Fifine at the Fair  

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"Fifine at the Fair" (1871) is a poem by Robert Browning.

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Elvire, will you partake in what I shall impart ? I seem to understand the way heart chooses heart By help of the outside face, — a reason for our wild Diversity in choice, — why each grows reconciled To what is absent, what superfluous in the mask : Material meant to yield,— did nature ply her task As artist should, — precise the features of the soul ; Which, if in any case they found expression, whole I' the traits, would give a type, undoubtedly display A novel, true, distinct perfection in its way. Never shall I beHeve any two souls were made Similar ; granting, then, each soul of every grade Was meant to be itself, and in itself complete. And, in completion, good, — nay, best o' the kind, — as meet Needs must it be that show on the outside correspond With inward substance, — flesh, the dress which soul has donned.

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 49

Exactly reproduce, — were only justice done Inside and outside too, — types perfect everyone. How happens it that here we meet a mystery Insoluble to man, a plaguy puzzle ? Why Either is each soul made imperfect, and deserves As rude a face to match \ or else a bungler swerves, And nature, on a soul worth rendering aright, Works ill, or proves perverse, or, in her own despite, — Here too much, there too little, — makes each face, more

or less, Retire from beauty, and approach to ugliness ? And yet succeeds the same : since, what is wanting to

success, If somehow every face, no matter how deform. Evidence, to some one of hearts on earth, that, warm Beneath the veriest ash, there hides a spark of soul Which, quickened by love's breath, may yet pervade the

whole

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FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

BY

ROBERT BROWNING.

LONDON: SMITH, ELDER AND CO., 15, WATERLOO PLACE. 187 2.

[The Right of Translation is reserved.]

Done Elvire. Vous plait-il, don Juan, nous eclaircir ces beaux mysteres ?

Don Juan. Madame, a vous dire la verite . . .

Done Elvire. Ah ! que vous savez mal vous defendre pour un homme de cour, et qui doit etre accoutume a ces sortes de choses ! J'ai pitie de vous voir la confusion que vous avez. Que ne vous armez-vous ie fron t d'une noble effronterie ? Que ne me jurez-vous que vous etes toujours dans les memes sentimens pour moi, que vous m'aimez toujours avec une ardeur sans egale, et que rien n'est capable de vous detacher de moi que la mort? — [Moliere, Don Juan^ Act i^^^*. Scene 3®.)

a^Z

Donna Elvira. Don Juan, might you please to help one give a guess, Hold up a candle, clear this fine mysteriousness ?

Don Juan. Madam, if needs I must declare the truth, — in short . . .

Donna Elvira. Fie, for a man of mode, accustomed at the court ^. To such a style of thing, how awkwardly my lord Attempts defence ! You move compassion, that's the word — Dumb-foundered and chap-fallen ! Why don't you arm your brow With noble impudence ? Why don't you swear and vow No sort of change is come to any sentiment You ever had for me ? Affection holds the bent. You love me now as erst, with passion that makes pale All ardour else : nor aught in nature can avail To separate us two, save what, in stopping breath. May peradventure stop devotion likewise— death !

PROLOGUE.

Amphibian.

The fancy I had to-day,

Fancy which turned a fear !

I swam far out in the bay,

Since waves laughed warm and clear.

2.

I lay and looked at the sun, The noon-sun looked at me :

Between us two, no one

Live creature, that I could see.

PROLOGUE,

3. Yes ! There came floating by

Me, who lay floating too, Such a strange butterfly !

Creature as dear as new :

4. Because the membraned wings

So wonderful, so wide. So sun-suflused, were things

Like soul and nought beside.

5. A handbreadth over head !

All of the sea my own, It owned the sky instead ;

Both of us were alone.

6.

I never shall join its flight. For, nought buoys flesh in air.

If it touch the sea — good night ! Death sure and swift waits there.

PROLOGUE.

7. Can the insect feel the better

For watching the uncouth play Of limbs that slip the fetter,

Pretend as they were not clay ?

8. Undoubtedly I rejoice

That the air comports so well With a creature which had the choice

Of the land once. Who can tell ?

9-

What if a certain soul

Which early slipped its sheath, And has for its home the whole

Of heaven, thus look beneath,

10.

Thus watch one who, in the world. Both lives and likes life's way,

Nor wishes the wings unfurled That sleep in the worm, they say ?

PROLOGUE.

II.

But sometimes when the weather Is blue, and warm waves tempt

To free oneself of tether, And try a life exempt

12.

From worldly noise and dust. In the sphere which overbrims

With passion and thought, — why, just Unable to fly, one swims !

13- By passion and thought upborne,

One smiles to oneself — " They fare Scarce better, they need not scorn

Our sea, who live in the air ! "

14. Emancipate through passion

And thought, with sea for sky, We substitute, in a fashion,

For heaven — poetry :

PROLOGUE.

15- Which sea, to all intent,

Gives flesh such noon-disport As a finer element

Affords the spirit-sort.

1 6.

Whatever they are, we seem : Imagine the thing they know ;

All deeds they do, we dream ; Can heaven be else but so ?

17. And meantime, yonder streak

Meets the horizon*s verge ; That is the land, to seek

If we tire or dread the surge :

18. Land the solid and safe —

To welcome again (confess !) When, high and dry, we chafe

The body, and don the dress.

PROLOGUE,

19. Does she look, pity, wonder

At one who mimics flight, Swims — heaven above, sea under,

Yet always earth in sight ?

FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

I.

O TRIP and skip, Elvire ! Link arm in arm with me ! Like husband and like wife, together let us see The tumbHng-troop arrayed, the strollers on their stage, Drawn up and under arms, and ready to engage.

2.

Now, who supposed the night would play us such a prank ? — That what was raw and brown, rough pole and shaven ^ plank,

I

2 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

Mere bit of hoarding, half by trestle propped, half tub, Would flaunt it forth as brisk as butterfly from grub ? This comes of sun and air, of Autumn afternoon, And Pomic and Saint Gille, whose feast affords the boon — This scaflbld turned parterre, this flower-bed in full blow, Bateleurs, baladines ! We shall not miss the show ! They pace and promenade ; they presently will dance : What good were else i' the drum and fife ? O pleasant land of France !

3.

Who saw them make their entry ? At wink of eve, be sure ! They love to steal a march, nor lightly risk the lure. They keep their treasure hid, nor stale (improvident) Before the time is ripe, each wonder of their tent — Yon six-legged sheep, to wit, and he who beats a gong, Lifts cap and waves salute, exhilarates the throng—

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 3

Their ape of many years and much adventure, grim And grey with pitying fools who find a joke in him. Or, best, the human beauty, Mimi, Toinette, Fifine, Tricot fines down if fat, padding plumps up if lean. Ere, shedding petticoat, modesty, and such toys, They bounce forth, squalid girls transformed to game- some boys.

4. No, no, thrice, Pornic, no ! Perpend the authentic tale ! 'Twas not for every Gawain to gaze upon the Grail ! But whoso went his rounds, when flew bat, flitted midge, Might hear across the dusk, — where both roads join the

bridge, Hard by the little port, — creak a slow caravan, A chimneyed house on wheels j so shyly-sheathed, began To broaden out the bud which, bursting unaware. Now takes away our breath, queen-tulip of the Fair !

4 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

5. Yet morning promised much : for, pitched and slung and reared On terrace 'neath the tower, 'twixt tree and tree appeared An airy structure ; how the pennon from its dome, Frenetic to be free, makes one red stretch for home ! The home far and away, the distance where Hves joy, The cure, at once and ever, of world and world's annoy ; Since, what lolls full in front, a furlong from the booth. But ocean-idleness, sky-blue and millpond-smooth ?

6. Frenetic to be free ! And, do you know, there beats Something within my breast, as sensitive ? — repeats The fever of the flag ? My heart makes just the same Passionate stretch, fires up for lawlessness, lays claim To share the life they lead : losels, who have and use The hour what way they will, — applaud them or abuse

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 5

Society, whereof myself am at the beck,

Whose call obey, and stoop to burden stifFest neck !

7- Why is it that whene'er a faithful few combine To cast allegiance off, play truant, nor repine, ■ Agree to bear the worst, forego the best in store For us who, left behind, do duty as of yore, — Why is it that, disgraced, they seem to reHsh life the

more? — Seem as they said " We know a secret passing praise Or blame of such as you ! Remain ! we go our ways With something you overlooked, forgot or chose to sweep Clean out of door : our pearl picked from your rubbish- heap. You care not for your loss, we calculate our gain. All's right. Are you content? Why, so let things remain!

6 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

To the wood then, to the wild : free life, full liberty ! " And when they rendezvous beneath the inclement sky, House by the hedge, reduced to brute-companionship, — Misguided ones who gave society the slip, And find too late how boon a parent they despised, What ministration spurned, how sweet and civilized — Then, left alone at last with self-sought wretched- ness, No interloper else ! — why is it, can we guess ? — At somebody's expense, goes up so frank a laugh ? As though they held the corn, and left us only chaff From gamers crammed and closed. And we indeed are

clever If we get grain as good, by thrashing straw for ever !

Still, truants as they are and purpose yet to be, That nowise needs forbid they venture — as you see —

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, 7

To cross confine, approach the once familiar roof

O' the kindly race, their flight estranged : half stand aloof,

Half sidle up, press near, and proffer wares for sale

— In their phrase, — make, in ours, white levy of black

mail.

They, of the wild, require some touch of us the tame, Since clothing, meat and drink, mean money all the same.

9- If hunger, proverbs say, allures the wolf from wood. Much more the bird must dare a dash at something

good : Must snatch up, bear away in beak, the trifle-treasure To wood and wild, and then — O how enjoy at leisure ! Was never tree-built nest, you climbed and took, of bird, (Rare city-visitant, talked of, scarce seen or heard) But, when you would dissect the structure, piece by piece, You found, enwreathed amid the country-product, — fleece

8 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

And feather, thistle-fluffs and bearded windlestraws — Some shred pf foreign silk, unraveling of gauze, Bit, may be, of brocade, mid fur and thistle-down : Filched plainly from mankind, dear tribute paid by town, Which proved how oft the bird had plucked up heart of

grace, Swooped down at waif and stray, made furtively our place Pay tax and toll, then borne the booty to enrich Her paradise i' the waste ; the how and why of which, That is the secret, there the mystery that stings !

For, what they traffic in, consists of just the things We, — proud ones who so scorn dwellers without the

pale, Bateleurs, baladines, white leviers of black mail, — I say, they sell what we most pique us that we keep ! How comes it, all we hold so dear they count so cheap ?

FIFINE A T THE FAIR, 9

II.

What price should you impose, for instance, on repute, Good fame, your own good fame and family's to boot ? Stay start of quick moustache, arrest the angry rise Of eyebrow ! All I asked is answered by surprise. Now tell me : are you worth the cost of a cigar ? Go boldly, enter booth, disburse the coin at bar Of doorway where presides the master of the troop, And forthwith you survey his Graces in a group. Live Picture, picturesque no doubt and close to life : His sisters, right and left ; the Grace in front, his wife. Next, who is this performs the feat of the Trapeze ? Lo, she is launched, look — fie, the fairy ! — how she flees O'er all those heads thrust back, — mouths, eyes, one gape

and stare, — No scrap of skirt impedes free passage through the air, Till, plumb on the other side, she lights and laughs again, That fairy-form, whereof each muscle, nay, each vein

2^

lo FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

The curious may inspect, — his daughter that he sells

Each rustic for five sous. Desiderate aught else

O' the vendor ? As you leave his show, why, joke the

man ! " You cheat : your six-legged sheep, I recollect, began Both life and trade, last year, trimmed properly and

dipt, . As the Twin-headed Babe, and Human Nondescript ! " What does he care ? You paid his price, may pass your

jest. So values he repute, good fame and all the rest !

12.

But try another tack j say : " I indulge caprice. Who am Don and Duke, and Knight, beside, o' the Golden

Fleece, And, never mind how rich. Abandon this career ! Have hearth and home, nor let your womankind appear

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, ii

Without as multiplied a coating as protects An onion from the eye ! Become, in all respects, God-fearing householder, subsistent by brain-skill, Hand - labour ; win your bread whatever way you

will. So it be honestly,— and, while I have a purse. Means shall not lack ... his thanks will be the roundest fc curse

That ever rolled from lip.

^K Now, what is it ? — returns

The question — heartens so this losel that he spurns All we so prize? I want, put down in black and

white. What compensating joy, unknown and infinite, Turns lawlessness to law, makes destitution — wealth, Vice — virtue, and disease of soul and body — health ?

12 FIFINE A7 THE FAIR.

14.

Ah, the slow shake of head, the melancholy smile,

The sigh almost a sob ! What 's wi-ong, was right ere-

while ? Why are we two at once such ocean-width apart ?

s

Pale fingers press my arm, and sad eyes probe my

heart. Why is the wife in trouble ?

This way, this way, Fifine ! Here 's she, shall make my thoughts be surer what they

mean ! First let me read the signs, pourtray you past mistake The gypsy's foreign self, no swarth our sun could bake. Yet where 's a woolly trace, degrades the wiry hair ? And note the Greek-nymph nose, and — oh, my Hebrew

pair

FIFINE A T THE FAIR, 13

Of eye and eye — o'erarched by velvet of the mole — That swim as in a sea, that dip and rise and roll, Spilling the light around ! While either ear is cut Thin as a dusk-leaved rose carved from a cocoa-nut. And then, her neck ! now, grant you had the power to

deck, Just as your fancy pleased, the bistre-length of neck, Could lay, to shine against its shade, a moon-like row Of pearl, each round and white as bubble, Cupids blow Big out of mother's milk, — what pearl-moon would surpass j That string of mock-turquoise, those almandines of glass. Where girlhood terminates ? for with breasts'-birth com- mence The boy, and page-costume, till pink and impudence End admirably all : complete the creature, trips Our way now, brings sunshine upon her spangled hips. As here she fronts us full, with pose half-frank, half- fierce !

14 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

i6.

Words urged in vain, Elvire ! You waste your quarte and tierce, Lunge at a phantom here, try fence in fairy-land. For me, I own defeat, ask but to understand The acknowledged victory of whom I call my queen, Sexless and bloodless sprite: though mischievous and

mean, Yet free and flower-like too, with loveliness for law. And self-sustainment made morality.

17.

A flaw Do you account i' the lily, of lands which travellers

know, That, just as golden gloom supersedes Northern snow I* the chalice, so, about each pistil, spice is packed, — Deliriously-drugged scent, in lieu of odour lacked.

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 15

With us, by bee and moth, their banquet to enhance At morn and eve, when dew, the chilly sustenance, Needs mixture of some chaste and temperate perfume ? — I ask, is she in fault who guards such golden gloom, Such dear and damning scent, by who cares what

devices, And takes the idle life of insects she entices When, drowned to heart's desire, they satiate the inside O' the lily, mark her wealth and manifest her pride ?

18. But, wiser, we keep off, nor tempt the acrid juice ; Discreet we peer and praise, put rich things to right use. No flavourous venomed bell, — the rose it is, I wot, Only the rose, we pluck and place, unwronged a jot, No worse for homage done by every devotee, I' the proper loyal throne, on breast where rose should be.

