeches.
In 1814, both suffered a sympathetic anxiety as their father held out at Thionville against the Allies, finally repulsing them by a sortie. This was pure loyalty to the fallen Bonaparte, for Hugo had lost his all in Spain, his very savings having been sunk in real estate, through King Joseph's insistence on his adherents investing to prove they had "come to stay."
The Bourbons enthroned anew, General Hugo received, less for his neutrality than thanks to his wife's piety and loyalty, confirmation of his title and rank, and, moreover, a fieldmarshalship. Abel was accepted as a page, too, but there was no money awarded the ex-Bonapartist—money being what the Eaglet at Reichstadt most required for an attempt at his father's throne—and the poor officer was left in seclusion to write consolingly about his campaigns and "Defences of Fortified Towns."
Decidedly the pen had superseded the sword, for Victor and Eugène were scribbling away in ephemeral political sheets as apprenticeship to founding a periodical of their own.
Victor's poetry became remarkable inLa Muse FrançaiseandLe Conservateur Littéraire, the odes being permeated with Legitimist and anti-revolutionary sentiments delightful to the taste of Madam Hugo, member as she was of the courtly Order of the Royal Lily.
In 1817, the French Academy honorably mentioned Victor's "Odes on the Advantages of Study," with a misgiving that some elder hand was masked under the line ascribing "scant fifteen years" to the author. At the Toulouse Floral Games he won prizes two years successively. His critical judgment was sound as well, for he had divined the powers of Lamartine.
His "Odes," collected in a volume, gave his ever-active mother her opportunity at Court. Louis XVIII. granted the boy-poet a pension of 1,500 francs.
It was the windfall for which the youth had been waiting to enable him to gratify his first love. In his childhood, his father and one M. Foucher, head of a War Office Department, had jokingly betrothed a son of the one to a daughter of the other. Abel had loftier views than alliance with a civil servant's child; Eugène was in love elsewhere; but Victor had fallen enamored with Adèle Foucher. It is true, when poverty beclouded the Hugos, the Fouchers had shrunk into their mantle of dignity, and the girl had been strictly forbidden to correspond with her child-sweetheart.
He, finding letters barred out, wrote a love story ("Hans of Iceland") in two weeks, where were recited his hopes, fears, and constancy, and this book she could read.
It pleased the public no less, and its sale, together with that of the "Odes" and a West Indian romance, "Buck Jargal," together with a royal pension, emboldened the poet to renew his love-suit. To refuse the recipient of court funds was not possible to a public functionary. M. Foucher consented to the betrothal in the summer of 1821.
So encloistered had Mdlle. Adèle been, her reading "Hans" the exceptional intrusion, that she only learnt on meeting her affianced that he was mourning his mother. In October, 1822, they were wed, the bride nineteen, the bridegroom but one year the elder. The dinner was marred by the sinister disaster of Eugène Hugo going mad. (He died in an asylum five years later.) The author terminated his wedding year with the "Ode to Louis XVIII.," read to a society after the President of the Academy had introduced him as "the most promising of our young lyrists."
In spite of new poems revealing a Napoleonic bias, Victor was invited to see Charles X. consecrated at Rheims, 29th of May, 1825, and was entered on the roll of the Legion of Honor repaying the favors with the verses expected. But though a son was born to him he was not restored to Conservatism; with his mother's death all that had vanished. His tragedy of "Cromwell" broke lances upon Royalists and upholders of the still reigning style of tragedy. The second collection of "Odes" preluding it, showed the spirit of the son of Napoleon's general, rather than of the Bourbonist field-marshal. On the occasion, too, of the Duke of Tarento being announced at the Austrian Ambassador's ball, February, 1827, as plain "Marshal Macdonald," Victor became the mouthpiece of indignant Bonapartists in his "Ode to the Napoleon Column" in the Place Vendôme.
His "Orientales," though written in a Parisian suburb by one who had not travelled, appealed for Grecian liberty, and depicted sultans and pashas as tyrants, many a line being deemed applicable to personages nearer the Seine than Stamboul.
