The Poetical Works of Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton, Bart. M.P Part 8

And what then chanced? O, leave not told, but guess'd; Is Love a G.o.d?--a temple, then, the breast!

Not to the crowd in cold detail allow Its delicate worship, its mysterious vow!

Around the first sweet homage in the shrine Let the veil fall, and but the Pure divine!

Coy as the violet shrinking from the sun, The blush of Virgin Youth first woo'd and won; And scarce less holy from the vulgar ear The tone that trembles but with n.o.ble fear: Near to G.o.d's throne the solemn stars that move The proud to meekness, and the pure to love!

Let days pa.s.s on; nor count how many swell The episode of Life's hack chronicle!

Changed the abode, of late so stern and drear, How doth the change speak--"Love hath enter'd here!"

How lightly sounds the footfall on the floor!

How jocund rings sweet laughter, hush'd no more!

Wide from two hearts made happy, wide and far, Circles the light in which they breathe and are; Liberal as noontide streams the ambient ray, And fills each crevice in the world with day.

And changed is Lucy! where the downcast eye, And the meek fear, when that dark man was by?

Lo! as young Una thrall'd the forest-king, She leads the savage in her silken string; Plays with the strength to her in service shown, And mounts with infant whim the woman's throne!

Charm'd from his lonely moods and brooding mind, And bound by one to union with his kind, No more the wild man thirsted for the waste; No more, 'mid joy, a joyless one, misplaced; His very form a.s.sumed unwonted grace, And bliss gave more than beauty to his face: Let but delighted thought from all things cull Sweet food and fair--hiving the Beautiful, And lo! the form shall brighten with the soul!

The G.o.ds bloom only by joy's nectar bowl.

Nor deem it strange that Lucy fail'd to trace } In that dark brow, the birthright of disgrace, } And Europe's ban on Earth's primeval race. }

Were she less pure, less harmless, less the child, Not on the savage had the soft one smiled.

Ev'n as the young Venetian loved the Moor, Love gains the shrine when Pity opes the door; Love like the Poet, whom it teaches, where Round it the Homely dwells, invents the Fair; And takes a halo from the air it gilds To crown a Seraph for the Heaven it builds.

And both were children in this world of ours, Maiden and savage! the same mountain flowers, Not trimm'd in gardens, not exchanged their hues, Fresh from the natural sun and hardy dews, For the faint fragrance and the sickly dyes Which, Art calls forth by walling out the skies: _So_ children both, each seem'd to have forgot How poor the maid's--how rich the lover's lot; Ne'er did the ignorant Indian pause in fear, Lest friends should pity, and lest foes should sneer.

"What will the world say?"--question safe and sage; The parrot's world should be his gilded cage; But fly, frank wilding, with free wings unfurl'd, Where thy mate carols--there, behold thy world!

And stranger still that no decorous pride Warn'd her, the beggar, from the rich man's side.

Sneer, ye world-wise, and deem her ignorance art; She saw her wealth (and blush'd not) in her heart!-- Saw through the glare of gold his lonely breast; He had but gold, and hers was all the rest.

Pleased in the bliss to her, alas! denied, } Calantha hail'd her brother's plighted bride: } "Glad thou the heart which I made sad," she sigh'd. } Since Arden's tale, but once the friends had met, Nor known to one the other's rapture yet; Some fancied clue, some hope awhile restored, Had from the Babel lured the brilliant lord.

The wonted commune Morvale fail'd to miss,-- We want no confidant in happiness.

Baffled, and sick of hope, wealth, life, and all, One night return'd the n.o.ble to his hall; He found some lines, stern, brief, in Morvale's hand,-- Brief with dark meaning,--stern with rude command,-- Bidding his instant presence. Arden weigh'd } Each word; some threat was in each word convey'd; } A chill shot through his heart--foreboding he obey'd. }

III.

What caused the mandate?--wherefore do I shrink?

The stream runs on,--why tarry at the brink?

Nay, let us halt, and in the pause between Sorrow and joy, behold the quiet scene;-- The chamber stately in that calm repose, Which Time's serene, sweet conqueror, ART bestows; There, in bright shapes which claim our homage still, Live the grand exiles from the Olympian Hill; Still the pale Queen Cithaeron forests know, Turns the proud eye, and lifts the deathful bow; Still on the vast brow of the father-G.o.d, Hangs the hush'd thunder of the awful nod; Still fair, as when on Ida's mountain seen, By Troy's young shepherd, Beauty's bashful Queen; Still Ind's divine Iacchus laughing weaves His crown of cl.u.s.tering grapes and glossy leaves; Still thou, Arch-type of Song, ordain'd to soothe The rest of Heroes, and with deathless youth Crown the Celestial Brotherhood--dost hold, Brimm'd with the drink of G.o.ds, the urn of gold!