1 6 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Or if the simpler sweets, we have to chose among, Would taste between our teeth, and give its toy the tongue, —

gorgeous poison-plague, on thee no hearts are set ! We gather daisy meek, or maiden violet :

1 think it is Elvire we love, and not Fifine.

19. ,

" How does she make my thoughts be sure of what

they mean ? " Judge and be just ! Suppose, an age and time long

past Renew for our behoof one pageant more, the last O' the kind, sick Louis liked to see defile between Him and the yawning grave^ its passage served to screen. With eye as grey as lead, with cheek as brown as

bronze, Here where we stand, shall sit and suffer Louis Onze :

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 17

The while from yonder tent parade forth, not — oh, no — Bateleurs, baladines ! but range themselves a-row Those well-sung women-worthies whereof loud fame still

finds Some echo linger faint, less in our hearts than minds.

20. See, Helen ! .-pushed in front o' the world^s worst night and storm, By Lady Venus' hand on shoulder : the sweet form Shrinkingly prominent, though mighty, like a moon Outbreaking from a cloud, to put harsh things in tune, And magically bring mankind to acquiesce In its own ravage, — call no curse upon, but bless (Beldame, a moment since) the outbreaking beauty, now, That casts o'er all the blood a candour from her brow. See, Cleopatra ! bared, the entire and sinuous wealth O' the shining shape \ each orb of indolent ripe health,

3

1 8 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Captured, just where it finds a fellow-orb as fine

I' the body : traced about by jewels which outline,

Fire-firame, and keep distinct, perfections — lest they melt

To soft smooth unity ere half their hold be felt :

Yet, o'er that white and wonder, a soul's predominance

I' the head so high and haught — except one thievish

glance, From back of oblong eye, intent to count the slain. Hush, — O I know, Elvire ! Be patient, more remain ! What say you to Saint ? . . Pish ! Whatever Saint you

please. Cold-pinnacled aloft o' the spire, prays calm the seas From Pornic Church, and oft at midnight (peasants say) Goes walking out to save from shipwreck : well she may ! For think how many a year has she been conversant With nought but winds and rains, sharp courtesy and scant O' the wintry snow that coats the pent-house of her shrine, Covers each knee, climbs near, but spares the smile benign

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 19

Which seems to say " I looked for scarce so much from

earth!" She follows, one long thin pure finger in the girth O' the girdle — whence the folds of garment, eye and eye, Besprent with fleur-de-lys, flow down and multiply Around her feet, — and one, pressed hushingly to lip : As if, while thus we made her march, some foundering

ship Might miss her from her post, nearer to God half-way In heaven, and she thought " Who that treads earth can

pray? I doubt if even she, the unashamed ! though, sure. She must have stripped herself only to clothe the poor.

21.

This time, enough's a feast, not one more form, Elvire ! Provided you allow that, bringing up the rear

20 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

Q) the bevy I am loth to — by one bird — curtail,

First note may lead to last, an octave crown the scale,

And this feminity be followed — do not flout ! —

By — who concludes the masque with curtsey, smile and

pout, Submissive-mutinous ? No other than Fifine Points toe, imposes haunch, and pleads with tambourine !

22.

" Well, what's the meaning here, what does the masque intend, Which, unabridged, we saw file past us, with no end Of fair ones, till Fifine came, closed the catalogue ? "

23.

Task fancy yet again ! Suppose you cast this clog Of flesh away (that weeps, upbraids, withstands my arm) And pass to join your peers, paragon charm with charm.

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 21

As I shall show you may, — prove best of beauty there ! Yourself confront yourself ! This, help me to declare That yonder-you, who stand beside these, braving each And blinking none, beat her who lured to Troy-town beach The purple prows of Greece, — nay, beat Fifine ; whose

face, Mark how I will inflame, when seigneur-like I place I' the tambourine, to spot the strained and piteous blank Of pleading parchment, see, no less than a whole franc !

24. Ah, do you mark the brown o' the cloud, made bright with fire Through and through ? as, old wiles succeeding to desire, Quality (you and I) once more compassionate A hapless infant, doomed (fie on such partial fate !) To sink the inborn shame, waive privilege of sex. And posture as you see, support the nods and becks

22 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

Of clowns that have their stare, nor always pay its price ; An infant born perchance as sensitive and nice As any soul of you, proud dames, whom destiny Keeps uncontaminate from stigma of the stye She wallows in ! You draw back skirts from filth like her Who, possibly, braves scorn, if, scorned, she minister To age, want, and disease of parents one or both ; Nay, peradventure, stoops to degradation, loth That some just-budding sister, the dew yet on the rose. Should have to share in turn the ignoble trade, — who knows ?

25. Ay, who indeed ! Myself know nothing, but dare guess That off she trips in haste to hand the booty . . yes, 'Twixt fold and fold of tent, there looms he, dim-discerned, The ogre, lord of all, those lavish limbs have earned !

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, 23

— Brute-beast-face, — ravage, scar, scowl and malignancy, — O' the Strong Man, whom (no doubt, her husband) by

and by You shall behold do feats : lift up nor quail beneath, A quintal in each hand, a cart-wheel 'twixt his teeth. Oh, she prefers sheer strength to ineffective grace, Breeding and culture ! seeks the essential in the case ! To him has flown my franc ; and welcome, if that

squint O' the diabolic eye so soften through absinthe, That, for once, tambourine, tunic and tricot 'scape Their customary curse "Not half the gain of the

ape ! " Ay, they go in together !

26.

Yet still her phantom stays Opposite, where you stand as steady 'neath our gaze, —

24 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

The live Elvire's, and mine, — though fancy-'stufF and mere Illusion j to be judged, — dream-figures, — without fear Or favour, those the false, by you and me the true.

27. " What puts it in my head to make yourself judge

you?^' Well, it may be, the name of Helen brought to mind A certain myth I mused in years long left behind : How she that fled from Greece with Paris whom she loved, And came to Troy, and there found shelter, and so proved Such cause of the world's woe, — how she, old stories call This creature, Helen's self, never saw Troy at all. Jove had his fancy-fit, must needs take empty air, Fashion her likeness forth, and set the phantom there I' the midst for sport, to try conclusions with the blind And blundering race, the game create for Gods,

mankind :

)

FIFINE A T THE FAIR. 25

Experiment on these, — establish who would yearn

To give up life for her, who, other-minded, spurn

The best her eyes could smile, — make half the world

sublime. And half absurd, for just a phantom all the time ! Meanwhile true Helen's self sat, safe and far away. By a great river-side, beneath a purer day. With solitude around, tranquillity within j Was able to lean forth, look, listen, through the din And stir j could estimate the worthlessness or worth Of Helen who inspired such passion to the earth, A phantom all the time ! That put it in my head To make yourself judge you — the phantom-wife instead 0' the tearful true Elvire !

28. I thank the smile at last Which thins away the tear ! Our sky was overcast,

4

26 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

And something fell ; but day clears up : if tHere chanced

rain, The landscape glistens more. I have not vexed in vain Elvire : because she knows, now she has stood the test, How, this and this being good, herself may still be best O' the beauty in review ; because the flesh that claimed Unduly my regard, she thought, the taste, she blamed In me, for things externe, was all mistake, she finds, — Or will find, when I prove that bodies show me minds, That, through the outward sign, the inward grace allures. And sparks from heaven transpierce earth's coarsest

covertures, — All by demonstrating the value of Fifine !

29.

Partake my confidence ! No creature 's made so mean But that, some way, it boasts, could we investigate. Its supreme worth : fulfils, by ordinance of fate,

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 27

Its momentary task, gets glory all its own, Tastes triumph in the world, pre-eminent, alone. Where is the single grain of sand, mid millions heaped Confusedly on the beach, but, did we know, has leaped Or will leap, would we wait, i' the century, some once. To the very throne of things ? — earth's brightest for the

nonce. When sunshine shall impinge on just that grain's facette Which fronts him fullest, first, returns his ray with jet Of promptest praise, thanks God best in creation's name ! As firm is my belief, quick sense perceives the same Self-vindicating flash illustrate every man And woman of our mass, and prove, throughout the plan, No detail but, in place allotted it, was prime And perfect.

30. Witness her, kept waiting all this time !

28 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

What happy angle makes Fifine reverberate Sunshine, least sand-grain, she, of shadiest social

state ? No adamantine shield, polished like Helen there, Fit to absorb the sun, regorge him till the glare. Dazing the universe, draw Troy-ward those blind beaks Of equal-sided ships rowed by the well-greaved Greeks ! No Asian mirror, like yon Ptolemaic witch Able to fix sun fast and tame sun down, enrich. Not burn the world with beams thus flatteringly rolled About her, head to foot, turned slavish snakes of gold ! And oh, no tinted pane of oriel sanctity, Does our Fifine afford, such as permits supply Of lustrous heaven, revealed, far more than mundane sight Could master, to thy cell, pure Saint ! where, else too

bright. So suits thy sense the orb, that, what outside was noon, Pales, through thy lozenged blue, to meek benefic moon !

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 29

What then? does that prevent each dunghill, we may

pass Daily, from boasting too its bit of looking-glass. Its sherd which, sun-smit, shines, shoots arrowy fire

beyond That satin-muffled mope, your sulky diamond ?

31-

And now, the mingled ray she shoots, I decompose. Her antecedents, take for execrable ! Gloze No whit on your premiss : let be, there was no worst Of degradation spared Fifine : ordained from first To last, in body and soul, for one life-long debauch. The Pariah of the North, the European Nautch ! This, far from seek to hide, she puts in evidence Calmly, displays the brand, bids pry without offence Your finger on the place. You comment " Fancy us So operated on, maltreated, mangled thus !

30 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

Such torture in our case, had we survived an hour ? Some other sort of flesh and blood must be, with power Appropriate to the vile, unsensitive, tough-thonged, In lieu of our fine nerve ! Be sure, she was not wronged Too much : you must not think she winced at prick as

we!" Come, come, that 's what you say, or would, were thoughts

but free.

32.

Well then, thus much confessed, what wonder if there

steal Unchallenged to my heart the force of one appeal She makes, and justice stamp the sole claim she asserts? So absolutely good is truth, truth never hurts The teller, whose worst crime gets somehow grace^

avowed. To me, that silent pose and prayer proclaimed aloud

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 31

"' Know all of me outside, the rest be emptiness For such as you ! I call attention to my dress, Coiffure, outlandish features, and memorable limbs, Piquant entreaty, all that eye-glance over-skims. Does this much pleasure ? Then, repay the pleasure, put Its price i' the tambourine ! Do you seek farther ? Tut ! I 'm just my instrument, — sound hollow : mere smooth skin Stretched o'er gilt framework, I : rub-dub, nought else

within — Always, for such as you ! — if I have use elsewhere, — If certain bells, now mute, can jingle, need you care ? Be it enough, there's truth i' the pleading, which comports With no word spoken out in cottages or courts. Since all I plead is ^ Pay for just the sight you see,

• And give no credit to another charm in me ! '

Do I say, like your Love ? ^ To praise my face is well,

• But, who would know my worth, must search my heart

to tell ! '

32 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

Do I say, like your Wife ? * Had I passed in review

• The produce of the globe, my man of men were — you ! '

Do I say, like your Helen ? ^ Yield yourself up, obey

• Implicitly, nor pause to question, to survey

' Even the worshipful ! prostrate you at my shrine !

' Shall you dare controvert what the world counts divine ?

• Array your private taste, own liking of the sense,

' Own longing of the soul, against the impudence ' Of history, the blare and bullying of verse ?

^ As if man ever yet saw reason to disburse

^ The amount of what sense liked, soul longed for, — ^given,

devised ^ As love, forsooth, — until the price was recognized ^ As moderate enough by divers fellow-men ! ^ Then, with his warrant safe that these would love too,

then, ^ Sure that particular gain implies a public loss,

• And that no smile he buys but proves a slash across

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, 33

The face, a stab into the side of somebody —

Sure that, along with love's main-purchase, he will buy

Up the whole stock of earth's uncharitableness,

Envy and hatred, — then, decides he to profess

His estimate of one, love had discerned, though dim

To all the world beside: since what 's the world to

him?" Do I say, like your Queen of Egypt ? ' Who foregoes ' My cup of witchcraft — fault be on the fool ! He knows ' Nothing of how I pack my wine-press, turn its winch

• Three-times-three, all the time to song and dance, nor

flinch ^ From charming on and on, till at the last I squeeze ' Out the exhaustive drop that leaves behind mere lees

• And dregs, vapidity, thought essence heretofore !

• Sup of my sorcery, old pleasures please no more !

^ Be great, be good, love, learn, have potency of hand ^ Or heart or head, — what boots ? You die, nor understand

5

34 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

' What bliss might be in life : you ate the grapes, but knew

• Never the taste of wine, such vintage as I brew ! '

Do I say, like your Saint ? * An exquisitest touch

• Bides in the birth of things : no after-time can much

• Enhance that fine, that faint, fugitive first of all !

' What colour paints the cup o' the May-rose, like the

small

• " Suspicion of a blush which doubtfully begins ?

' What sound out-warbles brook, while, at the source, it

wins

• That moss and stone dispart, allow its bubblings breathe ?

• What taste excels the fruit, just where sharp flavours

sheathe ' Their sting, and let encroach the honey that allays ?

• And so with soul and sense ; when sanctity betrays

• First fear lest earth below seem real as heaven above,

• And holy worship, late, change soon to sinful love —

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 35

' Where is the plenitude of passion which endures ' Comparison with that, I ask of amateurs ? ' Do I say, like Elvire . . .

(Your husband holds you fast Will have you Hsten, learn your character at last !) " Do I say ? — Hke her mixed unrest and discontent, Reproachfulness and scorn, with that submission blent So strangely, in the face, by sad smiles and gay tears, — Quiescence which attacks, rebellion which endears, — Say? 'As you loved me once, could you but love

me now ! ' Years probably have graved their passage on my brow, ' Lips turn more rarely red, eyes sparkle less than erst ; ' Such tribute body pays to time ; but, unamerced, ' The soul retains, nay, boasts old treasure multiplied. ' Though dew- prime flee, — mature at noonday, love defied

36 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

' Chance, the wind, change, the rain : love, strenuous all

the more ' For storm, struck deeper root and choicer fruitage bore,

• Despite the rocking world ; yet truth struck root in vain,

' While tenderness bears fruit, you praise, not taste again.

• Why ? They are yours, which once were hardly yours,

might go ' To grace another's ground : and then — the hopes we know, ' The fears we keep in mind ! — when, ours to arbitrate,

• Your part was to bow neck, bid fall decree of fate.

' Then, O the knotty point — white-night's work to revolve — ' What meant that smile, that sigh ? Not Solon's self could solve !

• Then, O the deep surmise what one word might express,

' And if what sounded "No" may not have echoed " Yes !"

• Then, such annoy could cause cold welcome, suchacquist

• Of rapture, that, refused the arm, hand touched the

wrist !

FIFINE A T THE FAIR, 37

' Now, what 's a smile to you ? Poor candle that lights up ^ The decent household gloom which sends you out to sup.

• A tear ? worse ! warns that health requires you keep aloof

' From nuptial chamber, since rain penetrates the roof !

'• For all is got and gained, inalienably safe,

• Your own, and, so, despised ; more worth has any waif

• Or stray from neighbour's pale : pouch that, — 'tis pleasure,

pride,

• Novelty, property, and larceny beside !