"Cromwell" was not actable, and "Amy Robsart," in collaboration with his brother-in-law, Foucher, miserably failed, notwithstanding a finale "superior to Scott's 'Kenilworth.'" In one twelvemonth, there was this failure to record, the death of his father from apoplexy at his eldest son's marriage, and the birth of a second son to Victor towards the close.
Still imprudent, the young father again irritated the court with satire in "Marion Delorme" and "Hernani," two plays immediately suppressed by the Censure, all the more active as the Revolution of July, 1830, was surely seething up to the edge of the crater.
(At this juncture, the poet Châteaubriand, fading star to our rising sun, yielded up to him formally "his place at the poets' table.")
In the summer of 1831, a civil ceremony was performed over the insurgents killed in the previous year, and Hugo was constituted poet-laureate of the Revolution by having his hymn sung in the Pantheon over the biers.
Under Louis Philippe, "Marion Delorme" could be played, but livelier attention was turned to "Nôtre Dame de Paris," the historical romance in which Hugo vied with Sir Walter. It was to have been followed by others, but the publisher unfortunately secured a contract to monopolize all the new novelist's prose fictions for a term of years, and the author revenged himself by publishing poems and plays alone. Hence "Nôtre Dame" long stood unique: it was translated in all languages, and plays and operas were founded on it. Heine professed to see in the prominence of the hunchback a personal appeal of the author, who was slightly deformed by one shoulder being a trifle higher than the other; this malicious suggestion reposed also on the fact that thequasi-hero of "Le Roi s'Amuse" (1832, a tragedy suppressed after one representation, for its reflections on royalty), was also a contorted piece of humanity. This play was followed by "Lucrezia Borgia," "Marie Tudor," and "Angelo," written in a singular poetic prose. Spite of bald translations, their action was sufficiently dramatic to make them successes, and even still enduring on our stage. They have all been arranged as operas, whilst Hugo himself, to oblige the father of Louise Bertin, a magazine publisher of note, wrote "Esmeralda" for her music in 1835.
Thus, at 1837, when he was promoted to an officership in the Legion of Honor, it was acknowledged his due as a laborious worker in all fields of literature, however contestable the merits and tendencies of his essays.
In 1839, the Academy, having rejected him several times, elected him among the Forty Immortals. In the previous year had been successfully acted "Ruy Blas," for which play he had gone to Spanish sources; with and after the then imperative Rhine tour, came an unendurable "trilogy," the "Burgraves," played one long, long night in 1843. A real tragedy was to mark that year: his daughter Léopoldine being drowned in the Seine with her husband, who would not save himself when he found that her death-grasp on the sinking boat was not to be loosed.
For distraction, Hugo plunged into politics. A peer in 1845, he sat between Marshal Soult and Pontécoulant, the regicide-judge of Louis XVI. His maiden speech bore upon artistic copyright; but he rapidly became a power in much graver matters.
As fate would have it, his speech on the Bonapartes induced King Louis Philippe to allow Prince Louis Napoleon Bonaparte to return, and, there being no gratitude in politics, the emancipated outlaw rose as a rival candidate for the Presidency, for which Hugo had nominated himself in his newspaper theEvènement. The story of theCoup d'Étatis well known; for the Republican's side, read Hugo's own "History of a Crime." Hugo, proscribed, betook himself to Brussels, London, and the Channel Islands, waiting to "return with right when the usurper should be expelled."
Meanwhile, he satirized the Third Napoleon and his congeners with ceaseless shafts, the principal being the famous "Napoleon the Little," based on the analogical reasoning that as the earth has moons, the lion the jackal, man himself his simian double, a minor Napoleon was inevitable as a standard of estimation, the grain by which a pyramid is measured. These flings were collected in "Les Châtiments," a volume preceded by "Les Contemplations" (mostly written in the '40's), and followed by "Les Chansons des Rues et des Bois."