All live again! The Art which images Man's n.o.blest conquest, as it slowly frees Thought out of matter, labouring patient on, Till springs a G.o.d-world from reluctant stone, Charm'd Morvale more than all the pomp and glow With which the Painter limns a world we know.

'Twas noon, and broken by the gentle gloom Of coolest draperies, through the shadowy room, In moted shaft aslant, the curious ray Forced lingering in, through tiers of flowers, its way, Glanced on the lute (just hush'd, to leave behind Elysian dreams, the music of the mind), Play'd round the songstress, and with warmer flush Steep'd the young cheek, unconscious of its blush, And fell, as if in worship, at thy base, O sculptured Psyche[P] of the soul-lit face, Bending to earth resign'd the mournful eye, Since earth must prove the pathway to the sky; Doom'd here, below, Love's footprint to explore } Till Jove relents, the destined wandering o'er, } And in celestial halls, Soul meets with Love once more.[Q] }

And, side by side, the lovers sat,--their words Low mix'd with notes from Lucy's joyous birds, Sole witnesses and fit--those airy things, That, 'midst the bars, can still unfold the wings, And soothe the cell with language, learn'd above; As the caged bird--so on the earth is love!

Their talk was of the future; from the height Of Hope, they saw the landscape bathed in light, And, where the golden dimness veil'd the gaze, Guess'd out the spot, and mark'd the sites of happy days; Till silence came, and the full sense and power Of the blest Present,--the rich-laden Hour That overshadow'd them, as some hush'd tree With mellow fruitage bending heavily,-- What time, beneath the tender gloom reclined, Dies on the lap of summer-noon the wind!

Roused from the lulling spell with startled blush At such strange power in silence, to the hush The maid restored the music, while she sought Fresh banks for that sweet river--loving thought.

"Tell me," she said, "if not too near the gloom Of some sad tale, the rash desire presume; What severs so the chords that should entwine With one warm bond our sister's heart and thine?

Why does she love yet dread thee? what the grief That shrinks from utterance and disdains relief?

Hast thou not been too stern?--nay, pardon! nay, Let thy words chide me,--not thy looks dismay!"

"Not unto thee, beneath whose starry eye Each wild wave hushes, did my looks reply; They were the answer to mine own dark thought, Which back the grief, thy smile had banish'd, brought.

"Well--to the secrets of my soul thy love Hath such sweet right, I lift the veil above Home's shattered G.o.ds, and show what wounds belong To writhing honour and revengeless wrong.--

"Rear'd in the desert, round its rugged child, All we call life, group'd, menacing and wild; But to man's soul there is an inner life; _There_, one soft vision smiled away the strife!

A fairy shape, that seem'd afar to stand On the lost sh.o.r.es of Youth--the Fairy land; A voice that call'd me 'brother;'--years had fled Since my rough breast had pillow'd that sweet head, Yet still my heart throbb'd with the pressure; still Tears, such as mothers know, my eyes would fill; Prayers, such as fathers pray, my soul would breathe; The oak were sere but for that jasmine-wreath!

At length, wealth came; my footsteps left the wild,-- Again we met:--to woman grown the child: How did we meet?--that heart to me was dead!

The bird, far heard amidst the waste was fled!

With earthlier fires that breast had learn'd to burn; And what yet left? but ashes in the urn: Woo'd and abandon'd! all of love, hope, soul Lavish'd--now lifeless!--well, were this the whole!

But the good name--the virgin's pure renown-- Woman's white robe, and Honour's starry crown, Lost, lost, for ever!"

O'er his visage past His trembling hand,--then, hurriedly and fast, As one who from the knife of torture swerves, Then spurns the pang, as pride the weakness nerves, Resumed--"As yet _that_ secret was withheld, All that I saw, was sorrow that repell'd,-- A dreary apathy, whose death-like chill Froze back my heart and left us sever'd still.

"One night I fled that hard indifferent eye; To crowds, the heart that Home rejects, will fly!-- Gay glides the dance, soft music fills the hall: I fled, to find, the loneliness through all!

Thou know'st but half a brother's bond I claim,-- My mother's daughter bears her father's name; My mother's heart had long denied her son, And loath'd the tie that pride had taught to shun.

My sister's lips, forbid the bond to own, Left the scorn'd life, a brother breathed, unknown.[R]

Not even yet the alien blood confest; Who, in the swart hues of the Eastern guest And unfamiliar name, could kindred trace With the young Beauty of the Northern Race?-- Calm in the crowd I stood, when hark, a word Smote on my ear, and stunn'd the soul that heard!