• Preposterous thought ! to find no value fixed in things,

^ To covet all you see, hear, dream of, till fate brings

• About that, what you want, you get ; then comes a

change.

• Give you the sun to keep, forthwith must fancy range :

• A goodly lamp, no doubt, — yet might you catch her hair

' And capture, as she frisks, the fen-fire dancing there !

• What do I say ? at least a meteor 's half in heaven ;

• Provided filth but shine, my husband hankers even

3S FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

' After putridity that's phosphorescent, cribs

• The rustic's tallow-rush, makes spoil of urchins' squibs,

• In short prefers to me — chaste, temperate, serene —

' What sputters green and blue, this fizgig called Fifine ! '

34.

So all your sex mistake ! Strange that so plain a

fact Should raise such dire debate ! P"ew famihes were

racked By torture self-supplied, did Nature grant but this — That women comprehend mental analysis !

35. Elvire, do you recal when, years ago, our home The intimation reached, a certain pride of Rome, Authenticated piece, in the third, last and best Manner, — ^whatever fools and connoisseurs contest, —

J I FINE AT THE FAIR. 39

No particle disturbed by rude restorer's touch,

The palaced picture-pearl, so long eluding clutch

Of creditor, at last, the Rafael might — could we

But come to terms — change lord, pass from the Prince

to me? I think you recollect my fever of a year : How the Prince would, and how he would not ; now, —

too dear That promise was, he made his grandsire so long since, Rather to boast " I own a Rafael '^ than " am Prince ! " And now, the fancy soothed — if really sell he must His birthright for a mess of pottage — such a thrust 1' the vitals of the Prince were mollified by balm, Could he prevail upon his stomach to bear qualm, And bequeath Liberty (because a purchaser Was ready with the sum — a trifle 1) yes, transfer His heart at all events to that land where, at least. Free institutions reign ! And so, its price increased

40 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Five-fold (Americans are such importunates !)

Soon must his Rafael start for the United States.

O alternating bursts of hope and then despair !

At last, the bargain's struck, I'm all but beggared,

there The Rafael faces me, in fine, no dream at all, My housemate, evermore to glorify my wall. A week I pass, before heart-palpitations sink, In gloating o'er my gain, so lately on the brink Of loss ; a fortnight more, I spend in Paradise : " Was outline e'er so true, could colouring entice So calm, did harmony and quiet so avail ? How right, how resolute, the action tells the tale ! " A month, I bid my friends congratulate their best :

• 'You happy Don!" (to me) The blockhead!" (to

the rest)

• ' No doubt he thinks his daub original, poor dupe ! "

Then I resume my life : one chamber must not coop

F2FINE AT THE FAIR, 41

My life in, though it boast a marvel like my prize. This year, I saunter past with unaverted eyes, Nay, loll and turn my back : perchance to overlook With relish, leaf by leaf, D ore's last picture-book.

36. Imagine that a voice reproached me from its frame :

• ' Here do I hang, and may ! Your Rafael, just the

same, 'T is only you that change : no ecstacies of yore I No purposed suicide distracts you any more ! " Prompt would my answer turn such frivolous attack : " You misappropriate sensations. What I lack, And labour to obtain, is hoped and feared about After a fashion ; what I once obtain, makes doubt. Expectancy, old fret and fume, henceforward void. But do I think to hold my havings unalloyed

6

42 FJFINE AT THE FAIR.

By novel hope and fear, of fashion just as new,

To correspond i' the scale ? Nowise, I promise you !

Mine you are, therefore mine will be, as fit to cheer

My soul and glad my sense to-day as this-day-year.

So, any sketch or scrap, pochade, caricature,

Made in a moment, meant a moment to endure,

I snap at, seize and then for ever throw aside

And find you in your place. But if a servant cried

• Fire in the gallery ! ' — methinks, were I engaged

In Dore, elbow-deep, portfolios million-paged

To the four winds would pack, sped by the heartiest

curse Was ever launched from lip, to strew the universe ; While I would brave the best o' the burning, bear

away Either my perfect piece in safety, or else stay And share its fate : if made a martyr, why repine ? Inextricably wed, such ashes mixed with mine ! "

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 43

37. For which I get the eye, the hand, the heart, the whole O' the wondrous wife again !

38.

But no, play out your role I' the pageant ! 'T is not fit your phantom leave the stage : I want you, there, to make you, here, confess you wage Successful warfare, pique those proud ones, and advance Claim to . . . equality ? nay, but predominance In physique o'er them all, where Helen heads the scene Closed by its tiniest of tail-tips, pert Fifine. How ravishingly pure you stand in pale constraint ! My new-created shape, without or touch or taint. Inviolate of life and worldliness and sin — Fettered, I hold my flower, her own cup's weight would win From off the tall slight stalk a-top of which she turns And trembles, makes appeal to one who roughly earns

44 I^IFINE AT THE FAIR.

Her thanks instead of blame, (did lily only know),

By thus constraining length of lily, letting snow

Of cup-crown, that's her face, look from its guardian

stake. Superb on all that crawls beneath, and mutely make Defiance, with the mouth's white movement of disdain, To all that stoops, retires and hovers round again ! How windingly the limbs delay to lead up, reach Where, crowned, the head waits calm : as if reluctant,

each. That eye should traverse quick such lengths of loveliness, From feet, which just are found embedded in the

dress Deep swathed about with folds and Sowings virginal, Up to the pleated breasts, rebellious 'neath their pall. As if the vesture's snow were moulding sleep not death, Must melt and must release; whereat, from the fine

sheath,

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 45

The flower - cup - crown starts free, the face is uncon- cealed, And what shall now divert, once the sweet face revealed, From all I loved so long, so lingeringly left ?

39. Because indeed your face fits into just the cleft O' the heart of me, Elvire, makes right and whole once

more All that was half itself without you ! As before. My truant in its place ! Because e'en sea-shells yearn, Plundered by any chance : would have their pearl return, Let negligently slip away into the wave ! Never may they desist, those eyes so grey and grave. From their slow sure supply of the effluent soul within ! And, would you humour me ? I dare to ask, unpin The web of that brown hair ! O'erwash o' the sudden, but As promptly, too, disclose, on either side, the jut

46 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Of alabaster brow 1 So part, those rillets dyed

Deep by the woodland leaf, when down they pour, each

side O' the rock-top, pushed by Spring !

40.

" And where i' the world is all This wonder, I detail so trippingly, espied ? Your mirror would reflect a tall, thin, pale, deep-eyed Personage, pretty once, it may be, doubtless still, Loving, — a certain grace yet lingers, if I will, — But all this wonder, where ? "

41. Why, where but in the sense And soul of me, the judge of Art ? Art-evidence, That thing was, is, might be ; but no more thing itself, Than flame is fuel. Once the verse-book laid on shelf,

FJFINE AT THE FAIR, 47

The picture turned to wall, the music fled from ear, — Each beauty, bom of each, grows clearer and more clear, Mine henceforth, ever mine !

42.

But if I would re-trace Effect, in Art, to cause, — corroborate, erase What 's right or wrong i' the lines, test fancy in my brain By fact which gave it birth ? I re-peruse in vain The verse, I fail to find that vision of delight I' the Razzias lost-profile, eye-edge so exquisite. And, music : what ? that burst of pillared cloud by day And pillared fire by night, was product, must we say. Of modulating just, by enharmonic change, — The augmented sixth resolved, — from out the straighter

range Of D sharp minor, — leap of disimprisoned thrall, — Into thy light and life, D major natural?

48 FIFINE A T THE FAIR.

43-

Elvire, will you partake in what I shall impart ? I seem to understand the way heart chooses heart By help of the outside face, — a reason for our wild Diversity in choice, — why each grows reconciled To what is absent, what superfluous in the mask : Material meant to yield,— did nature ply her task As artist should, — precise the features of the soul ; Which, if in any case they found expression, whole I' the traits, would give a type, undoubtedly display A novel, true, distinct perfection in its way. Never shall I believe any two souls were made Similar ; granting, then, each soul of every grade Was meant to be itself, and in itself complete. And, in completion, good, — nay, best o' the kind, — as meet Needs must it be that show on the outside correspond With inward substance, — flesh, the dress which soul has donned.

FIFINE A T THE FAIR, 49

Exactly reproduce, — were only justice done Inside and outside too, — types perfect everyone. How happens it that here we meet a mystery Insoluble to man, a plaguy puzzle ? Why Either is each soul made imperfect, and deserves As rude a face to match ; or else a bungler swerves, And nature, on a soul worth rendering aright. Works ill, or proves perverse, or, in her own despite, — Here too much, there too little, — makes each face, more

or less. Retire from beauty, and approach to ugliness ? And yet succeeds the same : since, what is wanting to

success. If somehow every face, no matter how deform. Evidence, to some one of hearts on earth, that, warm Beneath the veriest ash, there hides a spark of soul Which, quickened by love's breath, may yet pervade the

whole

7

50 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

0' the grey, and, free again, be fire ? — of worth the same, Howe'er produced, for, great or little, flame is flame. A mystery, whereof solution is to seek.

44-

I find it in the fact that each soul, just as weak Its own way as its fellow, — departure from design As flagrant in the flesh, — goes striving to combine With what shall right the wrong, the under or above The standard : supplement unloveliness by love. — Ask Plato else ! And this corroborates the sage, That Art, — which I may style the love of loving, rage Of knowing, seeing, feeling the absolute truth of

things For truth's sake, whole and sole, nor any good, truth

brings The knower, seer, feeler, beside, — instinctive Art Must fumble for the whole, once fixing on a part

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 51

However poor, surpass the fragment, and aspire To reconstruct thereby the ultimate entire. Art, working with a will, discards the superflux. Contributes to defect, toils on till,— Jiaf lux, — There 's the restored, the prime, the individual type !

45. Look, for example now ! This piece of broken pipe (Some shipman's solace erst) shall act as crayon ; and What tablet better serves my purpose than the sand ? — Smooth slab whereon I draw, no matter with what

skill, A face, and yet another, and yet another still. There lie my three prime types of beauty !

46.

Laugh your best ! " Exaggeration and absurdity ? " Confessed !

52 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Yet, what may that face mean,, no matter for its nose, A yard long, or its chin, a foot short ?

47.

" You suppose, Horror ? " Exactly ! What 's the odds if, more or less By yard or foot, the features do manage to express Such meaning in the main? Were I of Ger6me*s

force, Nor feeble as you see, quick should my crayon course 0*er outline, curb, excite, till, — so completion speeds With Gerome well at work, — observe how brow recedes, Head shudders back on spine, as if one haled the hair, Would have the full-face front what pin-point eye's sharp

stare Announces ; mouth agape to drink the flowing fate, While chin protrudes to meet the burst o' the wave :

elate

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, 53

Almost, spurred on to brave necessity, expend

All life left, in one flash, as fire does at its end.

Retrenchment and addition effect a masterpiece,

Not change i' the motive : here diminish, there increase —

And who wants Horror, has it.

48.

Who wants some other show Of soul, may seek elsewhere — this second of the row ? What does it give for germ, monadic mere intent Of mind in face, faint first of meanings ever meant ? Why, possibly, a grin, that, strengthened, grows a laugh ; That, softened, leaves a smile ; that, tempered, bids you

quaff At such a magic cup as English Reynolds once Compounded : for the witch pulls out of you response Like Garrick's to Thalia, however due may be Your homage claimed by that stiff-stoled Melpomene !

54 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

49-

And just this one face more ! Pardon the bold

pretence ! May there not kirk some hint, struggle toward evidence In that compressed mouth, those strained nostrils,

steadfast eyes Of utter passion, absolute self-sacrifice, Which, — could I but subdue the wild grotesque, refine That bulge of brow, make blunt that nosers aquiline, And let, although compressed, a point of pulp appear I' the mouth, — would give at last the portrait 'of

Elvire ?

50. Well, and if so succeed hand-practice on awry Preposterous art-mistake, shall soul-proficiency Despair, — when exercised on nature, which at worst Always implies success, — however crossed and curst

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, 55

By failure, — such as art would emulate in vain ?

Shall any soul despair of setting free again

Trait after trait, until the type as wholly start

Forth, visible to sense, as that minutest part,

(Whatever the chance) which first arresting eye, warned soul

That, under wrong enough and ravage, lay the whole

O' the loveliness it " loved " — I take the accepted phrase ?

So I account for tastes : each chooses, none gainsays The fancy of his fellow, a paradise for him, A hell for all beside. You can but crown the brim O' the cup j if it be full, what matters less or more ? Let each, i' the world, amend his love, as I, o' the shore, My sketch, and the result as undisputed be ! Their handiwork to them, and my Elvire to me : — Result more beautiful than beauty's self, when lo, What was my Rafael turns my Michelagnolo !

56 F2FJNE AT THE FAIR.

52. For, we two boast, beside our pearl, a diamond. I' the palace-gallery, the corridor beyond, Upheaves itself a marble, a magnitude man-shaped As snow might be. One hand, — the Master's, — smoothed

and scraped That mass, he hammered on and hewed at, till he

hurled Life out of death, and left a challenge : for the world. Death still, — since who shall dare, close to the image, say If this be purposed Art, or mere mimetic play Of Nature ? — wont to deal with crag or cloud, as stuff To fashion novel forms, like forms we know, enough For recognition, but enough unlike the same. To leave no hope ourselves may profit by her game ; Death therefore to the world. Step back a pace

or two ! And then, who dares dispute the gradual birth its due

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 57

Of breathing life, or breathless immortality,

Where out she stands, and yet stops short, half bold,

half shy, «  Hesitates on the threshold of things, since partly blent With stuff she needs must quit, her native element I' the mind o' the Master, — whaf s the creature, dear- divine Yet earthly-awful too, so manly-feminine. Pretends this white advance ? What startling brain-escape Of Michelagnolo takes elemental shape ? I think he meant the daughter of the old man o' the sea, Emerging from her wave, goddess Eidothee — She who, in elvish sport, spite with benevolence Mixed Mab-wise up, must needs instruct the Hero whence Salvation dawns o'er that mad misery of his isle. Yes, she imparts to him, by what a pranksome wile He may surprise her sire, asleep beneath a rock. When he has told their tale, amid his web-foot flock

5S FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Of sea-beasts, "fine fat seals with bitter breath! laughs she At whom she likes to save, no less : Eidothee, Whom you shall never face evolved, in earth, in air, In wave \ but, manifest i' the soul's domain, why, there She ravishingly moves to meet you, all through aid O' the soul ! Bid shine what should, dismiss into the shade What should not be, — and there triumphs the paramount Emprise o' the Master ! But, attempt to make account Of what the sense, without the soul perceives ? I bought That work — (despite plain proof, whose hand it was had

wrought I' the rough : I think w^e trace the tool, of triple-tooth, Here, there and everywhere) — bought dearly that uncouth Unwieldy bulk, for just ten dollars — " Bulk, would

fetch- Converted into lime — some five pauls ! " grinned a wretch, Who, bound on business, paused to hear the bargaining, And would have pitied me " but for the fun o' the thing ! "

FIFINE A T THE FAIR. 59

53. Shall such a wretch be — you ? Must — while I show Elvire Shaming all other forms, seen as I see her here I' the soul, — this other-you perversely look outside, And ask me, "where i' the world is charm to be descried I' the tall thin personage, with paled eye, pensive face, Any amount of love, and some remains of grace ? " See yourself in my soul !