The baffled publisher's close-time having expired, or, at least, his heirs being satisfied, three novels appeared, long heralded: in 1862, "Les Misérables" (Ye Wretched), wherein the author figures as Marius and his father as the Bonapartist officer: in 1866, "Les Travailleurs de la Mer" (Toilers of the Sea), its scene among the Channel Islands; and, in 1868, "L'Homme Qui Rit" (The Man who Grins), unfortunately laid in a fanciful England evolved from recondite reading through foreign spectacles. Whilst writing the final chapters, Hugo's wife died; and, as he had refused the Amnesty, he could only escort her remains to the Belgian frontier, August, 1868. All this while, in his Paris daily newspaper,Le Rappei(adorned with cuts of a Revolutionary drummer beating "to arms!"), he and his sons and son-in-law's family were reiterating blows at the throne. When it came down in 1870, and the Republic was proclaimed, Hugo hastened to Paris.
His poems, written during the War and Siege, collected under the title of "L'Année Terrible" (The Terrible Year, 1870-71), betray the long-tried exile, "almost alone in his gloom," after the death of his son Charles and his child. Fleeing to Brussels after the Commune, he nevertheless was so aggressive in sheltering and aiding its fugitives, that he was banished the kingdom, lest there should be a renewal of an assault on his house by the mob, supposed by his adherents to be, not "the honest Belgians," but the refugee Bonapartists and Royalists, who had not cared to fight for France in France endangered. Resting in Luxemburg, he prepared "L'Année Terrible" for the press, and thence returned to Paris, vainly to plead with President Thiers for the captured Communists' lives, and vainly, too, proposing himself for election to the new House.
In 1872, his novel of "'93" pleased the general public here, mainly by the adventures of three charming little children during the prevalence of an internecine war. These phases of a bounteously paternal mood reappeared in "L'Art d'être Grandpère," published in 1877, when he had become a life-senator.
"Hernani" was in the regular "stock" of the Théâtre Français, "Rigoletto" (Le Roi s'Amuse) always at the Italian opera-house, while the same subject, under the title of "The Fool's Revenge," held, as it still holds, a high position on the Anglo-American stage. Finally, the poetic romance of "Torquemada," for over thirty years promised, came forth in 1882, to prove that the wizard-wand had not lost its cunning.
After dolor, fêtes were come: on one birthday they crown his bust in the chief theatre; on another, all notable Paris parades under his window, where he sits with his grandchildren at his knee, in the shadow of the Triumphal Arch of Napoleon's Star. It is given to few men thus to see their own apotheosis.
Whilst he was dying, in May, 1885, Paris was but the first mourner for all France; and the magnificent funeral pageant which conducted the pauper's coffin, antithetically enshrining the remains considered worthy of the highest possible reverence and honors, from the Champs Elysées to the Pantheon, was the more memorable from all that was foremost in French art and letters having marched in the train, and laid a leaf or flower in the tomb of the protégé of Châteaubriand, the brother-in-arms of Dumas, the inspirer of Mars, Dorval, Le-maître, Rachel, and Bernhardt, and, above all, the Nemesis of the Third Empire.
MOSES ON THE NILE.("Mes soeurs, l'onde est plus fraiche."){TO THE FLORAL GAMES, Toulouse, Feb. 10, 1820.}
"Sisters! the wave is freshest in the rayOf the young morning; the reapers are asleep;The river bank is lonely: come away!The early murmurs of old Memphis creepFaint on my ear; and here unseen we stray,—Deep in the covert of the grove withdrawn,Save by the dewy eye-glance of the dawn."Within my father's palace, fair to see,Shine all the Arts, but oh! this river side,Pranked with gay flowers, is dearer far to meThan gold and porphyry vases bright and wide;How glad in heaven the song-bird carols free!Sweeter these zephyrs float than all the showersOf costly odors in our royal bowers."The sky is pure, the sparkling stream is clear:Unloose your zones, my maidens! and fling downTo float awhile upon these bushes nearYour blue transparent robes: take off my crown,And take away my jealous veil; for hereTo-day we shall be joyous while we laveOur limbs amid the murmur of the wave."Hasten; but through the fleecy mists of morn,What do I see? Look ye along the stream!Nay, timid maidens—we must not return!Coursing along the current, it would seemAn ancient palm-tree to the deep sea borne,That from the distant wilderness proceeds,Downwards, to view our wondrous Pyramids."But stay! if I may surely trust mine eye,—It is the bark of Hermes, or the shellOf Iris, wafted gently to the sighsOf the light breeze along the rippling swell;But no: it is a skiff where sweetly liesAn infant slumbering, and his peaceful restLooks as if pillowed on his mother's breast."He sleeps—oh, see! his little floating bedSwims on the mighty river's fickle flow,A white dove's nest; and there at hazard ledBy the faint winds, and wandering to and fro,The cot comes down; beneath his quiet headThe gulfs are moving, and each threatening waveAppears to rock the child upon a grave."He wakes—ah, maids of Memphis! haste, oh, haste!He cries! alas!