Poetical Works of Matthew Arnold Part 9

And many a mile of dusty way, Parch'd and road-worn, we made that day; But, Fausta, I remember well, That as the balmy darkness fell We bathed our hands with speechless glee, That night, in the wide-glimmering sea.

Once more we tread this self-same road, Fausta, which ten years since we trod; Alone we tread it, you and I, Ghosts of that boisterous company.

Here, where the brook shines, near its head, In its clear, shallow, turf-fringed bed; Here, whence the eye first sees, far down, Capp'd with faint smoke, the noisy town; Here sit we, and again unroll, Though slowly, the familiar whole.

The solemn wastes of heathy hill Sleep in the July sunshine still; The self-same shadows now, as then, Play through this gra.s.sy upland glen; The loose dark stones on the green way Lie strewn, it seems, where then they lay; On this mild bank above the stream, (You crush them!) the blue gentians gleam.

Still this wild brook, the rushes cool, The sailing foam, the shining pool!

These are not changed; and we, you say, Are scarce more changed, in truth, than they.

The gipsies, whom we met below, They, too, have long roam'd to and fro; They ramble, leaving, where they pa.s.s, Their fragments on the c.u.mber'd gra.s.s.

And often to some kindly place Chance guides the migratory race, Where, though long wanderings intervene, They recognise a former scene.

The dingy tents are pitch'd; the fires Give to the wind their wavering spires; In dark knots crouch round the wild flame Their children, as when first they came; They see their shackled beasts again Move, browsing, up the gray-wall'd lane.

Signs are not wanting, which might raise The ghost in them of former days-- Signs are not wanting, if they would; Suggestions to disquietude.

For them, for all, time's busy touch, While it mends little, troubles much.

Their joints grow stiffer--but the year Runs his old round of dubious cheer; Chilly they grow--yet winds in March, Still, sharp as ever, freeze and parch; They must live still--and yet, G.o.d knows, Crowded and keen the country grows; It seems as if, in their decay, The law grew stronger every day.

So might they reason, so compare, Fausta, times past with times that are.

But no!--they rubb'd through yesterday In their hereditary way, And they will rub through, if they can, To-morrow on the self-same plan, Till death arrive to supersede, For them, vicissitude and need.

The poet, to whose mighty heart Heaven doth a quicker pulse impart, Subdues that energy to scan Not his own course, but that of man.

Though he move mountains, though his day Be pa.s.s'd on the proud heights of sway, Though he hath loosed a thousand chains, Though he hath borne immortal pains, Action and suffering though he know-- He hath not lived, if he lives so.

He sees, in some great-historied land, A ruler of the people stand, Sees his strong thought in fiery flood Roll through the heaving mult.i.tude Exults--yet for no moment's s.p.a.ce Envies the all-regarded place.

Beautiful eyes meet his--and he Bears to admire uncravingly; They pa.s.s--he, mingled with the crowd, Is in their far-off triumphs proud.

From some high station he looks down, At sunset, on a populous town; Surveys each happy group, which fleets, Toil ended, through the shining streets, Each with some errand of its own-- And does not say: _I am alone._ He sees the gentle stir of birth When morning purifies the earth; He leans upon a gate and sees The pastures, and the quiet trees.

Low, woody hill, with gracious bound, Folds the still valley almost round; The cuckoo, loud on some high lawn, Is answer'd from the depth of dawn; In the hedge straggling to the stream, Pale, dew-drench'd, half-shut roses gleam; But, where the farther side slopes down, He sees the drowsy new-waked clown In his white quaint-embroider'd frock Make, whistling, tow'rd his mist-wreathed flock-- Slowly, behind his heavy tread, The wet, flower'd gra.s.s heaves up its head.

Lean'd on his gate, he gazes--tears Are in his eyes, and in his ears The murmur of a thousand years.

Before him he sees life unroll, A placid and continuous whole-- That general life, which does not cease, Whose secret is not joy, but peace; That life, whose dumb wish is not miss'd If birth proceeds, if things subsist; The life of plants, and stones, and rain, The life he craves--if not in vain Fate gave, what chance shall not control, His sad lucidity of soul.

You listen--but that wandering smile, Fausta, betrays you cold the while!

Your eyes pursue the bells of foam Wash'd, eddying, from this bank, their home.