54. And what a world for each Must somehow be ? the soul, — accept that mode of

speech, — Whether an aura gird the soul, wherein it seems To float and move, a belt of all the glints and gleams It struck from out that world, its weaklier fellows found So dead and cold ; or whether these not so much surround,

6o FIFINE A T THE FAIR.

As pass into the soul itself, add worth to worth, As wine enriches blood, and straightway send it forth, Conquering and to conquer, through all eternity, That 's battle without end.

55.

I search but cannot see What purpose serves the soul that strives, or world it tries Conclusions with, unless the fruit of victories Stay, one and all, stored up and guaranteed its own For ever, by some mode whereby shall be made known The gain of every life. Death reads the title clear — What each soul for itself conquered from out things here : Since, in the seeing soul, all worth lies, I assert, — And nought i' the world, which, save for soul that sees,

inert Was, is, and would be ever, — stuff for transmuting, — null And void until man's breath evoke the beautiful —

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 6i

But, touched aright, prompt yields each particle, its

tongue Of elemental flame, — no matter whence flame sprung From gums and spice, or else from straw and rottenness, So long as soul has power to make them burn, express What lights and warms henceforth, leaves only ash

behind, Howe'er the chance : if soul be privileged to find Food so soon that, at first snatch of eye, suck of breath, It shall absorb pure life : or, rather, meeting death I' the shape of ugliness, by fortunate recoil So put on its resource, it finds therein a foil For a new birth of life, the challenged soul's response To ugliness and death, — creation for the nonce.

56-

I gather heart through just such conquests of the soul, Through evocation out of that which, on the whole,

62 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Was rough, ungainly, partial accomplishment, at best, And — what, at worst, save failure to spit at and detest ? — — Through transference of all, achieved in visible things. To rest, secure from wrong, mid mere imaginings — Through ardour to bring help just where completion halts, Do justice to the purpose, ignore the slips and faults — And, last, not least, with stark deformity through fight Which wrings thence, at the end, precise its opposite. I praise the loyalty o' the scholar, — stung by taunt Of fools " Does this evince thy Master they so vaunt ? Did he then perpetrate the plain abortion here ? " — Who cries " His work am I ! full fraught by him, I

clear His fame from each result of accident and time. And thus restore his work to its fresh morning-prime : Not daring touch the mass of marble, fools deride. But putting my idea in plaster by its side. His, since mine ; I, he made, vindicate who made me !

FIFINE A T THE FAIR, 63

For, you must know, I too achieved Eidothee, In silence and by night — dared justify the lines Plain to my soul, although, to sense, that triple-tine's Achievement halt half-way, break down, or leave a blank. If she stood forth at last, the Master was to thank ! Yet may there not have smiled approval in his eyes — That one at least was left who, bom to recognize Perfection in the piece imperfect, worked, that night, In silence, such his faith, until the apposite Design was out of him, truth palpable once more ; And then, — for at one blow, its fragments strewed the

floor, — Recalled the same to live within his soul as heretofore.

58.

And, even as I hold and have Eidothee, I say, I cannot think that gains, — which would not be

64 FIFINE A T THE FAIR.

Except a special soul had gained them, — that such gain Can ever be estranged, do aught but appertain Immortally, by right firm, indefeasible, To who performed the feat, through God's grace and man's

will ! Gain, never shared by those who practised with earth's

stuff, And spoiled whatever they touched, leaving its roughness

rough, Its blankness bare, and, when the ugliness opposed, Either struck work or laughed " He doted or he dozed ! "

59'

While, oh, how all the more will love become intense Hereafter, when " to love " means yearning to dispense, Each soul, its own amount of gain through its own

mode Of practising with life, upon some soul which owed

FIFINE A T THE FAIR. 65

Its treasure, all diverse and yet in worth the same,

To new work and changed way ! Things furnish you

rose-flame, Which burn up red, green, blue, nay, yellow more than

needs, For me, I nowise doubt ; why doubt a time succeeds When each one may impart, and each receive, both share The chemic secret, learn, — where I lit force, why there You drew forth lambent pity, — where I found only food For self-indulgence, you still blew a spark at brood I' the greyest ember, stopped not till self-sacrifice imbued Heaven's face with flame ? What joy, when each may

supplement The other, changing each, as changed, till, wholly blent, The old things shall be new, and, what we both ignite. Fuse, lose the varicolor in achromatic white ! Exemplifying law, apparent even now In the eternal progress, — love's law, which I avow

9

66 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

And thus would formulate: each soul lives, longs and

works For itself, by itself, because a lodestar lurks. An other than itself, — in whatsoe'er the niche Of mistiest heaven it hide, whoe'er the Glumdalclich May grasp the Gulliver : or it, or he, or she — Theosuios e broteios eper kekramene^ — (For fun's sake, where the phrase has fastened, leave it

fixed ! So soft it says, — God, man, or both together mixed !) This, guessed at through the flesh, by parts which prove

the whole. This constitutes the soul discernible by soul — Elvire, by me !

60.

" And then " — (so you permit remain This hand upon my arm !— your cheek dried, if you deign,

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 67

Choosing my shoulder) — "then !" — (Stand up for, boldly

state The objection in its length and breadth!) " You abdicate, With boast yet on your lip, soul's empire, and accept The rule of sense ; the Man, from monarch's throne has

stept — Leapt, rather, at one bound, to base, and there lies,

Brute. You talk of soul, — how soul, in search of soul to suit. Must needs review the sex, the army, rank and file Of womankind, report no face nor form so vile But that a certain worth, by certain signs, may thence Evolve itself and stand confessed — to soul — by sense. Sense ? Oh, the loyal bee endeavours for the hive ! Disinterested hunts the flower-field through, alive Not one mean moment, no, — suppose on flower he

light,— To his peculiar drop, petal-dew perquisite,

^8 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

Matter-of-course snatched snack : unless he taste, how

tiy? This, light on tongue -tip laid, allows him pack his

thigh, Transport all he counts prize, provision for the comb, Food for the future day, — a banquet, but at home ! Soul ? Ere you reach Fifine's, some flesh may be to pass ! That bombed brow, that eye, a kindling chrysopras. Beneath its stiff black lash, inquisitive how speeds Each functionary limb, how play of foot succeeds. And how you let escape or duly sympathize With gastro-knemian grace, — true, your soul tastes and

tries. And trifles time with these, but, fear not, will arrive At essence in the core, bring honey home to hive. Brain-stock and heart-stufl" both — to strike objectors

dumb — Since only soul affords the soul fit pabulum !

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 69

Be frank for charity ! Who is it you deceive — Yourself or me or God, with all this make-beheve ? "

61.

And frank I will respond as you interrogate. Ah, Music, wouldst thou help ! Words struggle with the

weight So feebly of the False, thick element between Our soul, the True, and Truth ! which, but that intervene False shows of things, were reached as easily by

thought Reducible to word, as now by yearnings wrought Up with thy fine, free force, oh Music, that canst thrid, Electrically win a passage through the lid Of earthly sepulchre, our words may push against. Hardly transpierce as thou ! Not dissipate, thou deign'st. So much as tricksily elude what words attempt To heave away, i' the mass, and let the soul, exempt

70 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

From all that vapoury obstruction, view, instead

Of glimmer underneath, a glory overhead.

Not feebly, like our phrase, against the barrier go

In suspirative swell the authentic notes I know,

By help whereof, I would our souls were found without

The pale, above the dense and dim which breeds the

doubt ! But Music, dumb for you, withdraws her help from me ; And, since to weary words recourse again must be, At least permit they rest their burthen here and there. Music-like : cover space ! My answer, — need you care If it exceed the bounds, reply to questioning You never meant should plague ? Once fairly on the wing, Let me flap far and wide !

62.

For this is just the time, The place, the mood in you and me, when all things chime,

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 71

Clash forth life's common chord, whence, list how there

ascend Harmonics far and faint, till our perception end, — Reverberated notes whence we construct the scale Embracing what we know and feel and are ! How fail To find or, better, lose your question, in this quick Reply which nature yields, ample and catholic ? For, arm in arm, we two have reached, nay, passed, you

see, The village-precinct ; sun sets mild on Saint-Marie — We only catch the spire, and yet I seem to know What 's hid i' the turn o' the hill: how all the graves must

glow Soberly, as each warms its little iron cross, Flourished about with gold, and graced (if private loss Be fresh) with stiff rope-wreath of yellow, crisp bead-blooms Which tempt down birds to pay their supper, mid the

tombs.

72 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

With prattle good as song, amuse the dead awhile, If couched they hear beneath the matted camomile !

63.

Bid them goodbye before last friend has sung and

supped ! Because we pick our path and need our eyes, — abrupt Descent enough, — but here 's the beach, and there 's the

bay, And, opposite, the streak of Isle Noirmoutier. Thither the waters tend ; they freshen as they haste, At feel o' the night-wind, though, by cliff and cliff

embraced. This breadth of blue retains its self-possession still; As you and I intend to do, who take our fill Of sights and sounds — soft sound, the countless hum and

skip Of insects we disturb, and that good fellowship

FIFINE A T THE FAIR, 73

Of rabbits, our foot-fall sends huddling, each to hide He best knows how and where ; and what whirred past,

wings wide ? That was an owl, their young may justlier apprehend ! Though you refuse to speak, your beating heart, my friend, I feel against my arm, — though your bent head forbids ^ look into your eyes, yet, on my cheek, their lids That ope and shut, soft send a silken thrill the same. Well, out of all and each these nothings, comes — what came Often enough before, the something that would aim Once more at the old mark : the impulse to at last Succeed where hitherto was failure in the past, And yet again essay the adventure. Clearlier sings No bird to its couched corpse, " Into the truth of things — Out of their falseness rise, and reach thou, and remain ! "

64.

^^ That rise into the true out of the false — explain ? "

lo

74 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

May an example serve ? In yonder bay, I bathed, This sunny morning: swam my best, then hung, half

swathed With chill, and half with warmth, i' the channel's midmost

deep : You know how one — not treads, but stands in water ?

Keep Body and limbs below, hold head back, uplift chin. And, for the rest, leave care ! If brow, eyes, mouth,

should win Their freedom, — excellent ! If they must brook the surge, No matter though they sink, let but the nose emerge. So, all of me in brine lay soaking : did I care One jot? I kept alive by man's due breath of air I' the nostrils, high and dry. At times, o'er these would run The ripple, even wash the wavelet, — for the sun Tempted advance, no doubt : and always flash of froth, Fish-outbreak, bubbling by, would find me nothing loth

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, 75

To rise and look around ; then all was overswept With dark and death at once. But trust the old adept ! Back went again the head, a merest motion made, Fin-fashion, either hand, and nostril soon conveyed The news that light and life were still in reach as erst : Always the last and, — wait and watch, — sometimes the

first. Try to ascend breast-high? wave arms wide free of tether? Be in the air and leave the water altogether ? Under went all again, till I resigned myself To only breathe the air, that 's footed by an elf, And only ^wim the water, that 's native to a fish. But there is no denying that, ere I curbed my wish, And schooled my restive arms, salt entered mouth and

eyes Often enough — sun, sky, and air so tantalize ! Still, the adept swims, this accorded, that denied ; Can always breathe, sometimes see and be satisfied !

76 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

65. I liken to this play o' the body, fruitless strife To slip the sea and hold the heaven, my spirit's life Twixt false, whence it would break, and true, where it

would bide. I move in, yet resist, am upborne every side By what I beat against, an element too gross To live in, did not soul duly obtain her dose Of life-breath, and inhale from truth's pure plenitude Above her, snatch and gain enough to just illude With hope that some brave bound may baffle evermore The obstructing medium, make who swam henceforward

soar : — Gain scarcely snatched when, foiled by the very effort,

sowse. Underneath ducks the soul, her truth ward yearnings dowse Deeper in falsehood ! ay, but fitted less and less To bear in nose and mouth old briny bitterness

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 77

Proved alien more and more ; since each experience

proves Air — the essential good, not sea, wherein who moves Must thence, in the act, escape, apart from will or wish. Move a mere hand to take waterweed, jelly-fish, Upward you tend ! And yet our business with the sea Is not with air, but just o' the water, watery : We must endure the false, no particle of which Do we acquaint us with, but up we mount a pitch Above it, find our head reach truth, while hands explore The false below : so much while here we bathe,— ^no

more !

Now, there is one prime point (hear and be edified !) One truth more true for me than any truth beside — To-wit, that I am I, who have the power to swim, The skill to understand the law whereby each limb

78 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

May bear to keep immersed, since, in return, made sure That its mere movement lifts head clean through

coverture. By practice with the false, I reach the true ? Why, thence It follows, that the more I gain self-confidence. Get proof I know the trick, can float, sink, rise, at will, The better I submit to what I have the skill To conquer in my turn, even now, and by and by Leave wholly for the land, and there laugh, shake me dry To last drop, saturate with noonday — no need more Of wet and fret, plagued once : on Pomic's placid

shore, Abundant air to breathe, sufficient sun to feel ! Meantime I buoy myself: no whit my senses reel When over me there breaks a billow ; nor, elate .Too much by some brief taste, I quaff intemperate The air, o'ertop breast-high the wave-environment. Full well I know, the thing I grasp, as if intent

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, 79

To hold, — my wandering wave, — ^will not be grasped at all : The solid-seeming grasped, the handful great or small Must go to nothing, glide through fingers fast enough ; But none the less, to treat liquidity as stuff — Though failure — certainly succeeds beyond its aim Sends head above, far past the thing hands miss, the same.

67.

So with this wash o' the world, wherein life-long we drift ; We push and paddle through the foam by making shift To breathe above at whiles when, after deepest duck Down underneath the show, we put forth hand and pluck At what seems somehow like reality — a soul. I catch at this and that, to capture and control, Presume I hold a prize, discover that my pains Are run to nought : my hands are baulked, my head regains

8o FIFINE A T THE FAIR.

The surface where I breathe and look about, a space. The soul that helped me mount ? Swallowed up in the

race O* the tide, come who knows whence, gone gaily who

knows where ! I thought the prize was mine ; I flattered myself there. It did its duty, though : I felt it, it felt me ; Or, where I look about and breathe, I should not be. The main point is — the false fluidity was bound Acknowledge that it frothed o'er substance, nowise found Fluid, but firm and true. Man, outcast, ^^ howls," — at

rods ? — If " sent in playful spray a-shivering to his gods ! " Childishest childe, man makes thereby no bad exchange. Stay with the flat-fish, thou ! We like the upper range Where the "gods" live, perchance the daemons also

dwell. Where operates a Power, which every throb and swell

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, 8i

Of human heart invites that human soul approach, " Sent " near and nearer still, however " spray " encroach On " shivering ^' flesh below, to altitudes, which gained, Evil proves good, wrong right, obscurity explained, And " howling " childishness. Whose howl have we to

thank, If all the dogs 'gan bark and puppies whine, till sank Each yelper's tail 'twixt legs ? for Huntsman Commonsense Came to the rescue, caused prompt thwack of thong

dispense Quiet i' the kennel ; taught that ocean might be blue. And rolling and much more, and yet the soul have, too, Its touch of God's own flame, which He may so expand "' Who measured the waters i' the hollow of His hand " That ocean's self shall dry, turn dew-drop in respect Of all-triumphant fire, matter with intellect Once fairly matched; bade him who egged on hounds to bay, Go curse, i' the poultry yard, his kind : " there let him lay "

82 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

The swan's one addled egg : which yet shall put to use, , Rub breast-bone warm against, so many a sterile goose !