—What mother could confideHer offspring to the wild and watery waste?He stretches out his arms, the rippling tideMurmurs around him, where all rudely placed,He rests but with a few frail reeds beneath,Between such helpless innocence and death."Oh! take him up! Perchance he is of thoseDark sons of Israel whom my sire proscribes;Ah! cruel was the mandate that aroseAgainst most guiltless of the stranger tribes!Poor child! my heart is yearning for his woes,I would I were his mother; but I'll giveIf not his birth, at least the claim to live."Thus Iphis spoke; the royal hope and prideOf a great monarch; while her damsels nigh,Wandered along the Nile's meandering side;And these diminished beauties, standing byThe trembling mother; watching with eyes wideTheir graceful mistress, admired her as stood,More lovely than the genius of the flood!The waters broken by her delicate feetReceive the eager wader, as aloneBy gentlest pity led, she strives to meetThe wakened babe; and, see, the prize is won!She holds the weeping burden with a sweetAnd virgin glow of pride upon her brow,That knew no flush save modesty's till now.Opening with cautious hands the reedy couch,She brought the rescued infant slowly outBeyond the humid sands; at her approachHer curious maidens hurried round aboutTo kiss the new-born brow with gentlest touch;Greeting the child with smiles, and bending nighTheir faces o'er his large, astonished eye!Haste thou who, from afar, in doubt and fear,Dost watch, with straining eyes, the fated boy—The loved of heaven! come like a stranger near,And clasp young Moses with maternal joy;Nor fear the speechless transport and the tearWill e'er betray thy fond and hidden claim,For Iphis knows not yet a mother's name!With a glad heart, and a triumphal face,The princess to the haughty Pharaoh ledThe humble infant of a hated race,Bathed with the bitter tears a parent shed;While loudly pealing round the holy placeOf Heaven's white Throne, the voice of angel choirsIntoned the theme of their undying lyres!"No longer mourn thy pilgrimage below—O Jacob! let thy tears no longer swellThe torrent of the Egyptian river: Lo!Soon on the Jordan's banks thy tents shall dwell;And Goshen shall behold thy people goDespite the power of Egypt's law and brand,From their sad thrall to Canaan's promised land."The King of Plagues, the Chosen of Sinai,Is he that, o'er the rushing waters driven,A vigorous hand hath rescued for the sky;Ye whose proud hearts disown the ways of heaven!Attend, be humble! for its power is nighIsrael! a cradle shall redeem thy worth—A Cradle yet shall save the widespread earth!"Dublin University Magazine, 1839
("L'Avarice et l'Envie."){LE CONSERVATEUR LITÉRAIRE, 1820.}
Envy and Avarice, one summer day,Sauntering abroadIn quest of the abodeOf some poor wretch or fool who lived that way—You—or myself, perhaps—I cannot say—Along the road, scarce heeding where it tended,Their way in sullen, sulky silence wended;For, though twin sisters, these two charming creatures,Rivals in hideousness of form and features,Wasted no love between them as they went.Pale Avarice,With gloating eyes,And back and shoulders almost double bent,Was hugging close that fatal boxFor which she's ever on the watchSome glance to catchSuspiciously directed to its locks;And Envy, too, no doubt with silent winkingAt her green, greedy orbs, no single minuteWithdrawn from it, was hard a-thinkingOf all the shining dollars in it.The only words that Avarice could utter,Her constant doom, in a low, frightened mutter,"There's not enough, enough, yet in my store!"While Envy, as she scanned the glittering sight,Groaned as she gnashed her yellow teeth with spite,"She's more than me, more, still forever more!"Thus, each in her own fashion, as they wandered,Upon the coffer's precious contents pondered,When suddenly, to their surprise,The God Desire stood before their eyes.Desire, that courteous deity who grantsAll wishes, prayers, and wants;Said he to the two sisters: "Beauteous ladies,As I'm a gentleman, my task and trade isTo be the slave of your behest—Choose therefore at your own sweet will and pleasure,Honors or treasure!Or in one word, whatever