_Those gipsies_, so your thoughts I scan, _Are less, the poet more, than man._ _They feel not, though they move and see;_ _Deeper the poet feels; but he_ _Breathes, when he will, immortal air,_ _Where Orpheus and where Homer are._ _In the day's life, whose iron round_ _Hems us all in, he is not bound;_ _He leaves his kind, o'erleaps their pen,_ _And flees the common life of men._ _He escapes thence, but we abide--_ _Not deep the poet sees, but wide._

The world in which we live and move Outlasts aversion, outlasts love, Outlasts each effort, interest, hope, Remorse, grief, joy;--and were the scope Of these affections wider made, Man still would see, and see dismay'd, Beyond his pa.s.sion's widest range, Far regions of eternal change.

Nay, and since death, which wipes out man, Finds him with many an unsolved plan, With much unknown, and much untried, Wonder not dead, and thirst not dried, Still gazing on the ever full Eternal mundane spectacle-- This world in which we draw our breath, In some sense, Fausta, outlasts death.

Blame thou not, therefore, him who dares Judge vain beforehand human cares; Whose natural insight can discern What through experience others learn; Who needs not love and power, to know Love transient, power an unreal show; Who treads at ease life's uncheer'd ways-- Him blame not, Fausta, rather praise!

Rather thyself for some aim pray n.o.bler than this, to fill the day; Rather that heart, which burns in thee, Ask, not to amuse, but to set free; Be pa.s.sionate hopes not ill resign'd For quiet, and a fearless mind.

And though fate grudge to thee and me The poet's rapt security, Yet they, believe me, who await No gifts from chance, have conquer'd fate.

They, winning room to see and hear, And to men's business not too near, Through clouds of individual strife Draw homeward to the general life.

Like leaves by suns not yet uncurl'd; To the wise, foolish; to the world, Weak;--yet not weak, I might reply, Not foolish, Fausta, in His eye, To whom each moment in its race, Crowd as we will its neutral s.p.a.ce, Is but a quiet watershed Whence, equally, the seas of life and death are fed.

Enough, we live!--and if a life, With large results so little rife, Though bearable, seem hardly worth This pomp of worlds, this pain of birth; Yet, Fausta, the mute turf we tread, The solemn hills around us spread, This stream which falls incessantly, The strange-scrawl'd rocks, the lonely sky, If I might lend their life a voice, Seem to bear rather than rejoice.

And even could the intemperate prayer Man iterates, while these forbear, For movement, for an ampler sphere, Pierce Fate's impenetrable ear; Not milder is the general lot Because our spirits have forgot, In action's dizzying eddy whirl'd, The something that infects the world.

NARRATIVE POEMS

SOHRAB AND RUSTUM[6]

AN EPISODE

And the first grey of morning fill'd the east, And the fog rose out of the Oxus stream.

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

Through the black Tartar tents he pa.s.s'd, which stood Cl.u.s.tering like bee-hives on the low flat strand Of Oxus, where the summer-floods o'erflow When the sun melts the snows in high Pamere; Through the black tents he pa.s.s'd, o'er that low strand, And to a hillock came, a little back From the stream's brink--the spot where first a boat, Crossing the stream in summer, sc.r.a.pes the land.

The men of former times had crown'd the top With a clay fort; but that was fall'n, and now The Tartars built there Peran-Wisa's tent, A dome of laths, and o'er it felts were spread.

And Sohrab came there, and went in, and stood Upon the thick piled carpets in the tent, And found the old man sleeping on his bed Of rugs and felts, and near him lay his arms.

And Peran-Wisa heard him, though the step Was dull'd; for he slept light, an old man's sleep; And he rose quickly on one arm, and said:-- "Who art thou? for it is not yet clear dawn.

Speak! is there news, or any night alarm?"

But Sohrab came to the bedside, and said:-- "Thou know'st me, Peran-Wisa! it is I.

The sun is not yet risen, and the foe Sleep; but I sleep not; all night long I lie Tossing and wakeful, and I come to thee.

For so did King Afrasiab bid me seek Thy counsel, and to heed thee as thy son, In Samarcand, before the army march'd; And I will tell thee what my heart desires.

Thou know'st if, since from Ader-baijan first I came among the Tartars and bore arms, I have still served Afrasiab well, and shown, At my boy's years, the courage of a man.

