Robert Browning: How to Know Him Part 6

The songs in _Pippa Pa.s.ses_ (1841) are ail exquisite works of art.

The one on the King had been printed in the _Monthly Repository_ in 1835; the others appeared for the first time in the published drama.

All of them are vitally connected with the action of the plot, differing in this respect from the Elizabethan custom of simple interpolation. The song sung in the early morning by the girl in her chamber

All service ranks the same with G.o.d

contains the philosophy of the play--human lives are inextricably intertwined, and all are dependent on the will of G.o.d. No individual can separate himself either from other men and women, or can sever the connection between himself and his Father in Heaven. The first stanza repeats the teaching of Milton in the sonnet on his blindness: the second is more definitely connected with Pippa's professional work.

Untwine me from the ma.s.s Of deeds which make up life,

refers to her daily duty as a girl in the silk-mill, for she naturally thinks of the complexity of life as a tangled skein.

All service ranks the same with G.o.d: If now, as formerly he trod Paradise, his presence fills Our earth, each only as G.o.d wills Can work--G.o.d's puppets, best and worst, Are we; there is no last nor first.

Say not "a small event!" Why "small"?

Costs it more pain that this, ye call A "great event," should come to pa.s.s, Than that? Untwine me from the ma.s.s Of deeds which make up life, one deed Power shall fall short in or exceed!

OTHER SONGS FROM PIPPA Pa.s.sES

1841

You'll love me yet!--and I can tarry Your love's protracted growing: June reared that bunch of flowers you carry, From seeds of April's sowing.

I plant a heartful now: some seed At least is sure to strike, And yield--what you'll not pluck indeed, Not love, but, may be, like.

You'll look at least on love's remains, A grave's one violet: Your look?--that pays a thousand pains.

What's death? You'll love me yet!

Overhead the tree-tops meet, Flowers and gra.s.s spring 'neath one's feet; There was nought above me, nought below, My childhood had not learned to know: For, what are the voices of birds --Ay, and of beasts,--but words, our words, Only so much more sweet?

The knowledge of that with my life begun.

But I had so near made out the sun, And counted your stars, the seven and one, Like the fingers of my hand: Nay, I could all but understand Wherefore through heaven the white moon ranges; And just when out of her soft fifty changes No unfamiliar face might overlook me-- Suddenly G.o.d took me.

The most famous song in the play, which simply sings itself, is:

The year's at the spring And day's at the morn; Morning's at seven; The hill-side's dew-pearled; The lark's on the wing; The snail's on the thorn: G.o.d's in his heaven-- All's right with the world!

The last line is unfortunately very often misquoted

All's well with the world!

a remark never made either by Pippa or by Browning. In Browning's philosophy all may be right with the world, and yet far from well.

Perhaps it is too prosaically minute to point out in so beautiful a poem, a scientific error, but at seven o'clock on the first of January in Asolo the sun is still below the horizon.

MERTOUN'S SONG FROM A BLOT IN THE 'SCUTCHEON

1843

There's a woman like a dew-drop, she's so purer than the purest; And her n.o.ble heart's the n.o.blest, yes, and her sure faith's the surest: And her eyes are dark and humid, like the depth on depth of l.u.s.tre Hid i' the harebell, while her tresses, sunnier than the wild-grape cl.u.s.ter, Gush in golden-tinted plenty down her neck's rose-misted marble: Then her voice's music ... call it the well's bubbling, the bird's warble!

And this woman says, "My days were sunless and my nights were moonless, Parched the pleasant April herbage, and the lark's heart's outbreak tuneless, If you loved me not!" And I who--(ah, for words of flame!) adore her, Who am mad to lay my spirit prostrate palpably before her-- I may enter at her portal soon, as now her lattice takes me, And by noontide as by midnight make her mine, as hers she makes me!

The two lyrics, _Home-Thoughts, from the Sea_ and _Home-Thoughts, from Abroad_, were written during Browning's first Italian journey in 1838; and it seems strange that he did not print them among the _Dramatic Lyrics_ of 1842 but reserved them for the _Dramatic Romances_ of 1845; especially as he subsequently transferred them to the _Lyrics_. They are both notable on account of the strong feeling for England which they express. No great English poet has said so little of England as Browning, though his own feelings were always keenly patriotic. Even in _Pauline_, a poem without a country, there occur the two lines

... and I cherish most My love of England--how her name, a word Of hers in a strange tongue makes my heart beat!

The allusion to the English thrush has given immortality to _Home-Thoughts, from Abroad_. Many had observed that the thrush sings a lilt, and immediately repeats it: but Browning was the first to give a pretty reason for it. The thrush seems to say, "You think that beautiful melody is an accident? Well, I will show you it is no fluke, I will sing it correctly right over again." Browning was not in Italy in April--perhaps he wrote the first stanza on the voyage, as he wrote _Home-Thoughts, from the Sea_, and added the second stanza about May and June after he had reached the country of his quest.

HOME-THOUGHTS, FROM THE SEA

1845

n.o.bly, n.o.bly Cape Saint Vincent to the North-west died away; Sunset ran, one glorious blood-red, reeking into Cadiz Bay; Bluish 'mid the burning water, full in face Trafalgar lay; In the dimmest North-east distance dawned Gibraltar grand and gray; "Here and here did England help me: how can I help England?"--say, Whoso turns as I, this evening, turn to G.o.d to praise and pray, While Jove's planet rises yonder, silent over Africa.

HOME-THOUGHTS, FROM ABROAD

1845

I

Oh, to be in England Now that April's there, And whoever wakes in England Sees, some morning, unaware, That the lowest boughs and the brushwood sheaf Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf, While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough In England--now!

II

And after April, when May follows, And the whitethroat builds, and all the swallows!

Hark, where my blossomed pear-tree in the hedge Leans to the field and scatters on the clover Blossoms and dewdrops--at the bent spray's edge-- That's the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over, Lest you should think he never could recapture The first fine careless rapture!

And though the fields look rough with h.o.a.ry dew.

All will be gay when noontide wakes anew The b.u.t.tercups, the little children's dower --Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower!

The collection of poems called _James Lee's Wife_, published in the _Dramatis Personae_ (1864), seems to me ill.u.s.trative of Browning's worst faults; it is obscure, harsh, and dull. But it contains one fine lyric descriptive of an autumn morning, a morning, by the way, much commoner in America during autumn than anywhere in Europe. The second stanza is n.o.bly ethical in its doctrine of love--that we should not love only those persons whom we can respect, for true love seeks no profit. It must be totally free from the prospect of gain. A beautiful face inspired another lyric in this volume, and Browning drew upon his memories of Correggio to give the perfect tone to the poem.