you'd like best.But, let us understand each other—sheWho speaks the first, her prayer shall certainlyReceive—the other, the same boonredoubled!"Imagine how our amiable pair,At this proposal, all so frank and fair,Were mutually troubled!Misers and enviers, of our human race,Say, what would you have done in such a case?Each of the sisters murmured, sad and low"What boots it, oh, Desire, to me to haveCrowns, treasures, all the goods that heart can crave,Or power divine bestow,Since still another must have always more?"So each, lest she should speak beforeThe other, hesitating slow and longTill the god lost all patience, held her tongue.He was enraged, in such a way,To be kept waiting there all day,With two such beauties in the public road;Scarce able to be civil even,He wished them both—well, not in heaven.Envy at last the silence broke,And smiling, with malignant sneer,Upon her sister dear,Who stood in expectation by,Ever implacable and cruel, spoke"I would be blinded ofoneeye!"American Keepsake
("En ce temps-là du ciel les portes."){Bk. I. v., December, 1822.}
The golden gates were opened wide that day,All through the unveiled heaven there seemed to playOut of the Holiest of Holy, light;And the elect beheld, crowd immortal,A young soul, led up by young angels bright,Stand in the starry portal.A fair child fleeing from the world's fierce hate,In his blue eye the shade of sorrow sate,His golden hair hung all dishevelled down,On wasted cheeks that told a mournful story,And angels twined him with the innocent's crown,The martyr's palm of glory.The virgin souls that to the Lamb are near,Called through the clouds with voices heavenly clear,God hath prepared a glory for thy brow,Rest in his arms, and all ye hosts that singHis praises ever on untired string,Chant, for a mortal comes among ye now;Do homage—"'Tis a king."And the pale shadow saith to God in heaven:"I am an orphan and no king at all;I was a weary prisoner yestereven,My father's murderers fed my soul with gall.Not me, O Lord, the regal name beseems.Last night I fell asleep in dungeon drear,But then I saw my mother in my dreams,Say, shall I find her here?"The angels said: "Thy Saviour bids thee come,Out of an impure world He calls thee home,From the mad earth, where horrid murder wavesOver the broken cross her impure wings,And regicides go down among the graves,Scenting the blood of kings."He cries: "Then have I finished my long life?Are all its evils over, all its strife,And will no cruel jailer evermoreWake me to pain, this blissful vision o'er?Is it no dream that nothing else remainsOf all my torments but this answered cry,And have I had, O God, amid my chains,The happiness to die?"For none can tell what cause I had to pine,What pangs, what miseries, each day were mine;And when I wept there was no mother nearTo soothe my cries, and smile away my tear.Poor victim of a punishment unending,Torn like a sapling from its mother earth,So young, I could not tell what crime impendingHad stained me from my birth."Yet far off in dim memory it seems,With all its horror mingled happy dreams,Strange cries of glory rocked my sleeping head,And a glad people watched beside my bed.One day into mysterious darkness thrown,I saw the promise of my future close;I was a little child, left all alone,Alas! and I had foes."They cast me living in a dreary tomb,Never mine eyes saw sunlight pierce the gloom,Only ye, brother angels, used to sweepDown from your heaven, and visit me in sleep.'Neath blood-red hands my young life withered there.Dear Lord, the bad are miserable all,Be not Thou deaf, like them, unto my prayer,It is for them I call."The angels sang: "See heaven's high arch unfold,Come, we will crown thee with the stars above,Will give thee cherub-wings of blue and gold,And thou shalt learn our ministry of love,Shalt rock the cradle where some mother's tearsAre dropping o'er her restless little one,Or, with thy luminous breath, in distant spheres,Shalt kindle some cold sun."Ceased the full choir, all heaven was hushed to hear,Bowed the fair face, still wet with many a tear,In depths of space, the rolling worlds were stayed,Whilst the Eternal in the infinite said:"O king, I kept thee far from human state,Who hadst a dungeon only for thy throne,O son, rejoice, and bless thy bitter fate,The slavery of kings thou hast not known,What if thy wasted arms are bleeding yet,And wounded with the fetter's cruel trace,No earthly diadem has ever setA stain upon thy face."Child, life and hope were with thee at thy birth,But life soon bowed thy tender form to earth,And hope forsook thee in thy hour of need.Come, for thy Saviour had His pains divine;Come, for His brow was crowned with thorns like thine,His sceptre was a reed."Dublin University Magazine.