No, I want sky not sea, prefer the larks to shrimps. And never dive so deep but that I get a glimpse O' the blue above, a breath of the air around. Elvire, I seize — by catching at that melted beryl here, The tawny wavelet just has trickled off, — Fifine ! Did not we two trip forth to just enjoy the scene, The tumbling-troop arrayed, the strollers on their stage, Drawn up and under arms, and ready to engage — Dabble, and there an end, with foam and froth o'er face, Till suddenly Fifine suggested change of place ? Now we taste aether, scorn the wave, and inter- change apace No ordinary thoughts, but such as evidence The cultivated mind in both ! On what pretence

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 83

Are you and I to sneer at who lent help to hand, And gave the lucky lift ?

69.

Still sour ? I understand ! One ugly circumstance discredits my fair plan — That Woman does the work : I waive the help of

Man.

• ^ Why should experiment be tried with only waves,

When solid spars float round ? Still some Thalassia saves Too pertinaciously, as though no Triton, bluff As e'er blew brine from conch, were free to help

enough ! Surely, to recognize a man, his mates serve best ! Why is there not the same or greater interest In the strong spouse as in the pretty partner, pray ? Were recognition just your object, as you say, Amid this element o' the false."

84 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

70.

We come to terms. I need to be proved true ; and nothing so confirms One's faith in the prime point that one's alive, not dead, In all Descents to Hell whereof I ever read. As when a phantom there, male enemy or friend. Or merely stranger-shade, is struck, is forced suspend His passage : " You that breathe, along with us the

ghosts ? " Here, why must it still be a woman that accosts ?

71.

Because, one woman's worth, in that respect, such

hairy hosts Of the other sex and sort ! Men ? Say you have the

power To make them yours, rule men, throughout life's little

hour,

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 85

According to the phrase ; what follows ? Men, you make, By ruling them, your own : each man for his own sake Accepts you as his guide, avails him of what worth He apprehends in you to sublimate his earth With fire : content, if so you convoy him through night, That you shall play the sun, and he, the satellite, Pilfer your light and heat and virtue, starry pelf, While, caught up by your course, he turns upon himself. Women rush into you, and there remain absorbed. Beside, 't is only men completely formed, full-orbed. Are fit to follow track, keep pace, illustrate so The leader : any sort of woman may bestow Her atom on the star, or clod she counts for such, — Each little making less bigger by just that much. Women grow you, while men depend on you at best. And what dependence ! Bring and put him to the test, Your specimen disciple, a handbreadth separate From you, he almost seemed to touch before ! Abate

86 FJFINE AT THE FAIR,

Complacency you will, I judge, at whaf s divulged ! Some flabbiness you fixed, some vacancy out-bulged, Some — much — nay, all, perhaps, the outward man 's your

work : But, inside man ? — find him, wherever he may lurk, And where 's a touch of you in his true self?

72-

I wish Some wind would waft this way a glassy bubble-fish O' the kind the sea inflates, and show you, once detached From wave . . or no, the event is better told than

watched : Still may the thing float free, globose and opaline All over, save where just the amethysts combine To blue their best, rim-round the sea-flower with a tinge Earth's violet never knew ! Well, 'neath that gem-tipped

fringe,

FIFIN'E A T THE FAIR, 87

A head lurks — of a kind — that acts as stomach too ; Then comes the emptiness which out the water blew So big and belly-like, but, dry of water drained, Withers away nine-tenths. Ah, but a tenth remained ! That was the creature's self : no more akin to sea, Poor nidimental head and stomach, you agree. Than sea 's akin to who dips yonder his red edge.

73. But take the rillet, ends a race o'er yonder ledge O' the fissured cliff, to find its fate in smoke below ! Disengage that, and ask — what news of life, you know It led, that long lone way, through pasture, plain and waste ? All 's gone to give the sea ! no touch of earth, no taste Of air, reserved to tell how rushes used to bring The butterfly and bee, and fisher-bird that 's king O' the purple kind, about the snow-soft, silver-sweet Infant of mist and dew ; only these atoms fleet,

88 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Embittered evermore, to make the sea one drop More big thereby — if thought keep count where sense must stop.

74. The full-blown ingrate, mere recipient of the brine, That takes all and gives nought, is Man ; the feminine Rillet that, giving all and taking nought in turn, Goes headlong to her death i' the sea, without concern For the old inland life, snow-soft and silver-clear, That 's woman — typified from Fifine to Elvire.

75- Then, how diverse the modes prescribed to who would deal With either kind of creature ! 'T is Man, you seek to seal Your very own ? Resolve, for first step, to discard Nine-tenths of what you are ! To make, you must be marred, —

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 89

To raise your race, must stoop, — to teach them aught,

must learn Ignorance, meet half-way what most you hope to

spurn I' the sequel. Change yourself, dissimulate the

thought And vulgarize the word, and see the deed be brought To look like nothing done with any such intent As teach men — though perchance it teach, by accident ! So may you master men : assured that if you show One point of mastery, departure from the low And level, — head or heart-revolt at long disguise, Immurement, stifling soul in mediocrities, — If inadvertently a gesture, much more, word Reveal the hunter no companion for the herd. His chance of capture 's gone. Success means, they

may snufl", Examine, and report, — a brother, sure enough,

12

90 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Disports him in brute-guise ; for skin is truly skin, Horns, hoofs are hoofs and horns, and all, outside and in, Is veritable beast, whom fellow-beasts resigned May follow, made a prize in honest pride, behind One of themselves and not creation's upstart lord ! Well, there 's your prize i' the pound — much joy may it

afford My Indian ! Make survey and tell me, — was it worth You acted part so well, went all-fours upon on earth The live-long day, brayed, belled, and all to bring to

pass That stags should deign eat hay when winter stints them

grass?

76. So much for men, and how disguise may make them mind Their master. But you have to deal with womankind ?

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 91

Abandon stratagem for strategy ! Cast quite

The vile disguise away, try truth clean-opposite

Such creep -and-crawl, stand forth all man and, might it

chance, Somewhat of angel too ! — whate'er inheritance, Actual on earth, in heaven prospective, be your boast, Lay claim to ! Your best self revealed at uttermost, — That 's the wise way o' the strong ! And e'en should

falsehood tempt The weaker sort to swerve, — at least the lie 's exempt From slur, that 's loathlier still, of aiming to debase Rather than elevate its object. Mimic grace, Not make deformity your mask! Be sick by stealth, Nor traffic with disease — malingering in health ! No more of: '^ Countrymen, I boast me one like you — My lot, the common strength, the common weakness too ! I think the thoughts, you think ; and if I have the knack Of fitting thoughts to words, you perad venture lack,

92 FIFINE A T THE FAIR.

Envy me not the chance, yourselves more fortunate !

Many the loaded ship self-sunk through treasure-freight,

Many the pregnant brain brings never child to birth,

Many the great heart bursts beneath its girdle-girth !

Be mine the privilege to supplement defect,

Give dumbness voice, and let the labouring intellect

Find utterance in word, or possibly in deed 1

What though I seem to go before ? 't is you that lead !

I follow what I see so plain — the general mind

Projected pillar-wise, flame kindled by the kind,

Which dwarfs the unit — me — to insignificance !

Halt you, I stop forthwith, — proceed, I too advance ! "

77. Ay, that 's the way to take with men you wish to lead, Instruct and benefit. Small prospect you succeed With women so ! Be all that 's great and good and wise, August, sublime — swell out your frog the right ox-size —

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 93

He 's buoyed like a balloon, to soar, not burst, you '11 see ! The more you prove yourself, less fear the prize will flee The captor. Here you start after no pompous stag Who condescends be snared, with toss of horn, and brag Of bray, and ramp of hoof; you have not to subdue The foe through letting him imagine he snares you ! 'T is rather with ...

78.

Ah, thanks ! quick — where the dipping disk

Shows red against the rise and fall o' the fin ! there frisk

In shoal the — porpoises ? Dolphins, they shall and must

Cut through the freshening clear — dolphins, my instance

just ! 'Tis fable, therefore truth : who has to do with these, Needs never practise trick of going hands and knees As beasts require. Art fain the fish to captivate? Gather thy greatness round, Arion ! Stand in state,

94 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

As when the banqueting thrilled conscious — like a rose Throughout its hundred leaves at that approach it knows Of music in the bird— while Corinth grew one breast A-throb for song and thee ; nay, Periander pressed The Methymnsean hand, and felt a king indeed, and

guessed How Phoebus' self might give that great mouth of the gods Such a magnificence of song ! The pillar nods, Rocks roof, and trembles door, gigantic, post and jamb, As harp and voice rend air— the shattering dithyramb ! So stand thou, and assume the robe that tingles yet With triumph \ strike the harp, whose every golden fret Still smoulders with the flame, was late at finger's end — So, standing on the bench o' the ship, let voice expend Thy soul, sing, unalloyed by meaner mode, thine own, The Orthian lay ; then leap from music's lofty throne, Into the lowest surge, make fearlessly thy launch ! Whatever storm may threat, some dolphin will be staunch !

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 95

Whatever roughness rage, some exquisite sea-thing Will surely rise to save, will bear — palpitating — One proud humility of love beneath its load — Stem tide, part wave, till both roll on, thy jewell'd road Of triumph, and the grim o' the gulph grow wonder-white I' the phosphorescent wake ; and still the exquisite Sea-thing stems on, saves still, palpitatingly thus, Lands safe at length its load of love at Taenarus, True woman-creature !

79-

Man ? Ah, would you prove what power Marks man, — what fruit his tree may yield, beyond the

sour And stinted crab, he calls love-apple, which remains After you toil and moil your utmost, — all, love gains By lavishing manure ? — try quite the other plan ! And to obtain the strong true product of a man

96 FIFINE A T THE FAIR.

Set him to hate a little ! Leave cherishing his root, And rather prune his branch, nip off the pettiest shoot Superfluous on his bough ! I promise, you shall learn By what grace came the goat, of all beasts else, to earn Such favor with the god o' the grape : 't was only he Who, browsing on its tops, first stung fertility Into the stock's heart, stayed much growth of tendril-twine, Some faintish flower, perhaps, but gained the indignant

wine, Wrath of the red press ! Catch the puniest of the kind — Man-animalcule, starved body, stunted mind. And, as you nip the blotch 'twixt thumb and finger-nail, Admire how heaven above and earth below avail No jot to soothe the mite, sore at God's prime oflence In making mites at all, — coax from its impotence One virile drop of thought, or word, or deed, by strain To propagate for once— which nature rendered vain, Who lets first failure stay, yet cares not to record

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 97

Mistake- that seems to cast opprobrium on the Lord ! Such were the gain from love's best pains ! But let the elf Be touched with hate, because some real man bears him- self Manlike in body and soul, and, since he lives, must thwart And furify and set a-fizz this counterpart O' the pismire that 's surprised to effervescence, if. By chance, black bottle come in contact with chalk cliff. Acid with alkali ! Then thrice the bulk, out blows Our insect, does its kind, and cuckoo-spits some rose !

80. No — 't is ungainly work, the ruling men, at best ! The graceful instinct 's right : 't is women stand confessed Auxiliary, the gain that never goes away. Takes nothing and gives all : Elvire, Fifine, 't is they Convince, — if little, much, no matter ! — one degree The more, at least, convince unreasonable me

13

98 F J FINE AT THE FAIR.

That I am, anyhow, a truth, though all else seem And be not : if I dream, at least I know I dream. The falsity, beside, is fleeting : I can stand Still, and let truth come back, — your steadying touch of

hand Assists me to remain self-centred, fixed amid All on the move. Believe in me, at once you bid Myself believe that, since one soul has disengaged Mine from the shows of things, so much is fact : I waged No foolish warfare, then, with shades, myself a shade, Here in the world — may hope my pains will be repaid ! How false things are, I judge : how changeable, I learn : When, where and how it is I shall see truth return, That I expect to know, because Fifine knows me ! — How much more, if Elvire !

8i.

" And why not, only she ?

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 99

Since there can be for each, one Best, no more, such

Best, For body and mind of him, abolishes the rest O' the simply Good and Better. You please select Elvire To give you this belief in truth, dispel the fear Yourself are, after all, as false as what surrounds ; And why not be content ? When we two watched the

rounds The boatman made, 'twixt shoal and sandbank, yesterday, As, at dead slack of tide, he chose to push his way, With oar and pole, across the creek, and reach the isle After a world of pains — my word provoked your smile, Yet none the less deserved reply : * 'T were wiser wait ^ The turn o' the tide, and find conveyance for his

freight — ' How easily — within the ship to purpose moored, ^ Managed by sails, not oars ! But no, — the man 's

allured

100 FIFINE A T THE FAIR.

' By liking for the new and hard in his exploit ! ' First come shall serve ! He makes, — courageous and adroit, —

• The merest willow-leaf of boat do duty, bear

• His merchandize across : once over, needs he care

' If folk arrive by ship, six hours hence, fresh and gay?'

No : he scorns commonplace, affects the unusual way ;

And good Elvire is moored, with not a breath to flap

The yards of her, no lift of ripple to o'erlap

Keel, much less, prow. What care ? since here 's a cockle- shell,

rifine, that 's taut and crank, and carries just as well

Such seamanship as yours ! "

82.

Alack, our life is lent, From first to last, the whole, for this experiment

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, loi

Of proving what I say — that we ourselves are true ! I would there were one voyage, and then no more to do But tread the firmland, tempt the uncertain sea no more. I would we might dispense with change of shore for

shore To evidence our skill , demonstrate — in no dream It was, we tided o'er the trouble of the stream. I would the steady voyage, and not the fitful trip, — Elvire, and not Fifine, — might test our seamanship. But why expend one's breath to tell you, change of boat Means change of tactics too? Come see the same

afloat To-morrow, all the change, new stowage fore and aft O' the cargo; then, to cross requires new sailor-craft ! To-day, one step from stern to bow keeps boat in trim : To-morrow, some big stone, — or woe to boat and him ! — Must ballast both. That man stands for Mind, paramount Throughout the adventure : ay, howe'er you make account,

102 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

'T is mind that navigates, — skips over, twists between The bales i' the boat, — now gives importance to the mean, And now abates the pride of life, accepts all fact. Discards all fiction, — steers Fifine, and cries, in the act, " Thou art so bad, and yet so delicate a brown ! Wouldst tell no end of lies : I talk to smile or frown ! Wouldst rob me : do men blame a squirrel, lithe and sly. For pilfering the nut, she adds to hoard ? Nor I. Elvire is true, as truth, honesty's self, alack ! The worse ! too safe the ship, the transport there and

back Too certain ! one may loll and lounge and leave the helm, Let wind and tide do work : no fear that waves

o'erwhelm The steady-going bark, as sure to feel her way Blind-fold across, reach land, next year as yesterday ! How can I but suspect, the true feat were to slip Down side, transfer myself to cockle-shell from ship,

FIFINE A T THE FAIR. 103

And try if, trusting to sea-tracklessness, I class

With those around whose breast grew oak and triple

brass : Who dreaded no degree of death, but, with dry eyes, Surveyed the turgid main and its monstrosities — And rendered futile so, the prudent Power's decree Of separate earth and disassociating sea ; Since, how is it observed, if impious vessels leap Across, and tempt a thing they should not touch — the deep ? (See Horace to the boat, wherein, for Athens bound, When Virgil must embark — Jove keep him safe and

sound ! — The poet bade his friend start on the watery road, Much re-assured by this so comfortable ode.)