This too thou know'st, that while I still bear on The conquering Tartar ensigns through the world, And beat the Persians back on every field, I seek one man, one man, and one alone-- Rustum, my father; who I hoped should greet, Should one day greet, upon some well-fought field, His not unworthy, not inglorious son.

So I long hoped, but him I never find.

Come then, hear now, and grant me what I ask.

Let the two armies rest to-day; but I Will challenge forth the bravest Persian lords To meet me, man to man; if I prevail, Rustum will surely hear it; if I fall-- Old man, the dead need no one, claim no kin.

Dim is the rumour of a common fight, Where host meets host, and many names are sunk; But of a single combat fame speaks clear."

He spoke; and Peran-Wisa took the hand Of the young man in his, and sigh'd, and said:-- "O Sohrab, an unquiet heart is thine!

Canst thou not rest among the Tartar chiefs, And share the battle's common chance with us Who love thee, but must press for ever first, In single fight incurring single risk, To find a father thou hast never seen?

That were far best, my son, to stay with us Unmurmuring; in our tents, while it is war, And when 'tis truce, then in Afrasiab's towns.

But, if this one desire indeed rules all, To seek out Rustum--seek him not through fight!

Seek him in peace, and carry to his arms, O Sohrab, carry an unwounded son!

But far hence seek him, for he is not here.

For now it is not as when I was young, When Rustum was in front of every fray; But now he keeps apart, and sits at home, In Seistan, with Zal, his father old.

Whether that his own mighty strength at last Feels the abhorr'd approaches of old age, Or in some quarrel with the Persian King.

There go!--Thou wilt not? Yet my heart forebodes Danger or death awaits thee on this field.

Fain would I know thee safe and well, though lost To us; fain therefore send thee hence, in peace To seek thy father, not seek single fights In vain;--but who can keep the lion's cub From ravening, and who govern Rustum's son?

Go, I will grant thee what thy heart desires."

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

The sun by this had risen, and clear'd the fog From the broad Oxus and the glittering sands.

And from their tents the Tartar hors.e.m.e.n filed Into the open plain; so Haman bade-- Haman, who next to Peran-Wisa ruled The host, and still was in his l.u.s.ty prime.

From their black tents, long files of horse, they stream'd; As when some grey November morn the files, In marching order spread, of long-neck'd cranes Stream over Casbin and the southern slopes Of Elburz, from the Aralian estuaries, Or some frore Caspian reed-bed, southward bound For the warm Persian sea-board--so they stream'd.

The Tartars of the Oxus, the King's guard, First, with black sheep-skin caps and with long spears; Large men, large steeds; who from Bokhara come And Khiva, and ferment the milk of mares.

Next, the more temperate Toorkmuns of the south, The Tukas, and the lances of Salore, And those from Attruck and the Caspian sands; Light men and on light steeds, who only drink The acrid milk of camels, and their wells.

And then a swarm of wandering horse, who came From far, and a more doubtful service own'd; The Tartars of Ferghana, from the banks Of the Jaxartes, men with scanty beards And close-set skull-caps; and those wilder hordes Who roam o'er Kipchak and the northern waste, Kalmucks and unkempt Kuzzaks, tribes who stray Nearest the Pole, and wandering Kirghizzes, Who come on s.h.a.ggy ponies from Pamere; These all filed out from camp into the plain.

And on the other side the Persians form'd;-- First a light cloud of horse, Tartars they seem'd, The Ilyats of Khora.s.san; and behind, The royal troops of Persia, horse and foot, Marshall'd battalions bright in burnish'd steel.

But Peran-Wisa with his herald came, Threading the Tartar squadrons to the front, And with his staff kept back the foremost ranks.

And when Ferood, who led the Persians, saw That Peran-Wisa kept the Tartars back, He took his spear, and to the front he came, And check'd his ranks, and fix'd them where they stood.

And the old Tartar came upon the sand Betwixt the silent hosts, and spake, and said:-- "Ferood, and ye, Persians and Tartars, hear!

Let there be truce between the hosts to-day.

But choose a champion from the Persian lords To fight our champion Sohrab, man to man."

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

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

And to Ferood his brother chiefs came up To counsel; Gudurz and Zoarrah came, And Feraburz, who ruled the Persian host Second, and was the uncle of the King; These came and counsell'd, and then Gudurz said:-- "Ferood, shame bids us take their challenge up, Yet champion have we none to match this youth.

He has the wild stag's foot, the lion's heart.