("Lorsqu'à l'antique Olympe immolant l'evangile."){Bk. II. v., 1823.}{There was in Rome one antique usage as follows: On the eve of theexecution day, the sufferers were given a public banquet—at the prisongate—known as the "Free Festival."—CHATEAUBRIAND'S "Martyrs."}
When the Christians were doomed to the lions of oldBy the priest and the praetor, combined to upholdAn idolatrous cause,Forth they came while the vast Colosseum throughoutGathered thousands looked on, and they fell 'mid the shoutOf "the People's" applause.On the eve of that day of their evenings the last!At the gates of their dungeon a gorgeous repast,Rich, unstinted, unpriced,That the doomed might (forsooth) gather strength ere they bled,With an ignorant pity the jailers would spreadFor the martyrs of Christ.Oh, 'twas strange for a pupil of Paul to reclineOn voluptuous couch, while Falernian wineFill'd his cup to the brim!Dulcet music of Greece, Asiatic repose,Spicy fragrance of Araby, Italian rose,All united for him!Every luxury known through the earth's wide expanse,In profusion procured was put forth to enhanceThe repast that they gave;And no Sybarite, nursed in the lap of delight,Such a banquet ere tasted as welcomed that nightThe elect of the grave.And the lion, meantime, shook his ponderous chain,Loud and fierce howled the tiger, impatient to stainThe bloodthirsty arena;Whilst the women of Rome, who applauded those deedsAnd who hailed the forthcoming enjoyment, must needsShame the restless hyena.They who figured as guests on that ultimate eve,In their turn on the morrow were destined to giveTo the lions their food;For, behold, in the guise of a slave at that board,Where his victims enjoyed all that life can afford,Death administering stood.Such, O monarchs of earth! was your banquet of power,But the tocsin has burst on your festival hour—'Tis your knell that it rings!To the popular tiger a prey is decreed,And the maw of Republican hunger will feedOna banquet of Kings!"FATHER PROUT" (FRANK MAHONY)
(DEDICATED TO CHATEAUBRIAND.){Bk. IV. vi., July, 1822.}
Woe unto him! the child of this sad earth,Who, in a troubled world, unjust and blind,Bears Genius—treasure of celestial birth,Within his solitary soul enshrined.Woe unto him! for Envy's pangs impure,Like the undying vultures', will be drivenInto his noble heart, that must endurePangs for each triumph; and, still unforgiven,Suffer Prometheus' doom, who ravished fire from Heaven.Still though his destiny on earth may beGrief and injustice; who would not endureWith joyful calm, each proffered agony;Could he the prize of Genius thus ensure?What mortal feeling kindled in his soulThat clear celestial flame, so pure and high,O'er which nor time nor death can have control,Would in inglorious pleasures basely flyFrom sufferings whose reward is Immortality?No! though the clamors of the envious crowdPursue the son of Genius, he will riseFrom the dull clod, borne by an effort proudBeyond the reach of vulgar enmities.'Tis thus the eagle, with his pinions spread,Reposing o'er the tempest, from that heightSees the clouds reel and roll above our head,While he, rejoicing in his tranquil flight,More upward soars sublime in heaven's eternal light.MRS. TORRE HULME
("O! dis-moi, tu veux fuir?"){Bk. IV, vii., Jan. 31, 1821.}
Forget? Can I forget the scented breathOf breezes, sighing of thee, in mine ear;The strange awaking from a dream of death,The sudden thrill to find thee coming near?Our huts were desolate, and far awayI heard thee calling me throughout the day,No one had seen thee pass,Trembling I came. Alas!Can I forget?Once I was beautiful; my maiden charmsDied with the grief that from my bosom fell.Ah! weary traveller! rest in my loving arms!Let there be no regrets and no farewell!Here of thy mother sweet, where waters flow,Here of thy fatherland we whispered low;Here, music, praise, and prayerFilled the glad summer air.Can I forget?Forget? My dear old home must I forget?And wander forth and hear my people weep,Far from the woods where, when the sun has set,Fearless but weary to thy arms I creep;Far from lush flow'rets and the palm-tree's moanI could not live. Here let me rest alone!Go! I must follow nigh,With thee I'm doomed to die,Never forget!CLEMENT SCOTT