83.

Then, never grudge my poor Fifine her compliment ! The rakish craft could slip her moorings in the tent,

I04 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

And, hoisting every stitch of spangled canvas, steer Through divers rocks and shoals, — in fine, deposit here Your Virgil of a spouse, in Attica : yea, thrid The mob of men, select the special virtue hid In him, forsooth, and say — or rather, smile so sweet, " Of all the multitude, you — I prefer to cheat ! Are you for Athens bound ? I can perform the trip, Shove little pinnace off, while yon superior ship, The Elvire, refits in port ! '* So, off we push from beach Of Pornic town, and lo, ere eye can wink, we reach The Long Walls, and I prove that Athens is no dream, For there the temples rise ! they are, they nowise seem ! Earth is not all one lie, this truth attests me true ! Thanks therefore to Fifine ! Elvire, I'm back with you ! Share in the memories ! Embark I trust we shall Together some fine day, and so, for good and all, Bid Pornic Town adieu, — then, just the strait to cross, And we reach harbour, safe, in lostephanos !

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 105

84. How quickly night comes ! Lo, already 'tis the land Turns sea-like ; overerept by grey, the plains expand, Assume significance ; while ocean dwindles, shrinks Into a pettier bound : its plash and plaint, methinks, Six steps away, how both retire, as if their part Were played, another force were free to prove her art, Protagonist in turn ! Are you unterrified ? All false, all fleeting too ! And nowhere things abide, And everywhere we strain that things should stay, — the one Truth, that ourselves are true !

85.

A word, and I have done. Is it not just our hate of falsehood, fleetingness. And the mere part, things play, that constitutes express The inmost charm of this Fifine and all her tribe ? Actors ! We also act, but only they inscribe

14

io6 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Their style and title so, and preface, only they.

Performance with " A lie is all we do or say."

AVherein but there, can be the attraction, Falsehood's bribe,

That wins so surely o'er to Fifine and her tribe

The liking, nay the love of who hate Falsehood most.

Except that these alone of mankind make their boast

" Frankly, we simulate ! " To feign, means — to have

grace And so get gratitude ! This ruler of the race. Crowned, sceptred, stoled to suit, — 't is not that you detect The cobbler in the king, but that he makes effect By seeming the reverse of what you know to be The man, the mind, whole form, fashion, and quality. Mistake his false for true, one minute, — there 's an end Of the admiration ! Truth, we grieve at or rejoice : 'T is only falsehood, plain in gesture, look and voice. That brings the praise desired, since profit comes thereby. The histrionic truth is in the natural lie.

FIFINE A T THE FAIR, 107

Because the man who wept the tears was, all the time, Happy enough \ because the other man, a-grime With guilt, was, at the least, as white as I and you ; Because the timid type of bashful maidhood, who Starts at her own pure shade, already numbers seven Born babes and, in a month, will turn their odd to

even ; Because the saucy prince would prove, could you unfurl Some yards of wrap, a meek and meritorious girl — Precisely as you see success attained by each O' the mimes, do you approve, not foolishly impeach The falsehood !

86. That 's the first o' the truths found : all things, slow Or quick i' the passage, come at last to that, you know ! Each has a false outside, whereby a truth is forced To issue from within : truth, falsehood, are divorced

io8 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

By the excepted eye, at the rare season, for

The happy moment. Life means — learning to abhor

The false, and love the true, truth treasured snatch by

snatch, AVaifs counted at their worth. And when with strays they

match I' the parti-coloured world, — when, under foul, shines fair, And truth, displayed i' the point, flashes forth everywhere I' the circle, manifest to soul, though hid from sense. And no obstruction more affects this confidence, — When faith is ripe for sight, — why, reasonably, then Comes the great clearing-up. Wait threescore years and

ten!

87. Therefore I prize stage-play, the honest cheating ;

thence The impulse pricked, when fife and drum bade Fair

commence,

FJFINE AT THE FAIR. 109

To bid you trip and skip, link arm in arm with me, Like husband and Hke wife, and so together see The tumbhng-troop arrayed, the strollers on their stage Drawn up and under arms, and ready to engage. And if I started thence upon abstruser themes . . . Well, 't was a dream, pricked too !

A poet never dreams : We prose-folk always do : we miss the proper duct For thoughts on things unseen, which stagnate and obstruct The system, therefore ; mind, sound in a body sane. Keeps thoughts apart from facts, and to one flowing vein Confines its sense of that which is not, but might be. And leaves the rest alone. What ghosts do poets see ? What daemons fear ? what man or thing misapprehend ? Unchoked, the channel 's flush, the fancy ^s free to spend

no FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Its special self aright in manner, time and place. Never believe that who create the busy race O' the brain, bring poetry to birth, such act per- formed, Feel trouble them, the same, such residue as warmed My prosy blood, this morn, — intrusive fancies, meant For outbreak and escape by quite another vent ! Whence follows that, asleep, my dreamings oft exceed The bound. But you shall hear.

89.

I smoked. The webs o' the weed, With many a break i' the mesh, were floating to re-form Cupola-wise above : chased thither by soft, warm Inflow of air without ; since, I — of mind to muse, to

clench The gain of soul and body, got by their noon-day

drench

F J FINE A T THE FAIR. 1 1 1

In sun and sea, — I flung both frames o' the window wide,

To soak my body still, and let soul soar beside.

In came the country sounds and sights and smells — that

fine Sharp needle in the nose from our fermenting wine ! In came a dragon-fly with whir and stir, then out, Off and away : in came, — kept coming, rather, — pout Succeeding smile, and take-away still close on give, — One loose long creeper-branch, tremblingly sensitive To risk, which blooms and leaves, — each leaf tongue- broad, each bloom Mid-finger-deep, — must run by prying in the room Of one who loves and grasps and spoils and speculates. All, so far, plain enough to sight and sense : but, weights. Measures and numbers, — ah, could one apply such test To other visitants that came at no request Of who kept open house, — to fancies manifold From this four-cornered world, the memories new and old.

1 1 2 FIFINE A T THE FAIR,

The antenatal prime experience — what know I ? — The initiatory love preparing us to die — Such were a crowd to count, a sight to see, a prize To turn to profit, were but fleshly ears and eyes Able to cope with those o' the spirit !

90.

Therefore, — since Thought hankers after speech, while no speech may

evince Feeling like music, — mine, o'erburthened with each gift From every visitant, at last resolved to shift Its burthen to the back of some musician dead And gone, who feeling once what I feel now, instead Of words, sought sounds, and saved for ever, in the same, Truth that escapes prose, — nay, puts poetry to shame. One reads the note, one strikes the key, one bids record The instrument — thanks for the veritable word !

FJFINE AT THE FAIR. 113

And not in vain one cries : " O dead and gone away, Assist who struggles yet, thy strength become my stay, Thy record serve as well to register — I felt And knew thus much of truth ! With me, must knowledge

melt Into surmise and doubt and disbelief, unless ^ Thy music reassure — I gave no idle guess, But gained a certitude, myself may hardly keep ! What care ? since round is piled a monumental heap Of music that conserves the assurance, thou as well Wast certain of the same ! thou, master of the spell, Mad'st moonbeams marble, didst record what other men Feel only to forget ! Who was it helped me, then ? What master's work first came responsive to my call. Found my eye, fixed my choice ?

91. Why, Schumann's " Carnival ! "

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114 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

— Choice chiming in, you see, exactly with the sounds And sights of yestereve when, going on my rounds, Where both roads join the bridge, I heard across the dusk Creak a slow caravan, and saw arrive the husk O' the spice-nut, which peeled off this morning, and

displayed, 'Twixt tree and tree, a tent whence the red pennon made Its vivid reach for home and ocean-idleness — And where, my heart surmised, at that same moment, —

yes,— Tugging her tricot on, — yet tenderly, lest stitch Announce the crack of doom, reveal disaster which Our Pornic's modest stock of merceries in vain Were ransacked to retrieve, — there, cautiously a-strain, (My heart surmised) must crouch in that tent's corner,

curved Like Spring-month's russet moon, some beauty, fate

reserved

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 115

To give me once again the electric snap and spark

That prove, when finger finds out finger in the dark

O' the world, there's fire and life and truth there, link

but hands And pass the secret on ! till, link by link, expands The circle, lengthens out the chain, and one

embrace Of high with low is found uniting the whole race, Not simply you and me and our Fifine, but all The world — the Fair expands into the Carnival And Carnival again to . . . ah, but that's my dream !

92. I somehow played the piece : remarked on each old theme I' the new dress ; saw how food o' the soul, the stuff

that's made To furnish man with thought and feeling, is purveyed

ii6 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

Substantially the same from age to age, with change Of the outside only for successive feasters. Range The banquet-room o' the world, from the dim farthest

head Q' the table, to its foot, for you and me bespread, This merry morn, we find sufficient fare, I trow. But, novel ? Scrape away the sauce ; and taste, below, The verity o' the viand, — you shall perceive there went To board-head just the dish which other condiment Makes palatable now : guests came, sat down, fell-to, Rose up, wiped mouth, went way, — lived, died, — and

never knew That generations yet should, seeking sustenance. Still find the selfsame fare, with somewhat to enhance Its flavour, in the kind of cooking. As with hates And loves and fears and hopes, so with what emulates The same, expresses hates, loves, fears and hopes in Art : The forms, the themes — no one without its counterpart

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, 117

Ages ago ; no one but, mumbled the due time

I' the mouth of the eater, needs be cooked again in

rhyme, Dished up anew in paint, sauce-smothered fresh in

sound, To suit the wisdom-tooth, just cut, of the age, that 's found With gums obtuse to gust and smack which relished so The meat o' the meal folks made some fifty years ago. But don't suppose the new was able to efface The old without a struggle, a pang ! The commonplace Still clung about his heart, long after all the rest O' the natural man, at eye and ear, was caught, confessed The charm of change, although wry lip and wrinkled nose Owned ancient virtue more conducive to repose Than modern nothing roused to something by some shred Of pungency, perchance garlic in amber's stead ? And so on, till, one day, another age, by due Rotation, pries, sniffs, smacks, discovers old is new.

li8 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

And sauce, our sires pronounced insipid, proves again Sole piquant, and resumes its titillating reign — With music, most of all the arts, since change is there The law, and not the lapse : the precious means the rare. And not the absolute in all good save surprise. So I remarked upon our Schumann's victories Over the commonplace, how faded phrase grew fine, And palled perfection, piqued, up-startled by that brine, His pickle, bit the mouth and burnt the tongue aright, Beyond the merely good no longer exquisite, — Then took things as I found, and thanked without demur The pretty piece — played through that movement, you

prefer. Where dance and shuffle past, he scolding while she

pouts. She canting while he calms, in those eternal bouts Of age, the dog — with youth, the cat — by rose-festoon Tied teazingly for ever — Columbine, Pantaloon,

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, ' 119

She, toe-tips and staccato, — legato, shakes his poll And shambles in pursuit, the senior. Fi la folk! Lie to him ! get his gold and pay its price ! begin Your trade betimes, nor wait till you Ve wed Harlequin And need, at the week's end, to play the duteous wife, And swear you still love slaps and leapings more than

life! Pretty ! I say.

93

And so, I somehow-nohow played The whole o' the pretty piece; and then . . whatever

weighed My eyes down, furled the films about my wits, — sup- pose, The morning-bath, — the sweet monotony of those Three keys, flat, flat and flat, never a sharp at all, — Or else the brain's fatigue, forced even here to fall

I20 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Into the same old track, and recognize the shift From old to new, and back to old again, and, swift Or slow, no matter, still the certainty of change. Conviction we shall find the false, where'er we range, In Art no less than nature, — or what if wrist were

numb. And over-tense the muscle, abductor of the thumb. Taxed by those tenths' and twelfths' unconscionable

stretch ? Howe'er it came to pass, I soon was far to fetch, — Gone off in company with Music !

94.

Whither bound Except for Venice ? She it was, by instinct found, Carnival-country proper, who far below the perch Where I was pinnacled, showed, opposite, Mark's Church,

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. ^ 121

And, underneath, Mark's square, with those two lines of

street, Frocuratie-s>\diQ^, each leading to my feet — Since I gazed from above, however I got there.

95- And what I gazed upon was a prodigious Fair, Concourse immense of men and women, crowned or

casqued, Turbaned or tiar'd, wreathed, plumed, hatted or wigged,

but masked — Always masked, — only,' how? No face-shape, beast or

bird. Nay, fish and reptile even, but someone had preferred, From out its frontispiece, feathered or scaled or curled. To make the vizard whence himself should view the world, And where the world believed himself was manifest. Yet when you came to look, mixed up among the rest

16

122 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

More funnily by far, were masks to imitate Humanity's mishap : the wrinkled brow, bald pate, And rheumy eyes of Age, peak'd chin and parchment chap, Were signs of day-work done, and wage-time near, —

mishap Merely ; but. Age reduced to simple greed and guile. Worn apathetic else as some smooth slab, erewhile A clear-cut man-at-arms i' the pavement, till foot's tread Effaced the sculpture, left the stone you saw instead, — Was not that terrible beyond the mere uncouth ? Well, and perhaps the next revolting you was Youth, Stark ignorance and crude conceit, half smirk, half stare On that frank fool-face, gay beneath its head of hair Which covers nothing.

96.

These, you are to understand, Were the mere hard and sharp distinctions. On each hand,

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, 1^23

I soon became aware, flocked the infinitude

Of passions, loves and hates, man pampers till his

mood Becomes himself, the whole sole face we name him by, Nor want denotement else, if age or youth supply The rest of him : old, young, — classed creature : in the

main A love, a hate, a hope, a fear, each soul a-strain Some one way through the flesh — the face, the evidence O' the soul at work inside ; and, all the more intense, So much the more grotesque.

97. "' Why should each soul be tasked Some one way, by one love or else one hate ? " I asked, When it occurred to me, from all these sights beneath There rose not any sound: a crowd, yet dumb as death!

124 FIFINR AT THE FAIR.

98.

But I knew why. (Propose a riddle, and 't is

solved Forthwith — in dream !) They spoke ; but, — since on me

devolved To see, and understand by sight, — the vulgar speech Might be dispensed with. " He who cannot see, must

reach As best he may the truth of men by help of words They please to speak, must fare at will of who affords The banquet," — so I thought. "Who sees not, hears

and so Gets to believe ; myself it is that, seeing, know. And, knowing, can dispense with voice and vanity Of speech. What hinders then, that, drawing closer, I Put privilege to use, see and know better still These simulachra, taste the profit of my skill, Down in the midst ? "

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 125

99. And plumb I pitched into the square — A groundling like the rest. What think you happened there? Precise the contrary of what one would expect ! For, — whereas, all the more monstrosities deflect From nature and the type, the more yourself approach Their precinct, — here, I found brutality encroach Less on the human, lie the lightlier as I looked The nearer on these faces that seemed but now so crook'd And clawed away from God's prime purpose. They

diverged A little from the type, but somehow rather urged To pity than disgust : the prominent, before, Now dwindled into mere distinctness, nothing more. Still, at first sight, stood forth undoubtedly the fact Some deviation was : in no one case there lacked The certain sign and mark, say hint, say, trick of lip Or twist of nose, that proved a fault in workmanship,

126 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

Change in the prime design, some hesitancy here

And there, which checked man's make and let the beast

appear ; But that was all.