A sound, with withering laughter muttered o'er, Blistering the name--O G.o.d!--a sister bore; Nought clear, and nought defined, save scorn alone,-- Not heard the name scorn coupled with her own; Somewhat of nuptials fix'd, of broken ties, The foul cause hinted in the vile surmise, The gallant's fame for conquests, lightly won, For homes dishonour'd, and for hearts undone: Not one alone on whom my wrath could seize, From lip to lip the dizzying slander flees; No single ribald separate from the herd, Through the blent hum one stinging tumult stirr'd; One felt, unseen, infection circling there A bodiless venom in the common air, And as the air impalpable!--so seem The undistinguished terrors of a dream, Now clear, now dim, transform'd from shape to shape, The gibbering spectres scare us and escape.

"Fearful the commune, in that dismal night, Between the souls which could no more unite,-- The lawful anger and the shaming fears, Man's iron question, woman's burning tears; All that, once utter'd, rend for aye the ties Of the close bond G.o.d fashion'd in the skies.

I learn'd at last,--for 'midst my wrath, deep trust In what I loved, left even pa.s.sion just; And I believed the word, the lip, the eye, That to my horrid question flash'd reply;-- I learn'd at last that but the name was stain'd, Honour was wreck'd, but Purity remain'd.

Oh pardon, pardon!--if a doubt that sears, A word that stains, profane such holy ears!

So, oft amidst my loneliness, my heart Hath communed with itself, and groan'd apart,-- Recall'd that night, and in its fierce despair, Shaped some full vengeance from the desert air,-- That I forgot what angel, new from Heaven, Sweet spotless listener, to my side was given!

"But who the recreant lover?--this, in vain My question sought; that truth not hard to gain; And my brow darken'd as I breathed the threat Fierce in her shrinking ear, 'that wrath should reach him yet!'

I left her speechless; when the morning came, } With the fierce pang, writhed the self-tortured frame, } The poison hid by Woe, drain'd by despairing Shame. }

"Few words, half-blurr'd by shame, the motive clear'd, For the false wooer, not herself, she feared; 'Accept,' she wrote 'O brother, sternly just, The life I yield,--but holy be my dust!

Hear my last words, for, _them_ Death sanctify!

Forbear his life for whom it soothes to die.

And let my thought, the memory of old time, The soul that flees the stain, nor knew the crime, Strike down thine arm! and see me in the tomb, Stand, like a ghost, between Revenge and Doom!'

"I bent, in agony and awe, above The broken idol of my boyhood's love.

Echo'd each groan and writhed with every throe, And cried, 'Live yet! O dove, but brood below, Hide with thy wings the vengeance and the guilt, And give my soul thy softness if thou wilt!'

And, as I spoke, the heavy eye unclosed, The hand press'd mine, and in the clasp reposed, The wan lip smiled, the weak frame seem'd to win Strange power against the torture-fire within; The leach's skill the heart's strong impulse sped, She lived--she lived:--And my revenge was dead!

"She lived!--and, clasp'd within my arms, I vow'd To leave the secret in its thunder-shroud, To shun all question, to refuse all clue, And close each hope that honour deems its due; _But while she lived!_--the weak vow halted there, Her life the shield to that it tainted mine to spare!

"But to have walk'd into the thronging street, But to have sought the haunt where babblers meet, But to have pluck'd one idler by the sleeve, And asked, '_who_ woo'd yon fairhair'd bride, to leave?'

And street, and haunt, and every idler's tongue, Had given the name with which the slander rung-- To me alone,--to _me_ of all the throng, The unnatural silence mask'd the face of wrong.

But I had sworn! and, of myself in dread, From the loath'd scene, from mine own wrath, I fled.

"We left the land, in this a home we find.

Home! by our hearth the cleaving curse is shrined!

Distrust in her--and shame in me; and all The unspoken past cold present hours recal; And unconfiding hearts, and smiles but rife With the bland hollowness of formal life!

In vain my sacrifice, she fears me still!

Vain her reprieve;--grief barr'd from vent can kill.

And then, and then (O joy through agony!) My oath absolves me, and my arm is free!

The lofty soul may oft forgive, I own, The lighter wrong that smites itself alone; But vile the nature, that when wrong hath marr'd All the rich life it was our boast to guard But weeps the broken heart and blasted name;-- Here the mean pardon were the manhood's shame; And I were vilest of the vile, to live To see Calantha's grave--and to forgive: _Forgive!_"

There hung such hate upon that word, The weeping listener shudder'd as she heard, And sobb'd--