("Amis! ennui nous tue."){Bk. IV. xv., March, 1825.}
Aweary unto death, my friends, a mood by wise abhorred,Come to the novel feast I spread, thrice-consul, Nero, lord,The Caesar, master of the world, and eke of harmony,Who plays the harp of many strings, a chief of minstrelsy.My joyful call should instantly bring all who love me most,—For ne'er were seen such arch delights from Greek or Roman host;Nor at the free, control-less jousts, where, spite of cynic vaunts,Austere but lenient Seneca no "Ercles" bumper daunts;Nor where upon the Tiber floats Aglae in galley gay,'Neath Asian tent of brilliant stripes, in gorgeous array;Nor when to lutes and tambourines the wealthy prefect flingsA score of slaves, their fetters wreathed, to feed grim, greedythings.I vow to show ye Rome aflame, the whole town in a mass;Upon this tower we'll take our stand to watch the 'wildered pass;How paltry fights of men and beasts! here be my combatants,—The Seven Hills my circus form, and fiends shall lead the dance.This is more meet for him who rules to drive away his stress—He, being god, should lightnings hurl and make a wilderness—But, haste! for night is darkling—soon, the festival it brings;Already see the hydra show its tongues and sombre wings,And mark upon a shrinking prey the rush of kindling breaths;They tap and sap the threatened walls, and bear uncounted deaths;And 'neath caresses scorching hot the palaces decay—Oh, that I, too, could thus caress, and burn, and blight, and slay!Hark to the hubbub! scent the fumes! Are those real men or ghosts?The stillness spreads of Death abroad—down come the temple posts,Their molten bronze is coursing fast and joins with silver wavesTo leap with hiss of thousand snakes where Tiber writhes and raves.All's lost! in jasper, marble, gold, the statues totter—crash!Spite of the names divine engraved, they are but dust and ash.The victor-scourge sweeps swollen on, whilst north winds sound the hornTo goad the flies of fire yet beyond the flight forlorn.Proud capital! farewell for e'er! these flames nought can subdue—The Aqueduct of Sylla gleams, a bridge o'er hellish brew.'Tis Nero's whim! how good to see Rome brought the lowest down;Yet, Queen of all the earth, give thanks for such a splendrous crown!When I was young, the Sybils pledged eternal rule to thee;That Time himself would lay his bones before thy unbent knee.Ha! ha! how brief indeed the space ere this "immortal star"Shall be consumed in its own glow, and vanished—oh, how far!How lovely conflagrations look when night is utter dark!The youth who fired Ephesus' fane falls low beneath my mark.The pangs of people—when I sport, what matters?—See them whirlAbout, as salamanders frisk and in the brazier curl.Take from my brow this poor rose-crown—the flames have made it pine;If blood rains on your festive gowns, wash off with Cretan wine!I like not overmuch that red—good taste says "gild a crime?""To stifle shrieks by drinking-songs" is—thanks! a hint sublime!I punish Rome, I am avenged; did she not offer prayersErst unto Jove, late unto Christ?—to e'en a Jew, she dares!Now, in thy terror, own my right to rule above them all;Alone I rest—except this pile, I leave no single hall.Yet I destroy to build anew, and Rome shall fairer shine—But out, my guards, and slay the dolts who thought me not divine.The stiffnecks, haste! annihilate! make ruin all complete—And, slaves, bring in fresh roses—what odor is more sweet?H.L. WILLIAMS