TOO.

All ; yet enough to bid each tongue Lie in abeyance still. They talked, themselves among, Of themselves, to themselves ; I saw the mouths at play, The gesture that enforced, the eye that strove to say The same thing as the voice, and seldom gained its point — That this was so, I saw; but all seemed out of joint I' the vocal medium 'twixt the world and me. I gained Knowledge by notice, not by giving ear, — attained To truth by what men seemed, not said : to me one

glance Was worth whole histories of noisy utterance, — At least, to me in dream.

I

FIFINE A T THE FAIR. 127

lOI.

And presently I found That, just as ugliness had withered, so unwound Itself, and perished off, repugnance to what wrong Might linger yet i' the make of man. My will was strong r the matter ; I could pick and choose, project my weight (Remember how we saw the boatman trim his freight I) Determine to observe, or manage to escape, Or make divergency assume another shape By shift of point of sight in me the observer : thus Corrected, added to, subtracted from, — discuss Each variant quality, and brute-beast touch was turned Into mankind's safeguard ! Force, guile, were arms which

earned My praise, not blame at all ! for we must learn to live, Case-hardened at all points, not bare and sensitive. But plated for defence, nay, furnished for attack, With spikes at the due place, that neither front nor back

128 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

May suffer in that squeeze with nature, we find — life. Are we not here to learn the good of peace through

strife, Of love through hate, and reach knowledge by ignor- ance ? Why, those are helps thereto, which late we eyed askance, And nicknamed unaware ! Just so, a sword we call Superfluous, and cry out against, at festival : Wear it in time of war, its clink and clatter grate O' the ear to purpose then !

102.

I found, one must abate One's scorn of the soul's case, distinct from the soul's

self— Which is the centre-drop ; whereas the pride in pelf. The lust to seem the thing it cannot be, the greed For praise, and all the rest seen outside, — these indeed

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, 129

Are the hard poHshed cold crystal environment

Of those strange orbs unearthed i' the Druid temple,

meant For divination (so the learned lean to think) Wherein you may admire one dew-drop roll and wink, All unaffected by — quite alien to — what sealed And saved it long ago : though how it got congealed I shall not give a guess, nor how, by power occult. The solid surface-shield was outcome and result Of simple dew at work to save itself amid The unwatery force around ; protected thus, dew slid Safe through all opposites impatient to absorb Its spot of life, and lasts for ever in the orb We, now, from hand to hand pass with impunity.

103.

And the delight wherewith I watch this crowd must be

17

I30 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

Akin to that which crowns the chemist when he winds Thread up and up, till clue be fairly clutched, — un- binds The composite, ties fast the simple to its mate, And, tracing each effect back to its cause, elate. Constructs in fancy, from the fewest primitives, The complex and complete, all diverse life, that lives Not only in beast, bird, fish, reptile, insect, but The very plants and earths and ores. Just so I glut My hunger, both to be and know the thing I am, By contrast with the thing I am not ; so, through sham And outside, I arrive at inmost real, probe And prove how the nude form obtained the chequered robe.

104. — Experience, I am glad to master soon or late. Here, there and everywhere i' the world, without debate !

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, 131

Only, in Venice why ? What reason for Mark's Square Rather than Timbuctoo ?

105. And I became aware, Scarcely the word escaped my lips, that swift ensued In silence and by stealth, and yet with certitude, A formidable change of the amphitheatre Which held the Carnival ; although the human stir Continued just the same amid that shift of scene.

106. For as on edifice of cloud i' the grey and green Of evening, — built about some glory of the west. To barricade the sun's departure, — manifest, He plays, pre-eminently gold, gilds vapour, crag and crest Which bend in rapt suspense above the act and deed They cluster round and keep their very own, nor heed

132 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

The world at watch j while we, breathlessly at the base

O' the castellated bulk, note momently the mace

Of night fall here, fall there, bring change with every blow,

Alike to sharpened shaft and broadened portico

I' the structure : heights and depths, beneath the leaden

stress. Crumble and melt and mix together, coalesce. Re-form, but sadder still, subdued yet more and more By every fresh defeat, till wearied eyes need pore No longer on the dull impoverished decadence Of all that pomp of pile in towering evidence So lately : —

107. Even thus nor otherwise, meseemed That if I fixed my gaze awhile on what I dreamed Was Venice' Square, Mark's Church, the scheme was straight unschemed,

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 133

A subtle something had its way within the heart

Of each and every house I watched, with counterpart

Of tremor through the front and outward face, until

Mutation was at end ; impassive and stock-still

Stood now the ancient house, grown — new, is scarce the

phrase, Since older, in a sense, — altered to . . . what i' the ways. Ourselves are wont to see, coerced by city, town Or village, anywhere i' the world, pace up or down Europe ! In all the maze, no single tenement I saw, but I could claim acquaintance with !

108.

There went Conviction to my soul, that what I took of late For Venice was the world ; its Carnival — the state Of mankind, masquerade in life-long permanence For all time, and no one particular feast-day. Whence

134 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

'T was easy to infer what meant my late disgust

At the brute-pageant, each grotesque of greed and

lust And idle hate, and love as impotent for good — When from my pride of place I passed the interlude In critical review ; and what, the wonder that ensued When, from such pinnacled pre-eminence, I found Somehow the proper goal for wisdom was the ground And not the sky, — so, slid sagaciously betimes Down heaven's baluster-rope, to reach the mob of

mimes And mummers ; whereby came discovery there was just Enough and not too much of hate, love, greed and lust, Could one discerningly but hold the balance, shift The weight from scale to scale, do justice to the drift Of nature, and explain the glories by the shames Mixed up in man, one stuff miscalled by different

names

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, 135

According to what stage i' the process turned his rough Even as I gazed, to smooth — only get close enough ! — What was all this except the lesson of a life ?

109. And — consequent upon the learning how from strife Grew peace — from evil, good — came knowledge that,

to get Acquaintance with the way o' the world, we must nor fret Nor fume, on altitudes of self-sufficiency. But bid a frank farewell to what — we think — should be, And, with as good a grace, welcome what is — we find.

no.

Is — for the hour, observe ! Since something to my mind Suggested soon the fancy, nay, certitude that change, Never suspending touch, continued to derange

136 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

What architecture, we, walled up within the cirque O' the world, consider fixed as fate, not fairy-work. For those were temples, sure, which tremblingly grew blank From bright, then broke afresh in triumph, — ah, but sank As soon, for liquid change through artery and vein O' the very marble wound its way ! And first a stain Would startle and offend amid the glory ; next, Spot swift succeeded spot, but found me less perplexed By portents ; then as 't were a sleepiness soft stole Over the stately fane, and shadow sucked the whole Fagade into itself, made uniformly earth What was a piece of heaven ; till, lo, a second birth. And the veil broke away because of something new Inside, that pushed to gain an outlet, paused in view At last, and proved a growth of stone or brick or wood Which, alien to the aim o' the Builder, somehow stood The test, could satisfy, if not the early race For whom he built, at least our present populace,

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 137

Who must not bear the blame for what, blamed, proves

mishap Of the Artist : his work gone, another fills the gap. Serves the prime purpose so. Undoubtedly there spreads Building around, above, which makes men hft their heads To look at, or look through, or look — for aught I care — Over : if only up, it is, not down, they stare, Commercing with the skies," and not the pavement in

the Square.

III.

But are they only temples that subdivide, collapse. And tower again, transformed ? Academies, perhaps ! Domes where dwells Learning, seats of Science, bower

and hall Which house Philosophy — do these, too, rise and fall, Based though foundations be on steadfast mother-earth, With no chimeric claim to supermundane birth,

18

138 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

No boast that, dropped from cloud, they did not grow

from ground ? Why, these fare worst of all ! these vanish and are found Nowhere, by who tasks eye some twice within his term Of three-score years and ten, for tidings what each germ Has burgeoned out into, whereof the promise stunned His ear with such acclaim, — praise-payment to refund The praisers, never doubt, some twice before they die Whose days are long i' the land.

112.

Alack, Philosophy ! Despite the chop and change, diminished or increased, Patched-up and plastered-o'er, Religion stands at least I' the temple-type. But thou ? Here gape I, all agog These thirty years, to learn how tadpole turns to frog ; And thrice at least have gazed with mild astonishment, As, skyward up and up, some fire-new fabric sent

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 139

Its challenge to mankind that, clustered underneath — They hear the word and strait believe, ay, in the teeth O' the Past, clap hands and hail triumphant Truth's out- break — Tadpole-frog-theory propounded past mistake ! In vain ! A something ails the edifice, it bends, It bows, it buries . . . Haste! cry ^^ Heads below" to

friends — But have no fear they find, when smother shall subside. Some substitution perk with unabated pride I' the predecessor's place !

No, — the one voice which failed Never, the preachment's coigne of vantage nothing ailed, — That had the luck to lodge i' the house not made with

hands ! And all it preached was this : ^' Truth builds upon the sands,

140 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Though stationed on a rock : and so her work decays, And so she builds afresh, with like result. Nought

stays But just the fact that Truth not only is, but fain Would have men know she needs must be, by each so

plain Attempt to visibly inhabit where they dwell/' Her works are work, while she is she j that work does

well Which lasts mankind their life-time through, and lets

beheve One generation more, that, though sand run through

sieve. Yet earth now reached is rock, and what we moderns find Erected here is Truth, who, 'stablished to her mind I' the fulness of the days, will never change in show More than in substance erst : men thought they knew ;

we know !

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 141

114. Do you, my generation? Well, let the blocks prove mist I' the main enclosure, — church and college, if they list, Be something for a time, and everything anon, And anything awhile, as fit is off or on, Till they grow nothing, soon to re-appear no less K% something, — shape re-shaped, till out of shapelessness Come shape again as sure ! no doubt, or round or square Or polygon its front, some building will be there. Do duty in that nook o' the wall o' the world where once The Architect saw fit precisely to ensconce College or church, and bid such bulwark guard the line O' the barrier round about, humanity's confine.

115.

Leave watching change at work i' the greater scak,

on these The main supports, and turn to their interstices

142 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Filled up by fabrics too, less costly and less rare,

Yet of importance, yet essential to the Fair

They help to circumscribe, instruct and regulate !

See, where each booth-front boasts, in letters small or great.

Its specialty, proclaims its privilege to stop

A breach, beside the best !

ii6.

Here History keeps shop, Tells how past deeds were done, so and not otherwise : " Man ! hold truth evermore ! forget the early lies ! " There sits Morality, demure behind her stall, Dealing out life and death : " This is the thing to call Right, and this other, wrong ; thus think, thus do,

thus say, Thus joy, thus suffer ! — not to-day as yesterday — Yesterday's doctrine dead, this only shall endure ! Obey its voice and live ! " — enjoins the dame demure.

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 143

While Art gives flag to breeze, bids drum beat,

trumpet blow, Inviting eye and ear to yonder raree-show. Up goes the canvas, hauled to height of pole. I think, We know the way — long lost, late learned — to paint !

A wink Of eye, and lo, the pose ! the statue on its plinth ! How could we moderns miss the heart o' the labyrinth Perversely all these years, permit the Greek seclude His secret till to-day ? And here 's another feud Now happily composed : inspect this quartett-score ! Got long past melody, no word has Music more To say to mortal man ! But is the bard to be Behindhand ? Here 's his book, and now perhaps you see At length, what poetry can do !

117.

Why, that 's stability

144 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Itself, that change on change we sorrowfully saw Creep o'er the prouder piles ! We acquiesced in law When the fine gold grew dim i' the temple, when the brass Which pillared that so brave abode where Knowledge was, Bowed and resigned the trust ; but, bear all this caprice, Harlequinade where swift to birth succeeds decease Of hue at every turn o' the tinsel-flag which flames While Art holds booth in Fair ? Such glories chased by

shames Like these, distract beyond the solemn and august Procedure to decay, evanishment in dust. Of those marmoreal domes, — above vicissitude, We used to hope !

ii8. " So, all is change, in fine," pursued The preachment to a pause. When — ^^ All is permanence I " Returned a voice. Within ? without ? No matter whence

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 145

The explanation came : for, understand, I ought To simply say — I saw, each thing I say I thought. Since ever as, unrolled, the strange scene-picture grew Before me, sight flashed first, though mental comment

too Would follow in a trice, come hobbHngly to halt.

119.

So, what did I see next but, — much as when the

vault I' the west, — wherein we watch the vapoury, manifold Transfiguration, — tired would turn to rest, — behold. Peak reconciled to base, dark ending feud with

bright, The multiform subsides, is found the definite. Contrasting lifes and strifes, where battle they i' the

blank Severity of death and peace, for which we thank

19

146 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

One cloud that comes to quell the concourse, fall at last Into a shape befits the close of things, and cast Palpably o'er vexed earth, heaven's mantle of repose ?

120.

Just so, in Venice' Square, that things were at the close

Was signalled to my sense \ for I perceived arrest

O' the change all round about. As if some impulse

pressed Each gently into each, what was distinctness, late. Grew vague, and, line from line no longer separate. No matter what the style, edifice . . shall I say, Died into edifice ? I find no simpler way Of saying how, without or dash or shock or trace Of violence, I found unity in the place Of temple, tower, and hall and house and hut, — one

blank Severity of death and peace ; to which they sank

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, 147

Resigned enough, till . . ah, conjecture, I beseech, What special blank did they agree to, all and each ? What common shape was that wherein they mutely merged Likes and dislikes of form, so plain before ?

121.

I urged Your step this way, prolonged our path of enterprise To where we stand at last, in order that your eyes Might see the very thing, and save my tongue describe The Druid monument which fronts you. Could I bribe Nature to come in aid, illustrate what I mean. What wants there she would lend to solemnize the scene ?

122.

How does it strike you, this construction gaunt and grey? Sole object, these piled stones, that gleam unground away

148 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

By twilight's hungry jaw, which champs fine all beside I' the solitary waste we grope through. Oh, no guide However, need we now to reach the monstrous door Of granite ! Take my word, the deeper you explore That caverned passage, filled with fancies to the brim, The less will you approve the adventure ! such a grim Bar-sinister soon blocks abrupt your path, and ends All with a cold dread shape, — shape whereon Learning

spends Labour, and leaves the text obscurer for the gloss. While Ignorance reads right — recoiling from that Cross ! Whence came the mass and mass, strange quality of

stone Un quarried anywhere i' the region round ? Unknown ! Just as unknown, how such enormity could be Conveyed by land, or else transported over sea, And laid in order, so, precisely each on each As you and I would build a grotto where the beach

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, 149

Sheds shell— to last an hour : this building lasts from age To age the same. But why ?

123.

Ask Learning ! I engage You get a prosy wherefore, shall help you to advance In knowledge just as much as helps you Ignorance Surmising, in the mouth of peasant-lad or lass, " I heard my father say he understood it was A building, people built as soon as earth was made Almost, because they might forget (they were afraid) Earth did not make itself, but came of Somebody. They laboured that their work might last, and show

thereby He stays, while we and earth, and all things come and

go- Come whence? Go whither? That, when come and gone, we know

ISO FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

Perhaps, but not while earth and all things need our best Attention : we must wait and die to know the rest. Ask, if that 's true, what use in setting up the pile ? To make one fear and hope : remind us, all the while We come and go, outside there 's Somebody that stays ; A circumstance which ought to make us mind our ways, Because, — whatever end we answer by this life, — Next time, best chance must be for who, with toil and

strife. Manages now to live most like what he was meant Become : since who succeeds so far, 't is evident, Stands foremost on the file ; who fails, has less to hope From new promotion. That 's the rule — with even a

rope Of mushrooms, like this rope I dangle ! those that grew Greatest and roundest, all in life they had to do, Gain a reward, a grace they never dreamed, I think ; Since, outside white as milk and inside black as ink.

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 151

They go to the Great House to make a dainty dish For Don and Donna ; while this basket-load, I wish Well off my arm, it breaks, — no starveling of the heap But had his share of dew, his proper length of sleep I' the sunshine : yet, of all, the outcome is — this queer Cribbed quantity of dwarfs which burthen basket here Till I reach home ; 't is there that having run their rigs, They end their earthly race, are flung as food for pigs. Any more use I see ? Well, you must know, there lies Something, the Cure says, that points to mysteries Above our grasp : a huge stone pillar, once upright, Now laid at length, half-lost — discreetly shunning sight I' the bush and briar, because of stories in the air — Hints what it signified, and why was stationed there. Once on a time. In vain the Cure tasked his lungs — Showed, in a preachment, how, at bottom of the rungs O' the ladder, Jacob saw, where heavenly angels stept Up and down, lay a stone which served him, while he slept,

152 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

For pillow ; when he woke, he set the same upright As pillar, and a-top poured oil : things requisite To instruct posterity, there mounts from floor to roof, A staircase, earth to heaven ; and also put in proof. When we have scaled the sky, we well may let alone What raised us from the ground, and, — paying to the

stone Proper respect, of course, — take staff and go our way. Leaving the Pagan night for Christian break of day.

• For,' preached he, ' what they dreamed, these Pagans,

wide-awake

• We Christians may behold. How strange, then, were

mistake

• Did anybody style the stone, — because of drop

• Remaining there from oil which Jacob poured a-top, —

' Itself the Gate of Heaven, itself the end, and not

' The means thereto ! ' Thus preached the Cure, and no jot

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, 153

The more persuaded people but that, what once a

thing Meant and had right to mean, it still must mean.

So cling Folk somehow to the prime authoritative speech, And so distrust report, it seems as they could reach Far better the arch-word, whereon their fate depends, Through rude charactery, than all the grace it lends. That lettering of your scribes ! who flourish pen apace And ornament the text, they say — we say, efface. Hence, when the earth began its life afresh in May, And fruit-trees bloomed, and waves would wanton, and

the bay Ruffle its wealth of weed, and stranger-birds arrive, And beasts take each a mate, — folk, too, found sensitive. Surmised the old grey stone upright there, through such I tracts

Of solitariness and silence, kept the facts

154 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Entrusted it, could deal out doctrine, did it please : No fresh and frothy draught, but liquor on the lees. Strong, savage and sincere : first bleedings from a vine Whereof the product now do Cures so refine To insipidity, that, when heart sinks, we strive And strike from out the old stone the old restorative.

• Which is ? ' — why, go and ask our grandames how

they used To dance around it, till the Cure disabused Their ignorance, and bade the parish in a band Lay flat the obtrusive tiling that cumbered so the land ! And there, accordingly, in bush and briar it—* bides ' Its time to rise again ! ' (so somebody derides, Thaf s pert from Paris) * since, yon spire, you keep erect Yonder, and pray beneath, is nothing, I suspect,

• But just the symbol's self, expressed in slate for rock,

' Art's smooth for Nature's rough, new chip from the old block!'

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 155

There, sir, my say is said! Thanks, and Saint Gille

increase The wealth bestowed so well ! " — wherewith he pockets

piece. Doffs cap, and takes the road. I leave in Learning's

clutch More money for his book, but scarcely gain as much.

124. To this it was, this same primaeval monument. That, in my dream, I saw building with building blent Fall : each on each they fast and founderingly went Confusion-ward ; but thence again subsided fast, Became the mound you see. Magnificently massed Indeed, those mammoth-stones, piled by the Protoplast Temple-wise in my dream ! beyond compare with fanes Which, solid-looking late, had left no least remains I' the bald and blank, now sole usurper of the plains

156 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Of heaven, diversified and beautiful before. And yet simplicity appeared to speak no more Nor less to me than spoke the compound. At the core, One and no other word, as in the crust of late, Whispered, which, audible through the transition-state, Was no loud utterance in even the ultimate Disposure. For as some imperial chord subsists. Steadily underlies the accidental mists Of music springing thence, that run their mazy race Around, and sink, absorbed, back to the triad base, — So, out of that one word, each variant rose and fell And left the same "All 's change, but permanence

as well." — Grave note whence — list aloft ! — harmonics sound,

that mean : " Truth inside, and outside, truth also ; and between Each, falsehood that is change, as truth is permanence. The individual soul works through the shows of sense,

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 157

(Which, ever proving false, still promise to be true) Up to an outer soul as individual too ; And, through the fleeting, lives to die into the fixed. And reach at length * God, man, or both together mixed,' Transparent through the flesh, by parts which prove a whole, By hints which make the soul discernible by soul — Let only soul look up, not down, not hate but love. As truth successively takes shape, one grade above Its last presentment, tempts as it were truth indeed Revealed this time ; so tempts, till we attain to read The signs aright, and learn, by failure, truth is forced To manifest itself through falsehood ; whence divorced By the excepted eye, at the rare season, for The happy moment, truth instructs us to abhor The false, and prize the true, obtainable thereby. Then do we understand the value of a lie ; Its purpose served, its truth once safe deposited. Each lie, superfluous now, leaves, in the singer's stead,

158 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

The indubitable song ; the historic personage Put by, leaves prominent the impulse of his age ; Truth sets aside speech, act, time, place, indeed, but brings Nakedly forward now the principle of things Highest and least."

125. Wherewith change ends. What other change to dread When, disengaged at last from every veil, instead Of type remains the truth ? Once — falsehood : but anon Theosuto7i e broteion eper kekramenon^ Something as true as soul is true, though veils between Are false and fleet away. As I mean, did he mean, The poet whose bird-phrase sits, singing in my ear A mystery not unlike ? What through the dark and drear Brought comfort to the Titan ? Emerging from the lymph, " God, man, or mixture " proved only to be a nymph :

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 159

• ^ From whom the dink on clink of metal" (money,

judged Abundant in my purse) '* struck" (bumped at, till it

budged) " The modesty, her souFs habitual resident " (Where late the sisterhood were lively in their tent) " As out of winged car " (that caravan on wheels) " Impulsively she rushed, no slippers to her heels," And ** Fear not, friends we flock ! " soft smiled the sea-

Fifine— - Primitive of the veils (if he meant what I mean) The poet's Titan learned to lift, ere "Three-formed

Fate, Moirai Triviorphoi " stood unmasked the Ultimate.

' 126. Enough o' the dream! You see how poetry turns prose.

i6o FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

Announcing wonder-work, I dwindle at the close Down to mere commonplace which everybody knows. But dreaming disappoints. The fresh and strange at first, Soon wear to trite and tame, nor warrant the outburst Of heart with which we hail those heights, at very brink Of heaven, whereto one least of lifts would lead, we

think ; But wherefrom quick decline conducts our step, we find, To homely earth, and fact familiar left behind. Did not this monument, for instance, long ago Say all it had to say, show all it had to show, Nor promise to do duty more in dream ?

127.

Awaking so. What if we, homeward-bound, all peace and some

fatigue, Trudge, soberly complete our tramp of near a league,

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. i6i

Last little mile which makes the circuit just, Elvire ? We end where we began : that consequence is clear. All peace and some fatigue, wherever we were nursed To life, we bosom us on death, fmd last is first And thenceforth final too.

128. I . " Why final ? Why the more

Worth credence now than when such truth proved

false before ? Because a novel point impresses now : each lie Redounded to the praise of man, was victory Man's nature had both right to get, and might to gain, And by no means implied submission to the reign Of other quite as real a nature, that saw fit To have its way with man, not man his way with it. This time, acknowledgment and acquiescence quell Their contrary in man ; promotion proves as well

21

1 62 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Defeat : and Truth, unlike the False with Truth's outside, Neither plumes up his will nor puffs him out with pride. I fancy, there must lurk some cogency i' the claim, Man, such abatement made, submits to, all the same. Soul finds no triumph, here, to register like Sense With whom 't is ask and have, — the want, the evidence That the thing wanted, soon or late, will be supplied. This indeed plumes up will, this, sure, puffs out with

pride, When, reading records right, man's instincts still attest Promotion comes to Sense because Sense likes it best ; For bodies sprouted legs, through a desire to run : While hands, when fain to filch, got fingers one by one, And nature, that 's ourself, accommodative brings To bear that, tired of legs which walk, we now bud

wings Since of a mind to fly. Such savour in the nose Of Sense, would stimulate Soul sweetly, I suppose,

FIFINE AT THE FAIR, i6^

Soul with its proper itch of instinct, prompting clear

To recognize soul's self soul's only master here

Ahke from first to last. But, if time 's pressure,

light's Or rather, dark's approach, wrest thoroughly the rights Of rule away, and bid the soul submissive bear Another soul than it play master ever}- where In great and small, — this time, I fancy, none disputes There 's something in the fact that such conclusion

suits Nowise the pride of man, nor yet chimes in with attributes Conspicuous in the lord of nature. He receives And not demands — not first likes faith and then believes.

129.

And as with the last essence so with its first faint type. Inconstancy means raw, 't is faith alone means ripe

1 64 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Y the soul which runs its round : no matter how it range From Helen to Fifine, Elvire bids back the change To permanence. Here, too, love ends where love began. Such ending looks like law, because the natural man Inclines the other way, feels lordHer free than bound. Poor pabulum for pride when the first love is found Last also ! and, so far from realizing gain, Each step aside just proves divergency in vain. The wanderer brings home no profit from his quest Beyond the sad surmise that keeping house were best Could life begin anew. His problem posed aright Was — " From the given point evolve the infinite ! " Not — ^' Spend thyself in space, endeavouring to joint Together, and so make infinite, point and point : Fix into one Elvire a Fair-ful of Fifines ! " Fifine, the foam-flake, she : Elvire, the sea's self, means Capacity at need to shower how many such ! And yet we left her calm profundity, to clutch

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 165

Foam-flutter, bell on bell, that, bursting at a touch, Bhstered us for our pains. But wise, we want no more O' the fickle element. Enough of foam and roar ! Land-locked, we live and die henceforth : for here's the villa-door.

130. How pallidly you pause o' the threshold ! Hardly

night. Which drapes you, ought to make real flesh and blood so

white ! Touch me, and so appear alive to all intents ! Will the saint vanish from the sinner that repents ? Suppose you are a ghost ! A memory, a hope, A fear, a conscience ! Quick ! Give back the hand I grope I' the dusk for !

131.

'. That is well. Our double horoscope

i66 FIFINE AT THE FAIR,

I cast, while you concur. Discard that simile

O' the fickle element ! Elvire is land not sea —

The solid land, the safe. All these word-bubbles came

O' the sea, and bite like salt. The unlucky bath 's to

blame. This hand of yours on heart of mine, no more the bay I beat, nor bask beneath the blue ! In Pornic, say, The Mayor shall catalogue me duly domiciled, Contributable, good-companion of the guild And mystery of marriage. I stickle for the town, And not this tower apart ; because, though, half-way down, Its mullions wink o'er-webbed with bloomy greenness, yet Who mounts to staircase top, may tempt the parapet, And sudden there 's the sea ! No memories, to arouse, No fancies, to delude ! Our honest civic house Of the earth be earthy too ! — or graced perchance with

shell Made prize of long ago, picked haply where the swell

FIFINE AT THE FAIR. 167

Menaced a little once — or seaweed-branch that yet Dampens and softens, notes a freak of wind, a fret Of wave : though, why on earth should sea-change mend

or mar The calm comtemplative householders that we are ? So shall the seasons fleet, while our two selves abide : E'en past astonishment how sunrise and springtide Could tempt one forth to swim ; the more if time

appoints That swimming grow a task for one's rheumatic joints. Such honest civic house, behold, I constitute Our villa ! Be but flesh and blood, and smile to boot ! Enter for good and all ! then fate bolt fast the door, Shut you and me inside, never to wander more !

132. Only, — you do not use to apprehend attack ! No doubt, the way I march, one idle arm, thrown slack

i68 FIFINE AT THE FAIR.

Behind me, leaves the open hand defenceless at the

back, Should an impertinent on tiptoe steal, and stuff — Whatever can it be ? A letter sure enough, Pushed betwixt palm and glove ! That largess of a franc ? Perhaps inconsciously, — to better help the blank O' the nest, her tambourine, and, laying tgg^ persuade A family to follow, the nest-egg that I laid May have contained, — but just to foil suspicious folk, — Between two silver whites a yellow double yolk ! Oh, threaten no farewell 1 five minutes shall suffice To clear the matter up. I go, and in a trice Return ; five minutes past, expect me ! If in vain — Why, slip from flesh and blood, and play the ghost again !

( i69 )

EPILOGUE.

The Householder.

I.

Savage I was sitting in my house, late, lone :

Dreary, weary with the long day's work : Head of me, heart of me, stupid as a stone :

Tongue-tied now, now blaspheming like a Turk ; When, in a moment, just a knock, call, cry,

Half a pang and all a rapture, there again were we I " What, and is it really you again ? " quoth I :

" I again, what else did you expect ? " quoth She.

I70 EPILOGUE.

2.

" Never mind, hie away from this old house —

Every crumbHng brick embrowned with sin and shame ! Quick, in its corners ere certain shapes arouse !

Let them — every devil of the night — lay claim, Make and mend, or rap and rend, for me ! Goodbye !

God be their guard from disturbance at their glee. Till, crash, comes down the carcass in a heap ! " quoth I :

^* Nay, but there 's a decency required ! " quoth She.

3-

'^ Ah, but if you knew how time has dragged, days, nights !

All the neighbour-talk with man and maid — such men ! All the fuss and trouble of street-sounds, window-sights :

All the worry of flapping door and echoing roof; and then, All the fancies . . . Who were they had leave, dared try

Darker arts that almost struck despair in me ? If you knew but how I dwelt down here ! quoth I :

" And was I so better off up there ? " quoth She.

EPILOGUE. 171

4. " Help and get it over ! Re-imited to his wife

(How draw up the paper lets the parish-people know ?) Lies M, or N., departed frofn this life,

Day the this or that, month and year the so and so. What i' the way of final flourish ? Prose, verse ? Try !

Affliction sore, long time he bore, or, what is it to be ? Till God did please to grant him ease. Do end ! " quoth I :

" I end with — Love is all and Death is nought ! " quoth She.

THE END.

LONDON :

PRINTED BY SMITH, ELDER AND CO.,

OLD BAILEY, E.C.